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Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Now, some women say that we men are simple creatures, easy to understand and handle. And some of us guys say, no, we’re more like Shrek, the cartoon character. We’re a multi-layered onion that you must peel back one layer at a time to get to who we are. I’m sure you’re going, okay, now, Pastor, where are you going to go with a segue of that into the Holy Trinity? Well, here’s your segue.
In all sincerity, as you know, as a husband or a wife, or as you watched your own mother and father, they really did not get to know one another in the depth and the breadth unless time passed. And any good husband who will quickly admit that his wife is complex, and God willing, every wife says the same about her husband. Because time and events in your lives mark you as being changeable, malleable by God. And we are always becoming something, and yet we are always the same.
It’s kind of interesting because the longer we’re with someone, the more we begin to realize the multifaceted aspect of the other. It is the same with your Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the God in whose name you have been baptized. Typically, most of us do not remember a time when we didn’t believe in the Lord Jesus. And maybe some of us were blessed with the event of knowing that there was a time when I didn’t believe in the Lord Jesus and there was a time that I began to believe in the Lord Jesus. Either way, the longer you are connected and continually fed and nourished by Him, the more you begin to realize how great, mighty, merciful, and unpredictable our God is. A lot like in a marriage.
Now, it’s kind of interesting that in this relationship with our God, this abstract concept becomes far more concrete. To say I believe in God is one thing. To say I believe in the God who shed His blood for me on the cross and was born of a woman is a holy other thing. In this text this morning, in the Gospel reading, there is a very familiar verse. You heard it read at the baptism of Sierra Ruth. It was heard at your own baptism. It is heard again today. It’s the preceding verse that we quickly kind of forget.
It says, “And when they,” meaning the apostles, “saw him,” meaning Jesus, “they worshipped him, but some doubted.” Now these are the apostles upon whom the church is built. They doubted. This was sometime during the 40 days of which Christ dwelt on this world after He had risen from the dead and before He had ascended into heaven. These are the same apostles unto whom He revealed Himself twice in the locked room. These are the same apostles that He revealed Himself other times on the Sea of Galilee. They worshipped him, but some doubted.
Now, if God wanted to keep the reputation of the apostles crystal clear and clean, He would have never mentioned that, but it would have been kind of hard to believe, wouldn’t it have? Because we know about James and John asking their mama to ask Jesus, can one of us sit on his right and his left? We know about Peter abandoning Christ and denying him three times. We know about other foibles of these apostles. To see it in print that these are real men with real struggles is a great gift to us, His children. Because in the midst of saving faith, there will and has always been doubt. Because we are unholy, made holy by the Spirit who sanctifies us.
We are the unlovable and unredeemable, redeemed by the very Redeemer of all mankind, Christ Jesus, the Son of God. We are the exemplary prodigal son or daughter received back by the loving Father, though we do not deserve to be received back. We may have wonderful memories of our own earthly father. He may still be with us, and he may not be with us. If he is, you all better call him today. Either way, you and I know that none of us had a perfect father. We have seen our own father; if we are a father, we see ourselves perpetuate some of the idiosyncrasies that we wish not to perpetuate upon our own children.
But all of us know what a loving father is, don’t we? We can imagine what that’s like, even though we may not have experienced it in the flesh and blood of our own parent. And though we may not have perpetuated it upon our children, we know what it’s like because we have tasted and seen what it’s like. Forgiveness when there ought to be reprimand. Receiving when there ought to be holding at arm’s length. Calling out to us in our uncleanness, you are my beloved son or daughter rather than you’ve disappointed me and your mother.
When Jesus allows and embraces his apostles on that mountain, who believed and worshipped in him, and yet makes it very clear that they doubted, is a great example that that’s the kind of God in whom we believe. The God who has claimed us as his own and does not defer us to somebody else’s child. We’re legitimate. We’re not illegitimate. That’s a comfort. And the longer we’re with this God and this relationship in which He has foisted Himself upon us, entered our realm, and changed our lives with His love and forgiveness, the longer we are in this relationship, the more we begin to realize the great depth, breadth, and width of what it means to be a child of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
As men grow older, especially daddies, for whatever reason, it tends to be a common malady to reflect upon our lives, knowing full well we’re the responsible ones, as dads, for what we could have and should have and might have but didn’t. Typically, you will see that in your grandparents as they grow older, if you’re not old enough yourself. And if you are, you know exactly what I’m saying. It’s a part of being male. It’s a part of being dad. Because we know the responsibility is still to be borne upon our shoulders. But we also, in the midst of all this reflecting, know that there is also a loving Father who says otherwise.
The Bible is replete with examples of infamous fathers whom we have often named to be famous. David is one example, isn’t he? Every morning as he rose up, he would look out his window and see two graves that he knew. Those two graves, those two children of mine, Absalom and the boy born at seven days who died, he knew that those children were his problem. And his sin was why they dwelt where they dwelt, in the ground. And you don’t think Satan didn’t pick that scab? You know he did.
The longer you and I are in connection with this God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the more we begin to realize who we are as David did. We are not the creator. We are the creature. We’re not the redeemer. We’re the one who’s been redeemed. And we’re not the holy one. We are the one who has been made holy by the sanctifier. And the longer we are in this relationship in which Sierra Ruth has just begun, the more we begin to see and know that the Lord is good and gracious. Full of mercy and kindness. Long-suffering. Like the father of the prodigal son.
And just as another infamous or famous father named Joseph told his twelve brothers that it was God’s will that they did to him what they did to him, a lot like it was God’s will that the son should suffer for the sins of his brothers who threw him in the well and sold him for pieces of silver in order that he may have mercy on us. That’s the kind of triune God in which you believe and in which you’ve been baptized. And that’s the kind of father we’ve been given.
We cannot let what has happened in this world shape us. It is God who shapes us. And we will too go to our grave with many thoughts in our minds, doubting like the apostles on that mountain and yet worshiping God and believing in His mercy and trusting in the same. That is going to be what sustains us as we reflect upon our lives. Keep that wily foe far from us, as we prayed in this hymn. Drive far away our wily foe and your abiding peace bestow. With you as our protecting guide, no evil can with us betide. Teach us to know the Father, Son, and you from both as three in one, that we your name may ever bless, and in our lives the truth, the truth of His mercy confess.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and your minds upon Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.
