[Machine transcription]
In the name of Jesus, amen.
Dear saints, you’ve got a little something right there.
Do you think it’s strange that we put ashes on our head at the same time we read Jesus
telling us not to put ashes on our head?
And here’s the point.
Jesus is worried, and I think the church is worried about this, that we would think that
repentance is merely an outward matter. That we could stop eating, that we could throw
dirt on our heads, that we could wear rough clothing, and we could think that we’d accomplished
the Lord’s command to repent. But Jesus says that the things that matter are the things
done in secret, a broken and contrite heart, these the Lord does not despise.”
So that’s what we’re after, a broken heart.
And we know that the Lord has tools to do the breaking, ten really, His Ten Commandments.
So let’s lean into it.
you shall have no other gods.” This means that you should fear and love and trust
in God above all things, above yourself, above your strength, above your wealth,
above your family, that your hope should be in the Lord and in the Lord alone,
that on the throne of your heart, where you love to put so many things, Jesus
and Jesus alone would sit. Anything else is idolatry, and we are guilty. You shall
not misuse the name of the Lord your God. The Lord Jesus has given you his name so
that you could call upon him in prayer, praise, and thanksgiving, and we use the
In the Lord’s name like a curse word, we neglect our prayers, the thing that matters most,
the high calling as God’s children, that we have access to the throne room of God, and
we rejoice that we have access everywhere else, but never go and stand before the Lord
to pour before Him the things that we need, and more importantly, the things that our
neighbor needs, remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy. We should treasure God’s
Word above all things. Our ears and our hearts and our minds should be wide open to hear
the voice of the Holy Spirit speaking through God’s divine prophets and apostles. And
we despise the Lord, or even worse, we’re bored with God’s Word. We’re looking for
other things to entertain us because
the Lord’s word is so old and dusty.
We just neglected and put it to
the side or we’re ashamed of it.
Those things that the Bible says that seems so
old and archaic and kind of
embarrassing and we just wish
those pages would get glued
together so that we wouldn’t be
mocked and despised by the world.
Honor your father and your mother.
This not only means your parents,
but all other authorities. The Lord’s people are not rebellious people, but we are rebellious
people. We despise the authorities that are put over us. We chafe against those who have
authority over us. We want to be our own people, a law to ourselves, and so we neglect and
despise and even the â not just the spiritual authority, but temple authority in all its
different forms. We’ve neglected God’s gift of family. We’ve thought that there’s
more important things to do than husbands and wives to love and care for each other
and to raise their children in the fear and admonition of the Lord, and we let others
do it. You shall not murder. You think maybe here would be a little reprieve, right? At
least I’ve never murdered anyone, but remember Jesus who said, you’ve heard it said that
you shall not murder, but I say to you, if you’ve called your brother a fool, you’ve
murdered him.
If you’ve been angry with your brother in your heart, you have murdered him.
In other words, you and I stand before the Lord this day, right now, as guilty of murder,
despising the Lord’s gift of life, not coming to the aid of those who have needed our help.
You shall not commit adultery.
Christians are called to live chaste and decent lives in word and in deed, and treasure the
Lord’s gift of marriage.
But Jesus lets us know that even to look with lust is to commit adultery.
Can you imagine the fearful sight of all of our sinful words and deeds and thoughts?
If they were to creep out of our own imaginations and be projected before the world, what shame
would fill the world from just this one commandment,
you shall not steal.
The Lord has given us possessions
so that we might bless and serve the people around us.
But we are lazy, and we are greedy,
and we are afraid to lose anything at all.
We think that if we have enough, we are safe.
And we gladly cling to that false god
that Jesus calls mammon.
We think if we just had a little bit more,
If I just had a little bit more, I’d be content.
If I just had a little bit more, I’d be happy.
Just a little bit more and I’d be safe.
It’s gone tomorrow.
You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
Christians are truth-tellers.
The Lord would fill our mouths with truth, with encouragement, with things that build
up and not with things that tear down.
But we are bitter and we are angry and we are always putting the other one down so that
we can somehow lift ourselves up.
We’re fighting for our own names
rather than the names of our neighbors.
As if it mattered,
as if we could build our little kingdoms.
We’ll twist the truth when it serves us.
We’ll hide the truth when it comes out to our advantage.
We don’t think a thing about it.
We call it a white lie.
Already absolving ourself before we even commit the sin.
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house,
house, your neighbor’s wife or husband, your neighbor’s workers, your neighbor’s stuff.
From the beginning, God gives to Adam and Eve every single tree in the garden minus
one, and it wasn’t enough. They wanted that which they could not have. And you and I are
children of Adam and Eve. We’re never content. We’ve got grasping hearts. And all of these
sins, cry out to heaven for God’s justice. All of these sins shout out to the
divine throne room that you and I are guilty and that we truly do deserve God’s
eternal wrath and punishment. We are lawbreakers, we are enemies of God, and we
are those which have deserved to be the kindling of the fires of hell. But for
For our sake, He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the
righteousness of God.”
Your idolatry is on Jesus.
Your unholiness is carried on His shoulders.
Your neglect of the Word, your rebellion, your murder, your adultery, your greed, your
bitterness, your discontent, your law-breaking is on Him so that His righteousness can rest
on you.
God should be mad at you, He should be mad at me, but He is not.
He looks at you and He doesn’t see it.
He doesn’t see a single bit of it, not a single breaking of His law, not a single sin.
He doesn’t even notice those ashes on your forehead.
He sees you as holy and pure and blameless and clean, washed by the blood of Jesus, who
carried our sins, was beaten for our sorrows so that we might be called the children and
the friends of God.
He was in your place on the cross so that you could sit right next to Him in heaven.
And everything that we’ve done wrong, He has already forgotten.
Dear saints, Jesus loves you.
He shouldn’t, but He does.
He should throw you out, destroy you, wipe you out, all of us, and instead He comes down
and takes all of that trouble and He suffers it.
And this is repentance.
The Lord breaks our hearts so that He and He alone can bind them up.
He shows us our sin so that He could show us the depth of His love.
He reminds us of our failures so that He can comfort us with His perfection and bless us
and keep us in His name.
Pastor, someone told me, Pastor, I’m sure that I can’t get to heaven.
Why is that?
I said, because my sins, they’re too much.
I’ve done too much.
I’ve committed too many.
I’ve broken too many commandments.
I’ve done too many things wrong.”
And I said to this man,
well, congratulations.
You’ve managed to do what no one else in the world could do.
Because Jesus, the Son of God,
came down from heaven to carry the sins of all of the world
and die on the cross for all people,
but you’ve managed to out-sin Jesus’ love.
You’ve managed to commit a sin
that His blood cannot wash away, you’ve managed to do something that no one else could, to
escape from His kindness and mercy.”
And the man says, okay fine, you’ve got me.
And I said, no, Jesus has got you.
And He will not let go.
God be praised. Amen. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in
him we might become the righteousness of God. Amen. The peace of God which passes
all understanding guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
