[Machine transcription]
There was a man sent from God whose name was John.
He came as a witness to bear witness about the light that all might believe through him.
You may be seated.
In the name of Jesus, amen.
Dear Zach and Laura, about to confess your faith here before the Lord’s Altar.
To all of you who are confirmed confessors of the Christian faith, to the confirmands
preparing to confess your faith, to the children who look forward to joining us at the Lord’s
altar, today we have an example set before us in John the Baptist who came to be a witness.
Now that word witness is the Greek word martyr.
In fact, it’s a bunch of times in the text and even more in the text than we think because
do you see where it says in John testified?
That’s the same word, John martyred there.
And it’s an amazing thing to us because when we hear that word witness or when we hear that
word martyr, the first thing that we think of is not someone who’s in court
giving a testimony of the things that they saw. Rather, we think of those who
died for their faith, who suffered persecution and affliction. They’re
arrested and they were beaten and all the sorts of terrible things happened
and then they died. We think, for example, of John the Baptist who was
arrested by Herod the King and thrown in prison and beheaded. We even have the
apostles, the twelve apostles, in the almonds that are going around Jesus in
the window and most of them have the weapon or the device by which they
were martyred and tortured. The cross or the saw or the club or the
spear or the knife with the skin of Bartholomew there. I mean it’s pretty,
actually, we think it’s a pretty window but it’s actually kind of gruesome.
It talks about how the Christians were dying. That’s what we think about when we
think of the word martyr.
Now, how did that happen?
Because martyr just means one who gives witness, and in fact, it’s a technical term.
It’s a term that’s used in court.
We use the word witness all the time, and it’s an important thing in the Scriptures.
In fact, if I could submit to you, next time you read the Gospel of John, to read the
Gospel of John as John, who’s writing, is building a court case.
I don’t know exactly how to be a lawyer.
I mean, I have seen a couple of movies about it, and so I think this is how it works.
If you’re presenting a case in court, what you do is you make an opening statement, and
then you call witnesses to the stand, and then those witnesses are answering questions,
and they’re giving evidence based on what they saw.
They can be cross-examined, but there’s a witness, and then there’s another witness,
and there’s another witness, and these witnesses are building up your case until you finally
make a closing statement.
Well, that’s exactly the gospel of John.
In fact, in 1 John, he says the things which we saw, which we heard, and which we touched,
we made known to you.
So John is presenting a case for Jesus, and so he has this opening statement.
That’s what we’ll study on Monday, next Monday, on Christmas, John 1.
The word was, oh, I can’t wait for this.
The word was with God, the word was God.
He was in the beginning with God, all things were made through him, nothing was made that
was not made.
The word became flesh and dwelt among us.
That’s next Monday, that’s his opening statement, but then John calls to his
first witness and it’s John the Baptist. But the whole gospel is this way.
First we have John the Baptist who’s there and he’s baptizing and he’s
preaching and he’s testifying, I’m not the Christ, I’m not the Messiah, I’m the
voice crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, the one is here whose
sandal I’m not worthy to tie, that he’s in the midst of you, and then we have
further witnesses. We have Nicodemus in chapter 3. We have the woman at the well
in chapter 4. We have blind Bartimaeus. We have Lazarus. Lazarus, in fact, in
chapter 11 of John becomes the chief witness of Jesus because Lazarus
testifies that Jesus raised him from the dead. And then we get to the actual trial
where Jesus has tried, and then we get more witnesses after the resurrection.
Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of our Lord, James, John, Peter, Thomas, remember,
is enlisted as a witness to the resurrection of Jesus before John makes
his closing statement in the gospel. These things were written so that you
would believe and believing have life in his name. It’s a beautiful thing.
And here we have then in our gospel text, we’re watching John
call his first witness, John the Baptist, who’s not going to witness of
himself. That’s what the Pharisees wanted. Tell us about yourself. And he refuses.
are you the Christ? No. Are you Elijah? It’s like a guessing game. No. Guess again.
Are you the prophet? No. Who are you? I’m just the voice. I’m the voice of
someone else. Crying in the wilderness. Make straight the way of the Lord.
It’s really quite beautiful. And then this witness just continues to build and
all of it in the gospel is showing us that Jesus is the Son of God who came to
bear our sins and carry our sorrows and be our Savior.
It’s this testimony, Jesus is Lord.
And that’s what it means to be a Christian witness.
It means that we also know, we’ve heard it and now we say it, Jesus is Lord.
Now how did that understanding of someone who’s giving a public testimony come to mean
someone who dies for their faith?
It happened like this.
The church confesses Jesus as Lord, and the world and the devil and even our own sinful
flesh say, stop saying that, Jesus is Lord.
Would you stop saying that?
And we won’t.
This is the problem.
We, the Christian, will not stop confessing Jesus as Lord, will not stop saying that He’sâ¦
And so the world and the devil are trying to shut down that preaching, shut down that
confession.
They try first beating, remember how they arrested Peter and John, they beat them, they
said, you can’t say this name Jesus anymore, and they said to the Sanhedrin, well you can
be the judge if it’s right for us to obey you or to obey God, but we’re going to say
the name of Jesus.
We’re not going to stop confessing Jesus as Lord.
And so they said, well if they’re not going to stop, then we just have to kill him.
So James was killed, Peter was killed, the apostles were killed, the martyrs were killed,
all because they refuse to stop saying,
maybe this is a warning, Zach and Laura,
and to all of you who are confessing Christ,
what we say all the time, Jesus is Lord.
The devil hates it.
The world hates it.
Your sinful flesh hates it
and is fighting against that confession
that Jesus is Lord.
And in that way, to be a witness is to be a martyr.
One who has something that they are willing
to not only live for, but also something
that they’re willing to die for.
Now this is, dear saints, this is very unique in the world.
Most people don’t have anything that they’re willing to live for.
I mean, most people don’t even have anything that they’re willing to get up early for.
But you have something, you, can you imagine, when the Holy Spirit claimed you in your baptism,
he’s given you something that is worth living for and is worth dying for, something that
you will not let go of, even if it means losing your life.
I was thinking about this a lot, and we were talking about it in Sunday school too, how
the Lord Jesus, by his death and by his resurrection, takes away from us the fearfulness of death.
It’s not just that he takes away the fear of death, like we have this fear of dying
and he takes it away from us, he actually takes the fearfulness out of death.
death.
He takes the sting out of the grave.
He takes the pain out of dying.
Remember how St. Paul says it, he says, the strength of death is sin and the strength
of sin is the law, but praise be to God who gives us the victory over our Lord Jesus Christ.
Because the fear of death is the fear of judgment, but you will not be judged.
It happened on the cross already.
all your sins were cast on Christ in his death and by his resurrection. He’s now
set you free from the fear of death so that now you can live in this freedom.
The Christian is not afraid to die. Now, not only is our
fearlessness of death the result of the resurrection of Jesus, but it is in a
in a really profound way a proof of the resurrection of Jesus. I want to read
you something. Now I told Pastor LeBlanc this morning this is risky because I
don’t want to take my eyes off of you because I’m afraid of what you might do
if you might make a run for it or fall asleep or something. But I’m gonna read
you, I’m gonna read you something. This is Athanasius on the Incarnation. It’s a
couple of paragraphs. I might stop just to look up and check on you and expound
it a little bit. But now this is old. This Athanasius is probably writing
around the year 325.
This is the Athanasius who we named the Athanasian Creed after, the great hero fighting against
the Arians.
This is really before that fight.
He writes this essay on the incarnation, and he’s talking about Jesus taking on a body,
taking on our sins, dying in our place, freeing us from the corruption of sin and death.
And then he writes how Jesus, by His death, actually changes the way we look at death,
death, and that that changed perspective of death, that changed way that the Christian
looks at death is proof that Jesus has overcome death.
I’m going to start here, he says this, for that death was destroyed and that the cross
has become the victory over death, and that death has no more power but it is truly dead.
This is great.
Sorry, I didn’t even finish the sentence.
Let me just â I’ll read some more, but let me just see what Athanasius â by the
time he’s done, there’s only going to be two things left in the universe that are dead.
Because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, the only two dead things are death itself
and the devil.
And we are no longer dead.
Okay, let me try again.
For that death is destroyed and the cross has become the victory over death and it has
no more power, but it is truly dead, it is no small proof, rather it’s an evident warrant
that death is despised by all of Christ’s disciples.
And that they all take an aggressive against it and no longer fear it.
But by the sign of the cross and by faith in Christ, Christians treat or tread down
death as though it is dead.
For of old, before the divine sojourn of the Savior took place, even to the
saints death was terrible and all wept for the dead as though they perished. But
now that the Savior has raised his body, death is no longer terrible. For all who
believe in Christ tread death under as nothing and choose rather to die than to
deny their faith in Christ for they truly know that when they die they will
not be destroyed but actually begin to live and become incorruptible through
the resurrection. Oh that this mind would be in us that that we know that death
is not the end but it’s just the beginning and in fact when we die which
by the way we all will die unless the Lord comes back first so we all have to
think of it, when we die is when we start to live. Athanasius continues,
and that the devil that once maliciously exalted in death, now that its pains are
loosed, remained the only one truly dead. And a proof of this, that before men
believe in Christ, they see in death an object of terror and play the coward
before death, but when they are gone over to Christ’s faith and teaching, their
contempt for death is so great that they even eagerly rush upon death and become its witnesses,
its martyrs for the resurrection the Savior has accomplished against it.
Now this is true and maybe a little bit of warning for us because when you go back and
you read the accounts of the martyrs, you sometimes get the feeling that they’re a little
bit too anxious to die, that they’re a little bit too ready for it.
Remember this Ignatius, Ignatius was the student of Polycarp
who was the student of John, so it’s like third generation
in the church, and he’s been arrested
and he’s being taken over to Rome to be martyred
and he knows that the Christians in Rome
are plotting to try to prevent him from being martyred
so he writes him a letter and says,
don’t prevent me, don’t stop it, I’m ready for this.
Or Perpetua, Perpetua the martyr,
martyr, the famous martyr that Jerome writes about, and so constant was she in the arena
that they set leopards and bulls on her, and none of them killed her, and so she’s there,
and the gladiator comes to kill her, and the gladiator sees how she’s confessing Christ
and praising Him, and he can’t bring himself to cut off her head, and so she helps him
with the sword and puts it to her neck.
Now, that’s a little too excited to die.
Okay, but it gives a glimpse of what Athanasius is talking about.
Did you hear it says that they eagerly rush upon death, they become witnesses for the
resurrection.
Because for us, for you, for the martyrs, for the Christian, to live is Christ, so to
die is gain.
It’s not taking something away, it’s a blessing.
And this becomes our testimony to the world for Athanasius.
For while still tender in years, even the youth make haste to die.
And not just the men, but women also.
They exercise themselves by bodily discipline against it.
So that so weak has death become that the women who were formerly deceived by death
now mock death as dead and paralyzed.
And here Athanasius is going to give us an example.
You have to imagine that we’re living in a city or something that’s ruled by a tyrant
who’s just running roughshod over all the people, and he’s frightening and he’s scary
and everything.
And then the king comes in and sees the tyrant and arrests him and puts him in stocks, you
know, the stocks like in the Robin Hood movie, and he’s there in the middle of town and he’s
locked up.
And now this guy, the tyrant that we were always afraid of, is no longer fearful but
in fact a source of mockery.
Athanasius says this is how, this is what Jesus has done to death. He’s put death
on the stocks, so no longer are we intimidated by death, but now death has
become a mockery. Listen to the picture here, it says, for when a tyrant has been
defeated by a real king and bound hand and foot, then all that pass by laugh him
to scorn, buffeting him and reviling him, no longer fearing his fury and barbarity
because the king who has conquered him, so also death, having been conquered and
exposed by the Savior on the cross and bound hand and foot, all they who are in
Christ as they pass by trample on him. And witnessing to Christ, scoff at death,
jesting at him, saying what has been written against him of old, O death,
where is thy victory? O grave, where is thy sting? Like when you were on the
playground, here’s what I remember, and the bully was always there until the
teacher came and sat him on the chair, and then you walked by, as close as you dared
to get, always out of reach, and did this thing to him?
I don’t know why that’s a thing, but that was a thing, right?
This is what Athanasius is saying the Christian does to the grave, because the grave has been
destroyed, because the devil has been conquered, because death has been overcome by your Savior
in your flesh, bearing your sins and dying your death so that you can live forever with
him.
Here’s how Athanasius concludes, two more sentences,
in this then, sorry question, is this then a small proof of the weakness of
death or a slight demonstration of the victory won over him by the Savior when
youths and young maidens that are in Christ despise this life and practice to
die for a man is by nature afraid of death and the dissolution of his body
but there is this most startling fact that he who has put on the faith of the
cross despises even what is naturally fearful and for Christ’s sake is not
afraid of death.” So far, Athanasius. Now in this way, now watch what happens.
It’s not just that our speaking Jesus as Lord results in our death, but now, because
of the resurrection, the way that we die says Jesus is Lord.
Our death itself becomes a testimony to the life that Jesus lives forever.
And the way that we suffer becomes an exhibition of how Christ has conquered
all things for us. We know that Jesus does all things well, and He does all of
these things well for us, including His death and resurrection, which means there
is no judgment, no more fear. In fact, for us, no more dying, only life and joy
and peace because our Savior is our Savior. So we are his witnesses. We are
his witnesses because in our mouths on our lips we confess Jesus as Lord, in our
conscience is the blood of Jesus which takes away the fear of death, and in our
living and our suffering and in our dying we say that we belong to the one who
died and rose and now lives forever. John the Baptist was the first that
that John called in his gospel as a witness, but the Holy Spirit has called
us also to witness this. By faith, by the forgiveness of sins, by the fearlessness
which the Lord gives us to face death, he has made us his witnesses and given us
this joy and peace. May God grant us this courage in the name of Jesus. Amen.
And the peace of God which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and
minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
