The King's City: Safe and Secure

The First Sunday in Advent
November 28-29, 2015
Jeremiah 33:14-16

“The King’s City: Safe and Secure”

Thanksgiving is about going home – whether it’s mom and dad’s home, our home, or a friend’s home. Beyond the turkey and dressing, mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie, the holiday we just celebrated draws our hearts to giving thanks, and certainly one of the chief blessings we can have in this life is a place to call home. But how do you define where home is? That’s not always an easy question to answer, especially in the mobile and restless society we live in. Is home where you grew up? Or is it where you live now? Or is it someplace different? Home should be, but is not always, a place of safety and security; a place of belonging. Today’s Old Testament lesson from the prophet Jeremiah speaks to this theme of home and security. As we enter into this season of Advent, our prayer for Advent comes from the next-to-last word of Scripture: “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” (Revelation 22:20b). It is a prayer that the Lord Jesus would come soon and take his redeemed and waiting people home to be with him forever in that place where “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4). This is the kingdom of God in its full and final revelation, yet to be revealed and for which we now wait with patient hope. The kingdom of God is a major theme in Scripture, in God’s holy history. We trace it through both Old and New Testaments, through prophets like Jeremiah and apostles like Paul. The kingdom of God centers on the Son of God, Jesus, who is Christ our King, to whom all the prophets and apostles, and indeed all of Scripture, points. During this Advent season, we will focus on the appointed Old Testament lessons, all taken from different prophets, and all of which point to the promised coming of the King and his kingdom. Our Advent series is entitled “The King is Coming!” and today’s message, based on today’s Old Testament lesson from Jeremiah, is “The King’s City: Safe and Secure.” May the Lord’s rich and abundant blessing rest upon the preaching, the hearing, and the living of his Word for Jesus’ sake.

Jeremiah is sometimes called “the weeping prophet,” so named because the message he was called by God to bring was a message of judgement upon God’s people for their sin and stubborn refusal to repent and turn to the Lord. Jeremiah, like the Lord Jesus himself, wept over the people of Jerusalem. Their sins were grievous and flagrant: offering sacrifices to other gods within the courts of the temple itself, open adultery, trampling of the poor and needy, even child sacrifice. Humble and trusting faith had degenerated into a check-the-box rote religious duty, and people believed that if they kept the sacrifices going, then God would be appeased and protect them. After all, He was their God and they were his people. Jeremiah made it clear that both king and people had forsaken their God. Jeremiah suffered much because of the unpopular message God called him to bring in the closing days of Judah and Jerusalem. Nobody wanted to hear of Jerusalem’s destruction and its people being exiled into far off Babylon, but that is the Word of the Lord that Jeremiah was called to speak – a very tough job. Jeremiah’s call from God was “to pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant” (Jeremiah 1:10). This calling was not with physical buildings and structures, but with something far more challenging: the hearts of God’s people! Jeremiah was called, like pastors today are, to preach the Law which breaks down our sinful pride and arrogance; it destroys and overthrows our own idolatry in whatever form that may take. But Jeremiah was also called, like pastors today are, to preach the Gospel, to build and plant in the hearts of God’s people the good news that “with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is plentiful redemption. And he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities” (Psalm 130:7-8).

Advent is sometimes called “Little Lent.” It is a season of repentance, calling us to live as Jesus calls us to live in today’s Gospel lesson: “But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap” (Luke 21:34). More than simply preparing us for Jesus’ first coming, his birth in Bethlehem long ago, Advent calls us to prepare for Jesus’ coming again when He will return to judge the world in righteousness. And when that great and final day shall come, how will we “stand before the Son of Man?” (Luke 21:36). What will be our confidence and hope on that day? Will we fall back on what we thought of as good conduct or deeds that we did? God’s Word tells us that “all our righteous deeds are like filthy rags” (Isaiah 64:6), and “there is no one who does good, not even one” (Psalm 14:3:53:3). If we’re hoping in our own righteous deeds, that is a false hope and we will be sorely disappointed.

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David, and he will execute justice and righteousness in the land” (Jeremiah 33:14-15). Jeremiah points ahead to the only One who is righteous, and that is Jesus. He is the sinless Son of God who shed his blood on the cross as payment for all our sins. Think about it: when the world last saw Jesus it was when he was hanging upon the cross, derided and scorned by the world. That is the last public image of Jesus. Now we know and believe that Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, witnessed by his disciples, but not by the world. So when that great and final day comes again, what a shock the world is in for to see Jesus no longer broken, bruised, and bloody, but resplendent in heavenly glory and power as King and Judge of all creation. And this is what we need to hold on to now in these days of great uncertainty when everything seems to be going from bad to worse. Jesus our Righteousness is coming again! And where the King is, there is his city – new and heavenly Jerusalem, and as we are told: “And this is the name by which it will be called: ‘The Lord is our righteousness’” (Jeremiah 33:16). As the King is, so is his city, and by his grace, so are his people who are blessed to live there: “clothed in his righteousness alone, redeemed to stand before his throne!” (Lutheran Service Book #575, “My Hope is Built on Nothing Less,” stanza 4), safe and secure for all eternity.

“Behold the days are coming, declares the Lord…” And so we pray, “Savior of the nations, come; show the glory of the Son! Ev’ry people, stand in awe; Praise the perfect Son of God” (Lutheran Book of Worship #28, stanza 1). Amen. Come quickly, Lord Jesus. Amen.