Third Sunday after Epiphany, January 26th,
Year of Our + Lord 2014
Trinity and St. John Lutheran Churches,
Sidney and Fairview, Montana
The Holiness of Human Life - 2nd Kings 5:1-19a, Matthew
8:1-13
Sanctity means holiness. When we sing the Sanctus, we sing, “Holy,
Holy, Holy,” Holy in Latin being Sanctus, hence the name of the song. Sanctity means holiness.
The Christian Church in the United States
of America has for some decades now observed Sanctity of Human Life Sunday on a
Sunday close to the anniversary of the 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision of the
Supreme Court, which legalized abortion throughout the entirety of pregnancy,
for any reason. In response, the Church
celebrates the Sanctity, the Holiness of Human Life, which is holy, we declare,
from conception to death, a gift from God, to be protected. We add our voice to this celebratory
proclamation once again this morning.
But, is human life really holy? You might think differently.
For example, what is holy about the life
of a marauding warrior, a violent enemy, who attacks God’s people, killing and
robbing and enslaving his captives? If
an armored strong man suddenly descended on your house and stole your child
away from you, would you call him holy?
Sanctified? Or would you hate him
and consider him worthy of a painful death?
If you learned that such a violent enemy was plagued with leprosy, that
his skin constantly broke out in ugly, painful sores that made him both
miserable and disgusting to everyone around him, how would you react? Wouldn’t you take grim satisfaction, thinking
that he was, at least in part, getting what he deserves?
You and I might very well think such
things. But not God. Now, it’s not that God isn’t angered by
violence and murder and kidnapping and slavery.
The Lord after all is the one who said: Do not murder, do not steal, do
not covet your neighbors wife, or family, or servants. And yet, even though God hates sin and
promises to avenge all sin, even still, God at the same time acts mercifully toward
this violent enemy of God’s people, the Syrian general called Naaman. God acts toward Naaman in mercy and love. God
sanctifies, cleanses, heals and makes holy this very unholy man.
We are free to defend ourselves and our
loved ones when violent people attack us.
And, we might understandably be tempted to reject forever those who act
violently and evilly against us and our loved ones. But not God.
Even from such as these, from wholly unholy people, that is, from
completely unholy people, God chooses children for His kingdom. God does not reject the Syrian general Naaman,
and even works through an Israelite in order to reach out to him. Through a little Israelite girl, who had been
taken as a slave from her family, God chooses to begin His work of salvation in
the life of Naaman. Where you and I might
well expect this little girl to hate her master, God moves her to speak the
truth in love, to tell of the Prophet in Israel, whom she knows can help Naaman
with his leprosy.
As you heard in our Old Testament reading,
God works a very great miracle, sanctifying this violent enemy of His
people. God heals and converts Naaman,
working through the muddy waters of the Jordan River and the seemingly offhand,
and literally second hand words of the prophet Elisha, who doesn’t even go out
and speak directly to the general.
Through a messenger Elisha makes a ridiculous promise, that if Naaman
goes and washes seven times in the river, he will be healed, made whole,
cleansed. And, despite Naaman’s anger
and unbelief, the washing of water and the word does its work. Naaman is cleansed. And much more importantly, Naaman is
converted, now believing that the God of Israel, the God who spoke through
Elisha, is the one, true God, who had healed him.
And so we begin to learn that according to
God’s calculations, human life is holy indeed, and most worthy of our
celebration and protection, no matter how small the life, or how seemingly evil
the life, or how incapacitated and painful the life. God says human life is worthy of His loving
care, and so also our loving care.
Jesus puts His seal on the conversion of
Naaman in a number of places, including in the double healing we heard in
today’s Gospel, Jesus cleansing a leper, and then turning around and healing
the servant of a Roman Centurion, another foreign military officer serving a
king that subjugated and mistreated God’s people. Naaman showed his faith by his concern for
not being considered guilty of worshiping the false god Rimmon. The Centurion shows his faith by asking Jesus
to merely say the word, for he know and believes the authority and power of
Jesus’ Word. Naaman’s worldly duties
force him to enter the house of a false God with his earthly master, and he
seeks the Lord’s pardon. The Centurion
knows his sins and his worldly duties make him unworthy for the Lord Jesus to
enter his house, he simply seeks the Lord’s Word of promise and power. In each case, faith has been created, by the
Word of God.
From the power of God’s Word we also begin
to learn the how and why of the Sanctity of Human life. Human life is not holy, not sanctified,
because of what you and I or any other mere human being does. No, we are all sinners. Perhaps our outward sins don’t seem so
dastardly as those of Naaman. But God
sees the outside and the inside, and is concerned that all our thoughts, words
and deeds be holy. And they are
not. So we cannot claim to generate our
own holiness. But God by the power of
His Word can bestow holiness. The “how”
of human holiness is based in the fact that Jesus has suffered God’s vengeance,
the complete just punishment for all our sins. The debt is paid. Our debt for sin, and the power this gives
satan over us is gone, forever, in Jesus Christ, the Son of God made man. The “how” of human holiness is God through
His Word declaring the Good News that all sin is gone, and His Holiness is shared
with humanity, in the person of the Son, Jesus Christ. The “how” of human holiness is God declaring
holy and righteous everyone who trusts in His Holy Son, crucified and
resurrected for the sins of the whole world.
The “why” of human holiness is
simple. Why are humans holy and precious
and worthy of protection? Because God desires
to have a holy people, to live with Him in joy and glory forever. God desires a holy people, and He will not be
denied. God loves and has loved the
people whom He created, even though we daily turn away and fall short of His
standard. God has done and continues to
do all that is required to make us holy, recreating us holy, in His Son.
We are
right now, today, holy, holy by faith in Jesus, and we have the privilege of
seeking to grow in holiness during our lives, looking forward to that day, in
the life to come, when we will be free from sin forever. And so the Church lives from the forgiving
Word of Jesus, which makes us holy and keeps us holy and prepares us for an
eternity of holiness.
By your Baptism into Christ, you are justified
and sanctified. You are made holy. By the power of God’s forgiving Word, you are
sanctified, declared holy in the eyes of God, who looks at you and sees the
holiness of Christ.
Your life is holy, and precious to
God. But you may think differently. You may not feel like you are holy. Your sins shame you and make you doubt that
the holy promises of God could be true.
The devil points at your sins and sneers in your ear, “You aren’t holy,
God would never accept you.” The world
switches back and forth between denying holiness matters on one hand, and then turning
around and denying that you could ever be holy.
Your life in this sin soaked world may make you doubt the possibility of
your holiness, and so make you doubt the value of your life.
But God says differently. God says that you are holy, by your
connection to His Son. And so you are,
period. Do not let anyone ever tell you
your life is not valuable. Do not ever
tell yourself that you are not worthy of God’s love, or anyone else’s. Because Jesus Christ has made your holiness and
worthiness a reality.
So rejoice in the holiness that God has
declared over you. Rejoice, and
remember, that since Jesus came to wash away the sins of the whole world, it is
correct to say that all human life, no matter how small, no matter how evil, no
matter how weak or disabled, is holy in God’s sight, and not to be wantonly destroyed. God does provide for the restraint of evil. God does empower armies and governments to
fight evil, and even to kill wicked people.
But the Church, in her proclamation and in her action, always seeks to
serve and protect life, because of all that Jesus has done to serve and protect
our lives.
The Bible says you must be holy, for the
Lord your God is holy. The Bible also
declares that in and through Jesus Christ, you are already holy, sanctified,
precious to God and beloved. Rejoice,
Saints of God, and let your voices praise the Holy One, our Savior Jesus
Christ, Amen.
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