Palm Sunday Series A Sermon: Self-Sacrificing Savior

Preached on Isaiah 50:4–9
The Sunday of the Passion
With Responsive Prayer 2 and Scripture Readings
5 April AD 2020

Video: Click to view the YouTube video of Self-Sacrificing Savior. Sermon begins at the 11:25 mark, following the Opening Versicles from Lutheran Service Book 285, Psalm, Scriptures, Kyrie, Creed, Lord’s Prayer, and Versicles. Service concludes with the Prayer of the Church, Morning Prayer, and Blessing.

Summary: Today’s text is the third of Isaiah’s four “Servant Songs.” In them, the Lord addresses His Servant and the Servant also speaks of Himself and His saving vocation. As the songs point toward the life and work of the coming Messiah, they grow progressively more intense, emphasizing ever more the coming suffering and death of the One who would redeem sinners.

Now that we know the story of the Christ, it becomes easy to see in these songs the suffering and death of our Savior. How could anyone familiar with Jesus’ arrest and trial not realize that here in Isaiah 50, the Servant speaks of His own ill treatment at the hands of the Jewish leaders and the Romans?

The Gospels record the fulfillment of the prophecies that the Servant would faithfully carry out God’s will. Jesus would continue onward to the end of His tasks. He allowed His back to be beaten, His beard pulled, His face spat upon.

And though the world looks at what happens as disgraceful and shameful, Jesus accepts His wounds as badges of glory bestowed by His Father. They are signs that our adversary Satan cannot accuse us. Death can’t claim us as guilty sinners and and the grave can’t keep us for all eternity. God won’t listen to the Accuser as he tries to point out our sins. God instead listens to His Son who calls us His own and presents us to His Father in our robes of righteousness that He won in His Passion and granted in our baptisms.

Text: The Lord God has given me the tongue of those who are taught, that I may know how to sustain with a word him who is weary.

Morning by morning he awakens; he awakens my ear to hear as those who are taught. The Lord God has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious; I turned not backward.

I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.

But the Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame. He who vindicates me is near.

Who will contend with me? Let us stand up together. Who is my adversary? Let him come near to me.

Behold, the Lord God helps me; who will declare me guilty? Behold, all of them will wear out like a garment; the moth will eat them up. Isaiah 50:4–9

Scripture quoted from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®, © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Video: Click to view the YouTube video of Self-Sacrificing Savior. Sermon begins at the 11:25 mark.

Other Readings: John 12:12–19 (Palm Sunday Procession); Psalm 118:19–29 or Psalm 31:9–16; Philippians 2:5–11; John 12:20–43 or Matthew 26:1–27:66 or Matthew 27:11–66

Palm Sunday Series A Sermon: Emptied, Humbled, Dead

Preached on Philippians 2:5–11
The Sunday of the Passion
With Daily Prayer for Morning and Scripture Readings
5 April AD 2020

Video: Click to view the YouTube video of Emptied, Humbled, Dead. Sermon begins at the 6:00 mark, following Responses from Lutheran Service Book 295, Psalm, and Scriptures. Service concludes with Creed, Lord’s Prayer, Litany (LSB 288), Collect for Vocation, Morning Prayer, and Benediction.

Summary: Christ emptied Himself. He poured out His blood and His life onto the ground below His cross on Golgotha. His perfect obedience paid the price for sinners’ disobedience as He took every transgression from every person who had lived, was living, or would live from Eden to the end of time.

The Father honored His Servant-Son’s sacrifice. Per the angel’s instructions to Mary and Joseph, He already bore the name “Jesus,” meaning the Lord (YHWH) saves. From resurrection and ascension onward, His remains “the name that is above every name,” for “there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. (Acts Acts 4:12)”

Text: Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:5–11

Scripture quoted from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®, © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Video: Click to view the YouTube video of Emptied, Humbled, Dead. Sermon begins at the 6:00 mark.

Other Readings: John 12:12–19 (Palm Sunday Procession); Psalm 118:19–29 or Psalm 31:9–16; Isaiah 50:4–9a; John 12:20–43 or Matthew 26:1–27:66 or Matthew 27:11–66

Palm Sunday C Sermon: Hosanna, Jesus!

Preached on John 12:12-19
Sunday of the Passion, Series C
20 March AD 2016

Title: Hosanna, Jesus! (MP3 Audio)

Summary: The people of Jerusalem understood the word play as they called out to Jesus during His triumphal entry — yet they remained unaware of what they were asking for. Hosanna and Jesus stem from the same Hebrew word, meaning “to save.” They point to the same fact: The Word became flesh to save us from our sin. That’s why the angel told Joseph to name Mary’s Child “Jesus” (Matthew 1:21).

The crowd called upon the Savior to save them from Roman occupation, to restore the Davidic Kingdom in the Promised Land, and to restore Israel to its long-lost glory. What they got was a Savior who came to save them from satanic oppression, their own sinful natures, and God’s wrath.

Often, we are similarly unaware of our own full need for a Savior. Our cries of hosanna too often address the effects of being sinners living in a sinful world rather than the root cause of all our troubles. While we may not be looking for a new king to be crowned, we can certainly invent our own theologies of glory.

Yet even when we aren’t completely mindful of the extent of Jesus’ sacrifice on our behalf, He remains mindful of us. The fulness of His victory is ours in Word and Sacrament, by the power of the Holy Spirit. He saves us in Baptism, in the Absolution, in His Supper. He saves us by bringing us into the community of the Church. He saves us by giving the angels charge over us. He saves us by holding fast to us, even though our grip on Him often fails.

Text: The next day the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!”

And Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, just as it is written, “Fear not, daughter of Zion; behold, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt!”

His disciples did not understand these things at first, but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him and had been done to him.

The crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to bear witness. The reason why the crowd went to meet him was that they heard he had done this sign.

So the Pharisees said to one another, “You see that you are gaining nothing. Look, the world has gone after him.” John 12:12-19 (Palm Sunday Processional Gospel)

Scripture quoted from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®, © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Audio: Click to hear MP3 of Hosanna, Jesus!.

NB: For some reason, a few people have had problems trying to play the inline audio if Windows Media is their default MP3 player. If this occurs, you can either change to QuickTime or another default browser player, copy and paste the link directly into a selected player, or download it to your computer, where it seems to work regardless of which player. Several folks have suggested VLC Player from VideoLAN.

Other Readings: Psalm 118:19-29 or 31:9-16; Deuteronomy 32:36-39; Philippians 2:5-11; Luke 23:1-56 or Luke 22:1-23:56 or John 12:20-43

See Aardvark Alley for more on Palm Sunday.