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INJ
St Matthew 4:1-11
'Do You Love Me?'
Morning Service
Invocavit, the First Sunday in Lent | February 9, 2008
Dear Saints,
“Do You Love Me?” That is the question that our Lenten banner will hold before us these next seven weeks: “Do You Love Me?” This question needs considering because there are two different ways of reading this question, with two very different answers and conclusions.
The first way to understand the question is that Jesus is asking us this question, like He did to Peter after the resurrection. Remember how Jesus comes to Peter of the sea of Galilee and asks him three times, “Peter, do you love Me?” [John 21:16-19] And imagine if this is how we understand the banner, Jesus, from the cross, as He is suffering the agony of hell because of my sin, looks down at us and asks, “Do you love Me?”
This question stings, doesn't it. The best we could answer is, “Well, I'm trying to love You... I'm starting to love You... I'd like to love You...” But really this answer is, “No.” We do not love God, not like we're supposed to, not like we're commanded to, not like He loves us. I mean, we look at the cross, the agony and the blood, at His love, and then we look at our weak and pitiful efforts, our failure to give up anything and sacrifice even the smallest conveyance for the Lord or our neighbor and it is shameful.
And look, if we have this question thrust on us in this way, that the Lord Jesus is asking us how our love is for Him, this questions is the severest law- it shows us our sin, exposes our failure, and our utter weakness. It brings us to shame.
So, do we need the question soak in for a bit. Do we love the Lord with all our heart and soul and mind and strength? Do you?
Even if we've begun to love, there's always more, isn't there? That's the trouble with this word, this command: love. There are no loopholes, no way to squirm out, it demands our all, every ounce of it. That our riches and our lives and our strength is poured out for our neighbor and our Lord and we keep nothing back for ourselves.
But it get's worse when we think that because we've never kept God's command, and because, really, no one in the world has every kept His command to love, that it must be okay. Our sin is like a terrible smell that you get used to. Imagine walking into a friends home, and the stink would make you sick. “What's that awful smell?” “Oh, just a couple of rotting corpses in the closet, you'll get used to it.” This is how we treat our sin, our lack of love for our God and our neighbor, but we are not supposed to get used to our sin, to think it's okay. It's the reason you are dying. It's the reason you deserve God's wrath.
“Do you love Me?” “No.” We must answer with tears. “I have not loved you with my whole heart.” “I have not loved my neighbor as myself.” I'm a sinner. I remember it now. I see it now. I repent. I'm sorry.
But there is another way to have this question. Let's turn it around. How about, dear saints, instead of seeing this as a question from our dear Jesus to us, what if it is a question from us to God. What if we are the ones asking, “Do You, O Lord, love me?”
Now when the Lord is asking us this question, we feel the pinch, the squeeze of our conscience as the First and Greatest Commandment presses down on us. But it might be a bit more dangerous if we are asking the question, because when we cry to heaven asking if God loves us, we know what the answer should be.
We know our sin, we've covered that. And we know that we have deserved God's wrath and judgment, His hatred, His condemnation. We know that if we stand and shout at the stars, “Do You love me?” the answer should boom from the clouds, “No.”
But dear saints, look at this banner. Here is the Lord's shocking, surprising, unexpected and certainly undeserved answer to our question. The answer is not “No”, His answer is the cross. From the cross the Lord's answer comes through with comforting clarity: “Yes, I love you.”
God loves you. In spite of your sin He loves you. In spite of your failure He loves you. Before your love and even in spite of your lack of love for Him, He loves you, loves you to death. Jesus loves you more than He loves Himself and His life. He has given His life for you, so you can have it, and so He can have you.
Do you wonder if the Lord loves you? Because of your sin, your guilt. Because of all the trash and trouble that fills your life. Because of the things you've done or thought or said or desired. Because of all the unfair things that have happened to you. “How could God love me?”
Your answer is here, on the cross. The answer is, “Yes, God does love me.” And you can just as well undo God's love as you can go back in time and rip Jesus off the cross. There is nothing that can separate you for His love, from His forgiveness, from His promise of life.
And this, dear saints, is how I want us to read this banner. Our question with God's answer, and in this way the Lord will bring us His comfort and peace.
For the devil comes to tempt us just as He did our dear Lord Jesus in the wilderness. He tempts us to doubt our baptism.
Remember Jesus' baptism, how the Father had spoken to Jesus, “This is My beloved Son in Whom I am well pleased.” [Matthew 3:17] And now look how the devil begins his temptations, “If you are the Son of God...” [Matthew 4:3,6] “That promise you heard 40 days ago, that You are God's Son, prove it. Because it sure doesn't look like You're God's Son out here starving in the desert. Would not God feed and clothe and take care of His Son.”
So the devil tempts us. “You say you're baptized, that you are the Lord's child. Wouldn't a heavenly Father be a bit better to His children? Wouldn't He help you to avoid that trouble, or give you a break from the relentless toil...” or whatever it is. The devil would have us look around and try to prove by our troubles and difficulties that God doesn't care. “Does God really love you?”
But the cross is the answer, “Yes, I love you. You are my Baptized, children of the heavenly Father, brothers and sisters of Jesus.” Behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us, that we should be called the children of God.
The devil also tempts our Lord Jesus to doubt God's Word. This has been his plan from the beginning, to Adam and Eve: “Did God really say...” It is the same with Jesus. It is the same with us. “Did God really say that He came to save sinners? Perhaps He didn't know what you had done. Did God really say that salvation is a free gift? Surely you must do something to earn it or to keep it. Did God really say that He loves you? Well, that was a long time ago, before He knew you.”
Do you recognize the tempter's voice? His doubt, his questions? Dear saints, the Lord's answer, the Word of His cross, stands secure, established, unmovable. “For God so loves the world that He gave His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him would not perish, but have eternal life.” [John 3:16]
His love for you and me cannot be moved, it cannot be taken away. It's nailed down.
So it is that as our timid and loveless hearts ask the Lord, “Do You love me?” that His answer steals away all doubt. “Yes,” He says as He is lifted on the cross, “I love you.” May the Lord of God give us comfort and peace until in His love He returns for us to bring us home. Amen.
And the peace of God which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
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Pastor Bryan Wolfmueller
Hope Lutheran Church | Aurora, CO
