Sermon Tone Analysis

*Advent 3, **December 11, 2005*

*A People Mover*

Text: Isaiah 61:1–3, 10–11

Other Lessons: Luke 1:46b–55; 1 Thessalonians 5:16–24; John 1:6–8, 19–28

 

Theme: We have a People Mover, a Servant~/Messiah.

Goal:           That hearers will be moved from despair and depression to delight and rejoicing by the good news of Christ.

Zion is a distant, fading memory.

Trapped, tortured, and tormented in Babylon, the exiles of Israel Isaiah sees in our text have no access to the Judean hills, the Jordan River, or to the city of the great King . . .

Jerusalem.

Israel can only dream of the land promised to their patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

They feel as though they will never again smell the sacrifices, sing the psalms (cf.

Ps 137:4) or celebrate Passover, the Day of Atonement, or the Feast of Booths.

Israel appears forever locked in, with absolutely no way out.

But into this darkness the Servant~/Messiah proclaims, /“I will move you from ashes to beauty, mourning to gladness, despair to praise” /(see Is 61:3).

What else can Zion say but, /“I delight greatly in [Yahweh]; my soul rejoices in my God” /(v 10).

1.

          How many of you are familiar with the terminals at Detroit Metro Airport?

For those of you not familiar with the expanse and distance from one end of the airport terminal to the other, let me try to explain.

You’ve got to have some pretty good legs and some strong lungs to walk the length of almost 80 gates.

As a matter of fact, I was getting poohed out just carrying a light jacket and my computer from check-in to gate 78.

Then, I noticed something I had forgotten existed in big airports—people movers.

A people mover is a horizontal escalator, a movable sidewalk.

It allows a person on it to catch their breath.

It moves the body while you relax.

Some people still like to walk, so they have a special lane on it where you can take one step, and gain two or three.

What a difference a people mover makes!

It made me sigh in relief to see it.

It made me feel good that I was getting somewhere faster!

Now, my point is this: a people mover has a great deal of power to move several people quickly with seeming effortlessness.

2.

          Isaiah writes our text looking ahead to a day when God’s people will be stuck as captives in Babylon.

It will be a time when Israel has no king, no temple, no royal city, no land, no liturgy, no sacrifice, no future, and no hope of ever getting back.

The Psalmist speaks of the people reminiscing about the good old days when they worshiped in the splendor of Solomon’s temple, worked and shopped in the city of David, and saw the Mount of Olives from a distance.

Just listen to their plight from Psalm 137:1-3:

"/By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion.

On the willows there we hung up our lyres.

For there our captors required of us songs, and our tormentors, mirth, saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”/"

We can relate to feelings like that, all too well, don’t you think?

I suspect we all know what it feels like to be disciplined by God.

We know all too well what it’s like to make bad life decisions; to use barbed words meant to insult or otherwise hurt others; to judge others for their way of life—and the list could go on and on.

Yes, we too know the just judgment of our God.

The Ten Commandments and the Law of God are his hammers of judgment, and justice on our sinful lives!

And just when we feel like we are trapped and locked in a life of darkness and despair and depression, God says, look ahead, remember the promises I gave you.

3.

          Daring to lift our heads to face a Holy and Righteous Judge, God reveals something that makes us sigh with relief and hope.

What is it?

It’s God’s People Mover, the Servant~/Messiah!

The Servant~/Messiah’s mission is /“to preach the good news.”

/And the words are like wealth to the poor.

The meaning of the term for poor is not reserved for the realm of finances.

It is also employed to describe people who are “poverty stricken” because of iniquity and sin (cf.

Ps 25:16–21).

Luke discloses the words of hope from our Lord: /“[he has] not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” /(Lk 5:32).

That is to say, his Gospel has no effect on the callous and comfortable, but changes the lives of those who are stuck and mired in sin, guilt, and shame.

Then comes /“liberty.”

/Like the Year of Jubilee that Israel celebrated every fiftieth year, the cycle of slavery and debt is broken and the sinner is allowed to go free.

Jesus proclaims /“the year of Yahweh’s favor” /because he came not to condemn but to save the world (Jn 3:17).

But, let there be no doubt, there will be a day when He will execute the /“day of vengeance” /(Jn 5:22–29).

Like the people-mover at the airport, the effect on those mourning over sin means of entering into all the blessings of God’s favor, not wrath.

Surely, these are words the penitent long to hear.

But, the Servant~/Messiah does not simply throw words at the poor!

His words impart what they announce, and never return to Him void of fulfilling their purpose (Is.

55:10–11).

The point is this: Those who mourn, as with ashes on their heads, and sackcloth on their bodies; those who have despair in their hearts, become the recipients of Yahweh’s “great exchange” "/For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God./" (2 Corinthians 5:21).

You yourselves are living testaments to the power of His Word.

For, by that powerful word, you have received the beauty of His washing, the anointing of His Spirit, and the righteous garment of His praise!

You are known by a new name, /“oaks of righteousness, the planting of Yahweh.”/

God has given you a new identity with new promises, moving you from one degree of glory to another.

4.

          Let me take a moment to share with you how powerful the people-mover of God really is.

After Jesus reads the words from our text, Isaiah 61, he says, /“Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing” /(Lk 4:21).

/“Fulfilled,” /that’s a perfect verb indicating present and ongoing results.

So, what does this mean?

It means that the Jubilee, announced by Isaiah, was begun there in Nazareth, and is now still ongoing, even today.

The word recorded in Luke’s Gospel is the assurance!

And what was begun?

Just listen: To a dead son in the village of Nain, Jesus says, /“Young man, I say to you, get up!” /(Lk 7:14).

To a sinful woman at the house of Simon the Pharisee, he says, /“Your sins are forgiven” /(Lk 7:48).

To a woman with a flow of blood for eighteen years, Jesus said, /“Your faith has healed you” /(Lk 8:48).

To Jairus’s daughter, He says, /“My child, get up” /(Lk 8:54).

To the disciples, He says, /“Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom” /(Lk 12:32).

To the starved, the famished, the empty, He says, /“Come, for everything is now ready” /(Lk 14:17).

To Zacchaeus, /“Today salvation has come to this house” /(Lk 19:9).

To the Romans who maimed him, mauled him, and mocked him, he says, /“Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do” /(Lk 23:34 KJV).

And to every one of us he will one day announce with a loving gleam in his eye, /“I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise” /(Lk 23:43).

In the baptismal flood, Jesus moves us from hell to heaven by making our connection to the cross on which he died.

Get this: we’ve got a flight home that he won’t let us miss!

In the eucharistic body and blood, his body killed, his blood shed on the cross, he moves us from emptiness to fullness, from sorrow to joy.

In the Absolution, we are told again and again and again that we have been moved from death to life, that the forgiveness of the cross has been delivered to us.

And that life is forgiven and free forever!

We are going home!

5.

          Beginning with Israel in exile, everyone who has been so moved says, /“I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my God.

For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.

For as the soil makes the sprout come up and a garden causes seeds to grow, so the Sovereign Lord will make righteousness and praise spring up before all nations.”

/

          What, then, shall we say in response to all of this? “It is nothing short of revolutionary and life-changing!” “Exactly,” says Isaiah.

“Because I love you,” says Jesus! Amen.

\\ Sermon Outline

            1.

We could never overstate the power of a people mover.

2.

Particularly when we know all too well the feeling of being trapped in despair and depression.

3.

But look up ahead.

Is it a bird, a plane, Superman?

Infinitely better!

We Have a People Mover, a Servant~/Messiah.

4.

Jesus moves us from hell to heaven, emptiness to fullness, death to life.

5.

Everyone who has been so moved says, “I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my God.”