Jesus Died for Preaching

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Word they still shall let remain

Nor any thanks have for it;

He's by our side upon the plain

With His good gifts and spirit.

And take they our life,

Goods, fame, child, and wife,

Though these all be gone,

Our vict'ry has been won;

The Kingdom ours remaineth (LSB 656.4).

The devil and his minions in the world hate the Word of God. He would love nothing more than to see the Word extinguished, or at least hidden away in some dark, dusty corner and forgotten forever. The devil can abide the Word existing, but he cannot abide His being preached, proclaimed, or believed in any real way.

The devil would be just fine with letting the Word of God out in the world, if it were retold as some sort of neat story or historical narrative. He will let scholars use it in reconstructing the timeline of the evolution of religion and philosophy. He will sit back as self-proclaimed experts in the Bible attempt to tell the world what the Good Book says, as long as it has nothing to do with Jesus, the Gospel, or actually repentance and forgiveness of sins.

But what the devil cannot abide is the actual preaching of the Word. For where Jesus is proclaimed into the ears and hearts and minds of the people, the devil has no choice but to give place. The strong man is bound and removed by the champion. And so the devil works his hardest to thwart the true, faithful, life-changing proclamation of Christ to sinners.

The devil would like most of all to have the Word of God silenced. Where the Word does not ring forth purely and clearly, the devil's lies can sound forth loudly and bombastically. Of course, the easiest thing would be simply to have the Word silenced, but sometimes the preachers of the Word just will not give up. So the devil works to put to death those who oppose him by preaching the whole counsel of God. But it does not work.

Consider some of the examples of the prophets. Jeremiah was arrested, imprisoned, and sentenced to death. And yet he went on preaching. He could not stop if he wanted to, for the Lord kept giving him the Word to speak to the people, even though they despised, hated, and outrightly rejected it.

Amos preached the oracles of God against the unfaithful children of Israel, and he was accused of conspiracy and treason against the the king. He was sentenced to exile, because he was speaking against the king in the king's sanctuary, which was “a temple of the kingdom.” How dare that naughty prophet speak the Word of the Lord in the Lord's house! After all, Bethel was the king's temple, not the Lord's.

And of course there is Jonah. Jonah was called by the Lord to go and preach the Word of the Lord to the people of of Nineveh. So he headed in the opposite direction, got on a ship, and nearly got a whole shipload of sailors killed. So he commits suicide, both to save them and to get out of preaching the Word. And what happens? The Lord sends a whale to swallow Jonah and then spit him back out safely on dry land. Then Jonah goes and does what God commands, and – wonder of wonders! – the Word of God works, and the people of Nineveh, from the greatest to the least, repent and convert.

Even death is no match for God's desire for His Word to be proclaimed to the ends of the earth. When He wants His Word proclaimed, it will ring forth.

However, some must die for the preaching of the Word. For the devil sometimes gains a temporary advantage in this world. He is given a short leash on which to hang himself. And so the saints of God are put to death for the confession of the Gospel.

Witness the life of St. John the Baptist. He preached the Word, as the voice crying out in the wilderness. He pointed out the Lamb of God come into the world to save His people from their sins. He baptized His God and Lord in the waters of the Jordan. He stuck his bony finger into the face of Herod and called him out for stealing his brother's wife. And he lost his head for his troubles.

Of course, the ultimate example of what the preaching of the Gospel gets you is that of our Lord Jesus Christ. He healed the sick, raised the dead, comforted the broken-hearted and oppressed, and forgave the sins of all who were penitent. He preached against the hypocrisy and hard-heartedness of the religious leaders of His day. And they ran him in on charges of insurrection, sedition, and rebellion. The Jews could not have Jesus put to death for blasphemy, so they trumped up capital offenses so that they could have the Romans crucify the Lord of Glory.

And so the Word of God seemed to be silenced. They took Him, scourged and beat Him, made Him carry His own death-device, and nailed Him to the cross in the midst of sinners truly worthy of death. They mocked Him in the midst of His agony. Gross darkness fell upon the earth as the darkness of human hearts was exposed and lifted up. And then the Word of the Lord died.

But then came the great earthquake that split open the graves of the saints. The curtain of the Temple was torn in two. The boundary between heaven and earth was rent asunder. As the Lord was buried into the heart of the earth, His Word echoed forth even in His death. “Surely this was the Son of God!”

Jesus Christ, the Word of God Incarnate, was put to death for His preaching! He preached repentance into the forgiveness of sins! Scandalous! He says you have sins, and that you have to repent of them and give them up! He says that you cannot simply follow like sheep when the false shepherd leads the world astray into darkness and death.

Jesus was put to death for His preaching, because His preaching required it. For the Word of the Lord would mean nothing without the death of the Word-Made-Flesh. His death makes His preaching true. For if the Lord Jesus has not died and been raised again to life, then our preaching and our whole faith is in vain, and we fools are most to be pitied among all men.

But Jesus did truly die, and He is truly raised to life again. Death no longer has dominion over Him. And therefore it no longer has dominion over you. Although your bodies are being put to death by the prince of this world, he cannot take your life, because your life is hidden in Christ. And where Christ stands, the devil falls.

Jesus has died for His preaching. And He has been raised again for His preaching. You have died because of His preaching, and you have been raised again by His preaching. Your sins are forgiven by the preaching of Christ. Not just speaking about the historical guy Jesus, but the proclamation carried into your ears and your hearts and your lives by the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ, the Word of God, died for your sins and is raised for your justification.

Jesus died for His preaching. But He lives for His preaching! And He lives in you by His preaching. The Word of the Lord cannot be killed, but shall remain forever. And as surely as He remains, your sins are forgiven, and you remain safe in His keeping.

In the Name of Jesus. Amen.