“Open to Me the Gates of Righteousness”

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

Coco Chanel once said, “Don't spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.” Good advice, but yet it seems like so often we do just that.

You and I spend our time beating on the wall because we each want to find our own door. If I just beat hard enough and long enough and in the right spot in the right way, so we think, I will find a me-shaped door that will magically open to let me into the kingdom of God. And until then, we just beat blindly against the stone of our own sin and guilt.

The problem is not that we do not know the extent of the wall. Even in our blind, ignorant, sinful condition, the problem is obvious. Like David, we each say, “I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.” The Law of God is written on our hearts, and so we know what we should be doing, and yet we do the opposite. You know that you are not perfect, but you try to act like you are, as if you could just run away from your sin, or cover it up somehow. But none of us can get away from our sin and guilt. It remains before you, as clear as the face in the mirror.

Nevertheless, each of us tries to find a door to suit us, a door that will let us into heaven our own way. Martin Luther talked about the three basic human ways to heaven, into which the efforts of all people fall. These three “doors” are mysticism, merit, and speculation.

The way of mysticism says that one gets into heaven by personal experience. We see this most obviously in Eastern religions, and in the New Age movement that has brought East to West. To pass through this door, one must journey via the workings of the soul or spirit into places where the body cannot go and the mind cannot fathom. You must have a spiritual connection to God, one that is all your own. You must draw near to the divine, and the divine will meet you halfway. Bernard of Clairvaux brought this sort of thinking into Christianity, as he wrote about the soul's experience of Christ. According to Bernard, the Christian experiences union with Jesus not through the Means of Grace, but immediately and directly through ecstatic joining of souls. Bernard spoke of Jesus as the lover of souls, in a real sense of Him as the Bridegroom joining to His bride.

If that door sounds uncomfortable to you, the second option is the way of merit, or good works. To pass through this door, you must do enough good things and live a perfect enough life that God cannot help but think you are neat. If you sell all you have and give it to the poor, you might get there. If you live like Mother Theresa, you might get there. This is the path of traditional Judaism and Islam – the path of law. Make sure you do everything right, or at least enough to balance out the occasional foible. God helps those who helps themselves, so get out there and do what you have to do. Serve your neighbor, because he will testify that you were good. Give to the poor, because having stuff is bad. Suffer, because happiness means you are lazy. Mortify the flesh, because nothing good comes from the body. To get through this door, everything and everyone becomes a tool for you to use in that fight to the finish line.

Finally, for the thinking person lies the door of speculation. If you probe deep enough, you will find the door. The way out of the darkness lies not in the ecstasy of the soul or in the correct way of life, but rather attaining the correct understanding of the divine truths. Forget about all that supernatural mumbo-jumbo. If you want to talk about the flood, go find Noah's ark. If you want to talk about the children of Israel, you had better have historical corroboration. This Jesus person probably lived, since there are enough historical and quasi-historical records to fit with the general events outlined in the accounts of the Evangelists. The virgin birth, the Son of God bit, and the miracles – that stuff is just religious hype added by pious but deluded believers to make the story sound good to the uneducated masses. The thinking person's route to heaven requires one to strip away all that shellacking and find the real god behind the cross, then get to him or her or them by intellectual assent, rather than the Word and Sacraments.

Regardless of which path one might choose, the end result is still the same. We end up beating against a stone wall, hoping for a door to open. And so, in the depth of despair, we cry out, “Open to me the gates of righteousness, that I may enter through them.” In despair, we cry out because we cannot find the door, we cannot make the door, we cannot know the door exists. And yet, we also cry out in faith, moved by the Spirit of God to call upon the One who is the Door to open the way for us, that we may enter there. Faith sees and believes that there is a way, one which we cannot travel on our own, but which may be opened to us. Therefore, in faith we join our voices to the saints of old and cry out, “Save us, we pray, O Lord!” Save us from our blind, feeble struggles. Save us from our self-righteous bashing against the rocks. Save us from our sin and guilt and shame.

“Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord!” We cry out for salvation, and are not left alone. Like the people of old who welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem, we see our Lord enter through the door of righteousness for us. Jesus traveled the way of righteousness, fulfilling the Law for us who could not but break the Law of God. He came in human flesh and blood to fulfill all righteousness for us, to be the fulfillment of the Law, and to be the sacrifice for our sins. We bless Him because He has come in the Name of the Lord to be our righteousness.

For our Lord Jesus Christ has heard the cries of His people: “Hosanna!” The King of Israel has come to His people to save us from our sins. On the back of a donkey, He enters the city of God, leading the multitude of His people in joy. On the beams of a cross, He dies to save His people from our sins. Our God does not wait for us to come through the door to Him, but He comes out and brings us in, carrying us in His nail-pierced hands. Though He entered the city on a donkey, He rides out before us on a mighty steed, leading the charge against our enemy, the devil. For on the cross, it was not God nor man who lost, but Satan. The Lord of Glory, hailed by shouts of acclamation, has freed His people from their sins and has opened the eyes of the blind. In the glorious resurrection that follows, the whole people of God see that “The Lord is God, and He has made His light shine upon us.”

Therefore, we rejoice at the coming of the Son of Man on the back of a donkey, because we know that He opens for us the gates of righteousness because He passes through them for us. “O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for His steadfast love endures forever.” Give thanks to the Lord that He has sent His Son to bear our sin and be our Savior. Give thanks that our redemption is secure and our way to heaven is open.

“This is the day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it!” This is the day of salvation. This is the day that the Lord has made, and this is the day that the Lord has made you and me His children. Let us rejoice and be glad in it, because this is the day on which He has opened the gates of righteousness, that we may go in.

In the Name of Jesus. Amen.