MAJESTY died for our sin. Then how forgiven are you?

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1 5/20/12 GRACE, MERCY, AND PEACE FROM GOD OUR HEAVENLY FATHER, AND FROM OUR LORD AND SAVIOR, JESUS CHRIST. The text is Hb 1:3. [Christ] IS THE BRIGHTNESS OF THE GLORY OF GOD, AND THE EXACT IMAGE OF GOD'S BEING, WHO UPHOLDS THE UNIVERSE BY HIS POWERFUL WORD AND WHO, WHEN HE HAD MADE CLEANSING FOR SINS, SEATED HIMSELF AT THE RIGHT HAND OF THE MAJESTY ON HIGH. MAJESTY is the splendor of a monarch that humbles His subjects and leaves them in awe. I want to see THE MAJESTY ON HIGH. We ve seen that MAJESTY reflected down here in His creation; if you ll forgive me, we ve seen the Majesty on low. Here, on this lake bottom where not much light reaches and it's murky, still, for all that, the world is charged with the grandeur of God everywhere you look. And if lightning is the Majesty on low, what is THE MAJESTY ON HIGH? These spring days, you see the Force that through the green fuse drives the flower. The life, the green unfolding and stretching out, the blooming everywhere - it is the LORD, on low. Whatever else is going on, in fact the tree tops are moving in the moving air; the light is glancing on the leaves. Even in the lowest places: The poor little Nashua River flows through Fitchburg none too clean, but still, the skin of the water shines like some kind of silver silk. And the Fifth Street Bridge isn t much, but even while the cars drive over all oblivious, underneath, on the bottom of the bridge the reflections off the river are dancing, dappled light and dark, all the time. And look at the sky! Shifting colors, floating 1

2 shapes and even more, on some clear nights, when you can look out to the stars, the nebulas, the galaxies - those wheeling, heavy fires in which, through the fusion of helium and oxygen at unimaginable temperatures, God makes a new element, neon, which, when a human being way down here happened to touch with electricity, blazed with this crimson light that had been hidden by God in that colorless element from the dawn of time. Even in neon, man, even everywhere you look, HIS ETERNAL POWER AND GODHEAD ARE SEEN IN THE THINGS He has MADE. And I feel kind of funny getting all ooey about creation, except that left to ourselves, we spend more time watching our own inner TV screens than seeing His work all around us, and more time listening to our own inner broadcast than to the sound of God s wind in His pines and the clean cry of His crows. We spend too much time in our own inner imaginary worlds while His ETERNAL POWER AND GODHEAD surround us to be PLAINLY SEEN. And we ve to to be told to look? Are we that anxious to avoid being humbled and left in awe? Or just busy, busy, busy like mice? And I d also feel kind of funny getting ooey about creation, except that just about everybody on earth feels that way more often than they say. Everything beautiful down here: It's a reflection of something so beautiful - it means to move you, and it does move you, but then an old serpent s voice hisses at you from the ground, Get your head out of the clouds! But I don't want my head in the clouds; I want to get higher than that. I've seen God's beautiful work; now I want to see the beautiful God. I want to see THE MAJESTY ON HIGH. 2

3 3 We ve all seen Him in the depths. That was Jesus of Nazareth, THE BRIGHTNESS OF GOD'S GLORY, it says, not just a reflection, but THE EXACT IMAGE OF GOD'S BEING, because nothing is exactly like God but God and He was God, who HUMBLED HIMSELF on the lake bottom with us, but don t let that confuse you. On Ascension, HE SEATED HIMSELF ON THE RIGHT OF THE MAJESTY ON HIGH: HE SEATED HIMSELF in His rightful place, side by side with the Father Almighty. Because as a Man, He s less than the Father, but as God, He and the Father are One, the glory equal, THE MAJESTY co-eternal. Down here, the blaze of that glory was hidden in His skin. He said to His disciples, DON'T YOU KNOW WHO I AM, YET? But He said it in an apartment one flight up in a dirty Near Eastern city. He said it in a Galilean, red-neck accent. He said it, sitting there in the flesh, just like ours, only probably not quite as clean, and not just in the flesh, but IN THE LIKENESS OF SINFUL FLESH. Which means He got sick like us, and tired, like us, and before the end, scared like us. But there was MAJESTY all the same, even in what we could see: the love, and the healing, and the love, and the wonders and the tenderness and the brilliance, and in the walking on water and the calming of the storm and the love and the love and the love.

4 And if that was Him on low. What is He now? Now that He s ascended up and out in the heights? What s He like when He s at home? Now that He's broken the surface up and out into the loudness and the light and the wind ON HIGH, now that a human being is THE flesh and blood BRIGHTNESS OF THE GLORY OF GOD with nothing held in any longer, with no sweat in His eyes, now and no Galilean accent, but a voice like the ocean and a face like the noon-day sun, UPHOLDING THE UNIVERSE BY HIS OWN POWERFUL WORD? And we long to see THE MAJESTY ON HIGH. And who do think we are? On Ascension Day, yes, we look up and our hearts pursue our eyes. On Ascension Day, when we remember that HE ASCENDED FAR ABOVE ALL HEAVENS TO FILL THE UNIVERSE, we look around and all around we see glimmers of THE MAJESTY who s calling us. But on other days, in other moods, we ve got other longings sometimes for things that would be innocent, except that when we re crossed, we can go blind as Israel in the desert, blind to the Pillar of Cloud right in front of them. Things get hard sometimes and dry, and we can walk through His creation so full of rebellion that we see nothing and what do I care about skies and trees? And God knows we have other longings that aren't innocent at all, that leave us coiled in our stifling inner kingdom, and when the fit is on, who cares about what s ON HIGH? And we have to fight to remember what we really wanted? And prayer's numb to me and the Bible the window on Heaven the Bible is cold to me and I have to force myself? What is this? 4

5 I know sins come in every shade of black, but today, while we watch Him go up and throw wide open the sky-way Home today I know no sin's crazier than our absorption in our own inner TV screens and our own inner broadcast in our own inner mini-worlds, of which we each have been the mini-god. And it seems preposterous to talk about how I SHALL SEE HIM FACE TO FACE, when I know how much I shut my eyes to Him here and now. And if that's not true, then please, why does He have to tell us, SET YOUR HEARTS ON THINGS ABOVE, NOT ON THINGS BELOW? And it's not just why would He give us what we don't deserve; it's why would He give us what we sometimes barely want? And what kind of a mammoth insult is that to Him who is THE BRIGHTNESS OF GOD S GLORY, AND THE EXACT IMAGE OF GOD'S BEING, WHO UPHOLDS THE UNIVERSE BY HIS POWERFUL WORD, and WHO SEATED HIMSELF AT THE RIGHT HAND OF THE MAJESTY ON HIGH WHEN... When? It says, WHEN HE HAD MADE CLEANSING FOR SINS, by taking all the dirt on Him. When that was done He went up, and not before. WHEN HE HAD MADE CLEANSING FOR SINS. Thank God, that s done. He knows who He came after, more valuable than mice. He knows what He loves: Sinners who were made to know Him and enjoy Him forever, and wait ll you see you at Home and full grown. So He MADE CLEANSING for us first before He went there, so that we could follow Him, here and to the heights. MAJESTY died for our sin. Then how forgiven are you? 5

6 6 THE BRIGHTNESS OF GOD'S GLORY was nailed hand and foot. How seriously does He want you? THE EXACT IMAGE OF GOD S BEING got killed here to pay our way out to MORE THAN WE KNOW HOW TO ASK FOR OR IMAGINE. How sure is Heaven since the One who carries THE UNIVERSE bore the curse and broke it? NOT THAT WE LOVED HIM, BUT THAT HE LOVED US AND GAVE HIMSELF FOR US - and He thought it was a fair trade: HIM for us! Not because our eyes were fixed on Him, but because His eyes are fixed on us, which is the whole reason we fix our eyes on Him. Not because we longed for Him, but because He longs for us, which is the whole reason we long for Him. Not because our HEARTS have been SET ON THINGS ABOVE, but because His heart is set on us below. That's why MAJESTY went down deeper than any of us has ever been, and that's why He went up, BEYOND ALL HEAVENS TO FILL THE UNIVERSE with CLEANSING. Beside us and below us and around us and above us: There s His ETERNAL POWER AND GODHEAD and CLEANSING. Everywhere we hear the Word it's Him talking from ON HIGH. And the One who baptizes us here is the One who's blazing in the heights. And the Christ who's here, on low, under bread and wine: We eat and drink forgiveness, life, and salvation Himself. We eat and drink THE LORD who reaches from Heaven to here and from here to Heaven. He's the Goal and He's the Way there and He's the One who carries us up rung by rung, through a world that is still charged with His glory.

7 IF YOU HAVE TASTED THE GOODNESS OF THE LORD, then renounce your inner mini-world and head for the Wide Outdoors. And if you ve glimpsed His beauty in the things He makes, then renounce your inner mini-throne. Be humbled and prepared for awe, because I ve got good news: You re not a god. No. You re the one He loves. Which is why, for as long as we still need to be told, He tells us: Look outside of yourselves and then look all around and then look farther out. He says, LIFT UP YOUR HEADS; LIFT UP YOUR EYES. SET YOUR HEARTS ON WHAT'S ABOVE WHERE I already AM, THE BRIGHTNESS OF GOD S GLORY, AND THE EXACT IMAGE OF GOD'S BEING I WHO UPHOLD THE UNIVERSE BY My POWERFUL WORD, and keep the stars wheeling and the winds moving and the atoms dancing and the sunlight flickering on the bottom of the Fifth Street Bridge. Amen. 7