Sunday, June 10, 2012

Pentecost 2 - Set Free


Jesus said to them in parables, “How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but is coming to an end. But no one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man. Then indeed he may plunder his house. (Mark 3:23-27 ESV)
Grace mercy and peace be to you from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Our text is the Gospel text from Mark 3.
Dear friends in Christ,
There are two things that we should learn from our text.
The first is that Satan is very real.  This is important for us to know and understand.  Because many today do not take the Devil seriously.  They think of him as a trifle, or a made up being, a boogey man, a thing that goes bump in the night.  Many people today believe that Satan is only a psychological projection, a personification of fear.  He is neither of these things.  He is entirely real; just as real as you and me.  A part of our Lord’s creation.
But he is different from you and me.  Satan is not part of the Lord’s visible creation; rather he is one of the Spirit beings that our Lord created.  One of the angels who God created and made and was good and perfect and holy.  He was made without the wickedness and evil that is today his calling card.  The Lord created him to be without sin.  The Lord also created him with great power and beauty.  But he coveted the Lord’s power.  He wanted that power for himself.  He hated God for what God did not give him, what he felt God should have given him, and so He rebelled against the Lord.  For all his power and wisdom and glory, he foolishly over calculated his strength.  He could not defeat God; so instead he decided to destroy the perfect world God made. And he would do it by leading the man and his wife to commit that same sin that he committed.  He took the form of a serpent and he tempted Adam and his wife to believe that the Lord hadn’t given them all that there was to receive, that the Lord held back in his gifts and if they would only rebel they could be like God.  Wasn’t that what Satan wanted?  Wasn’t that the same temptation that destroyed him?  And now it has taken hold of us.  A desire to be like God, a desire to be our own God, free from the true God.  We don’t need him.  We are okay without him.  He hasn’t exactly lived up to our standard anyway.  That is what Satan wants you to believe.  And so he pushes you.  Oh so subtlely, so subtlely in fact that we don’t even know he has been there.  His temptations are so easily and naturally slipped in to our own thoughts that we don’t even perceive him.  We are so quick to agree with him that we don’t recognize him.  We have a lot in common with him, after all.  We fell for the same sin.  He wanted to be like God.  We want to be like God.  There is solidarity between us and the devil.  And so we have the words of Jesus.   
No one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man.
Satan is the strong man.  His house where he lives, his kingdom, is the world of men.  He is the prince of this world.  He is the ruler, the authority, the Lord of this present darkness. (Eph. 6:12)
In the Large Catechism, Luther writes, “Let me tell you this, even though you know God’s Word perfectly and are already a master in all things: you are daily in the devil’s kingdom [Colossians 1:13–14]. He ceases neither day nor night to sneak up on you and to kindle in your heart unbelief and wicked thoughts against the commandments.” [LC I p.100]
So far, here is what we know.  Satan is real.  He is part of God’s creation.  He was created to be perfect but then fell into wickedness because he wanted to be like God.  He failed in that attempt and so he set about destroying God’s creation and taking control of God’s creation by convincing us to fall for that same sin.  He succeeded with Adam and Eve our first parents and he has, ever since, been repeating that same temptation with us so that this world of wickedness and sin is his kingdom.   We live in the house of the strong man.  We are the possession of that strong man – the trophies that sit on his mantle.  God’s beloved creation that have been stuffed and mounted as evidence of his victory.
But there is another thing for us to know, a more important thing for us to know.  It is one thing to know that Satan is real.  It is one thing to know who he is and what he does and how he does it.  But if that is all you know, then that will only terrify you.  Jesus was not in the business of terrifying people.  Jesus came to bring comfort.  It is as he said when he went to visit the folks in his home town of Nazareth.  Luke records for us in chapter 4 that he had just been out in the wilderness doing battle with the devil.  He defeated Satan and his temptations and then he began to teach; not a do it yourself gospel.  Not an, “I’ve done it and you can too” gospel.  Instead, Jesus came to preach I’ve done it.  I have gone toe to toe with the Devil and I won.  He came after me with everything he had and I didn’t budge.  I have done what you couldn’t do and I did it for you.  I defeated the Devil, I am about to defeat death, and I have done it for you. And so Jesus opened the scroll of Isaiah and began to read,  “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”  (Luke 4:18-19 ESV)
In our text from the Gospel of Mark, Jesus said that the only way to plunder the house of a strong man is to tie him up.  The first thing you have to do is overpower him.  The way to defeat a strong man is that you have to first find a stronger man.  It’s kind of like all those big summer movies that are in the theaters these days – The Avengers or Spiderman or Batman.  There is a villain, a “strong man”, if you will who is bent on chaos and destruction.  The human race is in peril and the only way for us to survive is for a hero, a man stronger than the villain to come to our aid, to fight on our behalf and to defeat this enemy for us so that we can be free.  Satan is the strong man.  Jesus is the hero.  Jesus is the one who fights the battle for us in our place and overcomes the strong man, who restrains the strong man, who ties him up and then plunders his house.
 In Revelation 20, John sees a vision.  He writes: “Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended.” (Revelation 20:1-3 ESV)
John tells us of a time when this very thing has occurred!  When Satan, dragon, or from Jesus’ parable, “the strong man”, is tied up so that he can’t hurt you and so that his captives can be set free.  John tells us that he saw an angel come down from heaven with a chain, he seized the devil and tied him up for a thousand years. 
And so the question for us is who is that angel and when will that devil be tied up?  When will it happen that he is restrained so that his house can be plundered?  When will it happen that the saints of God can be set free from the chains of the devil?
Dear friends, do you remember that word that Jesus spoke to his disciples.  He said it first to Peter.  Peter you are the rock, and on this rock I will build my Church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.  And I tell you that whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.  (Matthew 16:18-19)
But that Word was too good to only say once!  Jesus had to say it again.  And he did.  It was in fact the first thing he said to his disciples when he saw them after he had been raised from the dead.  He had suffered, he died, he was buried.  On the third day he was raised again and his disciples were locked up, terrified of what would happened next and Jesus came to set them free.  To untie them.  To unlock them.  I hold the keys of sin and death.  I hold the chain that binds the devil and I give that chain to you.  I give the key that binds Satan to my church.  Jesus breathed on them. Jesus gave them His Holy Spirit so that their words were His Words and he said, “As the Father has sent me so I am sending you.  If you forgive the sins of any they are forgiven.  If you withhold forgiveness it is withheld.” (John 20:20, 23)
Dear friends, Satan is a strong man who has taken control of God’s world.  He has enslaved all of humanity, every man, woman and child.  But God made a key that unlocks each and every one.  A master key that when inserted into their chains unties them and sets them free.  And then God made another chain.  A bigger chain, an enormous restraint that wraps around that strong man’s neck and binds him and holds him fast so that he cannot escape.  And the Lord has given the power, the keys to that chain into the hands of his church.  And I speak that key that sets you free and that ties up the devil so that he cannot touch you, I speak that Word of God to you now.  Your sins are forgiven.  Jesus has set you free.  Satan cannot touch you.  He is locked up, locked away.  Satan is bound. Bound by the promise.  Bound by the blood.  Bound by the name of Jesus.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen