Second Mid-Week Advent Vespers Service, 2016

Today I was studying some of the Lutheran writers from the past, many largely forgotten. These were men from the history of the ELCA, so no one wants to remember their faithfulness to the Word of God. On the other hand, the Synodical Conference people (WELS-ELS-LCMS) do not want to acknowledge someone outside their own boundaries.

However, their works continue to be studied and reprinted because the truth of the Scriptures is timeless, just as the fads of the moment are locked into that era. I have watched many popular fads come and go. Nothing is so unloved as an old fad. But if something touches upon the eternal, its value is lasting and often discovered again and again.

Bach was forgotten after his era was over, but Mendelssohn said, "This musician is a genius." Now I see many people listing Bach as a favorite musician, along with the Grateful Dead and other celebrities. Bach was an orthodox Lutheran 

Moby Dick was hated in its own era and the few printed copies never really sold. When they burned in a fire, the publisher said, "No reason to reprint the lost ones, because they were not selling anyway." Decades later someone discovered the whale book again and it became required reading.  

The Suffering Servant passages of Isaiah were mysterious to the Jews for centuries, especially the reading for tonight. We can see how true that is, because the disciples did not see that before their eyes, not until all the events had unfolded. They were no different from the rest. The truth was so powerful and different that everyone was blind to it.

That is not strange, because the term King always bears the meaning of ruler and warrior. The combination is consistent throughout human history. Today many Third World rulers fashion themselves as military generals when they can fill that role or not.

Julius Caesar was first a successful Roman general, whose battles are still studied. In fact, some of his greatest successes are reproduced in animations so people can study how the descriptions of the battle looked.

As I wrote before, the concept of Messiah was wrongly associated with a soldier because descending from King David suggested battle. Judas Maccabeus and two zealot leaders after Jesus were the three Messianic pretenders who werenot the real Messiah.

The real Messiah was a different kind of King - "My Kingdom is not of this world." Jesus was not limited by the human concept of kingship. All governments fade away. All empires end. So many powerful kingdoms have passed away that people cannot remember them all.

One brilliant writer recorded the 1100 year history of the Byzantine Empire. The summary is good for three thick volumes. He wrote, "By the time I had finished this work, I was already forgetting some things that I had written in it." After all, how does one remember 11 centuries of history? And most do not know any of this.

We associate influence with power - how much territory is controlled, how many soldiers are armed, how many lethal weapons are developed. The Byzantine Empire had a liquid flame-thrower that terrified its enemies. 

The Suffering Servant is the opposite of all this. Jesus' greatest work was not one of power in the normal sense, but apparent weakness - allowing the forces of religion and state to torture and kill Him. All the worst aspects of abandonment were felt, but this was consistent with His birth. 

Instead of being born in a royal palace, He came to us in apparent weakness and poverty, so that the trappings of power would not frighten or repel us. 

Likewise, the description of Jesus in this passage can make us sympathetic with those who could not see the Messiah there - before it happened.

The passage begins with the repellent image of the tortured Servant. After the introduction, this is repeated with the question, "Who will believe our report?"

That question is repeated by Paul in Romans 10, because report is the equivalent of sermon. When people speak about how Jesus came into our world, born of a Virgin, dying for our sins, this account - sermon - report is the sermon that creates and sustains faith.