Audio of the sermon is here:

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

In the Old Testament, if you wanted to be in the presence of God, in the tabernacle, and then in the temple, you had to be pure, clean. And in order to be a priest, you had to go through a series of cleansing and purifying actions in order to do those things (Leviticus 8). If you were a member of Israel and you touched something unclean, or ate something unclean, or something happened to you to make you unclean, you had to go through a serious of actions, make the right sacrifices, be examined and declared clean by the priests before you could be among the people of God again. You had to ritually purify yourself to be in the presence of God.

Most people today don’t see any need to be ritually pure before God. But we have become our own, and our only, gods, and that means that we have our own purity standards, and we have our own ritual actions to regain purity. It becomes particularly clear around this time of the year. Maybe you’ve seen something like this on social media: “If you think this,” or “if you believe that,” or “if you vote for this or that person,” unfollow, or unfriend me! Be pure or you can’t be in my presence! It happens a lot with celebrities, where they will say or do or post something that makes them impure or unclean in the sight of certain people, the rage machine gets cranked up, and they are excluded. It might be possible, depending on the offense, to go through a series of purifying actions and rituals, and be welcomed back “in.” But if the person refuses, they will be excluded from certain circles of polite society.

And it’s exhausting, keeping up with all the new rules for being pure and clean. You can only say and do certain things. The rules keep changing and piling up. Things you could have said a few years ago, you can no longer say. Now, some of those things we never should have been saying! But it is exhausting, because it never ends. It’s never enough. And people are inclined to just quit.

Some people think that the church is that kind of society. Some people leave the church because they’re exhausted, they’re tired of trying to keep up with what they are required to think, and say, and do. They leave the world where they are required to do this and say that, and then they come to the church, and it’s just another set of rules about what makes them pure enough to be in this community. But that’s what it means to be under the Law, of whatever kind: the law continually says, do this, and it is never done. It’s never enough. You can never be completely pure or clean.

Now it is true that you must be pure to be in the presence of God. Hebrews says, “Strive for that holiness without which no one will see the Lord” (12:14). And it is the pure in heart who will see God (Matthew 5:8). However, the Proverb says, “Who can boast and say, ‘I have made my heart pure?’ or ‘I am clean from my sin?’” (20:9). The question is a rhetorical one, with the implication that no one can boast, saying, I have made my heart pure. No one can say, I am clean from my sin. No one does good. No one is righteous. There is no one who seeks God.

John also talks about a person purifying himself to be pure as Jesus is pure. How, if no one can boast, and no one is pure or clean? If no one is without sin? John starts by saying that things do not look like the promise. Out of God’s great love, He makes us His children. He has caused us to be born again from above by water and the Spirit. We are not simply called God’s children, as if it were false in reality. We are God’s children, and we are God’s children now. But we do not yet see it. What we will be has not yet been revealed. The world has not yet been revealed as the new creation that God has made it in Christ. But there is a promise that this is coming. We do not see it yet, but we will. We have not yet seen Jesus, but we will. And when He is revealed, when He is made visible to us in His glory, we will also be revealed for what He has made us. We will be like Him, because we will see Him as He is.

And what is He? He is the one who entered into this world of the impure and the unclean, those who did not seek God, nor want to; those who could not make themselves clean, even if they wanted to. Those who are exhausted by the striving and the working and the ritual purity tests which we always fail. He comes and takes your impurity, your uncleanness, your sickness, your death. He touches the unclean, like the lepers. He touches the unclean, like the dead. And He becomes that on the cross. He takes it as if it is His own. He becomes impure, unclean, cursed by hanging on a tree. He dies, forsaken by God in our impurity and uncleanness. But He is raised from the dead and exalted to the right hand of God in holiness, righteousness, and glory. When He touches the unclean and the impure, they are cleansed and purified. When He touches the lepers, they are healed. When He touches the dead, they rise. When He feeds the unclean and the impure with His body and blood, He makes and keeps us holy.

And He is our entire hope. When we see Him, then we will see ourselves as we can only believe right now. And those who have that hope, in the crucified and resurrected and glorified Jesus, purify themselves as He is pure. We will never be purified by ritual actions or words that we do and say. But we will be purified by Jesus who speaks to us and works in us. Our hope, tied to His promise, is our purity and cleanness. This is what it means to be a saint, that is, to be holy. Mountains and tents and animals and sacrifices and people do not make themselves holy by what they are. They are made holy as God makes them His own. Only what is God’s is holy. And you are God’s. You belong to Him. Therefore you are holy, pure, blameless.

And so you enter His presence. You come before the Father in Christ. You bear His Name and you hear His Word and you eat and drink. You are the blessed ones, the pure in heart. And you will see God, and then you will be like God-in-the-flesh, and He will transform your lowly body to be like His glorious body. Rest in this hope. No matter what happens on Tuesday, or this semester, or this year. In the exhaustion of trying to purify yourself, rest in the hope of Jesus’ promise to you, which cannot fail you. You will see Him.

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus,” (Philippians 4:7, ESV).

— Pr. Timothy Winterstein, 11/1/24