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᛭ INI ᛭

(5. Oops!: “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”)

“It’s a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” (Heb 10) He’s God; you’re not. We get that in theory. We confess it daily in the Apostles’ Creed and weekly in the Divine Service with the Nicene Creed: “I believe in God…in ΙΗϹ Christ…and in the Holy Spirit.” Yeah, it’s the faith…then life happens.

(4. Ugh!: We struggle with the silence and inaction of Christ!)

It’s that life happening that makes “it a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” It’s all well and good to believe that God’s god and not you, but it’s another thing to be on the receiving end of that. When life happens, God isn’t God in the way you think He should be God. He acts in a way that’s contrary to our expectations. It’s then that we struggle to be God in god’s place, then we fight against God who is God no matter how much we disagree…

Think of the Canaanite woman! The problem in the text isn’t her problem, that “her daughter is severely demon possessed.” The problem with the text is Christ! (Well, He’s not really a problem…) He’s the problem of the text because He’s being God as He chooses and not in the way we expect Him to act. When someone cries out to Him in need, we expect Him to act. Instead, “He didn’t answer her a word.” When He speaks to His disciples, He’s passive aggressive, “I wasn’t sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (That’s not her…) And to her kneeling before Him begging, “Lord, help me!” He answers, “It’s not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.” “What of that, Lord, and what of that?”

We’re sometimes in the same boat as that poor woman, aren’t we? THE DEVIL causes us trouble: trial, tribulation, hardship, temptation. We cry out to the LORD, and “He doesn’t answer us a word.” There’s no Word from the Bible that seems to fit our situation or give us comfort or a solution. Not only that, but we cry out, “Lord, have mercy!” and the trouble, the struggle, the problem, the devil remains. Christ didn’t answer our prayer, even though someone else who had the same situation got their prayer answered!

Then our hearts turn away from the LORD. We wanted the LORD to answer 100% as we wanted. In our time of need, faith often wavers. We believe that “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble,” (Ps 46) but in the midst of it all, we think He’s only that if He’s answering us in just the way we want. Not to say you can’t ask God for specific things. (The woman today did.) But are we let down because we trust Him as “the LORD, Son of David,” to do what is best for us, or are we let down because we expect Him to be our dutiful Servant and do everything at our own beck and call? In my own experience it’s because I treat Christ as Saul treated David, rather than how Jonathan treated David. (Or maybe Joab and Jonathan are a better comparison?)

In times of trouble, we ought to pray Christ’s mercy and for Him to answer us according to His good and gracious will. “God’s will is done even without our prayer.” (SC III) But that sort of prayer knows that whatever answer comes, a yes, a no, a silence, or another word, that then that answer is good and gracious. Even Christ’s silence, and even His inaction is good and gracious…

(3. Aha!: IN HIS OWN TIME, CHRIST DEFEATS THE DEVIL.)

This Canaanite, Gentile dog woman had great faith in Christ. Christ Himself said so! “O woman, great is your faith.” She let Christ be the Son of David as He is Son of David. His silence brought her closer. His Word to others made her get up in His face—in His Way. His Word to her got her simply to say: “Yes, Lord.” And then “her daughter was healed from that very house.”

All this occurred not because of anything that had to do with the woman, but Christ. He to do what He wants, where and when He wants to do it! He wants to defeat the devil. He wants to save the whole world, even this Canaanite dog woman’s demon-possessed daughter! And His gracious and merciful silence and in action, drew her in so closely to Christ that her faith cried out—greater faith at that moment than any of the 12 who wanted to send her away—her faith cried out, confessed agreement with the Lord’s Word. “It’s not right to give children’s bread to the dogs.” “Yes, Lord. I’m a dog,” she says, “but even the dogs get crumbs from their master’s table.” “Her daughter was healed from that very house.”

What is true of the woman is always true.

IN HIS OWN TIME, CHRIST DEFEATS THE DEVIL.

(2. Whee!: Christ defeated the devil ultimately by His death.)

And when CHRIST DEFEATS THE DEVIL IN HIS OWN TIME, it’s just like it was with that woman: His silence and His inaction is good and gracious. Now, you might be wondering how can Christ’s silence and inaction be gracious and merciful? Beyond drawing that woman to Himself in silence and inaction. I’ll go one step further: by His silence and inaction Christ defeats the devil!

“In the fulness of time, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, to redeem those who were under the Law, that we would receive sonship.” (Gal 4) He not only “redeemed us from the curse of the Law by becoming a curse for us (as it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree’),” but “by His death, He destroyed Him who has the power of death, that is, the devil.” The devil has the power of death, because, as Christ says, “Satan is a murderer from the beginning.”

IN HIS OWN TIME, CHRIST DEFEATED THE DEVIL with His death. There Christ is most silent, most inactive—dead! Then He was buried for His holiest Sabbath, “resting from all the work that He had finished” (Gen 2) in redemption. There the silence and inaction of Christ was most gracious and most merciful, most abounding in love and kindness and mercy. All for you, and not for us only but for the whole world!

It was all IN HIS OWN TIME—all to DEFEAT THE DEVIL. He even died IN HIS OWN TIME. “About the ninth hour… He knew that all things were accomplished. Fulfilling the Scripture he said, ‘I thirst’ Now a vessel full of sour wine was sitting there; and they filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on hyssop, and put it to His mouth. When Jesus had received the wine, he cried with a loud voice, ‘It is finished!’ And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.” IN HIS OWN TIME, CHRIST DEFEATED THE DEVIL with His death.

(1. Yeah!: We share in Christ’s victory over the devil.)

Now, we also share in Christ’s victory over the devil. “At the right time (κατὰ καιρόν) Christ died for the ungodly,” being “the propitiation for our sins, and not ours only but those of the whole world!” And that has to do with defeating the devil, because the devil is the great accuser. He’s a fun enemy. He tempts you to do stuff, and the accuses you, seeks to destroy your faith, over the thing he tempted you to do!

Anyway, you’re no longer part of that game. For at the right time, Christ baptized you. He brought you into the kingdom of His glorious might, not longer in the domain of darkness but transferred into the Kingdom of God’s beloved Son (Col 1) in the waters of Holy Baptism.

IN HIS OWN TIME, CHRIST DEFEATS THE DEVIL in the Holy Absolution, which forgives your sin, and silences all the devil’s temptations and accusations.

IN HIS OWN TIME, CHRIST DEFEATS THE DEVIL with Communion. His own body and blood, given and shed for you, defeating the devil, are given you as your spiritual and physical defense against the devil in the forgiveness of all your sins.

And when the devil prowls around looking for someone to devour, and he works temptation and tribulation in your life, and Christ is silent and inactive, remember the Canaanite woman. Christ was so for her, and it just brought her closer to Him to prove that she indeed was a lost sheep of the house of Israel by virtue of her faith in Him, so are you.

Besides all that: “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him graciously give us all things? …. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom 8) For IN HIS OWN TIME, CHRIST DEFEATS THE DEVIL.

᛭ INI ᛭