Sermon for Pentecost 20 – 10.6.24
+ 20th Sunday after Pentecost – October 6th, 2024 +
Series B: Genesis 2:18-25; Hebrews 2:1-13; Mark 10:2-16
Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church
Milton, WA
“The God of the Broken”
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Only three chapters into the story of the Scriptures and we discover a sad and tragic truth: what God calls and declares good is twisted, turned, bent, and broken by sin. This is what sin does; it breaks everything it touches.
Scripture reveals that sin is like King Midas’ golden touch; only instead of gold, sin breaks into God’s creation and spreads guilt and shame and sorrow and hurt and despair and death all over. Sin breaks everything it touches.
The Serpent – as we heard last week – broke faith with his creator and fell from heaven only to bring his brokenness and corruption into God’s good creation. Adam and Eve’s perfect relationship with God the Father and Creator – broken in guilt and shame. Adam and Eve’s perfect relationship with one another – broken by blame and sin and death. Adam and Eve’s children – broken as brother murdered brother.
We see the brokenness of sin on full display in today’s Gospel reading as well. Some pharisees came to Jesus not to help families in their synagogues wrestling with marriage difficulties, not to bring comfort to someone who was hurting or ashamed from a divorce. They came to Jesus not out of genuine concern for God’s gift of marriage but to play a game and entrap Jesus.
some Pharisees came up to Jesus, testing Him, and began questioning Him whether it was lawful for a man to divorce his wife.
They tried drawing Jesus into a popular rabbinic debate of the day. One school was extremely strict on divorce law, the other was quite lenient – to the point of allowing for divorce for the wife’s cooking displeasing to her husband. The pharisees hoped that whichever side Jesus chose, the opposition would reject him.
Again, this is what sin does. It breaks and twists and upends everything it touches. It was Sin that dulled Adam’s joy when he first laid eyes on Eve and said, “Finally – bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh!” It’s Sin that takes the joy of the wedding day and turns it into a drudgery and weariness so that religious people – like the pharisees in Mark 10 – can come up to Jesus looking for a reason to divorce their wives. It’s Sin at work in our old Adam who turned his back on his bride and left her alone and isolated, who pointed the accusing finger and blamed her for his own sin.
Jesus doesn’t fall for the trap. In good rabbinic tradition, he answers their question with a question. “What did Moses command you?” 4 They said, “Moses permitted a man to write a [b]certificate of divorce and [c]send his wife away.” 5 But Jesus said to them, “[d]Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment.
Because Sin breaks everything it touches. Sadly. Tragically. Painfully. God’s gift of marriage is no different. Yes, Moses made concessions for divorce. After Genesis 3, divorce may be tragically needful, it may be inevitable; it may not be possible even for two baptized children of God to put marital Humpty Dumpty back together again. And yet we know this isn’t how it always was. It’s not how it’s supposed to be.
Genesis 2 gives us God’s good design for marriage. His will and plan are simple. Beautiful. Joyful. Complimentary. Meant for building a family. Building a home together. One man. One woman. One flesh. That’s how it supposed to work.
And yet we also know that we live not in Genesis 2, but in the world of Genesis 3, where sin breaks everything it touches. In our homes. Our relationships. Our marriages. Those of our own family and friends as well. This is why Jesus takes his hearers back to Genesis 2 to show them that divorce wasn’t part of God’s plan. And whenever it happens, whenever Sin breaks into God’s gift, it’s a heart-wrenching, life-altering, painful, hurtful, sorrowful thing. anyone who has experienced a divorce can tell you; it’s always a painful story.
Because Sin breaks everything it touches. And yet, what does God do with broken things? Broken people? Broken lives and marriages? Does he do what we do when things are broken beyond repair? Sweep it all up, toss it in the garbage, and throw it out? No. That’s not God’s way of doing things. God is the God of broken things, broken people, broken lives, and yes, broken marriages. God is the God who is there to rescue Sinners broken by Sin and everything it touches.
Because when we’re honest, all our lives are broken in one way or another – by our sin, by others’ sin, by Sin itself. And this is why Jesus came. He came to enter the painful story of our lives with all its failings and falling short. With all our hurt and pain and sorrow. With all our guilt and shame and brokenness. He came to take it all on himself.
Truth is, there’s only one perfect marriage union in history. The true love story of Christ our Bridegroom who came to save us, his wayward bride…and calls us his beloved. No matter how badly sin has hurt us, or we’ve hurt others in our sin. No matter how deep our pain and sorrow go. No matter how ashamed or guilty we feel, the love of God always goes deeper. Always covers our shame in his blood. Always bears our guilt in our place. God’s love for you in Jesus never fails or falls apart.
For those of you who have gone through a divorce and wondered, “what about my brokenness? What does God have to say about that?” He has a word of good news for you. Jesus came to take your pain and sorrow and make it his own. Jesus came to bleed and suffer and die and bear all your brokenness in himself on the cross.
If you’ve gone through the pain of divorce, know that God’s gift of forgiveness in Jesus is bigger and greater and covers all the brokenness of sin. And God’s forgiveness is bigger and deeper than all the sin caused by others too. And if you’re struggling in your marriage or relationships, this is the place where you can pray and hear God’s word of forgiveness as you wrestle at forgiving one another. This is the place where brothers and sisters in Christ are called to care for you. Pray with you. Listen to you. be there to bear your burdens with you. Consider it an open invitation that my ear and time are always here for you to hear how Sin has broken into your life so you can hear how Jesus has died to forgive you. How he loves you. How he cares for you. And how his cross is bigger than all the brokenness caused by Sin. And if your marriage is going well – thank and praise the Lord. God has given you a great gift and blessing, and an opportunity to be a good example for others.
No matter what our marital status is, no matter how good or how messy our earthly relationships are, the good news is that the Sin which breaks everything it touches has been forgiven, covered in the blood of Jesus, and washed away in his mercy. Christ, our Bridegroom pledges to you his eternal faithfulness.
Jesus is our heavenly Bridegroom and in this holy union, Christ binds up the wounds of we who are broken by sin. We are his beloved, baptized, holy Bride. He unites Himself to us by water, Word, and the Spirit. He joins us in our humanity as our Bridegroom and Brother. He gathers us together in a holy communion, as we receive His Body and Blood.
Jesus our Bridegroom is bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh. And if Eve was taken out of Adam’s side and given new life, how much more are we, Jesus’ beloved Bride, taken from the side of Jesus who was pierced for us on the cross. Strangely as it may sound, one of the most common words for forgiveness in the NT is the word divorce. That’s what Jesus did on the cross for you. Jesus divorced us from our sin. So that nothing can separate you from the love of God which is yours in Christ Jesus. And today and always he gives you his solemn vow to take you as His beloved bride, to make you holy, pure and spotless; to have and to hold you for all eternity.
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.