Easter Vigil
Baptism and Eighth Day
The nails are gone. The crown of thorns removed. The body of God is wrapped in linens and spiced, and laid in a rock-hewn tomb.
The nails are gone. The crown of thorns removed. The body of God is wrapped in linens and spiced, and laid in a rock-hewn tomb.
The lifeless body of God hangs on the cross. It was a short life of 33 years for the eternal Word. “The Word of God became flesh and dwelt among us.” (John 1:14) Humbly, the Son of God began His fleshy existence in a house when Gabriel visited Mary; gloriously, it reaches its conclusion on a hill outside of Jerusalem called Golgotha. At the third hour on a Friday morning, Jesus the Christ, the Son of God, saw to His appointed duty to die for the sin of the world, and was nailed to a cross. In the matter of a few hours, it was done—it was finished. Satan was humiliated, brought low, his head crushed by the bruised heal of the the Seed, declared in one last word from the cross: τέτελεσται. One little word has felled the devil, and we translate it as “It is finished,” or, “It is completed,” or, “It is ended” (perhaps this is the word Luther had in mind).
These are the five sermons preached over the course of the five Wednesdays of Lent, not including Ash Wednesday or Holy Wednesday. Rather than posting them individually, I post them together because they are connected by a theme, which are the five wounds of Christ in His Passion, the Stigmata: His Back, His Head, His Hands, His Feet, and His Side.
I have long wanted to do something like this for Lent, but could never get myself into gear early enough to have it completely planned. This year, I started thinking about this and putting it together in January. You can see the supplied lessons for the services and the suggested hymns for each evening by reading this .pdf file.