God Hath Visited His People

The Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity

Oh, the deep, deep love of Jesus!
Vast, unmeasured, boundless, free;
Rolling as a mighty ocean
In its fullness over me.
Underneath me, all around me,
Is the current of thy love;
Leading onward, leading homeward,
To my glorious rest above.

When God became man, He found His chosen people back where they started. Subject to a foreign power, at home yet simultaneously in exile across the Greek-speaking world, and wandering astray under the yoke of a law impossible to fulfill in our sinful bodies.

Israel thought she had ended her sojourning, yet she rests not in her Lord, but upon her works of the law. There is no rest in the law, only endless toil and always failing to measure up. The only thing we increase under the law is our sin, for it exposes our nakedness.

The Church is Christ’s body, yet when we look within for righteousness or look at the works of our hands for our justification, we shall only find nakedness, lest we are clothed by Christ. Our works of self-righteousness have no merit and only gain us bloody hands. Our sins stain us, and although we cry aloud along with Lady Macbeth, “Out, damn spot, out I say!” nothing shall clean us except for the blood of Jesus. Hence, we cling to the One who cleanses us, crying out, “O Lord, we beseech thee, let thy continual pity cleanse and defend thy church, and, because it cannot continue in safety without thy succour, preserve it evermore by thy help and goodness, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” (Collect of the Day).

Oh, the deep, deep love of Jesus!
None can tell the reason why
He descended from his glory,
Came to earth to bleed and die.
I, a wrecked and ruined creature,
Sinful, helpless, all defiled,
But the love of God in Jesus
Made me God’s beloved child.

The Lord loves us greater than we love our sin. He loves us with such depths that He plummets to the depths of the earth and its bowels in order to manifest Love Divine. Christ becomes our sin so that we may have His righteousness and godliness henceforth forevermore. Christ goes to war against sin, satan, and all the demons of hell to grant us His peace. What can a mere mortal do for the Immortal One who became mortal for our sakes? God has become man, therefore, “I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Epistle lesson, Ephesians 3:14, KJV).

Christ Jesus came to conquer, and when we unite our dead Adam to His new Man, we are renamed, just as Abram became Abraham, Jacob became Israel, Simon became Peter, and so on. For Christ Jesus, “the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man.” (Ephesians 3:15-16, KJV). Be ye refreshed, fellow sinner, be ye replenished member of the body of Christ, be ye cleansed, o saint, “that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.” (Ephesians 3:17, KJV).

If we are to dwell, we are to dwell in Thee, O Lord.
If we are to rest, we find it in Thee, O Christ.
If we are to tabernacle, it is with Thee, O God.

Oh, the deep, deep love of Jesus!
Spread his praise from shore to shore;
How he loves us, ever loves us,
Changes never, nevermore;
How he watches o’er his loved ones,
Died to call them all his own;
How for them he’s interceding,
Watcheth o’er them from the throne.

Where shall we rest? Where we are planted. For we are grafted into the One living Tree of God, the Tree of Life, which is “being rooted and grounded in love.” (Ephesians 3:17, KJV). Our veins are now connected to the deep, impenetrable roots of the Ancient One, and we are nourished by Him alone. The living God has connected us to His Love, so we “may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.” (Ephesians 3:18-19, KJV).

You have heard of “the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7, KJV) and today you learn we are blessed “to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge” and elevates us to “be filled with all the fulness of God.” (Ephesians 3:19, KJV). Truly, our cup overfloweth when we look up to the Cross of Christ and see His love – far deeper, wider, and extravagant than we mere mortals can comprehend. The Infinite became finite so that we may be raised up to know Him: fully and completely, like a beloved knows His beloved.

O wayward traveler, I know you face cold, dark nights when you think you are alone. You are not. Jesus is the one who sees the widow and brings joy even on the darkest day. When Christ met the widow at “the gate of the city,” and beheld “there was a dead man carried out, the only son of his mother,” what did He do? (Gospel lesson, Luke 7:12, KJV). Why “when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and said unto her, Weep not.” (Luke 7:13, KJV). Weep no more, dearly beloved, for the bridegroom draws near. He comes to remove the veil covering our face, the veil that He tore in two so that He might draw us near. Christ approaches you even now, and even merely touching the bier of our worries, our concerns, and our sins, He destroys them. Christ comes not only to the young man who lies dead on the bier in Luke 7, but He even comes now to you as you sit dead in your trespasses, and He cries out to us, “Young man, I say unto thee, Arise.” (Luke 7:14, KJV).

Arise, my lost traveler, arise weary sojourner, arise for “he that was dead sat up, and began to speak.” (Luke 7:15, KJV). Jesus “delivered him to his mother” alive, and so too does He deliver us alive in our faith and baptism to our mother the Church, for now we have been adopted by God as our Father. Let us glorify God as the crowd did this day, and let us recognize alongside the people of Nain that the promised “great prophet is risen up among us,” but nay, He is more than a prophet! (Luke 7:16, KJV). May we have eyes to see as they did on this day, “That God hath visited his people.” (Luke 7:16, KJV).

Draw near with faith and look, O Church. Behold, the Day cometh soon when He shall return and once more God shall visit His people and bring judgment and new creation upon the earth. Come now, Lord Jesus.

Oh, the deep, deep love of Jesus!
Love of ev’ry love the best:
‘Tis an ocean vast of blessing,
‘Tis a haven sweet of rest.
Tho’ polluted, sinful, wretched,
Yet he calls me as his own;
He will lift me to the grandeur
Of his everlasting throne.