Grace, mercy, and peace be yours from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen

Isaiah 25:6-9 “Now the Lord of armies will prepare a lavish banquet for all peoples on this mountain; A banquet of aged wine, choice pieces with marrow, And refined, aged wine. 7 And on this mountain He will destroy the covering which is over all peoples, The veil which is stretched over all nations. 8 He will swallow up death for all time, And the Lord God will wipe tears away from all faces, And He will remove the disgrace of His people from all the earth; For the Lord has spoken. 9 And it will be said on that day, “Behold, this is our God for whom we have waited that He might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; Let’s rejoice and be glad in His salvation.” (NASB)

He has risen! The people reply, “He has risen indeed!” On Good Friday, Jesus was crucified unto death for you. He suffered excruciating physical pain, spiritual torment, and the forsaking of God His heavenly Father. He said of it all, “‘It is finished!’ And He bowed His head and gave up His spirit.”

In that moment it looked like fear, death, and devil had won. It appeared that the Son of God had been separated from God the Father forever. It looked as though faith in Christ had died with Him and that all the earth would live in fear and unbelief and in the shadow of death.

Holy Week is about death. It’s about the crucifixion. It’s about atonement and atonement by definition is a blood sacrifice unto death. Holy Week is about the old evil foe’s and the old sinful nature’s attempt to put to death the Life that came into the world. It’s about the darkness trying to snuff out the Light.

One week ago we celebrated with mixed emotions, the Triumphal entry of Jesus into the city of Jerusalem. We heard the shouts of the people, “Hosanna! BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD, even the King of Israel.”

During the Wednesday evening Lenten services we focused on the conflicts that took place between Jesus and the religious leaders of Jerusalem during Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of Holy Week. We came to know in more detail the plans of Judas and the chief priests to put Jesus to death. Then came Maundy Thursday, the institution of the Lord’s Supper, and Jesus’s prophecies abut the disciple who would betray Him.

On Good Friday we watched the results of that betrayal and the plan as we took part in a Service of Darkness. We read the passion story from the Gospel of John. We listened to those who mocked and beat Him. We walked with Jesus as He suffered both the punishment of men and the judgment of God up the hill to Mt. Calvary. The sanctuary grew darker and darker and when it was almost completely dark, we watched the Christ candle carried out of view, then heard the book slammed closed signifying the sealing of our Lord’s tomb. That is how Holy Week ends, with Jesus dead and entombed at sunset as the seventh day the week began.

Then came the sunrise of the first day of the week. There in the early hours of the morning, Jesus rose from the dead. The devil, fear, and death had been defeated just as Jesus said in John 12:31-32. “Now judgment is upon this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out. And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to Myself.”

By the way, the word exorcism comes from the Greek word “exballo,” which means to be “cast out or drive out.” Jesus’s crucifixion and resurrection unseated the devil from his place. The devil is a powerful being, but resurrected Jesus is the unchallenged King of creation.

Jesus said that judgment is upon (present tense) the world and Jesus ties the ruler being “cast out” to the next sentence about being lifted up and drawing all people to Himself. Your baptism into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ was an exorcism. Jesus took you from darkness and made you a children of the Light. The devil who once overcame by a tree in the Garden of Eden was overcome by the tree on Mt. Calvary.

That which the prophet Isaiah was given to write has come to pass. 7 “On this mountain” (Calvary) the prophet wrote, 7 “He will destroy the covering which is over all peoples, The veil which is stretched over all nations. 8 He will swallow up death for all time.”

In the Old Testament lesson appointed for this Easter, the prophet Isaiah gives a universal, all-encompassing summary the atoning sacrifice of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world and of the resulting resurrection of Jesus Christ.

While Isaiah makes a universal declaration about a universal all-encompassing saving act, it is in the incarnation, birth, life, death, and resurrection of a particular Man– Jesus, on a particular day– Good Friday, in a particular place–the Place of the Skull, and at a particular tomb–nearby where He was crucified, and at particular times of the day–the ninth hour that God provided Himself as the atoning sacrifice for the sin of the world.

The resurrection is a defeat of death. It bursts every boundary of peoples and nations. It transcends millenniums in both directions and is for all people in all times and when received by faith in Christ Jesus all the benefits of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus are given.

Isaiah said of the Christ, “He will destroy the covering which is over all peoples.” Death is the covering which is over all people. No one escapes it. Human beings attempt to soften death. They try to mitigate people’s fear of death. Death is sometimes referred to as a “natural process.” Sometimes it is talked about as a new beginning to something else. Some of the books and pamphlets handed out by hospice organizations try describe it as a leaf falling to the ground. Death is supposed to be “good,” because the dead leaf provides nutrients for further life. That’s doesn’t seem particularly comforting to me. The leaf remains dead. No good news in that.

Death by itself cannot be cleaned up. Death—without the resurrection of Jesus Christ—is the total negation of life. It is contrary to all that God created in the beginning. To allow it to stand is to allow the devil to win and to keep enslaved all of humanity in this world and the other.

In Isaiah chapter 24 and in may other chapters, Isaiah proclaims God’s judgment on sin. He writes about the universality of the terror of God’s judgment and of death. God’s judgment is without borders. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. The wages of sin is death.

Death is a cover that is cast over all people of all time. When someone dies we cover them up with sheets and blankets. If there isn’t one of those around, people will take off their coats and cover the body. That’s what the tradition of covering a casket with a funeral pall is intended to remind us of. The funeral pall is a veil to cover us in death.

But death doesn’t have the last word in the life of a Christian, so a Christian funeral pall is white and very often has Christian symbols on it reminds us that death doesn’t have the last word over us. It reminds us of our baptism and baptismal garments. We are wrapped in the righteous robe of Jesus Christ.

Isaiah says of Christ that “He will swallow up death forever” (v 8). This is a full victory. This is why caskets are suppose to be closed by the time of the Christian funeral service begins. It is one of the ways that the church teaches that death is not the final reality for the Christian. We close the casket. We put death in its place and preach and comfort those who mourn with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the resurrection of the dead.

I don’t know of a pastor who has served any significant period of time that didn’t bump heads with the family who wanted the casket open throughout the funeral service. While the pastor was trying in every way possible to direct the mourners’ attention to the only place where the sting of death is lessened (The resurrection of Jesus), the family wallows in death.

In times of death people seek comfort in animism, the belief that their beloved departed still roams the earth of in and sentimentality. But faithful under shepherds of Christ direct the people to Christ and Him crucified and resurrected. The casket is to be closed and the Christian funeral pall is to cover the casket, as a symbol that Jesus did exactly when Isaiah said He’d do. Jesus swallows up death forever and did so in our baptismal covering.

The one for whom the stone was rolled away left His funeral blanket, His pall, stood up, walked out of His tomb, and lived up to His God given name. “Jesus,” the one who will save His people from there sins. The name Jesus is derived from the Hebrew name “Yahweh”—the one Isaiah called the “Yahweh/Lord of hosts” (v 6).

Yahweh is God not of the dead, but of the living. The Gospel Luke tells us that one of the angels asked the women at the tomb, “Why are you seeking the living One among the dead ones? He is not here, but He has risen.”

With His name, He gives all that He is: He is the God who was, who is, and who will be (cf Rev 4:8). He is the God who causes all life to be. With His name comes all that He has promised. He promised to atone for the sins of all sinners (Isaiah 53). He has promised the resurrection of the body (Job 19:25–26). He has promised that “the Lord God will wipe tears away from all faces, And He will remove the disgrace of His people from all the earth.”

It is the name proclaimed in the Gospel. You are given the name. You now bear that name Christian, for Christ put His death and resurrection on you in Baptism. In your Baptism, everything He accomplished on the cross, everything he did in breaking the bonds of death and walking out of the tomb, is now imputed to you (Rom 6:3–10). When it is you or your loved one in that casket, Jesus’ death on the cross and His resurrection from the dead belong to you as surely as to Jesus because you have been baptized into his name.

His victory over death, his righteous standing before the Father, his joy of the eternal feast—it is your victory over death, your righteous standing, your eternal joy. He is risen; he is risen, indeed. “Behold, this is our God for whom we have waited that He might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; Let’s rejoice and be glad in His salvation.”

Amen.

May the peace that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Easter Sunday, 2021 – He Swallowed Up Death

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