Redemption is Near
Your Redemption is near for paper June 26 Rev. Terry Goerz Redeemer Lutheran Church
In speaking of the return of Christ Luke records Jesus: “There will be signs in the sun, moon and stars. On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea. Men will faint from terror, apprehensive of what is coming on the world, for the heavenly bodies will be shaken. At that time they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Luke 21: 25 – 28
One of the challenges with a passage like this is to figure out if there are specifics here to grasp or if the Holy Spirit is simply attempting to catch our attention to make us keenly aware of how critical it is that we stay close to Jesus by whatever means we can.. But let’s be clear here. The details of what is being described in this text are not nearly as critical as is the out-of-this-world importance of having faith in our Savior Jesus and letting him keep and guide us all the way through our lives until the end comes.
Luke gives us as signs of the end some things great and terrible that everyone will see. Things like the roaring sound of the sea, people fainting from fear, and the shaking of the heavens all point to the fearfulness of the coming of the end of time and the beginning of eternity. And then all will see Jesus coming, coming in power and great glory. There are other places in the New Testament describing his arrival that speak of all the angels being with him, of trumpets blowing, of great light shining, and so on. It will indeed be an event like nothing ever seen before!
Even just a cursory pondering of these words can bring great fright to a person. Think on it! Earthquakes, great thundering and storms like never before, with even the heavens being shaken, will make any normal person most afraid.
But what is it to be like for the believer? Here’s the critical point for us. The unbeliever, who now senses that his accountability to God is coming due, that he never did enough to satisfy God’s holy demands, but, even more, that he simply rejected the Jesus who now gathers all before him to be judged, will be “fainting with fear —stooped over, with head hanging low, low in great abjection. As opposed to that, Jesus says, “straighten up and raise your heads” The believer stands up tall, raises his head, looking to the Jesus in whom he trusted. He trusted in this Jesus because this Jesus fulfilled his promise to save, save by paying the full debt of the believer’s sin and sinfulness when he died on the cross. He trusted Jesus to keep him in his faith until the very end. And he trusted Jesus to come and retrieve him from this vale of trauma and trial and take him to himself, into the glories beyond all glories, those of heaven!
What’s interesting is how Jesus labels this end of all things for the believer. He says, “Because your redemption is drawing near”. So just what is redemption? It can be identified in a couple of different ways. Redemption is a buying back of that which was lost or stolen. Or, one could say, it’s paying the price for freedom from that which kept one a slave to something. Our goodness was lost when Adam and Eve sinned against God and brought that lost condition upon all of mankind. What they did is make all of mankind, their descendants, just like them. That lost condition makes everyone, then, a slave to her or his sin and sinful condition. It’s not possible ever to free oneself from that slavery.
So when we think of our redemption it is the price paid that frees a person, a believer, from that lostness and their slavery to sin. For every believer, redemption is truly near, near because by the faith given by the Spirit, it’s only a matter of time until this final redemption is completed.
As we ponder our own end, it might well bring a bit of fear. It’s not something anyone can experience or rehearse ahead of time. When the day comes, it’s going to be brand new, something we’ve never faced before. Yet because God the Spirit has remade us into people now counted holy by God, because he is with us at all times, because our sin debt against God has indeed been paid by Jesus, there is no reason to fear death itself, but there really is only eager anticipation to be with Jesus.
Yes, our redemption is near, as near as our own deaths or as near as the approaching last day. For whether our time to meet Jesus is soon or still a long way off, He, as Our Redeemer, Is Always Near— with us and in us. All we can ever do is thank God for the gift of faith and thank him for the home he has already prepared for us with him. So remember “When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”
Blessings