EASTER 6, C – May 9, 2010

SCRIPTURES: Acts 16:9-15; Revelation 21:9-14, 21-27; John 16:23-33

Today is Mother’s Day, and that’s a good thing. Sometimes we need to be prodded to think about Mom more and so do things that honor her and make her happy. For those who no longer have their mothers, this day can bring back memories of good days and happy times with Mom, and so bring comfort and joy. Mother’s Day also serves our society by holding before us the importance of motherhood and calling us to take seriously the obligations and responsibilities that a woman shoulders when she becomes a mother.

How fitting, then, that on this Mother’s Day we hear God say, “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.” In the figurative language of the book of Revelation God holds before us today the greatest of all mothers: the wife of the Lamb.

Who is this wife, this mother? Let’s first consider the husband. What a husband he is! – not a powerful and handsome man but a helpless Lamb. This is the lowly Jesus who was arrested, beaten, bloodied and bruised, and then nailed to a cross as the sacrifice for sinners. Lowly; and yet, heaven is His. He and the Lord God Almighty are worshiped there. If you want to enjoy the love of God and live with Him forever in His home in heaven, then this is who you must embrace and love: the dead Jesus hanging on a cross, His blood pouring forth from His spear-pierced side, all to take away your sins.

If this is the husband, then what about the wife? Frankly, she’s not much to look at; at least, not when He chooses her. During His life on this earth Jesus said that He had come, not for the impressive and the beautiful and the good, but for the sick, the sinful, the despised, indeed, all whose sins had destroyed their lives and made them very ugly. These Christ took as His Bride, and to be the mother of His children.

This wife of the Lamb, that John saw coming down out of heaven from God, is the Church. Martin Luther recognized this. In his Large Catechism, the 3^rd Article of the Creed, teaches us: “[God] has a unique community in the world. It is the mother that begets and bears every Christian through the Word of God.” This is Christ’s Bride, the Church: weak and sinful people, people whose sins are very ugly, indeed. They have nothing to offer to their Husband, nothing to attract or lure Him and nothing with which to bless His life.  But, wonder of wonders, this is who Jesus chooses to take to Himself in marriage!

I am reminded of an interesting song when I think of Christ the Bridegroom and the Bride He chooses. It’s a song that The 4 Tops sang years ago. It goes:

“If you wanna be happy for the rest of your life
Never make a pretty woman your wife
So from my personal point of view
Get an ugly girl to marry you.”

This is what Christ does. He chooses the ugly and unworthy and makes them His Bride – not for His happiness, but for theirs. So, if you want to be His Bride, if you want to live with God and in His love forever in heaven, then don’t hide your sins from Him. Don’t be concerned about defending yourself and coming up with excuses for your sins, and don’t compare yourself with others. Don’t hold up before Him your noteworthy attributes and the good things you do and expect Him to accept you because of them. Don’t think that you are in any way deserving of Christ and worthy to be chosen. Don’t even think that you can choose Him! He does the choosing, and He chooses sinners. So, be a sinner! Admit and confess your sins, and believe that in His death alone you have forgiveness, His love, and a new life! In Jesus sinners have a Husband who gives them a new life.

And, boy, what great things does Jesus do for His Bride! She may have been ugly when He chose her, but when He marries her, that is changed. “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb,” the angel says. Man, is she built! John describes her as a city “coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel… the glory of God gives it light.” Christ’s Bride, the Church, is seen as a beautiful city, so beautiful that John has a hard time finding the words to describe it. Why is it so beautiful? Because God’s glory is within it and gives it light.

Recall this vision from the book of Revelation when your sins are in your mind and heart, or on the lips of others, and you feel very dirty and ugly. Jesus is your Bridegroom, your Husband. He’s not surprised by who you are and what He sees. He sees the ugliness of your sins far more clearly than you! But, He married you to Himself when He baptized you and gave you His name; and, in a marriage, what yours is His and what’s His is yours. Like the prince who married Cinderella and lifted her from her poverty and despair to beauty and wealth and rule, your Bridegroom Jesus has taken you out of your sins and brought you into His kingdom. The blood He shed for your sins is upon you, and your sins are no more. His holiness is now yours and the beauty of the holy life He lived clothes you. You are beautiful in God’s sight!

This is how God looks upon the Church, those who rejoice in Jesus as their Savior. Let us look upon Christ’s Church this way, also. Would you ever speak ill of or belittle your own mother? Of course not! Well, do not belittle or disparage your mother the Church, either! Jesus has taken His people unto Himself and given them His name and His glory. Consider this when you consider one another, speak of one another, and interact with one another.

Consider and rejoice also in the fact that Christ surrounds you with His love and His protection. John saw the Church as a city with great, high walls, and with angels guarding each of the gates into the city. Pictured for Him was what we cannot see in this world but can only believe, that Christ is with His people and sends His mighty angels to protect them. Jesus sums up in blunt language how things so often are for us in this world: “In the world you will have tribulation.” We sure see and feel this, don’t we? The persecution of Christ’s Church and the belittling of the Christian faith seems to be increasing more and more. “But take heart; I have overcome the world,” Jesus says. He will never abandon His Bride, but will guard and protect her and through her bring forth children for God until the world as it is comes to an end. The powers of hell itself cannot prevent this.

Nor can they keep God from hearing your cries and coming to your aid. “Truly, truly, I say to you,” Jesus promises, “whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you… for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God.” Will a good and loving husband not help his wife when she is in danger and need and cries out to him? Because you are Christ’s, your heavenly Father will stand with you always.

I pray that you have a happy Mother’s Day today. As you remember and give thanks for your earthly mother, give thanks also for your Mother, the Church, and pray for her. May Jesus, her Bridegroom and Husband, keep her and through her bring forth many children for God, for the glory and praise of His name!