When you take a look at the liturgical calendar in the days that follow Christmas, you almost get the feeling that the Church fathers wanted to make sure that our warm and fuzzy Christmas feelings would quickly be jerked back into the real world where we really live. The real world where silent nights are few and far between, where holiness and innocence are more likely to be replaced with sin and evil and death. We had our Kodak moments on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but now we’re faced with the reality of life in a sinful and corrupted world.
Today, December 26, is the Feast of Stephen, a day to remember the death of the first Christian martyr. Stephen was bold enough to confess Christ in those weeks and months following Jesus’ ascension into heaven – and in the sixth and seventh chapters of Acts we read how the Jewish ruling council stoned him to death because of his faith.
Tomorrow, December 27, is the Feast of John the Apostle and Evangelist. John the beloved disciple was the only one of the 12 apostles to die of old age, but that fact doesn’t mean that he wasn’t persecuted throughout his life. He suffered much for his faith, and in his later years he was exiled to a small and forlorn island in the Mediterranean.
And then, on December 28, we remember the killing of the Holy Innocents, the account described in today’s Gospel reading. The account where we hear of King Herod’s murderous attempt to kill off a young boy identified by the Magi as the “King of the Jews.”
Herod the Great was, as we might say it today, a real piece of work. First-century Jewish historian Josephus Flavius needed only one word to describe Herod: monster. He was responsible for the deaths of one of his ten wives, as well as a mother-in-law, two brothers-in-law and three of his sons. Countless political and religious opponents were executed. Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus, who recognized the true evil of the “King of the Jews,” once said that “It is better to be Herod’s pig than his own son.”
In today’s Gospel lesson we hear about the slaughter of the young boys who lived in Bethlehem and the surrounding countryside, the crime that has come to be known as the martyrdom of the Holy Innocents. Although Josephus and others documented Herod’s crimes in great detail, not a single one of those historians so much as mentioned the massacre in Bethlehem. Matthew chapter 2 is the one and only place where this account can be found. Those who criticize the truth and accuracy of Scripture have picked up on this, claiming that a crime of this nature would certainly have been recorded in history – unless, they suggest, it never happened at all.
The answer, in all probability, is quite simple. In the overall scheme of life during the reign of King Herod, the massacre of the Holy Innocents was probably too insignificant for people outside of that general area to even notice. Bethlehem was a small town – a very small village, in fact – and even if you include boys under the age of two who lived in the nearby countryside, only a small number may have actually been murdered. Biblical scholars estimate that the number may have been 20 or even less. Now even a small number of murders doesn’t make it any less horrific. But to the historians of that time, killing a handful of young boys wasn’t anywhere near as newsworthy as many of the other murders that Herod ordered.
Not so different than the times we live in, is it? Today the United States has a population estimated to be almost 309 million. That’s a lot of people. So what would you say if I told you that roughly 3,300 children, give or take, are murdered in the United States each and every day? Statistically that number is too small to even notice – just like the massacre of the Holy Innocents 2,000 years ago was too small for people to notice. Punch those numbers into your calculator at home and you’ll probably get an error message – it does not compute. But the death of 3,300 infants in the United States each day does matter, just like the death of those children who lived in and near Bethlehem matters. Except for very rare occasions, you will probably never read anything about those 3,300 deaths in the newspapers or hear about them on TV or read about them on the internet.
By now you may have guessed that the daily death toll of 3,300 children I’m talking about is the number of legal abortions performed in the United States each and every day. Every day, while we go on with our lives and think nothing about it, 3,300 infants are killed before they ever have a chance to breath a single breath. Before they ever have a chance to make a single sound. Before they ever have a chance to be brought to the baptismal font and washed in the waters of Holy Baptism. Before they ever have a chance to hear the name of Jesus. Three thousand three hundred … each and every day. There is great evil in our world today. But there has been great evil in our world ever since Adam and Eve fell into sin.
Today’s Gospel lesson seems to focus on one evil king who tried – unsuccessfully – to kill off the one child who seemed to be his competition for his throne. But ultimately, our focus must move beyond Herod to the one who used and manipulated Herod in an unsuccessful attempt to kill off not some earthly king, but the true and only heavenly King – Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The real power behind Herod was Satan, the great deceiver who set his sights on this young Son of God and tried to kill him off before God’s plan of salvation for His people could be accomplished.
It didn’t work, of course, but that wouldn’t stop Satan from trying again. Following His baptism by John the Baptizer, Jesus went into the wilderness for 40 days and was repeatedly tempted by Satan. Once again, it didn’t work, so throughout Jesus’ ministry Satan would use people like the Jewish religious leaders and even the people of his own hometown of Nazareth to oppose Jesus over and over again. Eventually Jesus stood trial before another Herod, the son of the Herod who killed the innocent young boys in Bethlehem. And after that trial, Jesus did die.
Satan may have thought that he had finally won, but his joy was short-lived. Because Jesus died on God’s terms and on God’s timetable. He died when He had finished exactly what God had sent Him to do. He died after he had led a perfect life and after He had taken our sins to the cross. He died only after He himself proclaimed: “It is finished.”
Three days after that death, Jesus rose from the dead according to God’s timetable, and 40 days later He ascended into heaven. His death and resurrection and ascension mean that all who have faith in Him will spend eternity with Him in heaven. Satan lost his battle against God’s Son, so now he turns that battle against you and me. But God gives us protection against anything and everything that Satan tries to throw at us. Satan continues his war against us and he will continue that war until our bodies are also in the grave. It is a war that he cannot win. Jesus died for our sins. Jesus sent His Holy Spirit to bring us to faith – and to keep us secure in that faith. To keep us secure in that faith today … tomorrow … and even until life everlasting.
A few years ago I heard a Lutheran pastor describe an incident that took place while he was doing his vicarage. One day he was visiting an 80-something shut-in from his congregation who was confined to a local nursing home. She had no family and was very lonely, and she always looked forward to the vicar’s visits. But one day her face clouded over. The vicar asked her if something was wrong, and after a long silence she started to cry. She finally confessed something that she had never told a single human being – even the man who had been her husband for more than 40 years. She confessed that when she was young and unmarried and very vulnerable and very scared, she had become pregnant and had an abortion. And then, through her tears, she asked, “Can God ever forgive me?”
At that point a big smile appeared on the vicar’s face and he said, “You already are forgiven! Jesus died on the cross for each and every one of your sins. You have repented, and that sin is as far away from you as the east is from the west.” He quoted the words of Psalm 32:2: “Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit.” And finally, these life-giving words of Jesus: “Your sins are forgiven.”
There is a very good reason why we move so quickly from the joys of Christmas to evils such as murder and abortion and every type of sin imaginable. If we had nothing but the Kodak moments of the birth in the stable and the visit by the Magi, we today would have no forgiveness. We would have no salvation. We would have no hope. We would have no life.
Just one day after the joys of Christmas, we focus not on joy but, rather, on sin and death. That is because sin and death truly is the true focus of Christmas, the true focus of Christ’s birth. Our sermon hymn today was LSB number 370, “What Child Is This.” It’s a beautiful Christmas hymn – one of my favorites and possibly one of yours. It’s only three verses long, but I think we sometimes miss the message of verse 2. Listen again to these words that we sang just a few minutes ago:
Why lies He in such mean estate
Where ox and ass are sleeping?
Good Christian, fear; for sinners here
The silent Word is pleading.
Nails, spear shall pierce Him through,
The cross be borne for me, for you;
Hail, hail the Word made flesh,
The babe, the son of Mary!
The cross be borne for me, for you. The babe, the son of Mary. Merry Christmas!
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