Wednesday of Laetare

I invite you to turn to the first from Ezekiel 36, beginning at verse 23, which is our text this evening. Ezekiel was a prophet who lived among the exiled people of God, more than five-hundred years before the coming of Christ. The people had sinned greatly against God. As a result God allowed them to be conquered by the king of the mighty Babylonian empire. King Nebuchadnezzar burnt the city of Jerusalem to the ground and deported all her people to Babylon. This was the darkest hour in the history of the Jewish nation. They had forsaken their God. They had lost their homeland. The beautiful temple of Solomon had been destroyed. And they were prisoners in a foreign country.

At this time, the Word of the Lord came to the prophet Ezekiel. As we read these words, we will find that God was not only speaking to the captive Jews in Babylon; he is speaking to you today. This passage, written more than five hundred years before Christ, is about you and what God has done and still does for you in your baptism. “Thus says the LORD God: I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them” (Ezek 36:23).

Here we confess we can’t blame the problem on the wicked nations out there who have profaned the name of God. We too have profaned his name. Therefore, in our liturgy we pray that all the sin born in us from Adam, and also the sin which we have added since birth may be drowned in the saving flood. Even though we have profaned the name of God, he works in us through baptism and vindicates the greatness of his holy name among us.

I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. We confess this verse in our liturgy: In baptism God sunders you from the number of the unbelieving and places you dry and secure in the holy ark of the Christian Church. Baptism is the means by which God gathers each one of us from the nations and countries in which we were scattered, and brings us into his land and his kingdom.

I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleanesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. Here is God’s promise to make you clean through the water of baptism. The human heart is an idol factory. We are quick to follow a thousand other gods. Today, instead of gods of wood and stone, it is often the gods of money, sports, possessions or entertainment. But God says to you, “You shall be clean. I will cleanse you.” Certainly water alone doesn’t cleanse the heart, but the water with God’s promise can and does. Jesus says, “You are clean through the word that I have spoken to you.”

And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. Yes, we know that the heart is deceitfully wicked above all things. The world teaches us to believe what our heart tells us, but we hear from God’s Word that the heart cannot be trusted. My heart is deceitful. My heart lies. But God never lies, and in this verse God promises to give everyone of his baptized children a new heart. In place of a heart that is cold and dead because of sin, God has given you a heart that is alive and filled with the Holy Spirit. You have a heart that loves to hear God’s Word and follow his will. You heart is no longer guided by your sinful passions. Instead God has given you a heart that rejoices to be led by the voice of the Holy Spirit. How did you get the Holy Spirit? He is given to all who believe and are baptized, according to God’s promise: “A new spirit I will put within you.”

Finally, in baptism God promises, “You shall be my people, and I will be your God.” Before you knew God, he knew you. Before you loved him, he loved you. And more than five-hundred years before Jesus instituted Baptism, the Holy Spirit caused Ezekiel to speak of the means by which God would become your Father, and you would become his child. God has vindicated his holy name through you. He has taken you from the nations and brought you into his kingdom. He has sprinkled clean water on you, cleansed you from all your idols and uncleanness. He has created in you a new heart, filled you with his Holy Spirit, and given you a good land in which to dwell. You are one of his own people, and he is your God. Every one of these precious promises is given to you through baptism into Christ Jesus our Lord. To him be the glory forever. Amen.

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