Genesis 50:15-17 “When Joseph’s brothers realized that their father was dead, they said, ‘What if Joseph holds a grudge against us and pays us back for all the wrongs we did to him?’ So they sent word to Joseph, saying, ‘Your father left these instructions before he died: This is what you are to say to Joseph: I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they committed in treating you so badly. Now please forgive the sins of the servants of the God of your father.’”

You can’t say that Joseph’s ten half-brothers had had an easy life. They herded sheep for a living. That meant chasing animals around in the hot, hilly Middle East. This is the kind of work TV host Mike Rowe might include on his show Dirty Jobs. They lived in tents their whole lives. They and their families survived a seven-year famine. Now they lived in a foreign land where they were considered uncultured, unwashed, unrefined hillbillies. They were all part of one of the Bible’s most dysfunctional families full of jealousies, playing favorites, and political games.

Perhaps nothing was harder than the guilt they carried around for almost forty years. They sold their own brother into slavery. They lied to their father, claiming that a wild animal had killed him. Twenty-two years later they were reunited. They then learned that their brother’s thirteen years of slavery had also involved several years as in inmate in the king’s prison. For seventeen years following their reunion, their brother Joseph had treated them well, but the guilt always nagged, and they feared he had treated them well only out of respect for their father.

Now their father was dead. Their guilt and fear haunted them again. Brother Joseph had lived as a slave and a prisoner for thirteen years. Apparently his ten brothers had lived in a kind of prison or slavery of their own. “Serves them right,” we might be tempted to think. “They did this to themselves. They had it coming for doing such a horrible thing to their brother.”

It is true, they did this to themselves. They carried their guilt and fear around for decades in spite of the fact that Joseph had made every effort to show them grace. He had hugged and kissed them, given them gifts, and provided for their families these many years.

Now, what good could come of these ten men tiptoeing around Joseph in fear, thinking he held a grudge and would pay them back? Who would be served by that? It did nothing for Joseph. It didn’t change the years he had lost or make his experience easier. It only made him more alone, isolated from the people who should be his family.

It didn’t serve them to live in the misery. They weren’t paying off any debt or serving any justice. It wasn’t turning them into better people. It was far more likely to make them worse–moodier, short-tempered, self-absorbed, fault-finding, impatient with the people around them. It made them more alone, isolated from the people who should be their family.

It doesn’t serve us when past wrongs hang out unresolved, either. No good comes from it. I know of marriages destroyed this way. I know of parents who died in loneliness and poverty because of this. I have counseled brothers or sisters who had no one when they needed help because of situations like this. It only makes us more alone, isolated from the people who should be our family, or like one, to us.

Isn’t that why God has forgiven all of our sins? When we lived in fear of what he was going to do because of the way we treated his goodness to us, no good came of it. We searched for ways to appease him with some kind of magic. We tiptoed around him and tried to avoid him so that we wouldn’t have to deal with it. Maybe we tried to make it up to him by doing him some half-hearted favors. Or maybe, like these brothers a little later in the story, we throw ourselves down in fear and cry, “We are your slaves.”

But the one thing we don’t do is get close to him. There is no love, no trust, where there is fear. It only makes us alone, isolated from the one who should be the Father of our family.

So he introduced us to Jesus to take away our fears. He showed us forgiveness at the cross. He sent his Spirit to impress it on our hearts. He washed us in it at our baptisms. He fed it to us in his Holy Supper. And God’s forgiveness bore its fruit. It relieved us of our fears.

That’s what grace, that’s what forgiveness, does. It relieves our fears. It has already relieved our fear of God. It has the same power, it produces the same fruit, when God’s children forgive one another.

Matthew 25:10-13“But while they were on their way to buy oil, the bridegroom arrived. The virgins who were ready went in with him to the wedding banquet. And the door was shut. Later the others also came. ‘Sir! Sir!’ they said. Open the door for us!’ But he replied, ‘I tell you the truth, I don’t know you.’ Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.”

I know of nothing we celebrate in a bigger way than a wedding. Entire cities may celebrate championship teams with more expense and bigger entertainment. But divide that by the number of people who come, compare the planning and preparation to that which a single family pours into a wedding, and I believe that weddings still come out ahead.

The average wedding in the United States today costs more than $35,000. The average annual salary isn’t that much more, about $44,000 per year. The invitations, the flowers, the pictures, the dresses, the music, the venue, the limo, the meal, the cake–it all adds up. For many people it is the pinnacle of life’s joys.

It has been that way for thousands of years. Consider that Jesus produced over a hundred gallons of wine for the single wedding at Cana, and that was part way through the meal. Feasting, singing, huge guest lists–weddings have long been among the happiest things we celebrate.

It’s not a surprise, then, that Jesus uses a wedding banquet as a picture of the happiest, most joyful place in the universe: heaven. We may not know the details of what is waiting at the banquet–the menu, the decor, the music, all the guests on the list. We do know that this life’s grandest celebration and happiest event becomes the base line for describing what every day might look and feel like in the life to come. Those whose faith in Jesus burns till he returns will share his feast of joy that never ends.

The outcome for the rest is not so good. “Later the others also came. ‘Sir! Sir!’ they said. Open the door for us!’ But he replied, ‘I tell you the truth, I don’t know you.’” Jesus doesn’t work all the explicit pictures of suffering in hell into this story: the flames, the worms, the gnashing of teeth. But this is no picture of a happy alternative to heaven, a decent second choice where the party might be just as good and the people even more fun.

Those whose oil ran dry, whose faith was lost, are desperate to get in. But they are excluded, shut out. During life that door could admit almost anyone. Moses’ brother Aaron led a whole nation into idolatry, but he repented and entered. King David committed murder and adultery, but he was forgiven and got in. The Apostle Peter denied the bridegroom himself three times, but after his tears of sorrow he even held the keys to this very door.

After Jesus returns, the door is shut. The outcome is sealed. Those without faith are forever outside, because they aren’t ready when Christ comes.

The count is almost over. Our Savior will be coming for us soon. Keep watch, tend your faith, and be ready when he comes.

Matthew 25:1-9 “At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish and five were wise. The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them. The wise, however, took oil in jars along with their lamps. The bridegroom was a long time in coming, and they all became drowsy and fell asleep. At midnight the cry rang out: “Here’s the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!’ Then all the virgins woke up and trimmed their lamps. The foolish ones said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil; our lamps are going out.’ ‘No,’ they replied, ‘there may not be enough for both us and you. Instead, go to those who sell oil and buy some for yourselves.’”

Hope for the best, prepare for the worst. When a potential natural disaster is threatening, most people have the good sense to take some precautions and prepare for trouble. You may know that northerners think it’s funny when southerners clean out the grocery stores at the first hint of snow. But they don’t know how limited the highway and street departments are in the South. It makes some sense to stock up with a few extras. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

The young women in our parable were attending a wedding. Sometimes weddings start late. I have attended or conducted weddings that started late because of bad traffic, issues with the tux rentals, or rings or marriage licenses forgotten at the hotel. Not showing up until the middle of the night may be an extreme case. But weddings don’t always start on time.

Five of the virgins were ready for the delay. They brought extra oil for their lamps. Five of them were not prepared. This, then, is what Jesus is picturing: He is the bridegroom, the wedding banquet is heaven, and the ten virgins are the people who have received Jesus’ invitation to faith and life. They are the members of the visible church, Christians (at least in name) who are waiting for Jesus’ return to take us to heaven.

The oil for the lamps is faith, Christian life within the heart. This makes it possible to see our Savior and receive his gifts. Five of these ladies took their need for faith seriously. They weren’t satisfied that at least they had some at the moment. They took steps to make sure their supply was full no matter how long it had to last.

The other five didn’t consider the possibility of running out of faith. No doubt they genuinely had some in the beginning. But they weren’t willing to pay the price, or put in the effort involved, with getting more and carrying it with them. So they ran out of faith before they fell asleep in death.

What is Jesus saying to us? It takes a lot of faith to get through life all the way to the end. We are constantly burning through our supply. We need to refill if we aren’t going to run out.

You might think, “I know good and well who Jesus is and what he did to save me. I will never forget that he died on a cross to pay for my sins and rose three days later to prove it.” As a matter of knowledge, that may all be true. You are not likely to forget these facts as long as you live.

But faith is not the same thing as knowledge. Faith is trust, the kind of trust that puts all our welfare in life and in death in God’s hands. Life has a way of gnawing at this kind of trust until it isn’t there anymore at all. It is full of things that whisper in our ears, “God doesn’t really care about you.” People die, plans fail, relationships crumble, guilt nags, powers fade, jobs disappoint, wealth disappears, and our bodies limp toward a miserable death.

On the other side, life is full of slick salesmen and carnival hawkers calling out, “Come over here! Have I got a deal for you! We have the secret to real happiness. What you need is a new car, a newer, bigger house, a bigger TV screen with more mind-numbing power than ever before.” Even our innocent interests and distractions have the potential to put us in violation of the very first commandment, “No other gods!” Without a constant attention given to the needs of our soul they have the power to drain our faith.

Now is the time to buy our oil! Now is the time to build our stock. It won’t wait until tomorrow, because tomorrow may not be given to us. Today the Gospel is here, and we can hear it, read it, sing it, and take it to heart. Today God wants his love to find its way into our hearts through his word, and each day he gives us until we sleep. Ready or not, here Christ comes. There are just two ways to prepare for that day. Only those who continue to fill themselves from God’s word will be able to maintain their faith.

2 Thessalonians 1:6-7 “God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels.”

God will pay back trouble to those who trouble you. Do we know what to do with a statement like that? Is it hard to decide how that should strike us? Is it wrong for us to be happy that the Lord will punish them?

We know that Jesus says, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). In his letter to the Romans this same Paul says, “Do not take revenge, my friends,” (12:19). We know that God our Savior wants all men to be saved, and to come to a knowledge of the truth. If our desire for payback springs from personal hatred and resentment, if it leads us to love such people less than fully and unconditionally, we are guilty of a grave sin, and in danger of the same judgment Paul is describing here.

But what if, after all our efforts to repay their insults and injuries with kindness; what if, after all our attempts to show them the error of their ways and lead them to repent; what if, after all our preaching of the full and free forgiveness Jesus has won at the cross they WILL not repent? They WILL not believe? They WILL not receive God’s gift of grace and stop fighting against Christ’s people? At that point would it be right for God to say, “Oh, well. We tried to turn you around. Come and be happy in heaven anyway”? Would God still be just if he did?

Is it just our sinful flesh, and an evil desire for revenge, then, that agrees with God when he promises, “I will pay back trouble to those who trouble you”? Or doesn’t our faith also teach us that God is being just when he punishes the wicked? We may even find comfort in knowing that he will! We must agree that God’s judgment is right.

Maybe it will help us to look at this from God’s point of view. Even in secular society, people understand that certain crimes merit an appropriate punishment. Failing to do so insults and devalues the victim. When a man rapes or murders, and the courts let him go with little more than a slap on the wrist, they are doing more than putting innocent people at further risk. They are saying to the victim and her family, “Your body, or your life, aren’t worth very much in our opinion.” That is a miscarriage of justice.

Now God looks down from heaven on the dear children whom he has redeemed and adopted. They did not deserve his grace. Purely out of love and mercy he sacrificed the most valuable thing he had, his own Son Jesus Christ, to purify them of their sins and make them fit for his family. He so treasures these people that he paid an unspeakably horrible price to make them his own.

Then he called them with this message of free forgiveness and unconditional love. He overcame their natural fear and resistance and made them his very own by faith. This is the great value he has placed upon them.

Now when their enemies, to whom he made the same offer of grace, come along and trouble his blood-bought children; when they ridicule them for trusting in God’s love; when through shame or violence they try to tear them from their Lord’s loving arms, is God unjust if “He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you”? These men have nothing less in mind than to murder the souls of God’s people. He is just, and his judgment is right, to pay back trouble in the end.

2 Thessalonians 1:4-5 “Among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring. All this is evidence that God’s judgement is right, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering.”

The Christians who lived in the city of Thessalonica were severely persecuted people. Paul spent only three weeks in this city before those who opposed his teaching started a riot. He was forced to escape the city in the middle of the night.

After he left, the attacks on this little group of new Christians did not stop. Their former friends at the synagogue and their Gentile neighbors spread bad reports about them. They were no longer an accepted part of the community. Someone even forged Paul’s name on letters that contradicted Christian teaching and sent them to the church to deceive them.

Paul wrote them now not just because he felt sorry for them, but because he recognized the temptation they must feel. The same kind of temptation faces us in a world that rejects much of what we believe. One way or another we are tempted to deny our faith so that others will accept us. We become guilty of this a number of different ways.

Sometimes we just keep quiet about what we believe. We bite our lip and hold our tongue when the truth is under attack. Then others may think we agree with them. Maybe we find acceptance, but we are denying others the chance to know God’s truth, whether they accept it or not. Sometimes peer pressure may even lead us to say we agree with things we do not.

Ultimately, Paul was concerned that some Thessalonian Christians might leave and go back to the synagogue. What does Jesus say about this? “Whoever disowns me before men, I will disown before my Father in heaven.”

There is a second temptation that confronts us when people persecute us. We know that God is in control of all things. He may not approve of the sinful things someone else does to us. But he didn’t stop them, either. Is God’s judgment right, his decision to let this happen? Somewhere in every complaint we make we are questioning his judgment. We are opposing his ideas with our own. Our faith is slipping toward doubt. Paul was concerned that the Thessalonians not let their present persecution lead them to conclude, “The Lord doesn’t know what he is doing.”

But so far these Christians were holding their own. Their faith was intact, even growing. Persecutions can drive us more and more to God’s grace. The trials themselves are not a means of grace, but God uses them to lead us back to the gospel. Enduring them shows us that the message of Christ crucified for our sins, the promise of life God holds out in the resurrection, the forgiveness and love we find in the gospel is no dead theological theory. These have the power to change us and sustain us even when our beliefs come under attack.

The Apostle Peter wrote another group about their trials, “These have come so that your faith–of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire–may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed” (1 Peter 1:7). That is what was happening to the Thessalonians. The testing of their faith made them cling to God’s promises that much more. As a result, their faith was stronger, their Christian witness brighter, and their eternal future more secure.

The testing of our faith is a kind of discipline. It makes us better, and stronger, but it is never something we enjoy. “No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful” (Hebrews 12:11). But like God’s people of the past, we can be confident that it still produces “a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.”

1 Peter 5:7 “Cast all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.”

I have been involved in dozens of weddings, including my own. I don’t know of any that didn’t cause a few cares and anxieties for those tying the knot. My wife has dubbed them “blue cake” stories. At our own wedding, we wound up with a blue cake instead of the white cake with blue trim we had ordered. Other “blue cake” stories I know involve people showing up late, tuxedos or dresses that didn’t fit, members of the bridal party fainting, tornados causing power outages at the reception, brides lighting themselves on fire with the unity candle, and so on.

You realize that Peter is talking about things a little weightier than our party plans when he tells us, “Cast all your anxieties on him.” The people to whom he was writing this letter were getting a lot of grief from their neighbors and former friends for becoming Christians. Sometimes the persecution even turned violent. Needless to say, this created care and anxiety in the hearts of the people who first received this letter.

Life still brings many cares along with it. Parents worry about their children’s health, safety, schooling, or how their behavior reflects upon their child-rearing skills. Husbands and wives experience anxieties about their relationship: “Can we keep the romance alive?” “Can we make it last a lifetime?” The direction of our careers, the cost of living, health and healthcare, and our physical appearance can all become cares that take away our peace, or at least interrupt it from time to time.

No greater care weighs upon our hearts than the anxiety we feel because of our guilt. Cares and worries themselves are sins which merit God’s punishment, because they reveal that we don’t really trust his promises to take care of us. These same worries eat away at our faith. They undercut our relationship with him.

There is only one thing to do. Throw them all away. That’s not merely to pretend they don’t exist. Peter doesn’t tell us to cast them blindly to the wind, as though they will just blow away. He says, “Cast all your cares on him,” on your God, on Jesus, “because he cares for you.”

He cares for you. Those simple words border on understatement. No one has ever cared for you more truly, or more deeply. Others may make great sacrifices for us through life, but no one will ever give what our Savior has given. Long before we were even born, he had each one of us in mind. He took our sins to the cross with him, took all their blame, and let them kill him so that he could spare us.  He cares. He cares like no one else ever will.

If this God could carry our sins and get rid of them, then there is no burden too heavy for him to bear. Has a relationship hit a bumpy spot in the road? Pile the problem on his shoulders. He can take it care of it. Are we having trouble making ends meet? Leave it to the Lord to lead us to an answer.

We can’t shovel a mountain of problems onto his back so high that he won’t still be inviting us to give him more. We can’t go to him for help so many times that he won’t be eager for us to come back again and again.

At no moment does he stop thinking about you or caring about your needs. Give it all to him: your sin, your worries, your life. He cares for you.

Luke 20:27-35 “Some of the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus with a question. ‘Teacher,’ they said, ‘Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies and leaves a wife but no children, the man must marry the widow and have children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers. The first one married a woman and died childless. The second and then the third married her, and in the same way the seven died, leaving no children. Finally, the woman died too. Now then, at the resurrection whose wife will she be, since the seven were married to her?’ Jesus replied, ‘The people of this age marry and are given in marriage. But those who are considered worthy of taking part in that age and in the resurrection from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage.’”

 The Sadducees believed that they had come up with a scenario that made the idea of a resurrection and an afterlife nonsensical. Part of the welfare system in the Law of Moses required an unmarried brother to marry his brother’s widow if his brother died. This provided support for the widow, an heir for that branch of the family, and a way to keep the land in the family.

It also raised a problem in the afterlife in the minds of the Sadducees. Who would be married to whom? It wouldn’t be right for all these people to be married to each other. Marriage is between one man and one woman. It wouldn’t be right for the woman to be married to any one of these men in contrast to the others. None of them had a greater claim on the relationship. It seemed better to the Sadducees not to believe in life after death at all.

Jesus, however, affirms its reality. Marriage is a major part of how things work down here. But the Sadducees made a leap of logic by assuming that our marriages follow us into the life to come. It doesn’t, it turns out.

Jesus reaffirms the resurrection in another way. He highlights its desirability. The Sadducees did not desire it. They were the ruling class of their day. They were generally wealthy. They were on top now, and that was as close to heaven as they needed to get.

We may not be so satisfied with our present life as they were, but we are also tempted to settle for less than God offers. We become too obsessed with improving our current conditions. That may show itself as rank materialism. It may even become an obsession with improving our world’s morals. We try to find our heaven in better behavior rather than more things.

The resurrection, by contrast, is a gift of God’s grace. When Jesus says, “Those who are considered worthy of taking part in that age…” there is a special emphasis on the word “considered.” Our worthiness is not earned.

I once saw the side of a truck with an advertisement for the U.S. Marines. It had one of those swords the marines receive as a part of their dress uniforms. And the caption above the sword read, “Earned. Never given.” That’s the way our world usually thinks things should be.

But that’s not the way it is with the resurrection. Here the caption should read, “Given. Never earned,” at least, not earned by us. Eternal life is a gift that God freely gives. He gives it by giving his Son, who gives his life at the cross, so that he might give us forgiveness of all our sins. That is why we are considered worthy of taking part in the life to come.

Those Jesus raises to life with God, then, can no longer die. In place of death he promises, “They are God’s children, since they are children of the resurrection.” We are all children of God right now by faith. But do we always look like his children? I don’t always act like one. Sometimes my behavior makes me look more like I belong in that “other guy’s” family.

And life doesn’t always treat me like I am a member of God’s royal family. Sometimes my life is worse than ordinary. Problems can almost make it look like someone is out to get me. Is that what we expect for God’s children?

But in the resurrection, our new identity, the one we have now by faith, will be clear to see. Our status as God’s children will no longer be hidden behind sin and suffering. We will be glorious. We will be holy. We will be fantastic successes in all we do. Doesn’t that resurrection sound desirable to you?

Romans 3:21-24 “But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”

Each year Chapman University publishes a survey of America’s greatest fears. Any idea what more Americans fear than anything else? Almost two out of three of us are afraid of corrupt government officials. Other fears in the top ten include running out of money, terrorism, identity theft, and healthcare. Most of the remaining 70 fears involve things like natural or manmade disasters, crimes, or personal phobias. You might be surprised to learn that one out of ten of your fellow citizens is afraid of zombies. (And yes, these are adults who take the poll).

When we celebrate the Reformation, it is worth mentioning one fear that is notable by its absence. No one seems to mention fear of God’s judgment. If people are afraid of what will happen when life is over and they face God, they aren’t saying so. This was the fear that haunted Martin Luther’s early life, that drove his search for peace, and eventually led to his discovery in the Bible that we can face God’s judgment with confidence.

Luther’s solution for the problem of God’s judgment still needs to be discovered today. It is not by keeping his laws. God gave us his law to be our accuser. He gave us his law to make us conscious of our sins. He gave us his law to tell us, “My friend, you are a damned sinner, and you are going to hell.” I’m sorry, but there is not a nicer way to put that. God’s law can only make us guilty. And I am just as guilty as you are.

“But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.”

Righteousness is not something we do. It is something we receive through faith. In the Bible such a faith is not a strongly held opinion about whether or not something exists. There are those who claim there never was a Jesus of Nazareth. He was just a legend like King Arthur, or Robin Hood, or Paul Bunyan.

They say this in spite of the fact that First and Second Century rabbis didn’t deny his existence. They criticized his teachings and questioned heritage. Second Century Roman writers like Tacitus and Pliny don’t question his existence. They complain about the ideas he has inspired in his followers. If his strongest enemies didn’t question his existence, why should we?

We have every reason to believe there was a Jesus, then, but this is not the faith through which we receive the righteousness from God. Bible faith, saving faith, is essentially trust. If Jesus speaks, we know it must be so. His ideas, his words count for more than all our own opinions, even the things we have seen with our own eyes.

Such trust does not receive God’s righteousness because he is rewarding us for making the right choice. It is not some small, inner, moral act that makes him happy and leads him to respond by giving us something. “Good job, guys! You get Jesus right. Here, let me take away your sins and give you heaven for doing so.”

That would put righteousness back on us. Because righteousness comes from God, faith can only receive God’s gifts. How does God justify us? He does it “freely.” There is no charge to us at all. There is no “if” involved, “if you do this for me,” or “if you make this sacrifice.”  It’s not, “You can have this one free if you buy three more at regular price.” There is no, “This is free if you sign up for our premium plan.” Free means free.

How does God justify us? He does so “by his grace.” God gives us a righteous, sin-free status as the working out of his love for us, love that we have not earned or deserved. The Lord looked at sinful me and said, “You know, I have decided I like you. I am going to treasure you and treat you as though you have never committed any sins at all, just because that’s what I want to do.”

The one thing in the world that is truly, absolutely free, then, is the one thing that is more important than anything else there is: to be regarded as holy and sinless by God himself, loved by him as his very own, and promised a place with him in heaven forever and ever. We don’t have to fear God’s judgment, because righteousness is a gift he gives through faith.

Matthew 9:3-7 “At this some of the teachers of the law said to themselves, ‘This fellow is blaspheming!’ Knowing their thoughts, Jesus said, ‘Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts? Which is easier: to say, Your sins are forgiven, or to say, Get up and walk? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’… Then he said to the paralytic, ‘Get up, take your mat, and go home.’ And the man got up and went home.”

Jesus’ question is an interesting one, isn’t it. Which thing is easier to say? Forgiving sins may seem easier to say, but harder to do. Only God can forgive sins, and those he has chosen to speak for him. But can anyone challenge the statement? Sins don’t wash out like a visible stain. If I say, “Your sins are forgiven,” how is anyone going to prove it one way or another? You can’t see that they are gone.

On the other hand, it may seem harder to say, “You are healed. Get up and walk.” Healing or forgiving both take miraculous power. But the healing you can see. The person is either better or they are not. If you are going to say something like that, you better be sure you can do what you are saying, because everyone is going to know.

Jesus intended to use the second to prove the first. Have you ever wondered why Jesus did so many miracles during his ministry? Certainly, he did them because he loved people and he wanted to show them mercy.

But especially in John’s gospel, Jesus’ miracles are called “signs.” They weren’t just acts of power. They weren’t just acts of mercy. They were messages, indicators, communications from God about the real identity of the man who so easily bent and broke the laws of nature.

Miracles play a special role in our faith, then. Professor Peter Kreeft has made the observation that you can take the claims of miracles out of all the other world religions and you are left with essentially the same faith. But all the essential features of Christianity involve something miraculous: the virgin birth of Jesus, and God becoming a man; the atoning value of Jesus’ death on the cross; Jesus’ bodily resurrection from the dead; his ascension into heaven, to mention some of the highlights. All of these tell us that Jesus was more than a prophet, no ordinary man.

And in the healing of this paralyzed man, a miracle is more than just a fascinating act of power or demonstration of God’s love. It is a message proclaiming: “This is no ordinary man. This is your Savior. He has the power to forgive your sins and heal your soul.” The miracle was important, because it proved the power of Jesus’ words. But it still takes second place, because the needs of the body aren’t as urgent as the needs of the soul, the forgiveness of our sins.

This is still true. God may use his church to feed a hungry family or reconcile a hostile relationship or strengthen a struggling marriage. But we are still a collection of broken souls with one great need: the forgiveness of our sins.