Who is doing what? Who is choosing who? Or as you hear me say, “Who is running the verbs?” In our Gospel reading for this morning we bear witness of the consecration, the purification of Jesus, true God born in human flesh, born under the law, fulfilling the law for us, in our place. This rite of purification has its roots in our Old Testament lesson, which is our text, for this morning. It was not Israel who chose God, nor was it Israel who did something for God so that He would do something or give something to them, rather it was God who chose them and God who delivered them, and God who continued to promise to redeem them through an Offspring of the line of Judah. Because we are conceived and born in sin, because every inclination of our heart is evil all the time, as God says, so we are not able to redeem ourselves, we are not able to do anything for ourselves, we are not even able to choose or accept Jesus. We do not run the verbs; we do not run the show. God is running the verbs. God is running the show. He has chosen us. He has redeemed us. He has called us to faith, given us faith, forgiveness and life.
In our text for this morning we have the giving of the Lord’s command concerning the consecration of the first-born, which is what is being fulfilled in the Gospel lesson and which is the heart of our celebration of this first Sunday after Christmas. We read beginning at verse one, “1The Lord said to Moses, 2“Consecrate to me all the firstborn. Whatever is the first to open the womb among the people of Israel, both of man and of beast, is mine.” 3Then Moses said to the people,” (v. 1-3a). To “consecrate” means to set someone or something apart for a specific purpose. In the Old Testament people, places and things were consecrated or set apart, such as a city, the temple, the items used in the temple, prophets, priests and kings.
The setting apart or consecrating of these people, places and things meant that they belonged to the Lord. God put His name on them so they were His. Today we are consecrated at our Baptism when God chooses us, puts His name on us, gives us forgiveness of sins, writes our names in the book of life and gives us eternal life. God is the One running the show. God is the One running the verbs. God is the One doing the doing.
God gives His command, and He reiterates His command. Picking up at verse eleven, “ 11“When the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanite’s, as he swore to you and your fathers, and shall give it to you, 12you shall set apart to the Lord all that first opens the womb. All the firstborn of your animals that are males shall be the Lord’s. 13Every firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. Every firstborn of man among your sons you shall redeem” (v. 11-13). The command included every male animal. No animal was excluded.
And the command included every male human. Every first born son was to be redeemed or ransomed, bought back from the Lord. God is the prime mover. God is the giver. He gives and we are given to. He gives the gift of children and with the gift of the firstborn it is expect that the firstborn is redeemed, ransomed or bought back from the Lord, because He is the Lord and children are gifts from Him.
So, why this buying back? As we continue in our text, the command is explained. Picking up at verse fourteen, “14And when in time to come your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?’ you shall say to him, ‘By strength of hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt, from the house of slavery. 15For when Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the Lord killed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both the firstborn of man and the firstborn of animals. Therefore I sacrifice to the Lord all the males that first open the womb, but all the firstborn of my sons I redeem’” (v. 14-15). The root and the heart of this buying back, this redeeming is in the fact that it was the Lord who delivered the children of Israel from their bondage of slavery in Egypt. As we began saying, God is the One running the verbs. God is the One running the show. The children of Israel could not save themselves. The Lord saved them, thus they belonged to the Lord.
Because the children of Israel belong to the Lord, because, as we remember, it was the firstborn that was saved from the angel of death that passed over Egypt, so that firstborn son must be redeemed and bought back from the Lord.
So, what does this mean to us today? How does this parallel to us today? It was not simply that the Lord delivered Israel from Egypt that they belong to Him. They belonged to Him because He is the One who chose Abraham and promised that through his Seed, through His Offspring the world would be saved. They belonged to the Lord because He gave Abraham a son, and a grand son, and twelve great grand sons, the children of Jacob, who was given the name Israel. It was the Lord who brought the children of Israel out of bondage of slavery in Egypt. It was the Lord who brought the children of Israel into the Promised Land, giving them the land that was flowing with milk and honey. It was the Lord who made Israel the great nation she had become.
The Lord made Israel. They belonged to Him. Yet it was not simply that the Lord created Israel that they belong to Him. They belonged to Him because He put up with them. He put up with their constant straying. He put up with their chasing after other gods and idols that were not God. He continually called them back into a right relationship with Himself. He invested His life in them.
The same can be said of us. We are not our own. We were purchased with a price. We have been delivered from slavery to sin. We belong to the Lord. And it is not simply that the Lord has delivered us from slavery to sin that we belong to Him. It is the fact that the Lord has created us. At our conception He began our creation. He formed us in the womb. He knitted us together. He created us and gave us life, giving us a soul at our conception.
Yet it is not simply that the Lord created us that we belong to Him. After we were born, He chose us and put His name on us through the waters of Holy Baptism. Through the means of simple water and the Word of the Lord, that is, God putting His name on us through the means of the mouth of the pastor, He claimed us as His children. He gave us forgiveness of sins. He put faith in our hearts. He wrote His name on us. He made us His own and so we belong to Him.
Israel belongs to the Lord and we belong to the Lord because He has chosen us and made us His own. We are constantly reminded that God is the One who is running the show. God is the One who is running the verbs. God chose us. God called us. God put His name on us. God redeemed us, buying us back, paying the price for our sins.
And truly, we understand that the Lord chose us even from before the world was created. Because God does not live in time as we do, because God lives in the eternal present, when He began creating the world, He already had us in mind and He already had our salvation secured in Christ.
Thus, when God had completed all His creation it was good and even very good. Yet, when man began running the show, sin entered the world and God’s perfection became imperfect. Thanks be to God for His great love. God immediately stepped in to restore what Adam and Eve broke. God promised to send a Savior, a redeemer. This promise was made in the Garden of Eden before there was a Jew and a Gentile. This promise was made to all people of all places of all times.
And now we know that God has redeemed all people to Himself through the shedding of His own blood in the person of Jesus on the cross. We just celebrated, once again, the birth of the Messiah, Jesus, God in human flesh. This morning we celebrate His putting Himself under the law by being brought for purification in the temple. We celebrate His identifying Himself as one of us. Even more, we celebrate His taking our sins upon Himself and paying the price for our sins so that we have forgiveness of sins and with forgiveness we know that we have life and salvation.
I believe our text for this morning so well helps us to understand that God is the prime mover, that God is running show, that God is running the verbs. I also believe this text reiterates what Luther says in his explanation of the Third Article of the Apostles’ Creed, “I believe that I cannot by my own reason our strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. In the same way He calls, gathers, enlightens and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. In this Christian Church He daily and richly forgives all my sins and the sins of all believers. On the Last Day He will raise me and all the dead, and give eternal life to me and all believers in Christ. This is most certainly true.” This morning we celebrate that God runs the show. We celebrate that God has called us, that He has consecrated us, set us apart, redeemed, ransomed and bought us back. We celebrate that through the simple earthly means of water and His Word He gives us faith, through the simple act of confession and absolution we are forgiven, through the simple means of His Word He strengthens and keeps us in faith and through the simple means of bread and wine connected to His Word He forgives and strengthens us. We celebrate that He gives and we are given to. We celebrate, we rejoice and say, to God be the glory, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
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