Trinity Sunday
June 11, 2017
Matthew 28:17
His Creeds Against Our Doubt
In
the name of the Father and of the ☩
Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen!
Matthew
28:
Now
the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus
had directed them. And when they saw Him they worshiped Him, but some
doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven
and on earth has been given to Me. Go therefore and make disciples of
all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have
commanded you. And behold, I Am with you always, to the end of the
age.”
Why
do we have Creeds? The Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, the
Athanasian Creed? Why do we agree with these Creeds? Why do we make
them our personal statement of what we believe? Why? “Because some
doubted.” The text from Matthew that I just read to you said,
Now
the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus
had directed them. And when they saw Him they worshiped Him, but some
doubted.
But
some doubted. Creeds are meant to be universal truths drawn from
Scripture to nail down the faith in a short and simple way. The
Creeds of the church developed because some doubted and others failed
to listen to Jesus.
Sixty
years or so after Jesus’ ascension, a man named Cerinthus
(SIR-RIN-THUS) who claimed to be a Christian, but he doubted the
actions of the true God. This man taught that God the Father did not
make the physical world. He taught that Jesus was not God. Cerinthus
did not listen to Jesus’
command to observe all that Jesus had taught them.
In
response to this false confession of faith, the Apostles’, Nicene,
and Athanasian Creeds teach the truth:
they
teach that Jesus is the only Son of the Father,
they
teach that He was conceived of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin
Mary,
they
teach that He is God of God and Light of light, very God of very God,
begotten not made,
and
they teach that He is perfect God and perfect Man composed of a
rational soul and human flesh.
What
does this mean for you? It means that your forgiveness isn’t fake,
it’s real forgiveness, it’s not an illusion, it’s not imitation
forgiveness. It also means that Jesus Christ who is God and man, is
who Scripture says He is, and that He died fully and completely for
your sins. God didn’t skip out on the suffering of the cross or
death upon the cross, it was not the man only who suffered and died,
who took the cup of wrath down to the dregs. He suffered hell for you
and then He died.
He
did this dying for you; He died for every single last person, whether
they are over 100 years old or still in their mothers’
womb. Jesus died for liars, cheats, thieves, those who curse His name
and use it falsely, those who sleep around or dream of sleeping
around, for those with covetous hearts, and those who refuse to hear
His Word: He died for you and for me and for all our sins.
But
you might wonder, “I’ve failed at making these confessions my
confessions, I’ve not taught them well, I’ve not always honored
what Scripture teaches about Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I’ve not
had a faith that confessed these things consistently or with great
conviction, I’ve been a doubter . . . is their hope for me?”
Yes!
and I’ll tell you why.
When
you read the Gospel of Matthew you’ll notice that when Matthew uses
the word disciple he doesn’t use it to mean everyone
who follows Jesus. When Saint Matthew uses disciple he is
speaking of the specific men that Jesus handpicked to be the twelve,
when the eleven went up on the mountain to hear the words spoken by
the resurrected Christ it was the same handpicked group of men (minus
Judas).
So
when Matthew says that the disciples worshiped Jesus as God, it was
out of the same eleven that you hear that “some doubted.” The
Greek word translated some is an interesting one: it could
mean that some of them doubted or it could mean the ones there
doubted. Why is this important?
We
just had Pentecost Sunday and the events of Matthew 28 happen before
that day when the Holy Spirit was poured out on the disciples. Now
think of it: the resurrected Jesus,
Who
could not be stopped by nails and spears and a crown of thorns,
Who
could not be stopped by the chains of death,
Who
could not be stopped by locked doors,
Who
they had witnessed alive and glorious on a number of occasions
together as a group,
Who
had eaten with them in those days after His resurrection and done all
that He said He would do,
this
living Jesus stands before them yet again and there is still
doubt. Yet Jesus doesn’t say, “Well, I will only send the Holy
Spirit to those who muster up perfect faith; sorry guys, but not all
of you will receive the promised Comforter.”
No!
Jesus forgave their doubting and loved them just the same. Jesus
forgave them; Jesus will forgive you. He didn’t withhold the Holy
Spirit from any of them on the day of Pentecost and He doesn’t
withhold the Holy Spirit from you in your baptism. Jesus will forgive
you if you’ve failed in having perfect faith: ask and you shall
receive.
And
on the last day when the disciples, like we are risen with our
bodies, remember that the deeds you give an account of will be washed
clean in the blood of Christ Jesus. Sins forgiven and good works made
righteous by the same blood of Christ Jesus. Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit will see these works and declare them good and you will enter
into eternal life. So dear believers, believe and teach and confess
that:
the
Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His
life as a ransom for many. Amen!