Sermon: In a Single Day

Julius: Throughout this Lenten season, we've been focusing on readings from Zechariah fulfilled in Holy Week, and today we focus on Zechariah chapter 3. Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan was standing at his right hand to accuse him. The Lord said to Satan, the Lord rebuke you, Satan. The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you. Isn't this man a burning stick plucked from the fire? Now Joshua was clothed in filthy clothing and was standing in front of the angel. Then the angel of the Lord spoke to those who were standing in front of him. remove his filthy clothing. Then he said to Joshua, see I have taken your guilt away from you so that I may clothe you in a special robe. I said, let them place a clean turban on his head. So they placed a clean turban on his head and got him dressed while the angel of the Lord was standing by. Then the angel of the Lord spoke solemnly to Joshua. This is what the Lord of Armies says. If you will walk in my ways and perform my service, then you will also govern my house and watch over my courts, and I will give you access among those who are standing here. Now listen, high priest Joshua, you and your associates who sit in front of you, because these men are a sign. Look, I am going to bring my servant the branch. Look carefully at the stone that I placed in front of Joshua. On one stone with seven facets, will engrave an inscription, declares the Lord of Armies, and I will remove the guilt of this land in a single day. On that day, declares the Lord of Armies, each one of you will invite his neighbor to join him under his vine and under his fig tree. Ten years ago, the Moser family woke up to a sound like lightning striking within the house. And so Matt Moser, he ran out to see what was happening and when he looked outside the side door of his home, he saw that a mudslide had carried their car down the hill on top of their garage and the roof had collapsed. And he got his phone out and started taking a video just in time. to see another mudslide rush past him and you can hear him saying in the video, it's all gone. Hurricane Helene had struck two years ago. It's all gone. How long do you think it would take to rebuild and to restore what had been swept away? The Babylonian captivity 70 years before this vision had struck Israel and swept so much away. The nation had been devastated. The people had been taken away, muddy and beaten and bruised, and worse than a garage collapsing, the temple of the Lord itself had been reduced to rubble. How long would it take to rebuild it all? After 70 years, it still wasn't done. The people had returned, among them Joshua, who had been born in exile, but now inherited the title of High Priest. And High Priest of what? When you were a high priest, when there was a functioning temple in a functioning country, well then you had a functioning basin with clean water just for you to wash yourself and then to clothe yourself in a nice white robe and then to put on this turban with a little sign on the front, a golden plaque that said, to the Lord. and you could serve God's people as a high priest, representing them to God and God to them, doing sacrifices every day, especially that once a year sacrifice, the Day of Atonement, where that lamb was sacrificed to cover over their sins for the last year. That's what you could do if you were a real high priest. But here's Joshua, who had returned from exile and he had never done those things. And when he gets back, there is no basin to wash himself. There is no temple. He smells and looks filthy. He still smells like smoke and uncleanness from that exile. He's never had a chance to do what needs to be done to take away his sins and take away the sins of the people. How can he serve? How long is it gonna take him to build up his reputation, to rebuild his spiritual life and the life of the people so that he can do what he was called to do? And that's where Satan hits him. All these doubts are in his mind. All these things are striking his conscience when Zechariah the prophet is given this vision and it includes Joshua. We read, then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan was standing at his right hand to accuse him. It's not hard to imagine the weak points where Satan, which means the accuser, would accuse him. Joshua, you think you can serve the Lord? You think you can be high priest like all the ones before you? Where's your robe? Where's your temple? You still smell like exile. There's no way you can serve God. Satan accuses. and he still does that for us. We aren't called to be the high priest, but all of us are called to be priests. 1 Peter 2, 4 says, are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a people belonging to God that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His wonderful light. And the Lord has called each of us, chosen us, to declare His praises in the way we live, to represent Him to the world. in our various callings in life as children, as parents, as spouses, as friends, as workers, as Christians. And yet we live in exile in this world, and that gets us filthy. And you think of all the times you've failed to be a good Christian, to make people think good things about God, the times people could look at you if they really saw you, if they really knew you and say, that's what Christians are like, that's what God is like. And when you fail so miserably, the accusations come. Really, you think you can parent after that? You think you can be a spouse after that failure? You think you can serve God, really? You still smell like smoke and uncleanness. Satan accuses. That's what Zechariah saw in his vision. So how long? How long does it take for us to get that stench out when we fail? To get rid of that shame, to get rid of that guilt. Well, if it were up to us, it would take forever, and that wouldn't be long enough. But when it's up to God, The end of the vision tells us, look, I am going to bring my servant, my perfect servant, my holy servant, the one who never fails, the branch. Look carefully at the stone that I placed in front of Joshua. On one stone with seven facets, will engrave an inscription, declares the Lord of armies, and I will remove the guilt of this land in a single day. This makes me think of that story in the New Testament when that woman is brought before Jesus and she's accused and they say, caught her in adultery. Jesus, what are you going to say about her? And everybody's pointing at her. And what does Jesus do? He kneels down in the sand and he starts writing something there with his finger and they forget about her. And they're all looking at him and they can't condemn him. And he doesn't condemn her. When Joshua is standing there and he feels filthy and Satan is accusing him, what does the Lord say? Quit looking at him. Look at this rock that I've placed in front of him. Who is the rock, the branch? Psalm 118, the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is Jesus himself. Look at the rock. And it says it has seven facets, seven wonderful number and visions like Zechariah and Revelation. Where do we find the number seven? That's right, in Revelation, when we see the Lamb, when we see Jesus, and he's wearing seven crowns because he's in charge and he can save his people, where else do we see that number seven? We see it when God is taking his work of salvation, his work of cleaning people, and he's giving it to everyone in the world. Three, the number of the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Four, the four corners of the world. Three plus four equals seven, the Holy Spirit and Jesus. taking his work into all the world on this one stone, seven facets, salvation for everyone. And on it it says, I will engrave an inscription. In other words, what Jesus does isn't written with pencil. It's not even written with permanent marker. It's chiseled in stone. Just like Job's words, I know that my Redeemer lives. What the Savior does is chiseled in stone and cannot be taken away. And what does He do? It says, I will remove the guilt of this land. In how long? In a year? In two years? In forever if you're lucky? I will remove the guilt of this land in a single day. That's Good Friday. Coincidentally or not, this seven faceted stone, Jesus has seven words from the cross, and they tell us what he's doing. The first word, Father forgive them. That's why he's there on the cross. To forgive those who are unclean. The fourth word shows how he's doing it. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? He is suffering the fires of hell to snatch us from those fires. And the sixth word tells us that he did exactly what he set out to do. In just the amount of time he said he would, on that single day he says, it is finished. Cleaning up a hurricane takes two years or more. Rebuilding that temple in Joshua's day took about 25 years. Removing the guilt of the land, removing the accumulated sin and uncleanness of thousands of years of sinners, taking away our sins, that takes... One day. And that changed everything for Joshua. You look back to him in those first verses and what can be done for him because of what Jesus did on that single day. Joshua is put back into service. We read, The Lord said to Satan, the Lord rebuke you Satan. The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you. Isn't this man a burning stick plucked from the fire? Sure Joshua was still smoking from the exile, smoking from the fires of hell, but the Lord... plucked him from those fires. Now Joshua was clothed in filthy clothing and was standing in front of the angel. Then the angel of the Lord spoke to those who were standing in front of him, remove his filthy clothing. Then he said to Joshua, see I have taken your guilt away from you so that I may clothe you in a special robe. I said, let them place a clean turban on his head. So they placed a clean turban on his head and got him dressed while the angel of the Lord was standing by. Clean, plucked from the fire, filthy robes removed, new robes given of God's perfection, a clean turban on his head, what does it say? Holy to the Lord. This man can serve and the angel of the Lord is standing by with approval. This is what God does for you. Aren't we like sticks plucked from the fire? God has saved us. Through what Jesus has done on the cross, we are plucked from the fires of hell. Our filthy guilt is removed. We are clothed with the robes of Jesus' righteousness and baptism. We have a label on our foreheads, holy to the Lord, redeemed by Christ the crucified. And Jesus stands by with approval as he presses you back into service. You, yes you, can serve. You are chosen by God. You are a holy priesthood. Jesus made that happen in a single day. And that's what Matt Moser will tell you. When people ask him how the rebuilding is going after that hurricane, he takes out a notebook. Because in that notebook, Matt Moser has recorded names of people who have helped him get back on his feet. You say, how did you rebuild? And he says, ⁓ day one, an angel, I just call her an angel, she came by, she has a catering business, she fed us. And after that, how did you rebuild the home? He says, Andrew and Grace. They helped me. And they say, how did you clean up this mess in your yard? And he says, Austin, Ian, and Kai, they're the ones who helped us repair our home. Pages after pages of names of people have helped him. But you know the biggest name in the back of that notebook? God. When you come to visit his property, he says, let me give you a tour so I can show you how kind God has been to me. That's the name in the back of our notebooks, too. When we could fill pages and pages of reasons we shouldn't be able to serve God, pages and pages of our failures, the Lord has taken those away. We open up that notebook and there is one name in there. God. The one who has restored and rebuilt us in a single day. That's how long it took him. Now how long will it take us to thank him? To declare the praises of him who called us out of darkness into his wonderful light? Well that, that will take more than one day. That will take our lives and our eternities, and it still won't be enough to declare the praises of Him who saved us on one single day. Good Friday. Amen.

Zechariah 3 · chapter mention