Advent 3: Sunday
Read:
Psalm 85Restore us, O God of our salvation, And cause Your anger toward us to cease.
(Psalm 85:4)
“Will You be angry with us forever?” That's one of the questions of Psalm
85. The Lord was angry because of the peoples' sin: how long would He be
angry with them?
Now, in any other situation with any other god, you'd expect an answer like
this: “God will stop being angry with you when you shape up and start keeping
His commandments. When you start doing what He's commanded you to do,
then you can expect Him to cut you a little slack.” That makes sense: you can
probably imagine yourself saying to someone, “I'll stop being angry when you
stop provoking me so.”
But when it comes to God's wrath, it will never work. For one thing, you
can't keep God's law well enough to appease His wrath (Romans 3:19-20); in
other words, you're unable to shape up. But it gets worse than that: as long as
God deals with us only by His Law, that Law will cause us to sin more (Romans
4:15)! It's not that the Law is at fault. Rather, the Old Adam inside of us will
make us act like a little child whose parents have just said, “Don't touch.” As
long as we're sinful, we're going to do precisely what angers God. That's what
the Bible says.
So how will God's anger cease? Not by dealing with us by His Law, but by
dealing with us by His Gospel. Born sinless, Jesus obeyed God's Law. On the
cross, He suffered God's wrath for our sin. God took out His anger for you upon
His Son, so that He might deliver you from sin and wrath.
Thus we pray in this psalm, “Restore us, O God of our salvation, and cause
Your anger toward us to cease.” The import of those words is this: “O Lord, do
not deal with us according to Your holy Law, because our sin will only invite
Your wrath. Instead, deal with us in mercy for Jesus' sake. You have caused
Your anger to cease on Calvary, expending it all on Your Son at the cross.
Therefore, restore us to holiness—not because of our person or works, but
because of Your Son and the work He has done for our salvation.
And so we pray in the words of this psalm, “Show us Your mercy, LORD,
And grant us Your salvation.” The Lord does exactly that. He shows His mercy
by placing His Word into your ears, declaring, “I forgive you all of your sins.”
He shows you to His table and says, “Take and eat, this is My body and blood
for the forgiveness of sins.”
We give thanks that, when we gather in worship, we do not gather around
God's Law alone—to do so would be only to invite God's wrath. No, we gather
with this very Good News: God isn't angry with us anymore. For Jesus' sake, He
is the God of our salvation.
He wears no kingly crown, Yet as a King is known;
Tho' not arrayed in splendor, He still makes death surrender.
Hosanna, praise and glory! Our King, we bow before Thee. (TLH 57:3)