St. Luke Ev. Lutheran Church
Sermon delivered by Pastor Anthony E. Schultz
Ash Wednesday, March 1, 2006 Luke 23:34


Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”


People of God—rescued from the flaming lake of fire in hell by the innocent blood of the very Lamb of God:

Imagine a federal agent—a man who risks his life under cover—busting drug dealers. This federal agent stops at a gas station by Milwaukee to get a cup of coffee. How harmless is that? All of a sudden two young men decide to rob this man walking towards the gas station. They confront him. They yell at him to get down on the cement and blacktop by the gas pumps. They see he is wearing a gun. He yells to them that he is in fact a police officer and they shoot him. Helpless they shoot him—wound him so badly that no matter what the doctors do for the next whole week—still he suffers—still he dies! Now the two young men who are the robbers—the murderers of your son are caught and convicted and about to be sentenced! Before the Judge passes sentence—the parents of the victim are allowed to speak. What do they say? What would you say? The mother says—she would like to give each of these murderers a new Bible. A Bible for them to read and believe and be saved from the forever prison in hell! The father of the victim said—I wish you peace! Imagine that! Peace—a calm mind and a clean conscience—in the dark—in the night—when it’s time to sleep in your prison cell of cement and cold steel bars. Peace—the heart felt assurance that you are forgiven—by your Heavenly Father and by the survivors of your earthly sins and crimes! It’s hard to imagine—but there it was on the radio—the calm measured words of a father to those who had murdered his son.

This Ash Wednesday—we hear our Lord Jesus pray:

Father, Forgive Them!

1. We don’t always understand our sins
2. But Jesus paid for them completely

This Lenten Season we will listen to the seven times Jesus spoke while he was dying on the cross to wash away all our sins. We will go from Gospel to Gospel—as we piece together the different things that Jesus said. Our first statement strikes at the heart of why Jesus suffered to save us. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” It must have been tempting for Jesus to talk to the people around him. To talk to the soldiers who hammered nails into his hands and feet—who pressed a crown of thorns into his tender forehead. The soldiers who had punched him and pulled on his whiskers—taunting and mocking him. Talk about taunting! There were the chief priests—the Pharisees and the Sadducees—the teachers of the law—the elders and the Scribes! It has been said we should not lump the Scribes entirely with the proud self righteous hypocrites that were the Pharisees. The Scribes were about that priceless work of copying the Scriptures with painstaking care and precision! But how much more tragic to know the scriptures—not only verse by verse—but even letter by letter and pen stroke by pen stroke—and yet not see in Jesus the one that Moses and the Psalms and the Prophets wrote about—the lamb led to the slaughter—the sheep before her shearers silent. Pharisees! I’m glad I’m not one of them—aren’t you? Scribes knew God’s Word inside and out. Do we? Do we know the Scriptures very well? Could we with a little thought write down the seven things Jesus said from the cross? We who know what was at stake—Jesus’ forgiving love will motivate us to study the Scriptures more and more! We will be convicted of our sins—and healed by the comfort of Jesus’ unconditional love!

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing!” There’s a German word that has been used a lot lately. It’s the word schadenfreude. It means a sort of perverse pleasure at the grief of our friend. Oh, it’s more than looking at the covers of the Tabloids when you check out at the grocery store—and you see the beautiful people are getting divorced or having babies and they aren’t married—or they are caught drunk driving or with drugs—and they publish their hangover mug shot. And we smile and say to our self—“That’s what happens when you get paid a million dollars an episode for that ½ hour TV show you are making!” It’s more than that. It’s like you go out to eat with your friend—and they spill food on themselves and a little voice inside you says, “Good! That expensive tie—and now there’s a big grease stain on it—and even if they have it dry cleaned they will never get that stain out completely!” Or your friend gets a new car—and then they get a speeding ticket—because the ride is so smooth—not like your car—that won’t go 70 miles an hour—without rattling like parts are going to fall off. And that little voice says—“Good! That’s what you get with your fancy car with the big powerful engine!” Schadenfreude—is when you take sinful pleasure in your friend catching the flu—and you say to yourself—“See? If they took as good a care of them self as I take care of my self—this never would have happened!” That’s wrong! It’s a sin to be happy when something bad happens to anyone! It’s especially bad if that’s how we treat the people we call friends! Jesus died on the cross—to make us strong—so that when our friend is sad we are sad, too! And when our friend is happy—we are happy too! Not jealous. Not envious! Not bitter that good things always happen to them and never to us. Part of being brothers and sisters in Christ means we show love for Jesus by showing love for our neighbor. Rejoice with those who are blessed—and be sad with those who are having troubles!

“Father, forgive them!” There is a radio station in Madison that is running this contest where you send them a copy of one of your bills. You can send them your electric bill—your cable TV bill—your credit card bill—even your mortgage bill and they will pay it for you—maybe. What they are doing three times each day—is reach into this huge pile of bills—pull one out—and announce to the world—we are going to pay some bill for some person—chosen totally at random! Jesus’ forgiving love is far far more wondrous than that. Jesus died for every sin of every person who ever lived on earth in the history of the world! Jesus died for every single person—with an intense personal interest in everything about them! Jesus’ innocent blood paid a debt that we could not begin to calculate! It is exceedingly personal. My sins and my mistakes—all taken away because Jesus loves me by grace alone!

“Father, forgive them!” Forgiveness means our sins—our mistakes—our guilt is washed away because the innocent Lord Jesus suffered the penalty in our place! There is a sinful part of the heart and mind of each of us—that thinks—we can make up for sins—for bad things we do—by balancing out just slightly more good things! You can even find this in the business world. There is a company in our country that makes a product you can buy if you are old enough—in packs or cartons—that you put in your mouth and set on fire—that are highly addictive and painfully physically destructive! These packs and cartons—produce chemicals that cause cancer—chemicals that are literally poison! Well, this company would like you to know—if you are say 10 or 11 or 12 years old—or older—you can’t have any! Not—I’m convinced because they don’t really want you to have any—but because they understand that one of the best ways to make people 10 or 11 or 12 years old—or older to want anything—is to tell them—they absolutely positively can’t. All of a sudden—forbidden fruit becomes almost irresistible. In the meantime—this company that makes addictive poison in packs and cartons want you to know—they are really very nice people. How nice? Well, these same people make family style macaroni and cheese! How nice is that? They make a thing called cheese food. Little orange squares each wrapped in cellophane—that they can’t call just cheese—but cheese food is legally allowed! They make the stuff you use to make finger Jell-O and the stuff that looks like whipped cream but isn’t. They make stuff you put in a bag—then shake chunks of chicken in it—and they make coffee that’s supposed to be good to the last drop. Now does that make up for selling coffin nails? It doesn’t! It can’t! You can’t make sins and mistakes go away—by doing lots and lots of really nice stuff. It doesn’t work that way! The only way our sins go away—is when Jesus takes them away—every one—entirely and completely!

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing!” The last few weeks they held the Olympics in Italy. Imagine a young man who had already won the World Cup for skiing. This young man has been blessed with all the skill and all the ability to go zooming down a hill—around and around these sticks—stuck in the snow—faster than anyone else in the whole wide world! They said this young man could come home with 5 gold medals—he was that good! What happened? Imagine him coming to the Olympic games some 20 pounds out of shape—spending the evenings at parties—doing things that were unspeakably wrong. Then come the races—and 15 seconds—15 seconds into the race a fatal mistake—a breaking of the rules that means the whole rest of the race doesn’t count! How sad is that? How sad to waste this opportunity represent your country before the world—and to squander that opportunity doing what is sinful and wasteful and just plain wrong! It’s easy to find fault with others—to be saw dust inspectors of our neighbor’s mistakes. What about the barn boards in our eyes? I heard paid professional commentators make fun—even ridicule the Olympic medals because they were not the usual thick coin shaped medals. They are open in the middle—like a giant doughnut! Do you know why? They said it was to show the heart of the athlete! Imagine that! To not just be concerned about how fast anyone was. Not to say—because you are the best at this particular race—that excuses your rude, crude, ungodly behavior! What is in our heart? Jesus knows! Jesus knows when what is in our hearts is negative—quick to criticize others—quick to find fault—quick to tear down instead of to build up and encourage and help! When Jesus gives you a new heart—then there is kindness and gentleness and priceless peace!

“Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing!” Now that Jesus died and rose again to save us—do we know what we are doing? Are we running the race that God has set before us? Do we run—forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead—putting away the sin that so easily entangles—are we running with perseverance the race that Jesus marked out for us? If you read your Meditations devotions last week—they mentioned Glen Cunningham. When Glen was just 8 years old—a 3rd grader—there was a terrible gasoline explosion—an explosion so terrible at his school—his legs were so horribly burned—they said he would never walk again! Wasn’t he the one who set up ropes in his back yard—between laundry poles—where he dragged himself back and forth back and forth—until finally—haltingly he could put one foot in front of another—until he could walk and then walk faster and faster—until he could actually run! How fast? Faster than any one in the world—running for a whole mile! Glen Cunningham won his last 11 races in a row! Not bad for a young boy who was never supposed to walk again! That’s how determined we need to be—determined to live this Lenten Season glorifying God! We have opportunity to demonstrate that strength by forgiving one another! Where there was anger—bitterness—grudges—ugly scars deep within our heart—because someone did something hateful and unspeakable and hurtful to us. Now there can be forgiveness! Because Jesus has forgiven us—we will forgive one another. Amen!

To God alone all glory! Rev. Anthony E. Schultz