Bishop Jerry asks you carefully consider this sermon from Rev Ryan Underwood of the Anglican Orthodox Communion Worldwide. You should find this interesting and instructive.
Sermon Notes
Palm Sunday
The Mind of Christ: Through the Cross to the Resurrection!
5 April 2020
Anglican Orthodox Communion Worldwide
22 March 2020, Anno Domini
Today is the Sunday next Before Easter. Our forty days of preparation for this solemn commemoration of our Lord’s Resurrection are coming to a climactic close. In today’s Gospel we hear Matthew’s narration of our Lord’s Passion. In the coming week, the Church will present us with the Passion of Christ as recorded by all four evangelists, leading us
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ET this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
What is the mind of Christ Jesus? We see from this text that the Lord is the Second Person of the eternal, coequal, and undivided Trinity. He is equal with God, He is God! It is by Him that all the hosts of Heaven were made. It is by Him that everything in the world was made; the gold and silver, the majestic waterfalls and high mountain peaks, the mighty elephants and the tiniest ants, everything you love and enjoy and covet, Jesus made them all. Before the Incarnation, Jesus existed in perfect and eternal glory, so that nothing could add to the happiness of the Trinity. He needed nothing, He desired nothing to make Him full or complete.
And yet, He humbled Himself, He made Himself of no reputation, He who the heaven of heavens could not contain and before whom the mighty angelic hosts lied prostrate from the beginning of their creation in ceaseless praise, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords humbled Himself to be born of the Virgin’s womb in the stable of Bethlehem. He is perfect God and perfect Man. He came to this world, not as a great and worldly king, as the Jews vainly hoped, but in the form of a servant. Whose servant you ask? The servant of God, the servant of God to fulfill His Word which he spake so many years ago by His prophets,
Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened: burnt offering and sin offering hast thou not required. Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart. (Psalm 40:6)
Indeed, my friends, God neither needs nor desires sacrifices from you. He demands only your obedience. Do you think you can buy God’s favor and the forgiveness of your sins by your works, by your fastings and Lenten discipline? If so, you are grievously mistaken, for you cannot make satisfaction for your disobedient transgression of God’s perfect Law. You cannot escape the penalty for your sins by your works. What is that penalty? For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 6:23) Here is the penalty which you deserve, death, everlasting death and suffering in Hell. But how does Jesus serve His Father? Remember the words of our text, He “became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross”! When Adam transgressed and disobeyed the Law of God, mankind fell into rebellion against God, into total depravity, so that your wills are bound to sin, so that in your unregenerate state you cannot obey God. You cannot obey God, and therefore you are damned. But Jesus obeys the will of the Father in your place and as your representative, suffering the penalty of your sins for you in His ignominious and innocent death on the Cross. In this way, those who believe in Jesus are justified and counted righteous before God, receiving the remission of their sins and the hope of everlasting life. What motivated Jesus to do the will of His Father? The words of the psalm tell us, God’s Law [is] within His heart. And what is God’s Law? Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets (Matthew 26:37) It is out of sheer divine and unmerited love, out of the very grace of God, that Christ died for we poor and miserable sinners! Here is the mind of Christ, dear friends, the mind of Him who, being in eternal felicity, humbled Himself, taking upon Himself the form of a servant, that by His taking your place in perfect obedience to God’s Law unto the shedding of His precious and innocent Blood, He might make satisfaction for sin, defeat the Devil, and reconcile fallen man to God in everlasting life. Having a wholehearted and lively faith in this finished work of Christ is the way by which we partake of His Resurrection! Let us thank and praise God for this mind of Christ, for this mind of divine self-sacrificial loving obedience whereby we are saved! Let us meditate upon this mind of Christ in the appointed lessons over the course of the next week as we journey towards Easter day. Let us have faith in Jesus Christ, let us pray for the grace to lovingly follow and obey Him in our lives, Him in whom we have the hope of everlasting life! Let us rejoice over this mind of Christ with the ancient words of the Te Deum in our Prayer Book,
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HOU art the King of Glory: O Christ. Thou art the everlasting Son : of the Father. When thou tookest upon thee to deliver man : thou didst not abhor the Virgin's womb. When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death : thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
It is not enough for us to merely know the mind of Jesus. It is not enough for us to merely read the passion narratives in the coming week if they have no effect upon our hearts. No, for the Apostle says that you must not only know the mind of Christ Jesus, but that this mind must be in you. What does it mean for this mind of Christ Jesus to be in you?
Having the mind of Christ in you means that you faithfully and wholeheartedly know what Christ did for you, that He saved you from your sins and reconciled you to God in His precious Blood, and will preserve you and all who believe in Him unto everlasting life. It means that you act on this knowledge, dying to the old man of sin and living to the new man of Christ by His Holy Spirit, crucifying the lusts of the flesh and glorifying God in thought, word, and deed, repenting of your sins and following after Jesus by grace through faith. It means that you walk on the way of obedience to God’s Word, not with the purpose of getting something from God, but out of love for God and thankfulness for the finished work of salvation which He wrought on the Cross for you. It means carrying your own crosses through the valley of the shadow of death by His grace, lovingly serving God and others for His sake in obedience to His commandments, and finally being led by the Good Shepherd into the green pastures of the Resurrection in God’s eternal Kingdom.
But how can fallen creatures, whose minds are totally depraved by sin and iniquity, have the mind of Christ in them? Indeed, there is nothing you can do to earn it or to gain it by your own efforts, but rather it is the gracious gift of God, it is the fruit of that true regeneration in the blood of Christ by the Holy Ghost received through faith. Therefore, the mind of Christ is not worked for or earned, it is given, which is why Paul does not say, build in yourselves the mind which was in Christ Jesus, but rather prays to God for His people, Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. I pray God may give you this mind of Christ Jesus, that you may follow Him in this world, that you may faithfully walk the rough roads of Christian suffering to Calvary according to God’s Word, so that you may at the last enter eternal felicity with your Resurrected and Victorious Lord!
All very well, you may say, but what does it practically mean to have the mind of Christ? What does it mean to repent of my sins and to take up my cross and follow after my Lord in this life, to serve Him and others for His sake in the midst of suffering according to His Word, so that I may partake of the joy of that final Resurrection? How does this mind of Christ change my beliefs, my character, my worldview, my actions? Let us look again at the concluding portion of this text, and I think we will find the practical instructions we seek.
We see in these verses that if you have the mind of Christ, then you will have a profound sense of the sovereignty of God and the Lordship of Jesus Christ over every area of life. You will look to Jesus as He who is exalted to the right hand of God the Father Almighty, from whence He will come to judge the living and the dead, to judge each of you, knowing that His kingdom will have no end. In the light of God’s majesty, you will be convicted of your sins, and fall before Him in repentance and faith. You will forsake and utterly reject the many false gods and idols which enslave the world today, and will serve God in singleness of purpose, prostrating yourselves before Him in communion with the whole Church, militant and triumphant, in worship of Him. Yea as our text says, even the reprobate under the earth are forced to bow to the Lord Jesus Christ, and praise Him to their own condemnation. Indeed, this universal confession of Christ is the great hope of the Church, that hope for which she prays to God in her prayer for all sorts and conditions of men, to make thy ways known unto them, thy saving health unto all nations. Let us pray this Holy Week that our Lord’s Name and His Word may be known among all nations, to the glory of God and the salvation of souls, as well as a witness against obstinate sinners.
Friends, Do you bow before your Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, do you humble yourselves before Him, do you publicly confess that He is your Lord to the glory of God the Father, or do you, you who have heard His holy Word, continue in your sins and rebellion against Him who died for you? Do you think that you will be able to attain the glory of His Resurrection, the glory of His everlasting life, if you have not walked the way of the Cross yourselves, if you have not given yourselves up to His service, if you have not put on the mind of Christ? Indeed, I fear we have all been double minded in our service to Him, obeying God or mammon as we please. We proudly take the name of Christian, but then we betray God, we make idols, we lust, we bear false witness, we steal, we covet, we break all of God’s Commandments. Those who unrepentantly do these things do not submit to Christ’s Lordship, and have not the mind of Christ, for thus does Paul say, they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. (Galatians 5:24) If you hope for the mind of Christ, if you hope for everlasting life, pray for the grace of repentance, pray for God to crucify your affections and lusts with the piercing nails of His Word and the powerful hammer of His Spirit, so that the mind of Christ may truly be in you, so that you may faithfully and lovingly serve Him in obedience to His Word in the midst of this fallen world for the glory of God and the good of your fellow men. Indeed, for only when you have the mind of Christ Jesus in you, only when you faithfully and lovingly walk the way of the Cross by His grace will you come to the glory of the Resurrection, and join in the praises of God with that choir of the redeemed creation which John beheld in the Revelation of Jesus Christ,
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FTER this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; And cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb. And all the angels stood round about the throne, and about the elders and the four beasts, and fell before the throne on their faces, and worshipped God, Saying, Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and might, be unto our God for ever and ever. Amen.
