2nd Sunday in Lent “His Holy Hands” Series: Our Saviors Wounded Body
March 16, 2025 Matthew 27:35-42 (cpr2010)
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Dear brothers & sisters in Christ,
Before we begin, please allow me a little sidebar. One of the challenges of putting together a sermon series for Lent is to take all the events, the interactions, the comings & goings around the Passion of our Lord and find some common theme to string them together in an understandable way, 20 minutes at a time. Because there’s so much going on with Jesus as he teaches his disciples, & works with the public, debates with the religious leaders, & fulfills prophecies, its easy to get lost in the weeds == there’s so much going on spiritually, theologically, that a theme can become too complicated.
A couple of weeks ago, I began with an idea for a theme of using St.Luke’s presentation of the Lord’s Passion, but it suddenly became too in-depth. I know people say that it’s not wise to ‘change horses in mid-stream’, but if that horse is carrying you toward the waterfall, you should probably get off. So this morning, we’ll begin a different theme-series for our Sundays in Lent, with the prayer that the Holy Spirit will help us focus on our Savior’s suffering-work for us in a simpler way. [pray]
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So, the theme of this series is to relate Jesus’ suffering-saving work for us with His Body. Isaiah prophesied: ‘he was pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. All this vital, holy, spiritual work Jesus did for us was done with his human body: his hands, his head, his back, & feet, his side, his blood. This morning, we’ll begin with Jesus’ hands, as they work out our salvation. And the Scripture for our focus is from Matthew 27: (35-42)
35 And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots. 36 Then they sat down and kept watch over him there. 37 And over his head they put the charge against him, which read, “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.”
38 Then two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left.
39 And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads 40 and saying,
“You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” 41 So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, 42 “He saved others; he cannot save himself.
He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him.
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It’s a wonderous thing to watch a baby discover how the world works. A baby will focus for a long time on that strange thing at the end of their own arm as it waves back & forth, & wiggles around. And soon, those little hands are grabbing things left & right, trying to put whatever they can grab right into their mouth. It’s amazing, funny, …& concerning.
Those little hands reach for your eye-glasses, necklace & earrings. It’s not long before those plastic inserts appear in the outlets, to keep little fingers from grabbing something & sticking it into the outlet. And soon those plastic tabs are put on cupboards & drawers to prevent opening & from pinching little fingers. The wise parent becomes vigilant in keeping their child safe from what those ever-busy-hands may try.
Those little hands get bigger, and find bigger & more dangerous things to play with, such as hot pans on the stove, & glass tableware. Later, those hands may put a baseball thru a window, or open a window to sneak out without permission, or push a brother or sister down in frustration. Wonderful & useful hands can also wrap themselves around some pretty bad things for bad reasons. Thru trial & error, we all learn how our hands can be used for good = to help & serve; but they can be injured when we are careless, & used for bad things.
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Between our own trial & error, and our parents good guidance & discipline, we all learn to control our hands fairly quickly for our own benefit, & so we take care of them; our hands care for us, & serve our needs. But our hands will also be selfish, & are not always so quick to serve other’s needs; and that’s concerning to the One who created our hands.
There are times when you have wrapped your hands around something that did not belong to you. It may have been a cheat-sheet for a school test, or a snack from a store. Maybe there was a time when your hand took up a pen to write a scathing letter, or your fingers took to the keyboard to send an e-mail or text to cut someone down to size for what they said, or what we think they did. We allow our hands to speak for us, for good and for evil.
So it’s a little troubling for us when Matt.12:36 says that ‘on the day of judgement, everyone will have to give an account for every careless word they have spoken.’ It’s been said that ‘the pen is mightier than the sword’; but we can be thankful that the pen & words cannot kill the body, or else which one of us wouldn’t be a murderer?
Isn’t it our hands that hold our phone when we call someone so we can share a little ugly rumor about someone else? We are commanded not to harm our neighbor’s reputation, but are to protect it. We are to speak well of them; and our hands shouldn’t be participating in trashing them. Our hands wrap around our various remote control devices that put before our eyes & minds -either- what is good & wholesome, or immoral & shameful. Hands have been at the center of some of the most wonderful, caring, & joyful moments of our lives; as well as some of the darkest & dishonorable times.
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In Matt.8, after preaching the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was moving on to another place, and a man covered with leprosy ran up to him. The man knelt before Jesus & said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” In those holy hands of Jesus was the power to purify this man’s diseased flesh. A leper was ‘persona-non-grata,’ that is – treated as a non-person, cut off from the family & community because this skin-sickness was contagious.
And against the OT Jewish regulations, the Lord-of-the-Law reached out & touched the man with his own hand, and said, “I am willing; be clean.” With those healing hands, Jesus instantly took away the suffering of this poor man – who was drawn to Jesus in faith.
As it is sometimes said, ‘no good deed goes unpunished.’ The stiff-necked teachers of the law attacked Jesus for this good deed, as well as His countless other good deeds, & they gave him a wicked reward: when the adoring crowd wasn’t around, they sent a gang with clubs & swords to arrest him at night, and put him before the high priest for his perceived religious crimes.
Once Jesus was caught up in the crooked political pipeline, the Roman Governor, Pontius Pilate, traded favors and handed Jesus over to his enemies; better that one man die for the people, than for an inconvenient conflict to occur between the Romans & the Jews.
And so, strong hands carried out their unjust orders against the innocent Son of Man. They wrapped their hands around thorns & twisted them into the shape of a crown, & shoved it down on Jesus’ head; they mocked his claim to be a king, & then hit him with a pretend scepter.
With their hands, the soldiers put a cross on Jesus’ shoulder; and with those holy hands, Jesus carried that cross all the way to the spot where he would die. The soldiers grabbed iron mallets and drove spikes thru the base of his hands, holding Jesus onto the cross until finally he was out of breath.
All those hands back then belonged to the enemies of God, who stood opposed to the gracious ancient plan of God to provide a perfect sacrificial Lamb for their salvation. But Scripture says that all sinners are the conjoined enemies of the Holy God & of His Holy Son. Paul writes in Colossians 1: once you were alienated from God & enemies because of your evil behavior. As a sinner, we have all had a hand in nailing Jesus to the cross.
We stand hand-in-hand with those people who condemned & abandoned Jesus when we wrap our fingers around the wrong things. Our hands have been at the center of some of the most wonderful, caring, & joyful moments of our lives; but our hands have also been at the center of the darkest & most evil-filled moment in human history on that Good Friday.
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Despite that truth, God declares another truth. Our sin-stained hands is why Jesus came into this world and did such good things with his hands. For every time we sin against God by what we do, we know that Jesus paid the price. Every time we use the precious gift of these hands (hold up hands) for evil, our faith recalls those spikes & that cross, & that Jesus’ hands bear the marks of the punishment that we deserve. To defeat the evil that threatened his perfect creation, God himself became hands-on. As our gracious God, he went to the cross willingly.
Our faith has two parts with Scripture truth. 1st, we confess that God did not create sin or make us sin; we & every soul is accountable & fully deserving of the wages of sin = eternal death & separation from him. And 2nd, God moves us to also confess that His love for the world is such that the Son willingly took up human hands in order to grab hold of us & rescue us by taking our place under punishment, winning for us a full pardon. His forgiveness results in our eternal life.
With all his strength, Jesus’ hands held on to those nails until his suffering was enough; and we are assured that it was enough when he cried out, ‘it is finished.’ We are also assured that His death was enough when Jesus walked out of the tomb on the third day, just as promised thru the prophets. He showed his nail-pierced hands to the apostles, to the women, and to more than 500 others before he ascended back to the Father. Luke writes: ‘Then He lifted up his hands & blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven,’ with his promise to be with us always, and to return to us at the Last Day. (24)
In this NT time of his Church, the hands of Jesus are still at work thru the hands of his people = you & me. By the proclamation of his gospel, the HSp draws us into his hands. He washes us with the promise of forgiveness & faith in His baptism. He feeds us in the Meal of his very real body & blood. Our hands have a new purpose in caring for & serving our neighbors in their needs. And in the hour of our need, in this faith, we echo his words from the cross as our comfort & confidence: ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.’
Our Savior Jesus used his holy hands to save you, so that you & your hands will live a thankful & holy life. In our Savior’s strong hands, you & your hands are safe and have a heavenly future.
Amen