Mr. Lonely

TITLE: Mr. Lonely
DATE: January 17, 2020

Christ is risen. He is risen, indeed.

TEXT: 2 Corinthians 1:3-4  - ESV - Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

The 'father of lies' has taken the crucifixion and cleaned it up, sanitized it, beautified it and in other assorted ways made death on the cross not so bad.

It was not so. The Romans found that opening your veins in a hot bath was a comfortable way to die. Today, people may use sleeping pills. But, the father of lies, has convinced people to believe that crucifixion was almost the same way. It was not so. It was public execution with all the sights and smells of humanity at its worst.

It was death from which there was no reprieve, no opportunity for escape, no last minute phone call from the governor. It didn't matter whether thousands were crucified together as sometimes happened in the ancient world, no matter how many crosses there were, this was a lonely death staring you in the face. Death, painful death, slow death, public death. Man, with his inventiveness, may have developed more painful ways to die, but none were more devastating to body and mind than crucifixion. Scripture is right when it says, "Cursed is every man who hangs upon the tree."

Jesus, our Savior was cursed with crucifixion. He was not alone.

Many others had been crucified before Him. Many, before and after had felt the pain of Roman nails, many gasped for breath, many were laughed at, many were abused, many were separated from their loved ones. In this, Jesus was like many other crucified people.

 But no one in the history of the world has ever felt the pain our Savior felt as He was separated from His heavenly Father
Loneliness is a terrible thing. Many of you have been lonely. The elderly may feel forgotten, the young can be homesick

The wife may feel unloved and the husband misunderstood, teen-agers think they are neglected. This Jesus knew well.

The 'father of lies' had had Jesus driven out by His own hometown. Jesus' family had thought He was crazy. One by one, the father of lies separates Jesus from His friends, His church, His government. Then, by Divine Choice, He is deserted by His heavenly Father.

On cold Calvary, in the dark, He hung upon the cross alone. This is loneliness on a cosmic scale that you cannot begin to understand.

And why?

 So when your day comes. When your last day arrives, when you are breathing your last, you will not be alone. He, your loving, victorious, risen Savior will be there. You, a forgiven sinner will be at peace. Jesus is there, you are not alone.

THE PRAYER: Lord, in many ways the Lord Jesus went where I could not; endured what I could not. For experiencing the ultimate loneliness so I will never be alone I am most thankful. In His Name I pray. Amen.

NOTA BENE: As some of my Daily Devotioners didn’t get my first announcement, I am repeating it here. TOMORROW WILL BE THE LAST DAY FOR OUR DAILY DEVOTIONS. This decision is being made for a number of reasons: I didn’t have the time to develop the other segments of THE SAVIOR’S STORY website; I didn’t enjoy the web maintenance.  Finally, subscriptions had plateaued. For those of you who did get the notice and responded with words of appreciation and encouragement, let me say, “Thank you for your thoughts. They are appreciated. For those who asked if I could do these Devotions for another Lutheran entity, let me respond by saying, “None have asked, so I have no answer.” Finally, if I get bored with retirement, as Pam says I will, you will be the first to know. In Him, I remain His servant and yours, Pastor Ken Klaus.

The music which introduces and concludes our devotions was written by Guy Baumann. He along with three of his brothers perform on the album: The Baumann Brothers which may be ordered here: http://thebaumannbrothers.com/index.html