Hebrews 13:12-14

Judika, 5. Sunday in Lent 

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all. Amen.

….therefore Jesus also suffered outside the gate,to consecrate the people by his own blood. Let us then go to Him outside the camp, bearing the stigma that he bore. For here we have no permanent home, but we are seekers after the city which is to come.

Dear congregation,
Do you know the fairy tale 'The Bremer Town Musicians'?

There once was a man who had a donkey that had faithfully carried sacks to the mill for many years, but whose strength was now failing, so that he was becoming less and less fit for work. The master thought of getting rid of him, but the donkey sensed that things weren't going well, ran away, and set off for Bremen; there, he thought, he could become a town musician. After he had gone a little way, he found a hunting dog lying on the road, panting like one who had run himself tired. 'Well, why are you panting like that, you old rascal?' asked the donkey. 'Oh,' said the dog, 'because I'm old and getting weaker every day, and can no longer go hunting, my master wanted to kill me, so I ran away; but how am I to earn my bread now?' 'Do you know what?' said the Donkey, “I’m going to Bremen to become a town musician there, come along and join the band too. I’ll play the lute and you can play the drums.” The dog was satisfied, and they went on their way. It wasn't long before a cat sat by the roadside, looking as miserable as three days of rain. "Well, what's gotten in your way, old whisker-cleaner?" said the donkey. "Who can be cheerful when their neck is in danger?" replied the cat. "Because I'm getting on in years, my teeth are getting blunt, and I'd rather sit behind the stove and spin yarns than chase mice, my wife wanted to drown me. I managed to escape, but now I'm in a real pickle: where should I go?" "Come with us to Bremen. You're good at playing music at night; you could become a town musician there." The cat thought that was a good idea and went along. Then the three fugitives came to a farmyard where the rooster sat on the gate and crowed at the top of his lungs. “You’re crowing like a banshee,” said the donkey,
“What’s the matter with you?” – “I was prophesying good weather,” said the rooster, “because it’s Our Lady’s Day, when she’s washed the Christ Child’s shirts and wants to dry them; but since guests are coming tomorrow for Sunday, the housewife has no mercy and told the cook she wants to eat me in the soup tomorrow, and that’s why I’m supposed to have my head cut off tonight. So now I’m crowing at the top of my lungs as long as I can.” – “Well, what’s this, you redhead,” said the donkey,

“Come along with us instead, we’re going to Bremen, you’ll find something better than death anywhere.”

“For here we have no lasting city!” With these words, the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews confronts his readers and gives them a new focus. “…we are looking for the city that is to come.”

We seek and find something better than death!
This is a profound truth that is brought to our attention.
We humans are and remain mortal beings. We do not stay here, in this world, forever. We grow old—we die.
This insight can be gained in different ways and it can trigger different feelings.

The realization that nothing lasts, can be accompanied by great suffering.
Painful experiences of loss leave people with traumatic wounds and heavy emotions.

This is one perspective on reading: "We have no lasting city here."

We are no longer wanted. We are no longer needed.
This sentence encapsulates experiences of loss: the sudden death of someone felt too soon; a serious, terminal diagnosis; the end of a relationship; the loss of home; the loss of security.
In many different ways, we are confronted with the fact throughout our lives: "We have no lasting city here."
We are mortal. We leave much behind. We are approaching the end of our lives.
The resistance this realization triggers is numerous.
Even the donkey, the dog, the cat, and the rooster don't like it.

Resistance to mortality sometimes leads to attempts to do more medically than is humanly possible. To gain three more months, another round of severe chemotherapy with painful side effects. Medical research on human immortality, or at least on the project: everyone can soon live to be a hundred.

Yes, there is much resistance to our mortality, and the healthier we are, the better off we are materially, the more we live our lives self-determined, free, and carefree, the more deeply rooted we become and live in the illusion: This will go on forever.

The less rooted a person is in faith and the less God plays a role, the greater the fear of mortality becomes, the more painful and traumatic experiences of loss are. Because in the end, nothing remains but death.

The Letter to the Hebrews now opens a way to live reconciled to this mortality.
To find something better than death!
The writer adds to his apt observation, “We have no lasting city here,”: “We are looking for the city that is to come!”
So we no longer view our lives solely from the perspective of loss and impermanence, but a new perspective opens up to us: “There’s more to come!” . The author is convinced thereof.

This is a different experience of impermanence, of not lasting forever. It does not lead to resistance and a desperate defensiveness against every form of change, but rather it is the experience of being set free.
Freed and redeemed.

The animals in the fairy tale set out on an unknown path.

The Letter to the Hebrews does not focus on Bremen, but on Jesus Christ. This is the central theme of the Letter to the Hebrews: Look to Jesus Christ and understand that his suffering, that his death, was not merely loss and failure, but that God’s liberating power is at work within it.

Just as sharp as his analysis of, “Here we have no lasting city!” the author describes: “Jesus suffered outside the gate!”

He is referring to the site of the crucifixion, Golgotha, outside the city walls. But it goes deeper. “Outside the gate!” That is outside all security. That is beyond protective walls. That is outside the established community. That is beyond what the majority of people have recognized as true.

In the cross of Jesus, the writer sees a new revelation from God.
In many places, the Epistle to the Hebrews compares Jesus Christ to a high priest.

The high priest serves the community—he mediates between God and humanity. The high priest’s task was to offer the sacrifices on the Day of Atonement in the temple. A sacred ritual. A moving moment when people are freed from their past and a new future is opened to them.

Do you notice how closely related the words "past" and "impermanence" are?

On Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, once a year, Jews remember their liberation from the worship of the Golden Calf.

This task is now taken on by Jesus Christ: liberation from the worship of our golden calves: immortality, perpetuation, despair in the face of our own mortality.

Beyond all security—out there, where we are completely at the mercy of life and death, helpless and powerless: there God works and liberates us from the suffering of death.

“Therefore let us go also—let us bear his disgrace!”

This is not easy, and I understand well that this thought arouses resistance. But here lies and remains a mystery of our faith: it is such a deep trust in a place where fear and the pain of loss could become overwhelming.

It is not easy to go through life with an attitude that is ready to leave behind that which can no longer be changed.

This is a conscious decision, and it is not something that happens on command or at the
push of a button.
It is an invitation that we extend and take with us to more and more people: to find something better than death.

"We seek the future!" The future is not immediately here. What is yet to come is still hidden. It remains a search. This is not a triumphant march into a new world. It is not a violent liberation, a military victory, or a battle that is won.

Searching for the future—that is different from searching for immortality. Searching for the future—that is different from trying to continue forever as before.

Let us go out, let us set out. "We can find something better than death anywhere! The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen."