J. Albrecht…Trinity 10…August 9^th, 2026…Matthew 23:34-39…Jerusalem: A Signal Warning for All Who Are in the Kingdom.

³⁴ “Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, ³⁵ “that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. ³⁶ “Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. ³⁷ “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! ³⁸ “See! Your house is left to you desolate; ³⁹ “for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say,`Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!’”

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, Amen.

In the spring of 1902, a major election was being held on the Caribbean island of Martinique in the prosperous port city of St Pierre. Not far from this city lay Mount Pelee, an active volcano. Beginning in April, new steam vents began to appear on the top of Pelee. A few weeks later, on the morning of May 8^th, 1902, Mount Pelee erupted with such ferocity that it sent a superheated pyroclastic flow down the mountain at 300 miles per hour. There was no time to escape, no time to flee, and at least 28,000 people died within two minutes. Though some survived the initial explosion and flow of boiling ash, they died just hours later. Mount Pelee continued to erupt for months, and had a growing flow of lava that lasted another 3 years. It is the single greatest volcanic disaster of the 20^th century. The question is why was it so bad?

This was before the age of volcanology. There were not specialists spending their entire careers studying volcanoes and their likelihood to erupt. Nevertheless, there were still plenty of signs of what was about to happen, no one acted. The local government didn’t to evacuate. Between not wanting people to panic, and not wanting to disrupt important legislative elections upcoming, the local government refused to let people leave, even using the military to block people from escaping. The obvious warning signs were ignored for weeks ahead of the disaster. Nearly 30,000 deaths could have been prevented.

Saint Pierre isn’t alone when it comes to suffering disaster whose destruction of life was preventable. Jerusalem had more than weeks – it had years, centuries even of warning about God’s impending judgment, Two periods in history, the days of Solomon’s Temple, and in Jesus’ day, God had foretold destruction would come upon the city and its people, and in both periods, those warnings fell on deafened ears. Today, those periods of history stand as a signal warning to all, and especially to those in the Kingdom of God: to hear God’s call of grace – do not grow deaf. To use our time of grace – do not grow hard-hearted. To embrace the gift of grace – do not grow indifferent to the warning of judgment.

The words of our text come at the climax of Jesus’ final dismissal and denunciation of the Scribes and Pharisees. The entirety of Matthew 23 is 7 woes to the Scribes and Pharisees. Throughout Jesus’ ministry, they had been His enemies. Not metaphorically, but literally. They opposed Him at every turn, challenged Him in order to catch Him in a lie, and, when all else failed,  plotted to kill Him by any means necessary. It was an opposition motivated by fear, blinded by pride and greed, and directed by a hardness of heart. In our text, Jesus shows that this isn’t the first time God’s message had been met in this way.

Just a few hundred years before, their forefathers had done the exact same thing to God’s prophets. Many messengers from the LORD were beaten and killed for preaching repentance and warning of impending judgment. Jeremiah, Isaiah, Amos, and Ezekiel all faced persecution for their work.

But Jesus mentions just two – Abel, the son of Adam murdered by his brother Cain; and Zechariah murdered by order of the king. Abel, from the book of Genesis, the first book of the Hebrew Bible; and Zechariah, from the book of 2 Chronicles, the last book of the Hebrew Bible. Their blood was shed because of a refusal to hear God’s warnings. In these two, Jesus groups the whole of human history’s rejection of Him.

Think about Cain – how his own parents had been responsible for the fall into sin, but had first received God’s grace and the promise of a Savior. He had the first-hand account from his parents what God’s grace looked like and what it looked like to go against God’s will. He had become deaf to God’s warning much like his parents had when Satan tempted them. Abel’s blood stood as a warning of Cain’s failure.

Zechariah’s father, Jehoiada was the priest who kept King Joash faithful to the Lord. But, when that Jehoiada died, Joash turned away from the Lord. When the Lord called Zechariah to warn Joash, he did not remember the kindness of Jehoiada and had his son murdered inside God’s temple. Zechariah’s blood stood against a kingdom who had rejected God.

Now, think of Jesus’ day. The Scribes and Pharisees knew these accounts from when they were children. They knew how their forefathers had despised God’s prophets and calls to repentance and the judgment that followed – Jerusalem was destroyed and Solomon’s Temple brought to ruin and a people lost in captivity. Now, they had Herod’s temple, they had God’s Son warning them that God’s judgment will fall if they do not repent. But they hardened their hearts, killing God’s Son. And His blood stands not just against the Scribes and Pharisees, but all people who reject Him.

This wasn’t the same cycle as before – it was more obvious! They had history to look back on and God Himself urging repentance because God was willing to forgive – but their ignorant ears refuse to listen. And though God will send more prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, Killing God’s Son wasn’t enough, they continued in their madness as their fathers had done. “Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

But the real judgment is in Jesus’ final words in our text: ³⁷ “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! ³⁸ “See! Your house is left to you desolate; ³⁹ “for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say,`Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!’”

God was willing, He has always been willing to show mercy and grace to all, especially His people. Think of God’s major judgments in history – the Flood, the Tower of Babel, and Sodom and Gomorrah. In each of these, God provided a way to be saved. Then, He withheld His judgment through thousands of years of rebellion and wickedness because He promised to send a Savior. But now that the Savior had come, and they rejected even Jesus, He would fulfill what He said through Jeremiah, “Therefore I will do to the house that is called by my name, in which you trust, and to the place that I gave to you and to your fathers, as I did to Shiloh.” Jerusalem and the temple would be destroyed – and the worst judgment that would come is God’s presence finally leaving. The Gospel, His grace in action, would go to the Gentiles.

In 70 A.D. that destruction would come at the hands of the Romans. Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed, not one stone left on top of another, and great was the mourning in that day. But these words of Jesus continue to wring out. They serve as the same signal warning to us today as it did for the Jews in Jesus’ day. God has made it clear. You have the whole history of the Old Testament and the New Testament of what a constant rejection of God’s calling can bring.

It doesn’t matter what church you are in – if we become deaf to God’s call to repentance and His free gift of grace and forgiveness as the means of salvation – we too will be made desolate. And the judgment we will face will be God’s judgment over the whole world when there is no more time to repent. Like the disaster of Mount Pelee, God has given you and me ample time to see the warning against unbelief. And yet, how short is that time! Seek the Lord while He may be found, Call upon Him while He is near. The day will soon come when our time of grace has come to an end and our souls will be judged.

This is truly a negative text. Not in the sense that it is wrong, but that it is full of God’s judgment. On the one hand, we ought to remember that it is just. If we, as sinful human beings, know it is just to punish those who break the law, how much more just is it for God to execute justice on those who transgress His Law! This text is how God ought to talk to each one of us, for it is what we deserve because of our sin and rebellion. But, in every text, even the ones negative like ours, there is always the light of hope.

We find that hope in our text. Jesus’ last words, for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say,`Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!’” Isn’t that amazing? Even though His people rejected Him to the point of wanting Him dead, He is still leaving the door open to forgive them! There are two reasons for this: 1. Jesus knows He is about to go to the cross. Though they mean it as a way to get rid of Him, Jesus knows it is the Father’s plan for the salvation of the whole world. By His death, forgiveness will be won for every sin – no matter how grievous; and as many sins – no matter how plentiful. Would they repent, Jesus’ life and death would guarantee their forgiveness. 2. So long as anyone has their time of grace – that is, their life, the door remains open for salvation. Anyone at any time can believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved – and that is what Jesus wants.  No one needs to flee to God out of fear of His judgment, but run to Him because He loves you and wants to save you from your sin.

See how Jesus spoke about His desire to gather them as a mother hen gathers her chicks. That desire does not stop. As the love a mother has for a wayward child never grows cold, but always shines as a beacon of safety and comfort, so also does God’s love never grow dim or cold. He is still willing and ready to offer forgiveness to anyone who repents.

You might think, “We’ve talked a lot today about the children of Israel…what about me?” My brothers and sisters in Christ, this is directed to you. For we all struggle daily with sin and the temptation is ever near to become nose blind to God’s Law that convicts us of our sin. Today’s lesson is not condemning you for rejecting the Gospel – you have the Gospel and you have God’s grace overflowing in your life. The lesson for you and me is to never grow tired of God’s grace. To return to it day after day. There is no doubt that we deserve God’s justice, but instead He gives us the opposite. He doesn’t give us what we deserve – mercy and He gives us what we don’t deserve – forgiveness and grace. Rather than being separated from God forever, He welcomes us as His children, to be in His goodness forever in heaven. May we never grow tired of hearing God’s call to repentance, and being recipients of God’s endless grace. Amen.