Rev. Dr. Rick Stuckwisch, Pastor
Emmaus Lutheran Church
South Bend IN

The death of a child is surely one of the most difficult and painful sorrows that anyone can suffer. It hardly matters whether that child is three, thirteen, or thirty-three, or in the first or third trimester in the womb. To lose your child confronts you with the absolute and utter futility of your mortal life and the frailty of your flesh under the curse of sin and death. What difference does anything make when suffering, death, and the grave await you and your children, and your children’s children, too?

That is the legacy that you have inherited from your father Adam and your mother Eve; and if you have children of your own, it is the legacy that you have handed down to them, as well. Perhaps you have already had to bury a child (or more than one). Or perhaps you have had no spouse or child at all, which may spare you some sorrow of loss, but perhaps it has also left you feeling lonely and alone to begin with. If you do not bequeath the legacy of sin to anyone after you, neither are you any further ahead than those who do.

There still remains death to contend with, not only in yourself, but in your loved ones, whatever their relationship to you may be. In Adam all men die, because all men sin. And so it is with all the children of men. Each and all return to the dust of the ground, as surely as the serpent must crawl across the ground on his belly and eat dust as he goes.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is not spared this pain and sorrow, but she too is cut to the quick and pierced through the heart by the death of her dear Son, Jesus Christ, just as St. Simeon prophesied several decades earlier, when the Child was just forty days old. Do not suppose that it is any easier for Mary, or any less painful, just because she knew (or should have known) that it was coming. For every mother who has mourned the fruit of her own womb, there is a special kinship here to be found in the Mother of God, who stood at the foot of the Cross and watched her Jesus die.

He had been her little Boy to begin with, like any mother’s son, whom she bore and delivered, nursed and diapered, and taught so many things over the years as He grew and learned. What little games had they played? What smiles had they traded between the two of them? What bedtime stories and naptime cuddles had they shared? And shall He now be so cruelly put to death before her very eyes without piercing her heart and soul at their core?

Not for nothing does He die, although this Seed of the Woman is the one Man who should not have had to perish, because He is the one Son of Adam who was not conceived and born in sin, and who committed no sins of His own in heart, mind, body, or soul. For He is the Son of God from all eternity, and He was conceived of the Blessed Virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit. Thus, it was not because He had no choice, but solely out of divine and holy love, that He was born of the Woman under the Law, in order to redeem those who were under the Law.

Not only did He become flesh of her flesh and blood of her blood, but He voluntarily took upon Himself the curse and consequences of sin. He became, not only human, but mortal, and He bore all the sins of the whole world in His own Body to the Cross. He dies, therefore, not for any sins of His own — He has none — but for the sins of all His mortal fathers and mothers, and for all their sinful mortal children, for all His brothers and sisters in the flesh.

He dies for you and for your sins. And so it is that Mother Mary is given to grieve for her Son.

But what is one to do with grief like that?

You may be tempted to say or suggest that, for the Blessed Virgin Mary, it is surely no big deal. After all, her Jesus doesn’t even stay dead for very long, but He rises again on the Third Day. It all turns out okay, and really much better than “okay,” and everything is fine. All of which is true, but of course all of that is no less true for you than for St. Mary. The joy and hope of her Son’s Resurrection is likewise for you and for your children. Everything hinges on His death and on His Resurrection from the dead, which are fully accomplished, once and for all, without any iffyness.

Accordingly, just as St. Mary shares the same grief as so many other parents before and after her throughout history, so do you share the same hope and promise as St. Mary in her beloved Son.

Learn, then, to live in that hope and confidence of Christ Jesus. Not as though death were to be taken lightly or laughed off. Neither Jesus nor His dear Mother laugh at death, which is no joke, nor is it funny. Death is surely a gross intrusion upon the Lord’s good creation. It is the fruit of sin, and it is a vile curse. But for all that, death does not get to have the last word, because it has been defeated by this death of Christ, the Son of God, in human flesh and blood like yours.

So, where and how do you now live? Are you still trying to make a life for yourself in this mortal world, even though you are constantly confronted with its transient frailty and inevitable futility? Are you attempting to invest yourself in earthly empires, even though you should know that all such enterprises will collapse and fail? Are you hoping to establish a dynasty for yourself and all your sons and daughters of death, despite the fact that none of you will survive this present age?

Where is the house in which you can actually be safe and sound? Where are you truly at home, able to rest in peace? To what household and family do you really belong?

You can go looking and searching for all of these things on your own — and to some extent, that is what all of your restless seeking is after — but you won’t find it anywhere apart from Christ and His Word. Your “destiny” apart from Him is death and the grave, the place of the skull, the dust of the ground, and what is worse, to be cast out and cut off from the presence of God forever.

Sadly, the same legacy of sin that is putting you to death also turns your heart, mind, and spirit away from the Lord your God — away from His tender mercies and His gracious promises.

Adam and Eve took hold of the one thing He had not given, the one thing He had forbidden them, in the hopes of finding something better for themselves than the life they already had in Him. And when they had thus fallen into sin, they tried to run away and hide from Him, and to cover their naked shame with fig leaves. Cast out of the garden, but given the promise of the Gospel — of the Woman’s Seed who would crush and defeat the serpent and reconcile the world to God — the first man and his bride learned to hope in the Lord and to call upon His Name. Yet, consider what their sin had already wrought. The Woman brought forth her firstborn son, and she was so optimistic at first, but then he killed his brother in a jealous rage, and that first woman was bereft of her son.

Standing over the hole in the ground where the body of your son or daughter has been laid to rest, and standing at the foot of the Cross with Mother Mary, you are tempted to despair, to anger and bitterness, confusion and fear. You are tempted to cast about for some explanation that will make it all make sense. Or maybe you are driven to run away and try to hide. But you can’t escape. You’re left with empty hands, an aching heart, a lonely house with too many chairs around the table, and the naked shame of your own sin and your own approaching death.

But the Lord who loves you does not willingly grieve the sons of Adam and daughters of Eve. He takes no pleasure in death, nor is He nonchalant about your pain. He has subjected His good creation to such futility in the hope of redemption, in eager anticipation of His gracious adoption of many sons and many daughters, the many brethren of His only-begotten Son, Christ Jesus.

Here, then, is another Seth in place of Abel; a new and better Lamb in the place of Isaac, and in the place of all the firstborn sons of Israel; and a greater Son than Solomon, in place of the seven-day-old son of David and Uriah’s wife. Here is the beloved and well-pleasing Son of God, the Seed of the new Woman, given and poured out by His Father for all the children of sin and death.

Behold, His garments are removed to clothe and cover you, and in His nakedness He bears your shame. He does not run away and hide, nor does He turn His eyes away from you, but He willingly bears the curse and consequences of your sins, and in holy love He lays down His life for you.

He does not grasp or seize or take, but He receives and eats the bread of affliction from His Father’s hand, so that He Himself becomes your Bread of Life. His Body is the Fruit of a better Tree — the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden — and His Blood is the Fruit of this true Vine. “Take, and eat,” He says. He does not forbid you. “Drink,” He says. Taste and see. By this Food, freely given by God for you, for the forgiveness of all your sins, you shall not die but live.

The Son cares for His Mother, and He entrusts her to a good man who provides for her a house and home. The Lord gives her another son in the person of this man, the beloved disciple, who shall honor her as a Mother in Christ Jesus. And the same Lord Jesus Christ provides for you, as well, in your bereavement and mourning. He surely does care for the widows and the orphans in their distress. He also hears and listens to your cries, and He does not leave you forsaken. He has given Himself for you, and He shall not withhold His goodness from you.

Think of your own congregation, even when you cannot be with them. They are your mothers and your sons, your sisters and daughters, your fathers and brothers in Christ Jesus. Shall you not love them, and shall they not love you, in the mercy and compassion of our gracious Lord? You are not helpless or alone. You are not without a home and a family. And if you find no need in yourself, then consider the needs of your neighbors, and do what you can to help and support them in love.

Who among them has had a miscarriage and now mourns in silent sorrow? Whose parents are ill and dying? Whose job is in danger? Who is overwhelmed and struggling to manage, trying desperately just to get by? Who is drowning in depression and despair?

And which of you now stands at the foot of the Cross, watching and waiting on the Lord, and wondering (if not worrying) whatever shall become of you now?

Take heart, dear child of God. He has not forgotten you. You are a disciple whom Jesus loves. Indeed, He loves you dearly. Yes, even you. And not only has He given you to comfort and care for your brothers and sisters in His Name, and for the widows and orphans in distress, but He has also laid you upon the bosom of His Church, that you should find in her your own dear Mother.

From her font, by the Word and Spirit of God, you have been conceived and born again as a son of God in Christ. And at her festal board, the Son of St. Mary is still given in the same flesh and blood (like your own) in which He was born and lived and died for you — in which He has also risen from the dead for you, and lives and reigns forever at the right hand of His God and Father.

As He has made you a member of His Bride, the Church, the Mother of all the living, and as He has given you a place here in the home of all His beloved disciples, so it is that your place, your house, and your true home are with Him in heaven.

From “the place of the skull” you know that He is taken to be laid to rest in the garden. And now it is meet, right, and salutary that you should mourn His death on this day in particular. But not like those who have no hope. For His rest in the tomb is not the end, but a genuine Sabbath Rest, by which He has sanctified the graves of all His saints, including your grave and your children’s.

His departure is not from life into death, but from this vale of tears into Paradise, into the gracious and glorious presence of God. And as He calls you to Himself in love, so does He bring you with Himself through death into life, to an even better Garden than your first parents were cast out of.

Even now, you are not found naked, but you are clothed with Christ and His righteousness, so that you have nothing to be ashamed of and no need to be afraid. Even now, you are fed from the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden, so that, in the midst of mortal life, in the face of death and the grave, even though you are dying, yet, behold, you live.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.