Monday, December 26, 2016

Christmas Day (John 1:1-14)

Of the Father’s love begotten Ere the worlds began to be

He is Alpha and Omega, He the source, the ending He.

Of the things that are that have been, and that future years shall see

Evermore and evermore.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” Before the worlds began to be, before there was anything in all creation, from all eternity, is the Word; uncreated, outside of time, eternally begotten of the Father. The Word is with God, in fellowship with God, as God’s only-begotten Son. He dwells in heaven with God, enthroned in the splendor of the only true God. The Word is no creature, but is Himself eternal, Himself true God. The Word is God, the second person of the Trinity, one God with the Father and the Holy Spirit. There are not three Lords, but one Lord, just as there are not three almighties, but one almighty, and not three eternals, but one eternal. Yet, in the mystery of the Godhead, the Word is one person, the Father another, and the Holy Spirit another. There is plurality in the unity; one God, three persons, three persons, one God. The Father is God, the Spirit is God, the Word is God.

He is Alpha and Omega, evermore and evermore. He is the beginning and the end, He is the source of all things, and He is their end. “All things were made through Him, and without Him was not any thing made that was made.” God spoke, and it happened, “God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.” God spoke a Word, God spoke the Word, and all things came into being, the Word that was with God and the Word that is God. He is the source of all in creation; every creature, every detail, came forth by the Word, the Word that created in the beginning, the Word that still sustains creation, through the mandate given to all creatures: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.” Nothing has its being apart from the Word, nothing has life without Him. “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.” The Word who is God dwells in heaven, with the Father, enthroned in glory, evermore and evermore. We sing stanza two.

Oh, that birth forever blessed, When the virgin, full of grace

By the Holy Ghost conceiving, Bore the Savior of our race.

And the babe, the world’s redeemer, First revealed His sacred face

Evermore and evermore.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” The Word who is with God, the Word who is God, the Word by whom and through whom all things were created, the Alpha and the Omega, the source and ending of all things, this very Word took flesh. Very God of very God, the eternal Word, who exists outside of time, who created time, entered time. The Creator entered creation as a creature. In the womb of a virgin, without human participation, by an act of the Holy Spirit, the Word became flesh and took up residence among us. God of God and Lord of Lords is now a man, He has become flesh. God takes up residence among His people; as the tabernacle of old was the place where God was present in the midst of His people for their good, so now, in the body of Jesus, God dwells among His people once again. The cloud covered the tabernacle, and the glory of the Lord filled it, but now the glory of the Lord dwells in flesh; the glory of the Lord is a man, a human being, one of us, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

We have seen that glory, “glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John saw the glory upon the mountain; He saw Jesus revealed to be the Word from the Father, the very Son of God, full of grace and truth. The glory of the Creator, present in a creature, the glory that filled the tabernacle, once again present among His people. The light that shone forth in the darkness on the first day of creation, the light that existed before sun and moon and stars, had its source in the Word, who is Himself the Light, and now that uncreated, eternal light shines in the darkness of this sinful world. “In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” We sing stanza three.

This is He whom seers in old time Chanted of with one accord,

Whom the voices of the prophets Promised in their faithful word.

Now He shines, the long expected; Let creation praise its Lord

Evermore and evermore.

“There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.” Like a choir, an assembly of beautiful voices, the prophets sang in unity. Each sang a different note, each brought their own unique voice to the choir, each added to the rich tapestry, but all were singing same song: the Word made flesh, the long expected Messiah, the coming the Savior of the world. Moses and Isaiah, David and Micah, Malachi and Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel, Elijah and Elisha, and finally, the last prophet, the final member of the choir, John. “He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light.” They were not the light, no matter how bold their words, no matter how powerful their miracles, no matter how strong their voice. They came to bear witness to the light.

Their word was faithful, for it pointed away from themselves and toward the Word who was coming in the flesh. “He came as a witness to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through Him.” The Light, the Word, must increase, they must decrease; they pointed away from themselves and toward Jesus, crying out with John, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” One who follows Moses must believe in Jesus, he who clings to Isaiah’s words of hope must worship the One he proclaimed, those in awe of Elijah and Elisha’s great deeds must marvel at the One who fulfills their works. With their voices, voices raised in one accord, the prophets, the saints of old, from Adam and Eve who received the first prophecy to John who baptized the seed of a woman promised to them, the prophets pointed to Jesus, and cried out, “Let creation praise its Lord!” We sing stanza four.

O ye heights of heaven adore Him; Angel hosts, His praises sing.

Powers, dominions, bow before Him And extol our God and King.

Let no tongue on earth be silent, Every voice in concert ring.

Evermore and evermore.

“He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, yet the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him.” The prophets proclaimed Him, the angels sang His praises, the shepherd and the magi were His ambassadors, John pointed to Him, and God the Father Himself declared of Him, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” But the world did not know Him. He created all things, He was the instrument by which God spoke creation into being, but the creatures He gave life to did not receive Him. He was the One proclaimed by the prophets, promised to our first parents and every generation since, but when He came, His own people rejected Him. He came to save, and they put Him to death. He came of the Father’s love begotten, and they hated Him. They spat in His face, they scourged His back, they pressed thorns into His brow. Heaven sings His praises, and the world shouts, ‘Crucify!’ The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness gathers around it, the darkness tries to destroy it.

But the darkness has not overcome it. “To all who did receive Him, who believed in His Name, He gave the right to become children of God.” Let creation praise its Lord, high and exalted upon the throne of the cross, winning there the peace promised by the angels on the night of His birth. Let the angel hosts sing as He sheds His blood for the life of the world. Let powers and dominions bow before them, acknowledging as Lord the One declared the King of the Jews. Let no tongue on earth be silent, let every voice echo the concert of the prophets, singing with them, pointing to the cross, “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” And all who thus sing, all who thus believe, are reborn, made the children of God, “not of blood or of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” All who sing His praises are His children, all who sing His praises are reborn, all who receive Him have a new identity: children of God. We sing stanza five.

Christ, to Thee, with God the Father, and O Holy Ghost to Thee

Hymn and chant and high thanksgiving And unending praises be,

Honor, glory, and dominion, and eternal victory

Evermore and evermore.

Evermore and evermore, heaven and earth is joined together in praise of the Word made flesh. Evermore and evermore, heaven and earth, long divided, long separated, stands unified by the peace promised at the manger, the peace won at the cross, the peace delivered by the risen Christ. Evermore and evermore, this Jesus is praised in heaven and on earth in unity with the Father and the Holy Ghost. Evermore and evermore, we who are children of God, born of God through Christ, will stand praising our Lord. Evermore and evermore, creation is restored, evermore and evermore, the curse will be removed, evermore and evermore, the Word is flesh and ever will be flesh. Evermore and evermore, His praises ring, evermore and evermore His saints sing, evermore and evermore the manger, the cross, the empty tomb stand as tokens of our salvation. Honor, glory, and dominion, and eternal victory; evermore and evermore. Amen.

Advent Midweek service (Psalm 85)

“Lord, you were favorable to your land; you restored the fortunes of Jacob.” You acted in salvation, you saw your people in distress and you did not remain idle. You rent the heavens and came down; you came down to deliver, you came down to save, you came down bring your people out of captivity. When your people languished in slavery, with backs bowed in hard labor, you came; when your people dwelt in exile, far from home, you came; when your people were threatened with annihilation again and again, you came. “You withdrew all your wrath; you turned from your hot anger.” You were angry with your people, and justly, for they sinned, they turned away from you. They rebelled again and again, but in love, in mercy, you turned back to them. You rent the heavens and came down, releasing them from the bondage they deserved, the cruel overlords who were the agents of your wrath. But all of this was preliminary. When your people dwelt in the dark night of sin, subject to death, in the captivity of Satan, you came. You rent the heavens and came down, taking up residence in the womb of the virgin, and coming forth to walk the way of the cross. You came to die, to die in the place of your rebellious people, to die bearing their iniquity. You are the God who comes, and you came in humility, you came in victory, you came with healing in your wings.

“You forgave the iniquity of your people; you covered all their sin.” You did not ignore my sin, you did not turn your face from it, you did not make an exception in my case. No, your hot anger burned against my sin with as much intensity as it deserved. My sin deserved death and hell, and that is what you poured out against it. You did not spare one ounce of your wrath, but you raged against your Son, not against me. You did not ignore my sin, or the sin of anyone on this planet, but you placed it on Jesus, and your hot anger burned against Him. You covered my sin with the blood of Jesus, with His righteousness; because He died under your wrath, your wrath will not come upon me. “You withdrew all your wrath; you turned from your hot anger.” That is what happened at the baptismal font: your anger turned away, your wrath was withdrawn. I am saved, I am delivered, because you came, you came to this world at your first Advent, taking on flesh to walk the way of the cross, and you came on the day of my baptism, rending the heavens and coming down to make me one of your dear children.

You acted in the past; will you not act again? “Restore us again, O God of our salvation, and put away your indignation toward us!” We are languishing, dying in this world of sin and death, a world filled with decay, a world that still faces the just penalties of its sin. The sin and suffering of this world seems to have no end; every day we hear of violence and poverty, the incredible cruelty that humans show to one another only reaches new heights, terrible things happen to the innocent. A seven-year-old was hit by a car crossing the street last week, trying to get to school; will you not act? “Will you be angry with us forever? Will you prolong your anger to all generations?” How long will you wait, O Lord, how long will you delay? How much more suffering must this world endure? Why don’t you do something? You acted in the past, will you not act again? The world has been in the throes of death since the day Adam and Eve fell into sin, death has reigned over man and beast since teeth sunk into the fruit. How much longer must we endure this penalty? How much longer must we return to the dust, must the ground bring forth thorns and thistles?

“Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you?” Make us alive, we are dying! Bring us some joy, we are filled with sadness! This world sucks the joy from us, it brings us down into the depths of sorrow. We face the pain of loss, the shame and humiliation of our own weaknesses, the guilt of our sin. We live with aches and pains, our bodies rebel against us, they are racked with cancer, our hearts are ticking time bombs, diabetes lurks around every corner. This world fills us with tears, as we mourn those who are lost to us, those who have died and those who are estranged, those we don’t talk to anymore, those who have hurt us or we have hurt, and the relationships left tattered and torn. All who have hurt us, all who have left us, leave a hole in our heart. Deliver us from this corrupted world! O Lord, how long? “Show us your steadfast love, O Lord, and grant us your salvation.” Show us your love, we are drowning in hate, the false and fleeting love this world offers. Grant us your salvation, we are surrounded by sin and its corruption. We can’t endure this world much longer, we are hanging on by a thread—do you want us to fall? We are at the end of our endurance—would you have us give up? Your people are dying—what do you have to say for yourself?

“Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for He will speak peace to His people, to His saints; but let them not turn back to folly.” What you have for me is a Word. A Word, not a miracle, not a spectacular show of strength, power, and majesty. A Word. You won’t take all my problems away, you won’t give me heaven on earth, you won’t remove every instance of suffering from my life. Health and wealth aren’t your promise; an easy life is not your guarantee. Instead, you will give me a Word, a Word of peace. “Surely His salvation is near to those who fear Him, that glory may dwell in our land.” In the darkness of sin, in the bleak night of death, under the shadow that envelops this earth, the Light shines. The Light comes into this world, and the darkness of this fallen creation cannot overcome it. His salvation comes near to His people, His glory shines in the night. He rends the heavens and comes down this Advent, speaking peace to His people, His saints, those who fear Him, and His glory dwells in the midst of our land. His glory dwells in this place, it dwells wherever this Word of hope, this Word of peace is spoken. Do not turn back to folly, dear friends, do not give into despair, do not cry out to return to Egypt when the scarcity of the wilderness overwhelms you. Do not take comfort in the pleasures of sin, but in the assurance of the Word. A Word is His gift to you, a Word that assures you in the midst of your suffering, a Word that gives you His promises, a Word that guarantees for you sure and certain victory.

Because Jesus came at His first Advent, sin, death, and the devil have already been defeated, they will not triumph over you. Because Jesus comes every Lord’s day, you are constantly reassured in the midst of your sufferings that He will never leave you nor forsake you. Because Jesus will come again on the Last Day, you have the assurance that nothing, and no one, can destroy you, that no suffering will last forever, that death itself is an empty shell. In Jesus, “Steadfast love and faithfulness meet, righteousness and peace kiss each other.” God’s faithfulness and justice met with His love in Jesus, as the sinless Son of God was put to death in your place, fulfilling God’s justice against your sin to bring you His perfect, abundant love. God’s perfect righteousness and His everlasting peace kissed in Jesus, as the sinless Son of God fulfilled all righteousness upon the cross, dying to make you righteous so that you would be at peace with God forever. In Jesus, “Faithfulness springs up from the ground, and righteousness looks down from the sky.” God was faithful to His promises, preached by His prophets of old as they walked this earth, and righteousness, perfect righteousness, rent the heavens and came down to cover you on the day you were baptized into Christ’s name.

“Yes, the Lord will give what is good, and our land will yield its increase.” There is a place where suffering will be no more, where death will not even be a rumor, where conflict will be erased, where the divisions we once had will no longer matter. In that place, “Righteousness will go before him, and make his footsteps a way.” Righteousness, perfect righteousness, will characterize that place, and it is your home, the Promised Land that is your inheritance, when at long last, and for one final time, Christ rends the heavens and comes down, answering your prayers, and the prayers of the Church of all ages, forever. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Second Sunday in Advent (Luke 21:25-36)

“Now when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning is the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the twenty-first chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Luke. Dear friends in Christ: is the world prepared for the Last Day? Does the world know that it’s end is coming, that the Savior it rejected is returning to judge both the living and the dead? The strange thing is, I think this world knows that the end is coming, this world has an inkling that progress will not continue unabated forever, deep down this world knows that eventually the institutions and technologies that we trust in will fail. My evidence? Movies, books, TV shows, and video games. Our popular entertainment is filled with stories about the world falling apart, about the end of our current way of life, the destruction of those pillars of society that we cling to so tightly. The vision of the future presented in movies is not utopia anymore, but dystopia, a ruined future, populated by villains and zombies, a world devastated by war or ecological disaster. From Wall-E to the Hunger Games to the Walking Dead, this world has some sense, deep down, that the end is coming. Maybe these movies and shows are meant to be prophecies, maybe they simply give expression to our deepest fears, but in some limited way, the world is reading the signs of the end, and the world is terrified.

“There will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves, people fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world. For the powers of the heavens will be shaken.” The world fears the end because all the world can see is the sweeping away of everything that it holds dear. There is no safety in these dystopic futures; there is tyranny and oppression, there is violence and poverty. This is not a world that you want to dwell in, this is not a reality that you want to have happen to you. So people are spurred on to seek solutions, to safeguard themselves from apocalyptic disaster. Everything from stronger governments to powerful medicines, to things like recycling and doomsday shelters are all enlisted to avoid the disaster that is coming.

There’s a fundamental problem with these solutions: the end of the world isn’t coming from any action of man, and so no solution of man can halt it. The end of the world is an act of God Himself, and the only solution, therefore, is repentance, crying out for deliverance. Every minute that this world endures is due to the patience of God over the corruption wrought by sin, but eventually, that patience will run out. The only answer is to turn from the sins that fix your eyes on this doomed world and lift up your head toward God, begging for salvation. “But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap. For it will come upon all who dwell on the face of the whole earth.” This world, as much as it might fear the destruction of all that it holds dear, steadfastly refuses the only hope that is has been given to it: repentance.

Their hope comes from somewhere else. You see, these doomsday stories always have the ‘good guys,’ who are working their way through that terrible, destroyed world, and they will be the ones to rebuild. There is the potential of a new day, a resurgence of human culture, that from the ashes society will rise again. At the end of the movie, The Book of Eli, Denzel Washington’s character reaches an island where culture is preserved, and he gives them a copy of the Bible, to shelve next to the Koran. The message is clear: humanity will survive. What these stories try to get across to us is the same as any war movie: the triumph of the human spirit, that we as humans can overcome anything, even the utter destruction of our society. Yes, there is much to fear, but there is hope, and it is founded upon you and your fellow man, the heroism that dwells within. Salvation comes from you, and only from you; and together with other heroes, you can overcome.

That is where all of these stories fail so utterly. When the Last Day comes, you cannot save yourself, no matter how much ammo or canned goods you have stored in your cellar. No band of spunky humans will have the ability to rebuild anything, for everything will be destroyed. “The powers of the heavens will be shaken,” Jesus says; they will indeed be shaken, shaken apart. All that God so carefully put into place; the order that once characterized creation, will utterly fall apart. This is no disease, no ecological disaster, not even World War Three; this is the unraveling of creation itself. Environmentalists claim that we can destroy this world; they’re wrong—man can’t do it, but God can, and He will. The Last Day is complete, and it is total, and the only savior on that Day is the Savior that is coming on the clouds to greet His own.

“And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.” The world should fear; it is bowed low, engrossed in its sins, refusing to repent. When that Day comes, there will only be fear, “people fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world.” But for those who repent, those who believe, those who cling to the One who is coming on the clouds, that Day will be a Day of victory. “Now when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Lift up your heads, straighten your backs, dear friends. Do not be bowed low with sin, do not let this world drag you down into the filth, but stand tall in repentance, in faith. For the One coming on the clouds is the One who descended once before, who descended from heaven for your salvation. The One who is coming on the Last Day is the One who shed His blood for your sins, who rose again from the dead. The One who is coming is your crucified and risen Savior.

The angels told the disciples as they gazed into heaven, “This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven.” The One who is returning from heaven on the Last Day is the One who ascended into heaven having destroyed sin, death, and Satan. So rejoice, dear friends, rejoice to see the signs that are coming on this earth. We do not rejoice that these terrible things have happened to us or our neighbors, we rejoice in what these events point to—the end of all sin and suffering when Christ returns in glory. The world is coming do an end because your Savior is returning. Rejoice to see this world hasten toward its end; rejoice that your redemption is drawing near. The One who is coming is your Savior, your Lord, who forsook His rightful place at the right hand of God to take on human flesh for your salvation. The One who is coming is Jesus, who suffered at the hands of evil men, who faced the whip and scourge for you. The One who is coming is the One who loved you so much that He would not leave you in your sins; when the Last Day comes, so does your redemption: do not fear, rejoice!

There is no fear for the one who is in Christ, only joy. There is no fear for the one who is in Christ, only anticipation of what is to come. The tumults and terrors of this world, as horrifying as they are, as much as they may impact your property, your health, even your life, are signs that Jesus is drawing near. “Look at the fig tree, and all the trees. As soon as they come out in leaf, you see for yourselves and know that the summer is already near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near.” Every natural disaster, every market crash, every outbreak of disease should cause us to rejoice that Christ is drawing near—again, not in the disaster itself and the suffering it causes, but in the promise that the disaster points to. We cry out, ‘O Lord, how long?’ and rejoice to know that He is drawing ever nearer; the signs tell us that this world will not last for long.

There is no need for fear; the end of all these signs is your redemption. There is no need for fear; the end of all these signs is your Savior returning on the clouds. Jesus’ advice? “Now when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Straighten you backs; raise your heads. Stand tall, not bowed down with fear, not troubled by the terrible events described in the Scriptures. These signs must happen, but they are precursors to a reality that is indescribable, a reality without sin, a reality without evil, the new heavens and the new earth where you will dwell with Jesus, body and soul, forever. That is what the Last Day will bring, that is what we anticipate, that is what Christ brings with Him when He returns upon the clouds.

Are you ready? You must be, for all the signs point to Christ’s return at any moment; every sign of the end that Jesus gives us has happened and is happening right now. There is nothing left to be accomplished. Jesus can come at any moment, before the end of this sentence or the end of this sermon. He says it best Himself: “Watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap.” The very point of a trap is that it goes off suddenly—are you ready? The world would keep you drowsy, with your head down; the advice of Jesus is to be awake, alert in prayer, with your head lifted in anticipation of His return. “Stay awake at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are going to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.” Are you ready to stand before Jesus? The answer is found in our text. “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” You are ready because you are in Christ, you are covered by His blood, you are redeemed by His death. The only shelter on that Day is to be in Jesus. You are ready because you have a life in Christ that is indestructible, you have been claimed by the Word which endures even when all else passes away. His Word will not pass away, and neither will you, for the One who is coming is Jesus, your Savior, your Lord. In His Name, Amen.

Wednesday, November 23, 2016

Last Sunday of the Church Year (Isaiah 65:17-25)

“For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this Last Sunday of the Church Year is the Old Testament lesson read a few moments ago from the sixty-fifth chapter of the prophet Isaiah. Dear friends in Christ, years ago I was told a story (and despite numerous Google searches this week, I was unable to verify it), a story about a stone church in Europe. Right outside the walls of this ancient church was a massive rock, a rock that was slowly sinking into the soft earth. Year by year, the rock, as it sank and shifted, moved closer and closer to the wall of the church. Now, I was told that a legend had grown up about this church and this rock, a prophecy of sorts, that when the rock finally touched the wall of the church, the trumpet would sound and Christ would return. When this story was told to me years ago, I heard that to this day, you can see this church and the rock that was the ‘countdown clock’ for the Last Day. The rock still has not touched the wall of that church, and if you look closely, you can see why. It’s covered with chisel marks; every time the rock came close to touching the wall, the faithful would, almost in a panic, attack the rock, chiseling it away, making sure that Christ would delay just a little longer. It seems that they were not quite so eager for the Last Day to come, for the graves to open, for Jesus to come back.

The second to last verse of the Bible gives us what should be the cry of the Church in all ages: “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” If this story is true, then the cry of the faithful in that village was quite different: “Amen. Delay, Lord Jesus!” Delay, Lord Jesus, just a little while longer! I have children to raise, I have money to make, I’m planning retirement, I have this, that, or the other thing to accomplish, I’m not ready for you to return quite yet! Delay, Lord Jesus, give me some time to indulge my pleasures, to sin a little more, to take in all this world has to offer. God declares in our text: “Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.” The former things will pass away, we are told, and that is what scares us, because the former things are what we know, what we enjoy, what we cling to. Ask a couple on the night before their wedding if they are praying with the Church, “Come, Lord Jesus!” Ask a football player the morning of the Super Bowl. Ask a businessman the day he is to take over a company. Ask yourself before a long-awaited vacation, before you graduate high school (or college), before you are planning to enjoy any of the pleasures of this world: are you praying, “Come, Lord Jesus”?

We all have reasons that we want Christ to delay, just a bit longer, we all have our hammers and chisels sitting on the shelf, ready to go. We find it hard to pray, “Amen. Come Lord Jesus,” because deep down, we’re comfortable with life in this world and we aren’t too sure about what is to come; our typical idea of heaven doesn’t entice us. We have no experience of life without sin, the unknown makes us nervous, and (you know this is true), we like having the ability to sin. One of Satan’s tricks is to convince us to cling to the things of this world, to even desire them above the eternal gifts God wants to give to all the saints. But dear friends, this world is not worth clinging to! There is nothing that this world can offer that is worth ever saying, “Amen. Delay, Lord Jesus!”

What this world has to offer you is sorrow, mourning, sadness. Certainly, there are joys and pleasures in this life, and we receive them as gifts of God, but so often they are tainted by sin; indeed, this world seems to be of the opinion that only through sin can we have any pleasure or joy. Just listen to most comedians or watch the soft pornography that passes for primetime television today. Such joy and pleasure leaves you empty, instead of filling you up, the pleasures of sin make you hollow. And that’s what the world passes off as joy; what it gives you more often is the sadness and grief of broken relationships, of conflict; what it offers is the devastation of depression.

The world can only give you sorrow; Christ comes to bring joy, to make you joy incarnate, joy enfleshed. “Be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness. I will rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people; no more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress.” The joys that we have in this life are glimpses of the joy that is to come, for God declares that His new creation will be characterized by unbridled, undiluted joy, the joy of the resurrection, the joy of Christ’s victory over sin and death, a joy not tainted by sin, not corrupted by any kind of sorrow or sadness. There will be no depression, no sadness at all in God’s new creation. Sorrow will be replaced by joy.

For there can be no sorrow in a place with no death. But all this world has to offer you is death. No matter what pleasures it can give you, no matter how comfortable life can be, we all have the same destination, and the world can give you no escape. We keep building more (and bigger) hospitals, clinics and surgical centers are everywhere, but we continue to fight a losing battle with death. As much as we modernize, we still fear deadly diseases, and we all dread that six-letter word: cancer. Every day that this world endures is another day for children to die, for people to be diagnosed with terrible diseases. This world is the domain of death, where death rules and always has the last word.

But the new heavens and the new earth, the new Jerusalem, is a place where death will no longer reign, where its domination over all things will come to an end. “No more shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, for the young man shall die a hundred years old, and the sinner a hundred years old shall be accursed.” Now, God isn’t saying that people will die in the new creation, or that the wicked will dwell there, but He is describing His new creation by these illustrations to make this point: death will have no more grip on us there. Jesus Christ rose from the dead to put an end to death, to destroy death forever. What the world cannot do through bigger and better hospitals, through more advanced technology, Jesus did by dying. He died bearing our sin and He rose victorious over our enemies: sin, death, and Satan. He rose to establish a place where death is replaced with life.

If death is the destination that this world offers, the path to get there is paved with deprivation and want. There are some in this world who don’t have to watch their budget, who aren’t worried about how they will afford groceries for the month, who haven’t had to tighten their belt over the past few years. Yes, there are some. But for most people, want is the order of the day, whether on a small scale or a large scale. Millions in our country are out of work, millions are struggling to pay the rent, millions are dependent on food banks and other assistance. In this world, the works of our hands fail us; crops won’t grow, or are destroyed by numerous dangers, prices go up and wages go down.

When Jesus walked this earth, two of His greatest miracles involved the multiplication of food: the feeding of the five thousand and the feeding of the four thousand. He did this to point to an eternity where scarcity and want will be no more. “They shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be, and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity, for they shall be the offspring of the blessed of the Lord, and their descendants with them.” No more scarcity, no more want; Jesus has replaced deprivation with abundance, and we will live secure.

Security is not something that we often have in this world of violence and conflict. In our country, in our city, we may be more secure than many (perhaps most) other places around the world, but we still fear. We fear crime, we fear violence, we fear terrorism. Christians fear persecution all around the world. Conflict characterizes our existence in this world: conflict between family members, conflict between groups in our country, conflict between nations. There is no peace, and there never has been, since Cain killed Abel, in a world at war with God and at war with each other.

When Jesus appeared to His disciples on Easter evening, He had a simple message for them: “Peace be with you!” Peace was the result of His resurrection: peace between God and man, peace between you and your Creator. And that peace will fill the new creation, it will permeate our existence there: “The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain, says the Lord.” The conflict will be over—forever. The peace that we have with God through the blood of Jesus Christ means a new creation at peace, it means people at peace; no more violence, only peace.

Leave your chisels on the shelf, dear friends, as if you could delay the return of Jesus anyway. Do not pray, ‘Delay, Lord Jesus,’ but rejoice to cry out, “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” Come quickly to deliver us, to save us from sorrow and death, from deprivation and violence. Come quickly to reverse the curse, to replace mourning with rejoicing, death with life, want with abundance and violence with peace. Come quickly to deliver us from evil, to bring us all that you won through your death and resurrection for our sake. And we know that Christ will hear our cry, though the timeline is in His hands, for He has promised us, “Before they call I will answer; while they are yet speaking I will hear.” Christ will hear, and Christ will come, just as He has promised: “He who testifies to these things says, ‘Surely I am coming soon.’” To which the Church replies: “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” Amen.

Trinity 25 (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)

“And so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this evening is the Epistle lesson read a few moments ago from the fourth chapter of Paul’s first letter to the church in Thessalonica. Dear friends in Christ: grieve, weep for those whom you love. Go to their graves, place your flowers, shed your tears, go through all the stages of grief that counselors and psychologists identify. Be angry, be sad, cry out to God, cry out to others. Do not trap your emotions inside of you; let them out! Weep as Jesus did at the grave of Lazarus, be troubled as Jesus was as He faced His own death. Grieve, dear friends, but do not grieve as the world does. “We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.” Most seasoned pastors can tell the difference at a funeral between those who are active in worship and those who are not. Those who have abandoned the Church, who have cut themselves off from Christ and His gifts struggle to maintain any kind of control, they cannot let go, they linger by the graveside, or they go into a sort of shock, refusing to have any emotion at all. On the other hand, those who have heard the Word of God, who have been fed regularly by Christ’s gifts, do mourn, they do weep, it is not an easy day, but they have something the others do not, which Paul points out in our text: hope.

This hope does two things for the believer. First, it gives the Christian a quiet, calming confidence and peace that tempers the raw emotions of the day, and second, it gives the Christian the freedom to grieve, to weep, to mourn. You weep because you love the one who died, the separation of death is a tragedy, a tragedy that even Jesus felt. But your weeping is not hopeless, it is not wild and despairing; you weep as one who knows that the separation is only temporary: you will see them again. “For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep.” Your confidence isn’t without basis; it isn’t some ‘pie in the sky’ dream or a pious wish that ‘good people go to heaven.’ No, the hope sustains you as you grieve is founded on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Because Jesus died and rose again, because His grave is empty, we have confidence that the grave of our loved one will be empty one day, that our grave will empty. Those who believe in the One who conquered death will themselves conquer death; those who belong to the One who died in their place know that death has no permanent hold on them. Because Jesus died, because Jesus rose, we can say with confidence that those who died in Jesus are simply sleeping.

Three times in our text Paul says that those who have died in Christ are asleep. Jesus said this to the crowd, and the world laughed at Him. ‘They’re not sleeping, they’re dead!’ the world cries with anger and sorrow. But this word, ‘asleep,’ is the core of our hope. One who is asleep will awake; one who is asleep is waiting for the dawn, for the sun to rise. Sleep is not a permanent condition, and for the believer, death is not permanent either. Their bodies sleep in the ground, waiting to be awakened, but their souls are with Jesus. We should not make this word ‘asleep’ say more than it is meant to say, as if the saints are in limbo, and not with Jesus, as if they are unaware of heavenly bliss. Know this, dear friends, while their bodies sleep in the grave, still on this earth, the dead in Christ enjoy the fellowship of Jesus, their souls are with Him, right now. But even they are waiting, for they were created body and soul. Even though they are in the presence of the Lord, they still cry out, “How long?” Their salvation is still not yet complete, they still haven’t received their full inheritance, they are waiting for the trumpet to sound.

“For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God.” If the dead in Christ are asleep, that means they will awake; if the dead in Christ are asleep, that means they are waiting for the dawn. That is why the trumpet sounds, that is why the archangel shouts, not simply to alert the living, but to wake the dead. This is the great alarm clock of the Last Day, to awake all the sleeping. The dead haven’t missed out on anything, whether it is Abel, the first man to die, or the man who dies a second before the trumpet sounds: all will hear the sound, and all will awake.

There is no difference between the dead and the living on the Last Day. The dead will rise first, only because the living don’t need to rise; but all will be transformed. All will hear the cry of command, all will be changed. This mortal body will put on immortality; this lowly body will put on glory. This is true for every believer that has ever died, and every believer who is alive on that Day. There will be one generation that will not taste death, but know this, dear friends: all believers in Christ have conquered death, all believers live even though they die. On that Day, the living, those whose bodies are still awake, will join the dead, those whose bodies were asleep, and together we will be with Jesus. “Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.”

This is what all the saints are waiting for, those of us who are still alive, and those who have died and are with Jesus: resurrection. As Christ is raised, never to die again, so we will be raised, never to taste of sin or corruption ever again. And what will happen to our bodies will happen to this creation: it will be renewed and restored, cleansed from sin and corruption. Our existence for eternity will not be floating on the clouds, disembodied spirits wandering through a dreamland, but a real, physical existence, more real than anything we have experienced before, because there is no sin to corrupt it. It will be like turning a television from black and white to color, or waking up from a dream; not that this world isn’t real, but the world to come will be more, it will be better, it will be perfect.

For whatever else the new creation will be, Paul’s declaration will remain true: “We will always be with the Lord.” In the new heavens and the new earth, we will see Jesus face to face, in our bodies, just as Christ is Himself still true man. He will never shed His body, and neither will we, but will have fellowship with our God as He always intended. That is the result of the Last Day, and it is crystal clear: “We will always be with the Lord.” So much ink has been spilled, and so many pages wasted, speculating about the Last Day. Especially this text has been mined to figure out clues on how that Day will go. But Paul writes it not to give us a guidebook to the Last Day; instead he writes to encourage us about the results of the Last Day: the dead will be raised, they will join those who are alive, and “we will always be with the Lord.” The Lutheran Church’s confession of the Last Day is just as simple, proclaimed in the Small Catechism: “On the Last Day He will raise me and all the dead, and give eternal life to me and all believers in Christ.” One sentence, simple and clear, on a topic that others spend thousands of pages making muddy and complex. The dead are raised, and eternal life is given to believers, you and me. That’s it. That’s all.

“Therefore encourage one another with these words.” The Last Day is not a day to fear; for those who cling to Christ in the faith created by the Holy Spirit, the Last Day is a day to look forward to, to anticipate, to rejoice in. Encourage one another with the sure and certain confidence that the dead in Christ are sleeping; they will awake, and they are even now with Jesus in His glory, awaiting with the Church on earth the Day that is coming, the Day of victory, the Day of resurrection. Encourage one another with the simple confession of the Last Day, telling each other the truth: on that Day Jesus will fully deliver to you and me all that He won with His death and resurrection. As He rose, so you too will rise, and as He lives, so you too will live, for He died bearing your sin and He rose leaving it behind Him in the grave. “He who testifies to these things says, ‘Surely I am coming soon.’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” Amen.

Saturday, November 12, 2016

All Saints' Day (1 John 3:1-3)

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know Him. Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who thus hopes in Him purifies himself as He is pure.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this commemoration of all the saints, is the Epistle lesson I just read from the third chapter of Saint John’s first letter. Dear friends in Christ, the world doesn’t know all the saints. It doesn’t know how the mourning could be comforted, it doesn’t know how the meek will inherit the earth, it doesn’t know how the poor in spirit will receive the kingdom of heaven. The world doesn’t know all the saints, because it doesn’t know the Savior. “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, yet the world did not know Him.” The Creator came into the creation and those whom He made didn’t know Him. They didn’t recognize Him for who He was, and so they rejected Him, they turned their backs. But ignoring Him wasn’t enough. In their ignorance, they raged against Him, putting Him to death. Now, they certainly don’t know all the saints, those who proclaim alive a man the world put to death, those who follow a man the world watched die.

The world doesn’t know you, it doesn’t understand you, it doesn’t get you. If it did, it would be like you are, but as it refused to have anything to do with Jesus, it refuses to have anything to do with you. Christ and all the saints is a huge hole in the world’s knowledge; all else the world can quantify, understand, put in a lab, but people clinging to a crucified man, that the world will never understand. It can only know, it can only understand, by becoming as you are, one of all the saints. “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.” See the Father’s love, the love that He has for you, a love the world cannot understand or comprehend, a love the world does not know. But you know this love, for you have heard the Word proclaimed to you: “I baptize you in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” You have heard the declaration, as water was poured over your head, that you are now a child of God; that is what God has called you, that is what He has said about you at the font.

You are called a child of God, all the saints are called children of God, and these are no empty words. These are God’s words. Jesus said, “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” The Word of God does what it says. You are called a child of God, and so you are, His Word makes it happen. It is reality, not a pious wish, not an uncertain hope, but reality. You are a child of God; that is who you are, that is what you have become. God said it, and it is true. God said it, and He doesn’t lie, He doesn’t deceive. Your identity is as sure and certain as the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, as sure and as certain as the empty tomb.

“The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know Him. Beloved, we are God's children now.” The world doesn’t know you, for you have become something the world can never understand: a child of God. It doesn’t know Jesus, it refuses to know His resurrection, and so it doesn’t know you, it doesn’t know all the saints. The world scoffs at even calling you, or anyone else in the Church, living or dead, saints. The term ‘saint’ in our world today has come to means a person who is morally upright, who does good deeds incessantly, who acts in kindness toward all. And the world laughs at the notion that the Church could then ever be called the assembly of all the saints. The world sees our sin, it sees our wretchedness; it has encouraged it, it has led us from sin to sin. The world knows just how dirty we are, how filthy we make ourselves, it can even make some good guesses about the sins you think you have kept safely hidden.

All Saint’s Day seems like a joke, a lie, that the Church could somehow corner the market on sainthood. All Hypocrites’ Day seems more accurate, more true to life; the world calls us out on our pretending, our playacting, our hypocrisy. And we know that the world speaks the truth. When we examine our lives, we see very little that is ‘saintly,’ at least as the world defines that term. But the true definition of ‘saint’ isn’t about moral perfection and piles of good works. Those who are true saints, all the saints we commemorate today, are those who have been declared so by the Word of God. “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.” You are a saint, you one of all the saints, not because you do not sin, but because you are forgiven, because you are covered with the blood of Jesus.

You are a child of God now; that is your present reality, that is true because it has been declared to you, and God’s Word does what it says. You know this, it is certain and true, an anchor in this world of sin. It is especially true when you approach that time that all the saints must pass through: death. The world laughs at All Saint’s Day, it scoffs at our commemoration of those who are dead. The world can show us the graves, it can take us to the bones, it knows just as well as you do, that death is inevitable, it is inescapable. All the saints are dead, they’re gone, no more. Whether it is Peter or Paul, Augustine or Luther, or people closer to home, like Moe, Wally, Harold, or Danielle, the world simply proclaims reality to us: they’re all dead, and one day you will be too.

And we must admit once again that the world is right; certainly, all the saints who have gone before us remain in the grave, certainly the grave is our destination, too. In the face of death, we too shudder, we too fear its coming. But the one mystery that the world can never solve gives us hope, a sure and certain hope: the grave of Jesus is empty; He has been raised from the dead. And because He has been raised from the dead, so all those who belong to Him, all those who have been declared children of God through His shed blood, now live with Him, even though they died, and will one day be raised with Him. The world doesn’t know you, it doesn’t know all the saints, because it doesn’t know the resurrection. It searches for His body, but that body will never be found, for what the angels said on Easter remains true today: “He is not here, for He has risen, as He said.” Christ is risen, and all the saints will rise. Christ is risen, and all the saints who died in Him live. The world sees a dead man on the cross; we see the One who was crucified in our place rising in victory, the proof and guarantee that death will not hold us either.

That is the death and resurrection you were baptized into, and your present identity is the pledge of your future reality. “Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is.” Now we are saints not yet in glory, now we are saints who have the promise of resurrection. We are God’s children right now, at this very moment, possessors of an inheritance that Saint John hesitates to even try to describe in detail. Know, dear friends, that we will be like Christ, all the saints will imitate Him in His resurrection forever. We don’t see our inheritance with our physical eyes; the crown of glory and robes of Christ’s own blood-bought righteousness are invisible to us and to the world, and in fact what our eyes see is too often the opposite, but know that this inheritance belongs to you even now in this world of sin. And know what you will be: like Christ, seeing Him as He truly is to be seen, the glorified Son of God, enthroned in His splendor.

In this world, that reality is concealed, hidden from human eyes, but we have been given the very Word of the One who does not lie that this glory is ours, it is our possession right now because we are saints, because we have been called children of God, and thus we are. Jesus died for you and He rose for you, and He gives you a hope that is unshakable in this world of sin and death. “And everyone who thus hopes in Him purifies himself as He is pure.” All the saints are those who hope in Christ, those who have been given the promise, the sure and certain guarantee that they are children of God. All the saints are those who are pure, not because they are sinless, but because they are forgiven, because they have been cleansed by the blood of the Lamb, shed for them upon the altar of the cross. All the saints will imitate Christ: as His grave was left empty behind Him, so shall the graves of all the saints, including yours and mine, be.

The world doesn’t know all the saints. It doesn’t know how they could hunger no more, neither thirst anymore. It doesn’t know how the sun could not strike them, nor any scorching heat. It doesn’t know how graves could be opened and the dead could be raised incorruptible. The world doesn’t know the saints because it doesn’t know the Lamb. “For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and He will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” The slain Lamb will be our Shepherd, our Good Shepherd for eternity, shepherding all the saints to green pastures and quiet waters. In this world, you have mourning, but take heart, you will be comforted. In this world, you are poor in spirit, but take heart, you will receive the kingdom of heaven. In this world you are meek, but take heart, you will inherit the world. In this world, you hunger and thirst for righteousness, but take heart, you will be satisfied. In this world, you will be persecuted, but take heart, you will receive the kingdom of heaven. In this world, you are pure in heart through your baptism into Christ, and take heart, you will see God. You will see Him face to face, as the saints of old did, and you will see Your Savior as He is, for you will be like Him. You know this, this is your sure and certain hope; what the world doesn’t know, you do: you know your present identity as a child of God through your baptism into Christ, and you know your future reality reflecting the glory of Christ in imitation of Him. “And everyone who thus hopes in Him purifies himself as He is pure.” In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Saint Simon and Saint Jude (John 15:17-21)

“If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon as we commemorate the apostles Saint Simon and Saint Jude, is the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the fifteenth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint John. Dear friends in Christ: love one another, that is Jesus’ request, His command to all who will follow after Him. Love one another, for the world will give you only hatred. “These things I command you, so that you will love one another.” Love one another, bear one another’s burdens, sustain one another in the midst of a world that hates you all. You, dear friends, are Christ’s gifts to each other, given to love one another even unto death. Tradition has it that Saint Simon and Saint Jude, after having preached the Gospel in many and various places, journeyed together to Persia to proclaim the resurrection of Christ in that place, and there they were martyred together. “These things I command you,” Jesus said, “so that you love one another.” They loved one another as Christian brothers even unto death, they did not face the evil of this world on their own, but with the promise of Christ and the love of a brother Christian, they suffered even death for their Lord. They showed to each other the very love that Christ showed them, as they faced the very hatred that Christ endured.

We should not be surprised that the world hates us; it should come as no shock, no great mystery to those who have heard the Gospels, those who have read of Christ’s passion. “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.” Christ was sent into this world, to fallen humanity, not to destroy us, not to bring God’s judgment upon our heads, not to condemn us to hell. We were doing a good job of bringing God’s judgment upon us without Jesus’ help. Instead, He came as our Savior, to spare us from the judgment we deserved. He came to show us love, to love the unlovable, to comfort the mourning, to fill the hungry and thirsty with His righteousness, to give the meek and humble the inheritance of a cleansed and purified new heavens and new earth. He came to love. But the world showed Him only hatred. He came to raise this world out of the prison house of sin and death, and it delivered its redeemer to be scourged. He came to conquer this world’s enemies, and it delivered Him to those who persecuted Him. He fed this world with His Word and refreshed it with living water, and it gave Him gall and vinegar to drink.

But Christ did not despair. When He came to save, when He came in love, He found only hatred. But He did not for that reason give up His task of salvation, He did not at that moment change from a loving Savior to a wrathful destroyer, wiping humanity from the earth. He knew that the hatred of this world was not simply hatred of Him, but hatred of His Father. “They do not know Him who sent me.” Hatred of Jesus means hatred of God, hatred of the Creator. When they put Jesus to death, they were crucifying God, they were committing an incredible, almost unthinkable act of rebellion against their Creator. He came to give life, and they chose death, He came to deliver from hell, and this world desired the flames of judgment more than the glories of heaven. But Jesus didn’t for this reason give up on fallen man, He didn’t simply ascend into heaven and leave us to deal with our sin on our own. He submitted to the hatred of this world, He in humility delivered Himself into their murderous designs. He faced the blows, the scourge, the whip, and the cross because the hatred of this world did not diminish His love, and in love, He gave up His life into death for the sin of the world. He used the hatred of this world to save this world, to bring life and immortality to light.

Salvation has been won, despite and through the hatred of this world, but this world wants nothing to do with it; as it hated Jesus before and during His crucifixion, so they still hate Him after He has been raised. And in its hatred, this world will die eternally for sin that has been paid for and forgiven, it will face the judgement from which it has been released. In self-destructive hatred, this world will remain on death row when the doors have been burst open. But from the mass of hatred that fills this world, His Gospel call goes out, and many believe. He chose you out of this world, a world destined for destruction, when He preached the Gospel to you, when He baptized you into His Name. Rejoice, dear friends, rejoice in the hatred of the world. Rejoice that the world hates you, because if you belonged to this world, it would show you only love. “If you were of this world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” Dear friends, if the world loved you, you would have the same destination as the world: hell. But because the world hates you, rejoice, for you are not of the world. You are loved by Christ, and He chose you out of this world, so that you will not have this world’s destiny, or its penalty.

Do not despair, do not become callous. When the Gospel is met with indifference, with apathy, or with murderous hatred, we are tempted to give up. Indeed, that is precisely what the world is earnestly desiring. It wants you to give up, to go home, to be quiet and to speak no longer in Christ’s Name. But if Christ had done that, you and I would be lost. If He would’ve left this world when He faced its hatred instead of going the cross, you and I would still be in our sins. If He would’ve taken His Church out of this world when she was sorely attacked again and again, you and I would never have been baptized, or heard of the forgiveness of our sins, so that we, by the power of the Holy Spirit, would believe. Do not lose hope, do not cease speaking of Christ, do not stop doing good to your neighbor, for you bear the hatred of the world for the sake of Christ. “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.” If your proclamation and service brings forth one believing neighbor, or even if you manage to raise one believing child, rejoice. And if you see more fruit than that, count yourself especially blessed. “Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my Word, they will also keep yours.” The one who strikes the Master will not show kindness to the servant; the Head cannot wear a crown of thorns while the body reclines in comfort and luxury. This world is not persecuting you, it is persecuting Christ. Let it scorn and sneer today, let it rage all it wants. Let this world take everything from us, even our lives. The day will come when it discovers what its fate and what ours will be. We know what our verdict is, but on that Day, the world will hear an unbearable sentence.

The love the world shows its own is fleeting; it will all evaporate on that terrible and glorious Day. The love that Christ’s shows you is eternal, it even reaches beyond the grave, and no one or nothing can take it away from you. The world did not conquer Christ; He rose again in victory on the third day, unable to be contained even by the grave, and neither will this world conquer you. His love is indestructible. And it is that same love that we are to show to one another. “These things I command you, so that you will love one another.” We do not love one another as the world loves its own; we love one another as Christ loves us. We love one another because if the world hates us, and Christ promises us that it will, then we need the mutual conversation and consolation of one another to help us to endure. That is one important reason why we gather together in congregations, why we assemble as a group in worship. Christ does not choose out from the world any ‘free agent Christians,’ but He puts us in community, for the good of one another. You are certainly in worship first and foremost to receive the gifts of Christ, but you are also here for each other. And living in the love of Christ means you are forgiven when you fail to show love to one another, and that you forgive others when their love fails. You are here to love one another, even, if necessary, like Saint Simon and Saint Jude, unto death. “These things I command you, so that you will love one another.” The world shows hatred, we show love, the very love of Christ Himself. In His Name, Amen.

Trinity 21 (Genesis1:1-2:3)

“Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning is that portion of our Old Testament lesson just read, from Genesis chapter one. Dear friends in Christ: Who is man? The top of the food chain, say some, the pinnacle of evolution, and only getting better. A parasite, say others, sucking up the resources of this planet without contributing anything to its health. Man is the problem, they claim, the root and cause of ecological disaster, who poisons the water with his refuse and drives other species to extinction. The best thing for this planet, say some, would be for humans to decrease dramatically, to quit reproducing, or perhaps even go away. You can hear from those who are hoping for a repeat of the Black Plague: man is a scourge and a curse.

Who is man? Evolution’s greatest accomplishment or evolution’s great disaster? Neither, says God. “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” Man is unique, created in a way that is different than any other creature, for no other creature is made in the image and likeness of God. No other creature is made to have such intimate fellowship with God. Man is created to relate to God, to communicate with Him, to have a will that is perfectly aligned with that of God. And because of this unique relationship with God, man has a special task over all of creation: “Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” Man, the very image of God, reflects God to His creation as His representative. Man is created in the image and likeness of God to relate to God, to relate to creation, and to relate one to another as male and female. “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”

Together as male and female, man is made in the image of God. Together as male and female, man is to exercise dominion. In fact, the relationship between male and female is absolutely essential to the command to have dominion over this earth. “And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’” Together as male and female, man is to fill the earth because as God’s representatives, their dominion over all creation is to be extended to the corners of the earth. That is why it is not good for the man to be alone; he needed a helper fit for him to be fruitful and multiply, he needed a helper to fulfill this great task. God’s love for His creation is to be extended over this entire planet through means, by those He has created in His image and likeness. They are to provide for this creation and protect it, using it for their good as a gift from God Himself.

But something happened before man had the opportunity to be fruitful even once, before man had filled any more of this earth than a garden: sin. Man fell, together as male and female, as Eve was deceived and gave the fruit to her husband, and he ate. They who were already in the image and likeness of God tried to be like God and ended up only being like the devil. The image of God was lost; no longer did man reflect God’s righteousness, His holiness. And at that moment, man’s dominion over creation was changed; changed, not abolished. Man, including you and me, sons and daughters of Adam and Eve, are still to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it,” but this will no longer be a task of joy. God said to Adam, “Cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you.”

Creation will rebel against our every attempt to make it fruitful. Hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods, viruses and bacteria, famine and drought will all work against us, and try to destroy us. No more harmony, no more peace. The harmonious relationship between male and female is now a source of strife, the love that man was to have for woman, and woman for man, to be fruitful and multiply, is corrupted and perverted in a multitude of ways; the very distinction between male and female will be confused. And even when male and female do come together to fulfill the creation mandate, infertility will too often intervene, children will even die in the womb.

But do not begin to think, dear friends, that it is only the creation over which we are to rule that is corrupted by the effects of our sin. We, too, who have been given dominion over this creation, are also corrupted by sin; we rebel against the mandate given in the garden. Much more often than wombs become barren because of sin, we make ourselves unfruitful by artificial means. As often as children die in the womb because of sin, we put unborn children to death for any reason. We sinfully and in rebellion against our Creator disdain the command to “be fruitful and multiply,” perverting the natural attraction between male and female into a recreational activity for our own pleasure. And when that natural attraction is perverted because of sin, when even the distinction between male and female is confused, we do not call to repentance, we do not bring help, we give affirmation; in the name of tolerance and ‘love’ we endorse perversion. And our rule over creation is little better. We exploit this creation, we use it with no thought for our children, or the rest of the creatures over which we have been given dominion. Our rule is concerned only with our own good, our own bellies; we act more like we have a right to do what we want, than as those who have been given a mandate to reflect God’s love to His creation, as those who have been given this creation as a gift for our good and the good of our neighbor.

The image of God has been lost, and we can’t get it back. Only God could restore it, and He promised that He would, saying to the serpent: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” The creation mandate is still vitally important; for God promised that the command to “be fruitful and multiply” would bring forth a Savior, a Deliverer, the Offspring of a woman who would finally bruise the head of the serpent, destroying sin and death forever. This Offspring of a woman, brought into this world to bring an end to the curse, is none other than God Himself in the flesh, Jesus Christ. He comes to do what we in our sin are unable to: restore the image of God in us by destroying sin, putting our sin and this rebellious creation into submission. This Messiah, Jesus Christ, demonstrates His authority over creation as He does signs and wonders, healing once again in our Gospel lesson, exercising the kind of dominion that has been lost to us. But this is all preliminary to the cross, where the serpent will bruise His heel, putting Him to death, and He will bruise the serpent’s head, triumphing over him so completely that not even the grave could hold Him captive.

In the book of Micah, the work of the coming Messiah is described in this way: “He will again have compassion on us; He will tread our iniquities underfoot. You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea.” You were in the bondage of sin, in rebellion against the very commands that God gave to your first parents, with the image of God lost due to sin, you were separated from your Creator. But Jesus Christ came to have compassion on you; He came to tread your iniquities underfoot as he bruised the serpent’s head on your behalf, dying on the cross for you, bearing your sins. He came to cast all those sins into the depths of the sea, as He plunged your head beneath the baptismal waters. He redeemed you from your sin, paying the price, so that you are restored to fellowship with your God, with the promise that one day the sinful nature will be completely eradicated and the fully restored image of God will reflect His glory forever.

Who is man? A parasite? A curse? An invasive species? No, none of those things. Who is man? Created in the image of God. Made to have dominion, to reflect God’s love and rule over all creation. A sinner, who lost it all. Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. Redeemed to have fellowship with God. Redeemed to have fellowship with one another. Redeemed to have dominion over this creation. The solution to the perversions of God’s good creation that we see all around us, from the abuse of the natural world to the confusion of male and female, is a return by Christians to the mandate of creation: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it.” The wolf has no capacity to steward creation; he simply wants his next meal, and would eat the land barren if he had his choice; the atheist has no mandate from God to care for creation, for he’s already won the game of natural selection. Only Christians, restored to their Creator by Christ, sent forth by the mandate of creation, being fruitful and multiplying by having children and spreading the Gospel to the ends of the earth, can truly have dominion over creation, for that is God’s gift and his mandate, carried forth imperfectly in this world, and fully restored in the new heavens and the new earth, where we will dwell in glory, harmony, and dominion, forever and ever. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Trinity 19 (Genesis 28:10-17)

“And he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending upon it.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning is the Old Testament lesson read a few moments ago from the twenty-eighth chapter of the book of Genesis. Dear friends in Christ: Jacob saw a ladder. For a moment, heaven and earth, linked together. In a dream, the barrier between God and man, abolished. For a brief space of time, the division between Creator and creation, healed. At that instant. every obstacle between a holy and righteous God and His sinful people, removed, so that a highway could be established between the throne room of God and the dwelling place of man. Jacob saw a ladder, the angels of God ascending and descending upon it; he saw a glorious picture, one that could not be further from what he would see when he awoke.

Jacob wasn’t lying on a lavish bed in the tent of his father, he wasn’t sojourning in a rich man’s house as an honored guest. He was an exile, an outcast, alone and on the run, lying on a pillow of stone. “Jacob left Beersheba and went toward Haran. And he came to a certain place and stayed there that night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of that place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place to sleep.” Why did he leave Beersheba, why is he going to Haran? Why does he use a stone for a pillow? He’s fleeing the rage of his brother Esau. He and his mother tricked father Isaac, they seized the blessing that God had promised to Jacob even from the womb, and now Jacob must escape the rage of Esau, who had something stolen that was never to be rightfully his. Jacob heard the Word of blessing from his father, no matter how deceptive the circumstances were; he heard that he would receive the inheritance, that he would rule over his brother, that any who cursed him would be cursed, that any who blessed him would be blessed. But that is not what he sees. He sees an exile and outcast; he who was to inherit the tents of Isaac, driven from them. The promises of God through his father seem very hollow now, they don’t seem to have anything to do with reality.

He sleeps the sleep of misery, the sleep of doubt. God has promised so much, but He hasn’t delivered. Jacob’s life is considerably worse than it was before he received the blessing. Maybe the words he heard weren’t worth much, maybe God wasn’t really speaking through Isaac his father, maybe God is a deceiver himself, who promises much but never delivers. Maybe He doesn’t really care for Jacob, as He said, or maybe He isn’t really there in the first place. But then Jacob goes to sleep. “And he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven.” Jacob sees a ladder, and from that ladder, God speaks. “Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.” The promise given to Abraham, the promise given to Isaac, the same promise given to Adam and Eve, is now given to Jacob. In his offspring shall the world be blessed; it would be his descendant who would crush the serpent’s head. And for that reason, for the sake of his offspring, Jacob now has the assurance that he is not alone. The promises of God go with him, not for his own sake, not because he deserves it, but for the sake of the Messiah whose blood runs in his veins. “Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land. For I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

Then he awakes. The vision is gone; it was only a dream. Only a dream, yes, but much more than a dream: a dream that brought to Jacob the very Word of God. He looks around him, and seemingly nothing has changed. He’s still an exile and outcast, he’s still lying on a stone pillow. But in fact, everything has changed. He is no longer alone; the God of his fathers is with him. He is no longer without hope; God has affirmed His promise, He has proclaimed to him a reality that will remain true despite the danger that lies behind and the trials that are ahead. And he has learned something very important: in the midst of an evil country, on the run and surrounded by enemies, even there is the house of God. He cries out, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it… How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!” The house of God is not where it is safe, where there are no problems, only prosperity; the house of God is in the midst of devils, surrounded by enemies.

The house of God is there because that is where you dwell, with Jacob, resting on stones, pursued by enemies, with no sign of blessing around you. You hear the Word of God, giving to you great and various promises. It all sounds very impressive, promises like: ‘I AM with you; I love you; I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ You go into the world with the blessing of Almighty God ringing in your ears: “The Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you. The Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace.” You hear these words, these great promises of God, declaring great things to you, but as you walk through this life, they start to ring hollow. If God really loves me, if He is really with me, why is my life so miserable, why do I get only sadness? Why do my friends abandon me, betray me? Why did my child die, why did my mother leave, why am I struck with this disease when I should have so many more good years to live? Maybe the words we hear don’t mean much, maybe God wasn’t really speaking through the pastor, maybe God is a deceiver himself, who promises much but never delivers. Maybe He doesn’t really care for me, as He said, or maybe He isn’t really there in the first place. Maybe the promises are all lies.

But then we gather in the place to hear again the Word of God. “And [Jacob] dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it!” The dream of Jacob was given for your sake; it is God’s gift to you. As it reassured him so long ago, affirming God’s promises to him, despite all that he saw, so it does the same to you today. Jacob’s ladder is the promise that one of his offspring, one chosen descendent, would link together earth and heaven, He would reconcile God and man. He would do this by being both God and man, by placing Himself between earth and heaven on the cross, linking the two by His blood, shed for the sin of the world. Jesus tells Nathanael, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.” They ascend and descend to gaze with wonder at the mystery that is incomprehensible, that is for your salvation. They lift up their eyes and see the glory and majesty of God above them. They look down, and they see that same Divine Majesty subject to the violence of men. The highest is the lowest, the lowest is the highest. The God of God and Lord of Lords has been made the lowest creature, subject to death, even death upon the cross. The highest and the lowest are completely united in one and the same Person, Jesus, the highest God nailed to the cross. There, suspended between earth and heaven, the Son of Man, Jesus the Offspring of Jacob joins heaven and earth together, there the promise given to Jacob is fulfilled. “In you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.”

This is the reality that God’s Word proclaims to you this day, and every day that you gather here, that Jesus has linked together earth and heaven, that your every sin is forgiven and your inheritance is heaven itself. Jesus and His cross abolishes every barrier between you and your God. Jacob saw a ladder, we see the cross, but they are one and the same, they proclaim the same reality, to Jacob in prophecy, to you and me now fulfilled. This reality is true despite all the evil that enters your life, it is greater than anything that might happen to you in this world of sin. We walk by faith, not by sight. Martin Luther wrote: “This is the constant course of the church at all times, namely, that promises are made and that then those who believe the promises are treated in such a way that they are compelled to wait for things that are invisible, to believe what they do not see, and to hope for what does not appear. He who does not do this is not a Christian. For Christ Himself entered into His glory only by first descending into hell. When He is about to reign, He is crucified. When He is to be glorified, He is spit on. For He must suffer first and then at length be glorified.” And having heard of this reality, proclaimed to us by God’s holy Word here in this place, we have learned the same lesson that Jacob did: God establishes His house in a land of enemies, in the midst of devils, to reassure you, to continually remind you of the promise, despite all that appear contrary. “I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

Jacob saw a ladder, we see the cross. For eternity, heaven and earth, linked together. In living reality, the barrier between God and man, abolished. Forever, the division between Creator and creation, healed. At every moment until time ends, and then where time is no more, every obstacle between a holy and righteous God and His sinful people, removed, a highway established between the throne room of God and the dwelling place of man. Jacob saw a ladder, we see the cross, but it gives us the same promise as we gather here: “This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” Where the cross is proclaimed, that place is the house of God, that place is the gate of heaven, and that, dear friends, is where you dwell right now. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Friday, September 30, 2016

The 125th Anniversary of Saint John's Lutheran Church, Kiron, Iowa (Luke 16:19-31)

“‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.’” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning, the 125th anniversary of Saint John’s Lutheran Church in Kiron, Iowa, is the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the sixteenth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Luke. Dear friends in Christ, in death as well as in life, the rich man had no regard for the Word of God. It was in no way sufficient for him, and he suspected that it would not be sufficient for anyone else. What he understood was the language of power, the voice of money, his wealth and prosperity that made his life worth living. His eyes told him what was important, what would impress, and even in hell, having left all of his wealth behind him on this earth, he remains a theologian of glory. There, all he understood was the wonder of miracles, great signs and wonders that could convince any stubborn heart. On this earth, he trusted in his money; he thought that his wealth showed him (and everyone else) that God favored him, that God had blessed him. In hell, his money is gone, but he still trusts in appearances, he still relies on the big show. Only a miracle will bring his brothers to faith—this he knows. And so the strongest words spoken in our text are against the Word: “No, father Abraham!”

The Word is not sufficient; it doesn’t work, it can’t work. Wealth and miracles, power and signs, influence and wonders, those are the only things that can do any good. “No, father Abraham!” Who puts their trust in the Word, anyway? What can the Word alone possibly do that money cannot buy, that miracles can’t achieve? The church of the rich man takes great pride in beautiful buildings, the church of the rich man rejoices in schools that are bursting, the church of the rich man boasts about fancy sound systems and professional quality music. The church of the rich man dresses its pastor in a thousand-dollar suit, the church of the rich man gives him a brand new car and a massive house, the church of the rich man carves the pastor’s name in stone on the sign. The church of the rich man sits in a prominent neighborhood in a major city, the church of the rich man is well-known and respected in the community, the church of the rich man has successful businessmen and trusted politicians on its rolls. Trust in the Word? “No, father Abraham!” Trust in full pews, and full offering plates, trust in the power and influence of the Church upon the world. Trust in what your eyes see.

The church of the rich man has great optimism, the church of the rich man promises miracles, increase, prosperity. The church of the rich man declares that if you pray enough, that if you believe hard enough, that if you give enough, great things will happen. God will act. Miracles will come. That is how you know if your congregation is healthy and thriving, by the wonders you see, the blessings rolling in. In the church of the rich man, your own personal wealth, your own personal success, your own personal health is a sign that God is working in your midst, that God is actually present when you gather for worship. The church of the rich man has success stories left and right, the church of the rich man can point to numerous miracles, the church of the rich man has full pews and full offering plates because the church of the rich man can promise you both health and wealth. Trust the Word? “No, father Abraham!” Trust in full bank accounts, and full health, trust in prosperity promised and delivered. Trust what your eyes see.

But that’s the problem, isn’t it? What do your eyes see? Your eyes don’t see full pews, except for today, they don’t see full offering plates. Your eyes see rural areas emptying out, your eyes see fewer and fewer children getting on the bus. Your eyes see a former pastor, wearing the same suit and driving the same car as he did before—the only thing that has changed on both is the miles. Your eyes see a congregation that won’t make the news, that in the grand scheme of things seems pretty insignificant and out of the way, far from power and influence. Your eyes look at your own life, and you see bills that need to be paid, appliances and vehicles that will need to be replaced, you see failing health, you remember those whom God didn’t heal. Your attendance at worship, your prayers and your faith, they haven’s seemed to accomplish much. The church of the rich man seems mighty impressive next to St. John’s Lutheran Church in Kiron. Even 125 years doesn’t seem too impressive when you compare it with the church of the rich man; they celebrate ten years with much more fanfare. You look at your history, you page through the memory books or look at confirmation pictures, and it often seems that the glory days are far in the past, they have passed by, today seems in some ways to be only a day for nostalgia, for sighing about what used to be.

Is the Word enough, is it sufficient? “No, father Abraham!” we cry. Give me a sign and a wonder, give me some health and wealth, bless this place, make the pews and offering plate burst! Then we will know that God is with us, then we will know that God cares for us. “No, father Abraham!” But father Abraham will not give us what we want, the things the rich man lived on. Instead, he gives us the Word. “If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.” Take comfort, my child, father Abraham tells us, God’s Word is sufficient for you. Do you want wealth? Your congregation is immeasurably rich, for St. John’s Lutheran Church in Kiron, Iowa has the treasure of the Word, a treasure that will never run out, a wealth that this world cannot understand or have, the treasure that the church of the rich man forgot, to his sorrow.

Here, in this place, humble as it may be next to the church of the rich man, the greatest treasure that this world has ever known is given freely to you who gather. Here, in this place, the forgiveness of sins is poured out on you, a treasure that no money can buy, a pile of wealth that cannot be found anywhere but where Christ’s Word is proclaimed. This is the only wealth, the only treasure, the only inheritance that goes beyond the grave, for this treasure actually defeats death. And it is found here, in this place, on Sunday mornings; this place, along with all other places where this Word is purely preached, is the most important piece of real estate on the planet and it has been, for 125 years. For in this place Jesus is proclaimed, the same Jesus who spoke this parable, the same Jesus who was going to the cross bearing upon His shoulders all the sins of the world.

Do you want miracles? Someone did rise from the dead, Jesus Christ, the crucified One, the One who gave His life into death for the life of the world. The Word is sufficient for you because it proclaims to you the only miracle that matters, the only miracle you’ve been promised, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. You need no other miracles, for this miracle gives us all that you need. Jesus rose from the dead to pour out forgiveness, life, and salvation into every corner of our world, that His name may go forth in every century, to every tribe, nation, and language. Jesus rose from the dead to raise you from the dead, to give you the promise and the guarantee that your destination is the same as Lazarus. “The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side.” As I stand here again in this familiar pulpit, I am reminded of the dear saints who have been carried to Abraham’s side, who we commended to Abraham’s side here in this very sanctuary. That is the reason this congregation exists, to shepherd Christ’s flock through the turmoil of this life to the side of Abraham. This place is here because our world is dangerous, and Satan wants to shipwreck the faith of all the baptized; you need the Church to bring you the Word and Sacraments, which alone can keep you in the faith.

It doesn’t matter how impressive your church looks before the world; it doesn’t matter what the weekly attendance or offering is. What matters is the Word, and the Word alone. A faithful congregation is more vital to this dying world than any church of the rich man, and no faithful congregation is greater than another, no matter how much they differ by any outward measure. Each one is an outpost of the Gospel, a place where people gather to hear God’s Word, where the Word is sufficient for them, because the Word brings them Jesus, the Word gives them the promise of the side of Abraham. Each congregation, each Christian, is Lazarus: looked down upon by the world, covered in suffering and struggles, but given the promise of the banquet of heaven, the guarantee that one day they will rest at the side of Abraham. Appearances are deceiving. We do not trust what our eyes see, or else we become like the rich man, who even in hell was still a theologian of glory, who still put his faith in great signs and wonders. We trust what our ears hear: the Word, which proclaims to us a God who loved the world in this way, that He sent His only Son to suffer and die, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.

For 125 years, this congregation has been a beacon of hope, an outpost of the Gospel, an embassy of the kingdom of God in a foreign land. For 125 years the Word has been proclaimed in this congregation, in two different locations, by 10 different pastors, three of whom are with you today. At this font, countless children have been baptized into the faith, the Word has been joined with water to put to death the sinful man and raise up the new man to live before God in righteousness and purity forever. In this congregation, the very Body and precious Blood of Jesus has been put into the mouths of His saints. This is what we celebrate this day: the faithfulness of a God who put Saint John’s Lutheran Church in Kiron, Iowa to deliver His Word to people in desperate need of it. The Lord gave you this congregation; it is His gift to you, and a quick stroll through the cemetery, to learn the names of all those resting in the bosom of Abraham, tells you that you are not alone, that on the Last Day, there will be many who will rejoice that God used this congregation to bring them to the side of Abraham. Yes, father Abraham, the Word is sufficient for us, it is enough, because it gives us everything. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Trinity 17 (Luke 14:1-11)

“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. What does this mean? We should fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning is the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the fourteenth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Luke. Dear friends in Christ: on the seventh day, God created rest. “And on the seventh day God finished His work that He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work that He had done.” He did not rest for His own sake, for God needs no rest, even after creating all there is. He rested for our sake. “So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all His work that He had done in creation.” Rest on the seventh day, the Sabbath day—called the ‘Sabbath’ from the Hebrew word for ‘rest’—was God’s gift to His people, and it was to be zealously guarded. “Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates.” Pharisees are the kind of people tailor-made to guard the statutes of God; they delight in following what God commands to the letter, they rejoice to show the world how they keep His Law.

“One Sabbath, when [Jesus] went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching Him carefully.” Pharisees build great hedges around the law, pages and pages of legal codes that keep anyone from getting anywhere close to violating the commandment. Pharisees watch others carefully, for rules and regulations are what make the Sabbath for them; they demonstrate how to keep the Sabbath properly and condemn those who don’t measure up. For Pharisees, the Sabbath is about the show, it is about watching yourself carefully, it is about showing others that you are obedient, so that your life is a rebuke to those who are not so scrupulous. The Sabbath is a day for doing what is expected, for keeping up appearances, for making sure others see just how obedient a Pharisee can be, and calling out those who are not so careful.

Pharisees like us come to worship, we go through the motions, we do what is required. Pharisees like us keep up appearances, we make sure that others see us in the pew, but our hearts and our minds are far away. Pharisees like us despise God’s Word, we ignore it, we criticize it, we don’t hear it gladly. Pharisees like us are bored with God’s Word, we can’t wait until we’ve left this place to do something, anything else. Pharisees like us don’t concern ourselves with what is taught, what is proclaimed, only with what is expected. Pharisees like us gladly listen to false doctrine, we drink in false teaching, because it tickles our itching ears, it tells us what we want to hear. Pharisees like us haven’t bothered to learn enough to identify and flee from false teaching, and so we follow every whim and fancy of the culture or popular Christian literature.

Pharisees like us leave worship unchanged, silent; instead of praising God for what He has given there, we thank God that it is over. Pharisees like us pass ourselves off as zealous, devout, and faithful Christians on Sunday morning, but the rest of the week we live like the pagans around us. Pharisees like us are unchanged by the Word, but we still think we have done our duty, our work for God. Pharisees like us gain no knowledge of God’s Word; we leave each year with as little understanding of God’s holy Word as we did when we entered it. Pharisees like us don’t take the Word of God into our home; we fulfill our expectations, we get ourselves and our families into the pew or into the classroom, but we don’t pray, we don’t read the Scriptures, we don’t have devotions. Then Pharisees like us wonder why our young people leave the church.

Pharisees like us are not here to listen to the Word of God, we are here to keep up appearances, to fulfill our external duties. For first century Pharisees, it was refraining from work, scrupulously avoiding labor of any kind. For twenty-first century Pharisees, we have long ago given up the concept of keeping the Sabbath by avoiding work. Instead of a day without work, it is a couple hours ‘resting’ in a pew. If you have done that, then you have done your Sabbath duty. Pharisees like us certainly have kept the outward forms of the Sabbath, we come to church (usually), but our hearts are still hardened.

Jesus knows Pharisees like us; He knows us better than we know ourselves. And so He comes into our legalistic, outward-focused Sabbath in order to teach us how it truly is kept. “And behold, there was a man before Him who had dropsy. And Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, ‘Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?’” He responds to those who watch, even though no one has said anything. He knows the hearts of Pharisees like us, Pharisees focused on externals, intent on simply making sure the appropriate strictures are followed, and then the Sabbath is fulfilled. But the Sabbath is not fulfilled by following Pharisaical rules. “He took him and healed him and sent him away. And He said to them, ‘Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?’”

Jesus holds the Sabbath day sacred by making it a day for healing. He holds the Sabbath day sacred by making it a day for mercy. Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath? Yes! The Sabbath is a day for healing, a day for mercy, a day for Jesus to show love to His afflicted people. Jesus makes the Sabbath day a day for Him to give release to the prisoners, sight to the blind. He holds the Sabbath day sacred because it is the day on which He will heal the wounds of His people. The Sabbath is not about avoiding work, but being healed by Jesus. The Pharisees cannot see it, for they think they are well. But this man with dropsy leaves their midst restored, while they remain sick with sin. Outwardly, Pharisees like us are healthy; inwardly, we are deathly sick. Repent dear friends, repent of your misuse of the Sabbath, admit your sickness, your desperate need for restoration, for Jesus came precisely to heal us.

“Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on the Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” Jesus came upon us in our sin and iniquity, trapped in a well, with no way out; only death could be our share. And on the eve of the Sabbath, on Good Friday, He rescued us, He did not hesitate. Most people rescue a trapped person or animal by tossing down a rope and remaining safely on the surface. Jesus refused to save His own life, but jumped into the well with us and then heaved us out, leaving Himself behind in our place. There in that well, our tomb, He observed the Sabbath rest, spending the Sabbath beneath the ground. But on the third day He pulled Himself out of the well, rising victoriously from the grave, triumphant over death, having delivered us from every bond that held us. Jesus fulfills the Sabbath by resting fully and completely, the rest of salvation, sanctifying our own rest in the tomb. And when He rose from that rest, the Sabbath was fulfilled in salvation, and Jesus sanctified every day since as a day to hear of His salvation, a day to receive His gifts, the eighth day that will last forever, until it is fulfilled in our own resurrection day. Our Sabbath, our rest, is now every day, every day since Easter is a holy day, a Sabbath, and most especially those days that the congregation gathers around the gifts of Christ, assembled before altar, pulpit, and font. There Christ gives His healing, He gives true rest to forgiven Pharisees like us.

That is the gift of the Sabbath; Jesus has fulfilled its promise, He has finally made it complete. The rest of the Sabbath day was never meant to be an end in itself but it, was meant to be a taste of the rest that is yet to come, the rest that Christ won for us by His three-day rest in the tomb. That is what your eternity will be: an eternal Sabbath day, a never-ending day of rest, set aside for fellowship with your God, set aside to dwell in His presence. And so now, every Sabbath day, that is, every day since Easter, is a time for Jesus to heal us, to call us to repentance and cleanse us of our sin by His blood-bought gifts. That is what the Sabbath is all about—Jesus healing sinners, Pharisees like you and me.

So the Sabbath is not about avoiding work; it isn’t about following Pharisaical rules, keeping up appearances. Pharisees major in the minors; they observe what is incidental on the Sabbath while neglecting what is vital. What does Luther teach us about the Sabbath day? “We should fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.” The Sabbath is not kept simply by doing no work, or by simply being in the pew, although you certainly are violating the Sabbath command if you avoid the pew. The Sabbath is kept by gladly hearing and learning the Word of God. That is what the rest is for, that is why you are in the pew: to hear God’s Word. The rest of the Sabbath is meant to serve the Word.

How do we keep the Sabbath day? By gladly hearing and learning God’s Word, wherever and whenever it is read or proclaimed. By letting the Word fill your home, sanctifying each day with prayer and the Scriptures. The Sabbath rest of every day flows from the Sabbath rest of the Divine Service. Your pastors are here to help you in that task. We know that a prayer and devotional life is not easy, that it isn’t easy to raise your children in the fear and admonition of the Lord, and so we are here as your resources, to help you in this great task. How do we keep the Sabbath day? Not by doing or not doing, but by receiving. By taking time for rest during your week, coming to this place to receive all that Christ has to give: healing of our sin-sick souls, victory over death, His very Word which is the bread of life, and His Body and His Blood under bread and wine, the manna of heaven, the food of immortality. Here He gives you rest, the rest that you need, the rest that will never end, for here Jesus takes you, heals you, and sends you away, to dwell in perfect rest, forever. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.