Holy Cross Day (Numbers 21:4-9)

“Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning comes from Numbers, the twenty-first chapter. Dear friends in Christ, as most of you know, I come from Nebraska, which is just a bit west of here. I would guess that fewer of you know that the land I live on, that great expanse of prairie running through the middle of our country, was called by an interesting name when explorers first arrived. Many called it the “Great American Desert,” a term that seemed very appropriate for a treeless, dry land that had little evidence of ever becoming fertile. Of course, the story ends with Nebraska and her sister states becoming some of the most productive agricultural states in the union, and so when I am home I can look out over fields of green corn and beans and remind myself that I am standing in the ‘Great American Desert.’ I would think that deserts are something that many people in New York probably have little direct experience with. It is hard to imagine what the Israelites had to go through in our text when we look at all the bounty that our land can produce, with our beautiful tree-covered hills and fertile valleys. Because of this, we can often look down on the Israelites when we read texts like our Old Testament lesson for today. We don’t realize that Israel had been walking in circles for decades, Miriam and Aaron had just died, and they had been refused passage by a nation that should be a brother, the people of Edom. And now they looked forward to traveling around Edom in a punishing desert, where food and water would be scarce.

Our text for today tells us: “From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. And the people spoke against God and against Moses, ‘Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.’” When we see this text in the context of what Israel had been through lately, we can perhaps understand why they became impatient and complained. In fact, those reasons are quite major compared to the things that drive us to complain. We are a part of a culture that is increasingly impatient and negative. I think all you have to do to realize that is to drive on the highway sometime. Everyone is in a hurry to get somewhere, and we often don’t care who we push out of our way. Even if you are not a rude driver, you must admit that impatience creeps into your thoughts and words and you drive, I know they do for me. And even when we arrive at our destination, we can create an atmosphere of complaining and negativity that colors everything we do. Humans love to complain, and we love to complain in groups. We want a sympathetic ear, someone to share our misery with us. Just as Jesus says in Matthew: “Wherever two or three are gathered, there will be complaining.” Oh, I don’t think that’s the right quotation, but I think you understand what I mean. We complain about the weather, too hot, too cold. We complain about work, too many hours, too little pay. We complain about our family, friends, neighbors, and classmates. We have this remarkable talent for turning anything into a negative, and we do this very, very well. My favorite one, and this is one that I fall into very often, is to complain about negative people. How much more hypocritical can we get! Perhaps some of you even fell into that trap as I talked about complainers- “Go get, ‘em, Vicar! I hate complainers!”

The bottom line on complaining and impatience is that when we do this, we are forgetting all the good things that God has blessed us with. If Israel had much more to complain about than us, they also had much more to thank God for. They had been delivered from the tyranny of the Egyptians, freed from the bonds of slavery through the mighty acts of God. He had preserved them, given to them His Law as His own chosen people, and fed them in the desert. Why would He abandon them now? God is a provider, and He had quite a track-record of supplying His children throughout their desert journey. The last time that Israel had complained, God had simply provided, bringing water from a rock. This time, however, God’s anger and wrath overflowed. “Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died.” They received their punishment in the terror of a plague of snakes, something that makes our skin crawl. But this was not the only punishment they deserved. Israel only was an example of the sin and rebellion that all of our complaining and impatience demonstrates. We rejected God’s good gifts of a beautiful creation and a life lived in communion with Him. Instead we chose the path of rebellion, and the story is played out in every generation since Adam and Eve- God gives His good gifts and we complain. Our complaint is simply the surface result of a much deeper rebellion against God, a rebellion that only deserves death, not only temporal death, but eternal death.

Faced with this terrible verdict, what are we to do? We cannot see our punishment coming at us as an Israelite saw the viper before it struck, but we still know that it is all we deserve. We can only cry out with Israel: “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord, that He take away the serpents from us.” This is called repentance, when we acknowledge our sinful rebellion and beg for forgiveness. God is calling you to repentance today for all of your complaining despite all of His good gifts to you. But being sorry is not enough- we need restoration and salvation. Fortunately for us, as in our text for today, God did not only provide the punishment, He also provided the means of restoration, of salvation.

“And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” God did not choose serpents to punish and restore Israel on a whim, simply because He had used spiders last week. Serpents are used in the Scriptures to describe Israel’s enemies, or as a picture of judgment. Why is this? Because it was the serpent that Satan chose as his instrument to entice Adam and Eve into sin. From that point on, serpents have had a sinister character, and whenever they appear, trouble comes with them. We could say that the serpent is the embodiment of sin, bringing with it a reminder of how humanity lost all the good things God gave to it in creation. God sent this very embodiment of sin to punish His chosen people, but now the serpent became the instrument of salvation and restoration. The very embodiment of sin was lifted up and displayed above them. Sin was lifted high, and in looking at it, the Israelites had healing. But even if the serpent on a pole could remove the scourge of the fiery serpents, it could not remove the scourge of sin. For that Israel and all of creation would have to wait. But when the time had fully come, sin was once again lifted high, and because sin was lifted high, all people have forgiveness and salvation. When Jesus Christ stepped forth from the waters of the Jordan River, having been baptized in a river where people washed away their sins, He rose up as THE sinner, the true embodiment of sin here on earth. As He walked the dusty roads of Palestine, He continued to take on our sins, our weaknesses, our diseases. Even though He had no sin of His own, He became THE sinner because He took on all of your sin, taking to the cross. As the bronze serpent, that embodiment of sin, was raised high over the Israelites, so Christ, the true and perfect embodiment of all your sin, was raised high over a sinful world. As Jesus said in our Gospel lesson, “Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”

Moses followed the Lord’s instructions, and God worked through the serpent placed on a pole, just as He had promised. “So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.” The Israelites who faced the just punishment for their sins simply looked toward the embodiment of sin lifted high, and they lived. Healing and restoration came to them through the means that God appointed, and He kept His promise. But this would only be a foretaste of the restoration to come. Our Gospel text for this morning begins with some Greeks asking the disciples, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Jesus goes on throughout the text to tell them that they will only truly see Him when He is accomplishing salvation on the cross. As the Israelites looked to the bronze snake for salvation, so we look to Christ on the cross for our salvation, because it is there that God Himself provided the payment to satisfy His own wrath over your sin, especially your rebellion and complaining despite all of His good gifts. Through the cross, God has promised to forgive and restore you, and the proof of that came on Easter Sunday, when He raised Christ from the dead, just as He will raise you someday. Look to the cross for your comfort, look to the cross for your assurance, look to the cross for your salvation! For there you see Jesus, the embodiment of your sin paying the price that you owed to God. We rejoice this day and every day that God’s love sent Christ to the cross!

It is especially on this day, Holy Cross Day, that we focus on that instrument through which Christ accomplished our salvation. In our Gradual for this morning, we heard God say, “Behold, I will lift up my hand to the nations, and raise my signal to the peoples, So must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him might have eternal life.” It is on the cross that Christ won the victory, conquering all that held us captive. This is the sign by which we and all people are delivered, but because it is a sign of weakness, of death, the world rejects it. As Paul said in our Epistle lesson for today: “For the word off the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God… For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” May you glory in the foolishness and weakness of God, the message of the cross, because it is only through the cross that you have salvation, Amen.

Proper 18 of Series A (Matthew 18:1-20)

“It is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from Matthew 18. Dear friends in Christ, aren’t babies wonderful? Well, ok, I can’t speak from experience, but at least the ones I have encountered seem quite fun. Always smiling, laughing, and having a good time, they have to be the most wonderful gift anyone can receive from God. And they are, but I’m sure all of you here who have raised a few can tell us that there is another side, a side that includes sleepless nights, temper tantrums, and dirty diapers. But despite those things, babies are wonderful gifts, and they can teach us a lot. That’s right- babies have much to teach us! Jesus tells us in our text: “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” You see, babies have this faith and trust in those who take care of them that causes them to place their entire lives in the hands of others. And their faith extends to Christ! Children have this love and trust in the Lord that we adults can only dream about. Big people have so many other things to worry about that it is tough for us to put our trust in Christ like a child does. Yet Jesus calls on us to follow their example- in everything else they are learning from us, but in faith we are learning from them.
This childlike faith, created in hearts big and small by the Holy Spirit, is vitally precious to our Lord. You were given this faith when you were baptized, even if you were baptized as a big person. Jesus reserves His strongest condemnations for those who lead others astray from this faith: “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.” As those who have been given this childlike faith, you are constantly in danger of being led astray by others- Satan seeks to threaten your faith at every turn. On the other hand, unfortunately, we too often become Satan’s tools to lead others away. How do we do this? Most often, we do this by living in open sin. When we flaunt our sinful lives, we are placing a stumbling block in front of other Christians and helping them to fall. Especially when we hold positions of responsibility or leadership, our ability to lead others astray is multiplied. We do all sin every day, but what I am talking about is sinning openly when we know better, and flaunting our sin before others. As baptized children of God, we are to live lives of repentance, begging for forgiveness for all of our sins, not wallowing in the pigsty of our sin and encouraging others to come in and roll in the mud! Jesus has very strong words for us when we do this: “It is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes!”
But even though Jesus has strong words to say about those who do these things, He wants His Church to bring them back in. When those whom Christ has given the gift of a childlike faith live in open sin or are led astray by those who live in open sin, we are not to simply cast them to the curb. “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother.” We are to point out their sin to them in private, showing them their fault from the Scriptures and praying for repentance. We do this with persistence, not from the joy of pointing out their sin, but out of concern for the path they are on. Sometimes, however, more is needed. “But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.” We hope and pray that several people may be able to convince our wandering brother or sister of their wrong, leading them to repentance. But if they continue to be obstinate, one more step must be taken: “If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.” The Church cannot allow others to be led astray by the sins of this person- the childlike faith of those whom Christ has claimed for His own must be protected. So the person is sent out of the Church. But at that point we do not forget about them. What do we do with Gentiles and tax collectors? We preach the Gospel to them, in the earnest prayer that they may come to faith. When a person is excommunicated, they simply go from being a member to being a prospect.
We too often look at these principles as a list of rules we must follow to get someone kicked out of the Church. We forget that our primary duty is to restore our brother or sister to the faith, to bring them to repentance and back into the faith. We are called to be watchmen, as Ezekiel was in our Old Testament lesson. “So you, son of man, I have made a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me.” We must point out sin to our brothers and sisters, not to embarrass or prosecute them, but in order that they may see the error of their way and may be restored. Our concern is for those who have strayed- we are compelled by our love for them to go out and rescue them. Paul speaks about this love in our Epistle lesson: “Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,’ and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.”
We can only show this love because Christ first showed it to us. You were lost in your sin, wandering off on paths that could only lead to death, but Jesus sought you out in your sinful condition. He came to us as one of us, but yet true God. He gave up all of the heavenly glory that was rightfully His to become a poor shepherd. And as the Good Shepherd, He laid down His life for the sheep. As Jesus said in our text for today: “It is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.” Because the Father did not want a single one of His little ones, you and me, to perish, Jesus came to save. As we heard last week, the Father’s will, the divine ‘must’ of salvation was that Christ would die for your sins. He was the one who truly humbled himself as a child, and He humbled Himself to death on a cross for you. He did not cause any little ones to stumble, but He was the one who had the millstone hung around His neck for your sins of causing little ones to stumble. He took on the punishment you deserved and took it to the cross. The sheep did not have to die for their wanderings, though they rightfully deserved it. Instead the shepherd died, and in His death, you have the forgiveness of all of your sins. But the Good Shepherd did not only lay down His life- He also took it up again, and now wandering sheep have eternal life. You will die an earthly death, but on the last day, Christ will raise you as He was raised, and you will live with Him in glory forever. Thanks be to God that the millstone does not hang on your neck, but instead Christ bore it to the cross for you!
And because Christ loved you so much that He went to the cross for you, He continues to bring you the forgiveness He won each and every time that you wander off the path. Jesus told us in the Gospel lesson today: “What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray.” Jesus’ love for you is so strong that even when you rebel against Him, even when you wander away from the Good Shepherd, He will give up everything to bring you back to Him. As we heard earlier, the Church, Christ’s hands and fingers in this world, is to expend every effort to bring anyone who falls into sin back into the faith. Those in the Church are to show the love that Christ showed to any and all who fall. Christ spends a lot of time seeking after lost sheep, but He does this with joy because He loves His sheep, each and every one that He has given a childlike faith. All who have been given this faith are truly ‘great.’ Our text today began with the disciples asking Jesus who was the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Because of what Christ did for you on the cross, because He placed His Name upon you in Baptism, creating that childlike faith, you and all Christians are great in the kingdom of heaven. This greatness is found in Christ and His love. Jesus’ love brought Him to the cross for you, and now His love brings Him to forgive you whenever you wander, to bring you back into the fold. We hear again what He said in our text for today: “It is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.”
Christ is always at work seeking out lost sheep, and He does so through the Church. He does this whenever you go to your neighbor and point out a dangerous sin, or when you bring two or three trusted members with you, or even when that person is put out of the Church. Christ’s love for His sheep, for you, never stops. It sent Him to the cross, and it sends Him out to seek you whenever you wander away. Christ restores wandering sheep especially here in this place, because it is here that He has placed the means of restoration. He ultimately restored the broken relationship between you and God in your Baptism, where He made you a child of God and gave to you that childlike faith, breaking the barrier that separated you from your creator. Each and every day we live in our Baptism, dying to sin and rising to Christ, being reconciled to Him every time that we repent. And especially every Sunday that you come to this place as a sheep who has wandered and stumbled, or perhaps caused others to stumble, you receive forgiveness here through His Word, and every time that Christ works through His under-shepherd, Pastor Werly, to give to you His Body and Blood in the Lord’s Supper. Here in this place salvation and forgiveness comes to you, here Christ restores wandering sheep with joy- the joy that is motivated by His love. May you also have this joy every time that your brother or sister is found by our Good Shepherd, the joy that is motivated by your love for those whom Christ has claimed as His own, Amen.

Proper 17 of Series A (Matthew 16:21-28)

“Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from Matthew chapter 16. Dear friends in Christ--- when dealing with Jesus, the most important issue to consider is that of identity. Who is this Jesus guy anyway? The answer to this question has divided churches, friends, and families throughout history, and it continues to do so. How we answer this question sets us apart from others, and declares where we stand. More than these earthly things, this question has eternal consequences. Jesus claims to be God, the only way to heaven. If we believe Him and He is lying, we are doomed. If we choose not to believe Him and He is speaking the truth, we are in trouble as well. The disciples were faced with this question just moments before our text for today. Jesus asked them, “Who do you say that I AM?” This question demanded an answer, it demanded a confession, not only from the disciples, but from every person in every age. When we read and hear what Jesus says about Himself, we are faced with this question: “Who do you say that I AM?” When we confess the creed we will answer with Peter, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!” Jesus Christ is true God and true man, He is the Messiah who has come for our salvation. Peter knew who Jesus was, but did he know what Jesus would do, did he know what this confession meant?

Peter and the disciples were on cloud nine. He had made the bold confession on their behalf, and now they were ready to take on the world. But Jesus was not the kind of Messiah they expected. “From that time Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.” There is one little word here that is absolutely key- ‘must.’ The Greek word behind ‘must’ is extremely important. It speaks of necessity, of compulsion, the absolute ‘have to’ of the cross. Jesus was under a divine obligation to go to Jerusalem and die. This was the Father’s will, nothing could change it, Jesus had no choice. Why? Because it was the only way we could be saved. Only blood could deliver sinful man. Ever since the first sin of Adam and Eve, all humanity was trapped in the bonds of sin. You were born sinful and you cannot stop sinning. God required blood to pay for this sin, but the blood of animal sacrifices throughout the Old Testament could never fully hold back His wrath. Instead, these sacrifices pointed to God’s ultimate plan- He Himself would provide the sacrifice, God the Father would place His own Son on the altar. Only the sinless Son of God could bear away all of our sins and take it to the cross. It had to happen, it was absolutely necessary. God could not simply look the other way at our sin- His justice demanded punishment. God could not simply let us all die without hope- His love demanded action. And so Jesus came, not to be a king on earth, but instead to fulfill the Father’s will, the divine ‘must’ of salvation. He loved you so much that He was willing to pay that price to take away all of your sin. And so He did, by walking to Jerusalem and bearing a cross to a hill called Golgotha, where His shed blood washed away all of your sin. But the divine ‘must’ did not only include death, it also meant resurrection. And so, just as Jesus said in our text for today, on the third day, He was raised, and now you have eternal life in His Name! God’s divine ‘must’ was for you, and Christ fulfilled it for your salvation!

But this was not the Messiah that Peter wanted. He had made the great confession, he had visions of the glory that the Son of God would bring, suffering and death had no part in the picture that his mind drew. “And Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, ‘Far be it from you, Lord! This shall never happen to you.’” Peter did not want the cross, He did not want to see Christ crucified, but more than that, he knew what the consequences would be for the followers of Christ if Jesus was crucified. Peter saw his own cross in the words of Jesus, and so He tried to steer Jesus away. And can we blame him? We too often want a Jesus without the cross. We want a God, a Jesus who will make our lives easier, who will bring us glory. We don’t want Jesus to suffer, we don’t want ourselves to suffer, and if we were in Peter’s shoes, we would probably try to turn Jesus away as well. In this world Jesus often becomes a buddy, simply a friend, but not a Savior. Jesus truly is our friend, and He gives to us the comfort we need at every point of our lives. But Jesus is more than a friend, He is a Savior, and as our Savior, He must go to the cross.

Jesus’ response to Peter is stern and even a bit surprising: “But He turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of men.’” Anyone who attempts to derail Christ from His road to Jerusalem, from His road to the cross, is in league with Satan. The devil has sought from the very beginning of Jesus’ life to defeat this messiah, to prevent Him from carrying out the divine ‘must’ of salvation. Satan knows that if Jesus carries all of our sin and punishment to the cross, he is defeated, and mankind is saved. He enlists sinful humanity to help in the cause, turning one of Jesus’ most trusted disciples into an enemy. Satan wants Christ to grasp for the glory, but Jesus doesn’t bite- He instead goes to the cross for you and for your sins, bringing salvation to you through His death and resurrection.

Peter tried to turn Jesus away from Golgotha because he feared his own cross, and his fears ended up coming true. Peter would die for his faith in Rome crucified upside down. But even before his death, Peter carried a cross, as all followers of Christ do. Jesus has already told us about His own cross, the cross He would bear for the sins of the world, for your sins. Now, however, there is another cross to speak about- your cross. “Then Jesus told His disciples, ‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.’” Because we follow Christ, because He has come to us to create faith within us through His Word, because He has washed us clean through the waters of Holy Baptism, we will bear a cross in this life. Not a literal cross as Peter did, but instead we will face difficulties and even persecution in our lives. And why is that? Because in being a Christian we have denied ourselves, we have given up our lives in service to Christ and one another. Because of what Christ has done for us, we give up everything to follow Him. We refuse to recognize or acknowledge our old sinful selves because our identity is in Christ, and because we are in Christ, we serve others selflessly, putting their needs before our own. The life of a Christian is one lived in denial of ourselves and instead focusing on Christ. We lost our lives for the sake of Christ in our Baptism, and now daily we lay our lives down in service to Christ and our neighbor, knowing that we have eternal life waiting for us in heaven.

This is not an easy thing to do. When we lay down our lives and deny ourselves in service to Christ, we will often face hardship, we will face persecution, we risk being trampled on. The prophet Jeremiah knew what it was like to live under the cross. For decades he served the Lord as a prophet to God’s people, bearing the word of the Lord to His people and suffering as a result. In our Old Testament lesson, he cries out: “Know that for your sake I bear reproach…I did not sit in the company of revelers, nor did I rejoice; I sat alone, because your hand was upon me, for you had filled me with indignation… Why is my pain incurable, refusing to be healed?” Yet, in the midst of the lonely, hard life under the cross, Jeremiah could still say: “Your words were found, and I ate them, and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart, for I am called by your name, O Lord, God of hosts.” Jeremiah had hope and strength because the Word of the Lord sustained him, even as they caused him to bear a cross, they remained the delight of his heart. We too find strength to bear up under the crosses that this life sends our way, here in this place, where we receive God’s Word, and every time you come to that altar to receive Christ’s Body and Blood. We remember that we are called by the Name of the Lord because we were given that Name in our Baptism. We may face hardships in this life, we will bear crosses, but we have the promise of God: “They will fight against you, but they shall not prevail over you, for I AM with you, to save you and deliver you, declares the Lord.”

God is with us in our trials and tribulations, but here today, in this place, we are reminded that other Christians are with us as well. When we deny ourselves and lay down our lives for others, we also do so for our brothers and sisters in Christ. We help to bear them up in their trials, giving to them the comfort that flows from Christ, and the assurance that no matter what this world may throw at us, we have the promise of eternal life. Jesus repeated that promise today: “For the Son of Man is going to come with His angels in the glory of His Father, and then He will repay each person according to what he has done. Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.” Do not think that Jesus will judge you on the basis of your good works, here He is speaking of whether a person has believed, taking up the cross. When the Holy Spirit worked faith within you through the power of the Word, you were given a cross, and you now live a life under the cross. It is in this life that salvation comes to you. The Son of Man came in His kingdom on Good Friday and Easter Sunday, and He came to give you salvation, to fulfill the Father’s plan. May the Lord sustain you in the faith that He has given you through Word and Sacrament, strengthening you under whatever trials and crosses come your way, Amen.

St. Bartholomew, Apostle (John 1:43-51)

“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon today comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the first chapter of the Gospel according to Saint John. Dear friends in Christ, today we celebrate Saint Bartholomew, one of Jesus’ disciples, a man we know very little about. And I think that is alright, because our focus on a saint’s day should not be on the saint himself, but instead on who that saint pointed to through his words and actions- Christ. Before we begin, I think I should clear up something that might cause a bit of confusion. This is Saint Bartholomew’s day, but in our text, we don’t seem to encounter anyone named Bartholomew. There’s Philip, Nathanael, and Jesus, but no one else. You see, some biblical scholars (and apparently the folks who put together our lectionary) believe that the man named Nathanael in John is the same person called Bartholomew in the other Gospels and in Acts. You can ask me for the specific reasons later, but at least we can all agree that for the purposes of this sermon, Nathanael and Bartholomew are the same person. If so, then this is Bartholomew’s shining moment, his only recorded words in the New Testament. John the Baptist has only two days ago pointed to Christ as the one he was preparing for, and then on the next day, Jesus called Andrew and Simon Peter. In our text, the fourth day of John’s Gospel, Jesus called Philip.

“The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, ‘follow me.’ Philip found Nathanael and said to him, ‘We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.’” The amazing thing about Philip is that he does not stop to worship Jesus, he does not ask any questions, but he runs away. Now, I doubt that Jesus said ‘follow me’ and Philip turned tail immediately, but the important thing to note is that his first act as a disciple of Jesus was to find someone else to bring to Christ. I’m sure there are some of you in here who can relate, especially those of you who became a Christian later in life. The enthusiasm of your conversion though the power of the Holy Spirit sent you out to tell others, to bring them to the blessed waters of Baptism, to bring them into contact with Christ’s life-changing Word. For those of us, like me, who have been life-long Christians, we can often struggle to find that same enthusiasm, and even the enthusiasm of a new Christian fades away. Philip’s example is one that speaks directly to us- we go from this place where Jesus comes to us, out into the world, and what we speak are not our words, but instead they are the words of the Scriptures. Even when we are met with skepticism and rejection, when the Nathanael’s of the world scoff at us, we can simply say with Philip “come and see.” Come and see where Christ comes to people in His Word, in water, in His Body and Blood.

This sounds great, but Nathanael’s question should give us pause, even if it did not seem to slow down Philip one bit. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” If we stop to think about it, this is a ‘good’ question. The Greek word used here for ‘good’ has a strong practical, pragmatic meaning. It means that a person or thing has met a certain standard, and could easily be translated as ‘useful.’ Is Jesus useful? If you go to Barnes and Noble and search the ‘spirituality’ shelf, or even go to a Christian bookstore, you will find plenty of writers who think that He is. Jesus has been portrayed as a ‘good, useful’ teacher throughout history, and today is no exception. He has been claimed by almost every type of group on the face of the planet, from politics (did you know Jesus was a communist?), to food (did you know Jesus was a vegetarian?), to social issues (did you know Jesus was a homosexual?). Jesus has been found quite ‘useful’ by many people throughout history, but is this the Jesus of the Scriptures?

In the Gospels, when Jesus is called ‘good’ (with that specific Greek word) by someone, He almost always deflects attention to His Father. God the Father is good and useful, but Jesus does not look at Himself in the same way. Why? Because Jesus did not become man to be useful or ‘good.’ In fact, His coming had quite the opposite effect. In our text, we read how Saint Bartholomew came to faith. He would later die for that faith, in a gruesome, terrible way. Following Christ, for Saint Bartholomew and many others, was not ‘useful’ or ‘good,’ but instead it led to death. Following Jesus is anti-practical, anti-pragmatic, and it usually means a harder life under the cross. Christians in America don’t have to think about martyrdom very often, but even in a country where we have religious freedom, Jesus isn’t very practical. Following Christ does not gain us money, it does not solve all of our problems, it does not bring us an earthly life of bliss. Following Christ is tough, and it often means hardship, as we struggle to live our faith in a world that rejects it. I suspect this may be a reason we are reluctant to follow Philip’s example. We can only offer to the world around us a Jesus who often makes life harder. In fact, that is what tempts us to fall away. Why stand by Jesus when He only brings trouble?

So Nathanael is right. Nothing ‘good’ comes from Nazareth. Jesus is not practical, He is not useful, He is not pragmatic. He is in fact quite the opposite. Associating with Him means a cross, it means hardship, it may even mean death. God the Father is the good one- He created and sustains all of creation, bringing fruit from the earth and rain from the heavens. God is good, but Christ is something else entirely. What is He? If we look at the rest of our text, we will find our answer.

Nathanael’s skepticism melts away very easily. All Jesus has to do is demonstrate His divine knowledge and all-seeing eye, and Nathanael is hooked. “Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward Him and said of him, ‘Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit!’ Nathanael said to Him, ‘How do you know me?’ Jesus answered him, ‘Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.’” St. Bartholomew then confesses boldly: “Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” When you are reading the Gospels, one of the most important things to pay attention to is the names given to Jesus. This name, “the Son of God,” is very important. This is the foundation of our faith, that a man born in first century Palestine named Jesus of Nazareth, is true God. He is not simply a man, but He is God, and as God, He has taken human flesh, and He has taken it on to save.

And how will He do this? Nathanael’s second name for Jesus seems to give us the answer: “You are the King of Israel!” A king? Now this is truly ‘useful’ and ‘good.’ A messianic king will surely throw off the yoke of the Roman rulers and establish a kingdom on earth that will last forever. Two thousand years from his birth, Christians in upstate New York will live in luxury and security because they belong to this kingdom, the most powerful kingdom on earth! Nathanael is wrong! Something good did come out of Nazareth! And so many would think- and many still think this today. But the next time that Jesus would be called the ‘King of Israel’ or the ‘King of the Jews,’ He would be hanging on a Roman cross, giving up His life, shedding His blood for our sins. Jesus truly was a king, but He was not a practical, pragmatic, ‘good,’ or useful king. He was a king who could only establish His kingdom through His death. This death at the hands of sinful men, at the hands of those He came to save, would wash away the sins of the entire world, and establish a heavenly kingdom. When He rose from the grave triumphant on the third day, His kingdom was established and your sins were forgiven- especially your sins of not following Philip’s example and bringing His message to others. Christ was not ‘good’ or ‘useful’- He was a Savior, and as our Savior He endured the shame of the cross for you!

Nathanael’s bold confession causes Jesus to caution this enthusiastic new disciple: “Because I said to you ‘I saw you under the fig tree,’ do you believe? You will see greater things than these.’” This was not exactly Christ’s greatest miracle, and Nathanael’s response is a little too enthusiastic. Jesus does not want Nathanael to be carried in the wind by every desert preacher who makes a prediction or two. Jesus wants Nathanael to follow Him because He is true God and true man, and He is the one who will reconcile God and man. “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.” This third name of Christ, the Son of Man, is only used by Jesus Himself, and it is used to designate His state of humiliation, as He walked this earth as a man, taking on all of our sin and the punishment we deserved and taking it to the cross. But after the cross came the resurrection, and after Easter Sunday Christ was enthroned on high, and his prophecy to Nathanael, to Saint Bartholomew, was fulfilled. In Genesis, Jacob has a dream where He sees a ladder to heaven, with the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. God speaks to him and says, “In you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.” Christ is this promised offspring, and through His death and resurrection, all families on earth truly are blessed! Christ has replaced Jacob’s ladder as the link between heaven and earth, as the only means by which we can attain heaven. Christ is not ‘good’ or ‘useful’ in this life, but despite all the difficulties we may face, He will bring you to eternal life in heaven through His shed blood.

This blood has washed away all of your sins, as Christ has come to you in your sinful condition as the Son of God, as the King of Israel, and as the Son of Man. This forgiveness sends you back into the world to speak of Christ and the great things He has done for you. You cannot offer a God who promises an easy life, but you can speak of a Savior who has gone to the cross for all people and has delivered you from sin and death, you can invite those around you to ‘come and see,’ to come and see our Savior and our Lord, Jesus Christ, the Son of God. May this message sustain you and send you back into this sinful world carrying the light of Christ, Amen.

Proper 14 of Series A (Matthew 14:22-33)

“Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning comes from the Gospel lesson read just a few moments ago from Matthew chapter fourteen. Dear friends in Christ- Whew! The disciples had one long day! It may seem even longer to us, considering that we began it with the disciples in the sermon last week. We heard then from Pastor Werly how Jesus went to find a quiet place for reflection and prayer, for communion with His (and our) Heavenly Father, and instead found 25,000 hungry Yankee fans waiting for Him. Well, now He has finished feeding that multitude, the miracle is over, and it is time to go home. More importantly, it is time for Jesus to do what He came to do originally- pray. So the disciples are sent out to sea while Christ communes with the Father. But during this eventful day, even the night holds no peace. I don’t know about you, but one of the most frightening things I have experienced is to be out in the open during a storm. No shelter, no protection, you see it coming and there is nothing you can do. This is especially frightening when you are on the water, where the very surface you are traveling on is deadly. So we can easily imagine what the disciples felt like as things became dangerous: “The boat by this time was a long way from the land, beaten by the waves, and the wind was against them.”
Matthew does not tell us if the disciples cried out for help, but I think we can safely assume that they were hoping and praying for deliverance. Death was staring them in the face, and they needed help, they needed rescue, they needed safety. And so, off in the distance, Jesus comes to them. “And in the fourth watch of the night He came to them, walking on the sea.” Jesus came to them in their distress, He came to save, to comfort, as He has done so many times in your life. The fact that Jesus walked on water to come to His disciples is not nearly as important as that fact that HE CAME TO THEM. Their fear drove Him to them.
But the disciples retained their fear, they did not recognize their Lord, Savior and Teacher coming toward them. Matthew tells us: “But when the disciples saw Him walking on the sea, they were terrified, and said, ‘It is a ghost!’ and they cried out in fear.” In the terror of that night, everything was a phantom, another agent of death. The disciples let loose a cry, a cry of fear, a cry of doubt, a cry of worry.
Their cry did not go unanswered. Immediately, at that very moment, in the midst of their fear and distress, Jesus answered their cry. Paul tells us in our Epistle lesson that “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” And so they cried out, and Jesus called to them, “Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid.” Jesus spoke these words, words of comfort, words of courage, words of absolution. He did not calm the waves, but He simply spoke, and His Words held power to do what they said. First He said ‘take heart,’ encouraging them to stand resolute in the face of danger. Next came a statement of identity, ‘it is I.’ This English translation does not capture the significance of the words Jesus spoke. Jesus literally said, “Take heart, I AM.” Jesus is here invoking the Divine Name of God, saying that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the only True God, Yahweh Himself, the great ‘I AM,’ is here, and He is here to save. This man, born of a virgin in a stable is true God, and He brings salvation with Him. Because of who Jesus is as true God and true man, the Messiah sent from God, He can now say to the disciples, ‘Do not be afraid.’ These are the words of absolution, of true comfort. Their fear has been extinguished by the words of Christ. But do not think that just because Jesus was standing on water while He spoke these words that it is any different for you. You had reason to fear, you stood under the condemnation of God for your sin, but Christ came to you in your distress. He did not stand on water, but He used water to bring you into His kingdom through Holy Baptism. When the pastor said “I baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” Jesus said to you, “Take heart; I AM. Do not be afraid.” God placed His name on you in your baptism, the same name that Jesus spoke to the disciples, the only name in which salvation comes to us. When Pastor Werly says “As a called and ordained servant of Christ, and by His authority, I therefore forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” Jesus said to you, “Take heart; I AM. Do not be afraid.” In these words, by these means, Christ comes to us, and He comes bringing salvation.
But for Peter, the words of Christ were not enough. This wonderful, blessed absolution from Jesus, spoken in the midst of the storm, did not satisfy Him. And so He calls out to Jesus “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” It is easy for us to sit here and laugh at the foolishness of Peter, who has once again stuck his foot in his mouth. But if Peter seems to make a habit of doing just that, it is only because he is a representative of all the disciples and of us all. We too have trouble believing the absolution; we struggle to trust Christ’s words. We seek confirmation, sometimes looking within ourselves for some sign that God really does love us, and sometimes looking to God, like Peter, demanding a miracle. Words and water, or even bread and wine, do not seem to carry the importance we would expect. Christ can’t simply just talk to us, place some water on us, or give us a meal for our salvation. There must be something that we can do, we must need to come to Christ, if only partway. This is part of the air we breathe in our culture today, especially our Christian culture. Words are not simply enough, we need miracles, we need to come to Christ, it can’t be so easy that He would only come to us. And so we step out of the boat with Peter, in search of a miracle, driven by the desire to come to Christ.
And like Peter, we might find that walking to Jesus seems quite easy. Matthew tells us, “So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus.” Peter asked for a miracle, and he received it, He wanted to come to Jesus, and it seemed to be working out. There is something so distinctly American, so distinctly human about us walking to Christ. Even if we are only walking on the water through a miracle, we can still be proud that we are the ones who stepped out of the boat and made the effort to come to Christ. But then, the storms of life continue to be around us, and suddenly things don’t seem so rosy. We go through a tough time at work or at home, or we lose a loved one, and we realize that walking to Christ is a lonely road. “But when Peter saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink, he cried out, ‘Lord, save me!’” We will always sink when we are walking to Christ. For despite how much we talk about Christ as we walk, when we doubt His words of absolution we have rejected His coming to us and are attempting to walk to Him by ourselves.
But Christ, in His loving mercy, does not let us sink. We cry out for salvation once again, yearning to hear His words of Absolution, we cry out with Peter, “Lord, save me!” And Christ does save us, as He saved Peter. Our fears drive Christ to us. “Jesus immediately reached out His hand and took hold of him, saying to him, ‘O you of little faith, why did you doubt?’” Peter did not only doubt when he saw the wind and the waves, he doubted more importantly when he doubted Christ’s words of absolution, His coming to them, and instead struck out on his own. But Christ’s love for us compels Him to rescue us again and again, each time that we strike out on our own.
It was this love that brought us salvation in the first place. When Peter cried out “Lord, save me!” he wanted deliverance from the wind and the waves. But Christ did not come to this earth to simply calm storms. He came to rescue us all from drowning, from the fear of death and punishment that surrounded us, the terror caused by our fall into sin. He took away our fear and the punishment we deserved by taking it upon Himself, and taking it to the cross, where His shed blood washed away all of our sins. It is only through that sacrifice and the victorious resurrection on the third day that Jesus’ words “Take heart, I AM. Do not be afraid” have any significance. Without Good Friday and Easter, Pastor spoke empty words to you this morning in the absolution, and your Baptism simply made you wet. But with the death of Christ on Calvary’s cross and His victory over the grave on the third day, those words have meaning, they have power, they do what they say. They forgive your sins, they restore the broken relationship between God and man, they bring you salvation. And because He went to the cross for you, you can trust those words. You do not need to come to Christ, because He came to you in the midst of your distress, He calmed your fears, He forgave you through simple Words, water, bread and wine. As Saint Paul teaches in our Epistle lesson: “But the righteousness based on faith says, "Do not say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?'" (that is, to bring Christ down) or "'Who will descend into the abyss?'" (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? "The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart" (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim);” (Rom 10:6-8) The storms of life continue to rage, but through these means by which Christ comes to us we have the assurance that He has defeated the only storm that really matters in the end, that of sin and death.
And what is our response to this gift, this salvation conveyed to us in Word and Sacrament? As the disciples, we are moved to confession and worship. “And those in the boat worshipped Him, saying, ‘Truly you are the Son of God.’” We confess what Christ as done for us to those around us, and we join all other believers to continue to receive these gifts, here in this place and every day. God’s Word sustains us and gives us the strength to face life’s storms. May the Lord use His Word and His Sacraments to strengthen and preserve you in the true faith, today and every day, Amen.

Proper 8 of Series A (Matthew 10:34-42)

“Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from Matthew chapter ten. Dear friends in Christ, one of the most wonderful advantages of having three Scripture texts assigned to each Sunday is that we see these texts in different ways. Think back to the Old Testament lesson for this morning. In it, we see an encounter between Jeremiah and a false prophet named Hananiah. Just before this account, Jeremiah has proclaimed to rebellious Judah that Babylon will sweep down to conquer them. If they submit quietly to God’s instrument of punishment, they will be allowed to live in peace on their land. Hananiah, however, brings a different message. He preaches that God will “break the yoke of the king of Babylon” and defeat him. Judah only has to resist and God will save them. Our Old Testament text shows us the tense confrontation between two prophets who claim to speak for God, one true and one false. Jeremiah boldly says: “The prophets who preceeded you and me from ancient times prophesied war, famine, and pestilence against many countries and great kingdoms. As for the prophet who prophesies peace, when the word of that prophet comes to pass, then it will be known that the Lord has sent the prophet.” What a great text! After hearing that, we have a pretty good idea what is coming in the Gospel lesson- Jesus will proclaim peace.

But we are taken aback when we hear these words of Jesus “Do not think that I have come to bring peace on the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” What? Jeremiah promised that the prophet who preached peace was truly sent by the Lord. Does this mean that Jesus is a false prophet? To answer this question, we need to look at some grammar. No groans- especially if you happen to be one of my brothers. Jesus is here using a figure of speech, saying something that we do not expect and in fact is ridiculous to get our attention. Of course Jesus has come to bring peace- He said so just earlier in this chapter. He speaks in this way to shatter our illusions of what this peace means and to draw our attention to what He wants to focus on- the conflict. Theologians have noticed statements of this type throughout Scripture, and we should understand Jesus as saying “Do not think that I only have come to bring peace on the earth. I have not come only to bring peace, but even more, a sword.” Jesus is telling us that while He does bring eternal peace, the peace that comes when God and man are reconciled, this peace does not create a blissful utopia here on earth. Instead, the peace He brings creates conflict.

Most of us (I won’t say all) don’t like conflict. We would much rather have people live in peace with one another. But this is not the situation that Jesus describes. His message of peace, His reconciliation of sinful man with a holy God, will “set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.” This is not simply the squabbles that every family has, but a fundamental conflict over Christ. Some will believe in Him as mankind’s Savior, while others will violently reject Him. Families, joined together in the union of flesh and blood, will be torn apart. And not only that, but they will be torn apart and turned against one another. “A person’s enemies will be those of his own household.”

We would like to avoid this conflict, we do not want to see our families torn apart, our relationships destroyed, but the Christian cannot stand on the sidelines. The issue at stake is eternal life, and therefore we cannot compromise. Jesus knows that Satan uses our relationships in this world to tear us away from our Savior, and so He warns us, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” These are tough words for any daughter or son, mother or father. In addition, we interact with those opposed to Christ each and every day, even if our entire household belongs to Christ. We are called to love our friends and family, but we are called to love Christ more and to give up everything before deserting Him. Your love for your family and friends causes you to reach out with the Gospel, to shine the light of Christ in their dark world, and by His grace, many may be saved by your example. Yet your love cannot extend to the point of denying the Gospel, of denying Christ. Jesus states that those who do this are “not worthy of me,” that is, they are weighed and found wanting. Christ declares judgment on them. Anyone who follows those they love in denying Christ are found not worthy of Christ, and those not worthy of Christ can find only eternal punishment. The way of the Gospel, the way of ultimate peace, leads you through the midst of conflict, conflict with those whom you love the most.

But this conflict only touches those who follow Christ because it touched Him first. In verse thirty-eight, Jesus says: “Whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.” This is the first mention of this instrument of torture and execution in Matthew’s Gospel, and it appears here for a reason. Jesus would be the one to take up His cross and follow the Father’s will, He would be the one whose enemies came from His own household, the sinful humanity that He came to save. He came in human flesh to walk among us as our brother, and his brothers and sisters and fathers and mothers nailed Him to that cross. Jesus says in verse thirty-nine: “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Jesus lost His life on the cross for your sake, for the sake of the Father’s loving will, and because He laid down His life on that Good Friday, He found it in the resurrection on Easter Sunday. And because Jesus did that for you, you also find life, but only after you lose it. The last time I was home, it was for my Grandfather’s funeral. Grandpa now has found life, eternal life in Christ, but only after passing through death. But his most important death was nearly eighty years ago, when Christ put the old Adam in him to death through the waters of Holy Baptism. You also lost your life for the sake of Christ through these blessed waters, but because you were buried with Christ in Baptism you will find life, eternal life, the life that Christ won through His triumph over death.

But we would not know this, we would have no way to be put to death and made alive through Baptism if there was no one to proclaim this message, no one to Baptize. Our text this morning is the end of Jesus’ speech to the twelve disciples as He sends them off to do just that. He says: “Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me. The one who receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet's reward, and the one who receives a righteous person because he is a righteous person will receive a righteous person's reward. And whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward.” Throughout the centuries Christ has appointed men to proclaim this message. They bear the name of Christ through their baptism, as we all bear His name through our Baptisms. It is this saving Name that they proclaim, not any words of their own. These men often are persecuted by the world, that is why Jesus calls them ‘little ones,’ but they and we have the promise that He is with them. By receiving these messengers, we receive Christ Himself, because He has promised to work through their preaching and baptizing. Receiving them means to agree with the message they bring, to enter into conflict with those who reject Christ. Receiving them also means we receive a reward, the reward of eternal life with Christ in heaven. This word ‘reward’ gives us visions of earning what we deserve through our own effort, but our collect for today sets us straight. We prayed earlier in the service: “Almighty God, by the working of Your Holy Spirit, grant that we may gladly hear Your Word proclaimed among us and follow its directing.” It is only by the work of the Holy Spirit in and through us that we receive Christ’s messengers and the message they bring, and it is only through Him that we receive this reward. We do not deserve this reward, and in fact it is nothing that we do that earns it. Instead it is a gift given by Christ in the Gospel, proclaimed by those whom He has appointed.

And this gift only comes to us in the midst of conflict. Jesus is very clear with us in this text today. Any idea that we might have that the Christian life is easy, or that the Church is only a place of peace, or that Christians live only a life of peace, have all been shattered. The Church, that includes you and me, stand on the front lines of the conflict stirred up by Christ’s saving work in the world. Because you cling to His Name and His cross, sufferings and conflict will come to you, even from those you hold dearest. Christ has brought peace, peace between God and man, eternal peace in heaven, but on this earth, Satan still rages, and he seeks to tear you away from Christ, sometimes using those whom you love the most. You can only resist Him through Christ’s Word and His presence, and the Sacraments that sustain you and send you back into the conflict.

So Jeremiah was right after all. Centuries after he made his prophecy, the Prince of Peace did come to this world, He did reconcile God and sinful humanity with His death and resurrection, He did proclaim peace. But wherever peace is proclaimed by Christ, there Satan is also at work in those who reject this peace, and so we hope for that final peace when our last hour comes. May our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ preserve you in your faith in Him until that hour, and may He bring to you ultimate peace with Him in the resurrection of the dead, Amen.

Easter 6 of Series A (Psalm 146)

Halleluia, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Halleluiah! So we shout forth in this joyous season of Easter, when we confidently and triumphantly declare before all of creation that our Lord did not remain in the tomb, but is arisen, He has conquered over death, He will bring us to be with Him in eternal glory. Dear friends in Christ, the text for our sermon this morning comes from the Psalm of the Day, Psalm 146: “Praise the LORD! Praise the LORD, O my soul! I will praise the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being. Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation. When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish. Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the LORD his God, who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, who keeps faith forever; who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry. The LORD sets the prisoners free; the LORD opens the eyes of the blind. The LORD lifts up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves the righteous. The LORD watches over the sojourners; he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin. The LORD will reign forever, your God, O Zion, to all generations. Praise the LORD!”
We began this sermon with the word ‘halleluiah.’ Have you ever wondered where this particular term comes from? Well, we have it before us in the sermon text for today. ‘Praise the Lord’ in the Hebrew is two words that together are pronounced ‘halleluiah.’ It’s pretty simple, really. We give thanks to God for raising Christ from the grave, for promising to call us forth some day, and so we say ‘halleluiah,’ ‘praise the Lord.’ But yet here we are setting ourselves apart from the world. Whenever we say ‘halleluiah,’ we are saying that God deserves our ultimate praise, and no one else. This is a radical separation, because our world tells us that there are many places where we can place our praise and trust. Especially in the midst of a presidential campaign, the temptation is to say ‘praise Obama’ or ‘praise Hillary’ or ‘praise Ross Perot!’
And it does not even have to be a presidential candidate. We put our trust in many other people around us, hoping that they can give us what we need. We may not use the word, be we are often looking for ‘salvation.’ In some sense or another, we want them to deliver us. High gas prices, a slumping economy, threat of war and terrorism, we think that human beings are the answer. Every time you vote, you place your confidence in a person; one whom you think can make things better. It is so easy to place all our hope on a son of man, to put our trust in anyone but God. The first commandment is easily transgressed- we idolize other people because we look up to them, we depend on them, they are our ‘salvation.’ But the psalmist stops us dead in our tracks- he rebukes us, he tells the entire world that such trust, such ‘salvation’ is ultimately hopeless. “Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man in whom there is no salvation.”
This salvation is hopeless, because the people in whom we place our trust are as afflicted by sin as we are. The people in whom we put our trust, in whom we seek salvation from whatever might afflict us, all manage to let us down in some way or another. And even if they do in some way fulfill our trust, if they manage to make our lives a bit better, if they improve our world, they can do nothing about our primary problem- we die. The same Satan, who is at work in our world, leading sons of men astray, leads us to put our trust in those sons of men. We might find temporary deliverance from a son of man- but even there Satan is working, trying to get you to place your trust in the things and people of this world. You see, our world, and if you are honest, you yourself, do not ask the right question. We seek salvation from the worries of this world but we cannot vote away death, we cannot elect someone who can destroy this enemy. You can brag about all the medical accomplishments you wish, but the simple fact is that you will still die. The Psalmist puts it like this: “When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish.” Putting your ultimate trust in a son of man can only take you to where he is also headed- the grave. You need salvation from death, and this salvation no son of man can give you.
In the midst of this the psalmist tells us of the creator, the God in which all are blessed who find Him as their helper. This God created “heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them.” There is only one problem. Since Adam and Eve fell into sin, no person is able to find God as his helper, in fact every son of man is born into the domain of Satan, totally opposed to God. By the psalmist’s definition, no one is blessed, because no one can have God as His helper. This holy and pure God cannot be the helper of anyone tainted by sin. In fact, His divine wrath over man’s transgression doomed all children of Adam and Eve, every son and daughter of man, to hell.
But because God is love, He sought to satisfy His divine wrath over our sin, He had to act. The psalmist writes that God “guards faithfulness forever.” He made a promise that He would satisfy His own justice, His own wrath over sin, and even though the psalmist could not see it with his own eyes, God remained faithful to that promise.
The little words in Scripture are important. Sometimes one letter can make all the difference. The word ‘the’ is English is three letters, but in Hebrew it is only one. This one letter declares God’s plan. Salvation for this corrupted world could not come through a son of man, but it does come through the Son of Man. This is the self-designation of a man named Jesus, a man who was not simply a man, but God With Us, God in the flesh. He called Himself the Son of Man to demonstrate His humiliation, that He was walking the earth as one of us, though He was no ordinary man. As He says in our Gospel lesson for today, “I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” The Son of Man was obedient to the Father’s will, humbling Himself to death, even death on a cross.
This final act of humiliation, when Jesus Christ, Son of God and the Son of Man died, restored what had gone wrong with God’s original creation and granted us salvation by satisfying God’s wrath. This act was the culmination of a life of restoring fallen creation. The Son of Man in His humiliation worked the works of God, as Jesus tells us in the Gospel lesson: “The Father who dwells in me does His works.” The psalmist saw this work from afar and declared it, that God working through Christ would be the one “who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry. The LORD sets the prisoners free; the LORD opens the eyes of the blind. The LORD lifts up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves the righteous. The LORD watches over the sojourners; he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.” Surely God did these things in the Old Testament, but even more surely He has done them through Christ, and He has done them in your life. Jesus called Himself the Son of Man as He fed the hungry (four thousand and five thousand at a time!), healed the blind, lifted up those bowed down by sin, and raised the dead of widows.
Jesus has in His death and resurrection set you free from the bondage of Satan, Jesus feeds your spiritual hunger through His Body and Blood, Jesus healed your spiritual blindness through His Word, Jesus will raise up on the Last Day all who have died in the faith, Jesus preserves you in that true faith as you sojourn on this earth, Jesus brought to ruin the way of the wicked one. The path of death is replaced by Jesus who is the Way: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” In the middle of the psalmist’s list, we find the reason for it all: “The Lord loves the righteous.” God loves those whom He has declared righteous through the death of His Son. You are now right with God because of Christ, now you truly are blessed, and what the psalmist says he says to you: “Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God.” We may have to depend on sons of men for things in this world, but only with the knowledge that our ultimate trust can only be founded on Christ, the Son of Man.
On Easter morning, Jesus shed the title of ‘the Son of Man.’ No other New Testament writer uses it of our Lord, and we do not use it of Him even today. Christ is now enthroned in glory, and He will bring us to be with Him in glory when we die. Death is not our end- it has been defeated- our destiny is now life, life in heaven, life with God forever. Faced with this reality, we can only say with the psalmist: “The LORD will reign forever, your God, O Zion, to all generations. Praise the LORD!”
And yet today, we still remain in this world. We still vote, we still depend on police and firefighters, but knowing that ultimate salvation has only come through Christ. And we pray. The Church is a praying Church. And what better to pray than the psalms, God’s prayer book given to us? But we do not only pray, we echo the psalmist by praising and giving thanks to God for His deliverance in Christ, the salvation that came through the Son of Man. As Peter says in our Epistle lesson, “You yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ…You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” Our identity through Baptism is that we declare the praises of God, the God who delivered us through the Son of Man, and that is what we will do forever. Amen. Halleluiah, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Halleluiah!