“Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” 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 is from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago, from Matthew chapter twenty-five. Dear friends in Christ, weddings again? It seems like we just talked about weddings a couple weeks ago, and in fact we did. Jesus told a parable about a king who invited people to His wedding feast, but they refused to come, and so others were invited into the feast. If we have any wedding haters here today, you probably find yourself skipping over quite a few sections of the New Testament. Jesus loved weddings, though He may be less enthused with many of today’s over-commercialized ‘bridezilla’ versions. The fact was, our Lord was quite eager to use weddings as illustrations, for two main reasons, I think (there are probably more). First of all, Jesus Christ loved to celebrate- if you remember, His first miracle was making sure that a bridegroom had enough wine to survive the feast. Second, weddings provide so much imagery that connects with the kingdom of God, and this imagery reaches across the boundaries of time. Weddings are still very much a part of our experience today.
But even if we are experienced with weddings today, we still need a little education on first-century Jewish weddings to completely understand Jesus’ words. In our text, Jesus speaks of a specific part of the wedding ceremony. “Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.” In a Jewish wedding, the bridegroom prepared for the ceremony at his own home, then came to the bride’s home at a time and hour unknown. Meeting the bridal party there, he then conducted his bride and the rest back to his home. Jesus divides the virgins in our text into two groups: “Five of them were foolish, and five were wise.” The wise ones knew that the bridegroom could return at any time, and so they were prepared: “the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.” They were eagerly anticipating the return of the bridegroom, and so all was in perfect readiness.
The second group, however, was a study in contrasts. “For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them.” They were completely unprepared for the return of the bridegroom, they thought that the mere act of having a lamp would be enough, they had no need for extra oil. Aren’t we all like these foolish virgins? We too often depend on our outward acts, thinking that they will give us standing when the bridegroom returns. We are in the pews, aren’t we? We have a bible at home, right? No matter that while we sit here our mind is on football, or our bible only exists to hold up coffee mugs. Those with no oil in their lamps are those who cling to the show that they make before others, hoping that it will sway God when Christ returns in glory. As long as my name is on the membership roll, I’m alright, correct? God has some very harsh words to say for those who do this in the Old Testament reading for today: “I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies… Take away from me the noise of your songs; to the melody of your harps I will not listen.” God has no patience for simply going through the motions, trusting in our outward acts, whether in the Old Testament or today. Instead, He wants to see lamps full. “But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everlasting stream.” When we trust in our outward acts, in the ‘I am Christian’ nametag on our shirt, to save us before God, we often feel very secure, we feel comfortable, we feel sleepy. “As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept.” We are all guilty of sleeping in our spiritual life, of not paying attention and keeping watchful. The disciples themselves could not keep watch with Jesus in Gethsemane for even one hour, and so we too find it hard to wait, we become lazy with our spiritual life, wondering if Christ will ever return.
But as the foolish virgins discovered, this is a terrible mistake. “But at midnight there was a cry, 'Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.' Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' But the wise answered, saying, 'Since there will not be enough for us and for you, go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.' And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, 'Lord, lord, open to us.' But he answered, 'Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.' Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” They had finally been moved to seek out oil, but it was far too late, for when the bridegroom arrives the door of the feast is shut- forever. For those who were not prepared, the return of the bridegroom is exactly as Amos described in our Old Testament text: “Is not the day of the Lord darkness, and not light, and gloom with no brightness in it?”
The day of the Lord is darkness, it is gloom, and it has already happened. Judgment Day happened on Good Friday- it was that day that darkness covered the earth, it was on that day that God declared His judgment on sin. Sin deserves death, it deserves wrath, it deserves punishment. But the bridegroom Himself, Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, was the one who was judged. He was condemned by the Sanhedrin, He was sent to the cross by Pilate, but in the courtroom of God, He was judged as the sinner, and therefore deserving of punishment. But this was not simply the judgment for His own sin- Jesus Christ had no sin of His own for which to suffer. He instead was judged for your sin, each and every one of them, and every sin committed in all of history. He hung in agony upon that cross for your sins, He suffered the anguish of hell for you when God abandoned Him upon the tree. Judgment day was Good Friday, and it was on that day that God judged Jesus Christ ‘guilty.’ But because Christ was judged guilty, because He suffered and bled and died for your sin, your Judgment Day was also Good Friday. On that day, as the ground shook and sun refused to shine, God declared you ‘not guilty’ for the sake of Christ. God then affirmed this judgment, He showed that Christ really did die for your sins three days later, when the women came to the tomb and found it empty. The stone was rolled away and Jesus rose victorious over sin, death, and Satan, He rose and God confirmed His judgment of ‘not guilty.’ His judgment fell on the bridegroom, it fell on His Son, and so you do not have to fear it falling upon you.
Christ then walked this earth again for forty days and ascended back into heaven, promising to return. And like we believe all of God’s promises we believe that He will truly return, though we know neither the day nor the hour. But we do not have to fear this return, because Judgment Day already occurred, and it occurred on Good Friday, where Christ was judged ‘guilty’ and we were judged ‘not guilty.’ As Paul teaches us in our Epistle lesson, “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. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep.” We therefore watch with joy for Christ’s return, because it is a joyous day, a day on which we will be ushered into heavenly glory. Our lamps are filled with the Gospel, they are filled with His Word, they are filled to the brim by the Holy Spirit.
The Christian Church, the bride of the bridegroom, has been waiting for that Day since Christ ascended. In our text, the bridegroom ‘delayed,’ and to us it seems as if Jesus is doing the same thing. He has waited centuries to fulfill His promise, but slowness is not the explanation. He is not waiting around for us to do something, He is not frittering away His time in heavenly glory. Instead, He has picked a specific day, hour, and minute or His return, and all we know is that we are closer to that time than we have ever been. Without the promise of eternal glory, without the gift of the Word and Sacraments, the Church would not be able to survive this interlude between Christ’s first coming and His second. But with these gifts we look forward to what Paul describes: “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. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 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. Therefore encourage one another with these words.” These words truly provide us comfort and encouragement, because in them we have the promise of resurrection, that just as Jesus was raised, so we too will rise again someday. On that Day we will meet Jesus face to face, we will join with the Trinity in heavenly glory. On that day the messengers will cry, “Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet Him!”
Jesus cautioned us at the end of our text, “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” Throughout history, Christians have been watching and waiting for the Lord to return. When you read the letters of Paul, you become convinced that He expected Christ’s return any day, and you see that also in Luther, and many other saints throughout history. They eagerly anticipated His coming, they watched with joy. That is how we, as those judged ‘not guilty’ by God, also live- in eager anticipation of the Lord’s coming. We hope for His return, we yearn for it, because it is on that Day that the Lord will fully give to us the inheritance that He earned for us, it is then that God will wipe every tear from our eyes, as we heard last week. Only the power of the Holy Spirit can enable us to remain watchful, only the Gospel can prepare us to meet Him on that glorious day. May the Lord preserve and strengthen you in the true faith in anticipation of that Day, and may you eagerly look forward to when you will meet the bridegroom face to face, Amen.
Monday, November 10, 2008
All Saint's Day (observed) (Revelation 7:2-17)
“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.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this All Saints’ Day is first lesson, from Revelation chapter seven. Dear friends in Christ, we all have had the experience of losing a loved one. Since we moved to Fort Wayne to attend the seminary, Bethany and I have lost three grandparents. It is never easy, especially when you are far from home, when you can’t be there, but instead get the phone call and then start looking for plane or train tickets. My grandfather passed away this past Memorial Day weekend, and when we came home again in late June, I had the opportunity to climb a pulpit and preach a sermon. I said then that Grandpa’s most important death happened more than eighty years ago, when God put the old sinful Adam in him to death and brought forth a new man to live before Him forever. God knew what He was doing when He established Baptism- it gives us a rock to hold onto, a place to put our trust.
Baptism is this rock, because in the washing of water with the Word, God places His seal upon you. “Then I saw another angel ascending from the rising of the sun, with the seal of the living God, and he called with a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm earth and sea, saying, ‘Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.’” On your Baptism day, water was poured on your forehead “In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” The name of the Triune God was placed upon your forehead- there God claimed you as one of His own. A seal is a visible sign of ownership and of protection. In Baptism, God gave you that visible sign, declaring to you and the entire world that you are His child, that you are under His loving care. But God does not stop placing His seal on you in Baptism. He is continually sealing you each and every day, placing His Name on you through His Word. In the Lord’s Supper, Christ once again uses visible means, the bread and wine which are His Body and Blood, to seal you. They bear His name and His strength. The seal of God is not a one-time thing, but instead is continual and stretches throughout your life. Baptism, the Word, and the Lord’s Supper are all means by which He declares that you are His child.
We need this seal, we need this assurance, because once we are sealed, we are sent out into the world. When you were Baptized, Satan became your enemy, and he is continually working to separate you from the one who claimed you in those waters. He has little need to persecute someone who is already in his camp. Instead, Satan uses the turmoil of this world to divide people from Christ, to tear them away from their Savior. The book of Revelation describes the terrible events that will ravage the earth in the Last Days. What Christians often fail to realize is that we are living in the Last Days right now. Ever since Jesus ascended into heaven, we have been living in the Last Days, as history moves toward its climax in the Return of Christ. Revelation does not contain things to look for to know if we are near the End, it is a description of the trials and tribulations that will occur in the great sweep of history from Christ’s first coming until His second. When we see the death and destruction of a fallen world all around us, when we experience the tribulation that surrounds us, we are tempted to despair, to give up hope. So many throughout history have turned their back on their Lord because they are angry at God for something that has happened in their life, or they cannot see any God at all in the chaos of this world. Satan is constantly working to put distance between you and God, whether it is through the tribulation of this world or your own sin. Every sin that you commit puts space between you and God, and an unrepented sin only increases that distance day by day. Satan wants to see you wallow in sin, pushing God further and further away. He only wants you with him in hell. The same day that Christ claimed you in Baptism, Satan declared war on you, and he does not intend to quit.
With such a vicious enemy and such great tribulation all around us, where are we to turn? From where can we draw confidence? John shows us in our text for today: “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out in a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’” We draw strength from the great multitude around us, all those who have been sealed by God in Baptism. First we look at those around us today. We look at the courageous example of Christians living under persecution, those who risk their lives to serve Christ. Christianity is not an individual ‘experience,’ it is a community, it is a family, it is a Church, the entire Church throughout the world. That is why we come here and join with others, because we are called to strengthen and be strengthened by others. But this community, this communion of saints, does not only include those within these walls, or even all Christians living right now. The communion of saints encompasses every person sealed by Christ who has ever lived, from the first disciples of Jesus until this very day. The Church transcends time. That is why we worship the way we do, that is why we hold so firmly to the teachings handed down from the apostles. In our worship, in our teachings, we are joined with the Church of all ages in giving praise to the Lamb, we join with all those sealed by Christ in crying out: “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb!” As Hebrews tells us, we are constantly surrounded by a ‘great cloud of witnesses.’
We draw strength, confidence, and courage from this cloud of witnesses, but this is only because their strength, confidence, and courage is in the Lord. In our text, John writes that “He who sits on the throne will shelter them with His presence.” The word used here for ‘shelter’ is the same word used in the Old Testament for the tabernacle. The tabernacle was the center of God’s presence during Israel’s desert wanderings. In this tent God dwelt amongst His people, He ‘tented’ with them in His love and mercy. In John’s Gospel, the apostle uses the same word to talk about someone who appeared to be simply a man. “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.” Jesus Christ, born of the Virgin Mary in a stable in Bethlehem, was the Son of God, God in the flesh, God ‘tenting’ with us. Just as God dwelt with His people in a tent in the desert, so in Jesus He dwelt with all people in the tent of our flesh. He was present among us, and He was present for a purpose
Jesus Christ did not ‘tent’ among His people simply to be present, but He came in order to restore the broken relationship between God and man, He came to take away our sin. And in order to take away our sin, He came as the Lamb. “Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?’ I said to him, ‘Sir, you know.’ And he said to me, ‘These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.’” Just as the blood of lambs bore the sins of Israel throughout the Old Testament, so now the shed blood of the Lamb bears the sins of the entire world away, as John the Baptist cried: “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” Jesus Christ came to this earth to tent, to tabernacle, to dwell amongst His people, but His primary purpose was to die, to shed His blood as the sacrifice for all of our sin. As Isaiah says, “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” The Lamb of God was nailed to a cross, and there His blood was shed for all of your sin. And now your filthy, sinful robes have been washed in the blood of the Lamb, making them white and pure as snow. Your seal in our Baptism is founded in this blood, it is there that you wash your robes in the blood of the Lamb, it is there that your robes are made white.
Because of what Jesus did, because He offered Himself up as the sacrificial Lamb for all of our sins, God now dwells with us, we are the ones described by John in our text: “Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple; and He who sits on the throne will shelter them with His presence.” Despite all of the tribulations of this world, despite all that Satan does in an attempt to tear you away from Jesus, you will stand before God’s throne forever, He will shelter you with His presence, He will tent with you forever. God dwelt with His people Israel in the desert, He dwelt with all people in the flesh of Christ, and now He will dwell with you into all eternity. Because the Lamb shed His blood for you, because you have washed your robes in the blood of the Lamb, because you have been sealed in Baptism, you will live forever in the glory of God’s presence. We are already in His presence for the sake of Christ, He comes to dwell with us when we gather in this place and when we are in His Word. But as John says in our Epistle lesson, we have much to look forward to, for in the new heavens and new earth “We will be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is.”
Jesus is not only the Lamb, He is also the shepherd. John describes heavenly glory like this: “They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of their throne will be their shepherd, and He will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe every tear from their eyes.” What a glorious picture of what we look forward to! Christ has sealed us through the Word in our Baptism and in the Lord’s Supper, and He has sealed us in order to bring us through every attack of Satan that faces us. He has sealed us to bring us through every tribulation that we face as we live in the Last Days before He comes again. It is in the seal that we take our confidence, it in the great cloud of witnesses that we draw our strength, and it is in the shed blood of the Lamb that we find our assurance. God has claimed you, He has sealed you, He has washed you, and He will bring you to His throne!
Our only response to this promise is to join with all the saints in the praises that echo out from every person claimed by Christ in every age, the praises described in our text. “And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen!”
Baptism is this rock, because in the washing of water with the Word, God places His seal upon you. “Then I saw another angel ascending from the rising of the sun, with the seal of the living God, and he called with a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm earth and sea, saying, ‘Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.’” On your Baptism day, water was poured on your forehead “In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” The name of the Triune God was placed upon your forehead- there God claimed you as one of His own. A seal is a visible sign of ownership and of protection. In Baptism, God gave you that visible sign, declaring to you and the entire world that you are His child, that you are under His loving care. But God does not stop placing His seal on you in Baptism. He is continually sealing you each and every day, placing His Name on you through His Word. In the Lord’s Supper, Christ once again uses visible means, the bread and wine which are His Body and Blood, to seal you. They bear His name and His strength. The seal of God is not a one-time thing, but instead is continual and stretches throughout your life. Baptism, the Word, and the Lord’s Supper are all means by which He declares that you are His child.
We need this seal, we need this assurance, because once we are sealed, we are sent out into the world. When you were Baptized, Satan became your enemy, and he is continually working to separate you from the one who claimed you in those waters. He has little need to persecute someone who is already in his camp. Instead, Satan uses the turmoil of this world to divide people from Christ, to tear them away from their Savior. The book of Revelation describes the terrible events that will ravage the earth in the Last Days. What Christians often fail to realize is that we are living in the Last Days right now. Ever since Jesus ascended into heaven, we have been living in the Last Days, as history moves toward its climax in the Return of Christ. Revelation does not contain things to look for to know if we are near the End, it is a description of the trials and tribulations that will occur in the great sweep of history from Christ’s first coming until His second. When we see the death and destruction of a fallen world all around us, when we experience the tribulation that surrounds us, we are tempted to despair, to give up hope. So many throughout history have turned their back on their Lord because they are angry at God for something that has happened in their life, or they cannot see any God at all in the chaos of this world. Satan is constantly working to put distance between you and God, whether it is through the tribulation of this world or your own sin. Every sin that you commit puts space between you and God, and an unrepented sin only increases that distance day by day. Satan wants to see you wallow in sin, pushing God further and further away. He only wants you with him in hell. The same day that Christ claimed you in Baptism, Satan declared war on you, and he does not intend to quit.
With such a vicious enemy and such great tribulation all around us, where are we to turn? From where can we draw confidence? John shows us in our text for today: “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out in a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’” We draw strength from the great multitude around us, all those who have been sealed by God in Baptism. First we look at those around us today. We look at the courageous example of Christians living under persecution, those who risk their lives to serve Christ. Christianity is not an individual ‘experience,’ it is a community, it is a family, it is a Church, the entire Church throughout the world. That is why we come here and join with others, because we are called to strengthen and be strengthened by others. But this community, this communion of saints, does not only include those within these walls, or even all Christians living right now. The communion of saints encompasses every person sealed by Christ who has ever lived, from the first disciples of Jesus until this very day. The Church transcends time. That is why we worship the way we do, that is why we hold so firmly to the teachings handed down from the apostles. In our worship, in our teachings, we are joined with the Church of all ages in giving praise to the Lamb, we join with all those sealed by Christ in crying out: “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb!” As Hebrews tells us, we are constantly surrounded by a ‘great cloud of witnesses.’
We draw strength, confidence, and courage from this cloud of witnesses, but this is only because their strength, confidence, and courage is in the Lord. In our text, John writes that “He who sits on the throne will shelter them with His presence.” The word used here for ‘shelter’ is the same word used in the Old Testament for the tabernacle. The tabernacle was the center of God’s presence during Israel’s desert wanderings. In this tent God dwelt amongst His people, He ‘tented’ with them in His love and mercy. In John’s Gospel, the apostle uses the same word to talk about someone who appeared to be simply a man. “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.” Jesus Christ, born of the Virgin Mary in a stable in Bethlehem, was the Son of God, God in the flesh, God ‘tenting’ with us. Just as God dwelt with His people in a tent in the desert, so in Jesus He dwelt with all people in the tent of our flesh. He was present among us, and He was present for a purpose
Jesus Christ did not ‘tent’ among His people simply to be present, but He came in order to restore the broken relationship between God and man, He came to take away our sin. And in order to take away our sin, He came as the Lamb. “Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?’ I said to him, ‘Sir, you know.’ And he said to me, ‘These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.’” Just as the blood of lambs bore the sins of Israel throughout the Old Testament, so now the shed blood of the Lamb bears the sins of the entire world away, as John the Baptist cried: “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” Jesus Christ came to this earth to tent, to tabernacle, to dwell amongst His people, but His primary purpose was to die, to shed His blood as the sacrifice for all of our sin. As Isaiah says, “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” The Lamb of God was nailed to a cross, and there His blood was shed for all of your sin. And now your filthy, sinful robes have been washed in the blood of the Lamb, making them white and pure as snow. Your seal in our Baptism is founded in this blood, it is there that you wash your robes in the blood of the Lamb, it is there that your robes are made white.
Because of what Jesus did, because He offered Himself up as the sacrificial Lamb for all of our sins, God now dwells with us, we are the ones described by John in our text: “Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple; and He who sits on the throne will shelter them with His presence.” Despite all of the tribulations of this world, despite all that Satan does in an attempt to tear you away from Jesus, you will stand before God’s throne forever, He will shelter you with His presence, He will tent with you forever. God dwelt with His people Israel in the desert, He dwelt with all people in the flesh of Christ, and now He will dwell with you into all eternity. Because the Lamb shed His blood for you, because you have washed your robes in the blood of the Lamb, because you have been sealed in Baptism, you will live forever in the glory of God’s presence. We are already in His presence for the sake of Christ, He comes to dwell with us when we gather in this place and when we are in His Word. But as John says in our Epistle lesson, we have much to look forward to, for in the new heavens and new earth “We will be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is.”
Jesus is not only the Lamb, He is also the shepherd. John describes heavenly glory like this: “They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of their throne will be their shepherd, and He will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe every tear from their eyes.” What a glorious picture of what we look forward to! Christ has sealed us through the Word in our Baptism and in the Lord’s Supper, and He has sealed us in order to bring us through every attack of Satan that faces us. He has sealed us to bring us through every tribulation that we face as we live in the Last Days before He comes again. It is in the seal that we take our confidence, it in the great cloud of witnesses that we draw our strength, and it is in the shed blood of the Lamb that we find our assurance. God has claimed you, He has sealed you, He has washed you, and He will bring you to His throne!
Our only response to this promise is to join with all the saints in the praises that echo out from every person claimed by Christ in every age, the praises described in our text. “And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen!”
Monday, October 27, 2008
Reformation Day (observed)
“If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this Reformation Sunday is the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from John chapter eight. Dear friends of Christ, what was the Reformation about? Some would say that it was all about the abuses of the medieval church, that an Augustinian monk named Martin Luther was finally driven over the edge by the selling of salvation by the church. Others would say that the Reformation was all about change, and that the Reformation Church is therefore constantly changing. I would agree to those two thoughts to a certain extent. The Reformation did begin because someone was finally pushed over the edge, driven to speak out against the abuses of the Church. The Reformation also has an element of change- there were problems that needed fixing, there were changes that needed to be made. But I believe that the Reformation was about much more than church abuses or change for the sake of change. The Reformation was all about the Gospel, and the free and clear proclamation of that Gospel throughout the world. The Reformers were called by God to be His bold witnesses before the Church and the entire world.
And what did they bear witness to? They bore witness to the truth of the Gospel, the truth of God’s word. Their lives, and our lives, revolve around the confession of the truth, as it is stated in our text: “So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in Him, ‘If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’” And what is this truth? It is much more than a concept, than an abstract idea, it is a person. Jesus is the Truth, God’s Truth, the Truth that is sent into a world afflicted by the father of lies. Jesus Christ, the Truth Himself, is God’s answer to our sin, He has come to speak the words of ultimate truth- that no person can be with the Father except though Jesus. The Truth of God is that your heavenly Father had a plan to deal with your sin, and it included sending this Truth into the world as a man and then sending that Truth to the cross, where man refused to recognize God’s Truth and instead put Him to death. But it was only through that death, and His glorious resurrection, that the Truth could triumph over the lies of sin, death, and the devil.
The benefits of this triumph are now given to us through the Word. As Jesus said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples.” The truth then comes to you when you abide in the Word, God’s Holy Scriptures. Abiding is not only reading God’s Holy Word, but instead it is an intimate communion with this Word, letting it shape your life and strengthen your faith each and every day. It is not simply head knowledge, just as the truth is not simply a concept. Instead, it is the means of a connection, of a communion with a person, God’s Truth Himself, Jesus Christ. And when we are connected with the Truth through the Word, we then are given the privilege of being Christ’s disciples. We have the wonderful opportunity to sit at Jesus’ feet each and every day, to learn from Him and draw strength from His gifts. As Jesus says, “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” What a wonderful gift! To that we can only respond with thanksgiving!
But how do the Jews respond to this glorious message? They take issue with one little word, one that we haven’t even touched on yet in this message- ‘free.’ “They answered Him, ‘We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it then that you say, “You will become free”?’” Many in the Church at the time of the Reformation said much the same thing. They did not see any bondage or slavery in their beloved Church. It took Martin Luther and others to open people’s eyes to the bondage that the Church was under. The people were under a terrible slavery to the Law. They were expected to work out their own salvation through their own effort, in many cases, they were expected to buy their own salvation. The burden of salvation rested solely on the shoulders of the people, and it was a heavy burden. Because of this, the Gospel itself was in shackles, bound and chained to the Law. The clear proclamation of what Christ had done was rarely heard, but instead people had to look at what they had done, leaving little assurance to anyone.
But even that slavery paled in comparison to the slavery which you and all humanity are under. What, we ask, is the slavery that we are under? We live in a free country, we are bound to no one! Why would we need to be set free? We have the same objection as the Jews in our text or the people in Luther’s day. We “have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?” Jesus answers you, me, the Jews, and all people throughout history, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.” That is the slavery that we are under, that of sin! Sin is a narcotic, it is an addicting substance, it wraps its chains around you, becoming tighter and tighter as you fall deeper and deeper into it. Some sins are famously addictive, such as pornography, alcoholism, or stealing, but when you get down to it, every sin that you commit enslaves you. We think that we can quit at any time, but as we continue in a sin, it becomes harder and harder to do so. Jesus is exactly right- sin is a slave master, constantly seeking to bind us ever tighter. It calls upon our total allegiance, it begins to consume our entire lives. And there is no reward at the end of this slavery, our slave master will not let us go, and so this slavery only promises death, it only promises separation from God in hell.
As Jesus said in our text, “The slave does not remain in the house forever, the Son remains forever.” Because we are slaves, slaves to sin, we do not deserve to remain in the house, instead we deserve to be cast away from God’s presence. And that is what God’s judgment is on sinful humanity. But the Son, the Son remains forever. And who is the Son? He is none other than the Truth Himself, Jesus Christ. Jesus is the one who remains in the Father’s house forever. The word used here for ‘remain’ is the same Greek word used earlier in our text for ‘abide,’ and here it has the same meaning. It means an intimate communion between Jesus and the Father, a connection, a personal relationship that is closer than any other relationship that we could think of. Jesus is true God, He is in that relationship called the Trinity, one God in three persons, three persons in communion with each other. And without leaving that relationship behind, Jesus Christ became true man, and He became true man to do something about our slavery.
I said earlier that our slavemasters, sin and Satan, will not let us go. They have us in their grasp and there is nothing that we can do to set ourselves free. All of the good things that we do cannot break the bonds of slavery, they do not cancel out our sin. No, we will not be let go. But Jesus did not become man to negotiate our release- He came to take on sin, Satan, and death, to deal our slavemasters a blow from which they will never recover, He came to defeat them and free you. And how did He do this? By taking the form of a slave, taking our form, and humbling Himself to death, death on a cross. He allowed Himself to be bound by the Jews and the Romans, He allowed them to deliver Him to the death that you deserved. Upon a Roman cross, Jesus of Nazareth, God in the flesh, shed His blood, and He shed it for your sins and the sins of the entire world, He shed it to set you free from the bondage you were under. Then He broke the bonds of death, He threw off the shackles that enslaved you when He rose from the dead Easter Sunday. When the stone to the tomb rolled away, freeing Jesus Christ, you too were free, centuries before you were born. “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”
As Paul said in our Epistle lesson for today, you “are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith.” This grace comes to you today and every day as a gift, Jesus is constantly freeing you from the bondage of sin each and every time that you repent of your sins. Christ continually works to free you because you continue to fall into sin’s slavery, you will not be free of sin this side of heaven, but He still breaks your bonds daily. You see, Jesus’ grace is so overflowing and abundant that it pours into your life at every moment. And how does this grace come? As Jesus said at the beginning of our text, it comes by abiding in His Word. But this is not simply head knowledge or reading from a book. God’s Word comes to us primarily through His spoken word, when He comes into your ears with the message of freedom. But He also works to free us in Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Through those physical means, connected with His Word, we are set free from our slavery to sin. These means bring us into a relationship with Christ, through them we are in intimate communion with the Trinity, we abide in God, and He abides in us. We are now the sons who abide in God’s presence until eternity, we are claimed as His children through Christ. We no longer have any need to be enslaved to sin, for we have been set free by the grace of God through the triumphant victory of Christ over our slaveholders.
This message was the goal of the Reformation, no more and no less. Martin Luther and his companions did not intend to start a new Church, but instead they sought to release the gospel from its slavery and once again give it free course throughout the world. They sought to release men and women from the bondage of the Law and sin, proclaiming to them that Jesus has set them free through His death and resurrection. They sought only to emulate what John wrote about in our first lesson today: “Then I saw another angel flying directly overhead, with an eternal Gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on earth, to every nation and tribe and language and people.” May this eternal Gospel, the Gospel that you are set free from your sins through Christ, strengthen and preserve you in the true faith until life everlasting, Amen.
And what did they bear witness to? They bore witness to the truth of the Gospel, the truth of God’s word. Their lives, and our lives, revolve around the confession of the truth, as it is stated in our text: “So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in Him, ‘If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’” And what is this truth? It is much more than a concept, than an abstract idea, it is a person. Jesus is the Truth, God’s Truth, the Truth that is sent into a world afflicted by the father of lies. Jesus Christ, the Truth Himself, is God’s answer to our sin, He has come to speak the words of ultimate truth- that no person can be with the Father except though Jesus. The Truth of God is that your heavenly Father had a plan to deal with your sin, and it included sending this Truth into the world as a man and then sending that Truth to the cross, where man refused to recognize God’s Truth and instead put Him to death. But it was only through that death, and His glorious resurrection, that the Truth could triumph over the lies of sin, death, and the devil.
The benefits of this triumph are now given to us through the Word. As Jesus said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples.” The truth then comes to you when you abide in the Word, God’s Holy Scriptures. Abiding is not only reading God’s Holy Word, but instead it is an intimate communion with this Word, letting it shape your life and strengthen your faith each and every day. It is not simply head knowledge, just as the truth is not simply a concept. Instead, it is the means of a connection, of a communion with a person, God’s Truth Himself, Jesus Christ. And when we are connected with the Truth through the Word, we then are given the privilege of being Christ’s disciples. We have the wonderful opportunity to sit at Jesus’ feet each and every day, to learn from Him and draw strength from His gifts. As Jesus says, “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” What a wonderful gift! To that we can only respond with thanksgiving!
But how do the Jews respond to this glorious message? They take issue with one little word, one that we haven’t even touched on yet in this message- ‘free.’ “They answered Him, ‘We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it then that you say, “You will become free”?’” Many in the Church at the time of the Reformation said much the same thing. They did not see any bondage or slavery in their beloved Church. It took Martin Luther and others to open people’s eyes to the bondage that the Church was under. The people were under a terrible slavery to the Law. They were expected to work out their own salvation through their own effort, in many cases, they were expected to buy their own salvation. The burden of salvation rested solely on the shoulders of the people, and it was a heavy burden. Because of this, the Gospel itself was in shackles, bound and chained to the Law. The clear proclamation of what Christ had done was rarely heard, but instead people had to look at what they had done, leaving little assurance to anyone.
But even that slavery paled in comparison to the slavery which you and all humanity are under. What, we ask, is the slavery that we are under? We live in a free country, we are bound to no one! Why would we need to be set free? We have the same objection as the Jews in our text or the people in Luther’s day. We “have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?” Jesus answers you, me, the Jews, and all people throughout history, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.” That is the slavery that we are under, that of sin! Sin is a narcotic, it is an addicting substance, it wraps its chains around you, becoming tighter and tighter as you fall deeper and deeper into it. Some sins are famously addictive, such as pornography, alcoholism, or stealing, but when you get down to it, every sin that you commit enslaves you. We think that we can quit at any time, but as we continue in a sin, it becomes harder and harder to do so. Jesus is exactly right- sin is a slave master, constantly seeking to bind us ever tighter. It calls upon our total allegiance, it begins to consume our entire lives. And there is no reward at the end of this slavery, our slave master will not let us go, and so this slavery only promises death, it only promises separation from God in hell.
As Jesus said in our text, “The slave does not remain in the house forever, the Son remains forever.” Because we are slaves, slaves to sin, we do not deserve to remain in the house, instead we deserve to be cast away from God’s presence. And that is what God’s judgment is on sinful humanity. But the Son, the Son remains forever. And who is the Son? He is none other than the Truth Himself, Jesus Christ. Jesus is the one who remains in the Father’s house forever. The word used here for ‘remain’ is the same Greek word used earlier in our text for ‘abide,’ and here it has the same meaning. It means an intimate communion between Jesus and the Father, a connection, a personal relationship that is closer than any other relationship that we could think of. Jesus is true God, He is in that relationship called the Trinity, one God in three persons, three persons in communion with each other. And without leaving that relationship behind, Jesus Christ became true man, and He became true man to do something about our slavery.
I said earlier that our slavemasters, sin and Satan, will not let us go. They have us in their grasp and there is nothing that we can do to set ourselves free. All of the good things that we do cannot break the bonds of slavery, they do not cancel out our sin. No, we will not be let go. But Jesus did not become man to negotiate our release- He came to take on sin, Satan, and death, to deal our slavemasters a blow from which they will never recover, He came to defeat them and free you. And how did He do this? By taking the form of a slave, taking our form, and humbling Himself to death, death on a cross. He allowed Himself to be bound by the Jews and the Romans, He allowed them to deliver Him to the death that you deserved. Upon a Roman cross, Jesus of Nazareth, God in the flesh, shed His blood, and He shed it for your sins and the sins of the entire world, He shed it to set you free from the bondage you were under. Then He broke the bonds of death, He threw off the shackles that enslaved you when He rose from the dead Easter Sunday. When the stone to the tomb rolled away, freeing Jesus Christ, you too were free, centuries before you were born. “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”
As Paul said in our Epistle lesson for today, you “are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith.” This grace comes to you today and every day as a gift, Jesus is constantly freeing you from the bondage of sin each and every time that you repent of your sins. Christ continually works to free you because you continue to fall into sin’s slavery, you will not be free of sin this side of heaven, but He still breaks your bonds daily. You see, Jesus’ grace is so overflowing and abundant that it pours into your life at every moment. And how does this grace come? As Jesus said at the beginning of our text, it comes by abiding in His Word. But this is not simply head knowledge or reading from a book. God’s Word comes to us primarily through His spoken word, when He comes into your ears with the message of freedom. But He also works to free us in Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Through those physical means, connected with His Word, we are set free from our slavery to sin. These means bring us into a relationship with Christ, through them we are in intimate communion with the Trinity, we abide in God, and He abides in us. We are now the sons who abide in God’s presence until eternity, we are claimed as His children through Christ. We no longer have any need to be enslaved to sin, for we have been set free by the grace of God through the triumphant victory of Christ over our slaveholders.
This message was the goal of the Reformation, no more and no less. Martin Luther and his companions did not intend to start a new Church, but instead they sought to release the gospel from its slavery and once again give it free course throughout the world. They sought to release men and women from the bondage of the Law and sin, proclaiming to them that Jesus has set them free through His death and resurrection. They sought only to emulate what John wrote about in our first lesson today: “Then I saw another angel flying directly overhead, with an eternal Gospel to proclaim to those who dwell on earth, to every nation and tribe and language and people.” May this eternal Gospel, the Gospel that you are set free from your sins through Christ, strengthen and preserve you in the true faith until life everlasting, Amen.
Circuit-wide Reformation festival sermon
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. Greetings to all of you on this day on which we celebrate God’s gift of the Gospel, the light brought forth from all that shrouded it through the work of Martin Luther and others. Today we do not celebrate a man or even a movement, but instead we commemorate the Gospel, and God’s chosen instruments used to proclaim that Gospel clearly. God chose a simple Augustinian monk from Germany to reform the Church, to create a movement that would result in the Gospel once again being clearly proclaimed. This should be no surprise to any of us. God has a certain habit of using means, whether it is water, bread and wine, or the sinful lips of a pastor. He takes hold of those means and uses them to create and strengthen faith, He connects them with His Word in order to give life. But because He likes to use sinful human beings, you, me, and many others throughout history as His means, the proclamation of the Gospel rarely occurs without trial or stumbling. Even Martin Luther, a figure that seems to tower over history, was a sinful human, and it would be his struggle with sin that would define the rediscovery of the Gospel.
Luther’s life was filled with spiritual struggle and conflict. He was fully aware of his own sin and God’s punishment for that sin. Luther knew only of a God who judges, a God who condemns, and His condemnation is terrible, it is unavoidable, it is final. Our creator laid down laws for all humanity to follow, laws that no human could be expected to keep, then condemned us when we failed to live up to His standard. I think that we today have much to learn from Luther’s struggles. We are in a culture that dismisses sin- we are not conditioned to look at ourselves as sinners. But that is what you and I are. You can fight it all we want, you can tell your pastor to quit proclaiming it, but the simple fact is that you are a poor, miserable sinner. Perhaps those of you in the church do see your own sin, but do you realize the weight of your sin, the fact that God has every right to condemn you to hell for it? As we read in Romans, “The wages of sin is death.” Inside or outside the church, we encounter many people who honestly believe that they do not sin- they see their lives as perfect, or if they do admit to wrongdoing, they do not acknowledge the punishment they deserve. You’ve tried to live a good life, right? Surely that has to count for something! Moreover, many Christians believe that they are done with sin, that they have passed beyond the stage of sin and are now perfect, as God wants them to be. Luther’s awareness of his own sin is something that we can all learn from, as it is only from an awareness of sin that we have any need for a merciful God. Those without sin have no need of a Savior.
This acute awareness of his own sin drove Luther to find salvation for himself. It drove him to the monestary, where he was an exemplary monk, and he followed each and every regulation and instruction to the letter. But he could not find peace. As he said himself: “Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience… I did not love, yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners.” The more he worked toward his own salvation, the more he was aware that he was reaching for an impossible goal. All he deserved was death, eternal death.
Moreover, Luther was very aware of Satan’s work in the world. Today it is easy to simply dismiss this as part of the superstition of his day, but as you read Luther, you become convinced that he felt the hot breath of the evil one on his neck each and every day. In the monastery he heard Satan’s accusations from every angle, as he was accused of his sins and shortcomings. Today, many even in the Church seem to forget that he is the enemy, the accuser, the murderer and father of lies. How often do you speak of your enemy, how often do you appreciate that he is always striving against you? How often do you hear about your enemy from the pulpit? Every Christian should be aware of Satan’s work, whether through the world or our own sinful human flesh. You should engage Him in battle each and every day, every sermon that is preached should take him head on and strike him the blows that only God’s Word can land. As Luther said, “A Christian should know that the devil is about us everywhere…and we must fight with him.” You have a problem- it is called, sin, it is called death. You have an enemy- he is called Satan. Make no mistake, Luther was exceedingly aware of both his sin and Satan’s work, and both of those drove him first to his own works, but then to the Bible.
It was Scripture that saved Luther. This, once again, is no surprise. God has a habit of changing hearts through His Word- He has been doing it since the Creation, and he has not stopped since. Luther was led through his struggles and anguish to Romans chapter one, verses sixteen and seventeen: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’” These words tortured him, as they gave a picture of a righteous God who condemned all those who did not live up to His righteousness. God, however, continued to work through His Word. Finally, Luther realized that the righteousness demanded here was the righteousness of Christ given to us as a gift by faith. It was at that point that the Scriptures opened up for him, and for us! “There I began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith. And this is the meaning: the righteousness of God is revealed by the Gospel, namely… the righteousness with which God clothes us when He justifies us.” Jesus Christ was the one who fulfilled the requirements of the Law by becoming man, by taking on our human flesh. He was the one who faced the wrath of a just God over your sin, the one who died on the cross to fulfill all righteousness. On that Good Friday, Jesus hung upon that cross in your place, taking on the punishment that you deserved, and when He said ‘It is finished’ your salvation was completed. He shed His blood for you! He defeated your enemies- sin, death, and Satan. He dealt them a blow from which they will never recover when He stepped forth from the tomb on Easter morning. This same Jesus Christ then bestows on you His righteousness won on that cross through faith. This righteousness covers you like a robe so that when God looks at you from the judgment seat, He only sees Jesus. His judgment is therefore ‘not guilty,’ and you are given the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting for the sake of Christ. Righteousness is no longer an unattainable goal- in fact, it is not a goal at all, but a gift, a gift given to you through His shed blood. You are a poor, miserable sinner, but because of what Christ did for you, you are now saved from your sins, you do not have to fear the wrath of God. What wonderful news! The Scriptures all opened up for Luther to reveal the glorious narrative of God saving His fallen creation through the sacrifice of His Son.
And so the remainder of Luther’s life focused around proclaiming and defending this message, this glorious Gospel of God’s free grace for the sake of Christ. Every sermon and every page that came from his pen dripped with the blood of Jesus, it revolved around Christ and Him alone. This focus on the Gospel also led Luther to highlight the Sacraments, those means by which God comes to sinful man, the means by which He comes to you. In Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, Luther did not see something you do for God, but instead simply another way that God’s overflowing grace comes to you. Baptism encapsulated the Gospel, as the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation are given to you through water joined with the Word. In your baptism, you are clothed with Christ’s righteousness; you are one of those who are “coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” As Luther says in the Small Catechism: “Certainly not just water, but the Word of God in and with the water does these things… with the Word of God it is a Baptism, that is, a life-giving water, rich in grace, and a washing of the new birth in the Holy Spirit.”
In the Lord’s Supper, the fact that God took human flesh, becomes reality, a reality that you join in each and every time that you receive His Body and Blood. That is why he opposed so vehemently any attempt to make Christ only spiritually present in the Supper. As he states in the Large Catechism: “Here you have both truths, that it is Christ’s body and blood and that these are yours as your treasure and gift. Christ’s body can never be an unfruitful, vain thing, impotent and useless.” When you receive the Lord’s Supper in just a few moments here in this place, you will receive the very Body and Blood of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the same Body and Blood which was given and shed on the cross for all of your sins, and now it is given to you for the forgiveness of your sins. Luther always taught that salvation was accomplished on the cross, but it is distributed to His people in His Word and Sacraments- and it is distributed to you on this very day!
Luther’s goal was never reform for the sake of reform, or change simply for the sake of change. His goal was to proclaim the Gospel freely, detached from all that the medieval church had added to it. He did not introduce anything new, but instead sought to restore what had been lost, to bring the Church back to its Scriptural roots. How do we follow in his footsteps? By defending the Gospel with everything we have, opposing any teaching that adds any ounce of our own effort or striving to the Gospel. And by proclaiming this same Gospel, freely and clearly, to all whom you come into contact with. Those who have received this message by faith have no need of the Law to motivate them to speak this message to others. Instead, proclaiming the Gospel is simply something we do because of who we are, those redeemed by Christ. May this glorious message, the wonderful free gift of life and salvation through the death and resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, strengthen your faith and give you the confidence to stand before God as one of those redeemed by Christ, Amen.
Luther’s life was filled with spiritual struggle and conflict. He was fully aware of his own sin and God’s punishment for that sin. Luther knew only of a God who judges, a God who condemns, and His condemnation is terrible, it is unavoidable, it is final. Our creator laid down laws for all humanity to follow, laws that no human could be expected to keep, then condemned us when we failed to live up to His standard. I think that we today have much to learn from Luther’s struggles. We are in a culture that dismisses sin- we are not conditioned to look at ourselves as sinners. But that is what you and I are. You can fight it all we want, you can tell your pastor to quit proclaiming it, but the simple fact is that you are a poor, miserable sinner. Perhaps those of you in the church do see your own sin, but do you realize the weight of your sin, the fact that God has every right to condemn you to hell for it? As we read in Romans, “The wages of sin is death.” Inside or outside the church, we encounter many people who honestly believe that they do not sin- they see their lives as perfect, or if they do admit to wrongdoing, they do not acknowledge the punishment they deserve. You’ve tried to live a good life, right? Surely that has to count for something! Moreover, many Christians believe that they are done with sin, that they have passed beyond the stage of sin and are now perfect, as God wants them to be. Luther’s awareness of his own sin is something that we can all learn from, as it is only from an awareness of sin that we have any need for a merciful God. Those without sin have no need of a Savior.
This acute awareness of his own sin drove Luther to find salvation for himself. It drove him to the monestary, where he was an exemplary monk, and he followed each and every regulation and instruction to the letter. But he could not find peace. As he said himself: “Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience… I did not love, yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners.” The more he worked toward his own salvation, the more he was aware that he was reaching for an impossible goal. All he deserved was death, eternal death.
Moreover, Luther was very aware of Satan’s work in the world. Today it is easy to simply dismiss this as part of the superstition of his day, but as you read Luther, you become convinced that he felt the hot breath of the evil one on his neck each and every day. In the monastery he heard Satan’s accusations from every angle, as he was accused of his sins and shortcomings. Today, many even in the Church seem to forget that he is the enemy, the accuser, the murderer and father of lies. How often do you speak of your enemy, how often do you appreciate that he is always striving against you? How often do you hear about your enemy from the pulpit? Every Christian should be aware of Satan’s work, whether through the world or our own sinful human flesh. You should engage Him in battle each and every day, every sermon that is preached should take him head on and strike him the blows that only God’s Word can land. As Luther said, “A Christian should know that the devil is about us everywhere…and we must fight with him.” You have a problem- it is called, sin, it is called death. You have an enemy- he is called Satan. Make no mistake, Luther was exceedingly aware of both his sin and Satan’s work, and both of those drove him first to his own works, but then to the Bible.
It was Scripture that saved Luther. This, once again, is no surprise. God has a habit of changing hearts through His Word- He has been doing it since the Creation, and he has not stopped since. Luther was led through his struggles and anguish to Romans chapter one, verses sixteen and seventeen: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’” These words tortured him, as they gave a picture of a righteous God who condemned all those who did not live up to His righteousness. God, however, continued to work through His Word. Finally, Luther realized that the righteousness demanded here was the righteousness of Christ given to us as a gift by faith. It was at that point that the Scriptures opened up for him, and for us! “There I began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith. And this is the meaning: the righteousness of God is revealed by the Gospel, namely… the righteousness with which God clothes us when He justifies us.” Jesus Christ was the one who fulfilled the requirements of the Law by becoming man, by taking on our human flesh. He was the one who faced the wrath of a just God over your sin, the one who died on the cross to fulfill all righteousness. On that Good Friday, Jesus hung upon that cross in your place, taking on the punishment that you deserved, and when He said ‘It is finished’ your salvation was completed. He shed His blood for you! He defeated your enemies- sin, death, and Satan. He dealt them a blow from which they will never recover when He stepped forth from the tomb on Easter morning. This same Jesus Christ then bestows on you His righteousness won on that cross through faith. This righteousness covers you like a robe so that when God looks at you from the judgment seat, He only sees Jesus. His judgment is therefore ‘not guilty,’ and you are given the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting for the sake of Christ. Righteousness is no longer an unattainable goal- in fact, it is not a goal at all, but a gift, a gift given to you through His shed blood. You are a poor, miserable sinner, but because of what Christ did for you, you are now saved from your sins, you do not have to fear the wrath of God. What wonderful news! The Scriptures all opened up for Luther to reveal the glorious narrative of God saving His fallen creation through the sacrifice of His Son.
And so the remainder of Luther’s life focused around proclaiming and defending this message, this glorious Gospel of God’s free grace for the sake of Christ. Every sermon and every page that came from his pen dripped with the blood of Jesus, it revolved around Christ and Him alone. This focus on the Gospel also led Luther to highlight the Sacraments, those means by which God comes to sinful man, the means by which He comes to you. In Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, Luther did not see something you do for God, but instead simply another way that God’s overflowing grace comes to you. Baptism encapsulated the Gospel, as the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation are given to you through water joined with the Word. In your baptism, you are clothed with Christ’s righteousness; you are one of those who are “coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” As Luther says in the Small Catechism: “Certainly not just water, but the Word of God in and with the water does these things… with the Word of God it is a Baptism, that is, a life-giving water, rich in grace, and a washing of the new birth in the Holy Spirit.”
In the Lord’s Supper, the fact that God took human flesh, becomes reality, a reality that you join in each and every time that you receive His Body and Blood. That is why he opposed so vehemently any attempt to make Christ only spiritually present in the Supper. As he states in the Large Catechism: “Here you have both truths, that it is Christ’s body and blood and that these are yours as your treasure and gift. Christ’s body can never be an unfruitful, vain thing, impotent and useless.” When you receive the Lord’s Supper in just a few moments here in this place, you will receive the very Body and Blood of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the same Body and Blood which was given and shed on the cross for all of your sins, and now it is given to you for the forgiveness of your sins. Luther always taught that salvation was accomplished on the cross, but it is distributed to His people in His Word and Sacraments- and it is distributed to you on this very day!
Luther’s goal was never reform for the sake of reform, or change simply for the sake of change. His goal was to proclaim the Gospel freely, detached from all that the medieval church had added to it. He did not introduce anything new, but instead sought to restore what had been lost, to bring the Church back to its Scriptural roots. How do we follow in his footsteps? By defending the Gospel with everything we have, opposing any teaching that adds any ounce of our own effort or striving to the Gospel. And by proclaiming this same Gospel, freely and clearly, to all whom you come into contact with. Those who have received this message by faith have no need of the Law to motivate them to speak this message to others. Instead, proclaiming the Gospel is simply something we do because of who we are, those redeemed by Christ. May this glorious message, the wonderful free gift of life and salvation through the death and resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, strengthen your faith and give you the confidence to stand before God as one of those redeemed by Christ, Amen.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Article in Eagle Newspapers of Northern Madison County (New York)
Greetings in Christ, our Savior and Redeemer. My name is Vicar Christopher Maronde, and I am a seminary student at Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana. For the next year, I will be serving as a vicar in three churches in upstate New York, including Redeemer Lutheran Church in Canastota. My year in upstate New York is a time of hands on preparation for becoming a pastor in the Lutheran Church- Missouri Synod. While serving my vicarage, I will be submitting a monthly article relating to the Gospel of Jesus Christ for publication in the Eagle Newspapers of Northern Madison County.
In February and March of this year I was exposed firsthand to the hope which springs from the sharing of the Gospel as I spent three weeks in South Africa on a study abroad trip. During the weekdays, we stayed at a Lutheran seminary in Pretoria. On the weekends, we left the city behind and traveled the countryside, seeing the church and its people. South Africa is a very fascinating and unique country, but also a troubled one. Apartheid (a program of racism and forced removal of native Africans that lasted from 1948-1994) has left deep scars, and numerous issues that affect the entire nation along with the Lutheran Church. Not only this, but the issues of poverty, AIDS, and the growing influence of Islam are difficult issues facing the Church not only in South Africa, but all throughout the African continent. Preaching the Good News of Christ in Africa is challenging even in the best of times.
This is precisely why the seminary in Pretoria, Lutheran Theological Seminary- Tshwane, is so important. At this seminary there are students from all over the continent, trained in Lutheran theology, and then sent back out into their countries to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to baptize. The sacrifices these men make to answer the Lord’s call to become a pastor are simply amazing. One student, a South African of Zulu descent, had to leave his wife and children behind, because he could not afford to bring them with him, and he cannot afford to visit them. Another student from Uganda runs the family farm with a cell phone. All of the students live on next to nothing, but their faith remains strong. These men have given up everything to serve Jesus, and they pray for that day when they will rejoin their family and begin to preach God’s Word to their people. In Pretoria, South Africa, the cause of the Gospel throughout a hurting continent is being served.
This same Gospel is proclaimed at Redeemer Lutheran Church every Sunday at 4 pm (we meet at Trinity Episcopal Church in Canastota). We also have several bible studies- before church at 3 pm, at Whitman Road above Clockville on the 2nd and 4th Mondays at 2:00 pm, and at North Bay on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays at 6:30 pm.
In February and March of this year I was exposed firsthand to the hope which springs from the sharing of the Gospel as I spent three weeks in South Africa on a study abroad trip. During the weekdays, we stayed at a Lutheran seminary in Pretoria. On the weekends, we left the city behind and traveled the countryside, seeing the church and its people. South Africa is a very fascinating and unique country, but also a troubled one. Apartheid (a program of racism and forced removal of native Africans that lasted from 1948-1994) has left deep scars, and numerous issues that affect the entire nation along with the Lutheran Church. Not only this, but the issues of poverty, AIDS, and the growing influence of Islam are difficult issues facing the Church not only in South Africa, but all throughout the African continent. Preaching the Good News of Christ in Africa is challenging even in the best of times.
This is precisely why the seminary in Pretoria, Lutheran Theological Seminary- Tshwane, is so important. At this seminary there are students from all over the continent, trained in Lutheran theology, and then sent back out into their countries to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to baptize. The sacrifices these men make to answer the Lord’s call to become a pastor are simply amazing. One student, a South African of Zulu descent, had to leave his wife and children behind, because he could not afford to bring them with him, and he cannot afford to visit them. Another student from Uganda runs the family farm with a cell phone. All of the students live on next to nothing, but their faith remains strong. These men have given up everything to serve Jesus, and they pray for that day when they will rejoin their family and begin to preach God’s Word to their people. In Pretoria, South Africa, the cause of the Gospel throughout a hurting continent is being served.
This same Gospel is proclaimed at Redeemer Lutheran Church every Sunday at 4 pm (we meet at Trinity Episcopal Church in Canastota). We also have several bible studies- before church at 3 pm, at Whitman Road above Clockville on the 2nd and 4th Mondays at 2:00 pm, and at North Bay on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays at 6:30 pm.
Proper 24 of Series A (Matthew 22:25-22)
“Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” 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 is from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from Matthew chapter twenty-two. Dear friends in Christ, think back to the Gospel lessons of the past three weeks. We have been marching through the Gospel of Matthew, walking with Jesus on His way to the cross. These past three weeks, Jesus has launched three attacks against the religious leaders of His day. He has told them through three parables that the kingdom of God will be ripped from their hands and given to others. Israel has been disobedient, they have refused to do the Father’s will, killing the prophets sent to them, those who were inviting them to the wedding feast. Not only that, but they will soon kill His one and only Son. And what was their response? Did the Jewish leaders repent and follow Jesus? I think you can guess the answer- as we read a few weeks ago, “When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they perceived that He was speaking about them. And although they were seeking to arrest Him, they feared the crowds.” They could not just arrest Jesus out in the open, but they needed another strategy, a more cunning strategy. Our text is the first of three attempts to take care of this ‘Jesus problem,’ and to do this, the religious leaders have concocted a new plan.
“Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle Him in His talk.” This was their strategy, to get Jesus to say something that would turn people against Him. They needed a question that would have no good answer, that would place Jesus in a lose-lose situation. But first, they needed to butter Him up. “And they sent their disciples to Him along with the Herodians, saying, ‘Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone’s opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances.’” For all their false flattery, what these people said was correct. Jesus is true, and He does teach the way of God truthfully, most especially when He said that the only way to God is through Himself. Moreover, He does not care about man’s opinion. All that He cares about is the will of His Father, for whom He took on Human flesh. Jesus serves His Father, not the whims of men. These men spoke ‘truthfully,’ even though their purpose was deception.
The disciples of the Pharisees had a simple question for this teacher they supposedly revered so highly: “Tell us, then, what you think? Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” They think they have the perfect question, and in many ways, they do. It sounds very innocent, a simple and honest inquiry on how a conquered people should treat their conquerors. Moreover, there are two wrong answers to this question. If Jesus says ‘no,’ if He declares that the Jews should not pay taxes to Caesar, the Pharisees will turn Him over to the Roman authorities as a revolutionary. Jesus will then be declaring that His kingdom truly is of this world, that He has come to collect power and set Himself up as an earthly king. With the God-man at their head, the Jews will be unstoppable in their quest to throw off the shackles of the Romans. On the other hand, if Jesus answers ‘yes,’ if He tells those gathered around Him that they should pay taxes to Caesar, then the Pharisees can paint Him as an opponent of the Jews, One who has no regard for the privileges of His very own people. In either option, temptation lurks, Satan is waiting for Jesus to make a false step. This is another chance for Jesus of Nazareth to grasp at glory, to court the favor of the crowds, perhaps even a chance to join with the powerful Romans. Satan wants Him to reach for earthly glory, he knows that Jesus must be derailed from the cross. But Jesus sees through it all: “But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, ‘Why put me to the test, you hypocrites?’”
And Satan continues to tempt you and me with this same question. Especially in an election season, the question comes to each one of us, “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” No matter who wins and who loses on November fourth, roughly half of our nation will be elated and the other half despondent. For those of you on the losing end, the question then becomes, do we give this new government our loyalty as well? Or do we register our disappointment by failing to pay taxes or dumping our trash on yards with Obama/Biden signs? Now those are pretty extreme examples, but I am sure that you know many other ways to rebel against rulers you despise. More importantly, there is the mental despair and despondency that comes from seeing someone you detest take the podium on Inauguration Day. On the other hand, there is an equally insidious danger to the winners. Those who win political victory are tempted to put all of their trust in the government, to stake all their fortunes on the whims of a hundred million voters. Is this any different than what Jesus was tempted to do? Satan wanted Him to gather worldly glory, forsaking the purpose for which He became incarnate. Satan wants your focus on anything else but God, He wants your trust to be centered on the things of this world. On either side, despondency or elation, we forget where our hope and trust should lie. They do not lie upon humans, but instead upon the God who has created us, the God who has redeemed us. On November fourth I urge you to vote, but do we look to a candidate for our ultimate confidence, for our salvation? Do we put our trust in the government, in the mechanisms of this world alone? If not, what do we owe to Caesar, or Obama, or McCain? What did Jesus say?
The answer of Jesus is so simple that it almost seems ridiculous: “‘Show me the coin for the tax.’ And they brought Him a denarius. And Jesus said to them, ‘Whose likeness and inscription is this?’ They said, ‘Caesar’s.’ Then He said to them, ‘Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.’ When they heard it, they marveled. And they left Him and went away.” Such a simple answer to such a serious question! We simply give to the government what we owe it, whether it is taxes or obedience to the law. Jesus did not advocate rebellion, He did not take Satan’s bait to establish a kingdom upon this earth, but instead He rejected this temptation. We are especially tempted during an election season to put our hope in earthly rulers, but Jesus shows us a much better way. We give to our rulers what we owe them, no more and no less. We do not give them our ultimate hope and our confidence, we do not look toward them for salvation. But we do give them what they are owed. And why is that? What is so special about earthly governments that would have even Christians in their debt?
We render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s because Caesar’s ability to rule does not come from Himself, it comes from God. God has established earthly governments to take care of earthly things- their power flows directly from Him, just as our loyalty to government flows directly from our obedience to God. But that is not all- more importantly, God also uses earthly governments to His own ends. In our Old Testament lesson, God tells Israel that He will use Cyrus, the king of Persia, as His instrument to bring His promises to fruition, as His means of returning Israel from exile. And Cyrus will not even know it. “I am the Lord, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me, that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the Lord, and there is none other.” Just as God used Cyrus to fulfill His promises, so He would use other earthly rulers, Pontus Pilate and the Jewish leaders, to fulfill His ultimate promise. Jesus rejected Satan’s offer of earthly glory because He had come to this earth for a much higher purpose. He took on human flesh in order to die, to be killed, to be executed as a common criminal. God needed an instrument to accomplish this sacrifice, and so He appointed Pilate and the Romans, who did not know God nor His plan, to be His chosen instrument of salvation, of your salvation. Jesus reminded Pilate that he was simply a part of God’s plan in John chapter 19: “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above.” Jesus’ kingdom was not of this world, in fact, the world rejected it, as He was crowned with thorns and hung on a cross, shedding His blood for your sins and the sins of the entire world. Jesus was not just ‘true’ as the Pharisees flattered Him, but He was the Truth Himself, and the Jewish leaders exchanged the Truth of God for a lie when they sent Him to His death. But then God’s chosen instruments were witnesses to a greater miracle, as Pilate’s soldiers fell to the ground in fear as the tomb opened and Jesus stepped forth. His sacrifice now redeems you, His victory gives you life, life with Him forever. You have no need to put your trust in candidates, presidents, or rulers. God can use whomever we elect toward His own ends. Instead your confidence and hope is in Christ, the one who gave up His life for your sins, the one who covers you with His robe of righteousness and brings you to the marriage feast of God.
Because Christ has redeemed us, we can then live a life in fulfillment of Jesus’ words: “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” God has blessed us with so much in addition to our eternal salvation- every good gift flows from Him, and so we give back to Him what we have received from His providing hand. Not only that, but the very best, the first-fruits, go to Him in joyful thanksgiving to the Lord of the Harvest. And while we are not rebellious citizens, we are also not quiet ones. As baptized children of God, as those redeemed by Christ’s blood, we do not let the government infringe on the Gospel- it is there that we draw our line. The government was established by God to order our affairs in this life, but when those God-given authorities step into the realm of the Gospel, we are expected to disobey. We must obey God rather than men.
And so there is a balance to be struck in our Christian walk. On the one hand, we respect those placed in authority over us as those who have authority from God. On the other hand we do not tolerate their intrusion into areas in which God has not given them authority. This is not an easy balance. We prayed in our collect for today, “With You as our ruler and guide we may so pass through things temporal that we lose not the things eternal.” Satan is always using the things of this world in an attempt to draw our attention away from Christ. May we live our lives in this world in order that we do not put our trust in anything else but in Christ, the one who became man for you, the one who took on Satan for you, the one who died in your place. The Lord is forever faithful to His promises, and we pray that He will preserve us in this true faith until life everlasting, Amen.
“Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle Him in His talk.” This was their strategy, to get Jesus to say something that would turn people against Him. They needed a question that would have no good answer, that would place Jesus in a lose-lose situation. But first, they needed to butter Him up. “And they sent their disciples to Him along with the Herodians, saying, ‘Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone’s opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances.’” For all their false flattery, what these people said was correct. Jesus is true, and He does teach the way of God truthfully, most especially when He said that the only way to God is through Himself. Moreover, He does not care about man’s opinion. All that He cares about is the will of His Father, for whom He took on Human flesh. Jesus serves His Father, not the whims of men. These men spoke ‘truthfully,’ even though their purpose was deception.
The disciples of the Pharisees had a simple question for this teacher they supposedly revered so highly: “Tell us, then, what you think? Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” They think they have the perfect question, and in many ways, they do. It sounds very innocent, a simple and honest inquiry on how a conquered people should treat their conquerors. Moreover, there are two wrong answers to this question. If Jesus says ‘no,’ if He declares that the Jews should not pay taxes to Caesar, the Pharisees will turn Him over to the Roman authorities as a revolutionary. Jesus will then be declaring that His kingdom truly is of this world, that He has come to collect power and set Himself up as an earthly king. With the God-man at their head, the Jews will be unstoppable in their quest to throw off the shackles of the Romans. On the other hand, if Jesus answers ‘yes,’ if He tells those gathered around Him that they should pay taxes to Caesar, then the Pharisees can paint Him as an opponent of the Jews, One who has no regard for the privileges of His very own people. In either option, temptation lurks, Satan is waiting for Jesus to make a false step. This is another chance for Jesus of Nazareth to grasp at glory, to court the favor of the crowds, perhaps even a chance to join with the powerful Romans. Satan wants Him to reach for earthly glory, he knows that Jesus must be derailed from the cross. But Jesus sees through it all: “But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, ‘Why put me to the test, you hypocrites?’”
And Satan continues to tempt you and me with this same question. Especially in an election season, the question comes to each one of us, “Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” No matter who wins and who loses on November fourth, roughly half of our nation will be elated and the other half despondent. For those of you on the losing end, the question then becomes, do we give this new government our loyalty as well? Or do we register our disappointment by failing to pay taxes or dumping our trash on yards with Obama/Biden signs? Now those are pretty extreme examples, but I am sure that you know many other ways to rebel against rulers you despise. More importantly, there is the mental despair and despondency that comes from seeing someone you detest take the podium on Inauguration Day. On the other hand, there is an equally insidious danger to the winners. Those who win political victory are tempted to put all of their trust in the government, to stake all their fortunes on the whims of a hundred million voters. Is this any different than what Jesus was tempted to do? Satan wanted Him to gather worldly glory, forsaking the purpose for which He became incarnate. Satan wants your focus on anything else but God, He wants your trust to be centered on the things of this world. On either side, despondency or elation, we forget where our hope and trust should lie. They do not lie upon humans, but instead upon the God who has created us, the God who has redeemed us. On November fourth I urge you to vote, but do we look to a candidate for our ultimate confidence, for our salvation? Do we put our trust in the government, in the mechanisms of this world alone? If not, what do we owe to Caesar, or Obama, or McCain? What did Jesus say?
The answer of Jesus is so simple that it almost seems ridiculous: “‘Show me the coin for the tax.’ And they brought Him a denarius. And Jesus said to them, ‘Whose likeness and inscription is this?’ They said, ‘Caesar’s.’ Then He said to them, ‘Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.’ When they heard it, they marveled. And they left Him and went away.” Such a simple answer to such a serious question! We simply give to the government what we owe it, whether it is taxes or obedience to the law. Jesus did not advocate rebellion, He did not take Satan’s bait to establish a kingdom upon this earth, but instead He rejected this temptation. We are especially tempted during an election season to put our hope in earthly rulers, but Jesus shows us a much better way. We give to our rulers what we owe them, no more and no less. We do not give them our ultimate hope and our confidence, we do not look toward them for salvation. But we do give them what they are owed. And why is that? What is so special about earthly governments that would have even Christians in their debt?
We render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s because Caesar’s ability to rule does not come from Himself, it comes from God. God has established earthly governments to take care of earthly things- their power flows directly from Him, just as our loyalty to government flows directly from our obedience to God. But that is not all- more importantly, God also uses earthly governments to His own ends. In our Old Testament lesson, God tells Israel that He will use Cyrus, the king of Persia, as His instrument to bring His promises to fruition, as His means of returning Israel from exile. And Cyrus will not even know it. “I am the Lord, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me, that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the Lord, and there is none other.” Just as God used Cyrus to fulfill His promises, so He would use other earthly rulers, Pontus Pilate and the Jewish leaders, to fulfill His ultimate promise. Jesus rejected Satan’s offer of earthly glory because He had come to this earth for a much higher purpose. He took on human flesh in order to die, to be killed, to be executed as a common criminal. God needed an instrument to accomplish this sacrifice, and so He appointed Pilate and the Romans, who did not know God nor His plan, to be His chosen instrument of salvation, of your salvation. Jesus reminded Pilate that he was simply a part of God’s plan in John chapter 19: “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above.” Jesus’ kingdom was not of this world, in fact, the world rejected it, as He was crowned with thorns and hung on a cross, shedding His blood for your sins and the sins of the entire world. Jesus was not just ‘true’ as the Pharisees flattered Him, but He was the Truth Himself, and the Jewish leaders exchanged the Truth of God for a lie when they sent Him to His death. But then God’s chosen instruments were witnesses to a greater miracle, as Pilate’s soldiers fell to the ground in fear as the tomb opened and Jesus stepped forth. His sacrifice now redeems you, His victory gives you life, life with Him forever. You have no need to put your trust in candidates, presidents, or rulers. God can use whomever we elect toward His own ends. Instead your confidence and hope is in Christ, the one who gave up His life for your sins, the one who covers you with His robe of righteousness and brings you to the marriage feast of God.
Because Christ has redeemed us, we can then live a life in fulfillment of Jesus’ words: “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” God has blessed us with so much in addition to our eternal salvation- every good gift flows from Him, and so we give back to Him what we have received from His providing hand. Not only that, but the very best, the first-fruits, go to Him in joyful thanksgiving to the Lord of the Harvest. And while we are not rebellious citizens, we are also not quiet ones. As baptized children of God, as those redeemed by Christ’s blood, we do not let the government infringe on the Gospel- it is there that we draw our line. The government was established by God to order our affairs in this life, but when those God-given authorities step into the realm of the Gospel, we are expected to disobey. We must obey God rather than men.
And so there is a balance to be struck in our Christian walk. On the one hand, we respect those placed in authority over us as those who have authority from God. On the other hand we do not tolerate their intrusion into areas in which God has not given them authority. This is not an easy balance. We prayed in our collect for today, “With You as our ruler and guide we may so pass through things temporal that we lose not the things eternal.” Satan is always using the things of this world in an attempt to draw our attention away from Christ. May we live our lives in this world in order that we do not put our trust in anything else but in Christ, the one who became man for you, the one who took on Satan for you, the one who died in your place. The Lord is forever faithful to His promises, and we pray that He will preserve us in this true faith until life everlasting, Amen.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Proper 23 of Series A (Matthew 22:1-14)
“For many are called, but few are chosen.” 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 is from Matthew twenty-two, the parable of the wedding feast. Dear friends in Christ, everyone loves weddings! Well, almost everyone. I’m sure there are people that haven’t enjoyed a wedding since their own, and can’t really stand being at them. Since Bethany is not here (at a wedding), you can tell her the next time that you see her that I did honestly enjoy our wedding. Wonderful sermon, good fellowship, and great food. Oh, the food! I have realized by being in a number of weddings over the past few years that the very best thing about a wedding is the food. Some of the best food I have ever tasted was at rehearsal dinners, including a steak about this big. And the food at the wedding itself is no slouch either, plus cake. Who doesn’t like cake! It is no surprise, then, that Jesus speaks of the kingdom of God as a wedding banquet in our text for today. “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son.” Jewish weddings were a sight to behold, encompassing several days of joyous celebration, and more food than even a teenager could be expected to eat. Who could pass that up? Apparently, a lot of people.
God established the nation of Israel to be His chosen possession, to be the ones to carry forth His promises, to bring the Kingdom of God to fruition. This great banquet feast was set before them, the bounty of a King who loved His people. And so the call went out. God “sent His servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come.” The people of Israel, God’s chosen nation, rebelled against the God who had set them apart, and refused to come to the feast. They had much more important things to do: “Again He sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.”’ But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business.” God did everything He could to invite them into the feast. He made covenants with their forefathers, covenants to bless and multiply them and to give them the Promised Land. And He did deliver this promised land, after He brought them forth from bondage in Egypt and gave to them His holy Law. All they had to do was obey, and He would bless them, He would defeat their enemies before them. But the Israelites refused. They went chasing after other gods, the gods of the people into whose land they came. But the Israelites did not simply reject this message. They also rejected the messengers that carried it. “The rest seized His servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them.” This is the story of the entire Old Testament, as the God who loved Israel so much sent messenger after messenger to His beloved people, and each is rejected in turn. Many were killed, culminating with the King’s own Son, Jesus Christ.
But before we begin to point the finger at Israel, we must first look at ourselves. We too have been invited to a feast, the feast of God’s Word and His sacraments here in this place. And not only in this place, but each and every day we are invited to feast on God’s Word. And what happens? God “sent His servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come… They paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business.” Does this sound familiar? We too have quite a list of excuses for not coming to God’s banquet, whether here in His house or in our homes. The cares and worries of this life hem around us, choking out any opportunity to feast on God’s Word. Work, school, financial stress, and sports all supplant God’s banquet on our list of priorities. Even the menu can often fail to entice us. In our text, the king said, “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready.” God has prepared quite a feast for us here in this place, and every time that we dine with Him though His holy Word. He provides strengthening of faith, direction for our lives, and the forgiveness of sins, but we often cut ourselves off from this feast and barely survive on a spiritual starvation diet. What would we say if someone turned down a rehearsal dinner to eat a piece of moldy bread? Pretty crazy, but no less so than cutting ourselves off from God’s Word. By doing this, we are rejecting Christ’s messengers, and the message that they carry. We are showing God what we think of His invitation to dine, much as rebellious Israel did.
For Israel’s violent rejection of the prophets, those servants and messengers of God, the king must respond in kind: “The king was angry, and He sent His troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.” He had a right to be angry over their rejection- over our rejection- of His good gifts. The people whom He loved so much, as a husband loves his bride, had despised Him, and for that they deserved punishment. Thus, destruction was the fate for anyone who rejects God’s gifts, all who scorn the wedding feast. As the king said in our text: “The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy.” For their rejection, for our rejection, we deserve to be weighed on the scale and found ‘not worthy,’ only destined for destruction.
And that would have been our fate had God not sent one final messenger to Israel and all of humanity- His very own Son, Jesus Christ. Israel treated Him as they had treated God’s other messengers: “The rest seized His servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them.” Jesus Christ came preaching a message of repentance, preaching of the love of God for His rebellious creation, and for that He was hung on a cross, killed as a common criminal. But in God’s great plan for our salvation, it was only through His death that rebellious humanity could live. This is because Christ did not stay dead- He rose again victorious on the third day, and now He truly sits as the bridegroom in the banquet of heaven. Through His death and resurrection, He has won the feast for us, the feast of heaven, the Messianic banquet. Isaiah describes this in our Old Testament lesson: “On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.” The salvation promised for us is this banquet, the wedding banquet of Christ with His Church. Here the broken marriage between God and His creation is restored, here “He will swallow up on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death forever; and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the LORD has spoken. It will be said on that day, ‘Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the LORD; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.’” Because God dealt with our sin by dying on the cross, He will swallow up sin and death, He will wipe every tear from our eyes, bringing us to the heavenly banquet, the marriage feast of the Lamb who was slain, Jesus Christ Himself, the bridegroom wed to His Church, all those whom He has called.
And God’s call continues to sound forth to all people, as it once did to Israel. The King sends forth His servants to every land with this commission: “Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.” God calls us, and He does this through His Holy Word, spoken, read, and connected with means. God does the calling, but He continues to call through His chosen messengers. These men, called pastors, go forth throughout the world to preach this message to others, to be the instruments of God’s call. Moreover, all Christians are also sent out into the world to speak the Good News of Christ to those around them, and God works through their witness in words and action to extend His call to all people. Every Christian is therefore one of Christ’s messengers as they speak of the hope that is within them to all those they encounter. This call of God has power, not from the messenger who carries it, and not in the person who hears it. The Word of God has a power of its own, and it is through this Word that the Holy Spirit creates faith in the hearts of people, the faith that grasps the promises of God. The spread of the Word of God is truly a wonderful thing. “And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.”
And so the Church, the assembly of those called by God through the Word, has both good and bad people in it. What is the difference? We cannot see it, but the King knows. “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment. And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’” Only those with the proper clothing can remain at the wedding banquet into all eternity. And what are these clothes? Isaiah tells us in our Introit for today: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation; He has covered me with the robe of righteousness.” Only with the robe of righteousness, Christ’s own righteousness won on Calvary’s cross, can we sit at the wedding feast. And how does God bestow this robe? In our Baptism! In the earliest days of the Church, those who were baptized stepped into the water naked, were Baptized, and as they stepped out of the water they were clothed with a white robe. This robe declared that now Christ’s righteousness covered them, that when God looked at them He did not see a sinful human being, but instead He saw Christ and His righteousness. Whether or not you received such a physical robe on your Baptism day, the truth remains the same. In your baptism Christ covered you with His righteousness, He gave you the wedding garments that you will wear at His feast for all eternity. Cling to your Baptism through every storm in your life, for it is there that you can find the assurance that God is has clothed you with Christ’s righteousness.
Jesus concluded our parable with the words, “For many are called, but few are chosen.” We unfortunately see the truth of these words all around us. Many who are clothed with the Baptismal garments cast them off later in life, abandoning the faith and the robe of righteousness that Christ gave them. Some reject Christ without even putting on those garments. Why is this? It is only because of humanity’s sin that some reject Christ. When a person believes, the credit goes to God. But when a person rejects the wedding garments, the blame goes to that person. In the face of that we can only take confidence in Christ’s promises, not in our ourselves and our own feelings, we cling to our Baptism tightly, knowing that God is faithful to His promises, He is faithful to those whom He has claimed as His own, and we know that He will bring us to the wedding banquet, where we will dine with Him for all eternity, Amen.
God established the nation of Israel to be His chosen possession, to be the ones to carry forth His promises, to bring the Kingdom of God to fruition. This great banquet feast was set before them, the bounty of a King who loved His people. And so the call went out. God “sent His servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come.” The people of Israel, God’s chosen nation, rebelled against the God who had set them apart, and refused to come to the feast. They had much more important things to do: “Again He sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.”’ But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business.” God did everything He could to invite them into the feast. He made covenants with their forefathers, covenants to bless and multiply them and to give them the Promised Land. And He did deliver this promised land, after He brought them forth from bondage in Egypt and gave to them His holy Law. All they had to do was obey, and He would bless them, He would defeat their enemies before them. But the Israelites refused. They went chasing after other gods, the gods of the people into whose land they came. But the Israelites did not simply reject this message. They also rejected the messengers that carried it. “The rest seized His servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them.” This is the story of the entire Old Testament, as the God who loved Israel so much sent messenger after messenger to His beloved people, and each is rejected in turn. Many were killed, culminating with the King’s own Son, Jesus Christ.
But before we begin to point the finger at Israel, we must first look at ourselves. We too have been invited to a feast, the feast of God’s Word and His sacraments here in this place. And not only in this place, but each and every day we are invited to feast on God’s Word. And what happens? God “sent His servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come… They paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business.” Does this sound familiar? We too have quite a list of excuses for not coming to God’s banquet, whether here in His house or in our homes. The cares and worries of this life hem around us, choking out any opportunity to feast on God’s Word. Work, school, financial stress, and sports all supplant God’s banquet on our list of priorities. Even the menu can often fail to entice us. In our text, the king said, “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready.” God has prepared quite a feast for us here in this place, and every time that we dine with Him though His holy Word. He provides strengthening of faith, direction for our lives, and the forgiveness of sins, but we often cut ourselves off from this feast and barely survive on a spiritual starvation diet. What would we say if someone turned down a rehearsal dinner to eat a piece of moldy bread? Pretty crazy, but no less so than cutting ourselves off from God’s Word. By doing this, we are rejecting Christ’s messengers, and the message that they carry. We are showing God what we think of His invitation to dine, much as rebellious Israel did.
For Israel’s violent rejection of the prophets, those servants and messengers of God, the king must respond in kind: “The king was angry, and He sent His troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.” He had a right to be angry over their rejection- over our rejection- of His good gifts. The people whom He loved so much, as a husband loves his bride, had despised Him, and for that they deserved punishment. Thus, destruction was the fate for anyone who rejects God’s gifts, all who scorn the wedding feast. As the king said in our text: “The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy.” For their rejection, for our rejection, we deserve to be weighed on the scale and found ‘not worthy,’ only destined for destruction.
And that would have been our fate had God not sent one final messenger to Israel and all of humanity- His very own Son, Jesus Christ. Israel treated Him as they had treated God’s other messengers: “The rest seized His servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them.” Jesus Christ came preaching a message of repentance, preaching of the love of God for His rebellious creation, and for that He was hung on a cross, killed as a common criminal. But in God’s great plan for our salvation, it was only through His death that rebellious humanity could live. This is because Christ did not stay dead- He rose again victorious on the third day, and now He truly sits as the bridegroom in the banquet of heaven. Through His death and resurrection, He has won the feast for us, the feast of heaven, the Messianic banquet. Isaiah describes this in our Old Testament lesson: “On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.” The salvation promised for us is this banquet, the wedding banquet of Christ with His Church. Here the broken marriage between God and His creation is restored, here “He will swallow up on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death forever; and the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the LORD has spoken. It will be said on that day, ‘Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the LORD; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.’” Because God dealt with our sin by dying on the cross, He will swallow up sin and death, He will wipe every tear from our eyes, bringing us to the heavenly banquet, the marriage feast of the Lamb who was slain, Jesus Christ Himself, the bridegroom wed to His Church, all those whom He has called.
And God’s call continues to sound forth to all people, as it once did to Israel. The King sends forth His servants to every land with this commission: “Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.” God calls us, and He does this through His Holy Word, spoken, read, and connected with means. God does the calling, but He continues to call through His chosen messengers. These men, called pastors, go forth throughout the world to preach this message to others, to be the instruments of God’s call. Moreover, all Christians are also sent out into the world to speak the Good News of Christ to those around them, and God works through their witness in words and action to extend His call to all people. Every Christian is therefore one of Christ’s messengers as they speak of the hope that is within them to all those they encounter. This call of God has power, not from the messenger who carries it, and not in the person who hears it. The Word of God has a power of its own, and it is through this Word that the Holy Spirit creates faith in the hearts of people, the faith that grasps the promises of God. The spread of the Word of God is truly a wonderful thing. “And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.”
And so the Church, the assembly of those called by God through the Word, has both good and bad people in it. What is the difference? We cannot see it, but the King knows. “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment. And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’” Only those with the proper clothing can remain at the wedding banquet into all eternity. And what are these clothes? Isaiah tells us in our Introit for today: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation; He has covered me with the robe of righteousness.” Only with the robe of righteousness, Christ’s own righteousness won on Calvary’s cross, can we sit at the wedding feast. And how does God bestow this robe? In our Baptism! In the earliest days of the Church, those who were baptized stepped into the water naked, were Baptized, and as they stepped out of the water they were clothed with a white robe. This robe declared that now Christ’s righteousness covered them, that when God looked at them He did not see a sinful human being, but instead He saw Christ and His righteousness. Whether or not you received such a physical robe on your Baptism day, the truth remains the same. In your baptism Christ covered you with His righteousness, He gave you the wedding garments that you will wear at His feast for all eternity. Cling to your Baptism through every storm in your life, for it is there that you can find the assurance that God is has clothed you with Christ’s righteousness.
Jesus concluded our parable with the words, “For many are called, but few are chosen.” We unfortunately see the truth of these words all around us. Many who are clothed with the Baptismal garments cast them off later in life, abandoning the faith and the robe of righteousness that Christ gave them. Some reject Christ without even putting on those garments. Why is this? It is only because of humanity’s sin that some reject Christ. When a person believes, the credit goes to God. But when a person rejects the wedding garments, the blame goes to that person. In the face of that we can only take confidence in Christ’s promises, not in our ourselves and our own feelings, we cling to our Baptism tightly, knowing that God is faithful to His promises, He is faithful to those whom He has claimed as His own, and we know that He will bring us to the wedding banquet, where we will dine with Him for all eternity, Amen.
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