Sermon for 10/27/24: Reformation (observed)

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“Be Still…”

Psalm 46

 

Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Amen. 

 

A famous composer once said that the rests are the most important parts of any piece of music. The rests in music are those places where there is no music—or, at least, no music you can hear. What could the composer have meant? After all, music is sound, right? But there’s some logic to this assertion. The placement of those rests, those bits of musical silence, determines how a piece of music will ultimately sound. To place those rests anywhere else would, in fact, create a completely different piece, even if everything else remained exactly the same. And so, silence, the absence of musical sound, becomes equally important to, if not even more important than, the sound itself.

Through His Psalmist, the Lord admonishes us: “Be still and know that I am God.” This morning we remember Martin Luther and the Reformation he led. Psalm 46 has always been identified with the Reformation and Luther because his great hymn, “A Mighty Fortress is our God,” draws its inspiration from the opening verses of the Psalm: “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” But the Psalm also says, “Be still, and know that I am God.” These words seem to be uncharacteristic for what we know of Luther. The Reformation was not a quiet time; it was a time of frenzied activity, a time of violence and death and destruction. Luther himself was anything but quiet. He was bold; he was brash; he was, frankly, crass. He probably would have been cancelled today, because much of what he thought, spoke, and wrote was filled with what our culture would consider abuse. While he was deeply and pastorally concerned for the flock of God, he cared little about the feelings of the theologians who perverted the truth of God and the secular rulers who took advantage of the poverty and powerlessness of their subjects.

Even so, I believe these closing verses of Psalm 46, the admonition to stillness before God, are more descriptive of Luther and the nature of the Reformation than anything else. All the things that fill the histories of the Reformation—the frenzy, the activity, the writing, the theological confrontations—these things are not as characteristic of what happened in those days than the fact that Luther and his followers faithfully heeded these words of the Lord: “Be still, and know that I am God.” “How so?” you might ask.

Above all, Luther was a man of prayer. Philip Melancthon, his co-worker in the Reformation, tells us that Luther would spend literally hours a day in prayer, that his prayer was like a child in conversation with his father who loves and cares for him. This man of great spiritual power and towering intellect knew that all he might do would come to nothing without listening to the Word of the Lord and prayerfully seeking His blessing.

One of the reasons why the Church in our day seems so helpless is that we don’t live this way. We are guilty of telling God first what we think should be done, and then seeking His blessing on what we have already decided to do. My vicarage bishop, God bless his soul, once suggested that we should have a ten year moratorium, a complete stop, on new programs from the Synod, that those ten years would be better spent on our knees in prayer. The suggestion was not well received by his hearers.

But it raises an important question: What do we think about prayer? We often look at prayer as a sort of last resort, something to do when everything else has failed. We have been programmed to think of prayer as “inactivity,” of doing nothing, a way to flee obligation, a means of avoiding our spiritual responsibilities. Especially in our nation, we have a bad habit of thinking that the first responsibility of a Christian is to take action rather than listen to the Word of the Lord.

I cannot speak for you, but for me, prayer is some of the hardest work I do. It is spiritually taxing because Satan, “the old evil foe,” as Luther called him, doesn’t want me doing it and does all he can to stop me. I am sure he does the same to you. Prayer is the single most important thing we as Christians can do. Prayer is not fleeing our spiritual obligations nor avoiding responsibility for them; prayer confronts those responsibilities head on. I’ve heard people—even Christians—say that prayer is worth Nothing in times of tragedy and disaster, even mocking those who pray. Anyone who thinks that prayer spares him from real-world responsibility either does not really pray or is not paying attention. To pray is to confront head-on the tasks God would give us to do. It is to enter the battle, face to face, with the devil, the world, and our own sinful flesh. “Be still,” the Lord says, “and know that I am God.” “Be quiet and listen to me, and I will make you ready to do battle for the Kingdom of God.”

Part of being still is remembering that we are first known by God. Indeed, He has known us from eternity; He was determined to make us His own by way of Baptism and the Holy Spirit, forgiving our sins and saving us for eternal life. He has called us by the Gospel to faith in Him, to know Him now and eternally as the One who has redeemed us from sin and death.

And so, to “be still” is to know that God can always be trusted, that we need never put our confidence in anything but His grace and mercy. It is to know that His love for us in Christ is a love that will have no end. It is to know that we have a God who will never leave us nor forsake us. As the Psalmist put it: “The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge.”

So think of those words we just sang:

                The Word they still shall let remain
                    nor any thanks have for it;
                He’s by our side upon the plain
                    with His good gifts and Spirit.
                And take they our life,
                    Goods, fame, child, and wife,
                Though these all be gone,
                    Our victory has been won;
                    The Kingdom ours remaineth.

No matter the opposition we face—whether it’s people who hate the Gospel and deny the one true God, or the government as it infringes on our freedom to live and worship as we desire, or even the devil himself—we know that “the Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge.” Thanks be to God, for the victory over sin, death, and the power of the devil has been won in our Lord Jesus Christ! In the name of the Father and of the Son (+) and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus always.  Amen. 

 

Sermon for 10/06/24: LWML Sunday

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“The Servant of the Lord”
Luke 1:26-38

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

What has God called you to do? We Lutherans talk about a very big word: vocation. In the narrow sense, a vocation is what pastors and missionaries have: a direct Call from God to serve in His Church. In that sense, you might think it’s easy for pastors to say what God has called us to do; after all, we serve God directly as His Called and Ordained ministers of the Gospel.

But the word vocation has a wider meaning, and it applies to all of us. The Small Catechism helps us to understand this. As you confess your sins, the Catechism tells you to “consider your place in life…” It tells you to ask yourself, “Are you a father, mother, son, daughter, husband, wife, or worker?” Each of these is a vocation, a task to which God calls you. Think about what you do in the course of your days. Are you a farmer or rancher? Are you a nurse? Do you coach a team or perform in a choir? Do you have a neighbor who needs your help or needs to hear the Gospel? Do you volunteer your time and talents? Are any of you ladies perhaps a part of the Lutheran Women’s Missionary League? What else do you do? All of these things and more are vocations, and God has called you to them. By your faithful service in those various tasks, you give glory to God and you love and serve your neighbor.

We heard Last Sunday how God uses the holy angels as messengers, among other things. This week we see Gabriel in his vocation as messenger. This is no chubby-cheeked cherub, no mild mannered, soft-spoken guardian in a sweater vest. This is a divine messenger, a being who reflects the holiness and righteousness of God. Some accounts list Gabriel among the archangels. A mere human standing before such a being would certainly have reason to be terrified—much like when a police officer or a pastor shows up at your door unannounced, only more terrifying, because at least the police officer and the pastor are common occurrences.

But that’s not what Mary finds so troubling—and that is exceptional enough. But what about that news? “Mary, I know you’re a virgin and all, but you’re gonna have a baby. Oh, and your pregnancy has happened by the power of the Holy Spirit.” How overwhelming it must have been for Mary to hear that she would be part of the fulfillment of the most important prophecies ever. You may recall that Isaiah prophesied to King Ahaz, “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.” You may also recall the promise God made to the satanic serpent in the Garden of Eden: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.” This Son, this Seed of a woman, this Child—promised to Adam and Eve, to Abraham the Patriarch, to King David, to King Ahaz, and to all those who clung by faith to that promise—this Child shall be the One to defeat Satan forever. And Mary—sweet, innocent, virginal Mary—was chosen by God to be the mother of God. This is to be her vocation.

That’s what Mary finds so troubling. Gabriel wasn’t kidding when He said, “The Lord is with you.” The Lord through whom all things were made would reside in her womb. The Word made flesh to dwell among sinful humanity would grow inside her until He would be born in Bethlehem. It would not be easy for Mary. She would be the object of scorn. Joseph, her betrothed, would seek to divorce her. And that’s before the Child was born. When Jesus was a mere eight days old, old Simeon prophesied that “a sword” would pierce her heart. Later, Mary would run through the streets of Jerusalem with Joseph, trying to find the Child who had wandered away from her to be where He knew He had to be: in His Father’s house. Finally she would stand at the foot of the cross on which her Son would hang, weeping as she watched Him die His innocent death, suffering, bearing the sins of mankind as He had said He must do. She may not have known all the details at first, but she knew this would be a rough life. Nevertheless she answered Gabriel, “Let it be to me according to your Word.” And Mary would be okay. After all, the Lord is with her.

And the same is true for you: The Lord is with you. You may not have the same struggles as Mary—certainly none of you are pregnant with the promised Messiah—but everyone has their own difficulties. No matter your vocation—father or son, mother or daughter, boss or worker, teacher or student, pastor or layperson, and all the rest of the things you do every day—the Lord has called you to serve Him in these various tasks of your life, and each vocation carries its own troubles, especially when you try to live according to your faith.

But one thing you can be sure of is this: the Lord is with you. This is not some imaginary presence. He is with you physically, in the flesh, just as present with you now as He was in Mary’s womb. “The Word became flesh.” He has never stopped being flesh, and He has never stopped being present with you. He placed His name upon you in the waters of Holy Baptism. He speaks His Word into your ear—the same Word by which all things were created. He feeds you with His own flesh and blood, hidden in and under the bread and wine. He is present with you, just as He has promised. Find Him in the font. Find Him on the altar. Find Him where His Word is preached in truth and purity. Don’t worry that you can’t see Him; you have His promise, and His Word does not fail. So do not be afraid. Whatever it is that you face in your life, whatever the challenge before you, know this: the Lord is with you. He will not make you face any of your trials or tasks alone. God grant you faith and courage so that you may say, “I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your Word.” In the name of the Father and of the Son (†) and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus always. Amen.