Sermon for 11/27/24: Day of National Thanksgiving (observed)

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“Remember the Lord Your God…”
Deuteronomy 8:1-10

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

 

We don’t really need a special Thursday in November to give thanks to God, do we? Thanksgiving is our priestly duty as baptized believers. This is what priests do: they offer sacrifices. Thanksgiving is a sacrifice, an offering to God for all His blessings not only to us, but to the whole world. Faithful hearts are also grateful hearts. We are thankful for all the gifts of creation. We are thankful for our own lives. We are thankful for God’s preserving gifts of clothing and shoes, food and drink, house, home, and family. We are thankful for the good land He has given us, for our freedoms, and for the protection He provides for our bodies and lives. The Catechism reminds us that God gives us all of this “out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in [us].” And we, His children, say, “Thank you.”

We thank God for the gifts of our redemption: for the coming of His Son, Jesus Christ, into human flesh; for His perfect life and death; for His resurrection; for His atonement for the sin of the world; and for His governing of all things. We thank God for the gifts of the Spirit; for the preaching of the Gospel; for the Church and for faithful pastors; for our own rebirth in Holy Baptism; for our refreshment in the Holy Supper; our fellowship together with all the saints in Christ; the resurrection of our bodies, guaranteed by the resurrection of Jesus; and the sure hope of eternal life. The least we can do is give thanks to our gracious and generous God.

Moses spoke to Israel on the threshold of the Promised Land. “Remember the Lord,” he said. Remember that He brought Israel out of Egypt, that He fed you when you were hungry, that He trained you to live by every word that proceeds from His mouth. And now He is bringing you into a good and rich land, where all the blessings of life are easily gotten. All of this was a foretaste of the feast to come, a preview of heaven itself, where God sets the table and His people eat and drink in freedom and joy.

But Moses also knew the impediments to thanksgiving. He warned them to beware. After they had eaten and were full in their comfortable homes, after their work was paying off, they would forget the Lord. They would begin to believe that their own reason and strength had gained them everything, that they were dependent on no one, that they did all these things. They made idols of the image in the mirror.

“Remember the Lord your God,” Moses would later tell them, “for it is He who gives you the power to get wealth.” He causes the rain and the sunshine in their season. He gives grain to the sower and bread to the eater. He gives life and all that you have—and more than that, He gives us the gift of life and salvation in the ultimate Sacrifice: the body and blood of the Lamb of God, our Savior, Jesus Christ. We live every moment, in this life and in eternity, out of the goodness of His hand.

It is so easy to forget the Lord because He hides behind the means He uses. We think of the farmer, the baker, the grocer. We note our own hard-earned income, our strength, our power, our intelligence, our skill. We forget about the hidden Lord who works in creation. We pray, “Give us this day our daily bread,” but bread never simply shows up out of nothing. God works through means…but these created things easily become the idols we worship.

Idolatry brings anxiety; anxiety happens when our false gods fail us. We thought the money would hold out, that our health was secure. “Be anxious for nothing,” Paul says. “That’s easy for him to say. He wasn’t facing what I face.” Maybe. But Paul was in prison when he wrote those words. Picture Paul in a jail cell, writing, “I can do all things through Him who gives me strength.”

So, what do you do? Paul says: “In everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” Ask Him whatever you wish. Talk about whatever causes your anxiety, and do it with thanksgiving. Are you hungry? Pray for food, and thank God for your hunger. Are you lonely? Pray for a friend, and thank God for the solitude. Are you sick? Pray for healing, and thank God for your illness. Only faith in the crucified and risen Christ can pray that way.

As James reminds us in his Epistle, faith is seen by its works. This kind of thanksgiving at the feet of Jesus is the fruit of true faith in the Lord, to whom we are indebted for our very lives. He is the Word through whom all things were made. The turkey and the cranberries, the potatoes and the pumpkins, and yes, even that good bottle of wine: all are His gifts, given in blessing to you. God cares for you more than you could ever care for yourself. Even the very hairs of your head are all numbered, as are all your days. No detail of your life is too small or unimportant. You are precious to Him—as precious as the blood of His Son that purchased you from sin and death. He pours every good gift on us, without any merit or worthiness in us. “For all this it is our duty,” Luther tells us—our privilege, our priestly responsibility—“to thank and praise, serve and obey Him. This is most certainly true.” In the name of the Father and of the Son (†) and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

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

 

Sermon for 11/24/24: Last Sunday of the Church Year (B)

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Lord Jesus, Come Quickly

Mark 13:24-37

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

One of my favorite hymns is “Songs of Thankfulness and Praise,” hymn number 394 in your Lutheran Service Book. The fourth verse reads:
        
        Sun and moon shall darkened be,
        Stars shall fall, the heav’ns shall flee;
        Christ will then like lightning shine,
        All will see His glorious sign;
        All will then the trumpet hear,
        All will see the Judge appear;
        Thou by all wilt be confessed,
        God in man made manifest.

This image, which we hear in our Gospel text, tells of the powerful signs leading up to the Day of Judgment. Genesis 8:11 tells us, “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, and day and night shall not cease.” Yet a day is coming when these things will no longer take place.

          By the signs in our text, along with others given in Scripture, many have tried to predict the day of the Lord’s return in glory. Heck, I could even make a prediction now. Let’s see… We’ve already had eclipses, so the sun and moon have been darkened. James Earl Jones died, and he is one of the biggest stars our world has ever seen or heard, so you could say that stars have fallen. And clouds move away all the time, so the heavens have fled. Why, Jesus could be coming back any time now. We might not even get through the Divine Service!

I’m sure you can tell I’m not serious about my prediction, even though Jesus very well could return before we’re done this morning. But many make guesses based on whatever evidence they choose. One of the best-selling books on the end times is The Late Great Planet Earth by Hal Lindsey. Even though the world was supposed to end in the 1980s by his reckoning, the book is still being printed today! He has made other predictions since then; I guess being wrong the first time wasn’t enough. But many such predictions have come, and none of them have come to pass.

          Jesus would rather not have us focus on when the end will be. After all, no human knows. The angels don’t know. Jesus tells us that even He doesn’t know in His state of humiliation. People who claim to be able to predict the Day of Judgment are claiming that they know more than Jesus! Only the Father knows the day and the hour, and He’s not telling. Jesus has shown us the signs, and we recognize that these signs are being fulfilled in our sight, even as they were being fulfilled in the days of the disciples. We’ve been waiting nearly two-thousand years since Jesus spoke the words of our text to the disciples, and the day has not yet come. Yet we are living in the last days, which could last another ten thousand years…or another ten seconds. It’s enough that we know that the end is coming; it’s not for us to know exactly when.

          We don’t need some crackpot standing on the corner to tell us that the end is near. We already know that. Jesus has told us of that wondrous Day, the Day when He will return in glory, when His holy angels will gather us together to be with our Lord, when all trials and sorrows and illness and death will cease, when those who believe will be restored in the image of God. He has told us that He is coming soon. What is important for us as we wait is to be prepared—to watch for Jesus, to be ready for His return. Don’t get me wrong: Jesus is not telling you to save yourself. That has already been done, and nothing you can do can add to the work that Jesus has already done on your behalf. Rather, we are well prepared when we hear the Word of God and cling to it.

          Jesus gives us the brief parable of the doorman who waits for his master to return from a journey. The master is returning; of this he is sure. He doesn’t know when that return will be. He may return in ten minutes, having forgotten his briefcase. He may return in a year, having successfully concluded his business. Either way, the master is returning. Is the doorman supposed to try to figure out when the master will come back? No. The doorman stands at his post, ready for the master to come back at any time. It’s enough for the doorman to believe the master when he says he will come back. He does the job the master has selected him to do. He does not shirk his responsibility. He doesn’t earn a special reward for doing what he’s supposed to do; but if he abandons his post, if he shirks his responsibility, he will be in trouble when the master returns and finds the door locked with the doorkeeper asleep or away from his post.

          This preparation sounds like an awful burden. And it is. Jesus died bearing it for you. He came in humility as a servant. He came as a sacrifice, bearing our sins to the cross. He has clothed you in righteousness through the Word in the waters of Holy Baptism. Through that Baptism, Christ will recognize you as His own when He returns in glory. Do not doubt that for an instant.

How you prepare to receive Christ as He comes to you in glory on the Last Day is the same way you prepare to receive Christ as He comes to you in His body and blood in the Holy Supper. Luther tells us concerning the worthy reception of the Lord’s Supper, “That person is truly worthy and well prepared who has faith in these words: ‘Given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.’ But anyone who does not believe these words or doubts them is unworthy and unprepared.” Jesus has done the hard part. Now all we have to do is cling to the words and promises of Jesus by faith. And even that faith is a gift of God! It’s no burden for us to praise Christ as God in the flesh, the one who shall return in glory to judge the living and the dead. We’re even given the words to pray in Scripture, words which the Church has been blessed to pray in the Divine Service, as we do this morning.

Jesus says, “Behold, I am coming soon!” The signs are all around us. The end is near! For those who do not believe, it will be a dark day. They will have been found sleeping on duty. But for us, God’s children who cling by faith to His Word and gifts, it will be the eternal Day of great joy. And so Jesus reminds us, “Behold, I am coming soon!” Do not doubt this for a moment: He is coming soon! And by the grace of God and the work of the Holy Spirit, we respond, “Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly!” 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.

 

HYMN: Blessed Are You, O Lord, God of Our Fathers

I thought I was done with the Easter Vigil project. Then one of my circuit colleagues suggested I write a hymn text for the Song of the Three Young Men, which recounts the song of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego--also known as Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah--as they are in the fiery furnace at the order of King Nebuchadnezzar. 

Here is the first draft. Feedback is love.

Oh, and I have a couple more texts to post once their intended purpose is met. One is submitted for a district convention, and the other is written in honor of a beloved mentor. One you might not see until next summer, and the other is waiting on an original tune from a colleague who suggested writing the text in our mentor's honor in the first place.

Blesséd Are You, O Lord, God of Our Fathers

1. Blesséd are you, O Lord, God of our fathers,
Worthy of honor and glory and praise.
Blest be Your name, be it holy forever:
Blest in Your Temple for uncounted days.

2. Blesséd are You, O Lord, gazing with wisdom 

Into the deep from Your cherubim throne.
Blesséd are You on the throne of Your kingdom.
Blesséd are You in the heavens alone.

3. Bless you the Lord! Bless Him, all of creation!
Bless you the Lord! Raise your voices and sing!
Bless Him, you heavens; exalt Him with anthems
Sung to the Lord, to our wonderful King.

4. Bless you the Lord, all the host of the angels!
Bless Him, you waters above and below.
Bless Him, you sun, moon, and stars in the heavens!
Bless Him, you powers, whose wonders you show.

5. Bless Him, you winds, with your powerful blowing!
Bless Him, you cold and you heat in your time,
Springtime and harvest and summer and winter,
Rain, dew, and snow: falling water sublime.

6. Earth, bless the Lord, oh you hills and you mountains.
All things that grow in the ground, bless His name!
Bless you the Lord, all you seas, springs, and rivers,
Whales, turtles, dolphins, your praises proclaim!

7. Bless Him, you airborne, you birds ever flying.
Bless Him, you cattle, you beasts of the field.
Bless Him, O Israel, you sons, priests, and prophets.
Bless Him, you righteous, whose souls He has healed.

8. Bless Him, you holy, you humble in spirit.
Bless Him, you martyrs, you saints, holy throng.
Bless Him who rescues from death and dread Hades!
Saved from the furnace, oh, praise Him with song.

9. Thanks be to God for His generous goodness!
Thank You for mercy, O God, without end.
Bless God the Lord in your sweet songs of worship.
Oh, bless the Lord! Let your praises ascend.


Alan Kornacki, Jr., b. 1974
11 10 11 10
MORNING STAR (LSB 400)
Easter Vigil; Song of the Three Young Men

Sermon for 11/10/24: Proper 27b

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Come and Die
I Kings 17:8-16

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

Dietrich Bonhoeffer once wrote, “When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die.” Though these are hard words to hear, they could not be more true. Four times in the Gospels, our Lord tells His disciples to take up their cross and follow Him. Our view of the cross is shaped by two thousand years of history. We think of what Jesus accomplished with His death on the cross, and that perhaps allows us to think of it as something less than a cruel instrument of execution. Only criminals who had been sentenced to die for the most heinous crimes carried crosses. And so, what Bonhoeffer said is absolutely correct, even as stark and abrupt as it sounds. When Jesus tells us to take up our cross, He is calling us to come and die.

Elijah’s words to the widow at Zarephath probably sounded just as harsh. He saw that the widow and her son were starving. He knew that little oil and flour remained. He knew that he was asking her to give him all that she had. Still, he said to her, “Bring me a morsel of bread in your hand.” And for her part, the widow knew that the prophet’s command was the Lord’s command. In her ears, it must have seemed like he was saying, “Obey my words even though they will kill you.” The Word of the Lord often seems that way. His holy Word of Law kills us whenever we hear it. We never live up to its perfect standard of holiness and love. If we were truly obedient to the Law of God, we would never put our own life before the lives of others; we would never doubt God’s love or worry about the future. But too often, we seek our own good first. We doubt God’s love; we look to our friends, our family, our jobs, our bank accounts for the peace and security that can really only come from God. And in these difficult economic times, our lives are often clouded by fears about the future, and we can sometimes wonder if we really will be provided with all that we need.

God’s Word of Law can only kill us. Not only are we not God; sinners that we are, we oppose God’s will at every turn, and our doubts and fears make it clear how little we actually believe what the Lord has promised in His Word. Our bodies of sin and doubt and fear must die. They must be nailed with Jesus to His cross. When Christ calls a man, He truly bids him to come and die. Our sinful flesh must die with Jesus on the cross. It must be buried with Him in His tomb.

All of this is bound up in Holy Baptism. It is in Baptism that your sinful flesh has been put to death. The word to the widow of Zarephath does not end with, “Bring me a morsel of bread.” After the widow honestly lays out her fears before the prophet, Elijah says, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel, ‘The jar of flour shall not be spent, and the jug of oil shall not be empty, until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth.’” Nor does the Word that God speaks to you end there, either. Just as the Lord drowned your sinful flesh in the waters of your Baptism, so also He has raised you to new life in Christ.

When you are facing death, it is hard to see God as your creator who loves you, who sustains you, who provides for all your needs. Death makes the love of God seem like a lie. We are always coming before God, asking, “What have you done for me lately?” When we say this, we are forgetting that every breath we breathe is a gift from God. But even in our unbelief and ingratitude, God is still gracious to us. Elijah’s answer to the widow was the promise that the Lord would provide for her. It was more than she could expect; it was more than she deserved. But that is God’s way: He simply gives the gift because of who He is. He is loving and merciful. He is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He provides for the birds. He clothes the lilies of the field in splendor. There is nothing that falls outside the protection of His gracious and generous hand.

It is absolutely certain that God will always give us what we need. What is not so certain is what that generosity will look like in the end. When we suffer, God’s provision for us is still there, though it often seems hidden. Sometimes it is not revealed until years later, and sometimes we are not allowed to see at all the good God works for us through the evil we experience. But all things that are needful for us our God has provided. God has taken all your sin, all of your suffering, and all of your fear and doubt, and He laid them on the shoulders of Jesus. And your Savior has taken all of those things to the cross and has suffered and died to dispose of them.

In place of your fear and doubt, Christ has won for you life and salvation and forgiveness. All of these things are certain because God Himself has accomplished them for you. There is nothing for you to fear. There is nothing for you to doubt. There is only Jesus, Your Savior, who has borne your sin to the cross and has given to you the anointing oil of Holy Baptism and the bread of His Holy Supper. And these gifts, with all their blessing, will not run out until you are safely with all the saints, the angels, and with God Himself, forever and ever. 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 10/27/24: 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.

 

Sermon for 9/29/24: Feast of St. Michael and All Angels

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Holy Angels and Little Ones
Matthew 18:1-11

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

          Every year on September 29, the One Holy Christian and Apostolic Church celebrates the Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels. Today we remember with joy these created beings who protect us at the Lord's command. 

        When the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary to announce that she would be the mother of the promised Messiah, Mary sang of the Lord, “He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and exalted the lowly.” God rightly humbles those who would puff themselves up with their own words and deeds, as He did to the people of Babel who attempted to raise themselves up to be equal with God; and He lifts up those who have been brought low in sin, who kneel before the Lord to confess to Him that they are poor, miserable sinners.

          It seems as though the disciples of the Lord have always had the bad habit of exalting themselves. Whether it’s James and John asking to sit at the Lord’s right hand, or the whole collection of the disciples rebuking those who brought children to Jesus for His blessing, or when they all inquire as to who is greatest in the kingdom of heaven, they’re all quite interested in lifting themselves up and pushing others down. And we who consider ourselves to be faithful don’t seem to mind that very much. We take pride in our doctrinal faithfulness—and this is a particularly dangerous temptation for the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod—as if our faithful adherence to the Word of God alone puts us in an exalted position in the kingdom of God.

And that brings us to the holy angels, the holy beings created by God to serve Him and His people. The high and mighty of the Church can see no need for angels. Surely only the weak need to rely on these invisible beings. Angels, they say, are for children. Angels, they say, are for those who are childish in their spiritual development, those who childishly believe that some higher being lovingly shapes our destinies.

God grant us such a childlike faith and humility, so that we acknowledge our weakness before God and thus pray in faith, “Let Your holy angel be with me, that the evil foe may have no power over me.” Viewing angels as something only necessary for children or for weak people misunderstands what the word “angel” means. Angels aren’t merely heavenly commandos; the words in Hebrew and Greek from which we get the word “angel” both mean “messenger.” These heavenly soldiers come armed mightily with “the sword of the Spirit, which is Word of God.” Angels are mouthpieces who repeat what the Lord says back to Him in prayer, praise, and thanksgiving. They speak against the devil in defiance, for the protection of the children of God. Angels speak the Word of God. The Word is their weapon…and it is a most effective weapon. Consider our appointed Epistle. St. Michael and the angelic band fight with Satan, and they cast him down. Their weapon is nothing else than the Word of God. John tells us, “They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their witness.” Satan fights by using words of deception, always his most effective weapon against the faithful. Saint Michael and the angels, on the other hand, fight by speaking the Word of God.

The Lord continues to send messengers today. They do not have golden wings or halos. They do not resemble the cute little cherubs you see in the Hallmark store. In fact, they look a lot like you do. They stand at the altar and in the pulpit, wearing collars that mark them as slaves of Christ, as blood-soaked dogs who protect the sheep from the wolves. They wear black to demonstrate that they, like their hearers, are sinners who have been humbled before the Lord. And they cover that black with a robe of white that demonstrates the righteousness of Christ upon them through the waters of Holy Baptism…the very same righteousness that rests upon their hearers. Pastors do not lift themselves up. Instead, with the angel who talks to John in Revelation, they say to their congregations, “I am your fellow servant… Worship God!” And like the heavenly messengers, these pastors come among us armed only with the blood of the Lamb and the Word of God—but these weapons bear the power of God to overcome Satan as effectively as they do for Saint Michael and the holy angels.

Those whom the Word converts become as little children.  They are humbled, and, in turn, humble themselves as children. But those with childlike faith are exalted to the highest place in the Kingdom of God. Everyone in God’s kingdom relies on and takes to heart that angelic Word, whether it is spoken by invisible messengers named Michael and Gabriel or by the visible messengers who preach the Word from this pulpit and feed the flock with the body and blood of the Lamb. And when that Word of God brings even one lost sinner to repentance, St. Michael and all the holy angels of heaven rejoice. God grant that we welcome His messengers, receiving the Word with repentance and faith, so that the angels would rejoice over us. 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 9/22/24: Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost (Proper 20b)

No sermon audio. The recorder malfunctioned. Sorry. It's a shame too, as the delivery was much better in the second service.

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Finding the Real Jesus
Mark 9:30-37

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

          Sinful man does not readily receive the things of God. He does not comprehend the message of a Lord who suffers, bleeds, and dies like a common criminal, hanging naked from a wooden stake in the ground outside the city walls. To the sinner, such a God is weakness, and the notion that such a death has lasting meaning is pure idiocy. To the sinner, the Gospel itself is utter foolishness. “My god is great,” says the sinful heart. “My god is the one who is all powerful and yet would never punish me for anything. He is love when I want him to be love; he is hate when I want him to be hate.” The god of sinful humanity is our own belly. Mankind creates a god in our own image—a god we see when we look in the mirror—to suit our own needs.

Because our flesh still clings to our sin, Christians also try to put Jesus in a box that suits our own desires. We confess Him as Lord and Redeemer, and then we relegate Him to a moral example. We allow Him ro be the Savior who forgives sin, but we ignore Him when He declares, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” He is either the righteous and merciless Judge who is eager to condemn, or He is our buddy who is more concerned with good intentions than the impurity of our hearts and deeds.

In our heart of hearts, we want the Jesus who will triumph over those who hate us and give us our every whim. He is the God to whom we render thanks and praise in times of joy, but whom we question and even curse in our pain and sorrow. We come to Him in prayer, but we neglect to include that most vital part: “Not my will, O Lord, but Your will be done.” We live in defiance of His commandments and then attempt to make ourselves look better by pointing out the sins of others. We allow Jesus to be either Lord or Savior, but we will not allow Him to be both.

Sinners do not readily receive the things of God. We do not hear the Word and see that it is reasonable and therefore deserving of consideration. The sinful heart is so blackened and marred by sin that only God himself can change it. Not even the disciples were able to receive the news of God’s Kingdom. They heard the heart and core of the Gospel—Christ’s death and resurrection—and they were afraid to ask what it meant. Does it not seem a little strange that Jesus speaks of His impending betrayal, death, and resurrection, and His disciples have no idea what he is talking about? How could they not comprehend what must come to pass for the Son of Man? Surely they, of all people, could put two and two together! They surely were familiar with the words of Jeremiah from our Old Testament reading of the lamb being led to the slaughter—and they most certainly could have connected that with John the Baptist pointing to Jesus and saying, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”

No, like the rest of the Jews, the disciples desired the Jesus who would defeat their Roman oppressors. Even Peter, James, and John did not comprehend what must happen, and they had the privilege of witnessing the Transfiguration in the presence of Moses and Elijah. They could only imagine with horror a betrayal of Jesus into the hands of men. Along with Peter, they all swore they would never let such things occur. They did not want to deal with what Jesus was telling them; they did not even want to ask.

Our text for this day is not a mundane repetition of what everyone already knew. Jesus speaks of His betrayal, which came at the hand of Judas, and His crucifixion at the hand of the Romans, and His disciples were scandalized beyond belief! God tests the faith of his people. Part of that testing is withholding knowledge of certain things. He withheld from the disciples a clear comprehension of His betrayal and death to test them. He withholds no such knowledge from us, for we have been taught the Scriptures and the meaning of His death. And yet, we need to hear that message continually, because it is not what we read in the imagination of our hearts.

The Lord tests the faith of his people in many and various ways, but in so doing, He draws them to Himself, under the shadow of His wings. His ways are not our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts. You will receive tests from the Lord during your earthly pilgrimage. And there will be times that you question what He is doing. “Why are things turning out for me this way?” “Why didn’t I get the scholarship I expected?” “Why is my health the way it is?” “Why doesn’t my worship and prayer life make me feel a certain way?” “Why doesn’t my witness to other always make believers out of them?” In such times of uncertainty and trial, you must look to what God has promised and not dwell upon what He has not promised. He has already promised you that He works all things for your benefit and for your eternal good. He promises that He will always be there to comfort you in distress and be your oasis in the wilderness of this sinful world. But He only does these things in the ways He has promised: through the cleansing waters of Baptism, in the word of Absolution, and in His body and blood in the bread and wine of the Supper.

Seek the Lord where He has promised to be. This won’t any easier for you than it was for the disciples, but His promises are the same, and He does not falter in keeping them. Receive His gifts and be continually fed by them, for your Lord is there to give you rest from the burden of your sin and to strengthen you in His love and mercy. 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 8/18/24: Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost (Proper 15b)

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Sober Singing
Ephesians 5:15-21

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

 

 

St. Paul wrote to the Ephesians, “Do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit…” It seems in most places that there are two or three churches for every bar or club. Even so, I suspect that the taverns have more people on a Saturday evening than there are in the churches on Sunday morning. People generally prefer to consume distilled spirits over receiving the Holy Spirit. Looking for comfort, strength, courage, or whatever else in the bottom of a bottle may be a fruitless search, but it’s still a more popular alternative because it doesn’t require you to do or say or believe anything. This is why people prefer to get drunk on Saturday evening over attending the Divine Service on Sunday morning. As many of our Lord’s disciples said as they were walking away, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”

Of course, it doesn’t help when churches are led by preachers whose doctrine changes like the wind. As soon as the social justice warriors change the standards of human conduct, many pastors are quick to fall in line. It used to be shameful for a woman to preach; today it is thought to be shameful to refuse women preachers. Living together outside of marriage used to be hidden, shamefully talked about in whispers if spoken of at all; today it’s considered by many to be hateful for a pastor to speak against cohabitation, much less attempt to discipline a couple for it. Whatever the fashionable and favorite sin of the moment, the world acts as if it is hateful and evil to agree with God when He condemns that sin.

Those who abandon divine truth to be popular with the world make their appeal to the love of Jesus. “Jesus is love,” they say, “and so anything done in the name of love must be good.” But the world does not know what love really is; “love” has become just another word for excusing sin. When the Church bows to the world, it abandons truth. When there is no Law to condemn us in our sin, the world sees no need for a message of the forgiveness. Jesus Himself has becomes irrelevant in the eyes of the world, no matter how often His name is invoked.

But where the church has kept the treasure her Lord has given her; where God’s law is preached without compromise, condemning us for our sins; where Christ’s suffering and death for us is proclaimed to real sinners guilty of real sins; where the sacraments of Christ are administered as our Lord instituted them; it is there that God blesses us with the riches of heaven. He joins us and speaks to us where we live; He draws us into communion with Himself. Heaven and earth, God and sinners, are reconciled, and we find our little bit of heaven right here on earth.

When Christians gather together as the church, we make melody in our hearts to the Lord. We sing to God. We worship Him. We give thanks to Him. But we also sing to one another, “speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.” We sing together our faith, our confession. We say to each other what we believe. Confessing the faith marks us as Christians. The apostle reminds us that we share the faith with one another by means of music. We confess our faith in our God in the same way. The thanksgiving we offer to God is offered in the name of the Lord Jesus because it is in His name—the name placed on us in the waters of Holy Baptism—that we are children of God. 

That brings us back to Paul’s command not to be drunk. He presents a clear contrast between getting drunk, where we lose control, and being filled with the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is our Teacher. He is our Comforter, our Counselor, and our Advocate. He is not the Spirit of unbridled emotional exuberance; He is the Spirit of truth. He teaches us the truth. He tells us that we are to love God with our heart, soul, and mind. We don’t learn the will of God for us by losing our minds or losing control; we learn the will of God for us through being transformed by God. Spiritual enlightenment is a wonderful work of God for us. It takes place within the minds of His people as the Holy Spirit opens the Word to us. We don’t choose between getting high on alcohol and getting high on religion; we choose between living in conformity with the evil in our world and living as Christians; we choose, as we heard last week, between imitating God by walking in His ways and imitating the world and its prince, the devil.

We go to church because we cannot live the Christian life without the Christian faith. We need the Gospel. Our faith depends on it. We need to confess our sins to God, for our sins have captured our affections and we cannot set ourselves free. We need to hear the Gospel; we need to hear that we are forgiven by the blood of Jesus and we are set free. Just as surely as Christ’s body and blood are given us to eat and to drink, God forgives us all our sins for the sake of Christ. Our sinful hearts will deny this. The world will scoff at it. The devil will rail against it and slander those who preach it and confess it. But it is our greatest joy; it is what opens our lips to sing God’s praise. And when we confess this truth together, when we sing it together, God binds us together and builds us up as Christ’s church, with a joy no alcohol or narcotic can match. 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 8/11/24: Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost (Proper 14b)

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Imitating God
Ephesians 4:17-5:2

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

There always seems to be a dispute about whether or not behavior is influenced by what we see on the television, video games, and movie screens, and by what we hear over the airwaves. Of course, there are statistics that support both sides of the issue, as statistics can always be made to say what someone wants them to say. Perhaps you remember that Mark Twain said, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” But whatever the stats say, common sense tells us that behavior can be influenced by what is seen and heard. And even more persuasive than common sense is the Biblical argument St. Paul makes in this text. He tells us that we are to be imitators of God. How could that be if there was not something from God, something seen and heard, that we are to imitate?

It has been said that imitation is the highest form of flattery. If that is true in positive things, like imitating God, why would it not also be true in negative things? If God wishes His children to imitate Him in His ways, would it not also be the case that His great enemy, Satan, would try to get us to imitate him? The truth is, imitation is something we do all the time. We are likely not even aware how often we imitate what others do or say.

Of course, it should go without saying that we are not to be imitators of Satan. But there are such imitators in the world, many of them in places where we would least expect them. On one occasion, Jesus said to the Jews: “You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires...” Obviously this is something we should avoid. But we should not even be thoughtless imitators of men. Yes, there have been great men and women of faith, and Scripture encourages us to remember them and imitate their faith. But like us, they were sinners. They needed the same Savior you and I need. They may be good models for imitation, but only in certain ways. We should imitate St. Peter, for example, in sharing our faith; we should not imitate him in taking the sword to our neighbor’s ears. Where we can and should imitate the saints who have gone before is in the faithful confession they made by the power of the Spirit to the Savior of the world.

If we are to be imitators of God, then we must have a clear picture of Him. To give us that clear picture of God, St. Paul might have laid out a series of divine characteristics we should follow. Instead he chose one divine attribute which includes all the others: love. The clearest picture of God is received by seeing His love. And this encouragement to imitate God is surrounded by His love. We heard St. Paul say, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” And then, two verses later, our reading says: “Walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us...” To know God, and then to imitate Him, means that we first see His love for us perfectly revealed in Jesus Christ. As St. John wrote in his first Epistle: “In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him.” This is the love of God in Jesus Christ that has reconciled the whole world to Himself. In Jesus Christ, God loves us poor sinners. And this is the God of love we are now to imitate. If we believe that God has so loved us as to give His very best for us—His own dear Son—we must love Him in return. Imitating God, then, is not something we are forced or compelled to do. It is not even something we choose to do. The power of that divine love itself persuades us. It is never a matter of fear or intimidation, but a free and willing return of love to Him who has loved us.

Of course we should be concerned by the troubles of our neighbor and extend the hand of love to him. But it is of even greater importance that we are concerned about the needs of his eternal soul. As Jesus wept over the unbelief and rejection from His own people, so we, too, should pray over those among us and around us who remain in unbelief and rejection of Jesus Christ. From a loving heart, we ought to speak of their soul‘s salvation and the love of God for them. Sometimes we have to love someone so much that we must tell them that they are dead in sin. “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” In this, too, we are to be imitators of God. 

And, of course, when our Lord gathers His disciples together to feed them with His own body and blood right before He goes to the cross, once again we should imitate our God. Jesus tells us to do this—to take and eat, to take and drink—for the forgiveness of our sins. In receiving this holy Bread of life into our mouths, as He urges and even commands us to do for our good, He strengthens us as we seek to imitate Him in mercy and charity.

My brothers and sisters in Christ, St. Paul is encouraging us here to imitate God in all of His goodness and love—not because our efforts to do so contribute anything to our salvation, but because the blessings of that salvation are already ours by His grace. May God grant that we would be faithful imitators of His love and mercy, that the lives and souls of those whom we encounter every day might also find in Jesus Christ their hope for life and salvation, now and forever. 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.