Sermon: December 20, 2020

“Favor Saint Mary”

(Luke 1:28)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

     Why did God pick Mary to give birth to Jesus? Martin Luther thought it would have looked better to pick a noble young woman, from an important Jewish family – maybe the daughter of Annas or of Caiaphas (Luther’s Works 21:314). So why did God pick this nobody – of lowly birth (Luke 1:48) – Mary of Nazareth? It’s because “God abhors the confidence which we have with regard to ourselves” (LW 3:4). And that’s what a prosperous, powerful young woman would possess. So God picked Mary instead. God strikes us with lowliness “to awaken us with many awe-inspiring examples of His wrath, that we may learn to despair of ourselves and to put our trust in His grace alone” (LW 2:4). Trusting in God alone is what’s required of the Messiah’s mother. And her lowliness embodies that trust. If God is going to favor her (Luke 1:28), then she must be lowly of heart. For indeed, God “loves the remnant of those who fear Him [Luke 1:50] and hates the mass of the unrepentant sinners” (LW 2:53).

     In order to exalt the only Son of God, we ourselves must decrease (John 3:30). If we inflate ourselves, then Christ will be diminished “because the world and Christ cannot be in harmony…. [So] faithful heralds of the Gospel… do not seek their own greatness,… do not curry the favor of others,… do not hunger after wealth and honor, but… seek only to enrich Christ, to return both the talent they received and rich interest [Matthew 25:27]” (LW 20:103). This requires lowliness – recognizing that “sticks and stones are not as ignorant and mad as we are” (LW 75:43). And so God picked Mary of Nazareth to be the mother of Jesus. By so doing he favored what was of low estate (Luke 1:28, 48) – a favorable exaltation that she could never do for herself. This is what God does – “to place before us all things beyond our grasp, things impossible and clearly desperate, so that we might cast all things aside and believe in God. [For he wants] to humble the proud and exalt the humbled” (LW 16:183). And so he chooses what is “foolish in the world to shame the wise” (1 Corinthians 1:27). Making Saint Mary glorious in and of herself, would then be contrary to God’s purposes. It’s rather her lowliness that is to catch our eye and inspire us to walk down that same lowly path.

     But will we ever do that? We who love the darkness rather than the light (John 3:19)? What chance do we have to be lowly? How shall we find help – we who love money, pleasure and ourselves (2 Timothy 3:2–4)? Can anything turn us around? Is salvation possible? Well, guess what – “what is impossible with men is possible with God” (Luke 18:27). Just as God could bring Jesus from a virgin’s womb (Luke 1:37), so he can bring forth lowliness out of the corruption of our self-aggrandizement (Romans 4:17). For indeed, “Mary… grasped the word and through faith became pregnant with it in her heart [and] also became physically pregnant with that which the word in her heart said to her” (LW 37:90, 36:341). God’s word is that powerful. It “breaks the cedars of Lebanon, it makes the oaks whirl, and strips the forests bare” (Psalm 29:5, 9) – bringing forth the virgin born along with believers in him.

     When God implants his word in us and bestows on us the gift of faith (James 1:21, Ephesians 2:8), then we follow Christ (John 10:4). And he’s worth it! He’s “from the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 1:20). And that’s what we need. For Luther was right – “I do not want a Christ… as my Savior who is only a man. Otherwise I would go to the devil. For mere flesh and blood could not erase sin, reconcile God, remove His anger, overcome and destroy death and hell, and bestow eternal life.” (LW 24:108)! These words about Christ’s saving sacrifice go with Christmas. They aren’t reserved for Good Friday. The death of Jesus is always at the center of our faith – regardless of the church season (1 Corinthians 2:2, 2 Corinthians 4:10). In a newly translated Christmas sermon from 1544, Luther joins the death of Jesus with his birth – “Ah, heavenly Father, You put Your Son at a maiden’s breast to nurse Him with a spoonful of milk, and then let Him hang upon a cross to die – and all this takes place for our sakes” (LW 58:194). So you see my friends, the nursed one is also the nailed one!

     Celebrating Christ’s nativity, then, without concentrating on his death, rips the truth right out of Christmas. No wonder in 1525 Luther snapped – “At Christmas, they rock a baby and practice their nonsense rhymes” (LW 76:386)! Give up on that and diligently dwell on these words instead from another of Luther’s Christmas sermons: “By His blood [Christ] has made satisfaction… so that we receive both forgiveness and grace without our cost or labor, but not without Christ’s cost and labor…. Our faith…. is not righteous unless it… firmly believes that not we but Christ for us can and has satisfied God’s righteousness…. In the entire Gospel He does nothing more than draw us out of ourselves into Him…. What a rich, inexpressible thing is Christian faith, which brings such great, incomprehensible treasures to all believers!... Crawl into Christ [and] remain under His shelter” (LW 75:246–47).  

     And in Christ’s shelter be sure to bless Saint Mary as Scripture calls us to do (Luke 1:48). Luther thought saying The Hail Mary was a wonderful way to do that. Through those words we “penetrate to Christ and to God himself… through her” words (LW 43:39). But he cut off the last line from The Hail Mary about praying for us sinners at the hour of our death. That was because it wasn’t Biblical to “surrender… our death wholly to her care” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1999, §2677). It’s enough to pray – “Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus.” That’s because all of these words are Bible verses (Luke 1:28, 30, 31, 41, 42, 43). So hold onto that abbreviated Hail Mary as one good way to show God that you, following the example in his word, also want to honor Christ by favoring his mother, Saint Mary. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “Savior of the Nations, Come” (LBW 28)

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2n7zLLYKRM

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn:  “Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus” (LBW 30)

Sermon: December 13, 2020

“Test Everything”

(1 Thessalonians 5:21)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

     Generous, yes; gullible, no. That should be our Christian mantra. Every day those words should guide our steps. Generous, yes; gullible, no. But they don’t. And that’s because we’re gullible and stingy instead. Alas – “wretched man that I am!” (Romans 7:24). Stingy indeed we are – we don’t help “those in need.” And we’re surely gullible – being “tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine” (Ephesians 4:28, 14). Just think of it! And it’s probably our gullibility that brings about our lack of generosity. That’s how those two are connected. We buy into the false teaching that we’re better than everyone else, and so we don’t want to sacrifice anything to help others (Philippians 2:3, Romans 12:3, 10, 16, 1 Peter 3:8). That’s how generosity flies away. The best secular account of our collective meanness is that slender volume by Peter Unger – Living High & Letting Die: Our Illusion of Innocence (1996). You can’t go wrong by it. It exposes as threadbare the many excuses we have for not being generous.

     So how shall we fight against our gullibility – and lack of generosity? How shall we block them? The Bible says we can stop being gullible, or at least reduce it, by testing everything (1 Thessalonians 5:51, 1 John 4:1). That means take nothing for granted. Learn to be suspicious. Don’t trust anyone (Jeremiah 17:5, John 2:24). Martin Luther put it this way – “entrust duties… but [then] watch with unceasing vigilance” (Luther’s Works 45:123). For we live in a world that is “mad and foolish, wild and wicked” (LW 22:198). But how are we to develop Luther’s vigilance? He goes on to explain – “believe nothing unless it is founded in the Scriptures” (LW 36:195). We are to rely on Scripture “so much that where something is not in Scripture, it is not to be held as true” (LW 75:270). The Bible is to “regulate” our lives (LW 17:144). We are to “yield to the Word” (LW 14:339). We are to think “in the way Scripture does” (LW 25:261). In those ways the Bible becomes our habitation, our domicile, our home – for we are “surrounded on all sides by the rays of the Word” (LW 2:353). Then the creed that we live by will be that “we should disregard all human… teaching… and pay attention only to the clear Scripture…. We should retain the right [to] accept with discretion only what agrees with Scripture” (LW 76:86). Then we will “flee for refuge to the most solid rock of Divine Scripture and not… believe rashly any, whoever they may be, who speak, decide, or act contrary to its authority” (LW 27:156). That gives us godly equilibrium. We then have spiritual stability.

     That happens because the Bible brings us to “port” – “so that we are certain of what we should teach, learn, and hold, and… no longer vacillate” (LW 59:289). Without Scriptures we are then at bay – “O unhappy Christians that we are!.... We rely upon human doctrine and wandering spirits, putting God’s Word last and scorning the advice of the Holy Spirit…. We poor creatures leave God’s Word and follow our own opinion. We order, we institute, we bid and forbid, we do and omit whatever pleases us” (LW 36:194–95). But then we no longer are suspicious and critical as we’re supposed to be. Remember that for Christians “everything must be read and accepted with fear and trembling, even that which is handed down by great and holy men” (LW 31:223). And that’s done with the Bible which “alone is the true lord and master of all writings and doctrine on earth” (LW 32:11–12). Christians, therefore, will “reject the word of man, or else read it with discrimination” (LW 32:217). That rejection or discrimination is our suspicion – it’s our criticism. And so we must be “bound… by the chains of Scripture and the holy Word” (LW 32:119). That’s what it’s like to be “slaves of righteousness” (Romans 6:18).

     But none of this will happen unless first that strong man, the prince of darkness, the god of this world (2 Corinthians 4:4), is bound (Mark 3:27). For as long as he remains unbound, we are not bound by the chains of Scripture. We are wild and sinful – “living in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of body and mind” (Ephesians 2:3). But in God’s great mercy we are not left like that. Instead Christ Jesus, God’s only son, comes and “destroys the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Luther called them “sin, death, God’s wrath, the devil, hell, and eternal damnation” (LW 23:404). These are cancelled by nailing them to the cross (Colossians 2:14). These are defeated by the blood of the cross (Colossians 1:20). That blood washes us clean (Revelation 7:14); that blood saves us from God’s wrath (Romans 5:9). That’s because the sacrifice of Christ is certain (LW 12:380). For only Christ has made “satisfaction for the sins of the world.” Only through him can we “throw wrath into the corner” and “learn to reconcile… the wrathful God with man the sinner” (LW 12:363, 321). So let us with joy shout out – “Christ, our Asylum” (LW 16:195)!

     Strengthened by this freedom and faith and joy in Christ Jesus, may we now continue with our fast before Christmas – even though we know that “laws do not make Christians” (LW 8:264). And in addition to that, may we also take up the discipline of being ruled by Holy Scripture, which is here to correct us and keep us from the wayward teachings of our own liking (2 Timothy 3:16, 4:3). Luther shows us twelve ways to do this. Holy Scripture, he writes, “crushes the great, that is, humbles the proud; it straightens the crooked, that is, corrects the disorderly; it bends the straight, that is, bows down the exalted; it levels the rough, that is, soothes the angry; it extends the short, that is, encourages the timid; it shortens the long, that is, terrifies the presumptuous; it widens the narrow, that is, makes the stingy generous; it narrows the wide, that is, makes the spendthrift economical; it sharpens the blunt, that is, gives knowledge to the unlearned; it blunts the sharp, that is, makes the wise ignorant; and it repels rust, that is, banishes laziness” (LW 14.338). This stirring litany echoes John 9:39 – that God both blinds those with good sight, and gives sight to the blind! May the depth and breadth of these insights “rule” over us, and be the “womb” that gives us life (LW 23:51, 17:93). May this “whole counsel of God” (Acts 20:27) manifest in Luther’s litany never leave us. And may we daily recall these twelve Scriptural corrections, that they intensify our discipleship as we struggle now, and until our last days on earth, to test everything. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “O Lord, How Shall I Meet You” (LBW 23)

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DPBN7WzS4o

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “Lo! He Comes with Clouds Descending” (LBW 27)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjn3fBTvBjY

Sermon: December 6, 2020

“Repent”

(Mark1:4)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

     Why doesn’t Isaiah 1:27–28 settle it? It says that “Zion shall be redeemed by justice, and those in her who repent, by righteousness. But rebels and sinners,” the Lord warns, “shall be destroyed together, and those who forsake the Lord shall be consumed.” So why don’t we repent? Jesus thought we should, and so in Luke 13:3–5 he threatens us twice – “repent or perish.” So why don’t we join Isaiah and Jesus and repent? Why risk being destroyed? Why resist repenting? Well, because first it’s too hard on us. And second, it waters down God’s mercy. That sounds like two strikes and you’re out. In one fell swoop repentance is cut out of the Christian life – and with it Isaiah 1 and Luke 13 as well. A positive self-image and taking God for granted rules the day.

     So let’s look at these. First there’s our self-image. It’s what first blocks our repenting. That’s because it hurts our feelings. It highlights what’s wrong with us. Repentance doesn’t cut us any slack. We long for compliments over repentance. So do we need to sing a round or two of that popular song of old, “Accentuate the Positive” (Johnny Mercer, 1944)? Well, it all depends, doesn’t it? We shouldn’t ever sing that song if Mark 7:20 is true – “what comes out of a man is what defiles a man.” Neither should we if Romans 7:18 is true – “nothing good dwells within me.” Nor if Revelation 3:17 is true – “you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.” And if John 3:19 is true, we also should never sing it – that “men loved the darkness rather than the light.” If these divine revelations have it right, then self-castigation is just what we need.

     So forget that Johnny Mercer song! Rather, take up Martin Luther when he said that “we are obnoxious [and] human nature will ever remain the same” (Luther’s Works 19:73). Follow Luther when he says that our lives are filled with “utter darkness, and [contempt for] God, lying, deceiving, greed, gluttony, drunkenness, whoring, knavery, adultery, violence, and murder [with] neither love nor trustworthiness” (Luther’s House Postils, ed. E. Klug, 1996, 1:126, LW 22:390). Follow Luther when he says that we’ll need to “learn… how great the... depravity of human nature is” (LW 7:235). Follow Luther in the Lutheran Confessions when he says that “you must all become other than you now are and do otherwise than you now do, no matter who you are” (The Book of Concord, ed. T. Tappert, p. 304). Follow Luther because he followed 2 Corinthians 13:5, 9 – “Examine yourself, to see whether you are holding to your faith. Test yourself [praying for] your improvement.” And that improvement comes from the Gospel which “preserves nothing of the old man but destroys him completely and makes him new, until hatred of himself utterly roots out love of himself through faith in Christ. Therefore all boasting of erudition, wisdom, and knowledge is useless; for no one is made better by these, no matter what good and laudable gifts of God they are. Indeed, besides the fact that they do not make a man good, they become a covering for wickedness and a veil over the disease of nature, so that those who are pleased with themselves because of them and seem to themselves to be good and sound are incurable” (LW 29:119). Only the faithful can live with these condemnations – “lest the penitent perish” (LW 7:257). We run that risk because when we become “fully occupied with the feeling of sin,.... [we shrink] back and cannot see the rays of mercy in the clouds of divine wrath” (LW 12:375, 316). So faith is needed because then we can repent and still move away from being “coarse [and] hard” sinners (LW 12:334, 323) – receive forgiveness and finally be saved.

     And then there’s God’s mercy. It also is used to dump repentance. For we suppose that if we have to repent before God forgives us, then his mercy looks compromised and puny. For more is needed than just pure grace. So an evangelical alarm goes off – and we pull the plug on repenting. But should we? God promises that he will not despise a “broken and contrite heart” (Psalm 51:17). Should we then play with fire – should we provoke God’s displeasure by not repenting, by not being broken and contrite? Shall we tempt him to despise us? If we refuse to repent in God’s name and for his sake, it’ll surely boomerang on us – for “impenitence is the unforgivable sin” (LW 33:35). In fact, not repenting “condemns” us (LW 67:11). Repentance is how we acknowledge that “God is right and… we are… all condemned” (LW 51:318). Therefore God wants you to “grieve over the sins you have committed and [become] ashamed of them” (LW 56:304). Indeed, joy comes to heaven when we repent (Luke 15:10). And why shouldn’t it? What’s being eradicated in us through repentance and forgiveness are “works of the devil, works of sin, works of darkness, works of folly” (LW 31:65). Indeed, “what a great evil sin is” (LW 7:280). So when we “realize that sin is in [us, we] will surely fear to become [servants] of sin” (LW 25:301). And we’ll take up Luther’s clarion call that “the entire life of believers [should] be one of repentance” (LW 31:25). We need to be “converted day by day,” every day of our lives (LW 17:117). And this is not contrary to God’s mercy, but part of it. God makes repentance a condition for his mercy, for he “wishes to forgive sins to those who acknowledge them and does not wish to forgive sins to those who do not acknowledge them. This promise is the sole cause, the first, middle, and last cause; that is, it is everything” (LW 12:333). Therefore “you must confess your sin. If not, everything is in vain” (LW 58:240).

     But even with all of these testimonies and explanations, we still have problems with repentance. That’s because it is so hard to change our minds once we’ve made them up (Elizabeth Kolbert, “That’s What You Think: Why Reason and Evidence Won’t Change Our Minds,” The New Yorker, February 27, 2017). Because so many of our problems are rooted in refusing to change our minds for the better, some are now proposing to “contain and harness the Dionysian energies of psychedelics,” in order to push us in the right direction (Michael Pollan, How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence, 2018, p. 404). But for us, we have another word to hear, that’s about a divine force that takes us right into the kingdom of God (Colossians 1:13). It’s that power that pushed the murderous Saul into a holy life – not of his own choosing (Acts 9:3–9, John 15:16). Now that’s some doing! Power like that gives us hope – for it’s far more than a “name for the people [we] can become together” (The American Scholar, Winter 2021, p. 44). It rather is a power beyond anything any of us can muster on our own. It helps us when we cannot help ourselves. And it’s in the word about the Lord being patient, “not wanting you to perish, but… to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). To bring that about, God has given us Jesus to suffer for us that he might be “our repentance and satisfaction before God” (LW 40:345). That makes possible what otherwise would never be – that we might repent and be saved from our sins (Mark 1:4). His repentance brings about ours. That’s because by way of it we’re “plagued by a desire for salvation and for the mercy of God” (LW 5:154).

     Just think of it – a good plague for once! For God’s word meddles with us whether we like it our not. It cuts into our souls (Hebrews 4:12). That word implants itself into us to change us for the better from within us (James 1:21). And it barges in without asking permission – through closed doors (John 20:19). It is a mighty word even when it looks inert and weak – unable to move things around like a big steam shovel does (2 Corinthians 12:9, Acts 5:38–39). It is that almighty word made flesh in Christ Jesus, who on the cross “stepped into the place of our sinful nature,... loaded onto Himself all the wrath of God which we deserved with all of our works, and... overcame it” (LW 76:19). Now that’s some power! It overcomes divine wrath (Romans 5:9) and brings forgiveness to the repentant. And because Jesus refused to end his prolonged suffering and come down from the cross (Matthew 27:40), “it must follow that no one through his own work or holiness can atone for his sins or put away God’s wrath” (LW 77:321). Only the death of Jesus does that. And this gracious message is manifest even when God uses us to get it across – as in the case of Ananias (Acts 9:10). So “get busy and work, and yet expect everything from God alone.... Labor, and let Him give the fruits. Govern, and let Him give His blessing. Fight, and let Him give the victory. Preach, and let Him win hearts. Take a husband or a wife, and let Him produce the children. Eat and drink, and let Him nourish and strengthen you” (LW 14:115). We do not have this power within us (2 Corinthians 4:7). We are only witnesses to it (Acts 1:8) – that his saving power among us may increase (John 3:30).

     And there’s still more to this Christian message because of the season. During these days before Christmas we should also fast – and even sanctify a fast for the church to share in together (Joel 2:15). Luther warned that we should not “tolerate hypocritical Christians who consider it sufficient… to believe that they are Christians, remain in sins and filth, and are not changed. If they believed sincerely [they] would… purify themselves” (LW 30:268). So we also need to join that purification project. But we have to be careful as we already have been saying. We have to remember that faith is “preached against works, even if works cannot be left out afterwards” (LW 67:76). They’re needed but they can’t save us sinners. They’re needed because they’re “works of faith,… done out of the spirit of liberty and solely for the love of God” (LW 25:234). So be cautious, but still fast. Deprive yourself of the foods you especially like, to help reinforce that you are just an “unworthy servant” of the Lord, doing your duty (Luke 17:10). None of us are hotshots. Know, then, that it is good to fast. Hold on to that. And remember that “one fasts in the right way by not giving the body more food than is needed to keep it healthy, and by letting it work and wake, in order that the old ass may not become too reckless, go dancing on ice, and break a leg but may be bridled and follow the spirit” (LW 30:28). So fast, bridle yourself, and follow the Lord and the Spirit of his might, that you may, with God’s gracious help, use these days before Christmas to repent. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “Comfort, Comfort Now My People” (LBW 29)

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “Fling Wide the Door” (LBW 32)

Sermon: November 29, 2020

“Long for Heaven”

(Mark13:35)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

     Christians are supposed to be good people – always trying to help everyone (1 Thessalonians 5:15). Indeed, we’re even told that whoever “does good is of God” (3 John 1:11). But there’s a hitch. And that is that good deeds don’t make you rich toward God (Luke 12:21). For that you have to set your minds on him rather than on earth, where good deeds are done (Colossians 3:2). For what’s on earth is transient (2 Corinthians 4:18). Indeed, it’s passing away (1 Corinthians 7:31). But God’s word lasts forever (1 Peter 1:25). And those eternal words are not found on earth (John 6:68). Martin Luther knew this – and that’s why he said that “this life is useless;... this life is nothing” (Luther’s Works 60:119, 52:14). It can’t direct us to what’s of “surpassing worth” (Philippians 3:8). For he knew that the Holy Scriptures didn’t “spring from the soil of the earth” (LW 22:484). “Flesh and blood” can’t give us God’s word (Matthew 16:17). That wisdom must instead come down from heaven (James 1:17). It’s not left to smart people to dream up – like Plato (429–347 BC) did with his philosopher king in the Republic. No, all of us are “worthless” (LW 33:257). So eternal life takes something else to make it happen. Christ has to “prepare” it for us (John 14:3). He has to “transport us to heaven” (LW 73:136). To tune into it, Luther thought, we have to “be dead to… earthly life. We should not receive and tolerate those earthly doctrines and false opinions from ourselves,” he goes on to say. For they are “only earthly, nothing more.” They do not “ask or strive for God’s will and kingdom and eternal life” (LW 77:107).

     All of this is true because good deeds are not uniquely Christian. They don’t turn us into children of God – away from being “children of wrath” (Ephesians 2:3). For that we have to be born from above (John 3:3). Good works can’t do that. Think of Muslims. They are very good people. Martin Luther thought – even during a time of war with them – that not even “Christ Himself… presented such a fine appearance,” and that any Christian spending only “three days among” them, would convert to Islam (LW 59:259). In fact, he thought, it would be better to be ruled by a “prudent” non-believer than by a “good” Christian who knew nothing about government, even if the non-believing ruler were to “harm” Christians in the process (LW 9:19).

     But none of this makes Muslims children of God. That’s because good fruit cannot make a tree good (LW 76:210) – it’s actually the other way around (Matthew 7:17). For indeed, a good tree is a person with a “good heart” – and not just good deeds. And a good heart comes from being born of the Spirit, and being grounded “in the Word of God,” which enables obedience to God and love for the neighbor (LW 21:265, 266). So good works are not enough, because they can’t make us good. No, righteousness “precedes works” (LW 25:152). Works in themselves, then, are actually “dirt” – because after we do them “we want to boast” about what we’ve just done (LW 56:320). So in good deeds we are “nothing but sows” (LW 57:33). The only way to do truly good deeds is first to become a good person by way of faith in Jesus. In that case, good works “follow” faith, and “count for something by virtue of faith; but they are not at all the equal of faith even though they arise from faith. And faith does not cleave to the works but solely to… the works of God” (LW 23:182). That leaves us with this, that faith should “preach against works, even if works cannot be left out afterwards” (LW 67:76).

     So faith matters more than good works – because we’re saved by grace “through faith” (Ephesians 2:8, Romans 3:25). No one is saved by good works – for a person is only saved “by faith apart from works of the law” (Romans 3:28). We should then believe and be baptized (Mark 16:16) – and stay alert, and stay awake (Mark 13:35). We must be ever vigilant. For as Luther warned – “faith takes no holidays” (LW 35:378, 75:329). And why’s that? Why the need for utter diligence in matters of faith? “Oh, what a difficult task it is,” Luther writes, “to come to God.… [It’s] like making your way through a wall of thorns” (LW 19:74). Wow, somebody better warn the evangelists! So be careful never to take faith for granted. Once you’ve received faith as a “gift” from God, struggle mightily with “fear and trembling” to live within that very “household of faith” (Ephesians 2:8, Philippians 2:12, Galatians 6:10). So you’ll be “misusing the gospel” if you remain “sleepy and secure” – imagining that you’ve been “so liberated by the gospel that there is no further need to do anything, give anything, or suffer anything” (LW 51:207). What a sham that would be! No wonder faith “can be easily lost” (LW 26:114) – and indeed many raised in the faith do in fact “toddle off into some form of emptiness” where they find a counterfeit repose that suits them (Handing Over the Goods: Determined to Proclaim Nothing But Christ Jesus & Him Crucified – Essays in Honor of James Arne Nestingen, 2018, p. 254).

     So stay awake and look to Christ the pioneer and perfecter of your faith (Hebrews 12:2). So great is the power of faith – for by it we “cling” to Christ (LW 21:263). So “in the very hour in which we begin to believe and to take hold of the Word we also begin to live in eternal life” (LW 8:190). Therefore we must never be “so caught up in the world as if we wanted to remain here forever and leave heaven to God” (LW 57:26). Instead we should “seek the glory of God alone” (LW 17:263). We should “only strive to be in Christ forever” (LW 79:275). It’s bad for us to be “deeply enmeshed in temporal things” (LW 45:280). It’s best for us not to “settle down” here (LW 77:197). We can’t forget that it was “for eternal life” that we were baptized (LW 57:27). So we should leave the temporal behind and “always stretch for the eternal” as the goal set before us (LW 77:200). And why not? Heaven is that “better country” (Hebrews 11:16). It’s where a room awaits us in the heavenly mansions (John 14:2). It’s where sin, suffering, sadness and death are finally wiped out (Revelation 21:4).

     Because Christ is so great, due to the salvation he brings, much is at stake. For if you don’t believe in him, then “the wrath of God rests on you” (John 3:36). That will surely bring suffering from “the punishment of eternal destruction and exclusion from the presence of the Lord and the glory of his might” (2 Thessalonians 1:9). When that happens, he is “a frightening Christ… for those hardened hearts…. He, without mercy, must trample them under His feet” (LW 77:85). And we should worry about this because even though faith in eternal life may be rightly taught, it’s “not easily learned.” It may be “rightly preached, but not easily believed; finely admonished, but not easily followed; well said, but poorly done” (LW 57:22). But that threat doesn’t take away Christ’s mercy for the broken, contrite, and heavily ladened (Psalm 51:17, Matthew 11:28). No, that venerable Christian formula still stands, that “the obdurate and stubborn,… you should rebuke sharply. But those who are overtaken in a trespass and sorrow and grieve over their fall [you should comfort] with sweet words and embrace… in your motherly arms” (LW 27:111, 20:176). May we do just that – “terrify the hardened and console the afflicted” (LW 17:264) – in order that more and more may come to long for heaven.

     And in that same regard may we also constantly pray (1 Thessalonians 5:17). May we pray to God that his Holy Spirit brings new birth and the longing for heaven among us all (Luke 11:13). May this come about by having Christ’s words “dwell richly” in us (Colossians 3:16). And let us do that knowing that the greatest work of faith is to “teach others the Word,” and that whoever “works faithfully prays twice” (LW 51:139, 43:194). In one of his famous 1522 Wittenberg sermons, Luther said, “I can drive no man to heaven or beat him into it with a club” (LW 51:79). What a relief! Thank God instead for his word and his Spirit that graciously and mercifully sees to it that we, in his good time (Galatians 5:5), are also found to be among those who long for heaven. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “Rise, My Soul, to Watch and Pray” (LBW 443)

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “Rejoice, Rejoice, Believers” (LBW 25)

Sermon: November 22, 2020

“Live in Christ”

(1 Corinthians 15:22)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

     The Holy Scriptures declare that Christ is King (1 Timothy 1:17). And for a hundred years we have been singing “crown him with many crowns” (Lutheran Book of Worship, 1978, hymn 170). But now that’s coming to an end. Yes, you heard that right. And it’s because of the attacks being waged by the best and brightest in the church. “God the king no longer fits,” they argue, in a world of “change and chance,” nor does it properly express how “passionately” God loves us (Brian Wren, What Language Shall I Borrow? God-Talk in Worship: A Male Response to Feminist Theology, 1989, pp. 126, 234). This revision has trickled down into our worship by taking the word king out of Psalms 10, 68, 95, 97, and 149 (Evangelical Lutheran Worship, 2006). This onslaught is undergirded by trenchant theological arguments against God’s well attested almighty power (Charles Hartshorne, Omnipotence and Other Theological Mistakes, 1984). And they’re everywhere. When God, for instance, looks almighty as the potter shaping the clay in Jeremiah 18:6 and Romans 9:21, it isn’t really so, because there’s a “give-and-take relationship” between the two, which requires the potter to remold the “animate,” resistant clay to get it into the right shape (John E. Sanders, The God Who Risks: A Theology of Divine Providence, Revised Edition, 2007, p. 92). Or when God overpowers Jonah in his flight from responsibility by “interrupting” his getaway (Jonah 1:4, 3:3) – it really doesn’t mean that God’s “in control of the situation” because Jonah is still free to complain about it (Terence E. Fretheim, Reading Hosea–Micah, 2013, p. 177). Or when God knocks Saul to the ground in Acts 9:4 to force him to preach Christ, he’s not acting like a “mob boss,” but only showing loving compassion (T. J. Oord, God Can’t: How to Believe in God and Love After Tragedy, Abuse, and Other Evils, 2019, p. 58).

     How did we get into this mess? How did we ever get started down this road with a God of our own making who would never push any of us anywhere against our wills? How did we end up with a God who no longer can overthrow the mighty and destroy nations (contra Job 12:19, 23)? Was there skullduggery and deceit involved? Actually we came by it quite naturally – and it has taken all these many years to finally catch up with us. For when they saw Jesus in the Bible they didn’t bow down before a grand potentate, in charge of the whole world, but instead scratched their heads saying – “Isn’t this the carpenter’s son?” (Matthew 13:55, Mark 6:3). Martin Luther knew where this quip was headed, and it’s finally coming true. “If… someone wants first to know who Christ is,” he cautioned, “and then afterward to believe on account of the status of the person, it will do no good” (Luther’s Works 69:235). How bizarre! You’d think if he looked like a king you would more likely treat him like one. “Clothes make the man,” you know – from the 16th century Latin maxim, vestis virum facit. But not in this case. With Jesus you start with “what He preaches and teaches” and go on from there. Then you will “understand well enough who Christ is and where He is from” (LW 69:235). He’s the word made flesh, after all (John 1:14) – and his glory is in his words and deeds (John 12:23). And they have nothing to do with establishing a kingdom on earth that dominates culture and society, by someone who looks regal. “My kingship is not of this world” (John 18:36) – Jesus ardently reports. And so “everything which is God’s Word and work must be troublesome, bitter, and difficult to the outward man” (LW 75:246). Indeed, Luther warned, “what is of God must be crucified in the world” (LW 25:177).

     So how do we make any headway in the kingdom of God? How can we get a grip on what doesn’t even look right? First, we will have to “abase” ourselves and sincerely believe that we are “the lowest in all the world” (LW 51:38). We have to wish to “become nothing” (LW 48:288). You must realize that “everything that is yours must be cast aside, and new things must be done. These old things of yours cannot contain these new things, nor can the righteousness of the Law and the righteousness of faith both stand simultaneously or agree with each other” (LW 67:73). Christ is all and “we are nothing” (LW 23:182). And so God only exalts those who are humble (Luke 18:14). Indeed, “it is impossible for someone who does not first hear the law and let himself be killed by the letter, to hear the gospel and let the grace of the Spirit bring him to life” (LW 39:185). For God “accepts only the forsaken, cures only the sick, gives sight only to the blind, restores life only to the dead, sanctifies only the sinners, gives wisdom only to the unwise” – indeed, he only makes “something out of nothing” (LW 14:163). That’s because it all goes back to the word (Luke 11:28) – and fit hearers of it are those who have been “reduced to nothing” (LW 4:49). They are the ones who do not follow their own insights (Proverbs 3:5), but are instead “regulated” by God’s word – verbo esse debent (LW 17:144). We stand in its debt! They are the ones who know that “the majesty of God is supreme,” and that “we are completely worthless” (LW 16:16–17). Then we’re off our high horse, and can actually listen to God’s word – rather than “find fault with it and dispute it” (LW 23:229). Then we have quit trying to turn God into the most “insignificant and despised disciple on earth” (LW 51:384). Then we have at long last come to cherish that “the glory of the grace of God… makes us enemies of ourselves” (LW 27:364). Suffering is integral to this realization (Romans 8:17). And so it’ll be important to challenge our children – “I hope you will be treated unfairly, so you will know the value of justice. I hope that you will suffer betrayal, because that will teach you the importance of loyalty.... I hope you will be ignored, so you know the importance of listening to others. And I hope you will have just enough pain to learn compassion” (Joan Biskupic, The Chief: The Life and Turbulent Times of Chief Justice John Roberts, 2019, p. 323).

     And secondly we will have to look to Christ above everything else (Colossians 3:2) – for he is the only one of “surpassing worth” (Philippians 3:8). Indeed, “it is the absolute truth that without Christ all is darkness” (LW 23:321). That’s because he died for our sins (1 Corinthians 15:3). No one else has done that for us. Only he was obedient unto death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:8). Only he shed his blood to save us from the wrath of God (Romans 5:9). This is great because by believing that he died for us, we “shall not be judged…. for through… faith the judgment has been abolished” (LW 22:376, John 5:24). This makes Christ our king, even if he doesn’t look like a worldly king. And that is because he instead is our king “for the express purpose of destroying death completely as His enemy” (LW 28:134). “It requires great insight and understanding to tear the false christ out of our hearts and to learn to think of Him correctly” (LW 77:83). And when we do, we live in him, both now and forever (1 Corinthians 15:22). And when you live in Christ, “what damage can be done to you by… the censure of the whole world?... You have God’s Word; they don’t! You are in [His] grace; they are not! You are [His] child; they are [His] enemies!” (LW 14:134). For when we believe in Jesus – that “transmits divine... works to [us], namely, His suffering [and] His death... and makes them our own” (LW 23:182).

     What an amazing gift! Not only does it give a peace which the world cannot give (John 14:27), but this “unspeakably great person” also inspires us “in a friendly way to serve others.” For we exhort both “faith and good works” (LW 60:15). Those who miss out on this joining together are “justly condemned, harder than stone, darker than hell” (LW 76:421). May we never be numbered among them. May we instead have a new birth (John 3:3) which leads us “into a completely new way of life” (LW 78:322). May we instead gladly (2 Corinthians 9:7) feed the hungry and thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, visit the sick and imprisoned (Matthew 25:35–36). May we do all of this steadfastly, knowing that we in effect have heard from our Savior – “Fear no one and trust no one except God alone, who says [to] fear nobody but me, for I can smite you, and put your trust in none but me, for I can help you. No prince will give you either good or evil, for both are in my hand” (LW 51:139). May we “always walk in this rule, constantly continue, pursue it, and reach for it” (LW 79:296). And in this we rejoice and pass it on to our neighbor. For fear dwindles in us. Bravery begins to mark us (LW 12:222, 386, 388, 32:29, 33:150, 67:158). Christ is the “head of the body, the church” (Colossians 1:18), and that makes him our master and king. So if you “trust in him then you need fear no one and trust no one except God.” With Christ as your king, you will do far more than merely “fall upon your knees” (LW 51:139). You will also stand up boldly and serve your neighbor as you enter into the fray to live in Christ Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “At the Name of Jesus” (LBW 179)

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “The Head That Once Was Crowned” (LBW 173)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g_ryz_A848

Sermon: November 15, 2020

“Watch & Be Ready”

(Matthew 25:13)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

     Christianity is a contest (Micah 6:2, 1 Corinthians 9:24). Do you believe that? And if you do, are you in it? Or do you think the Christian faith is something else? – maybe ease and merry-making (Luke 12:19). Now if you’re actually in the contest, what is it? What’s the fight over? What’s the contest about? “Unfaithful creatures! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God” (James 4:4). So is that the contest? Are we in a battle over who our friends should be – God or the world? “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15). So it looks like that is our battle! The world wants us to love ourselves (2 Timothy 3:2–4). Jesus says we better not, because if we do, we’ll never make it into heaven (John 12:25). Therefore when we deal with the world, let us learn to do so in such a way that we really are not dealing with it at all (1 Corinthians 7:31). That odd way of life is rejected by many, seeing the “mercy” that’s in “dumb luck” on earth to be good enough for worthwhile living (Sean Carroll, A Series of Fortunate Events: Chance and the Making of the Planet, Life, and You, Princeton University Press, 2020, pp. 11, 16).

     And surely it is an odd way of living, but it’s our way – even though it makes us fools and aliens (1 Corinthians 4:10, 1 Peter 2:11). Martin Luther helps us think through this strangeness. He thought that we can be both in the world and not of the world by withholding any enjoyment or feeling for what we do here on earth (Luther’s Works 25:516). Søren Kierkegaard (1813–1855) – that great champion of Luther – agreed with him, arguing against “using eternity to give a flavor to the enjoyment of life,” and then calling it good enough to be Christian (Journals, ed. Hongs, §4:4725). Furthermore he argued that the church, in pursuit of only “finite objectives for finite purposes,” has reduced Christianity to “a mood one has on Sundays, lest he overdo it” (Journals, §4:4814). Harsh though that may be, it’s fitting because “God in heaven is the only power who does not hold sales or reduce the prices; his prices remain eternally unchanged, more firmly fixed than the North Star” (Journals, §2:1821). If that wasn’t the case, then God would be at most “a handsome ornament, a luxury item – for there [would be] no duty toward” him (Journals, §2:1808).

     How best shall we wage this battle in favor of God – and against the world? What can we do to make sure that we win this contest our faith has dragged us into? There’s no better place to go than the parable of The Ten Maidens in Matthew 25, for there we have losers to avoid and winners to join. The story is old and familiar. The ten maidens are waiting for a wedding to start, and they need to keep their oil lamps burning until it begins. Five came prepared with extra oil, the other half didn’t. When they begin to run out, they ask the others to share some of their extra oil. They say they can’t because they need it. So the five unprepared maidens leave to get extra oil. While gone, the wedding starts and the door is closed. Upon returning, they knock on the door to get in late, but are denied entry. The parable then ends with the admonition – “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour” (Matthew 25:13).

     There’s much not to like about this parable – including the stinginess of the five prepared maidens, to say nothing of the inhospitality of the wedding host. But Luther doesn’t let these things distract us. He says we have to focus on the main point of the parable which is that “it is very horrible... when God in wrath turns someone away with nothing but scorn” (LW 79:211). Included in his assessment is a reference to Aesop’s fable of the cricket and the ants (Aesop, The Complete Fables, trans. R. Temple, 1998, §336, p. 246). Luther loved those fables (Carl P. E. Springer, Luther’s Aesop, 2011). In this one the cricket runs out of food in the winter, and asks the ants to share what they have stored up from the summer. The ants ask what he was doing in the summer when he should have been storing up food for later. The cricket says that he was singing. Then the ants respond – “Ah well, since you sang in the summer you can dance in the winter.” Luther thought this harshness was a perfect fit for Jesus’ parable.

     So watch! Watch, my friends, and be ready! Don’t be so enamored with what’s going on in the world around you that you forget God (Colossians 3:2, Philippians 3:8). Don’t think that what’s happening now is more important than what will happen when the world ends (John 5:28–29, 2 Peter 3:10). “True Christians [encourage] the fear of the Lord and a dread of sin, and [to keep] weeping, praying, admonishing, and rebuking” (LW 31:188). They know that the best way to prepare for the end is “coming to the end of oneself” (Lin Enger, American Gospel: A Novel, University of Minnesota Press, 2020, p. 204) – by being “displeasing... to ourselves” (LW 27:181). Kierkegaard, whom we commemorate today, knew that this ending, this displeasing, linked up well with learning “that Christianity is suffering, anguish, [and] a death struggle” (Journals, §4:4725). So rather than seeking self-fulfillment and the enjoyment of life (Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death, 1987, 2005, Lance Strate, Amazing Ourselves to Death, 2014), seek first the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33). If you do you will win the contest. Pure and simple. If you do, you will be included with the five maidens who were prepared and ended up getting into the wedding party. It’s not rocket science. So don’t be like the cowboys of old, “wandering the open prairies, free from the confines of the city, of marriage, of capitalism, and of the many other fetters and fetishes that plague our lives” (Christopher Knowlton, Cattle Kingdom: The Hidden History of the Cowboy West, 2017, pp. 339–40). For he who “loves his life more than Christ does not yet possess Christ through faith” (LW 25:318, Matthew 10:37).

     So seek first the kingdom of God. “This is a general teaching for all Christians,” Luther believed, “that they should treasure that eternal blessing which is theirs in the faith, despising this life so that they do not sink too deeply into it either with love and desire or suffering and boredom, but should rather behave like guests on earth, using everything for a short time because of need and not for pleasure” (LW 28:52). True indeed, but still befuddling! And Kierkegaard makes it more so. He says there is nothing we can do to seek first this kingdom – neither helping the poor nor witnessing for Christ will do it. Instead “become nothing before God, learn to be silent,” he insists. “In this silence is the beginning, which is to seek first God’s kingdom.... [And this is also] the beginning of the fear of God, because just as the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom [Proverbs 1:7], so silence is the beginning of the fear of God.... In this silence the many thoughts of wishes and desires God-fearingly fall silent; in this silence the verbosity of thanksgiving God-fearingly becomes silent.... And so it is; to pray is not to listen to oneself speak but it is to become silent and to remain silent, to wait until the one praying hears God” speaking from his holy word (Kierkegaard’s Writings, 18:10–11).

     Well that is a mouthful – albeit a Danish one. No wonder we’ll need help in seeking the kingdom of God first. Christ, who is at the center of it all (Colossians 1:13), is the one alone who draws us into the kingdom through his word and Spirit. For indeed, his “pain is my comfort; his wounds, my healing; his punishment, my redemption” (Luther’s House Postils, trans. E. Klug, 1996, 3:474). That’s because, as Kierkegaard explains, “I stand saved beside this other one, beside him, my Redeemer, who puts himself completely in my place” (KW 18:123). And so Kierkegaard is quick to add that “he who trusts in the atonement is greater than the most profound penitent” (Journals, §3:3078). That sacrifice, that atonement, that standing beside us, is so important for us because God “hates, damns, and wills evil to all sinners, that is, to all of us” (LW 25:382). And it is this sacrifice that makes Christ our “advocate” (1 John 2:1) – so that when he stands beside us as our substitute before God, it works. Hallelujah! As Kierkegaard argued, God beats up Jesus rather than us (Journals, §3:2976). Hallelujah! Therefore may we ever delight in him, and so be drawn to him, who dies for us, that we may be forgiven and saved for eternal life (John 12:32). Surely Christ is a wonder to behold!

Hymn of the Day: “The Lord Will Come and Not Be Slow” (LBW 318)

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling” (LBW 315)

Sermon: November 8, 2020

“Suffer & Rejoice”

(1 Thessalonians 1:6)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.     

     Who doesn’t want to be happy? Who doesn’t believe that when it comes to happiness – “the least can lift a ton” (The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson, ed. T. H. Johnson, 1890, 1960, p. 383)? We know that happy times help us forget sad moments that have depressed us just days before. The Bible even chimes in saying that “a cheerful heart is good medicine” (Proverbs 17:22). Martin Luther cherished this verse because he knew from personal experience that whoever “does nor bear his suffering with rejoicing, becomes sullen” (Luther’s Works 30:127). So we long for those good days – those happy days – because they make life sweet. Laughing together, and having good times with family and friends, makes life enjoyable and memorable.

      So it’s arresting, to say the least, when the Bible also tells us to rejoice in our sufferings and leap for joy when people hate us (Romans 5:3. Luke 6:22–23). This linking of happiness with pain is not what we were expecting. It puts together opposites that have no business being joined. But the Bible is relentless about this – “You received the word in much affliction, with joy inspired by the Holy Spirit” (1 Thessalonians 1:6). Once again we have the unanticipated – in this case, affliction combined with joy. But if we “wish to be Christians, it is necessary that we... both fear and rejoice” (LW 12:77). But we can’t just have joy now – that’s reserved for life in heaven (Revelation 21:4). “Whoever does not want to do this may have a good time here and live to his heart’s desire, but hereafter we will have to mourn forever” (LW 21:18, Luke 16:25). Even so, there is still room now for some joy, just not joy by itself. Indeed, “where there is faith, it is impossible for... joy not to be there too. [For joy] in tribulation necessarily results from faith” (LW 30:304). God, after all, is “repelled by sorrow of spirit.... He came to refresh us, not to sadden us” (LW 27:93). It’s that basic.

     But whence cometh this strange coupling, then? Why – contrary to most of us – does the Bible insist on putting together what we know shouldn’t go together? Well, the Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord (Job 1:21). And, “whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s” (Romans 14:8). So it’s because of God that his word reveals this strange understanding of how things unfold. Joy is supposed to go with sadness because God gives both joy and sadness – just never sadness alone (LW 27:93). So to think that our happy times shouldn’t be co-mingled with our dreary days, would be to go against God and his will for us. For not one sparrow dies “without your Father’s will” (Matthew 10:29). All things that happen come from God – whether for good or for evil; for weal or for woe (Isaiah 45:7).

     Who can possibly believe this? Well, Martin Luther comes barging into the room and says that “it is for certain,” mind you, “that it is by the Father’s sure knowledge and will that we suffer [and so] we ought to rejoice and to embrace the will of the Father with a joyful heart. We should set,” he goes on to explain, “God’s wondrous and fatherly care against all evils and all our sufferings, however wretched. Indeed, we should take all of our tribulations and swallow them up and drown them like a spark in the sea of God’s infinite love and care for us” (LW 67:109).

     But mind you, there’s no way to see this without beholding the Lamb of God, Christ Jesus, who takes away the sins of the world (John 1:29) – for the “human heart is like a ship on a wild sea, driven by the storm winds from the four corners of the world.” “He who is sad and disturbed is... of a stormy mind.” Indeed, what “a miserably divided thing is the human heart” (LW 35:255, 25:518, 69:18). But Christ is steady, strangely helping us by being derided and murdered – and then exalted and risen to glory in heaven (Philippians 2:8–9, Romans 4:25). He resolutely combines both in himself. He joins together what we think flies apart. He makes reasonable what looks crazy, for in him all things cohere, or hold together sensibly (Colossians 1:17). In him is suffering and joy, defeat with victory, death and life combined together. So his life wasn’t one of unmitigated happiness. No, “Christ was not always joyous.” In fact, “during His entire earthly sojourn He was consumed with a constant sorrow” (LW 52:147, 22:236). But that didn’t keep him from being productive, for by his very dying he restored life – indeed “through death” he destroyed “the power of death” (Hebrews 2:14). That is because when he died on the cross he sacrificed his life for sin (Hebrews 9:26). And on the cross he, in effect, cried out – “My blood intercedes loudly for you” (LW 22:146). By doing so, he destroys what is deadly in sin – its power to send us to hell for everlasting punishment, for “eternal destruction and exclusion from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might” (2 Thessalonians 1:9).

     Here we finally see clearly “the super-abundant goodness that God shows us in Christ, causing Christ to die for us before we would ask it of him, indeed, while we were still enemies” (LW 35:374, Romans 5:8). “What can the sins do when [Christ] Himself... has taken them away?... What can terrify when He has given Himself for you?” (LW 75:203). Because of Christ’s sacrifice, our damning “conscience is one drop; the reconciled God is a sea of comfort.” Therefore we have benefited from a miraculous exchange – “on our side there are nothing but sins. We share His good things; He shares our wretchedness. I believe in Christ. Therefore my sin is in Christ” (LW 30:280, 225). What a glorious message of deliverance and salvation (Romans 7:24, Colossians 1:13)! For who could “express fully what it means to be in the hellish darkness, under God’s eternal, unbearable wrath, judgment, and condemnation?” (LW 57:282).

     No wonder we are to rejoice in the Lord, over and over again (Philippians 4:4). No wonder, at his first coming to earth, the angels sang about this “good news of great joy” (Luke 2:10). So joy limited to Christ’s work is the best joy – knowing that if we were “always glad, the devil would befoul us.” And so our joy is limited to the Lord Jesus. And this is so even if “a Christian should and must be a cheerful person” (LW 54:96). It is just that this joy in Christ is the only happiness that can “stir the depths of the heart” (LW 75:158). It “is a genuine and complete joy.... It is not worldly or outward, but rather a secret and hidden joy” (LW 69:83). It “does not come from temporal goods, or honors but from the Lord, who makes the victory... through His mercy” (LW 20:305, 25:518). And so “the faithful rejoice... when the Gospel is disseminated, and when many come to faith and thus the kingdom of Christ is increased” (LW 27:93–94). And so “whoever has desire and joy in Him has died and been severed from the world” (LW 56:273).

     So believe in Christ, for he says to us all – “unhesitatingly set your foot on Me [for] I will be the Bridge to carry you across [into heaven, so] wager boldly on Me, go cheerfully and happily, and die in My name” (LW 24:42). For Christ is “the blessed and joyful redemption from this vale of misery and wretchedness” (LW 35:316). May all then who believe in this joy amidst the sorrows of life, share it with all who ask about the hope that is within you (1 Peter 3:15). Remind all who ask that living a life without joy is like planting “a tree in a narrow pot” (LW 15:176). It cannot expand and flourish! But note that “to have pleasure in sins is of the devil, but participation in good and honorable pleasures.... is pleasing to God, even if one may at times carry playfulness too far” (Luther: Letters of Spiritual Counsel, trans. T. Tappert, 1960, p. 93). In this way we “live differently than previously” – pursuing “a divine, heavenly life” (LW 77:106). For “true faith does not permit you to be impatient and to do harm” (LW 57:193). So may God inspire us all to move beyond the shame (Mark 8:38) that strikes us periodically in our walk of faith, tripping us up because of that odd call to not only suffer but also, along with it, to rejoice. Amen.

Hymn of the Day: “Jesus, Thy Boundless Love to Me” (LBW 336)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SQjWQeH5ww

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling” (LBW 315)

Sermon: November 1, 2020

“Hunger for God”

(Matthew 5:6)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.     

     Are saints dignified, well-spoken, decent people? Well, if you dwell on the kindness and patience in Galatians 5:22–23, then they are. But what if exhorting and reproving are also part of sainthood (Titus 2:16)? What then? Are they to be ignored or dropped altogether? If so, is that then the end of the good fight of faith for saints (1 Timothy 6:12)? Are we then too nice to any longer wage war against the “principalities, powers, and world rulers of this present darkness” (Ephesians 6:12, LW 56:113, 58:178)? Are we too placid to be struck that the remnants of our “recent past are scattered in the wild wind” (Bob Dylan, “Black Diamond Bay,” Desire, 1976, The Lyrics. Since 1962, 2014, p. 528)? Are we too polite to reiterate our Lord’s words against the serpents and brood of vipers who are being “sentenced to hell” (Matthew 23:33)? Are we ashamed of the Apostle Paul for saying that the sons of the devil, the enemies of righteousness, are “full of all deceit and villainy” (Acts 13:10)? Where shall we go to resolve these contradictory descriptions of sainthood?

     “Take Christ out of the picture,” Martin Luther carefully delineated, “and in whatever concerns me I will gladly humble myself and even let you walk all over me.” Here Luther gives us saintly kindness and patience galore. “But,” he quickly goes on to add, “do not tread on Christ or His Word, for when Christ is concerned, I stand my ground [and] must pass for [a] stubborn and impetuous [hothead] (Luther’s Works 23:330). There we have reproof – to say nothing of caustic condemnation – as being part of sainthood. What does that give us – Luther’s wild and wooly combination of calm and calamity? A Biblical dialectic – that’s what he gives us. He takes two contradictory goods and shows how they – contrary to displacing each other – can actually work together. What Saint Paul does, Luther does as well – be “sorrowful,” Saint Paul admonishes, “yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). Just as he combines sorrow with joy, so Luther combines affirmation with assault, calm with calamity. Just think of it. No flat, boring, cartoon figures here (Herbert Marcuse, The One Dimensional Man, 1964). Instead what we have is a complex agent who empathizes – while carefully and judiciously holding in reserve – biting criticism as well. According to Luther we can and must both cut people slack and then pull them up short when needed. At their best, then, Christians are “strange beings and wonders to the world” (LW 20:216). They are the ones who have “a spirit of restlessness amid the greatest calm” (LW 24:88). Too bad there are so few of them (Matthew 7:14, 22:14, LW 45:91, 79:245). This agility and scope of concern enhances our much needed service in the world. The world doesn’t need any more lop-sided suck-ups and bullies. It doesn’t need the throwaway line – “Seems like every time you turn around there’s another hard-luck story that you’re gonna hear” (“Black Diamond Bay,” p. 529). It rather needs Luther’s dialectical disciples. Without that duality, all that the church has to offer are “pseudo saints” or, worse yet, “demonic” ones (LW 22:141, 21:190).

     How shall we go about building real saints – beginning even on this All Saints’ Sunday? We have no better place to start than with Matthew 5:6 about God blessing those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Pray that this hunger will take over people near and far away. Pray that the hungers that now grip us will give way to being “filled with the Spirit” of Christ (Ephesians 5:18). Competing hungers – just like contrary loyalties – can’t work together (Matthew 6:24). So Luther warned: We “must be fervent in one of the two, either the spirit or the flesh…. So a lazy cook, about to prepare a meal, does his work in such a way that the food gets cold during serving. Who would not despise him, and rightly” so? (LW 25:456). Make sure then that you hunger after God. Indeed, “the hens that eat at home but lay their eggs elsewhere deserve to be killed” (LW 21:187). Divided loyalties are damnable! So don’t under-estimate the problem. Hunger after God rather than after worldly delights. Don’t set your mind on those concerns (Colossians 3:2). Take up thinking and speaking “in the way Scripture does” (LW 25:261). Then you’ll be hungering after God. To do so is to have God take you “on His lap.” And there is no better place to be, because if you aren’t there, then you’re going to “plunge into the depths of hell” (LW 3:139). But it’s a bumpy ride on God’s lap, and so many won’t last long. For indeed, “the word of God comes… to change and renew the world [and this] cannot take place without commotion and tumult” (LW 33:52). That’s why Luther said “my books are very stormy and... warlike. I have to dig out the roots and stumps, chop out the thorns and underbrush, and fill in the potholes. Thus I am the rough woodsman, who has to clear and straighten the path” (LW 59:250, Ronald F. Marshall, “Luther the Lumberjack,” Lutheran Quarterly, Spring 1996).

     When we abide in God’s word – making it our womb (LW 17:93) – we grow in our hunger for God (1 Peter 2:2). His word nurtures us. It’s our spiritual food. “No book on earth” can feed us but the Holy Scriptures (LW 78:8). As we grow in grace, we discover that we have to hunger for God because we are never perfectly accomplished (Philippians 3:12). We’re always longing for him. Indeed, the longing, this wanting “is righteousness, not just a large part but all the righteousness [we can have] in this life…. For this entire life is a time of willing to be righteous, but never achieving it, for this happens only in the future life” in heaven, after we die and are raised to be with Christ forever. And, what is more, this longing, wanting, and hungering, “compels us to grow weary of this life and to hope for the future life” (LW 25:268). Our hungering also teaches us how much we need Christ – for apart from him we can do nothing (John 15:5, LW 67:53, 68:96). We know that some menial things we can do on our own. But Christ has power “where the authority, power, and wisdom of men stop. He can save and help where no man, no creature on earth or in heaven can help – against sin, that we may not be damned by it; against death, that it may not devour us; against the devil, that he may not keep us captive” (LW 13:239, 56:59). For this we rejoice and are glad that we hunger after God. Finally our hungering teaches us that we must never be half-hearted (Matthew 22:37, LW 69:376). We have been baptized with “fire” (Matthew 3:11) after all, and so we must be ardent and fervent and burning hot in our longing and hungering for Christ. No wonder Christians desperately “cling” to him (LW 5:48, 24:42, 26:33, 28:163, 29:185, 43:201, 52:34, 56:117, 69:80, 75:367, 76:23, 77:281, 78:321).

     But how shall we get our fires burning brightly? “No sooner heard than done” – that can’t be true (LW 22:142). Why we can’t even own “a favorite skipping stone” (Austin Smith, Flyover County, 2018, p. 35). So we’ll certainly need help with this larger task. And it comes from Christ who himself is filled with fire (Luke 12:49). That fire compels him to “come storming in… to transform… men’s hearts” (LW 69:212). And that’s exactly what we need. For “man drifts,” indeed the most successful “have drifted into their successes” (Joseph Conrad, Victory, 1915, III.3). And when Christ comes to transform us, what is it again that he does? Luther says that this song is so good that it “bears repetition.” It’s the word of grace, “that God is merciful to us… for the sake of Christ our Lord, forgives us all our sins, and that He does not impute them to us or punish us with eternal death. [That is because of] the death of Christ. He alone has brought us grace and truth. He died and shed His blood for us in order that all who believe in Him and call on Him might attain forgiveness of sin…. The custom of holding a crucifix before a dying person has kept many in the Christian faith and has enabled them to die with a confident faith in the crucified Christ” (LW 22:139, 147). That’s our song of grace, and it brings light into our dark world (John 8:12, Luke 1:79). We desperately need this light because even the best that we do, “the most excellent thing,... is ungodly, wicked, and deserving the wrath of God” (LW 33:249, Isaiah 64:6).

     With these fires of Christ “rekindling” our faith (2 Timothy 1:6), how then shall we live in his favor and grace? We’ll want to share the comforting warmth from these fires with those who are despondent and in despair (2 Corinthians 1:4). And if we live in a land that comes from “escaped convicts, younger sons, persecuted minorities, and opportunists” (Louise Glück, American Originality, 2017, p. 3), then there are plenty standing in need of the comfort we have to bring. So first, we will want to affirm that we truly are “outwardly and temporarily… oppressed by many evils.” We feel like we have been “put to death, and inwardly crushed by the consciousness of our sins and vexed by demons.” We don’t want to deny any of this terror. It’s real. But we also want, all the same, to hold out the hope of being “alive in Christ, in whom and through whom we are kings and lords over sin, death, the flesh, the world, hell, and every evil… How? In faith. For our blessing has not yet been revealed. But meanwhile we await it in patience and yet already possess it certainly through faith.” By this faith – mixed in along with all of the terrors that torment us in this life – we hold on to Christ, who “redeemed us from our sins and from eternal death by His death on the cross,…. [as] our only Justifier and Savior” (LW 26:453). May this realistic faith that refuses to deny the traumas of life, nurture us as we live out our days on earth, never in full possession of God’s promised glory, but always still, nevertheless, hungering after him. Amen.

Hymn of the Day: “Lord, Keep Us Steadfast in Your Word” (LBW 230)

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “Ye Watchers and Ye Holy Ones” (LBW 175)

Sermon:  October 25, 2020

“Know You're Slaves”

(John 8:34)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.     

     Stuck in the mud. That’s what it’s like to sin. Do you believe that? Or do you think that tomorrow is a new day and that you can turn it all around by yourself? Jesus figured that you would say that, and so he emphatically opposes you. “Truly, truly, I say to you,” he pushes forth relentlessly, “every one who commits sin is a slave to sin” (John 8:34). Why does he say that? It’s because we’re in the wrong family. “You are of your father the devil,” he shockingly reveals, “and your will is to do your father’s desires” (John 8:44). And that equals sin. And that equals slavery. But that also sounds harebrained that the devil is our father! Well, maybe if you only have gruesome pictures in mind of bats and snakes and babies being sacrificed. But remember that the devil shows up as “an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14). And those who do his bidding are “lovers of self, lovers of money,… lovers of pleasure” (2 Timothy 3:2–4). That part of the list of infractions doesn’t sound so bad. Maybe then it’s pretty good to be in that wayward family. Either way, Martin Luther actually believed all of this outlandish talk about slavery to sin. “We sin and err constantly” he insisted (Luther’s Works 37:233). “An ungodly man sins against God whether he eats or drinks or whatever he does, because he perpetually misuses God’s creatures in his impiety and ingratitude, and never for a moment gives glory to God from his heart” (LW 33:264). No new day to turn everything around for him. Nope, just more of the same, day in and day out. We’re slaves to sin!

     And as slaves to sin, “your heart seethes with countless horrible passions and desires against God and other human beings” (LW 73:145). For the demons “wake, sleep, and live with us like an evil guest whom we have invited to our house and cannot get rid of” (LW 30:47). Can’t get rid of? That’s why we’re slaves to sin! We’ve been taken over by sin. Just think of it. “If ungodliness and worldly passions were painted on the wall of a house, then you could run out of the house;… if they grew in your hair, you could have it shaved off;… or if they were baked into bread, then you could eat roots instead. But now that they are stuck in your heart and utterly possess you, where will you run so that you will not take them with you? What can you put on where you do not remain under it?.... In short, what will you do so that you, as you are in yourself, are not there? Dear man, the great enticement is inside you” (LW 75:192).! Talk about being enslaved. No wonder that all that we do – whether we see it or not, whether believe it or not – “are works of the devil, works of sin, works of darkness, works of folly” (LW 31:65). No wonder, then, that “the whole world is guilty, all the children of men are turned aside and worthless, no one fears God, no one is not wicked, no one understands, no one seeks God” (LW 33:257, Romans 3:11). No wonder we “charge right in like a pig in the mud, inventing opinions with obstinacy and rashness” (LW 73:525). Indeed, “what a shameful den of murderers is lying in the human heart” (LW 67:180)!

     Can the Bible pull us out of this mud hole? Not if we peer into it from within the devil’s family where we’ve all grown up. That’s because the devil is a “corruptor and slanderer of God’s majesty, Word and works,” and so we see no more in the Bible “than a cow sees” (LW 57:155, 56:188). Talk about slavery! We’re nothing but cows. The Biblical message is one big blank to us. For even though “Scripture is clear,... our eyes are not” (LW 75:276). So, alas, there’s no help from God’s Word for us. Struggle though we may, we see no salvation there. But wait! There’s more. “Whoever realizes that sin is in him, which he must govern, this man will surely fear to become a servant of sin” (LW 25:301). And there is the breakthrough! It’s right at this point. For as long as we remain “smug,” there’s no hope for us (LW 1:159, 12:179, 358, 405, 24:15, 320, 25:268, 338, 478, 26:214, 310, 324, 347, 362, 418). We pass by the Word of the Lord “with a deaf ear” (LW 67:116). But, when fear grips us, then hope is ready to spring forth. And we find ourselves running to Jesus “the pioneer and perfecter of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2, LW 78:264). This is why God “allows the devil so much power against humanity: in order that unbelievers, the godless, and the hardened might be pierced through and might learn to fear and trust and call upon God” (LW 67:53). This is why “the aim of... preaching... is first to magnify sin” (LW 56:302). Then we “listen to God’s Word with fear and treat it with humility and not barge in with our own opinions” (LW 56:198). For only then do we come to see that Christ is the light of the world (John 8:12). He takes away the sins of the world (John 1:29). So we trust in him and cling to him. “Hold on to Christ [then] as the workman for our sins” (LW 73:199). For it is Christ who does “the true works... of God: blotting out sin, driving off death, extinguishing hell” (LW 57:176). May “the blood of Christ... surge in your heart” (LW 58:185). Become slaves in obedience to him and his righteousness (Romans 6:16).This is how “God creates the trust to come to Him” (LW 67:141). And why shouldn’t we, if he is the workman for our sins? Why not become his slave rather than being slaves to sin? He did for us what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. He was the workman for our sins. He came “for sin” and he condemned it (Romans 8:3). And when he condemned it, he did so by sacrificing himself for it to save us from having to do it for ourselves (Hebrews 9:26). He is the workman for our sins. “Workman” is the translation for the Latin word operarium. Jesus is our operarium. That also makes him our great substitute (LW 22:167 and 57:283, 58:45, 79:250). For because of the work that he does for us, as our operarium, he stands in for us; takes the hit for us; is punished in our place that we might be set free from the wrath of God (John 3:36). He is the workman for our sins!

     As believers in Christ you now have strength to do all things through him (Philippians 4:13). This divine workman transfers some work even to us mortals to do. That’s because “it is through us [that God] shows mercy to the poor [and] comforts the afflicted” (LW 33:243). Indeed, Luther is right that we are “the lord’s ladle” (LW 57:204). So, on this Reformation Sunday, work for the reformation of the church as the lord’s ladle, and for those afflicted in the church by the church. But do not put your trust in these works because when you become embroiled in conflict over reforming the church, you’ll see that they’re “all… nothing” (LW 4:54). But do them still, just as you now have reconfigured them. Do them, but don’t trust in them. Call the church to “hate what is evil, [and] hold fast to what is good; [to] love one another. [To] never flag in zeal, [to] be aglow with the Spirit, [and to] serve the Lord. Rejoice in... hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints, practice hospitality” (Romans 12:9–13). Call the church “to the continuous effort of recognizing, hating, killing, and burying sins” (LW 67:72). Call the church back to its one true mark of “following and obeying the divine Word” where these practices and admonitions are given (LW 68:244). This word with its practices and admonitions is crucial because where it’s absent – Luther is so bold to warn – “the devil shits into that church” (LW 68:246). So be steadfast in encouraging all Christians to take up with zeal the holy word with its admonitions and practices, that the church may be reformed in our day, by the power of the Lord (John 15:5), and that we, abiding in the righteousness of the Lord, may all become his diligent slaves. Amen.

Hymn of the Day: “Salvation Unto Us has Come” (LBW 297)

Prayers 

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn: “O God, O Lord of Heaven and Earth” (LBW 396)

Sermon:  October 18, 2020

“Fear the Lord”

(Matthew 21:41)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.     

     “He will put those wretches to a miserable death” (Matthew 21:41). Well, that’s not very pleasant – especially to have read on the Lord’s day. But it’s the way Jesus ends his Parable of the Vineyard – with a bang, and a nasty one at that (Matthew 21:33–41). He quickly goes on to make it clear that it’s about how God will punish the unbelieving and disobedient (Matthew 21:43). It’s about how “the wrath of God rests on” the wayward, smug, recalcitrant and sassy (John 3:36). It’s about God withholding his mercy due to our rebellion and his severe reaction to it (Romans 11:22). It’s about God hating his own heritage because they wouldn’t repent (Jeremiah 12:8). It’s about the fury of the Lord burning hot against the ungodly (Ezekiel 5:13). It’s about God wanting to kill sinners (Isaiah 13:9). It’s about God withering us down to our roots for not bearing any fruit (Mark 11:20). It’s about God tormenting the unbelieving and greedy in hell for all of eternity (Luke 16:23, 28). Can you believe it? Can you really believe in such a rambunctious and violent God?

     Martin Luther, for one, could (Luther’s Works 31:127, 79:341). He believed that God inflicted horrible punishments on evil people. He believed that “because there [are] hard and impenitent people in the churches, we must repeatedly and diligently drive home.... God’s wrath threatening the destruction of the whole world” (LW 73:100). But how about you? What do you think? “It is not uncommon for men of outstanding intellect to be habitually blind in a matter which is plain even to a dull and uninstructed mind, and to show how weak an argument drawn from human authority is in divine affairs, where divine authority alone has weight” (LW 33:150). So how about you? Are you too smart for this? Do you think that God’s love is inconsistent with such things (contra Revelation 3:19)? Do you think that his love always wins the day (contra Acts 12:23)? Do you think that God never threatens us with destruction (contra Luke 13:5)? Or are you really sophisticated and think that God is too majestic and sublime to be caught up in the give and take of earthly life (contra Job 1:21, Psalm 75:7, Luke 1:52, Revelation 3:7) – being unapproachable and that from which everything is generated instead (Acts 17:28, 1 Timothy 6:16)? (see G. Kaufman, “On the Meaning of Act of God,” chapter 6 in his God the Problem, 1972, and Matt McCormick, “The Paradox of Divine Agency,” chapter 26 in The Impossibility of God, ed. M. Martin & R. Monnier, 2003). Well, if you do, then you’re fooling yourself. And that’s because Luther was right – “that God is angry… is innate in the human heart. His wrath is [also] evident in the world…. in sickness, pestilence, fever, war, famine, and other distress and misery” (LW 22:375). And we know that this is so bad that “nothing can withstand His wrath” (LW 9:59). His angry pronouncements come in “frightful and big words” that cannot be altered because they’re born in “a voice of iron” (LW 28:264). Even so, it’s still the case that he doesn’t like doing any of it, but has to because he is “forced into it by the wickedness of man” (LW 2:134). So no happenstance here. No chance occurrences either. And – if the truth be known – God’s wrath makes it “impossible for man to be happy. He is in constant fear that God is standing behind him, cudgel in hand, ready to strike him down” (LW 22:375). But don’t be fooled – “the longer God puts up with idolatry and other sins, and the longer He pays no attention to them, the more intolerable will His wrath reveal itself to be later on” (LW 2:223). So don’t think you have gotten away with murder just because God’s punishing blows haven’t struck you yet.

     Does that box us in? Do we have nowhere to turn? Not if what we’ve heard so far frightens us “in earnest because of our sins.” To do so would be to take the Bible “seriously,” by reading it “against ourselves,” as we should (Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works 11:378). And we’re also not boxed in if we admit that we cannot “endure that wrath or… remain standing in the face of it [if we don’t] respect or recognize it.” For if we do, then we’ll be ready to embrace that this “wrath could be averted in no other way and reconciliation could be acquired through no payment other than through... the death and blood of the Son of God.” And this is true even if we’ve been “the cause of this wrath of God, so that God’s Son had to be sacrificed on the cross and had to shed His blood” because of our sinfulness and wretchedness (LW 77:19). Because God has done so much to rescue us from his wrath, it would be a very bad move to side with the wicked and try with them “to invent a new god and in this way to escape God’s wrath and so to attempt to avert something which we, because of sin, have justly deserved.” It would be foolish beyond measure to “attempt to find a way to mitigate an inescapable evil” (LW 13:96). For it’s only by Jesus dying on the cross that “God is reconciled… so that he may avert from us the wrath of God which we by our sins have deserved” (LW 36:177). So God is glorified “if you fear Him and grasp Christ as the object of mercy. This is true theology about the true God and the true worship of God. It is false theology that God is wrathful to those who acknowledge their sins. Such a God is not in heaven or anywhere else, but is the idol of a perverse heart” (LW 12:322). That’s because “Christ is always intent on leading us into the Father’s heart. If we but love Him, we should have no worry or fear. Then we cast and tear all thoughts of wrath and terror far out of our hearts…. [For Christ] Himself vouches for the Father’s love. If we believe in Him and are in His love, there is no longer any anger in heaven or on earth; there is nothing but fatherly love and all goodness. God, together with all the angels, smiles on [us] and keeps watch over us as His dear children” (LW 24:157).

     This love through faith in Christ empowers us to “do all things” through him (Philippians 4:13). Let us then use that strength to forgive those who have wronged us. This good work is embedded in the Lord’s Prayer, with the warning that if we don’t forgive others, then “neither will our Father forgive our trespasses” (Matthew 6:15). So if “your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him; and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, and says, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him” (Luke 17:3). We need this admonition and warning because while Christ frees us from the wrath of God and from the fear of damnation, the fear of the Lord still helps us do good works like forgiving those who have hurt us and are sorry for it. That’s why it is essential that Christians go about their tasks – if you can believe it – “in full awareness of God’s wrath” (LW 13:130). May this realization ever be with us as we live out our Christian lives in the very fear of the Lord. Amen.

Hymn of the Day: “Lord Christ, When First You Came to Earth” (LBW 421)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Vh9-V3NTl0

Prayers