Sermon:  August 30, 2020

“Have Great Faith”

(Matthew 15:28)

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

     Faith in Jesus gets us into heaven after we die (John 14:1). But how much of it do we need for it to work? Matthew 17:20 says it only takes a small amount – nothing more than a tiny mustard seed. This is very reassuring since we aren’t able to muster much more than that – being only wretched bodies of death ourselves (Romans 7:24). Furthermore our trust in Christ hinges on him choosing us before we choose him (Philippians 3:13, John 15:16). If that weren’t so, no one could believe in Jesus – since we can’t do anything without him (John 15:5). We’re just the clay that God makes into whatever he wants (Romans 9:20). Martin Luther drives home this point on our dependence. “Learn to know God, leave everything to Him, and see that you cling to the Head,” he thunders. “In short, nothing that is in us or can be done by us makes us Christians” (Luther’s Works 56:117, 77:189). No wonder that belief is a gift (Ephesians 2:8).

     But faith isn’t inert. It can be enhanced – it’s pliable. That’s why the disciples go to Jesus and say – “Increase our faith” (Luke 17:5). But why ask for more of it, if a little of it will do? The reason is that Jesus wants us to love him with “all of our heart, soul and mind” (Matthew 22:37–38). Now that’s a boat load – nothing like a little mustard seed at all! No wonder Jesus lifts up the woman who believed in him under duress, exclaiming – “O woman, great is your faith!” (Matthew 15:28). And that accolade comes all the way down to us, thousands of years later, saying – “May your faith be great too!” Jesus wants us to grow up and become mature (1 Peter 2:2, Colossians 1:28). But how do we increase our faith? The answer is unexpected and surprising. It takes hardship for your faith to grow. We, however, think that duress destroys faith. But not so. It rather provides the needed fertilizer to get faith growing (LW 6:162). Indeed, Christians “always thrive best when men are most determined to persecute and suppress them” (LW 45:347). This was the case of the humiliated woman of great faith in Matthew 15. Jesus called her a dog and she settled for eating scraps from under the table. How humiliating! But it didn’t crush her, nor lead her into the bitterness of despair. Instead, beating her down actually lifted her up (Edna Hong, The Downward Ascent, 1979, Marlena Graves, The Way Up is Down: Becoming Yourself by Forgetting Yourself, 2020). How could that be? Luther knew. He argued that “no one is so dangerous to me as I am to myself” (LW 57:196). Indeed, “we have no greater enemy than ourself” (LW 42:48, 27:364). So dying to ourselves doesn’t hurt us (Galatians 1:20). Being beaten down by the traumas of life isn’t bad for us. Forgoing pleasure doesn’t deplete us. Nothing else will “soften [us] up” (LW 35:18). Our “fallow ground” needs to be broken up before faith can grow (Jeremiah 4:3, Hosea 10:12). Strange as it sounds, this is the Biblical message and it works. Saint Paul benefited from being “abased” (Philippians 4:12) – and so should we.

     Faith, then, is more than trusting in Jesus – it also includes fighting against ourselves and whatever is contrary to God. It includes fighting the good fight of faith (1 Timothy 6:12). Because faith is at stake, this “struggle is much worse than death, prison, or any disease or persecution” (LW 28:373). Therefore we need help. And so, in our battle “Christ must also do battle and make war” (LW 59:267). He fights against the devil to destroy his works (1 John 3:8). He fights to make faith possible and bring us salvation. And so he “puts away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Hebrews 9:26). And he also puts away the “wages of sin,” or its consequences, which is death (Romans 6:23). Sin falls and then death with it – in a chain reaction (LW 76:443). The freedom that comes from this breaking up of sin and death enables us to fight the good fight of faith. No longer are we tricked into approving things “that manifestly conflict with the divine Scriptures” (LW 60:62). Now we can “steadfastly endure in hardship so that we may be stirred up to resist the devil [for the] defense of the Church” (LW 73:381). In all of this we give thanks to God for his mercy and strength to hang in there.

Hymn of the Day:   “O Christ, the Healer, We Have Come” (LBW 360)

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:    “How Firm a Foundation” (LBW 507)

Sermon:  August 23, 2020

“Praise God's Word”

(1 Kings 19:12)

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

     We like this still small voice of God in 1 Kings 19:12 – but for all the wrong reasons. Martin Luther knew about this. He thought it was because we are “nothing but bags of worms or bags of manure, infested with lice, maggots, stinking and foul” (Luther’s Works 22:133). We are like this because we think that if we hold on to this verse tightly enough we can drown out Exodus 20:18–19 about God thundering from Mount Sinai and scaring the wits out of us with his law and wrath. But what Luther called God’s “cataracts” (LW 10:156), cannot be so easily silenced. That’s because God wants the “unpleasant and… deadly voice” of his law to “screech dolefully” in our ears, in order to condemn us and to drive us to Christ (LW 2:160–63, 16:232). These thunderbolts are needed for the “foolish and stiff-necked” (LW 29:143) – even though we may already have joined the minions of those who are looking for and longing for a better Bible that is “lighter on the condemnation and heavier on the delights of this earth” (Timothy Egan, A Pilgrimage to Eternity: From Canterbury to Rome in Search of a Faith, 2019, p. 89). Indeed, nothing else than God’s cataracts will get through to us foolish creatures. Even though we hanker after something nicer, we’ll never be helped by “a God without wrath [bringing] men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross” (H. Richard Niebuhr, The Kingdom of God in America, 1937, 1988, p. 193). No! We need far rougher treatment than that. Therefore, “it is always God’s wonderful practice to make all things out of nothing” – and so he must first “reduce all things to nothing” (LW 7:105). For “whoever considers himself hale and hearty is not interested in a physician” (LW 22:458) – let alone in God’s healing hand (Romans 3:11).

     God’s voice, then, cannot just be a still small voice (1 Kings 19:12). That reductionism would leave sinners high and dry – without any hope of being turned around (Acts 14:15). For that to happen, a “savage purging” is needed, “not to destroy us,” but “to improve us” (LW 7:231). We need to be hit hard by God’s condemning law. We cannot forget that “the violence of the fire, the storm, and the earthquake had to come first, before the Lord Himself followed in the still small voice” (LW 26:311). This is why God’s word must break us into pieces and cut us up (Jeremiah 23:29, Hebrews 4:12) before it blesses us (Luke 11:28). Only this will draw us away from the earthly (Colossians 3:2) – which is what blinds us from seeing the ways of the Lord (2 Corinthians 4:4). This is what it takes to move us away from the mantra – “take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry” (Luke 12:19). This is what gets us to “share in the sufferings of Christ” (1Peter 4:13). This is what pulls us away from loving the world (1 John 2:15–17, James 4:4). This is how we come to deny ourselves daily (Luke 9:23). This is what gets us to “eagerly await” judgment and Christ’s return (Hebrews 9:27–28). And this is what establishes the church in “the genuine, legitimate, Christian sense and spirit of the Word of God,” and where this word is “present in its purity and is active, the church is there” – making it “like an immovable column” (LW 28:302).

     These blessings directly come from Christ’s crucifixion. Indeed, “our Lord Jesus Christ is the one and only Victim with which satisfaction has been made to the wrath of God” (LW 7:227). Without his sacrifice on the cross that wrath would only bear down on us (John 3:36) – and this is not some “trifling wrath of God” either (LW 77:19). It’s horrible! It’s torture (Revelation 9:5). Therefore declaration of this sacrifice for us – while we were yet sinners (Romans 5:8) – only comes “gently to those who are terrified and humbled.” Indeed, “we should not preach Christ with fury or with a tempest of words” (LW 29:143). Now we’re ready for that still small voice (1 Kings 19:12). “A dimly burning wick he will not quench” (Isaiah 42:3). If it were to come any earlier, it would be wasted on us rank sinners – manure and all (LW 22:133). Here we have at last the fragrant aroma of Christ (2 Corinthians 3:15). Here we have at last the precious Christ who doesn’t trip us up (1 Peter 2:7–8). This is the message of salvation which the church has for the world. Let us then confess with Luther – “I want to be and remain in the church and the little flock of the fainthearted, the feeble, the ailing, who feel and recognize the wretchedness of their sins, who sigh and cry to God incessantly for comfort and help, who believe in the forgiveness of sin, and who suffer persecution for the sake of the Word, which they confess and teach purely and without adulteration” (LW 22:55).

Hymn of the Day:   “Thy Strong Word” (LBW 233)

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:    “Jesus, Priceless Treasure” (LBW 457)

Sermon:  August 16, 2020

“Bless Saint Mary”

(Luke 1:48)

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

     God’s Word calls all of us to bless Saint Mary, the Mother of our Lord, Jesus Christ (Luke 1:48). So we are to praise her and give thanks to God for her – we are to bless her again and again, in very generation. On this Saint Mary Festival, we will then do just that, in obedience to the Holy Scriptures, as we have been struggling to do in our church, every year, for the last forty years. Those many celebrations have even included on occasion Martin Luther’s 1535 hymn on Saint Mary, “To Me She’s Dear, the Worthy Maid” (Luther's Works 53:292–94).

     But not everybody is happy about that – regardless of what Luke 1:48 and Martin Luther say, that this is what we are to do! No, they feel that praising Saint Mary in any manner whatsoever will only take glory away from the Holy Trinity – and so this August feast day should have its plug pulled. But that antipathy may come from a deeper place than wanting to reserve glory for God alone. It may instead have to do with how God favored her (Luke 1:28). Primarily that comes, of course, through being the mother of God. But notice the joining, ensuing damage attached right away to that motherhood. Quickly we see that Mary’s young life was anything but a rose garden – regardless of how she is depicted in western art. No, right out of the chute Joseph wants to divorce her because of her surprise pregnancy – miracle or not (Matthew 1:19). And then that prophesy about having a sword pierce her heart (Luke 2:35). So, close on the heels of divine favor there is shame and pain. Who would want to celebrate that? Keep your Saint Mary festival to yourself. No thanks; I’ll skip it.

     But Christianity has a way of turning things upside down (Acts 17:6) – and making liabilities look like assets. “When I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10). Who would ever have thought that! And so with Saint Mary. In her Martin Luther saw “the Christian Church, the spiritual Virgin Mary” – and not as some victorious champion, but as the one with a pierced heart. And in that defaming he saw the gospel “tortured… through her,” in her pierced heart (LW 52:119). “When I am weak, then I am strong” – the church is singing with the Virgin Mary. But should we really do that? Shouldn’t we instead let shame and pain remain awful, as they truly are? Not for Luther. He argued rigorously and dramatically that the church thrives best when its enemies “persecute and suppress” it (LW 45:347). And he added that “if there is no opposition [in the church], Christ is not there either” (LW 52:119). In order for us to grow in grace we need to be opposed by adversaries who wish we were dead and gone.

     Why is this trauma so good for the church? Luther believed it was because “Christianity lives only by fleeing and deserting temporal cities, places, goods, honor, body, and everything earthly, and goes through them to eternal life just as it goes through sin, suffering, and death.” So it would be a disaster “to build the church half upon temporal things, to mix the physical and the spiritual, and to unite sin and grace” (LW 39:219). The church needs to be weaned of the temporal – and suffering helps it do that. That’s because we don’t leave the temporal easily. That’s why it takes suffering to pull us away from it. We have to die to the world before we can live with God. “Therefore, it is impossible for someone who does not first hear the law and let himself be killed by the letter [2 Corinthians 3:6], to hear the gospel and let the grace of the Spirit bring him to life” (LW 39:185). So “one thing brings the next” – “if you now turn back to Me, I will turn back to you too” (LW 20:161). Living is linked to dying as is thriving to suffering.

     But what if working out one’s salvation in suffering and shame, and in fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12), is too much for us? What then? First, we can’t “use or understand Scripture as referring to a man’s being able to do a thing when it speaks only of his being required to do it.” And that’s because, secondly, “being able to do a thing and being required to do it,…. are far apart” (LW 20:162). They’re so far apart that we need rescuing – because we’re “at war” and defeated by that war (Romans 7:24, 23). Sin has worn us out. This drives us to Christ – where we find “the highest article of our faith,” namely, “the forgiveness of sins through Christ” (LW 12:27). Not to Mary, but to Christ, for Mary “was not crucified... for us” (LW 69:262, 22:146). And how, again, does Christ’s crucifixion help us? Well, God “sent His only-begotten Son into the world to make peace with [Him] for our sins by His death, and through His blood to cleanse and save us without our merit” (LW 78:300). Amazing, isn’t it? That’s why for anyone to believe in this, it must be because God has implanted it in us as a pure gift for us (Ephesians 2:8, James 1:21). This is how law and gospel work together for our salvation. First, we must have “the voice of the law that men may be made to fear and come to a knowledge of their sin and so be converted to repentance and a better life. But we must not stop with that, for that would only amount to wounding and not binding up, smiting and not healing, killing and not making alive, leading down into hell and not bringing back again, humbling and not exalting. Therefore we must also preach the word of grace and the promise of forgiveness by which faith is taught and aroused” (LW 31:364). Glory be to God for the whole counsel of God – both law and gospel (Acts 20:27)! Without “such faith no heart is good but is by nature stuffed full of evil speech and blasphemy against God and all his saints” LW 43:40).

     But there’s more, if you can believe it. We must also walk in the spirit, taking care of our families and neighbors (Galatians 5:25). We must also do good works (James 2:26). But be sure that you have the “right balance.” “Don’t be lazy or idle, but don’t rely solely on your own work and doings. Get busy and work, and yet expect everything from God alone” (LW 14:115). On this feast of Saint Mary, we should underscore our association with the lowly, since she was of low estate herself (Romans 12:16, Luke 1:48). And that makes her the mother of the church – mater ecclesiam (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1999, §963). Luther thought this would please her more than anything, “to have you turn in fear from all lofty things on which men set their hearts, seeing that even in [Christ’s] mother God neither found nor desired anything of high degree. [Rather] the exceeding riches of God joined in her with her utter poverty, the divine honor with her low estate, the divine glory with her shame, the divine greatness with her smallness, the divine goodness with her lack of merit, the divine grace with her unworthiness” (LW 21:323). May we also pursue these same half dozen couplings in our lives, and so, now, and in every generation, bless Saint Mary. Amen.  

Hymn of the Day:   “My Soul Now Magnifies the Lord” (LBW 180)

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:    “For All Your Saints, O Lord” (LBW 176)

Sermon:  August 9, 2020

“Seek Wisdom & Justice”

(1 Kings 3:11)

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

     Who in their right mind would do that? Who would not instead ask for money; take it; and run? All of us, indeed, would rather have the cash. No doubt about it. But not Solomon of old. He could have asked for wealth, but he didn’t. He instead asked for the wisdom to tell the difference between good and evil (1 King 3:11). But didn’t he already know that? Wasn’t his request, then, a waste – a lost opportunity for great fortune? Surely he knew that killing people walking down the sidewalk in front of your house is wrong, and that providing emergency medical care for the injured is right. So what did he need to find out that he didn’t already know?

     Solomon was worried about weightier moral issues – like how to “distinguish between spirits” (1 Corinthians 12:10). They have to do with broad social trends like greed and licentiousness (Mark 7:22, 1 Thessalonians 2:5). And we are to be on top of them. “Test the spirits to see whether they are of God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). Take being fair, for instance. Do you know how to do that? God loves justice, and so should we (Isaiah 61:8, Philippians 4:8). But that doesn’t tell us how to be just and fair. Does it mean coming up with a plan for a society free of all prejudice (John Rawls, A Theory of Justice, 1971)? Or does it have to do more with finding practical ways to remove injustices wherever you find them (Amartya Sen, The Idea of Justice, 2009)? But how would you even know? Have you been fair when you have given everyone a chance to achieve? Or do you also have to assure some measure of success in addition to their efforts? Does that have to be added? And how much has to be added? And how do you know when all the prejudices have been identified and removed from the good society? Or is the only way to be fair if everyone is equal in every way? These questions are hot ones. Ouch!

     In the face of this confusion Jesus tell us to treat others the way we would like to be treated (Matthew 7:12). That’s called the Golden Rule. This is the right judgment we are to practice (John 7:24). If we don’t follow this law we will end up calling “evil good and good evil” (Isaiah 5:20). Martin Luther knew that this mixing-up is what gives us a “corrupt heart and… blurred vision.” When that happens, what “Christ and his adherents do must necessarily be wrong, but what the devil and his followers” do must be just fine (Luther’s Works 23:240, 242). But can we straighten this out? We long for a world “that’s more user-friendly” (Woody Allen, Apropos of Nothing: Autobiography, 2020, p. 313). But we suffer from severe limitations. Nothing at all is sound in us (Isaiah 1:6). Indeed, a “deluded person views nothing properly with his distorted thoughts, even when faced with words of truth; for his heart is embittered and inflamed by hatred” (LW 23:240). Why can’t those words of truth from God himself move us in the right direction? The answer is breathtaking, to say the least. Those words don’t turn us around, because we think we can “correct” them, supposing that we are “smarter than our Lord God” (LW 23:208). “What God has done is too poor and insignificant, even childish and foolish…. This is the nature of the shameful wisdom of the world, especially in the Christian church” (LW 51:384). Too bad that we haven't taken to heart the wish from that old pop song to “find a good book to live in” (Melanie Safka, “What Have They Done to My Song Ma?” 1970). Luther knew that good book was the Bible that we should learn to live in by thinking the way it does (LW 25:261).

       Now to get going in that direction, a shock is needed. This shouldn’t surprise us because this is exactly what it took to turn the Apostle Paul around (Acts 9:3–4). And our shock is Matthew 20:15 – “Do you begrudge my generosity?” Here Jesus does what is unfair – not paying everyone the same for the same amount of work – and he calls it being generous. Now there’s a shock for you! We also see it in the Parable of the Prodigal Son when the father celebrates the wayward son’s return, but not the older, faithful son’s kindness and help, steadfastness and industry (Luke 15:25–32). This lavishing of grace by God upon the undeserving (Ephesians 1:8) is a game-changer, as they say. Now something matters more than being fair – if you can believe it. Now sinners don’t receive their just desserts. Instead, they’re treated like righteous saints when they aren’t. That’s because they’re made to look better than they are. Robes of righteousness cover them (Isaiah 61:10). And we’re washed sparkling clean “in the blood of the Lamb” (Revelation 7:14). And that blood is the key to it all. Jesus is punished and dies as we should have when he fulfills the “just requirement” of the law (Romans 8:4). On the cross he cancels this legal bond which stood against us by suffering under it himself (Colossians 2:14). So Jesus dies for undeserving sinners (Romans 5:8). And that shock from the cross is what draws us to him (John 12:32). Then the righteousness of God is ours, and we belong to Christ (1 Corinthians 1:30, Philippians 3:12). May we then trust in him big time – with all of our heart, mind, and soul, knowing that, before we get there, even a little confidence will do (Matthew 22:37, 17:20)

     Oh, and there is one more shock – just so you can match your faith with your works (James 2:26). You who have been lavished upon by God’s grace and received far more than you deserve (James 2:13), God calls you also now to do the same for others. So surpass justice, just as God has done in your salvation. Go ahead and “count others better than yourselves” (Philippians 2:3) – regardless if it makes any sense to you or not. And remember that those “who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please” themselves (1 Corinthians 15:1–2). May God continue to bless us so that we can abide in this godly wisdom and justice. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:   “O Word of God Incarnate” (LBW 231)

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:    “God of Grace and God of Glory” (LBW 415)

Sermon:  August 2, 2020

“Love the Rock”

(Isaiah 44:8)

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

     What will happen to us? What will happen to the compassion we depend on coming from our good shepherd, Christ Jesus, our Lord and our God (Matthew 9:36, John 20:28)? What will happen when Jesus runs up against Isaiah 44:8 that God is a rock? How can a rock love us, show compassion and be kind to us? How can a rock be incarnate in Christ Jesus? A rock is so cold and solid. The big ones are heavy and immovable. How can such a Rock of Gibraltar care for us, bolster us, and save us? What will happen to us if God is our rock, and if Jesus is a boulder?

     The Bible sees no problem here. God is a rock (Isaiah 44:8) and God is love (1 John 4:16). They’re in the same holy book; they go together; they belong together. But critics say that’s impossible. Rocks and love clash and are incompatible – and so a loving rock of a God, makes no sense at all. Thinking that God is our rock is a delusion. That’s because in order to love someone, there has to be give and take. The lover adjusts to the needs of the beloved if there is to be any love between them. But rocks can’t do that. They’re immutable because they’re immovable – and that makes them unloving. Very smart people have been arguing for a long time that the church and its Bible are wrong about this. Trying to push a loving but immutable God is a “gigantic hoax of priest craft” (Charles Hartshorne, The Divine Relativity, Yale, 1948, p. 26). For the careful reader, the Bible even seems to be aware of this hoax, allowing for change in God “in ways entirely appropriate to the change” we experience in our lives (Charles Hartshorne, Omnipotence and Other Theological Mistakes, SUNY 1984, p. 43). God, then, must be changeable if there is going to be any love coming to us from him.

     But all of this theological uproar hasn’t changed the Bible a bit. It still says that God can’t change because he won’t change (Malachi 3:6). Martin Luther says that’s because our unworthiness cannot “hold back” his love for us, since his love for us was given “freely” to us in the first place, not being based on “any merits of any men,” since we’re all sinners and without any merit any way (Luther’s Works 18:413). Even though God does “different works” with various people, he remains “the same Lord” through it all, working “in the same spirit” (LW 17:37). The same goes for his holy Word which is “eternal” and applies “to all men of all times [remaining] the same through all the ages” – even though “in the course of time customs, people, places, and usages may vary” (LW 14:290). So God doesn’t erode like nature (Psalm 102:27). He’s changeless. And God isn’t fickle like people (Numbers 23:19). He’s faithful (1 Corinthians 10:13). What he brings is perfect – not being subject to any “variation or shadow due to change” (James 1:27). “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is [his] faithfulness” (Lamentations 3:22). “I am who I am” (Exodus 3:14), he says, and you can’t change that. No wonder his only son is the same every day and for all times (Hebrews 13:8). According to the Bible, if God weren’t changeless his love would be flimsy and worthless. But because he is changeless, his love is “firm, certain, unchangeable, and eternal” (LW 57:181). And that’s because his love for us is not based on our love for him. Luther, again, sees this very clearly. God “loves us,” he writes, “because of His love” for us; we are not loved by God “because [we] are attractive [to him]” (LW 30:301, 31:57). He doesn’t have to like us to love us. And that non-reciprocal love we can count on and admire – “we love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). While we were sinners he died for us (Romans 5:8). About this rejection of reciprocity, Luther states the obvious – “God is not changed just because you are changed” (LW 25:432). And so we want to imitate his love because it’s better due to being irreversible – “God does not change… as man does (1 Samuel 15:29)” (LW 17:258). Unlike us, “God refuses to change His ways…. It is God’s nature to help… by grace alone, without any merit or any works” coming from us (LW 56:207, 210). If God were changeable we couldn’t count on that.

     But while there is faithfulness in that rock, it doesn’t automatically win us over. For God’s faithfulness can also frighten us. Standing before that mighty rock of God, we tremble. Remember the opening lines from our opening hymn – “Know that the Lord is God alone, he can create, and he destroy” (Lutheran Book of Worship, 531). Søren Kierkegaard (1813–1855) – that “Danish Luther” (R. F. Marshall, Kierkegaard in the Pulpit, 2016, p. 286) – knew about this. His last published discourse was on it – “The Changelessness of God.” And so he writes that “there is sheer fear and trembling in… the changelessness of God. It is almost as if it were far, far beyond human powers to have to be involved with a changelessness such as that; indeed, it seems as if this thought must plunge a person into anxiety and unrest to the point of despair” (Kierkegaard’s Writings, 23:278). How can we stand it, after all, to hear God say that it is not for our sake that he helps us, but “for the sake of [his] holy name” (Ezekiel 36:22)? That troubles us. If his care for us isn’t inextricably bound up with our deserving it, then won’t his love for us soon peter out?

     And so despair would surely not be far away – if it were nor for the “steadfastness” of Christ (2 Thessalonians 3:5). His changelessness is different. It surprisingly draws us to him (John 12:32) – for by that changelessness and steadfastness he was obedient unto death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:8). And his changelessness doesn’t repel us – for it is a “perfect love” that casts out fear (1 John 4:18). It is a love that suffers for us and with us (Romans 8:3, Matthew 11:28–30). It is a love that “always takes sincere interest in our needs” (LW 78:261). And it can always do that because it’s changeless. And it is just such reliability that can restore us. Indeed because of it, “we die to sin through Christ, who was made a sacrifice for sin and therefore killed sin so that it is no longer able to rule in us” (LW 73:294). Now that’s glorious! Let us then “crowd [his] gates with thankful songs” (LBW 531). And may we also listen to Jesus (Matthew 17:5), if we can but focus on him with a “constant gaze” (LW 26:356). “See to it,” Luther imagines him saying, “that you tread on Me, that is, cling to Me with strong faith and with all confidence of the heart. I will be the Bridge to carry you across. In one moment you will come out of death and the fear of hell into yonder life. For it is I who paved the way and the course. I walked and traversed it Myself, so that I might take you and all My followers across. All that is necessary is that you unhesitatingly set your foot on Me, wager boldly on Me, go cheerfully and happily, and die in My name” (LW 24:42). Indeed, by the poverty of Christ, we become rich – for he takes us with him, that where he is, we may also be (2 Corinthians 8:9; John 14:3).

Hymn of the Day:   “O Holy Spirit, Enter In” (LBW 459) 

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:     “On What Has Now Been Sown” (LBW 261)

Sermon:  July 26, 2020

“Trust the Bible”

(Isaiah 55:11)

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

     Martin Luther trusted in the Bible – even though he knew that there were many reasons not to. Unfortunately, we too know about them, these many years later. For we see what Luther saw – “that in appearance God’s Word and work are very insignificant and despicable because they are not produced and portrayed with great pomp and majesty [and so they fail to] make the eyes stare and the mouth gape” (Luther’s Works 57:143). If the Bible physically vibrated with saving power and literally glowed with an intense, eerie light, we’d pay attention to it, for it wouldn’t any longer look just like an ordinary book. Then we’d diligently prepare for and attend Bible studies, and have the Good Book “regulate” [debent] our lives (LW 17:144). We would want everyone to join in with us poring over this stunning book. But the Bible doesn’t come across that way. And God allows this “for the precise purpose of making a fool out of the world’s wisdom. Since it tries to split hairs and find fault with God’s words and works, not allowing any of them to be right or good, He chooses to give it plenty of them and, despite everything, by such insignificant, despised words to accomplish things in His Christians which it can never understand or achieve”(LW 57:144). 

     Isaiah 55:11 rightly then says that God’s word does not return empty but accomplishes what it sets out to do – regardless of how it comes across and the way it looks. If you fall asleep during a performance of the famous speech, “All the world’s a stage,” in Shakespeare’s As You Like It (1600), then it returns to the Bard of Avon empty. But the Bible isn’t like that. It is reliable and we can trust in what it says and promises us. So when Exodus 3:20 said, for instance, that God will stretch out his hand and smite Egypt, and after that Pharaoh will let Israel escape from slavery into freedom – it happened (Exodus 15:13–16). And when Jesus said in John 11:25 that even though we die we shall live again – it happens because 2 Corinthians 4:14 says that the one who raised Jesus from the dead will also raise his followers from the dead. But when Jeremiah 1:18–19 says that God will turn Jeremiah into a fortified city with bronze walls and no one shall prevail against him – that promise looks broken when Jeremiah is beaten and thrown into a deep hole and left for dead (Jeremiah 20:2, 38:6). Jeremiah certainly believes that the promise was broken (Jeremiah 20:7). But was he right? Well, even though he was beaten, he was not killed. And even though he was thrown into that deep, dark pit – Ebedmelech, the Ethiopian, rescued him (Jeremiah 38:13). So God’s promise to Jeremiah hinges on what the line means that “no one shall prevail against him.” If it means that no one will lay a finger on him, then God’s promise was broken. But if it means instead that when the storms beat against his house, it will not fall (Matthew 17:25) – then the promise was kept.

     And likewise are all of God’s Words kept. For God does whatever he pleases (Psalm 115:3) – and no one can resist him (Romans 9:19). That’s because even though God “will not do what you want, [he] will do what [he wants], even when you are hostile and resisting” (LW 17:258). We can’t even prevent God from saving us by refusing to believe in him. Paul tried that and he failed miserably (Acts 9:20). For if our will “prevents [us from being saved], it must be mightier that God’s will…. [Therefore God] dares to stir up the whole world so that it sets itself against His will, so that they may see that His will must be done. How, then, does it make sense to say that I prevent and hinder my being saved if it is God’s will?” (LW 56:122–23). This is true because our faith in Christ is not based on our believing in him, strange though that may sound – but rather on the fact that he has chosen us (John 15:16). This drives us crazy that God would take into his favor those who don’t want him (Isaiah 65:1). We would rather reverse John 15:16, making it say instead: “‘I do not want to be chosen by God, but I want to anticipate Him and choose Him.’ But God can and will never tolerate this; He reverses [back] the order and declares: ‘You cannot and shall not choose Me, but I must choose you. Things will not go as you plan, but as I will. I will be your Lord and Master; I refuse to be taught by you’” (LW 24:260).

     This slap in the face enrages us all the more. We insist if that’s how it’s going to be, then there will never be any faith in us if it must be imposed on us from outside our range of preferences. God may force me in a direction that I do not want to go, but he’ll never make me rejoice in it. But we think that because of a wooden view of conversion that God doesn’t even care about, let alone use. Even though God takes us to himself, it still costs us “much travail” before we actually become his children. Before this selection in fact takes place, we surely have “to be humbled and to become rascals” (LW 30:133–34). This is all part of the potter molding the clay (Jeremiah 18:2–6, Romans 9:21). Faith is more turbulent than a mere change of mind. It’s a fight (1 Timothy 6:12). It’s like hanging between “heaven and earth.” It’s like being “suspended in the air and crucified,” Luther thought (LW 29:185). “To believe in Christ is to reach out to Him with one’s whole heart and to order all things in accord with Him.” And to believe in Christ is to gladly take up “every word” of his. “Because if you fail to believe even one word, you no longer are living in the Word of God. For the whole Christ is in every word and wholly in each individual word” (LW 25:238). That takes divine molding. That takes a fight against the flesh (Galatians 5:17). This “arduous battle” is imposed on us when God chooses us (LW 28:73). That’s because faith remakes us – giving us a new, second spiritual birth (John 3:3). Now we are fixing our minds on heaven and not on earth (Colossians 3:2) – giving up on the transient for the eternal (2 Corinthians 4:18). 

     But it’s worth it because Christ is of surpassing worth (Philippians 3:8) – that pearl of great price (Matthew 13:46). What makes Jesus Christ so expensive is that he was obedient unto death, even death on a cross, and by that sacrifice to God, saves us from being punished for our sins (Philippians 2:8, Hebrews 9:14, 26, 1 Peter 2:24). That’s why we’re told that Jesus died “for sin” (Romans 8:3). Luther believed this and argued that Christ took “our sins upon Himself” when he died on the cross. That transfer frees us from any eternal punishment in hell for our sins. So if we give up the faith, “we are done for” (LW 56:87). Off to hell we go when we die, never to bask in the glories grace again (2 Thessalonians 1:9).

Hymn of the Day:   “Almighty God Your Word Is Cast” (LBW 234) 

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:     “On What Has Now Been Sown” (LBW 261)

Sermon:  July 19, 2020

“Don't Be a Smarty Pants”

(Matthew 11:25)

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

     Believing in Jesus isn’t a philosophy. It’s not about arguments for the truth of what he said and did. It’s not about a theory explaining the world as he envisioned it. That’s why he said it wasn’t for the wise and intelligent (Matthew 11:25). Amazing, isn’t it? You would think he would’ve wanted as many smart people on his side as possible to defend what he was advocating so that it would have a better chance of catching on with more and more people in as many places as possible all over the world. But he didn’t. Later the educated and brilliant came. Later he was supported by all kinds of rational conversations, speeches and books. But Jesus never asked for any of this. Maybe that’s why his follower, Soren Kierkegaard (1813–1855), insisted that Jesus “needs no defense, is not served by any defense – [he] is the attacker” (Christian Discourses, 1848, Kierkegaard’s Writings 17:162). Be that as it may, Jesus knew adults would balk at what he had to say, so he gathered children around him instead who would go along with him without bickering or questioning him. In fact he insisted that his kingdom was actually for children (Matthew 19:14). Only kids, he said, could get in (Matthew 18:3).

     The spirit of Jesus has been reiterating this ever since he first sprang it on the world. That’s because so many of his followers want their faith in him to be intellectually respectable. They don’t want to be thought of as fools – regardless of the ancient, Biblical moniker that Christians are fools for Christ (1 Corinthians 4:10). They want to be thought of as smart – even though their faith isn’t based on reliable observation or non-controvertible evidence (Hebrews 11:1). It’s based on a leap, and not on arguments and evidence – not on walking by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7). Martin Luther was an intellectual who believed this and therefore had to take a stand against himself. Now is the acceptable time! Now is the day of salvation! (2 Corinthians 6:2). Don’t wait for the arguments to line up and the evidence to fall into place. Believe now! God is calling you to newness of life (Romans 6:4). God wants you to believe while living in a society that sings out against the faith – “I’m from the place where the church is the flakiest and n⁎gg⁎s been praying to God so long that they atheist” (Michael Eric Dyson, JAY-Z: Made in America, 2019, p. 6). Believe anyway. Know that only those who haven’t seen what they believe in are blessed (John 20:29). Luther knew that Christianity was a leap, but not “across a shallow stream, with safe and solid banks on both sides.” No, he writes, “we must leap from the safe shore of life into [an] abyss without seeing or feeling a sure footing under us. We must leap, as it were, at random, merely trusting… God’s supporting and saving hand” (Luther’s Works 19:66). Children will do this – but not the careful and cautious, not the educated and prosperous, not the socially conscious, not the self-possessed. So Luther wasn’t surprised when he saw Jesus calling the simple, childlike fishermen – who dropped their nets and immediately took off with him (Mark 1:18). “Christ gave the nation’s sovereign the cold shoulder,” Luther writes, “and He did not invite men of distinction. He… selected the poorest and most wretched beggars He could find,… simple, uncouth bumpkins” (LW 22:189). They “live altogether in faith, without reason…. There is a lack of reason but not of faith” (LW 54:335).

     But are we like that? Or are we too smart for our own good? Are we full of ourselves? Have we become smarty pants? Have we fallen into the old trap of relying on our own insights (Proverbs 3:5)? Luther thought that “the worst of all are the most rational” (LW 76:54). Indeed, the “more learned… we are, the greater evil doers we become” (LW 79:248). Faith eludes us. Salvation slips away (Hebrews 2:1). So do you think that Jesus thought the smart were like the rich, and that they too would have a harder time getting into heaven than a camel does going through the eye of a needle (Matthew 19:24)? No doubt they share a common fate. What then shall we do? Divest of our wealth and erase whatever educational advantages we might have? The Bible has another way. Repent, it says. Take on a broken and contrite heart (Psalm 51:17). If you don’t you’ll only get worse – with your sin being magnified, enlarged and aggravated (LW 6:195). Nothing will stop us from being “headstrong, proud, ignorant, and deceitful, unbridled, and haughty” (LW 73:126). But if we repent, then we “begin to hate sin sincerely; to recognize this immense, incomprehensible, and ineffable gift [of Christ’s sacrifice for sin]; to give thanks to God for it; to love, worship, and call on God; and to expect everything from Him” (LW 73:86).

     What drives us to repent is grace (LW 73:74). That grace is rooted in Christ’s sacrifice – whereby he killed “sin by sin.” And Jesus did that by the sacrifice he “made for sin,” by dying as a sinner himself (LW 73:86). That means that Jesus says to you – “You are no longer a sinner, but I am. I am your substitute. You have not sinned, but I have” (LW 22:167). How gracious! How merciful! And how effective. Indeed everything is finished (John 19:30) if this is what Jesus indeed does for us. So “run to Christ in faith” – ad Christum fide (LW 73:110)! May we rejoice and be glad – and watch out for any tampering with salvation on our part. Luther warns us that the world “insists on playing a role in this too. But the more it aspires to do in atonement for sin, the worse it fares. For there is no atoner but this Lamb; God recognizes no other” (LW 22:167). Let that exclusivity fill your hearts with joy – and no envy at all. Know that while you were still sinners, Christ had mercy on you, even though you didn’t deserve it (Romans 5:8). And by being punished in your place, you who were spiritually poor and in despair, are now rich with joy and freedom (2 Corinthians 8:9).

     So be children in the faith, brimming up with joy, peace, and contentment – knowing that you graciously belong to God (Philippians 3:12). Let thanksgiving for this great gift mark all of your days. And once on this road of righteousness, be on the look-out for heartier fare (Hebrews 5:12–13). Heed the call to maturity (Colossians 1:28, 4:12) – seeing it as a proper development of your childlike faith. Get ready to share in Christ’s sufferings (1 Peter 4:13). Watch out for God’s holy Word maliciously becoming “negligently cultivated and learned…. Go to battle, fight, steadfastly endure in hardship…. All these things are necessary” (LW 73:381). And to do that requires that you become mature in the faith – not giving up when the going gets tough (Matthew 13:21). That intestinal fortitude is the maturity sought in our life with Christ – rather than some sort of intellectual sophistication and theorizing. So be ready for that particular, volitional form of Christian maturity, knowing that it has nothing at all to do with being a Christian smarty pants. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:   “Dearest Jesus, at Your Word” (LBW 248) 

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:     “Peace, to Soothe Our Bitter Woes” (LBW 338)

Sermon:  July 12, 2020

“Walk in Newness”

(Romans 6:4)

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

Jesus is famous for welcoming all of the weary – not just the beautiful and kind and smart. No, he clearly and emphatically says – “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). So if you wearing out, Jesus wants to help you. Period. He won’t turn anyone away for lack of funds (Matthew 10:8). All you need to know is what Jesus says about himself – “I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your soul” (Matthew 11:29). So don’t miss out on this free and welcoming offer. Sing out with Martin Luther – “Oh, the vast and rich mercy of Him who calls miserable sinners to Himself!... For He who is calling all excludes no one…. In this way we may ‘with confidence draw near to the throne of His grace’ (Hebrews 4:16).” So “Christ is our calm, our victory, our peace, our salvation, and our joy” (Luther’s Works 67:141, 142).

     But there it ends. In those very same verses Jesus says that though he may welcome all who are weary, expectations quickly accrue for those who join up with him. It’s not naptime. No, it’s time to go to school. “Learn from me,” Jesus admonishes – “for I am meek and lowly in heart,” and so should you be (Matthew 11:29). “Learn, learn, learn, therefore, to be meek” and lowly in heart (LW 67:144). Go to the school of Jesus. He wants you to change, to be educated in the spirit. Learn to “turn an unbearable yoke into one that is not only bearable but even pleasant and light, not by changing the load itself but by changing the person carrying it” (LW 67:148). And that’s you. Because Christ was gentle and lowly in heart, so must we be who believe in him. We are to walk in his footsteps (1 Peter 2:21). And that means walking in newness of life (Romans 6:4); putting on a new nature (Colossians 3:10); becoming a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17); being born all over again (John 3:3). It means giving up selfishness and ingratitude – and screwy wishes like, “Holy Lord, that I might fly private until the end of days, and so be closer to thee” (Jim Carrey, Memoirs and Misinformation: A Novel, 2020, p. 183).

     Well that’s a mouth full! Doesn’t sound much like help, does it? I thought rest would come by doing less and not being pushed on to greater heights. Didn’t you? Well we’re both wrong, I guess. But Luther wasn’t fooled like we are. He knew that when we believe in Jesus “it is necessary to peel off the old skin and the old birth” (LW 22:281). That’s because Jesus repeatedly taught that new wine needs new wineskins to keep it from spilling all over (Matthew 9:17, Mark 2:22, Luke 5:38). So faith needs a new person to believe what it beholds! “The Holy Spirit works faith in us, and through this faith we regain the image of God which we lost in Paradise…. Whoever believes in Christ, whoever believes that Christ was born, that He died for us, was buried for us, and was raised for us – is born anew or reborn. This rebirth makes a person a new man…. All that is necessary is that he be baptized by the Holy Spirit and attain faith through Him. This works a new birth…. We are reborn from death to life, from sin to righteousness; here we are transferred from the kingdom of the devil into the kingdom of God” (LW 22:285, 286, 287).

     This is a massive change – “beholding the glory of the Lord, we are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another” (2 Corinthians 3:18). If we know nothing about this transformation we know nothing about Christ and his kingdom. “Unbelievers are so stuck in their sins that they pay no attention” to this transformation. The believer in Christ, on the other hand, “fights against sin and evil desires and feels what he does not want to feel” (LW 77:329). That’s why he fights. So sin doesn’t distinguish us from unbelievers. That’s because we both sin. It’s the battle against sin that differentiates us. Christians are the only ones who take up “the good fight of faith” (1 Timothy 6:12). So “see to it that you are a good Christian, and… prove your faith with your works. But if you go along without further ado, you will find out what your fate will be” (LW 30:131). The wrath of God will rest on you (John 3:36). So don’t seek the “favor and applause of men, peace with the world, and the serenity of the flesh rather than the glory of Christ and the salvation of souls” (LW 27:103). Seek first the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33). This kingdom is “divine and imperishable and… gives me eternal life, righteousness, peace, joy, and salvation,... and it will all be infinitely more glorious and abundant than what I can get here on earth, even with great sorrow, anxiety, and labor” (LW 21:203). The best educated among us have been painfully learning this of late at our colleges and universities where most professors are part time now, but paid at a much lower rate for the same work the full time do because they’re not regarded as “faculty, or even people [but] units of flexibility” (Charles Petersen, “Serfs of Academe,” The New York Review of Book, March 12, 2020, p. 42).

     And how can I have this better kingdom (Hebrews 11:16, 13:14)? We have to give up the “mad passion for [our] own glory” (LW 33:226). But how can I do that? We after all live in a world that “is nothing else than a prison for mad and blind men” (LW 7:182). So what can we do? It takes “a constant gaze that looks at nothing except Christ, the Victor over sin and death and the Dispenser of righteousness, salvation, and eternal life” (LW 26:356). So don’t budge. Keep your eye on the ball at all times. For when the “Word enters the heart in true faith, it fashions the heart like unto itself, it makes it firm, certain, and assured. It becomes buoyed up, rigid, and adamant” [steiff, auffrecht und hart] (LW 15:272). And why not? Faith, after all, holds on to the glorious new revelation of God in Jesus Christ (Isaiah 43:19, Revelation 3:12). For he is the mediator of a new covenant with God (Hebrews 9:15). His blood saves us from God’s wrath (Romans 5:9). Indeed, “Christ mediates with His blood so that we are redeemed in our consciences before God, because God has promised to give the Spirit through the blood of Christ,” which gives us faith in him (LW 76:408).

     But this faith isn’t ever completely settled. We never have it perfectly (Philippians 3:12). “For our condition in the kingdom of Christ is half sin and half holiness” (LW 21:205). And that’s because “our condition [is] always… mixed, so that we feel both the Holy Spirit and our sins and imperfections. Our condition must always be that of the sick man who is in the care of a physician and who is to become better” (LW 77:329). The Christian is sick in spirit – struggling with might and main to live in harmony with holy baptism (LW 35:39). Much lies ahead of us – still yet to be done. May we all work toward that better life – that perfected life (Matthew 5:48). May we all strive for God’s truth “in its entirety,.... striving for it, and moving and progressing toward it every day” (LW 21:129). May we all work to supplement our faith with virtue, and knowledge, and self-control, and steadfastness, and godliness, and love (2 Peter 1:5–7). And when we do, may we ever thank God in meekness and lowliness – as we walk, a little bit now, and a little bit then, in the newness of life. Amen.    

Hymn of the Day:   “Let Us Ever Walk With Jesus” (LBW 487) 

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:     “All Who Believe and Are Baptized” (LBW 194)

Sermon:  July 5, 2020

“Fear God's Word”

(Matthew 10:28)

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

Look around you – and you would never know that it is the fear of God that is the beginning of wisdom (Proverbs 1:7). That’s because we have replaced that fear with math and science (James D. Stein, How Math Can Save Your Life, 2010, and Addy Pross, What is Life? How Chemistry Becomes Biology, 2010). No longer are people obeying the Lord in fear and trembling. Now we figure out things on our own – discovering what will improve life and calculating the details so we can keep track of them for our well-being. The days are gone when people in droves fall down before the footstool of the Lord (Psalm 99:6). The days are gone when we cry to God to give us a heart of wisdom (Psalm 90:12). That’s because the secular has usurped the sacred – with “the rise of a culturally hegemonic notion of a closed immanent order” (Charles Taylor, A Secular Age, 2007, p. 774). And so Christians have been fooled into taking from their worship books, Annie Hawks’ (1835–1918) hymn, “I Need Thee Every Hour,” where we used to sing – “come quickly and abide, or life is vain” (Service Book and Hymnal, 1958, Hymn 479).

     But even for those who buck these trends, there’s little fear of the Lord – fearing the God who can not only take our lives but also throw us into the everlasting fires of hell (Matthew 10:28). That’s because we’ve forgotten that it is a fearful thing to be in the hands of the living God (Hebrews 10:31). But not Martin Luther – he instead was chilled by that verse. He knew that when we defy God by living on our “own power, wisdom, and stubbornness,” that we’re in for it. That’s because even if we were “a thousand times more proud and powerful” than the whole world, God would still look on our onslaught as if it came from “a dead fly” (Luther’s Works 78:104–105). Once God is provoked, nothing can stop the venting of his fury and the spending of his anger upon us (Ezekiel 5:13).

     So if we can’t shut God down, what’s left for us? To be consumed by his wrath and perish? No, there’s Isaiah 66:2 waiting for us. No matter how bad we are, we cannot erase that verse from the Scriptures. That same word has been beckoning wayward believers for centuries – and it still is. It says to each of us that God will bless whoever “trembles” at his word. For Luther than meant treating Holy Writ “with veneration and profound awe” or fear [grosser surcht] (LW 22:283). Sometimes that goes too far. Sometimes it sinks into deep mysticism and silence. God becomes so great that human words cannot express divine truths. Our profound fear of God’s Word ends up silencing God among us. Out of fear, God becomes the “wholly other” – the “ineffable and inconceivable” one (Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy, 1917, p. 186). But that can’t be – for then the Bible would have to disappear since nothing can be said of the wholly other, mysterious God.

     But the Bible has God speaking to us in human words – Thus says the Lord – we hear the Bible saying over and over again (Isaiah 37:6, Jeremiah 2:2, Ezekiel 3:11, Amos 7:17, Zechariah 11:4). And these words are not random. They express God. Many modern scholars reject this tight linkage – seeing “the actual God” to be in sharp contrast to, and of greater value than, the “textual God” of the Bible (The Catholic Biblical Quarterly, July 2020, p. 484). But not Martin Luther. He even thought that the Biblical words identified God – “the Word is God [and] God is the Word,” he argued (LW 75:284). That means that God is sealed by the Word and circumscribed by it (LW 12:352). It binds him – alligavit in the original Latin (LW 58:329). The English word “ally” comes from that Latin word – and so God is allied to his Word. They have the same purpose. So when Isaiah 61:8 says that the Lord loves justice, there’s no mystery here. It’s flatfooted. We also must be just (Philippians 4:8). Luther derives a principle from this in his lectures on Isaiah – in verbo esse debent – “be regulated by the Word” (LW 17:144). So too Isaiah 65:1 – “I was ready to be sought by those who did not seek me.” Another clear, straightforward word from God – this time about his grace. And there is the famous Isaiah 45:7 “I make weal and create woe.” Nothing vague about that. Nor is Isaiah 55:11 unclear – “my word… shall not return to me empty.” And the damning word about us in Isaiah 1:6 also stands tall – “from the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness.” Another one like it is Isaiah 64:6 – “all our righteous deeds are like [filthy rags].”

     These are the words, the Holy Scriptures (LW 34:227), that we are to tremble before – and obey and follow. Luther is emphatic about this because the fear of God requires it. So do not probe the Word, “measure it, and twist the words to read as you want them to, brood over them, hesitate, doubt, and then judge them according to your reason” (LW 23:229). But how shall we comply? Isn’t the genie out of the bottle? Yes it is – if it weren’t for the Word made flesh in Jesus Christ (John 1:14). Jesus embodies what God has to say to us. He even suffers for it. And that is where he catches us – drawing us to himself on the cross (John 12:32). We see ourselves in that guard at the crucifixion – being moved to faith when Jesus dies (Matthew 27:54). It is at that point that we are forgiven and freed from all guilt for the bad lives we have lived – we have all strayed like lost sheep (Isaiah 53:6). Because Jesus was punished for our sins (Hebrews 9:26), we do not also have to be punished for them – by his stripes we are healed (Isaiah 53:5). So if “the body were not given and the blood not poured out, then the wrath of God would remain upon us and we would retain our sins” (LW 36:177). Believe then in Christ crucified! For faith is “a valiant hero who is to hold to the Word; this appears insignificant and as nothing, so that the world would not give a penny for it. And yet it is so active and so mighty that it tears heaven and earth apart and opens all graves in the twinkling of an eye” (LW 28:73).

 

Hymn of the Day:   “Lord of Our Life” (LBW 366) 

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:     “Praise and Thanks and Adoration” (LBW 470)

Sermon:  June 28, 2020

“Escape God's Wrath”

(Romans 5:9)

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

     None of us are safe. Trouble abounds. We’re “afflicted at every turn – fighting without and fear within” (2 Corinthians 7:5). Many of the prosperous, however, think differently. But wait a minute. We’ve been in a pandemic for some three months now, and Dr. Shoham from the prestigious Johns Hopkins University Medical School just recently said – “We don’t know what the right decision is…. We’re all learning on the fly” (“The Most Dangerous of Games,” The Seattle Times, June 23, 2020). And after COVID-19 passes, is there another virus waiting to strike us worldwide? Well, “on average, people have 174 species of viruses” in their lungs (Carl Zimmer, A Planet of Viruses, Second Edition, 2015, p. 4). And keep in mind that “we live in a globally interdependent world, with widespread rapid travel and many… people, pigs, and birds living in close proximity. Thus, that world has become a hyper-mixing vessel…. [When a new virus comes] it will spread before we realize what is happening. And unless we are prepared, it [will] be like trying to contain the wind” (Michael Osterholm and Mark Olshaker, Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Killer Germs, 2020, p. 268). And even if we survive all of this, taking our own lives has still shot up (“U. S. Suicide Rates Climbed 35% in Two Decades,” US News and World Report, April 8, 2020). And shootings in our major cities are also high (“104 Shot, 14 Fatally, on Father’s Day Weekend in Chicago, Chicago Sun Times, June 22, 2020). Can we, then, really doubt the divine revelation we’ve heard about being “afflicted at every turn – fighting within and fear without”?

     Even if we can, there is still more bad news. For other holy words from the Bible say that we shouldn’t fear people shooting us down, but our Father in heaven instead who can not only kill us but also send us straight to hell (Matthew 10:28). Hell’s a bad place we’re damned to after we die. The torture there is so terrifying that we wish we could die to escape (Revelation 9:3–6) – but we can’t because its fires never go out (Mark 9:48). The punishment is so severe because our failures are so immense. Our rebellion against God is so great (Ezekiel 2:4–5) that a vast separation keeps us apart from his divine favor and aid (Isaiah 59:2). We’re cut off. “My companions are in darkness” (Psalm 88:18). We cannot save ourselves from despair and eternal punishment in hell (Romans 9:16). So the cultural icon, Bob Dylan (b. 1941), sang years ago now, “Every man’s conscience is vile and depraved, You cannot depend on it to be your guide, When it’s you who must keep it satisfied” (“Man in the Long Black Coat,” Oh Mercy, 1989, The Lyrics, Since 1962, 2004, 2014, p. 750). Martin Luther would agree. In our fallen state, he preached, we “lay captured in unbelief and blindness under God’s wrath [in] the kingdom of terrible, dreadful, inner darkness of heart” (Luther’s Works 57:280).

     Is there any hope for us, then? Or are we “clean cut off”? (Ezekiel 37:11). On our own, we are – because a leopard cannot change its spots (Jeremiah 13:23). But with God, all things are possible (Luke 18:27). But has anything actually happened to help us – or are we left wandering around in the realm of possibilities? No, something has happened – and it’s even finished (John 19:30). Jesus became poor on the cross by suffering and dying as a criminal, in order to be punished in our place so that the riches of divine forgiveness and mercy might be ours (2 Corinthians 8:9). Glory be to Jesus! (1 Corinthians 10:31). His death saves us from the wrath of God (Romans 5:9, John 3:36). His death brings about peace between us sinful creatures and our righteous God (Colossians 1:20). Only Jesus could do this for us. That’s because God’s wrath “is so great and severe that no creature can interpose to makes satisfaction or achieve reconciliation.” Only the spilled blood from the pure lamb of God on the cross can do that (1 Peter 1:19). Christ “had to take on Himself sin, God’s wrath, and death, under which human nature lay, and become the sacrifice for it.” Without that there would be no salvation from sin. So let us “fervently believe that we obtain God’s eternal grace and eternal life for the sake of this Savior and Mediator,” as Luther explains and assures us (LW 77:367).

     But that’s not the end of it. There is more to our faith than believing in Jesus. And that’s because he also admonishes us “to sin no more, that nothing worse” befalls us (John 5:14). We have work to do. We are to fight against sin – since the “remission of sins [was not] instituted [for the] permission to sin” (LW 30:245). And we fight against sin by glorifying God and caring for our neighbors (Matthew 22:37–39). But we can grow weary in well doing (Galatians 6:9), so Luther brings back God’s wrath to chasten us. And that’s also because “Scripture… exalts the fear of God. It impresses on men so to live that they fear God’s wrath at all times and feel that they have merited death.” This will keep our motivation strong so that we don’t drop the ball. From this comes what Luther calls “the highest wisdom” – which is “to go about our tasks in full awareness of God’s wrath. In this way we are ready, like the earth for the plow, to receive the divine seed” (LW 13:130). So having escaped the wrath of God through the death of Jesus, let us not then forget that wrath – for by remembering it daily, our discipleship stays on track, even as it grows in grace. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:   “What Wondrous Love is This” (LBW 385) 

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:     “Rise Up, O Saints of God!” (LBW 383)

Sermon:  June 21, 2020

“Die to Yourself”

(Hosea 6:5)

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

We can’t take it. There’s no doubt about it. Hosea 6:5 would never make it in flowery, flowing print onto a greeting card. It could never follow the likes of Psalm 27:1 – “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear.” No, Hosea 6:5 doesn’t have a chance when it declares – “I have slain them by the words of my mouth.” Slain us? God wants to kill us with his word? In the old Latin Bible the word for slain is occidi, from which comes our English word Occident or the West. Here killing is as gentle as the setting or dying of the sun in the West. But not for us! There’s nothing gentle about Hosea 6:5. Instead it terrifies us.

     And it doesn’t do that all by itself. No, there are other places in the Bible where we hear that we are under attack from on high. In Hebrews 4:12 we’re told that God’s word is sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing into our souls. And in Jeremiah 23:29 it says that God’s word is fire that burns us up; and a hammer than smashes us to pieces. So Hosea 6:5 doesn’t stand alone. And it isn’t confined to one time and place in ancient Israel either. Martin Luther knew that it was a broad, universal word – always going after all people everywhere (Luther’s Works 14:290). And when it attacks us – to slay us – it’s working to cut us down to size, by showing us that we are sinners and that we need to come to our senses (LW 18:32).

     This display, this showing forth, is rugged, however. And it has to be because we aren’t pushovers. We put up a fight – we belong to a rebellious house (Ezekiel 2:8, Acts 7:51). We are brutes – with “a huge and horrible monster,… the presumption of righteousness,” dwelling in us (LW 26:310). And so we cannot be led gently into another way of life. We cannot “waltz to heaven on velvet cushions and on roads paved with silk” (LW 23:362). We instead have to be bludgeoned. And so Luther said we needed “the hammer of death, the thunder of hell, and the lightning of divine wrath,” attacking us if that monster is ever to be thwarted (LW 26:310).

     Most can’t see this ever happening because words seem so impotent. “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me” – goes the old children’s rhyme. Words or names can’t break our bones, so why worry over them? No wonder that the Biblical word looks “very insignificant” (LW 57:143). Luther, however, thought differently. He believed that the Holy Spirit “comes with the preached Word, purifies our hearts by faith, and produces spiritual motivation in us.” As such, we die and “are made new and different [when] a new judgment, new sensations, and new drives arise in us” (LW 26:375). That happens when we hear Matthew 11:25 preached, that the wise and understanding can’t know God on their own. We seem to figure out most things one way or another on our own, but not God. We hit the wall with him. So Luther famously said that “reason is a whore” and cannot help us find God (LW 40:175). God therefore rejects intellectuals (LW 56:207). So if we’re going to find God, he will have to open our eyes and heart – for “you do not find Him; He finds you” (LW 75:35). Hearing that, does in our self-confidence (LW 3:4). It slays us. And “no rock is too hard’ for God to break (LW 8:27).

     The same happens when we hear Matthew 13:22 preached. It says that riches and prosperity choke the word of God out of us. They’re really a threat, not a blessing. Riches test us to see if we trust God or money more (LW 3:248). That takes the fun out of spending money on ourselves, and so we die. We also die when we hear John 3:36 preached that God’s wrath is waiting to crush those who disobey Jesus. So much for lightheartedness. And Romans 13:14 kills us by pushing the thought that life’s not about gratifying the desires of the flesh – fun though they may be. Spirit must dominate the flesh (Galatians 5:16–17). The same happens when Ephesians 5:20 is preached that we are always to be thankful for whatever happens. This flies in the face of aesthetic discrimination and the pursuit of happiness. And so we die yet again. Then Matthew 5:44 upends how we feel toward our enemies – saying that we should love them and pray for them instead of hoping they somehow drop dead. That word also slays us. We die again when Luke 16:15 is preached that what the world exalts in God hates. So much for hoping for awards and esteem from your peers. That support will have to come from elsewhere (Ephesians 5:18). When John 12:25 is preached that we are to hate ourselves if we want to go to heaven, the rug is pulled out from under us. Pride and our positive self-image are leveled. How can we proceed? we wonder – and we’re slain. Matthew 10:28 tells us to be afraid that God might send us to hell. This kills the fluffy love of God that has blinded us from the true God (Hebrews 10:31, 12:28) – like huge bilious pillows packed in around our heads. And so we’re slain yet once again. Finally, 1 Corinthians 7:22 pushes us into Christian slavery. So much for privilege, independence and freedom before God and in society (Romans 6:18). Again we die along with our hopes and dreams of self-rule and self-determination.

     All of this sounds impossible – all of this dying – if it were not for the agonizing death of Jesus on the cross. There he cries out to God to stop forsaking him (Matthew 27:46). In that anguish he dies before he dies. He suffers the loss of pride and favor. And on that cross he becomes an offering for sin in order to “satisfy” God’s yearning for justice (Isaiah 53:10–11). His death is the punishment for all sinners everywhere. That’s because when he dies he carried the sins of all sinners in his body (1 Peter 2:24). And so for every nail that was pounded into him on the cross, “more than one hundred thousand should in justice pierce you, yes, they should prick you forever and ever more painfully” (LW 42:9). But what should have happened, didn’t happen. “Note the wonderful exchange: One man sins, another pays the penalty; one deserves peace, the other has it” (LW 17:225). Jesus goes ahead and dies for us when we did not deserve it, when we were still sinners (Romans 5:8).

Hymn of the Day:   “Jesus Sinners Will Receive” (LBW 291) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RODV7z-UQhI

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:     “By All Your Saints in Warfare” (LBW 178 vv. 1, 18, 3)

Sermon:  June 14, 2020

“Build on the Rock”

(Matthew 7:25)

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

“Christianity is such a silly religion” – or so says Gore Vidal (1925–2012), winner of the National Book Award in 1993 (quoted in “A Gadfly in Glorious, Angry Exile,” Time, September 28, 1992). If he’s right, then Jesus is wrong that we should build our houses – our very lives – on the rock which he is (Matthew 7:25). For if he’s silly, then any construction based on him would be wrongheaded. And many agree with Vidal – lining up against Jesus (Luke 2:34). They too say that he’s silly – and that he is anything but a rock of stability and the abiding truth (John 14:6). Love your enemies (Matthew 5:44)? You’ve got to be kidding. Equal to God (John 5:18)? Come on now. Against all that the world exalts in (Luke 16:15)? Where will that get you? Deny yourself (Luke 9:23)? Hate yourself (Luke 14:26, John 12:25)? Lose your life (Matthew 10:39)? You have no worth (Luke 17:10)? That’s preposterous! Indeed, the very principles and practices of Jesus are taken to be “antithetical to… the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights” (1948)” (Hector Avalos, The Bad Jesus, 2015, p. 9). For many, that’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back (Matthew 7:13–14). That’s enough to dump him.

     But against all of this the disciples still cry out that only Jesus has the words of eternal life (John 6:68). And so as Luther says, they “desire the sweet face of Jesus” (Luther’s Works 79:36). They don’t want to be “miserable and foolish people,” who won’t “stand on the rock, that is, on the doctrine of Christ, but on the shifting sand of their own suppositions and dreams” (LW 21:282). Because “God wants to retain the stone, he must forsake” those miserable and foolish people (LW 68:122). But the faithful know that only Jesus can set us free from the lifelong bondage to the fear of death (Hebrews 2:15). Only Jesus grants “an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison” (2 Corinthians 4:17). Only Jesus can set us free indeed (Galatians 5:1). And this gives him credibility. So that when this Light of the world asks us to follow him, we go where he tells us to go (John 8:12). And then we find out that he’s neither immoral nor maniacal – but truly “from God” (John 7:17). And as such he can enrich us through the forgiveness of sins (2 Corinthians 8:9, John 20:23). And how exactly does he do that? When crucified, “he bore our sins in his body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24). And when he bore them, he canceled them, along with the legal bond which stood against us (Colossians 2:14). That makes grace a payment to God (LW 77:96, 30:12). As such, Jesus is our new paschal lamb who is sacrificed for us (1 Corinthians 5:7). As such, he saves us from the wrath of God (Romans 5:9). So when the angel of death flies over us – as he did in ancient Egypt (Exodus 12:3–12, Psalm 78:49) – he passes over us because he sees the blood of Jesus on us. And it is that blood which washes us clean (Revelation 7:14). This is “the scandal of scandals,” as Luther liked to say (LW 67:116). So “the very stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner” – and it cleans us up (Matthew 21:42). Rejecting Jesus, then, doesn’t deflate him. That’s because “wherever Christ is,… there must be opposition or it is not Christ” (LW 52:118). So even though rejected, Christ still has power to cleanse us from our sins. And that cleaning, by way of the cross, is worth studying your whole life long – for “even if we made it our study for a hundred years we would never finish learning it” (LW 56:137).

     And sin surely needs the cross to scour it. For sin is horrible. It makes us dirty. It crops up within us, and defiles us (Mark 7:20). And so we need cleansing (Psalm 51:10). Its lawlessness and doubt are what make us dirty (1 John 3:4, Romans 14:23). That wildness and recklessness ruins our hearts. We become savage animals (Daniel 4:16). We are debased (Romans 1:28). Our hearts are deceitful beyond measure (Jeremiah 17:9). They drift far away from God (Matthew 15:19). It’s all so horrible. But when a church is built upon the supernatural rock, which is Christ Jesus confessed (1 Corinthians 10:4, Matthew 16:18), then there is hope. In that church Christ is preached and faith emerges in a cleansed heart (Romans 10:17). Without it, “the church is not the church” (LW 67:211). But when God’s word is “mightily [gewaltig] preached” in it, then it is the church (LW 68:123). And in this true church we receive “an honest and good heart” – a new one, in fact (Luke 8:15, Ezekiel 11:19). For faith makes us new creatures – children of God, rather than children of wrath (2 Corinthians 5:17, John 1:12, Ephesians 2:3). Finally we are pleasing to God (Hebrews 11:6). And it truly takes your breath away. Now, when God sees us, he no longer sees us, but Christ himself, in us. And that’s because through faith in Christ, we no longer live to ourselves, but Christ lives in us (Galatians 2:20, 2 Corinthians 5:15). Martin Luther calls that “a peculiar phraseology” (LW 26:168). Well, that’s the understatement of the centuries! It’s the weirdest, strangest thing ever said! But it still matters. And that’s because when Christ dwells in us, we can then “do all things” through him (Philippians 4:13). We can treat others the way we want to be treated (Matthew 7:12). We can even count others better than ourselves (Philippians 2:3). Generosity and gratitude mark us – rather than stinginess and complaining (Luke 10:33, Ephesians 5:20). We are focused on the one thing needful – Christ Jesus (Luke 10:42, Hebrews 12:2).

Hymn of the Day: “Built on a Rock” (LBW 365)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBpG3D55Uys

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:     “God of Grace and God of Glory” (LBW 415)