God Means What He Says.

 Matthew 22:34-40

When the Pharisees heard that He had put the Sadducees to silence, they gathered themselves together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?" And He said to him, "YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.' This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets."

Sermon for Eighteenth Sunday After Trinity 09/29/24

God Means What He Says

My Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

This morning I intend to preach only half of the Gospel lesson. It is not that the whole Gospel and all of the words are not important - it is just that I want to focus on the answer Jesus gave about the greatest commandment in the Law. For a change, I don't want to talk about the context of the lesson or what else may have been happening in the Gospel - just the words. These words of Jesus mean the same thing no matter what other context you apply. They answer the question more completely than the questioner probably intended. The message I want you to take away with you this morning is the title of my sermon, "God Means What He Says."

Of course, God means what He says. Why else would He say it?

But if He means what He says, why do so many people act as though He has not spoken - or say that they know what He has said, and then act as though He did not really mean what He said? When Jesus gave this answer, it was uncontroversial, according to scholars. It was the answer anyone would give to this question. When Jesus faced this question in Luke 10, He challenged the Lawyer who asked it to answer it for himself, and the answer the lawyer gave was the same. The Jews have known it since before the time of Christ. Christians have known this answer ever since the time of Christ, yet none of us seems to live according to the answer Jesus gave.

All that the Law, the revealed will of God, commands, desires, and encourages is love. God commands that we love Him with all that we are and have and love our neighbors in the same way we love ourselves. We don't see a lot of that, of either sort of love - love for God or love for our neighbors - that measures up to the command of God. We don't see it in society and we don't see a lot of it in the church, do we?

The first thing the Law commands is that we love God. God isn't talking about some simple emotional thing. He isn't saying that you should feel all warm and squishy about Him. That is where the current crop of Christian music seems to get it wrong. They talk about feelings. I am so uplifted by God, and my heart soars, and I feel so wonderful because my God I so great and warm and good to me!

God says you should love Him with all of your heart, and all of your soul, and all of your mind. He doesn't mean love - as in a feeling you get. He means love - as in how you think and speak and behave. When you love God with all your heart, your love for God controls and gives form to the emotions and passions of your life not that you have an emotion about Him, but that all of your emotions are shaped by Him and His value and presence in your life. It is a love that includes emotion, but which also transcends them and shapes their power in your life.

You are to love God with your entire soul as well. The soul, in Biblical imagery, is the seat of the will. You are to use your will in connection with - and guided by - love for God. Everything you want, and all of your plans and intentions are to be shaped by love for the Lord and, therefore, by His will. For the child of God, the lusts of the flesh are to take a back seat to God and His will. The desires for comfort and beauty and such are secondary to love for God. Personal goals and plans are made in the presence of one's commitment to the true God and in the light of what is God-pleasing and God-serving.

Finally, you are to love the Lord your God with all your mind. Every thought is to be taken captive to your love for God. What you know, and what you choose to know, is subject to God and loving Him and serving Him. We often waste our time and our brains on things that have no relationship to God - baseball statistics, football standings, the words to our favorite country music songs. Those things are not evil - and you can do and know them as a faithful Christian.

  It is just that loving God with all your mind means that everything you take the time to know is part of your love for God, somehow - and that you use your mind in service to your love for your Lord by learning and knowing the things most clearly and closely connected to Him.

Think about it. We experience puppy love pretty much the same way. When a young person, for example, has a crush on someone, they teach themselves what the one they love likes and they try to share those emotions - like the same things. They plan their lives around the other, changing their desires to coincide with their beloved's so that they have more in common and more to share. They will often learn things just to please their new love, and to experience who they are more completely. Oftentimes, for teenagers, they discover quickly that the desires, interests, and knowledge of the other do not fulfill them, and they grow tired of the infatuation, and "fall in love" with someone else. Sometimes they don't fall out of love but grow into a deeper love - something most husbands and wives do quite deliberately. They learn to like and to share the will and thoughts of the one they love, and find that sharing pleasing.

That is how love for God works within us. You love God with the use of your emotions, rather than just as an emotion. You love Him with your desires and will by shaping it around Him and His will. And you place your mind in the service of knowing Him and that which enables you to live in Him and for Him more fully - and so know Him better and love Him even more. Of course, the Law commands that you do this perfectly - with ALL your heart, and with ALL your soul, and with ALL your mind.

Who among us does it perfectly? Instead, we love the fun, the comfortable, and the pleasant. We enjoy the titillating and the salacious. The dirty story tickles us. Comfort of the moment and temporary happiness pleases us. We love them even when they have no connection to our love for God - and often even when it is clearly contrary to our love for God.

We all want the good life - whether that is the best thing for us or for the mission which our Lord has given us. We desire for ourselves - when God commands us to think about the other guy first. We will to our own advantage, even when the better thing is to ignore our advantage and take care of the other guy. It is just simple human nature - and we are, by nature, sinners.

We often fill our minds with thoughts and images which are not holy, but profane. We use our minds to think about how to take advantage of the other guy or to rationalize our values and behaviors which are not consistent with our professed love for God. We use our minds to explain away the commands of God and our failures to be the sort of people we know that God would have us be. Rather than loving God with our whole mind, we use our minds to justify our sins and our ignoring what we know is the will of God.

But God means what He says. He not only expects us to love Him with every fiber of our being, but He commands us to love our neighbors in the same way as we love ourselves. If we want to be comfortable, we are to see to the comfort of our neighbor. If we want to be respected in the community, we are to respect our neighbors - each and all of them. If we love ourselves by feeding ourselves, we are to see to it that our neighbors have food to eat - good food. If we expect people to take the time to listen to us and understand how we think and how we feel - then we are to love our neighbors in the same way, with our time, our attention, and our understanding.

This is the conduct and life of the child of God. This is not optional, as though you could choose to do it or ignore it, nor are we allowed by God to decide it is too hard for us, and quit. Forgiveness does not alter the validity of this command. These two commandments are the sum and substance of the will of God contained in all of Scripture. God wants - and commands - and expects every Christian to do these things. God means what He says.

But who is equal to all of this? Who does it perfectly? No one.

Well, that is not precisely true. But only One has. Only Jesus has loved God with this perfect love - and His neighbor in the same way as He loved Himself. He loved God with His affections by making God's love for us His own. He placed us higher on His table of values than Himself. What does it say in Philippians? Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

And He loved God enough to go all the way to the cross and the grave according to the plan of the heavenly Father.

He loved God so completely that God's will became His own - and even in the depths of terror - "My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death" - His Father's plan and His Father's will were His own, and He prayed, "Not My will, but Thine be done."

Jesus knew where He was going and what was going to happen, and He knew what He must do - even to the point of crying out in thirst when He had no intention of drinking, but only that every word of Scripture might be fulfilled. He knew everything He needed to know - and chose not to know the things that He did not need to know, things that we not for Him to know - so He could honestly tell His disciples that no man knows the day or the hour, not an angel in heaven, not even the Son, but only the Father knows the hour of the end of the world. He loved God with all His mind.

And He loved us, His neighbors, in the same way, and just as much as He loved Himself. A greater love has no man than this, that He lay down His life for His friends. He loved us to the cross, and into the grave, that we might be redeemed and our sins forgiven. Because of Jesus, your sins, whatever they may be, have been forgiven, and you are given the gift of resurrection from the grave and everlasting life in glory with Him. Death and illness no longer have a claim on you. You will not die but live.

And we have His promise that in this world He is with you to keep you and guide you and that all things will work together - by His deliberate direction - for good for you and for all those who love God - those who are called according to His purpose.

The perfect love for God and man has existed and does exist in Jesus Christ our Savior. It is poured out on you. Your sins and lack of love have been completely forgiven.

Now, go and sin no more! God means what He says. Forgiveness does not wipe out the will of God or invalidate it. God still wants you to love Him with that love that commands every fiber of your being - your heart, your soul, and your mind. And He still commands us to love our neighbors - the people around us - as we love ourselves. It is time to re-examine our lives, our priorities, our thoughts, and our desires - and shape them according to our love for God. No excuses. Jesus has fulfilled the law of God in your place - and your sins are forgiven - but they are forgiven to redeem you into the glory of God and holiness of life - not to excuse deliberate and ongoing sin or exempt you from His will.

After all, what is the will of God for us? <Our salvation.> And who would want to be exempted from that? Remember, God means what He says. Love God, and love one another! And give thanks!

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

(Let the people say Amen)

Humility

 Luke 14:1-11

And it came about when He went into the house of one of the leaders of the Pharisees on the Sabbath to eat bread, that they were watching Him closely.  And there, in front of Him was a certain man suffering from dropsy.  And Jesus answered and spoke to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?"  But they kept silent. And He took hold of him, and healed him, and sent him away.

And He said to them, "Which one of you shall have a son or an ox fall into a well, and will not immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day?"  And they could make no reply to this.

And He began speaking a parable to the invited guests when He noticed how they had been picking out the places of honor at the table; saying to them, "When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you may have been invited by him, and he who invited you both shall come and say to you, ‘Give place to this man,' and then in disgrace you proceed to occupy the last place.  But when you are invited, go and recline at the last place, so that when the one who has invited you comes, he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher'; then you will have honor in the sight of all who are at the table with you.  For everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled, and he who humbles himself shall be exalted."

Sermon for The Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity                       09/22/24

Humility

My Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

It had to be a difficult way to live.  Jesus probably experienced the reality of modern celebrities way back then.  People were watching Him, looking for an opportunity to do Him in.  They were not merely content to wait, they were baiting the trap, setting up situations where Jesus would do something they thought they could use against Him.  They would quiz Him, hoping for a sound-byte that would serve them.  In our Gospel, they set a man in front of Him who was sick and just waited for Jesus to do something they could use against Him.  Our theme is "Humility".

Not that the adversaries of Jesus had any.  They apparently had no shame either.  He is invited out to dinner at the home of one of the leaders of the Pharisees, and they set a seriously ill man in front of Him.  They knew that Jesus had this proclivity to heal, and I suspect that they wanted to use the Sabbath as a weapon against Jesus, if He should heal the man.

Jesus took the question directly to them.  He asked them, speaking directly to the head Pharisee and the Bible Experts who stood around him.  He said, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?"   They could not answer – or they chose not to, and since they could not condemn that action in principle, they lost the ability to use it against Jesus in this situation.  So, Jesus healed the man.  Score one for Jesus.

But He didn't just leave it there.  They had put Him to the test, and He returned the favor.  He pointed out that what He had done was just common decency and concern, something that every one of them would likely have done, if the situation were just a bit different.  And He said to them, "Which one of you shall have a son or an ox fall into a well, and will not immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day?"  And they could make no reply to this.  He pointed out that even if it were an animal, they would have rescued it.  There was no shame, no violation of the Law of God in rescuing one of their fellow-men from evil, even on the Sabbath.  Their silence speaks clearly.  Jesus was right, and even their test was wrongly conceived.

Their problem was their pride.  The word you probably hear used in such circumstances is "Hubris", although it is usually pronounced "Hyoobris."  They were the leaders, or so they thought.  They were the clever ones and they were to be respected and feared!  Their pride showed itself in the way they went about seeking the best places at the dinner.  The Greek doesn't actually say "at the table," probably because they did not use what we would call a table.  That is why the words were in italics in the text - which will all see when you rush home and read the text so you can review the sermon in your mind and not lose the thought of today's sermon too quickly.


They lay around the "table" on pillows.  The "important people" would have certain places where they would lie, and everyone else sought the good spots, close to the important people, where they would be able to participate in or at least hear the conversation.  Jesus seizes upon the competition for the best spots and uses it as a parable about pride and humility.  The elements of the parable are drawn from the activities around them, but are extreme, to focus on the lesson.

He says to choose the lowest spot - the least desirable place - rather than going for the best spot.  If you choose the best spot, and someone more important than you, in the eyes of the host, arrives, you will be humiliated and forced to slink off to the lowest place, the place everybody avoided, and so it is the only one open.  Jesus says to choose the least desirable spot.  Then the host will see you, and invite you to move up, and you will have honor in the eyes of everyone else.  

Practically, does it work that way?  I don't know.  I suspect sometimes, yes, and sometimes, no.  But this is a parable - and everyone can clearly see the principle here.  Pride can lead to humiliation.  Jesus says, in fact, that before God it always does.  Humility avoids the pitfalls of pride - and can bring the delightful moment of what Jesus calls "exalting" when you are asked to move up.  Again, in the presence of God, humility is always rewarded.

But this is about the Gospel.  Within the Gospel, there is no room for pride.  We don't earn or deserve a thing.  Earthly position and human effort accomplish nothing, and holding them out as our rationale, our hope, or our sense of entitlement is pointless.  Not one of us deserves the invitation to the dinner which is eternal life.  If we don't just naturally belong at the dinner, our place at the dinner is also not ours to choose.  We may think that we are something, or that we deserve something – but we don't.  I think St.  Paul was pointing at this very thought in Philippians 3: "If anyone else has a mind to put confidence in the flesh, I far more:  circumcised the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless.  But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ.  More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish in order that I may gain Christ."

It doesn't matter who we are.  It is of no account what we are able to do, or what good things we have done.  Our sense of deserving is wrong, because it always overlooks our sins and measures our worthiness by the wrong standards.  In the Gospel, everything is gift.  Everything is Christ!  He died, not us, even though the sin and the guilt is ours.  He gives us undeserving people His life and His eternity and His love.  If we presume to claim a place, an honor, an importance even here in our little congregation, we claim something that belongs to Jesus, and it is His to bestow as He wishes.

Only true humility can see that and accept that.  True humility is to see yourself in the Law, and know that there is no way you can deserve what you so long for – God's favor, and salvation.  Our hope is not found in self-assertion, or self-promotion.  Our hope is found in humility - that is in repentance.  We have to be humble enough to see ourselves as we truly are and confess our sins and seek God's forgiveness.  Only when we take that lowest place at the dinner, can our Savior invite us to ‘come on up higher' and give us a place at the table of salvation.  Then we truly have honor in the eyes of all, not the honor of someone who thinks he is something, but the honor of being chosen, beloved, truly valued by God Himself, and made a member of the household of God and invited by one no less glorious than Jesus Himself to break bread with Him and eat at His table.

Then, in life, we go where He sends us and do the things He gives us to do.  Who we think we are isn't important.  What we want or what we think we may deserve for whatever reason is irrelevant.  Our very presence at the Supper is the delightful gift of our Lord.  Better the lowest seat in the kingdom of heaven than the highest glory in the kingdom of Hell.  Our salvation is all about Jesus.  He won it, and He gives it.  He forgives you all of your sins, and He calls you by name into His family and makes you are sharer in His glory both now and for eternity!

So what if life didn't turn out the way you had dreamed?  You have everlasting glory instead.  So what if you are bearing a cross you would rather not bear, a cross which you did not anticipate?  Jesus already bore the cross on your behalf, and He is giving you something important to do - but important in His eyes, not necessarily in your own.  Humility.  It is the state of those who know themselves, both as sinners, and as those who have possession of something that they just have no business having – the grace and favor of God.  But they have it because Jesus has seen them and invited them to move on up, and exalted them in the presence of all humanity.

When Jesus teaches the importance of the attitude of humility, He is not engaged in some abstract speculation on ethics.  In fact, while He was teaching it, He was already living it out.  He humbled Himself to be born human.  He humbled Himself to live among sinful men.  He humbled Himself to the point of death, even death on a cross.  He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.  And therefore, by His stripes, we are healed!  So, when Jesus is urging humility, He is not just recommending a successful approach to social engagements, He is telling us how we may be like Him, and what it is that shapes the minds and the lives of those who will sit at table with Him at the Wedding Feast of the Lamb of God in glory.

So, your life is the gift of God, both here and now and in eternity.  It is grace and forgiveness and not deserving or self-chosen glory.  But you can only accept that, if you exercise true humility.  So, repent, and believe, and trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding (or preferences) In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.  The name of the game is "humility".

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.
(Let the people say Amen)

Jesus Felt Compassion

 Luke 7:11-17

And it came about soon afterwards, that He went to a city called Na'in; and His disciples were going along with Him, accompanied by a large multitude.  Now as He approached the gate of the city, behold, a dead man was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow; and a sizeable crowd from the city was with her.  And when the Lord saw her, He felt compassion for her, and said to her, "Do not weep."  And He came up and touched the coffin; and the bearers came to a halt. And He said, "Young man, I say to you, arise!"  And the dead man sat up, and began to speak. And Jesus gave him back to his mother.  And fear gripped them all, and they began glorifying God, saying, "A great prophet has arisen among us!" and, "God has visited His people!"  And this report concerning Him went out all over Judea, and in all the surrounding district.

Sermon for Sixteenth Sunday After Trinity                                     09/17/24

Jesus Felt Compassion

My Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

This miracle account is full of drama.  

     Life, in the person of Jesus, confronts death, in the person of the dead son of the widow of Na'in, in a cosmic battle.  

     Jesus, the Rabbi under the unfriendly observation of the Scribes and the Pharisees, disregards the customs and traditions - yes, even the law - and walks up and touches a dead body - or at least the bier upon which it is being borne, thereby defiling Himself and risking scorn and condemnation.  

     Jesus, the miracle worker, speaks to the dead man and commands Him to sit up.  There is drama upon drama in this short Gospel lesson.  

If this were a radio melodrama, this is the point at which the announcer would have said, "Tune in tomorrow for the thrilling conclusion to our story."

But it isn't a radio drama, it is history, an account of Jesus coming upon the procession of grievously sad funeral.  The drama is real.  

     Death confronts life, and life comes out the victor!  

     Jesus touches the funeral bier and instead of being defiled by the touch of death, the whole thing is cleansed by His touch and His Word and life takes possession of the funeral, and joy simply drives away the sorrow.

      Jesus commands the dead to get up, and the young man springs to life, and rises from the bier, and speaks - and Jesus presents Him alive again, to His suddenly frightened and delighted mother.  

     And everyone starts babbling about God and His work among his people and about the healing and resurrection of this one young man.  

And it all happened because Jesus felt compassion for the grieving mother.  And that is our theme, Jesus Felt Compassion.

The story itself is amazing, and you could get lost in the details, and forget the over-arching message.  Here was a woman who had already lost her husband.  Her son was her only support.  Now, suddenly, he is gone as well.  I know that it is suddenly, because they buried their dead on the same day they died, in Israel, unless they died quite late in the day – and then they would be buried on the next morning.  This woman was devastated.  Her only child was dead.  The true depth of her sorrow, and the troubles that it was bringing to her could be measured in the crowd of mourners - "a sizeable crowd was with her", according to Luke.

Now, I am informed that in that culture you were obligated to join the funeral procession, if you were aware of it.  It was an affront to the Creator for anyone to ignore it, and pretend that it did not touch them - because death will finally touch everyone, and death is part of life, and we ought always to recognize and honor life, even - perhaps especially - when it has been extinguished.

Jesus is approaching Na'in from Capernaum with a large crowd following Him.  This miracle was no small, private affair.  It was well witnessed and well-attested to.  When Jesus surveys the scene, he felt compassion.  I am sure that the meeting appeared to be pure chance - and I am certain that God timed all things that this meeting would happen just as it did.  And it happened not just to show us the power of Jesus, or that He could do it, but to show us the compassion of Jesus.

He could have ignored it - or joined in with the crowd to wail and mourn at the visitation of death and all the attendant sorrows and troubles it brings.  After all, death was nothing unusual even back then.  In fact, death was more common, and less postpone-able then than it is now.  And when somebody died, they were taken home and cleaned up and wrapped up and buried that same day - there was no mortuary and no dressing the body up and putting on make-up so that the dead appeared merely to be sleeping.  But Jesus did not ignore it, this time.  He did not play along.  Perhaps it reminded Him of His coming death, and His mother's approaching sorrow.  Whatever the cause at the moment, Jesus felt compassion.

So He healed the man, that is, He raised him from death and caused him to be alive again, and gave him back to his mother, to the joy and wonder and fear of everyone there.  Life conquered death.  Jesus spoke to the dead man as if he were merely asleep, and the man heard Him and awakened from death itself.  Of course, he had to die again, one day, but that is another story for another day, and it is one that the Bible does not take time to tell us.  What is striking - aside from raising the dead, of course, is the compassion of Jesus.   Although it happened - this raising the dead thing happened only occasionally in the ministry of Jesus, He has that same compassion towards us all.

"He died for all", the Bible tells us, and "God so loved the world" - not just certain persons in it - "that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."  That was and is His compassion.  He saw our need in sin and He healed us, raising us from the dead, so to speak, since we would have died eternal death in hell without Him.  But, through His Word, He has called us to life eternal and made us heirs of glory with Him.

Our Gospel lesson this morning doesn't just say Jesus has the power to raise us from the grave - although it does make that point powerfully - it says the Jesus has compassion.  It teaches us about the caring of our Lord - something we often forget to think about because life has rough edges and sharp corners and we have to deal with pain, and tragedy, and terrorism, and hurricanes, and what all.  But God would, by the words of our Gospel lesson, show us the compassion which moves Him, so that, in the words of our Epistle Lesson today, "so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fulness of God."

The Greek word in our Gospel for "felt compassion" means "moved in his guts" or "felt it in his viscera".   It means that it is not some abstract, academic notion, but the same sort of compassion you feel when you turn on Fox news and watch children wading through the latest flood, or see a pile of ash on the screen and realize that before the riots or the tornadoes or whatever that was someone's home.  Jesus knows how we feel.  He understands the hurts and the fears.  He doesn't fear the way we do, never did, because He was never without hope - and He had the certainty of the good will of God for us, and for Himself.  But He knows - and He understands fear and pain from a very personal standpoint.  He can feel it right along with us - that is what compassion means; to feel along with.

In all of our troubles, He is there.  He knows our pain and He is watching over us.  He takes no pleasure in our pains and suffering - which is why He died for us, to spare us the greatest suffering of all.  Remember, He was under no obligation to stop and care for the pains of this widow woman.  Surely there were thousands of other opportunities to do just the same in the lives of others, where He did not.  But for this one Jesus felt compassion, and He acted to assuage her pain and meet her needs.

We know that we stand in a special relationship with Him, by virtue of our Baptism, and His choosing of us to be His children.  That choice comes with certain troubles connected to it, guaranteed.  But it also comes with His compassion guaranteed.  Those troubles come because the world hates Christ, and we show the world Christ shining through us in His Word and in His worship and in His working through us.  In these troubles, we have the promise of God that He is with us every step of the way to strengthen us and that we shall not have to bear more than we are able to endure.

He also gives us His Word and the fellowship of the saints, and the powerful gift of the Holy Supper to help us and strengthen us and encourage us.  When we partake of the Holy Supper, we receive Christ's true body and blood, and with that forgiveness and strengthening and His presence in us and with us to make us equal to the work which He gives us to do, and the cross which He calls us to carry in His name.

That doesn't mean that pain will not hurt, or that we will not be genuinely challenged by the cross which we must bear.  It would not be a cross if it did not bring pain and hardship.  But Jesus feels compassion.  He will not give us more than we can endure - and everything we must endure is stamped with His purpose.  We may not see the purpose, or the increase that results from our cross and our work.  We are never promised that we will understand it all, or finally see how what we did and what we endured worked out His holy will.  We are only promised that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.  Our work is faithfulness.  What we do and how it accomplishes the will of God is His work.

But in the hour of trouble, or pain, or sorrow, we can find great comfort in knowing that Jesus feels compassion for us just as He felt compassion for that woman in her sorrow and deep need, so long ago.  He acted, miraculously, to help her and comfort her – and He will act on our behalf and for our comfort and blessing as well.  He has acted, in redeeming us, and He continues to act through Word and Sacrament for our comfort and strengthening.  And He will act in our lives and in our needs - by means of our brothers and sisters in the faith, and by means we may not imagine, and many not recognize as His acting until much later.

But be of good cheer.  In every situation, we may trust that our God knows and is working our good and blessing - we can see an example of it in our Gospel, where Jesus felt compassion.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.
                                       (Let the people say Amen)

Do Not Be Anxious

 Matthew 6:24-34

"No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will hold to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.  For this reason I say to you, do not be anxious for your life, as to what you shall eat, or what you shall drink; nor for your body, as to what you shall put on.  Is not life more than food, and the body than clothing?  Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not worth much more than they?  And which of you by being anxious can add a single cubit to his life's span?

"And why are you anxious about clothing?  Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory did not clothe himself like one of these.  But if God so arrays the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more do so for you, O men of little faith?  Do not be anxious then, saying, ‘What shall we eat?' or ‘What shall we drink?' or ‘With what shall we clothe ourselves?'  For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.  But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you."

"Therefore do not be anxious for tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own."

Sermon for Fifteenth Sunday After Trinity                                        09/08/24

Do Not Be Anxious

My Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

There are times when preaching this text is simple and safe.  Life is good, and everyone is happy and telling people not to be anxious or worried about life is a comfortable thing.  For some, this is not one of those times.  This has been a summer of extremes.  The campaign season has raised stress for almost everyone who pays attention to it. Almost weekly we are treated to another account of another mass shooting somewhere in America.  And some of the politicians in our nation are publicly calling for violence and turmoil in an attempt to prevent one of the candidates from becoming our president.

The effects of the ugly nature of our national politics and the renewed "protesting" and rioting over the conflict in the middle east are still waiting to be seen.  Colleges and universities are now centers for violence in favor of those we have known to be terrorists.  Aurora Colorado has been co-opted by Venezuelan gangs, and now there is an apartment complex in Chicago taken over by a Venezuelan gang.  There are now no-go areas for Americans in America!   It is in the face of such conditions as these conditions that the Word of God speaks to us today and tells us, in the words of our Lord, Do Not Be Anxious.

It is a matter of faith.  Our Lord reminds us in our Gospel of the familiar facts that God feeds the birds, and He clothes the fields in beautiful flowers.  Neither one of them labors for what they get.  The flowers of the field simply grow there.  They are, none the less, beautiful.  The birds do not sow or reap or store up grain, and yet God feeds them.  In the same way, we may depend upon God.  He knows what we need, and He will provide.  But to get there, and find comfort in these circumstances will take faith.

Let's face it, there are a lot of birds dead on the highways and roads - and people - in the horrendous shootings that seem to be increasing in our nation.  God knows situations in which we must live, and what we need to survive. It is tempting to look at the problems and the human cost left behind and say, "how does this square with the text?"  "Where is the supply of which Jesus was speaking?"

Of course, Jesus said to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these thing will be added to you.  Let's face it, we are not witnessing a lot of seeking of God or His righteousness in the midst of the widespread violence going on in out nation, and in many places dominated by Islam.  But the lack of godliness isn't the whole answer.  Part of the answer is in the fact that whether we experience every moment as richly supplied and safe or not, we experience it.  And God has preserved us.  We do not have to deal with the immediate conditions in Colorado or Chicago.  We see it, and we can respond to it - and we should respond to it somehow.  But it is not our suffering, not yet, and so God has been true to His promises and provided us with all that we need, even if it is not all that we want.

He has also preserved those who are facing those conditions.  They might have preferred to have ridden the growing storm out in comfort, and have their worldly possessions spared - but, as in the book of Job, when we start judging God based on how we respond to how He is blessing us, we are trying to suggest that we could do a better job of being God than He does.  Of course, that is silly - and blasphemous - on its face. 

Besides, we want to remember what Jesus actually said.  He did not promise that we would always have everything we desire just the way we want it.  He said that God knows where we are and who we are and what it is that we need, and that all of our fretting and worrying cannot make it better.  Jesus asked, "Which of you by being anxious can add a single cubit to his life's span?"  While I am not certain how much 18 inches - a cubit - of life adds to your span of life when measured in years, the point is that our worry doesn't empower us to change the immediate circumstances of our lives any more than the clear frustration and depression of the victims of the Venezuelan Gang activity makes them able to defend their homes or find somewhere safe appear out of nowhere.  Someone has to bring the answer into circumstances like theirs, and when they do, that someone was sent by God - whether they realize it or not.

And of course, some people will likely die because of the insane violence we see in the news from Colorado or in the neighborhoods of Chicago.  If people die, it is because God has appointed that moment for their death - and death would have found them in Minnesota, fishing on a clear and cool lake - if it was their time - just as certainly as it found them struggling amid the new war on our country or that found those young women walking or jogging in their neighborhood in Maryland or Georgia or Texas.  God will take care of each of us while we are here, and summon us out of this world when our time is done.  It is precisely at that moment that the kingdom of God and His righteousness will be come of paramount importance for us.

The promise of our Gospel is that when we have sought the kingdom of God and His righteousness, all these things - the stuff of life - will be added unto us.  Now Jesus knows that we cannot search for God or choose to believe - so He is telling us to pay attention to the most important stuff, and trust God to handle the rest.  As the beloved children of God, can we imagine that God will short us on the necessities?  I would say no - and looking about this morning, I see that all of us have had all that we have needed for life up to today - and many of us have enjoyed a whole lot more than simply what we needed.

We are the chosen of God.  He has set His love upon us.  He has loved us with the greatest love: a greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for His friends.  Jesus laid down His life for us on the cross, to redeem us from sin and death and hell.  Because of Jesus your sins are forgiven, and when your body dies, that is not the end, nor is it the worst moment - but merely the beginning of the better and more lasting life with Christ in glory.  He has promised that you will even get your bodies back, refreshed, renewed, and repaired; better than when you laid it down.  He has taken care of you here, and has planned and executed your rescue and redemption for the hereafter.

While we live in this world, we live as God's favorite people - favored with His love and under His watchful care.  Nothing can happen without God's care for you.  All of your needs will be met, and many of your desires, right up to the time appointed for your home-going.  At that moment, it may appear to the world around you that you lack the needs of the moment.  But the truth is that your greatest need will have been fulfilled: life beyond the grave, a life that has no ending or sorrow, or sickness - only fulness of joy and glory with Jesus Christ.

Between this day and that, you can trust God.  You don't have to worry about what you shall eat or what you shall drink or what you shall put on.  Your heavenly Father knows that you have needs of these things.  Everyone is looking for them.  The ungodly who murder innocent women, The victims of the Venezuelan gangs, all people are searching for the needs of life, for food and water and shelter.  The chosen people of God who endured the violence of things we get to see on the news are searching for them.  God knows – and He will provide.  He says so – and by faith, we may trust Him and depend on Him and not worry.

So, do not be anxious.  Just look around you.  Breathe in and out.  Take note.  You are alive.  You have food enough for the moment.  You have plenty of air to breathe.  The needs of this moment are taken care of, and the reason that they are taken care of is the goodness and kindness of God.

Tomorrow may present new needs, but that is tomorrow.  Jesus says that the troubles of today are enough for today.  We take it one day at a time.  You cannot fix tomorrow until you get there.  One of the appeals in this election cycle is to find someone who can make us safe again.  The Bible tells us to trust not in princes.  You should take your privilege and duty as a citizen seriously, and pay attention, and vote for whomever you think would be able to serve our nation in a God-pleasing way, but know for certain that your hope and your safety and your security is in the hands of God. 

You cannot do tomorrow today, nor can you fix yesterday tomorrow.  You have one day, today, and a loving heavenly Father who will take care of you.  So, do not be anxious.  Live in today's blessings today, and have a little faith in God.  He loves you with a proven love - and He has promised to add all the rest that you need - now that He has clothed you in His righteousness and marked you as one of His chosen and beloved children.

Do Not Be Anxious.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

(Let the people say Amen)

Your Faith Has Saved You

 Luke 17:11-19

And it came about while He was on the way to Jerusalem, that He was passing between Samaria and Galilee.  And as He entered a certain village, ten leprous men who stood at a distance met Him; and they raised their voices, saying, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!"  And when He saw them, He said to them, "Go and show yourselves to the priests."  And it came about that as they were going, they were cleansed.

Now one of them, when he saw that he had been healed, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice, and he fell on his face at His feet, giving thanks to Him. And he was a Samaritan.  And Jesus answered and said, "Were there not ten cleansed?  But the nine – where are they?  Was no one found who turned back to give glory to God, except this foreigner?"  And He said to him, "Rise, and go your way; your faith has made you well."

Sermon for Fourteenth Sunday After Trinity                             09/01/24

Your Faith Has Saved You

My Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

In many ways, this Gospel lesson is the quintessential lesson for the Church.  There are several lessons neatly coiled up in this pericope, and any one of them could fill a sermon.  There is one lesson about doing what the Lord gives us to do.  There is another lesson about the power of Jesus, and His willingness to heal.  I have heard many sermons, and preached a few myself, on the lesson about thanksgiving in this account, and then there is the lesson I have chosen for the today's theme – the lesson about how faith saves.  I will try to touch on each of these lessons, this morning, but our main theme is, Your Faith Has Saved You.

Jesus is traveling.  He seems to have done a lot of that.  His ministry was called a "peripatetic" ministry, which means He did it while walking around.  He is traveling to Jerusalem, but He is passing between Samaria and Galilee - a Gentile area and the most Gentile area of Israel in the time of Jesus.  In other words, He is traveling among a mixture of Jews and Gentiles and not among the most orthodox practitioners of Judaism.  It is in this mix that He comes upon a mixed group of lepers, as He approaches an unidentified village.  It was unusual for Jews and Gentiles to mix, although this was the most likely area for that to happen, since Lepers were, generally, outcasts, and so what difference would it make to them whether the next leper was a ‘pure Jew' or an ‘unclean Gentile'?  They were all unclean and all outcasts.

They approached Jesus at a distance.  I imagine that they stood between Him and the city gates, making it possible to speak to Jesus without His simply entering the city and locking their cries for mercy outside - not that Jesus would do that, but how were they to know for sure?  Anyhow, they cried out loudly.  They said, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!"

The word "Master" is interesting, because it means ‘commander' or ‘chief', you know, someone with the authority to give orders.  It wasn't, strictly speaking, a religious title.  They simply recognized Jesus as having authority.  Then they cried out for mercy.  That is the cry of sinful man to God.  It means exactly the same thing in our liturgy when we sing, "Lord, have mercy upon us." They were in trouble, and they needed help, and they cried out in their desperation to Jesus for relief.  The only difference between them and us is that they were confronted by their physical leprosy with the urgency of their need.  We often pretend that we are quite alright.

The first lesson: Jesus did not say anything about mercy - He just told them to go and show themselves to the priests.  Jesus gave them something to do that did not necessarily make a lot of sense at the moment, and He did not promise - or even speak of - healing.  The best we can do with the words of Jesus is note that the first step for one who has recovered from or has been healed of leprosy, according to the Law of Moses, was to show themselves to the priests for examination.  We presume that their healing depended on their doing what Jesus told them to do, and yet He didn't say so, or indicate that he going would cleanse them.

Jesus often places us in circumstances where we know what we should do, but other ways and other things may be more inviting.  Jesus is looking for faithfulness.  The first lesson tells us that we are to do what Jesus gives us to do, and not whatever else may appeal to us.  Sometimes, that is very hard.

The second lesson is about the will of Jesus to heal, and the power of Jesus to heal.  The lepers had faith of the sort that said that Jesus could heal, and that Jesus was the sort who would, so they obeyed His command.  We should also act on the basis of the trust that Jesus has a good will toward us, and that He can do what we need done, whatever that may be.  That would mean that we should not despair of God's mercy or believe that just because things haven't gone the way we want them to so far, God isn't aware of our plight, or interested in helping us.  In other words, trust God – trust His goodness, trust His good will toward you, and trust that He can make the difference you need.  Even when things don't seem so good, this Gospel would encourage us to live each moment in cheerful dependence on God and His good will toward us.

The third lesson is the thanksgiving lesson.  There were ten lepers.  All ten were cleansed as they went on their way.  Only one turned back to give glory to God and thanks to Jesus.  Strangely, that one was a Samaritan, the hated Gentile.  We could look at the proportion: one out of ten.  Is that a realistic proportion?  Some days we might want to say yes, and other days we might be uncertain.  The point is that thanksgiving is far more rare than no thanksgiving.

But then we can note especially that those who were Jews, the ones who should have known better, whose religious upbringing should have prepared them, were not grateful, but the Gentile - the outsider was.  I have seen that too.  I had two weddings on one specific day.  It turned out to be among the hottest days of the summer.  The wedding party of the church members who were getting married at one church in the dual parish were drunk and disorderly and showed no reverence for the place they were to sanctify their nuptials.  The unbelievers who had come to be married at the other church - and had gone through pre-marital counseling and weeks of training in the fundamentals of the Christian faith just so that they could use the church for their wedding were humble, and pious, and treated our church with reverence and awe and gratitude.  This lesson could be about how familiarity breeds contempt and how those who should treasure the riches of their faith and heritage often take them for granted and forget all about thanksgiving.  This, then, would be a cautionary tale for us.

The one man, the Samaritan, was so overwhelmed by the wonder of the gift, that he couldn't help himself.  He had to go back and give thanks and praise to God.  The others, Jews, were more of a mind to expect a blessing, and to take it for granted.  I mean, what took God so long!?  Now that they had it, they were not going to miss a beat and mess it up.  Just the Gentile was dumb enough to turn back.  The nine had, at the heart of it, a shortage of thanksgiving, and perhaps a sense of entitlement, as the Chosen People.

Do we have that attitude as Lutherans?  Life-long Lutherans often forget what is so good about being a Lutheran, something those who come in from outside rarely forget.  Some people come to church out of a sense of duty rather than out of the delight in the goodness of the Lord.  Some of us are like the nine, perhaps, doing what we oughta, and some of us have come to give thanks and praise for the abundance of blessings that Jesus has given to each of us.

It is when you recognize yourself - and you are not the Samaritan overcome with thanksgiving and praise - that the Gospel is so sweet.  Jesus died on the cross, innocent of any sin of His own, so that He could take your punishment and meet the wrath of God that you have earned and deserved, so that He could cleanse you of your leprosy - sin.  Your sins are hatreds and evil deeds, unbecoming thoughts and desires, and wicked words.  Your sins include not just bad things you have done, and so disappointed yourself, but also the decent things you did for selfish reasons, and without a thought for Jesus and His sacrifice for you.  Your sins even include forgetting - or merely and wickedly neglecting - to give thanks when and where it is merited - and in this life of sin, every good thing and every blessing merits our heartfelt thanks.

Like those lepers, Jesus has commanded us to go and show ourselves as cleansed.  He announced our forgiveness from the cross when He cried out "It is finished!"  He has sent His servants to remind us with the preaching of the Word and the Holy Absolution that we have been redeemed by Christ the Crucified.  He has washed us in Baptism, and fed us with His body and blood in the Holy Supper.  It doesn't necessarily make us feel any different.  This forgiveness, life, and salvation doesn't impose on us a specific code of conduct, although there are always those ‘out there' who want to tell us that it does - that we "must walk the Christian walk in order to be saved."  But Jesus set us free from our behavior by His own.  We are redeemed and forgiven and set free from the Law into the glorious liberty of the grace of God.

And like the one leper, the one we would hope to emulate, Jesus says to us each time we leave the altar after the Supper, or the assembly of the holy people of God after divine service, "Rise, and go your way; your faith has saved you."  We receive all the good that we get from God by grace through faith.  Your faith, not your church attendance, or your good works, or your good thoughts, but your faith has saved you.

I know that the text of your Bibles probably say, "Your faith has made you well", but the original words of Jesus in Greek mean literally, "Your faith has saved you."  It is interesting to note that Jesus uses the word "cleanse" and the word "heal" in this Gospel lesson - but what He said to the Samaritan who had been cleansed was "Your faith has saved you."  The other nine merely received the healing.  This tenth man received something more, for He believed something more, and acted out His faith -which demonstrated it.  He recognized Jesus for who He is, and when he returned, he was giving thanks and praise to God in the person of Jesus.  He believed more than just the healing - in fact, the healing was his whether he came back to Jesus or not - but the salvation he got he received by grace through faith, just like we do.

Lesson four in this Gospel is the lesson of salvation - Your faith has saved you.  Such faith should lead us to lives of holiness.  It should drive us to heartfelt thanksgiving.  It should lead us to trust Jesus for more than just heaven - and so guide us to do what Jesus has laid before us to do, even when doing it does not present us with any immediate advantage for ourselves.  But regardless of what it should do (and all of the things we earnestly desire for ourselves that our faith will accomplish in us), what it actually does is receive the wonders of forgiveness and life that Jesus has won for us and pours out on us through Word and Sacrament.  Your faith has saved you.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

(Let the people say Amen)