In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Not like a man with intellect and reason and experience, not like a seasoned veteran of war, not like a teacher with initials and degrees come down from the ivory tower, or even like a man who has run a business and shown a profit, but like a child, a little one, you must become. You must give up your airs, your status, your independence and control. You must be vulnerable. You must turn, repent, be converted and risk all on the simple trust that God is good, that He knows best, and that He will take care of you. That, dear friends, is faith.
So it is that greatness in the Kingdom of heaven is measured differently than greatness in the kingdoms of men. For the greatest and most wonderful thing in the Kingdom of heaven is the most despised and pitiable thing in the kingdoms of men, even the unjust, brutal, and bloody execution of Our Lord. In Christ's kingdom, where Grace rules, weakness is strength, poverty is riches, and dependence and vulnerability are virtues.
Child-like faith is not the exception. It is the rule. We should not be surprised that infants are capable of believing. For faith is not of the intellect, but of the heart. It lives and moves in the soul. No one is saved apart from faith in Jesus Christ. No one enters the Kingdom without a vulnerable and dependent trust that risks all on His death and resurrection. Child-like faith does not mean innocent faith. It means asking and letting God change your diaper, wipe away the stinking filth from your most intimate and sensitive parts.
Child-like faith means being confident that He will not only not hurt you or laugh at you, but that He will also cleanse you and keep you healthy. Whoever humbles himself like a child, whoever is dependent and vulnerable and trusting in the mercy of the Father by way of the Son in the Holy Spirit, he is the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven.
"Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down." He has been wiped off our bottoms. He, who accused us "day and night before our God" has been defeated, overcome by the Sacrifice of a perfect Lamb, who had no blemish, no guilt, who went silent to the slaughter for the love of man that words and angels cannot express, which the grave with all its terror could not hold.
And, thus, it is that you "have conquered" that foul tempter and accuser, that pretender, that demonic liar and seducer. How? "By the Blood of the Lamb." By the death of the Innocent for the guilty, by the intervention of the perfect, immaculate One for the imperfect and corrupt, by the power of His resurrection from the dead. For there was war in heaven. But that war is over, that dragon is done. It is only the last skirmishes, the flickering fights of a trounced enemy heading for Hell, that spark around us.
Angels long to look into this victory, this mystery: God became man, died in man's place, satisfied His own holy wrath over man's rebellion, that man would be free and belong again to Him! No angel, however mighty, pure, and loyal he might be, calls God, "Father" and His Son, "Brother and Kinsman." But, you, weak, defiled, unfaithful rebel, you are bold, for you are a son or a daughter by Divine decree, by Grace, by the Blood of the Lamb. You are pure. You belong in the Kingdom. It is yours. You have been bought and forgiven. You are His own little child, marked forever with His Name and pulsing with His life-blood.
And your angels, hosts upon hosts of supernatural powerful beings, are always before the face of His, and your, Father in heaven. Those angels pray for you. They serve you. And at last they shall bear you home.
The ladder in Jacob's dream is not a ladder meant for man to climb up to heaven. Instead it is the means by which angels cross back and forth from there to here and back again. Our Lord identifies Himself as that ladder. The angels ascend and descend upon Him to serve man. By virtue of the Incarnation and the redemption of mankind, that which was a little lower than the angels – mankind – is now higher. In the great and happy exchange, where God took our sin into Himself and freely gave us all that is His: righteousness, holiness, innocence, purity, and heaven; He also gave us the service of His holy angels. Jacob's ladder is placed into your mouth and you are mystically joined to heaven, angels descend to serve you. For that which is placed into your mouth is the very Flesh that was nailed to the cross, laid in the tomb, rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven. It is placed into your mouth for the forgiveness of your sins and to unite you to Him who has loved you more than He loved His life.
And He gives you the protection and service of His holy angels to guard and keep you from all evil. He surrounds you with their mighty protection, because without the holy angels to restrain sin and evil, you would meet your destruction in an instant. They are the walls holding back the sea-tide, the shield deflecting the flaming arrows.
The Holy Angels are God’s instruments, His servants, to take care of us. The book of Hebrews says, “Are [the angels] not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation?”(1.14).
If He wanted to, God could sustain and preserve us against the devil without the angels. But God does not want to do things this way. God works through means.
Fathers and mothers, governments, teachers, sun and moon, water and air – God works through means. Luther said that God “has so arranged it that one creature is to serve another.” God has built servanthood into the structure of creation; everything is ordered around love and service. Parents care for children, spouses care for each other, and so on.
God cares for us by means of the holy angels. Why do we need this care? Because the demons hate us. All manner of people seem to believe in angels, but belief in the devil and demons is relegated to the mockery of medieval superstition. Of course, this is precisely what the devil wants. An enemy is most deadly when you are not expecting him, not on your guard.
Which, of course, is why He sends to you another rank of angels, if you will. The Lord God sends to you His appointed and anointed messengers of the Covenant – His pastors, whom He has called and ordained to be His mouthpieces, to speak to you the strict condemnation of the Law, so that you might be broken in heart and contrite in spirit. He likewise sends His men to preach to you the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, who was crucified for you, for the forgiveness of your sins. He sends His angels to the churches in every land to proclaim the glorious victory of the Lamb over sin, death, and the devil.
The Lord always sends you what you need. And what you need is an angelic man who is outfitted only with the Word, the same Word of the angels, the Word steeped in divine blood, shed for you. That is all he has, for that is all he needs, for the Word does it all.
This is the Word that converts you into little children so that you enter the kingdom of heaven. This is the Word breathed into water so that heaven becomes your second womb and you are born from above. This Word is the Spirit’s sword by which he cuts off the hand or foot which causes you to sin, that cuts to the heart of the matter, that divides joint and marrow, and leads to confession and absolution, to repentance and forgiveness.
This is the Word joined with our flesh and blood in Mary the Virgin, that we might eat that same flesh and blood in the Church our Mother. This is the Word that makes each of you greatest in the kingdom of heaven, for it plants you in the King of the Kingdom and makes you a partaker of his never-ending life.
Woe to him who causes you to sin. Who would dare to stand against you, God's elect, marked with the watery cross of Baptism? Who would accuse you? There is no one. There is only Him who was slain but who lives, He who loves you, surrounded by His holy angels that pray for and serve you. Be comforted by this: the wars and troubles of earth will not last, but the mercy of God endures forever, and your angels – yes, your angels – are always before Him.
In the Name of Jesus. Amen.
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