In Christ

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

As we review the year coming to a close – how have we used it? “Is there one commandment we have not transgressed? Is there one day in which we have not sinned?” Is there one gift for which we have been perfectly thankful and used always and only as God intended? Is there one day where our mouths have poured forth only prayer and praise? “Is there one rescue from trouble for which we have offered the proper praise to God” (Walther)? Is there one sermon we have heard (or preached) that we have fully applied and taken to heart? Is there one neighbor whose needs we have seen to completely and joyfully?

As this year comes to a close, we can only cry out, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” And for those good things we have done, we can only say, “We are but unprofitable servants; we have only done what was our duty.”

“His Own Received Him Not”

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

He came unto His own and His own received Him not. It is not merely wicked Herod, but all of Jerusalem with him, that is deeply troubled at the coming of the wise men from the East. The wise men want to know where the King of kings, that Prince of Peace, is to be born. These wise men are wise by virtue of Daniel who prophesied in their country. And yet, they have more of the Scriptures, more of God’s wisdom, than merely Daniel. By God’s Grace they also have Moses. From Moses they have Balaam’s promised sign of a star. They have seen it fulfilled and with faith, with trust that the God of Moses has fulfilled these things and provided a Savior, they come to worship the One thereby announced.

But they do not have everything.

The Christmas Gift

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today is opened before you a gift of inestimable worth. It is a gift spoken of from in many and various ways, by prophets and patriarchs, by kings and poets. But it is not a new and strange thing. The New Testament contains this great gift. For the New Testament is nothing more than a revelation of the Old Testament. It is as though someone had sealed a letter long ago, and it is just now broken open. So the Old Testament is the testamentary letter of Christ, which He has commanded broken open after His death and proclaimed to the whole world through the preaching of the Gospel.

The fulfillment of the Scriptures is brought forth today, wrapped in swaddling cloths. What was formerly wrapped in shadows and mysteries, known only to seers and prophets, is now revealed to the whole world. The mystery is broken open, the gift is given, the will is read. God is no longer hidden in cloud and smoke; He is present in flesh and blood.

Unto You

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

This evening we gather to hear the words of St. Luke, recording the birth of our Lord, and the angel's proclamation to the shepherds of the great tidings. Listen again:

Fear not; for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.

One might say that this was the first Christmas sermon ever preached. It was delivered from heaven to earth by the angelic messengers of the Lord Himself. And the angel's message continues to be preached year after year, because we can never get enough of hearing it.

Emmanuel Shall Come

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today is the day in the Church Year, every year, when we get the privilege of adding our voices to the ancient choirs who sing throughout the ages the hymn “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.” We sing the haunting melody and the words of the supplications to the God who is coming to us. So let us take a moment to consider the supplications we offer:

Come and teach us the way of prudence.
Come with an outstretched arm and redeem us.
Come quickly to deliver us.
Come and rescue the prisoners who
     are in darkness and the shadow of death.
Come and enlighten those who sit
     in darkness and in the shadow of death.
Come and save us all, whom You formed out of clay.
Come and save us, O Lord our God.

God Gives His Divine Service

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

If there is one thing that all religions have in common, it is the notion of sacrifice. Something or someone must offer or be offered as a sacrifice to appease the deity or universe or nature, or whatever. Sacrifice is a concept so familiar, one might almost say that it is ingrained in the human psyche.

Therefore, one often does not stop long to consider the meaning of the sacrifices, and what God is commanding, in a passage like Deuteronomy 12. God commands the Israelites to destroy the pagan worship sites in their land, left over from the Canaanite peoples they have conquered. Then, they are to go to the place which God will choose, and offer there the sacrifices, offerings, and tithes, which the Lord has commanded.

So that would make it seem as though the Lord is appeased by the slaughter of domestic animals and the incineration of pantry staples. That is the end of the thing, right?

Or is it?

Witness to the Light

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Last week we heard the preaching. Today we consider the preacher. “There was a man sent from God, who name was John.” Who was he, this strange man of the wilderness, dressed like an Old Testament prophet, subsisting on wilderness food? In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, John is a prophet, sent in the spirit of Elijah. In fact, he is Elijah, says Jesus, if you believe that Jesus is the Christ. He is Elijah come to prepare the way of the Lord.

But it is different in the Gospel according to St. John. John puts the question right up front in the opening verses. Why? Many think that it is because John was written at a time when disciples of John the Baptist were still around, even claiming that he was the messiah, or at least one of the messiahs, a prophetic one. That would kind of make sense. But John sets the record straight. The word that describes John in the Gospel according to St. John is not prophet but witness. John was sent from God as a witness, to bear witness to the light, that all might believe through him.

God Gives the Church

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Why does the Church exist? What is the driving force behind this institution? Every institution exists for some purpose, some underlying cause – whether it be social interaction, support of a common cause, shared belief, or whatever – and if it does not, or ceases to, then the institution crumbles.

In the 19th Century, the German theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher asserted that the Church is “a fellowship created by the voluntary actions of men.” That is, men and women come together and form this sociological body that we call the Church for purposes of mutual assurance and affinity. And of course, if the mutual assurance and/or affinity changes or ceases, then the assembly is free to mutate in order to restore it, or else simply to disband – whatever is most expedient for the group.

But is that really what the Church is all about?

Funny-Looking Angel

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

This time of year seems to bring out all kinds of stories about strange-looking characters. There is the kid's story that now seems like a classic, the Elf on a Shelf. Now, someone has come up with a Jewish counterpart – the Mensch on a Bench. St. Nicholas Day was yesterday, so children around the world have have a round of presents delivered, if they were good little boys and girls. In some countries, St. Nick is a rather bizarre, wizened character. And, if the children were not good, on 5 December Krampus came around to do all manner of mischief and mayhem. We still have Santa Lucia Day coming next week, when those of Italian or Scandinavian extraction celebrate the eyeless young maiden who comes with a wreath of candles on her head.

Legend and history is not the only source for funny-looking characters. Today's Gospel lesson introduces us to John the Baptist, the Forerunner of our Lord. Mark introduces him by quoting from the prophet Malachi, who says, literally, “Behold, I send My angel before your face, who will prepare Your way.” John is a funny-looking angel.

God Gives His Word

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Advent is a season of preparation. For much of society, it is simply a pre-Christmas; it gives an excuse to put up the tree, spend gobs of money, and go to parties. A preponderance of the talk, thought, and advertising this time of year is devoted to giving gifts. You must find the perfect gift for everyone on your list. You must determine the best place to buy said gift. You must beat the rush, the crowds, and your own budget to get the best deal. And you expect everyone else to do the same for you.

But this Advent, we will take some time to meditate upon the Gifts that God gives to us.

Rend the Heavens

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Sometimes, people are not grateful when you do something nice for them. Of course, there are the tongue-in-cheek anecdotes about the New York City greeting being an expletive. But sometimes it is more clear even than that.

Have you ever changed a baby's poopy diaper? You walk into the nursery to find a child screaming for attention, and you pick him up, and the odor coming from his backside is unmistakeable. So you set him down on the changing table, undo his clothes, and he starts squirming. You undo his diaper and he starts crying. You start wiping away the muck, and he tries to crawl away, jump off the table, or anything other than lie there and let you clean his bottom. Then, when you have him cleaned up, re-diapered, and re-dressed, he screams because you changed him instead of feeding him.

Mercy and Thanksgiving

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Mercy - the word only has five letters, but it has a lot of meaning. The ten lepers in today's Gospel lifted up their voices, saying, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us." Blind men cried aloud saying, "Have mercy on us, Son of David." A woman whose daughter was demon possessed cried aloud, saying, "Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David" All these people and many more came to Jesus and asked for help with the words "have mercy." Sometimes they expressed their need, but other times as in today's Gospel, they simply asked for mercy and left the expression of that mercy up to Jesus.

Mercy often partners with grace. Grace gives something wonderful that you do not deserve. Mercy holds back something bad that you do deserve. In some ways mercy is sort of the opposite of grace. Grace gives. Mercy holds back. In other ways mercy and grace complete one another. We usually receive grace and mercy together and we are better off for it.

Hospitality

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today's text confuses a lot of people, even a lot of Lutherans. It seems to be contradictory to everything else that we believe, teach, and confess. All that business about salvation by grace through faith in Christ alone – that looks like it gets chucked out the window with this passage. After all, the King is basing His judgment on the works done by those on His right and left. This seems to lend itself to the idea that you will be judged on the works you have done, whether you have done enough to merit the favor of the King.

The Church of Rome reads this discourse in just such a fashion. To them, this passage is all about hospitality that you must show to your neighbor. Your faith is formed by your love, which is worked out in your service to your neighbor. This passage is straightforward Law: do this, and go to heaven; fail, and go to hell. Salvation cannot possibly be grace through faith alone; Jesus commend these faithful for their works of hospitality and service.

Perception

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

It has often been said that "perception is reality." Basically, how I perceive things to be is how they really are. If I think someone is a jerk, so be it. He is a jerk. It does not matter what else he does in life. It does not matter what anyone else says. My perception is my reality. Of course, we know this is not always true. Perception is not always reality. I perceive the world to be flat, therefore the world is flat. I perceive that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, therefore the sun must surely revolve around the earth. You can certainly argue with me and tell me that the world is round and that we orbit the sun and so on, but my perception is my reality. I think you are wrong! Nowadays, we would just have to "agree to disagree." Truly, perception is not always reality.

Keep Your Lamps Ready

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.” That is, the kingdom of heaven is like those who are turned out to meet the King when He comes, from every sort, every walk of life, all holding their lamps.

“Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.” In this assembly, all waiting for the Bridegroom, there are wise and there are foolish persons.

This is the nature of the Church on earth.

It Is Not A Forced-Choice Test

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

In today's Gospel, the Pharisees want to talk about taxes. Well, what they really want to talk about is how to trap Jesus in His words, which is ridiculous, because you cannot trap God. Nevertheless, they come to our Lord and ask Him about whether Jews ought to pay taxes. Should the faithful people of God do such a thing? Should we obey pagan leaders when they exercise their authority over us?

Often, in Christian circles, this exchange is portrayed as something of a forced-choice test, a broken dichotomy between God and Caesar. In other words, you must give to God His due, and to Caesar his due, and ne'er the twain shall meet. It is as though God inhabits certain corners of your life, and Caesar inhabits other corners, and you can put yourself into various boxes or pigeon-holes, depending on the moment.

But this is not a forced choice.

Are You Serious?

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Is the Lord's invitation to the marriage feast of His Son serious? In today's Gospel lesson, you have heard how our Lord Christ compares the kingdom of God to a king who gives a marriage feast for His Son, to which He invites guests. However, the invited guests disdain the King's invitation, stay away, and even deal scornfully with His servants, who were merely sent to call the invited to the feast.

What is this kingdom? The kingdom of heaven is not an earthly kingdom. There are no governors, no presidents, no Congress, no elections.

How Will You Die?

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Jesus said, “And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.”

Either way, you are dead. Either you fall on Jesus in broken-hearted, empty-handed, beggarly repentance or you get crushed by the weight of your own engineered pseudo-salvation crashing down against the resistance of your own self-justification. But either way, you are going to be broken when you encounter Jesus.

Jesus told a parable against the unbelief of Israel. A man planted a vineyard and let it out to tenant farmers who were supposed to tend it and give a share of the harvest. He sent a servant to collect, and he was beaten and sent away empty-handed. He sent another, and he was mocked and scorned and sent away empty-handed. He sent a third, and they wounded him and cast him out. He sent his son. “His beloved son.” And they took one look at the son and said, “This is the heir. Let us kill him and the inheritance will be ours.” And they threw him out of the vineyard, and they killed him.

Stop here for a moment and consider.

Michael vs. the Dragon

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pains and the agony of giving birth. And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she bore her child he might devour it. She gave birth to a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne, and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which she is to be nourished for 1,260 days.

At the fullness of time, according to the will of God, Mary, the Mother of God, appeared in midst of the heavens, clothed with the radiance of the sun, bedecked with the royal garments of God, because she, having been overshadowed by the Holy Spirit, was greatly pregnant with none other than the eternally uncreated, only-begotten Son of God come into the flesh. She is borne aloft by the moon, the lesser light, and encircled by the twelve stars, the witnesses of the one Holy Church from ages past and in time to come.

“Salvation Belongs to the Lord”

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“O Lord, how many are my foes! Many are rising against me; many are saying of my soul, there is no salvation for him in God.” What a state to be in, to be surrounded by your enemies, outnumbered by your foes, and to have voices continually whispering in your ear that your faith is a lie and your God is a fraud.

Many are saying of your soul, “There is no salvation for you in your God.” The devil's lies float on clouds of air and land as softly as a butterfly. But they bite like the worst mosquito in history. And they itch and fester and plague just as badly as any mosquito bite. The whispers, or shouts, that tell you that God is dead, if He ever existed in the first place. Or maybe it is that He is there, but He does not love you. How could your God be a God of love when He committed the most heinous example of divine child abuse ever?

Sweet Bitterness

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today, the Church remembers and gives thanks for the life and work of St. Matthew, as is right and salutary. We rejoice to remember those who have gone before us in the Faith, remembering their example of godly living and joining in their steadfast confession of the Faith once given to them, now delivered to us. St. Matthew now resides among the great cloud of witnesses, in whose midst we we one day stand as well.

So who was St. Matthew? The Gospels tell us that he was also called Levi. Scholars reckon that this is simply a case of a guy having a Hebrew or Aramaic name, and also a Greek or Latin name. Simon is Cephas is Peter. Saul is Paul. And so on; it was a common occurrence in the ancient Near East.

That Matthew is called Levi indicates that he was a Jew. Which fact makes it such an indictment of his character that he worked as a tax collector. Often we are told to think all sorts of hateful things about tax collectors. They are cheats, crooks, swindlers. They are out to steal from everyone who crosses their desks. They take delight in putting the screws to the little guy. Such is the case with Zacchaeus. He was all these things, and freely admitted it, and made it right when our Lord called him to faith. However, about Levi we have no such record. Following the Eighth Commandment, we ought simply to think that he did his job within the constraints of the laws of Rome. As far as we know, Levi was an honest tax collector.

Who Satisfies You?

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Bless the LORD, O my soul,
and all that is within me,
bless his holy name!
Bless the LORD, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits,
who forgives all your iniquity,
who heals all your diseases,
who redeems your life from the pit,
who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy,
who satisfies you with good
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.

We chanted these words from the mouth of David this morning, and we rejoice to confess the wondrous works of the Lord with the Blessed Psalmist, and to give thanks to the Lord for all His gracious benefits to us. It is psalms like this that make the soul joyful and exultant in the Lord. And this is good, right, and salutary.

The Greatest

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Beaten with rods, flayed like a fish and then crucified upside down.” This was the fate of St. Bartholomew, also known as Nathanael. He is among the lesser-known disciples. In fact the story of his martyrdom is one of tradition. It is a tradition to which we subscribe, but know full well that it is not Scripture. But what is Scripture is the Gospel appointed for this day of St. Bartholomew. And one could ask the question, “So why is this Gospel lesson chosen for him? He is not mentioned by name. None of the disciples are mentioned by name” The answer is found when you put the story of his martyrdom and this Gospel together.

“Who is the greatest of all the disciples?” Certainly it has to be St. Peter, the confessing rock of the Church, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” No, it is not him. Remember, Jesus calls him Satan in the same conversation in which Peter confesses the truth about Jesus. And three times Peter denied his Lord, the very same night of this debate between the disciples. Certainly he is not the greatest.

Dogs and Crumbs

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today's Gospel lesson is not a popular one. It is not one of those accounts of Jesus being all nice and sweet. He does not multiply bread and fish and feed a zillion people. He does not have compassion and heal crowds of sick people. He does not do anything neat and cute and altruistic. He does not even say anything nice that we can file away in a Hallmark card and save to spout later when it sounds cute. In fact, today's Gospel lesson makes Jesus sound like a jerk.

Here is this poor woman, and she comes to Jesus, asking Him to heal her daughter who has been severely oppressed by a demon. And what does Jesus do? Nothing. Not one thing. He keeps on walking. He ignores her. Gentiles do not approach Jews, and women do not approach rabbis. It is as if she does not exist.

Then, after she has pestered His entourage enough that the disciples entreat Jesus to make her go away, He tells her that He was not sent to her, and calls her a dog, one of the more offensive terms one could hurl at another human being in that day. Dogs were scum, scavengers and nuisances, a cause for concern and disdain, dirty and impure. And Jesus called this woman a dog, simply for coming to ask Him to heal her daughter. What a jerk, right?

Limits

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

In J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings saga, there is a scene where the band of good guys are racing through the underground realm of Moria, and they are confronted with an ancient evil foe risen from the lowest depths of the earth. The Balrog comes up from the darkness and pursues them through the caverns and halls, until they reach the bridge of Khazad-Dum, a narrow stone bridge spanning an abyss that falls into the very heart of the earth. The men, dwarves, and hobbits race across the bridge toward safety, but, seeing that they are in dire danger, Gandalf the wizard stops in the middle of the bridge, plants his magical staff, and defies the enormous ancient beast, shouting, “You shall not pass!” The demon tries with all its might to attack Gandalf, but the light holds fast against the darkness, until Gandalf strikes the bridge, shattering it and sending the Balrog down into the abyss, allowing the rest of the Fellowship to escape. However, at the last second, the demon's whip grabs Gandalf and pulls him down, too.

Blessed, Not Destroyed

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Jesus had compassion upon the people. He looked upon their infirmities and their afflictions, and He healed them. And He healed them. And He healed them some more.

He healed them of their illnesses and their diseases. He drove out their demons. He made the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk, the mute speak. He forgave sins and proclaimed freedom to those held captive by sin, death, and the devil. He did all this out of compassion for their sorry state of affairs. And what did it cost the poor, bedraggled masses? Nothing.

Then it got late. It was a desolate, wilderness place, and the day was far spent. The disciples petitioned Jesus to tell the crowds to go away. “Send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves.” Go away and leave us alone. Find your own food. Can't you see that Jesus has done enough? You already chased Him all over hill and dale, all the way across the Sea of Galilee. Let the poor man rest, and go spend your own money for once.

The Mystery Man

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Once upon a time there was a desolate land, a land of dust and death and grit and thorns. Anything that lived on the land decayed and died. Plants, animals, people – they all died, and some, in dying, suffered greatly, and some, watching the dying, suffered greatly as well.

During the short time that the people lived on this land, they quickly grew backs that bent way over from them trying to scratch out a living upon the face of the cursed ground and to keep from dying. Most of the time it was only the old ones who died, but sometimes it was a young man, a promising child, or a baby girl.

The people did not like the thought of dying for they had seen what a struggle it was. To keep from being reminded of dying, the people of the land did not think about it much. Whenever someone did die, they dug a hole in the ground or in the side of a hill, and they put the dead man or woman or youth or child or baby into the hole. And if it was a baby, the hole was not very big.

A Mixed Bag

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Church of God here on earth is a mixed bag. In any given Christian assembly there are the faithful saints of God, redeemed by Christ and anxious to hold fast to the pure Word of God. And right alongside them are the false saints, the pseudo-Christians who would reject the truth of the Gospel, water down the proclamation of the Word, or propose new ways and new measures to accomplish their goals. We may wish it were not so, but that is how things are.

This is what the parable Jesus tells in today's Gospel reading teaches. The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field, but in the middle of the night, the enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat. No one was any more the wiser, until the plants grew up and their fruits were evident.

When it was evident that the weeds had been sown over top of and into the midst of the wheat, the servants of the master asked whether they should go and rip out the weeds. The master told them to leave the weeds alone until the harvest, lest they damage the wheat as they worked. Then, at the last, they could separate the good from bad and deal with each accordingly.

Doing Hard Things

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Sometimes it is difficult to get things done. You set out with a plan for the day, a list of things to get accomplished. And, almost as soon as you get started, it seems, things are derailed. An unexpected phone call. A slew of activity on Facebook. A breakdown of equipment. Something is bound to come along and lay waste to your best-laid plans.

It is even more difficult to get things done when you do not want to do them in the first place. There is always something more interesting on the internet. Something is always wandering about in the yard outside the window. Some other project, whatever it might be, is always more intriguing or seems more important. Anything at all that you can come up with in order to avoid doing the things you do not want to face.

Face it – how many people actually – really, truly, honestly – enjoy hard work?

Apathy vs. Confession

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today we celebrate the Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul, apostles and martyrs. This is the day the Church has marked as the date of the death of these two pillars of the Church, so that we may rejoice to receive the gifts God has given to His people through these saints. For it is indeed good, right, and salutary that we should reflect upon those who have gone before us, give thanks for their faithful confession of the Faith, and meditate upon their examples of holy living.

Ancient tradition holds that Peter and Paul were both martyred on this day, although the exact year, or whether they both died the same day, or on separate years, has been debated throughout the centuries. It is believed that St. Paul was beheaded just outside the city of Rome proper, at a place now called Tre Fontane. He was then buried at a place now covered by the Basilica of St Paul Outside the Wall.

St. Peter, on the other hand, is reported to have suffered a much more gruesome martyrdom. Origen asserts that “Peter was crucified at Rome with his head downwards, as he himself had desired to suffer.” This is taken as fulfillment of what Jesus said to Peter in John 21: “when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.” It is understood that Peter met his death in the Gardens of Nero on the Vatican hill. His remains now lie in a vault beneath the high altar of the Basilica of St. Peter in Vatican City, the altar from which the Pope celebrates the Mass.

Fear and Fear

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

On Saturday, 4 March 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt took office as President of the United States. Shortly after taking the oath of office, Roosevelt delivered his first inauguration speech, one that has come to be iconic of America rhetoric. He said:

This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory.

Roosevelt took office in the midst of one of the great crises of American history.

(What) God Be With You (?)

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

If you have ever visited an Eastern Orthodox church, you have seen an unfamiliar picture of God, the Bible, and the world presented before your eyes. Instead of plain white walls, patterned after stoic German congregations, their walls are cluttered with pictures. You might almost feel that all the angels and saints are elbowing each other for space. They paint the picture of salvation on three levels.

On the lowest level – ground level, you might say – is Christ with His apostles celebrating the Holy Communion, John the Baptist baptizing, and other such scenes. This is the level on which we, the Church, now live. Our religious life, our life together as Christians, reaches its apex in embracing Christ within the Divine Service. He who lived and ate with His disciples now lives and eats with you in the Supper of His Body and Blood. The Blessed Sacrament is for us a living icon, the visible Word.

"With One Accord"

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today we gather, as did the apostles, after the fact of our Lord's ascension into heaven, beyond the sight and sound of humanity. He is risen from the dead – at this fact we rejoice. He is ascended into heaven – this fact is cause for rejoicing, but is just as likely to cause some melancholy. For what comes now? The apostles were told to go back to Jerusalem and wait. And what should they do while they waited? What should you do while you wait for the Lord?

“All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and His brothers.” Note two things about this verse. First, the apostles were of one accord. They were literally “of the same thymus”, that is, of the same soul, life, or desire. That is to say, the apostles were united in desire and will, and certainly in action. For with one accord they were devoting themselves to prayer. As one Greek lexicon renders it, they were “persisting obstinately” in prayer. They were united, and they were stubborn about adhering to the prayers of the brethren. Nothing could divide the apostles in those days, while they waited for the will of the Lord to be made manifest.

But what is the nature of this accord with which the apostles, the women, and the brethren of Jesus were united? Is it merely a bond of affection? A mutual consolation and wish for similar goals? Is it a common bond of grief for the One whom they all loved and lost?

Memorial Day 2014

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

Lord, it belongs not to my care
Whether I die or live;
To love and serve Thee is my share,
And this Thy grace must give (LSB 757.1).

Each year, Americans gather on this day to remember the fallen warriors of our nation's history. We remember those who have paid the fullest price for the freedoms which we now enjoy. We give thanks for the gifts they have given, which continue to give to far-removed generations. We honor the memory of those we have lost, and we entreat the Lord of Hosts that no more may be slain.

When a soldier goes off to war, it is a somber moment.

What Did Jesus Do?

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Fast bound in Satan's chains I lay;
Death brooded darkly o'er me.
Sin was my torment night and day;
In sin my mother bore me.
But daily deeper still I fell;
My life became a living hell,
So firmly sin possessed me (LSB 556.2).

Recently, I watched a television show where science fiction crashed right into the realm of religion. In the show, the main characters crash-land onto a forlorn planet hovering precariously on the edge of a black hole, but mysteriously not being sucked in and destroyed. Some scientists had discovered this planet, and scans found that there was a massive, unexplainable energy source in the middle of it, so they set about drilling down to reach it. What they found was mind-bending: they found the Abyss, the prison of Satan, the great Beast.

A Stick or A Cross?

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Gospel Reading for this Sunday has one of the most beautiful Gospel proclamations ever spoken by Jesus, our Redeemer. Sadly, this same part of God's Word is also one of the verses most misused.

Please listen to John 14:6 with the following question in mind: "What Kind of Stick is This?" “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.'”

In order that this sermon may be one that is memorable, consider the fact that, on May 1, 1885, Rev. Dr. C. F. W. Walther, in his 26th evening lecture, stated in Thesis XV: "In the eleventh place, the Word of God is not rightly divided when the Gospel is turned into a preaching of repentance." Now it should be noted that this thesis rightly follows Thesis V which was part of his 9th evening lecture of November 21, 1884 during which Dr. Walther stated that the grossest confounding of Law and Gospel occurs when Christ is represented as a new Lawgiver and the Gospel is turned into a doctrine of meritorious works. Got it?

But, wait a minute.

Shepherd of Souls

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Many people struggle with taking what you hear on Sunday in the sermon and connecting it to the rest of your daily lives. This is one of those things that pastors spend time and effort trying to do, to give you something that will stay with you through the week. Of course, the hope is that the Gospel – that Christ has borne your sin to the Cross, suffered and died taking on the punishment and paying the price for your sins there upon the cross, and is raised for your justification that you may be his own and have eternal life – that this Gospel is the thing that stays with you throughout the week.

But if we were to be honest, it is quite easy to forget just what the sermon was about. How often have you sat here, listened to some preacher hold forth for ten, fifteen, twenty minutes, sometimes eloquently and persuasively, sometimes not, and then forgotten what he said by the first distribution hymn? How many of you, if quizzed on Wednesday, would remember today's sermon?

What Is Faith?

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Father. Amen.

What is faith? What is the purpose of believing? An awful lot of talk happens in Christian circles about faith – growing in faith, the power of faith, faith moving mountains, and so on. But why? What is the big deal about faith?

 

Is faith an intellectual assent to a set of propositions? “Strong belief” or “complete trust”, as some dictionaries define it? Or perhaps faith is an emotional connection to something? Many religious sorts would posit that faith is defined by a burning in the bosom, some sort of internal and immediate flush of feeling and conviction that serves some sort of devotional purpose. To such as this, faith is not about intellectual matters so much as a matter of the heart simply hearing the call of God and experiencing the nearness of Christ, or some such business.

"Such Faith"

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” (1Pet. 1:3-5)

You have been born again to a living hope. Why? Because Jesus is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity. Death no longer has dominion over Him, and being in Him, it no longer has dominion over you. You live in hope of an imperishable inheritance which is now already yours, and is waiting to be revealed in the last time. And while you wait, you are being guarded through faith, by the power of God. But how do you obtain such faith as guards your soul and body unto life everlasting?

Earthquakes

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“I feel the earth move under my feet / I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down / I feel my heart start to trembling / Whenever you're around.” This opening stanza from Carole King's 1971 rock anthem might well be the words of the soldiers posted at the tomb of our Lord that first day of the week, the day of our Lord's resurrection.

They felt the earth move under their feet as the Lord of Life broke the bonds of death once for all and the tomb that could not hold the Living God was burst open and the Prince of Life who died strode forth in immortal splendor. He is not dead; He has risen!

Of course, this is not the first earthquake in these few days of history.

Clinging

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Awake, my heart with gladness, / See what today is done; / Now, after gloom and sadness, / Comes forth the glorious sun.” Awake, o ye faithful! Awake and arise from the sleep of death, for the glorious sun of righteousness has dawned upon the never-ending day of the new creation in our resurrected Lord Jesus. See what today is done – how our Lord conquered the powers of sin, death, and the devil, and rose victorious over cross and grave!

Awake, be attentive to the Wisdom that comes down from on high! Be attentive to the Lord who appears to His people to fulfill the blessed visions of the Prophets and the testimony of the Evangelists. Be attentive to the Wisdom of God revealed unto salvation for mankind. Be attentive to the voice of God calling you from weeping to rejoicing at the blessed vision of your Lord and your God.

Ending and Beginning

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Dear Christians, one and all, rejoice! Tonight the holy penitential season of Lent is ended. Fasting and weeping are put away. Tears and sorrow are removed. Your salvation is completed.

And yet, this is but the end of the beginning. For on this holy night, we keep solemn vigil. We keep watch for the One who comes in the Name of the Lord, the coming King. St. Augustine wrote:

In that life for the attainment of the peace of which we labor, and which Truth promises to us in the resurrection after the death of this body or at the end of this world, we shall never sleep, just as we shall never die. For what else is sleep but a daily death which does not completely remove man hence nor detain him too long? And what else is death but a very long and very deep sleep from which God arouses man? Therefore, when there is no death, there is likewise no sleep, the image of death. Finally, there is no sleep except that of mortals.

The Family of God

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Facebook phenomenon of picking sides in political and philosophical battles hurts families. Facebook has made it easy to tell tales out of school, and many have found themselves filled with sorrow at such actions. At one time, we disagreed with our parents’ politics in dorm rooms. We complained about our in-laws over coffee to close friends. Those we loved, but disagreed with or even disrespected, in part, remained mostly unaware of it. They were not hurt very much by it. We could strut and boast and conduct thought experiments in relative safety, without much long-term damage. Now we broadcast our disagreement, and often our disrespect, all over the world in an indelible, digital format that might well follow us the rest of our lives. Was the old way more dishonest than the new? Perhaps. But it was also less damaging and less painful, easier to correct and amend.

Our families are more broken and dysfunctional than we care to admit. We look back at the medieval idea of courtly love and Victorian romance with derision for its artificiality. But any judgment on our part reveals our hypocrisy. We are a people raised on sitcoms and pop music. Our culture’s view of love is that it is mainly a matter of affection and that the good feeling it gives is the highest good. We think love is god, but by love we mean our own amusement and pleasure. Thus, we have little room for sacrifice or duty. If it feels good in the moment, it must be love, and if doesn’t feel good, or if it grows stale, we drop it.

“If I Do Not Wash You”

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Peter said to Him, 'You shall never wash my feet.' Jesus answered him, 'If I do not wash you, you have no share with Me.'” If you will not let Jesus serve you, then you will not receive the benefit of His service. It is that simple.

God comes to mankind to serve us. It has always been that way. Speaking to the Samaritan woman at the well, Jesus instructs her to ask Him for the living water that will well up in her unto salvation. She believes, albeit after some trepidation and some questioning. Therefore she receives the living water of salvation. The crowds come Jesus to be healed and cured and cleansed and taught. They believe, and their afflictions are taken away. The weary crowds come to Jesus for food, and He feeds them. “Whoever feeds on My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life.” Our Lord serves His people not only with the bread and wine of the earth, the perishable stuff that preserves our perishable bodies for a time, but also His own true physical Body and Blood to preserve us now and unto life everlasting.

Envy and Blame

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pilate “knew that it was out of envy that [the Jews] had delivered [Jesus] up.” It was evident to anyone with half a brain that the chief priests and the teachers of the Law were out to get Jesus because they feared for their position and reputation. Caiaphas himself said prophetically that “it is better for you that one man should die for the people, not that the whole nation should perish.” (John 11:50) They feared that if Jesus were elevated in the estimation of the people, the whole nation would follow after Him, and the priests and scribes would be dishonored.

Envy leads people to do some awful things. It leads to wars and genocides. It leads to murders and beatings. It leads to discrimination and division. It leads to people whom you might consider otherwise neighborly and peaceable doing and saying things that are downright despicable and destructive.

Of course, envy is nothing new.

"Like A Weaned Child"

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Long ago, the legend holds, Daedalus and his son Icarus were imprisoned by the wicked king Minos in a high tower atop a cliff overlooking the Aegean Sea. Daedalus determined that their only means of escape would be to build wings and soar off like birds. Being an engineer and a clever man, Daedalus constructed a set of wings covered with bird feathers held on with wax. He made a set for himself, and one for his feckless son Icarus. Before they set out on their escape, Daedalus warned his son not too fly too low to the sea, lest his wings become waterlogged, nor too high in the sky, lest the sun warm the wax and cause the wings to melt. They launched into the bright Grecian sun, and were free!

However, hapless young Icarus soon became overwhelmed with the power of flight and wheeled too high into the heavens. So close to the sun he went that his father's warning proved true. His wings melted and came apart, and the poor boy fell and drowned in the sea. He did not heed sound counsel, but lifted up his eyes and his heart to things beyond his powers, and was destroyed for want of wisdom. So goes the efforts of the people of this world in attaining knowledge and understanding of things not given to them.

Ubi Jesu, Ibi Vita

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

In the middle of winter, even a well-managed cemetery is a bleak place to visit. It is not designed to be this way: trees and shrubs and flowers are carefully planted to give color and beauty to the resting place of loved ones, to a site of mourning and grief. But winter comes with cold winds and freezing temperatures, with snow and ice. Life retreats: green disappears, the lawns turn brown, leaves fall, and branches look like dead sticks while the gravestones stand sentry and time goes on. For those weeks of winter, it is a place where all seems dead. This year, it seemed like the cemetery itself was buried under a cloak of white death.

But it is not so. Though sometimes it seems like it will never happen, the sun will rise higher with warmth and light, and the cemetery will be more a like a garden again. Those trees and shrubs and lawns are not dead forever; they are merely dormant, waiting for the sun to bring them back to life.

With that, the Lord teaches us an important lesson: what is true for the trees is also true for the people of God who rest from their labors. The Son of God comes to bring them back to life. Where Jesus, there life.

Rescue Me!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

As we have gathered together these weeks to mark the Lenten season, we have meditated on the Psalms of Trust, as they are often called. Tonight we turn our attention to Psalm 71, and we learn from the Psalmist how we ought to trust in the Lord in the face of opposition for the sake of the Word.

“In you, O LORD, do I take refuge; let me never be put to shame!”, cries the Psalmist. Whither shall you go for refuge in this world? For you are like Peter, faced with the choice of belief or disbelief: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” Shall you go to the scholars of this age? They will tell you that refuge is to be found in health and wealth. They will give you prescriptions for every ailment under the sun, and then more prescriptions to counteract the prescriptions they prescribed in the first place. They will tell you to put your money in this or that or the other thing. Invest in gold; invest in farmland; invest in emerging markets; invest in “glocal” businesses.

The Blind Servant

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

In the ancient world, and even into the middle ages, to be blind left open a peculiar set of employment options. Two jobs often reserved for blind men were poet and prophet/priest. In many cults of the past, the prophet or priest or seer was often blind. It was thought that a blind prophet had his power to see the physical world replaced with an ability to foresee the future, or to see the will of the gods.

The blind poet is a stock figure in history. Legend has it that the great Greek poet Homer was blind, as well as John Milton, James Joyce, and several other significant writers throughout history. Church history even has its own blind bard, if you will – the fourth-century Alexandrian theologian Didymus the Blind, known for his incredible memory and stirring theological insights. The archetype of the blind poet assumes that because one has been deprived of the physical sense of sight, the eye of the mind is opened to other ways of thinking and processing, and thus new forms of creativity.

Today's Old Testament lesson speaks of the blind and deaf servant of the Lord.

God Has A Mom

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

It is fitting that we should pause in our Lenten observance, these nine months before Christmas, and contemplate the joy of our Lord’s Annunciation. For it is God’s good and gracious will that those who are humbled and fatigued by the grief of penitence and who mourn deeply for their sins, might be consoled by the Word and promise of God whose Son, born of Mary, takes away the sins of the world.

The angel sent from God comforted Mary with these words: “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.”

He promised more than a Son to the Virgin. In this, he also promised pardon to the guilty, redemption to the captives, and opening of the prison to them that are bound. He announced the Kingdom of the Son and in that Kingdom the glory of the righteous and the reward of faith. The Name Jesus – The Lord who saves – is the terror of Hell and the joy of Heaven.

Water and Marriage

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Today you have heard about the encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well. Like most of the vignettes in the Gospels, a great deal of ink has been spilled in attempting to tease out the meaning and significance of this account.

The structure of this account bears striking similarities to the account of Abraham's servant seeking out Rebekah for marriage to Isaac. Only here the bridegroom is not the far-off son of an unknown master, but the Great Bridegroom Himself, the very Son of God, only-begotten of His Father from all eternity. And the Bride is not just one beautiful woman, but the one most desirable to the Bridegroom – the bride whom He has washed clean and sanctified by His own blood and with His innocent suffering and death.

Today, our Lord gives us a lesson in the importance of the Church.

An Example of Trust

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Trust in Him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us.” Thus sings David, and thus the Church of God lives. What refuge is there for the man of God but to trust in God at all times?

Today, the Church calendar provides us with an example of what it means to trust in God at all times. St. Joseph was a just man and faithful to the Law of Moses. He was honorable and righteous, and he sought to do the right thing. He was betrothed to the Virgin Mary, and was willing to do for her according to the Law and the customs of their people. And Joseph no doubt expected her to live up to her end of the contract also. So it should come as no surprise to you that he was knocked for a loop when “she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.”

What is an honorable man to do when him fiancee is found to be with child, and he is certain that it cannot be his, since they have not known one another? He would have been within his rights to stone her for fornication, or at least certainly to divorce her publicly and smear her name irretrievably. But “Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.” From this, the Church has often inferred that Joseph did genuinely love the Blessed Virgin, that he would not seek the full measure of the Law's justice upon her.

But did he trust her word, about the origins of the child she was carrying? Would you?

Signs and Idols

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Of ourselves we have no strength.” We make this confession in the appointed Collect for today. And indeed, we have no strength. Neither you nor I have any strength in us to do anything useful. Our wills are corrupted and our bodies are weak and feeble. We live in a dying world, among the walking dead. Of ourselves we have no strength, because of ourselves we are dead.

One of the things for which you have no strength is resisting temptation. Even the regenerate man, the person baptized into Christ and marked with the Name of the Lord, still faces temptation, and more often than not gives in to it. Today's Gospel lesson alludes to a great temptation – the temptation of images and signs.

On one hand, there is the temptation toward idolatry. Depicting God in any form, even the face of Jesus Christ, runs the risk of creating an idol, an object of worship, or at least dependence. This is why the Reformed traditions reject all forms of church art or visual depictions of God. They assert that to depict God in any way, shape, or form is to diminish His glory, because the glory of God is beyond the capacity for human beings to represent. Furthermore, they assert that to depict Jesus in visual form is to rob Him of His divinity, because the divine cannot be expressed in visual terms. Finally, the Reformed claim that God commands His people to worship Him and to deal with Him only in Word and Spirit, and that to depict Him visually is a direct disobeying of this edict.

Light and Shelter

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? With these words, God tenderly invites us to trust in Him for hope and salvation, just as David did. Since the Lord is your light and salvation and your refuge, what have you to fear?

When you might be assailed by fear and temptation, remember these words, and then remember your Baptism. In Holy Baptism, you were marked with the sign of the holy cross upon your forehead and upon your heart. You were engraved with the Name of the Lord God Almighty, and your name was inscribed in the Book of Life. Your salvation is secure, therefore. Fear not; who can harm you now?

Remember what happens in the Rite of Baptism.

Coyote in a Trap

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Coyotes are known for being tenacious and relatively fearless creatures. They are also obsessively stubborn in the pursuit of something they want. One peculiar characteristic of the coyote is how he will react to being caught in a trap. It has long been known that if a coyote is caught in a trap, he will do anything to escape, even down to gnawing off his own foot or leg in order to get free. Of course, that more than likely means that he will die of blood loss, infection, or starvation. But he will die free! A friend told me that he has never caught a coyote minus a foot, but he has often found severed feet in a trap.

Between last week and today, a line has been crossed. We have entered from the blissful season of Epiphany into the penitential season of Lent. And another line has been crossed in today's Gospel lesson. Jesus, fresh out of the waters of the Jordan where He was baptized by John, is immediately driven out into the wilderness to fast and to be tempted by the devil.

Notice that there is no lolly-gagging about at the Jordan. No party, no cake, no massive to-do or society debut. Right upon the heels of Baptism, Jesus begins to suffer and to be tempted by the devil. The trap has snapped shut. There is no turning back, if there ever was anyhow.

Rend Your Hearts

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

This past Sunday, we celebrated the Feast of the Transfiguration of our Lord. We were privileged to have the heavens opened and the voice of God speak to us. We saw the face of our Lord bright and shining as the sun. And now the heavens are shut up tight.

Epiphany is a season of having the gates of heaven flung open to the whole world. The Lord of Hosts is here. And now we enter in to the season of Lent, where the doors are closed. The way is barred. The gates are locked. You may not enter heaven, not even in a vision. You may not hear the song of the angels. No glory resounds in the sky now. Mankind may not enter into heaven, but must remain on earth. You must sit beside the waters of Babylon, weeping for your sins and praying for a Redeemer. Mourn for yourselves, for your children, for the consequences of your sin. Transfiguration is over; today is Ash Wednesday.

"And Our Redemption See"

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

'Tis good, Lord, to be here!

Thy glory fills the night;

Thy face and garments, like the sun,

Shine with unborrowed light (LSB 414.1).

So goes the first stanza of the familiar hymn written for the Feast of the Transfiguration, which we celebrate here today. And indeed, 'tis good, Lord, to be here!

It is good to be in this place, in the presence of the Lord, to hear and see the Lord of Hosts display His glory for His creatures to see, even if for a brief moment in time. The glory of the Lord fills the night and shines out through the day, eclipsing even the sun itself in His brightness and radiance. The face of our Lord Christ shines with truly unborrowed light, light more pure than even that of our brightly-burning star. Our Lord's garments are transfigured to be as white as snow, whiter than any fuller's soap or laundress' bleach could hope to get them.

This is the glory of the Lord on display for the people of God to see. This is the Word made flesh who dwells among us, just as St. John declares. In His face we see the glory of the immortal, invisible Father in heaven, whom no one has seen, whom no one may see and live. In the light of Christ, we see light. In His radiant face we behold the glory of the Father, full of grace and truth. In this brightly beaming face, we see the radiance of grace and mercy, the countenance of God which He is pleased to lift up upon us, the face which He makes to shine upon us, being gracious to us and showing His steadfast love to us.

'Tis good, Lord, to be here,

Thy beauty to behold

Where Moses and Elijah stand,

Thy messengers of old (LSB 414.2).

It is good to be here, to sit at the foot of the mountain and see our Lord holding converse nigh with Moses and Elijah. Our Lord shines with grace and mercy in the company of the Law and the Prophets. Everything that has been foretold about our Lord is coming to pass. The plan of salvation is coming to fruition.

But what in the world is going on? Why is Jesus metamorphosized? Why do none of the holy evangelists explain the significance of the account they narrate? Our Lord even commands His apostles not to tell anyone about what they have seen or heard until after His passion and resurrection. Why? “They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.” (Luke 16:29).

It is good to see our Lord transfigured on the mountaintop. There is nothing wrong with catching a hint of the glory of the Lord to be revealed in the great and latter day of the Lord. But the glory of the Lord knocks Peter, James, and John flat on their faces. They are blinded and bewildered, and utterly terrified.

That is the same reaction the people of Israel had when Moses came back from talking with the Lord on Mount Sinai. His face glowed from being in the presence of the Lord, and the people were frightened. Why? Because the presence of the Lord is an awful place for sinners to be. Because even being in the presence of Moses and Elijah is enough to still a beating heart.

“He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says.” (Rev. 2:7) You have the Law and the Prophets. You even have the Evangelists and the Apostles. Listen to them. Hear the Word of the Lord. Read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest the Holy Scriptures. The Word of the Lord is revealed in the sacred writings. You have these before you always. Listen to them.

The three disciples saw Jesus and they fell on their faces. And yet, Peter got up and said, “Lord, it is good that we are here. If You wish, I will make three tents here, one for You and one for Moses and one for Elijah.” St. Luke adds the editorial comment here: “He did not know what he was saying.”

The Father gives instructions to the apostles – “Listen to Him!” Listen to Jesus, and not “cleverly devised myths” (2 Peter 1:16). Listen to the Word of God, which is open and public and clear. You cannot stay on the mountaintop. The “Rocky Mountain High” wears off, and then you have to find something concrete and solid upon which to rest your faith.

If you want to see Jesus, then look where He is to be found. Look where you find Moses and Elijah, where you find Malachi and Matthew, where you find John and Jeremiah. Look in the Scriptures. For the Scriptures testify of Christ. The occasional mountaintop experience is not all it's cracked up to be, because sooner or later the sun sets and it gets cold up there on the hill.

You have the Law and the Prophets. Listen to them! Satan has been working very hard for a very long time at getting the children of man to listen to him, to the wind – to pretty much anything but the Word of the Lord. And it works, too – an awful lot of the time. Eve listened to the serpent's hissing instead of the Word of the Lord, and Adam listened to her.

The trouble is that the Word of the Lord speaks loudly and clearly regarding the will of the Lord for you. Sometimes the Word of God is harsh. Sometimes He says that you cannot have what you want. He says that your neighbor's wife and his things and his life are not yours, so keep your hands and your eyes to yourself. He says that your brother's good name and reputation are gifts from God, so help him to protect and improve them. He says that all life is a gift from God, in whatever form and on whatever timetable it comes along, so support and encourage those in peril of life and limb.

Peter, James, and John should have counted themselves fortunate to be able to witness the transfiguration of our Lord, and live to tell about it. There was not even any blood shed on the occasion. When Moses and the elders of Israel went up on the mountain to speak with God, they first had to be covered in the blood of the covenant.

For without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. And without the forgiveness of sins there is no way for a sinful human being to be in the presence of the Lord. But then, of course, the apostles did not voluntarily enter into the presence of the Lord.

Fulfiller of the past

And hope of things to be,

We hail Thy body glorified

And our redemption see (LSB 414.3).

Moses and Elijah appear at our Lord's side, the icons of the Law and the Prophets, the Scriptures of the Old Testament, the former covenant which is passing away – although not being abolished or abrogated. They appear to testify to the person and work of our Lord, just as the voice of the Father from heaven identifies Him as the Beloved Son. Moses and Elijah are the types of what would come after them. They are the patterns which will be filled in later with the thing itself. They are the signs which point to the Man Himself.

And so they come to testify to Jesus as the fulfiller of the past and the hope of the future. They stand at the side of Christ to hail Him as the glorified and transfigured Lord. And so the apostles fall on their faces, blinded by the glory of the Lord revealed in the face, yea the whole body, of our Lord Christ. The apostles are blinded by the transfiguration of our Lord, and yet this is just the opening act of His trip to another mountain – Mount Calvary. They see the glorified body of Jesus, but that body has not yet accomplished their salvation. Rest assured, however – they will see the Lord's Christ high and lifted up in glory.

Before we taste of death,

We see Thy kingdom come;

We long to hold the vision bright

And make this hill our home (LSB 414.4).

Indeed, before Peter, James, and John tasted death, they saw the Kingdom of Heaven come to earth. They saw what was prefigured in Moses and Elijah, and what was presaged by the Transfiguration. They saw the Lord Jesus Christ high and lifted up, not in radiant splendor upon the throne of heaven, but in ignominy and shame upon the cross. They saw the vision bright in the midst of the deep darkness – our Lord Jesus Christ crucified and dead upon the cross for us men and for our salvation. They saw not the fleeting radiance of the Transfiguration, but the everlasting glory of God revealed in His all-merciful act of shedding His blood for you, for the forgiveness of your sins.

We may long to hold the bright vision of the Transfiguration in our minds and make that mountain our home, but that is not the way things work. Visions do not create faith, nor do they forgive sins. Visions merely give us a glimpse into the reality that God has already revealed. We do not make the Transfiguration mount our home, because God is no longer there. For this same reason, we do not make pilgrimages or maintain holy shrines. You do not take a vacation to go visit God.

You do not go to God, because He comes to you. He comes to you in His Word, and He comes clothed in His Church. St. Augustine once wrote, “His garments are a type of His Church. For garments, unless held up by the one having donned them, fall.” The Church stands and falls not on visions and mountaintop booths, but on the Word of God and the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. For it is this, and none other, that forgives sins, restores life, and promises eternal salvation to all who believe, as the words and promises of God declare.

'Tis good, Lord, to be here!

Yet we may not remain;

But since Thou bidst us leave the mount,

Come with us to the plain (LSB 414.5).

It was good for Peter, James, and John to witness the Transfiguration. It is good for you to have the Spirit at work in your heart. But you may not remain within these walls forever, any more than those three could remain on that mountaintop. You may not remain, because life goes on, because the Church is in motion to serve a world in chaos.

But since our Lord bids us leave the tranquility of the mountaintop and the safety of the sanctuary, He feeds and clothes us for the journey forth. He spreads a table before you in the sight of your enemies and feeds you with overflowing cup and abundant plate. He feeds you with food better than anything served to Moses and Elijah. For which of the prophets was ever blessed to eat and drink the very Body and Blood of our Lord? He fortifies you with this food and drink, that you may be strengthened in faith and enlivened by the forgiveness of your sins. And He clothes you with His robe of righteousness, so that you may be well-dressed for the work of mercy which He sets before you. It is no longer you who live, but Christ lives in you.

Look to the hills, whence comes your help. Look up, and see the glorious vision of your redemption. You will not see the bright, beaming face of Transfiguration, but the bloody and bruised face of Calvary, now crowned with glory and risen with healing and salvation for you, and for all people. Fix your eyes on this Jesus, and see no other.

In the Name of Jesus. Amen.

+ Donald A. Flugge +

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Donald Flugge was not what you might call an “easy to get along with” person. He liked to argue, about pretty much anything. He had his ideas and his opinions, and he enjoyed verbal sparring with anyone who would come out and sit and talk with him. I once spent three hours in his living room, arguing with him, and and the end of it, we got up, laughed about the whole thing, and I went home. Once Don's mind was made up about something, come hell or high water, you were not going to change it.

In many ways that tenacious quality of Don's personality may have been a source of annoyance or frustration to his family and friends. But there is one place in which that tenacity served Don well, and which would serve us well in his memory. Don was stalwart in his profession of Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. Through the ups and downs, through the good days and the bad days, Don knew that his Redeemer lives and that the Lord's promises to him held true, no matter what. It is this that brought today's Scripture readings to my mind.

"Be Holy"

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 'Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them, You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy.'” There you have it. The mandate for the Christian life. God is holy; therefore go ye and do likewise. Even Jesus said, “You must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” You must be perfect. Get out there and do it.

At least that that is the way much of “churchianity” casts the Christian life. God is perfect, and He requires you to be also. Maybe we can start with the joys of the grace that awakens you to Him and to His kingdom, but then you better make the right choice between death and life, good and evil.

If you are going to be perfect, you need to spend more time in devotions. You need to spend more time in quiet meditation, opening yourself up to hearing the still, small voice of God in your heart. You need to get out there and do the work of the kingdom. You need to have a well-ordered house, well-groomed and well-behaved children, and a well-tempered husband. You need to attend a Spirit-filled church and receive a spiritual good feeling from your worship experience. You need to keep growing and improving, and you need to stop sinning, or at least cut down as much as you can. Because if you are not improving, you are backsliding, and maybe you do not have enough faith, or you do not love Jesus hard enough, or something.

Be Reconciled

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Very often, when a doctor wants to make a diagnosis, he has to look at your insides. Thankfully, we have come a long way since the days when the only way to do that was “exploratory” surgery, where he literally went in just to take a look around to see what was going on. That’s how surgery was invented, and thanks be to God, things have progressed far beyond cutting you open just to take a look inside. Today there are a variety of means at your doctor’s disposal, everything from ultrasounds and X-rays, to various kinds of CAT scans and MRI scans that can deliver a picture of what’s going on inside you.

 

That is what is going on in today’s Gospel reading and this part of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Jesus is taking the Law into His own hands, literally into His own mouth, and explicating in such a way that you get a good look at your insides. There is a line from a famous Lutheran hymn that goes:

The Law is but a mirror bright
To bring the inbred Sin to light
That lurks within our nature.

Jesus is delving into the depths of your hearts to assess your internal condition. Not simply your hands and eyes, but your hearts. Not simply the external symptoms we call sins, but the internal condition called Sin that necessitates your being baptized in Christ and being born again from above. Not just the outward action here, but the inward orientation and attitude.

 

Foolish Salt

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“As presumptuous as it sounds, we Christians are the reason that God preserves the world and does not destroy it right now.” One of my seminary professors once struck at the heart of today's Gospel lesson this way, and it is perhaps a worthwhile entry into Jesus' discourse.

Jesus says to His disciples, “You are the salt of the earth.” Oceans of ink have been spilled onto forests of paper debating what this means. You all know what salt is and what it does. It is one of the most necessary compounds on the planet, right up there with water and oxygen. Salt is one of those things that makes the world go round. Wars have been fought and nations built on the salt of the earth.

But, “if the salt becomes foolishness, in what way will it be made salty?” Salt is a preservative. Aeons ago, salt was practically the only preservative known to man. And it still is the most common way to preserve food throughout the world. And so also you are the salt of the earth. You – the Church – are the preservative of the world.

Barrenness and the Firstborn

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Lord closed Hannah's womb. She was afflicted with the burden of barrenness, the cross of childlessness. Her suffering was compounded by the rich fertility of her husband's other wife, who bore him many children, and received from Elkanah the recompense for her labor. Hannah was tormented not only by the failure of her own flesh, but by the taunting and despising of her own household. Though Elkanah her husband loved her, there was nothing he could do about her pitiable condition.

Why was this the situation? Why did our Lord choose to close Hannah's womb, and to open the womb of Peninah over and over? Why some and not others? This is the question that virtually everyone asks with respect to some desired state at some time in life. For the barren woman, or couple, this is a daily plea: “Why me, O Lord?” The Lord gives abundantly to some, and withholds from others. The answer, for those who live under the sun, is that we do not know. The Lord gives, and the Lord withholds – blessed be the Name of the Lord.

What's Wrong With Preaching?

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 Throughout the church today, one hears the same lament over and over again – what's wrong with preaching? A brief survey of sermons reveals that what is missing is Christ himself. especially a clear and weekly proclamation of Christ crucified. This sad condition would cause the apostle Paul to launch into a harangue like the one in his first letter to the Corinthians, particularly in those first two foundational chapters.

The sad state of preaching may have more to do with the theological darkness that has come over the Church than a sudden crisis in the style of preaching. The other two lessons today assert that Epiphany is the season to see the light of Christ shine in the darkness. In both Isaiah and Matthew, “the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined.” If Christ is not preached, then our preaching is in darkness. Are we a people who walk in darkness – who dwell in a land of deep darkness? Are we a people who, through preaching Christ, have seen a great light – who have had the light shine upon us?

"Behold the Lamb of God!"

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The disciples of John the Baptist knew all about the lambs.

There were stories of one-time sacrifices, like the story of Abraham and Isaac where the son was nearly killed. You know the story: Abraham and Isaac climbed that mountain together, with Isaac innocently asking where the sacrifice was. Abraham, unable to speak the truth, uttered those famous words, "God will provide for Himself the lamb" (Gen. 22:8). And so it was: Just as Abraham lifted the knife to sacrifice his only son, the Lord pointed him to a ram, caught by his horns in a thicket. The ram was sacrificed that day. Isaac was delivered because God provided the lamb.

There were the annual sacrifices, too, like the Passover Lamb. Every year, the people of Israel were to remember the Exodus by the sacrifice of a lamb for Passover dinner. They were to recall how the Lord saved the firstborn of each family because the angel passed over the doors marked by the blood of the lamb. The lamb died; the firstborn sons lived.

And then there were the twice-daily sacrifices, too, still going on at the temple: Morning and evening, a lamb was sacrificed to God by the priests, in accordance with God's command: "One lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer at twilight" (Deut. 29:39). Two lambs every day, offered to the Lord. So long as the Temple was intact, the shedding of lambs' blood continued.

"All That the Eye Beholds"

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

All that the mortal eye beholds

Is water as we pour it.

Before the eye of faith unfolds

The pow'r of Jesus' merit.

For here it sees the crimson flood

To all our ills bring healing;

The wonders of His precious blood

The love of God revealing,

Assuring His own pardon (LSB 406.7).

How well Luther unfolds the tension between what we see and what we receive in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism! The eye sees one thing, and yet the soul receives something quite different, quite a bit better. And what a joy it is for us to have this precious grace simply wash over us, purely out of God's grace.

But in order to enjoy the cleansing and regenerating Bath, you must see it for what it is. All that the mortal eye beholds is water being poured. All that the world sees is someone spouting a few pious platitudes and walking away with a wet head. Foolishness of the highest degree, the world says, to think that a bit of damp on your head could do anything more than muss up your hair.

Even other Christians scoff to think that one might hold to Baptism as much more than a sign of obedience or an act of one's personal confession. John Calvin taught that Baptism is simply a token or proof of one's initiation into the Church.

Many so-called evangelicals today consider Baptism merely an outward sign. Man does the work, and so it must be a human work. Human works do not save; therefore Baptism does not save. It is necessary because Jesus commanded it, but it is only a sign of one's personal dedication to Christ. As such, one must not receive Baptism until one is of sufficient maturity to articulate what this act signifies. “All that the mortal eye beholds is water as we pour it.”

And this is not the only thing which the mortal eye beholds. Who is it that the eye beholds in today's Gospel lesson? John the Baptist. The Jews come out to him at the Jordan, and they cannot figure him out. He preaches as one having authority, but who gave it to him? Who is this man, and from where has he come? They see a crazy man, but they hear the voice of God. When they question him, his answer: “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, 'Prepare the way of the Lord!'” John seems to be a lunatic, a bruised reed shaking in the wind, a clanging cymbal or a gonging drum.

And who is this who comes out to meet him? Another mere man. Jesus Bar-Joseph, the only son of the Nazarene carpenter. We know you, the Jews will taunt Him – we know your brothers and your father and where you grew up. What have you to do with us? What is so special about you that we should esteem you?

John knows who this Man is, but yet has his thinking mixed up. Jesus comes to John to be baptized, and John knows that this is the One greater than him. Jesus is the one whose sandals John is unworthy to untie, and He wants John to baptize Him. “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” This is not what this scene should look like, to the mortal eye.

Of course, when one looks upon Jesus, all that the mortal eye beholds is human flesh and blood, the son of Mary and Joseph. He is a human being, possessed of body and soul, eyes, ears, and all His members, His reason and all His senses. He hungers and thirsts, laughs and cries.

So it is likewise no surprise that when the mortal eye beholds His Sacrament of the Altar, it beholds merely bread and wine. All that the mortal eye beholds is a bit of food, to be piously munched, then treated by the body as any other food. It may be called a memorial of the Lord's work for us, but it is merely bread and wine. All that the mortal eye beholds is wine as we pour.

Perhaps one very important place where “all that the mortal eye beholds” is not all that is there is when you see a person who is suffering. Mental, physical, emotional, financial – it makes no difference what sort of suffering the person is enduring. In your life, you have and will continue to encounter people who are suffering in one way or another. It might be the widow in the pew across from you grieving the loss of her husband. It might be the person on the next street who is suffering the effects of addiction. It might be the child who suffers the effects of instability and dysfunction in the home.

Perhaps the person suffering in your life is unknown to you. It may be someone you see regularly, speak with often. And she wants her suffering to go away, her longing for peace to be fulfilled, her guilt to be turned to joy. But the Lord permits her to suffer. Why?

All that the mortal eye beholds is someone suffering. Suffering is awful – no one likes to suffer, for any reason. It is all the more distressing when it seems like there is no reason, when the suffering simply piles on the head of one person over and over. And so the mortal eye sees someone with a problem in need of a solution. To make the person better/happier, the suffering must be taken away.

So if the goal is to alleviate suffering, any means necessary justify the end. Whether it be destroying another human life in the quest for happiness. Whether it be granting the so-called “right to die” to a person in pain. Whether it be shoving the sufferer off to the fringes and making her someone else's problem.

But these are all evidences that what the mortal eye beholds is not the whole story. What is the whole story? John asks Jesus, “I need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?” John knows that he is sinful. He knows that he has been angry, that he has despised his opponents instead of loving them, that he has been lustful and prideful and lazy. He knows all this, because he knows the Law. And he knows the One who has come to fulfill the Law.

But he learns, as you must also, not to despise the weak nor discount the frail and faulty evidence before your mortal eyes.

Do not despise the blessings of the holy Font, because although the mortal eye sees only water as we pour it, the eye of faith beholds the blessed flood flowing from the pierced side of Christ, flowing from His cross and passion out through the world, and into this blessed laver, to cover you in the forgiveness of sins, wash you clean not just of dirt but of the uncleanness of your soul, and to bring the curse of the Law upon you to a watery end.

Do not despise the man who stands in front of you and speaks with the voice of the prophets and apostles. Although the mortal eye sees only some poor fool in fancy robes spouting a bunch of pious-sounding nonsense, the eye of faith beholds the Man of God, greatly beloved, called and ordained for the purpose of delivering to you the faith once given to the saints, the Gospel of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, the joys of heaven which have been promised by our Lord Himself to come through this poor sinful man.

Do not despise the bread and wine which stand before you on the Altar of the Lord. Although the mortal eye sees only a crummy snack, not even that great tasting, the eye of faith beholds the Lord of Hosts Himself laid out for you to eat and drink, the Lamb of God sacrificed for you, for the forgiveness of your sins, the Bread of Life and the Cup of Blessing in which there can be no harm to those who believe our Lord's Word.

Do not despise those who suffer in this world. For although the mortal eye sees only someone weak, poor, distressed, and dying, the eye of faith beholds Christ Jesus our Lord wrapped in human flesh and blood. “Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.” The mortal eye sees the face of someone in misery, but the eye of faith sees the face of Christ, the One who needs no service, but who commands you to love and serve this, the least of His brethren.

Do not despise what your mortal eye sees, because you shall see with the eye of faith that you are the weak, the insignificant, the irrational, the unexplainable, the foolish, the sufferer. You are the sinner. You are the one for whom Christ Jesus our Lord was born and died. And you are the one for whom our Lord rose again, to give one such as you eternal life and salvation.

Today, Christ our Lord comes to the Jordan, to enter the waters and be baptized by John, in order to fulfill all righteousness. He comes not just to John, but He comes to you. He comes to be baptized into your Baptism, in order that you may be baptized into Him. St. Cyril of Jerusalem had this to say about Jesus' Baptism:

 

Jesus sanctified Baptism by being Himself baptized.  If the Son of God was baptized, what godly man is he that despiseth Baptism?  But He was baptized not that He might receive remission of sins, for He was sinless; but being sinless, He was baptized, that He might give to them that are baptized a divine and excellent grace.  For since the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise partook of the same, that having been made partakers of His presence in the flesh we might be made partakers also of His Divine grace:  thus Jesus was baptized, that thereby we again by our participation might receive both salvation and honour.  According to Job, there was in the waters the dragon that draweth up Jordan into his mouth.  Since, therefore, it was necessary to break the heads of the dragon in pieces, He went down and bound the strong one in the waters, that we might receive power to tread upon serpents and scorpions.  The beast was great and terrible.  No fishing-vessel was able to carry one scale of his tail:  destruction ran before him, ravaging all that met him.  The Life encountered him, that the mouth of Death might henceforth be stopped, and all we that are saved might say, O death, where is thy sting?  O grave, where is thy victory?  The sting of death is drawn by Baptism.¹

Jesus makes all fonts holy and blessed baths of washing and regeneration by His having entered into the waters for you. The mortal eye sees only water, but the eye of faith sees Christ in that water, drowning your old sinful nature and uniting you to Himself, that just as He was crucified and raised from the dead, so too are you dead and buried to sin, and alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

And although this great and wondrous work is hidden from the mortal eyes of the world, it is by no means a hidden thing. For when Christ our Lord comes to baptize a person into Himself, He does not come alone. No, He brings with Him the angels and archangels and all the company of heaven. He brings with Him the prayers of all the saints in heaven and on earth for the preservation of the faith given to the one newly washed. He brings with Him the Holy Spirit, whom He bestows on you, who are clothed with the white robe of Christ's righteousness and marked with the Name of God upon you.

Baptism is the possession of Christ, and a possession of the Church because our Lord gives it. And so are you. You are the possession of Christ, because you are baptized into Him, and you are likewise baptized into His Church. You are not alone, despite what your mortal eye may see, but the eye of faith beholds the great cloud of witnesses surrounding you, praying for you, worshiping with you. You are God's own child! Gladly proclaim it to the devil, the world, and whatever may tempt you: You are baptized into Christ! It is no longer you who live, but Christ lives in you, now and forever.

In the Name of Jesus. Amen.

1Lecture III: On Baptism, para. 11. NPNF2:7.16-17