The Gates of Righteousness

[note: This sermon was preached first at New Hope Lutheran Church in Charles City, IA on 31 March 2012, when I filled in for their pastor. It was then preached at St. Peter on 1 April.]

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

“Open to me the gates of righteousness, that I may enter through them and give thanks to the Lord.” So we pray in the Psalm for today. We ask the Lord to open the way before us, that we may enter into the place of righteousness, that we may enter into the place to which He has called us. And He has done just that.

After all, the Lord is in the business of opening gates, of letting His people into places of blessing. He admitted them into the Garden of Eden, the paradise whence sprang all of the wonders of creation. There He fed and nourished them, and walked and talked with them. There it was good, very good.

God opened the womb of Eve with the gift of a son, Cain. By this opening, He brought forth the whole population of mankind, for all who have lived have come from the womb of our first mother. Even our Savior was born of a woman, born of the lineage of man according to the flesh.

“Open to Me the Gates of Righteousness”

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

Coco Chanel once said, “Don't spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.” Good advice, but yet it seems like so often we do just that.

You and I spend our time beating on the wall because we each want to find our own door. If I just beat hard enough and long enough and in the right spot in the right way, so we think, I will find a me-shaped door that will magically open to let me into the kingdom of God. And until then, we just beat blindly against the stone of our own sin and guilt.

The problem is not that we do not know the extent of the wall. Even in our blind, ignorant, sinful condition, the problem is obvious. Like David, we each say, “I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.” The Law of God is written on our hearts, and so we know what we should be doing, and yet we do the opposite. You know that you are not perfect, but you try to act like you are, as if you could just run away from your sin, or cover it up somehow. But none of us can get away from our sin and guilt. It remains before you, as clear as the face in the mirror.