Establish Your Hearts

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

Waiting is difficult for children. Advent is a rough time for a young mind. The tree goes up, the wrapped packages start appearing, and you may not touch them. Talk of Christmas presents starts to happen – maybe even the trips to the stores to buy them for others. They spend the time from Thanksgiving to Christmas with daily reminders of what is coming, but is not yet. The wait is excruciating. The temptation to touch, to handle, to go exploring, is almost more than they can bear. It is as the Chipmunks say:

Christmas, Christmas time is near
Time for toys and time for cheer.
We've been good but we can't last;
Hurry Christmas, hurry fast!
Want a plane that loops the loop,
Me, I want a hula hoop.
We can hardly stand the wait;
Please Christmas, don't be late!

"Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God"

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

“Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Him while He is near.” That sounds good. Good directions for the Christian life. Seek God while He may be found. And when is it that God may be found? Right now, of course! God is here, just like He has always been. The time to find God is always now, the present, this moment.

Of course there is a temptation in this knowledge. You can seek the Lord today, or you can seek Him tomorrow. He has always been here, so He will be here later when you decide that you need Him. Things are good now, you might think, so you do not need the Lord. All quiet on the western front, God is in His heavens, and let's leave well enough alone.

Martin Luther once compared the Gospel to a passing rain-shower. It is here today and gone tomorrow. The Lord may be found while He is here, but He does not promise to be handy to you at all times. The Spirit blows where He wills. If you turn your back on Him today, He may choose to leave you to your own devices tomorrow. “Have it your way” may work great for hamburgers, but it is a terrible word of judgment from the Lord of Hosts.

The Fear of the Lord

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

There is an old verse to the hymn “Amazing Grace” that has not made it into our hymnals. The second verse in many renditions outside Lutheranism goes “Twas grace that taught my heart to fear / And grace my fears relieved. / How precious did that grace appear / The hour I first believed.” When we sing this hymn, we do very well without this verse. Why? Because it simply is not true.

Grace is not what teaches the heart to fear. Think about it. There is nothing at all fearsome about grace. What is there to fear in the unmitigated, unbridled, unfiltered love of God poured out upon you because of the sacrifice of Christ upon the cross? Are you afraid because your sins have been forgiven, your life is secure in Christ, and your heavenly home is prepared for you? Grace does not teach you to fear. Grace only makes you unafraid.

But does that mean that you should not fear anything?

Eat With Your Ears

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

What do you have that was not a gift? What do you have that you have not received from the hand of another? Your body is the product of the design of God and the flesh of man. Your life is a gift sustained by the providence of God. All that you have and all that you are is a gift from God, who has created you and called you into being.

What do you have that was not a gift? You have sin. You have the disease of concupiscence, that ancient evil infection that corrupts your entire being with a bottomless desire for all things opposed to God. This, even, was an inheritance received from your fathers and forefathers before you, who received it from their fathers, all the way back to our first-father, Adam. But your sin is your own. It is the product of your own sinful nature, which finds ever more inventive ways to flout the command and promise of God.

Come, Lord Jesus

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

Even if our spirits are willing, our flesh is weak. It is terribly difficult to subdue, and the things we would not do – the things we hate – those we do. It betrays us again and again. Our flesh is the seedbed of lust, gluttony, and avarice. All our deepest sorrows come from our sins.

The years sweep by and retrospect has little to show but a list of crimes, a catalogue of lies you have told, of promises you have forgotten, of slander that has risen up out of your hearts. Is it any wonder that our families are so broken? That our lives are so complicated? That the prisons are so full?

So too do we see in retrospect the signs of God’s wrath and the temporary character of this earth. Terrorists, earthquakes, divorce, and war all serve as warnings of the judgment to come. Nothing on earth is the same today as it was a year ago. If we get one step forward, we still suffer two steps back. All things are in decay, are dying. We are in constant turmoil and change. Death is having its way. Only the Word of God never changes.

You Shall Bless the LORD Your God

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

“The whole commandment that I command you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the LORD swore to give to your fathers.” This is the instruction which Moses gives to the children of Israel, that they are to be careful to do all which the Lord has commanded them.

But notice that the Lord attaches a threefold promise to His commandment: that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give. The Lord has already sworn to give good gifts to His people. Now, all they must do is follow the rules He has set forth in order to receive them.

We sing the hymn:

The Law of God is good and wise
And sets His will before our eyes,
Shows us the way of righteousness,
And dooms to death when we transgress (LSB 579.1).

"The Lamb Who Died"

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

There is something to be said about the fact that the preparers of our lectionary, whoever they be, appointed this scene from the crucifixion of our Lord to be the Gospel lesson for the last Sunday in the Church year. In Year A, the year ends with a vision of the final judgment, where we see the sheep and the goats separated and sent into their respective homes for eternity. In Year B, we are left with the promise that the Word of the Lord remains forever, and with the charge from our Lord: “Stay awake.”

But this year, you have heard from the pen of St. Luke the first words of Jesus from the Cross. And how fitting it is that, at the end of time (so to speak), we hearken back to the beginning of the End.

John Calvin once called the shouts and jeers and mocking of the crowds, the insults of the Jews, and the scoffing of the impenitent thief a “premature triumph” on the part of the devil. The devil and his minions looked around and saw that they had Jesus under their thumb. He was beated, scourged, bloody, and broken. The Son of God was about to die. And would God save Him? “He saved others; let him save himself, if he is the Christ of God, his Chosen One!”