READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:
Isaiah 55:1-9
Ephesians 5:15-21
St. Matthew 22:1-14
Grace, mercy, and peace will be with us, from God the Father
and from Jesus Christ the Father's Son, in truth and love. (2 John)
Who speaks you this morning saying,
Our Scripture reading for today is from the Gospel where Jesus names a man “friend”. God included this in His Word to show that a false friend always tries to hold his position, but a true friend gives his position away. God points us towards Jesus that we may watch Him suffer and die to purchase true friendship for us and with that gift, we may be a friend to all.
What a friend we have in Jesus, right? I mean, if you ever
had any question as to whether or not the world loves Jesus, than look no
further than all the pop songs about Him. Jesus is a friend of mine. He helps
me do all the things. If you were ever in doubt as to whether or not Jesus
approves of me and my lifestyle, you can know Jesus is just alright with me.
And don’t worry about me Jesus, I’m alive and doin fine. Go back to Your
religion corner till we need you.
Woe to you if you disagree with me! You don’t speak for Jesus. You can’t tell me what I can and can’t do. So unless Jesus speaks to me Himself or directly intervenes to change what I’m doing, I’m just going to assume I’m right. I’ll wait for that, but until then don’t expect me to have to answer to you for my faith.
Isn’t it great to have Jesus as a friend?
What sort of friendly things is He promising to do in today’s Lectionary readings? Well, as long as I keep Jesus as my friend, my very best pal, then I get all the wine I can drink and food too, says Isaiah. He’s also going to make an everlasting covenant with me, so I won’t have to worry about anything, especially those pesky religious squabbles that no one cares about.
In the Epistle He is saying how I need to be careful and make sure I do just enough holy stuff so that others can see it. I need to pay my membership dues at church, make a good show of my Jesus-language once a week, and be thankful I’m so great. Hooray Thanksgiving!
Isn’t it great to have Jesus as a friend!
Repent. Jesus is such a good friend to you, that you are able to forsake Him completely and still believe yourself right with God. Jesus is such a good friend, that as long as your imagination is in communion with Him, then your actions towards Him and others do not matter. Jesus is such a good friend, that He lets you be God, determining what His Church is on earth, because, let’s face it, its the greatest having me as a friend, right Jesus?
We must be reminded of the gospel reading: it is the “friend” that gets kicked out! Yes, my friends, When Jesus comes to look in on all His wonderful friends that He has accrued, He has them bound hand and foot and tossed into the outer darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, forever.
Don’t get mad just yet. Maybe “friend” isn’t so great a title after all, but there is a Divine Path set out by God, for us to discover godly friendship. Job is our example, his friends, actually. Their friendship is on point, though their doctrine is wrong. They do not come to the suffering Job preaching, they come to find their friend, sitting in misery, and they just sit there in misery and silence with him for 7 days and 7 nights.
If they would have remained silent after that, the book of
Job would be a lot shorter and its conclusion reached quicker. But they didn’t
and it wasn’t. It was this way in order to teach us Job’s confession in chapter
30, “I have become a brother to serpents and a friend to sparrows” (v. 29).
In other words, my sin has made me to be numbered with
sinners and to that dust I shall go. Of such is the friendship of sinful man.
All too eager to befriend the devil disguised as the angel of light, but never
to befriend the God-made-man. To be among a haunt of serpents, in the Bible, is
to be in a place where no one lives. This is one of the judgments given to
Israel in Jeremiah 10:22.
Israel today has become as God judged them: a wilderness devoid of faith.
Repent! Jesus is not the friend you want, but He is the
friend you deserve. This is for two reasons: 1) He is the friend that tells you
what you don’t want to hear, and no one likes that friend. He accuses you of
being a brother to serpents and a friend to sparrows and judges you as not fit.
And 2) He does things on His own. He doesn’t do things to make you feel happy, or approved, or changed. This makes us uncomfortable. All this adds up to disgust inside us, when we finally realize that if Jesus is my friend, then that friend must be kicked out into the outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, forever.
Jesus is indeed cast out. He is given lip service as a friend, as a fellow Jew, as a fellow man, but sinful hearts are focused on crucifying Him. They call Him friend and yet kiss Him on the cheek in front of the rabble and their guards. They call Him friend, but scatter to the wind at the first hint of the cross. They call Him friend, but watch Him suffer, die, and be buried, alone.
Friendship with the world is enmity towards God (Jas 4:4). This does not lessen the desire of Jesus to be a friend, as He says. However, in His friendship, He is the only Way. Therefore, in His way, even the sparrow finds a home in the Lord.
Psalm 104 says, “In [the trees of the Lord] the birds
build their nests;
the stork has her home in the fir trees” (Ps 104:17)
And from Isa 43:20, “The [serpents] will honor me”
Psalm 84:3 says, “Even the sparrow finds a home…at your altars, O Lord of hosts”
In the crucifixion of Jesus, the sinner is given a place to make his nest in a tree (Ps 104:17), the tree of the cross, in order that these wild serpents and birds give honor to God (Isa 43:20) in the renewal of their minds. Jesus is the friend who makes sinners into saints, in order that they too find rest, honor, and true friendship at the Altar of God (Ps 84:3).
“There is a companion”, says Sirach 37:4-5, “who rejoices in the gladness of a friend, but in time of affliction will be against him. There is a companion who for the belly’s sake labors with his friend, yet in the face of battle will carry his buckler.”
Jesus is our friend Who doesn’t just carry all our sorrows, but also our “holy deeds” as well. He is a friend that doesn’t just listen to everything in prayer, but is wounded for our thoughtless words. He is a friend that cleanses both good intentions and bad, because both are soiled with sin.
He is the friend that has given away His wedding garment to clothe the poor, the sick, the needy, the foolish, and the drunk. He has given it away, because His is the only garment that gets you into the everlasting covenant, filled with the Holy Spirit.
As our Introit reminded us, as Job did, we have received judgement, because we have sinned. In faith we pray for God to give glory to His Name, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, that we may be baptized into His righteousness and be fed the bread of heaven from His nail-opened hand, making us friends of the condemned Jesus Who is risen from the Dead.
So let us be friends, genuine friends, with a quiet mind, humbling ourselves before God and our neighbor, because the friendship of Jesus is no small thing. Let us find pardon and peace in the Word and sacrament of Christ our friend, knowing that it is His will that His friendship be His sacrifice, His Body, His Blood, laid down for you, in your hand and in your mouth, that cleanses from all sin (1 Jn 1:7).
What a friend we have in Jesus, Who gives us the Altar of God and the Tree of God that we may find not only true friendship, but also a true home. What a friend we have in Jesus, rejected instead of us, cast out instead of us, Who chooses us while we were yet unfriendly, to be Called friends, by the Crucified, Who laid down His life, in order that we could pick it up and follow Him for eternity.
Who speaks you this morning saying,
“‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding
garment?’ And he was speechless.”
Our Scripture reading for today is from the Gospel where Jesus names a man “friend”. God included this in His Word to show that a false friend always tries to hold his position, but a true friend gives his position away. God points us towards Jesus that we may watch Him suffer and die to purchase true friendship for us and with that gift, we may be a friend to all.
Woe to you if you disagree with me! You don’t speak for Jesus. You can’t tell me what I can and can’t do. So unless Jesus speaks to me Himself or directly intervenes to change what I’m doing, I’m just going to assume I’m right. I’ll wait for that, but until then don’t expect me to have to answer to you for my faith.
Isn’t it great to have Jesus as a friend?
What sort of friendly things is He promising to do in today’s Lectionary readings? Well, as long as I keep Jesus as my friend, my very best pal, then I get all the wine I can drink and food too, says Isaiah. He’s also going to make an everlasting covenant with me, so I won’t have to worry about anything, especially those pesky religious squabbles that no one cares about.
In the Epistle He is saying how I need to be careful and make sure I do just enough holy stuff so that others can see it. I need to pay my membership dues at church, make a good show of my Jesus-language once a week, and be thankful I’m so great. Hooray Thanksgiving!
Isn’t it great to have Jesus as a friend!
Repent. Jesus is such a good friend to you, that you are able to forsake Him completely and still believe yourself right with God. Jesus is such a good friend, that as long as your imagination is in communion with Him, then your actions towards Him and others do not matter. Jesus is such a good friend, that He lets you be God, determining what His Church is on earth, because, let’s face it, its the greatest having me as a friend, right Jesus?
We must be reminded of the gospel reading: it is the “friend” that gets kicked out! Yes, my friends, When Jesus comes to look in on all His wonderful friends that He has accrued, He has them bound hand and foot and tossed into the outer darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, forever.
Don’t get mad just yet. Maybe “friend” isn’t so great a title after all, but there is a Divine Path set out by God, for us to discover godly friendship. Job is our example, his friends, actually. Their friendship is on point, though their doctrine is wrong. They do not come to the suffering Job preaching, they come to find their friend, sitting in misery, and they just sit there in misery and silence with him for 7 days and 7 nights.
Israel today has become as God judged them: a wilderness devoid of faith.
And 2) He does things on His own. He doesn’t do things to make you feel happy, or approved, or changed. This makes us uncomfortable. All this adds up to disgust inside us, when we finally realize that if Jesus is my friend, then that friend must be kicked out into the outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, forever.
Jesus is indeed cast out. He is given lip service as a friend, as a fellow Jew, as a fellow man, but sinful hearts are focused on crucifying Him. They call Him friend and yet kiss Him on the cheek in front of the rabble and their guards. They call Him friend, but scatter to the wind at the first hint of the cross. They call Him friend, but watch Him suffer, die, and be buried, alone.
Friendship with the world is enmity towards God (Jas 4:4). This does not lessen the desire of Jesus to be a friend, as He says. However, in His friendship, He is the only Way. Therefore, in His way, even the sparrow finds a home in the Lord.
the stork has her home in the fir trees” (Ps 104:17)
And from Isa 43:20, “The [serpents] will honor me”
Psalm 84:3 says, “Even the sparrow finds a home…at your altars, O Lord of hosts”
In the crucifixion of Jesus, the sinner is given a place to make his nest in a tree (Ps 104:17), the tree of the cross, in order that these wild serpents and birds give honor to God (Isa 43:20) in the renewal of their minds. Jesus is the friend who makes sinners into saints, in order that they too find rest, honor, and true friendship at the Altar of God (Ps 84:3).
“There is a companion”, says Sirach 37:4-5, “who rejoices in the gladness of a friend, but in time of affliction will be against him. There is a companion who for the belly’s sake labors with his friend, yet in the face of battle will carry his buckler.”
Jesus is our friend Who doesn’t just carry all our sorrows, but also our “holy deeds” as well. He is a friend that doesn’t just listen to everything in prayer, but is wounded for our thoughtless words. He is a friend that cleanses both good intentions and bad, because both are soiled with sin.
He is the friend that has given away His wedding garment to clothe the poor, the sick, the needy, the foolish, and the drunk. He has given it away, because His is the only garment that gets you into the everlasting covenant, filled with the Holy Spirit.
As our Introit reminded us, as Job did, we have received judgement, because we have sinned. In faith we pray for God to give glory to His Name, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, that we may be baptized into His righteousness and be fed the bread of heaven from His nail-opened hand, making us friends of the condemned Jesus Who is risen from the Dead.
So let us be friends, genuine friends, with a quiet mind, humbling ourselves before God and our neighbor, because the friendship of Jesus is no small thing. Let us find pardon and peace in the Word and sacrament of Christ our friend, knowing that it is His will that His friendship be His sacrifice, His Body, His Blood, laid down for you, in your hand and in your mouth, that cleanses from all sin (1 Jn 1:7).
What a friend we have in Jesus, Who gives us the Altar of God and the Tree of God that we may find not only true friendship, but also a true home. What a friend we have in Jesus, rejected instead of us, cast out instead of us, Who chooses us while we were yet unfriendly, to be Called friends, by the Crucified, Who laid down His life, in order that we could pick it up and follow Him for eternity.
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