What to do with the Trinity [Trinity Sunday; St. John 3:1-15]

Jesus speaks to you all today saying,

“Nicodemus came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.””

So, really; what does Isaiah’s vision of the Lord upon a throne have to do with Trinity Sunday? Well, we could say that this part we heard today, from Isaiah’s book, is filled with threes.

The Lord is on a throne, high and lifted up, and His robe fills the Temple. The Seraphim, which means fiery-ones, have 6 wings; that’s 3 times 2. The wings cover face, feet, and they fly. They cry out, Holy, Holy, Holy. Isaiah is in fear of his life because he has unclean lips, his people have unclean lips, and he has seen the Lord of Sabbaoth.

Finally, one of the Seraphim flies to Isaiah with a burning, hot coal which touches Isaiah’s lips, takes his guilt, and atones for his sin. So, at second glance, maybe the reading from Isaiah has a lot to do with the Trinity. We could spend all week in the Old Testament finding similar and more obvious examples.

Looking at the antiphon for today, it comes from the book of Tobit. It was written in-between the time of the Old and New testament. Even there, we hear the angel Raphael exclaiming to Tobit the glory of the Trinity.

Of course, then, in Jesus’ own words, He tells us to baptize in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Any way you shake a stick at it, it falls out as the Holy Trinity.

Now, where did things go wrong? In the Garden of Eden. Since that time in the beginning, the true understanding of the Lord has been attacked. The Bible has been rewritten and edited just so that most of these references are taken out. If they can’t edit them out, then they taught that God is only one and He would just use angels for two others to be there.

But we don’t just need symbolism to be taught that God is three in one. Its not even going to be the words of men that is going to convince anyone of a God that is one but yet three persons. As the Gospel tells us, only the Spirit will make us believe.

“That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”

As we found threes in Isaiah, we could also search for threes in our heart or threes in our life, but we would be sorely disappointed. As the saying goes, good or bad, things come in threes. If they wanted to speak the truth, they would say that those things don’t just come in threes but in multiples of three.

Nothing of the flesh; nothing in nature tells us of God. We don’t know His will, we don’t know His personality, and we certainly don’t know what He is saying. We will also certainly agree with those who tell us that the Trinity is not in the Bible, because the word “trinity” is not there.

Against human nature, then, the Church has firmly placed the Trinity in the centre of the true faith, by establishing the creeds. Moses and the Prophets have constantly preached the Trinity, as we heard, even to the Jews. If all of this is true and of monumental importance, what does it have to do with you? What does “one God, not three gods” and “not by confusion of substance, but by unity of person” have to do with planting corn, counting pennies, or graduating?

It has to do with world-view, meaning, how you view everything you think , say, and do in the world  AND how you view everything that others think, say, and do in the world. A man that believes in the Trinity does plant corn the same way as everyone else, but he does not plant corn for the same reason as everyone else.

This is because now that the Trinity has placed true belief in his heart, the only motive behind planting, working, or doing anything is so he can go to Church.

Now that God has revealed Himself in His Bible, now that this verbal revelation has taken on flesh, and now that the Trinity offers Himself, literally, to His Church for her salvation, what is the point of doing anything else or to being anywhere else except the place God does this?

Indeed, it appears as if things become pointless; meaningless. They become altogether too much for our small minds to handle: an eternal washing accomplished with tap water? Heavenly salvation simply by listening? Divine forgiveness given in eating and drinking?

Yet, it is in these impossible things that the Trinity points us away from and points us to easy to understand things such as words in a book, working, and graduating, among other things.

We are not allowed to remain confused and overwhelmed, but are given gifts and tasks that are within our means to comprehend. Jesus has perfected and accomplished all the impossibles for this reason. These high and mighty topics still remain, but now everyone understands them through Jesus.

Therefore, since we have such a great high priest and since this glorious salvation is already ours, along with the entire kingdom of God, we can simply live. Having faith in baptism that never dries out, we can go into a dry field, plant crops, and know that big or bust, Christ has secured our salvation. Having faith in a Gospel that gives faith freely, we can work 9-5, 9-12, or 12-12 and know that we believe. Having faith in the Body of Christ, we can gain all the knowledge in the world and know that it is all a wash if we do not have the forgiveness of sins.

When Nicodemus comes to Jesus and does not understand baptism, Jesus takes offense, because He knows Nicodemus has worked long and hard to elevate his teaching and life to an high, godly plane of existence. However, Jesus is not in the high and lofty. Jesus is not working and saving that which is high and lifted up. Jesus, and therefore the whole Trinity, is working here, down below.

If Nicodemus really wanted his work to be godly, he wouldn’t work out the most holy things he could think of. He would realize that, in Christ, he is already as holy as he is going to get and therefore could have the most meaningless job on the planet and yet still be doing holy work.

The only thing that divides the work of the Christian from the works of everyone else is faith. Faith that even if we do, what we feel is, a worthless task, God takes pleasure in it. Because, no matter what the Christian does, he can do it loving God and loving his neighbor.

Faith tells us that, even though the Trinity is impossible to understand, it can still shape our life and affect us. Belief in the Trinity therefore changes our worldview and makes us see that it is not what we do, but what Christ has done for us. Therefore we should seek Him out where He wills Himself to be found.

That place, of course, is His own Church where forgiveness and salvation daily come by His merits and are handed out for free.

The Child [Easter 4; St. John 16:16-22]

The resurrected Jesus speaks to you today, saying,

“When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a man has been born into the world.”

A mother’s sorrow is not just limited to labor pains, nor is ended when her child grows and goes through adolescence. A mother’s true sorrow begins when she examines her own life and realizes what a great impossibility it is that she is alive, at that very moment.

For when she was in her own mother’s womb, there were any number of things that could have gone wrong, from ectopic pregnancies to umbilical cord complications, not to mention the strong peer pressure to abort.

Through no fault of her own, the woman as a fetus, really had such an impossible task just being born. Then its time to deliver and I don’t think we have to go over the amount of danger involved in that. Let’s just say its so much, that the prayer of the Litany devotes solemn attention to the perils of women in childbirth.

Once she is out, then its vaccines, viruses, bacteria, and nutrition. Then its clothing, shoes, house and home, food and drink, and everything else associated with bare needs care of the body.

If you were to stand back and examine the sheer probability to be overcome in order for a child to survive, you may be taken aback. Thus, when she thinks about having her own kids, she asks, “Why would I subject someone else to all that danger?”

A child born is a child that will die, so what’s the point? Many give this argument today to not only not have their own children, but also to prevent others from having so many, or even one.

Repent! Last week we were lamenting over a Good Shepherd that dies and leaves us and today we are hearing the same thing about children. You think they are only good for taxing your wallets, patience, and emotions. You feel that bringing them into the world will only add to the sorrow and despair of an already doomed world.

On top of that, you are conceived in sin (Psa.51:5). There is no escape, so what’s the point in having children? In doing anything?

There is another impossible and that of a virgin birth. Where there was no life and no hope, the Lord of Life was conceived and born. Where there was only deep darkness, Christ, our Crucified Lord created His Church.

You must never forget that this Gospel is about Jesus and it is Jesus who gives us clarity here. Jesus, both God and man, is going to leave His Temple in order to enter this world from another “temple”, that of the virgin’s womb. Jesus is going to risk His life, going through all of that danger of fetus-hood and childhood, in order to be made man.

He is going to subject Himself to blood, disease, and evil. He is going to subject His parents to toil, tribulation and sorrow. He is going to strain the world’s economy and environment, by being another person to be supported. Through this suffering and pain, the salvation of the world is purchased.

Jesus does it this way. Jesus chooses this path to be the Way. There were others, but Jesus made it so that the death of the Lamb of God would serve as infinite goodness and righteousness to His poor miserable creation.

And if the death of God is of infinite importance to the Church, then the death of His children are of infinite importance to the Lord. Not that we seek out our own deaths, but that by the Crucified Christ, we are comforted and no longer fear what death can do.

The Christian brings new children into this world in hope. The world does not have this hope because it does not believe the words and promises of Jesus. This is the hope of perfect healing, eternal life, and the resurrection of the dead.

Hope is what the Christian has, because of one birth: the birth of Jesus. The woman in labor has hope, because her Lord has traversed fetal development and has come out kicking and screaming. Parents in anguish have hope, because their Lord has conquered sin and death.

All children, young and old, have hope because the resurrection is theirs in baptism. You have hope because Jesus gives His Church life in abundance and that means having children. Not just physically, but spiritually.

If you ever doubt that there is joy to be had in the birth of a child, simply look into this baptismal font and you will see and never-ending line of newborn children in the Faith, all having Christ’s righteousness and all having Christ’s life and forgiveness.

There is joy in the birth of the Christ Child. There is joy in the death and resurrection of Jesus. There is joy in the death and rebirth of sinners, in baptism. There is joy in having children, because there, not that you have fun going through all the bad stuff, but because your Lord has given these things to you as a gift, it is the right thing to do: having children.

For a little while, in the Church, we will have sorrow. We will have sorrow, because our hour has come to stand in the face of sin, death, and the devil and either we will give in or Christ is triumphant for us. On that day we will fear because either we will deny Christ before men or Jesus will confess us to the Father, for us.

Because Jesus has accomplished and secured our salvation for us; because He has given us the hope of the resurrection, our sorrow turns to joy, because the God-man has been born into the world and suffers and dies for you. And when He rises again from the dead, all the hope you need is found in that promise that His resurrection is for you.

"...is a dead shepherd." [Easter 3; St. John 10:11-16]

Jesus truly speaks to you all today saying,

“The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.”

Last week, when we heard about the St. Thomas incident, one thing that should pop into your mind is what the Church thought of St. Thomas. They picture him as a sort of engineer, because his “coat of arms”, so to speak, contains the image of a square. Not the 4-sided kind, but a measuring square.

Thus, the Church expects some sort of intelligence from the Apostles, especially when it comes to the resurrection, to be able to prove and disprove it. When we get to Jesus, what He does and what He says, we also expect the same sort of intelligence, but when He talks about the Good Shepherd laying down His life for the sheep, this one throws us for a loop.

What good is a dead shepherd? Just as bad as a shepherd that flees is the shepherd that dies. Both leave the sheep and both abandon their duties. Forgetting the hired hand, for the moment, we find that the good shepherd gives his life for the sheep, but what then?

Maybe he thinks that he can atone for some past sins, by dying. Maybe he thinks this is the only way. Maybe he thinks that he should fight to his very last breath, rather than regret no having fought hard enough against the wolf.

You have to admit that the hired hand has the right idea, for you have heard it said, “He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day.” The shepherd is more important than the sheep. For if he lives, he can just rebuild the flock, after the attack, and care for them. The sheep can not do that on their own.

How much more good can be accomplished if one goes on living, instead of being a living sacrifice? The soldier can return home. The shepherd can continue his livelihood. The parent can continue to parent.

Repent! The twisting of Scripture continues! By this logic, Jesus made a mistake. He should not have died. He should have been exonerated and continued to live, teaching and caring for the outcasts and the unloved by society. Live, Jesus live. You are better to us alive rather than dead.

Jesus doesn’t think so and since He is God and knows what He’s doing better than you, you should stop and struggle with this. Jesus doesn’t think that the hired hand is coming back. Jesus doesn’t think that the soldier can sacrifice enough. Jesus doesn’t think that you have all the good intentions you say you do, on Sunday mornings.

Against all reason and intelligence, Jesus, the Good Shepherd, lays down His life. In other words, He dies. Death claims the victory and the Sheepfold is left undefended. At least, that is what the devil would have us think.

Rage and ruin as they might, death and the devil could not hold the Good Shepherd in their icy grasp. Jesus bursts from the tomb, having laid down His life for the sheep. Not just any life, the life of God. For it is only Jesus, true God and true man, who could offer Himself for us.

God will be the shepherd. He will not do that job through door-to-door salesmen, but Himself will come and shepherd His flock. The salesmen will have you believe that they are doing God’s will; that they know what God wants and that only you have the power to please Him or to anger Him.

The salesmen will point you to this method or that path and they will point you inside yourself asking, “What does this mean to you” or “Won’t you give everything to Jesus”.

The Good Shepherd points you to Himself and leads you to Himself. He does this with His sacraments. The promises in and with the sacraments provide an mighty bulwark as a sheep pen. The water combined with God’s Word is worked into a reinforced titanium gate. The Gospel, purely preached, creates the Shepherd’s voice to follow. Eating and drinking in Faith, not only gives strength and health to the sheep, but also a sure foundation of forgiveness.

In this wonderful, gracious way, the Church is not left to fend for itself. Jesus has left His voice behind for us to hear and to believe. Jesus has left the pen open to all who believe and keep this Word as a priceless treasure.

The Shepherd that lays down His life is the Shepherd that never leaves His flock, even in death. The Good Shepherd is the man that speaks to His flock by Moses, the prophets, and the Apostles. The Good Shepherd is the man that bursts from death to new life, dragging His sheep behind Him.

The Word and the Sacraments always point to Christ and therefore are always what the Son of God uses to forgive His people in the 21^st century. If a door-to-door salesman ever stops by to ask you to do something outside of this scope, asks him if baptism saves, as the Bible says. If it does, then you have no need for the door-to-door salesman. If he says it doesn’t save, or you must do something beyond that, then you still have no use for the salesman.

Jesus physically keeps you in the one, true faith and in the one, true Church. This is the takeaway for today. The Good Shepherd is good because He died, and lives still today. The salesman is known by his incessant talk of himself and his works. The hired hand knows nothing of the Sacraments and denies their power.

The Good Shepherd, Who died and rose again, gives His resurrection to you in baptism. He gives his Faith to you, by His Gospel. He strengthens and keeps you close to Himself by forgiving your sins in His Supper. These are His good and gracious works, done for you and these are the only works that matter.

Dis-moistening [Easter 2; St. John 20:19-31]

Jesus speaks to you today, saying,

“And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’”

And in saying this, the words of the prophet Ezekiel are fulfilled. In front of Ezekiel, God only breathed into an entire valley of dead people. Through Jesus, God breathes life into every single person that ever existed.

But whose bones are in Ezekiel’s valley and where did they come from? It is quite possible that they are the bones from when Israel was wondering through the desert, with Moses. Remember a whole generation had to die before they could enter the promised land.

It is also quite possible that they are bones from no one in particular, maybe even non-jewish. Which makes a little more sense since they have been left un-buried and un-cared for; a truly pagan act.

Regardless, the Lord answers this question by saying that the bones are Israel. The literal and the spiritual, bones of Israel. For Israel has turned away. Their zeal is dried up. Their faith is dried up. Their good works are dried up. Nothing is left but dust and ashes.

Even in this locked room where the disciples are, the valley of dry bones has extended its reach beyond time and presents itself to Jesus, as we hear this account from the Gospel.

Note the striking parallels: Jesus stands in the midst of His disciples as Ezekiel was stood in the valley. Thomas echoes Ezekiel’s unbelief in knowing whether or not dead bones can live. The Word preaches and bone assembles to bone, while Jesus tells Thomas to place his hand to touch His rib, where the spear was thrust.

Jesus has risen from the grave to prove that He is true man and also true God and finally breathes the Holy Spirit into the disciples as the holy breath of God was given to the dry bones.

This means that the place where Jesus is standing is in the midst of dry, dead bones. Bones that have lost their vigor. Sinews that have lost their will. Flesh and skin that has lost its value. Breath that has stopped.

Repent! Jesus asks, “When the Son of man returns, will Hefind faith on the earth?”. If Thomas and Peter don’t stand a chance against  unbelief, then what chance do you think you have? Indeed, you have no tools at your disposal that is able to break through the barrier of unbelief, even when presented with one who has risen from the dead.

However, Jesus is not made man and born of a virgin for a lost cause. He does not suffer at the hands of Pontius Pilate, die, and is buried with no hope. Jesus does not return from the dead and reinstate Peter and Thomas on their merits and He does not leave His Word around for you to hear it, for no good reason.

Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Light, The Way that Jesus makes is paved with His intentions and His good works. The Way that is given to us to tread has been made straight. Because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, the dust and ashes of our own sinful selves has been given the breath of Faith.,

The issue here is that, in your sin, you do not believe. In your sin, you are in the same sad state that the dry bones are in. In fact, that valley stretches to the end of time and has dried up the faith of the entire world. Thus, Jesus comes to us, not looking for righteousness or faith, but He comes to give it.

In the exact same way that the dry bones gained life, so you gain life. In the beginning, Adam was a pile of dust. The Lord breathed into him and he was made man. Adam sinned and was once again returned to the dust and died.

Your problem is unbelief. Your problem is sin. Your problem is that you are dead towards God. The solution is the Word of God. The solution is Jesus, contending with death and winning. The solution is your resurrection from the depths of your sin and also your resurrection from your physical death at Christ’s return.

The valley of dry bones has reached even to our age, even to our church. You may easily be able to point it out in others, but you are never certain when it has its grip on you. Like Peter and Thomas, then, it is best to assume you are in it all the time.

In that Way, the Holy Spirit can come and revive you, as is His Job. He can wash you and speak to you the Words of Jesus. The Holy Spirit comes to this place, with the gifts purchased on the cross, in order to raise you to new life in Christ. Thus, Christ’s Church is a fertile valley.

We know the bone valley has reached us because we see our cemeteries getting bigger. We know the dead valley has reached us because we see the churches getting smaller. We know the dead valley has reached us, because we hear the breath of Christ blowing over us, giving us His Holy Spirit, and recreating us, in His Image.

The plain fact that the Church is here, points to our daily need of repentance and forgiveness. The fact that the Word and Sacraments are here, shows us that dying and rising to new life are a daily necessity for the Christian.

For Jesus is brought to you today by the Holy Spirit. He is set down in the middle of a valley of bones and the Lord, once again, asks if these bones can live. Jesus gives His final breath from the cross; He gives His Body, scourged and pierced; and He gives His true Blood, poured out, and in this divine sacrifice, life occurs.

Not just the rattling of bones; not just a shell of sinews, flesh, and skin, and not just any old breath. Jesus, right here for you, gives rescue from death and the devil. He works the forgiveness of sins and gives eternal salvation to all who believe these words and promises: “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved.”

In a dry, sin-filled world, baptism floods every dusty corner. In old and dry satan-controlled territories, the Word is breathed out with new life. In the dead sinner, the true, life-giving Body and Blood of Christ is grafted and ingested in. All in order that you may believe that the Word is being breathed out upon you today and that you are gaining saving faith, that is the forgiveness of all your sins.

For the Word of Christ really does create a clean heart and a right Spirit within you.

Palm Sunday [The Passion according to St. Matthew 26:1-27:54]

It is a glorious witness to the power of God when we hear the same Gospel reading from Advent 1, on Palm Sunday. Glorious, because Jesus is coming; not just to a Silent Night in Bethlehem, but to fallen creatures singing His praise today, but shout “Crucify” on Friday.

Thus, Jesus speaks today, saying:

“When morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death.”

Another wonderful witness comes from the Pharisees. Their patriotic speeches are littered with unintentional prophecy. The high priest declares that it is better for one man to die than for a multitude to suffer and the Pharisees incite the Good Friday crowd to say, “His blood be upon us and our children!”

Pilate gives one final witness before the cross. He inscribes upon it the charges brought against Jesus. In his eyes they were meant to deter anyone else from doing this same thing, so they would not be crucified as well. It read, “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.”

Even the Moslems are not to be outdone. 1000 years after Jesus on the same highway that Jesus is riding upon and the same Great Gate He passes through to Jerusalem are, today walled up and blocked with a graveyard. Their thinking is that if a Jewish Messiah were prophesied to come in through the East Gate (the King’s gate) he would have to be ritually clean. Touching dead bodies negates that and here’s a wall just in case.

They are all better witnesses of the person and work or Jesus Christ than you, because they are willing to sacrifice everything for it and take Jesus at His Word. They believe putting Jesus to death would show everyone just how not-godlike Jesus really is.

Remember, death is not your friend or their friend. So, while Jesus will die, death is not going to do what everyone wnts. This is because death is not a thing, in and of itself. Just like sin is not a thing. Both of them are not created things and they have no business being here.

Yet it is here. We can not explain it. We can not rationalize it. It is something that should not be. It causes much harm, much sorrow, and much regret. It is the one thing you avoid at all cost and yet, here Jesus is practically running to His death.

The first time we hear of death, it is from the lips of the Lord. He says that eating the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil will only lead to the death of Adam. Thus the Prophet of prophets tells us of death and also tells us it is not His doing.

Think about it this way: your bodies cannot handle heaven. They can’t even handle life on earth and yet they were made by God. Does this mean God is a failure? Many of you love various sins and vices and use the excuse that God made you that way. Does this mean God is schizophrenic?

God created all things. There is only one Creator so anything that is here or that we discover is made by Him and yet it is also true that God did not make death. How we understand that is how we understand sin. God created your bodies and souls, but He did not create them corrupted or fallible and yet they are.

Likewise, God created life, but He didn’t create life to end. He is life. That would be ridiculous. In light of this, we call death what it is: a corruption. God created life; sin corrupted it. And it is corrupted beyond repair. It is corrupted to the genetic level, never to be undone.

In your sin, you deserve nothing but this death. In your sin, you also cheer on those who wish to prove God to the world by putting Him to death. You wish to see for yourself, for you are not completely convinced, Jesus dying just like you: alone and afraid.

However, Jesus dying is exactly what the plan is. He says to you, “Your will be done”. You wish to see God share in your struggles and grief? He does. You wish to see God handle the stress of life and the anguish of despair? You got it. You desire to see God having to die? Sure thing.

What the Pharisees don’t understand is that it is precisely through death that Jesus is proven to be faithful and true. It is exactly in His Blood poured out upon them that they save everyone. What Pilate doesn’t get is that a true King lays down His life for friend and foe alike. What the Moslems don’t understand is that not even death can stop this King of Life.

Death is the last enemy to be overcome because it is the last door for a Christian to go trough. Death is the last enemy because it is the final cut between old creation and a new creation, for one who has died has died to sin and sin and the Law can no longer condemn him. However, in Christ, the Christian does not die, but falls asleep.

Jesus, the Lord of life has had His creation wrenched from His hands and thrown down a death spiral. What was once forward, life, is now backwards, death. However, Jesus goes backwards, into death, in order to once again right the ship.

Jesus reverses the reversal. It can not be explained any better. Death, which is irrational and unnatural, must be conquered by the irrational and unnatural; namely the death of God.

And, as we heard last Wednesday evening, this death is proclaimed by your entire body in the Lord’s Supper. No more does sin and sorrow reign, because Jesus has given us His pledge. The sign of all this is the cross of Jesus. His pledge to you is the Sacrament of the Altar.

The real misunderstanding of unbelievers is that God can be both spiritual and physical. Not only that, but that God can die, being one substance and one person with Jesus. That He can be buried in the ground, same as you. That He can fulfill your will in striking the final blow against Jesus and in the same act, relieve you of your guilt as you cry out, “I put my Lord on the cross!”

It was the will of the father to sacrifice His Son. It was the Son’s joy and delight to give His Body and spill His blood upon you and your children, in Baptism. It is the great endeavor of the Lord that the Bridegroom die and bleed upon your sins, in order that Jesus now be your life in death and bring you to heaven’s portals.

Life from death [Lent 5; St. John 8:46-59]

Jesus speaks to you today, saying:

“⁵³ Are you greater than our father Abraham, who died? And the prophets died! Who do you make yourself out to be?”

On Good Friday, you will hear the Jews make a startling declaration. They publicly confess that they have no king but Caesar. At that point it was either admit that Jesus was a king or take Caesar and you know they hated the former more.

Thus they declare a prince of this world as their ruler. Today, you hear something similar. The Scribes and the Pharisees love to claim Abraham as their father; their direct blood-line to the promise of God. They will also do the same to the prophets.

But here, they are not. Notice what they say. They say, “Our father Abraham”, but then note that he died. They say, “Our prophets”, but also note that they died. So who really is their father? Who really is the one that rules over them? Who is this mysterious Caesar that they have voted for unanimously?

As the Jews see it, they are hearing God’s words and are living by them. They have Abraham, Moses, and all the prophets written down for them. They have their faithful teachers preaching and teaching them and yet Jesus says that they do not hear God.

The reason is this: they are dead in their sin and death is their true father. Rather than have Jesus be God, they challenge Him with their god: death. Abraham died and even the Prophets died, Jesus. Are you greater than our God, death?

Can you blame them? Is it easier to believe in death, which you experience everyday, or to believe in life after death of which no one has reported to you?

Think about it. Death is seen as a friend, because he lets you live a full life and then takes you in your sleep. Death eases your burden by removing you from this life. Death quietly waits until you are ready and gives you rest. What a kind and merciful master!

Repent. The dead do not hear God. The dead do not see God and death is not the friend you force him to be. Sure, in your youth, when illness is far away, death is a great adventure waiting just around the corner, but he is really an unwanted intruder, snatching and grabbing when and where he chooses.

Yet, here is where you find yourself: in death’s grip. It is a sure thing. Youth can not prevent it. A fountain or a grail are not going to remove it. Make-up, vegetables, or even right-living all turn on you, when you need them the most.

You find yourself in sin. You find yourself taking up arms against your brothers and hauling them before unbelievers to judge them. You find yourself dead in sin. You find yourself not listening to God. You find that you have no king but Caesar.

Jesus says that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is not the God of the dead, but of the living. He says that the Father will glorify Him. He says that He speaks the Word of God. He says that there is a day in which your father Abraham was glad to see and that day involves death.

You and the Jews ask Jesus, “Who do you make yourself out to be, Jesus?” “Are you greater than our god, death?” “We’ll put you on a cross to prove that you aren’t.”

Jesus answers by saying that Abraham has already seen His day and he rejoiced. Jesus answers by saying, “Watch me go to the cross, and I’ll prove it to you.” And when He does, Jesus, who is both God and man, does not become less, but more.

Where last week, Jesus told us of eating heavenly bread, at the cross Jesus eats death for you. You see Jesus crowned with glory because of His suffering and death in order that He would taste death for everyone (Heb.2:9).

The God of all creation; indeed, the only God out there, lowers Himself to sit at your “god’s” table and death lays it all out. The spread is awful. The fare is each and every person’s death since Abel. The main course is your sin and dessert is God on a cross.

And death is swallowed up in life (2Cor.5:4). Death is swallowed up in victory (1Cor.15:54). Jesus makes what the devil has kept in his mouth to come out and the nations no longer stream to him (Jer.51:44).

Jesus has swallowed you, uniting with you; baptizing you into His death in order that you would share in His resurrection (Rom.6:5). The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God in Jesus’ suffering and death is eternal life (Rom.6:23).

The Lord did not create death. He did create the resurrection. The Lord did not create you for death. You body can not handle it, quite literally. As the Jews tempt Jesus, they teach you this by saying that all the really special, godly people died. Even though God was with them, feeding them, and working through them, they still died.

True, but now that even God has died, death is no more, and in faith, though you die you will live. You will know suffering. You will experience dying, but you will never know death. Jesus has taken that away. Even Abraham and the prophets did not die, but fell asleep.

In baptism, you share in this wonderful Gospel. In baptism, you are united, flesh and blood, to the Body that death could not hold onto. In baptism, you are one with the one true God and one true man who has tasted death and yet come out alive. There is no more reason to fear death.

You do not have to bow to it. You do not have to plead with it. You do not have to make bargains or strike up deals with it. Death now serves God in every way. The only power it has over you, now, is to remove you from its shadowed valley.

That’s it. It can not tear you from Jesus. It can not remove faith from you. It can not destroy what God has promised you. It can not take anything from you, for what death has taken, Jesus gives back in the resurrection 100 times over. Death is now a slumber; a portal, from this life of sin to the promised life of eternity, in Christ.

Where this world turns on you and all your efforts yield no fruit in front of death, Jesus turns to you and yields imperishable fruit. Jesus turns to you and offers this fruit in His Sacraments, for there is no other way to obtain fruit from the Tree of Life except from the Lord of Life Who hung on a tree.

Certainly true [Wednesday prayer; Rom.6 & 1 Pet. 3]

Thus far, we have concluded the first three Chief parts of the Catechism. First: the 10 commandments; Second: the Creed, and Third: the Lord’s own Prayer. You could call these first three the Foundation. Not only, in that order, do they explain themselves, but they prepare you for the Sacraments.

In giving the 10 Commands, we hear God tell us what we are to do and not do. Yet, from these commands alone, we do not know God. The Creed then explains the Commands in a way in which we may know Who God is and what we can expect Him to be doing.

Then, in seeing our complete failure with the first part; hearing God’s perfection in the Second part and realizing our utmost need in the Third, we finally come to the sacraments that give Faith something to cling to.

It is at this point that Dr. Luther admitted Christians to the Lord’s Table. On top of confessing Christ’s true Body in the bread and His true Blood in the wine seen on the altar, these first Chief Parts form the kernel of true Faith, in a simple way.

Of course, there is always more to learn from the Bible and the catechism. It would take more than a lifetime to master either of them. Thus, the catechism continues to the second section: the ways in which God gives Faith on earth; also known as the sacraments.

 St. Peter minces no words and describes the sacraments in perfect simplicity: baptism now saves you. Plain as plain can be, St. Peter gives Faith a solid, immovable mountain to stand upon in an ocean of shifting sand. On these four words, false belief is prevented and shame is overcome.

This is because the Word of God promises something here. Now, it is true that God promises long life to those who honor their father and mother, but where is this long life? Can I taste it? Can I touch it? I see people honoring their parents and yet they die the same as everyone else.

The sacraments are different than just a promise made by Jesus. They are a promise attached to a physical location. With Baptism, Jesus promises salvation in a washing with water and the Word. You are not doing the washing. You are not creating the water and you are not imagining the Word. All this is done outside of you.

And that’s the main difference. With honoring your parents or following Jesus or anything else God demands of you, you can find it inside yourself or its something you can attempt. With the Gospel, it is only something you can find outside of you and being done to you.

Thus, holy Scripture presents baptism as the water combined with the Word of God. In fact, God stakes His very honor, power and might upon this sacrament to do what He says it does. This is found also in the Word as Jesus commands and promises, “Go into all the world, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

The command is plain. The promise is plain. Do not doubt that baptism is God’s own creation; that, even though it is performed by men’s hands, it is God’s own act of washing you.

“Therefore we always teach that the Sacraments and all external things which God ordains and institutes should not be regarded according to the coarse, external mask (as we regard the shell of a nut) but as that in which God’s Word is enclosed. 

For we also speak of parents and the civil government in the same way. If we propose to regard them in as far as they have noses, eyes, skin, and hair, flesh and bones, they look like Turks and heathen, and some one might come and say: Why should I think more of this person than of others? But because the commandment is added: Honor thy father and thy mother, I behold a different man, adorned and clothed with the majesty and glory of God. The commandment (I say) is the chain of gold about his neck, yes, the crown upon his head, which shows me how and why I should honor this particular flesh and blood.

Thus, and much more even, you must honor Baptism and esteem it glorious on account of the Word, since He Himself has honored it both by words and deeds; moreover, confirmed it with miracles from heaven.