Celebrating St. Michael

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE. 

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Daniel 10:10-14, 12:1-3

• Revelation 12:7-12

• St. Matthew 18:1-11

In the Name...

Dear saints at St. John’s: grace to you and peace from Him Who is and Who was and Who is to come; from Jesus Christ the faithful Witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth.

 

Who speaks to you today, in your hearing, about angels in every one of our holy Scripture readings.

The Feast day that the Church uses to celebrate St. Michael the Archangel and all the angels is over 1500 years old and predates the Roman Catholic church. Yet, as you have heard this evening, Christians have been celebrating St. Michael as their champion since the time of Daniel, really since even Moses time, when St. Jude says in the New Testament, in 1:9, “Yet Michael the archangel, in contending with the devil, when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, ’The Lord rebuke you!’”

So really, we are talking about Day One of the Church. And since we have not seen or heard of it since recently, we are talking tonight about just as many years of giving up things in Church. Yes, for at least 500 years, the churches have not been persecuted enough, because instead of the evil one taking things away and forbidding it by earthly decree, we have been voluntarily giving things up.

So much have we given up that it has affected our culture in our own country. Ever so slowly, even the Lutherans, have allowed so many things to go by the wayside and fall out of use in the Church. The celebration of saints days is one of them, the use of incense another, and chanting, genuflecting, and the list goes on.

Now, who cares, you say? None of that affects my salvation and relationship with Christ. It doesn’t matter how i worship, it only matters what’s in my heart. If that is true, then you have no grounds to complain about the state of your country. If that is true, you have no right to bemoan the fact that God is not in our schools. If that is true, you have no call to even come to church, for who needs church when they have their own heart-sanctuary?

To fight against this, we produce ceremonies which occupy time, thoughts, and physical energy. The Reformation was so dead set on not losing everything valuable that the Church had produced since time immemorial that in our own Confessions that say, “Falsely are our churches accused of abolishing the Mass; for the Mass is retained among us, and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved, save that the parts sung in Latin are interspersed here and there with German hymns, which have been added to teach the people. For ceremonies are needed to this end alone that the unlearned be taught [what they need to know of Christ].” (AC 24:1-4)

The world wants empty space. Empty space on our calendars, empty space in our hearts, and empty space in our heads in order that it may fill up that space with whatever evil, shame or vice it wants. And slowly but surely we agree and whether its to be more likeable or more tolerant, we voluntarily begin to give up everything that makes the Church, /Church.

When one day, we look at what we have and say, “What am I doing wasting my time in this worthless place?” and wake up to find Christ nowhere in our country.

But I am not concerned with our country and neither is Jesus or St. Michael. We are all concerned with faith. Your faith and your salvation. We want your church to be a fruitful place, not just full of activity, but full of Christ. Swimming in a sea of Christ. Eating and breathing Christ.

So the Christians before us, Old Testament, New Testament, and after have determined to fill up our lives with Christ. As we have already spoken on Sunday, they had an easy starting point: the Lord’s Temple. All the items and ceremonies involved with that was God’s starting point, but even then all those happenings there pointed to the Messiah to come.

When the Apostles came about, Christ gave them the fulfillment of that Temple culture and ceremonies in Word and Sacrament, which was not very different from what went on in the Temple. So we hear them being devoted to the doctrines, the breaking of the bread, fellowship, and prayers, in Acts 2:42.

The festivals in Church necessarily changed with the Incarnation of God. Since God was made man in Christ, now there was even more to occupy Church time. Not only could we celebrate Creation, Exodus, and God’s Word, but the sanctification and salvation that He worked through men.

With the new revelation that Jesus is both God and man, now men had a part in the Church culture. Now, the Holy Spirit did not dwell in temples made with stone, but with temples made by the hand of God, clay jars, dusty dolls: you. 

Now, the great work of proclaiming perfect salvation to the world lies in the hands of men. Are we in trouble? Most of the time. But do we have a champion, a great prince fighting on our side? Yes. the Lord not only sends His Prince of Peace, Jesus, but also sends His entire army to our side, led by St. Michael, the prince of angels.

For it is with angels and archangels that we celebrate the Divine Service. And since we have such a rich history given by God, and since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, and since there is nothing more important in this world than communing with the Lord of all in body and blood, then we will make every excuse in the Church to get together as often as possible.

We will celebrate Apostles, Angels, and bishops and pastors. We will celebrate miracles, and platitudes, and commandments. We will celebrate books, and chapters, and verses. We will celebrate memorization, repetition, and monotony. We will celebrate the Lord’s forgiveness which is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

We will gather together to eat, drink, and be merry in the Faith as often as we can, for our Lord has come down all glorious to save us from sin, death, and the power of the devil through Word and Sacrament. And we will clothe that Gospel truth in all the richness we can muster in ceremony, hymnody, and art.

St. Michael and all angels are celebrated in the Holy Bible, but even if they all be forgotten and we never celebrate St. Michael or any other saint ever again, celebrating Christ 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year in Word and Sacrament is worth it and enough. Thank God we have a God Who loves celebration as much as we do and so His Church reflects that, as best we can.

We believe and confess that the liturgy of our Church has the great function of keeping us in touch with the past and the dead in the Lord. So we use what has been given to us to celebrate a salvation history accomplished “yesterday”, the God-man Who lives and communes today, and the sure and certain hope of His resurrection for us “tomorrow”.

A blessed St. Michael’s Day to you all.

Ceremony and Celebration [Trinity 17]

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE.

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Proverbs 25:6-14

• Ephesians 4:1-6

• St. Luke 14:1-11

 

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Rom 1)

 

Who speaks to you today, in your hearing, saying:

“And Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, ‘Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?’”

 

When Jesus asks this question, He demands an answer from you. Not answering is an answer, but its not one you want to give to God. So you quickly agree with Jesus, not really understanding why. This is also what you don’t want to happen, because Jesus gives you two parables to teach you “why”.

 

So today, we go after ceremonies in the Church, in order to understand what our Lord wants us to in healing and in the Sabbath. This is important, because God’s Word has already spoken on this issue through Moses in Exodus 20. You know it well: 

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it” (Ex 20:8-11).

 

But everyone’s real favorite is the enforcer verse, because we are all disguised dictators. Exodus 34 says: “Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant” (v. 15-16).

 

This is the injunction hanging over everyone’s head as everyone is watching Jesus carefully, not only in the Gospel, but today. for the question still remains: does Jesus do things the right way or the wrong way? Is He a consistent God or does He contradict Himself and disqualify Himself from being God?

 

One place the world looks to discredit Jesus is in His ceremonies that He instituted in the Old Testament, such as the Sabbath Day. And as the Old Testament has shown us, ceremonies are important to God, so it makes sense for us and the Pharisees to critique God, or at least a man claiming to be God, on this point. Does what Jesus do line up with what God does?

 

First, what is “ceremony”, more specifically “ceremonial law”, as that is how the Pharisees are using it? Ceremony and Ceremonial Law can easily be put together and defined thus: They are the outward and external arrangement of sacrifices and the entire culture surrounding the Temple. Meaning everything that went on within Temple grounds was ceremony commanded by God.

 

Within this culture, the Lord ordered and disciplined His people to especially separate them from other, false religious cultures. The Lord’s good order kept a solid line between false worship and true worship and His discipline made sure to keep those boundaries closed. Ceremony literally is proper order and wholesome discipline.

 

Why so strict? Because eventually all false religions degrade into flesh fests and the basest of emotions. Islam, though they speak of Jesus, has a prophet who condoned sexual deviancy. The Mormons went the same way. Even those who call themselves “christian” have regressed to emotional induced flailing in praise music.

 

Point is, ceremony keeps us on the right path. The Church is to be in the world not of it and should not look like the world or take on its sinful characteristics. The Church will stand out and it should.

 

So, ceremony can also be divided into two parts: Sacrament and Sacrifice. The sacrifice part we get. It is what we bring to God: thanks, praise, song, and offering. These things we love because these things we can do. It makes God easier to comprehend. The Sacrament part complicates things if only because of its seeming impossibility.

 

A sacrament is a ceremony or work, whereby God gives us that, which the divine promise

attached to this ceremony, offers. Here, we are getting to the crux of the matter. Without sacrament, there is no sacrifice. Without a God making the ceremony valid, all the praise bands in the world will not open us His ears.

 

This is even in the Lord’s command on the Sabbath. Yes there is “death” attached to it, but He says this in Exodus 31:13, “Surely My Sabbaths you shall keep, for it is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you.”

 

Repent! The only way you know your efforts are worth it is if God has commanded it. But you only know if God accepts it if you don’t die. And we all die.

 

However, as Exodus told us, it is God’s efforts that are important. If God is sanctifying, before we do any work, then our work is valid and pleasing to Him. More importantly, God is doing His work with His own Body and His own, rational soul. Which means two things: God will offer an Atoning sacrifice and that faith is necessary for that ceremony.

 

So Jesus, both God and man, comes to live and act out His own ceremonies and in so doing give us the real and true purpose of them. For Jesus, God made man, is our sanctification from God. “But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption— that, as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord”, says 1 Corinthians 1:30-31.

 

In St. Mark 2:27-28, our Sanctification says, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath.” This is not an excuse to ignore it, but an invitation to observe the Sabbath, and all ceremonies, correctly. As in, the Sabbath was made for your rest. It is an appeal to a God who cares so much for you, that He builds a weekend break into the fabric of Creation itself.

 

And what does the Christ do on the Sabbaths He celebrates? What are His ceremonies? Yes, He heals on the Sabbath, but we know and believe that healing from Jesus means salvation. Jesus works salvation on the Sabbath. For this, sinners want Him dead, as Israel accomplishes on Good Friday.

 

But in an ultimate “gatcha”, Jesus observes the Sabbath perfectly on Holy Saturday with His rest in the tomb. On that 7th Day, the Lord of all Creation finally perfects and completes His work that He began so long ago. The Ceremony of Salvation that started in Genesis, is finished on the cross with God’s Sacrifice of Atonement.

 

And because Christ observed the Sabbath ceremony perfectly and because He fulfilled all the Law perfectly, God raised Him to life again. So even though it looked as if Christ suffered the death penalty for His apparent transgressions against the Sabbath, of which He was falsely accused and condemned, God delivered Him because He delighted in Him.

 

The ceremony that God commands is the ceremony that God finishes in Christ. the Sacrament and the Sacrifice, such that there is no work left for us to do which then makes us also observe the Sabbath perfectly as well!!!

 

Jesus does this, not by taking away work, but by giving faith. Faith that all the work necessary for pleasing God has been accomplished and is freely given in Christ’s Body and Blood. Faith is the key to making ceremonies “work”. Without faith, there is nothing.

 

Colossians 2 says: “So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a feast day or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but Christ’s body makes the shadow. 

Let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom all the body, nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God.”

 

Our Sabbath, and all our God-given ceremonies are kept in Christ. If we are not “in His rest”, as Psalm 95:11 says, then we do not keep God’s Word nor follow our Savior. But now that the New Day of Resurrection has overtaken the ceremonial day of the Sabbath, today, if you hear His voice crying from His resurrected flesh and blood, do not harden your hearts (Ps 95:8).

 

Do not harden your hearts to the Sacrament, the place where God sanctifies people and work, promising to give all of His Kingdom to all who believe. The ceremony God now interacts in is Communion and Baptism. The instruction and institution is given by the Gospel. The ceremonies have necessarily changed because of that, but again, the ceremonies are there for us, not for God.

 

So when it comes to ceremony in Church, there is freedom. Freedom in how we proclaim and magnify God’s Sacrifice and God’s Sacrament. This is why Jesus moves on in the Gospel to places of honor at the Feast. the Feast being His Supper.

 

Where is the focus, He asks? Who has the honor? Is it not the one who is served at the feast that has the position of honor and not the one who serves? But behold Christ is among you as the One Who serves. Jesus is in the highest place, sanctifying for His Name’s sake, and He is in the lowest place sacrificing Himself on behalf of the people.

 

All that’s left, is to honor you who have heard the Word and believe. All that’s left to do is to bestow the forgiveness of sins to those who believe it. All that’s left is to eat, drink, and depart in the peace of God’s ceremonies perfected for you. Christ at the center is the ultimate understanding of any ceremonies offered in the Church.

 

For, if God is only “in us” and not in the externals, then we are the guests of honor. If God uses means, then He has the honor. White-washed churches equal idol-filled hearts, striving to keep the Sabbath and all other ceremonial laws with their own two hands, closing the gates of heaven for all who are not like them.

 

what they can’t believe, or don’t believe, is that the ceremonies have all been abolished, for Christ’s sake. Those outwards works were instituted, not forever, but only in Israel’s generations, as we heard in Exodus 34:16, and as is said in other places. They have also been abolished because they were only a shadow of the coming Christ, as we have already said, “a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of” God made man (Heb 10:1).

 

And finally, because God himself promised a new covenant. “Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and the house of Judah” (Jer 31:31) and  “In that he saith a new covenant, he hath made the first old” (Heb. 8 : 13).

 

We celebrate ceremony in faith and the freedom of Christ. the core, which does not change, is the doctrine of Christ and His Sacraments. The outward works that surround that doctrine, do change, as you notice in the Divine Service offered here. 

 

Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath? In other words, is it lawful to perform acts of mercy, kindness, and piety on the Sabbath? You agree with Jesus because He is raised from the dead on a sabbath, will raise you from the dead, and comes to you in Word and Sacrament. 

 

This is why the correct observance of the Sabbath is not based on you, but Jesus. For on a true Sabbath you are to not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.

 

 

The Resurrection [Trinity 16]

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE.

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• 1 Kings 17:17-24

• Ephesians 3:13-21

• St. Luke 7:11-17

 

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Rom 1)

 

Who speaks you this morning saying,

“And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, ‘Do not weep.’”

 

From today’s readings, we are presented with two mothers. Two mothers that have lost something very important and two mothers who, quite understandably, put full faith in the Resurrection of the dead. For if there is no resurrection from the dead, not only will their sons not be returned to them, but having children in the first place becomes meaningless.
 
In this way, belief in the resurrection of the dead is pretty much completely logical, even from the very beginning of all things, for life is meaning-full. Yes, the Lord takes joy in creating every lily of the field the same way He did from Day 1, year after year and never tires of it, but even in those feelings coming from His work in Creating all things, we can get a taste of eternity. In that, He would not mind spending eternity creating lilies.
 
And our God is not just a simpleton gardener, oblivious to all else. He has become a Son Himself, thus teaching us all that He is not just raising and ruling nature, but also raising His own family. And yet, after all that perfect effort He goes through, something or someone has trampled the vineyard and destroyed the family.
 
We meet both our mothers today in the aftermath of such a tragedy. Their precious lilies that they nurtured and raised in a family have been stolen. Yes, stolen. It is not just the “circle of life” and it is not “just how it goes”. Life has been stolen and it is not right.
 
But this belief about life taking priority and precedence does not come from nature. No, you will not find funeral rites, or memorials, or cemeteries in nature. 
 
Kill or be killed. Dog eat dog. When talking about the resurrection, here is where it beinsspeaks against reincarnation. To continue to be killed over and over again is nothing to believe in. Not a circle, but a loop of despair with no hope of relief.
 
This belief about life being of infinite value also does not come from philosophy. The best the greatest minds can come up with is “preservation of self”, even more foul and specific: the genetic self. Preservation of self means solitude and sterility; a loss of life which is not to be confused with individualism. It is such a loss of life that, engraved in this so called “humanism”, is the perpetual goal of reducing the world’s population. Well, I say, them first.
 
And yet the world runs on nature and this philosophy. Our crony-businessmen, so-called scientists, and politicians cannot understand anything outside of the material world which they can touch, smell, taste, see, and hear. And if that’s the case, why are these mothers getting so upset? Why are they so concerned about a clump of cells that happen to walk and talk? Why are they crying over dust and ashes?
 
Repent! You speak a good game about valuing life, but why do you value it? You try to talk about love and togetherness, but death steps in to disprove your thoughts and feelings. You then turn in on yourself and begin self-preservation just as the world has taught you to do.
 
So why do you value life?
 
I’ll tell you the only reason you and everyone else on earth values life: the resurrection. You may think that’s crazy, but when life doesn’t have an ending, that is when it becomes more valuable. Don't believe them when they say “live like there’s no tomorrow” or “live like you were dying” as if some horrible fear could coax people into being good.
 
Dear Christians, we live like there is a tomorrow, because there is. We live like we are going to live, not die, because we will. And our Lord points us this way in holy Scripture heard today. For at one point in time, sons were lost. But at the next point, sons were regained. “You were dead in your sins, now you are alive towards God”.
 
There is a tomorrow because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Who with His own flesh and blood ended the cycle of death and made a living way into the most holy place in front of God, for us His fellow priests (Heb 10:20). As His fellow priests we can tread where no priest has gone before. By faith, we have access to the heavenly Jerusalem. The Heavenly Jerusalem that is filled with life, the everlasting kind.
 
Through His flesh, says Hebrews 10:20, Jesus consecrates a Living Way for us. Flesh and blood as we know it has an end. We are reminded each and every time we pass a cemetery or a treasured photograph. But the Flesh and Blood of God. What would that be like? Like shining gold? Indestructible? Immortal?
 
But then what do we make of God dying on the cross? Only this: that God’s flesh and blood are so indestructible and immortal that not even death can tarnish it. The Flesh and blood of Jesus Christ remain alive and retain their immortality even in death and even when served in bread and wine.
 
This nature and philosophy do not teach. Only God in His Word. But even when God preaches and teaches, it does not make it through thick, sin-filled heads. So He must engrave it and tattoo it upon flesh and blood. He must not only preach and teach, but take action and give object lessons.
 
And the object lesson of Christ Crucified is that life is not only what we can touch, smell, taste, see and hear. It is not only the material world around us in nature. It is not only the logical ramblings of philosophy. It is also filled with love, because there is a God Who created all things and loves all the things He created and wants to keep them around forever.
 
So the Son of God teaches this lesson. He is conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of His mother. He also is robbed of His life, leaving His mother behind. He enters death’s treasury and pillages the whole lot. He is the Son Who comes back in order to bring all other sons back. Our God and Savior, Jesus Christ, with His own Flesh and Blood not only straddles heaven and earth, but life and death, bringing heaven to earth and life to death.
 
Here now is the true weight of the Promise and belief in the Resurrection. That Life wins in Jesus. That Jesus lives and we will live in Him. Our two mothers today place all of their faith and hope in that promise, because it is a promise for all time, not just for one day. So too, our mother, the Church, repeats that promise to you every chance she gets in the Divine Service.
 
We have said it before, but the real problem is not solved by Jesus raising these two sons to life again, just to die later on. The real solution lies in the Body of Christ which has died and risen again on its own. The real resurrection is only gained by being united with that Body.
 
This is why it is so important to Jesus to create His Church. This is why it is so important to us, really a life or death situation, that we be in Church. But being in the Lord’s Church does not just mean keeping a pew warm. It means communing with and interacting with the God Who comes down to the Divine Service with us.
 
It means having Jesus drape Himself over us, not just three times, but infinity times in baptism, covering the multitude of our sins for all time. It means having Jesus approach our funeral bier, bring a halt to death’s celebration over our dead body, and institute the Feast of Life with His alive Body, feeding us immortality and light.
 
It is only in this way, in this faith, and in this church that the words of Jesus, “Do not weep”, bring comfort instead of anger and sorrow. It is only knowing and believing that our weeping now will be turned to joy, that we can keep moving forward. It is only in the God-man conquering all things and defeating death for us, that there is any hope in this world.
 
God values life, so we value life. Not just one part but all parts. The devil is easy to spot in this one. He is the one taking life and destroying life, as is seen on our bulletin covers. Those then who call for more life to be taken are not with God but against Him, because “…Christ …suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit” (1 Peter 3:18) so that “…the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, [will] perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you”  in the resurrection of all flesh (1 Pet 5:10).
 
 

Faith, not Command [Trinity 15]

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE. 

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• 1 Kings 17:8-16

• Galatians 5:25-6:10

• St. Matthew 6:24-34

To you all who are in Accident, beloved of God, called to be saints:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Rom 1)

 

Who speaks you this morning saying,

“But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?”

 

Today our Lord connects anxiety with serving false gods. The anxiety comes from knowing, deep down, that your god is false, that he does not hear you, that he is not coming to rescue you, and that you are wrong. As we said last week, we look to our false gods for activity and presence in our daily lives, counting on their power to lift us up in the moment.

 

Whereas the one, true God is handing out faith, forgiveness, life and salvation, and those things rarely have a visible component to them in our daily lives, outside of Word and Sacrament. At least one in which we can say definitively: God loves me. Which makes the First Commandment so frustrating to us and why we seek after other gods when the real one appears to not care for us as He cares for the sparrows or the lilies.

 

On the First Commandment, Dr. Luther says, “where the heart is rightly disposed toward God and this commandment is observed, all the others follow” (LC 1:48). Not only will obedience to all other commandments follow, but peace, rest, safety, and even the Kingdom of God and His Righteousness will follow you all the days of your life (Ps 23:6).

 

The Law of God is necessary. By Law we don’t just mean the Commandments, but each and every demand that God makes of us. Each and every time God tells us to do something or gives us a conditional statement, that is His Law. Such as St. John 14:15 where Jesus says, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”

 

Is there room in there for discussion? The Fundamentalist will be happy to write you out of God’s Book of Life if they don’t see you keeping even one of the commands. More importantly is the question, is there room for mercy? Also no. Either you get it done or you don’t. Either you keep the command or its broken and you will not get out of “Breaking-Commandment-prison” till you have paid the last penny, Jesus says in St. Matthew 5:26.

 

Unless, of course you turn to St. Paul’s letters. For it is there that St. Paul appears to overturn this holy Law and say things like Ephesians 2, “For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility ¹⁵ by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, ¹⁶ and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility” (v.14-16).

 

Among other places, here we hear of “abolishing the law of commandments” and immediately our fundamentalist friends are triggered. That’s anarchy! You mean everyone can just do whatever they want and be forgiven? Blasphemy. And they would be right, if all that other stuff surrounding “keep my commandments” did not exist.

 

Stuff like “if you love me”, Jesus said. Which is exactly what the First Commandment is aiming for. And if God has to say “you shall have no other gods” and make sure it is written down for all generations to be taught and learn (Deut. 6:7, 11:19), it means you aren’t doing it. And since God’s Word doesn’t change, neither does your transgression against it.

 

Repent! We don’t need Jesus to tell us that we love Mammon, our money and possessions. We live it everyday. “Many a one thinks that he has God and everything in abundance when he has money and, possessions; he trusts in them and boasts of them with such firmness and assurance as to care for no one”, says Dr. Luther (LC 1:5). Even on the other hand, “he who has none doubts and is despondent, as though he knew of no God. For very few are to be found who are of good cheer, and who neither mourn nor complain if they have not Mammon. This [care and desire for money] sticks and clings to our nature, even to the grave” (LC 1:8-9).

 

We don’t need Jesus to tell us that we have founded and unfounded anxiety for food, drink, and clothes. We don’t need Him telling us that we provoke one another and envy one another, as we heard from our Epistle. We don’t need to be told that we do not restore those who sin against us, are deceived, and mock God by failing His commandments. We know. 

 

We are reminded every time we look in the mirror. We are reminded every time we look at a “more successful church” and every time we see a perfect Christian on TV. And yet this is exactly where God’s Law wants you: weak, comfortless, and dead to the Law.

 

Because Jesus’ cure is to say this to us, “O ye of little faith” in verse 30 of the Gospel. This is why St. Paul brings up the “household of faith” at the end of our Epistle reading. Because Faith alone receives the gift of forgiveness and salvation that God hands out.

 

This is why Galatians 3 says:

“Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. ²⁴ So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. ²⁵ But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, ²⁶ for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. ²⁷ For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ” (Gal. 3:23-27). [As Rilynn declared to us today].

 

Our obedience is not the answer. Faith alone is. Have the Commandments gone away because of this? No. They are even more in force, because they never have and don’t point to a perfect obedience from you. They point to a perfect obedience from the Son of God, Jesus Christ.

 

Philippians 2:13 says, “It is God Who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose.” Listen to that again: It is God Who works! It is God Who loves, God Who gives clothing and shoes, food and drink, house and home, land, animals, and all that I have. He richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life.

 

How? With His Body and Life. Faith is the primary and only way to fulfill God’s Law. And to prevent us from having other gods, God comes in the flesh and sets Himself up as the standard. Where false idols have no ears, no eyes, and no heart (Habakkuk 2:19), Jesus has all those things. Where other gods are pieces of wood, silver, or gold (Ps 96:5, 115:4-8), Christ is living flesh. Worse yet, they turn out to be demons (Deut. 32:17) who only desire your hurt, but God laid down His life for you.

 

When Jesus says, “No one can serve two masters” He doesn’t mean there are two masters to choose from on some sort of “master buffet table”. He means no one can do it because there is only one master. Any other master is a figment of the imagination and turns out to be only a man. For only a true Master can suffer and die and yet remain Master.

 

Remember our Ephesians 2 passage from earlier. Jesus doesn’t simply get rid of the Law, He abolishes it in order to “…create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, ¹⁶ and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility” (v.14-16).

 

You are just dying to be your own master and god and that is the hostility created between you and God when God gives His Law. But the Law is not given to create hostility. It is there to show the great love God has for you. It is there to show the lengths God is going to go to retrieve you from your sin. It is there as a path for the God-man to follow and win salvation for you.

 

2 Corinthians 13:5 says, “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!” Examine yourself to see, not whether you have followed the commands and not whether you have faith, but whether you are in the faith. Christ being placed in us is how we are “in the faith”. And the only objective certainty of Christ being placed in us is Word and Sacrament. [Baptism]

 

Not one Christian fails this test because the outcome is not based on whether or not you feel that Jesus is in you, but whether or not you can prove to God and to everyone else that He is there. Your works of the Law won’t do it. You keeping of the commands won’t do either, as we have already explained.

 

The work of Christ does prove it, though. The work of Christ which opens ears to receive faith and believe. The work of Christ which baptizes and saves and the work of Christ which feeds and forgives. If you take our Old Testament reading as this example, Elijah “not being anxious” did not put flour and oil in the widow’s jars day after day. Faith did.

 

And as we said last week, faith saves. It makes you well, gives you peace, and saves you. And this faith only comes from the one true God, whom we should fear, love, and trust above all things. Having no other gods means never ascribing the suffering, death, and resurrection to anyone apart from Jesus Christ. 

 

Thus, Faith ascents to being baptized. Faith agrees to eat and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus. Faith allows for the preaching of God’s Law and Gospel, all in order that you may be certain and confident that God has saved you. Having no other gods means receiving the gifts the Holy Spirit brings in Word and Sacrament. Having no other gods means hearing Jesus say, “Be it done to you as you have believed” and receiving forgiveness, light, and salvation from Him.

 

 

Service of Humility and Repentance - 9/11

 READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Joel 2:12-19

• St. Matthew 6:16-21

Grace to you all and Peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus, the Christ.

 

Heard today, Jesus speaks from Joel 2 saying,

“Rend your heart and not your garments and turn unto the Lord your God for He is gracious and merciful”

 

It has been a very satanic and twisted 20 years of US history that have brought us to tonight. And all the lies have focused on one thing: subverting God’s Word. How? Because Western civilization, in other words our current culture, needs Christianity and has been shaped by Christianity and has succeeded because of Christianity.

 

One example of this is the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do to you”, says our Lord in St. Matthew 7:12. This one, golden thread has shaped modern thought, research, and warfare since it was spoken nearly 2000 years ago. For not only does it force us to see our enemies as human as we are, it places the onus on us to be the better person first.

 

Outside of Christianity, this does not exist. Other cultures do have some form of the Golden Rule, but it is only because Christ has been preached to them and they have hijacked it for their own purposes.

 

Regardless, the Golden Rule has been changed to the Kevlar Rule, spattered with blood. It now reads: Do unto others before they do unto you. Of course, we would reject this aberration. But not if it was fed to us slowly and especially not if it was buried in a pile of Patriotism.

 

Here is the key turning phrase that has changed the Golden Rule into the Kevlar Rule for us: we’re the good guys. Now, this is not “we’re the good guys” as in “we did nothing wrong and don’t deserve to be attacked”. Of course we, as individuals, did nothing to provoke anyone. In fact, we want to be left alone to our own lives more than anything else. And that’s good.

 

However, since we have adopted “we’re the good guys”, any and everything has become permissible beneath that phrase. Any thing done in the name of the USA, anything mandated beneath the flag, or anyone aggressed in the name of “democracy” has become the excuse to break the Golden Rule.

 

For this we repent whole heartedly. For this we are accomplices in the destroying of millions of lives. For this we come before our holy God guilty.

 

And of course this is too big for us. Of course our betters take the reins and then say we were to dull and stupid to handle things anyway. For this we beg for mercy from God.

 

Our first reaction, in sin, is to put the blame back on God: well He started wars too. Yes, He did, but are you wiser than God? You do remember that all the war and fighting in the Old Testament was local and terminal, right? God was very specific in His battles; this time, this place, these people, these things AND NO MORE.

 

Plus, all of God’s wars are religious wars. They are based on a false god taking people from Him. They are based on others saying their gods are better than the one, true God. They are completed when those sins have been eradicated and His people restored to holiness.

 

Which means that all wars are God’s wars and they are “… against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Eph. 6:12). In other words, vengeance is not yours. War is not yours. You are to love your enemy. And in the face of a world obsessed with violence, here is what you do.

 

First, the wars and violence of the world should remind you of your own violence against God. As we are doing tonight, you need to constantly as the Holy Spirit to carry on His war against your flesh until everything that opposes God is destroyed. Romans 8:13 says, “For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” Thus, we pray against ourselves.

 

Second, war, violence, and tyranny should be prayed against, not used. Yes, God’s love and mercy means that He will intercede against our enemies, however, we are to bring those sins of violence to God, for in our sin we are enemies of God. Pray against our enemies, but those prayers should also be followed by prayers that visualize making the sign of the cross on their foreheads. God invites us to name our enemies and the pain they have inflicted upon us clearly, but we are to let God handle the dirty work in His way.

 

And His way is the Incarnation of Himself in Jesus Christ. The third thing to do is to remember this Incarnation where God was spared no violence and war against Himself. Betrayal, unjust trials, and undeserved persecution. This our sins inflicted upon God in order that He show us that there is not instance of pain or suffering that is outside the bounds of prayer.

 

For Jesus, more in number than the hairs of His head are those who hate Him without cause and mighty are those who would destroy me, those who attack Him with lies. What He sis not steal, it is demanded of Him that He must restore (Ps 69:4). They hated Him without cause, says St. John 15:25.

 

Which then moves to our fourth thing to do and that is hold the cross before our eyes. For it is in the violence of the suffering and dying of our Savior that we see clearest God’s love for us and our enemies. Jesus wrestles with the death of friends, unplanned disasters, and political overreach in His Passion, which is not sanitized in the Bible at all. So our prayers and repentance should be just as unsanitized.

 

Finally, war, violence, and tyranny in the world and in us should draw us to the empty tomb. All this injustice demands that God move, act, do something definitive about the success and reign of death and evil in this world. And His definitive action is in the suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

 

The bowels of death have been forever ripped apart because Jesus has descended into hell and broken its power. The resurrection of Jesus declares that God has acted and that God will continue to act forcefully in the face of evil and death, to break their power over us.

 

In this way, the presence of sin, death, and the power of the devil invite us to pray boldly in the power of the resurrection. Christians should, in good faith, pray in the face of violence as needed, because every act of praying is a gathering at the cross, an act of preparing the burial spices, and an announcement of the resurrection of Christ, the triumph over death, and the victory of God in the flesh—however much our present circumstances resemble a cold and empty tomb.

 

Because it is only in the power of the cross of Christ, the power of the Gospel that will undo the endless cycle of violence and oppression in the world. It is only in God’s warlike act of converting sinners, which will save us. It is only in God’s violence against Himself, proclaimed, that the wicked man forsake his ways and the unrighteous man his thoughts and return to the Lord for mercy.

 

In this strong God, Who promises peace and mercy, we are given faith. And in faith and hope and trust in God’s Will, we love our enemies as ourselves, do good to those who hate us, and pray for those who persecute us (Mt 5:44, Lk. 6:27-28). Are we pacifists? We can be if we want. Are we violent when defending righteousness? We can do that too.

 

It does not change things. We are still in need of repentance, for our thoughts are evil from birth. It is not clothing, outward appearances, that need rending, but our hearts. And our hearts of stone can only be broken by God and replaced with a new heart, one beating with everlasting life, able to forgive all sins, and never stop. This heart, given by Christ, is a gift, strengthened and preserved by Him

 

We repent of our violence which causes God’s crucifixion. But we repent in hope. Hope that God fights for us. Hope that this life of war and bloodshed ends quickly. And hope that our bloodstained hands are forgiven, which Christ Crucified declares they are.

Not wellness, but salvation [Trinity 14]

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE. 

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Proverbs 4:10-23

• Galatians 5:16-24

• St. Luke 17:11-19

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Rom 1)
 
Who speaks you this morning saying,

“Rise and go your way; your faith has saved you.”

 
Now maybe you noticed it and maybe you didn’t. But if you go back to your bulletins, or even bring out your Bibles, you will not find my verse that I just quoted, as I quoted it. Out of 62 English translations of the Bible, 49 of them will have some form of what’s in your bulletin which says, “Rise and go your way, your faith has made you well.” The last verse of the Gospel reading.
 
The vast majority of translators have made the choice to translate one Greek word into “made well” instead of “saved”, as I have done for you. Is it because these translators are evil? Not any more than you or I. However, what this translation error produces leads to doubt and that will lead to evil.
 
There is a word you know, from the Bible, as one of Jesus’ titles. That of Savior. In the Greek, Savior is related to “saving” or “being saved”. One cannot be without the other. You cannot be saved without a Savior and there is no Savior if no one is being saved. Which you would think goes without saying, but sin’s only purpose is making us forget our Savior.
 
As today’s Gospel reminds us when we hear of 90% of the people who had the life giving Word of God given to them directly from His own mouth, do not return in recognition of this fact. 
 
Regardless, God is Savior. He saves because He is Savior. It is Who He is and what He does. He has not earned it as a merit badge and He has not studied it for centuries to become a master. He is Savior. Christmass reminds us, “unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord” (Lk. 2:11) and Acts 5:31, “Him God has exalted to His right hand to be Prince and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.”
 
These 10 leprous men today seek out a master, not to learn from, but a master who has control over what is going on in their lives; their lives that are turning against them and killing them. And in this English translation, it is given to us that these men are sick, so of course the miraculous thing would be to heal them. Thus, it says Jesus says, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.”
 
In the Gospels, there are at least 4 of these incidents. In St. Luke 8, Jesus is approached by a woman with a 12 year flow of blood. He says to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace” (v.48). to Jairus, about his daughter who died, in the same chapter of St. Luke, Jesus says, “Do not fear; only believe, and she will be well” (v.50).
 
To the solitary, former leper, Jesus said that same thing, as you already heard, and to Blind Bartimaeus in chapter 18, Jesus says, “Recover your sight; your faith has made you well” (v.42).
 
It is no wonder people believe Jesus is just a simple healthcare worker, helping others wherever and whenever He can. Even we agree, because we believe Jesus is God so why couldn’t He heal as needed? Jesus is a master healer, in that respect, and diseases need healing. What else do you do with a disease that current medical practices cannot cure? Faith makes you well. Its so obvious. Its made me well…that….one time maybe and of course God was in control, so who else could have made it happen? So yeah I gave thanks. I am the Leper who comes back.
 
Yes. God so loves me for that. Maybe? 
 
Repent. The group of nine, healed lepers are sinners. You are a sinner. You have accepted the easy and good things from the Lord, but curse Him when He sends the bad. You demand that God major in the matters of daily life and you want to gauge His presence and His activity based upon what you see and feel and want.  You are dying sinners in a dying world, yet you do not by nature long for God to serve you with His forgiveness, life, and salvation.
 
So if Jesus is simply a master healer, why is He so upset? Isn’t He happy with just doing good and not getting thanked for it? Turns out, Jesus is not applying simple healing hocus pocus here in the hopes of spreading random acts of kindness.  For in those multiple places where we heard Jesus “makes someone well”, only demote Jesus and His station as Savior.
 
He is called Jesus, because He will save people from their sins (Mt. 1:21). The word “savior” is also related to Jesus’ Name, because it is Who He is and what He does. In this light, our Gospel reading does not make sense. In our English translations that we heard, all it taught us was of healing. But when Jesus heals, more is happening than simply a biological and pharmaceutical event.
 
To get us going in that direction, Jairus prophesys for us. In St. Mark 5:23, Jairus is speaking to Jesus about his daughter and says, “My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well and live.”
 
What’s interesting there is that Jairus doesn’t just want his daughter healed. He wants it so she can live. And as a father, I’m sure he wants her to live the best life she can. Does that include healing her only for her to die again later? No. Any good father would not want his child to ever experience anything like that ever again.
 
And Jesus delivers. For it is in the Greek that we discover the English “made well” is used to translate the word for “saved”. For the woman with the flow of blood, for Jairus’ daughter, for the lepers, and for the blind man. In each and every case, Jesus is not saying “made well”. He is saying, “Your faith has saved you.”
 
With this piece of information, Scriptures begin to make more sense. The Bible becomes less and less of the hard nut that we mistake it for. Jesus really isn’t just healing, He is saving. Before we thought of Jesus as just a wandering miracle worker Who only helped those that were near to Him, because He didn’t heal everybody. And if He didn’t heal everybody, it means He couldn’t, which then would mean He wasn’t God. a dangerous slippery slope.
 
But all of those doubts are unfounded. The Bible talks about healing, but it talks about healing in terms of salvation. You can believe and not doubt that this is true about all of Jesus’s actions and words. He was constantly and intimately concerned about salvation. So concerned, that He went to the cross.
 
If God was only a physician, He would not have to suffer and die for something He easily did for anyone who asked Him. Our God is a physician of body and soul. His interest in you does not end with a healthy happy life. Though He gives those things to us, there is no promise of its permanence. This can be seen in the repeated application of medicine, necessary to keep us “well”.
 
Jesus’s interest lies outside of what corrupt medicine can do. Though medicine is God-given, it can only heal, it cannot save. it cannot prevent the same thing from happening later and it cannot prevent death. the world is still after the fountain of youth, but it is dried up. Sin has corrupted every and all things. Jesus’s main interest is in purifying those things and remaking them.
 
So Jairus’ prophesy comes true. His daughter not only is saved by the words of Christ Crucified, but lives as well. Not just until tomorrow and not even just until her funeral. She lives within the salvation that the Savior purchases. Thus, she is healed, saved, and will live forever.
 
Here is the importance of making the distinction between the words we hear others translate for us and the Word. The Crucifixion must inform not only everything we read in the Bible, but also how we interpret the world around us. If God goes to the cross and grave, that means that my health is of temporal and eternal importance. 
 
And God does go to cross and grave. He does not open a hospital. He does not join Red Cross. His desire is for all to repent of their sins and live. Live a life fulfilled in faith and have that life continue forever. The True Master is master over life and death, not just temporary diseases, and He uses all His power to save, not just heal.
 
God’s love and mercy is three-fold. Where the world offers potions and placebos, God gives immune systems to naturally fight, defend, and heal. Where the world offers shallow comfort in the midst of strife, Jesus offers everlasting peace and forgiveness. Where the world has no recourse in the face of death, Christ offers life eternal by His side through His heavenly medicine of Word and Sacrament.
 
It is important that Christ is saving by His dying and rising again, because if we were to view the world as God being a wandering healer, then He is fickle and incompetent, not healing everyone, healing those who we think don't deserve it, and not healing where its needed most. Not a God to continue to worship.
 
However, if Jesus, the God-man’s, goal is to rescue us from needing to be rescued all the time, if His aim is to bring us away from sin and death, if His true intention is to bring us to His side where we will never face sickness and death again and offer this for free in Word and Sacrament, then all honor, glory, and blessing should be His forever and ever.
 
And since this is true, if He were to set up some sort of convenient place where He would appear and commune with people, handing out these gifts for free, then the Faith which Christ gives would recreate us in His image and we would all, like the 10th leper, return to our Lord as often as possible, eating and drinking His eternal life and forgiveness from a fountain that never dries up.
 
Because it is in this house, the House of the Lord, in which the Lord does present Himself, as He did to the 10 lepers. It is in this place in which we cry out to God for mercy upon that which finds no healing here on earth. It at this Altar and Pulpit which Jesus proclaims His judgement, “Go and show yourself to the Priest”.
 
Praise God, that the Priest has shown Himself first. Our Great High Priest Who knows our needs has accomplished everything for us, first, just as He did for the 10 lepers as they were already healed before they left His side. 
 
Our Great High Priest, Jesus, has healed both body and soul, by His Crucifixion, and continues to make us into Himself, such that we are made to be the 10th leper that returns, gives thanks, and is once again saved and strengthened by His Lord, to go back and face life, and wait for His return by returning to His Body and Blood as often as we can.