READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:
Malachi 4:1-6
Romans 15:4-13
St. Luke 21:25-36
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. (Rev 1)
Jesus speaks to us on this second Sunday of the new Church Year, saying,
“Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.”
One easily overlooked way of hearing “my words will not pass away” is that the Word of God is such a power in the cosmos, that what it says comes into being in front of your face. What I mean is, we think of the “Word enduring forever” as the ultimate force, that’s on our side of course, for us to use against our neighbor.
It is the ultimate force, but it’s God’s ultimate force and He uses it to bring His wonderful gifts and promises to you.
Baptism proves this point for us today. Not only do we see water, but we hear God’s Word that will never pass away, talk about the water. First is the obvious, “whoever believes and is baptized will be saved” and “baptism now saves you”. Second is the uncomfortable, from today’s Gospel reading, “And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves.”
To the first way we hear God talk about water: its the easy way. These “easy to understand” words of Jesus are what we would call the sedes doctrinae, or the seat of doctrine. What that means is when we want to teach about something from God, in this case, Baptism, we go to the easiest to understand verses in the Bible. “Baptism now saves you” is as simple as it gets.
We turn to those simple words of Jesus for correct understanding and correct faith. We also may employ “the New Testament interprets the Old Testament” when things get a little off the chain, in the old days. This helps us find comfort in the Gospel, even outside the 4 books of the Gospels.
An example might be something like this:
Malachi today talked about ovens and being ablaze. Scary. Fire is scary, but not as scary as water. So how do you put out a fire? Throw water on it. How do you put out, or quench, Malachi’s ovens and ablaze-ment? Throw baptismal water on it. Throw your baptism at the Final Judgement on the Last Day and God’s Judgment against you goes out. You are clothed in asbestos for Christ’s sake.
That is Bible reading 101.
Our problem today is that we are put in a backwards position. It is the New Testament that is hard, with apparently no help from the Old Testament to interpret for us. For it is there that we hear about the not-so-nice water having roaring waves and no New-new Testament to interpret for us.
So what do we do? Just talk about how Jesus can be scary if He wants to be and if you’re not on His side then you are an eternal loser? That if you’re not sure if you’re going to heaven or hell if you would die tonight, that you’re out of luck? How is that going to bring people in to our church?
Jesus talking about the last days, today, do not help this endeavor either. So who do we turn to for help? We turn to our very own Church. The Church of Christ. The Church of time and history, who has had to live through the ages with nothing but the words of Jesus which will not pass away, as He said. This life of faith will tell us how to read our Bible.
Repent. Where are the words of Jesus in this church? Most churches you visit will proudly boast that every pew has a Bible or that just about every person brings their own Bible to church. Why do we do no such thing and why do you think that having a Bible in hand will get you “more Bible”?
Let me ask you in a different way: how many times have you stopped reading your Bible because you run into things you don’t understand? More than we’d like to admit.
We lean on our own understanding more than we lean on God’s wisdom. This is because we’ve been trained to think about God’s Word in two opposing ways at the same time. We’ve been trained to think of it as down to earth, parables and such, but at the same time it being God’s wisdom that is too high, we cannot attain unto it (Ps 139:6).
So at the same time that you feel you can really grab a hold of everything in that Bible, you also believe that you will never understand your Bible. This is our roaring wave. This is our “disturbed water” that threatens to drown us. But it is to this wave that we also turn for aid.
Again, we are learning in the Divine Service how to read our Bibles. So when we hear of roaring, life-threatening water, we immediately recall our Sunday School lessons on the Flood. That was actual water that roared and killed.
But not all. Eight being were saved in all, Noah and his family. And in Psalm 69, Jesus uses that to point to Himself on the cross. In this light, the Church as it has been living in this “my words will never pass away”, places all water in baptismal water. As in, when the Church has difficulty understanding the Bible, it turns to the promises and sacraments of God.
Jesus prayed the psalms on the cross. He knew better than Noah and He knows better than us in these last days of roaring waves, what it means to “have come into deep waters, and [have] the flood sweep over me” (Ps 69:2). This is His cry on His cross.
On the cross, the sin-filled Flood completes its purpose by drowning and killing God. The roaring waves that mostly threaten you, find their ultimate fulfillment in Jesus dying on the cross. In the midst of deathly waves, God throws the wood of His cross.
And it floats! Meaning, just as the Ark floated over the Flood, the cross of Christ floats above sin, death, and the power of the devil and all those who find themselves hoping and believing in the cross of Christ and everything it stands for and accomplishes, will also float.
Since Jesus has now descended into the depths, He has calmed the storms with His Body and Blood. His sacrifice made on our behalf causes the death-filled waves to use up all of their force until they are emptied of it. There is no more threat from distress, perplexity or fear, for Christ has passed the eternal gates.
So, when we go through the motions of the Baptismal rite, and when we hear those readings and prayers, and when we move through our own Divine Service in weekly, monthly, and yearly devotion, we are not only hearing God’s Word, but we are living it. Which is more than you get from just studying it like a textbook.
The Bible, God’s Word, in your church, is in your hymnal and in your Divine Service. When you leave here today, you will be dripping and drenched with so much of God’s Word that you will not know what to do about it except maybe feel good.
But know this, your church is saturated in Scripture. Look at your hymnals again. There is nothing we do or say or sing or pray in here that is not the “words that will never pass away”. This is because living out the “words that will never pass away” is better than just studying and memorizing. Not that that doesn’t happen as well, but that is not our goal.
Our Goal is always Christ and eternal life with Him. It is always to His cross that we run. Into these “roaring of sea and waves” we now throw the cross and the crucifixion of Jesus sanctifies it all for us, such that we can place our babies into that distress and perplexity and bring them out at peace with God.
The wind and the waves, and the storms are all the sinful and "passing away" world. That is what is out there, not in here. In here is the Word Who endures forever, even death on a cross, and does not pass away. The same Word that promises comfort and joy in the midst of raging chaos, is the Word that washes and feeds you.
This is the life of the Christian, housed in the Ark of the Church. The storm outside, the promises of God inside. The backwards, misunderstanding left at the door, the forward salvation in Word and Sacrament on our lips and in our hearts.
Do not be afraid. You have already won. In the face of “Christmas is not a Christian holiday”, you have won. In the face of “my team did not win”, you have won. In the face of this world is going downhill fast, you have won.
You have won, because the Lord and Creator Who calmed the wind and the waves, now shuts down any defeat for His Christians. You believe this because you have heard it from God and from this pulpit. That is the point of every sermon. To get you to believe once again and to teach you how to read your Bible.
There’s not too much mystery behind what goes on from this pulpit, but now I hope you are aware of this point. That you should read and understand the Bible according to what is said here. No matter how elaborate or daunting the sermon is. It is simply teaching you how to understand those things you can’t on your own.
Christians should be baptized. Christians should be taught. Your life of faith is 50% Bible study and 50% Divine Service all of which is 100% Jesus.
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