Keep My Words [Pentecost]

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READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Genesis 11:1-9

• Acts 2:1-13

• St. John 14:23-31

 

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

 

Who speaks to you today, saying:

“Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me.”

 

Thus far from our Gospel reading today, included by God to teach us just how to be a Christian. This points us to the Author and Perfecter of our faith, Jesus, and points us away from ourselves, so that Jesus may receive all the glory and draw all people to Himself, without us getting in the way.

 

Thus, in faith, we intend to keep the words of Jesus, as He says, so that we not fall into the category of not loving Him and being rejected by Him on the Last Day. And it is in keeping the words of Jesus that keep in check those who do and do not have authority in His Church. For the Holy Trinity does not work apart from the Word.

 

The ugly truth is, what we think of as “keeping Jesus’s words” is not keeping Jesus’s words. We think, if we read it then do what it says, that that is keeping His word. Again and again we revert to our base, sinful instincts and believe that God has just handed over a contract, instruction manual, or magical formula. And that’s it.

 

It is the devil who will be our teacher then. He spouts off words of God all day long, as we see at the Temptation of Jesus. He even does them. Dare I say, he may even believe them. How can he not? Being one of God’s creatures, he really has no choice, but to obey the Word of God.

 

Now where does that put us? Maybe if we bow down and worship, the Lord will passover us. Maybe if we seek a baptism of fire and speak in tongues, He will let it slide. Maybe if we build Him the biggest, tallest, best-est tower in the world, He will have no choice but to acknowledge our efforts.

 

Make no mistake and repent. The ruler of this world is coming in all his pride and arrogance. He is a better follower of God than you. He is a better keeper of the words than you. He has a better bloodline than you: angelic! You are bested. You are outworked. You are outmatched.

 

That is, if faith, hope, and love are based on works; if keeping His word is based on works. We hear Jesus, sure, but immediately we have forgotten His words. For, before there is “keeping His word”, there is a prerequisite. Before we can even think about holding God to His contract or commands, there must be faith. We know, because Jesus introduces “keeping His words” with “whoever loves me”.

 

How does one love God? Is it simply a matter of building a relationship with Him? How is that accomplished? Is there any time when God voiced His favorite things or what He likes to do? Has He taken an ad out in the personals about loving cozy winter nights by the fire and long walks on the beach? 

 

The best we can hope to accomplish in trying to be in a relationship to God is a made-up relationship. A fake one. It will be all one-sided and all on our side. That happens, because God has not spoken about such a thing. God has never specified something like a relationship with Him. But, if we make it up, then we get to make it up.

 

Dear Christians, God has already defined the terms and conditions of the relationship He desires with you and it is only found in the Body of His only-begotten Son. Yet, even though that is said, God also needs to explain that. So we start in Genesis, not with the tower, but with the creation of all things. 

 

After speaking every single thing into existence, God doesn’t lock it away in a closet. He gives it away. He hands over dominion, wisdom, authority, and love to Adam and Eve. God is the Giving God. He creates and He hands over. 

In the Person of Jesus, it is the same. Jesus creates the way to salvation and hands it over to us.

 

So, the relationship is this: God is the Absolute Giver and you are the Absolute Receiver. 

“Greater love hath no man than this”, says Jesus, “that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Jesus is the One Who gives His life. But more than that, resurrected life. For, of what use is a dead friend’s love? Again, Jesus is not giving instructions, He is giving the gift of His life: crucified and resurrected. 

 

It was in Love that God created all things. It is in love that God gives His Word. Love that is the fulfillment of all the words and commands God has ever given. Prefect love that only resides in the God Who is Love, Who became man, suffered, died, and rose again only to, once again hand over His greatest treasure, His Bride, to those who love His Love and keep His words in His Love.

 

True authority does not silence debate, but sparks understanding. A true relationship does not intimidate, but illuminates. We do not dictate to God, “whatever You Will, O Lord, I will do”. Instead, faith says, “whatever You give, O loving Savior, I will take”.

 

And it is not uncertainty, it is not wrath, and it is not condemnation that He gives. It is peace. Peace I leave with you. Does keeping Jesus’s words, according to someone else, cause you anxiety and stress? Maybe you are not thinking about Jesus, but yourself. Keep your eyes on the Crucified Christ and you will keep His Word. Not just the moral standards that anyone can accomplish, but His sacramental standards as well.

 

Those words of Giving. The giving of forgiveness, the giving of faith, the giving of eternal life only in, with, and under His True Body and Blood given and shed for you. If you want to keep Jesus’s words, I suggest you begin at the place He is speaking: His flesh and Blood, in His Church.

 

In this Love, then, what does “keep my words” mean? It means to treasure them. It means we treat it like a treasure, locking it up so that it is always around. Keeping it on display that others may enjoy it. Making sure to visit it often, taking it in, memorizing the sight of every single detail. 

 

To keep the words of Jesus, love is necessary. Not fake love we fabricate, put on yard signs, or throw in each other’s faces in parades. The fulfillment of God’s Law is not accomplished by mere outward actions or sincere efforts or the best of intentions. The fulfillment of God’s Law is accomplished by love: pure, sacrificial, obedient, serving, perfect love for God and our neighbors. 

 

This is why St. Paul wrote to the Galatians, “For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them’” (Galatians 3:10).

 

So, what does God teach and do in the Gospel? (LSCE q. 8, p. 52) “In the Gospel, the good news of our salvation in Jesus Christ, God gives forgiveness, faith, life, and the power to please Him with good works.”

 

From the moment man fell into sin and lost the image of God, God reached out in love, one sidedly, to reclaim sinful humanity.  Already in Genesis 3:15 He promised to give the One who would come to crush Satan.  That Promised One is Jesus Christ.  The world was created through Him (Col. 1:16; John 1:3, 11) and yet He became flesh (John 1:14) to give redemption to the world that had rebelled against Him.  

 

He is the One who comes among His people to teach them His Word and to feed them with His Body and Blood for their forgiveness.  In Christ, God makes you a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17).  In the Divine Service today and every week, He creates in you a clean heart and renews a right spirit within you.  As we receive Holy Communion, we acknowledge that our worship is joined with that of the angels, the Apostles, and all the company of heaven.

 

Alleluia!

Amen.

 

 

Scandal of the Gospel [Easter 7]

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Ezekiel 36:22-28

• 1 Peter 4:7-11

• St. John 15:26-16:4

 

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

“I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away.”

 
“Falling away” has such a gentile sound to it. Like the leaves from an autumn tree. Or the winter hat of an energetic child. It almost puts one at ease rather than alarm. A leaf easily returns in the spring and a hat is easily retrieved. 
 
Thus when we hear Jesus today speak of “falling away”, it is just as comforting, if you will. It is a sad thing to happen, but it is not the end of the world. We will be cared for. We will be sought out. Daddy will come to clean up our mess and everything will be made right.
 
Did you know, though, that there is a price on your heads? A bounty set in red letters? Jesus talked about it after the “falling away” saying, “the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God” (16:2). And in an age of religious tolerance, we shrug it off and say, “not in my experience” and thus remake the world in our image, because our experience tells us so.
 
As long as we say it is so, it is so. There are no real consequences for our words. If I say day is night or dark is light, it will be written and it will be so. No penalties. No responsibilities.
 
This is one of the modern delusions we have today. We have grown so complacent, that we believe virtual reality is reality, if I just believe hard enough. We have grown so asleep at our posts that we believe augmented reality is reality, if I just say it is. We have grown so numb, that we believe anything anyone tells us, if only to not offend, and as long as it doesn’t hurt my goals.
 
The “price on your head” point, drives Jesus’s teaching on “falling away”. It is not simply falling away that He mentions here. It is scandal. He says, “I have said all these things to keep you from being scandalized.” It is much more serious than originally heard.
 
“Offense” is another soft word used to translate scandalize into English. As in, “Then the disciples came and said to him, ‘Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?’” (Mt 15:12). That saying, said to the Jews, was: “this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me” (15:8). A heart far from Jesus is a heart of stone, unable to live, believe, and find comfort in Christ alone.
 
A final word chosen to translate “scandalize”, that’s three now for those keeping count, is “sin”. This begins to at least get nearer the mark. In St. Luke, we hear that “it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin” (Luke 17:2). To scandalize the little ones.
 
Now we can at least see and hear that causing offense and falling away are indeed sinful acts taking the place of faith and worth more than just a passing “oh well”. 
 
But so what? Scandals aren’t that big of a deal today, especially since we have been inundated with them. It used to be that people worked hard to remain honorable and chaste. Today, we have been liberated from such folly. Who needs self-control and sobriety? Since love covers a multitude of sins, I can serve and speak according to my rules.
 
Repent. Be scandalized by the agenda of these English translations and be scandalized that your heart would even think of moving away from Christ. Especially when it comes to matters of faith, we experience the most freedom from offense, because as long as I increase my spirituality, I’m good in front of God. Spending time getting to know myself is best. How can I be in a relationship with God, if I don’t know who I am first? Maybe I don’t like God…
 
Since inwardly I can have my own religion, we call it relationship, outwardly I can be in any church I want. And as long as I have outward fellowship that “smells” Christian, then I please God. As long as I say the right words, go to a place that calls itself “church”, and follow the man in front.
 
Any man who claims for himself the authority to make laws about acts of worship, about changing the sacraments, or about doctrine; who then wants his articles, decrees, and laws to be divine and requirements for faith, scandalizes and makes us twice the sons of hell as himself (Mt 23:15).
 
Scandal. Not good. Yet Jesus seems to cause scandal. By the Holy Law of God, some are made scandalizers, those who are hostile to the Law because it forbids what they like and commands what they do not like (SA III:II:2), as Jesus says, “But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness”, in Romans 7:8.
 
Jesus can scandalize? More like sin and the sinner are scandalized by Jesus. Jesus causes the conscience to tear its robes by confronting it with sin. Jesus lays the Truth out and we hate it. How? Let’s turn to the other place St. John uses “scandalize” in chapter 6, to find out.
 
There Jesus had just finished saying “eat my flesh and drink my blood” and “knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, ‘Do you take offense at this?’” (John 6:61).
 
Are you scandalized by this? Does it upset your sinful sensitivities that Jesus’s words are spirit and life? “It is the Spirit Who gives life”, He continues in John 6, “the flesh profits nothing.” And yet, His words He gives say, “take and eat and drink”. 
 
Falling away does not mean backsliding into old sin. Being offended by Jesus does not mean that you have a problem with what He says. Being scandalized means you do not believe in His Word and second, you do not believe that how He is doing things, in His Church today, is the right way.
 
We are scandalized by the Word of God because He was made flesh, died in the flesh, rose again in the flesh, and still comes to His Church today, in the flesh. This puts a wrench in our spiritual plans. We want to be spiritual, as in spirits, as in air, as in flighty. We don’t want to have to depend on bodies to serve and please God. 
 
Service to God is flesh and blood. When Jesus causes St. Paul to teach, “offer yourselves as a living sacrifice”, in Romans 12:1, He meant we are to live in Him. Yes, Christ is the only sacrifice for sin, that’s receiving the heart of flesh from God, in our Old Testament reading. 
 
Second, though, the living sacrifice is to live, not under some new-fangled, man-made, completely-under-God’s-control, as an instrument of righteousness. That’s still Jesus only. The Living Sacrifice lives His life in the ordered Church of God, worshipping and communing as God has commanded. 
 
And there is the real scandal. That God dares to command how we worship Him, how we approach Him, how we access Him. We are scandalized that its not our holier-than-thou works. Instead, our true service to God is yielding and conforming to His service to us.
 
Yes, we aim to amend our sinful lives, but no one is offended by someone trying to turn their life around. In fact, we encourage such a thing. Everyone is offended, however, if you spend your precious time celebrating something called the Ascension. What is that?! Everyone is offended, however, if you spend your time believing that pastor’s forgiveness is God’s forgiveness. How dare you!
 
Everyone is offended, however, when you tell them that this past Sunday you ate the flesh and drank the blood of God.
 
When we are offended by the physicality of God; when we fall away from gathering together to devote ourselves to the Apostles doctrine, the fellowship, the breaking of the bread, and the prayers; when we sin against the Body and Blood of Christ, that is the scandal.
 
That is the scandal that leads to death. Why? Not because these are man-made laws of worship, but because these are institutions of Christ Himself. I don’t make baptism save you, Jesus’s blood and righteousness does. I don’t make the Lord’s Supper forgive your sins, Jesus’s words of Spirit and life do. 
 
Jesus is sending the Helper. You do not have to call Him to you. Jesus is giving the Spirit of Truth. You do not have to witness to Him or testify about Him to get His attention and love. Thus, our main work of God is to gather around His gifts and believe that Jesus was sent in Body and Blood, to forgive our scandals in sin.
 
Alleluia…
Amen 
 

God's Questions [The Ascension]

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READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• 2 Kings 2:5-15

• Acts 1:1-11

• St. Mark 16:14-20

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

 

Who speaks to us this evening, from the Book of Acts and our Introit:

“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

 

Jesus has gone up with a shout and has left us with His Mighty Word to save. Leaving us teachers to ask questions and expect answers. Answers that confess Who God is, what He says, and what He has done for you. Thus, rather than an answer to our questions, God gives Himself in the flesh.

 

The question from the angels in Acts, is asked along the same lines as others from Holy Scripture: “Why do you seek the living among the dead?” (Lk 24:5), “Who told you you were naked?” (Gen 3:11), and “Why is it that you ask my name?” (Gen 32:29).

 

Do you know how many questions there are in the Bible? By one count, there are 2,506 questions asked in the NRSV translation of the Bible: 1,679 questions in the Old Testament, and 827 questions in the New. If you search for English question marks, the number goes up to about 3300. The Bible is evidently a book of questions as much as it is a book of answers.

 

Questions are important. We do not learn without them. They cause us to form information we’ve learned and solidify our own learning, thoughts, and opinions. Our Catechism works off, what’s called, the scholastic method: question and answer. I think that asking the right question can be even more important than getting the right answer. Maybe a life well-lived is found not by having all the answers, but by asking all the right questions. 

 

But what do we do when God asks the questions? There is always the “Job option” where we simply fall on our face at the question, and answer, “Behold, I am of small account; what shall I answer you? I lay my hand on my mouth. I have spoken once, and I will not answer; twice, but I will proceed no further” (Job 40:4-5).

 

That may have worked out well in the end, for Job, but it did not work out so well for King Ahaz. The Lord spoke to Ahaz through Isaiah demanding he ask the Lord for a sign, any sign, of the Lord’s victory among them and Ahaz refused God. He was countered with a question from the Almighty: “Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary men, that you weary my God also?” (Isa 7:13).

 

Another way may be the St. Peter option where we speak up and answer. Being taught by the Lord Himself, should have given St. Peter the right answer to Jesus’s questions. It wasn’t the teaching, but the student. In Matthew 16, Peter tries to deny Christ’s suffering and crucifixion and gets, “Get behind me satan” for his troubles.

 

There is a third option and it is the most interesting and exclusive only to Christianity. That is discussion. In a breach of Creator-Creature protocol, God opens up dialogue. He allows Himself to be questioned and examined. He invites both doubt and discussion. From Isaiah 1, “Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord:” (v.18).

 

Now we see the questions have a point. Not that we necessarily have the right answer, but that we learn something. But learn what? Isaiah 1 continues: “though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.”

 

Why is it that no option of answering the Lord works in our favor? Because of sin. We have lost the knowledge and understanding of holy reason and divine insight. In other words, we have lost the Image of God. This means that we cannot know God as He wishes to be known nor be perfectly happy in Him.

 

We are not holy and righteous, doing God’s will. The Lord may be asking questions, yet He may not want an answer for us, but a confession. 

 

Think about it. When the Lord asked Adam where he was, after eating the fruit, did He really not know? God knows everything. What He wanted was for Adam to come out on his own and say, “Here I am, a poor miserable sinner who ate the fruit of the tree. I have sinned. Forgive me.”

 

When the Spirit took Ezekiel to the valley of dry bones and asked, “Son of man, will these bones live?” (37:3). He wasn’t asking for Ezekiel to do something or even to understand. He simply wanted Ezekiel to confess: no they won’t, in order that the Lord reply, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible” (Mt 19:26)

 

The answers to all of God’s questions lie within the God-man, Jesus Christ. He is the Ever-Living Who walks among the bones of the dead and makes them alive again. He is the One Who was stripped naked in front of the world, scourged, and crucified to reclothe His fallen creatures in His Blood. He Alone has the Name that is above every Name, which confers salvation to all Who trust and believe.

 

For He is the One Forsaken by God, yet beloved of the Father. Crucified, died, yet is living. The answers we seek and the signs we desire all rest with the God-made-man. In answer to the St. Job option, we remain silent and let God speak and act as He wishes. This requires faith to submit to God’s Way, instead of our own. Its not that our answers offend Him, its that He wants all the glory in our redemption.

 

In answer to the St. Peter option, Jesus allows our sinful answers to have a voice. He willingly and joyfully takes on that sin to Himself, in order that it hinder us no longer in our quest for holiness. Faith believes and so it speaks, right or wrong, but seeks forgiveness for it all.

 

In answer to the St. Isaiah option, God is made man, just like one of us. 100% man. He thinks, speaks, and acts. He grows weary, thirsty, hungry. He weeps, gets angry, and laughs. In His own Body, He presents His Holy Way to us in such a way that we are able to follow His footsteps. For He does not give us strength to succeed, but strength to believe in Him.

 

Thus, when asked what we are doing looking up into heaven as if Jesus were returning immediately or if we just stay in that one spot long enough, He’ll come back and say “just kidding”. 

 

Like St. Job, we are to remain silent, having faith that Christ’s ascension and removal from our sight is for our advantage, as He told us (Jn 16:7). Though we do not understand it, we have faith this is most certainly true. Like St. Peter, we are to speak up. The Lord has ascended, we cry! 

“I believe in Jesus Christ His only Son our Lord…Who…on the third day He rose again from the dead and ascended into heaven.”

 

Like St. Isaiah, we wait in hope for the Lord to then cause our own ascension, biding our time and waiting amongst His holy signs in Word and Sacrament. We continue the lessons, constantly asking what is this Word, what is this water, what is this bread and wine? And constantly receiving the answer through faith, by grace, for Christ’s sake.

It is the Lord and His Way of His Church is glorious.

 

Jesus will return on the same path He ascended. Though He is hidden yet from mortal eyes, the pillar of cloud will be lifted, the scales of sin will fall off our eyes, and we will finally see behind the veil of Moses, that it was, is, and ever shall be the flesh and blood of God answering all our questions.

 

 

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

 

Bloody Prayer [Easter 6]

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO HERE

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Numbers 21:4-9

• James 1:22-27

• St. John 16:23-30

 

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Rom 1)
 
Who speaks to you today, saying:
“Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.”
 
God receives nothing from our prayers. We receive everything from our prayers, because we pray in faith. But faith is not just something we make up, it is a gift, a physical gift, given to us that we may see and understand prayer rightly, and thus be enabled to pray for all rightly.
 
As many times as this Gospel has been read, we have heard Jesus speak in this way. That, if we ask, we will be full of joy. That because we get to ask, because we get to pray to a God Who cares and listens and will answer, then we should be joyful little creatures, or else. That is how its popularly taught.
 
The promise of prayer that Jesus makes is unique to Christianity: to be worshipping and praying to a God Who is near enough to listen and answer. Though every religion has some sort of prayer, it is for them a magical formula. Say the right words, on the right day, at the right time, with the right offering/child sacrifice and your god may listen to you. 
 
Of course, if its Crom you’re praying to, he will only laugh at you. But heard prayer is heard prayer, right?
 
Now we know! Now we understand! Now we believe, say the Apostles. Now that Jesus has related Himself, and by proxy, God, to other gods in this world, they get it. Now they know that God needs our prayers, just like other gods. Now they understand that God is not special and requires prayers to operate, like other gods. 
 
Now they believe, because the things God asks for are spiritual, just in our imaginations. Now they believe that the God Jesus is talking about, is the God of their fathers Who commanded Moses out of a burning bush and from a pillar of cloud. Commanded to pray for the people, from our Old Testament reading, and also for Pharaoh, lest we forget to pray for our enemies.
 
Yet truly they do not, now, know, for the truth is the opposite. God does not need our prayers, we do. We like to think that we have a hold of prayer. That it is one of the easiest things, from God, to understand. So much so, that we have relegated it to “having a chat with God” or worse, something we only do every once in a while. 
 
But you do not have a hold of prayer. Though you are commanded to pray, you do not comprehend the depths of the gift given to you. Jesus gives prayer and thanksgiving as one of the marks of His Church on earth, thus it is something much more than a phoneline open to Jesus.
 
The problem we have is we believe that when something is spiritual, or at least mostly in the hidden world, that it doesn’t have the least bearing on real life or faith. It’s not like prayer makes planes fly. Prayer doesn’t do anything real so I don’t have to take it seriously and I don’t have to make others believe it is serious.
 
Jesus gives us three other letters through St. John to follow up. In his first epistle, Chapter 3 says, “whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do what pleases Him” (1 Jn 3:22). Ah, the age-old goal of keeping the commandments. Let’s not forget James 2:10, “whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it” and Hebrews 11:6, “without faith it is impossible to please Him.”
 
This doesn’t mean don’t try to pray, it just means there is something more to prayer than making a crane game of God. His commandments must be kept and we must please Him, we just have to keep listening to find out how, instead of running with only half an answer.
 
1 John 3 does continue: “And this is His commandment, that we believe in the Name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another” (v 23). What Name? The Name you were baptized into, “In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” (Mt 28:19). What Son? The only begotten Who is the Only Beloved: “This is my beloved Son, Who pleases Me” (Mt 3:17), the cloud says.
 
Belief is the command required to receive anything we ask for in prayer. But its not just naked belief, as in “I believe Jesus is my Lord and Savior and my belief is mine so I get what’s coming to me”. It is belief in the Name. It is belief in any and everything Jesus has come to will and to do.
 
St. John goes on in chapter 5: “this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us” (v 14). According to His Will. What is His Will? John 6: “For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day” (v 40) and “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent” (v 29).
 
Belief gives eternal life. The Son’s Will and Work that He has come to do is to purchase and win eternal life for His creatures. He did not come to suffer for a hotline. He did not die to create a naughty/nice, prayer/no prayer list. He did not rise again in order that you gain spiritual control over Him through contract/covenant prayer.
 
‘Cause that’s what it feels like to us, when prayer is just spiritual. It is a virtual playground in which we get to imagine all sorts of answers from God, without proof. 
 
But prayer is not bloodless, because faith, belief is not body-less. You may close your eyes to pray, you may say most of what you want in your head, you may even imagine God on the other end listening. But if you do not have the righteous blood of Jesus covering all of it, then you do not have prayer.
 
The prayer of the unrighteous is not heard, therefore the One, Righteous Man must pray for you. And He must intercede by way of His mouth, which is a flesh and blood mouth. He must Promise His Righteousness to you, which is only in His Body and Blood. He must give you faith, He must give you love and that requires a body.
 
This, once again, is the Easter lesson. Prayer, in His Name, means in the Body and Blood of Christ, literally. Moses was leading Jesus’s people through the wilderness, bodily. The people were not imagining snakes biting them and they did not fake their resulting deaths. There was a physical problem, with physical consequences, needing a physical remedy.
 
This, Jesus brings in full measure, so that there is no room for doubt. Jesus is made man in order to unite us to Him. He reveals Himself and His command that we pray. He comes in a body to teach us to pray the prayer He uses. He takes His Body and rational soul through suffering to death on a cross, then rises again.
 
And in that resurrection, He shows us the total and complete union of God and man, such that God comes into the world in our dying flesh, but ascends with undying flesh. Then, to make our joy complete, fulfilled, perfect, He unites His Body to our body, His Blood to our blood and promises faith and belief in that way.
 
This, then, is today’s prayer. Jesus is teaching another prayer. He is not only saying that when you pray you should be joyful. He is saying “pray for joy”. He is saying, when you pray, ask me to fill up your joy and you will receive it. Why? Because where true joys are to be found, there the resurrected Christ stands with His wounds, offering union in Word and Sacrament.
 
You cannot understand prayer without having first being united to Christ. You cannot begin to pray without beginning within His Body and Blood, washed over you in baptism and ingested by you in Communion with Him. 
 
And though, in prayer, you will pray for many things, in many states of mind, and in many seasons of life, the One thing you are always praying for, in whatever words come out, is for the Crucified and Risen Christ to rescue you from this body of death and for Him to give you a new life beside Him, for all eternity.
 
This is the answer to every prayer and the words to every prayer. Rescue. Redemption. Joy. Only the promise of such things is found on the old earth. Thus, we are told to pray, we are told to hope, and we are told to rejoice in the Promise. So we pray, while we wait in our meat suits, knowing and believing that we will rise again to live, breathe, and have our being in complete, endless, and utter Joy.
 
 
Alleluia!
Amen.