Grace, mercy and
peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Amen. Our text today comes from the
epistle lesson, especially these words, “The Lord knows those who are
his.” Thus far our text.
Dear friends in
Christ. For the second time in a little
over a year, you have a vacancy coming up in your congregation. And I can only imagine that it feels
uncomfortable and challenging, after all you were served by the same faithful
pastor for decades. And even the last
year, following his retirement, another faithful pastor has served you. But soon vacancy will come again. Soon, your flock will be without an under-shepherd
called to serve you here in this place – at least for a time.
And it is in times
like this, as you prepare for a second vacancy in as many years, that it’s
important to consider what the job of a pastor is, what you are looking for in
the call process, and what the purpose of a pastor is. Luckily for us, we have
for our epistle lesson the book of 2nd Timothy.
Timothy was a
pastor. One of the first in fact. He had converted from Paganism to Christianity
due to the preaching of St. Paul. After
spending time learning from St. Paul, he began to be a pastor himself, serving
the church in Ephesus at the time of St. Paul’s martyrdom. And our Epistle lesson is the farewell letter
from Paul to Timothy – the final words written from Paul to his good friend.
What was that
final message? To go on propagating the
gospel just as he had begun doing. Or as
our lesson says, to “rightly handle the word of truth.” To speak God’s Word in and out of season. And to remain true to that calling, not to be
distracted by bickering, or “irreverent babble.” Not to take part in foolish ignorant
controversies. Paul says stick to the
Word of Truth. For St. Paul, that Word
is the most important thing that Timothy needs to deal with.
And you too, dear
friends in Christ, need to hear this message.
You need to call a pastor who will bring God’s Word to you faithfully,
just as your last pastors have done. And
there is nothing else more important in your call of a pastor than guaranteeing
that you will hear that Word.
But that’s not
what the world teaches us, is it? No,
our world tells you that other things are more important. It tells you to seek a pastor who worships in
the style you think will bring in more people.
It tells you to seek a pastor who is charismatic and avoids the issues
people don’t like to talk about. They
need to preach a sermon that is only 7 minutes long but tells you how to live
your life so that you are healthy, wealthy and wise. You want them to be relatable to the
youth. The world wants you to look at
whether or not his wife will play the organ, and whether their kids will
benefit the local school’s football team.
And on top of all these things, so often we want a pastor who will do
things the way we want them to.
What is it, dear
saints, that you want in a pastor? What
things are important to you?
When we look for a
pastor based on worldly characteristics, every person in a congregation has a
different idea of what they want. And
fights arise over what item is most important.
Bickering becomes common.
Disagreements reign.
Congregations fall apart. All
over their own silly perceptions about who their pastor should be.
I know it sounds
ridiculous that this could happen, but I’ve seen it firsthand. I grew up in a non-Lutheran church in Lincoln
Nebraska. A well liked pastor retired,
and the time arose for a new pastor.
Everyone brought their own opinions on who should be there pastor – and
those opinions were usually based upon the people’s own self-interest. I remember the voter’s meeting where the
decision was made on the new pastor, and when the decision was announced, 1/3
of the members left never to return. A
small group remained who sought to undercut the new pastor at every turn, so
that soon the new pastor grew weary and left.
The church soon fell apart completely.
Dear friends, St.
Paul tells Timothy that those things are peripheral. He tells Timothy that the most important
thing for the pastor to be about is the Word of truth – the Word of Jesus. And the same is true for you as a
congregation as you look again for a pastor.
Look for the Word of God before you look at the number of children the
pastor’s family has. Look for the Word of
truth before you consider how handsome or homely the man may be. Look for the Word of truth as the first and
foremost as you look for a pastor.
Why? Because it is the Word of Truth that brings
you Jesus. It’s the Word of God that
brings forgiveness straight to your ears.
It is the Word of truth that gives you the promise of eternal life with
God forever. Because that Word of God
became flesh and dwelt among us – as St. John writes. That Word is Jesus. He lived among us, preaching repentance because
His kingdom was near. And then to bring
that kingdom about he went to the cross.
He was crowned with thorns, he was dressed in purple robes, and seated
upon the throne of a cross – all of it for you.
There he bled for your sin, he suffered for your weakness, he was mocked
and tortured for your bickering and fights.
He died, so that you might live.
And in case you didn’t believe it, he rose from the grave, declaring
that all who trust in him also shall live.
That is the message of the Word of God, that is the message that Paul
tells Timothy to hold to, that’s the message that you want your next pastor to
bring to your ears in sermon and hymn, as well as in baptismal waters and in
the sacrament of the altar.
For, as Paul
writes just before our text begins this morning, “Remember Jesus Christ, risen
from the dead, the offspring of David, as preached in my gospel… (so that) you
may obtain salvation in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. The saying is trustworthy, “if we have died
with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with
him, if we deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he remains
faithful.”
Dear saints of
Oakes, ND, do not take that word of truth for granted. Do not think that just because you have faithfully
received the Word of God these last 40 years, that it will automatically
continue. Make that Word of truth your
first priority as you seek a new pastor.
And trust that Word to continue to work in your lives and in your
congregation as you go forward day by day in the grace of Christ, crucified and
risen for the forgiveness of sins.
I pray that God
will send you a faithful pastor like Timothy, who will bring God’s Word of
Truth to you. And I know that God will
do this thing for you. He may be old, or
young, handsome, or not, funny or awkward, married or single – I couldn’t tell
you that now. But, none of that matters,
so long as he “rightly handles the Word of Truth in this place. IN the name of Jesus. Amen.
