Sunday, December 31, 2017
Monday, December 25, 2017
Wednesday, December 20, 2017
Advent Midweek 3, 2017 - The Means of Grace - Sacrament of the Altar
1 Corinthians 11 - For I received from the Lord what I also
delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed
took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he
broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance
of me.” 25 In
the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the
new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of
me.” 26 For as often as you eat this bread and
drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.
27 Whoever,
therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy
manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. 28 Let
a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the
cup. 29 For anyone who eats and drinks without
discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. 30 That
is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. 31 But
if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be
judged. 32 But when we are judged by the
Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not
be condemned along with the world.
Luke 14 - When one of those who reclined at
table with him heard these things, he said to him, “Blessed is everyone
who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!” 16 But
he said to him, “A man once gave a great banquet and invited
many. 17 And at the time for the banquet
he sent his servant to say to those who
had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’18 But
they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a
field, and I must go out and see it. Please have me excused.’19 And
another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to examine them.
Please have me excused.’ 20 And another
said, ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.’ 21 So
the servant came and reported these things to his master. Then the master of
the house became angry and said to his servant, ‘Go out quickly to the streets
and lanes of the city, and bring in the poor and crippled and blind and
lame.’22 And the servant said, ‘Sir, what you commanded
has been done, and still there is room.’ 23 And the
master said to the servant, ‘Go out to the highways and hedges and compel
people to come in, that my house may be filled. 24 For
I tell you, none of those men who
were invited shall taste my banquet.’”
Grace, mercy and
peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Dear friends in
Christ, it is Advent. The time of the
church year when we focus on the fact that Christ comes to us. He is coming, his advent is near. And for our midweek advent services this
year, we will be focusing on the way that Christ comes to us, specifically in
the means of grace. We’ll be learning
each week about one of the ways that God comes to create faith with us.
There are three
ways that this takes place. Through
God’s Word, proclaimed into our ear.
Through baptismal waters poured upon us.
And through participating in the very body and blood of Jesus in the
Lord’s Supper. In these three things,
the Holy Spirit works to create faith in us, so that we receive the
forgiveness, life and salvation that Christ so freely gives.
This week we
hear about the Lord’s Supper. And its
appropriate that we are only a few days from Christmas itself as we hear about
this great gift of God. Because at
Christmas we celebrate God coming to us, in the flesh. The eternal God who created all that we
understand and know entered the creation, born of a woman, laid in a manger,
for the very purpose of dying for our sin.
And in the Lord’s Supper, he enters our world in the flesh again. Only this time, for us to eat and to
drink.
Its true, the
fulness of the eternal God comes in the flesh for you, in a tiny morsel of
bread. The fulness of the blood that
coursed through his veins and poured from his wounds comes for you to drink in
with and under a taste of wine. You
participate in God and in His salvation whenever you eat or drink. As Christ’s own words say, “This is my body,
this is my blood,” and as he says in Matthew’s gospel, “poured out for
forgiveness of sins.”
Yes, in the
Lord’s Supper, you receive forgiveness for your sins. What a great benefit in that simple eating
and drinking. For you have sinned much,
and justly deserve God’s eternal wrath and punishment, but he has decided to
let you feast on his flesh and drink his blood so that you may be forgiven of
your sin. Which sins? All of them.
How can that
be? Because Christ is the sacrifice that
paid for your sins. His work on the
cross earned forgiveness life and salvation for you. Since his flesh died and rose again, when you
eat and drink, you participate in the saving action of the cross. And he personally brings that forgiveness to
you in the bread and the wine become body and blood.
And he is truly
present as well. For his own words say
so. It isn’t a figure of speech, it is a
truth, written in clear language. Every
word is recorded for us, “This” “is” “my” Body”, This is My Blood. He really is there. That’s why we kneel at the altar rail, in
reverence to Christ’s holy presence, knowing that we are partaking in the God
who saved us by his cross. We ought not
take it for granted that we are in the very presence of God when we come to the
rail to partake.
And our Lord
bids us to take it often. As Paul says, “For
as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's
death until he comes.” He doesn’t
say, “As seldom,” or “When you feel like it.”
He says as often. You should
partake in the Lord’s supper often.
Luther says if you don’t participate at minimum 4 times a year, than you
aren’t even a Christian, though partaking every week is even better as many
churches are beginning to do again in our own church body. Why?
Because you sin every single day, and thus you ought to partake in the
food that delivers forgiveness for that sin as often as you can. It is good to eat and drink often, as the
Lord himself says, “Do this.”
And yes, we do
practice closed communion, as Paul teaches about to the Corinthians in our text
for tonight, saying that those who come with a wrong confession of faith have
eaten and drank to their own damnation – even saying that’s why some have died
among them. For that reason, we do seek
to have a united confession of faith for all who partake, not because we are
better than other, but only so that we don’t distribute judgment upon those who
know no better. (the same reason a pharmacist doesn't just hand out drugs willy nilly - they might hurt the one who takes them wrongly.)
Dear Christians,
the Lord’s Supper is a gift. It bring
forgiveness, life and salvation to Christians who partake. It ought to be taken as often as possible. It publicly declares our unity in the
faith. And it truly, really, absolutely
brings Christ into our very presence.
Just as God was truly present in swaddling clothes laying in a manger,
so too is he truly present in bread and wine for the forgiveness of our
sins. Thanks be to God for this great
gift. In the name of Jesus. Amen.
Tuesday, December 19, 2017
Sunday, December 17, 2017
Wednesday, December 13, 2017
Sunday, December 10, 2017
Wednesday, December 6, 2017
Advent Midweek 1, 2017 - The Means of Grace - God's Word
Luke 1:26-38 - In
the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee
named Nazareth, 27 to a virgin
betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And
the virgin's name was Mary.28 And he came to her and
said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!” 29 But she
was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting
this might be. 30 And the angel said to her, “Do
not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31 And
behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall
call his name Jesus. 32 He will be great and will
be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him
the throne of his father David, 33 and he will
reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no
end.”
34 And
Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?”
35 And
the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power
of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be
born will be called holy—the Son of God. 36 And
behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and
this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. 37 For nothing
will be impossible with God.” 38 And Mary said,
“Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your
word.” And the angel departed from her.
Grace, mercy
and peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ. Amen.
Dear friends
in Christ, it is Advent. The time of the
church year when we focus on the fact that Christ comes to us. He is coming, his advent is near. And for our midweek advent services this
year, we will be focusing on the way that Christ comes to us, specifically in
the means of grace. We’ll be learning
each week about one of the ways that God comes to create faith with us.
There are
three ways that this takes place.
Through God’s Word, proclaimed into our ear. Through baptismal waters poured upon us. And through participating in the very body
and blood of Jesus in the Lord’s Supper.
In these three things, the Holy Spirit works to create faith in us, so
that we receive the forgiveness, life and salvation that Christ so freely
gives.
This week we
hear about God’s Word, and the tremendous power that it has to accomplish God’s
will. We see that first in our Gospel
lesson, where an angel visits Mary to announce to her the birth of Jesus. The Word declares to her that God will take
on human flesh with in her own womb, that the almighty, all powerful,
omnipresent God will grow within human flesh, and that she will give birth to
God. And how will it happen? Not through the will of man, not though the
natural way babies come about. Instead,
when the Word of God is spoken into her ear, the power of the most high comes
upon her and Christ is conceived.
IN other words,
God’s word does what it says it will do for her. The word says let the God become man to save
humanity from sin, and behold Mary becomes pregnant. It is not unlike when God’s word said, Let
there be light, and there was.
Dear
Christian, God’s Word works for you what it says for you as well. What I mean is, when you hear God’s Word,
purely preached in full truth, it creates faith in you. Paul writes this, “Faith comes by hearing,
and hearing by the Word of God.” Jesus
says the same thing in John chapter 17, that after his death Christians would
believe through the word of God. Yes,
the Word creates faith in Christian hearts.
The reason it
does so, is because wherever the Word is, there the Holy Spirit is also. SO when you hear the Word, it is as the angel
Gabriel says, “The Holy Spirit comes upon you” to create and sustain and build
faith with in you. God’s word teaches
this very idea throughout all its pages.
So why, then
O Christians, if God’s Word works such wonders, if it is one of the precious
means of grace, if it is where the Holy Spirit promises to be at work in us for
our salvation, why then do we so despise the word? Why are we so unconcerned with it? Why are we fine to take the time to watch How
the Grinch stole Christmas this December, but won’t open to read the Nativity
account in Luke’s Gospel? Why do we have
people who time to go to Christmas concerts, but not to Church? Why do we struggle to read, learn and
inwardly digest God’s pure word each and every day, instead thinking that since
we read the bible during Sunday School decades ago, that’s enough? Why do we think its ok to skip Bible study
for football games, lunch, work, or really for any reason? Why are the countless bibles sitting on our
shelves so difficult to open and read?
Because we
are sinners.
Sinners who
deserve death as just punishment for sin.
We are
unholy, unrighteous, we are guilty before God, especially for despising his
blessed word.
So Repent
this Advent. Know that God is coming to
you in his Word. Confess your loathing
of his word, confess your laziness is studying it, confess and repent, and hear
God’s Word come to you in this absolution.
Your sin is forgiven.
It is
forgiven by the very word of God himself, made flesh to dwell among us. The Word that entered Mary’s ear, grew in her
womb was born, and laid in a manger for you.
It was an invasion of this sinful world by the Lord God himself. It began his travel to Jerusalem, to the
cross, to death itself – all for your sin.
The Word made flesh shed his blood to forgive you your sin. The Word allowed that flesh to be nailed to a
cross for you. The Word died so that you
might be forgiven, and now forgive you are.
And that Word rose again, into eternal life, the same thing that awaits
you, Dear Christian.
And now, in
that forgiveness, gladly hear God’s Word.
Or as Paul says it, “16 Let the word of
Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all
wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with
thankfulness in your hearts to God.”
Have peace in Christ. Dust off
that bible from the shelf. Fathers, read
the Nativity account to your kids this Christmas. Mothers, sing the Word to your children as
they go to sleep. Church members, encourage
one another to be in the word, and talk about what the Word teaches each
week. And know that in that word, the
Holy Spirit is creating faith in you, he is saving you, he is giving you
eternal life freely.
The Word
brings you comfort dear friends, It brings you peace, thus saith the Word of
God. That word is always there, always
crying out to you, always delivering the cross of Jesus to you. It washes you with water, as we’ll hear next
week. It feeds you with the bread and
wine of heaven as we’ll hear in two week.
It creates faith in you. And so
we pray along with Mary in our Gospel lesson, Lord, let it be to me according
to your word. In the name of Jesus. Amen.
Sunday, December 3, 2017
Sunday, November 26, 2017
Thursday, November 23, 2017
Sunday, November 19, 2017
Sunday, November 12, 2017
Service Catch Up
Pastor Moline was in Israel for the first two Sunday's of November. Here's the services.
Wednesday, November 1, 2017
Thursday, October 26, 2017
Reformation 500 Southeast Circuit ND Divine Service
Streaming should begin shortly before 10:00 a.m. Sunday October 29th.
Sunday, October 22, 2017
Sunday, October 15, 2017
Sunday, October 8, 2017
Elaine Hentz Live Stream
Push play on appropriate video.
If live stream fails to work, search "Immanuel Hankinson" on youtube - it should appear there.
Sunday, October 1, 2017
Trinity 14-16 catch up.
Trinity 14 - Pastor at LWML Retreat - elders read my sermon
Trinity 15 - Rev. Don Meyer guest preacher - Pastor on vacation
Trinity 16 - Jesus Ruins Funerals
Sunday, September 10, 2017
Sunday, September 3, 2017
Sunday, August 27, 2017
Sunday, August 20, 2017
Sunday, August 13, 2017
Sunday, August 6, 2017
Trinity 8 - G - 2017 - Luther Sermon
|
Eighth Sunday after Trinity
|
8/6/2017
|
26
|
Jeremiah 23:16-29
|
Acts 20:27-38
|
Matthew 7:15-23
|
Thus says the Lord of
hosts: “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to
you, filling you with vain hopes. They speak visions of their own
minds, not from the mouth of the Lord. 17 They
say continually to those who despise the word of the Lord, ‘It shall
be well with you’; and to everyone who stubbornly follows his own heart,
they say, ‘No disaster shall come upon you.’”
18 For who among them has stood
in the council of the Lord
to see and to hear his word,
or who has paid attention to his word and listened?
19 Behold, the storm of the Lord!
Wrath has gone forth,
a whirling tempest;
it will burst upon the head of the wicked.
20 The anger of the Lord will not turn back
until he has executed and accomplished
the intents of his heart.
In the latter days you will understand it clearly.
to see and to hear his word,
or who has paid attention to his word and listened?
19 Behold, the storm of the Lord!
Wrath has gone forth,
a whirling tempest;
it will burst upon the head of the wicked.
20 The anger of the Lord will not turn back
until he has executed and accomplished
the intents of his heart.
In the latter days you will understand it clearly.
21 “I did not send the prophets,
yet they ran;
I did not speak to them,
yet they prophesied.
22 But if they had stood in my council,
then they would have proclaimed my words to my people,
and they would have turned them from their evil way,
and from the evil of their deeds.
yet they ran;
I did not speak to them,
yet they prophesied.
22 But if they had stood in my council,
then they would have proclaimed my words to my people,
and they would have turned them from their evil way,
and from the evil of their deeds.
23 “Am I a God at hand, declares
the Lord, and not a God far away?24 Can a man hide
himself in secret places so that I cannot see him? declares
the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? declares
the Lord. 25 I have heard what the prophets
have said who prophesy lies in my name, saying, ‘I have dreamed, I
have dreamed!’ 26 How long shall there be lies in
the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies, and who prophesy the deceit
of their own heart, 27 who think to make my people
forget my name by their dreams that they tell one another, even as
their fathers forgot my name for Baal? 28 Let
the prophet who has a dream tell the dream, but let him who has my word
speak my word faithfully. What has straw in common with wheat? declares
the Lord. 29 Is not my word like fire,
declares the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?
For I did not shrink from declaring to you the
whole counsel of God.28 Pay careful attention to
yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made
you overseers, to care for the church of God, which
he obtained with his own blood. 29 I know
that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not
sparing the flock; 30 and from among your own
selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after
them. 31 Therefore be alert, remembering
that for three years I did not cease night or day to admonish every
one with tears. 32 And now I commend you
to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up
and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified. 33 I
coveted no one's silver or gold or apparel.34 You
yourselves know that these hands ministered to my necessities and to
those who were with me. 35 In all things I
have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak
and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is
more blessed to give than to receive.’”
36 And when he had said these
things, he knelt down and prayed with them all. 37 And there
was much weeping on the part of all; they embraced Paul and kissed
him, 38 being sorrowful most of all because
of the word he had spoken, that they would not see his face again.
And they accompanied him to the ship.
“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's
clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You
will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes,
or figs from thistles? 17 So, every healthy
tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 18 A
healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good
fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit
is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus you will
recognize them by their fruits.
21 “Not everyone who says to me,
‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does
the will of my Father who is in heaven.22 On that
day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name,
and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your
name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them,
‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
This morning’s
sermon is from Martin Luther, preached in 1532 at the Town Church in
Wittenberg.
From this Gospel
lesson, especially, we who want to be Christians should learn that Christ, our
dear Lord, earnestly exhorts and admonishes that we be attentive and willing
hearers of God’s Word, always on guard against false prophets. He appeals to us as his dear children. We have God’s Word now. Let us see to it that we receive and hold
onto it. If we don’t, it will eventually
be taken away and we will be left with the devil’s word.
No other
alternative exists for a person who refuses to hear Christ. Whoever is unwilling to learn the way to
salvation and true godliness from the Word of God will end up leaning shame and
mischief from the devil. God’s Word
teaches us the way to heaven; the devil teaches a person the way to hell. The former inculcates peace and every good;
the latter, grief and misery. Our dear
Lord understood this, and that’s why he admonishes his discples and us to
hearken to God’s Word faithfully and gladly while we still have it. When we do this, things will go well for us;
if we refuse, the time will come when we will wish that we should hear the
Word, if only we still had it. As said,
our dear Lord Jesus Christ forewarns us very earnestly in this lesson to
treasure God’s Word and learn from it.
If we do, things will go well for us; but if not, we will be forced to
listen to the devil.
Now, there’s no
one really who would want to be listening to the devil, the master of lies and
murder, whose only purpose is to throttle, mislead, and burden people with
great misery, as indeed is true even now for mankind. Already at the beginning, through the fall of
Adam and Eve, he brought death upon all mankind. He caused the fall from the blessed estate in
which man had been created, bringing us into death, under sin’s dominion, and
made subject to the wrath of God. That
is what that troublesome spirit did for us, making us sinners and children of
wrath, and subject to death.
This should
certainly put us on notice that we ought to pay attention to God’s Word, not
the devil’s. What Christ wants us to
understand is that when we refuse to hear God’s Word it is by his ordaining
that we must listen to the devil’s, even as by Adam and Eve’s transgression we
have all come under the death and wrath of God.
Like them and all their descendants we have become sinners and subject
to death. But Christ also tells us, I
have nonetheless rescued you from that misery and freed you from sin and death
already now. That’s why I have given you
my Word. Hold tightly to it and I will take
your place in the suffering and pain and struggle of sin caused by the Word of
the Devil.
-Paragraph deleted-
Christ admonishes
us very earnestly to remain with God’s Word, hear it gladly, and zealously
learn from it. If you do this, Christ
promises to be with you with his grace.
If not, then, Christ says false prophets and wolves will come and devour
you. Therefore, have a care that you
hold firmly to my Word, so that the devil cannot mislead you; for if you let my
Word go, you will again be duped.
This is a
true-blue admonition that should certainly move us to hear and learn from God’s
Word. But it avails little for the many
who say, “Oh, I’ve already learned the Gospel, understand it well and have no
immediate need for it.” Many indeed
blurt out that they no longer require pastors and preachers, since they can
read the Word for themselves at home.
But the fact is that they don’t do it.
Or if they read it at home, the Word is not as productive, nor as
dynamic, as it is when publicly proclaimed through the mouth of the preacher
whom God has called and ordained to do such preaching for them. Christ warns these people: Be careful, you will be misled; false
prophets will come to you, and they will do so in sheep’s clothing. You need not think that a false prophet will
come admitting that he is a deceiver who intends to pull the wool over your
eyes and bring you to the devil.
Hardly! Every false prophet’s
approach is in sheep’s clothing. That is
why your false security is disastrous.
Be on guard, because you are like schoolchildren whom the devil wants to
dupe. Because you don’t apply yourself
to the Word of God, you should realize that the devil already has his foot in
the door!
-7 Paragraphs skipped-
This is the reason
why things are so bad in the world today, why people find it impossible to get
along – the old, the young, the household servants – and why there is so much
robbing, stealing, disobedience and failure to trust. For everyone who despises God’s Word and
listens instead to the devil and his prophets, both in the church and in the
homes. As a result it is impossible for
true faith toward God to exist, also genuine dutifulness among people, true
love, and trust. And where true faith
toward God and obedience among men are lacking, there wil be pestilence,
famine, hunger, war and every kind of evil.
Such is the reward when God’s Word is despised.
Accordingly,
everyone ought diligently take heed to God’s Word and say, “I want to remain
faithful to God’s Word, believe and obey it, be steadfast in faith, obey my
mother and my father, and serve my Lord faithfully. Everything that is not in harmony therewith,
I will not follow or obey, sweet though it may try to sound. This is what I know for sure: If I abide in God’s Word, believe in God, and
am obedient to my parents, and so forth, I know I have a gracious God, and the
devil cannot destroy me. Even though I
may have to suffer because of it, I will not be ashame, for it is better to
endure something at God’s hand, than to be torn to pieces by the devil. Therefore I go on, cling to the Word,
proclaim it faithfully, and tend to my calling.
Though I must suffer because of the Word and my calling, it matters
not. It is better when, for Christ’s
sake, I suffer, rather than to deny Christ and be damned with the devil.”
There are the
lessons, therefore, which we ought learn from this Gospel: whoever will not hear God in his Word, must
hear the devil; and therefore we should
learn to obey God in his Word, so that we are not destroyed, and look to Jesus
Christ our Lord and Savior, in whom alone we have forgiveness, life and
salvation. IN him, and in his Word, we
have hope, so that we are not destroyed and may have good days here now, and
hereafter, everlasting salvation. May
God our dear Father, grant us this through his Holy Spirit, for Jesus Christ,
our Lord’s sake. Amen.
Sunday, July 30, 2017
Sunday, July 23, 2017
Sunday, July 16, 2017
Sunday, July 9, 2017
Sunday, July 2, 2017
Trinity 3 - G - 2017 - Sinners searched for and rescued
Due to a loose cable, the video didn't record. Sorry for the inconvenience!
Monday, June 26, 2017
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Sunday, June 18, 2017
Sunday, June 11, 2017
Sunday, June 4, 2017
Sunday, May 28, 2017
Thursday, May 25, 2017
Sunday, May 21, 2017
Easter 6 - Rogate - G - 2017 - Prayer: What is prayer and what's it do?
Sunday School sings at 12:00
Sunday, May 14, 2017
Sunday, May 7, 2017
Tuesday, May 2, 2017
Sunday, April 30, 2017
Sunday, April 23, 2017
Sunday, April 16, 2017
Easter Sunrise Sermon - Abridged from Martin Luther 1534
Easter
Sunrise!
Christ is
Risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
Amen.
To the honor and
praise of our merciful, eternal God, we wish to preach today about the
resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. It
is proper that we do so. This festival
enables us to focus on the Gospel’s account of Christ’s resurrection and to
learn from it. It is incumbent upon us
therefore, to speak of these happenings, since so much depends upon them for
our good, not only in this present life but also in the life to come. Moreover, when we dwell upon these events, we
do so not only because it is useful and good, but also because there with God
is praised and glorified. At least a few
on earth may listen to it earnestly and then to come to thank our Lord Jesus
Christ for his suffering and resurrection.
Accordingly, it pleases God when we thus pay attention to and preach
about the story.
In fact, the times
never comes when we have preached and heard enough concerning the significance
of Christ’s resurrection. We are not
preaching anything new, but always, without ceasing about that man who is
called Jesus Christ, true God and true man, who died for our sins and rose for
our justification. Yet even if we were
again and again to preach about and dwell upon these events, we could never
really exhaust their meaning. We would
remain like infants and young children, just learning to speak, scarcely able
to form half words!
That is why we
wish to speak about it now, because our highest good depends upon it. So, it is my greatest concern to sustain your
interest in this article so that when I’m dead and gone, I might have left you
with this treasure. A treasure that
lasts forever, where rust and mold do not destroy. A treasure of eternal life found in the
resurrected Lord Jesus Christ.
Yes, today is
about him. He is the one who has won the
victory for us. Death attacked him, who
should not die, and was defeated. For
death had to be swallowed up! The devil
must have trembled in fear along with our enemy death. For they were felled and laid prostrate under
Christ’s feet.
Christ tore open
the belly of the devil and the muzzle of death on this day! Sin death, do you hear? Shameful devil, why are you accusing us? What right have you against us? Sin death and the devil must now be silent as
far as Christ is concerned, for he triumphed as Lord over sin death and the
devil, not only because he was true God, but also because he was innocent as
concerns his human nature.
And now we esteem
him as highest. Christ is Lord of
all. For if he is mighty, so too must be
the resurrection which he experienced – and which we will one day experience as
well. Yes, you will raise because Christ
has raised. Death is powerless, in fact
it has been reduced, as Christ says himself, to a sleep.
Hear it
again! Today we rejoice because our Lord
Jesus Christ by his triumph overwhelmed and felled death and the devil; the
devil he strangled in his own body, death he drowned in his own blood; sin he
erased with his martyrdom and suffering.
All this Christ personally accomplished, but not for himself. He did not require such a victory for himself
after all, he accomplished it for you and for your forgiveness. Because of his work, you, I and everyone
else, all of us are benefited. That is
the power and the fruit of Christ’s suffering and resurrection.
If a person does
not wish to believe this, let him be. We
preach to those who gladly hear and who have need of this message. These are the ones who live in mortal fear
and despair of death and say, “I have sinned I have neither peace nor
rest. I will one day die for my
guilt.”
Against such an
enemy it is necessary and needful that we arm and compose ourselves with a
correct understanding of the power and fruit of Christ’s Resurrection. He did not come for his own sake to
earth. He did not permit himself to be
killed for his own sake. He had no need
of this, but instead he bore your sin, and by his death he swallowed up your
death (and mine) forever. Hell, which we
deserved, he has destroyed, as Hosea writes, “I will ransom them from the power
of the grave. I will redeem them from
death.”
And so it is that
we must remember this day, this Easter, every day of our life. If the devil approaches us and says, “Look
here, see how great your sin is; see too how bitter, how terrible is the death
you must suffer;” then you must counter with “Devil, don’t you know the power
of my Lord Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection? In him there is eternal righteousness and
eternal life; his resurrection from the dead is mightier than my sin, death,
and hell, greater than heaven and earth.
My death and sin are minute drops, but my Lord Jesus’ death and
resurrection is a vast ocean.
Dear friends, Christ
is risen today! We should be confident
that through Christ’s resurrection and victory we have the firm assurance that
no sin, not even death, may frighten us.
If sin and death frighten us, it is unjustly so, or because we don’t
believe, for Christ has set us free. He
has surmounted all excruciating suffering, and wishes to be our comfort,
greater than our sin and death, yes greater than heaven and earth. But how does our human nature react? Since this treasure is not in dollars or gold
pieces, which we can see and our fists grab hold of, we despise it when it is
preached to us through the Word. I
admonish each of you that you learn and comprehend these facts well. Whoever is not well-grounded and practiced in
these articles of faith will find when attacked what a master the devil
is. May our Dear Lord Jesus Christ, who
wishes to be our comfort, give us his grace and Spirit, so that we may well
remember and retain this lesson.
For Christ is
Risen! He is Risen Indeed! Alleluia!
Amen.
Saturday, April 15, 2017
Friday, April 14, 2017
Thursday, April 13, 2017
Maundy Thursday Sermon
Maundy Thursday
Exodus
12:1-14
The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of
Egypt, 2 “This month shall be for you the beginning
of months. It shall be the first month of the year for you. 3 Tell
all the congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of this month every man
shall take a lamb according to their fathers' houses, a lamb for a
household. 4 And if the household is too small for
a lamb, then he and his nearest neighbor shall take according to the number of
persons; according to what each can eat you shall make your count for the
lamb. 5 Your lamb shall be without blemish, a
male a year old. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats, 6 and
you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, when the whole
assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs at twilight.
7 “Then they shall take some of the
blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in
which they eat it. 8 They shall eat the flesh that
night, roasted on the fire; with unleavened bread and bitter herbs they
shall eat it. 9 Do not eat any of it raw or boiled
in water, but roasted, its head with its legs and its inner parts. 10 And you
shall let none of it remain until the morning; anything that remains until the
morning you shall burn. 11 In this manner you shall
eat it: with your belt fastened, your sandals on your feet, and your staff
in your hand. And you shall eat it in haste. It is the Lord's
Passover. 12 For I will pass through the land
of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt,
both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute
judgments: I am the Lord. 13 The blood
shall be a sign for you, on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood,
I will pass over you, and no plague will befall you to destroy you, when I
strike the land of Egypt.
14 “This day shall be for you a
memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout
your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast.
1
Corinthians 11:23-32
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to
you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took
bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke
it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance
of me.” 25 In the same way also he took the cup,
after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this,
as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For
as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's
death until he comes.
27 Whoever, therefore, eats the bread
or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty
concerning the body and blood of the Lord. 28 Let
a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the
cup. 29 For anyone who eats and drinks without
discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. 30 That
is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. 31 But
if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. 32 But
when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not
be condemned along with the world.
John
13:1-15, 34-35
Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus
knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the
Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to
the end. 2 During supper, when the devil had
already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray
him, 3 Jesus, knowing that the Father had
given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God
and was going back to God, 4 rose from supper.
He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his
waist. 5 Then he poured water into a basin and
began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was
wrapped around him. 6 He came to Simon Peter, who
said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?” 7 Jesus
answered him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but
afterward you will understand.”8 Peter said to him, “You
shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you
have no share with me.” 9 Simon Peter said to him,
“Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” 10 Jesus
said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except
for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are
clean, but not every one of you.” 11 For he
knew who was to betray him; that was why he said, “Not all of you are
clean.”
12 When he had washed their feet
and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to
them, “Do you understand what I have done to you? 13 You
call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. 14 If
I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to
wash one another's feet. 15 For I have given you an
example, that you also should do just as I have done to you.
“For I received
from the Lord what I also delivered to you.”
Thus Paul begins his teaching on the Lord’s Supper to a very divided and
struggling congregation in the Roman city of Corinth. And as Paul uses this words, he uses a very
technical greek phrase for the passing on of a tradition. Meaning the thing he is talking about didn’t
begin with him, or his fellow pastors or teachers in fact. Paul received it, Paul was taught it, and the
source of that teaching, he says, was the Lord Jesus Christ on the night he was
betrayed.
In other words,
the Lord’s Supper is just that, the teaching of the Lord. It’s the Lord’s Word that is involved. It’s the Lord’s Supper. It delivers the Lord’s promises, which Paul
says, the Lord is now passing on to you as well.
And what are those
promises? They are two-fold really. First as he take the bread and the wine he
promises that these are now – by His word – his body and blood. That means that Christ’s body and blood are
really present in the Lord’s Supper. Its
not for us to understand how this happens, we can’t explain it using philosophy
or science. We can’t see it, we can’t
prove or disprove it, all we can do is receive the teaching of the crucified
and risen Lord Jesus and believe Him. It
is His supper after all. It is His Word
that says so. We take him at his
word. The bread is his body. The wine is his blood. He is present.
Secondly, he
promises that this eating and drinking is for you. Specifically, he teaches in Matthews Gospel
that it forgives your sins. Yes,
yours. The body and blood, in the bread
and the wine deliver the forgiveness earned by Christ on the cross right into
our own mouths. By eating the body of
Christ in the bread, you have forgiveness of sins. By drinking the cup of wine which is his blood,
you have forgiveness of sins. And to be
clear it’s not that your action of taking, eating and drinking do this – it is
God’s Work. He gives you this great
gift, he comes into your presence to be eaten for your forgiveness.
That’s the message
that Paul received – ultimately from the Lord Jesus himself, and that he is
passing along to the Corinthians as is recorded in the words of Scripture.
And that same
message is passed along to us today as well.
It is what we believe teach and confess as Lutherans. We have these words from St. Paul, which we
hear tonight in remembrance of Christ’s first uttering them. What Paul received, he passed down to us
also. The Word of the Lord, spoken that
first Maundy Thursday comes to us here now as well.
And so, tonight,
will you let the Lord have his say? Will
you let him forgive your sins in the eating and drinking of His own body and
blood? Will you participate with angels
and archangels and all the company of heaven in the foretaste of the wedding
feast of the lamb in His kingdom? Or
will you ignore him? Will you change
what he says to better suit your own rationalism? Will you make the Lord’s Supper into your
supper?
Of course not,
you’ll take the Lord at his Word. You’ll
eat his body in the bread, and his blood in the wine, and be forgiven. You’ll participate in the heavenly wedding
feast of Jesus as it is hidden in the Divine Service.
The first part of
that is acknowledging you have sin that needs to be forgiven. You know that you do. We’ve already confessed it, haven’t we? I, a poor, miserable sinner, confess unto
You all my sins and iniquities with which I have ever offended You and justly
deserved Your temporal and eternal punishment.
But I am heartily sorry for them and sincerely repent of them, and I
pray You of Your boundless mercy and for the sake of the holy, innocent, bitter
sufferings and death of Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ, to be gracious and
merciful to me, a poor, sinful being.
And what we spoke was true for all of us.
And we heard God’s
Word, and were forgiven. That too is
taught by Paul, in chapter 15 of 1st Corinthians. “For I delivered unto you as of first
importance what I also received: that
Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried,
that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures.” And thus the forgiveness for Christ’s sake
was announced by God’s word.
And now in that
forgiveness, we feast. We eat the body
in the bread. We drink the blood in the
wine. We relish the continued
forgiveness of sins. We participate in
that forgiveness boldly. And in so
doing, we remember the Lord Jesus Christ who remembered us upon the cross.
It is the Lord’s
Supper we receive tonight, on the night he was betrayed. It is a precious means of grace that delivers
the forgiveness of the crucified and risen Lord Jesus to us Christians to eat
and drink. It is a teaching we have
received as upmost importance. And as
often as we eat and drink – which we ought to often, we proclaim the Lord’s
death until he comes again.
In the name of
Jesus. Amen.
Sunday, April 9, 2017
Lent 6 - Palm Sunday - G - 2017 - Crowds at Holy Week
The pastor apologizes - somewhere he bumped the button and turned his microphone off.
Text of sermon below:
Text of sermon below:
IN the name of
Jesus Amen. Our text today are the
Gospel readings just read. Thus far our
text.
Dear friends in
Christ. The entire last week of his
life, Jesus is surrounded by huge crowds of people. We saw it in our processional Gospel
lesson. Jesus enters Jerusalem with
crowds of people cheering him on.
Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes
in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the
highest! The crowd waved palm
branches. They strew his way with their
cloaks. They followed him into the
temple. The crowd was enormous.
And the crowd
listened to him for the entirety of Holy Week as he taught in the temple. The rulers of Jerusalem were afraid of the
crowds in fact. Scripture is clear that
they did not seek to arrest him because they were afraid of the large crowds
that followed Jesus. In fact, they had
to arrest him in secret, in the middle of the night, with the help of one of
his own disciples.
The crowds
continue in our Passion Sunday Gospel reading.
Only now the Pharisees have wrangled up their own crowd – still a huge
number of people. And this new crowd
shouted, “Crucify him! Crucify
him!” This crowd makes the Roman
Governor aghast at their demands! You
want me to crucify your king? And the
crowd shouts Crucify him again? Pilate
washes his hands, declaring he is innocent of this man’s death, and the
enormous crowd shouts, “Let his blood be upon us and our children.”
Then the crowd
follows the beaten and bloodied Jesus outside the town walls, and watches as
they crucify him. Yes, Jesus is
crucified to forgive the sins of the crowd that follows him. And then, as he is hanging naked, bleeding,
and dying – as he is suffering hell for sinners, the crowd of people there
belittle and mock him, asking him to come down from the cross – essentially
asking him not to save them from their sin.
Crowds surrounded
Christ, from Palm Sunday to Good Friday.
More people than live in our town witnessed these events first
hand. Huge numbers saw with their own
eyes the triumphal entry, the trial, and the death of Jesus.
But what about in
our day and age? Will there be crowds
that gather to remember what our Lord has done for us? Will there be giant crowds that remember
Christ’s promises in the Lord’s Supper this Maundy Thursday? Will there be crowds on Friday that hear
Christ’s own words from the cross during the hours he hung from that
cross? Will there be people gathered in
the church remembering that Christ was taken down from the cross and laid in a
tomb Good Friday evening? Will they
gather in the church on Saturday to remember their baptism, to hear God’s Word
and to look forward to the resurrection of Christ that means our resurrection
also?
Nobody has time
for all that, right?
Of course not. We’ve got other priorities! We’ve got to take the kids to athletic
practice and school. We’ve got to fit in
40 hours of work this week – so how could I fit 8 or 9 hours in for church? We’ve got smart phone that need to be
watched. We’ve got to see if that
giraffe had a baby or not. We’ve got a
long to do list that we’ve got to work on sometime. Plus it’s so beautiful, and the days are
getting longer, shouldn’t we spend some time outside? The TV won’t watch itself! The Refrigerator needs to be cleaned, doesn’t
it? The Christmas lights need to be
taken down – I need to do that in fact!
And so the holy week crowd lessens each year, because priorities change,
as our sinful natures point out to us time and again.
What does it
matter anyways, right? These services
are all the same, we’ll hear the same stuff we hear every week, right? Plus, don’t you know how hard it is to keep
children quiet during church? All kids
will do is disrupt, it’s not like they’d get anything out of being a part of
the crowd that focuses on Christ’s passion.
Yes, there may
have been a crowd that first Holy Week.
But not this Holy Week. I mean
it’s hard to get a crowd together for anything, isn’t it? We are apathetic about everything! We can only scrounge up crowds when beer is
for sale in the street, or when we are protesting an election or something that
we’ve deemed to be a social injustice.
We can only get crowds for bison games – or Sioux games. Or prom.
Or graduation. Or ice fishing
tournaments. Or regular fishing. Or High School sports. Or academic banquets. Or the 4th of July. Or cares for cancer. Or meals at the community center. Or wedding receptions. Or funeral lunches. Or parades.
Or polkaing. Or…
See how hard it is
to get a crowd together? Why should
church be any different? Especially
since all that church offers is complete forgiveness of all sin so that
Hankinsinners like you can have eternal life in God’s peace and joy.
Yes – that’s all that
holy week means for you. It means Christ
died for your sin of indifference, just like he died for all your sins. Good Friday means the Son of God in human
flesh pours out his blood while suffering your place in Hell upon the cross –
and that he does all this for you – specifically for you! For your
forgiveness! Christ gave up 12 hours of his life to be arrested and undergo
a fake trial for your sin. He gave up 6
hours of his life to hang on the cross – and spent that time praying for you –
“Father forgive them, they know not what they do.” He gave up his life, and shouted – “It is
finished.” Meaning the payment for your sin was finished by his own death. He laid for three days in the tomb and then
rose so that there will be an end to the time you lay in your tomb. So that one day you would rise to live before
God in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness!
This forgiveness,
earned by him, comes to you here where he promises to be! It comes in the word, because he promises
that in his word he will send the Holy spirit to you. It comes in your baptism – which we
constantly proclaim in this place.
Forgiveness comes to you as you eat the true body and blood of Jesus
which he gives to you from this altar. Christ
promises to be present here for you, for your forgiveness. He never ceases to give his mercy to you in
this place through his Word and sacraments!
So repent. Join the crowd that wishes to receive
forgiveness from Christ. But hear this
one word of warning – don’t think that by your action of attending church you
are going to earn that forgiveness.
Don’t think that the number of hours you suffer through church will make
God happy. Instead realize that we come
to church not to fulfill a good work to God, but instead to receive the gifts
Christ freely gives. He gives you forgiveness
of sins, life and salvation, freely through the means of grace – His word and
his two sacraments! Which are given
often and generously in the divine service this Holy Week, and really every
week.
In the name of
Jesus. Amen.
Wednesday, April 5, 2017
Sunday, April 2, 2017
Sunday, March 26, 2017
Wednesday, March 22, 2017
Sunday, March 19, 2017
Sunday, March 12, 2017
Wednesday, March 8, 2017
Sunday, March 5, 2017
Wednesday, March 1, 2017
Sunday, February 26, 2017
Friday, February 24, 2017
Confessions Study Sermon - February 24 - St. Matthias
IN the name of
Jesus. Amen. Dear friends in Christ. Today is St. Mathias day. So what do you know about St. Matthias? Well really not much of anything. He is installed in the office of Apostle in
our text for today, and we hear not of him again. Sure, there are a few traditions, about
planting a church in the region of Cappadocia, the armpit of the armpit of the
Roman Empire, a land comparable to the badlands of North Dakota. However, compared to the other Apostle’s the
details are rather scant and vague. We
know little about the man himself, or what things he did as an apostle of
Christ.
There’s no
accounts in scripture or outside of scripture of Matthias performing
miracles. There’s no glorious
confessions of the faith before emperors or even governors so far as we
know. There’s not even large populations
centers, instead only a few small underground towns and villages carved into cliffs. Matthias goes not to the population centers,
instead he is called to preach the Gospel in flyover country.
And the way Matthias
becomes an apostle is different as well.
He is put forward along with Justus Barsabbas as a possible replacement
for the faithless Judas who committed suicide in despair at the death of
Christ. They both had followed Christ from the
beginning, they both had witnessed what things had taken place, but they did so
quietly from the background. And when
their names are put forward, they are basically drawn out of a hat, and
Matthias is selected.
There’s no booming
voice from heaven, “This is my apostolic replacement, listen to him.” There is no discussion of how good he is with
the youth, or that he is a fantastic public speaker. They didn’t examine his age, or his family
circumstances. They didn’t look to see
if he had any advanced degree, or a trajectory to become a district president
or synod bureaucrat. He didn’t even
write any surviving letters or books which sold so well that CPH had to put
them on backorder. All they cared about
was that he had seen Jesus’s life, death and resurrection, and that God caused
his name to be drawn in the lot.
Yes, God is the
one who made Matthias an apostle. God is
the one who gave him the Word to preach.
God put him in an office, and sent him to proclaim the Word about Jesus,
the word about forgiveness of sins in the blood of the crucified and risen
Lord. God put him in an office to
baptize. To teach. To distribute the mysteries of God according
to the institution of Christ. God sent
him to the hinterlands of the mighty Roman empire to proclaim that Word,
because God cared about the people living there as well.
And so Matthias
goes, and preaches, and administers the sacraments, serving according to the
grace given to him by Jesus Christ. He
serves in the very forgiveness of sins that he proclaims, not earned but given. And does so without glory, or recorded
history, or even much remembrance of his name beyond 3 verses in one book of
the bible.
Dear friends in
Christ. Many of you too are put into an
office by God. You also are called to
serve faithfully, to preach the Word, and to administer the sacraments
according to God’s institution of them.
You are not the smartest pastor in the wider church. You are not the most well-educated pastor in
the world. You do not have the degrees
the world thinks are glorious, for Godly glory is not found in them. You aren’t going to make big money – you
might not even get paid what you ought to be.
But you do have the call of Christ to serve in His office as long as His
grace places you there. You’re no more
than God’s man to serve God’s people.
And the place you
are called to serve is not someplace fancy like Beverly Hills, or the mission
fields of some exotic land. You do not
serve in a big city like Minneapolis or St. Paul, no, not even the sacred and
holy city of St. Louis itself where our church body’s bureaucrats busy
themselves. You serve in a small rural
part of fly-over country which many people of our wider nation think is too
cold to even bother to visit in the summer time. You are the servant God placed by his call to
serve the people of North Dakota.
And you serve here
because God has caused your lot to fall here.
You serve here according to God’s grace.
You serve the people here because God loves them just as much as God loves
you. There’s no glory for self in
it. In fact, in 50 years you’ll just be
a name written in a dusty church record book, or perhaps a picture hanging on
the wall, little remembered except by those who say, “He was grouchier and
longer winded than our current pastor.”
And that’s ok. Because you serve you not to be remembered for your great
exploits, but rather so that through your preaching of God’s Word, God’s people
will be remembered by their Lord.
After all, you are
not here for your own glory, or your own ambition, or self-advancement, or even
as a stepping stone to higher positions in the church. You are here because the Crucified and Risen
Lord Jesus has caused your lot to fall here.
He has placed you in an office.
He has given you a task here, to proclaim His Word here in season and
out, and to distribute His gifts to His people.
And like Matthias,
God is with you. He forgives you the
same way he’s forgiven those you serve.
Christ’s blood was shed for you and your ministry, just as it was for
those you serve. You are his man. He has caused your lot to fall here, and he
will not send you and abandon you. He
doesn’t require you to be brilliant, or good-looking, or even smart, just
faithful to what He’s told you in his Word.
His mercy covers the rest. His
love cares for you and provides for you.
In fact, he even forgives your unfaithfulness, because He is more
faithful to you, that you to him. His
blood covers you. His mercy is
yours. You serve because His grace has
called you.
You might not
become a bigwig in the church. Your name
might not be remembered more than the picture on the wall. But God works through the Word he’s given you
to preach, to serve his people according to His will. Just like with Matthias. In the name of Jesus. Amen.
Wednesday, February 22, 2017
Sunday, February 19, 2017
Sermon for the Installation of Rev. Paul Warnier - Zion Lutheran Church Claire City
Texts: Ezekiel 34:1-16, Romans 10:14-17, Luke 12:35-43
In the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen. Our text comes from the Old
Testament lesson just read, especially these words, “I will seek the
lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured,
and I will strengthen the weak, and the fat and the strong I will
destroy. I will feed them in justice.”
Thus far our text.
Dear Pastor
Warnier, and Saints of Zion Lutheran. The
Lord works in his Word. In fact he does
all his work through his Word in one way or another. And if this should happen through the office
of the ministry, the pastor must first and foremost see to it that the Word is
preached in its truth and purity.
After all, it is
the Word that seeks the lost, that touches the heart of man and lets him know
that God seeks after him. But that Word
must be God’s Word, the Living Word from God’s lips that is filled with God’s
longing for His children.
And it’s the Word
that brings back the strayed sheep to the flock. Only the Word can show the way home. But, if the Word is corrupted it cannot lead
right. If our preaching does not lead
the way, does not point to the springs of life in the Bible and the Lord’s
Supper, if it does not speak clearly about the sins that bind men and haul them
away, the neither can it lead them back.
It is the Word
that binds up the injured. If the
preaching cannot paint Christ as crucified and cannot proclaim His atoning
death, then neither can it heal the wounded conscience. It then leads only to complacency, to
uncertainty, or to despair.
It is the Word
that strengthens the weak. Only a
rightly proclaimed Word can show men that they in their weakness can and may
live in faith in Jesus, that it is the faith in Him that makes them children of
God, and that it is this faith that strengthens our weakness so that we do not
tire of seeking the forgiveness of sins and do not tire of fighting against our
Old Adam.
It is the Word
that pastors are ordained and installed to bring out honestly, humbly,
persistently. If the pastor skimps,
compromises or forgets, he hinders the Word from seeking, bringing back,
binding up, and strengthening.
The Word does the
work. And the pastor is given to carry
this Word out into the world. He must
himself go out with the Word to seek, and lead back, to bind up the broken, and
to strengthen the weak. He seeks out
with the Word. Pastor Warnier, this is
your task here in this congregation – to give God’s Word in season and out of
season. And Blessed is that servant whom
his master will find so doing when he comes.
And that is good
that God has brought you to proclaim his Word here. Because it could be said of us all, even the
members of Zion Lutheran Claire City, the same things as God says about Israel
in this chapter of Ezekiel. “My sheep
were scattered, they wandered over all the mountains and on every single
hill.” “With none to search or seek for
them.” (3:6). It is this that all too
often happens.
For if pastors are
given to preach the Word, then congregations are given to hear the Word gladly,
after all “Faith comes through hearing and hearing the Word of God.” Congregations are to be in the pews,
listening and rejoicing. They are and to
attend bible studies, they are to receive the Lord’s Supper gratefully and
regularly for the forgiveness of sins.
And not only are
they to hear to Word, but they are also to love and support the one whom God
has given to preach that word to them. After
all, How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news! And so congregations rejoice in caring for
the one who brings the Word to their ears!
They provide a living wage so that he can support his family and loved
ones. They listen to his concerns and
they pray for and forgive his shortcomings.
For he brings the Word to their ears, and the Word does the work.
But so often we
listen not to the Word, but instead look to the man. Our sinful natures want to look to the
personality of the pastor, and decide whether we like him or not, after all,
the pastor can be replaced if we don’t like him. It wants to measure the entertainment level
of his sermons, and points to its watch when 15 minutes of preaching has been
passed. It wants him to know his place,
as servant, not master. Our sinful
nature is so willing to complain about the man God has sent us rather than to
listen to the Word he proclaims.
That’s why we need
the Word the pastor brings so badly, because our sinful nature needs the Word
of God to break its wickedness with the law, and to heal it perfectly and
purely with the Gospel.
Such is the
Word. It breaks. It binds.
It destroys. It heals. It seeks.
It gathers. It feeds and
strengthens. It sets free. It does the work of the Lord. It brings Jesus to you here who need Jesus so
badly.
Christ comes when
the Word comes, which is why the Word is so important. The blood of Jesus covers the Words of the
pastor so that they are his Word. The
blood of Jesus is attached to the Word of the pastor. That’s why when he says “I forgive you all
your sins” it really happens, because Christ is at work in His Word. That’s why when he speaks, “Take and eat this
is my body, take and drink this is my blood,” it matters, because it is God’s
Word at work. And even when that Word is
combined with plain old water, baptism comes about. The Word does the work of God. And the pastor brings the Word.
So the pastor uses
the Word to call back the scattered sin filled sheep into the flock of the
Lord. The pastor strengthens the weak
and the wounded with the Word of God.
The pastor binds up the wounded, visiting them in their homes and even
while they are in the hospital. The
pastor brings the Word, the Word does the work, and the congregation rejoices
that the Lord cares for them so much that they might hear the Word of God
regularly and in their own community. They
come and they hear, and by their hearing they believe.
And behind it all
is Christ. Pastor Warnier, as you begin
to serve this congregation officially, you do so in the grace and mercy of the
Word of Christ. You do so in the
forgiveness of sins earned by his cross.
You use the Word he gives you to care for His people, because He has
placed you here – you are his man here and he will not abandon you, nor forsake
you.
And dear
Christians, God cares for you enough to use his word on you, to send you a man
to preach that word of forgiveness into your ears and hearts. He brings you his grace day in and day out. He loves you for the sake of Jesus, and he
always will. Listen to the Word that
tells us of what Christ has done, and believe that word.
Pastor Warnier,
the Word is entrusted to you today. Dear
saints of Zion, this pastor is entrusted to bring you this Word today. May the Word work in all of you, so that
saints may be gathered, healed, and strengthened. And God has promised that it will be so.
In the name of
Jesus. Amen.
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