Series C - Proper 14 - Gospel - Jesus takes God's wrath upon himself on the cross.

Grace Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. Our text today is the Gospel lesson which was just read, especially verses (Luke 12) 49-50, "I came to cast fire on the earth and would that it were already kindled! I have a baptism to be baptized with." Thus far our text.

Dear friends in Christ, fire, wrath, division, suffering and distress. These are not often pictures we think of when we think of Jesus. Instead we might associate these things with war and famine, punishment and evil. We might even use these things to describe the work of the devil. These things cannot describe Jesus, the Prince of Peace, can they? But our text today is clear, it tells us that these are the things that Jesus has come to cast upon the earth.

"Fire I have come to cast upon the Earth, and how I wish it were already kindled," Jesus says in our text. Throughout the pages of Old Testament scripture, we see fire as God's judgment and wrath upon sin. We see this in the flaming sword brandished by the angel to keep Adam and Eve out of Eden following the fall. We see it in the account of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah where fire and brimstone destroy and kill. Fire is what separated the people of Israel from God on Mt. Sinai as handed down the law. We even see it in our Old Testament lesson as God says, "Is not my word like fire, like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?" (Jeremiah 23:29) and "Behold the storm of the Lord! Wrath has gone forth, a whirling tempest." (Jeremiah 23:19)

Dear friends in Christ, Jesus' coming brings this flaming wrath upon sin. We already have hear this in the message of John the Baptist which tells us clearly "Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire." (Luke 3:9) The coming of Jesus brings this punishment for sin, and the punishment is fire and wrath for all who are in sin, for all who are not completely and totally perfect in every way. Those who do not bear good fruit will be cast into the fire.

What fruit do you bear? The fruit of sin, or the fruit of righteousness? If we are honest, we know that we bear the fruit of sin all too often in our lives. All too often we show that we really are poor miserable sinners in our thought word and deed by the fruit we bear. Our relationships with both God and man are broken. Our sin divides us.

This division exists, Christ speaks in our text about it in human terms, but first we must look at it in heavenly terms. When God created the world He created it faultless and holy. He created man in a perfect relationship with God. When Adam fell into sin, that relationship was ruined. Adam turned away from God and instead trusted in himself. Division came into the world. No longer was there a faultless relationship between God and man, for man said to God, "No thank you, I'll do fine on my own. I don't need your help. I will be my own God."

Dear friends, we are no different from our fore-father Adam. Even today, we say the same thing to our Heavenly Father. "I'll do fine on my own, I will be my own God." Money is tight this month, I will take care of it. I am sick, I will take this medicine to cure myself. After all, I control what happens to me. I am my own master. We too are divided from God. We break that first commandment, to fear, love and trust in God above all things, and instead trust in the great and powerful me, myself and I.

This division between God and us spreads also to relationships in our everyday lives. How often are we divided from our neighbor, from our family, from our friends by petty bickering and arguing, or maybe something someone did or said? There are families that have not spoken to one another for years. This is what Jesus says will take place. The text says, "They will be divided, father against son, and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against her mother."

Friends, Sin divides. Sin cannot bring together, but only separate. In this sinful world we on our own will never be able to overcome these divisions. Within each one of us is a heart of stone, cold and dead. Jesus tells us in this text that he has come to cast the fire of God's wrath upon us for our sin. He has come to show forth the divisions our sin brings. This message is the Word of the Lord, and our Old Testament again says, "is not my word like fire, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?"

Christ comes to cast fire, Christ comes to divide, but that is not all Christ comes to do. Christ comes to heal and to sooth. Christ comes to break our hearts of stone, and to give us living beating hearts that have life in them. How? Christ does this on the cross. On the cross, sin is forgiven and life is bestowed to you.

"I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how great is my distress until it is accomplished." Jesus says in our text. Jesus' baptism is a baptism of blood, it is a baptism of suffering and death, and he is anxious to accomplish this for you. Jesus has cast the fire of God's wrath upon the Earth, yes, but Jesus does not leave us alone to deal with this wrath. Instead, He takes your place under the wrath of God. He takes it upon himself.

The wrath of God is poured on Jesus as He suffers on the cross. There Jesus was beaten and mocked, and his blood poured out, for you. There Jesus hangs naked suffering and eventually even dying, for you. There God's wrath for sin, the fire cast in our text, was taken by Jesus and destroyed for you. And to prove that you now have life and life to the full, Jesus did not stay dead, but was raised again to life everlasting. In Jesus this the promise is now for you.

Friends, Christ's death on the cross was for you and your sin. It was to heal the divisions in your life. God's wrath for sin was taken into Jesus, so that you might be able to have a relationship with God again, faultless and pure. In Jesus, God's gifts again flow down to you through the death and resurrection of Jesus. This very morning, two souls were baptized, one here and one at ________________. Two helpless little babies were snatched out of the fire of God's wrath, and were divided from their sin by God's holy and precious Word. Two babies were washed in the blood poured out for them and for you on the cross, and put back into a relationship with God. This very gift is given to each of you who also were baptized, daily drowning you to sin, and raising you to new life.

In addition to the gift of Baptism, we also have the gift of the Lord's Supper. Here today, we as the undivided body of Christ, will partake in the very body and blood that suffered and rose for you. In that gift is forgiveness of sins, life and salvation. Instead of God's wrath, you received God's life for you.

Dear friends, Christ did bring wrath, but he took that wrath upon Himself in your place. Christ did bring division, but that division divides you from your sin, and gives you peace. Peace, not as the world gives, but as Christ gives it to you in the promise of everlasting life with Him in heaven. On earth we still have to deal with wrath and divisions, but we have the eternal promise of heavenly peace, and here on earth, we have the gifts of Christ to sustain us until we realize God's peace in full. Friends,

JESUS BRINGS US HEALING THROUGH THE FIRE AND DIVISION OF HIS OWN BAPTISM ON THE CROSS.

But where the situation is most dire, there and only there does the mercy of Christ shine most clearly. There do we see God's glorious rescue of you from your sin. There do we see Jesus crucified and risen to take away all division and wrath and suffering and distress. Behind the cross of Jesus we are safe. Amen.

Now may the peace of God which far surpasses all human understanding keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

Series C - Proper 13 - G - 2010 - Christ's whole inheritance for you

Grace Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text today is the Gospel (Luke 12) lesson, especially this verse, "Someone in the crowd said to him, 'Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.'" Thus far our text.

Dear friends in Christ, how many of you, can remember when you were a child saying something similar to this: "Mo-om…. he has all the Lego's and he won't share them with me." Does that sound familiar? What about this: "Dad-uh, his piece of pie is bigger than mine and that's not fair." For me, I can definitely remember times when my brothers and I said those words to my parents. And now I am sure that before too long, I will be on the parental end of conversations like this.

Its not fair, I want my share, give me what I deserve. These phrases are all ones that we hear often, and also things that we often think in our hearts, and the man in our text today is no different. The man in our text comes to Jesus asking for half of an earthly inheritance, but Jesus refuses to get involved in the matter. Why? Because

JESUS DID NOT COME TO GIVE HALF AN EARTHLY INHERITANCE, BUT A WHOLE AND COMPLETE HEAVENLY INHERITANCE.

In our text today a crowd is following Jesus and listening to his teachings. A man out of the crowd comes forth and asks Jesus to settle a dispute with his brother over who gets what out of the inheritance of their father. The man wants Jesus to step in and give the man what he feels he deserves here on earth.

Jesus responds to this man by telling the entire crowd a parable about a rich man, whom God blessed with a plentiful harvest. The man harvested so much that he didn't have enough room to store all that he had. Instead of rejoicing in God's gift, and using it for God's glory, the man devises a way to use this harvest to have a cushy life. He says, "I will build a bigger barn, and I will say to my Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years, relax, eat, drink and be merry." But God says, "You fool, your soul is required of you this night, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?"

The man in the parable has put his love for earthly things ahead of his love for God. He has taken the good gifts that God has given him, namely a good harvest, and turned that into his "god." He has broken the first commandment: You shall have no other Gods, what does this mean? That we should fear, love and trust in God above all things. This man instead trusts in himself and in his possessions. He wants a partial earthly inheritance. He wants what he can see now, rather than to wait and trust in something he can't see and for which he feels he has no guarantees.

What about you, dear friends? Do you have things you want? Do you desire an incomplete earthly inheritance? In our sinful nature the answer is a resounding yes. Each of us, if we examine our life sees something that we want or treasure here on earth that we put ahead of God and his gifts. It could be something we own. It could be something we do. It could be something we want to own someday. The list goes on and on.

Take me for example, my Dad owns my great grandfather's .270 caliber Winchester bolt action rifle, and has promised it to me one day as an inheritance. Every time I go to visit I go down and look at it with him, and I desire to have it and to shoot it. I want it to be mine. But Jesus says, "You Fool!! One's life does not consist of his possessions." But we try to make our lives consist of what we have or do. It is our sinful nature.

We covet all sorts of things. Our homes. Our cars and trucks. Our retirement funds and bank accounts. Even at times our life itself. Sin causes all of these things to enter into our hearts, and become our own personal idols. We watch TV and we see the newest gadget, and we have to have it. We see our neighbor's new car, and we want one that is fancier. We store up all sorts of things for ourselves that don't really matter. I remember in our neighborhood back in Fort Wayne seeing people's garages that were so full of things that they could hardly close the door and didn't even have room for their cars (the whole purpose of a garage!). As the text says we lay up earthly treasure for ourselves, and are not always rich toward God. We make what we own a god in the place of the true Lord and Savior of the world.

And if we are honest, it is not just things themselves that we treasure up. The thing that we most often covet is more serious. The thing that we most hold on to, and most desire in our heart, is sin itself. We want to hang on to our pet sins and keep them close in our care. After all they too are a part of our earthly inheritance. We still gossip and tell white lies. Hold on to those things because we feel it would be too hard to give it up. We know we can't turn away from these sins, and even if we could, we wouldn't want to. That is who we are, a covetous, sinful people.

Our Old Testament lesson for today comes from Ecclesiastes and it says, Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. After all, these things that we treasure cannot last eternally. They cannot save us. One day, dear friends, we will all die. Our sin will catch up to us. Where will those idols be then? Not one of them can stop death. The things that we desire in our hearts are really nothing more than death. The things of this world that we covet and desire are nothing more than an incomplete earthly inheritance. In response to our desire our text says "You Fool, this night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?"

But there is one who did not covet earthly things. There is one who did not have false desires in His heart. Our Lord Jesus Christ did not covet any earthly possessions. He came and was born into a poor family. He lived a poor life desiring nothing for himself, but instead always gave. He gave sight to the blind. He gave food to the hungry. And it was not only these things that he gave, he gave himself in an even more literal sense. He gave his own body to be beaten and nailed on a cross in your place. He gave his own holy and precious blood to be poured out for your sin and to cover you. He gave up his life… that your own sinful life might be forgiven, that your sinful desires and covetousness might be destroyed. In Jesus' death and resurrection He gives you a whole and complete, eternal heavenly inheritance.

He has given this inheritance to you as you were brought to the baptismal waters, just as ___________________ was brought this morning (at St. John's) and was washed in the blood of the lamb, and made a member of Christ's heavenly kingdom. It is a gift of Christ that daily drowns you in the flood of baptismal waters, and kills your sin and then raises you to your eternal inheritance with Christ. As the epistle lesson says, "For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory." That is what happens to you in baptism. Sin is washed away in the blood of Christ giving you new life.

Christ is still giving to you. Here today, at this altar he is giving you His very living body and blood in with and under the bread and the wine for the forgiveness of sins, life and salvation. Here from this altar Christ gives you this heavenly gift that you might partake of it with your own lips. This gift is here to create and sustain faith in Him in your heart and He gives it to you.

Dear friends in Christ, if there is one thing that Jesus covets more than anything else, it is to have a relationship with you. Jesus treasures that so much that he has given up all earthly things to have and maintain that relationship with you. Yes, here on Earth you and I will sin, we will build idols in our hearts, we will turn from God and at times look to the things we desire in our heart. But in the end, Christ gives us a treasure in heaven more valuable and more wonderful than anything we can imagine. He gives us forgiveness that leads to eternal life.

The man in our parable wished to have an easy life where he could "be at ease, eat, drink and be merry." Here on earth, a life like that could never last, it is only a fleeting dream. But in heaven, Christ gives us an eternal life with God where we really will be at ease apart from our sin, where we will drink the very blood of Christ, and eat his body. He gives us a life where we will celebrate for all eternity the things that God has given to us. Our treasure is in heaven. In Christ it doesn't matter if our neighbor has more than we have here on Earth, because in Heaven, we have everything. We have the God's whole inheritance. Amen.

Borkowski-Fink Wedding Sermon July 31, 2010

Grace Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. Our text today is the lesson read earlier from 1 Corinthians, especially verses 4-8, "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away."

Dear Friends in Christ, Family and Friends, and especially Andrew and Darci.

After reading the text in preparation for today, I realized that I kept on walking around our house humming a song. After looking at the text, I am sure that you can guess the title, "All you need is love" by the Beatles. And it is no wonder, because our text today is all about love, and rightly so. Standing here, seeing your nervous smiles, and even just having gotten to know the two of you, one can easily see that you two are in love. Weddings are after all about love right? Love is the reason that you Andrew and you Darci are here today before God and this congregation to pledge love and faithfulness to one another. But the sinful world asks you a question, can you really make and keep this promise here today? Can you promise right here and now to be faithful and true to one another for a life time? Especially in this day and age, when marriage is not held in high esteem by the world, The world challenges the question from the Beatles song and instead says, "Is love really all you need?"

To answer this question we must examine where love really truly begins. We have to ask,

WHERE DOES LOVE COME FROM?

Often times we think of love as coming from within our own hearts. The dictionary defines Love as an outward expression of what I feel deep in my heart. When we think of Love we often think of Valentine's Day with its boxes of chocolate and pink candy hearts asking you to "be mine" and cupids shooting arrows. Love is that fluffy warm emotion we get when we think of that special person. We often think that the most important thing is that you Andrew feel (emphasis on feel) love for Darci, and that you Darci feel love for Andrew. That you feel some sort of attraction to one another.

Yes, I am certain that you feel that way now, but sadly, in this sinful world, you may not always feel this way. Sometimes you may get angry or frustrated at each other and it will seem like love is not present in your marriage. Sometimes you may not even want to be around one another. You may fight over little things, like what to have for supper, or big things, like how to handle money problems. You will eventually say things to hurt one another and know exactly what to do to push each other's buttons. Love may be the furthest thing from your mind as you struggle to make ends meet. Or maybe the stress of life and work will make that happy feeling of love difficult. These things and more will test and stretch and even at times break that fluffy feeling of love you have today. Their will be questions of how you will take little Andrew to Soccer practice and little Darci to Dance Lessons while still having time to say more than just good night to one another will be a difficult one. At times in your married life, you will feel tired, and worn out.

IN these lifelong struggles you may realize the truth, that if love is just a happy feeling that comes out from ourself, it will not be enough to stand the test of time. If love is just the emotion that you Andrew and Darci feel for one another today, it cannot maintain your marriage, because our own sinful natures will get in the way. You will want to selfishly look inward about what you want to do rather than what is best for you as a family. You will not be as our text says, Patient and kind, but instead may be arrogant or rude, and insisting on your own way. Love is difficult, and our own human love is sinful and incomplete.

But we know that there is another kind of love, One that can overcome all shortcomings within ourselves. Our text tells us that there is a love that really is patient and kind. A love that does not envy and does not boast. A love that is not arrogant or rude, one that does not insist upon its own way, but rejoices with truth. There is a love that bears all things, believes all things and endures all things. This love is Jesus Christ himself. He loves each of you so much that he was willing to suffer and die upon a cross for each of you. As Jesus says in the Gospel of John, Greater love has no one than this, that he give up his life for his friends. Andrew, Darci, This is the love Christ has for you. Christ first gave that love to each of you in the waters of Holy Baptism. He continued to nurture that love as you grew up hearing the word and began receiving the Lord's Supper. He will now continue you to give you that love together as you now as a married couple continue attending church to receive His sacraments and in them forgiveness, life and salvation.

The Love of Jesus is the love that can overcome all things, even the struggles with in your life as a married couple. And as Christ gives that love to you, it will overflow into each other, allowing you to forgive one another. The love of Christ will allow you to keep the vows you make here today, not because of anything you do, (or no matter how hard you try) but because of the love of Christ working with in you. Christ's love is the foundation for your life together. It is this love that will carry you through the hard times and the good times. It is this love that will overflow and be shared with any future children and grandchildren God provides. The love of Christ is the love that will sustain you.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. This is the love Jesus has for you, and as our text implies, the things we do here in life will pass away, but the Love of Jesus never ends. Andrew, Darci, there will be struggles in your lives, just as there have been in the past. Marriage will not be a magical formula that will change that. You may still become frustrated at one another, and still have arguments. Nevertheless, even through all trials in this life, Christ has and will love you. His love, not yours, is the foundation on which the two of you are here today, becoming one flesh. So Darci, when you are trying to get Andrew to take you dancing, and he says no, remember Christ loves him and has forgiven him all his sins. Andrew, when Darci shoots more pheasants than you on a hunting trip, remember Christ loves her as well. Each of you is forgiven first by Christ so that you can forgive one another in Christ's love for you. Upon this love everything that is important is built.

Love is the foundation for marriage, but this love is not our own mere emotion, but instead Love is Jesus Christ, crucified for your sins. Andrew and Darci, God will richly bless you and keep you in this love all the days of your married life. Amen.

Series B- Proper 13 - "What must we do to be saved?" John 6:22-35

The next day the crowd that had stayed on the opposite shore of the lake realized that only one boat had been there, and that Jesus had not entered it with his disciples, but that they had gone away alone. Then some boats from Tiberias landed near the place where the people had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. Once the crowd realized that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went to Capernaum in search of Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, "Rabbi, when did you get here?" Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval."
Then they asked him, "What must we do to do the works God requires?" Jesus answered, "The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent."
So they asked him, "What miraculous sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? Our forefathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written: 'He gave them bread from heaven to eat.'" Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world." "Sir," they said, "from now on give us this bread." Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.

John 6:22-35

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text today is the Gospel lesson, with special emphasis on verses 28 and 29. “Then they said to him, ‘What must we do, to be doing the works of God?’ Jesus answered them, ‘This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.’” Thus far our text.

Dear friends in Christ. When I was a child growing up here in Lincoln, I was a member of the Boy Scouts. It was a fun chance for my friends and me to go off camping or hiking or do all sorts of other fun activities. Throughout all of these fun activities I was always working to advance myself in rank. I went all the way from lowly tenderfoot to Eagle Scout. It was fun to get a new badge and to have a little awards ceremony when the you were advanced to the next rank. The only trouble was to go from one rank to the next, I had a set number of requirements I had to accomplish. I had to earn this many merit badges and do this many hours of service work to become the next rank. I had to work to earn each and every advancement in Boy Scout rank.

That is the way it is with many things in our world today isn’t it? We have to earn things to actually get them to belong to us. To own a car, many 16 year olds have to go and get a part time job to pay not only for the car, but for the gas to make it go, and most expensively, insurance. To own a house, people have to work for years and years to pay off the mortgage, and they also have to pay the gas bill and the electric bill. These things have to be earned. You have to work hard to earn things. Even our relationships work that way. To remain good friends with someone, you have to spend time working on the relationship. To keep my wife happy, I have to work hard and turning my socks right side out before laundry day. (Though she might tell you I don’t do well at that.) Everything here on Earth we have we have to go and earn for ourselves.

The old saying goes, there is no such thing as a free lunch. But what about at Church? What about Religion? What about the thing that brings us all together today in this building? What do we do to earn salvation? We must ask our selves the same question that the crowds asked Jesus in our text. As verse 28 says, What must we do to work the works of God?

This is at times a very difficult question, one where the answer is not clear to us, just as it was not clear to the crowds in today’s text. They basically ask Jesus, what are the requirements to your club, how do we advance?

Just like the crowds in today’s text we ask what must we do… but we don’t always listen for the answer. Instead we have our own ideas. We think we already know what we need to do to please God. And I would venture a guess that almost all our answers fall into one of two camps. We either think we have to be absolutely perfect to the point of legalism, or we think that it doesn’t matter and we can do whatever we want. These two camps form opposing views on what God wants from us in our lives. They both try to answer the question of what we must do, but both fall short of the mark.

Let’s take the first group, the legalistic camp. It is the thought that if we do enough nice things, if we are good enough people that we can earn our way to heaven. It’s the thought that if I do enough community service I can advance to the next rank in holiness.

This point of view isn’t only in religion, it is everywhere. We see this sort of thing all the time on television. When I watch the evening news on television they always end there broadcast with someone who is doing a wonderful thing for their community. They tell you what a wonderful person they are, and how you should go and do the same. Be a wonderful person, and you will earn yourself nationwide praise on the evening news.

Sadly there are churches that teach the same thing. They teach you that you have to earn Jesus’ love and concern by doing a certain list of things. They ask you questions about what your purpose in life is. They give you steps to complete, “Do these 10 steps and you will be a better Christian, then Jesus will really love you.” They want you to be your best self now. These churches and books tell you that they are telling you about Jesus, when in reality they are only telling you about yourself. “You, you, you,” not Jesus. They are taking the focus off of Jesus Christ, and putting it on what you can do yourself.

They answer the question in today’s text, saying to do the work of God, you must be perfect, love your neighbors, love your family, love strangers and always do your very best to help them. They are those coaches that you had in childhood sports who told you to give 150% on the field. Sometimes, we fall into this camp. Sometimes we become legalistic. We pretend to obey every single letter of the law. The only problem is that we can’t. We can’t be perfect, sin affects us too much.

All of us have sinned, and in that sin we are incomplete. On our own we are dead. We cannot do it ourselves. And we know that from our lives. If we are honest with ourselves we know that we have not done all we could to love our neighbors or our God. Even if we say we do, we really don’t.

So if we can’t do it for ourselves, if the legalistic way doesn’t work, then how do we do the Works of God? There are other people we see in our world that have a different answer to that question. They say that you do the works of God not by worrying about fulfilling the law, but by doing what feels good to you. These are the people of the second group. They say, if it is something you want to do, then it must be something God wants you to do. They throw the law completely out because they feel they can’t obey it. They feel it is only a hindrance. Instead these people say that doing the work of God is being true to oneself.

This unfortunate point of view has allowed all sorts of evil to creep into the church. This is what allows homosexuality into so many churches in the world today. This is also why there are struggles with woman pastors in so many denominations. This is why so many churches throw out God’s word contained in the Liturgy for something that makes them feel upbeat. If it feels good for you, then do it, right? If we throw out God’s law, and only do what feels good to us, then we no longer listening to God, and if we aren’t listening to Him how can we be doing His work?

We too fall prey to this problem. We too have our own pet sins that we enjoy. Every once and a while when I drive, I like to yell at another car that I have judged to be operated by a rather second rate driver, even though God’s word tells me to love my neighbor. But I do it anyways, because I have judged it to be the right thing to do at the time. Its what I feel at that moment.

What about you? Do you have a similar issue? It might be with anything, it could be with alcohol, it could be with something of a sexual nature, it could be those swear words that escape your lips. The list could go on and on. Do you care that God says no to some things, or do you feel a little differently about things that God’s word says? Often times these people put there own life experiences at a higher level than what God’s word says.

This too is empty. This too will not save anyone from their sin. Instead it separates people from the true God. When asked “What must we do to do the works of God,” this answer says, “Nothing.” In fact, it echoes what the serpent said to Eve in the Garden, “Did God really say?” Just like the legalistic point of view, this view disrupts our view of the Gospel. When we hear the question, but ignore the answer that God gives us, we end up separated from God.

So what is the answer, what must we do to do the works of God? To know, we must look at what God answers us in His word. Let’s look at what our text says. “Jesus answered, ‘The work of God is this: To believe in the one he has sent.’” That’s it. That’s the work. It isn’t living a prefect life, it isn’t doing whatever makes you feel good about yourself. No. It is believing in the living Son of God who was sent to set you free from sin. It is having faith in the dirty and bloody death of Jesus, and believing that in the end, death had no power over him. It is this that sets us free, that earns for us eternity.

But how do we believe. This is a question that I struggled with for a long time. I even remember when I first began attending Good Shepherd having a long conversation with one of the pastors here about it. “How do I make myself believe? I just can’t seem to make myself.” That my friends is the beauty of it. We don’t do anything. That faith, that belief, is all a gift. It comes to us as a wonderful present from God. We receive that faith and trust in Jesus through the Word and Sacrament. In Baptism and the Lord’s Supper we receive faith as a gift. In the hearing of God’s word, preached and heard in the liturgy, we receive Jesus as a gift.

Each of us, on that day when we were baptized into the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, were brought into the family of faith. There we began to struggle with this belief in our lives. Yes, it is not always a constant thing, in our sin, our faith does waver, but we have the daily promise that baptism gives to us. It is the promise that daily we will die to sin and raise with Jesus Christ, just as he died on a cross and raised again. In those baptismal waters we are washed in the blood of Jesus, the blood he shed for us, and then raised into glorious life.

Here at this altar, we have that grace poured out on us again and again as we come to receive the very body and blood of Jesus. We partake in that body which was beaten, bloodied and killed upon a cross. In that eating God works the miracle of faith in us, just as He did in baptism. And as we gather together to hear that word, that faith is strengthened.

You see, Faith is completely a gift from God. We don’t do anything to believe in the one God sent. God gives us that belief, just as He gives us the promise of eternity. It is as we confess in the Catechism, I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord, or come to him, but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, and sanctified and kept me in the one true faith. This is God’s promise. It is not a promise to take lightly, it is a promise sealed in blood. It is a promise that was earned for us by the blood of the one God sent.

Dear friends in Christ, what must you do to advance in faith? What must you do become a child of God? In our text today, Jesus tells us the answer. Nothing, He has done it all for you. It is through faith by grace that you daily receive the gifts God gives. It is in Jesus that you have done the works of God. It is in those precious means of grace, that you are God’s children. It is God’s promise to you, sealed in Christ’s blood. It is our faith, believing in the one God sent. Amen.

Final Vicarage Sermon "The Gospel is not Hidden"

Grace, Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. Our text today comes from the book of 2nd Corinthians, chapter 4. “Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart. Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:1-6) Thus far our text.

Dear Friends in Christ, when I was a kid, my brothers and I used to play hide and seek. I am sure all of you have played it. Everyone goes and finds a hiding spot while another person goes out to look for them. I always liked to be “It” because it was easy to find my brothers. They would do there best to hide, but there was always something that gave their hiding spots away. There was always a way to find them. Maybe one of them would be partially visible, or maybe you could hear them whispering. In any case, it was impossible for them to hide perfectly. It was impossible for me the great hide-and-go-seeker to not find them.

Our Gospel lesson says the same thing, with a little bit of a twist. In our lesson, Satan is trying to hide the good news about Jesus. He is trying to cover it up as best he can and to prevent us from seeing, hearing, and believing it. He is trying to keep us from finding Jesus using deception, sin, pain and suffering. Through these things, it is difficult to tell if Jesus really is there or not. It is difficult to tell if Jesus actually existed or not. It is difficult to believe the Gospel.

In the world we see all sorts of other things besides Jesus. We see murder, and war. We see hunger and pain. We see sickness and death. We see these things as we watch the news. We see these things as we look at our own lives. Sin is everywhere, and at times it seems like the Gospel is nowhere like it is hidden.

With all of these bad things going on, we wonder, “Where is God? Where are all of those wonderful promises that God had made to us? Where can we look for comfort and hope when all we see is pain and suffering? Is God hiding from us?

Sometimes, it seems like God is hiding and we are only left with pain and suffering. Every where we look we see this pain and suffering. Many of us daily deal with this. Perhaps we have a loved one who is sick, or dying. Perhaps there is someone we know who has faced a terrible tragedy. In my time here, just over the last year, I have seen many who have to struggle with pain for a loved one. Almost all of us here have had to deal with some sort of physical struggle, one which leaves us asking, “Is God hiding from me?”

But God is not hiding himself. Instead it is our sin that takes our eyes off of him. It is our sin that separates us from him. Our text says: “the god of this age is blinding many from seeing the truth of the Gospel.” The god of our age is Sin, it is Death and it is the Devil. Those things are blinding our eyes from seeing the gospel clearly, from knowing where and how God works. It is those things that makes it seem like God is hiding.

This is all the work of Satan. He takes great delight in our suffering with sin and death. He loves watching us struggle. He loves it when we doubt that there is a god. Satan loves that we often times wonder if God is hiding from us, or that God doesn’t care about us.

He loves it when we have those doubts, because it makes it easier for us to trust in something else. When we doubt in God, when we think he is hiding from us, we think we have more authority in our lives. We think we can decide what is right and wrong for our own lives. When we think God is hiding from us, we think we are free to sin as we please. Millions of people today struggle with this. It leads to abortions, it leads to sexual immorality, it leads to idolatry. Most importantly, it leads us to the false assumption that we can do whatever, and not get caught! If God is hidden, we are free to be our own God.

This is what we want. We want to be in charge of ourselves. Because we want to be our own boss, we often times our selves hide from God. We are afraid of God, so we pretend like He isn’t there. We know that God is just, and that God is holy and that we are not. We don’t want to come into his presence because we know that we are incomplete. Each and every one of us has sinned. Each and every one of us has failed to fulfill what God wants us to do. Instead we are continually falling short of what he wants from us. We don’t love our neighbors. Instead we bicker and fight. Instead we complain about them to others. We don’t even love God himself. Instead we criticize him for the way He handles things. We hate him because we think He is making us suffer though this life here on Earth.

We don’t want to be in God’s presence. We want him to hide, it is safer for us if He is not around. We would rather be separated from him. But separated, where can we look for help? Where can we look for hope, in whom can we trust?

But God did not hide himself. There is hope. Even as Satan tries to hide God from our eyes, God makes such a loud and bold proclamation that we cannot miss what he has to say. We cannot miss the Gospel, because it is all around us. We hear this message here at Mt. Calvary. It is here and in other churches that the Gospel is boldly proclaimed to all who would hear it. And that message is this, as our text says. “Jesus Christ is Lord.” Jesus Christ, the man who came and lived among us was also true God. As true God he fully paid for all of our sins by dying on the cross. That is the Gospel, Jesus Christ Crucified for all your sins.

As I said, that message is what is preached here at Mt. Calvary. That is the very reason that I have been here for the last year. To preach the Gospel to you, and to learn how to better preach it in the future. I have loved getting to know you, but more importantly I have loved telling you about Jesus. That is what Vicars and Pastors are supposed to do! St. Paul even talks about it in our text today. “For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake.” As my time here comes to a close, that is what I pray has been proclaimed to you. I have loved being here, and will take many fond memories with me. But unless I did my best in preaching the gospel, none of it was worth anything. It is the gospel that unites us. It is in that Gospel that we put our hope.

And it is not only through the hearing of God’s word that we receive the Gospel. There are other means by which we get the good gifts of God. God does hide, but God hides right where he has promised to be. God hides much like my brothers, where we can always find Him. God is hidden in Bread and Wine, which when we eat it, we receive the very Body and Blood of Jesus Christ for our sins. God is hidden in water as a baby receives the Holy Spirit in the Sacrament of Baptism. There God is hidden right where we can find him. We have access to God, we can come into contact with Him. Satan cannot keep us away from Jesus.

Because we cannot be separated from Jesus our sin has been hidden, because it has been covered in the blood of the lamb. No matter how hard anyone looks, they cannot find a sin that Jesus will not forgive. Jesus Christ died, to hide our sins away for ever. Now we are free from them. No longer do we need to hide ourselves from Him, because we have forgiveness. As our text says, the God who said, “Let there be light” is the same God who says, “Let your sins be forgiven by Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Just as my brothers were never really hidden away from me, so too is God never hidden from us. He is always right where he promises to be. We know and we can trust in the ministry that God has given to us, Word and Sacrament. As I head back to Ft. Wayne tomorrow, I will take great joy in knowing that we all share in this Gospel message. We all have the promise that God will not hide from us, and that we cannot hide from God.

Series B-Trinity Sunday-"Who knows what God is like?"

Grace Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Our text today is from the book of Romans, chapter 11:33-36 “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! "Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?" "Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him?" For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen.”

Thus far our text.

Friends in Christ, today is Trinity Sunday. We sometimes dread this day of the year, because we know that church will be 10 minutes longer than normal. No not because of my sermon. On this day every year, we take the time to say the longest of all our creeds, the Athanasian Creed, and it is long, two pages in our hymnal. We say this creed to try and get an idea of what God is like. We always have the question, what is God like? People paint pictures of what they think the trinity looks like or even what God the father looks like. We can think of some of paintings. Perhaps we get an idea of God being like His depiction on the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Maybe we even have another way of thinking about God. There are all sorts of books that attempt to describe what God is like. But does any human depiction really make sense? Can our limited understandings actually understand what God is truly like? Who is God?

When we think about God, often times we think that He rather mysterious. We have a difficult time understanding him, and there is good reason for that. If we were to glance at the words of the Athanasian Creed, we would see that it does make God out to be rather mysterious. With all the discussion there in about equal and coequal and begotten and infinite, it is difficult to understand what it is really telling us about God.

And we do struggle to understand God. As I said earlier, our minds are rather limited. When we think about the Trinity, it is impossible for us to understand. We can’t fathom how three persons could be one God. We can’t understand how one of those persons took upon Himself human flesh. It just doesn’t make sense. And it never will.

Our minds are full of sin, and being as such, they cannot understand something that is without sin. God is mysterious to us because He is without sin. He is mysterious to us because our limited sinful minds are unable to understand something that is not like us. It is impossible. God will always seem mysterious because He will always be holy. As our text says today, “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!”

God is also powerful. In fact, it is often times God’s power that we are more worried about. God is the almighty all powerful Creator of the universe and all that is in it. He is so powerful; He even did all of this with simply his word. He said “Let there be,” and there was. That is God’s infinite power.

God’s power can be a little nerve-racking for us, because we don’t have the same power, in fact we are completely at God’s mercy. He can do what ever He wishes to us at any time. Have you ever stopped to think what God’s awesome power really means for us? Especially as we are sinners, and He is not. God has almighty power, and we have disobeyed Him in our thoughts words and deed, by what we have done and by what we left undone.

Perhaps this illustration will help. Imagine that you are a cricket, and not just any cricket, but one that has been captured by a person, and is now firmly trapped in that person’s hand. As the cricket there are only two things you really know. First that the person has you completely and totally surrounded, and you can’t escape him. Secondly that with little thought, that hand could squash you completely and totally.

Is that how you feel about God? That He is inescapable no matter what you want or desire. Do you sometimes want to hide things from Him, even though you know you can’t? Are you in fear of Him, in fear that He will squash you without so much as a second thought? At times in our lives this is the way it seems. Our struggles seem so great that we struggle to come to any conclusion other than that God must be planning on squashing us, there is no escape, He is after us and we are doomed. God is powerful.

So God is Mysterious, and God is Powerful, and now, we also know from scripture that God is just. As I mentioned earlier, this also is truly scary thing for us. God is just. He cannot stand sin. He will not allow it to come into his presence. He will deal with it harshly and justly. He will destroy those in sin eternally. They will forever be apart from Him.

That is a scary prospect if we are honest with ourselves. We are sinners, we are not holy. We can tell this by the things we do, by the way we lust after all sorts of wicked things. What’s more, we often times pretend to have the same attributes as our Holy God. We pretend that we are mysterious, like we have some big secret that the world needs to find out about us. We pretend that we are powerful, that we can really make a difference in the world, and we pretend that we are holy. We pretend that we are not sinners and that we are not guilty, even though we are.

When we hear these things about who God is, there is little good news for our ears. But there is one more way in which we can know God: By what He does. And what He does makes those other attributes not bad news, but rather good news.

What God does is rescue. What God does is save. What God does is pour out mercy upon people. He loves His creation. We see that in the way that He sent His Son Jesus Christ for us. He gave His only begotten Son, the second person of the Trinity to die for your sins, and for the sins of the world.

Jesus’ name even means that, in the Hebrew original the name Jesus means “The Lord saves.” And that is what God does. That is truly how we know about God and about the Trinity. It is through Jesus Christ, and Him Crucified. As the Athanasian Creed says, “Jesus Suffered for our salvation.” There do we see the attributes of God clearly.

Yes we are sinners, but Christ dies for them. He washes us in His very own blood. There is not a single sin that cannot be forgiven. Jesus was served our punishment, He suffered in our place. He was killed because we fell short of what God wanted, and then He delivered that forgiveness to us. Christ has died for our sins, and now we are set free.

God is not just some cruel torturer from above, no, He is full of love. Through the death of Jesus, we better understand what this love is all about, and how the Trinity works. When we look at God through the lens of Jesus Christ crucified, we still see a Holy God, but now this Holiness is passed on to you and to me. Not by our own works, but instead by the work of Jesus. Through his death you have been returned to a relationship with God.

Through that same lens, we see God’s powerfulness, and it no longer is something to be afraid of, but instead something used to set us free from sin. God could have left us alone. God could have squashed us like a bug, but instead, He used His almighty power, to save. He did everything necessary, and everything imaginable to rescue you, not to punish you. He did this because of Jesus’ death.

And the mystery of it all is why? Why does God save us sinners? Why does He care about us when we turn away from Him every day? Because He loves us, and because Jesus suffered for us. It isn’t because of our own preconceived notions of God. It isn’t because we did something good, or are really smart. Rather it is the very nature of God, the nature of the Trinity to save sinners from sin. God the Father created you, God the Son rescued you from sin death and the devil, and God the Holy Spirit points you to that faith everyday of your life. God, Three in one, one in Three, loves you and has rescued you from your sin.

So what is God like? As our text says, “"Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor? Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! He has rescued us from our sins. That is the important thing to know about God. Amen.

Series B-Pentecost-2009-G- "The Holy Spirit Testifies About Jesus"

"When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me. And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning.

I did not tell you this at first because I was with you. "Now I am going to him who sent me, yet none of you asks me, 'Where are you going?' Because I have said these things, you are filled with grief. But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment: in regard to sin, because men do not believe in me; in regard to righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; and in regard to judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

"I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you."

-John 15:26-27, 16:4b-15

Grace Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Our text today is the Gospel lesson; especially verse 26 “When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me.” Thus far our text.

Dear friends in Christ, I like to go hunting every fall. I enjoy getting out doors and spending some time out in God’s beautiful creation. I especially enjoy it when I got to go pheasant hunting with my dad. My dad owned 2 Britney spaniels, pointing dogs. These dogs would run in huge circles wherever they wished, sniffing for birds. Upon finding some sort of bird, they would come to a perfect stop instantly, and point to where the birds were. They would stay there pointing until we could get up there to flush the birds, so that we, hopefully, could hit them. The dogs loved this, they loved the opportunity to run and to point birds. That’s all they did. They would point the birds and wait for you to flush them. And if you missed, the dogs would be sure to give you a sideways look, as if saying, “I pointed them out to you, and you couldn’t even hit them?

Friends, the Holy Spirit works the same way. The Holy Spirit is always pointing something out to us, Jesus. On this great church holiday, Pentecost, we celebrate the giving of the Holy Spirit, but even then, it is not just the Holy Spirit that we need to think about, but instead we need to know what the Holy Spirit does. How the Holy Spirit points not to Himself, but instead to Jesus Christ and Him crucified for all of our sins. Our text today makes that clear, as Jesus says, "When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, He will testify about me.” The Holy Spirit testifies about Jesus, and Jesus alone. He is like a giant road sign that says “Hey Jesus is this way! Follow me to Jesus”. But sadly, we as sinful human beings sometimes struggle with this. We don’t always understand or listen to the Holy Spirit. And when we misunderstand the Holy Spirit, we misunderstand who He is testifying about, Jesus Christ.

To know how we misunderstand who the Holy Spirit is testifying about, we have to know how it works. Jesus promises in today’s text that He would send a helper, a counselor, who when He comes will guide you in all truth. This promised helper is the Holy Spirit, and even today He does the will of Jesus. He convicts of our sin as we hear God’s word, and He pours out forgiveness through both Word and Sacraments. We call these the Means of Grace, where God works with us poor sinners today. These are the ways that we get the forgiveness of sins earned for us by Jesus on the cross.

But often times today, we ignore the work of the Holy Spirit. We ignore the means by which He is a helper and counselor to us. Instead we neglect and ignore His work, and end up looking for God in all the wrong places.

Take the first of the means of grace, God’s word. How often in our lives do we neglect hearing God’s word. Yes, we come to church, but do we always pay attention to God’s Word outside of Church? I know that for myself, a vicar at a church getting ready to return to studies at the Seminary, it is very difficult to keep in God’s word every day. Sure I look at it, and I study it for sermons, but it is difficult to get into God’s word for the purpose of devotion. There is always something else to do, rather than read a few chapters of scripture. I can watch the television. I can clan the house. I can go for a jog, or a walk. I can find hundreds of different things to do to avoid God’s word, to ignore the work of the Holy Spirit pointing me towards Jesus.

What about you? Do you sufferer from the same excuses that I have? Do you too avoid God’s word? Even today, people struggle to believe whether or not the Bible is the truth, or if it really means what it says. When this happens, we begin to doubt God’s word itself, and when we doubt God’s word, we doubt whether or not the Holy Spirit works through that word or not.

With this the other two means of grace, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper also suffer. It is the very word and promises of God themselves that make those two things so valuable to us as Christians. In Baptism we believe that we are connected to the death and resurrection of Jesus. But if we doubt God’s Word, we can’t really believe that to be true. If we doubt God’s word, Baptism becomes just a nice symbolic act. And the Lords’ Supper is where we eat the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, but if we doubt God’s word, it is a nice little post sermon snack.

With these doubts, the Counselor, the Holy Spirit who Jesus sent, is no longer connected to God’s word. And if it is not connected to God’s word, it isn’t really a help at all. Yes, we may look for the Holy Spirit elsewhere. Perhaps we try to find him in other places, maybe in how we feel, maybe in how we think, maybe in what we “do” for Jesus. But He has not promised to be there. The Holy Spirit promises to work through God’s word, and so it is there that we must find him, even though, that is not where we often times look for Him.

If we ignore the Holy Spirit, it would be like hunting with my dad’s pointers and when they went on point by a bird, searching the next field over looking to scare up the birds. No longer would we actually find any birds to even shoot at. No longer would we be trusting our helper, or our counselor. In the same way, when we ignore the means of grace by which the Holy Spirit work, we ignore who they point to.

But that is not the way we hunt, and it is not the way that Christians find the Holy Spirit. Today on Pentecost, we heard in the Epistle lesson how the Holy Spirit was poured upon the apostles like tongues of flame. How the Holy Spirit came upon them and caused them to go out and testify that day, not about themselves, but instead about Jesus Christ. You see the Holy Spirit isn’t out there pointing at himself, but instead is always telling us about Jesus.

It is the work of the Holy Spirit that tells us today, “Even though you are a sinner, even though you are guilty, Jesus has died for you.” Jesus was beaten and bloodied, for you. Jesus was mocked and ridiculed, for you. Jesus was nailed upon a cross and left to suffer there until death, for you. And then Jesus raised from the dead on the third day and now lives and reigns for all eternity, for you. All of these things were done for you and for your sin. This is the message of the Holy Spirit. And it doesn’t end there. Instead there is more good news in the message of the Holy Spirit. He proclaims now that you are directly connected to that suffering and death.

How? Through those means mentioned above. It is in these means that God gives by the work of the Holy Spirit we are brought to and sustained in faith. In these things, the Holy Spirit shouts, “Jesus died for you,” and now you hear that message with your ears. The Holy Spirit shouts, “You have died and risen with Jesus, because you are washed in the waters of Holy Baptism.” You now partake in that very body and blood of the crucified and risen Jesus Christ at the Lord’s Supper. These things all point us directly to Jesus Christ.

Yes sometimes in our lives we struggle with what we believe about them. Yes sometimes we even ignore them, or mistreat them, but they are always there pointing and directing us back to the cross. Even when we turn and stray away, the Holy Spirit returns us to the correct path.

On Pentecost, the Holy Spirit was poured out, and now He testifies about Jesus Christ crucified.

Because of the Holy Spirit’s testimony, the apostles testified about Christ Jesus, and that message through the Holy Spirit has come down over thousands of years, and now the Holy Spirit testifies that same message to you. Jesus Christ has died for your sins. Jesus Christ suffered for you. Jesus Christ loves you, and will be with you always, even to the very end of the age. “There He is in the hearing and study of God’s Word. There He is in the receiving of the Sacraments.” The Holy Spirit is there to point and guide us, so that we cannot miss Jesus.

Friends, the Holy Spirit testifies about Jesus, and how Jesus saves you from your sin. You are now forgiven, because Jesus died for you, and the Holy Spirit tells us about it. That is what Pentecost is all about. Amen.

Now may the peace of God which far surpasses all human understanding keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord unto Life everlasting. Amen.

June Newsletter Article

As we announced a few weeks ago on Ascension Day services at Church, Elizabeth and I are the proud parents of a blueberry sized baby. We are expecting him or her to be born in early January. We are both excited, but are also a little bit nervous. There are now so many things to worry about, and to take care of.

We are excited, because God’s word tells us that this baby is already a human being. From the moment of conception, God has knit together this baby in the womb. (Psalm 139:13) In other words, we aren’t waiting to be parents, we are currently parents, because God has already made this tiny baby a person. This person has a soul and is loved and cared for by God.

What’s more, I believe that we can trust that this baby has faith. The baby comes to church every week with my wife, and shortly (as the ears form…) will be able to hear the entire congregation singing hymns. It will hear the sermons and scripture readings where the Word of God will be read and proclaimed in it’s truth and purity. Furthermore, the baby eats whatever Elizabeth eats. When she partakes in the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, the baby too partakes. Thus a baby is partaking in the forgivness of sins even in the womb. Through these means, babies have faith, the same way that you and I have faith.

That is not to say that the baby is perfect. Quite the contrary, this baby is a sinner, a poor miserable one. Scripture tells us that “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.” (Psalm 51:5) This can’t be denied, though many try to. Babies are sinful. Our confessions speak of sin as being curved in upon oneself (incurvatus est) and that is what we see in babies. There only concerns are about getting fed, or changed, or how they feel.

Babies are sinful, just as you and I are. At times we even tease each other about our sin, saying, “Quit your whining you big baby!” or other such things. Saying these things acknowledges not only the sin in our babies, but also in ourselves. We too are often only concerned with ourselves, curved in upon ourselves. With this, we are living in sin.

But just as the baby in my wife’s womb is being brought to faith by the Means of Grace and the work of the Holy Spirit, so too are we. God washes us in baptismal waters, the same way he does for a newborn baby. God also keeps us in the one true faith through the hearing of His word and feeds that faith through the eating of the very body and blood of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

These gifts are freely given to us, so that we who because of sin were separated from God now freely trust in Him. It is a miracle. Nothing in what we say or do should lead us to believe in God, but still through His work, He leads us to trust in Jesus Christ crucified for the sins of the world. In the same way he does so for babies. Yes it seems like babies shouldn’t be able to believe, but God works a miracle in their hearts, and brings them to faith. We shouldn’t be able to believe either, but God allows us to believe.

“But Vicar, babies can’t understand anything? How can they understand faith?” Faith is not about understanding. Faith is about God working salvation for us through the cross, even when we don’t understand it. Faith is about God bestowing those gifts to us though we don’t deserve them. Faith is about Jesus Christ. As I said in last months article, Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. It is completely and totally God’s work.

For this reason, I have no doubt that the baby growing in my wife’s womb already has faith in Christ. It already trusts in Jesus, and thus is already a member of the eternal kingdom of God. That baby has already come into contact with the Means of Grace. We too have been brought into contact with those Means, and now we too have faith. God is good and gracious.

Easter 7 Series B 2009 "The Name of Jesus"

Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me.
I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth;
your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.

-John 17

Grace Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. Our text today is the Gospel lesson, with special emphasis on the first two verses.

Brothers and Sisters in Christ. Is your name important? Does it actually mean something, or does it mean nothing? In the play Romeo and Juliet, Juliet determines that a name doesn’t really mean anything, saying “What’s in a name? A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.”
It seems like names don’t mean anything. We toss them around and use them like they don’t matter. I can’t remember how many times, when I was in trouble as a kid, that my mom would call me both of my brothers names before finally realizing that it was me, Adam, that was in trouble. She knew which one was the one who was in trouble, but she the name wasn’t the important thing at the time.

And many of us don’t like our names either, we change them or shorten them, we pick nicknames and demand that people call us that instead. For us people in today’s day and age, names just aren’t really that important at all are they? No matter what you call something, it just doesn’t change what it is.

But to God, names are important. To God names mean something. Throughout the pages of scriptures, God gives people names that mean something. These names identify who the person is, and what they have done or will do. We have Peter, whose name mean rock, and upon whose confession, “You are the Christ” the church is founded. We have Abraham, whose name means Father of the People, who became the father of many nations. The list goes on and on, but the most important name is the name of Jesus, the Greek version of Joshua, which means the Lord saves. Jesus, who would die on a cross for all of our sin, has the very name meaning he will save us.

In today’s text, Jesus prays that the Father might keep us in the name that God has given, the name of Jesus, the name “The Lord Saves.” In that name we are one, in that name we are united as the Church of Christ.

But we haven’t always been in that name. We were born of another name, We were born into the name of sin, into the name of Death, into the name of the Tempter. We have been held captive to this name. We could serve no other name on our own. Instead we were held bondage to the owner of this name, Satan.

We have been subject to the name of Satan since almost the very dawn of time. It was when our forefather Adam ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of Good and Evil that we have been bound to that name. In that act, all of us have been sold into slavery to Sin death and the devil.
And we can see that in our daily lives. We are slaves to sin, and because of that we can not truly love God. Our sin shows itself in every way imaginable. St. Paul tells us in Galatians 5, that the acts of the sinful nature are obvious: Sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, factions and envy, drunkenness, orgies, and the like. Those are the things we are guilty of. We are guilty of these things because each one of them stems from our broken relationship with God. These things are sin. Sin tarnishes the name of God, it separates us from him.

When we are separated from God, we no longer have his name upon us, instead we have the name of Sin Death and the Devil. And really, we don’t want to have God’s name upon us do we? How many times in our lives do we avoid the opportunity to witness to who’s name is upon us? We are at times embarrassed to be known to be a Christian, to have Jesus’ name upon us. Our text tells us that because we have God’s word, that the world will hate us. We don’t want to be hated, we want to be liked. We want to have friends. We want respect. Instead we brazenly claim any other name we can, but we ignore the name of God. We don’t want to claim that name for ourselves. But we will claim any other name.

I am an American. I am a South Dakotan. I am a republican, or I am a democrat. I am doctor, I am a Teacher, I am a whatever, but when it comes to faith we feel like we have to be careful who knows what we believe. We have to be careful who we share our faith with. I don’t want to put my job on the line by claiming to be a Christian. I don’t want to offend anyone who thinks differently then me because I am a Christian. So I will just keep it quite and inside. I won’t tell anyone. I don’t want to be embarrassed infront of my friends, so I ignore my faith in public.
Its easier to do that. We don’t want people to think badly of us. We don’t want to be criticized. Instead we want everyone to like us. But God says in our text today that he has given us his word, and that the “world has hated them” because of it. The world hates Christianity because it is not of this world.

But we do have God’s name upon, even though we are in sin. Even though we deny it before the world, we are God’s possession, and we do have His name upon us.

You received that name in the waters of Holy Baptism. You received a new name, the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. That name is the name above all names, the name at which all other names will bow. That is the name of Jesus. You receive it upon you, and it claims you as its own.

In the ancient Christian church, all the baptisms, for both adults and children were done at one time, the day before Easter. At that time all the baptismal candidates would come into the church in the very early morning before Easter Dawn, and they would be washed in the baptismal waters. Upon coming out of the water, they would receive a new Christian name, and leave behind their old pagan name. Instead of having the name of Apollo, the pagan god, you would have the name Christopher, the bearer of Christ. Instead your pagan name you received a Christian name, one that marked you as Christ.

In modern baptism, we have a remnant of that, as the Pastor asks, “What is this child to be named?” and immediately following, that baby is baptized into the name of God. In baptism we too have left behind our old name, the name of Sin, the name of Death, the name of the devil. Now we have a new name, one that marks us as belonging to Christ.

In the book of Revelation, we see that name being recorded in the book of Life. In baptism, your name was recorded into that book, written in the blood of the lamb. You see it isn’t just claiming the name “Christian” that saves you. Instead it is that by being washed in that name, you are connected to the very death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. When you received the name of God, you died with Christ on the cross. When you received the name of God, you laid dead with Christ in a tomb for three days. When you received the name of God, you rose victoriously with Jesus, and now will never die again. Now you have eternal life and you have it to the full.
Friends in Christ, Jesus has given you his name, so that when God the Father looks at you, he doesn’t see your former name of sin, he doesn’t see all those times when you thumbed your nose at Him. Instead, God sees Jesus every time He looks at you. Thus He says, “Well done, good and faithful servant, you are serving me in Christ’s name, the name of Jesus, the name which means God saves.”

Jesus prays in today’s text that you might be kept in that name. IN our world today, we will face many struggles. People will die unexpectedly. Friends will suffer from sickness and disease. People will hate you because you are in that name. Through it all, God has promised to keep you in that name. God has promised that you will remain His, for nothing can snatch you out of his had. He has promised, and that promise is written in the blood of Jesus Christ, crucified for the sins of the world.

Jesus name means God saves. Jesus name is written upon you. Jesus name cannot be erased by anyone else no matter what. You are His. He will now guard and protect you even to life ever lasting. Names do mean something. God’s name means you have forgiveness life and salvation. Nothing is as sweet as that promise: Life in Jesus Name.

Amen.

May Newsletter Article

No, this is not a sermon, but it is still something I wrote.

"Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for." -Hebrews 11:1

Faith is a difficult thing in today’s world, especially if we look at the definition that the author of Hebrews gives. In today’s world, “Seeing is believing.” If you can’t see it or touch it, then how do you know that it is real? Science takes that to the extreme saying for something to be true, we have to be able to duplicate it in a lab, and be able to explain it.

We like to be able to follow that law, “Seeing is believing.” We want to be able to have some sort of proof that what we believe is the truth. We don’t always get that in religion. We can’t talk to any eye witnesses from the day of Jesus. There aren’t photographs of Jesus on the cross, or even more importantly for faith, resurrected from the dead. We don’t have recordings of Jesus giving the Sermon on the Mount. We don’t have scientific evidence of any of Jesus’ miracles. All we have is 4 different historical accounts of Jesus (the Gospels) and a few other references in history, along with a smattering of letters written by early Christians. Is that enough to believe?

It wouldn’t be enough to be published in a scientific paper as truth, not according to modern standards. But some things in life are unexplainable. Some things in life are completely beyond explanation, despite the efforts of people everywhere. No matter what science says to try and explain it, it can never fully understand the love a mother or father has for their child. It cannot explain the reason that someone will forgive someone else time and time again, even when the same situation happens over and over. These things are completely unexplainable.

Faith is also unexplainable. It sounds ridiculous to human ears because it involves trusting in something we can’t see. We cannot see God, and we cannot always tell how he is caring for us or providing for us. It is impossible. But there is still a certainty that we have. We know that God loves us and provides for us. We know that Christ has died for our sins. We know that God will give us eternal life in heaven with him. We know these things, but we cannot prove them or see them.

“Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” That is faith, that is why we confess we have faith, and not that we have “certainty.” As Thomas first saw Jesus resurrected and said “My God and my Lord,” so too do we say it now, though we have not seen Jesus face to face like Thomas. But Jesus speaks of us saying, “Blessed are those who have not seen, but yet believe.” (John 20) That is us. We have not beheld Christ with our eyes, but we believe, because we know him to be there in truth. In this case, seeing is not necessarily believing.

Even though seeing is not believing in this case, we do physically experience Christ. We partake in His very body and blood, even though we do not understand why. We eat them and in that eating gain life and salvation. We are covered by His blood in the waters of Holy Baptism, but we don’t understand how. It is about more than just understanding it is about faith. It is being certain of what we cannot see or understand, and being sure of what we hope for.