Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Kerrville Texas

John 16.16–23a
Jubilate, the 3^rd Sunday after Easter

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

On the night in which He was betrayed, Jesus told His disciples, “A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me, because I go to the Father.” This enigmatic statement sends the disciples into a tizzy. “What is this that He says to us, ‘A little while , and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me;’ and, ‘because I go to the Father?’” It is a bit cryptic. “A little while” isn’t a definite period. And “going to the Father?” He had told them in John 8:16, “I am with the Father who sent Me,” and He will tell them in a few verses after today’s reading, “I am not alone, because the Father is with Me” (John 16:32). What does it meant to “go to the Father” if the Father is always with Him?

The “little while” of which Jesus speaks is His death. “A little while, and you will not see Me,” means that in a little while they will not see Him because He will be taken from them, scourged, crucified, and buried. This is how He will go to the Father, for when He dies, He says, “Father, ‘into Your hands I commit My spirit” (Lk 23:46). His body is buried, laid to rest in the heart of the earth. His soul goes to His Father in paradise. But this, too, will last a little while. He will rise from the dead on the third day. Here He says it this way, “And again a little while, and you will see Me.”

The disciples don’t understand what He’s talking about. Jesus knows that they ask each other about this saying of His. He explains His words, “A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me,” this way: “More assuredly, I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; and you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned to joy.” That doesn’t seem like much of an explanation of the disciples not seeing Him, then seeing Him, and His going to the Father. But Jesus doesn’t tell them this to prophesy His death and resurrection. He had done that on several occasions already. On that night He wanted to teach His disciples how to deal with His suffering and death, and not only this trial, but all the trials they would face for His sake.

During the little while when they did not see Him, they would weep and lament. They loved Jesus. They were His closest disciples. And Jesus loved them. They would weep and lament because their Lord was taken from them and would be killed. The world, on the other hand, would rejoice at His going away, at His death. He said in John 7:7, the world “hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil.” Jesus had preached against the world’s wickedness, especially its chief wickedness—unbelief in Christ and its’s idea that it can get to God by its own works and merits. It’s one thing to condemn the vices that everyone sees. It’s quite another thing to identity the chief underlying vice, that the world wants to forge its own path to God, its own worship, and its own righteousness. The world hated Jesus because He exposed that. And just as Herodias could not bear John the Baptist’s preaching, but had to silence him by chopping off his head, so the world could not bear Christ’s preaching, but had to silence Him by trial, conviction, and crucifixion. Not only would the disciples weep and lament at the loss of their Lord for this “little while,” but the world’s rejoicing would make their grief heavier.

But just as He would be gone “a little while,” so after a little while they would see Him again. This is what they were to remember during the little while of their suffering. They would see Jesus again! And seeing Jesus again, seeing Jesus alive, would turn their sorrow into joy. For as painful as their suffering would be, it would only last “a little while.” Then they would have joy. Jesus compares it to woman in labor. She has sorrow because her hour—the hour to deliver the baby—has come. She must suffer the pains of childbirth, the physical as well as the emotional. But there is an end to the suffering. The suffering gives way to joy when the child is brought safely into the world. Holding her newborn child, “she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world.” Once Christ was raised form the dead, born into the world alive from the womb of the earth, the disciples’ anguish would be a distant memory, having been overwhelmed by joy.

Then Jesus explains, “Therefore you now have sorrow; but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you.” There is sorrow. There is suffering. These cannot be averted, bypassed, or circumvented. If they didn’t have sorrow, if they didn’t suffer at their loss of Jesus, they wouldn’t have been true disciples of Jesus. They wouldn’t have truly loved Him. But since they do love Jesus—and know that Jesus loves them—they will suffer.

But the suffering lasts only “a little while.” When He rises, when they see Him again, their hearts will rejoice with a joy that no one can take from them. It is the joy that Jesus lives! His enemies did not destroy Him. The world, for as much as it hates Christ, cannot silence Him. Death, the final enemy of us all—for all must die—is destroyed by the fact that Jesus, who died, lives! All who are in Christ by faith will then live and be raised on the last day even as He was raised from the dead. Our sins—the reason for which Christ died, so that He might make perfect payment for all of them—can trouble us no more because God raised Jesus from the dead to show that He accepts that perfect payment for the sins of the world. The devil—who desires our downfall and our eternal suffering in hell with him—has no power over all who believe in Christ and trust that His death atones for their sins. Jesus is alive! Let sin, the world, and the devil do their worst, it matters not. The joy of Jesus’ resurrection. Nothing in all the world, no among of sorrow, suffering, or misfortune can take that joy from you.

Isn’t there something refreshing about this, to hear Jesus say, “You now have sorrow?” So much of our life is aimed at mitigating, or at least minimizing, suffering and sorrow, because no one wants to suffer. Yet for all our medical technology and psychological tools, suffering still happens. Affliction bears down on each one of us in different ways, in our bodies, our minds, and our situation. Along with afflictions there are crosses which we must bear specifically for the sake of confessing Christ.  The world—and our own sinful flesh, for that matter—encourage the wringing of hands accompanied by the litany, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” But that is not the way forward. That’s the way of self-righteousness. God, after all, makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Mt 5:45). Job asks his wife—and all the faithful who suffer—“Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?” (Job 2:10). It isn’t a question of whether suffering will come. It is a question of how God’s people deal with it.

Which is one of the many things Jesus teaches His disciples on the night in which He betrayed. He taught them to endure suffering and sorrow in patience and trust that it would last but “a little while.” And then they would see Jesus again. Then they would have joy, and it would be a joy that no person, no situation, not even hell or the devil, could take from them. It was in that same joy with which the disciples were to endure every affliction and bear every cross that would come upon them after Christ’s ascension.

It is the same joy with which you are to bear every cross and endure every affliction that God, in His holy wisdom, allows to come upon you. It will last but “a little while.” And however long that “little while” is, you have the joy of the resurrection. Sin cannot harm you. Jesus lives to justify you each day by repentance and faith. The devil cannot hurt you. Jesus lives to defeat the works of the devil (1 Jn 3:8). The world, though it hates you because you love Christ, whom it hated first, can do its worst. But Jesus still lives and has overcome the world. And death? If that is how God choose to relieve your affliction or cross from you, then rejoice, for Jesus lives to bring you through death, so that you might see Him face to face. This is a joy that no one can take from you, no one can invalidate for you, not even affliction and suffering, not even cross and trial. Those will surely come. They cannot be avoided. But they will only last “a little while,” and your Father in heaven knows how long that little while is. And during that little while, whatever its duration, you have the joy of the resurrection. Jesus lives! What can sin, death, the devil, or the world do to you if your Savior lives? Nothing. Amen.

May the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Amen.

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John 20.19-31
Quasimodo Geniti, the First Sunday after Easter

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

By evening of that day, Jesus’ disciples had heard the women’s testimony that Jesus had risen. Peter and John had gone to the tomb and seen for themselves that it was empty. All that lay in the burial place was the linen and head wrapping in which their Lord had been wrapped. They had also heard from Cleopas and another disciple how Jesus had met them on the road to Emmaus, opened the Scriptures to them, and only revealing Himself to them when He began to eat with them. They come to the others and tell them, “The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” (Lk 24:34), for the risen Christ had appeared to Simon Peter at some point in the day as well. These men had several testimonies that their Lord had, in fact, risen from the dead and was alive.

All these eye-witness testimonies began to build up their faith. They began to believe. But their faith was weak. That is why that evening the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews. The Jews—the same ones who had arrested Jesus, tried Him, and crucified Him—knew that Jesus’ body was not in the tomb. They knew because some of the guard came into the city and reported to the chief priests all the things that had happened (Mt 27:11) St. Matthew tells us that the elders assembled, consulted amongst themselves, then bribed the soldiers with a large sum of money to tell people, “His disciples came at night and stole Him away while we slept” (Mt 27:13). That the Jews knew of Jesus’ resurrection—though they would not have called it that—filled the disciples with fear. If they had had no compunction about crucifying the Christ, the Son of the living God, they would not disapprove of putting His disciples to death. In fear and little faith, they fortify themselves that evening with shut doors, unsure of what would happen next.

But what happened next was that Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be with you.” Shut doors are no issue for the One who passed through the stone earlier that morning. Shut doors may keep out angry Jews—and keep in fearful disciples—but not the Son of God. He passes through the door because as the eternal Son of God, He can go wherever He wants whenever He pleases. And that evening, it pleased Him to enter the room where His disciples languished. He enters, stands in the midst of the ten disciples who were present, and speaks the antidote to their fear, “Peace be with you.” They have nothing to fear from the Jews, from their own sins, from death and hell itself because Jesus is alive to give them His peace. Then He shows them the antidote to the unbelief with which they had been grappling, for when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. All the accounts that Jesus was alive were true. They weren’t tricks of grief on anguished hearts. They were figments of sorrowing imaginations. He was the very same Jesus whom the Jews had crucified. And He was standing in the midst of them, showing them the trophies of His victory over death. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. The risen Christ had come to bring them peace of conscience and proof of His resurrection.

But Christ wasn’t finished. He said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” As His heavenly Father sent Him into the world to redeem the world from sin, so He now sends them out to preach that redemption. He calls them to be His apostles and immediately equips them by breathing on them then saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” He gives them the Holy Spirit so that they might be faithful and bold to do this: forgive the sins are those who are penitent and retain the sin of those who are impenitent. For Christ came to earn perfect forgiveness for all mankind, and He succeeded in that. But the forgiveness He had earned must now be divvied out. These men are to go into sinful world even as Christ came from His Father into the sinful world. These men will suffer for the sake of their calling even as the Lord suffered—and died—to fulfill the calling His Father gave to Him. These men will go forth, forgiving the sins of the penitent and retaining the sins of the impenitent as apostles of Jesus and ambassadors of Christ through whom God pleads with sinners: be reconciled to God by repentance and faith.

But Thomas wasn’t there that evening. In fact, Thomas was not even where the ten disciples were spiritually. They believed, though weakly, that Jesus was alive. They grappled with unbelief. But Thomas had given himself completely over to it. When the ten tell him, “We have seen the Lord!” he will have none of it. “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.” Hadn’t Jesus showed the ten His hands and His side? But just as the ten struggled with the eyewitness of account of the women, others, and Peter, so Thomas refused to believe the ten’s eye-witness account. He sets the bar even higher than seeing Jesus. He wants to touch Him, put his hand in the mark of the nail and in Jesus side. This is not doubt. Doubt is the limping back and forth between two opinions. This is unbelief.

For a week the Lord allows Thomas to continue in His recalcitrance. That means the Lord allowed the ten disciples a week to mourn over Thomas, for that week Thomas was outside of faith, without salvation. But on the next Sunday evening, Thomas was with them. The doors were shut once again. Had the ten’s faith begun to weaken? Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, “Peace to you!” He strengthens their weaking faith, proclaiming His peace to them to fortify their faith in the fact that He was very much risen from the dead. He turns to Thomas to deal with the unbeliever in the group, and says, “Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.” Jesus gives him what he thinks he needs, and Thomas can only answer in faith, “My Lord and my God!” He confesses Jesus as Lord and God—unlike so many today who refuse to allow Jesus to be either Lord or true God. But even more, Thomas confesses Jesus to be his Lord and his God. Christ enters the room of Thomas’ heart, the doors shut and casts out unbelief so that He may dwell in Thomas by faith, give Him peace, and sent him into the world to proclaim this same peace to the penitent.

Then Jesus says something which runs counter to all our thinking and human reason. “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” It isn’t bad that Thomas saw Christ and believed He had risen from the dead. Thomas, like the other apostles, had to be a witness of Christ’s resurrection (Ac 1:22). Thomas had to be able to say with Peter on Pentecost, “This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses” (Ac 2:32). Thomas, like the others, had to be led to faith in the One whom they had seen, so that they might, by their preaching and writing, lead you to faith in the One whom you have not seen. For as often the gospels and epistles are read, heard, and penetrate the heart, the apostles’ witness and teaching continues its work. Their work continues in the office that they held, and gave to others, the office of the ministry which exists to forgive the sins of the penitent, to speak the peace of Jesus to the fearful and doubting, and, when necessary, to retain the sins of the impenitent so that they might see the severity of their sin and their great need for forgiveness, and return in repentance.

The apostles’ ministry continues until the end of the age so that you who have not seen the risen Christ with your eyes, may yet believe that He is risen. And not only that He is risen, but that He is risen for you, to forgive your sins as often as you repent; to speak peace to your conscience as often as you think on His promises; to drive fear, cowardice, and unbelief from your heart. He is risen for you, to dwell in your heart by faith, to daily renew your mind, so that you delight in His teaching, walk in His ways, and pursue His paths. There are times when you may wish you could see the risen Lord who dwells in your heart. There are times you are tempted to imagine that if you could only see, then all doubt, cowardice, and fear would dissipate. But that is not for you. It was for Thomas. It was for the apostles. But you, you are among those whom Jesus calls as blessed. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Why? Because faith is the victory that has overcome the world. That is why there is no need to fear as the disciples did. For by faith, you have overcome the world, for you are blessed, for you have a risen Christ who is your Lord and your God. Amen.

May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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1 Corinthians 11.23-32
Maundy Thursday

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

There comes a time in everyone’s life when they realize the need to have a will. Often, it’s when they begin having children. For others, that realization comes when they receive news that they have a terminal condition. Regardless of what sparks the realization, it is nearly always motivated by love. We want to make sure that after our death our children, our families, and our church, receive the good things that we have earned in our lifetime. And so, we record our final wishes in clear and plain language. The notary attaches his seal to them. Then, the will sits in a safe place until the day the Testator—the one who made the will—dies. Then it goes into effect.

St. Paul records the last will and testament of our Lord in tonight’s epistle. He was not in the upper room with the twelve apostles on the night in which He was betrayed. Paul was taught this directly by Christ. “For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: The Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’ In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.’”

Our translation renders the word covenant, but testament is better. Covenant implies two parties, each making promises to the other; “I will do this for you. You will do this for me.” It only takes one to make a testament, in which that one says, “I bequeath this to you.” A testament is unilateral. A testament is a promise. And it is confirmed by a death. This is how God ‘made a covenant’ with Abraham in Genesis 15. God promised Abraham that He would give the land of Canaan to Abraham’s descendants. The covenant was confirmed by the death of a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon (Gn 15:9). These animals were cut in two—with the exception of the birds—and the Lord passed through the separated animals without Abraham, signifying that He was making a unilateral covenant—a testament.

This is how He dealt with Israel, the descendants of Abraham. He made them the promise, through Moses, in Exodus 3:8, “I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites.” Israel believed God’s promise and received it in faith. Then the testament was confirmed by a death—the death of the Passover lamb. And as the Passover lamb was a temporal and transitory thing, so was the Old Testament, and so was Israel’s possession of the land of Canaan. He had promised the land to Abraham’s descendants so that they might be separated from the other peoples of the earth, a people from whom the Messiah of all peoples might be born. The lamb, therefore, along with all the ceremonies Moses gave Israel, prefigured the true Paschal Lamb: Christ.

He came as a man, conceived without sin, and lived without blemish. His flesh was roasted in the fire of God’s wrath while on the cross. Like the lambs that prefigured Him, He was not allowed to remain on the cross until morning but was taken down and buried. Christ is the true paschal lamb, who died to ratify the New Testament which God had promised to make in Jeremiah 31[:33-34]. He said this covenant would not be like the one He made with Israel when He brought them out of Egypt. Israel had despised their separation from the nations and turned the laws and ceremonies God had given into a way of earning God’s righteousness. God foretells the New Testament when He tells Jeremiah, “I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”

As the Paschal Lamb which died to confirm the covenant was the eternal Son of God, so the New Testament He makes promised eternal benefits. The New Testament is the promise of the forgiveness of sins for Christ’s sake. The New Testament is the promise of the Holy Spirit, who writes God’s law—His eternal will—on men’s hearts so that they begin to live as God’s people from the heart. This is what Christ bequeaths to all believers.

But before He died, on the night in which He was betrayed, He gave His apostles a sign and seal of the New Testament. The Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’ In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.’” He had promised them the forgiveness of all their sins, new life, and eternal salvation. So that they might be certain in this promise, He tells them He will die for it. He will give His body and shed His blood to earn the forgiveness of all of their sins. And He leaves both—His very body and His very blood—to them as a sign, a seal, a notary, if you, that His testament is true and that it is truly theirs by faith.

It would have been enough to give them the New Testament—the promise. Their faith could have clung to His promise. But God knows their frame, that they are dust. He knows their weakness, so He gives them bread which is simultaneously His body and wine which is simultaneously His very blood which was shed for them, so that they might have even greater assurance and the strengthening of their faith. God has always put visible signs and seals to His promises, by which men might be stirred up all the more to faith. To Noah He gave the rainbow. To Gideon He gave the fleece. For the New Testament, though, He gives the very means by which He confirmed the New Testament: His body and blood for us Christians to eat and drink.

For although He gives it to the apostles, He does not give it only to them. It is for the Christian’s forgiveness and the strengthening of their faith. This is why He tells them, “This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.” As often as you do this, remember His suffering and death. Not in a mere historical remembrance but remember it by receiving the blessings He gives as often as you do this. That Christ wanted more than just the apostles—but all Christians—eat His body and drink His blood for the forgiveness of their sins, new life, and eternal salvation, is evident from Acts 2:42 that the church after Pentecost continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread—which was the sacrament—and in prayers. That Christ meant this to be done by all Christians is evident from the fact that the apostle Paul gave it to the Corinthian congregation and taught them the necessity of self-examination before partaking, lest they eat and drink in an unworthy manner and be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. That He gave His body and blood for Christians to eat and drink in the sacrament is evident from the fact that He gave His body and blood as a sign and seal of the New Testament which is for all people.

Our Lord Jesus Christ, on the night in which He was betrayed, left His last will and testament for those who are children of God by baptism and faith. He gave it to the apostles to give to the church because out of His infinite love and great compassion, He wants God’s baptized children to enjoy the blessings He earned by righteous life and His innocent, bitter sufferings and death. Knowing the enemies with which His baptized faithful must do battle, He wanted them to be strengthened in their faith, so that they trust His testament all the more. That they might take all the more conform in His testament—the promise of forgiveness, the promise of new life by the power of the Holy Spirit, and the promise of eternal salvation—He gives them His body and blood as a notary. For He instituted the sacrament of His body and blood to give you His testament and reconfirm it to you as often as you do this, remembering Him and receiving His benefits. For this cup is not a symbol of the New Testament, nor it is an empty sign of it. It is the New Testament—the Gospel itself—in His blood. Amen.

May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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Philippians 2.5-11 + Matthew 21.1-9
Palm Sunday, the Sixth Sunday in Lent

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Jesus approaches Jerusalem on a colt, the foal of a donkey. By riding a beast of burden into the David’s city, He fulfills the words of the prophet Zechariah. And although the multitudes receive Him as they should—with rejoicing, with garments and palms forging a royal highway, and shouts of, “Hosanna—that is, Save us please—Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, it is still a moment of lowliness. In fact, His entire earthly life had been one of humility and lowliness. He told one would-be disciple in Matthew 8:20, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” He was regularly rejected on account of His teaching. Those who were spiritually poor—who acknowledged they had no work or worthiness good enough to offer to God—heard Him and flocked to Him. But those who thought of themselves as spiritually worthy of God in themselves, those rejected Him because the self-righteous need no Savior or Teacher but themselves. Christ even described Himself as “gentle and lowly in heart” in Matthew 11:29. Christ’s entire ministry, indeed, His entire earthly life, was typified by humility and lowliness.

St. Paul, in today’s Epistle lesson, writes of this great mystery and holds it up for us as something to emulate. “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” What mind did Jesus have, meaning, how did Jesus think about Himself? His mind was humility. Christ, “being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men.” Christ was in the form of God and did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, meaning that Christ was divine. He was, as we confess each Sunday, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God. He is equal to the Father because He is begotten of the Father from all eternity. If there was anyone who could claim equality with God the Father and not be overstepping His place, it is Christ Jesus. He did not consider it robbery to be equal with God because He could not steal what is rightly His.

And yet, this one who is in the form of God and equal to God, “made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant,” or better translated, slave, “and came in the likeness of men.” The only-begotten Son of God from all eternity assumes human flesh. He becomes man and humbles Himself so that He might experience the limitations of mortal men. He who gave Moses the Law on Mt. Sinai becomes man to live under the Law He gave Israel which no man was able to fulfill. He emptied Himself of His divine prerogative, using His divine power sparingly in the miracles for the sake of His neighbors whom He loved as He loved Himself. Though He is God in human flesh, He does not parade Himself around and demand the honor due to Him.

Rather, He made Himsel of no reputation. Literally, He “emptied Himself” of all divine prerogative so that He might become “obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.”  Crucifixion is the most shameful, disgraceful, and painful death that wicked men could concoct for another man. But Christ is obedient to His Father’s will to the point of such a death, and He is obedient from the heart, not grudgingly doing His Father’s will, but willfully, deliberately, and lovingly. He does so to atone for the sins of the world.

The only One who is equal to God empties Himself and dies to redeem those who, in their sin, try to be equal with God. In paradise, the serpent tempted Eve to disobey God’s command with these words, “You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Ge 3:4-5). Since the moment Adam and Eve sinned and made sinners of themselves and all their posterity, this has been the sinner’s goal: to be like God. Sinners want to be equal to God so that their will can be done. People want to be “like God” so that their word and thoughts can determine what they should believe, how they should live, and to whom they should listen. Sinners want to be equal to God so that they can declare themselves worthy of good things so that they do not have to wait upon another for their good things in this life. Whether people chase the highest good from science, government, technology, reputation, or the gratification of their own desires, it is all comes from the same root: Sinners want to be equal with God so that they may be their own God, living righteously by their own word and their own ways.

But the devil is a liar, in fact, He is the father of lying. Seeking equality with God by disobeying God didn’t make Adam and Eve equal with Him. It made them slaves of sin. Jesus says, “Whoever commits sin is a slave of sin” (Jn 8:34). Adam and Eve brought death upon themselves and all their descendants, as St. Paul writes in Romans 6:23, “The wages of sin is death.” The great lie, told to Adam and Eve continues to this very day: equality with God is attainable. It will make you free. The great lie is that you can worship how you see fit, in ways of which God surely would approve, though not how God commands in His Word. The great lie is that your will is better than God’s, or at least equal to it, so it should be done. The great lie is that you don’t need to pray because you can work things for good by yourself. But all of this is enslavement to self and sin. Equality with God is not within our grasp. Creatures can never be equal to their Creator. Trying to be “like God” only ends in slavery to sin, death, and the power of the devil. This is where most people are in our world today, trusting in anything other than the true God for good things in this life and the life to come.

But here is Christ, coming into Jerusalem, fulfilling what was written centuries before, “Behold, your King is coming to you, lowly, and sitting on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey” (Mt 21:5). Here is Christ, presenting Himself as the sacrifice for the sins of all mankind, going forth to the cross willingly, deliberately, and lovingly. Here is Christ, allowing Himself to be arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane, even though He could effortlessly call twelve legions of angels to His side. Here is Christ, standing in Pilate’s Praetorium, refusing to defend Himself, being “obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” Doing no will except His Father’s.

He does all this humbly, meekly, and in all lowliness, so that He might earn redemption for the world. The One who is actually equal to God allows Himself to be crucified to pay for the sins of those who are not equal to God but attempt to be. His obedience to the Father’s will in Garden of Gethsemane pays for Adam and Eve’s disobedience in the Garden of Eden. His innocent death atones for our sins by which we truly deserve death, both in this life and eternally. The One who actually IS God Himself, offers Himself on the altar of the cross to save those who delude themselves and think of themselves as their own gods so that they can do their own will. His blood pays for all our sins and the sins of all mankind, so that everyone who trusts His death has the forgiveness of their sins, and everyone who trusts His perfect righteousness has it as their own. When this forgiveness and righteousness is received by faith, it frees you from the lie that you can be like God.

And it presents you with the example of Christ, the one who is equal with God, but made emptied Himself for us and our salvation. St. Paul began the epistle lesson, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” The mind we’re to have—the way we are to think about ourselves, others, and God—is the mind that Christ had while on earth: humble, gentle, and lowly. The mind of Christ is not pride, arrogance, or self-importance, but humility which serves others in love, so that we look out not only for our own interests, but also for the interests of others (Phil 2:4). Nor is the mind of Christ prideful toward God, imagining that it knows better than He does or what He has revealed in His word. The mind of Christ is humble submission to God’s will and word, because the mind of Christ knows that God the Father works all things for the good of those who love Him. The mind of Christ does not seek equality with God—though He Himself has that from all eternity—but seeks to be obedient in all things to His Father’s will. The Christ who entered Jerusalem on this day so humbly still comes to us in humility and gentleness, offering us the fruits of His suffering and death: the forgiveness of all our sins and everlasting life. By giving us these gifts, He renews our minds so that we have the mind which was also in Him during His earthly life. For that, let us give Him thanks as praise as did the crowd outside Jerusalem. Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Amen.

May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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John 8.46-59
Judica, the 5^th Sunday in Lent

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Today’s gospel lesson is the final part of a long conversation between Jesus and the Jews. Throughout this conversation, Jesus has exposed the Jews’ unbelief. They claim to be descendants of Abraham, but they do not behave like Abraham behave. He told them, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would to the works of Abraham. But now you seek to kill Me, a Man who has told you the truth which I heard from God. Abraham did not do this” (Jn 8:39-40). Instead, they do the deeds of their father—the devil. They lie and distort Jesus’ words and seek to kill Him, even though they cannot convict Him of any sin. Jesus summarizes this when He says at the beginning of today’s gospel, “He who is of God hears God’s words; therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God.” They do not hear Jesus’ words for what they are—the words of God Himself—because they are not of God. They are not born from God by faith and baptism. Instead, they show themselves to be children of the devil by refusing to believe that God is His true Father and that He is God’s true Son.

Unable to convict Jesus of any sin, they attack His person. They call Him a Samaritan—not a true descendant of Abraham—and say that He has a demon. Jesus doesn’t bite on the accusation of being a Samaritan because even Samaritans can be true children of Abraham if they share Abraham’s faith. But He does respond to being called a demoniac, because it is blasphemy to call the word of God the word of the devil. He does not have a demon but honors His Father. He trusts His Father to seek His glory and vindicate Him against the attacks of the Jews, both of which He will do at when He raises Him from the dead on the third day after His death. Trusting His Father to seek His glory and vindicate Him, against this ungodly nation, He continues to teach these Jews what they desperately need to hear.” He had told them earlier the conversation that if they don’t believe in Him, they will die in their sin (24) but that His word will set them free from sin (36). Now He draws the conclusion. If one does not die in their sin, but is free from sin’s slavery, he will have eternal life. “Most assuredly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word he shall never see death.” The one who keeps His word—believes it, treasures it, holds fast to it in faith, guards it in his heart, and lives according to it—will not see death.

The Jews, thinking carnally, assume He means that His word will keep people from physical death. They say, “Now we know that you have a demon! Abraham is dead, and the prophets; and You say, ‘If anyone keeps My word he will never taste death. Whom do you make Yourself ‘out to be?’” But Jesus isn’t speaking of physical death. Nowhere does He promise that those who believe in Him will not bodily die, just as He never promises them an earthly life without suffering and cross. All who believe in Him—except those who are alive in the body when He returns in glory—will taste death. But His promise is that though they taste death, they will yet live with God. His word is true because He Himself will do this very thing—He tastes death—so that those who keep His word will not see eternal death. The author of Hebrews wrote, “Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone” (Heb 2:9).

Even Abraham. Moses wrote, “Abraham breathed his last and died in a good old age, an old man and full of years, and was gathered to his people” (Gen 25:8). Abraham tasted death. And although dead, Abraham lives with God because He kept God’s word, the word. He kept the word given to Him when God told him to leave his country, his family, and his father’s house, and go to the land which God would show him. He kept the words which God gave him that God would make him a great nation, bless him, and make his name great, and that in him all families of the earth shall be blessed (Gen 12:3). Abraham kept that word. He believed it and held fast to it, so that it was his most precious possession in this life. He lived according to it, though imperfectly because of sin. Trusting God’s word, he left his country, family, and father’s house, looking forward to Jesus’ day, to the Seed promised to Him—Christ—because it is in Christ’s atoning death for the sins of the world, and the proclaiming of that gospel to all mankind, that all families of the are blessed.

Still thinking carnally, still knowing Christ according to flesh, the Jews cannot help but ask, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?” The answer is “yes.” Because “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.” He has been saying this all along. If God is His Father, the one who has begotten Him, not created Him, and His word gives life, so that the one who keeps it will never see death, then He is God from God, light from light, and true God from true God. He is the one who appeared to Moses in the burning bush and identified Himself as “I AM WHO I AM” (Ex 3:14). This is why His word frees from sin. It is the very word of God. This is why His word gives life to all who keep it. It is the very word of God. The Jews understand perfectly well what so many deny today. They understood that Jesus identified Himself as God, as “I AM.” Their murderous desires, kept at bay up to this point, burst forth at what they believe to be blasphemy. They pick up stones to that they might make Him taste death in that moment. But in an act of divine power, He hid Himself and went out of their midst. For though He would taste death for all, it is not to be in this way, nor is it to be at this moment.

The Jews believe none of this. Not because they were ignorant of God’s written word. “To them were committed the oracles of God” (Rom 3:2). Nor is it because Jesus could have spoken more winsomely. He spoke bluntly to them because He was aggressive for their salvation. They did not hear His word because they were not of God. They thought that they were of God—that they were God’s children—because they were physical children of Abraham. But God is able to raise up children to Abraham from stones as John the Baptist had said (Mt 3:9). What makes one a child of God is faith in God’s word—believing it to be true, treasuring it as the word of eternal life, holding fast to it in faith that it is true for you, guarding it in the heart from all enemies who want to remove it, and living according to it, for if what is believed is not lived, it won’t be believed for very long.

The Jews of Jesus’ day trusted in their genealogy, that they were sons of God because they were biological descendants of Abraham. The Jews do this to this very day. They claim to be of God, but they refuse to acknowledge Jesus as God’s only begotten Son, and because of that they do not keep His word. On the other hand, many people claim to be Christians in this life, but they do not hear God’s word, and if they hear it, they do not keep it so that they believe it and live according to it. They live as Paul says, having a form of godliness but denying its power (2 Tim 3:5). As you approach the yearly celebration of your Lord’s Passion once again, the Holy Spirit puts this conversation between Jesus and the Jews before you so that you might consider your hearing—and keeping—of God’s word, repent of the sluggishness to hear it and the slothfulness in keeping it. The Holy Spirit puts this conversation of before you once again so that you might stir yourselves up with the knowledge that you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:26).

As God’s dearly beloved children, take care how you hear God’s word, that you hear it for what it is: the word which frees you from your sins and their guilt, a word which, if kept, keeps you from seeing eternal death. For this is a great and precious promise because, unless Christ returns in glory during our lifetime, you will most certainly die. You will taste death like Abraham and the prophets tasted death. But like them you will never see the eternal punishment of everlasting death. Jesus says in John 5:24, “He who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.” By faith in Christ and baptism you have been born of God and passed already from death to life. Since you have passed from death to life in holy baptism, since you have been born of God through water and the Spirit, because you are of God, because you believe that Christ is the only begotten Son of God, keep His word. Continue to believe it. Treasure it, hold fast to it in faith, guard it in your heart, comfort yourself with it in affliction and crosses, and live according to it. And on the day you die, you will live, because you have lived keeping the word of the One who tasted death for you. Amen.

May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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Galatians 4.21-31 + John 6.1-15
Laetare, the 4^th Sunday in Lent
Amos Sullivan Confirmation

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Jesus feeds the five thousand with five barley loves and two small fish, and the crowd has as much as they wanted. Afterwards, the disciples filled twelve baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves which were left over by those who had eaten. The crowd of five thousand men experiences bread in the wilderness and make the connection. “This is truly the Prophet who is to come into the world,” the say. The Lord told Moses in Deuteronomy 18:18, “I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him.” What could be more like Moses than miraculously feeding a crowd of people in the wilderness with bread? They have the idea to take Jesus by force and make Him their king. There’s no doubt they wanted Him to be their king because He could provide daily bread for them like Moses had. But did they see in Jesus something else? Did they see Jesus as a prophet like Moses who would destroy their earthly enemies—in their case, the Romans—as Moses led Israel in victory against the Egyptians and Amalekites. Did they see Jesus as a new lawgiver, who would usher in a golden age in which everyone obeyed Moses’ law and God rewarded Israel with earthly peace and prosperity? Did they rejoice at the possibility of a Jerusalem, a temple, and a people restored to their former glory?

Jesus perceives these hopes in their hearts and retreats to the mountain by Himself alone. The crowd was right, He was The Prophet like Moses whom God foretold to Moses, the One to whom all people should listen and believe. But He is not the prophet they are looking for. He is not a new lawgiver. He is not earthly king who will rule over an earthly Israel in an earthly Jerusalem, an earthly temple, nor will He usher in an age of peace and prosperity for the Jews. He is a king. He will tell Pilate on the morning of His death, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from here” (Jn 18:36). The eternal Son of God did not become man to establish an earthly kingdom; not then, not now, not in the end times or on the Last Day. His kingdom is not from here. Nor is it a kingdom that operates like an earthly one. Where it is from? St. Paul tells us in today’s epistle lesson.

He tells us that Jesus’ kingdom, His Jerusalem, is the Jerusalem above, which is free. To understand what the apostle means by this we must understand His allegory. He says Abraham had two sons. Each symbolizes a covenant. The first, Ishmael, Abraham conceived by the bondwoman and was conceived according to the flesh, that is, according to the natural way that children are conceived, apart from the promise of and the Word of God. The second son, Isaac, was not only born of the free woman, Sarah, but through God’s promise. God promised Isaac to Abraham and that he would be Abraham’s heir. These two ways of being born—according to the flesh and through promise—signify the works of the law and faith in the gospel, the Jerusalem that now is, and the Jerusalem from above.

The Jerusalem which is now, is not so much the physical city, but the religion of the law enshrined there. The Law brings forth children who are slaves. They are under the law’s coercion. They think that if they want to live eternally, they must do this and that. They must do certain things in order to be righteous in God’s sight. They must abstain from other things to remain righteous in God’s sight. But coercion cannot fulfill the law should be done in love for God, not because one has to. Not only are they coerced by the law, if they are honest with themselves, they are condemned by the law. The law says, “You shall not,” but the honest man will admit that He has done that very thing which God forbade. The law says, “You shall,” but the honest man will admit that he has not done the very thing that God commanded. And though he be outwardly pure and pristine in his words and behavior, he will see that in His heart he has done that which the law forbids and not done that which the law demands he do. This is why St. Peter called the law “a yoke . . . which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?” (Ac 15:10). There is no salvation by works of the law, according to the flesh. This is why this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds to Jerusalem which is now, and is in bondage with her children.” It does not bring forth sons, but slaves. This is not the Jerusalem over which Christ will reign, an earthly kingdom which tries to make children of Abraham according to the flesh, by works of the law.

He will only be king of the Jerusalem above, that is, the spiritual Jerusalem, the church. This Jerusalem is free from the law’s coercion because Christ has taken the law upon Himself and done it all willingly. This Jerusalem is free from the law’s condemnation because Christ has done all the law perfectly, from the heart. This Jerusalem gives birth to children for Abraham, not according to the flesh and works of the law, but as Isaac was born—through promise. It is not achieved by works of the law. It is received by faith in the promise of the Gospel, the promise that for Christ’s sake, God freely forgives the sins of the penitent, regenerates them as sons of God, and gives them His Holy Spirit and eternal salvation. Faith in the promise means God sees you covered in the righteousness of Jesus. Faith in the promise means God has made you His son. Faith in the promise means you are free from the law’s coercion and condemnation. You may now live according to the law, loving God and neighbor as yourself, in thankfulness and praise that you have been reborn by God. It is by the gospel that Christ reigns in your hearts—and the hearts of all believers—in the true Jerusalem.

Since Christ reigns in us, not with the law for our condemnation, but with the gospel and its freedom from sin, guilt, and eternal death, so that we have new life with God, we freely answer Isaiah’s call which we sang in the Introit. The prophet wrote, “Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, All you who love her, rejoice with he; Rejoice for joy with her, All you who mourn for her” (Is 66:10). Rejoice that the Jerusalem above, which is your mother, for it is the Holy Christian Church that Christ has rebirthed you in water combined with His word. Rejoice with Jerusalem and be glad with her, for in her Christ feeds you, not with barely loves and fish, but with His word and sacrament. For by the clear and pure preaching, Christ nourishes your souls. By His body and blood in the Sacrament, Christ nourishes your faith, strengthening it to persevere trials and crosses with joy. Rejoice that though the world sees the Jerusalem above as desolate and looks down upon her because she seems small and weak, she continues to give birth to children of Abraham, sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, and she will endure forever, even against the gates of Hell itself.

Today we have another reason to rejoice. Fourteen years ago, the Jerusalem above gave birth to a son of God. On the day of his birth according to the flesh, Amos Wells was also born from above through water and the Spirit in the waters of Holy Baptism. Amos was justified by faith—which the Holy Spirit created in his heart that day—not by any works he worked or merits he merited. He has continued in the faith and learned the Faith into which He was baptized. Now he is ready to confess the Christian faith publicly, desiring to receive the forgiveness of his sins, life, and salvation in His Lord’s Supper. Today is not another rebirth, for Confirmation is not a sacrament. It was instituted by man. Nor is today an augmentation of the gifts God gave him in baptism, for the gifts Christ gave Amos in baptism don’t need any supplementation. God does not deal in incomplete gifts, nor does He make half-children in baptism. Today we rejoice with Jerusalem and be glad with her, for she is not bearing a new son of God, but admitting one of her sons to her Lord’s Table to be fed and nourished with Christ’s very body and blood for the strengthening and perseverance of his faith.

Let this reason to rejoice encourage you in your faith in Christ—that you are children of the promise because you know and believe in Christ. Let this reason to rejoice encourage your confession of Christ—that He justifies you by penitent faith in Christ by each day, and not your works and merits. Let this reason rejoice remind you that you are citizens of Jerusalem, not the earthly city, enslaved to sin and burdened by an unbearable yoke, but the Jerusalem above which is free, and that means you are free—from sin, from the law’s condemnation, and from the law’s coercion. You are free to live as sons of God who have all of His promises. Rejoice  with Jerusalem and be glad with her. Amen!

May the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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