Second Sunday after Trinity

Posted on June 9, 2024 by Pastor

1 John 3.13–18 + Luke 14.16–24

Jesus is dining at the home of a Pharisee on the Sabbath when He tells them the parable of the great supper. After healing a man and teaching the pharisees about humility, someone at the table piously says, “Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God!” To this man, the kingdom of God is a future reality which. And when the Lord ushers in the kingdom, this man expects to be welcomed in and enjoy all the blessings of God’s kingdom. The man thinks he enter God’s kingdom when the day comes, and he receives God’s call. What the man—and his fellow Pharisees—don’t see, is that the kingdom of God is already at hand. This is precisely what John the Baptist had preached. Is was the message of Jesus, and it was the message His twelve disciples were to preach when He sent them to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. The call is going out, even at this very Sabbath meal, yet he—and so many like him—refuse to enter to into the kingdom. To open his eyes, Jesus tells a parable.

“A certain man gave a great supper and invited many, and sent his servant at supper time to say to those who were invited, ‘Come, for all things are now ready.’” The certain man is God the Father. The great supper is Christ and the kingdom over which He reigns. The supper God prepares is the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The supper God prepares is the bread of life, which if a man eats, he will never hunger, nor will he die eternally. The supper God prepares is living water, which if a man drink, will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life (Jn 4:14). The great supper is Christ. It is the gospel, which if eaten—that is, believed—gives forgiveness of sins, everlasting life, and the Holy Spirit.  This gospel is truly good news because the one invited doesn’t bring anything, for all things are now ready. Nothing is to be brought to the supper, but the invitation requires that certain things be laid down.

This is what so many refused to do. “But they all with one accord began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of ground, and I must go and see it. I ask you to have me excused.’ And another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to test them. I ask you to have me excused.’ Still another said, ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.’” When the kingdom of God is announced to those whom the prophets and John the Baptist had invited, all of a sudden there are more important things to attend to. While they had been anticipating eating bread in the kingdom of God, when the kingdom of God arrives and they are told to come to the feast, they excuse themselves.

There’s nothing wrong with buying a field and inspecting it. There’s nothing wrong with buying a farm implement and looking it over. Nor is there anything wrong with marriage. God has us all things graciously. He commands us to labor. St. Paul says in 2 Thessalonians 3:10, “If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat,” and Solomon says in Ecclesiastes 3:13, “Every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor — it is the gift of God.” God gives temporal blessings as well—money, wealth, possessions—which are to be enjoyed and used to serve others. God established marriage in the Garden of Eden and still brings men and women together in holy marriage. God calls marriage “honorable among all, and the bed undefiled” (Heb 13:4). God blesses marriage with the gift of children who are to be raised in the training and admonition of the Lord (Eph 6:4).

There is nothing wrong with the blessings God gives in this life. But there is something wrong—something terribly wrong—with using the blessings of this life in such a way that they become excuses for refusing the great supper God has prepared and offers—not in the future—but right now. We see this all around us in the world. Where is true life to be found? Many prioritize their labor, their job, their career, and the status and worldly honor it brings. Others prioritize the fruits of their labor, living for the sake of enjoying their possessions and wealth. Others prioritize relationships, misusing marriage to fulfill their lusts, or abandoning it altogether for living together without marriage, homosexual relationships, or just plain-old promiscuity. Any of the good gifts which God gives to us in this life can be turned into idols, gods from whom we seek all good things and in whom we take refuge in all distress.

The Christian is not immune from the temptation to turn God’s good gifts in idols, so that the things of this life enrapture and entrance them, so that they, too, ask to be excused from great supper of Christ until it’s more convenient for them. But Jesus reminds us in John 12:24, “He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” To love your life means to prefer this life to Christ and God’s kingdom. To hate your life in this world means to prefer Christ and God’s kingdom over above life in this wretched world. Christ is our life. To live under Him in His kingdom of grace is to enter eternal life now, so what we enter into it fully whenever the Lord calls us from this life. To love life in this world more than Christ to love God’s good gifts more than Christ, even to love father or mother, son or daughter, more than Christ, is to make oneself unworthy of Christ—the great supper of forgiveness, life, and salvation God has prepared. So, the master of the house says in the parable, “None of those men who were invited shall taste my supper.” They loved their lives in the world more than their true life—Christ—and forfeit the gospel and kingdom.

But the Lord wants His house to be filled. So, he tells his servant, “Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in here the poor and the maimed and the lame and the blind.” When the servant says that he’s already done this but there’s still room for more at the supper, the master says, “Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.” These are the people who hear the invitation and rejoice that they’re invited to the great supper where all things are now ready. Those who excused themselves and refused the master’s offer wanted to treasure this world, their sin for just a bit longer, and later come to the feast. But the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind, those on the highways and sleeping under hedges, are those who hear the invitation to the Great Supper, “Come, for all things are now ready,” and rejoice that nothing is to be brought to the supper. They also willingly lay down the love of this life for the sake of entering—and remaining in—the kingdom of God. This doesn’t mean they forsake their labor, their possessions, and their marriages. Those are good gifts of God. It means they repent of setting their hearts on the good gifts of this world, misusing them, and making idols out of them.

Entering into the supper—the kingdom of God in which we daily feast on Christ and His blessings by faith—then fills us with love. And our love for one another—especially the brethren, our fellow Christians—is how we know that we have passed from death to life. Having entered the great supper already by faith in Christ, and experiencing His love in the gospel, we love one another. What does love do? John says in the epistle, “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.”

How did Christ love us? Not with words only, as if that were what love is, but in deed and truth. He sacrificed Himself for us, so we sacrifice ourselves, our time and our desires  to give to the brethren in need. If we have this world’s goods love opens our hearts to the brethren in need so that we share this world’s goods with them. Loving Christ above the things of this world—even the good gifts God gives us—enables us to use the things of this world properly, for God’s glory and the blessing of the brethren. Only by entering the great supper in which God graciously prepares all things for us, can we go forth from this place, filled with Christ—filled with Christ’s love—to enjoy this world’s goods in a godly way, with thanksgiving, and sharing them because we love the brethren. Amen.

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First Sunday after Trinity

Posted on June 2, 2024 by Pastor

1 John 4.16–21 + Luke 16.19–31

There is a life after this one. Heaven or hell. The bosom of Abraham—the place of comfort and rest to which the angels take Lazarus, or the torments of hell which the rich man finds himself in upon death. This life after death is attested to by Moses and the prophets. Jesus says in Luke 20[:37-38], “Even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised, when he called the Lord ‘the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ For He is not the God of the dead but of the living, for all live to Him.” Moses also testifies how the life of comfort and rest is attained in the next life. He writes of Abraham in Genesis 15:6, “He believed in the LORD, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.” Life, peace, rest, comfort, and joy in the life to come is only attained by faith in God’s promise. No amount of good works can attain that life. For one, we already owe them to God. Two, the prophet Isaiah reminds us that all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags (64:6). God commands good works. He commands us to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. But any work or love that does not flow from faith, St. Paul calls sin (Rom 14:23). Good works only are good because they are done by the one who places their trust in God’s promise as Abraham did.

This is why the rich man Jesus tells us about had no works of love. He let Lazarus languish outside of his front gate. He could have helped him but chose to neglect the poor beggar instead. He could have had his table scraps or leftovers taken to the man, but chose not to. Why didn’t he help the beggar at his gate, the neighbor whom God had placed their to exercise him? He chose not to because he did not have true faith in his heart, and so He had no love for God in his heart. St. John reminds us in today’s epistle, “If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?” (1 Jn 4:20). True faith and love for God would have produced love for his neighbor and moved him to help poor Lazarus. The rich man certainly had faith, but not in God’s promise. His faith was in his riches. He had set his heart on them so that his wealth and his comfortable lifestyle had become his idol. He expected all good things in life as long as he had riches, as long as he protected his riches, and as long as he enjoyed his riches. And faith in riches cannot produce love for neighbor. Faith in riches only produces more and more love for one’s self and it’s idol. Thus, when the rich man dies, he finds himself in the torments of hell. While he was a child of Abraham by blood, He was not a true child of Abraham. During his earthly life he never repented of his false faith—loving riches and trusting in them for every good thing, and the lack of love his false faith produced.

Lazarus on the other hand, has nothing but faith. He doesn’t even have any good works of love. This is because love, even love that flows from faith, is not what justifies us before God. This is evident from the fact that that we had nothing in this life, and though he only had sickness and debilitation, when he dies, angels take him to the bosom of Abraham. And you only go to the place where Abraham is if you were righteous like Abraham was, who believed in the LORD, and He accounted it to him for righteousness. Poor Lazarus, like his father Abraham, believed God’s promises, especially the promise to send a Messiah who would make atonement for the world’s sins and justify believers. Jesus tells us that this was the faith of Abraham when He told the Jews in John 8:56, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.” Faith justified Abraham. Faith produced love in Abraham as well, so that Abraham rescued lot when he was kidnapped by the king of Sodom. Abraham’s Faith produced love by which he loved his son Isaac and—although very imperfectly—loved all of his other children after Isaac. Faith produced love in Abraham as a witness and testimony to the fact that Abraham believed the Lord and it was credited to him for righteousness.

This is the faith in which Lazarus lived. He had nothing in this life. Yet, he is the one escorted by angels to the bosom of Abraham when he closed his eyes in death. Lazarus would have had good works of love if he had of had health, because He loved God by faith. Even if he had the good work of praying for others—which is still well within the power of even the bedridden person—those works would still not have justified him, for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified as St. Paul writes in Galatians 2:16. Works of love follow faith as good fruit comes from a good tree.

It’s this life of faith—believing God’s promise as Abraham believed—which justifies, so that when you close your eyes for the final time and death, the angels will carry you to Abraham’s bosom, Paradise, eternal rest and true blessedness. There you will live with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all who have died in the faith but continue to live to the Lord, serving him, praising him, rejoicing in His salvation, and waiting with them. Waiting, because Abraham’s bosom is not the final promise. All who live to Christ Jesus in paradise eagerly await the resurrection of their bodies on the Last Day, when they will be made whole, with glorified bodies, to reign with the Triune God forever in the new heavens and new earth. Yesterday, angels escorted our brother Matt to Abraham’s bosom. And though we mourn, we do not mourn without hope, for we know that Matt, like Abraham, like Lazarus, like all the elect, believed God’s promise in the gospel and was counted, by God, as righteous by that faith. He, with all our loved ones who have died in the faith, are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple. And He who sits on the throne will dwell among them. They shall neither hunger anymore nor thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any heat; for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes (Rev 7:15-17).

Too many imagine that, like the rich man, they can be externally of Israel and still worship their lifestyle, their wealth, and their creature comforts. Too many place their faith in the things of this world, thinking that as long as they have those things, they have everything they need. Too many view riches, popularity, worldly honors, and pleasures as signs that God counts them righteous. Yet none of these idols justify anyone before God. Nor does trusting in them produce the love for neighbor. Like the rich man, trusting in riches—or any worldly thing—only produces a sinful love of oneself. Too many will, at death, go to Hades where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, where they will be in torment in that flame, having missed the time of grace during which they had the opportunity to repent of their sin and believe God’s promise as Abraham did. The rich man serves as a warning to us so that if riches, popularity, worldly honors, or pleasures increase, we do not set our hearts on them, but set our hearts on things above, where true joys are to be found. With this Christ would warn His faithful against the subtle creep of unrecognized idolatry, lest we share the rich man’s fate.

Christ would have us be Lazarus instead, so that no matter what He gives and what He takes away in this life, we trust in His mercies. Christ would have us be Lazarus so that regardless of whether we have good health or poor, riches or poverty, popularity or persecutions, we believe God as Abraham did, who did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God,  and being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform (Rom 4:20-21). This is the faith that justifies. This is the faith that will lead you to the bosom of Abraham on your last day, to perfect comfort, peace, and rest. And until that day, this is the faith that will lead you to love one another in a true Christian love. For we have this promise: he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him (1 Jn 4:16). May God grant us this for Jesus’ sake. Amen. 

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The Feast of the Holy Trinity

Posted on May 26, 2024 by Pastor

Romans 11.33-36 + John 3.1-15

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

“We worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity.” This is the full revelation of who God is that we have received from our Lord Jesus Christ. He taught us throughout His earthly ministry that God was His Father. He didn’t mean this in a figurative sense. God the Father truly begat a son from eternity, though in a God-befitting way, not a human men beget sons. And as human sons are of the same essence as their fathers, so God the Son is of the same essence as His Father. The Jews understood this perfectly well. In John 5:18 they wanted to murder Him because He said that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God.” God’s eternal son took on human flesh in the womb of the virgin Mary and entered into our world as a man. The apostle John tells us, “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him” (Jn 1:18). God the Son becomes man to reveal God the Father to us, so that we might have eternal life. Jesus says while praying in John 17:3, “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” Jesus doesn’t mean He isn’t God. He says this to teach us that God the Father is His source, His begetter, and—according to His human nature—His God. 

Christ also taught us that God the Father has a Spirit, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father (Jn 15:26). In the Western church we say that the Spirit proceeds from the Son, as well, since He is called “the Spirit of Christ” in Romans 8:9 and “the Spirit of His Son” in Galatians 4:6. Like God the Son, God the Spirit is God from God. He is not a created thing. Nor is the Spirit begotten from the Father—otherwise the Spirit would also be God’s son—but proceeding from the Father. The Spirit, like the Father and Son, is a person, not an appendage of God. The Spirit creates. The Spirit helps. The Spirit comforts. The Spirit testifies of Jesus. The Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God “(1 Cor 2:10). The Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered (Rom 8:26). The Spirit can be grieved. He can be rejected. He can be blasphemed, too. The Holy Spirit bears witness to Christ, so that men believe Christ and His teaching about the Father.

We ought to never think that the doctrine of the Holy Trinity is an academic abstraction. Nor should we think of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity as an optional belief, as if belief in a generic “God” will do. Far from being an abstraction, far from being optional, the doctrine of the Holy Trinity is the saving message of the gospel. God the Father send God the Son to take up our flesh, life perfectly righteous and make perfect atonement for our sins, so that all who believe Him might have eternal life. Eternal life is knowing the true God and His Son. And such knowledge—such faith—is only created and sustained in the heart by God the Spirit. You can’t have the gospel with the Trinity because the gospel is the work—not of an abstraction or generic god— but the work of the Trinity in Unity and the Unity in Trinity: One God in three persons and three persons in One God.

And so that the revelation that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit less abstract, the Triune God concretizes this for us in baptism. He does it first at Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River. When Jesus comes up from water, the heavens were opened. The Spirit descends in the form of a dove and remains on Him, while God the Father speaks from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Throughout the Old Testament there were hints that the one God consisted of three persons. God’s Word and Spirit were often personified Moses and the prophets. But God saves the full revelation of Himself as one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity for the New Testament, so that He may attach the full revelation of His identity with the gospel and baptism. So that we see the importance—the necessity—of the doctrine of the Trinity, Christ sent His apostles into the world to baptize all nations “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” so that baptisms are performed in the stead of the Triune God and we understand God to be the one doing the baptizing, and so that we know and believe we are baptized into His name and doctrine.

This is what Jesus teaches Nicodemus in today’s gospel lesson. “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus understands this in the natural sense of being born a second time and inquires how a man can be born when he old? “Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” But this being born again, this rebirth, is not physical. It is spiritual. One is born again of water and the Spirit Jesus says. The Spirit rebirths people through water because their first birth is a fleshly birth, and that which is born of the flesh is flesh. The first birth from our mother is one of flesh in which we inherit the corruption of sin from Adam and Eve, the sinful flesh which cannot fear, love, or trust in God, and which desires to sin. But that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” The second birth of water and the Spirit is the Holy Spirit’s work, by which He brings forth a new creation, in which the passions and desires of the sinful flesh have been crucified, and which lives in purity and righteousness before God. Only God can do this, and this precisely why Jesus calls baptism a birth of water and the Spirit. This new birth is not a new physical birth that can be seen. Like the blowing of the wind, you will only hear the sound of it as the new creature lives in righteousness and holiness.

Jesus goes on to teach us about this baptism of water and Spirit. “No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.” Baptism originates, not with man, but with God. It comes from God, which Jesus alludes to when he says, “unless one is born again,” the word again having the nuance of “from above.” One must be born a second time “from above,” by the Spirit of Christ, the One who descended to earth in human flesh, was lifted up on the cross to atone for the sins of the world, and ascended back to the Father so that He might send His Holy Spirit. Having been baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, we know the true God. We have eternal life, knowing the true God and Jesus Christ whom He sent. Having been born “from above” by the Spirit we set our minds on things above, not things of the earth. We seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God (Col 3:1-2). Since our life is from above, we daily live with that life and those things in mind.

Through the gospel and baptism, we have a fuller knowledge of Him than the saints of the Old Testament. “Many prophets and kings have desired to see what you see, and have not seen it, and to hear what you hear, and have not heard it” (Lk 10:24). Nevertheless, we do not know God perfectly in this life. As Paul says, “For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known” (1 Cor 13:12). The doctrine of the Holy Trinity reveals God to us as so that we may know Him and be saved, and we look forward to knowing Him as we are known. But this doctrine also reminds us that God is beyond our comprehension, and that we can only comprehend Him to the extent that He revealed in His Word. As we cannot comprehend God apart from His word, we cannot comprehend God’s works apart from His word. When We look at the world and do not see God’s hand at work and comprehend His doings as He rules over the nations, we say with the apostle, “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! “For who has known the mind of the LORD? Or who has become His counselor?” “Or who has first given to Him and it shall be repaid to him?” For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.” We know from His word that He rules all things. We know from His word that He fills all things and puts all things under His feet. We know from His word that He works all things for the good of those who love Him. Just as His revelation of Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is for our salvation, so is what He has revealed in His word about His works, so that regardless of our comprehension, we may worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, live as those He has rebirthed from above, and leave that which we do not understand to His mercy. Amen.

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

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The Feast of Pentecost

Posted on May 19, 2024 by Pastor

Acts 2:1-11 + John 14:23-31

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

In Acts 1, St. Luke records that Jesus commanded His apostles not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, “which,” He said, “you have heard from Me; for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now” (Acts 1:4-5). After Christ ascends, the apostles go back to the city to wait. And how did they wait? Luke writes, that the apostles all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers (Acts 1:14). This is how the Christian waits on God to fulfill His promises: prayer and supplication, that is, patiently asking for what God has promised. Being moved by the Holy Spirit, they also choose Matthias to fill the apostolic office that Judas had vacated. Matthias is one of the many that had accompanied Jesus from the baptism of John, witnessed Jesus’ resurrection by seeing Him alive, and seeing Him ascend into heaven. He is the one whom God chose to complete the apostolic number, so that as God had His twelve tribes in the Old Testament, now He once again has His twelve apostles.

These men and others are waiting for the promise of the Father, and the Father fulfills His promise on the day of Pentecost. Pentecost was a harvest festival for the Jews. Moses had commanded Israel to count seven weeks from the time they put the sickle to the barley (Deut 16:9). After the seven weeks are complete, they celebrated the Feast of Weeks, Pentecost. This is why there were Parthians and Medes and Elamites, those dwelling in Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya adjoining Cyrene, visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs in Jerusalem. These were Jews from all over the known world, come to Jerusalem to celebrate the harvest festival. And not only Jews, but proselytes, people who were not Abraham’s descendants by blood, but by faith, having converted to the religion of Abraham. It is on this day, this festival, with Jerusalem packed with people, that the Father baptizes these men with the Holy Spirit, pouring our His Spirit upon them so that they might do precisely what Jesus had said they would do: be witnesses to Christ in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth (Acts 1:8).

What does it look like when the Holy Spirit is poured out on them? There came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. Then there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now, it’s vitally important to remember that the apostles and those with them already had the Holy Spirit. They believed in Christ and confessed Christ, and Paul tells the Corinthians that no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor 12:3). That these men and those with them believed in Christ for their salvation was the work of the Holy Spirit in their hearts. This baptism of the Holy Spirit, this outpouring, is a bit different. It isn’t a supplement, as if they had part of the Holy Spirit, but needed the rest of Him. God doesn’t give partial or incomplete gifts. No, this was a special gift of the Holy Spirit given to them specifically for this moment in time, so that they might, at the Festival of Harvest, plant the church.

They each speak in other tongues, other languages, the languages of the Jews and proselytes gathered in Jerusalem, so that they all heard—in their own native languages—the wonderful works of God. The purpose of the new tongues was that these people might hear of Christ Jesus:  His suffering, His death, His resurrection, His ascension, and His future return in glory to judge the quick and the dead. This is precisely what Peter preaches to them, the Holy Spirit working to cut these men to the heart, that they are the ones who, fifty-some days before, had called for the crucifixion of the Son of God. The solution? “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spiri (Act 2:38).

Luke tells us that those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them. About three thousand people received Peter’s word gladly. But it wasn’t Peter’s word they received. It was the Holy Spirit’s word, which was Jesus’ word, which was the Father who send Him’s word. About three thousand were baptized and received the Holy Spirit through baptism. They all received this gift. None, we are told, spoke in other languages as a result. The tongues had served their purpose. Even later in the book of Acts when the Spirit gives this special gift again, it is for the purpose of planting the church among the gentiles, and once the church was planted and the gift of the Holy Spirit given to men so that they, too, believed Christ’s word, the gift ceased. The tongues of fire, and the other tongues in their mouths, was not the point of Pentecost. The point is the Spirit, implanting Christ’s word in men’s hearts, so that they believe Christ, and believing Christ, love Christ and keep His word.

This is a far greater miracle than miraculously speaking in another language. Other languages can be learned with great effort, but no one can make themselves believe the gospel, or make someone else believe it. That is the chief miracle of Pentecost: that the Spirit creates faith in about three thousand men through the preaching of Christ’s word and baptism. The miracle is that sinners, who are by nature spiritually dead and cannot raise themselves, are raised to new life by the Holy Spirit. The miracle is that sinners, whose natural minds are enmity toward to God and cannot change their minds, are given new minds by the Holy Spirit. These, who had previously crucified Christ, now, by the power of the Holy Spirit, love Christ and His word, for Christ and His word forgives their sin and has made them new creatures. And what does Jesus say about the one who loves Him? From today’s gospel: “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.” As lovers of Christ, they keep His Word by believing it, treasuring it, and by avoiding everything contrary to it. As lovers of Christ and keepers of His word, they become temples of God, where God the Holy Trinity dwells in grace and mercy.

The miracle of Pentecost is one that continues to happen, even to this very day. Not the tongues. They’re unnecessary. If the Holy Spirit wanted us to have them, we would have them. No, the miracle of faith in our hearts, that the Holy Spirit implants faith in us through the preached word. The Holy Spirit works through Christ’s word to create new hearts within us, new minds, and new wills. It is the Holy Spirit’s work in baptism which gave us faith in Christ and rebirthed us as sons of God. It is the Holy Spirit’s work through Christ’s word that has preserved the faith He worked in us and strengthened it. We cannot do this of our own powers, minds, or wills. It is the Holy Spirit’s work, which He accomplishes through the word of God, that you believe Christ’s word, take Christ’s words to heart, and apply them to yourselves, because by the Holy Spirit’s work you truly love Christ.

There are many who say they love Christ, but don’t keep His words, treasure them, and avoid everything contrary to them. They imagine they can love Christ and love the world at the same time. They imagine that Christ can live in them even as they live as the unbelievers live. But Jesus says very plainly, “He who does not love Me does not keep My words.” The one who does not keep His word does not truly love Him. Jesus tells us this to warn us to remain in His word, keep it, and treasure it, so that we do not extinguish the fire of love which the Holy Spirit has kindled in our hearts. He tells us this to encourage us to continually hear His word, so that hearing the wonderful works of God that He has done for us in Christ, the Holy Spirit may preserve our faith in Christ and increase our love for Him. This is the miracle of Pentecost—then and now—that the Holy Spirit works through Christ’s word to make us Christians, new creatures of God who love Christ and keep His word, whose hearts are home to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Amen.

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

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Exaudi, the Sunday after the Ascension

Posted on May 12, 2024 by Pastor

1 Peter 4.7–11 + John 15.26—16.4

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

Jesus promises to send the Helper to the apostles. I mentioned this two weeks ago, but it’s worth recalling that the word translated “Helper” is paraklētos. A paraklētos stands by your side as an advocate, encourager, and guide. This is how the paraklētos whom Christ will send will help the apostles. The paraklētos Christ sends is from God the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father.” Christ promises, not human or created help, but God the Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father, whom St. Paul calls “the Spirit of His Son” (Gal 4:6) and “the Spirit of Christ” (Rom 8:9). When the Holy Spirit comes upon the apostles, Jesus says, “He will testify of Me.” They also will bear witness of Christ. because they have been with Him from the beginning of His ministry.  They will go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature, as Jesus commanded them in Mark 16:15. They will make disciples of all the nations by baptizing and teaching, as Jesus commands them in Matthew 28[:19-20]. For this task they will have the Helper, the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit will give them the words to say and inspire their preaching so that their words are the very words of God Himself. The Holy Spirit will also testify to Christ with signs and wonders, miracles, and various gifts He gives to the apostles. The special gifts the Holy Spirit gives them will confirm the gospel they preach and show that they preach and teach by God’s command and with God’s authority. We will see the first of these special gifts next week when we celebrate Pentecost. Many more afterward will follow, just as Jesus told them in Mark 16, and we see many of them in the book of Acts. Through the miracles the apostles perform, the Helper confirms their teaching so that all who hear it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe (1 Thess 2:13).

There is another reason Christ promises to send them the Helper. “These things I have spoken to you, that you should not be made to stumble.” Jesus has told them these things about the Helper—the Holy Spirit—because they will be opposed. Even though they go into all the world with the word of God, with the gospel of forgiveness, new life, and eternal salvation, there are forces at work which do not want people to hear of the forgiveness of their sins, the power by which to lead a new and altogether different life, and eternal blessedness. The devil, who was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, who is a liar and the father of it (Jn 8:44), will fight against their preaching of the truth. The world, which hates Christ because He testifies that its works are evil (Jn 7:7), will oppose them as they preach against its works so that people repent and turn to Christ.  The sinful flesh of men, which lusts against the Spirit and is enmity against God, will do all it can to silence their message of judgment against sin and salvation through Christ.

Their opposition isn’t just for show. The devil, the world, and the sinful flesh aren’t paper tigers. They will silence the apostles by any means necessary. “They will put you out of the synagogues.” This is more than being asked to leave. It’s excommunication, declaring them to be outside the church and outside salvation as long as they preach that faith in Christ alone justifies sinners before God. The opposition the apostles will face runs deeper though. “Yes,” Jesus says, “the time is coming that whoever kills you will thing that he offers God service.” Those who kill the apostles will imagine that to murder them is God-pleasing worship since they believe them to be excommunicated, heretics cut off from the true Israel of God. Why will they do this? “These things will do to you because they have not known the Father nor Me. They think they know the Father, but they only know an idol, a god who looks, thinks, and acts remarkably like them. Since the apostles’ gospel exposes their religion as idolatry, their piety as false worship, and their good deeds as sins, the apostles must be opposed to the point of death. “But these things I have told you, that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you of them.” It is as if Jesus were saying, “Do not be discouraged when you are opposed. Do not let your faith in Me stumble when they excommunicate you, murder you, and say all kinds of evil against you for My sake. For as it was for Me in this world, so it shall be for you, as well. So that you may not stumble, I send the Helper to you to witness of me.”

This is the apostles’ lot—and comfort—in this world. Ministers who faithfully follow the apostles share in this lot—and comfort—in their lives. Sometimes the world and false church use persecution to silence faithful ministers. They are ejected from congregations and excommunicated by synods for teaching the gospel: that faith alone justifies sinners before God, not any works of our own, nor any justification prior to faith. The world and false church do its best to marginalize faithful ministers so that people shy away from them as if they were spiritual pariahs on the one hand and ignore them as irrelevant on the other. It is as St. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 4:13, “We have been made as the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things until now.” But like the apostles before them, ministers know this may be part of the reward of faithfulness. Ministers must know this because otherwise they would stumble in faith, perhaps never to rise again, at the different forms of opposition, some active, some passive, they must face. Yet there is the promise of Jesus to send the Helper, the Spirit of truth, to bless the ministry—not with signs, wonders, and miracles, by working effectively in those who hear the word.

This is the apostles’ lot—and comfort—in this world. It is the faithful minister of the gospel’s lot—and comfort—in this world. And it is your lot—and comfort—in this world, dear saints. As Christians, members of Christ’s body, you, too, face opposition from the devil, the world, and your own sinful flesh. The devil, you know well, attacks you with all sorts of spiritual temptations to doubt God’s Word so that he may lead you into sin, and then if he succeeds, that he may lead you to despair of God’s mercy, so that, having stumbled, you refuse to rise in repentance and faith, thinking your sin too big for God to forgive. Then there’s the world which calls you ignorant and hateful because you won’t celebrate its sins as the height of virtue and affirm its wickedness as the pinnacle of truth. The world attacks the faith—and those who believe it—hoping to make you stumble in faith, perhaps to the point where you don’t rise again. Then there’s your own flesh, which lusts against the new man—and seeks to grieve the Holy Spirit and drive Him out by willful sinning.

But against all these opponents; against all their tactics and temptations, their leverage and lies, you have the Helper, the paraklētos, God the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit dwells in our hearts and makes us His temples, so that He might testify of Christ to us. He does this by calling to mind the divinely inspired witness of the apostles, whether we have read it or heard it preached. He dwells in us so that we stand against the opposition which the devil, the world, and our own flesh puts up against Christ, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ (2 Cor 10:5). The Spirit of truth dwells in our hearts by faith so that we may stand, as Peter says, serious and watchful in our prayers. The Helper dwells in our hearts by faith to increase His gifts in us, especially the gift of love, so that we have fervent love for one another, for ‘love will cover a multitude of sins,” that is, keeping our minds focused on loving our neighbor and therefore away from sinning, and also bearing with others in love, forgiving their sins against us as they repent. The Helper is given to us so that we may administer the gifts God has given us for the sake of others, so that that might speak to people truthfully and lovingly, and so that we serve one another with the ability which God supplies.

The devil, the world and false church with it, and our sinful flesh will continue to oppose Christ. If we are called to suffer for Christ’s sake, then let us suffer according to His good and gracious will. But whatever we suffer, and whatever Christ’s church suffers, we know beforehand that these things must be, for Jesus has told us beforehand. He has also sent the Helper to dwell in our hearts, so that regardless of the crosses Christ sends, we will not be made to stumble, but to stand. Amen.

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

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The Ascension of Our Lord

Posted on May 9, 2024 by Pastor

Acts 1.1-11 + Mark 16.14-20

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

Forty days after Christ’s resurrection He ascends to the right hand of God, the Father almighty. Being spatially minded people who are contained to a certain place at any given time, we assume that the right hand of God would be a spatial place, a location in heaven in which Christ now physically sits. But this is to think of Christ only in human terms and limit Him to a certain location. The Scriptures teach that the right hand of God is His power. The Lord says in Isaiah 48:13, “Indeed My hand has laid the foundation of the earth, And My right hand has stretched out the heavens; When I call to them, They stand up together.” His right hand—His almighty power—created the cosmos. After being saved from Pharaoh’s armies at the Red Sea, Moses sings, “Your right hand, O LORD, has become glorious in power; Your right hand, O LORD, has dashed the enemy in pieces” (Ex 15:6). The Lord’s right hand—His almighty power—saved Israel on that occasion and countless others. This is the right hand to which our Lord Jesus Christ ascends forty days after His resurrection. Not a specific place, as you are sitting that specific pew and I am standing in this specific pulpit. God’s right hand is His almighty power, as Jesus Himself told the Jews who tried Him, “Hereafter the Son of Man will sit on the right hand of the power of God” (Lk 22:69).

But didn’t Christ, being the eternal Son of God, already possess God’s almighty power? Wasn’t He fully God before He ascended into heaven? Of course. He is of the same substance as the Father as we confess in the Creed. St. Paul says in Colossians 2:9 that “in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” When Christ ascends He does so with the same body which He assume in the womb of Mary, the same body which suffered, died, and was buried. When Christ ascended it was with the same resurrected body which still had the imprint of the nails that Thomas had wanted to touch.   The ascension isn’t for the benefit of His divine nature. He possessed the full power of God by virtue of His divine nature already. The ascension is for the benefit of His human nature. For Christ never shed His humanity, having taken it up for our salvation. Nor will He ever shed His human flesh, for by assuming our flesh, and remaining in our flesh, He ‘brothers’ us so that our Advocate before the Father in heaven knows our weakness and thus intercedes for us. These two facts of the ascension are of utmost importance for our faith, first, that Christ ascended into heaven to sit at the right hand of God, that is, to be enthroned in the power of God and second, that He ascended into this as fully God and fully man.

St. Paul writes in Ephesians 4:10 that He who descended is also the one who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things. And there’s the mystery of the ascension. Christ ascended that He might fill all things. Since the two natures in Christ are inseparable, as we said a moment ago, that means that the human nature shares in the attributes of the divine nature, one of which is ubiquity, or omnipresence, or in today’s language, “He’s in all places at all times,” according to both natures. There’s the mystery. Christ is present everywhere according to both natures. He is among us according to His divine nature AND His human nature. Human reason scoffs at this because human nature is fleshly and carnal. Human reason cannot imagine a person who is not bound by location, a person who is not circumscribed to one place at a time. But this is why Christ can exit Joseph of Arimathea’s tomb without breaking the seal on the tomb or rolling the stone away. This is why Jesus, on the evening of His resurrection, can pass through the locked door which conceals His terrified disciples from the bloodthirsty Jews. Christ now fills all things according to His divinity and His humanity, because He is One Christ, not two Christs. He is one person with two natures and those two natures share their attributes with one another, just as they did during the days of His earthly ministry when He would heal the sick with word and raise the dead with the touch of His hand. This is the ineffable and unfathomable mystery of Christ’s ascension: Christ, according to both natures, is everywhere at the right hand of God.

But we cannot rejoice that our Lord is everywhere. Christ does not wish to be sought everywhere in His creation, under every rock and in every sunset. A wise man once quoted another wise man, saying, “A God who is everywhere is as good as a God who is nowhere.” If Christ had left His apostles without instruction, they surely would have looked for Christ under every rock and in every nook and cranny of the world. St. Paul is true that in Him we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28), but we cannot find Christ, according to either nature, in just any old place in all creation. People claim they can find God in all sorts of places. The golf course. The driving range. The church of St. Mattress of the Holy Pillowcase. And a host of other places. But a God who is everywhere is as good as a God who is nowhere. Christ is not to be found in any of those places. He is to be found in place where He said He would be, the place where His word is spoken over bread, “This is my body, given for you.” He is to be found in the place where His word is spoken over natural wine, “Take and Drink. This cup is the New Testament in my blood, shed for you for the remission of sins.” Christ is everywhere according to both natures, human and divine, and that precisely what allows His very body and very blood to be present on our altar this morning and every Lord’s Day.

The ascension takes Christ away from us physically. The apostles experienced this as they gazed up into the heavens as Christ ascends into the clouds. But before His suffering and death Christ left His Word with them so that they would know exactly where to look for Him. The ascension of Christ is what makes is possible for Christ to say, “This is my body” and have that bread be what He says it is. The ubiquity, the omnipresence of Christ according to His human nature, makes is possible for Christ to be physically present in, with, and under the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper. He does this so that He might always be present with His baptized ones to forgive their sins, to unite with them in the flesh, and to strengthen the faith He gives to them in Holy Baptism. In the Holy Supper Christ localizes Himself once again so that you know right were to find Him and so that you know exactly what He gives you. You don’t have to look under every rock of creation with uncertainty, “Have I found Christ, and if so, what can I be certain He is telling me in this rock, this sunset, this skyline, and the like?” There is no need to rush to and fro looking for Him, wondering what His will is for your life. In the Supper you see His holy will, how through the remission of sins He desires to break and hinder every evil counsel and will that does not want us to hallow God’s name or let His kingdom come. By giving you His true body and His true blood you see His will that He desires to strengthen you and keep you firm in His Word and faith until you die. A God who is everywhere is as good as a God who is nowhere. But a God who locates Himself in, with, and under bread and wine for you and your salvation, that is a God worth having. A God who would assume human nature only to shed it at His death, in His resurrection, or ascension, would not be a God worth having, for if He ever set aside His flesh He would cease to be our brother and advocate. But a God who assumes your human flesh so that He can bear all of your sin, your weakness, your fragility, and your sorrows, that is a God worth having for you know that He was made like you in every way, except without sin, so that He knows your temptations and still willfully forgives you when you confess your sins. Jesus is ascended to the right hand of the Father, but not for His own sake, but for your sakes. He ascends in triumph to be installed in the power of God the Father almighty so that His Words to you are true, the words which say, “Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age,” (Matthew 28:20) for your Jesus is not bound by location or time as you and I are. He is with you always, according to both natures, human and divine, and this is grasped only by faith. But He also promises to be with you physically in the Supper, for He has said, “This is my body” and “This is my blood.” Contrary to human reason, in opposition to fleshly imagination, and beyond all human explanation, your ascended Lord is present here today again in, with, and under the bread and wine to forgive your sins, to strengthen your faith, and to prepare your body for the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting. Amen.

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

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Rogate, the 5th Sunday Easter

Posted on May 5, 2024 by Pastor

James 1.22–27 + John 16.23-30

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

On the fifth Sunday after Easter, we are still in the upper room with Jesus, on the night in which He was betrayed, listening to Him teaches His disciples before He goes to the Father. Today, He teaches them to pray. He tells them, “In that day—that is, after He ascends to His Father—you will ask Me nothing. Most assuredly, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in My name He will give you. Until now you have asked nothing in My name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.” Jesus had taught His disciples to pray on previous occasions. He had given them the Our Father. They knew that to pray is to ask God the Father for the things they need—especially the things He has promised to give—to let their requests be made known to God as Paul says it in Philippians 4:6. But now He teaches them to pray in a way they had not done yet. They are to pray in His name.

To pray in Jesus’ name means to approach God the Father directly. Praying in Jesus name means we approach His heavenly Father because of His merits and for His sake. We cannot approach God the Father in our own name, as if we are worthy in and of ourselves to ask Him for what we need. Nor can we approach God the Father through the name and merits of the saints for the same reason. During their lives they approached God in Jesus’ name, and there’s no word of Scripture telling us ask them to approach God for us or alongside us.  Jesus gives us direct access to God the Father in His name, so that we can ask Him for what we need as dear children as their earthly fathers for good things. And we know that He hears us and will answer us precisely because we do not come in our own name, or in the name of any other, but because we come in the name of His only begotten Son whom He loves.

Praying in Jesus’ name also means that we pray as Jesus prayed during the days of His humiliation. Too often people hear Jesus’ words, “Whatever you ask the Father in My name He will give you,” and fasten their hearts on the word “whatever” and ignore the rest of the sentence. They imagine that God will give them whatever they want in this life. They approach God the Father as if Jesus had promised to give them whatever their heart desires: Health, wealth, and every good thing in this life. They imagine all they need to do is name it and claim it since Jesus has said, “Whatever you ask the Father in My name He will give you.” But to pray “in Jesus’ name” is not a magic incantation to twist God’s arm into give you whatever our hearts and flesh desires, so that health, wealth, and whatever else we desire will be given to us unconditionally. He promises to give us all we need for this bodily life, and we know that God gives daily bread even to the wicked and unbelieving. We ask for earthly things in prayer, but the earthly blessings we always ask for conditionally, like David did as He crossed the Brook Kidron, the leper in Matthew 8, and as Christ prayed in Garden of Gethsemane, “Nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will” (Matt 26:39). And we trust that whatever God’s will is for us regarding the things of this life, it is good and gracious.

We pray for daily bread conditionally because God hasn’t revealed His will about what He will give us today, but we pray for the spiritual blessings Christ promised unconditionally, since Christ has told us precisely what God’s will is when it comes to these things. God the Father wants to forgive our sins every day, so we ask confidently for mercy in Jesus’ name each day. He wants to give us His Holy Spirit so that we believe His word and live according to it, so we ask for the Holy Spirit. He wants to continually give us all things that pertain to life and godliness (2 Pt 1:3), so we ask, trusting that God has given us what we need in order to live a godly life, to daily put off the old man and live as the new man in Christ. To pray “in Jesus’ name” is to pray for the things He has promised to give, and He has promised these spiritual blessings, which are far greater than the worldly blessings He gives to believers and unbelievers alike. To pray “in Jesus’ name” is to pray for things as Jesus prayed for them, and even Jesus prayed for earthly things, “Thy will be done.” But when asking for spiritual blessings through Christ, we don’t say, “Thy will be done” because He’s told us that it is His will to give them to us, for He has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ (Eph 1:3).

Then Jesus says, “Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.” The joy that comes is not the joy of having received that for which you asked. That’s part of it, yes. Who isn’t joyful when they receive their request? But more than that, the joy that fills us is the joy of knowing that we have direct access to God the Father in Jesus’ name. This is something that we often take for granted, but if we truly think about what Jesus is promising, we cannot help but be filled with joy. He says, “In that day you will ask in My name, and I do not say to you that I shall pray the Father for you; for the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me, and have believed that I came forth from God.” We do not even need Jesus to pray for us! The Father loves us and wants to hear our prayers. This is not the agape love of John 3:16, “For so God so loved the world.” This is the love of friendship and enjoyment. He loves you in this way because you love His Son and know that Christ came forth from God. Because you love Christ by faith, God the Father loves you, dwells with you, wants you to ask for what you need, and wants to give it to you. We’re happy when we receive what we ask for, but we’re filled with joy when we consider that God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, loves us this way.

He even encourages us pray despise the fact that knows all things already, including what we will ask for in prayer. In the gospel for two weeks ago, when Jesus tells them about the little while in which they will not see Him, John tells us, “Jesus knew that they desired to ask Him, and He said to them, “Are you inquiring among yourselves about what I said?” (Jn 16:19). At the end of today’s gospel they exclaim, “Now we are sure that You know all things, and have no need that anyone should question You. By this we believe that You came forth from God.” Even though they know Jesus knows all things—including what they will ask for—Jesus tells them to ask. He removes the excuse the flesh makes when it says, “God already knows what I need, so there’s no point in praying.” Of course, God knows what you will pray for. David says in Psalm 139[:2,4], “You understand my thought afar off. For there is not a word on my tongue, But behold, O LORD, You know it altogether.” And though He knows even our thoughts, He commands us pray nonetheless, because He wants to hear us and because prayer exercises our faith in God’s promise to hear and answer us.

Against any excuse to not pray that the flesh may find, James reminds us in today’s epistle, “Be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” This applies to the entirety of God’s word. He tells us to keep all things He has commanded (Matt 28:20), so it applies to prayer, as well. Be a doer of the word. Be a pray-er. Ask God for what He has promised to give. If we hear Jesus’ promise, then go our way and only pray to Him in this place, we are like a like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. This is the very thing that we prayed for in the Collect of the Day. “O God, from Whom all good things do come, grant to us, Thy humble servants, that by Thy holy inspiration we may think those things that be right and by Thy merciful guiding may perform the same.” He guides our thinking through His word so that we do as James tells us: bridling our tongues, visiting the helpless in their trouble, and keeping ourselves unspotted from world. While these things are pure and undefiled religion—the outward, visible acts of piety God’s words directs us towards, they only flow from the internal religion—the fullness of joy we have because we have a God and Father in heaven who loves us, who dwells in us by faith, and who inspires us by His word to think those things which are right and God-pleasing, so that we do them.

“Whatever you ask the Father in My name He will give you.” This promise—and the joy that comes from knowing that God loves us because we love His only begotten Son—is more than enough to motivate us to pray each day in every temptation and trial, in every adversity and affliction. With this promise, in Jesus’ name and by His merits, “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb 4:16). Amen.

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

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Cantate, the 4th Sunday after Easter

Posted on April 28, 2024 by Pastor

John 16:5-15

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

On the night in which our Lord Jesus Christ was betrayed He tells His disciples He is going away. Naturally, this news saddens the disciples, for they had spent the last three years of their lives travelling with Jesus, listening to Jesus, and learning from Jesus. Jesus answers their sorrow. He says, “Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you.” Jesus goes to His Father, and the apostles will go into all the world, to preach the gospel of Christ. For that they will need the Helper. The word Jesus uses is paraklētos. A paraclete is someone who is called to be on your side, to be your advocate, who comforts and guides you. The Helper whom Christ will send is not a created helper, but the Spirit of truth, God the Holy Spirit.

How will He help them? “He will guide them into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell them things to come.” God the Holy Spirit will inspire these men’s preaching by giving them Christ’s words to speak, so that they speak the very words of God to men. The Holy Spirit will glorify Christ in this way, by taking the things of Christ—which are the things of the Father—and giving them to the apostles, so that the apostles will always have the things of Christ, the words of Christ, the teaching of Christ, to preach to men. They are to have no doubt that what they are preaching is God’s Word. Because Christ sends them the Helper, the Spirit of truth to takes the things of Jesus and give it to them, they are to have no doubt that their preaching pleases God.

They’ll need that comfort because the work the Holy Spirit will do through them is the work of convicting, or rebuking, the world. When the Helper has come, Jesus says, “He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” With these words Jesus shows us that the world and all that is in it, has the wrong idea about sin, righteousness, and judgment. If the gospel of Christ is to take effect in people’s hearts, the Spirit of truth must first open their eyes so that they everything world and their own flesh teaches them about these three things is false.

What does it mean that He will convict the world of sin? Jesus says, “Of sin, because they do not believe in Me.” Typically, the world thinks of sin as only the outward act. The world disapproves of insurrection, murder, adultery, theft, and slander. It doesn’t acknowledge that the inward desire to rebel or speak ill of others is sin. The world is incapable of admitting that the inward lust to commit adultery or take what belongs to someone else, is sin and should be corrected. These are natural impulses, the world says, and if a person doesn’t act on them and fulfill them, they’re still good people. But the Helper—the Spirit of truth—will convict the world for this lie. The inner desire is sin, and it all comes from one source: unbelief. The world does not believe in Christ. That’s why the world can go about setting up sliding scales of sinfulness based on human convention. Sin is not defined by what God says, but by what man says. And as you well know, man can change his mind, so that if enough people agree that what was previously viewed as sinful is no longer sinful, then what they previously viewed as sin, they now come to celebrate. The Spirit of Truth rebukes the world’s lies and condemns it for the chief sin, the fountain of all actual sins: unbelief. Because the world refuses to believe in Christ and hear His word, the world cannot do anything but sin.

What does it mean that He will convict the world of righteousness? Jesus says, “Of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more.” This is a cryptic saying. But when we consider that “going to the Father” is Christ completing His work and ascending, it becomes a bit clearer. Christ, by His perfect life and His innocent suffering and death earned perfect righteousness, and then goes back to the Father. Christ’s work was to live the perfectly under God’s law so that He might redeem those who are under the law. He shows us what true righteousness is. It is to love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself (Matt 22.37 ,39). Since we cannot do this by our own natural powers, since they are tainted with sin, Christ does this for us, so that who put their trust in Him, God counts as righteous with the righteousness of Christ.

The world has an altogether different opinion about what righteousness is. The world has always thought of righteousness as doing righteous things. Until recently decades, the righteous things the world praised happened, for the most part, to coincide with God’s moral law: Be a good person and treat others with respect. But in recent years, the righteous deeds the world praises are entirely different. In fact, it’s not even deeds so much as it is having the right opinion or this or that social or political issue. People judge the righteousness of others based on whether the support abortion, illegal immigration, homosexuality, and transgenderism, endless wars, and the like. The world has its sinful, godless agenda, and those who speak well of that agenda—even if they don’t lift a finger to advance it—are praised as righteous, good, and God-pleasing. Self-righteousness—based on God’s law or on man’s opinions—is the righteous of the world that the Helper rebukes as false and a lie.

What does it mean that He will convict the world of judgment? “Of judgment,” Jesus says, “Because the ruler of this world is judged.” The ruler of this world is the devil. He rules, not by right but because he usurped God’s rule by taking humanity captive through sin. The ruler of this world pronounces judgment on the things of God—the things of Jesus—calling the things of Jesus sinful, hateful, and unloving, while calling his things—sin and self-righteousness—good, empowering, and loving. The world—with its ruler—makes the wrong judgment and can only make the wrong judgment because both are enmity with God. The Holy Spirit rebukes the devil and the world’s judgment as false and deceptive. The Spirit of truth shows the world that it is driven by the spirit of error, and for its unbelief, false righteousness, and satanic judgments, must be convicted.

The apostles would need the Helper, the Spirit of truth, to preach the very Word of God to the world, to write the New Testament scriptures by the Spirit’s inspiration, and to stand firm under the world’s hatred at being rebuked. He promised them, “If I depart, I will send Him to you.” He fulfilled His promise on Pentecost, ten days after He went to the Father.  The Holy Spirit worked in men’s hearts through the apostolic witness and He continues to work in your hearts, and the hearts of all believers, through the preaching they left behind in their written witness. The Holy Spirit still works to convict the world of sin, righteousness, and ungodly judgments because He can only comfort those who have been convicted. He can only reconcile those who repent at His rebuke.

How does He comfort? How does He reconcile? By taking of what is Jesus’s and announcing it to you: Jesus’ perfect righteousness, Jesus’ atoning death for the sins of the world, Jesus’ having gone to the Father to fill all things and rule all things for the benefit of His Church—those who believe in Him. We are in the world, no longer of the world, because we have been baptized and believe. But because the sinful flesh remains in us, we still, at times, believe the world’s lies and submit to its unbelief, self-righteousness, and false judgments. And when we do, the Holy Spirit convicts us of the unbelief, the self-righteousness, and the desire to agree with the world’s judgments. By this He shows us His love, as well as the love of the Father and the Son, for the Triune God does not want us to be swept away with unbelievers, but that He wants to convict us so that He might comfort us with the all the blessings Jesus has earned for us. And so that we remain in this comfort, and fight against the world and our flesh’s unbelief, false righteousness, and unjust judgments, Christ gives us the Helper to help us live in godliness. The Spirit—the paraclete—is sent to you for your help, for your comfort, and to guide you, not with world’s things, not even with His own, but with the things of Jesus. Amen.

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

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Jubilate, the 3rd Sunday after Easter

Posted on April 21, 2024 by Pastor

1 Peter 2.11–20 and John 16.16–23a

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

Today’s gospel lesson—and the gospels for the rest of the Easter season—takes us back to the night in which Jesus was betrayed. Jesus taught His disciples many things on Maundy Thursday, especially about what His death, resurrection, ascension, and what life would look like afterward. Today hear Jesus teach them, “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.” The disciples don’t understand this and ask about it among themselves. What does He mean that He goes to the Father? But they seem especially hung up on the three words—which is only one word in Greek—“a little while.” John directs our focus to this words by the way he records the entire conversation. “A little while” is used seven times.

What does Jesus mean, “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?” The little while of which He speaks is His three days in tomb. This is the little while in which the disciples will not see Him. But after that little while they will see Him again because He will rise from the dead on the third day, as He had told them on several occasions during His ministry. He tells them, “Most 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 into joy.” This is how it happened. Once Jesus is arrested later than night, the disciples fled from Him. Peter wept in repentance over the fact that, relying on his own strength, He publicly denied Christ three times. They all lamented the fact that their Lord was taken from them and crucified. While they were filled with sorrow the world rejoiced. Jesus said in John 7:7 that the world “hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil.” The world—including the self-righteous Jews which plotted His execution—rejoiced because it had succeeded in silencing the One who exposed it’s evil and condemned it’s works, it’s ways, even showing that its righteousness is worthless in God’s sight.

But this is how Jesus goes to the Father. His body is laid in the tomb by Joseph and Nicodemus, but His spirit goes to God the Father in paradise, having completed the work the Father sent Him to do. He accomplished the atonement of mankind, earning the forgiveness of sin for all who believe in Him. He lived perfectly in God the Father’s sight so that He might give His perfect righteousness to everyone who puts their trust in by Him by the power of the Holy Spirit. His death is how He goes to the Father. But this is only to be for a little while. He comes back to the disciples by rising from the dead. He does this to conquer death so that He has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep (1 Cor 15:20), a sign and pledge that all who belong to Christ by faith will be raised on the Last Day. It’s His return to life—His resurrection—that puts an end to the disciples’ sorrow and turns it into joy. It isn’t only the joy of seeing their Lord again in the flesh. It’s the joy that although there is suffering and the cross to bear, these only last a little while, and once the little while is over, there is eternal joy that no one will take from them. It is similar to a woman in labor. She experiences the sorrow of delivery, but the moment she hears her baby crying, all the sorrow turns into an unfathomable joy.

Jesus says, “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.” If a woman’s sorrow turns to joy—a joy which no one can take from her—how much more will the disciples’ joy be theirs in a way that no one will able to steal from them? The world, which rejoiced at Jesus’ suffering and death, will not be able to take it from them. That’s saying something, considering how much hatred the world had—and still has—for Christ. The world will hate these men as it hated—and still hates—Christ, for Christ chose them out of the world to be His apostles, to be His witnesses, to preach the gospel to all nations. The world will do everything in its power to silence them as it had Christ. But it doesn’t matter; “To live is Christ, and to die is gain” for those whom He has called out of this world (Phil. 1:21). Suffering and cross, affliction and death, will not take the joy of Christ from them; the joy that Christ has gone to the Father, having earned forgiveness, new life, and salvation for believers; the joy that Christ lives—never to die again—and reigns over all things for the good of those who believe in Him.

This joy is yours, too. You have not seen Christ in the flesh as His disciples did because He ascended to the right hand of God—God’s power—”that He might fill all things” as Paul writes in Ephesians 4:10. But you will see Him when He returns in glory. In spite of not having seen Jesus in the flesh, this joy is yours because you believe the apostles’ witness about Jesus. You have the joy of knowing that, for Christ’s sake, you have a God who is for you, not against you. You have the joy of knowing that, for Jesus’ sake, you have a God who will forgive your sins as often as you confess them to Him. You have the joy of knowing that you are temples of Holy Spirit so that you can fight against temptation and live as God’s children, following the example of our older brother in the flesh, our Lord Jesus. You have the joy of knowing that your loved ones who have died in the faith live with God even now, and will rise again with all believers on the Last Day. You have the joy of knowing that although the world hates you because you believe Christ and strive to live a godly life, Christ has overcome the world by dying to it and rising to new life, so that even if the world demands that you suffer for Christ’s sake, even that you die, it doesn’t matter. “To live is Christ, and to die is gain” for those whom He has called out of this world (Phil. 1:21). No matter what things you must suffer in this life for the sake of Christ and His word, “In all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us” (Rom. 8:37). This is our joy that no one can take from us.

This is why St. Peter writes to you as sojourners and pilgrims, people chosen out of this world. Because of this joy which no one can take from you, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. Fight sin in your mortal body and take every thought captive to Christ. Behave yourself honorably among the gentiles—unbelievers— that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they observe, glorify God in the day of visitation. This even means submitting ourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake. As it was then, so it is now. Unbelievers look for any reason to disbelieve the gospel and accuse Christianity of trying to subvert the State. In our day it seems like some of the governing authorities want Christians to rise up against them. Peter reminds us that Christians submit to governing authorities, the only exception being in they command us to sin. Peter reminds us that we are sojourners and pilgrims here. We are not interested in setting up the kingdom of God on earth, though many Christians in our day imagine that that is the answer to the societal rot they see all around them. The joy of the gospel fills our hearts so that we submit ourselves to every ordinance of man, because the Lord is the one who has put the governing authorities over us. The joy of the gospel doesn’t look for God to establish His kingdom here on earth. It looks for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3:13). And if, in this little while in which we live, must suffer, let us suffer wrongfully, rather deservedly, on account of conscience toward God, not on account of sin.

But whatever crosses and suffering the Lord lays upon us, we can endure them with the joy of the gospel, the joy that no one can take from us. We know, first, that our trials last but a little while. God will turn our sorrow into joy. He does this sometimes in this life and when He does, we give Him thanks. But as Christians, we know that no matter what He allows to happen to us, no matter what we must endure as sojourners and pilgrims on earth, no matter how He calls upon us to suffer for His sake, it will be followed by the everlasting joy of going to Father in everlasting blessedness. This is the joy of the gospel which we possess now, by faith, and will enjoy in eternity by sight. Amen.

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

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Misericordias Domini, the 2nd Sunday after Easter

Posted on April 14, 2024 by Pastor

1 Peter 2.21-25 & John 10.11-16

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

“I am the good shepherd.” With these words, Jesus separates Himself from all the wicked, lazy hirelings who had assumed they were good shepherds. Jesus speaks these words to a group of Pharisees, men who thought of themselves as shepherds of Israel in the same vein as Moses and Aaron, David, and the prophets. They were not the shepherd of God’s flock, though. They were hirelings, wageworkers who didn’t care for the sheep because the sheep weren’t theirs. They were no better than the false prophets and elders of Israel who shepherded Israel before the exile, whom the Lord condemned through the prophet Ezekiel. Like those Old Testament hirelings, they eat the fat of the sheep and clothe themselves with the wool. The weak they did not strengthen with the gospel. They did not heal those who were sick with sin but taught them to rely on their own works. They did not bind up the broken with God’s promise of mercy. They didn’t bring back those the world had driven away, nor did they seek the lost sheep who had strayed from the flock by sinning. Instead, these men ruled over the flock of Israel with force and cruelty, teaching the commandments of men as if they were the doctrine of God, enriching themselves and their egos at the expense of people of God’s pasture and the sheep of His hand.

“I am the good shepherd,” Jesus tells them. What makes Him the good shepherd? “The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.” The Pharisees—who sat in Moses’ seat as the self-appointed teachers of Israel—did not give their lives for the sheep. Theirs wasn’t a ministry of service to the sheep. They didn’t defend the flock from the wolf, which signifies every spiritual danger to God’s flock: sin, spiritual death, and the devil. These men were unwilling to put themselves between the flock and the wolf to save the sheep. The hireling, Jesus says, “who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them. The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep.” When the wolf came they fled, so that sin, spiritual death, and the devil were allowed to devour the Lord’s lambs and maim the members of His kingdom. These men fled because strengthening the weak with God’s promises, healing the sick with the promise of God’s mercy, binding up the broken, and going after the scattered and lost was just too much work. They styled themselves shepherds of Israel, but they only deserved the name “hireling.”

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.” Jesus does not come as a hireling. He is the good shepherd. He sees the wolf coming—sin, death, the power of the devil—and doesn’t run. He puts Himself between the wolf and His flock. This is what David had done as a shepherd. When he stepped forward to fight the giant Goliath, he told king Saul, “Your servant used to keep his father’s sheep, and when a lion or a bear came and took a lamb out of the flock, I went out after it and struck it, and delivered the lamb from its mouth; and when it arose against me, I caught it by its beard, and struck and killed it” (1 Sam. 17:34-35). Jesus is the Son of David, the new David, whom God promised shall feed Israel and be their shepherd (Ezek. 34:23. Like His ancestor David, Jesus stepped forward, placing Himself between the wolf and sheep. But unlike His ancestor David, Jesus allows Himself to be devoured by the wolf. He was reviled by sinful men in order to pay for our reviling of God and our neighbor. He was insulted to atone for every sin with which we have insulted God’s holiness. He Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree (1 Pt. 2:24), allowing the wolf to destroy Him, so that He might rescue all who believe in Him from the jaws of that wolf. The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep. But Jesus is no hireling. He is the good shepherd. He knows His sheep and is known by His sheep, and they know Him as the Son of God, whom the Father knows from eternity and who knows the Father from eternity, because He is of substance with the Father. This one, the Son of God Himself, who lays His life down for the sheep.

Jesus not only lays His life down for the sheep. As the good shepherd, He gathers His sheep—believers—into His flock—the Holy Christian Church. He says, “Other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.” Who are these other sheep? The gentiles. Jesus, as the good shepherd, lays His life down to atone for our sins and takes back up His life on the third day so that He might justify believers and bring them into His fold. The weak of faith He strengthens with His Holy Spirit. Those sick with sin He heals with forgiveness. The brokenhearted He binds up with His peace. Those who are driven away by falsehood He brings back with His truth. Those who have been lost because of their sins, He seeks with repentance and the promise of mercy. He does this first with His disciples after His resurrection. Then He sends them into all the world as His undershepherds. The apostles and the minsters that follow after them do this work of shepherding, not by compulsion but willingly, not for dishonest gain but eagerly; nor as being lords over those entrusted to them, but being examples to the flock (1 Pt. 5:2-3). Every minister whom Christ calls—unless He be a hireling in His heart—shepherds Christ’s flock, not His own, and follows Christ’s example of laying down His life for the sheep, giving of Himself so that the Lord’s lambs might be fed and protected.

And as ministers, as Christ’s undershepherds, are to follow in the steps of the good shepherd, all of us, as His lambs of His flock, are to follow the example He left us. Peter says, “For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps.” We often think of following in Jesus’ footsteps as living as Jesus lived. But Peter specifically encourages us to follow in Jesus steps by suffering as He suffered. Everyone wants to avoid suffering at all costs, but those who following a suffering Savior know to say with St. Paul in Acts 14:22, “We must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.” While we aren’t to go looking for crosses to bear and impose suffering upon ourselves, when God lays the cross on us, when He sends afflictions, we aren’t to try to throw off the cross or wiggle free from the affliction He sends. We are to endure it patiently, following the pattern Christ established:  ‘Who committed no sin, Nor was deceit found in His mouth’; who, when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when He suffered, He did not threaten, but committed Himself to Him who judges righteously; who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness — by whose stripes you were healed. For you were like sheep going astray, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

When God lays the cross upon us—which is suffering specifically for the sake of Christ and His word—we do not bear it alone. When God afflicts us in our body, mind, or life, or when He afflicts us in the body and mind of a loved one, we do not bear the affliction alone, for we have, by faith Christ’s suffering and death, returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls. As the shepherd and overseer of our souls, our Lord Jesus Christ leads us through every cross and each affliction. Sometimes He lifts the cross from our shoulders. Sometimes He removes the affliction from us or our loved one. But that is not how He leads us as our good shepherd. In the midst of every suffering, He makes us to lie down in the green pastures of His word and leads us besides the still waters of all His promises, so that by His gospel promises He may restore our souls. He leads us in the paths of righteousness, for we have died to sins and unrighteousness. He comforts us in the valley of the shadow of death by the fact that He has walked this valley before—and lives! He protects us from the wolves which seek to devour us—our sin, the world, and the devil—and even prepares a table in the presence of our enemies, with a cup of blessing which overflows with consolation. He is not a hireling. He’s in it for the long haul because He cares for the sheep. He knows His sheep and His sheep know Him because He has laid down His life for the sheep, and taken it up again, so that they might have live eternally in His fold. Amen.  

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

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