Small Catechism: The Ministry of the Keys

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Sermon on the Chief Parts of the Catechism, Part 5

2 Samuel 12:1-15 +  Matthew 16:13-19

The Fifth Chief Part of the original Small Catechism was simply entitled, “How the simple should be taught to confess,” providing Christians with a basic outline of what private confession should look like. It assumes that Christians are going regularly to confession, as had been the practice in the Church for centuries by Luther’s time. It also assumes that Christians already know about the authority of a minister to pronounce absolution in God’s name. Later generations added a preface to that, dealing specifically with that authority that God has given to His ministers, which we call “the ministry of the Keys.”

Let’s start with that. We’re talking here about the Keys of the kingdom of heaven, which Jesus spoke of in Matthew 16, which you heard this evening. Jesus had asked His apostles, Who do you say that I am? Peter answered for them, saying, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. That’s when Jesus said to him, Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

Jesus describes here what the “keys” are that He promised He would give to Peter. They’re the authority to “loose” a person from his sins, or “bind” a person to his sins. Now, He’s not talking here about sins people commit against one another. Each person has the right to forgive sins committed against himself. When someone sins against you, you have the “right” to give forgiveness to the person or to withhold it, the right to stop holding that sin against them or to keep holding that sin against them, as far as you’re concerned. Now, if the person comes to you in repentance and you choose to withhold forgiveness, then that’s how God will treat you when you come to Him in repentance, so you’d better be very careful if you want to refuse your forgiveness to the penitent. But you still have the authority to refuse it.

No, what Jesus is talking about here is the authority to forgive sins committed against God, the authority to speak for God in either absolving (or loosing) a person from his sins, or to refuse forgiveness, with the assurance that God in heaven is acting through these keys, either forgiving or retaining sins, unlocking or locking heaven to a person.

To whom has God given this authority? In every case where Jesus speaks of it, He’s speaking to His twelve (or eleven, or ten) apostles. Here in Matthew 16, He’s addressing Peter, who has just answered for the other disciples. But He repeats it to all of them in Matthew 18, and again in John 20, after Jesus rose from the dead, where Jesus breathed on His ten disciples (the eleven minus Thomas) and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit! If you forgive the sins of any, to them they are forgiven, and if you retain the sins of any, to them they are retained. The “power” or “authority” of the keys was given to the ministers of the Church at that time, just as the command to baptize was given to the eleven apostles. In fact, baptism itself is one of the uses of the Keys to forgive sins, as is the Lord’s Supper, as is the preaching of the Gospel in general. This is what the office of the ministry is primarily for, for men on earth to forgive sins in the name of God, with the full authority and approval of God. That’s why we call the ministry of the Word the Means of Grace, because the God attaches His promises of grace to Word and Sacrament, persuading us to believe what He promises and so to receive the promised gifts. The Lord Christ authorized the original ministers to act in His name, and then, through the call of the Church, He authorizes more and more ministers to go forth and act in His name and by His authority.

But God’s authority also comes with God’s instructions. God doesn’t authorize ministers to forgive whomever they please or to refuse forgiveness to whomever they please. He has instructed them to forgive those who repent and look to Christ for forgiveness, just as He has instructed them to refuse forgiveness to the impenitent and unbelieving. When ministers act according to God’s command, then we should believe with the certainty of faith what we confess in the catechism section on the ministry: I believe in what the called ministers of Christ do among us, by His divine command—especially when they exclude public, impenitent sinners from the Christian congregation, and when they absolve1 those who repent of their sins and are willing to mend their ways—that it is all as valid and certain in heaven also, as if our dear Lord Christ did it Himself.

So a minister first uses the key of forgiveness on a person in Holy Baptism as the personal application of the forgiveness of sins. He uses them in the Lord’s Supper. He uses them in a general way, by preaching the Gospel. And he may also use them in the private setting of confession and absolution.

Going regularly to private confession was never commanded by God. It wasn’t even practiced in a widespread way for the first few hundred years of the Church’s existence. It became more common, but still optional, in the 5th through 9th centuries. It grew in use until the year 1215 when, at the Fourth Lateran Council, it was first required to be practiced by Christians in the Roman Catholic Church at least once a year, where people had to list every sin for which they wanted forgiveness. Then, in the centuries leading up to the Reformation, it became more common for priests to require it as a condition anytime someone wanted to receive Communion.

That was the practice Luther inherited. And he didn’t entirely reject it. Instead, Lutherans confessed in the Augsburg Confession: We also retain (private) confession, especially on account of the absolution, as being the word of God which, by divine authority, the power of the keys pronounces upon individuals. Therefore it would be wicked to remove private absolution from the Church.

So, as Lutherans, we retain private confession, but not as a requirement. One could argue that requiring private confession, at least occasionally, made more sense in the large churches they had 500 years ago, where the pastors had much less individual interaction with most of their members. But even now, in our small congregations, our members should know that they can sit down with the pastor anytime they want and confess, in confidence, the sins that are weighing on their hearts, so that they can receive, one on one, both the word of absolution and personal encouragement and guidance from God’s Word. At the same time, that one-on-one setting allows the pastor to tend his sheep better, to find out about the struggles his sheep are facing, and to make sure that they aren’t going astray in any direction but are staying on the narrow path toward the heavenly pasture.

In any case, the Fifth Chief Part of the catechism provides us with a simple format for private confession, similar to what we use on Sundays in our general confession, where confession consists of two parts: First, that a person confesses his sins. Second, that a person receives the absolution or forgiveness from the minister, as from God Himself, not doubting, but firmly believing that his sins are thereby forgiven before God in heaven. Because, as we said, the forgiveness that the minister gives is not his personal forgiveness, but God’s own forgiveness, given by God’s command, given through means, given through a humble servant of God, so that his words carry the full weight of God’s own words: And I, by the command of our Lord Jesus Christ, forgive you your sins, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit! Amen.

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Bread with a higher purpose

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Sermon for Laetare – Lent 4

Galatians 4:21-31  +  John 6:1-15

A lot of people are giving up bread these days as part of their diet. And not just those who have a gluten allergy or an intolerance for wheat. A lot of people are giving up bread altogether, because of potential contamination with harmful chemicals, or because of all the starches and carbs it has, or because some of them hold to a paleo, evolutionary view that man was never meant to consume grains or the breads that are made from them.

From a Biblical perspective, bread itself is a good thing, a gift of God, something for which we are taught to ask for in the Lord’s Prayer, something for which we ought to give thanks to God, even if there’s something wrong with some people’s bodies that makes it impossible for them to eat it.

But, bread can also become harmful if a person consumes too much of it. It can even become an idol, if a person becomes too focused on it, if he becomes more interested in acquiring bread for his body than he is in serving God with his body, or than he is in feeding his soul. As Moses said to the Israelites, as Jesus later said to the devil, Man does live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Here “bread” represents food of all kinds. The body needs food. It has a purpose for sustaining our bodies. But man is more than the body. We’re body and soul creatures, and the soul needs to eat, too. And in today’s Gospel, we see a higher purpose for the bread that Jesus provided, although that purpose was not fulfilled for everyone who ate.

The feeding of the five thousand took place at a time when Jesus was trying to get away from the crowds for a little while. He had gotten into boat with His disciples and crossed the sea to a deserted place. But the multitudes had seen Him leave and had left on foot to meet Him on the other side of the lake. John tells us why they pursued Him: Because they saw all the signs He was doing and they wanted to see more. And they wanted to have their bodily illnesses healed. Mark’s Gospel tells us that Jesus had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd, wandering aimlessly, attracted by the “flashing lights”—by all the miracles Jesus was doing.

So, as the other Gospels tell us, Jesus spent the rest of the day teaching them and healing their diseases. And when evening came, Jesus had one more lesson to teach, both to His disciples and to the crowd—a lesson that centered on bread. After all, as John tells us, Passover was near. Passover—and with it, the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

People’s minds should have been wandering over to that important annual celebration, just as most of us think about and plan ahead for Christmas, and (hopefully) also Easter, weeks in advance. Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread—a reminder of God’s physical providence in redeeming Israel from slavery in Egypt, of the unleavened bread they ate in their haste to leave, and of Moses leading them through the wilderness where God provided bread for them every day in the form of Manna, teaching them to rely, not on their own strength to provide for themselves, but only on God and His Word, for everything. But the Passover was also a reminder of God’s spiritual providence in His promise to redeem Israel by the blood of Christ, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, the Prophet who is greater than Moses, who would offer the true Bread from heaven, the sustenance that mankind needs most of all: Himself as the one Mediator between God and man. There it is again: bread for the body pointing to a higher purpose for the soul.

First, Jesus tests Philip and the other disciples. Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat? They looked to their own ability to buy bread and they knew immediately that they couldn’t possibly provide it. All they found was a boy who had five loaves of bread and two small fish, but, “What are they among so many?” They’re nothing, in the hands of men. But in the hands of the Son of God, they’re more than enough.

Jesus had His disciples seat the people on the grass—5,000 men, plus women and children. Then He took the boy’s bread and fish, gave thanks to the Father for providing this good food, and then started handing out bread and fish to the disciples, and the disciples to the multitudes, and the food just kept coming. All 5,000 ate their fill, with twelve baskets of broken pieces left over, enough to feed still others when they got back to town.

Yes, man does live on bread. That’s how God designed us. But who provides it? Where does it come from? It comes from God the Father; it comes through Jesus, the Son of God and the Word of God. It comes from God usually through parents or through hard work. But God can also rain bread down from heaven or multiply what’s in the pantry, if that’s how He has to keep His promise to provide for His people. Recognize God as the source of your bread. Recognize Jesus as the Giver. And receive your daily bread with thanksgiving. Receive it with gladness. Enjoy it while you have it, and share the leftover pieces with those who need it.

But recognize that bread has a higher purpose than just sustaining your body. It sustains your body so that you can stay alive long enough to be brought to faith in Christ Jesus! It sustains your body so that you may have the chance to hear God’s word, so that you can receive God’s teaching about sin—your sin, and the sin of everyone else, and the sin that has corrupted even nature itself, the sin that will result in the death of your body and the destruction of this earth. Your soul needs to feed on God’s teaching about His grace—His gracious plan of salvation through faith in Christ Jesus, His gracious acceptance of all who believe in Christ, His gracious gift of His Holy Spirit to begin a new obedience in the Christian, His gracious help in bearing the cross each and every day, until you reach the goal of the undying life.

Tragically, the multitudes in our Gospel today fixated on bread for its own sake, most of the Jews at that time did, who wanted to stick with Hagar, if you recall the Epistle today from Galatians 4. They wanted to stick with “Jerusalem below,” with the First Covenant of the Law, focused on a living a good life here on earth, instead of the Second Covenant of grace and of the Promise of forgiveness and eternal life through Christ. The people in our Gospel believed that Jesus was the Prophet who was to come, but what most of them wanted from and expected from the Christ was an earthly king to fill their bellies with bread, to fight their battles with political opponents, to give them social justice, a pleasant and comfortable earthly life. As it says at the end of the Gospel, the people who ate the bread were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king. And so, as we learn from the rest of John 6, those very multitudes pursued Jesus to the other side of the lake on the next day, and then quickly abandoned Jesus when He refused to give them more bread, when He insisted on offering them Himself instead, as the living Bread who came down from heaven who would give His very flesh and blood to reconcile them with God and to bestow on them, not an extended earthly life, but an eternal heavenly one.

Like those crowds, people today are happy to follow Jesus, if it’s the Jesus who gives away free things—material things, who gives them a better life, who makes them feel good. They’re happy to have a Jesus who didn’t create the world, who doesn’t demand any sort of obedience or worship. They’re happy to follow a Jesus who does only the things they think He should do, who works together with other religions to solve social problems, who would never pass judgment. Such a Jesus the people of this world might have for a king.

But the real Jesus appeared, teaching that He is the Creator of all, and the Judge of all, the only true God, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, the One who came to call poor sinners to repentance and to terrify the impenitent with the fiery judgment that awaits. The real Christ came to suffer the judgment we deserved for our sins and to offer forgiveness of sins and eternal life to the penitent and believing. The real Christ calls people to repent and be baptized. He calls them to sit at the feet of the pastors whom He has sent, just as He didn’t distribute the bread and fish to the people directly, but through the hands of the apostles. He calls Christians to be active in a church that teaches His truth purely, to receive His very body and blood in His Sacrament, and to recognize His Word and Sacraments as the true food for the soul and as the source of a life that’s so much bigger than what we can see here.

That Jesus was not accepted then, and He still isn’t accepted now—not by most of the world, even by most of your neighbors, even by many churches that bear His name.

But, by the grace of God, you know better, don’t you? Look to the Lord Jesus for daily bread and receive it from Him with thanksgiving. But remember that the bread He provides serves a higher purpose. Look to Him for the higher things, for the things that last: for the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation which He earned for you through His suffering and death, and which He now hands out for free in His Word and Sacraments. Then and only then will you be able to “rejoice with Jerusalem,” not with the earthly Jerusalem that rejects Jesus’ word, but with the Jerusalem above, which is the home of all the blessed who are saved by faith alone in Christ Jesus alone. Amen.

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Small Catechism: Holy Baptism

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Sermon on the Fourth Chief Part of the Catechism

2 Kings 5:1-14  +  Matthew 28:16-20

The first three chief parts of the Catechism teach us (1) about God’s commandments for how His people are to live; (2) who God is, what He has done, is doing, and will do for us; and (3) how God has taught us to pray to Him, and the things for which we should ask. The last three chief parts teach us about three specific ways in which God interacts with us, three gifts He has given to us in the Christian Church. The first of these is the Sacrament of Holy Baptism.

First, let’s define a “sacrament.” The word isn’t in the Bible. When Lutherans use the word “sacrament,” we’re talking about outward ceremonies that God has established and commanded, ceremonies in which some earthly element, like water, is used, ceremonies to which God has attached a promise to do something for us, namely, to forgive us our sins and to save us from sin, death, and the devil.

And so we turn, first, to the first sacrament, the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. There are four parts to the catechism-explanation of Baptism. First, What is it?

Christian Baptism is always a washing with water. It’s always a “water Baptism.” The Evangelicals have tried to separate “Spirit Baptism” from “water Baptism,” placing a much greater emphasis on “Spirit Baptism.” But, to be blunt, they don’t know what they’re talking about. We’ll get back to that in a moment.

For now, understand that, when we talk about Christian Baptism, Holy Baptism, we’re always talking about water. But not plain water, not just any use of water. The Greek word itself, “baptism,” can be used for any washing. It can refer to dipping someone or something in water, as Naaman dipped himself seven times in the Jordan River in the first lesson you heard this evening, where the Greek word for “dipped” is actually “baptized.” But it can also refer to sprinkling water or pouring water, or to the ritual washing of hands, pitchers, cups, or couches. In those cases, a “baptism” is just a washing with water.

But actually, in Naaman’s case, it was more than that, wasn’t it? Because his washing in the Jordan River was done at the command of God. God, through the prophet Elisha, told Naaman to “go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and you shall be clean.” So Naaman’s washing was done at God’s command.

So it is with Holy Baptism. It’s the water included in God’s command and connected to God’s word. Our Lord Christ says to His apostles in the last chapter of Matthew, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” The eleven apostles received the command and authorization from Jesus to baptize, and they, in turn, along with the rest of the Church, later ordained other ministers to carry out this important command. Meanwhile, “all nations” are the ones who are to be baptized, just as Peter commanded the crowds in Jerusalem on the Day of Pentecost, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you!” God has commanded the washing of Holy Baptism.

Second, What does Baptism do? As Luther says in the explanation of the catechism, it works forgiveness of sins, delivers from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation, to all who believe this. This is very important: Baptism does something. Look at what happened with Naaman. God had promised, through Elisha, that washing seven times in the Jordan River would result in his being cleansed of leprosy. When Naaman finally gave in and washed himself according to God’s command, he was cleansed! Because God promised to do something miraculous for him through that simple washing.

So it is with Holy Baptism. God promises to do something through this simple washing. Repent and be baptized, Peter said in Acts 2, for the forgiveness of sin. Arise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, said Ananias to Saul. Baptism now saves you, Peter declares in 1 Peter 3. He who believes as is baptized will be saved, says the Lord in Mark 16. You are all sons of God through faith in Jesus Christ, for as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ, says Paul in Galatians 3. God promised physical cleansing to Naaman in that one-time baptism-like ceremony he was to undergo in the Jordan River. He promises to give spiritual cleansing and even greater spiritual blessings to all who are washed in Holy Baptism, no matter where they are or who they are.

But faith is required in order for a person to receive the promised blessing. Baptism works salvation…to all who believe this. Naaman didn’t have a strong, unwavering faith in God’s promise, but it took at least a little faith to do what the prophet had told him to do, or else he wouldn’t have dipped in the Jordan those seven times. So Jesus also says, not, “Whoever is baptized shall be saved,” but, “Whoever believes and is baptized shall be saved.”

Third, How does Baptism do all this? It isn’t the water that does it. All the power is in God’s word and promise. With the word of God it is truly a Baptism—a water of life, rich in grace, and a washing of regeneration in the Holy Spirit. Faith comes by hearing, because the Spirit of God is at work in the word that’s preached. So, too, the Spirit of God works in the word that’s preached in connection to water. The word of God says to a person, “Be baptized and have your sins washed away!” And the Holy Spirit convinces the person that, yes, God will do as He has promised. So the person proceeds to the washing of Baptism, takes God at His word, and is born again of water and the Spirit, having his sins washed away.

Let’s get back to “Spirit Baptism” for a moment. The Spirit is and has always been at work where the Word of God is preached. But the original “Baptism with the Holy Spirit” took place on the Day of Pentecost when the Spirit was “poured out” on the believers in Jerusalem. That Day of Pentecost was unique. It doesn’t keep recurring. What does keep happening is the giving of the Holy Spirit to the baptized in connection with Holy Baptism. As Peter said at Pentecost, “Repent, be baptized…and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Not necessarily the outward, miraculous gifts of the Spirit, but the Spirit Himself dwells in and with the baptized believer, so that St. Paul can say to each baptized believer, Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God?

And that leads us to the fourth part of Baptism. What continual significance does Baptism have in the life of the baptized?

It signifies that the Old Adam in us should, by daily contrition and repentance, be drowned, and die with all sins and evil desires, and that a New Man should daily emerge and arise again, to live forever before God in righteousness and purity.

We’re only baptized once, because Baptism is like being born. It can’t be repeated. It’s God’s adoption ceremony, an initiation ceremony into the New Testament and into the Holy Christian Church, our initial being clothed with Christ Jesus in the sight of God. It doesn’t erase or remove the sinful nature, the “Old Adam” that we’re all born with. It covers it. It adds something to it. It creates a second nature, a new nature, a “New Man” within the Christian. And it’s the New Man in us whom God calls on continually to “walk with the Spirit.” The Holy Spirit dwells alongside the New Man in us, constantly urging him to drown the Old Adam by daily contrition and repentance, so that the Old Adam dies with all his sins and evil desires. At the same time the Holy Spirit coaxes and guides the New Man to emerge and arise daily, to live before God in righteousness and purity, now, in this life, and forever in the life to come.

That daily dying to sin and arising from the grave to live a new life is pictured in Baptism. Remember, Baptism is not only a picture or a symbol; it actually does some amazing things. But it is also a picture or a symbol, a picture of dying and rising again. God calls on you, His baptized children, to live each day in your Baptism, to count yourself as dead to sin but alive to God in Jesus Christ, our Lord, remembering that it was through Baptism that God united you to the death of Christ, buried you with Christ, so that you may also arise each day and walk with Him in a new life, the new life that began with, the new life that still receives its power from, the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. Amen.

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Hear and keep the word of the Stronger Man

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Sermon for Oculi – Lent 3

Ephesians 5:1-9  +  Luke 11:14-28

There were at least three beliefs about Jesus floating around Israel as He carried out His earthly ministry. He’s either out of His mind, or He’s working with the demons, or He’s the very Son of God. Believe it or not, it was His own earthly family who thought, for a time, that He was out of His mind. St. Mark tells us that in His Gospel just before he records the same events you heard in today’s Gospel from St. Luke. The scribes and Pharisees thought He was in league with the demons, as you heard in today’s Gospel. And, as St. Matthew records this same event, there were still others who believed that Jesus was the promised Christ, the Son of David, the very Son of God. But what those people thought about Jesus isn’t nearly as important today as what you think about Jesus, what you believe about Jesus, because the only way you escape the devil’s control and the devil’s kingdom is by believing in Jesus as the Son of God, as the only One who is stronger than the devil.

Jesus was casting out demons again as our Gospel begins. This one was both blind and mute, holding the poor possessed man in a terrible state of isolation. Jesus used no incantations, no sacred objects, no magic spells. He didn’t even command the demon to depart “in the name of God.” He did it in His own almighty name, and the demon had to obey. That display of divine power caused some in the crowd to conclude, “Could this be the Son of David?”

But the scribes and Pharisees were quick to dissuade those people from believing in Jesus. He casts out demons by Beelzebub, the prince of demons. Why did they think that? Well, they saw supernatural power at work, and there are only two sources of supernatural power: God (who also empowers His holy angels), or the devil and his demons, who still retain some of the power God gave them in the beginning, before they turned against Him. The unbelieving Jews just couldn’t accept that Jesus was the very Son of God, just as they couldn’t accept His word which declared that all men, including them, were in need of a Savior from sin, because no one is good enough to earn his own salvation. Since they rejected Jesus’ word, they saw Him as a false prophet, in league with the devil, while they viewed themselves as being on God’s side.

But Jesus showed them how absurd their accusation was. (Worse than absurd, actually, because by claiming that Jesus’ power was from the devil, they were actually committing blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, because it was the Holy Spirit of God who was the One who was truly at work in Jesus’ miracles, and they were branding Him “Beelzebub.”)

His first argument was this: Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to ruin, and a house divided against a house falls. If Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you say that I cast out demons by Beelzebub. It was foolish to claim that Satan was helping Jesus to drive out Satan. That would show division among Satan’s ranks, weakness, and it would mean that his kingdom would soon self-destruct, just like any kingdom or house divided against itself eventually does (which makes one wonder how much longer our own divided country can possibly survive!). But Satan’s kingdom isn’t divided. He and all his demons are united in their love for wickedness and in their war against God and against the people of God. Satan’s kingdom is strong. He’s strong. And his kingdom will not self-destruct. The only way for men to be rescued from Satan’s powerful kingdom is if someone comes in from the outside, someone stronger than Satan, someone who actually has our best interests at heart. That’s Jesus.

He continues His argument: And if I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? So they will be your judges. But if I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. When a strong man, well-armed, guards his palace, his possessions are secure. But when a man who is stronger than he comes against him and overcomes him, he takes from him all his armor in which he trusted and divides the spoils. To me, it seems clear that what Jesus means is that, although some of the Jews were going around attempting to cast out demons, they weren’t very successful. But Jesus was, every single time! That proved that He was using not the power of the devil but the “Finger of God” to cast out demons, which Matthew’s Gospel identifies as the Holy Spirit. His power over the demons was not proof that He was working under the devil. It was proof that He was stronger than the devil. Only Jesus was able to rescue people out of the devil’s kingdom.

And the same is true today. Whether the devil holds people under his direct control or whether he simply counts them among his children who are trapped inside his kingdom and, therefore, outside the kingdom of God, he and his demons are just as powerful today as they ever were. His grip on mankind remains firm, and his lies are potent. Look at how he deceives the nations! Look at the rising violence and addiction in the world, the widespread acceptance of wickedness and the widespread rejection of truth. Look at how the witness of the genuine Christian Church has been all but silenced. All this is Satan’s doing, aided by his demons and helped along by his allies among men. How can the Church prevail in the midst of all this? How can anyone still escape from the devil’s grasp? Only if there’s Someone stronger than the devil at work, Someone who actually has our best interests at heart. That’s Jesus.

And there’s no in between when it comes to Him. As He says in the Gospel, Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. You’re either with Him by believing that He is the very Son of God and by keeping His Word, or you’re against Him, in league with the devil. You’re either gathering with Him, confessing Him before men as the very Son of God so that they come into His kingdom, or you’re scattering people, pushing them away from Him by promoting Him as anything less than the very Son of God.

Here I’d like to share with you a wise observation from C.S. Lewis, because, apart from the three reactions to Jesus that we mentioned above, which Lewis also mentions here as real possibilities, there is a fourth, absolutely ridiculous attitude toward Jesus that is very common today, just as it was common in 1952, when Lewis wrote these words. It’s the perception of Jesus as a great moral teacher who is not the Son of God. As Lewis writes, “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Jesus: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.” (C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity). You’re not rescued from the devil’s kingdom or protected from the demons by having nice thoughts about Jesus, by thinking highly of His moral teachings, or by picking and choosing which doctrines of Scripture you’ll believe or discard. Only faith in Christ Jesus as true God and true Man, who bore our sins, suffered and died for them, and rose again from the dead, only faith in His promise to deliver us from the devil’s kingdom will actually result in a person being rescued.

But even after being rescued, there is still a risk of being recaptured! Whenever an unclean spirit goes out of a man, it goes through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, it says, ‘I will return to my house out of which I came.’ And when it arrives, it finds the house swept and put in order. Then it goes and brings seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and dwell there. And the last state of that man is worse than the first.” What does it mean that a demon goes back and finds its house “swept and put in order”? It means that the person who was at first rescued from the devil allows a vacancy to remain in his heart. Maybe he’s straightened up his life. Maybe he’s not indulging in open wickedness anymore. But unless the Word of Christ dwells in a person richly, unless the Spirit of Christ dwells in a person’s heart by faith, he remains vulnerable to the devil’s attacks.

So what to do? Jesus tells us in the final words of today’s Gospel. And it happened that, as he spoke these things, a certain woman from the crowd raised her voice and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts at which you nursed!” But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it.” There it is. That’s the recipe, that’s the answer. That’s how to fill your heart so that the devil has no room to get in. Hear the word of God and keep it. It’s a simple thing, really, but it’s also a lifelong thing, to keep hearing God’s Word, and not just the verses you happen to like, but the whole thing, the whole of Scripture, and the preaching of it which God’s ministers provide, if they are faithful. And not only to hear it, but to ponder it, think about it, and then “keep” it. Treasure it. Hold it close. Do what it says. Or, as St. Paul put it in today’s Epistle, Be imitators of God. Walk in love. Walk as children of light. Then you will be blessed, happy, fortunate, enviable, because where the Word of God is heard and kept, there is the Spirit of God, and the Father, and the Son, making their home with the one who believes. And where God is—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—there the devil has no power. May the word of Christ dwell in you richly, that you may know Jesus rightly, follow Him steadfastly, and be preserved from every evil. Amen.

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Small Catechism: The Lord’s Prayer

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Sermon on the Third Chief Part of the Small Catechism

1 Chronicles 29:10-18  +  Matthew 6:5-15

In the Ten Commandments, we learn the will of our God for His children, the rules of His house, while we remain on the earth. In the Creed, we confess who our God is and what He has done and still does for us and for our salvation. In the Third Chief Part of the Small Catechism, we learn how to pray to our God in the Lord’s Prayer, and from what better place could we learn it than from the Son of God Himself?

It seems that the Lord Jesus taught His disciples this prayer on at least two occasions, maybe more. You heard the context of the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew’s Gospel just a moment ago. In Luke’s Gospel, where the Lord’s Prayer is also recorded, the context is much simpler. One of Jesus’ disciples came to Him with a request: Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. And the Lord proceeded to teach them the Lord’s Prayer.

In Matthew’s Gospel, it’s given in the context of the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus begins by teaching His disciples two ways not to pray. Not like the hypocrites, who are more concerned about looking good before men then about approaching God with genuine faith and with sincere requests. No, don’t pray like that, Jesus says, not to be praised or honored among men. And not like the “heathen,” that is, the pagan Gentiles, who repeat little mantras or phrases over and over, as if their gods would only listen if they said the right words enough times. No, don’t pray like that, Jesus says, as if you had to inform God of your needs and then coax Him to help with endless repetitions.

Instead, He says, pray in this way:

Our Father, the One who is in heaven. We call this the “address” or the “invocation” part of the Lord’s Prayer. And right away, Jesus makes it clear who can pray in the first place. Only the children of God can pray, or at least, pray successfully. God is the Creator of all, but He is not the true Father of all, because all men are born in sin, born outside the family of God, hostile to the true God, unable to fear Him, to love Him, or to trust in Him, and, therefore, unable to pray to Him, even as He is unwilling to listen to the prayers of His enemies. But, to those who believe in the name of Christ Jesus, the Son of God, He has given the right to become children of God. When we come to the Father through Jesus, He wants us to know that our prayers are acceptable to Him, because we are acceptable to Him, through our faith-connection to Jesus, who is the most acceptable of all. He wants us to know that He claims us and loves us as His own children. And so, by teaching us to pray to “our Father,” Jesus is teaching us, as beloved children of God, to ask our beloved Father for certain things—seven of them, in fact, expressed in the seven petitions of the Lord’s Prayer.

The First Petition: Father, may Your name be hallowed or “sanctified” or “made holy.” Your name is already holy, already set apart from every other name. But we ask in this petition that it may be kept holy among us also, in two ways. First, help us treat Your name as holy and sacred by making sure that Your name is taught purely among us. Second, help us to treat Your name as holy and sacred by making sure that we, as Your children who bear Your name, lead holy lives according to Your Word. Our Father’s name is blasphemed and profaned among many who call themselves Christians, through false teaching, which keeps people from knowing God rightly, and through the openly wicked lives that some Christians lead, which also sends the wrong message about who God is and what it means to be His children. So it’s vital that we pray for our Father’s help, so that we may bring glory to His name by our teaching and by our living—glory, and not disgrace.

The Second Petition: Father, may Your kingdom come. It already comes, where and when the Spirit of God wills. It would come whether we prayed for it or not. But here we ask, Father, may it come to us also. Grant us Your Holy Spirit, to dwell in our hearts as individuals, to dwell among us as a church, so that by Your grace we may believe Your holy Word, and lead godly lives, here in time, and there in eternity. Help us to submit to the kingship of the Lord Jesus. Keep us in His kingdom. Use us to spread His kingdom in the world. And may His kingdom, His holy Church, prevail against the very gates of hell, so that the devil’s kingdom may finally be crushed to pieces as the kingdom of Christ fills the world.

The Third Petition: Father, may Your will be done here on earth, among us, Your children, just as it’s done above in heaven by our cousins, the holy angels, whose every thought, whose every intention is to serve You and do Your will, as You have revealed it to us in the Holy Scriptures. And, at the same time, break and hinder every evil plan and every evil will—like the will of the devil, the world, and our flesh. They would keep us from hallowing Your name, Father. They would prevent Your kingdom from coming among us through their lies and through their temptations. Hinder them, and strengthen us, and keep us steadfast in Your Word and faith until the end. And to all our prayers and petitions, Father, when we ask for things You haven’t promised to give, let it be understood that we ask not for our will, but always and only for Your will to be done.

The Fourth Petition: Father, we ask You, again today, for our daily bread. It’s a simple request to give us what we need to sustain our earthly life, whether it’s food or drink, or clothing, or shelter, or the people we need in our lives so that we can flourish. Father, You know what we need better than we do. You know what we need even before we ask. So take our petition for daily bread as a thanksgiving, because we acknowledge that all we have comes from You, and we trust in You to determine what we need and to give it to us each and every day. We ask only for what we need today, Father, trusting that tomorrow is in Your capable hands.

The Fifth Petition: Father, we know and confess to You that, even though You have made us our children and have forgiven us our sins in Holy Baptism, we are not worthy of anything for which we ask, nor have we earned it, for we daily sin much and surely deserve nothing but punishment. But as Your dear Son has instructed us, we ask again today that You would forgive us our trespasses and sins, only on the basis of Your grace and goodness. And since we know that You have commanded us to truly forgive from the heart those who sin against us when they come to us in repentance, we will do it. We ask only that You would forgive us in the same way.

The Sixth Petition: Father, lead us not into temptation. We know that You never lead anyone into sin, but we ask in this petition that You would guard and keep us so that the devil, the world and our flesh may not deceive us, nor mislead us into false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice; and although we are often troubled by these things, we ask that You would lead us safely through all the temptations and make us victorious in the end.

The Seventh Petition: Father, You know that we are surrounded by evil in this world. Some of it we see and feel, much of it happens behind our backs and without our knowledge. There are so many threats to our bodies and souls, such powerful forces, raging against us that we could not hope to survive on our own. And so we pray, deliver us from evil in this world, from every sort of evil of body and soul, of property and honor; and finally, when our last hour comes, grant us a blessed end, and graciously take us from this valley of sorrow to Yourself in heaven.

Some (but not all) Greek texts of Matthew 6 also include a beautiful doxology, a word of praise to conclude the Lord’s Prayer—words which we are happy to include, even though they aren’t included in the Catechism: For Yours, Father, is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever. We know, dear Father in heaven, that these petitions are acceptable to You and are heard by You; for through Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, You have commanded us to pray in this way and have promised to hear us. And so we conclude our prayer today, Amen, Amen, Yes, yes, it shall be so! And we’ll say the same thing again when we say this prayer tomorrow. Amen.

 

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Faith overcomes all the demons

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Sermon for Reminiscere – Lent 2

1 Thessalonians 4:1-7  +  Matthew 15:21-28

We met the chief demon in last week’s Gospel, the devil himself, also known as the tempter and Satan. This week, we meet lesser demons in the Gospel. But they’re no less harmful. We meet a woman from outside of Israel whose daughter is severely tormented by demons. Demons can afflict people in various ways. In some cases, they’re able to completely possess an unbeliever’s body, and it’s likely that the Canaanite woman’s daughter had been an unbeliever, as that woman herself likely was for much of her life. But demons also have ways of tormenting believers, influencing believers, and, most certainly, tempting believers to sin, and they already have a strong ally in our own sinful flesh.

But the devil’s temptations often become God’s tool for saving people. What the devil does to destroy us and to separate us from God, God uses to bring unbelievers into contact with Him so that, sometimes, they become believers. As for God, He tempts no one, but He does test His children, even as He tested His own Son in the wilderness, in order to strengthen us, to build up our perseverance and character, to bring us closer to Him and His Word, and to accomplish other purposes that we may never even know about. So the temptations and the testing continue in today’s Gospel. They were brutal. And what was it that overcame all the temptations and testing? What was it that overcame the demons? Faith. Faith overcomes all the demons.

The Gentile woman and her daughter from the region of Tyre and Sidon (to the north of Israel) almost certainly started out as unbelievers, who had been raised their whole lives to worship idols, to believe falsehoods, and to live in sin and depravity. That was their upbringing. But when the woman’s daughter was attacked by the demons, it caused her to go looking for help. And we can surmise from her behavior in the Gospel, and from the way she addressed Jesus as “Son of David,” that she had learned about the LORD God of Israel, and of His promises to send the Son of David, the Christ, as a mighty champion, as the one who would save Israel, but whose salvation extended beyond the borders of Israel. She had learned, even in her foreign country, about Jesus and His goodness and power. She had heard that He was the promised Messiah. And faith came by hearing. Faith overcame her pagan heritage and her unchurched upbringing and the demonic lies that she had believed her whole life. See how already the Lord was turning the torments of the demons into something beneficial!

When the woman heard that Jesus had entered her territory, outside of Israel, she knew she had to find Him and seek His help. She cried out to Him over and over again, “O Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is dreadfully tormented by demons.” You might think that the Lord would have jumped at the chance to help her. But sometimes faith needs to be exercised and stretched so that it grows, or else, if it always gets what it asks for immediately, it may well shrivel up and die. So Jesus tests her new-found faith by not replying to her. He said not a word in reply. Surely the demons were there, tempting the woman to doubt His kindness, to doubt His mercy—as you also may be tempted to doubt when God doesn’t seem to reply when you pray to Him for help. But faith overcame the demons, and she just kept crying out for help.

Then another test to her faith arose, this time from Jesus’ own disciples. As she kept crying out for mercy, Jesus’ disciples came and begged him, “Send her away! She is crying out after us!” Surely the demons were there, tempting the woman to take offense at the disciples’ unloving behavior, at their heartless indifference to her suffering, tempting her to despair of Jesus’ help and to run away in shame—as you also may be tempted to turn away from God when other Christians behave badly, as they sometimes do. But faith overcame the demons, and she stayed right where she was, without anger, without despair, ignoring the behavior of the disciples, focusing only on Jesus, still expecting to receive from Him the help she so desperately needed.

Jesus then responded, but not in a positive way. He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Now, how to understand those words? Well, Jesus was sent first to the house of Israel, to gather their lost sheep, the ones who had fallen away from the faith and needed to be brought back. 99% of His earthly ministry was devoted to serving the people of Israel, because that’s what He had promised in the Old Testament to do for them. But the Old Testament had prophesied that He would also gather people from the Gentiles into His kingdom. And He had already helped other Gentiles by this point in His ministry. How would the woman understand His words? Surely the demons were there, tempting her to take His words as a dismissal, tempting her to despair, tempting her to give up on God, or to find some sort of sinful racism in Jesus where it didn’t exist—even as the demons may tempt you to think that Jesus came to help everybody except for you, either despairing of His help or charging Him with unfairness. But faith overcame the demons, and the woman fell down before him, saying, “Lord, help me!”

Jesus replied with one final test. He answered, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Clearly He was referring to the Jews as the children and to the Gentiles as the dogs. It isn’t right to take the mercy that was promised to the Israelites, that was intended for the Israelites, and redirect it to the Gentiles. But, of course, that reply implies that God’s mercy is limited! And it isn’t! As the Scripture says, The Lord’s mercies are new every morning. Great is His faithfulness! His mercy endures forever. Still, the demons were surely there, tempting the woman to become indignant with Jesus, tempting her to take offense at being compared to a dog, tempting her to become jealous of the people of Israel who got to sit at God’s table as His children—even as they may tempt you to give up on God’s mercy, or to become jealous when it seems as if God favored other people over you. But, once again, faith overcame the demons, and the woman walked through the door Jesus had left open for her, Yes, Lord. But the dogs do eat from the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.

Then, finally, after the woman had passed all the tests, after faith had conquered every demon, Jesus spoke those words of praise that He had only spoken once before, also to a non-Jew, Great is your faith! And because faith stayed attached to Jesus, glued to Jesus, as it were, the demons who were torturing the woman’s daughter were also overcome. “Let it be done for you as you wish.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

Jesus’ praise of that woman’s faith overcame still other demons that were tempting Jesus’ disciples and would tempt Christians in the future. The Jews—the children sitting at the table!—were regularly tempted to see the Gentiles as inferior, to treat them like dirt, and to praise themselves for being life-long law-keepers. The disciples might have been tempted to dismiss the Gentiles, to ignore them at best or to mistreat them at worst. But Jesus’ praise of this Gentile woman would ring in their ears in the years to come, because they had seen and would continue to see that very few in the house of Israel showed the kind of great faith that the Gentile woman showed in today’s Gospel, and none of them were praised as directly by Jesus for their faith as she was. And so this brief encounter recorded in today’s Gospel has been responsible for overcoming untold numbers of demons over the ages, whenever the demons have tempted Christians to look down on another person for their race, their heritage, their background, or their upbringing. The Holy Spirit shows that great faith can dwell in anyone, and where faith in Jesus exists, there is no longer Jew or Greek, male or female, slave or free—or black or white or rich or poor—for all believers are one in Christ Jesus.

In today’s world, the kind of unwavering faith shown by the woman in today’s Gospel, the kind that withstands temptation and that holds up under testing, is extraordinarily uncommon, and, as a result, the demons are having their way among men, whether by internal possession, or external oppression, or the influence toward violence, or the instigation to disbelieve God and to believe any and every lie. Worse still, the demons are having their way among many who call themselves Christians but who refuse to submit to the Bible’s teachings, or who insist on living in sin, causing the witness of the Christian Church in the world to be stifled or skewed, or even to become an anti-Christian witness. The demons are powerful, and they will not be overcome by unbelief. They will not be overcome by false doctrine. They will not be overcome by a tepid or timid faith. But, as we learn in today’s Gospel, they will be overcome—all of them—by a faith that clings steadfastly to Christ and His Word. They will be overcome if you fix your gaze on Christ Jesus, hold fast to His word, endure testing with patience, and wait expectantly for His help to come. Then you will see what the woman in the Gospel saw, that faith overcomes all the demons. For, as St. John writes, whatever is born of God overcomes the world (and the demons with it). And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. See to the strengthening of your faith by immersing yourself in the Word of God and by receiving His Sacrament often, and may God, who is faithful, grant you a firm and steadfast faith, the kind that is fixed on Jesus and His mercy toward sinners. Against such a faith, the demons don’t stand a chance. Amen.

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The Apostles’ Creed

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Sermon on the 2nd Chief Part of the Small Catechism

Isaiah 42:1-9  +  Colossians 1:12-23

The Second Chief Part in the Small Catechism is the Apostles’ Creed. A creed is a statement of faith, what a Christian should and does believe. The Apostles’ Creed wasn’t put together or approved by the apostles, or by a Church council. It was put together, starting in the second century, as far as we can tell, for practical reasons, as a way of teaching new converts the basics of the Christian faith, so that, when they were baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, they knew the God into whose name they were being baptized.

So the Creed has three parts or “articles,” one for each Person of the Holy Trinity, each of whom is credited as having a primary role in certain aspects of our salvation.

In the first article, God the Father is emphasized. We believe in Him as the Almighty Creator of heaven and earth. Implied in that belief is the acknowledgement that the account of creation in the book of Genesis is historical and true, that the whole universe, all things, visible and invisible, had a beginning and were created in six literal days, that all life, whether plant or animal or human (or angel!), comes from God, and that man is the crown of His creation, that the human race was (originally) made in His image, according to His likeness, with a rational soul and with a perfectly good and righteous character.

We also believe that God the Father preserves His massive creation, but all for the benefit of a single planet, the one we call “Earth.” (And yes, we say that, even knowing how vast the universe is. God’s creative focal point was always Earth.) He holds it all together and causes it to keep functioning according to the laws of physics that He wrote into His creation. God’s work of preservation includes providence, as He continues to provide for all His creatures the things that we need to sustain this body and life. It also includes protection, as the Father sends forth His angels to shield us from harm and to guard and protect us from all evil, not because we deserve it, but because our Father is good and kind toward all that He has made.

But when you say in the Creed, “I believe in God the Father,” you don’t just mean that you accept these facts as true. You’re saying, “I believe in this Father who has done all these things for His creatures, including me, and I recognize that I owe Him my thanks, and my praise, and my obedience.”

But, as we know, mankind has not been obedient. Mankind quickly turned away from thanking and praising and worshiping God, to seek out his own, sinful path. And so, instead of wiping us out or condemning us to an eternity in hell, God the Father is credited with something else: He planned already in eternity to send His beloved Son into the world to redeem fallen mankind, and then He carried out that redemption in time. That’s the theme of the Second Article of the Creed.

In the second article, God the Son is emphasized, who is both true God and true Man. True God, as we heard in the reading from Colossians, the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. Firstborn, not in the sense of being the first thing created, but in the sense of being “born,” not created,” the firstborn (or, as He’s called elsewhere, the “only-begotten” or “only Son”) of the Father, through whom and for whom all things were created. But to redeem fallen mankind, the Father sent His Son into human flesh, to be born of the virgin Mary. When you say in the second article that He is “our Lord,” you’re telling the world that you not only know who Jesus Christ is, but that you acknowledge Him to be your Lord and Master, whom you love, whom you serve, to whom you owe your undying allegiance, to whom you owe your very life.

And why do you love Him? And why do you owe Him your life? Because you know Him as your Redeemer, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried, so that He might purchase and win you from all sin, from death, and from the power of the devil, not with gold or silver, but with His holy precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death.

But, of course, your Redeemer didn’t stay dead. His state of humiliation ended with His burial. But then the Father exalted Him. He descended into hell to preach His victory to the spirits imprisoned there, and He rose from the dead on the third day, and ascended into heaven, and sat down at the Father’s right hand to reign over all things until He comes again in glory, at the end of the age, to judge the living and the dead.

And what was His goal in becoming your Redeemer? His goal wasn’t to set you free and then leave you be. No, He redeemed you that you should be His own, that you should live under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness, just as He is risen from death, lives and reigns forever and ever.

But what is His kingdom, and how do you come into it, and where does it all lead? That’s the theme of the Third Article of the creed.

The Third Article focuses on the Holy Spirit and His work of sanctification. People are not automatically saved just because Jesus died for their sins and rose again. We’re saved by our faith-connection to Jesus Christ. But faith is something we’re born without. In fact, we’re incapable of it by nature. By our own reason and strength we are unable to believe in Jesus Christ or come to Him.

And so the Lord Jesus, as He reigns at the Father’s right hand, sends the Holy Spirit into His Church, to call people through the preaching of the Gospel: Repent! Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved! The Spirit is the One who enters our hearts through the word that’s preached, enlightening our eyes to see Jesus as our Savior from sin, death, and the devil. When that happens, the Spirit gives us new birth and sanctifies us, setting us apart from the sinful world and bringing us into Christ’s holy Church. He gathers all those whom He has enlightened and brought to faith into the Holy Christian Church, the communion of saints throughout the world, where the Gospel is rightly preached, where the Sacraments are rightly administered, where, through the ministry of Word and Sacrament, He continues to enlighten us with His gifts, forgives us our sins richly and daily, keeps us with Jesus Christ in the one true faith, and abides with us to turn us into holy people who are progressively molded into the image of Christ, our Redeemer.

And where does it all lead? It leads to the Last Day, when our bodies will be raised from the dead and transformed into glorious bodies, like that of the risen Lord Jesus. And then we who have been sanctified by the Spirit in this life will go into the life everlasting, where we’ll live in the presence of our God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, forever and ever.

These are the basics of our Christian faith. These are the things that every true Christian believes. These are the things that we stake our lives—our very souls—upon. So, with the catechism, let us always boldly and gladly confess the Creed, and, after each article add a heartfelt: This is most certainly true! Amen.

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A great High Priest who was tempted as we are

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Sermon for Invocavit

2 Corinthians 6:1-10  +  Matthew 4:1-11

It says in the book of Hebrews: Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Those words look back, in part, to today’s Gospel, where we watch Jesus, our great High Priest, enduring the temptations of the devil during His forty-day fast, being in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. And as a result, we can now approach God the Father through His Son Jesus Christ, our great High Priest, as someone who can sympathize with us in our weaknesses, as someone who, through His victory over temptation, both earned for us mercy (the forgiveness of sins) and gives us the grace to withstand in the day of temptation.

After His Baptism, where Jesus, our great High Priest, was anointed and placed into office by God the Father, He was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted. His being tempted was an essential part of God the Father’s plan for Him. Not that God tempted Him; the devil alone did that. But since the devil had had so much success against the human race, going all the way back to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, it was essential that the Son of Man also be made to confront the devil, to see how He would do. Would He stand? Or would He fall, like the rest of mankind has always done? If He stands, He is qualified to be the great High Priest who offers Himself as the sinless sacrifice for the sins of the world, and who will forever stand before God the Father as the one priestly Mediator between God and man, between God and sinners. If He falls, at any point, then mankind belongs to the devil forever. There is no other plan for our salvation.

Let’s walk through the three temptations that are recorded for us in the Gospel.

The first temptation is a temptation to doubt God’s goodness. It comes at the end of Jesus’ forty-day fast. He’s hungry, starving, even, and the devil tries to take advantage. If You are the Son of God. You’ll notice, the devil begins two out of the three temptations with that “if You are the Son of God” condition. It was about 40 days earlier, when Jesus was baptized, when, you remember, God the Father spoke from heaven and proclaimed, “This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased.” “Well, if that’s true,” the devil implies, “then You should get some special privileges, like tapping into Your power as the Son of God to turn these stones into bread for Yourself. Wouldn’t that be nice? You haven’t eaten in over a month, right? You could have food right now, this very minute. You’re entitled to it. Right?”

It’s eerily similar to the devil’s temptation of Eve in the Garden, where he tried to convince her that she deserved to have that piece of fruit that was just hanging there in front of her eyes. God had no right to keep it from her. She was entitled to it—even though God had given her all the other fruit in the garden, and every possible gift and blessing was at her fingertips, except for this one thing that God hadn’t given her: the forbidden fruit.

Hasn’t the devil approached you in similar ways, holding forbidden fruit before your eyes, tempting you to doubt God’s goodness, trying to convince you that you’re entitled to things that God hasn’t provided for you (in spite of all that He has provided for you), persuading you to become discontent with what you have, to believe that, somehow, God owes you? “Don’t focus on Him. Focus on your hunger! Focus on your need! Steal, if you need! Fight, if you need to! (Forget the fact that the fruit is forbidden!).”

Turning stones into bread to feed Himself was forbidden to Jesus. He was sent to live in humility, like the rest of us. He was expected to depend on His Father for providence, just like the rest of us. He knew it would have been “cheating” to use His divine power to provide for Himself. Now, Jesus could have argued with the devil. But, instead, He chose to answer the temptation very simply, with the written word of God. It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Moses spoke those words to the Israelites, reminding them why God had caused them to wander in the wilderness for forty years: And you shall remember that the Lord your God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and test you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord. Jesus, too, had to be humbled, and tested. But unlike Israel, He never complained. He never grumbled against God. He waited patiently for His Father to provide, and so He passed the test and defeated the temptation.

In the second temptation recorded in Matthew’s Gospel, the devil tempts Jesus to doubt His Father’s word—just as he had done with Eve in the Garden of Eden. He took Him up to a high point on the temple and said, If you are the Son of God, cast yourself down! For it is written, ‘He will put his angels in charge of you,’ and, ‘In their hands they will lift you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ Yes, the devil can use God’s word. He can pretend to go along with what God says. That should serve as a sobering warning for us, because many people use God’s word today for evil purposes, just as the devil did with Jesus. The devil didn’t quote Psalm 91 to get Jesus to trust in His Father. He quoted it so that Jesus would doubt His Father and put His Father’s word to the test. Would He really keep His word and send His angels to rescue Jesus, if Jesus jumped down from the temple? Only one way to find out!

Hasn’t the devil tempted you in similar ways to doubt the word of God? Did He really create the world in six days, as He said? Was the world really destroyed in a flood? Did Jesus really rise from the dead? If only you could find some proof, something tangible, something scientific! Or, maybe worse, he uses God’s word to lead you into false belief, as he tried to do with Jesus, so that you misinterpret God’s word, so that you end up believing something that God never intended, and then stake your life on it. He never intended, for example, for His promises of angelic protection to lead His children to needlessly endanger their lives.

But Jesus, our great High Priest, knew His Father’s word well enough to stand up to the devil’s temptation. It is written again, ‘You shall not test the Lord your God.’” Again, He was quoting Moses, who was warning the Israelites not to repeat their past sins of testing the Lord, as they did early in their journeys when they angrily demanded that Moses give them water to drink—as if God had to prove His faithfulness by giving in to their demands. Jesus refused to do such a thing. He would trust in His Father’s word and in His Father’s faithfulness—blindly, if necessary. Nothing His Father said could ever be false, could ever be wrong. And so He passed the test and defeated the temptation.

Finally, the devil tried to get the Son of Man to abandon God altogether so that He could have everything a man could ever want—riches, power, fame, and fortune, the world itself—and have it easily at that, without having to work for it or earn it, or suffer for it, just by switching sides from God’s side to the devil’s side. All these things I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.

Hasn’t the devil approached you with similar temptations? Have the job or the relationship that you want! Have the pleasure you desire! Have the approval of men that you crave! For once in your life, stop worrying about what God wants. You do what you want! You take what you want! All you have to do is set aside the First Commandment briefly.

Jesus would have none of it. Go away, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.’ And so Jesus endured every temptation and passed every test. He met the requirement of sinlessness and so became our great High Priest.

Now, since our great High Priest faced temptation just as you do, since the whole purpose of His incarnation was to become the sinless Substitute for sinful mankind and thus to become the perfect Mediator between God and man, since He has now conquered the devil and death itself, Let us come boldly to the throne of grace, to Jesus Christ Himself, who is the Mercy Seat of God, that we may obtain mercy. Come to God with your sin, with your shame, with all the times you’ve given in to temptation, and give it all to the great High Priest! He has already suffered for your sins and offered Himself once for all as the sacrifice for them, the sacrifice that God the Father has accepted. Come to the Father through His Son, Jesus Christ, and you will obtain mercy from Him, even the forgiveness of your sins.

And, as forgiven children of God, Let us come boldly to the throne of grace…and find grace to help in time of need. You will be tempted again. You will be tempted throughout your earthly life, tempted as Jesus was tempted, tempted to stop listening to God and to listen instead to that other voice, the voice of the devil and his demons, the voice of the unbelieving world, the voice of your own sinful flesh, nudging you away from God’s commandments, prodding you toward sin and shame and disgrace. In such times, turn boldly to the throne of grace. Remember how your great High Priest used Holy Scripture to withstand temptation, and equip yourself ahead of time with the word of God, so that you have that mighty weapon at your disposal when you need it the most. Pray to your High Priest. He will understand your struggles, will sympathize with them, and will offer you all the help you need to stand strong for Him, as He once stood strong for you against the devil and against all the powers of hell. As it says in Hebrews, Since we have a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works. Amen.

 

Source: Sermons

The Ten Commandments

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Sermon for the First Day of Lent

Romans 13:8-10  +  Mark 12:28-34

The Lenten fast or “giving up something for Lent” has been around for a long time. And, if used for the purpose of self-denial, prayer, works of charity, or reflection on spiritual things, fasting can be a helpful tool, a useful discipline. We maintain that fasting should never be forced on anyone in the New Testament Church, since God doesn’t force it on us. But during this Lenten season I’ll encourage you to engage in another kind of discipline. During the six Wednesdays of Lent, prior to Holy Week, we’re going to review together the six chief parts of Luther’s Small Catechism. One part per week, starting tonight. And I’m encouraging you, not only to set aside every Wednesday for these services, but to take your Small Catechism out, and read the part for the week at least once a day. If it makes it easier, you can pick up a copy of the weekly catechism reading from the table in the narthex.

This evening, we begin with the First Chief Part: The Ten Commandments. We can’t possibly talk about each one in depth in a single sermon. But it’s my hope that this service will help you to read them fruitfully throughout the coming week.

The Ten Commandments were thundered down to Israel by God from Mt. Sinai, and later written by God’s own hand on two stone tablets. They were part of the Old Testament, the binding covenant which God established with Israel, through Moses, and into which the people of Israel willingly entered. All the words which the LORD has said we will do.

Why do we care? We are not Israelites, after all. We never signed onto that covenant and were never asked to. We care about the Ten Commandments, because we did sign onto the New Testament by being baptized into the name of the same Yahweh God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And in the Ten Commandments, the will of our God for mankind’s behavior is revealed. They reflect who our God is, teach us what His standards are of right and wrong, teach us what we are to do and not do, think and not think, desire and not desire, in order to be holy people in fellowship with the holy God. We care, because the Ten Commandments teach us Christians why we needed a Savior named Jesus in the first place.

As you heard tonight in both Scripture lessons, the Ten Commandments are summarized with the word, “Love.” Love is not optional. It wasn’t for OT Israel, it isn’t for NT Christians, either. Love is the fulfillment of the law. And, as you may remember from your catechism classes, the Law serves as both mirror and guide.

The Law is a mirror. It shows us what we look like—like sinners, who have not kept God’s commandments. As a mirror, the Ten Commandments tell us what we’re supposed to do and not do, desire and not desire, so that we may see clearly how far short of God’s glory we fall. The man who does these things shall live by them. But we haven’t done them. Not all of them. Not all the time. No one has. And so the curse of the Law is pronounced on all men: Cursed is the one who does not continue to do everything written in the book of the Law…Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.

But the Law is also a guide. As a guide, it shows us Christians, who have been redeemed from the curse of the Law by Christ, who became a curse for us, the holy lives that holy people are called to live. We are called to walk by the Spirit. And the Ten Commandments are a Spirit-inspired summary of how the Spirit teaches us to walk.

So we turn to the First Table of the Law, the first three commandments, summarized by love for God.

1st: You shall have no other gods. Every form of idolatry is forbidden, every form of worship of any god except for the One who reveals Himself in the Bible as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Instead of serving other gods, we are to fear, love, and trust in the true God above all things, including ourselves. He is to be our all in all, while all that we have and all that we are is to be entirely devoted to Him.

2nd: You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God. The LORD, or Yahweh, or God, or Jesus, or Christ, is not a name to be tossed around lightly, much less used as a curse, or for needless swearing, lying, deceiving, or practicing witchcraft. His name is to be holy to you. For sacred use only. God’s name is to be used for good, to call upon Him in the day of trouble, to praise Him in front of other people and tell of all His wondrous deeds, to give thanks to Him, at all times, and in all places.

3rd: You shall sanctify the Day of Rest, or, Remember the Sabbath Day, to keep it holy. The Old Testament regulation about doing no work from sunset on Friday to sunset on Saturday has fallen away. But God’s command to hear His Word regularly, to cherish the preaching of it, to use His Sacraments with reverence, and to honor and support the ministry of the Word—that command remains.

The first three commandments summarize how we are to love God directly, by honoring Him, His name, and His Word. The rest of the commandments, the Second Table of the Law, show us how to love God by loving our neighbor. Your neighbor is literally the person next to you, the one whom God places in your direct path, which begins with your immediate family.

4th: You shall honor your father and your mother. God has placed children under the authority of their father and mother, not only demanding outward obedience to them, but also the honor and respect of the heart. That honor and respect are to remain even when the parents are old, even if the same level of obedience to them is no longer required. By extension, this commandment applies to all the authorities that God has placed us under. We are to honor them, serve and obey them, love and respect them.

5th: You shall not murder. No one is permitted to end a human life (and yes, that includes abortion) unless God authorizes it in His word, as He does for the government in the case of evildoers, or as He does for the average citizen if a thief breaks into his home or poses an imminent threat to his life. And if we are to avoid taking another person’s life, then we are also to avoid mistreating our neighbor’s body (or our own bodies!). On the contrary, we are to provide help for our neighbor’s bodily needs as we are able.

6th: You shall not commit adultery. Or as the writer to the Hebrews puts it, Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. God gets to define the terms of sexual relations, just as He gets to define man and woman, husband and wife. He designed marriage to be a sacred, loving, lifelong bond, where husbands and wives love and cherish each other. And He clearly forbids all sex outside of marriage, all homosexual behavior, all pretending to be a different gender than the one He made you to be, and divorce in most, but not all, cases.

7th: You shall not steal. God permits people to acquire things and to own things, and He forbids people from taking things that another person owns, unless the person freely agrees to sell it or trade it or give it away.

8th: You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. Our tongues and our typing fingers are to take great care, lest we say or write something that may harm our neighbor’s reputation. Lying about our neighbor to get him in trouble is a sin, but so is telling the truth about our neighbor in such a way that we expose a sin that we have no business exposing.

9th: You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. This commandment, together with the next, is especially revealing. No human government can regulate your desires. But God can, and does. Not only are you not allowed to take your neighbor’s house from him. You aren’t even allowed to desire it, to set your heart on it, to be discontent with your own house. And not only house, but…

10th: You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, workers, animals, or anything that is his. You are to control your desires, to the point that, whatever possessions the Lord enables you to have, whatever opportunities, whatever place in life the Lord gives you, you are to be content with these. And while you may desire something beyond what you now have, you commit those desires to the Lord, and if He provides it, good! And if not, good! But setting your heart on what your neighbor has, and growing bitter over your neighbor having something that you crave, such desires are forbidden by God.

If you stop and really think about all these commandments, what obedience looks like from the start of your life to the end of it, when you take into account what James says about the commandments, that whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it, it’s clear that all men, including us, are lawbreakers.

But during this Lenten season, we celebrate our Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Ten Commandments show us the reason why, because no man can hold up his own obedience to the commandments to God and claim, “See, God! I have kept them all!” Instead, everyone must approach God as a humble beggar and admit, “Oh, God! I am a poor, wretched sinner!”

But sinners are called, not to despair, but to repent, and to run to Christ, the Redeemer, where God promises that sinners will find forgiveness, on the basis of His obedience, on the basis of His suffering and death, which He suffered for all our lawbreaking. So run to Christ and stay close to Him, because where He is, there the commandments can no longer accuse or condemn, because Jesus has fulfilled them all in our place.

But as you stay close to Christ, you dare not ignore God’s commandments. As John says, This is love for God: to keep His commandments. For the redeemed, this is the path. This is the way, each and every day. Do you love the God who has redeemed you? Would you serve the God who has redeemed you? Would you be holy, as God Himself has called you to be? Then, as Jesus Himself said, If you love Me, keep My commandments. Amen.

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Faith, hope, and love, even in the dark

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Sermon for Quinquagesima

1 Corinthians 13:1-13  +  Luke 18:31-43

Sometimes the ways of the Lord are clear as crystal; the pieces of the puzzle all seem to fit together; the things going on around you make sense. But sometimes the Lord’s ways are about as clear to us as mud. And that’s okay. You’re not supposed to understand everything yet. It’s like when you read a book. Many things that the author understands perfectly well are not understood by the reader, or by the characters in the story, until the end, or close to the end. As the Lord says through the prophet Isaiah, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” says the LORD. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.”

What do you do when you’re in the middle of the story, and the Author’s plans seem fuzzy and dim? We learn that lesson from today’s Gospel and Epistle, from Jesus’ disciples, from the blind beggar, and from the apostle Paul. And the pattern we learn from them is simple: Have faith, hope, and love, even in the dark.

As Jesus made His way through Judea to Jerusalem for His final Passover, He began to spell things out for His twelve apostles. See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all the things that were written through the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be fulfilled. For he will be delivered to the Gentiles, and he will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon. And they will scourge him and put him to death. And on the third day he will rise again. For His part, Jesus saw everything clearly. He knew exactly who He was—the Christ, true God and true Man; He knew where He had come from—from God the Father; and He knew exactly why He had come: that the world through Him might be saved—saved from sin, death, and the power of the devil; saved from every evil and every trouble at the end of the story. He even saw clearly the path to get there, both because He was the Author of the plan, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, and because it had been revealed, although somewhat obscurely, in the Old Testament Scriptures. He would go to Jerusalem at the Passover and allow Himself to be betrayed by His own friend, handed over to Pontius Pilate by His own people, falsely accused, condemned, tortured, and killed. He would do this willingly in order to make atonement for the sins of the world. And then He would rise from the dead on the third day, ascend into heaven, and work, by His Spirit, with the preachers whom He would send out into the world to bring men out of darkness into His marvelous light.

The light of the Gospel, shining on Jesus as the merciful Savior, is clear to all who believe, but it doesn’t always shed a bright light on the path directly ahead of us on our way to the salvation at the end of the story. Even when Jesus shined the light on the path that lay ahead of Him in the coming days, His disciples were like blind men still groping about in the dark. We’re told that they understood none of these things; this saying was hidden from them. How can that be? It can be, because, when it comes to the ways and the things of God, only the Spirit of God can truly enlighten the mind, and sometimes He has a reason for keeping even the faithful in the dark about certain things, as an author often does in the story he’s writing.

In the case of the apostles, it wouldn’t work out the way it was supposed to if they had perfect understanding of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection ahead of time. They had to be kept in the dark for a little while longer, for their own sake, for our sake, but also for Jesus’ sake, so that He could suffer more. You see, it lessens a person’s suffering to share it with friends, with those who can sympathize and understand. On the other hand, it increases a person’s suffering to go through it alone, without the understanding of family and friends. And Jesus had to suffer alone.

What did they do when they didn’t understand? Well, first they listened to Jesus and pondered what He said, even though they didn’t understand. They listened, and then, later, after Jesus’ resurrection, they were able to remember what He had said. But even before they remembered, they trusted. They had faith in Jesus, that He knew what He was talking about, even though they didn’t. And so they kept following Him, hoping and expecting that things would turn out well, for Jesus and for them, hoping for the details to be made clear when the time was right.

So listen to God’s Word and ponder it, if the path ahead seems blurry or dim, and have faith in the God who has given you His Word, and who has given you His only-begotten Son, and who, through His Son, has also given you His Holy Spirit, to enlighten your minds as much as necessary for the place where you’re at in the story. The Lord has His reasons for not making everything clear to you now. Not that He has hidden His overall plan or His saving works from you. He has revealed more than enough of it in Holy Scripture to bring you to trust in Him, and to preserve you in the faith, and to give you hope that things will turn out well. Have faith! And hope!

Next in our Gospel, we encounter a blind man. Actually, two blind men, according to Matthew, but they believed as one and called out to Jesus as one. Mark reveals the name of one of them. His name was Bartimaeus. He had no physical sight. He was reduced to begging, and the Lord hadn’t revealed to him why it had to be this way. In that way, too, he was left, for a time, in the dark.

But Bartimaeus’s physical blindness, and his blindness to the Lord’s plan, didn’t hinder him one bit from listening to the word of God in the Old Testament, and to the word about Jesus being the Christ, the promised Son of David, and, having heard, he believed. He had faith. And because he had faith, he cried out to Jesus, as soon as he heard that Jesus was passing by, Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me! And he refused to be silenced, when the crowds told him to keep his mouth shut. He cried out boldly, confidently, and with great hope, Son of David, have mercy on me! So Jesus stopped the procession, called the man over, and asked him what kind of mercy he was seeking. Bartimaeus said, Lord, I want to receive my sight!

And what happened? Jesus said, Receive your sight! Your faith has saved you. Jesus granted his request freely, willingly, gladly. Not only that, but he praised Bartimaeus’ faith as that which led to his healing. Not because faith had the power to heal, but because faith brought him to Jesus, who had the power to heal. The blind man’s eyes were opened, enlightened, just as his mind had already been by the Holy Spirit. His sight was restored. And then, what? He followed Jesus, glorifying God.

It’s really the same lesson as with the apostles. If you confess Jesus as Lord and Christ, as the apostles did, as the blind beggar did, then have faith in Him, even if it’s blind faith, for the moment. And put all your hope in Him, even if it’s blind hope, for the moment. You don’t have to understand everything now. Go along with the story now, as it unfolds. Follow along with Jesus. Do the things He has given you to do, the things you know to do, because His Word has clearly revealed those things. Have faith. And hope. You won’t be disappointed in the end. There will be a cross. But there will also be a resurrection and a glorious future in the kingdom of God.

There’s one more thing God calls on you to do while you remain in the dark, in addition to having faith and hope. St. Paul wrote a whole chapter of the Bible about it, which you heard as today’s Epistle: Love.

We learn love from Jesus in today’s Gospel. The way He stopped and took time for the man in need. The way He spoke kindly to him and helped him gladly. And, of course, we hear from the Apostle Paul in today’s Epistle a beautiful description of what Christian love looks like. Love is patient. It is kind. Love does not envy. Love does not boast. It is not conceited. It does not behave indecently. It does not seek its own. It does not become angry. It does not dwell on evil. It does not rejoice in iniquity but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.

Being in the dark about the path ahead, being confused or frustrated doesn’t give you the right to behave badly toward your family, toward your neighbor, toward your fellow Christian. On the contrary, you are called to keep loving at all times, with Christ Jesus Himself as the prime example. In fact, you are called, as Christians, to be characterized by love—not love according to the world’s definition, but love as God defines it in His Word, love that is consistent with God’s commandments. Yes, you are to be known in this dark world as people of faith and people of hope. But just as much you are to be known as people of love—the kind of love Paul describes in the Epistle, which will continue into the next life after there is no longer a need for faith or hope, because all that is now dark will be made bright. As Paul says, For now we see through a mirror, darkly; but then we will see face to face. Now I know in part; but then I will know fully, even as I am also fully known. And now faith, hope, and love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Have faith in Christ, whether or not you fully understand. Trust in Him who willingly and intentionally suffered and died for you. Wait in hope for the Lord to act and to reveal things in His time. And be a person characterized by love. In faith, hope, and love, keep following the Lord Christ, wherever He goes, wherever He leads, knowing that your Shepherd will never lead you astray. His path is the path of the cross. But if we suffer with Him in shame, we will also reign with Him in glory. Amen.

 

Source: Sermons