Second Sunday after Pentecost

Second Sunday after Pentecost (B—Proper 4)

June 3, 2018

Text: Mark 2:23-3:6

            It is the Sabbath Day, and the hungry disciples are picking heads of grain.  And the Pharisees are bugged.  “What’s up with this, Jesus?  Would you take a look at Your disciples”… “why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” (Mark 2:24; ESV).  Well, first off, who says it isn’t lawful?  We just read the Commandment in our Old Testament lesson.  Yes, it’s true, God says to His people that on the Sabbath Day “you shall not do any work” (Deut. 5:14).  The Children of Israel were not to go out and gather manna.  They were not to harvest their fields or sheer the sheep.  They were not to send their servants out to work or make their oxen tread the grain.  They were to take care of business the other six days of the week.  But the point of the Law is clear in the text.  “You were a slave in Egypt, O Israelite.  You know what it means to have no rest, no day off, no relief from the taskmaster’s whip.  You are not to be that way.  The LORD your God has called you out from that.  Man and beast need a day once a week to be renewed.  And you need a day to worship, to meditate on my Words, to enjoy the Rest I alone can give.  So the Seventh Day, the Sabbath Day, is to be a holy day, a holiday.  Take the day off.  Take some time with your family.  Take some time to immerse yourself in my holy Word.”  The Sabbath is not given to be a burden, but a gift!  Now, consider again the disciples in the grain field.  Which is more restful?  To be hungry or to be satisfied?  Is it not a labor to be hungry?  And I don’t know about you, but I love to enjoy a good meal when it’s time to relax.  Or consider the man with the withered hand in the second part of our Holy Gospel.  Is it not a labor to suffer under a debilitating disease?  And to be freed from that debilitating disease, to be made whole, that is true rest, the Rest that only Jesus can give.

            Let’s do a little Catechism review.  What is the Third Commandment?  “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.  What does this mean?  We should fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.”[1]  How do we keep the Sabbath Day holy?  How do we sanctify it?  By hearing God’s Word.  Going to Church, having our sins forgiven, remembering our Baptism, listening to the Scriptures and the preaching, and eating and drinking the Holy Supper of our Lord’s body and blood.  Being fed by the Lord.  Luther says, “God’s Word is the treasure that sanctifies everything [1 timothy 4:5]… Whenever God’s Word is taught, preached, heard, read, or meditated upon, then the person, day, and work are sanctified.”[2] 

            In the Old Testament, the Sabbath Day was to be kept on the Seventh Day, Saturday.  In addition to the gift of rest and God’s Word, the Sabbath was to be an act of faith on the part of the people.  God will take care of them and prosper them, even if they don’t work this one day of the week.  God Himself set the pattern.  In six days God did His work of creating the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested from His work, not because He was tired, but because He was setting up the pattern for His people, and He was setting up a Commandment which finds its fullness in Jesus.  Jesus follows the pattern.  Of course, in His earthly ministry, He kept the Sabbath on Saturday, resting and attending Synagogue.  His righteous fulfillment of the Commandment counts for us all, praise be to God, for we have not kept them Commandment, outwardly or inwardly.  But it’s more than that.  In Holy Week, Jesus does the work of New Creation.  He undoes the damage of Adam’s fall and the curse of the Old Creation.  He undoes it by dying on the cross, atoning for Adam’s sin and ours, suffering the curse in our place.  And on the seventh day, in a glorious repeat of the First Creation, He rests!  He rests in the tomb.  This is actually what this has all been about from the very beginning.  God rests from all His work on Holy Saturday.  Jesus rests, having completed the sacrifice.  For it is finished.  And then, THEN, on the Eighth Day, the First Day of the New Week and of the New Creation, Sunday, Jesus Christ rises from the dead.  Behold, He has made all things new. 

            So now, in the New Testament, every day is our Sabbath Day, for Jesus Christ Himself is our Sabbath.  He is our Rest.  For now every day we rest in the forgiveness of sins that is ours in Jesus.  We rest in His peace.  He has reconciled us to God our Father.  We rest in His unending life.  Death is no longer our oppressor.  We rest in His freedom.  We are no longer enslaved to sin and the kingdom of the devil.  We don’t have to go around proving ourselves all the time.  We don’t have to justify ourselves anymore.  Jesus has justified us, declared us righteous, once and for all by virtue of His righteousness and death for our sins.  This is why He says to the Pharisees, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27).  The Sabbath is not meant to be a new burden, but a joyous gift from God to man.  Don’t you need a rest?  Aren’t you always craving a day off or a vacation?  Why?  You need Sabbath!  We all know this instinctively.  Jesus gives it.  Here and now.  In His Word.  In the Sacrament.  In Himself.  Peace.  Be at rest.  Be in Jesus. 

            This is also why He says, “the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath” (v. 28).  It is the Lord who defines the Sabbath and what it means for us.  The Pharisees do not.  Church leaders do not.  All the manmade laws that grew up around the observance of the Sabbath among the Jews were meant to be a hedge around the Law to keep us from transgressing it outwardly.  But the great irony is that in making the Sabbath into a burden, they broke the very Sabbath they were trying to protect.  They made the Sabbath, not Rest, but a work!  They made salvation dependent on the traditions of men.  They have no such authority.  In so doing, they make themselves gods.  It is not the case, beloved, that the New Testament Church or the Pope or even the Apostles changed the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday.  Man cannot change the Word of God.  Nor did Jesus change it, incidentally, though He certainly has the authority to do so if He wants.  Sunday is not the Sabbath.  Not in the Old Testament sense.  But that’s just the point.  Now that Jesus is our Sabbath, in the New Testament, every day is our Sabbath.  Saturday is our Sabbath.  So is Sunday.  Even Monday.  And every day in between.  For Jesus has brought us into the New Order of things, the New Creation.

            Why, then, do we worship on Sunday, if Sunday is not the new Sabbath?  Actually, we don’t have to.  Nowhere in the Bible is Sunday prescribed, though it is called “the Lord’s Day” in the New Testament and very quickly becomes the primary day of worship.  Why?  Because Jesus Christ rose from the dead on Sunday.  Thus Sunday is a very good day to hold the Divine Service and gather around the risen Lord Jesus in His Word and Supper.  The earliest Christians, incidentally, worshipped every day.  After all, every day is the Sabbath, so…  But maybe it’s not practical for us to come to Church every day, so we need to set aside at least one day of the week when we know there will be preaching and Sacrament and Christian fellowship.  We could do it on Tuesdays.  That would not be a sin.  But better, we do it on Sunday as a custom of commemorating our Lord’s resurrection, for every Sunday is a little Easter for the Christian Church. 

            And what is the Commandment for us?  How should the Christian regard the Third Commandment?  Go to Church.  If you had to sum up the command in a few simple words, it would be this.  Go to Church.  And pay attention.  God is speaking.  Listen up.  I was just writing out some graduation cards to a couple of my kids from Michigan whom I confirmed many years ago.  Well, what do you say?  I’m more or less against most of the things we say to kids at graduation (“Reach for the stars.”  “Follow your heart.”  “Live your dreams.”  It makes me sick to my stomach).  So I wrote that I was proud of them, which I am.  They’re good kids.  And then I wrote, “Don’t forget to go to Church!”  A nice little Law thought from their old pastor. 

            It is the Law in the sense that, if you don’t want to go to Church, tough!  Get out of bed and go.  You don’t have anything more important to be doing.  But when you get right down to it, commanding you to go to Church is like commanding your kids to come open Christmas presents.  Look, all of this that we’re doing here this morning, is receiving one continuous line of gift after gift from Jesus.  And these aren’t just underwear and socks kind of gifts.  These are the real thing.  Kingdom gifts.  Forgiveness of sins.  Eternal life.  Heaven.  Resurrection.  The Father’s House.  Joy.  Peace.  Abundance.  The New Creation.  All things.  God only has to command us to come receive these things because we’re so dense.  We’re absolute blockheads, as Luther would say. 

            I don’t really care if you go home and mow your lawn this afternoon, though some Christians would be absolutely scandalized by it.  (I say, do it for their sake.)  That’s not the point of the Sabbath.  The point of the Sabbath, as is the point of everything in theology, is Jesus.  Jesus rested the rest of death, that you might have the rest of life.  The risen Jesus gives you the Rest that is Himself.  He feeds you and He makes you whole.  We’re not worried about the picking of grain on this day or any day.  It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.  Jesus does it for you.  And like King David, your High Priest, Jesus, the Son of David, gives you the Bread of the Presence to eat.  He gives you the Bread of Life, that is Himself.  Come to His Table.  Take a load off.  And rest.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

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[1] Luther’s Small Catechism (St. Louis: Concordia, 1986). 

[2] Luther’s Large Catechism (St. Louis: Concordia, 2010) p. 34.

Pentecost/ The Holy Trinity

The Day of Pentecost (B)

Confirmation Day

May 20, 2018

Text: John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

            The Rite of Confirmation is not a Sacrament.  It has no command from God.  There is no visible element.  And it does not forgive the sins of the confirmand.  It is a human rite, with an ancient pedigree.  It’s very old.  And it is good.  But we mess it up with our false notions and sentimental piety.  We either act as though Confirmation is nothing more than a rite of passage, a graduation of sorts (phew, the kids are off the hook now, and we don’t have to show up to Church anymore until the kids are ready to get married!), or we assign more to it than we should, as though Confirmation were, in fact, a Sacrament of sorts, that imparts the Holy Spirit, as our brothers and sisters in Rome and the East believe.  This is an historic occasion this morning, the first youth Confirmation class of Augustana Lutheran Church, Moscow, Idaho.  And so, a certain amount of clarity is called for.  We should know what all this is about.  What is Confirmation, and why do it?  And what is it not?  What myths do we need to bust about this ceremony?  And perhaps more to the point, what is this day all about for these five confirmands and for this congregation? 

            The Feast of Pentecost is one of several traditional days for the Rite of Confirmation, and what a great day to have this celebration.  Pentecost is all about the gift of the Holy Spirit, coming upon His Church in all His fullness fifty days after our Lord’s resurrection from the dead, ten days after His ascension.  The Jews were gathered together in Jerusalem for the great harvest festival.  For the Old Testament believers, Pentecost was a feast of firstfruits, bringing their first and best, especially of grain, to sacrifice to the LORD fifty days after the Passover.  It was also the day traditionally celebrated as the anniversary of God’s giving Moses’ the Ten Commandments, so Pentecost is a celebration of God’s Word.  Pentecost simply means “fiftieth,” as in the fiftieth day after Passover.  The first disciples, being faithful Jews, were gathered for the feast in Jerusalem, waiting together in one place, as the Lord commanded them, for the gift of His Spirit, when all of a sudden, the sound of a mighty, rushing wind (spirit, wind, and breath… all the same word in Greek, and all the same word in Hebrew for that matter), came blowing through the house, and, you know the story.  Divided tongues as of fire rested upon the disciples and they began to preach.  And what was incredible about their preaching is that they spoke in tongues, which is to say, human languages they had never previously known or studied.  That, incidentally, is what the gift of tongues is.  Not ecstatic speech or gobbledygook, but the speaking of God’s Word in a language the speaker doesn’t know.  And it’s always for a missionary purpose.  The Jews from all over the known world were in Jerusalem for the Feast, and they were hearing the Gospel proclaimed by the Apostles in their own languages.  They were hearing for the first time about this Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified, but who is risen from the dead, in whom they have the forgiveness of sins and eternal life.  And that is what converts about 3,000 of them that day.  Not the miracle of tongues, but the preaching of the Gospel.  Because the Spirit comes in the preaching.  The Spirit comes by the Word.  So that is what this day is all about in the Church.  The pouring out of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. 

            And here is what that has to do with Confirmation.  While the Rite of Confirmation itself does not give the gift of the Spirit to our children, it is a direct result of His being poured out upon them in their Baptism and in their continued hearing and learning of God’s Word.  Beloved, Pentecost is not a one and done event in the history of the Church.  God pours His Holy Spirit upon and into every Christian in your Baptism and in Scripture and preaching and Supper.  The means of grace are the vehicle of the Spirit.  They pipe Him in with all of His gifts.  It’s another Pentecost every time a little baby or a not-so-little adult is brought to the font, every time your sins are forgiven in the stead and by the command of Christ, every time you hear a sermon or attend a Bible study or a sit through a Catechism class, every time you come to the altar to be fed with the crucified and risen body and blood of Jesus.  It doesn’t usually happen with all the fireworks, the mighty, rushing wind, the tongues of fire and the tongues speaking, but it’s just as much a miracle, and you know it, if only the Spirit gives you eyes to see and ears to hear.  And He does.  That’s His job.  He comes on the wings of the Word to bring you to faith in Christ, to give you that faith as a gift, to turn you from yourself and from your sin to your Savior, in whom you have the forgiveness of sins and eternal life.  He brings you to repentance.  He converts you.  He points you ever and always and only to Christ for salvation.  He gives you faith.  He strengthens your faith.  He keeps you with Jesus Christ in the one true faith.  He works in the Church.  That is why the Third Article of the Creed is about the Holy Spirit and the Holy Christian Church.  This is the Spirit’s arena here, in the Communion of saints where the Word is preached and the Sacraments are administered.  Here He forgives your sins.  Here He gives you life.  Here He marks you for the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting.  He is the Lord and Giver of Life.  Spiritual life now, bodily life then.  He is the breath of life breathed into Adam at creation (spirit, wind, and breath, all the same word!).  He is the Spirit breathed out by our Lord in His dying breath on the cross.  He is the Spirit Jesus breathed on the Apostles the evening of the First Easter when He instituted the Office of the Holy Ministry and said to them “Receive the Holy Spirit.  If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld” (John 20:22-23; ESV).  The Spirit makes the forgiveness your own!  This is why, when I say, “The Lord be with you,” you respond most properly, “And with thy spirit,” for you recognize the Holy Spirit is in the Word preached, to do these things for you.  This is the fulfillment of what our Lord says in our Holy Gospel, “he will guide you into all the truth” (John 16:13), for in preaching and in catechesis, and in the tangible Word that is the holy Sacraments, the Spirit does all His work.  And He opens your lips to confess.  You say the Creed.  You witness.  And this morning, five of our children confess that they believe the faith into which they are baptized and as they’ve come to know it in the Catechism.  They believe it, by grace, by the Spirit’s gift.  They believe it, and, in fact, they’d die before they ever forsake it.  That is a confession you can only make if you are possessed by the Holy Spirit.  That kind of confession is pure, divine gift. 

            Confirmation, therefore, is not the pouring out of the Spirit, but the result of the pouring out of the Spirit.  It is the fruit of His work in their lives.  Confirmation is a big deal for that reason.  Here these five young men and women, having learned the Word God gave to Moses and all the Prophets and Apostles, offer their first and best to God on this Pentecost Day in confessing Him.  And He promises, “everyone who acknowledges,” confesses, “me before men, I will also acknowledge,” confess, “before my Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 10:32).  But the bigger deal is what came before.  Their parents brought them to Holy Baptism.  And then to Church and Sunday School.  Week after week.  And they taught them the faith at home.  They read the Scriptures to them and taught them to pray.  And they brought them to Catechism class, and for two years these kids have met with me every Wednesday for an hour and a half, learning the Scriptures and the Catechism, committing it all to memory, learning it by rote so that they know it by heart.  And they do.  They know it.  But it’s not even the head knowledge, so much, that is the point.  It’s that the Holy Spirit was in all of that, doing His thing, giving faith, giving life, giving Jesus…  And, by the way, you don’t graduate from any of that.  In no sense whatsoever is Confirmation a graduation.  Catechism class never ends.  We’re always learning it.  We’re always students.  And we always need what the Spirit has to give in His Word.  I still expect to see you in Church and in Sunday School.  Every week.  You five already know that, but they may not know that, so I’m saying this for their sake.  You know the Catechism better than they do right now, so if you still need to be here, they still need to be here.  And as I told you, when you’re all grown up and I’m a really old man, I’m coming to your house, and I better find that you still have your Catechism and you still use it and you’re teaching it to your own children, or there’s gonna be trouble.

            The other thing that is a really big deal about today that we often combine with Confirmation, but it’s not the same thing, and it’s actually a much bigger deal than Confirmation, is your First Communion.  This really is a Sacrament.  Here the Spirit really is poured out on you in your reception of the body and blood of Jesus, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.  Having been instructed in the Christian faith, and confessing that faith and particularly what it is you expect to receive in the Lord’s Supper, namely, the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, under the bread and wine, for your forgiveness, life, and salvation, you now are given to receive this most precious gift with us.  Receive it often.  Every week.  As often as you can.  St. Ambrose said, “Because I always sin, I always need the medicine.”  He was talking about the body and blood of Jesus.  The Sacrament is the medicine that forgives our sins and gives us the resurrection life of Jesus.  It nourishes us and strengthens us and marks us for the resurrection of our own bodies on the Last Day.  So don’t miss it.  Be here.  Be where Jesus is, right here, right now, at His altar, for you.  Giving you His death and resurrection.  Giving you Himself!  Giving you His Spirit.  Giving you to sit at His Table in the Father’s House. 

            Confirmation is not in the Bible, and God doesn’t command it.  It does not impart the gift of the Holy Spirit.  But it is all about the gift of the Holy Spirit.  And for that reason, though it is a human rite, it is a good human rite that we should by all means retain and celebrate.  What Confirmation is, when you get right down to it, is the ceremony that brings together all the important things God does for us by His Spirit here in the Church.  It is a celebration of your Baptism, faith, catechism, and the Supper.  Jesus doesn’t command Confirmation, but He does command Baptism and Catechism class.  You five know the verse well now, by heart: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:19-20).  Baptism and teaching, Baptism and Catechism, the two always go together.  You can’t separate them.  And in this way Jesus says, “I am with you always, to the end of the age” (v. 20).  And He is.  Really.  In His body and blood.  Which is where those who are baptized and catechized are now fed.  The Spirit gives you birth in the water.  He leads you into all truth.  And He brings you to the altar.  And that is the whole Christian life.  Not just for these five, but for every one of you.  Jesus has been breathing on you, Holy Spiriting you, throughout the Divine Service this morning, from the first word of the opening hymn.  And He’ll do it until the last word of the closing hymn, and in every encounter you have with His holy Word throughout the week, until He gathers you back here around the altar to do it all over again.  That is the pattern.  And that is Pentecost.  The Word of God is Jesus’ breathing life into you, which is to say, His breathing the Spirit into you.  Confirmation is simply your hearty “Amen” to that.  So let’s do it.  Let’s say it, like we mean it, Lutherans: In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.     

     

The Holy Trinity (B)

May 27, 2018

Text: John 3:1-17

            On this Feast of the Holy Trinity, our Lord Jesus is speaking to us about Baptism.  That should not surprise us.  For it is in Baptism that our Triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, brings us into the ineffable mystery that is His Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity.  He puts His Name on us.  He marks us as one of His own, chosen and precious, purchased for Himself by the blood and death of God the Son made flesh.  He writes His Triune Name on us for the same reason you write your name on anything.  Because He doesn’t want to lose us.  Because we belong to Him.  Because he would not have us belong to anyone else.  This is an adoption into the family and life of God, into the love and communion of the Holy Trinity.  In fact, it’s more than an adoption, it’s a new birth.  It is the love between the Persons of the Trinity for one another, flowing forth to fashion a new object of that love, holy believers in Jesus Christ.  You.  You are His child.  Therefore Jesus speaks to Nicodemus and to us this morning about Baptism, the means by which God makes us His own: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3:5; ESV). 

            And Nicodemus is absolutely baffled.  He is as baffled by Baptism as we are by the teaching of the Holy Trinity.  It doesn’t make sense to him.  Now, when it comes to understanding the finer points of theology, Nicodemus is no slouch.  Remember who he is.  He is a member of the Sanhedrin, a man of the Pharisees, a ruler of the Jews.  He’s a rabbi.  So it’s not that he’s intellectually incapable of thinking through a complicated concept.  When he objects to the idea of being born again, asking Jesus whether a fully grown man is supposed to climb back into Mom’s womb and come out again, he knows he’s being ridiculous.  He is not a literalist.  He’s being sarcastic.  It’s a rhetorical device.  He’s telling Jesus that the whole idea is ludicrous.  And this is instructive.  It is not that Nicodemus is incapable of understanding the meaning of the words Jesus speaks, or even the concept.  It’s that he can’t believe it.  Literally, he can’t.  He’s incapable of it.  He cannot believe something so foreign to his own conception of reality, his own reason.  He cannot believe something that depends so little on him.  Think about this.  You were born through no decision or work of your own.  And Jesus is saying it’s the same thing coming into the Kingdom of God.  You are born into it, apart from your will or your good behavior.  In other words, by grace.  It’s God’s work, not yours.  And Old Adam will have none of that.  Which is precisely why Old Adam must die.  Your sinful nature must die.  And you must be born anew of water and the Spirit, water and the Word. 

            Jesus says it right here in our Holy Gospel.  “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (v. 6).  Why can’t Nicodemus accept what Jesus is saying about Baptism?  Because of his unbelieving, sinful nature, inherited from Adam.  He’s born of the flesh.  He has not, as yet, received the new birth of the Spirit.  St. Paul riffs on this in his first letter to the Corinthians.  He says, “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Cor. 2:14).  Well, no wonder we have so much trouble with the things of God.  It shouldn’t surprise us that Nicodemus is incredulous, and it shouldn’t surprise us that so many people don’t believe.  As we are born according to the flesh, in our father Adam’s sinful nature, we cannot and will not believe.  We are born spiritually blind, dead, and enemies of God.  To come to faith in Him, He must kill us and make us alive.  He must bring us to new birth.  By His Spirit.  Through water and the Word.  By grace.  That’s what He does in Baptism.  And when He does that, when we are born of water and the Spirit, our blind eyes are opened, we are raised to new life, and reconciled to God.  And the things of the Spirit we now see by faith to be true. 

            Remember we’re talking here not about intellectual understanding, but the understanding of faith.  There’s a big difference.  Nicodemus understands perfectly well what Jesus is saying.  He just can’t believe it.  We believe it, but this does not mean we intellectually comprehend it.  Who can?  How can water do such great things, like give us new birth in the Holy Spirit and saving faith in Christ?  We confess that it’s not just the water, but the water included in God’s command and combined with God’s Word.  That’s a wonderful and true explanation.  But how does that work?  Well, God’s power is in the Word.  Okay.  But do you really understand it, intellectually, how all of that works?  Of course not.  You believe it, because Jesus says it.  And that is enough.  God’s Word is enough.  You’ve gotta get over this idea that you need to rationally comprehend everything God does and says.  You’re like a child, always asking his father, “why?”  Sometimes it’s enough that your Father in heaven simply says, “Because I said so.”  God doesn’t owe you any more than that.  And that’s not the understanding you really need.  The understanding you really need is faith.  And that’s what God gives you when He gives you new birth by water and the Spirit. 

            So the teaching of the Holy Trinity.  Who can comprehend it?  Who can wrap his mind around it?  You can’t.  Not rationally.  Only by faith.  Only as God has revealed Himself in Christ and in Scripture.  One God, three Persons.  Three Persons, one God.  “And the catholic faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, neither confusing the persons nor dividing the substance.”  Even in the Athanasian Creed, we struggle to say clearly what we cannot comprehend, but can only believe.  There are not three Gods.  Just one.  But He is three, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and we must not confuse the Persons.  The Father is not the Son is not the Holy Spirit is not the Father.  But they are of one essence, one substance.  The Father is not a part of God.  He is God.  He is not the Son, and yet the Son is God, and they are not different Gods.  Somebody pass the aspirin.  Don’t try to work it all out.  You’ll be wrong.  Although Dr. Winfree has a very intriguing theory about the number e (the number, not the letter) being a good illustration of the Holy Trinity.  He should have you over to dinner sometime and unpack it on the white board for you.  You’ll be riveted. 

            But see, you don’t have to work it all out.  Just believe what you’ve been given.  That is the catholic faith (which, remember, doesn’t mean Roman Catholic, but literally “according to the whole,” the whole doctrine, the teaching, believed at all times and everywhere by the one, holy, Christian Church).  That faith is a gift.  It’s your inheritance.  It’s your birthright.  It is given to you in Baptism.  And in preaching and Scripture and Supper.  It is the Name written on you by the stylus of the Spirit.  And it is that which looks to Christ crucified for your sins and lives.

            The love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is not of such a nature that it can be bottled up and hoarded within the Trinity.  It is always love directed outward.  It is love poured out in the coming of the Son into our flesh, eternally begotten of the Father, born in time of the Virgin Mary, flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone.  God loves us in this way, that He gives His only-begotten Son.  He gives Him to us.  He gives Him for us.  He gives Him into death, the death of the cross, as the sacrifice of atonement for our sins.  Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, and the Israelites suffering the mortal snake bites could simply look at that serpent and live, so the Son of Man, Jesus Christ, has been lifted up on the cross.  And we, bitten by the serpent, our wicked foe, Satan, justly perishing in our sins, look to Jesus on the tree.  He is suffering our death, there.  He is paying for our sin.  The serpent’s fangs pierce Him.  And in this way, He crushes the serpent.  And we live.  To know that is not to rationally comprehend it.  It is simply to know and trust that it is for me.  Whoever believes that will never perish.  He will not be condemned.  The Son has not come to condemn you.  No, He comes to give you life.  By His death.  In His resurrection.  And you are baptized into that.  Born anew of water and the Spirit.  And it is all His gift.

            The Father gives the Son.  The Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.  The Spirit gives you faith in the Son who reconciles you to the Father.  It is the Holy Trinity in action for your eternal salvation.  Don’t worry about how one God is three Persons, Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity, neither confusing the Persons nor dividing the substance.  Just believe that it is so, and know what this Triune God has done for you and continues to do for you.  He gives you His Kingdom.  And know who He is for you.  He is the Father who made you and loves you as His own child.  He is the Son who became flesh for you, suffered and died for you, lives for you and calls you friend and brother.  He is the Holy Spirit who gives you new birth in the water, your Lord and Giver of Life who works in the Word and the Sacraments to forgive your sins and keep you in the one true faith unto life everlasting, who will raise you bodily from the dead on the Last Day.  Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the Trinity.  He is your God.  He is for you and not against you.  His Name is on you.  His Name is yours to call upon at all times and in every place, as you trace the mark of your redemption upon your body and say: In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.                    

Seventh Sunday of Easter

Seventh Sunday of Easter

May 13, 2018

Augustana Lutheran Church

Moscow, Idaho

Sixth Sunday of Easter

Sixth Sunday of Easter (B)

May 6, 2018

Text: John 15:9-17

            What a joyous day to meditate on the love of God for us in Christ Jesus.  The Holy Baptism of Saphira Brielle is, in so many ways, the living picture of that love.  Here these parents, and this family, who have opened their hearts and their home to her, to make her their very own, one of them, now bring her forward to the font where our Father in heaven makes her His very own, His own beloved child, a member of this family, Holy Church, and He gives her a spiritual home here in Augustana Congregation.  It is an adoption by grace, a miracle of love that happens right before our very eyes.  Old Adam in Saphira is drowned and dies in the water.  All her sins, past, present, and future, are washed away.  The demons are cast out.  Saphira is plunged into the death and resurrection of Christ.  His death is her death.  His life is her life.  She is raised from the dead, spiritually now, and she will be bodily, on that Day, for she is baptized into Christ.  There is Jesus in the water for Saphira.  There is the Holy Spirit descending upon her and taking possession of her.  There is the voice of the Father saying of her, “You are my beloved daughter by virtue of your Baptism into my beloved Son.  For this reason, and for His sake, with you I am well pleased.  You are perfect in my eyes.”  He puts His Name on her, “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,” the Christian family name, and He marks her with the sign of the holy cross, by which she is redeemed.  God loves her.  And we love her.  Because, as St. John writes in our Epistle, “everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him” (1 John 5:1; ESV).  Saphira has been given new birth from above this morning, born of God, born of water and the Spirit.  She’s one of us, a dear sister in Christ.  The angels rejoice today, more than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance.  And so do we.  She’s been with us for a while, adding her hearty “Amen” to our prayers.  But now it’s official.  There is a new member of our family.   

            What is particularly beautiful about today and its corresponding Holy Gospel is how Saphira is such a tremendous example of what our Lord says to all of us: “You did not choose me, but I chose you” (John 15:16).  Look at the series of events that brought Saphira to this day.  It is the Lord’s doing, not ours.  From our point of view, it is a succession of remarkable circumstances that have resulted in this day of her Baptism.  But from God’s point of view, it is simply obvious that this would be the case.  This is the natural next step.  Of course He brought her here, to this family, and to this Church.  Of course she is baptized today.  This is no surprise to Him.  Why?  Not just because He knows all things (okay, He does have an unfair advantage there).  But because He chose Saphira to be His own from before the foundation of the world.  That’s why.  That’s grace.  Nothing Saphira did brought her to this place and time.  Nothing we did brought her to this place and time.  No decisions for Jesus.  No acts of our will.  If anything, were it not for God doing constant damage control, our will would just mess everything up.  No, this is all God’s work.  God brought Saphira to this place and time today, as was His plan from all eternity.  He brought her to the font.  He baptized her.  Baptism is not our work for God, it is God’s work for us.  That is why Peter can say that Baptism now saves you (1 Peter 3:21), and he isn’t arguing against salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.  That’s what Baptism is.  Grace.  The place you are given faith in Christ.  The act by which Christ’s sin-atoning, saving work is poured out upon you and made your own.

            You see, what is true for Saphira, is just as true for you.  Whether you were baptized as a little baby, or an older child, or an adult… Even if, from your point of view, you decided to be baptized, don’t suffer any illusions… You didn’t do a work there.  God did.  The Holy Spirit brought you to the font.  Not you.  Not your parents.  You didn’t invite the Father into your heart.  The Father invited you into His.  You didn’t choose Jesus.  He chose you.  That’s what He says.  Because He loves you.  So He does it all.  By grace. 

            What is love?  It’s such a nice-sounding word, isn’t it?  Even the world loves the word “love.”  But don’t be fooled.  When the world talks about love, it doesn’t mean what the Bible means.  The problem is, the word “love” is so flexible in meaning that it’s really ambiguous.  Especially in English.  The Greek has no less than four words to talk about different things that we call “love.”  We pack it all into one.  For example, I can say, “I love my wife and children.”  And in the next breath I can say, “I love peperoni pizza.”  Do these two sentences express the same concept of love?  I hope not.  If that is the case, either I love one too much, or the other not enough.  Context is important in determining the meaning of the word.  For our purposes we need to clarify that the context is God’s love for us, our love for God, and our love for other people.  That’s the kind of love we’re talking about in the Scriptures.  But even that doesn’t help us much when we’re dealing with the world.  Because the world’s concept of love is that we’re all nice to one another and tolerant of whatever each person wants to believe or do… in fact, not just tolerant, but accepting and affirming.  Start calling something a sin or a false doctrine, and suddenly you’re not loving.  And you Christians, start talking about how your God is the only God, Jesus is the only way to heaven, all other religions are idolatry, and that people really can and do go to hell, well… that’s not loving.  That’s hate speech, there.  In fact, we can’t tolerate it. 

            Beloved, it is absolutely vital that you be clear on what love is and is not.  Love is not an emotion.  It is not a feeling.  It is not the warm fuzzies in your heart.  Those things can come along with love, but they are not love.  Love is not tolerance for things that are intolerable to God.  It is not acceptance and affirmation of that which God does not accept and affirm.  And it’s not hate to say so.  Actually, it’s love to say so.  Love says the hard things.  Love sacrifices reciprocation and honor for the good of the beloved.  It endures rejection.  It endures insult.  It endures anger, resentment, and even outright hatred on the part of the beloved.  For when we talk about love as the Scriptures speak of it, as Jesus defines it and personifies it, we are talking about the love that suffers and dies for the sake of the beloved who hate the Lover and are responsible for His suffering and death.  That’s agape love, the self-giving, self-sacrificing, loving unto the death of self, kind of love, the love of which we are incapable in and of ourselves, that only God can actually give, and does give in His Son, Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).  “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).  Friends, Jesus calls us, we who killed Him by our sin, who reject Him constantly by our lovelessness and rebellion and self-idolatry.  He gives His life for us.  To make us His own.  God’s love fashions its own object.  It is not that God loves us because we’re so gosh-darn loveable.  He loves us because that’s what He has decided.  And so He acts.  He sends His Son.  Jesus goes willingly to the cross.  That… that, my friends, is love. 

            Love is a decision put into action for the sake of the beloved, without regard to whether it brings love in return.  By the Spirit’s gracious working in Baptism and the Word, many of us are captivated by this love of God in Christ.  Others are not.  Others will reject it to their dying day, which, for them, means an eternal rejection of God, and therefore eternal death.  But you, like Saphira, have been called out of the number of those who reject Him, who remain in their hatred and rebellion against their Creator and Redeemer.  The Spirit has turned you.  He’s repented you.  He daily repents you.  By His gifts.  The Word.  The Water (Baptism).  The Blood (the Cup).  In His death on the cross, our Lord breathed out His Spirit in His dying breath.  And from His spear-riven side poured blood and water, the after-birth of the New Eve, the Church.  And here it is, that same water, that same blood, in the font and in the chalice, birthing you anew and nourishing you, giving you Jesus’ life, Jesus’ peace, Jesus’ presence, Jesus Himself.  “For there are three that testify: the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three agree” (1 John 5:8).  These three are one, the Greek says.  That is to say, the means of grace give you the one Lord Jesus Christ for your forgiveness, life, and salvation.  They pour out the love of God for you in Christ.  His love flows into you.  And you, now, filled to the brim with His love, ever receiving more love from the unfailing fountain of Christ, go and love your neighbor. 

            And that’s why you do what Jesus commands.  Not because you’re going to be saved by your obedience.  Look, you’re not that good at doing them.  If  you’re going to be saved by the Commandments, there’s no hope for you.  You’re saved by Jesus, by His obedience, by His suffering and death and resurrection.  But you do them for your neighbor.  You decide to love your neighbor, because loving your neighbor is loving Jesus.  And you don’t just love your neighbor in feelings and words and intentions, but in action.  Love does things.  You love your spouse.  You may not always feel all that warm and fuzzy about him or her.  But you love your spouse because you’ve decided to love your spouse, and that means you take out the trash and make dinner and do the laundry and fix the car, and you get up and you go to work and bring home the paycheck which you spend, not on yourself, but on your family.  Because that’s how you love them.  And you love your Church, so you make sure you’re here to receive the love of Christ in the means of grace, but also because that is loving your neighbor.  We’re all encouraged when you’re here.  We’re all discouraged when you’re not.  You love other people, too, both those you’re close to, and those you’re not.  You don’t murder your neighbor, because you love your neighbor.  You feed him and clothe him because you love him.  You don’t commit adultery or fornicate because you love your neighbor.  You encourage him to live a chaste and decent life and be faithful to his spouse.  You don’t steal from your neighbor, or tell lies about him, or covet his things, because you love him.  You want him to prosper and you want to defend his reputation and speak well of him.  The Commandments are all about loving Jesus by loving your neighbor.  There’s a shape to this flow of love.  The Father pours out His love on you in Jesus by the Holy Spirit, and that love flows through you toward your neighbor, who, in receiving your love, may just come to faith by the Holy Spirit working in the Word, faith in Jesus, who reconciles your neighbor to the Father.  Isn’t that beautiful?  That’s what Jesus means by “love one another” (John 15:17).  Imitate Jesus’ love.  Love with Jesus’ love.  Love because Jesus loves you.  Love your neighbor, so that your neighbor will love Jesus. 

            Our Lord has chosen us for this very thing, by grace, and this morning He has shown us that He has chosen Saphira.  What great joy!  Yes, joy!  Christians are full of joy.  Even when we’re not very happy.  We’re still full of joy.  Joy is different than walking around smiling all the time or never crying tears of sadness.  Joy is much deeper. It is knowing the outcome of all this.  Heaven.  Resurrection.  The Kingdom.  Jesus’ joy is in this, and in this your joy is full.  The Father loves you.  Jesus loves you.  Therefore, beloved, love one another.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.             

Fifth Sunday of Easter

Fifth Sunday of Easter (B)

 April 29, 2018

Text: John 15:1-8

He is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!

            Christ is the Vine.  You are the branches.  You have been grafted into Christ the Vine from wild, fruitless plants.  That is to say, by the preaching of the Gospel and Holy Baptism, the Holy Spirit brought you to saving faith in Jesus Christ, grafted you into the Vine.  And now you receive all your nourishment and life from Him.  If you abide in Him, remain connected to Him, you will bear much fruit.  That is the Promise.  Your life will be of infinite worth, because Christ, who shed His blood to purchase you for Himself, will use your life to accomplish His saving will for others.  You’ll raise your children in the faith.  You’ll talk about Jesus to friends and family.  You’ll give your time, talents, and treasures to the Church and to missions.  You’ll love your neighbor.  Which is to say, you’ll do good works, because those good works will flow from faith in Christ.  You’ll put love for your neighbor into action by seeking to live according to God’s Commandments, honoring your parents and other authorities, not murdering but seeking your neighbor’s bodily welfare, not committing adultery but living in chastity and fidelity to your spouse, not stealing but helping to improve and protect your neighbor’s possessions and income, not giving false testimony but speaking the truth in love while defending your neighbor’s reputation and putting the best construction on his words and actions.  That’s the fruit, and you can only bear that fruit in Jesus. 

            For while you may keep those commandments outwardly apart from faith in Christ, and it may look like good fruit, it’s just an illusion.  The fruit looks beautiful and good for food on the outside, but inside it is rotten and full of death.  Like some grapes my wife and I purchased from Walmart the other day (nothing against Walmart produce, we just picked up the wrong sack of grapes).  They were good for nothing but to be thrown away.  We couldn’t eat them.  The difference between the fruit of believers and unbelievers is not one of outward appearance.  In fact, the unbeliever’s fruit may look shinier than the believer’s!  But in the end, it is this that makes the difference: The believer’s fruit has been grown from its connection to Christ.  It has been fed and enlivened by Christ, by His resurrection life.  And whatever imperfection and evil we add to the fruit has all been perfected and made good by the obedience and sin-atoning work of Jesus.  The unbeliever only has the best fruit he can grow by himself, which is good for nothing but to be thrown away.  And that’s what Jesus says will happen.  The branch that does not bear fruit or is not connected to Jesus will be thrown into the fire and burned.  That is to say, the unbeliever will go to hell.  Yes, there is a hell.  We don’t like to talk about it, but we have to, because Jesus does.  There is a real hell, and those who don’t believe in Christ really go there.  And this won’t be because of lack of fruit, lack of good works.  Rather, it will be because the branch is dead, because of the lack of Christ.

            It all depends on Christ the Vine!  Our life, our eternal fate, depends on our connection by faith to Christ the Vine.  Our works, whether they are truly good works before the Father, or useless and dead works, depend on whether or not we are connected by faith to Christ the Vine.  The works, the fruits, are evidence of the life that flows into us and fills us from Christ.  Any good we do is all Christ.  Apart from Him all we can do is nothing.  And this teaches us the proper relationship between salvation and works.  We cannot do works unless we are already saved by grace.  We can do them outwardly by ourselves, but they won’t be pleasing to God, because inside they will be dead.  But once we have been grafted into Christ by the Holy Spirit’s converting us to faith in Him, then the life of the risen Christ flows into us and we start doing works that are truly pleasing to God, not because they’re so good in and of themselves, but on account of faith, on account of Christ.  So all of this is to say, we are not saved by doing good works.  We are not saved by faith AND good works.  Doing good works does not prepare us for faith.  When it comes to how we are saved, works have no place in the discussion.  Our salvation is wholly by grace, through God-given faith in Christ, who won our forgiveness and life on the cross.  It comes completely from outside of us.  But then it works its way into us.  The resurrection life of Christ flows into us, and we grow, and after we grow, then we begin to bear fruit.  First the branch must grow, then the branch can blossom and produce a good crop.  In this way we can say we are saved by faith alone, but faith is never alone.  It always overflows in good works, works of love toward the neighbor.

            And from this, too, we learn what is truly a good work.  It is not the work itself, but that it flows from faith, that it is connected to Christ.  A good work is something commanded by God, flowing from faith in Christ, in love for your neighbor.  Notice first of all that we don’t invent good works, like saying the Lord’s Prayer ten times while standing on one foot (an actual example), or maybe less ridiculous but more applicable, not dancing or playing cards or going to the theater or drinking beer or whatever it is that the Church has forbidden from time to time in order to increase your personal holiness.  Those things aren’t commanded by God.  Stop inventing things to do.  You have enough to do in the Ten Commandments.  Just give those a try.  And you do it because that’s what faith naturally does.  You want to please your heavenly Father now that the Holy Spirit has turned you.  You want to serve your Savior.  Faith is a living, busy, active thing, says Luther.  It does not ask if good works are to be done, but it is already and incessantly doing them.  And it is doing them out of love for the neighbor, because faith recognizes that God doesn’t need our good works.  There is nothing we can add to God or give Him that He doesn’t already possess.  But our neighbor does need our good works.  Our neighbor does need us to keep the Commandments, to feed him when he’s hungry and not murder him, to not commit adultery with his wife or her husband (or fornicate with his future wife or her future husband), to help him keep his property and not to take it away from him, and in fact, to bless him by generously lending and recklessly giving to him so that he is enriched all the more.  So if you want to do a good work, you look to the Ten Commandments, and you put those to work for you in faith toward God and fervent love toward your neighbor.

            The thing about fruit-bearing plants, though (and those of you who are gardeners or farmers know more about this than I do), is that they require pruning to be healthy.  Jesus says those branches that don’t bear fruit will be cut off, cast into hell.  But those that do bear fruit, which is to say, those united to Him by faith, will be pruned.  Parts of them will be cut off.  And as you can imagine, that hurts.  This is the holy cross Jesus is talking about.  In this case, not His cross, by which our salvation is won, but the crosses He lays upon us, the sufferings of body, mind, and soul by which He shapes us into the Christians He would have us be.  He molds us to look like Him: Cruciform.  For our health.  For our good.  It doesn’t feel like good at the time.  We may never know why a particular cross had to be borne, why we were pruned in a particular way, why the Lord cut a particular part off.  It’s really not our business.  He’s in charge.  He knows what He’s doing.  We wouldn’t get it if He told us the whys and the wherefores.  We just have to trust Him.  What is painful helps us grow.  And it helps us produce fruit. 

            So Christ is the Vine, you are the branches, and it all depends on you abiding in Him, remaining connected, by faith, and the result is that you produce much fruit.  Vital, it is, to abide in Him.  And how do you do that?  I’ll bet you know the answer.  We all grow together here in the Vineyard that is the holy Christian Church where Christ the Vine nourishes us with His gifts in Word and Sacrament.  We’re grafted in by Baptism.  That’s what happened to the Ethiopian eunuch in our first reading (Acts 8:26-40).  Philip preached to Him.  He preached Christ right out of the Scriptures, Isaiah 53, and he instructed him in the faith.  And apparently he told the eunuch about the surpassing greatness of Holy Baptism, for when they came to the water, the eunuch entreated Philip to baptize him.  And once we’re baptized, we live firmly rooted in that Baptism, which is to say, in Christ the Vine.  We are nourished by His Word and by His body and blood.  That is how we abide in Him.  By His means of grace, the Word and the Sacraments.  And so, it is all His gift, from start to finish.  He connects us to Himself, grafts us in by His Spirit working faith in us by the Word and Baptism.  And He keeps us connected to Himself by His Word and Supper.  And we produce fruit.  That’s what happens.  We are pruned, to be sure, but we grow and thrive, always and only in Christ.  Now, we can cut ourselves off.  We can not make use of the nourishment Christ our Vine gives us here in His vineyard.  We can not come to Church.  But that would be spiritual suicide, and we know what happens to the dead branches.  Why would we do that?  Just rejoice that you are here.  By grace.  By God’s love.  By the will of your Father.  By the mercy of Christ.  By the Holy Spirit’s calling you by the Gospel and sanctifying you with His gifts.  Yes, here we are home.  Here we are in the Vineyard.  Here we are in Christ.  And here we call upon the Father and He hears and answers.  God keep us all in Christ, attached to the Vine, so that His life flow through us and bear much fruit.  For He is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.