Sermon: St. Irenaeus - 2020

27 June 2020

Text: Luke 11:33-36 (1 John 2:18-25)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

St. Irenaeus is one of our heroes of the faith.  The western Christian world remembers him today.  And this is one reason the world hates us, dear brothers and sisters: we remember.  We love our fathers and mothers who came before us.  We don’t try to eradicate their memory, but to the contrary, we believe the commandment to “honor your father and your mother” applies to our history as well.

Irenaeus was born only a century after our Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross and rose again.  He served in the pastoral ministry and was made bishop in the city that is today known as Lyons, France.  He was a faithful bishop who fought for the faith against heresies, and in fact, we still read his book called by that very name today: Against Heresies.

His pastor was Bishop Polycarp of Smyrna, who died as a martyr at the stake at the age of 86 rather than renounce his faith in Jesus.  And St. Polycarp was himself taught directly by St. John the Apostle – the disciple whom Jesus loved, witness of the crucifixion and resurrection, and author of four books of the New Testament.  

Irenaeus believed in truth, and it is our duty as Christians to seek the truth, to know the truth, and to confess the truth – whether it is popular or not.  We know the truth because of the witnesses to that truth – the truth of Jesus.  And even this early on in Christian history, St. Irenaeus looked to the Gospels and the genuine books of the New Testament to contend for that truth against heretics who wandered away from the truth of the Christian Church as taught by faithful bishops – men like himself who learned the faith from men who learned it from the apostles.

Our Lord teaches us, “No one after lighting a lamp puts it in a cellar or under a basket, but on a stand, so that those who enter may see the light.”  We often speak of coming to a knowledge of the truth as “enlightenment.”  And in the Christian faith, enlightenment is not a mystical Zen moment, but it comes from the Light of the Word of God, along with guidance by the Holy Spirit.  We recite in the Catechism that the Holy Spirit, “calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth.”  And this word “enlightens” that Dr. Luther employs in both Latin and German is the very word our Lord uses here.  Truth is the light.  We put the truth on display, and it gives us a clear picture of reality.  Darkness is the very opposite, dear friends.  In the darkness, we cannot experience reality, and so we must either guess or lie about reality.  Darkness is the realm of Satan.  Some people are more comfortable with the lies they tell themselves in the dark, rather than to allow the Holy Spirit to illuminate their way to the truth.

St. Irenaeus battled a heresy called Gnosticism.  This weird mix of paganism and Christianity taught that there was secret knowledge that only a few supposedly enlightened people had.  But they would not put this supposed light on a lampstand, but rather you had to join them and put your trust in them and their cult before you could become supposedly enlightened.

Dear brothers and sisters, our Lord Jesus Christ never operated this way.  He taught openly about the kingdom of God.  He preached Scripture.  He preached that which God had revealed to us.  He exposed the darkness with light, and He comforted those who sat in darkness by the illumination of the Gospel.  Jesus said, “I am the light of the world.”  And it is the light of Christ that St. John confessed, that St. Polycarp preached, and that St. Irenaeus taught.  We Christians today teach the same faith, preach the same good news, and illuminate the world with the same Christ – Jesus Christ, “the same yesterday and today and forever.”

You might not be aware of this, but Gnosticism has a great deal of influence today.  One of the fathers of modern psychiatry, Carl Jung, was a student of this ancient heresy, who dabbled in the occult, and integrated much of this weird cult into his theories about the human mind.  Sadly, even a lot of Christians have lingering Gnosticism.

One example is this idea that when you die, you go to heaven, where you will float around as a spirit for eternity.  This is the Gnostic heresy, for the Gnostics hated the material, they hated the body, they saw the highest good as separation from the body – which is what we call death.  Gnosticism is a dark religion that denies the Lord’s creation of matter as “good.”  Dear friends, there is a reason why the Nicene Creed ends with “I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.”  We Christians teach the physical, bodily resurrection, because that is what Jesus did Himself, and that is what Jesus promises to us.  

The word “look for” in Latin is “exspecto.”  It literally means to watch out for, but it is where we get our English word “to expect.”  We expect the bodily resurrection, and we are watching out for it.  We yearn for it, and we are convinced of its reality – because we have been enlightened by the Holy Spirit to believe the Word of God.  And this we believe, teach, and confess.

St. Irenaeus would not compromise with the Gnostics on this point.  It separates us Christians from every other religion in the world.  

Irenaeus’s bishop’s bishop, John the apostle teaches us the importance of the flesh.  We worship a God who takes on a physical body – something repugnant to the Gnostics – and even to the Jews and the Muslims today.  John says, “No one who denies the Son has the Father.”  He speaks of “antichrists” who deny the fleshly incarnation of Jesus.  These antichrists of John’s day included Gnostics, who taught a weird, spiritual Christ rather than the physical Jesus who walked out of His own grave and miraculously comes to us materially in His body and blood.  

Irenaeus’s study of Scripture convinced him that before our Lord’s return, there would be a major antichrist figure known as the beast in the Book of Revelation, without whose mark, no-one will be able to buy or sell.  

This is why we must remain faithful, dear friends, for St. John Himself says, “It is the last hour.”  He exhorts us to “Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you.  If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father.  And this is the promise that He made to us – eternal life.”

We honor our fathers in the faith, including St. Irenaeus, not because he taught something new, something novel, but precisely because he didn’t.  He was faithful to Polycarp, who was faithful to John, who was faithful to Christ – the Light of the World who enlightens us through the ministry of the Holy Spirit, who draws us to the Word.  And unlike the Word of the Gnostic faith, this Word “became flesh and dwelt among us,” as St. John proclaims, a teaching that is repugnant to the Gnostics, old and new, and to unbelievers in our world today.

And so, dear friends, in these days of darkness, let us look to Irenaeus, who defended the truth, who proclaimed the Light of Christ, the Word Made Flesh, in whom we abide.

The Church teaches the same faith, the same truth, offers the same enlightenment, and bids us in the same way to abide in the Son and in the Father through the ministry of the Holy Spirit.  

Abide, dear friends!  Remain faithful!  As St. Irenaeus teaches us, do not wander off into the darkness, but remain in the light.

And in the words of the hymn, we pray:

Lord Jesus Christ, with us abide,

For round us falls the eventide.

O let Your Word, that saving light,

Shine forth undimmed into the night.

In these last days of great distress

Grant us, dear Lord, true steadfastness

That we keep pure till life is spent

Your holy Word and Sacrament.

Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Sermon: Funeral of Catherine Gegenheimer - 2020

27 June 2020

Text: John 14:1-7 (Lev 26:3-13, Phil 1:21-23)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Dear Kathleen, Buddy, Carol, family, friends, brothers and sisters in Christ, and honored guests, peace be with you!

When someone lives to be nearly a century, we are tempted to think that death is natural.  It isn’t.  God did not create us to die.  Rather, He created us to live.  Death is a result of the fall into sin of Adam and Eve, and that act of rebellion against God continues to reverberate to us in our day.  

Of course, we see the effects of sin all around us.  How can anyone look at the news and think that this is how God meant things to be.  And just because someone had a long and fulfilling life does not make death any more normal or natural.

Catherine was part of our lives in different ways, whether a relationship of family, of friendship, of coworker, of student, of brother of sister church member, or as someone who gave her the body and blood of Christ.  Indeed, Catherine made every room she walked into brighter.  The fact that she was aged does not diminish our desire to see her in the flesh again, to hear her voice again, and to embrace her again.  The temptation to see death as natural is wiped away when we consider our mourning.

At her burial, I read St. Paul’s reminder that although we Christians do indeed grieve, we do not “grieve as others do who have no hope.”  Our hope comes from the fact that “Jesus died and rose again” and “through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep.”

And so for us Christians, death is not the end of our existence, but the beginning of truly becoming whom we were meant to be.  Our dear sister Catherine is in the loving arms of her Savior, in whom she was baptized, in whom she believes, in whom she has everlasting life.  And on the Last Day, she and all believers will rise in the flesh, and we will be reunited in a very real physical way, even as we say in the creed, we believe in “the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.”

Do you want to look into Catherine’s eyes again, hear her tell you that she loves you in her own voice, and embrace her again?  Well that, dear friends, is the promise that was made to you and to Catherine when she was baptized.  For Almighty God Himself took her into His holy covenant, saying, “I will… be your God, and you shall be My people.”  He promised to Catherine that her enemies would be destroyed, and dear friends, death is our enemy.  

But in Christ, death is a conquered enemy, rendered powerless to defeat us.  For us Christians, death is a temporary separation, and we look forward to the resurrection and to the promise of everlasting life.

And this, dear friends, is why we Christians live life to the full, without fear of death.  For we know that “to live is Christ, and to die is gain,” as the apostle confesses.  Life is a gift from God, and certainly Catherine loved life and loved her family in this life.  She loved partaking in the Divine Service and sharing in the body and blood of Christ.  But to the Christian, as St. Paul says, as much as we love our lives here, our “desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.”

The unbelieving world cannot make sense of this.  To them, death is seen as the end of all existence, and it is frightening.  They do indeed grieve as those who have no hope.  But we Christians hear the comfort of our Good Shepherd, our Lord Jesus Christ, who says, “Let not your hearts be troubled.  Believe in God; believe also in Me.  In My Father’s house are many rooms.  If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?”

We have a place in life, and in death.  Our place is with Christ.  And in death, we continue to be with Christ until the day of the resurrection, when our bodies will be restored.  And we will continue to be with Christ and with all of our loved ones who are baptized and who believe for all eternity – in the flesh – eating and drinking, rejoicing and embracing, alive to the full in bodies that are perfect, without pain, without suffering, without sin, and of course, without death.

This is why Catherine loved to be in the sanctuary of the church, where she heard the Word of God, the good news of salvation and eternal life.  It is proclaimed here by men who have been given authority to preach the Gospel.  It is here, in the sanctuary of the church that we hear the words of Holy Absolution spoken directly to you by men who have the authority to speak those sacred words.  It is here, in the sanctuary of the church where Christians young and old are brought to the saving waters of Holy Baptism.  It is here, in the sanctuary of the church where Jesus physically comes to us in a miraculous way, penetrating space and time to join us physically in His true body and blood, as Jesus says, “for the forgiveness of sins.”

Jesus says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through Me.”

Catherine knew this truth and confessed this truth.  She staked her very life on this truth.  She raised her family in this truth.  Her faith was strengthened by Word and Sacrament in this truth.  And it is this truth that sets Catherine free: free from the fallenness of this world, free from pain, free from aging, free from death.  For in Christ, Catherine is victorious over sin, death, and Satan.  

And again, as I read as we committed Catherine to the tomb to await the resurrection, I read St. Paul’s beautiful words of defiance against death: “When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written, ‘Death is swallowed up in victory.  O death, where is your victory.  O death, where is your sting.”

We feel the sting of death in being separated from our loved ones, but they do not feel death’s sting, for they are in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has redeemed Catherine and all the saints by His grace, according to His mercy.

And whether a person is one day old or a hundred years old, when death comes, we are reminded that it is unnatural.  But when death comes to the Christian, we are also reminded that this unnatural enemy has been defeated by our Lord Jesus Christ.  His victory is Catherine’s victory.  And we will see her again.  We have our Lord’s promise of that.  For He is the way, and the truth, and the life.

And to Catherine, to you, and to all Christians, “The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.  Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Sermon: Nativity of St. John the Baptist - 2020

24 June 2020

Text: Luke 1:57-80 (Isa 40:1-5, Acts 13:13-26)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

St. John the Baptist is the last prophet of the Old Testament, though he appears in the New Testament.  John’s prophetic message was also prophesied by the prophets of the Old Testament.  

John is the product of a miraculous birth, like the promised Isaac being born to the elderly Abraham and Sarah.  John was born to the formerly barren Elizabeth, following an announcement to Elizabeth’s husband Zechariah, a priest of the temple.  He was told that his wife would bear a miraculous son by the archangel Gabriel.  Zechariah’s doubted, and his doubt was punished by him suddenly being struck dumb, unable to speak.

Elizabeth conceived John six months before her cousin Mary miraculously conceived John’s cousin Jesus.  Mary and Elizabeth would meet while both were pregnant.  And the world itself was pregnant with the expectation of the events to come.

Of course, we focus on the miraculous birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, as well we should.  His birth changed the course of all history.  Jesus is God in the flesh, the “Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”  But it was His cousin John who spoke these words, inspired by the Holy Spirit, confessing who Jesus is.  And these words are sung in our liturgy and in the services of Christians around the world for two thousand years.  Our Lord Jesus Christ is God, to be worshiped and adored, our Savior born in the flesh, whose death redeems us, whose resurrection confirms His divinity and assures us of our own resurrections by being baptized into Christ, according to Christ’s institution.

But in a real sense, John is there to be an example for us as to how we are to live the Christian life.  John did not seek his own glory, but said that Jesus must increase, even as John must decrease.  John’s disciples became Jesus’ disciples. 

John is an example to preachers, for He preached the Word of God, in season and out of season, calling sinners to repent – the great and the small, even kings and queens, and pointing them to His divine cousin Jesus to receive forgiveness, life, and salvation.  John showed no favoritism.  John accepted no worldly praise.  John was willing to take ridicule from both the religious establishment and the government.  It made no difference to John, for he was called to “Comfort, comfort” God’s people, and “speak tenderly to Jerusalem.”  But he was also called to lift up every valley, and make low every mountain.  John called sinners to repent, and John directed the repentant to Jesus.  Those who would not repent heard condemnation.  Those who would repent heard comfort.

That is the task of the preacher.

But John is also a model for the laity as well.  For he is a confessor of Jesus.  He is a follower of Jesus.  He places himself in the service of Jesus.  He refuses to submit to wicked shepherds, but he submits to the Good Shepherd.

St. John’s faithful preaching and confessing of Jesus will cost him his life.  All faithful pastors enrage those who hear the law from his lips, and all faithful Christians endure the hatred of those who hate Jesus.  St. John was willing to put himself in harm’s way for the sake of the truth, for the sake of Jesus.  John was called to be a martyr, that is, a witness – a witness to our Lord Jesus Christ, to the Word of God, and to the proclamation and confession of the Word – even as all Christians are.

John is known both as the Forerunner and the Baptist.  He was to point to Jesus as the Lamb, and He was the instrument by which the Father and the Holy Spirit spoke to the world of the Son’s incarnation and ministry, of who He is, namely the Lamb, the one all-availing sacrifice to save those whose who accept the gift in faith, and to destroy the malignant devil and his hordes by the ultimate act of love.  John baptized Jesus to fulfill the prophets, and John faithfully carried out that calling.

The priest Zechariah, John’s father, upon regaining his ability to speak following the naming of his son in accordance with the archangel Gabriel’s instructions, spoke the Word of God.  Being “filled with the Holy Spirit,” the priest fulfilled his calling as preacher.  He blesses the Lord God of Israel, “for He has visited and redeemed His people.”  Zechariah preaches about Jesus, who was already living in the womb of the virgin Mary, as a “horn of salvation for us,” the infant King from the royal house of David.  

The mission of Jesus is indeed comfort for His people.  For though they were punished for their sins by being placed under the rule of foreigners, Zechariah points God’s people to the words of the prophets, that in Christ, “we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us.”  Think about this, dear friends, when you feel the crippling and stifling hand of hatred squeezing down upon your chest.  For we are indeed living in such times, where hatred and violence seem to reign unchecked, where churches are now being called upon to smash their images and tear down their statues of our Lord Jesus Christ, to change their preaching to offer comfort to sinners who need to hear the call to repent instead.  But in Christ, we are indeed delivered from the “hand of all who hate us,” whether in this life or the next.  We are called to confess Jesus, whether loved or hated by men.

St. Zechariah reminds us of God’s “mercy promised to our fathers” and God’s remembrance of his “holy covenant.” 

Zechariah addresses his infant son, whose calling would be that of the first preacher of Jesus the Christ, saying “You, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High,” and will “go before the Lord to prepare His ways,” to “give knowledge of salvation… in the forgiveness of their sins.”

And John’s calling, for which he will dedicate his short life according to God’s will, is ultimately for the sake of guiding “our feet into the way of peace.”

So where do we find this peace, dear friends, even in the midst of hatred, riots, statue-toppling, fearmongering, and destruction – and even open season on Christian people?  We find our peace in the One preached and confessed by John.  We find our peace in being disciples of Jesus.  We find our peace in the Word of the prophets and of the preachers: in the proclamation of the “Lamb of God that takest away the sin of the world.”

The miraculous birth of John leads us directly to the miraculous birth of Jesus.  And in a very real sense, this six-month countdown to Christmas is a reminder that in Christ, every day is a kind of Christmas – a celebration of the Incarnate Word in our midst, proclaimed by preachers and distributed by the sacramental and priestly ministry of shepherds who share the Lamb of God with the flock of God, given to you to eat and to drink.

For indeed, “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”  And “to us has been sent the message of this salvation.” 

Let us give thanks for St. John and his proclamation, and let us worship the One to whom John’s preaching directs us: to the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world, our comfort, and our salvation, even Jesus Christ our Lord!  Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Sermon: Trinity 2 - 2020

21 June 2020

Text: Luke 14:15-24 (Proverbs 9:1-10, 1 John 3:13-18

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

The Russian writer and defender of human rights, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, suffered under communism.  He spent eight years in prison camps.  After coming to America, he explained the monstrosity of the Soviet Union: “Men have forgotten God.  That’s why this happened.” 

As our culture crumbles into violence, and indeed pushes us toward communism, we see an increase in hatred against men and God.  Churches are increasingly in the crosshairs – especially churches that don’t compromise God’s Word.  

The apostle “whom Jesus loved,” St. John, wrote: “Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you.  We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers.”

Of course, we are to love everyone, including our enemies.  But the apostle is not speaking about that here.  He is referring to the Church as the brotherhood.  We Christians need to take care of each other.  We are brothers and sisters, and there is a special obligation that we have within the household of faith.  And in fact, the apostle John recorded our Lord’s words: “By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

It’s easy to compartmentalize our lives so that Church is just the thing we do on Sunday or Wednesday.  Indeed, we have all sorts of relationships: people who believe politically like we do, people who share hobbies, those with whom we work, and so on.  It’s easy to see the people sitting in the pews here as just like those relationships, no more or no less.  But our Lord Himself says that Christians are His “brother and sister and mother.”  Your Christian brothers and sisters are a more important bond than your friends or coworkers.  And as the world’s noose tightens around the Church’s neck, we will need to depend on one another all the more.

We are indeed surrounded by scoffers.  And these days, they don’t merely mock us.  Today’s scoffers try to destroy the lives of the people they hate.  They will scour the internet to see if there is something you have written that they can justify attacking you by.  They will find out where you live or work and harass you.  They will try to get you fired.  They will surround you with protestors with signs and bullhorns.  They may restrict your movement.  They may pound on your house.  They may even break windows and set fires.  Such is the hatred and the lack of restraint we see among today’s scoffers – some of whom even wear clerical collars and harass their brother pastors. 

The Holy Spirit instructs us: “Whoever corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse, and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury.”  Indeed, if you correct someone, you are inviting injury.  And yet, that is part of the Church’s job: to be the prophetic voice in the world, to proclaim the Word of God, both Law and Gospel, to call sinners to repent, and forgive them when they do.  But those who are wedded to their sins, who refer to breaking God’s law as “pride,” to those who justify violence, to those who practice racial hatred, to those who destroy public property, to those who burn and loot and pillage – any criticism is an invitation to more injury.  How true is the Scripture: “Do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you; reprove a wise man, and he will love you.”  A Christian responds to the Law with confession.  Those who follow a different god respond to the Law with rage.  “Give instruction to a wise man,” says the author of Proverbs, “and he will be still wiser; teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning.”  And indeed, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.”

So how do we learn to fear the Lord?  Where do we gain this knowledge of the Holy One? 

Our Lord Jesus Christ commissioned us to “make disciples of all nations, baptizing them” and “teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.  And behold I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

The Church baptizes, and she teaches.  She teaches Christians about their Lord.  And she teaches those in the world who are wise, those who are not scoffers.  And sometimes she is abused for teaching that which the scoffers find repugnant.  You, dear Christian, can never learn enough about our Lord.  You, dear brother, dear sister, can never have too much Scripture.  The Scripture is the Word.  The Scripture is Jesus.  It is the source of your wisdom, indeed, it is your very life, even in death.

How easy it is to fall into the way of the world, to see worship as something we have to force ourselves to do, rather than a privilege.  How easy it is to become the excuse-making villains in our Lord’s parable, being invited to the eternal banquet with the Bridegroom and with all the saints, to recline at table with Jesus, but to become bored.  How easy it is to choose other things to do rather than hear the Word and partake of the Sacrament: “I have bought a field… I have bought five yoke of oxen… I have married a wife… Please have me excused.”

Of course, there are times when we have no choice but to be absent from the Divine Service, but this should be grievous to us.  Our heart should ache.  It should be unthinkable that we would enjoy being absent from our Lord, from Him who said, “I am with you always, to the end of the age.”  Imagine responding to Jesus by saying, “That’s nice.  I’ll see you when it’s convenient for me, when I’m not doing something more fun.”

Our Lord told this parable to those who ultimately rejected Him, to those who put their trust in their ethnicity and the religious tradition whose motions they went through without really having faith.  For in the story, those who were invited were dis-invited.  Those who took the master’s grace for granted lost the master’s grace – and others were called instead.  The Church would suffer rejection from most of the Jews (who took pride in their ethnicity), and the Lord brought in Gentiles to be seated at the banquet instead.  “Go out quickly to the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in the poor and crippled and blind and lame,” says the Lord to the Church.  And, “Go out to the highways and hedges and compel people to come in that My house may be filled.” 

This is a warning, dear friends.  Don’t take our Lord’s grace for granted.  Don’t gradually become a scoffer.  But rather embrace wisdom, submit to the reproof of the Law, and rejoice in the proclamation of the Gospel.  You are able to do this by being here: in the Divine Service.  It is here that we confess our sins and receive forgiveness.  It is here that we become wise by fearing, loving, and trusting in God above all things.  It is here that we “increase in learning” by attentively listening to the Scriptures.  It is here that the hymns and preaching imbed the love of God into our hearts and minds.  It is here that we find love and acceptance from brothers and sisters who do not scoff at our faith, but rather share it and strengthen it.  It is here that the Lord keeps His promise to be with us in His true body and blood, miraculously given to you to eat and to drink for the forgiveness of sins, even unto eternity.

And the Good News, dear friends, is in this Divine Service, you are invited to the banquet, to recline at table with the living God, to be surrounded by your loved ones who are no longer with us in this fallen world, protected by myriads of unseen angels, and in the very presence of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And so let the world rage.  Let scoffers hate.  Let those governed by the supremacy of the color of their skin, of whatever ethnicity, those who put their trust in their works or in their manmade religion – let them all fuss and fume.  But let us not forget God.  Let us love the brothers.  Let us revel in the banquet.  Let us “pray, praise, and give thanks,” now, and even unto eternity.  Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Sermon: Wednesday of Trinity 1 - 2020

17 June 2020

Text: 1 John 4:16-21

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

There is a little ritual that has become popular in recent years among some Christians.  The first person says, “God is good, all the time,” and the response is “All the time, God is good.”  This is certainly a biblical theme, as God is indeed “good.”  In the Hebrew sense of the word, “good” implies perfection.  Muslims often confess their god Allah to be good when they proclaim “Allahu Akbar.”

But there is not much comfort for sinners in emphasizing the goodness of God.  

The great Lutheran bishop and writer Bo Giertz captured this in his novel, The Hammer of God.  As an elderly man lay on his deathbed, he was tormented by his sins.  The youthful pastor tried to comfort the old man by saying, “But God is good.”  Johannes replied, “Yes, God is good, very good.  It is just for that reason I am in such a bad way.  Pastor, you do not know how good God has been to me.  He has sought my soul and bidden me walk the way of life.  But I have not done so.  He has shown me heaven’s purity, but I shall never win it.”

The “God is good, all the time” chant doesn’t really convey what is important about God’s nature for us “poor, miserable sinners.”

St. John, the apostle whom Jesus loved, teaches us a more excellent way: “We have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us.  God is love.”

“God is love,” dear friends.  Love does not focus on itself in order to settle grievances, or to keep score with someone else’s lack of goodness.  Love doesn’t operate this way.  Love is focused on the beloved.  Love is unconditional.  Love is non-judgmental.  Love seeks a way to elevate the other rather than try to tear him down.

And yes indeed, God is good.  God is perfect.  God is just.  God demands that we too be perfect, or we deserve death and hell.  This is all true.  But love finds a way to save the beloved from his fate – even if the fate is well-deserved.  “God is love,” and this is why the second person of the Holy Trinity, our Lord Jesus Christ, condescended to take on our mortal flesh, to breathe our poisoned air, to live in our rotting, fallen world – in order to rescue us.  He allowed Himself to satisfy the demands of justice by dying in our place.  His blood was shed for our sins, and His righteousness is declared to be our righteousness.  His Word created reality, and His absolution at the cross offers the reality of forgiveness to all people of every time and place.

Of course, love does not force or compel.  Love is freely offered, and it can be freely accepted, or freely rejected.  For those who reject the free gift, there is no salvation.  For those who refuse to repent of their sins, there is no salvation.  For love doesn’t work like that.  But to all who receive the gift of salvation in love, in faith, with repentant hearts – all are welcomed, even as the lover embraces the beloved – without judgment, and without condition.

Johannes did not need his pastor to tell him of God’s goodness, but rather of God’s mercy, for mercy is a component of love.  True love is merciful and directed toward the beloved. 

In our fallen world, love is often talked about, but often perverted.  Just look at the characters in our stories today – especially in TV shows and movies.  Hollywood’s heroes are anti-heroes: narcissistic, self-centered, operating according to a political agenda far removed from love.  Today’s movie heroes are often sociopathic, lacking a conscience, devoid of empathy, and in many cases, outright evil.

But, dear friends, our God: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is love.  Christ doesn’t merely tell us that He loves us, nor does He even simply demonstrate love – rather He is love down to the core of His being: both human and divine.  Jesus empties Himself and takes the form of a servant in order to redeem us.  He willingly takes the hatred of his own people, of the religious leaders, of the Judean government, and of Rome itself.  He offers Himself up as the ultimate sacrificial Lamb for the life of the world, an oblation on the altar of the cross, His blood covering all of us who confess His name, we who are washed in His blood in the waters of Holy Baptism.  He freely gives this redemption as a free gift.  You do not, nor can not, earn it or pay for it.  Salvation is a gift of love.

The Christian life, dear friends, is a response to this love, to this gift, to this salvation that we have in Christ’s blood purely by grace.  As St. John reminds us: “Whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in Him.”  To abide means to remain.  We remain steadfast in the love of God through hearing the Word and receiving the sacraments.  We abide in His love by showing love to others – not in order to earn God’s love, for love isn’t earned, but rather given.  The love of God (who is love) is made manifest in us when we show love to our neighbor.  And when we fail, as we inevitably do, our loving and merciful Lord provides the sacrament of Holy Absolution, so that we may rest secure in the love of God by means of His Word of love and forgiveness spoken directly to us.

And it is in abiding in the Lord’s love, in living in His love by being immersed in Word and Sacrament, that “love is perfected in us,” in order that “we may have confidence for the day of judgment.’  Our faith is not in our works, not in how well we measure up to some ideal.  Our faith is in the Word and promise of God (who is love), that for the sake of that love, we are forgiven, and we receive this love, mercy, and forgiveness all by grace.

And it is by grace that we become vehicles for God’s love to others, for “because as He is so also are we in this world.”

Since God is love, and since we are loved by God, it is fitting that we love others.  It is not fitting for one who has been loved by God to hate his brother.  “For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.”

The Christian life is not about securing for ourselves a place in heaven, and even then, to try for the best seat in the house by means of doing more good works than the next guy.  Salvation is already ours as a gift.  Instead, our good works are acts of love for our neighbor without regard to what is in it for us.  This selfless love, the love of Jesus, is the kind of love we are called to as His redeemed, beloved people, dear friends.

Indeed, let us always remember, in good times and in bad times, that “God is love, all the time.  All the time, God is love.” 

Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Sermon: Trinity 1 and Baptism of Emmeline Hart - 2020

14 June 2020

Text: Luke 16:19-31 (Gen 15:1-6, 1 John 4:16-21)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Our Lord tells this dramatic story about a rich man and a poor man.  The rich man is in hell, and the poor man is in heaven, at “Abraham’s side.”  The rich man wants to warn his brothers in order to avoid the same fate, but Abraham tells him: “They have Moses and the Prophets, let them hear them.”  The rich man claims that if someone were to rise from the dead, they would believe.  Jesus, speaking as the character Abraham says: “If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.”

Why are people so blinded to the Christian faith?  Why won’t they listen to Moses and the Prophets, and especially to our risen Lord Jesus Christ?  Why are hearts so hard?  Why do ears refuse to hear?  Why do people live their lives in stubborn denial until it is too late?

Well, just five verses before our reading, St. Luke identifies our Lord’s hearers for whom He told this parable: “The Pharisees, who were lovers of money,” and they “heard these things, and they ridiculed Him.”  Our Lord is warning them, and us, to repent now, before it is too late.  But they ridicule Him.  Some things never change.  Nothing, indeed, is new under the sun.

So is it evil to be rich?  Is it sinful to have money?  Of course not.  Scripture is filled with both virtuous people and scoundrels from all across the wealth spectrum.  Is money evil?  Of course not.  It is a tool.  It makes it possible to trade even with people who don’t want what we produce.  Without money, a Latin teacher who wants to buy milk for his children would have to hope beyond hope that the guy in the village with the cow wants to study a dead language.  Money is not the root of all evil, as Scripture is misquoted, but rather the love of money.  For the Pharisees were “lovers of money.”  Money became their god.  Their misplaced love took the place of love of neighbor.  They became cold and uncompassionate.  They had no love, no mercy.  They became enslaved to their passions.  They became the villainous rich man in our Lord’s story.

And this is why wealth is such a temptation, dear friends.  It distorts us from knowing true love and from understanding where our true treasure is.

Consider little Emmeline, the world’s newest Christian.  She has the greatest treasures in the world.  She has the kind of wealth that money can’t buy.  She has a godly mother and father, a loving nuclear family, and extended kith and kin.  She has a Christian congregation where she will hear the Word of God.  But her greatest treasure – which is also so valuable as to be beyond payment even for all of the money in the world – is her baptism.  

She has been redeemed by Jesus Christ, by His blood shed at the cross.  She has been brought into the covenant – one of those offspring of Abraham more numerous than the stars.  Her sins are forgiven.  She has been born again.  Her baptism “works forgiveness of sins, rescues from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this, as the words and promises of God declare.”  She is truly born again, dear friends, of water and the Spirit.  She is “God’s own child… baptized into Christ.”  Emmeline enjoys wealth that by comparison makes the rich man look as impoverished as the beggar Lazarus.  For she has been purchased and won “from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil,” and this purchase, dear friends, is far too expensive for even the richest man in the world to buy.  For her redemption was bought “not with gold or silver, but with [Christ’s] holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death.” 

And because she could not pay it, Jesus “gave [her] full redemption price.”  “Gave,” dear friends.  By grace.  A gift.

And Emmeline joins all of us in asking defiantly, “Do I need earth’s treasures many?”  And we answer together, dear friends: “I have one worth more than any, that brought me salvation free, lasting to eternity.”

The great irony is that the greatest of all treasures are already paid for – paid in Christ’s blood, and given to us as a free gift.  Today, dear friends, today, in space and time, in your viewing and hearing, Emmeline received this vast treasure that no-one can take away from her.  There is no force in the universe that can snatch her out of the Father’s hand.

If this were offered for sale, the world’s elites would outbid one another to buy it.  Can you just imagine what the most wealthy people on the planet would pay for immortality?  And all the while, it has already been bought, and it is delivered not by an Amazon truck or an armed courier, but by three scoops of water and a promise of the almighty Triune God, the God who is love!

A promise, dear friends.  In this day and age, what is a promise worth?  But now consider the promise of God that Emmeline is His own child for eternity, a promise signed in the blood of the Lamb, a promise sealed by the Holy Spirit, a promise delivered by water and the Word.  

The great irony is that today people chase after money.  They lust after it.  They are willing to kill for it.  But today, money isn’t even gold or silver, but rather a promise, a false promise at that.  People worship a phony money god that isn’t even real money, but just pieces of paper with numbers on them.  This money is treated like magic, when in fact, it is an empty promise given by an empty god.  It is worth what the false god says it is, and nothing more.

Can money buy love?  Redemption?  God’s grace?  Eternal life? 

Once again, money has its place.  It is a tool.  It enables us to trade with our neighbors whose vocations are means by which God clothes us and feeds us and provides our daily bread.  But it is God Himself whom we are to “fear, love, and trust above all things.”  Three splashes of water and the name of the Trinity are the greatest treasure that little Emmeline will have during the course of her entire life – a life that will have no end.

Our Lord Himself promises that whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, will be “carried by the angels to Abraham’s side.”  And that belief, dear friends, comes by hearing the Word of Christ.  Ben and Anna, you already know this, but I will remind you anyway, the very greatest thing you can do for your baptized children is to love them, raise them in the faith, bring them to God’s house, teach them the fear of the Lord, and surround them with the Word.  Have them confess their sins and hear the sweet words of Holy Absolution.  Raise them to hear the Gospel proclaimed from the pulpit.  And when they are ready, bring them to the Sacrament of the Altar.  

This is worth more than all the gold and silver in the world, all of the money in circulation, and is of more value than anything else that you can provide for them.

For in our Lord’s parable, the rich man was not rich at all.  His god was mammon, a shriveled up, pathetic, false deity that can only make one disconnected and self- absorbed – even to death and hell.  The truly rich man was Lazarus, whose treasure was in heaven, who was rich in grace, whose wealth lay in his steadfast confession of the true and living God even in the face of suffering.

For in the end, Lazarus was blessed with immeasurable wealth, by hearing Moses and the prophets, and by means of the One who did rise from the dead, whose mercy knows no bounds, and whose love cannot be bought or sold at any price – and yet is free.  For it is by grace that you are saved, grace that has flowed over the sinful body of Emmeline, Word-infused blessed water that has transformed her into “God’s own child.”  And yes indeed, dear brothers and sisters, we gladly say it together, before God and before men, before friend and before foe, before the angels and before the demons, in life, in death, and by grace: “I am baptized into Christ; I’m a child of paradise!” 

Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.