Sermon: Holy Innocents – 2022

28 December 2022

Text: Matt 2:13-18

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

In warfare, the innocent suffer.  Non-combatant civilians – even women and children – are hit by bombs and bullets, and lose their lives.  This is the nature of warfare in our fallen world.  The military has a euphemism for such casualties – trying to minimize the humanity of such victims, as people may not support the war effort if they think too much about it.  The word is “collateral damage.”

We see collateral damage in our large cities, as gunplay between gangs often tragically causes innocent people to die in the crossfire, often children.

But what happened in the slaughter of the innocents was even worse, dear friends.  For these boys who were killed by the sword of Herod’s soldiers were not accidentally hit by stray missiles.  No, this was intentional.  These children were the intended larger target as a means to hit the narrow target: Jesus.

The wise men had inadvertently tipped off Herod – who was a fraudulent king – that the boy prophesied in Scripture to become the successor of King David, that is, the Messiah, had been born.  They were making a pilgrimage to see Him.  King Herod tried to trick the wise men into betraying the location of the baby King, but the Holy Spirit intervened, and the wise men instead tricked their intended tricker. 

Herod became “furious” – and instituted a plan to snuff out the life of the one who would reclaim the throne of Israel.  Herod ordered all boys “two years old or under” to be put to death, both in Bethlehem and in the surrounding area.  St. Matthew doesn’t give us the gory details, but one can only imagine the horror – for the families of these children, and for the soldiers themselves.  St. Matthew does point to the passage in Jeremiah’s prophecy about “Rachel weeping for her children” and refusing to be comforted, and applying it to this incident.

The entire Herodian dynasty was comprised of thugs and grifters.  They were sycophants of Rome, and had no sense of honor or morality or loyalty to their own nation.  The actions of this King Herod were par for the course for that bottom-feeding family 

Jesus came into our world precisely to defeat this kind of diabolical evil.  He took flesh like these Holy Innocents.  And indeed, He would Himself die as the Holy Innocent – though not as an infant.  Jesus would briefly stand trial before a future King Herod, another fraudulent parasite.  And indeed, our world leaders of today are mostly just as corrupt and evil.  It is the way of this fallen world, the world Jesus came to replace by a New World in a New Age.

Indeed, today we have a slaughter of the innocents in the world and in our country that dwarfs Herod’s intentional destruction of infants.  And though Roe v. Wade was overturned, abortions will not stop until our culture stops seeing death as a solution to our problems, and instead embraces human life as sacred, as the image of God.

In Canada, medically-assisted suicide is seen as a solution to their socialized medicine that cannot keep up with demand.  If you kill some, along with curing some – you might ease demands on the healthcare system.  You can even get same-day service.  You can be a depressed teenager, and your doctor will put you down like a diseased pet on the same day, with no waiting period or consultation.  This is the sick spirit of King Herod continuing in our world, in our “culture of death.”

An early writing of the Christian Church called the Didache taught that “There are two ways, one of life and one of death; but a great difference between the two ways. The way of life, then, is this: First, you shall love God who made you; second, your neighbour as yourself….  And the way of death is this: First of all it is evil and full of curse: murders, adulteries, lusts, fornications, thefts, idolatries, magic arts, witchcrafts, rapines, false witnessings, hypocrisies, double-heartedness, deceit, haughtiness, depravity, self-will, greediness, filthy talking, jealousy, over-confidence, loftiness, boastfulness; persecutors of the good, hating truth, loving a lie, not knowing a reward for righteousness, not cleaving to good nor to righteous judgment, watching not for that which is good, but for that which is evil,” and so on. 

Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life.”  Jesus is the way of life, and those who walk this way will strive to love God and love his neighbor.  The way of life is narrow, and few find it.  The broad way leads to destruction.

So what separates us from Herod, from those who make their living off of aborting children?  What makes us any better than those operating the euthanasia stations in Canada that have already killed ten thousand people who needed medical help? 

Nothing.

As shocking as it is, we are all Herod.  We like to think that we are better than “those people,” but didn’t we just confess together that we are “poor, miserable sinners”?  Think about the sin that you just confessed, for which Jesus forgave you, dear brother, dear sister.  That sin you chose to do was a step on the way that leads to death.  It was a slap in the face to Jesus.  It was happily biting the forbidden fruit because you felt that you could be like God, or at least ignore God, and do what you want.

And so, Jesus comes into our world, to fix that brokenness.  The Holy Spirit providentially protected Jesus from Herod.  Those Holy Innocents are a reminder of the fallenness of our world.  They died because of sin: their own sinful nature, and the sin of those who walked the way that leads to death.

They died as a kind of substitute for Jesus, the target that made all of them targets as well.  Their blood was shed in order that Jesus might live.  Jesus’ blood was shed, dear friends, in order that we might live.  His blood covers our sins, great and small.  And we plead His blood and call upon it to cover us when we find ourselves drawn to the Herodian way of death.

For indeed, our Lord did not die in Herod’s holocaust.  But He would become the one all availing holocaust, that is, the sacrificial offering, under another sinful ruler by the name of Pontius Pilate, some thirty years later.  For that was God’s plan.  The cross is indeed the way that leads to life.  Our Lord’s death gives us life.  His blood is shed in lieu of our own.  His grace and mercy drags us off of the broad way that leads to death, and sets us alright on the narrow path that leads to life.

We should look upon wicked Herod using the paraphrased words of St. Paul, “There but for the grace of God go I.”

So let us embrace life, defend life, and walk the way of life, by loving our neighbor, by serving our Lord, and by rejoicing that we have been Redeemed by the Baby Jesus, who grew up to be the crucified King of the Jews, who is indeed, the Good Shepherd, the Lord of the Universe.

Let us continue to invite people of every walk of life – including politicians and workers of death – to join us in a walk of repentance, in turning toward God and embracing the gift of the one who was born into our fallen world, He who heroically conquered sin, death, and the devil.

For the target of our Lord Jesus Christ is the devil himself.  And the collateral damage to those who walk the walk of death with Satan is unnecessary.  For, we are all the beneficiaries of His blood.  All have the hope of repentance, of forgiveness, life, and salvation. 

Let the silent testimony of these Holy Innocents point to the grace and mercy of Jesus, to His substitutionary sacrifice, to His mission to forgive the sinner and raise the dead.  And even as the Holy Innocents gave their lives for Jesus, let us also bear our own crosses as we walk the way that leads to life. 

Amen.

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

Sermon: Christmas – 2022

25 December 2022

Text: John 1:1-18 (Ex 40:17-21, 34-38, Titus 3:4-7)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Merry Christmas, dear friends!

When the children of Israel were wandering in the desert for forty years under the leadership of Moses, they had no building to worship in.  They were all living in tents.  And so God established a sanctuary for them, also in a tent.  This tabernacle could be taken down and put up whenever God told the people to set out and move to another location.

This tabernacle was a portable home for the Presence of God, and “the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.”  God’s Presence was hidden by a cloud. 

Fifteen hundred years later, the “glory of the Lord” once more came to His people in the person of Jesus.  Our Lord is the Messiah, the Christ, who was prophesied of old.  And we learn that He is also God.  And this time, His tent, His tabernacle, is not made of fabric by human hands.  Indeed, He is tabernacled with us in flesh and blood.  And like the days of the Israelites in the desert, the “glory of the Lord” is in a portable form that moves about with His people. 

This time, instead of a cloud, His glory is veiled by the human nature of Jesus of Nazareth.  The Glory of the Presence of God is there, dear friends, but it is hidden to the eyes.

The Evangelist, St. John, begins His account of the life of Jesus not with the announcement of the angel Gabriel to the virgin Mary that she was to give birth to the Son of God, the Christ, the King of Israel.  Nor does He begin His Gospel on the day of His birth, when “clothed in flesh [He] came to earth.”  Rather John begins at the creation of the universe.  Like Moses’s Book of Genesis, John’s Gospel begins with the words, “In the beginning.”  And “in the beginning,” Jesus was already there, long before His birth, long before His conception, long before His divine presence with the children of Israel – Jesus was there, the Word “by whom all things were made.” 

The glory of God was not hidden in a cloud at that time, because there were no clouds.  There was only God in His three persons that existed “in the beginning.”  But it was the Word that spoke, “Let there be light, and there was light.”

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” John’s Gospel begins.  Jesus is both with God and is God.  “All things were made through Him.”  Jesus is the Creator of the universe, whose Word brings everything into being.  The entire Old Testament is about Jesus and His creation, His covenant with His people, and even the sacrifices in the tabernacle and temple point to His cross: the shedding of His blood as the payment for our sins, making peace with God, restoring our broken creation.

But before the Creator could become the Redeemer by dying for His people, He had to take flesh.  He had to become incarnate.  He had to veil His glory yet again, coming to us with His glory hidden behind ordinary forms.  And so once again, the Word comes in the form of a tabernacle, a tent: His flesh.  And so what “a great and mighty wonder” it is, dear friends, that God should become human – and all in order to die.  This was an act of love to save us: the ultimate heroic action to drop into a combat zone surrounded by hostile enemy forces in order to carry out an impossible rescue mission.  And it would be impossible for anyone else other than God, the Word Made Flesh, dear friends.

For “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”  The word translated as “dwelt” literally means “tabernacled” or “tented.”  John is drawing a direct line from the Old Testament portable sanctuary in which was found the Presence of God, and the baby Jesus who grew up to be the Crucified One.  And of course, John connects Jesus to the Creation of the world.  He is the Word who created us, and the Word who tabernacles among us.  He is the Word that saves us.  He is the Word in whom we see God’s glory, even if it is veiled by earthly forms.  There will come a time when we will see Him in His full glory, dear friends.  But for now, we all live in frail and imperfect tents not made by human hands.

His true glory is not in His power and might, not in His creative brilliance, not in His dazzling appearance, but rather in His love.  Love caused Him to tabernacle among us.  Love caused Him to be laid in a manger.  Love caused Him to be nailed to a tree.  Love caused Him to be laid in a tomb.  Love caused Him to rise again for our justification.

And “when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us,” says St. Paul, “not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy.”  This is His glory, dear friends, “glory as of the only Son from the Father.”  And He saves us, “by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”

Jesus took flesh, was born, ministered, died as a sacrifice, rose again, and sent out apostles to baptize, to administer this “washing of regeneration” and to proclaim the Good News.  We have been baptized by the ordinariness of water combined with the supernatural power of words – words of the Word Made Flesh!  And so indeed, even as Mary and Joseph and the shepherds and the wise men saw God’s glory veiled and tabernacled, we too see His glory veiled and tabernacled in Holy Baptism.

Our Lord also commanded the apostles to administer His tabernacled glory in another way.  Calling to mind His birth in Bethlehem, which means “House of Bread,” and remembering that when He was born, He was laid in a manger – a food box – Jesus took the Twelve aside, took bread and wine, and by the creative power of His Word, said, “This is My body” and “This cup is the New Testament in My blood.”  And it is so.  And Jesus commissioned them, “This do in remembrance  of Me.”

And so we also see His tabernacle glory under the veiled forms of bread and wine, dear friends. 

The first witnesses of the Word Made Flesh saw a baby.  But with the eyes of faith, they saw the Word of God tabernacled among us, fulfilling prophesies, our Christ and King: the one who rescues us by His love.

And today, dear friends, we see His glory, “glory as of the only Son from the Father” veiled in the Word of God proclaimed, and the Word tabernacled among us in Baptism and the Eucharist.  We have seen one greater than Moses, and we have seen a greater tabernacle than the people of ancient Israel. 

For “from His fullness we have all received grace upon grace.  For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”

Merry Christmas, dear brothers and sisters!

Amen.

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

Sermon: Christmas Eve – 2022

24 December 2022

Text: John 1:1-14 (Isa 7:10-14, Mic 5:2-4, Isa 9:2-7, Matt 1:18-25, Matt 2:1-12)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Merry Christmas, dear friends!  This is one of the two times of the year where it seems that everyone is talking about Jesus, both believers and unbelievers.  Unbelievers will try to convince us that we don’t know much about Jesus, but in fact, we know Him well from the Scriptures and from those who knew Him.  The Church that He established upon the foundation of the twelve apostles is in every country today.  We are still here.

If we think of Christmas as the beginning of Jesus’ life, we miss the point.  Of course, we know that His life also goes back to Mary’s visitation by Gabriel nine months before, fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.”  And indeed, as the poet said, “Of her, Emmanuel, the Christ was born, in Bethlehem all on a Christmas morn.”

But the story of Jesus doesn’t begin there either, dear friends.  For Jesus is not only a man, born of a woman nine months after being conceived in her womb – for Jesus was already in existence.  And this is why we celebrate Christmas.  For it is the miracle of the infinite God taking on the limits of a fleshly body.

The life of Jesus has no beginning.  For “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”  Jesus was already there before anything was made.  In fact, John’s Gospel says: “In the beginning was the Word.”  The Word, in Greek, the Logos, is where we get the word “logic.”  For in the beginning, “the earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep.”  The Word brought order to the chaos, brought reason and logic and the laws of the universe to the shapeless blob.  For the Word is the Creator of all things, dear friends.  As St. John said, “The Word was with God, and the Word was God.”  For “God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.”  The Word spoke, and from nothing came everything.  “All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.”

And this is why we celebrate the birth of this Eternal Word: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”  The Blessed Virgin Mary became pregnant as a result of God Himself, as God the Father is the Father of Jesus, God the Son, by the action of the God the Holy Spirit. 

The birth of every child is a wonder, dear friends, a miracle.  And the birth of this child reminds us that we are creatures created in God’s image.  His birth reminds us of “the beginning,” when the Word created Adam and Eve, and placed them into a perfect world – a world that they would ruin by their sin – sin that we have inherited and added to.  Light was the first thing created by the Word, but we creatures yielded to the darkness, and fell captive to death.  But listen to John’s description of the Word that became flesh and dwelt among us: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.”

Our world became dark and mortal.  But into our world came Light to dispel the darkness, and the one Life that could destroy death.  And again, the Word spoke, dear friends: the Word Made Flesh, the Word that was born to Mary, the Word witnessed by men who followed the light of a star to behold the face of the God who created all stars, the flesh of the Word that created light itself.  The face from which the poet says come “radiant beams,” for He is “love’s pure light.”

The Word spoke for some thirty years, bringing light to the darkness, bringing life from death, bringing righteousness to sinners, bringing the hope of light and life “to those who sat in darkness and in the shadow of death.”  And the Word is still speaking, dear friends.  For just as the Word is eternal and predates His own birth, death did not mark the end of Jesus.  He died a sacrificial death for the sins of the world, and He rose: the victory of life over death. 

The word of the Word still resounds today, dear friends.  We heard it in all of these passages of Scripture, the Word of God.  We hear it as these good tidings of great joy are proclaimed in the preaching of the Word.  And we will hear it yet again when the very words of the Word Made Flesh are spoken over bread and wine, saying, “Let there be My body and blood,” and it shall be so.  The Word is still speaking, still creating and recreating, still bringing light to dark places, and bringing that which is dead back to life.  The Word Himself says, “Take, eat” and “Take, drink.”  The Word is even so kind as to tell us why: “For the forgiveness of sins.”  Jesus is speaking that forgiveness to you, dear friends, bringing light to your darkness.  And when you approach death, you will have the gift of life.

That is why we celebrate this birth.

For Jesus is not only God, but He is fully man, just like us: flesh and blood, only without the sin that condemns us to death.  Jesus died not as a result of His own sinful nature, but because of ours.  His little body was laid in the manger in Bethlehem, the city whose name is “House of Bread,” so that His mature body might be nailed to the cross and laid in the tomb just outside of Jerusalem, whose name is “City of Peace” – so that His risen and sacramental body might be given to you to eat.  For the Word did not remain apart from us in heaven, but rather “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

The Word was born in Bethlehem, not only a “House of Bread” but also the city “too little to be among the clans of Judah.”  For the one born here, in the “little town of Bethlehem” when “she who is in labor has given birth,” will indeed “be their peace.” 

St. Matthew gives us an account of the Lord’s birth.  He explains that the angel Gabriel not only came to Mary, but also to Joseph, her betrothed.  Our Lord Jesus has no earthly father, but he had a godly guardian, the husband of His mother Mary.  And Matthew also tells of the wise men who followed the star and came to see the baby Jesus.  This strange visit caused King Herod and his officials to search the Scriptures.  For this phony king, who was appointed by the Romans, was not pleased to learn of a possible rival to the throne.

But the wise men brought gifts to the newborn king.

And so indeed, we celebrate the birth of God, the coming of the eternal Word into space and time, into flesh and blood, into our sinful world to redeem it.  The created light of the star that He created led men who suffered the darkness of sin and death to Him who is “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God.”  He is the one who “was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary and was made Man.”

And, dear friends, this is not merely a history lesson.  For the Word has no beginning and no end.  “He is Alpha and Omega,” as the poet says, “He the source, the ending He.” Just as He was with God in the beginning, just as He was in the virgin’s womb, just as He was in the manger, just as He was on the cross, and just as He emerged triumphant from the tomb, He is present here.  His body is not limited, but is the flesh of the eternal and infinite Word.  His body is here in this “House of Bread,” and His blood is here in this “City of Peace.”  He continues to come to “Christian folk through the world” to bring us “out of darkness and the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

He is here for you, still speaking to you, still enlightening your darkness, and still giving you the gift of eternal life.  The Word is still flesh and still dwells among us, dear brothers and sisters.  And we participate in His incarnation, death, and resurrection when we eat His flesh and drink His blood “for the forgiveness of sins.”

So let us rejoice!  Christmas is not simply a time of family and decorative lights.  It is the present reality of the Word becoming flesh and dwelling among us.  Because of Immanuel’s coming, because of the Father’s love begotten, we are drawn into God’s family, and the Uncreated Light brings light to our darkness.  We are forgiven.  We have the promise of eternal life, the “dawn of redeeming grace.” 

Merry Christmas, dear friends!

Amen.

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

Sermon: St. Thomas – 2022

21 December 2022

Text: John 20:24-29

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Sometimes nicknames stick for a long time.  St. Thomas the Apostle and Martyr has a nickname: “Doubting Thomas” that has even become part of the English language.  And this nickname comes from one sentence that he uttered in frustration.  And yet, his entire life and ministry was not that of a doubter, but rather that of a believer! 

St. Thomas went on to make his way all the way to India, where he established churches that exist to this day.  Thomas was also martyred for the faith, being put to death by a spear.  This is quite the life and ministry for a man known as “Doubting Thomas.”

But Thomas’s life is not only an inspiration to us, dear friends.  Thomas’s story is also the triumph of faith and the confession of who Jesus is.  For to the Christian of every vocation, whether one is an apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, teacher, or for any other member of the body of Christ: father, mother, son, daughter, one who doubts, one who struggles, one who is in pain, one who mourns, one with regrets, one who bears the cross and follows Jesus as best as he can – Thomas is the bearer and proclaimer of hope to you!

On the evening of the first Easter, the risen Lord Jesus appeared in the flesh to the disciples whom Jesus would soon make apostles, that is, ones sent with Good News to preach to the world.  They were all present except for Thomas.  He missed it.  And when he returned, his friends and colleagues, all of whom had been sad and confused, excitedly told him that they had seen the Lord!  Thomas, still dejected and confounded, lashed out at them, “Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into His side, I will never believe.”

We all think and say harsh things in our worst moments.  Maybe we mean them, maybe we don’t.  But in this fallen world, we are all tempted to “false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice.”  Perhaps Thomas’s condition was not merely doubt, but despair.  Hope had fled him.  And in his condition, not even the testimony and preaching of the Lord’s chosen had immediate effect.

But, dear friends, the Word of God works.  We have His promise.  Maybe it takes time.  Preachers and hearers need to trust the Holy Spirit and be patient.  For the Lord did not give up on Thomas.  Planted seeds take time to sprout and grow and bear fruit.

A week passed, and the very next Sunday, the “disciples were inside again,” and this time, “Thomas was with them.”  And “although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”

Dear friends, this is the “peace of God which surpasses all understanding” as St. Paul wrote to the Philippians.  This is the perfect Shalom that Jesus brings: a restoration of communion between Creator and creatures, an end to enmity between Creator and creation.  It is the kingdom that Jesus brings by means of His blood, by means of His Word, by means of His sacrifice, by means of the proclamation of this Good News.  Jesus isn’t merely telling us about something that happened, dear friends, rather Jesus is coming to you right here and right now, giving you forgiveness, life, and salvation, giving you faith and overcoming your doubt, giving you hope that dispels despair, coming to you in a way similar to the way He came to Thomas – in a tangible way that you can look at, in His body and blood.  And the Word that is preached to you is supernatural and powerful.  You are being transformed even as Thomas was, dear friends.  It is happening to us here and now.

Jesus, the Word Made Flesh, overcomes Thomas’s doubt by throwing Thomas’s own words back at him, and doing so in His flesh.  Jesus invites Thomas to indeed put his hands into His wounds – the wounds by which we are saved and redeemed, recreated, and endowed with faith.  “Do not disbelieve, but believe,” invites our Lord.

And the most magnificent and sublime words of all in this passage, dear friends, is St. Thomas’s confession of faith.  For he takes our Lord up on His invitation.  When confronted with the body and blood of Jesus, when confronted with His Word, when confronted with risen Lord in the flesh where he stands, St. Thomas can do nothing other than to confess, “My Lord and my God!”

This confession is what separates Christians from all others in the world: from the skeptic who doubts that Jesus lived at all, from those who believe Jesus lived, but was evil, from those who believe that Jesus was merely a prophet, from those who believe Jesus was a moral teacher, but not God.  No, indeed, St. Thomas’s confession is our confession, dear friends.  For we have been forever changed by the Word and by His flesh and blood that we experience in space and time and in our senses.  Our doubt is replaced by belief, by the faith that comes by hearing, even as Jesus comes to us in another form than as He appeared to St. Thomas.

For our Lord says to Thomas, “Have you believed because you have seen me?  Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”  Dear brothers and sisters, that blessing that you have just heard from Jesus applies to you.  “Blessed are you.” 

We do not see Jesus as Thomas did, dear friends, but we see Jesus with the eyes of faith, as our Lord Himself says: “This is My body” and “This is My blood.”  Jesus said to you, I baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”  And Jesus says to all of us, again and again, “I forgive you all your sins” in that same blessed name of the Most Holy Trinity.

Faithful Thomas confessed Jesus as his Lord and his God.  He became a bearer of the Word – the Word Made Flesh – whom he preached across Asia.  St. Thomas is a picture of every Christian, especially those who are burdened by sorrow and despair.  And the preaching of Believing Thomas is the same preaching we hear today, dear friends: the preaching of the risen Lord by whose wounds we are saved and called out of the world into the kingdom.

Amen.

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – St. Katharina Luther – Dec 20, 2022

20 December 2022 - St. Katharina Luther

Text: Rev 8:1-13

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Today we remember St. Katharina, the wife of the Reformer, St. Martin.  The Luthers lived in perilous times of plagues: of black death, of cruel wars, and of religious persecution.  Katie knew well the theology of the cross, and the fact that Christians are not exempted from suffering in this fallen world.

In our readings from the Book of Revelation, we see a globalized version of the plagues of Egypt, prophesied to come to pass at some point in the future.  These plagues are presented figuratively as “trumpets.”   There are ecological disasters, calamities by what seems to be something like an asteroid strike, a global fouling of fresh water, and something that happens that restricts the sunlight and moonlight. 

These plagues will cover the entire earth, and some one-third of the earth’s population will perish.  And it will get even worse: “Woe, woe, woe to those who dwell on the earth, at the blasts of the other trumpets that the three angels are about to blow.”

Even though Katie Luther did not live in the period of these plagues, she lived in a time and place of disease, warfare, and the constant threat of her husband’s execution by hostile princes.  In spite of this Sword of Damocles that constantly threatened the Luthers, they raised six children in a joyful and happy family according to their calling.  Their home was a place of hospitality and love.  An apocryphal quote of Martin Luther was that if he were told Christ would return tomorrow, he would plant a tree.  For we Christians live in the fallen world, and yet we have hope.  We do not despair, even in our suffering.  We know that God is often “masked” behind suffering, even as the Lord Jesus suffered crucifixion and death in order to save us.

St. Katharina died as a penniless widow as a result of an accident while fleeing yet another plague.  She died in the faith, according to witnesses, saying, “I shall cling to Christ like a burr on a coat.”  And in spite of her hardscrabble, cruciform life, she was blessed by the Gospel, by the gift of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ!

Dear friends, we live in crazy times in which the secular world is directly attacking not only our Christian faith, but the very concept of truth itself.  We Christians are increasingly targeted.  But what a glorious opportunity to confess, to point people to the stability of the cross, even though the world is spinning out of control!  Let us read these accounts of the suffering that must take place before our Lord’s return with an emphasis upon holding fast to the faith, come what may, knowing that our Lord will return to save us, or we will return to Him in a blessed death.

Let us likewise confess with St. Katharina, “I shall cling to Christ like a burr on a coat.”

Amen.

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

Sermon: Rorate Coeli (Advent 4) – 2022

18 December 2022

Text: John 1:19-28

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

As we near Christmas, the birth of our Lord in the flesh, we are brought to the village of Bethany in Judea, just two miles outside of Jerusalem.

For here, priests and Levites come to John the Baptist to interrogate him regarding his work.  They ask him bluntly, “Who are you?”  They know that John is doing the work of a prophet, and that he is preaching in a way that the priests and Levites, the Sadducees, the scribes, and the Pharisees do not.  He is preaching a new message about the kingdom being near.

What they are really asking John is if He is the Messiah, that is, the promised Shepherd-King of Israel as proclaimed by the prophets of old.  By this time, Greek has replaced the Hebrew language, and so John denies that he is the Messiah, using the Greek word “Christ” instead of the Hebrew word “Messiah.” 

Indeed, “he confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, ‘I am not the Christ.’”  This denial baffled John’s interrogators.  So they ask him if he is Elijah – for many Jews believed that Elijah would return to earth before the end of the world.  “I am not,” John answers.  Well, this is very strange.

They ask John if he is “the Prophet” – since they are confused about the Prophet whom Moses promised would come.  The Prophet is the Messiah.  So John the Baptist also denies being this Prophet.

The priests and Levites who are questioning John are frustrated.  They are losing patience with his answers.  “Who are you?  We need to give an answer to those who sent us.  What do you say about yourself?”

And indeed, St. John the Baptist will now not just give them a list of whom he is not, but he will now confess that he is indeed a man sent from God: “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said.’”

John informs them that he is the one that Isaiah was talking about.  John is a prophet prophesied by an earlier prophet.  And so his interrogators are even more confused.  And we learn that their bosses who sent them were none other than the Pharisees: the legalists who will be the enemies of the Christ whom John was sent to announce to the world. 

John is baptizing people in the Jordan River in a cleansing ceremony that indicates repentance.  The Pharisees did not authorize this.  Neither did the priests, the Levites, the scribes, the king, nor any rabbi.  John was preaching and baptizing without their authority, and crowds beyond number were coming to him to be baptized. 

And so their next line of questioning is, “Why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?” 

They are offended by John’s actions apart from them.  They are really accusing him of acting without authorization.  He is a strange figure with his camel hair clothing and unusual diet of locusts and wild honey.  He doesn’t come to them asking for permission, and his short answers to their questions seem to show a kind of detached disrespect toward the religious leaders that everyone else holds in high esteem.  John the Baptist seems to shrug all of them off, and continues with his preaching and baptisms.

John answers their question in a way that they don’t want to hear.  Instead of explaining and defending himself, John points his interrogators to someone else – someone whose identity that John himself does not yet know.  “I baptize with water,” John says, “but among you stands one you do not know, even He who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.” 

Of course, John is pointing them to their as-yet unknown and unrevealed Messiah, the Christ, who is the Prophet, who is the fulfillment of Elijah’s preaching, the one whom John’s entire reason for being born was to point to.  John will soon learn that the Christ is his cousin Jesus, and John will send his disciples to be His disciples.  John will reveal the Christ in his preaching, and the rest of his life will be devoted to proclaiming Jesus the Christ and the kingdom that has now drawn near.

Indeed, “these things took place in Bethany,” even before the baptism of Jesus, even before the start of His ministry.  And three years later, our Lord’s earthly ministry will draw to a close as He makes His way to Jerusalem to be crucified, to die, and to rise again.  And on the way to His cross, Jesus will stop in Bethany, where He will raise Lazarus from the dead.  For Jesus is not only the Prophet and the Messiah, He is God in the flesh, the Creator who is to also the Redeemer.  He is the light that dispels the darkness.  He is the life that overcomes death.  And what Jesus does for Lazarus, He does for us, dear friends.  That is the kingdom that John proclaims.

John is not the Christ.  Rather he is a preacher of Christ.  John, and all preachers and baptizers in the history of the church have the same task: to point our hearers to Jesus, who is the Christ.  We preachers can raise the dead, because we preach Christ, who indeed has given you the promise at your baptism that you have been born again, born from above, “not of blood, nor the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God.”  You have been born of water and the Spirit.  And as St. Paul teaches us, “We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death.”  And “if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we shall certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His.”

The preaching of John had power, not because John had power, but rather because he preached Christ – the one whose Word washes us, forgives us, creates faith in us, and raises us bodily from death.  All preachers wield an alien power that is not their own.  It is the power of the Word: the one whose sandal neither John nor any other preacher is worthy to untie.

You are receiving this grace now in the hearing of this good news.  The Word of God bears this power, and you are receiving it right here and right now, dear brothers and sisters. 

In this final week of Advent, we are very near to the feast of our Lord’s incarnation and birth.  Let us ponder anew the mystery of His coming, the fact that Jesus fulfills all of the prophesies, that He is the Christ, God in the flesh, Emmanuel, God with us, our Savior, our Redeemer, the one who will call our name from the tomb, and we will, like Lazarus in Bethany, walk out and come back to life.  And this mystery includes His coming to us in preaching and in His body and blood.

And we baptize, and we are baptized, with the power of Jesus, with the authority of God, for our Lord Himself gave us this command: “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”  Dear friends, you are baptized into this name, born again, and given the promise of the resurrection.

Though we are not worthy, Jesus is.  And He has come and made us worthy by means of His own worthiness. John has proclaimed the kingdom.  Jesus brings the kingdom.  We have received the kingdom.  So let us receive our King!

Amen.

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – St. Lucia – Dec 13, 2022

13 Dec 2022 - St. Lucia

Text: Rev 1:1-20

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

St. Lucia was executed by the sword for her Christian faith in the year 304 under Emperor Diocletian.  She had a reputation of charity and purity.  Since her name means “light,” she is often portrayed artistically as wearing a wreath of candles on her head.  Her witness calls to mind the testimony of St. John the Evangelist in his Gospel that Jesus is the light that “shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5). 

John also wrote three letters that are in the New Testament, as well as penning the final book, the Apocalypse, or the Revelation, toward the end of his life on this side of glory.  John’s Revelation is the final prophetic vision given to the church, and has yet to be completely fulfilled before the return of our Lord, who is “the Alpha and the Omega… who is and who was and who is to come.”  The text includes this blessing: “Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near.”

John writes during a time of “tribulation,” a time similar to the persecution in the later days of Lucia.  John is suffering exile on the Greek island of Patmos.  And it is there that our Lord appears to him and tells him to “write what you see in a book.”  He is instructed to send this book to seven churches in the Roman province of Asia Minor (which is today within the Muslim nation of Turkey).  Although those seven churches no longer exist, John’s Revelation is read by Christians all over the world as they await the return of our Lord, who is “coming with the clouds.”

The vision shown to John is a series of strange things, like a dream, symbols of things to come in the history of the world and of the church.  St. John obediently writes down the strange vision.  The voice he hears on the “Lord’s day” (Sunday) is none other than that of his believed Lord, surrounded by “seven golden lampstands” and wearing a “long robe” and a “golden sash.”  This indeed sounds suspiciously like the Sunday Divine Service of the church.  And in this act of Sunday worship “in the Spirit,” John sees the Lord’s face “like the sun shining in full strength” – as the Lord had previously appeared to him, along with Peter and James, on the Mount of Transfiguration. 

John’s book of Revelation – which is really Jesus’ Revelation – rallies the church to hope – even in times of persecution.  And even in the parts of it that we are not yet able to understand, it provides hope, strength, and comfort to the Holy Christian Church, especially in times of persecution.  St. Lucia was given the gift of steadfastness and strength even as she faced death for the sake of her confession of Jesus, and she was certainly one of those who was blessed to hear “the words of this prophecy” and who kept “what is written in it” – especially when her time was near.

And let the church continue to worship her Lord with His very Word: “to Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood and made us a kingdom, priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever.”

Amen.

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

Sermon: Gaudete (Advent 3) – 2022

11 December 2022

Text: Luke 21:25-36 (Isa 40:1-11, 1 Cor 4:1-5)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

The first words that we sang together in this Divine Service, dear friends, was “Rejoice in the Lord always.  Again, will I say rejoice.”  This comes from St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians, and churches all over the world sing this as the introit on this third Sunday in Advent.  In Latin, “rejoice” is “Gaudete” – and that gives this Sunday its name.  The rose colored vestments and the rose colored candle in the Advent wreath remind us to rejoice!  

As we wait for our Lord, we rightfully mourn our sins and pray for forgiveness.  We rightfully seek reconciliation with God and with other people.  We rightfully hear the Law and the warning that our Lord is coming back as the King of the world, and we do not want to be on the receiving end of His wrath.  But let us never forget, dear brothers and sisters, that our King came not to condemn, but to save.  And we are saved by calling upon His name in faith, by confessing Him as Lord, and in being brought into the covenant by means of Holy Baptism. 

We rejoice at the Lord’s coming – His coming in the past as the babe of Bethlehem, His coming in the present under the forms of bread and wine, and His coming in the future to ransom His redeemed and to judge His enemies. 

In the gradual that we sang right before the Epistle reading, we prayed to Jesus our Dayspring to “come and enlighten those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death.” 

King David, in Psalm 143 speaks of his own enemy who “has made me sit in darkness like those long dead.”  He prays to God to save him.  And in the New Testament, St. Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, sings the answer to King David’s prayers: the coming of Jesus, the Son of David, the “sunrise” who shall “visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.”

In our Gospel reading, Zechariah’s son, St. John the Baptist, sits in darkness and in the shadow of death, having been placed into a dungeon by King Herod, who was offended by his preaching.  It is a dark place.  It is a place of death. 

And John the Baptist is suffering as he sits in the darkness of his own cell, and the shadow of his own death looms, as his enemy Herod will have him executed.  In his distress, St. John sends disciples to ask Jesus, “Are You the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”  Jesus encourages John to rejoice, even in prison; to rejoice, even in the face of death. 

Our Lord tells John’s disciples to “go and tell John what you hear and see.”  And Jesus gives John a list of reasons to rejoice: concrete and literal examples where those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death are indeed enlightened, and even raised from their mortal condition.  Jesus points out the miracles that are happening, the prophecies of Scripture that are being fulfilled: “the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them.  And blessed is the one who is not offended by Me.”

Jesus sends John’s disciples and messengers not with a command to rejoice, but rather with an invitation to do so, based on what is happening, based on what God is doing in the world.  For not even John’s imprisonment, and not even his death, can prevent his rejoicing at what is happening in the world, and indeed, what will happen to John. 

And with John, we too rejoice.  Not because we are compelled to do so, but rather because we can’t help but to rejoice in the face of what is happening to us.  The darkness that covers this earth cannot abide the “Light of the world” who is Jesus.  The mortality, the death that we sit in, cannot contain us any more than it could contain Jesus in the tomb.  Death is being undone by our Lord’s conquest and victory – a victory that John the Baptist shares in, and so do we, dear friends!

We rejoice because we are “surprised by joy,” as the great C.S. Lewis worded it.  Because in this fallen existence, we all, like John the Baptist, sit in darkness – the darkness of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature.  We all, like John, sit in the shadow of death, our own death and the death of our loved ones.  Death blocks out the sunshine and casts a cold shadow over us.

But here is why we rejoice, dear friends.  We rejoice because our fortunes have changed.  We were once blind to the Lord’s mercy, but now we see.  We were once deaf to the Lord’s promises, but now we hear.  We were once trapped, but now we can walk.  We were once consumed by the fleshly destruction of sin, and now we are cleansed.  And though we will die, we will rise again!  We poor, miserable sinners have “good news preached to [us].”  The Good News is that we are forgiven, we will rise from where we now sit: in darkness and in death.  We will rise from the gloom to the brightness.  We will rise from the tomb and will indeed revive.  And blessed are we, dear friends, when we are not offended by Jesus.  In fact, we are not offended, but rather we are filled with joy!

“Rejoice in the Lord always.  And again will I say, rejoice!”

The prophets who have been sent, and the preachers who have been commissioned to proclaim this good news have the same vocation, as the Lord commanded Isaiah: “Comfort, comfort My people, says your God.”  The prophet and the preacher are to give comfort to their hearers: “Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.”

This is good news!  This is enlightenment to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.  And Isaiah gives us a preview of John the Baptist, “A voice cries: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God….  The grass withers. The flower fades, but the Word of our God will stand forever.”

This is good news, dear friends!  For our previous bad condition has suddenly been reversed.  The blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and we poor, miserable sinners indeed hear this good news preached!

As St. Paul writes to the Corinthians, let us regard those who preach this Gospel to us as “stewards of the mysteries of God.”  For we stewards have food to serve you, dear friends: food that has not only the power to nourish your bodies, but even to raise your bodies from death: the body and blood of the very Lord Jesus Christ, who invites us to rejoice because of what He has done!  For St. Paul describes our Lord, who is coming again in glory, as the one “who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart.”

So let us continue to look around and remind ourselves of what John was told, what the Lord was doing, and what He continues to do, dear friends.  Let us take St. Paul’s inspired invitation to “rejoice” to heart.  Let us look to Jesus as our Dayspring, praying for Him to “come and enlighten those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death.”  Let us come to this rail, leaving behind the darkness of sin and death to receive the Light of the World: the one who shines to dispel our darkness, to forgive our sins, and to raise us from death.  For He invites us to hear His Gospel and see His redemptive work in our lives. 

“Rejoice in the Lord always.  Again will I say, rejoice!”

Amen.

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