Sermon: Trinity 8 – 2023

30 July 2023

Text: Matt 7:15-23 (Jer 23:16-29, Acts 20:27-38)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Jeremiah, St. Paul, and our Lord Jesus are all warning us today about “false prophets.”  They have been around since the very beginning.  They are liars who claim to speak for God.  And the danger is that we believe them and act on bad information to our harm.

So, how do we recognize a false prophet?  How do we know that we are being lied to?  Jesus teaches us, first of all, that they are “ravenous wolves” that come to us “in sheep’s clothing” – and that we “will recognize them by their fruits.”  In other words, look for something that doesn’t seem right.  Is the person claiming to be teaching us the truth only trying to appear as one of us?  Is he trying to fool you? 

Is the man from the US Health Service trying to look like a woman?  Is that military chaplain claiming to be a Christian and wearing a cross actually a Mormon – a religious body that does not use the cross as a symbol?  Does the politician speak one way but vote a different way?  Does the church claim to be Lutheran but has turned their worship services into non-liturgical entertainment?  Real prophets, real teachers of the truth, do not engage in bait-and-switch tactics.  As our Lord bids us, they let their yes be yes, and their no, no. 

Jesus also uses the image of trees and fruit: “Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?”  Our Lord is appealing to your sense of reason and logic, dear friends.  If you were going to buy a tree to plant in your yard, and you can see that it has little oranges on it, why would you believe anyone – even the store manager, even someone who has a PhD in botany, if he tells you that it’s really an apple tree?  As we say in the Small Catechism, the Lord Himself has given us: “eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and still takes care of them.” 

We are constantly being lied to by “false prophets” who claim to be experts.  And we are told to follow them like sheep – even when we can plainly see that the fruit on the tree doesn’t match the claim.  And young people are particularly vulnerable to this.  Young people who want free healthcare and free college are now openly embracing Communism, and they are in full denial of the concentration camps and poverty that happen in every single socialist country.  And part of the reason for this, dear friends, is their socialist professors in college.  They are false prophets.  This is why our Christian colleges must especially insist that our professors be genuine sheep and not wolves, and that everybody involved in our schools – from preschool to seminary – be “good trees” that bear “good fruit.”

But it’s not just young people.  How many people followed along when the talking heads on TV, and politicians, and people claiming to speak for science closed our churches but allowed thousands of BLM protestors to gather in public?  How many politicians and celebrities hectored normal people to isolate themselves while they had parties and got their hair and nails done?  How many times did you have to see them put on their masks for the group picture only to see them take them off right afterwards?  Why did so many people fall for this lie? 

A big source of such false prophecy are screens: massive ones in your living room, at the sports bar, in the airport, and the little ones in your pocket.  False prophecy comes to us by means of movies and shows and TikTok and YouTube and video games – where we are barraged with false prophecy and lies – even in the commercials.  We are always being “messaged” to, and young people are especially vulnerable.  You don’t think you are, but you are.  So when your parents limit your TV-watching or your video-game playing, they are being good parents.  Young people, all you have to do is to look around you to people in their twenties and thirties who have disfigured their faces, who don’t know the difference between a boy and a girl, and who have messed up their lives with drugs and alcohol and bad relationships – and remember that they were kids like you who were led astray by TV, movies, and bad friends – “false prophets.”  But older people are also vulnerable – leaving the TV on in the background just for the illusion of not being alone, programming you with deceptive words.  If you don’t think the TV influences you, why do companies spend billions of dollars making commercials?  And “the news” is also fake, dear friends.  These newscasters are reading scripts.  They are entertainers looking for ratings like everyone else.

The prophet Jeremiah points out that false prophets are even found in the church.  There are Christian people today who claim to be prophets.  They’re not prophets.  They claim to have dreams and visions.  They are lying.  We have the Word of God in the Scriptures today, dear friends.  And in the Old Testament, a prophet who made a prediction that didn’t come true was put to death.  Today’s person who claims to be a prophet never pays for his or her false prophecies.  We had such people in this church decades ago, and they split our church with their lies.  Don’t believe them.  Don’t become one of them.  Don’t fall for the lust for power and attention. 

We see this in the recent resurgence of witchcraft and the occult.  This is not innocent.  This is not compatible with Christianity.  Avoid tarot cards, fortune tellers, astrology, and people who turn crystals and little statues into some kind of spiritual practice.  They are false prophets.  Your eyes and ears and reason – along with your Bible – teach you that this is wrong and evil.  Flee from it. 

We usually think of the false prophet as the wealthy TV preacher who flaunts his money while pressuring you to send him or her more money.  And yes, that false prophet is more obvious.  But many people still read their books because they sound so nice.  They may even teach some truths.  But it is the lie mixed in that is the real danger, dear friends.  There is a popular book called Jesus Calling in which the author claims Jesus spoke to her while she was in a trance, and she engaged in the occult practice of “auto-writing.”  This means that she claims this book of hers is literally the Word of God.  It doesn’t matter that it is filled with nice-sounding Jesusy words and phrases, dear friends.  God spoke to us through the real prophet Jeremiah, “I have heard what the prophets what the prophets have said who prophesy lies in My name, saying, ‘I have dreamed, I have dreamed!’  How long shall there be lies in the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies, and who prophesy the deceit of their own heart?”  No good ever comes from such lies.  These false prophets are not innocent.

So where do we find truth, dear friends?  In God’s Word.  Don’t follow shepherds who are not themselves guided strictly by the Word of God.  Look at their fruits.  If you see what seems to be grapes growing on a fig tree, run away.  If you hear authority figures telling you a man is a woman, don’t believe anything they say.  They are liars.  Denounce them.  Mock them, even.  That’s what Elijah the prophet did to the false prophets of Baal.  Help other people discern the truth from the lie.  You have to know the Word of God to know when you are being lied to by false teachers in the church.  You have to be able to think logically to know when you are being lied to by professors and politicians and so-called experts on TV.  You need to stop trusting every person who has a degree or who won an election or who pretends to be someone else in a TV show.  They are nearly all false prophets. 

St. Paul teaches us how to recognize a true prophet: “For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.”  He warns of false prophets who would try to undo his work.  “Therefore, be alert… and now I commend you to God and to the Word of His grace.”

Dear friends, the truth is found in the Word of God, in God’s grace – not in Hollywood movies, the TV news, or your Sociology class.  The truth is this: God sent prophets among us to point us to Jesus.  Jesus came as “the way, the truth, and the life.”  Jesus came to undo the devil’s lies and teach us the truth: our world is fallen, but it has been redeemed by Christ’s blood.  We are created in God’s image and every human being is created male and female and has dignity by virtue of God’s creation and by the redeeming power of Jesus on the cross.  The truth is that you are baptized and saved from the lies of this world and from false prophets within the church.  The truth is that you can trust what is in the Holy Scriptures, and you can be wise when Scripture enlightens your senses and your reason.  You do not have to rely on people who claim to be prophets and experts, whether they are on TV or even if they are found in our sanctuaries and pulpits.  Listen to the whole counsel of God: Law and Gospel, and follow only those shepherds whose preaching comes from the Scriptures, and only listen to those who tell the truth backed up by evidence and reason.

Here is the truth: Jesus has come to rescue you.  He is the Good Shepherd.  He always tells us the truth.  We have His Word that the Holy Spirit caused to be written.  He forgives your sins and redeems you from all the lies of the devil.  And the true prophet Jeremiah promises us: “In the latter days you will understand it clearly.”  Thanks be to God for His Word, His cross, His grace,  and His glorious truth!

Amen.

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