Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday of Easter 5, 2024

30 Apr 2024

Text: Luke 12:13-34

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

There is a difference between wisely saving for the future as opposed to hoarding in fear.  For God has promised to provide for us, as our Lord comforts us: “Do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on.  For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing.”  Jesus refers us to the birds: “God feeds them” day by day without need for barns and storage facilities and banks.  When we trust in God, when we have faith in His promises, we can keep things in proper balance: managing our material goods wisely without falling into fear and covetousness. 

For as our Lord teaches us, our souls could be required of us at any time, maybe even today.  And then what becomes of our amassing of wealth?  So instead of laying up treasures for ourselves, we should be “rich toward God.”  Our lives should be focused on the kingdom and not on securing more stuff.

We were all stunned and saddened that the Rev. Charles Henrickson, was suddenly called to his heavenly home.  To some of you, he was a teacher.  To some of us, he was a colleague.  To many, he was a friend.  He was also a husband and a pastor.  To God, he is and remains His dear child, redeemed by the waters of Baptism and the mighty promises of the Word of God.  Pastor Hendrickson’s last sermon, which went unpreached to his congregation, proclaimed this same Gospel that comforts all of us when the souls of our friends and loved ones are required of them.  Pastor Henrickson’s sermon included this proclamation of the Gospel:

“‘Abide in the vine.’ In other words, stay connected. Remain where you are, connected to the vine. The idea of remaining where you are could sound kind of boring. But when it comes to the Christian life, nothing could be further from the truth. Far from being dull and lifeless, for the Christian, abiding in the vine--that is, remaining connected to Christ--is dynamic, active, and productive…  Is this how you see yourself?  We may have many identities in life:  teacher, student; employer, employee; husband, wife; parent, child.  But first and foremost is your identity in Christ.  In baptism you were connected to Christ.  You were joined to Jesus.  Now your life is linked to his.  Jesus gives you your identity.  And here’s what he says it is:  ‘You are the branches.’  Branches are defined by their connection to the vine.  Jesus is the vine, and so your identity is defined by your connection to Christ.  It is in that relationship that you will bear fruit in your life…  Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, as you rejoice in your Baptism and you receive the body and blood of Christ in Communion.  Let God’s word transform your mind and sink deep into your soul, as you sing the liturgy and hymns of the church and hear the preaching and teaching of God’s word.  Let Jesus’ words abide in you…  Abide in the vine.  Stay connected to Christ.  Your relationship to Jesus is your basic identity in life.  He is the source of your life and the secret to your fruitfulness.  Receive life from him as you continue in his word.  This is where and how you will find what you need to be fruitful.  Abide in the vine, and you will bear much fruit.”

Thanks be to God for this proclamation from His servant.  For we don’t have to amass and hoard wealth.  God Himself provides “daily bread” for us.  We can be wise without being fearful.  We can be frugal without being miserly.  We can be generous without being foolhardy.  But most importantly of all, we can live our lives with boldness, without anxiety, as branches connected to the vine.  We don’t have to fear poverty, and we don’t have to fear death.  Life is meant to be lived, as Jesus says, abundantly.  We do so by faith in His words.  And we, like Pastor Henrickson, are ready whenever our souls are required of us, for we are attached to the vine.  And like our dear brother who now awaits the resurrection of the body with us, but who waits in heavenly glory singing with the saints and angels, we have “moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys.”  For, dear friends, just as Pastor Henrickson preached and taught, just as he lived and died, and just as we will see him again in the flesh: “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” 

Thanks be to God for his mercy shown to us, and to Saint Charles his servant.  Let us all likewise hold fast to the vine and reap our eternal reward.  Let us “fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” 

Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Thursday of Easter 4, 2024

25 Apr 2024

Text: Luke 10:23-42

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

St. Luke places the Parable of the Good Samaritan right before the lesson of Mary and Martha.  It’s an interesting contrast.  In response to a question from a lawyer about salvation and works, Jesus composed a story called the Good Samaritan.  In this parable, the priest and the Levite have the opportunity to serve their neighbor by acting, but they don’t – and they are the villains of the story.  And of course, the Samaritan who takes action in showing mercy and serving his neighbor, is the hero. 

In the real-life incident between the sisters Mary and Martha, it is Mary, who instead of “much serving,” like her sister Martha, chooses to sit down “at the Lord’s feet” and just listens to Him.  Martha is annoyed that she is doing all the serving, while Mary is not doing anything.  And Martha scolds Jesus: “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?  Tell her then to help me.”  Jesus is gentle with Martha, but He corrects her: “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things.  But one thing is necessary.  Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.” 

So what is better, dear friends?  To sit and listen, or to act?  Is it more blessed to hear the doctrine, or to do it?  Our sinful flesh, like the lawyer, wants to do something – even to “inherit eternal life.”  The lawyers and the Pharisees were engaged in this kind of serving: but it is self-serving, “desiring to justify [themselves].  Martha, though she was serving her neighbors, was “distracted.”  She was mentally occupied with herself, fixated on how she was doing the work while her sister was not – and this made her increasingly angry.  But true service is not concerned with the self.  True service, like that of the Samaritan, is consumed with love, and not with self-righteousness and self-justification.  True service is the emptying of the self for the sake of the one in need.  And in order to become such a servant to one in need, one thing is indeed necessary: to listen to Jesus, and not to be distracted with the self-serving desire to “do something.” 

The lawyer’s question, “What must I do?” is all about him: himself, his actions, and his rewards.  It is service, but only to the self.  The priest and the Levite were serving themselves by ignoring the one thing necessary that their neighbor, the crime victim, could have used at that time.  Maybe the priest and the Levite felt that it was better to think about doctrine and meditate on the law rather than put it to use as a matter of compassion to one in need.

Dear friends, one thing is indeed necessary, the good portion, that is, the Word of God.  In order to serve, we must first be served by the true Good Samaritan: our Lord Jesus Christ.  Unlike the priest and the Levite, and unlike the lawyer, Jesus has compassion on us.  He binds up our wounds with the wine and the oil of the Word and the Sacraments.  He becomes the beast of burden Himself, carrying us to the only one who can help us, bringing us to our heavenly lodgings.  He pays the entire cost by means of His own blood.  For He was not merely stripped and beaten and left half-dead.  He was put to death for us, as the victim, as the sacrifice, as His priestly service to us.  The one thing necessary is to believe this Word of compassion that is given to us by His blood: to hear and to believe our Lord’s promise.

We must avoid being “distracted with much serving,” with being “anxious and troubled” about ourselves.  Before we can serve, we must ourselves be served.  Before we can be instruments of rescue to those who are left half-dead by this world, we must ourselves be rescued by the Good Samaritan Jesus.  Indeed, the Christian life is about both listening and serving.  It is neither like the priest and the Levite – who know the Law but refuse to act with compassion – nor is it the kind of self-made busyness that would make us think we deserve credit for our service, and to think busy work is better than sitting at the feet of Jesus and listening.

It is not either/or, but both/and.  It is only in light of our salvation, by the one who has compassion on us, that we can be revived from our own mortal wounds.  And it is only then that we can “go and do likewise.”  We do not “do” in order to “inherit,” rather we inherit, freely and with no strings attached, at the feet of Jesus, listening to His teaching, believing His promise, being rescued by Him – and then (and only then) are we freed to serve our neighbor with the same compassion which Jesus gives to us.

So, whatever our vocations, and however we serve, let us choose the good portion.  Let us not forget the one thing that is necessary.  Let us both listen, and let us always be eager to share and show the compassion of Jesus with those who are in need.  For Jesus tells us that many prophets and kings have desired to see what we see, and hear what we hear – but did not.  We have, dear friends.  And blessed are we, dear brothers and sisters, blessed are we to see the kingdom through the compassion of our Servant-King!    

Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Wednesday of Easter 4, 2024

24 Apr 2024

Text: Lev 16:1-24

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

The Old Testament rituals and feasts were put in place to atone for the sins of Old Testament Israel.  The Word of God was clear and exacting – and to unbelievers, they sound either ridiculous and superstitious, or they just make God seem arbitrary.  And so we read about the Day of Atonement – and the entry of the priest into the Most Holy Place beyond the veil, before the mercy seat.  Aaron is vested and bearing a sacrifice.  There is also a ritual involving a scapegoat, whose head bears the sins of the people, and who is cast out of the settlement to die as a sacrifice.  There is incense.  There is blood, sprinkled on the people.  There is water that is applied ritually to the priest.  And when all of these things have happened, the sins of Israel have been atoned for.  And this liturgy will be repeated every year.

But to us in New Testament Israel, we do not see these rituals as superstitious or arbitrary.  Rather what we see is the cross.  We see the atonement of the sins of the world!  We see Jesus!

All of the imagery is there, dear friends.  The Word of God is clear and exacting: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Tim 1:15).  The final Day of Atonement has come, and it never again needs to be repeated.  For the veil to the Most Holy Place was torn from top to bottom.  The mercy seat is now wherever Jesus is.  The priestly vestments worn by the men who serve in Christ’s stead and by Christ’s command, speaking Christ’s Word, remind us of Jesus: our great High Priest.  Jesus has brought the sacrifice: Himself, once and for all.  He is the Lamb whose blood is slain.  He is the Scapegoat whose “sacred head now wounded” bears the sins of the world.  He is sent out of the city to die on the cross: the bloody sacrifice to end all bloody sacrifices.  In our churches, we may well see and smell incense.  And there is indeed blood, according to the Word of Jesus: the blood in the cup given to the people.  There is water, used ritually applied to all of the priestly people of God, making us clean not merely ceremonially, but in rebirth by the Holy Spirit.  And because all of these things happen, the sins of the world have been atoned for, and we receive that atonement as a free gift.

The Old Testament makes sense when viewed from beneath the cross, through the lens of Jesus our Priest and our Lamb, shared in the Divine Service.  Every Mass is a reminder of our atonement.  Every Sunday is a sacrifice of praise for the one who was sacrificed “for us men and for our salvation.”

Jesus is the temple.  Jesus is the ark.  Jesus is the Most Holy Place.  Jesus is the priest.  Jesus is the sacrifice.  Jesus is the scapegoat.  Jesus is the source of the water and the blood that are present not only at the temple on the Day of Atonement, but also from His side at the cross on the Day of Atonement that is never again to be repeated.  The Lord’s blood will never again be shed, but it is shared.  His body will never again be offered as another atonement, but it is offered to you again and again as the one complete and eternal atonement.  Take, eat.  Take, drink.  For the forgiveness of sins!

Let us read the Old Testament with joyful reverence, dear friends, knowing that Christ has fulfilled it all, knowing that Israel is saved by her King and her Savior, and that His body and blood atone personally for you, who receive, and who believe. 

Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday of Easter 4, 2024

23Apr 2024

Text: Luke 9:37-62

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

Jesus “set His face to go to Jerusalem.” 

This is a turning point in Luke’s narrative of the Gospel.  Luke describes our Lord’s turn toward Jerusalem – and toward the cross – using the language of Isaiah (50:7): “I have set My face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame.”  And yet, in the previous verse, Isaiah speaks of the Messiah: “I gave my back to those who strike, and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard; I hid not my face from disgrace and spitting.”  Jesus endures shame on the cross, but by the cross, He will be glorified. 

Jesus knows what He must do.  He knows what He will do.  He knows what He has been prophesied to do.  He knows what the Father’s will is for Him to do.  And it is in this knowing and this willing – and in this loving – that our Lord will victoriously absolve the world from His cross: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).

The disciples still don’t know what Jesus is doing, nor what they will do in Jerusalem.  They are still bickering like children as to who is the greatest among them.  Jesus places an actual child among them, saying, “He who is least among you all is the one who is great.”  The work of casting out demons intensifies, and our Lord’s work of exorcism has even gone beyond the twelve.  But Jesus warns them not to interfere with those who are “for you” – since they are “not against you.”  Those who confess Him are also part of the church.  They also bear His Word that the demons fear.

Unlike the disciples at that time, we disciples of today have not been blinded to the reality of the cross.  To us it has been revealed by the Holy Spirit that Jesus is the Messiah foretold by Isaiah.  He is the greatest who was born a child.  He is the one who endures being struck and spat upon, being nailed to the cross.  He is the one who proclaims the Gospel of the forgiveness of sins from His cross.  And He also bids us to take up our own cross to follow Him as a matter of urgency.  For even as Jesus has set His face like a flint toward the cross, so too do we who follow Him, dear friends.  We face His cross that redeems us, receiving His absolution from the cross that forgives us, and believing in His sacrifice for our redemption.  And in love for God and our neighbors, we take up crosses of our own.  It is a matter of urgency.  There is no time for other priorities to encroach upon our discipleship.

“Leave the dead to bury their own dead” and “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God,” says our Lord.  So let us turn our faces to the crucified one, and let us resolve to follow Him with the faith of a child.  Let us continue to make war against the demons, and let us, as the church, as the Bride of Christ, “proclaim the kingdom of God.” 

Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday of Easter 3, 2024

16 Apr 2024

Text: Luke 7:18-35

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

John the Baptist is also John the Prophet.  He is the last, and in many ways, the greatest of all the prophets.  And yet, the kingdom of God that John proclaims, paradoxically, makes even the one who is least in the kingdom even greater than he!  For John is a preacher of righteousness, of being made perfect.  John does this by proclaiming Christ.  And Christ makes all of us perfect by His coming: His Incarnation, His passion, His death, and His resurrection – which John and all the prophets proclaimed.

Jesus says that John is even “more than a prophet,” for He is the pinnacle of the prophets.  He is the prophet prophesied by the prophet Isaiah: John is the “messenger,” the one who “will prepare [the Messiah’s] way.”  He is the last of the prophets and the first of the Christian preachers. John’s father Zechariah prophesied about John as well, which St. Luke recorded for us, and which we often sing in Matins: “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High… to prepare His ways… to give knowledge of salvation… in the forgiveness of their sins… to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” 

And now it is John who sits in darkness and in the shadow of death.  He is in prison, having been arrested by Herod, who was offended at his preaching.  Now it is John who needs to hear the good news, whose feet need to be guided into the way of peace.  And so it is now the Christ Himself who preaches the kingdom to the prophet who went before.  It is the fulfillment of the kingdom proclaimed by the King Himself that brings comfort and peace to John.  For as John’s father also prophesied about Jesus: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited and redeemed His people.”  For we shall be “saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us,” serving Him “without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all our days.”

John’s days will be cut short by his enemies who hate us, by a man who calls himself king of the Jews.  John’s preaching will be silenced.  But the Word cannot be silenced.  The kingdom cannot be stifled.  The fulfillment of John’s proclamation cannot be suppressed.  For the word of the prophets has been fulfilled by the Word Made Flesh: “the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to them.”  The kingdom has indeed come with signs and wonders, but more importantly, by the cross, by the real King of the Jews who is the King of the universe.  And just as John the Baptist baptized Jesus with water, John the evangelist will testify of the blood and water that flowed from our Lord’s pierced side when the kingdom was brought to its completion.

John’s preaching, his own life and death – and his own coming resurrection on the Last Day – all testify about the King and the kingdom.  “Wisdom is justified by all her children.”  We are wise to heed the prophets, and we are wise to see in Jesus their glorious fulfillment.  We are wise to continue to hear Christ preached, even sitting in darkness and in the shadow of death, to be drawn into the kingdom, and to become even greater than John by the grace of the King about whom he prophesied. 

Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday of Easter 2, 2024

9 Apr 2024

Text: Luke 4:31-44

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

Our Lord’s ministry began by surviving an assassination attempt in His hometown of Nazareth, after He had announced that He is the fulfillment of Isaiah.  But Jesus doesn’t just talk, He preaches and teaches in a way that His hearers were “astonished,” for “His word possessed authority.” 

Our Lord’s authority is backed up by what He does with it.  He demonstrates His authority over even “an unclean spirit.”  This demon announces Jesus in a way that is even more shocking than our Lord’s preaching that nearly got Him killed.  The demon confesses: “I know who You are – the Holy One of God.”  But this confession will not redeem the rebellious angel.  For he serves the devil.  And it is not the demon’s place to speak, and certainly not to the Son of God.  Our Lord “rebuked him, saying, ‘Be silent and come out of him.’”  And Jesus cast out the demon effortlessly, and the people “were amazed.”  They asked, “What is this word?  For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they come out.”

Our Lord’s reputation spreads quickly.

But Jesus not only takes charge over evil spirits, freeing the victims of these demons.  Jesus also has compassion on the sick.  He cured Peter’s mother in law, and soon after, “all those who had any who were sick with various diseases brought them to Him.”  Jesus healed them by laying His powerful and authoritative hands on them.  He cast out more demons, and the demons continued to admit in their rage, “You are the Son of God!” 

Our Lord’s ministry, however, was not primarily that of a healer and exorcist, but as a preacher.  “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God,” says Jesus.  And He takes His leave for “other towns” as He “was sent for this purpose.”  Jesus has come to undo the damage that sin has ravaged upon mankind: sickness, strife, chaos, lack of communion with God, guilt, demonic influence, up to and including death itself.  Our Lord’s miraculous ministry will roll back all of these effects of the fall, and His preaching – and the preaching of those whom He will send – will proclaim the coming of the kingdom and the coming of our King!

And that proclamation of the kingdom and the power and the glory of the Father continues to this very day, dear friends.  And it will continue until Jesus returns again in glory, and this age ends with the beginning of a new heaven and a new earth.  For Jesus is the King who wields both authority as given to Him by the Father, and power in His own right as God in the flesh.  And we remain “astonished at His teaching,” for “His Word possess[es] authority.”

Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday after Easter, 2024

2 Apr 2024

Text: Heb 10:1-18

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

The old covenant had “but a shadow of the good things to come.”  Its rituals were not “the true form of these realities.” The sacrifices of the Old Testament did not have the power to “make perfect” those who participated in them.  The lambs were tokens of the Lamb.  The blood of beasts was a token of the blood of Christ.  For as the author of Hebrews puts it bluntly, “It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.”  But these tokens were signs of a promise – the promise fulfilled by Jesus in His crucifixion: the actual sacrifice that these shadows and tokens pointed to.

Many Christians claim the old covenant is still in force with the biological children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  There are Christians who claim that we should continue to keep the Jewish Sabbath and rites like Passover.  Some Christians annually butcher the Lord’s Supper in the form of an unhistorical Seder meal.  Just as in the days of St. Paul, there are Christians who want to return to the slavery of the old covenant with dietary rules and rituals that were temporary pointers to the eternal reality of our great High Priest and His once-for-all sacrifice.  But what does the Holy Spirit teach us through the Scripture in this Letter we call Hebrews?  “He does away with the first in order to establish the second.” 

God has not abandoned the Jews, nor has he replaced them.  But He has replaced the old covenant, and in the new covenant, He invites all nationalities, Jews and Gentiles alike, to be His chosen people!  For the fulfillment of every aspect of the old covenant has come.  For our Lord Jesus Christ “offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins,” and He “sat down at the right hand of God.” 

The revelation of God is not only for people of one ancestry.  But through that one nation, just as He promised, through the “Seed” of Abraham – God has blessed all peoples of the earth (Gen 22:18).  The Law is no longer limited to stone tablets in an ark in a temple under the stewardship of one nation.  Rather, quoting Jeremiah (31:33), “this is the covenant... I will put My laws on their hearts and write them on their minds.”  And what’s more, the new covenant is not only the Law and the realization of our sins, but is also the Gospel, again in fulfillment of Jeremiah (31:34): “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.”

This new covenant, as Jesus teaches us, is not found in the “blood of beasts on Jewish altars slain,” but rather in the cup of His blood (1 Cor 11:25).  And as the author of Hebrews confesses: “Where there is forgiveness of these [sins and lawless deeds], there is no longer any offering for sin.”  The promise has been fulfilled.  The sacrifice has been offered and accepted.  So we Christians share in the fellowship of His blood, and “we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”  So we sing with the hymnist:

But Christ, the heavenly Lamb,
Takes all our sins away;
A sacrifice of nobler name
And richer blood than they.

Amen.

Christ is risen!  He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!

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