Sermon: Good Friday – 2022

15 April 2022

Text: John 18:1-19:42

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Nothing happens to Jesus by accident.  There are no surprises to Him who is God, but to us, dear friends, there is much to be surprised at.

First of all, where in the history of the world do we ever read about God becoming human, proving that He is indeed God by doing things that only God can do?  And instead of being worshiped by His own people, He isn’t merely assassinated, He is publicly tortured to death.  And this, after He was hailed as a king entering the city only five days earlier. 

And this was a conspiracy with deep roots.  It involved many of the conservative Pharisees and lawyers and scribes, as well as their rivals, the liberal priests and Levites and Sadducees, as well as the hated politicians known as the Herodians.  And all of these groups conspired with the pagan Romans, whom they considered to be a hostile occupying force.  It involved the provincial ruling council, the Sanhedrin, which was also a Jewish religious court.  It involved the Roman governor, a military captain, a detachment of soldiers, and one of our Lord’s leading disciples as well, who was the group’s treasurer.  This cabal also included the mobs of ordinary people, who were whipped up into a frenzy by their leaders and by the fake news of the day. 

They were so brazen, that this collaboration between Big Religion and Big Government with what was essentially the Big Media of the day, placed the charge over the head of Jesus in three languages at a busy crossroads – the equivalent of airing the execution of Jesus on live TV on all of the news channels.

Indeed, they pulled off what seems to be the most unlikely coup in history: the murder of God, the assassination of the King of the world, the lynching of the one man in history who fulfills all of the prophecies of the Old Testament, and who promised to restore Paradise.  This conspiracy seemed to foil God Himself.

And surprisingly, Jesus was killed because He did things like healing people from incurable diseases.  The doctors and politicians of the day could not cure leprosy.  If you had this disease, you were subjected to a lockdown for the rest of your life.  Jesus embarrassed the doctors and politicians by healing the lepers.  And the same for those who were blind and deaf and mute.  Jesus did what surgeons could not do.  Jesus even raised at least three people from death itself, and promised to raise everyone who believes in Him. 

Why, it’s little wonder the powers that be had to kill Him.  They conspired to commit the ultimate act of injustice.  There is an old saying: if you want to know who rules over you, find out whom you are not allowed to criticize.  And our Lord had plenty to say about all of these groups!  Far from being the syrupy-sweet Mister Nice Guy that ignorant and biblically illiterate people think Jesus is, in fact, He is bombastic and unrelenting in His attacks on the very people that He was “not allowed” to criticize.  It’s all right there in the Gospels.  It is surprising to people when they actually read the Bible.  For Jesus took on the whole lot of them.  And for three years, all of these disparate groups who hated each other could only take their pounding from Jesus, who called them out on all of their evil words and deeds.

Of course, there was another option for our Lord’s hearers: they could have repented and believed the good news.  And some of them did.  Some Pharisees and Sadducees converted and followed Jesus.  There was even a zealot, that is, a formerly violent revolutionary, who laid down his sword to follow Jesus.  Sanhedrin members Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, who courageously asked Pilate for the body of Jesus, were such followers of Jesus from among the ruling elites.  Even the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, believed Jesus to be innocent, and wanted to release Him.  Pilate got the last laugh by posting “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews” and doing the equivalent of posting it on Twitter and running it on every cable news channel.  But even Pilate, in the end, did the bidding of the mob.  The captain who oversaw the crucifixion of Jesus confessed Him to be the Son of God, as did one of the other men who were being crucified.

This was indeed quite the conspiracy.  It even drew in our Lord’s inner circle of disciples, who abandoned Him – even St. Peter, the head of our Lord’s disciples, betrayed Jesus in a shameful way, just as Jesus predicted. 

Perhaps most surprising of all is that Jesus knew every bit of the conspiracy.  He did not use His divine power to evade what was to come.  He did not call upon the legions of angels at His disposal to crush His attackers and the plotters in this conspiracy.  He went to the cross willingly, like a Lamb to the slaughter, for that is indeed who He is, down to the very marrow of His unbroken bones: “The Lamb of God that takest away the sin of the world.”

It is indeed surprising that Jesus willingly endures all of this suffering, and dies quickly, before the beginning of the Sabbath.  Jesus dies when He chooses.  For though sinful men participated in this conspiracy, His passion, death, burial, and yes, His resurrection to come, are part of a bigger conspiracy: a conspiracy between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to commit the ultimate act of justice: the payment for the sins of the world.  While the merely human actors in this conspiracy were motivated by selfish hatred, and the desire to be served, the divine conspiracy to place Jesus on the cross is motivated by outwardly-directed love, and the desire not to be served, but to serve, and not only to serve, but to save.

At the cross, Jesus cures the root causes of leprosy, blindness, deafness, muteness, and death itself.  By means of the cross, Jesus conquers the sinfulness and the hatred that motivated this conspiracy and put Him on the cross.  He destroys the head of the conspiracy by crushing the head of the serpent.  And this is the biggest surprise of all, dear friends.

And the details of all of this would not be known, and the depth of this conspiracy and its ramifications would not fully come to bear, until His resurrection, until His ascension, until the coming of the Holy Spirit, and until the Gospels were themselves written, so that we might study and reflect upon the surprising life, death, resurrection, and eternal reign of Jesus.

To this very day, we are lorded over by charlatan religious hucksters and corrupt politicians from all over the world who continue conspire in vain against Jesus and His flock.  There are traitors in the church, from lowly parish pastors pushing lies and feathering their nests, to millionaire TV celebrity preachers, to bishops and popes, and even bureaucrats in our own synod and its various institutions.  And lest we become forgetful of our own sins, like the disciples, we too are part of the conspiracy, dear friends.  For our sins ultimately put our Lord on the cross.  It was to forgive our sins that He willingly died, using the evil intentions of all of the actors in this tragedy, and turning it into a triumph.

So let us plead the blood of Christ when we are confronted with our own sins.  When Satan, who temporarily rules over the mobs and governments and religious factions who oppose the Word of God, when the devil tempts you and accuses you, remember that He tried to tempt Jesus as well.  He accused Jesus as well.  But it was all to no avail.  Remind the devil of the cross, for indeed, “It is written.”

The biggest surprise of the cross is that it forgives you, dear brother, dear sister.  For it is the means by which Jesus becomes your atonement, and your healing from everything.  It is how you are restored, and go from sinner to saint.  The cross is the antidote to sickness and death itself.

And the death of God upon the cross by means of a huge conspiracy that includes both heaven and earth is not even the biggest surprise, dear friends.  And it really isn’t much of a surprise for us, because we have the Word of God to tell us where this is all leading.  Indeed, it is written.  The black drapes that pall our crosses and images of Jesus on this day will give way to white paraments and vestments and glorious celebratory music on the third day.  For the conspiracy to overthrow the King of the universe and to put God into a tomb is a colossal failure to them, but the greatest success of all to Christ and His bride, the church.  The conspirators – included the devil himself – played right into God’s hands.

And not only will our Lord Jesus rise from the slab and walk out of His own tomb, so will all of us who confess Him, dear friends.  This will be the greatest surprise of all to the remaining members of the conspiracy to kill God and silence His criticism.  But we speak the surprising truth with St. Paul, to friend and foe alike: “The word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

Let us gather again here in this place on Sunday, and let our stubborn and vocal presence be part of the worldwide counter-conspiracy to confess Him as God and as King! 

Amen.

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday of Holy Week

12 April 2022

Text: Heb 3:1-19

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

The writer to the Hebrews demonstrates Jesus as the New and Greater Moses, the fulfillment of the Law of Moses.  For “Moses was faithful in all God’s house as a servant… but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a Son.”  And “we are His house if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.”

In other words, Moses gives us the Word of God that points us to Jesus; Jesus is the Word of God incarnate who fulfills the Law of Moses.  And reflecting on Moses and our need today as Christians to “hold fast” to Christ as our hope, the writer of Hebrews uses the Israelites from the Book of Exodus as an illustration, quoting Psalm 95: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness, when your fathers put me to the test and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work.  For forty years I loathed that generation and said, ‘They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways.’  Therefore I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’”

Because of their falling away, the Lord made that rebellious generation to wander forty years, until all of them died, never reaching the Promised Land.  “Take care,” he says, lest our unbelieving hearts lead us to “fall away from the living God.”

This is a stern dose of the Law, dear friends.  It is a cautionary tale.  So how do we avoid the fate of the wandering Israelites?  “Consider Jesus,” he says, “the apostle and high priest of our confession.”  Our steadfastness is not in ourselves, our knowledge of Moses, our intimacy with the Law.  Rather, we are to be steadfast in Christ, the one who fulfills the Law.  We are to “hear His voice,” and by doing so, we will not be hardening our hearts like the rebellious Israelites. Our salvation, our life in the eternal Promised Land, is found in Christ, for “we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.”

In other words, dear friends, we are to be steadfast in faith – faith not in ourselves, not even in Moses’s Law, but rather in Christ, who died for us, and who is leading us faithfully on to eternity.  It is rather much like the hymn attributed to St. Patrick that says: “Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise, Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me, Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me.”

Indeed, it is Christ who is our “confidence and our boasting in His hope!” 

Amen.

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

Sermon: Palmarum (Lent 6) – 2022

10 April 2022

Text: John John 12:12-19

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

“Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!  Hosanna in the highest!

Our Lord’s disciples “did not understand these things at first.”  They made their way to Jerusalem with Jesus, and they saw this amazing royal welcome.  Herod was the king of Judea, but the crowds are welcoming Jesus as king.  They are strewing palm branches along His path.  They are cheering His entry into King David’s royal city.  In the course of His ministry, the disciples heard Jesus referred to as the “Son of David” – which means that they recognize His kingship.  And now, Jesus rides a donkey, “the foal of a colt, a beast of burden” into the royal city, which is how King David’s first son, King Solomon, made his entrance to take over the kingdom from his deceased father.

But the Romans occupy the kingdom, and they hand-pick the rulers of Judea: King Herod, the collaborator, who was in fact a pretender to the throne, and Governor Pilate, an appointee of Caesar to lord over the Jews.

But now there is excitement as the crowds hail Jesus, whose name means “God saves,” whose name is the same as the Old Testament Joshua who succeeded Moses and took the people into the promised land.  And they greet this Jesus with cries of Hosanna: a praise that is also a prayer: “Save us!”  So think about this, dear friends: the people are welcoming their king, crying out “Save us!”  And His name is literally “God saves.” 

No wonder they don’t understand.  But at the same time, at least three times, Jesus told them bluntly what was to happen: he was to be arrested, betrayed to the Romans, humiliated, tortured, killed, and raised from the dead on the third day.  But here we find crowds of Jews hailing their King.

However, they were to figure it out “when Jesus was glorified.”  We might think that this royal welcome is our Lord’s glorification.  Not so.  For His real glory is in carrying out His name: “God saves.”  He is glorified when He answers the crowds’ prayers of Hosanna, “Save us!”  For that glorification will be on the cross.

No wonder they are confused.  Crucifixion is a humiliation.  It is painful.  It results in a slow, agonizing death.  It is meted out to slaves and traitors.  In our minds, this is not the stuff of glory.  Being transported into the royal city as a conquering hero is our idea of glory. 

So why is our Lord’s horrific ordeal of His passion, crucifixion, death, and burial considered “glory,” dear friends?  For this is love.  This is the sacrifice of self for others.  This is the same kind of glory that the Congress of the United States honors with the Medal of Honor.  This is the kind of glory that made the name “Leonidas” synonymous with heroism and honor.  It is rare that a king leads the troops in battle and is willing to die for the people.  Usually, it is the other way around.

It is at the cross, and then after the resurrection, and then after the Holy Spirit comes, that the disciples “get it.”  It is then that they will understand the name of Jesus, the “name that is above every name,” the name of “God saves.”  He rescues us from our sin.  He dies for us, the righteous for the unrighteous, the Son come down from heaven to pull us out of hell.  All of our greatest heroes in history are nothing compared to Jesus, the King of the Jews, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the all-atoning sacrifice, the Creator who dies for His beloved creation – even a creation that disobeyed Him, hated Him, tortured Him, crucified Him, mocked Him, killed Him, and buried Him.  They thought they silenced Him, and they thought they silenced His disciples’ prayers of Hosanna.

But, dear friends, here we are singing our Hosannas – week in and week out, two thousand years later, in our worship all over the world and in every language.

But the word “Hosanna” is the same in every language.  It is still a praise and a prayer.  And for us, we welcome and recognize and confess our King – our true king, not our phony politicians and posers and pretenders – but King Jesus, our Lord, our God, our Savior.  He was glorified on the cross, and His glory continued to manifest itself in His victorious resurrection.  Like the disciples, we remember “that these things had been written about Him and done to Him.”

For the crowds who hailed Him “ had been with Him when He called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead.”  And they “continued to bear witness.”  For they knew that this was a sign of things to come.  They knew that there were to be more “Lazaruses” to come.  For those Lazaruses are us, dear friends: we who confess Him, we who bear witness of Him, we who remember that these things had been written about Him.” 

We are those same people, dear friends.  Hence our palms and our cries for salvation!  Hence our praise for our true Redeemer King!  Hence the songs of children making sweet hosannas ring!

We know the glory of our Savior, and we know that this glory is shared with us: His life as a ransom for our death, His resurrection as a preview of our own resurrection.  We reflect also on the sign of Lazarus, knowing that we are Lazarus and our loved ones are Lazarus. 

And this is one of the times when the Pharisees got it right about Jesus, dear brothers and sisters.  It is to the Lord’s glory, and it is to our glory, but it is to the shame of the devil, the world, our sinful nature, and the enemies of the cross.  For the Pharisees observing this same royal welcome are filled with dismay and panic: “You see that you are gaining nothing.  Look, the world has gone after Him.” 

And indeed it has and it does – and it will be until His return in glory: saving us and delivering us from the evil one, bringing us into the Promised Land of eternity, calling us by name out of our graves, and giving us a renewed body in the resurrection, fit to live in a world without sin, without suffering, and without death.  The Pharisees and others who rely on their own self-righteousness are “gaining nothing.”  But to us poor, miserable sinners, to those of us who confess our sins and our need for a Savior, to those of us who pray: “Hosanna, save us” to Jesus, our God who saves, we are gaining everything.  We Christians all over the world sing Hosanna and wave palms on this day, knowing that our Lord’s moment of glory was His victory on the cross, and the victory lap of that glory is to come at His resurrection.  And that too, we remember “ that these things had been written about Him.

“Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!  Hosanna in the highest!”

Amen.

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

Sermon: Louisiana Wing Conference CAP – Saturday of Lent 5

9 April 2022

Text: Mark 11:1-10

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Most of the Christian world celebrates Palm Sunday tomorrow, calling to mind the events of our Lord’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem, preparing for His triumph at the cross and at the empty tomb.  Lest we forget that He is the Son of God, and is God, we are reminded of the miraculous provision that Jesus makes for Himself in securing transportation for this entry into David’s royal city.  And lest we forget that He is Man, the Son of Man and the Son of David, He rides this “colt, the foal of a beast of burden” into Jerusalem, just as David’s Son King Solomon did, as He took up the throne of His father David.

But this King, this Jesus, is a New and Greater Solomon.  For He does not take foreign wives and follow foreign gods.  King Jesus is faithful to His Father and to His Bride, the Church.  He does not chase after temporal glory and empire, but rather empties Himself, “taking the form of a servant,” and drawing us into His kingdom that is “not of this world.”  Rather than order other men to serve Him by shedding their blood and dying for Him, this King “comes not to be served but to serve,” and to save us by shedding His blood and dying for us.

The people hail Him in royal fashion with palm branches and acclamations of “Hosanna!” – a word that means “Save us.”  The name of Jesus means: “God saves.”  Luke’s account of our Lord’s entrance into Jerusalem teaches us that not everyone recognized their King.  The Pharisees ordered Jesus, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples.”  Those same authoritarian voices exist today: those who would silence our confession of Jesus and stifle our worship of our King.  Our Lord tells them: “If these were silent, the very stones would cry out.”  And indeed, dear friends, even the stones confess Christ as Lord.  The stone that sealed His tomb will confess Him, as it will be rolled away to make way for Him.  The stones of the temple that were “thrown down” confess Him as the King of a kingdom that is “not of this world.”  For He is the “stone the builders rejected” that has become the “cornerstone.”  The stones of jewels in the gates of the New Jerusalem in the Book of Revelation confess Him as well, and will do so for eternity.

Like the stones, we will not be silenced in our confession, dear friends.  For we cry to Jesus, the God who saves, and we acclaim Him with Hosannas, prayers for God’s salvation, knowing that we are poor, miserable sinners in need of redemption, redeemed by the blood of the Lamb.

We are honored to wear the uniform of our country and corps, to serve one another and our community, state, and nation.  And we are honored to wear the robes that have been washed and made “white in the blood of the Lamb.” It is our joy to serve our Lord and our neighbor in the kingdom. 

Let us continue to preach and confess “Christ crucified,” our King who was “raised for our justification.”  May this Holy Week remind us to always and evermore give “glory, laud, and honor” to our “Redeemer King,” and may we children of the Heavenly Father make “sweets hosannas ring,” now and even unto eternity.

Amen.

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

 

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday of Lent 5

5 April 2022

Text: Mark 14:53-72

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

In 2 Peter 3:5, St. Peter uses an expression that is sometimes translated “willingly ignorant” concerning people who deny Biblical truth.  Such people are different than those who either have never heard of the Scriptures, or honestly just don’t believe them.  To be “willingly ignorant” is a deliberate deception, a lie that one tells to oneself.  And it is disordered and diabolical.

We see “willing ignorance” on display during our Lord’s trial. 

Certainly, Jesus was, and is, controversial.  There are many who do not believe that He is God in the flesh, nor the Savior of the world, holding this view honestly, because they have been taught a different narrative.  Muslims see Jesus as a prophet.  Jews see Jesus as either a misguided rabbi or a madman.  Some Hindus believe Him to be an incarnation of one of their gods.  Some Buddhists consider Him to be an enlightened soul.  Modern secularists like to create Jesus in their own image: whether as a Socialist intellectual, a black militant, a politically correct hipster free spirit, a guru who is “spiritual, not religious,” or just as some dead guy who said some boring stuff a long time ago that makes no difference today.

But we see something different at our Lord’s trials.  First of all, the “high priest” and the “chief priests and the elders and the scribes” engaged in an active, deliberate, and deceptive conspiracy as they “came together” to suborn “false testimony” against Jesus.  And “their testimony did not agree.”  Moreover, this was not a legal trial.  It was a lynch mob unlawfully convened at night with selective members of the Council called to render judgment.  Such shenanigans do not happen where the prosecution knows that it has a good case.  This is a classic case of “willful ignorance” in claiming not to know that Jesus is the Christ.  Otherwise, they would have conducted an honest inquiry.

St. Peter – who gave us the term “willful ignorance” – knows what he is talking about.  He claimed to be ignorant of who Jesus is, but his “ignorance” was an act of the will.  He deliberately lied about Jesus to preserve his own life – contrary to his earlier vow: “Even if they all fall away, I will not” (Mark 14:29).

We will see all the players in this conspiracy to put Jesus on the cross displaying “willful ignorance.”  They know exactly who He is and why He has come.  But they refuse to submit to His authority.  Everyone has something to gain by participating in this sacrifice of innocent blood.  Pontius Pilate will go so far as to pronounce our Lord’s verdict of innocence, just before turning Him over to the mob for execution.  When has this ever been done in the history of jurisprudence? 

Let us be neither ignorant, nor willfully deceptive, dear friends, when we are called upon to confess Christ, “the Son of the blessed.”  For indeed, He is as He says and as His words and deeds profess.  He is the great “I am” and we “will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.”  Let us confess with St. Peter when he earlier, without any willful ignorance, testified: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”  For we too have something to gain by participating in this sacrifice of innocent blood: “forgiveness, life, and salvation.” 

Amen.

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

Sermon: Judica (Lent 5) – 2022

3 April 2022

Text: John 8:42-59 (Gen 22:1-14, Heb 9:11-15)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Jesus is bombastic in John Chapter Eight.  The average person who doesn’t attend church or read the Bible might not even believe Jesus would ever talk this way.  They might even say that He should be more like Jesus – because the Jesus they think they know is a figment of their imaginations.  Jesus is not Mister Rogers with a beard.  They don’t nail you to a cross for being nice.

There are times when Jesus is not very nice or sensitive.  This takedown of what Scripture calls “the Jews who had believed in Him” is an example of Jesus getting in their face and trading insults.  He tells them harsh truths that they need to hear. 

There is a backstory to John Chapter Eight.  This chapter begins with a woman who was caught in adultery.  Jesus is not harsh with her.  The law has done its work.  She is repentant of her sin, but her Pharisee accusers are not.  Instead of condemning the woman, Jesus writes words that condemn her Pharisees accusers, who leave in shame.  But the woman leaves forgiven after Jesus points out that her accusers are all gone, and He does not condemn her. 

The Pharisees return and begin to accuse Jesus of being a liar and implying that He doesn’t know who His own Father is.  Jesus replied, “You know neither Me nor My Father.  If you knew Me, you would know My Father also.”  The Pharisees are enraged.  Rejecting our Lord’s offer to set them free of their sins, the Pharisees engage in identity politics.  They claim that they are “offspring of Abraham,” and “have never been enslaved to anyone.” 

For instead of putting their trust in Jesus and the Gospel, they put their trust in their bloodline.  And this is common today, dear friends.  People find their identity not in Christ, but in their ethnicity or nationality, their sex, their so-called “gender identity,” their skin color, or some other category, like being handicapped or being speakers of other languages. 

And yes, we are to honor our fathers and our mothers – which means we should honor all of our ancestors.  We are all of some ethnicity or nationality.  And it isn’t wrong to be aware of this and to celebrate our heritage.  God also made us male and female, and that is not to be denied.  And if we have physical or emotional handicaps, we don’t deny that either.  But that does not define who you are.  Your identity, dear brothers and sisters, is in Christ, as a baptized child of God and citizen of the kingdom.

The woman whom Jesus forgave does not find her identity as an adulteress.  Rather, she is a forgiven sinner, a Christian.  If you struggle with alcohol or drugs or some other addiction, this doesn’t define who you are.  You are a forgiven sinner, a Christian.  If you have had or procured an abortion, if you have a criminal record, if you struggle with same-sex attraction, if you were abused or suffer from PTSD or anxiety or depression, this is not your identity.  You are a forgiven sinner, a Christian.

The lepers and the deaf and the blind and the demoniacs that Jesus healed are not defined by their infirmities.  Nor are you defined by cancer or heart disease or auto-immune disorders or chronic pain.  You are forgiven sinners, Christians.  Lazarus was not “the dead guy.”  He is a forgiven sinner whom Jesus raised from the dead.  He is a Christian.

St. Paul wrote to the Galatians that when it comes to our salvation in Christ, there is no Jew or Greek, no male or female, no free or slave.  Our identity is that we are forgiven sinners.  We are Christians.

The proud Pharisees put their trust in their ethnicity and in their supposed superiority to Jesus.  And Jesus pops their bubble of pretension by saying: “If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing what Abraham did, but now you seek to kill Me.”  He also told them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I came from God, and I am here.”  He told them, “You are of your father the devil.”  He tells them, “The reason why you do not hear [My words] is that you are not of God.”

Their putting of their trust in their ancestry and ethnic identity is a form of idolatry, dear friends.  And that is what identity politics is.  Again, being comfortable in your own skin and honoring your heritage and ancestors is a good thing.  Being part of a people with a distinct culture and customs is a good thing.  But being in the Klan or the Black Panthers or La Raza, finding your identity in your ancestry instead of in Christ is to turn a gift into a curse.  And these harsh words of our Lord then rest upon you.

Dear friends, at the beginning of Lent, I put an ashen cross on most of your foreheads.  I reminded you that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.  This is because you are sinners.  That is part of your identity regardless of your ethnicity.  But those ashes were in the shape of the cross – which we received on our foreheads at our baptism.  The cross, and not your sins, defines who you are.  Your identity is found in your baptism.  Your identity is that you are a forgiven sinner, a baptized child of God, a Christian.  Your identity is in Christ and the forgiveness He won for you at the cross.  And when Satan reminds you of your sins, you remind Satan that you are baptized and forgiven.  That, dear friends, is your identity!

And here we are nearing the end of Lent.  Next Sunday is Palm Sunday, and Holy Week begins the final countdown to Good Friday and Easter Sunday.  We have been reading these harsh words of Jesus on this Sunday in the church year for centuries.  Our Lord called the Pharisees to repentance.  Their response was, as He said, to seek to kill Him.  And they did kill Him, by means of a conspiracy that included Judas the traitor, the priests, the Pharisees, the scribes, the council, King Herod, Governor Pilate, the mob, and a detachment of Roman soldiers. 

The Pharisees falsely accused Jesus of having a demon.  They were furious that Jesus spoke with familiarity about their ancestor Abraham, whose bloodline made them think they were better than everyone else, including Jesus Himself.  And our Lord never backs down, never tries to “make nice.”  He doubles down and calls them liars.

The last straw was when Jesus reveals to them just who He is.  “Before Abraham was, I am,” He said.  Jesus told them He was older than Abraham.  Jesus told them that He was the “I AM” that spoke to Moses from the burning bush.  Jesus just told them that He is God. 

They are so furious that they try to lynch Him on the spot.  But it isn’t yet time for Jesus to die as the sacrificial Lamb.  That time will come soon.  And thanks be to God that it does.  For Jesus is the “Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.”

In our Old Testament reading from Genesis, Jesus is shown in the account of Abraham and His Son Isaac.  For Isaac was Abraham’s only beloved son, and Abraham was told by God to sacrifice him.  Isaac carried the wood of the sacrifice on his own back as they went up the hill together.  Abraham trusted that God would somehow raise Isaac from death and keep His promise to provide Him with offspring from Isaac.  And before Abraham could slay Isaac, his son, the Angel of the Lord intervened and provided a substitute: a ram caught in a crown of thorns.  Both Isaac and the ram are previews of Jesus, the Son who is sacrificed, and the substitute who dies in our place.

In the Epistle reading from Hebrews, Jesus is shown as our “high priest of the good things that have come.”  He is the “mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.”

Dear friends, your identity is not in your ethnicity, nor your challenges in this life, nor your past or present sins.  Your identity is bound up in the substitutionary atonement of Jesus, your High Priest, the Son of God who was before Abraham, and who is Himself the great I AM.  Your identity is that you are a baptized child of God, washed in the blood of the Lamb, signed with the holy cross, so that by our Lord’s death, you have conquered death.  And by His resurrection, you too will rise.

Let us never fall into the trap of the Pharisees, of identity politics, of pride, of idolatry, of contempt for Jesus.  Let us, like the woman whom Jesus forgave, receive His grace with joy.  Let the blood of the lamb redeem us and define us.  Let our Great High Priest who is God, the great I AM in the flesh, define who we are, no matter what the devil, the world, and our sinful nature would say to us by way of deception.  Let us never forget our true and eternal identity, dear friends: we are forgiven sinners.  We are Christians. 

Amen.

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

Sermon: Wittenberg Academy – Tuesday of Lent 4

29 March 2022

Text: Mark 12:13-27

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

“You are quite wrong.”  Jesus does not fit in with our postmodern age, where all opinions are equal, where truth is subjective and flexible, and where we don’t tell people they are wrong, because that is apparently an example of systemic racism and white privilege, or heteronormativity or some other such woke nonsense.  And we all know that Jesus was nice, at least when He was alive, and we should never be sarcastic, because Jesus was never sarcastic.

Of course, I’m being completely sarcastic.  There are times when sarcasm is called for, when the devil is to be mocked, and when people who try to confuse and bamboozle us are to be laughed out of court, so to speak.  Our Lord dealt with this kind of dishonest intellectual discourse without regard to trying to live up to other people’s expectations of niceness.  There is nothing wrong with being nice, but when we are being manipulated into either confessing a lie or being silenced from telling the truth, we are called to push back, hard and without being “swayed by appearances.”  And no amount of crocodile tears and gaslighting can silence Jesus, who is the way, the truth, and the life.  And, dear friends, we are called to confess the truth.  Jesus is the truth.

The Pharisees and Sadducees both tried to play semantic games with Jesus to try to either get Him in trouble, or to trap Him into confessing a lie. 

The Pharisees try to butter up our Lord with flattery and insincere praise: “Teacher, we know that You are true and do not care about anyone’s opinion.  For You are not swayed by appearances, but truly teach the way of God.”  You can practically hear the venom dripping from their serpentine, split tongues as they hiss this out at Him – and it is all true, of course.  They play a game of gotcha with Jesus, but He traps them in their own trap, “knowing their hypocrisy.”

And the Sadducees likewise play their own game to try to get Jesus, the first-fruits of the resurrection, the one who raises the dead with the ease of rousing someone from slumber – to join them in their denial of the resurrection.  Our Lord has no compunction about telling them they are ignorant and wrong.  Had our Lord spared their feelings, others might have been led astray.

Dear friends, let us know both the Scriptures and the power of God.  Let us confess Christ, who is the way, the truth, and the life; Christ, who is the resurrection and the Word made flesh; Christ, who is Lord over both Caesar and the Church; Christ, who is living and who is the “God of the living.”  Even in Lent, we confess that “Christ is risen, He is risen indeed.”  Let us not be intimidated by those who seek to impose doubt by stealth and by appeals to weasel-words and loose logic, no matter how much they swagger and bluster.  They are quite wrong.  Let us double-down like our Lord and confess Christ: our Teacher who indeed is “true” and “does not care about anyone’s opinion.”

Amen.

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

Sermon: Laetare (Lent 4) – 2022

27 March 2022

Text: John 6:1-15 (Ex 16:2-21)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

In a typical mystery novel, the beginning of the book involves a crime, the middle is a series of clues, and the last page reveals who did it.  The Bible is not a mystery book, but it is a book of mysteries, some that have been revealed, and some that have not.

The crime indeed happens near the beginning of the narrative.  But we know right away who the criminals are: Adam, Eve, and all of us who join them in their sin.  We are all guilty.  As a result of this rebellion, the superabundance of the Garden of Eden was transformed into a world of scarcity, and of even more crime, as human beings fight over scarce resources.  But instead of the introduction of a detective who tries to bring the guilty to justice, our Creator comes to the scene of the crime to work out forgiveness for the man and the woman, who were created in God’s image, and to destroy the one who deceived them.

God made a promise to the serpent that a future Savior would be born, a “Seed of the woman.”  And though the devil would bruise His heel, He would bruise the devil’s head, mortally wounding him.  The mystery in the Bible, for a couple thousand years, was “Who would this Seed of the woman be, and what will He do?”

We had clues throughout the Old Testament, like the Angel of the Lord who visited Abraham, and the mysterious stranger who wrestled with Jacob and changed Jacob’s name to Israel (“the one who wrestled God”).  There was Melchizedek, the mysterious king and priest to whom Abraham tithed and gave gifts of bread and wine.  There was this mysterious sacrifice of Abraham’s son Isaac, that ended up not happening, replaced by a sacrifice of a substitute, a ram whose head was tangled in thorns.  There is the suffering servant prophecy of Isaiah, and many previews in the Psalms about this coming Christ.

The mystery is not revealed on the last page of the book, dear friends, but in the beginning of the New Testament, in the Gospels: our Lord Jesus Christ.  He connects the Old and New Testaments by fulfilling the Old and by drawing us into the New Testament in His blood. 

Moses taught us about Jesus when he recorded God’s provision of the Israelites by feeding them manna in the wilderness. This was miraculous bread from heaven that gave the people life even in the desert, the place of scarcity.  And, of course, the people grumbled about it.  But God preserved them anyway.

In our Gospel reading from John Chapter Six, we notice that “the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.”  The Passover featured a meal of bread and wine, and a slaughtered lamb, whose blood brought salvation to the people of Israel.  Jesus is the “Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.”  And He is about to give us a continuation of the Passover, with bread and wine – and a feasting upon the slaughtered Lamb unto our salvation.

The mystery of the Passover is revealed in Jesus, and He is about to show us what He is up to in this miracle, a preview of the Last Supper.  He has the crowds sit, and “when He had given thanks,” He has his servants, that is, His ministers, distribute this new manna, this miraculous bread from heaven. And not only had everyone “eaten their fill,” but twelve baskets were left over.  The scarcity of our fallen world was rolled back to the abundance of Eden before the Fall.  Jesus is demonstrating that His coming is intended to undo the effects of sin and death, and to restore Paradise.  Of course, the people do not understand, and they only seek to make Him their political leader.  Jesus wants no part of that. 

Later, these same people demand yet another sign from Jesus, saying, “Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”  Jesus responds that it was not Moses who gave them bread, but rather: “My Father gives you the true bread from heaven.  For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”  For, dear friends, Jesus is this bread.  He fulfills the mystery of the manna.  “I am the bread of life,” He says.  By saying “I am,” Jesus is claiming to be God.  For that is God’s name that He revealed to Moses. 

In an interesting repeat of history, “The Jews grumbled about Him because He said, ‘I am the bread that comes from heaven.’”  But here, once again, Jesus doubles down.  He reminds them that their ancestors ate manna, but died.  But we who eat the bread of His flesh “will live forever.”  This results in more grumbling, and Jesus again doubles down.  He says something terribly shocking and offensive: “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you.  Whoever feeds on My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me and I in Him.” 

This caused some of His disciples to be offended and leave.  Jesus asks the twelve if they too are going to abandon him.  And although they do not yet understand this mystery of eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the bread of life, of the Lamb of God, Peter speaks for them in response: “Lord, to whom shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life.”

Dear friends, we don’t know how all of this works.  We don’t know how the manna got there or what it was made of.  We don’t know how Jesus multiplied the bread and the fish.  We don’t understand how we eat bread and drink wine and also eat His flesh and drink His blood – but we trust His Word: for He has the words of eternal life! 

Part of the mystery was revealed “on the night when He was betrayed.”  He “took bread.”  And just as He did when He multiplied the loaves, “when He had given thanks, He broke it and gave it” to His disciples.  And interrupting the Old Testament Passover ritual, just before His passion and death, our Lord establishes the New Covenant: “Take, eat, this is My body,” He says.  “This cup is the New Testament in My blood.”  And on that day, the mystery was revealed to the twelve, that is, what He meant by eating His flesh and drinking His blood, “for the forgiveness of sins.”

Our Lord returns us to Paradise, dear friends.  Just as He rolled back scarcity and gave us abundance when He fed the five thousand, He now multiplies His true body and blood, the bread of life come down from heaven, the blood that covers the sins of the people and protects us from the angel of death.  And just as Adam and Eve sinned by eating from the forbidden tree, their sin is undone by the tree of the cross, and we eat this manna, that is, His flesh, and we drink this cup: the blood of the New Testament, “shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.”  Instead of the fruit that leads to death, we now partake of the fruit that leads to life.  Instead of the cross as a tree of death, it is now the tree of life – and we are invited to partake and live forever!

There are many mysteries in the Scriptures, dear friends, and God does not answer every question.  But the mystery of God’s response to our sin is revealed to us.  He sends His Son to die for us, to destroy death, to rise again, to feed us with His body and blood, and proclaim the Good News of forgiveness, life, and salvation to us in His Word. 

The end of the book does not reveal the criminal, but rather reveals the never-ending end of our narrative: living in a paradise restored in perfect harmony with God, with one another, and with all creation – just as was always meant to be.  The serpent’s head is crushed, and he is destroyed.  We no longer have to eke out a living of bread by the sweat of the brow, but rather we enjoy the feast of the banquet that never ends: the richest food, the sweetest wine, and eternal table fellowship with Him who has forgiven our sins, restored abundance, and called us out of darkness into paradise. 

The last page of this revealed mystery does indeed tell us who does it, dear friends.  Jesus does it.  “He who testifies to these things says, ‘Surely, I am coming soon.’  Amen.  Come, Lord Jesus!  The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all.”

Amen.

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

Sermon: Funeral of Merlin Schexnayder – 2022

24 March 2022

Text: John 11:20-27 (Isa 49:13-16a, 1 Cor 15:51-57)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

Dear Kelli, Kris, Rachel, dear Helen, family, friends, brothers and sisters in Christ, and honored guests: “Peace be with you.” 

 It was a privilege to visit Merlin a good bit during his last few weeks on this side of glory.  He was at home and surrounded by his loved ones and friends.  He was, of course, tired, but smiled and retained his sense of humor to the end.  It was a blessing to be with him in the presence of Kelli, Kris, Rachel, and Helen as we together confessed our sins and heard the words of absolution, as we heard the testimony and promises of God’s Word, and as Merlin was able to receive the body and blood of Christ in faith.

It is a lot of work to take care of family members at home, but it is truly a labor of love, just as Merlin loved and served you on this side of the grave. 

We Christians mourn the losses of our loved ones, and we mourn the loss of Merlin.  And so how strange it must sound to unbelievers to hear a reading that begins: “Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth; break forth, O mountains, into singing.”  But the cause of this joy, dear friends, is because “the Lord has comforted His people and will have compassion on His afflicted.”  The heavens and earth sing out in joy because of the Lord’s promise of compassion, even in such times of sadness and mourning.  For God says, “Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of My hands.”  Isaiah wrote these words in 700 BC, long before God’s hands were impaled by nails at the cross, showing compassion to Merlin by rescuing him, promising him a resurrection like the resurrection of Jesus.  For Jesus died for Merlin, and Jesus promises you, dear brothers and sisters, fellow believers in this promise, that you will see Merlin again!

“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,” says St. Paul.  It will happen very quickly.  “The last trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable.”  And when our Lord returns, “this mortal body must put on immortality.”  This mortal body, dear friends.  St. Paul is talking about Merlin.  For Merlin received the promise that Jesus Himself gave: “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved.”  St. Paul continues, and we join him, with boldness in mocking death: “Death is swallowed up in victory.  O death, where is your victory?  O death, where is your sting?”  We feel death’s sting, but it is temporary.  We feel this sting because St. Paul identifies it as sin, whose power is the law.  But St. Paul continues: “Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

And just like the prophet Isaiah, the apostle Paul points us to the cross, to the victory of our Lord Jesus Christ, who shares that victory with His beloved and redeemed people.

We also heard John’s Gospel teaching us about a famous funeral.  Martha is mourning the death of her brother Lazarus.  She laments that Jesus was not there to prevent him from dying.  But in spite of this sad reality, Martha has faith that Jesus will fix things even now.  “Your brother will rise again,” says Jesus.  And Martha confesses, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” 

Our Lord speaks to her words that Christian people cherish – especially when we face death; “I am the resurrection and the life.  Whoever believes in Me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die.”  This is our Lord’s promise given not just to Martha, but to all of us: including Merlin, for whom our Lord died.  And when Jesus asks Martha if she believes this, she speaks for all Christians: “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”

Jesus ruined that funeral a few moments in the future when he called Lazarus out of the tomb.  Like all things in creation, his body obeyed the voice of his Creator.  Lazarus was raised from the dead.  And Jesus performed this miracle not only out of compassion for Martha and her sister Mary, and for all the family and friends of Lazarus who gathered together to bury him and to mourn, but Jesus did this for all of you, gathered together here, even as we place Merlin into the tomb.

We await the “last trumpet” when Merlin will be called by name and restored to life.  And at some point in the future Jesus is going to ruin this funeral as well.  And the heavens and earth will sing, and we will mock death, for Jesus is the resurrection and the life.  Having faith in Him and His Word is how we receive the promise and receive it to ourselves – just as Merlin did.

Just as you brought him home and cared for him as the Lord enabled you, so too we will bring Merlin home to the tomb, where his body will dwell temporarily, awaiting being called to a permanent home, living in a new heaven and a new earth, one without aging and disease and suffering and death.  A promised world without separation, ever again.  And we look to this glorious resurrection, dear friends, holding fast to the promise and knowing that it will be a reality. 

What a great joy to know that we will be reunited in our bodies, where we will eat and drink and laugh and embrace, and will do so eternally.  This is not a mere figure of speech or empty words.  This is rather a promise made, and a promise fulfilled, by Jesus: at the cross and at the empty tomb.

In a few weeks, we will celebrate Easter: the celebration of our Lord’s resurrection.  On this Easter, let us especially remember and celebrate Merlin, knowing that the resurrection of Jesus points us to Merlin’s resurrection, and to our own resurrections, when we will pick up where we left off, and where we will join the heavens and the earth in singing for joy!  Where we will mock death, and where we will forever sing the praises of Him who promised: “I am the resurrection and the life.”

Amen.

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