Encore Post: Beautiful young women in long, flowing white gowns, with big, downy wings, with a glowing, gold halo. A chubby, winged baby. The spirits of deceased Christians, also bearing wings and a halo, carrying a harp, are floating on clouds. Images like these fill our pictures, movies, TV shows, and songs. Yet none of these are real, nor do they share much in common with God’s Holy Angels. They are very different creatures and are not mild, gentle beings. They are God’s Heavenly Army, powerful and, when they appear, command respect.
First of all, angels are not people. They are spirits created by God to serve him (Hebrews 1). Christians do not become angels when they die. Our spirits are unnaturally separated from our bodies at death — bodies which decay. But we do not remain in that state. On the last day, God will raise our bodies from the dead and reunite our spirits with them.
Angels are powerful beings, sometimes tasked with battling Satan and his demons (these are fallen angelic creatures). They guard us, plead for us before the throne of God, and stand in his eternal presence. When they appear to people, they so often inspire fear that almost always their first words to humans are “fear not.” Some of God’s people are even tempted when they appear to fall down in worship. Scripture even poetically refers to them as gods.
Unlike the popular TV series and movies, angels are not like humans with flaws, prone to temptation and sin. Good angels are now eternally sinless, having been tested by Lucifer’s rebellion. They have a perfect knowledge of God. While they always take the form of a male human when they appear to humans, they never marry. They also are not young, having existed since before the fall of Adam and Eve, nor are they ever female. The scriptures do not mention halos (these are put into medieval art to draw eyes to images of holy people and beings, especially in stained glass) and only describe angels with wings when referring to seraphim and cherubim.
Most importantly, they ministered to Jesus during his earthly ministry. Angels are used by God to draw us to Jesus. On our last day and the last day, they will escort us to the throne of God, where we will live with God forever. So we thank God for the ministry of Angels and sing with them his praises, both here on earth and forever.
Encore Post: In the church’s long season of ordinary time (Sundays after Trinity if you are on a one-year cycle, Sundays after Pentecost if you are on a three-year cycle), the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels (September 29) marks a change in the themes of the day. After this day, we turn our thoughts to the Last Day, when Jesus will return to be with us forever. We use the day to thank God for his holy angels, especially Michael the Archangel, whose army of light defeated Satan and his forces, casting them out of Heaven to the earth. In the English-speaking world, it is nicknamed Michelmas (Michael’s Mass), similar to Christmas (Christ’s Mass)
The Holy Angels (מַלְאָךְ, ἄγγελος) are God’s messengers. They were created by God to praise him and bear his messages to his people. After the fall of Satan and his evil angels, they also battle these forces and protect us from harm. Two angels are named in Scripture: Michael (“who is like God?”) and Gabriel (“God is my Strength”). Michael the Archangel is the leader of the heavenly army of angels that battled Satan and his forces, casting him down from Heaven. Gabriel is the heavenly messenger who interpreted Daniel’s dreams and announced the conceptions of John the Baptist and Jesus.
We thank God for the ministry of angels, who stand by our side, protect us from the evil one and will, on the last of our days, escort us home to Jesus. With Martin Luther, we pray:
I thank you, my heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, Your dear Son, that You have kept me this night from all harm and danger; and I pray that You would keep me this day also from sin and every evil, that all my doings and life may please You. For into Your hands I commend myself, my body and soul, and all things. Let Your holy angel be with me, that the evil foe may have no power over me. Amen.
[Eightieth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: In the Middle East, shepherds often build a common sheep pen for their town. All the shepherds in the village would keep their sheep together in this pen overnight. They would build a wall to keep the sheep from wandering away and to keep wolves and other predators from attacking them. A watchman would guard the gate or door to the pen so that only shepherds could enter. This discouraged thieves.
When a shepherd was ready to feed his sheep, he would go into the pen and call them by name. A shepherd had an intimate relationship with his sheep. Sometimes, they would be as close to them as a pet is to us. So the sheep recognized the voice of the man who cared for them. When he called them by name, they would follow. The shepherd would take them to good, green pastures and nice, quiet waters. He would keep them from wandering off and would treat any wounds, binding them up. He would protect them from wild animals, often doing battle with them, as King David describes what he did as a young shepherd. True shepherds would risk their lives to save their sheep.
Kings often compared themselves to shepherds. They liked to be seen as caring for them and keeping them safe. They expected their subjects to follow them willingly everywhere they wanted to go.
In the Bible, God tells us He is our Shepherd. He will feed them, gather their lambs in his arms, and hold them close to his heart. (Isaiah 40:11) Most of all, in Jesus, God is our Good Shepherd. He leads us with his word, guides us, and protects us from evil. Like a good shepherd, he laid down his life for the sheep. He died so that we might be saved. On the last day of our lives, he will lead us through the valley of the shadow of death safely home to dwell in his house forever. (Psalm 23)
[Seventy-eighth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: Leprosy was a dreaded skin condition during Biblical times. It was caused by several diseases, from bad rashes to sicknesses that caused the loss of fingers, toes, and other parts of the body. Lepers were made to live away from everyday people and to yell unclean if anyone came close to them. They were not allowed to go to the synagogue or the temple, and so were cut off completely from God and the care of family and friends. Often they lived together with other lepers. If a person touched a leper, they were called unclean, too, and couldn’t enter the temple or synagogue.
Sometimes, lepers would get well. To recognize that the person was no longer a leper, a person would go to the priests to be declared clean again. One sign of the Messiah’s coming was that he would heal lepers. Jesus showed God’s love for everyone, including lepers, by healing them.
One day, when Jesus was walking down the road, ten lepers shouted to Him from a distance: Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. He told them to see the priests in Jerusalem. As they went, they were healed. When one of them, a Samaritan, saw that He was well, he went back to Jesus, loudly praising God. The man lay down at Jesus’ feet to worship Him and thank Him. Jesus asked where the other nine were. Jesus told the man to get up because his faith had made him well.
Even though the Jews of Jesus’ time despised Samaritans and treated them poorly, Jesus once again makes the point that God does not discriminate against people because of sickness, race, or religion. All people are his children, and he shows mercy to us all. After all, he was about to bear the sins of all the sons and daughters of Adam on the cross. On the last day, people from all nations, races, and times, redeemed by his blood, will gather as one to praise him. So now, we join the former lepers in praying, “Lord, have mercy,” and reach out to care for all his children in need.
[Seventy-eighth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: One day, Jesus sat down to teach in the temple’s Court of the Women, where he could watch people putting freewill offerings into the offering box. People from all walks of life put money into the treasury, from the wealthiest to the poorest of God’s people. One of those people was a poor widow who contributed her last two copper coins.
Since this offering was not required, anyone who gave to the Lord in this way showed love for God. The rich people Jesus saw contributing were giving from their wealth and did not miss the money at all. The widow showed complete trust in God. She literally did not know where her next meal would come from. Yet she gave her last resources so that God could be praised.
In the time of Jesus, widows had a hard life. Very few women had independent means of support. When a widow’s husband died, she was completely at the mercy of her relatives, especially her sons. If they did not care, she would have to scrape by in any way she could. The widow in our story is likely one of the less fortunate ones.
Jesus commented on this woman’s faith and praised her for her trust that God would care for her. He did not condemn the giving of others. Instead, Jesus taught the disciples that the amount someone gives to God is not as important to him as the faith it demonstrates.
Christians are not commanded to give a specific amount of money or even a particular percentage of their income. We provide offerings to our church, to other organizations in the Church, and to care for those in need. We love God and want to participate in His mission to save the lost. So we share what we have, praying that God would bless them for the good of others.
[Seventy-sixth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: For Jesus and the disciples, it had been a long day. The crowds had turned out to hear Jesus teach, and he did so all day. In the evening, Jesus challenged the disciples to feed the crowds with five loaves and two fish. They couldn’t, but he did. They gathered up the pieces in twelve baskets. So, Jesus needed to get away to pray. They just needed to get away. So Jesus pushed them to get in the boat and do what they knew very well — travel across the lake. He went away to pray alone.
For people in ancient times, the sea was a symbol of chaos and evil. They did so for a good reason. Not only was the sea a place that could become violent at a moment’s notice, but they also had no way of knowing about coming storms as we do today. The disciples were veterans of the sea, not bothered much by the wind and waves, even when it was rough. That evening, the sea was much trouble. They could not use their sails, which would be blown to pieces. So they labored to row against it all night. They made good progress nevertheless.
Yet they were so exhausted that they did not recognize Jesus at first. They thought he was a ghost. When He told them who He was, they still weren’t sure. Peter came up with a test. If it were Jesus, Peter could walk on the water too, if Jesus wanted him to. As long as Peter paid attention to the Lord, he walked on water. Only when he turned to watch the wind and the wave did Peter fear and begin to sink. What they missed was that they did not need to be afraid. They should have known they could trust Jesus. By this event, Jesus taught His disciples to trust Him, even when water and waves threaten to destroy them.
The writer of the must-loved hymn, “Eternal Father, Strong to Save,” sums it up well:
O Savior, whose almighty word The winds and waves submissive heard, Who walked upon the foaming deep, And calm amid the rage did sleep; O hear us when we cry to Thee For those in peril on the sea.
[Seventy-sixth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: In the ancient world, most children died before their 18th birthday. In fact, childhood death was common until the twentieth century. Every couple could expect to bury at least one child during their lifetime. That is why the childhood prayer was taught to generations of young people: “Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. If I should live another day, I pray the Lord to guide my way.”
Children and young people, therefore, were kept at an emotional distance and paid little attention. Besides, the children were disruptive, especially when a rabbi was trying to teach. They do not understand abstract thought and so would look for other ways to entertain themselves and get attention. They were expected to behave, to be just like the adults with them. So, they were pushed aside so that adults could attend to “important” business. Keep them out of sight and out of mind.
Jesus made two points by bringing a child before them. First, all people are important to God, no matter how small. He loves them, cares for them. In fact, Jesus came to die for them, too. They are not the future of the church — they are the church.
Second, children trust adults to take care of them, live humbly, and assume their love. In fact, they are better Christians than adults! To be Christians, after all, means to trust God to take care of us, to deny ourselves, knowing we are cared for, and to dedicate our lives to the service of others. This comes naturally to them. They are not bothered when they cannot understand something adults or God tell them. They accept the truth, rely on it, and build on it because they trust their parents, their teachers, and God. They may not know something, but they know someone. So, ironically, if we want to grow in faith, we need to become like them and trust the God who made us, loves us, died for us, cares for us, and will bring us home one day to be with him forever.
Advent Midweek III Jonah 3:1-5, 10 December18, 2024
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Would you go? Would you go to Los Angeles and tell everybody you meet they need to repent? Would you walk right into the mayor’s office in Los Angeles and say, “Mayor, change your ways, believe in the Lord.” And then you would say, “Yet forty days and Los Angeles shall be overthrown!” That would take guts! We all might think that we would simply be escorted out of the office with guards, never to see the Mayor’s face again.
Would you go? Would you go to Las Vegas, to the casinos and the brothels, and go to the magnificent mansions and tell the leaders of the city, “Yet forty days and Las Vegas shall be overthrown!” Doesn’t it seem like a nearly impossible task to accomplish? Do you blame Jonah for running the other way?
Would you go? Would you go to Washington D.C. to turn the nation back to the Lord? You wouldn’t go there for political purposes and you wouldn’t go there for a vacation. You would go there to say to the President, “Yet forty days and America shall be overthrown!” I imagine the message falls on deaf ears. The security would probably think that you were nuts!
But Nineveh was not known for those things that Los Angeles and Las Vegas and Washington D.C. are known for. No, Nineveh was known for murdering enemies. The Ninevites were ruthless people. They killed babies. Would you go to Nineveh? Would you walk into the offices of the Nineveh of our day, Planned Parenthood, and preach against that slaughter and murder of the next generation? “Yet forty days, and Planned Parenthood shall be overthrown!” Imagine how many people would hate you! Imagine trying to stay alive yourself if you did that.
We may be able to sympathize with Jonah. We wouldn’t want Jonah’s job either. I think that all of us would rather run away from God and His people who need to hear the Gospel. We may not take a boat on the sea, but who among us would get in a car or a train or a plane to go anywhere but the place that God sends us.
Dear people of God, the first thing we ought to do is to pray for those Christians who are enduring persecution. Pray for the Pastors certainly, but also the congregations who live in the midst of great and grievous sin, who live where love and life are so messed up, who live among great leaders who despise God’s Word and do not gladly hear and learn it.
It takes incredible courage to be willing to go and to obey the voice of the Lord. The Lord said to Jonah a second time in our reading today, “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you.” Sometimes parents do have to say something more than once for the kids to do what they ask. And in this case, God did have to tell Jonah more than once what his job really was. I have been pondering this recently with one of my friends who was called to Canada. Would you uproot your family who had lived fifteen years in one place to move to a different country, to become citizens, to change schools, to endure the cold? I think for most of us we would definitely think twice before making that decision.
But that is the thing about God. He calls us to tell others about Jesus, and He does the rest of the work. There was no hope for Nineveh. They were ruthless, but by the power of the preached Word, by the conviction of the Law, especially these words, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” By these words and certainly the rest of the sermon, the whole city of Nineveh repented and believed in God. He worked a miracle. Jonah started as a coward, but God turned him around and sent him to the city. And Nineveh started as murderers, but they ended in sackcloth and ashes and turned a whole city to God.
We spend a lot of time thinking about the fascinating story of the Joppa high dive and the digestion of whales. But here is the message: And the people of Nineveh believed God. Imagine for a moment what happened, 120,000 souls turned and believed in God. The Lord used the most unlikely prophet to convert the most heathen city at that time.
Now, I have no desire to live in a city, and we continue to pray for those who do. But sometimes I’m jealous of Jonah, for his preaching converted 120,000 and I work to convert just 1,000 or 2,000. But I get ahead of myself. This is not my ministry; this is our ministry. This is not only our ministry; this is God’s ministry here in Curtis and the surrounding area. Together, we work to convert the people of our community to the church of Christ. It is tough work, but it is amazing work. We tell others about Jesus, and God will do the rest of the work of converting souls and changing hearts.
This is what He already has done in us, and like Nineveh, we believe in God and trust in Him for all things. Like Nineveh, God has relented against the disaster planned against us for our sins. Like Nineveh, Jesus died for us to save us from sin, death, and the power of the devil. Like Nineveh, God’s Word goes out, and it does not return to God void, but it accomplished that for which He sent it, namely for your faith by His grace unto life everlasting.
[Seventy-fifth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: Jesus had sent his apostles out on a mission to preach in the towns and villages of Galilee. When they returned to him, he decided that rest was in order. So they got into a boat, went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee to a place in the wilderness. But people saw where they were going and ran ahead of them. When they got out of the boat, a crowd had gathered. So he taught them. The disciples recommended that Jesus send them away in the evening to get something to eat. But Jesus told them to feed the crowd. Since they had only five small loaves of bread and two fish, they thought it was impossible, but did as he asked. The whole crowd was fed with twelve baskets of bread pieces left over. (Mark 6:33-44)
The people no doubt remembered that, when God freed His people from slavery in Egypt, He led them into the wilderness for forty years. He fed them with bread from Heaven, called manna, and quails for meat at night. Much later, during a drought, the prophet Elijah stayed with a widow and her son in Zarephath. God made the widow’s flour and oil last until the prophet left.
When Jesus fed over five thousand people in the wilderness, they would remember these things and the other ways that God took care of His people. Later, Jesus would give us the Lord’s Supper, where He gives us His Body and Blood to eat with bread and wine. This sacrament meets our need for forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. When we remember how God provides us with food to eat, we also think of how He feeds us with his own body to strengthen us. He gives us bread in the wilderness of this life and bread for our long journey until we arrive home.
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Dear people of God, we ought never to wish that we were dead. It is perfectly normal to desire to meet Jesus in heaven and we certainly will when we die. But there is always a reason that we are alive, and we should never wish that we were dead. We are alive to spread the Gospel, we are alive to serve our neighbor; we are alive to worship our God.
And we ought never to wish that other people would die. We must protect and defend every human life regardless of circumstance. Life is a gift from God. We must never hope that so-and-so would die, that evil nation would be defeated, that despicable family would experience hardship, or anyone else. That is committing murder in our own hearts.
And that is taking life from others who God has created, loved, and died for. We are alive to spread the Gospel to our enemies, we are alive to serve those who hate us, and we are alive to worship God all our days.
I mention all this because Amos wrote about the judgment against all of Israel’s neighbors for the previous four chapters. This nation was unfaithful; that nation was murderous. This nation was sinful; that nation was worthless. And at least to some degree, the people would cheer for the destruction of others. Those people should die! Think of how it is today. That nation rises up against nation to annihilate each other, total war, bombs, rockets, and missiles.
We should give thanks that we are safe from warfare at this point. And we should pray to God that we do not enter into war. But there is definitely a bit of smugness in each of us when we think, “But they deserve to die. Those people are evil. That group hates Christians.” And we sit on our couches wishing vengeance on our enemies.
But then the Lord commands Amos to preach against the people of Israel and Judah as well. For it is well-known that no one is righteous, no not one. And that caused a moment of reflection. What? You mean that we also deserve to die? That we also are under judgment? That Your vengeance, O Lord, shall be exacted against us?
Three times in Amos 5, the preacher preaches, “Seek the Lord and live!” That was a call to repentance. For it was easy to cheer on destruction when it wasn’t happening to us. But here is that chilling realization that God shows no partiality. If anything, God expects more out of us than He does out of the pagan nations.
But the people were praying and praising for the destruction of others. This is what Amos means when He says, Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord! Why would you have the day of the Lord? Amos preaches to bloodthirsty, vengeful people who want to see the downfall of other nations. Amos preaches to self-righteous hypocrites who do not acknowledge that they have murderous hearts.
I remind you, we are alive to spread the Gospel, we are alive to serve our neighbors, and we are alive to worship God. Shouldn’t we spread the Gospel to Russia AND Ukraine? Shouldn’t we pray for war to cease in the Middle East?
These wars and rumors of wars are for us an example of what we deserve from the Lord: death. And this violence and threat is an example for us of what the day of the Lord would be for us if we did not have the Gospel. As Amos says, It is darkness, and not light,as if a man fled from a lion,and a bear met him. In our reading today, Amos provides a scary picture of the end of the world, a hopeless image of running from a lion to a bear which would end with the same result: death.
But this is not because the Lord does not love us. It is because the hearts of God are not gracious and merciful. It is because our souls want revenge. We want other people to die because they deserve it, because they are evil and we are not. Or so we think.
Consider these words from God through the prophet Amos: “I hate, I despise your feasts,and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings,I will not accept them. I totally get it, when God is angry with us, His Word cuts us to the heart. To be sure, there is not much hope or Gospel in this passage today. God’s Word does cut us deeply in our hearts. This is how it happened with Cain after he killed Abel. This is what happened when Nathan confronted David about killing Uriah.
But let us learn this lesson today and not repeat the sins of the past. As Amos says, “Seek the Lord and live. Seek good, and not evil, that you may live; and so the Lord, the God of Hosts, will be with you, as you have said. Hate evil, and love good, and establish justice in the gate; it may be that the Lord, the God of Hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.” I remind you, it is not God’s will to destroy us, to kill us. Rather, it is one of the major themes of Advent, that God is with us.
Do not forget that. God is with you. What a comfort that is when there is vengeance against all the nations. God is with you even when the cities are falling. God is with you even if you have to fight in a war. God is with you and it is not His intention that you ought to die, or that anyone else should die.
Seek the Lord and live, the Word says to you today. For our God has been gracious to us, the remnant of Joseph. God is gracious to us now, that He spares our lives. He spares us so that we can spread the Gospel to the nations who are warring against one another. He spares us so that we can serve our neighbors and even our enemies. God spares us destruction and woe so that we can freely worship Him here. God spares us that we can live now on earth, and eternally with Him in heaven.
For it is in heaven, as Amos says, that justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. What a beautiful picture. And what an obvious joy! That there is no war in heaven; there is ever-flowing peace. That there is no anger in heaven; there is ever-flowing joy. That there is no vengeance in heaven; there is ever-flowing grace. Like a stream, like the stream of living water, our Lord Jesus Christ shall reign with justice and righteousness as the eternal King of Kings.
