Encore post: Fall brings changing colors to landscapes in northern areas of the United States. Green leaves change to a breathtaking variety of red, orange, yellow and brown. People will drive miles to just take in all in. The beauty of it all brings out praise of God for his creation.
In Lutheran Churches, colors change in the sanctuary almost weekly during late October and early November as the church marks the last weeks of ordinary time. This time begins with red paraments for Reformation Day, celebrated on the nearest Sunday before October 31. Red is the color used for the Holy Spirit and his work and martyrdom.
The color soon changes to white for All Saints’ Sunday, celebrated the Sunday after November 1, All Saints’ Day. White is the color of the resurrection, celebration and the saints, who wash their robes white in the Blood of the Lamb.
The next week or two, the color returns to the green of Pentecost or Trinity season (the name depends on how your church counts the Sundays of ordinary time) Green is the color of life and growth. It is also used in Epiphany Season.
The theme for the last three Sundays of the church year is preparation for the Second Advent of Christ. In fact, in some lectionaries, the Sundays are referred to as the Third-Last Sunday, Second-Last Sunday and the Last Sunday of the Church year. Some churches call the last Sunday the Sunday of the Fulfillment or Christ the King Sunday. Some churches change color to white.
Finally, the new church year begins with a change to the color blue or purple for the season of Advent and the beginning of a new church year. Purple is the color of repentance and is traditionally used for Lent — where the church fasts to receive Jesus as the Son of God and Son of Mary. Blue is the color of hope and used more recently, where Advent is celebrated as a season of joy.
One more color change happens in some churches (to white) in the United States for Thanksgiving Day, which is the celebration of the good gifts God has given to us and our thanks to him for these blessings.
Enjoy this season of meditation, joy, expectation and hope as we consider the various blessing Jesus has given and will give to us because of his love for us, shown by his incarnation, sufferings, death, resurrection, ascension and soon return in glory.
[Second in a series of posts on Last Things] Encore Post: This is one of a host of throwaway platitudes we may say at the death of a Christian. We’ve inherited … Or, more correctly, we’ve been infected by the language of a faithless culture around us. In the absence of the faith, in the absence of the certainty of the resurrection promise of Holy Baptism, the pagan world speaks from ignorance to sloppily salve suffering in grief.
None of these words comes from an evil intent. It’s honorable and good to try to speak peace to those in grief. But we’d do better to stick to the words and themes of the Bible.
“Heaven needed another angel.”
No, we don’t become angels when we die. Heaven’s angels are fixed in number. They are created heavenly beings. (Colossians 1:16) They are the messengers of God. The angels are His army, His mighty host. (Joshua 5:14-15; 1 Samuel 17:45) The angels are fearsome in appearance. (Luke 2:9-10) And God has charged His angels to protect and defend us from the minions of the Evil One.
The Evil One, Lucifer, the Devil, was also one of God’s angels. (Luke 10:17-18) He and one-third of the angels in heaven rebelled against God. They were cast out. (Revelation 8:10-11; 9:1-3) Satan and his demons (angels) now dwell in hell apart from God and make war to separate us from the love of Jesus.
God didn’t send His Son to suffer and die to redeem the fallen angels. He did that for us. We are loved and have been redeemed and forgiven in a unique way. Saying that we will become them denigrates the angels. It diminishes God’s love for us to deny that our path to eternal salvation remains human and regains our flesh on the last day. Not angels–fully perfected human beings.
“He’s gone. She’s in a better place.”
Where’d he go?! Is she in a better place, like Antigua? He was hooked up to an awful lot of machines the last time I saw him.
The science-y view of nothingness beyond death leads to language like passing away. They are “gone” in that there’s nothing more. When we say someone has gone to a better place. We’re agreeing that we don’t know where. It’s a grief-softening move for those without hope. But we have great hope and a tremendous promise.
We Christians have more to say than that. We can speak the words of the scripture to console and correctly locate our loved ones. The blessed dead in the faith are at rest in Christ. The better place to which they’ve gone has a name. They have gone to heaven! We should leap at the chance to name the place where they are. That’s true, consoling, faithful, and beautiful.
The scriptures say that someone has died. (see all of Genesis 5). If we’re still uncomfortable saying someone has died, the scripture still gives us softer words. These softer words contain and still confess the hope we have.
Gained Heaven
We can say that they have “gained heaven.” “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” (Philippians 1:21)
At Rest
We should say they are “at rest.” “Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brothers should be complete, who were to be killed as they themselves had been.” (Revelation 6:11)
“And I heard a voice from heaven saying, ‘Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.” “Blessed indeed,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them!” (Rev 14:13)
If you go through an old Lutheran churchyard (cemetery), you’ll see a curious thing. When the gravestones switch from English to German, the common phrases switch too. “Loving mother/father and beloved child” give way to something else. You’ll see things like: “Hier Ruhet.” “Ruhet in Gott,” or “Ruhe’ in Christi.” These mean: here rests, rest in God, and rest in Christ.
Let’s stick with the language and imagery of the Bible.
Hang on tight—what happens when we die? Comes next.
[First in a series of posts on Last Things]Encore Post “In this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes,” quipped Benjamin Franklin. He was right about death, at least. In 1997, a satirical online newspaper ran this headline: “World Death Rate Holding Steady At 100 Percent.” They were right. All but two people in the world’s history have died — including God in the person of Jesus Christ! Yet all people fear death because it means that, in the end, they will lose control of everything. We do everything we can to extend life, and, in our age, we have done quite well at it. Yet still, all people will die, and some quite young.
Physically speaking, death is a process that happens as our vital organs cease to function. Practically speaking, medical science pronounces death when the heart stops without the possibility of reviving it or when brain waves cease.
Yet, death is much more than the end of our physical life. It is the judgment of God on sin. Since sin cuts us off from the source of our life, God himself, we will die. When God forbade Adam from eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, he warned: “In the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Gen 2:17). When Adam fell, he pronounced his sentence — and ours. “You return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” (Genesis 3:19)
There is also another aspect of death that is not about the end of physical life. The essence of our life, our spirit, our soul, is violently separated from our bodies. For Christians who are redeemed by the atoning death of Jesus, the soul separated from its body by death is cleansed of its sin, relieved of pain and grief, and lives in paradise with Christ and the souls of all who are redeemed. There, they wait for the second coming of Christ. On that day, the Lord will call their bodies from the grave, reunite their souls and bodies, transforming them to be fit for eternal life.
[One hundred and fourth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: Ever since Jesus ascended to Heaven, Christians have wondered when He would return. We look forward to the day when He will bring an end to sin, sickness, sorrow, grief, pain, and death. Every day, horrible things happen, and we wonder whether this could be the day He comes back.
In every generation, some people thought that they had figured out the secret. They read the prophecies of the Bible and try to match events in their lifetime to the symbols in them. They do the math and come up with a day. But the Bible is not a giant math problem where you plug in the right events into the equation and get a date. In fact, all the signs of the end of days were fulfilled at the time the last books of the Bible were written. We are in the last days and have been for 2000 years.
Jesus warned us about such dreaming. He told us that no one knows the day or the hour of his return. So, we are to be ready for him. He will come for us — at the end of time or at the end of our times. We do not know which will come first or when it will happen. The reason we do not know when He will return is that God wants us always to be ready. He wants us to love Him and take care of each other every day, not just on the day we think is the end of time or the day we will die. When things are hard in our lives, Jesus wants us to know that He will fix it all one day. We can then face these things, knowing it will not be forever.
Instead, the sure and certain hope of the resurrection of the dead comforts us. On that day, sin will be removed from us forever. There will be no more grief, sorrow, sickness, or pain. At the voice of Jesus, we will rise from the grave, body and soul reunited, our bodies transformed into a glorious body like the one Jesus has, fit to live forever. It will be as God intended it forever. It is why we join the church of all times, places, races, languages, calling out, “Come, Lord Jesus, come!”
Campus Ministry Sermon Psalm 24, 1 Samuel 10 October 25, 2023
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
The theme is this: Saul points us to Jesus as the Prophet, Priest, and King.
Last month, we began this series recognizing that Jesus is the King of all. This month, we focus in on the very first king of Israel, Saul of the tribe of Benjamin. There are many stories you have probably heard about King Saul, but today we will only look at Saul’s anointing to become king. At Saul’s anointing, we notice that he foreshadows Jesus, who will be the Prophet, Priest and King for us.
First, we hear in the reading this evening, “Then Samuel took a flask of oil and poured it on his head and kissed him and said, “Has not the Lord anointed you to be prince over his people Israel? And you shall reign over the people of the Lord and you will save them from the hand of their surrounding enemies. Anointing with oil is not a common practice anymore in the world or in the church. We hardly have kings anymore; parliaments and presidents are much more common. But in the days of Saul, becoming a king was a religious experience. It was the church who anointed the kings. It was God who established the government authorities. Israel truly was a godly nation at that point in history.
But oil on the head only set Saul apart from the people as their king. What was it that confirmed that he was the king? Samuel prophesied a few signs. Our reading says, “And this shall be the sign to you that the Lord has anointed you to be prince over his heritage. When you depart from me today, you will meet two men by Rachel’s tomb in the territory of Benjamin at Zelzah, and they will say to you, ‘The donkeys that you went to seek are found, and now your father has ceased to care about the donkeys and is anxious about you, saying, “What shall I do about my son?”’ First, Saul has to go to Bethlehem; he had to journey to Rachel’s tomb and there he would pick up some donkeys. It is no small detail that the kings of Israel began to reign in Bethlehem. Before Bethlehem was known as the City of David, before David was even a king, Bethlehem was known as the City of Rachel, the burial place for Rachel, the wife of Jacob.
But more than Rachel, more than Saul and more than David, we all know that Jesus was born in Bethlehem and was given gifts by three kings, gold, and frankincense, and myrrh. It was at Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem that He was named the King of the Jews. It was in Bethlehem that He laid among the donkeys and other farm animals.
But donkeys? How can forget to mention the donkeys? It is shocking that Israel’s kings rode on donkeys. No movie shows a king riding on a donkey. No nation wants their kings riding on donkeys. Can you imagine instead of Air Force One that the President of the United States would ride into town on a donkey? What about the King of England? No, kings do not ride on donkeys. But here Saul is on the search for donkeys and he will get them.
And Jesus, the king of all, will ride on donkeys too. Jesus will ride on a donkey with His mother Mary as they journey to Bethlehem. Jesus will ride on a donkey into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday too. Saul, the first king of Israel, shows us what it means to be king, to ride on a donkey. And because of that, Jesus too is truly a King.
But what else is in this story? Then you shall go on from there farther and come to the oak of Tabor. Three men going up to God at Bethel will meet you there, one carrying three young goats, another carrying three loaves of bread, and another carrying a skin of wine. And they will greet you and give you two loaves of bread, which you shall accept from their hand. This second sign for Saul demonstrates the work of the priests. From Bethlehem as king to Bethel as a priest, Saul now sees a sign of three men, three goats, three loaves of bread, and some wine. The priest with the goats will make a blood sacrifice. The priest with the three loaves will make a grain offering. The priest with the skin of wine will make a thanksgiving offering. All of these things proclaim and confirm the kingship of Saul.
How does this point us to Jesus as a priest? Jesus will make a blood sacrifice, not of goats’ blood, but of His own blood. This is what John means when He proclaims, “Jesus the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!” Not only this, but Jesus will make a grain offering, feeding 5,000 and 4,000 souls by the Sea of Galilee, doing a grain miracle just like the manna in the wilderness. And Jesus will take the cup of wine, and He will declare to the disciples, “This is the New Testament in my Blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” Yes. Jesus is a priest. In fact, He is the High Priest. He makes the sacrifice for the earth to cover all sins of all people.
But wait. What is the final sign? Our reading continues with these words: After that you shall come to Gibeath-elohim, where there is a garrison of the Philistines. And there, as soon as you come to the city, you will meet a group of prophets coming down from the high place with harp, tambourine, flute, and lyre before them, prophesying. Then the Spirit of the Lord will rush upon you, and you will prophesy with them and be turned into another man. Now when these signs meet you, do what your hand finds to do, for God is with you.
First, we saw that Saul was to be the Bethlehem king. Then we saw that Saul was to be the Bethel priest. Now, Saul will be a prophet. In the midst of the Philistines, Saul will begin to proclaim the true God to unbelievers. What a miracle that was! This passage shows us so much more than establishing the kingship of Israel. It is way more than oil on the head. In this reading, we recognize what godly kings are supposed to be like and what they are to do.
Saul’s anointing as king over Israel foreshadows to us that Jesus will be the true King of Israel. It shows to us that Jesus is the King, the Priest, and the Prophet of God Most High. Saul was the first king of Israel, but his life turned out that he was not the best of the kings of Israel. Yet Saul’s anointing reminds us and helps us look forward to Jesus’ anointing.
Jesus the King lives and reigns over all of creation. Jesus the Priest sacrificed for the whole world. Jesus the Prophet proclaimed the Easter victory over sin, death, and the powers of hell. What Saul could not accomplish, Jesus has accomplished for us.
Long live the King, the King Jesus! Now let us live forever with Him.
Encore Post: The Lutheran Church is a liturgical church. This means that the theme of the day is set well ahead of time by the lectionary that your parish uses. Each Sunday is normally named by the place it is in the church year — a certain Sunday in Advent, a certain Sunday in Lent, a certain Sunday of Easter, or in Epiphany, or a certain Sunday after Pentecost or Trinity.
Each day is assigned a set of propers — a Psalm, a Collect (a prayer for the day that collects the thoughts of the people related to the theme of the day), a Gradual (a few sentences of scripture spoken between the Epistle and the Gospel lessons), Scripture lessons and a proper preface (said by the pastor during the beginning of the Service of the Sacrament). These are proper to the season and day and so change from week to week or season to season. In the long season of ordinary time (Sunday after Pentecost), the themes chosen traditionally shift about every ten weeks (after the Feast of the Holy Trinity, St. Lawrence’s Day, and St. Michael and All Angels)
Once in a while, you will run into a Sunday that is named after a person, like Saint Peter, or an event, like the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist. These days are typically called Feasts or Saints’ days. Most of these are Biblical figures or events, with Reformation Day and The Presentation of the Augsburg Confession being notable exceptions. In a church, a college, or a seminary chapel, where there are services every day, these days are often observed on the appointed date. Most Missouri Synod parishes, however, celebrate them only when the date falls on a Sunday.
Also scheduled on the church calendar are commemorations. These are available to congregations of the church but are rarely used. They include Biblical figures, especially Old Testament ones, Christian leaders, or memorable figures from the church’s history. In the Missouri Synod, they include musicians (like J. S. Bach) and other artists of various kinds and figures of the Synod’s history (like C. F. W. Walther and Rev. Smith‘s favorite — F.C.D. Wyneken)
We celebrate these people and events because they point to Jesus. Saints are not perfect, nor do they have special powers. They were sinners just like us, but now live in Heaven with all the saints. (Hebrews 13:7-8)
[Ninety-Ninth in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: The word “martyr” is a Greek word that means “witness” — a person who reports what he or she sees. Just before returning to Heaven, Jesus predicted His disciples would be witnesses of His death and resurrection.
The apostles appointed Stephen a deacon. It was his task to feed the widows and the poor, using the funds collected for that purpose. God blessed his work by performing miracles as well. When men from the local synagogue asked what he believed, God blessed Stephen’s word, so that his opponents could not find a reply to answer his arguments. They finally silenced him by charging him with blasphemy — speaking lies about God.
The same Sanhedrin that had condemned Jesus just a few weeks earlier now convened to hear Stephen’s case. Stephen told the truth — that the Sanhedrin had handed over Jesus to death falsely. This infuriated them. The last straw came when Stephen related a vision of Jesus standing at the right hand of God in heaven. For the Jewish people of the time, this was another way of saying that Jesus Himself is God. Jesus said the same thing in that very spot in the early hours of Good Friday. They condemned Stephen to death, too. This time, Pontius Pilate was not in Jerusalem. So they felt safe in defying Roman law and executing Stephen by the method ordered by the Jewish Law. They took Stephen out of the city and stoned him to death. The man who would one day be the Apostle Paul held the coats of those who killed Stephen.
With the death of Stephen and others that followed, the word “martyr” took on new meaning. Now it meant dying for witnessing to the truth about Jesus and for preaching the good news. The martyrs’ deaths impressed the Romans. If you believe in something strongly enough to risk death by torture, they thought, then perhaps the martyrs might be right. Many were baptized because of such witnesses. That is why the church likes to say: “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.”
Sermon on Matthew 8:18–22 Friday in the Week of the 6th Sunday after Pentecost July 6th, 2018 Kramer Chapel Concordia Theological Seminary Fort Wayne, Indiana
Text: “Now when Jesus saw a crowd around him, he gave orders to go over to the other side. And a scribe came up and said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” Another of the disciples said to him, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” And Jesus said to him, “Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.”
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.Introduction
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
The text for this morning’s meditation is from the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 8, verses 18 to 22.
Welcome to Zion on the St. Joseph—where tranquil vistas, first-class architecture, vibrant worship, and perhaps the most comfortable, well-ordered library in the world await you. Here, you sit at the feet of profound scholars, studying Scripture and the Confessions. Yes, you have chosen well—and all it cost you is your whole life.
The would-be disciples in our text did what any pious, Torah-loving Jew of the age would do: they chose a great rabbi. But Jesus of Nazareth was unlike any other. He called His own students.
And so it is with you. You are here because you believe God may be calling you to ministry, in answer to the prayers of the Church that He send workers into His harvest field.
As those early disciples discovered—and as you may have discovered upon meeting your first drill sergeant, your Greek instructor—there is much more to come. If you haven’t already, now is a good time to assess the cost. And I don’t mean financially.
Ministry requires sacrifice and dedication.
The first would-be disciple thought that becoming a scribe meant simply following the teacher and taking notes. But Jesus reminded him: no five-star hotels, no comforts—just the road, wherever it leads. The second disciple wanted to fulfill his familial duties first. But Jesus made clear: the kingdom of God comes first, even before family.
This is not a lucrative trade. You won’t make much money as a Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod pastor. Stock options? Unlikely. Appreciation? Sometimes scarce.
You’ll arrive at your first parish and discover they expect you to be “on” before you’re even ordained. I remember pulling into my first church to unload books a week before installation. I was invited to dinner to meet the daughter of a member, who happened to be in a cult. Immediately, I was on. Time for cult evangelism.
The ministry calls at unexpected hours and in unexpected ways. It’s not just on Sundays. It’s 24/7, 365 days a year. Yes, you’ll have a vacation—but pastors are often called back for funerals. Even family time may be shortened, vacations truncated, and relocations sudden. Yes, this costs you your whole life.
Sometimes, that burden is heavy. When a policeman shines a light into your bedroom window at 3 a.m., you may not respond with grace. Yet ministry calls. Sometimes you’ll wonder why you ever said yes. Sometimes you’ll be appreciated. Sometimes your sermon will hit the mark—and the congregation will growl. Sometimes they won’t receive you at all.
Friedrich Wyneken arrived in town with a breathtaking call:
“Come, we need a shepherd.” But when he introduced himself, the man didn’t even look up. “So, you’re a preacher? The sick man’s house is over there. But you probably want to see the wagoner down the block.” How’s that for a welcome?
You’ll often feel unfit. Luther’s sacristy prayer says it best:
“Lord, you have made me a pastor and teacher of the Church, and you know how unfit I am for so great and responsible an office.”
So what do you do? You don’t pack up. You don’t leave. You do what God has called you to do.
And remember what it cost Jesus to call you. Though He was God, He did not cling to equality with God but emptied Himself, became man, and went to the cross. He died for you and me, taking our sin, our pride, our expectations—and nailed them to the cross. He rose again, and we rose with Him. You are never alone.
Now, when ministry is hard, God is with you. Jesus strengthens you through His gifts—through your hands, He blesses your flock with forgiveness, life, and salvation. He is present in the Sacrament and in the prayers of saints near and far. That grandmother who can’t make it to church? She prays for you daily.
You are never alone. He lives with us every day. And when we lay down our office in death, we will go to where He is now—where there is no sorrow, sighing, crying, or pain. And on that day, we will see the true fruits of the ministry He worked through us. It will have been worth it.
And now may the peace of God, which passes all human understanding, fill our hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
There are a few things about Obadiah that I think you should know. First of all, it all boils down to Jacob and Esau. Jacob deceived Esau and got Esau’s birthright for a bowl of soup. And Jacob deceived Isaac for Esau’s blessing for well-cooked wild game. Jacob got everything; Esau got nothing. Even though Esau was older and Esau was stronger, Jacob prevailed and he made off with the promises of God.
Jacob ran away after that for twenty years. I was just reading with someone about Jacob and Esau the other day. And Jacob and Esau did finally meet again. And Jacob assumed war, but he and his brother reconciled. And yet there was still bad blood between them. For Israel ended up with the good land and Esau’s descendants ended up with the land of Edom, on the east of the Jordan.
Obadiah’s whole book is about this feud. His small chapter in the Bible, only 21 verses, was written about 1,300 years or more after Jacob and Esau lived in the land. By that time, Edom had attacked Israel and judgment was upon them. Brother rose up against brother, as it were. Assyria had already taken the northern kingdom and Babylon was near at hand to take Jerusalem. And Edom was gloating and boasting at the ruin of their brother Jacob, the nation of Israel. There was little hope for the people of God who had forsaken the Lord.
That’s the first point, that it all boils down to Jacob and Esau. But just like Jacob ran away from Esau in the beginning of this feud, Obadiah mentions that the people of God will also escape when he says, But in Mount Zion there shall be those who escape, and it shall be holy,and the house of Jacob shall possess their own possessions.The house of Jacob shall be a fire,and the house of Joseph a flame. In other words, and this is the second point, the church shall not be snuffed out. And that is valuable for us. Think about what God has done. First, He gave Jacob the blessings. Then He helped Jacob escape. Later, God’s people received the judgment and yet God still delivered them and they escaped.
Here we see 1,300 years of God’s mercy at work. Obadiah reminds us that we shall not be utterly destroyed. While there are powerful forces in our world that would love to humiliate us and to displace us, we have nothing to fear, for like Jacob we shall be preserved. Consider how much greater the house of Jacob is in our world today than the house of Esau. There is no house of Esau. But there is an incredibly vast and numerous church. Esau’s land was small, but the church has spread to every nation and tribe and language.
It is as Obadiah says, that the house of Esau is stubble; they shall burn them and consume them, and there shall be no survivor for the house of Esau, for the Lord has spoken. At the end of the day, Esau has been judged. While Jacob was suffering at that time and Israel was under attack and nearly lost everything, the church, the Israel of God, has prevailed and expanded by God’s grace.
Consider what St. Paul says about this Jacob-Esau feud in Romans chapter 9. He boils it all down to this simple point: “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. We know that this is true. We do not fight battles and wage wars for material gains by human will or exertion. We do not fight battles and wage wars for an eternal earthly kingdom. Rather we know that God has mercy on us and has compassion towards us. Fighting only accomplishes small victories. But God’s grace through faith is the eternal victory that has lasting, ahem, everlasting effect, as you yourselves can testify.
But to the next point. And this is the one that most clearly points us to Jesus. Obadiah ends his book with this beautiful promise: Saviors shall go up to Mount Zionto rule Mount Esau,and the kingdom shall be the Lord’s. Here is the Jesus prophecy that we need to hear. The Savior shall fight for the church. The Savior shall save the church. From Mount Zion to the Mount of Olives, your Lord Jesus Christ overcame all the enemies and made them a footstool under His feet. From Mount Esau to Mount Calvary, your Lord Jesus Christ established the kingdom of God, the church on earth.
The Savior has come! That’s the Advent message for you today. We already knew that Obadiah’s prophecy was fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. We already knew that from Jacob’s family, Jesus has been born. We already knew that our God would deliver us, as He did for thousand of years before His Son was born in Bethlehem.
The kingdom is the Lord’s, dear people of God. His kingdom grows and expands more and more by His grace and through faith. And His kingdom shall have no end. Let us rejoice and sing, for what Obadiah has foretold has come true for us, that God saves us now and forevermore.
[Eighty-Second in a series of posts on Bible Stories] Encore Post: At the Transfiguration, Jesus appeared to his disciples in his full glory as God. In the Three-Year Lectionary, it celebrates the end of the season of Epiphany with a theophany — an appearance of God. The season also began with a theophany. At the baptism of Jesus, the Father spoke over his Son from heaven, and the Holy Spirit appeared as a dove. Now the Father speaks from the cloud of God’s Presence, and with him is the Holy Spirit.
But that is not all. At the Transfiguration, Jesus appeared with the two greatest witnesses of the Old Testament — Moses and Elijah. God used Moses to lead his people out of Egypt and gave the Law to them through him. God buried Moses when he died. Elijah was the great and fearless prophet, whom God carried into heaven in a chariot of fire. God promised the Messiah to Moses, calling the Messiah a prophet like him. Later prophets predicted Elijah would return to witness to the Messiah on the day the Messiah would come.
Now on the mountain of Transfiguration, Moses and Elijah discussed with Jesus his Exodus — his departure. As Moses led Israel through the Red Sea to freedom, Jesus would bring us all through death to everlasting life by his death on the cross. Not knowing what to make of it all, Peter offered to set up tents like the people had used during their wilderness wanderings. As usual, Peter missed the point.
So the Cloud of God’s Glory appeared on the mountain. In that cloud, the Angel of the Lord led the people by day through the wilderness and showed God’s presence in the tabernacle and temple. From this Cloud, God the Father speaks a second time. “This is my beloved Son,” he said, “listen to him.”
The message of the Transfiguration is that Jesus is God, yet He set aside His glory to die for our sins. We should serve God by doing what He says and serving one another.
