Word of God – Page 5 – What Does This Mean?

A Sermon for the 5th Sunday after Pentecost

Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

No one really knew what was coming as 2020 came into focus. Many of us myself included figured a few weeks of isolation would stem the tide sweeping the nation that was the virus. I know for myself I was not really prepared to face a longer period of the “stay at home” stuff. Much was needing to be done. I felt more busy than ever. Much of my busyness being brought on through anxiety. Trying to navigate how to best serve a church in the middle of the pandemic. Every move, every decision, wore me down. I felt pretty helpless.

As God has a way of using events of the world to bring folks to their knees in repentance, I too was brought to my knees in a few ways. I was reminded and perhaps you have been as well, that you have little strength in and of yourself. And the strength you have in yourself in the long run does not last, nor are you able to add one day to your life by it. I was reminded time and time again not to lean on my own understanding, my mind and my body were going through the wringer. I was burdened and heavy laden with anxiety about how everything would be heard and received. As like many workers in the midst of the pandemic I was being reminded that I was not the savior. In my office as an installation gift I received an icon, depicting Christ walking on the Water. In the icon on my office wall Jesus is lifting St. Peter from the water. It reminds me of something I should have never forgotten: Jesus is the savior of St. Peter, not me.

I am one who needs to come and put off the yoke of my heavy burdens. I am weak. Christ is the strong one. O that we might all have this revealed to us by the Father in Heaven. May we be made into little children and trust in the gracious will of our Lord, instead of try to trudge through our burdens of sin/shame/anxiety alone.

Think about your own situations and lives. There are plenty of situations that you have in your life that likely make you feel helpless and hopeless. Maybe it is something along the lines of family dynamics which we have touched on in previous weeks as the Gospel lessons have brought to the fore. Maybe you teachers are feeling lost in the sea of Covid-19 classroom preparedness. Maybe you are concerned for all your students who have not received the last months of school and now summer is really here and you are anxious where they are in life and in education. Just how far down the ladder have they fallen? Maybe you are trying to do it all, working and trying to make sure no child is left behind. But how can you do that? Feeling the burdens? Do you feel like you have failed? And those are some secondary and tertiary vocations. We aren’t really even talking about the vocations of mothers and fathers. Fathers, have you been burdened by the fact that your livelihood and the lives of your family members have been affected economically? I don’t think this has been the case for our members as much thanks be to God, but many have lost months of income and the standard of living has fallen for many around us. Anxious about what comes next? Burdened by worry? What do you do and where do you turn?

Turn to the one who cries out, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him. Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:25-30).

Jesus Christ offers freely rest for our wearied souls. Worry and anxiety are symptoms of a failure to fully fear, love, and trust in the promises of God our Father in heaven. They are sins against the first commandment. We worry because we don’t think we can handle what’s been put on our plate. And usually we are right about being unable to handle it because our focus is on the wrong thing. Our focus is on ourselves and our own strength. We find ourselves to be weak, especially when the burden of our failings mount up against us. Repent. That is the only way to have relief for our souls and conscience.

Jesus tells us a bit more about how this happens. This rest comes to you in knowing Jesus and by knowing Jesus we know His Father. It’s a trinitarian act: For The Holy Spirit is the Person who speaks to us knowledge about Jesus and his Gospel, that is what we confess as the work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gathers us to Jesus, and Jesus reconciles us to His Father. And there is our rest knowing that our burdens and our sins, our worries, our anxieties have been taken on by Jesus and dealt with once and for all. We are not the savior, Jesus is. And that is rest to our weary souls indeed.

Like anything, our anxieties and our worries come and go, our feelings of helplessness ebb and flow. Sometimes we feel like we are on top of the world, other times we are feeling like we are walking through the valley of death. Sometimes we will want to give up and give in, throwing the pity party that can come when we feel alone and the load is too much for us to bear alone. Yet, in all circumstances, Christ calls you to walk with him in his way, carrying the easy yoke that leads to eternal life.

He calls you to be like little children. Children do not do much for themselves. They need to be fed. They need to be reminded of a parent’s love for them. They need hugged. They need picked up when they fall off their bike. They need a kiss on the scuffed-up knee. They need to know you care for them. So too you being a child of God you need that same kind of encouragement, a better love that never ends nor fades, a love that picks up all the pieces of your weary body and life and makes it all well in the cross of Jesus.

You are little children, beloved by your Father, made God’s own Child, because you are baptized into Christ. By baptism you are connected to Christ, both his crucifixion, and his resurrection. All your anxiety, all your worry, all your sin, and the shame that burdens your conscience taken away there in Christ’s death. And you participate in that by being washed clean in the waters of Holy Baptism. St. Peter talks about Baptism in this way: Baptism now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. You are given a light yoke; you are given knowledge of Jesus who has died and risen from the dead that you might live forever with your Heavenly Father.

In some churches, the font is in the back of the church and each parishioner passes right by the font as they go to their pew. In those churches, if you have ever been to one, you might have seen some folks take the liberty of dipping their finger into the water and making the sign of the cross upon themselves. What an awesome way to be reminded of the gifts Christ gives to us in Holy Baptism. We are called by the grace of our Lord into a life that is ours on behalf of Jesus, a life that is not to be burdened with the cares of being the savior of ourselves or our families or anyone else. No, that job has been covered and taken forever by Jesus. Look to the font and know your burdens have been taken up by Christ and he has dealt with them once and for all.

And know too that if we falter and do worry and fall into sin, we have the Son who comes to us and picks back up and takes those sins away. This is the continued out-flowing of God’s love for you. That love is made manifest to you in the Divine Service, where you repent and confess your sins and receive rest for you souls, rest that lasts through eternity, receiving that rest by receiving Christ on your ears in the hearing of His Word and on your very lips as you eat his body and blood for the forgiveness of sins and strengthening of your faith.

Christ cries out, come to me, and I will give you rest. St. Augustine that great 4^th Century Church Father put it this way: You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.” Thanks be to God that Christ continues to call to us, calling the young and old to rest but above all to souls distressed longing for rest everlasting. And you have been brought into that rest who is Christ by Baptism and He has been put into you by Holy Communion. So be at rest, you souls distressed. Be at rest, Christ is your savior and he has come and carries your burdens far from you.

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Rev. Jacob Hercamp
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
La Grange, MO

Discipleship: Following Where Jesus Goes

Encore Post: So just where does Jesus go? Well he goes to places that are pretty messy sometimes. If we just consider the 12 disciples who Jesus called to himself at the beginning of his ministry, we see a man in Matthew who was a tax collector. We see a zealot in Simon, we see a couple of brothers who want honor and glory. And that’s just a few of them! What we see in the 12 disciples are sinners! And all the disciples of Jesus including us are sinners! Jesus preaches to sinners like the 12 and still to you and me.

A term that comes from the bible is that of disciple. And that is a great thing to recall. We who follow Jesus as taught in the Bible according to the words of the apostles are disciples of Jesus. We believe the teaching that was handed down by Jesus to the first disciples who were later called apostles who then wrote their Gospels, Epistles, and Prophetic books that make up the New Testament.

The season of Epiphany is a great time to be talking about the disciples because we just heard the reading of Peter, James and John being called to be “fishers of men” and soon we will be hearing the words from the Mount of Transfiguration, “Listen to Him!” Disciples are and to follow and to listen to their master, their Lord Jesus. Peter on the mount shows a desire to stay on the mountain and bask in the glory, but that is not where Jesus stays. No, he goes, setting his face like flint towards Jerusalem, getting ready for the Cross, where He would atone for the sins of the world. Many people, even Peter, don’t want this to be the case, but it must be so. That is why Jesus was sent.

A disciple then follows Jesus to the cross. That is where our journey takes us, the place where our salvation is won. The place from which comes all our blessings including the blessing of being able to tell others about Jesus’ wonderful work there for all humanity. Disciples then don’t just keep this message of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus to themselves, but rather disciples tell others who do not know about Jesus to follow Jesus unto that Promised Land which he has entered and will ultimately gather us together with all the faithful disciples who have gone before us.

Rev. Jacob Hercamp
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
La Grange, MO

Words that Carry Weight

Encore Post: Perhaps you can think of a time when you received some words with weight behind them. I remember the words of the pastor who announced to the congregation that my wife and I were married. Perhaps you have had similar words spoken. Maybe they weren’t words of great joy but maybe they were those heavy words from a doctor saying you had cancer. Or you can remember back in high school how the gossip got around. That old lie we tell ourselves: Sticks and stone may break my bones, but words can never hurt me. Words definitely carry weight. Some good weight and others much worse.

And so it is with Jesus. He is preaching the Word given Him to preach. We were told what this Word was last week in his first sermon, right out of the prophet of Isaiah. He was anointed to preach good news to the poor. He preaches with authority unlike any people of the towns had seen. And His Word carries weight! And His Word is effective!

Jesus’ word has power. You might think it odd, but have you ever read the bible out loud to yourself? To hear the words, reverberate into you own ears. Paul makes the connection to faith. Faith comes by hearing the Word of Christ.

In a manner like Peter’s mother-in-law, you have been raised back to life by the word of Jesus. You were dead in your trespasses and sins. But by the power and authority of the Word of Jesus you are made alive. You were called by the very Word of Jesus at the moment of your Baptism. The very Word which was preached and proclaimed to the demon was said to you. “Out you unclean spirit, and make room for the Holy Spirit.” You were dead in trespasses and sins, held in captivity and slavery of sin, death, and Satan. And Christ speaks a mere word from the cross, “It is finished.” The time of slavery is finished, the time of death is done. “It is finished,” says your Lord and Savior Jesus.

And He speaks life into you, calling you to a life of faith in Him. Clinging to the promise and pledge that by his life, death, and resurrection, we too have the same resurrection. You have already been raised to a new life by Baptism where He speaks to a very wonderful Word carries real weight!

Rev. Jacob Hercamp
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
La Grange, MO

Inerrancy: What Does It Mean?

Encore Post: Inerrancy means to be without error. If the Bible contains errors then what use is it for us and our salvation? How could we find the errors? What would be true, and what would be erring? If one thing is wrong in the word it might as well be thrown out entirely.

This is what we get with Higher Historical Criticism of the Bible. If the words written on the pages of the Bible are not truly God’s word then certainly the words there are riddled with errors because they were written by men. The Bible was questioned even in the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod. For a much greater overview , I highly recommend you take an opportunity to read the newest book by David Scaer where he lays out these things as they were happening inside the Missouri Synod’s St. Louis Seminary in the 1950s, leading to the walk out of its liberal faculty in 1974.

One place that people said even Jesus erred in the Bible was when he gave the saying, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 10:23-26) Those with the view that Jesus erred would say that Jesus had no idea of germination. It was always assumed that it died but now science has shown otherwise. They claims Jesus didn’t know this. But all that does it show their cards when it comes to understanding Jesus. They think He was just a man and not God in the flesh. But the Bible tells us otherwise. And besides, those of the errant view did not care to see what Jesus was doing in the verse before it. He tells the the people, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” Jesus is talking about his death on the cross and his resurrection. He is speaking about your salvation, not about the science of how a seed germinates and the like. He effectively says, “I am the seed that must die in order to bring life to you who believe in me.”

But if we take seriously the words of John 1, that Word was Made Flesh, we should take seriously the words which are recorded for us in the Bible because that word speaks of Jesus. For He is the Word of the Father, and that Word has been glorified for us by his incarnation, life, death, and resurrection, for our salvation.

Rev. Jacob Hercamp
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
La Grange, MO

The Word of God Changes Everything

Encore Post: A good book, a great movie, a stirring song or a work of great art — all of these have the power to take you away to another place, another time, worlds away from day-to-day life. You can escape into them and find an energy there to face life for a little while longer. Yet even the best of them, even the most inspiring, do not change your world at all. Everything is still where you left it and you have to go on.

The Bible is different. It is not just any other book. It is like no other book. The Bible is God’s Word, breathed out by his Holy Spirit in the same way that God created the world. (1 Timothy 3:15-17) By God’s Word, the Holy Spirit creates faith in our hearts. (Romans 10:14-17, John 20:30-31) This faith takes hold of the promises of Holy Scripture, trusts the Gospel it hears when the Bible is read and lives by it. (Romans 1:16-17)

This is the reason why Christians have read the Bible in every worship service since Christ founded it and why the Hebrew and Jewish believers before them have read and meditated upon it for 3500 years. Great literature and works of wisdom authored by human skill can be very helpful to us when we want to understand the world and God who made it. These writings can just as easily confuse us, faith to provide insight and often completely mislead us. They often miss the mark when they assume that by our wits, we can understand God. But we cannot.

Because Holy Scripture is God’s own message, it can be trusted to be true, where every other message can fail us. It teaches us when we do not know what to do. It is eternal and never-changing and so is a solid base on which to build our lives. It helps us see through the complications and confusion of life in a sin-filled world. The Word of God changes things, reviving our souls, giving us joy in times of depression and comfort in times of grief. (Psalm 19)

The very center of the message that the Scripture proclaims is the Cross. God saw us lost in our sins and loved us. Not willing to see us die forever, He came to seek us, find us, lay down his life to save us. In Jesus, he took all our sin and guilt upon us. As the Lamb of God bore it all away. On the cross, he paid the full debt due because of it. Rising from the grave, he broke the power of sin, death and the devil forever. That is why we gladly hear the Word of God, give thanks to him for it, and use its power to obey it and serve him gladly.

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

The Four Ways of Interpreting Scripture

Encore Post: Pastor Smith has spoken a little about the four fold sense of interpreting Scripture. The Alexandrian theologians (at least some of them) followed this four fold sense method. Antioch held just to the literal or historical sense.

Those four are: Literal, Allegorical, Tropological, and the Anagogical senses. Below, I will try to explain them. I hope it proves to be a helpful primer. I do not believe I have a full grasp on each of these senses, but again I hope this gives some idea as to how the senses of interpretation were used to “get deeper into the meaning.”

The literal or historical sense is applicable to both a historical event and literary text. The literal sense is emphasized insofar as it historically grounds subsequent spiritual interpretation. Every subsequent sense was supposed to be connected then to the literal sense.

The allegorical sense then is used after the literal sense. The allegorical sense has been argued to go all the way back to St. Paul, even Jesus uses allegory in some of this parables. The allegorical sense of Scripture has been understood as referring to the mysteries of Christ and the Church as prefigured in Scripture. So then in the allegorical sense the object of allegory is properly Christ and the Church. Another principal of the allegorical sense in light of the Old Testament is that the object of allegory in reference of the Old Testament is a reality in the future.

The tropological sense applies a Scriptural text to the moral life. This sense, historically, has been a contributing factor for Christian anthropology and spirituality. The tropological and allegorical senses are united because while the allegorical sense refers to Christ and Church, the tropological sense refers to the individual members of the Body of Christ.

Finally the analogical sense is the eschatological sense of Scripture that looks forward to the consummation of everything in Christ at his final coming. In light of this we can kinda begin to see how these senses work all together. For instance, the anagogical sense represents the fulfillment of allegorical sense.

This was all supposed to find Christ, but more often than not, theologians went much further afield. This is why Luther was very weary of it. The medieval Church came up with some fanciful interpretations that had absolutely nothing to do with Christ.

Rev. Jacob Hercamp
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
La Grange, MO

Grace Alone and Scripture alone at Leipzig

It really was not about indulgences. The Ninety-Five Theses were a spark that ignited a debate about the place of the Pope and other church authorities. Luther’s opponents noticed the Reformer had challenged their authority when he criticized the abuse of indulgences. Luther had given German princes the excuse they needed to forbid the sale of forgiveness. Luther pleased Renaissance thinkers, who lived by the motto Ad Fontes (to the source) and put the allies of the papacy on the defensive. That is why the attack on an obscure monk consumed all of Europe and why Johann Eck led the charge.

Eck challenged Luther’s friend Andreas Karlstadt to a disputation about free will and grace. He did this hoping the Reformer would join the debate. His goal was to get the Reformer to admit he was attacking the Pope and his power. Duke George “the Beard” of Saxony offered to host the disputation in Leipzig. He pressured the University of Leipzig into organize the event. On 27 June 1519, the disputation opened with a mass at St. Thomas Church (where two centuries later Johann Sebastian Bach would be a Church musician and composer) The event itself was held in the great hall of Duke George’s castle.

Karlstadt and Eck began the debate by discussing the role of free will and grace in the salvation of sinners. Karlstadt argued that a sinner had nothing to contribute to his own salvation, but was completely dependent on the grace of God. He defended this doctrine on the basis of the Scriptures. Eck responded that the Pope and Church tradition taught that grace was necessary, but there was something in a person that worked with it to save him. Karlstadt countered that Scripture is the final word on such matters. The Wittenberg professor was a good scholar, but Eck was a brilliant debater and had set the table for Luther to enter the discussion.

Luther and Eck covered a wide range of topics. In the end, the debate turned on the authority of the Pope and Church Councils. Eck accused Luther of promoting the teachings of Jan Hus, who was condemned as a heretic by the Council of Constance one hundred years earlier. Hus was burned at the stake when the Holy Roman Emperor at the time went back on his promise to Hus of safe conduct. It was a powerful slander. With that, Eck labeled Luther and his followers Lutheran, implying they followed Luther and not Christ. This forced Luther to admit that both Popes and Councils could make mistakes and that there was some truth to the charge.

Later Eck would admit that Luther had proved twelve of his thirteen theses. The last one, and in his eyes, the most important, Eck believed he had won. The result was to make clear the brake between the teachings of Luther, and the Scriptures, and the Pope. There would be no turning back. It was only a matter of time before the church would excommunicate Luther.

Martin Luther, St. Paul and Righteousness

We think of Martin Luther as a great reformer, a writer and a pastor. And he was all of these things. But his call was as a professor. His first lectures were on the Psalms, Romans, Galatians and Hebrews. To do these well, he spent many hours reading commentaries and the writings of the Church Fathers and the scholars of the Middle Ages. Once in awhile, he found himself not quite understanding a passage or a word. He spent months trying to understand some words. When he finally came to understand repentance, he described his excitement as if it unlocked all of Scripture for him.

Over Five Hundred years ago, as he was preparing to lecture on Romans, the great scholar, Erasmus of Rotterdam, published a Greek New Testament (1516) with Erasmus’ own Latin translation with it. It was then he came up against Romans 1:17: ” ‘For in it [the Gospel] the righteousness (δικαιοσύνη) of God is revealed from faith for faith” Everything he read said this righteousness was the quality of God that moves him to condemn sinners. He just couldn’t understand how that was good news.

His friends urged him to lecture on the Psalms again, so he began teaching the book in March and April of 1519 — five hundred years ago. While he was working on his lectures in his tower study, he couldn’t get Romans 1 off of his mind. Then his eyes fell on the context: “The just shall live by his faith.” All of a sudden, it occured to him that the righteousness of God is not the holy nature of God, but it is God’s gift of righteousness that Christians receive by faith as a free gift for the sake of Jesus’ death and resurrection. It was as if God had opened the gate of heaven for him. God’s righteousness is a gift God gives by his grace.

Luther has a way to go before he fully understood theology they way Lutherans do today. Yet God had revealed to him the central teaching of the faith. He would never forget his tower experience.

God’s Mission is to Seek and Save the Lost

What do you think of when you hear the word missions? Preachers hacking their way through the jungle? Doctors and nurses caring for the sick in India? People in white searches and ties knocking on doors? Yes, these romantic images are a part of the way God’s church has sought to bring the good news to those who have never heard it. (although reality rarely squared with the romance of the Mission Festival sermons!) But the truth is really seeking and saving the lost is not our work — it is God’s work.

Theologians call God’s mission the missio Dei — the mission of God. The word is from the Latin for “sending.” You already know one passage that describes that mission. “God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16 — my translation) He sent his Son because he is not willing that anyone should perish (Ezekiel 33:11, 2 Peter 3:9), but that all be saved. (1 Timothy 2:4) He sent him to seek and to save the lost. (Luke 19:9-10) Like a shepherd, he seeks out his lost sheep. Like a woman who has lost a denarii, he sweeps out the house to find it. Like a Father whose son has forsaken him, he watches day and night for his return. (Luke 15) He did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom. (Matthew 20:27-28)

So, how do we fit in? First of all, he wants us to rejoice with him when he saves the lost. (Luke 15) But more than that, he invites us to join him in his mission. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you,” Jesus says to us. (John 20:21) He sends his Church to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them and teaching them. (Matthew 28:19-20) He chooses to work through us to accomplish his mission — not only around the world but where we live and work at the jobs he has called us to do.