Encore Post: In my first post about accepting Jesus as your personal Savior, I explained that you do not need to do so. Why? Because God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit has already accepted you. God made you his child when God the Father loved you before he made the world, chose you to be his own, rigged your future to make sure you would be adopted as his child. The Son became man, shed his blood to redeem you and the Holy Spirit sealed you in baptism and lives within you as a down payment on your eternal life. (see Ephesians 1)
So, where does that leave those who have pledged their lives to Jesus, invited him into their hearts and believe they are born again? The bottom line is all of this shows some sort of faith in Christ and trust in his promises. That faith saves them. They are mistaken that the commitment in any way saves them. The reason: it is God’s grace alone, received by faith alone that saves us. They have the cart before the horse. Works do not save you. Salvation gives us the power to do good works — including giving our lives to Jesus. (Ephesians 2:8-10)
In fact, Lutherans make commitments to serve God and their neighbors all the time. It begins with vows at our baptism — made by us when we are baptized as adults and for us when we are baptized as children. In every divine service and in private confession, we confess our sins and confess our faith in the ecumenical creeds. At Confirmation and every time we join a new congregation, we renew these vows. These frequent confessions and pledges have a very practical value. Since Christians continue to sin the rest of their lives. It is only at death the we are sin-free. These confessions tap the power of the gospel to strengthen our faith.
The trouble with depending upon our own strength to commit our lives to Jesus for salvation is we can never be certain we’re saved. Were we sincere? Did we really commit our lives to Christ? Or were we in it for the approval of other or to escape hell. So many re-commit themselves at every opportunity. We become unsure of whether God loves us and whether he really love us. This could, ironically cost us our faith and salvation. This is why Lutherans insist on the gospel
Rev. Robert E. Smith Concordia Theological Seminary Fort Wayne, Indiana
Encore Post: Our evangelical brothers and sisters in Christ are all about making a decision for Christ. They will often ask, “Have you accepted Jesus as your personal Savior?” Such a question sounds strange to Lutherans, along with the similar question, “are you born again?” The reason is Lutherans believe these are really the wrong questions. Why? Because Jesus sought us, found us, saved us by his suffering and death, accepted us in baptism and gave new birth in it by water and the Holy Spirit. So, yes, thank you, I am born again, but no, I did not accept Jesus as my personal Savior. He accepted me and made me God’s child and his brother. There is nothing more personal than that.
I once was asked by someone if I could study all the Bible passages with him that talk about accepting Jesus as Savior. My answer was no, because there are no such passages. In fact, if you go through the Bible looking for people who were lost and sought God, you will find very few. Think about it for a moment: God made Adam and Eve. When they sinned, he came and found them. He went to Noah and told him to build the ark. He found Abraham and told him to leave home, promising to give him a son. He came to Jacob when the patriarch ran away and wrestled with him. He called to Samuel in the night. He sent Samuel to find and anoint David. Almost every book of the words of the prophets begin with: “and the word of God came to…” We don’t seek God, he seeks us out.
Why is this? We were dead in our sins. (Ephesians 2:1-3) As the saying goes, “Dead men tell no tales.” As Martin Luther says it, “I cannot by my own reason or strength, believe in my Lord Jesus Christ or come to him.” (Small Catechism 2.3) Because he loved us, he is gracious to us. He was moved in Christ Jesus to become one of us, live a perfect life for us, take our sins upon himself and die on the cross for us. It is by this grace we are saved, through his gift to us of faith.
In a sense, we can talk about decision theology, then. God decided to save us. He is our personal savior, because he made it so. We will live with him forever because of this. We can rest in the peace this brings, confident that he will remove every sin from us one day, the day he calls us forth from our graves and dries every tear in our eyes.
Rev. Robert E. Smith Pastor Emeritus Fort Wayne, Indiana
Sermon on Matthew 9:36; Luke 10:1-20 4th Sunday after Pentecost Our Hope Lutheran Church 3 July 2022
Text: When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest… “Heal the sick in it and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you” … “The one who hears you hears me, and the one who rejects you rejects me, and the one who rejects me rejects him who sent me.” The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” … Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”
Intro: These past few months have been filled with tragedies that made the news. School shootings, natural disasters, brutal warfare, the incredible evil one human being can do to another, especially the innocent and defenseless. We confront this coming out of a truly scary plague and the overreaction of those who meant well making it worse. We can’t help but feel bad for people. And so we reach out and offer our thoughts and prayers – and we follow through, too! It all seems so weak a response. What can you do when you want to do something! When there is not much you can do?
A question that leaps to mind – especially for a man of my generation – is what would Jesus do? The gospel lesson and its sister passage in Matthew begin to answer that question and its follow up – what would Jesus want us to do?
Jesus reacted as Jesus often does… his heart went out to them and he sent help.
Christ’s heart goes out to us.
There are several Greek words the New Testament uses to talk mercy talk. Two of them are:
ἔλεος – to be kind to people, even if they do not deserve it. It is used in the most ancient prayer of the church — Κύριε, ἐλέησον, Lord, have mercy
Σπλαγχνίζομαι – To feel compassion in your internal organs. In the New Testament, it is almost always entirely used of Jesus. The closest we can come to translate it is to say: “his heart went out to them” or “it broke his heart.”
Our English word is not too bad – it comes from latin: compassio – to suffer with.
When Jesus’ heart goes out to people, compassion results in action.
He feeds 5000.
He heals the sick.
He raises the dead.
He calls on us to pray – and sends workers out.
Sometimes our compassion doesn’t go that far.
We see something and say, “that’s awful”
Sometimes we pray, which is not chump change, by the way, but that’s it.
Once in awhile, our heart itself moves, and we do something. But not much.
God wants us to always have compassion, but most of the time we don’t have that emotional bandwidth. Our heart is not in it.
Jesus invites us to share his compassion.
Why didn’t God just crumple the world into a ball and build Earth 2.0? He loved us.
The heart of God went out to us, and his Son became one of us.
He lived a perfect life for us, suffered and died for us, rose again for us, because he had to do something, but not just anything!
The Holy Spirit took out our heart of stone and gave us a heart of flesh in Baptism.
Now we want to show mercy, as our Father shows mercy.
Conclusion: So what to do? Pray for sure. Jesus invites you to do so. Donate? Of course; either in kind or cash. Roll up your sleeves and go to work on the ground? There are many churches and non-profits here in the Fort that would love to have you. Mister Rogers used to say, when asked what to tell children with disaster comes to TV was, “Look for the helpers. There are always helpers.” Maybe one of them is you.
Rev. Robert E. Smith Concordia Theological Seminary Fort Wayne, Indiana
It shouldn’t surprise us that a sinful world misidentifying love would also fail to accurately recognize hatred. This has been a moving target over the past ten or twenty years. The sequence was tolerance, acceptance, celebration, and elevation. This sequence applied a moving standard to Christians. We were deemed hateful by failing to meet the current pagan standard of what is allowed outside of the 6th commandment.
Tolerance: you will allow LGBTQ lifestyles. It was the toe-in-the-door. The pagan world told Christianity that we shall not define acts outside of the 6th commandment any way other than acceptable. The choices wouldn’t be called preferential or good. But, anything less than acceptance was deemed hateful.
Acceptance: LGBTQ lifestyles are good and acceptable within your social circles. There are two things happening here. You must allow these folks into your social circles. And, their absence from your social circles is cause for suspicion. Your failure to include LGBTQ persons in your peer group may see you judged as a hater by this former standard.
These first two goal post positions defined my youth and young adulthood. I was coming of age during this shift. Churches began to allow lifestyles defined solely by their setting aside 6th commandment. Sex is a gift only rightly enjoyed by a man and a woman, married to each other until death. Society disagrees with God’s Law and was succeeding in pushing incremental change into the church. Soon, LGBTQ persons would be invited to the altar, then the pulpit, then the church hierarchy.
Celebration: LGBTQ is a laudable lifestyle. All aspects of culture and faith must embrace it within themselves. Here, the lifestyle must be judged “good” in a moral sense. You may not call the thing sin any longer. Our identification of sexual sins as sin is sinful, in the eyes of our pagan culture. Instead, we must recognize and celebrate the LGBTQ persons in their lifestyle.
Elevation: this lifestyle is morally superior to CIS gendered existence. CIS is a pejorative term that may not appear in your lexicon yet. It means all forms of heterosexuality and fixed gender identity. The category of people diminished by this term also includes folks engaged in unacceptable heterosexuality, according to the 6th commandment.
It is preferable in the current stage of elevation for people to be in the LGBTQ community. They are allowed to exclude and belittle CIS persons for their closed-mindedness and hateful views. Consider TV, film, and other media. More often than not, the LGBTQ characters are smarter and morally superior to other characters in portrayal. The killer, the evil actor, or the perpetrator are most likely a CIS male, or for want of one, a CIS female.
Each of these progressive phases encourages sin. “Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.” (Romans 1:32)
Love can never encourage sin. That’s the opposite of love. Behavior that encourages our neighbor to sin is actually hatred. If we allow our neighbor to persist in the idea that their sin doesn’t separate them from God, we want them to perish eternally. What can that be, other than hatred?
“For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.” (1 John 3:11-15).
Our Lord died to forgive sin. Faith in that promise flees from sin. Tolerance, acceptance, celebration, and elevation of sin are a rejection of the forgiveness that Jesus won for us.
Live instead in that forgiveness.
Rev. Jason M. Kaspar Sole Pastor Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool La Grange, TX and Mission planting pastoral team: Epiphany Lutheran Church Bastrop, TX
Encore Post: That talisman worn by the LGBTQ activist inside and outside the church would have us believe that romantic love is completely equal to Christian love. Further, they would have us believe that human love is not corrupted/corruptible by original sin.
In the Greek language there are four different words for love. These refer to familial love, brotherly love, perfect/Godly love, and romantic love. Rather than getting into the weeds of the Greek here, there’s one important point for us in this discussion. The word for romantic love doesn’t appear in the New Testament.
So, each discussion of Love in the bible is referring to love in completely different way from the talisman: “love is love.” That use only means romantic love and specifically the sexual component of the romantic love. Moreover, this sexual love must be pure and good in their minds because “love is love.” This is self-referential justification.
Jesus talks about love this way: “And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. ‘Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?’ And he said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.’” [Matthew 22:35-40]
Jesus summarized the entire first table of the Law, commandments 1-3, in love of God. And, He summarized the entire second table of the law, commandments 4-10, in love of your neighbor. Love cannot lead our neighbor into sin. Love as God defines it is in perfect compliance with His law for us.
The discussion of “love is love” revolves around the sixth commandment. In Martin Luther’s small catechism we learn it this way. You shall not commit adultery. What does this mean? We should fear and love God so that we lead a sexually pure and decent life in what we say and do, and husband and wife love and honor each other.
When Christians talk about romantic love, we may only speak about love between a husband and a wife, a man and a woman. Jesus says this in answer about marriage to the Pharisees. “But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” [Mark 10:6-9]
Romantic love is only practiced in Christian love between a man and woman. A woman and a man, who are married to each other. The entirety of the acts condoned under the “love is love” talisman fall outside of Christian love. So too, divorce and extramarital sex of all sorts fall outside of Christian love. In that Mark chapter 10 passage, Jesus is specifically condemning divorce on grounds of personal preference.
Love is Love? No, human love is just as likely to be corrupted by our sinful nature as any other deed. It may even be more corruptible than other aspects of our modern life.
God loves you perfectly and intends better for you.
Rev. Jason M. Kaspar Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool La Grange, TX
As we open our mouths to offer praise to the Lord, this time we recognize how God takes care of us each and every day. While the world focuses on what we are missing, what is running short, and what is getting more and more costly, we remember that we live by faith and by God’s gracious giving all that we need.
Gracious God, You send great blessings New each morning all our days. For Your mercies never ending, For Your love we offer praise.
Each day the sun comes up and warms the earth. Each day we wake up and have our duties before us. We have spouses to greet, children to hug, work to do, and chores to accomplish. While we may forget it, we live lives just like the people in the Bible: in one way or another, we are taking God of God’s creation. But it is even more specific than that: we are taking care of those who God gave to us.
Refrain: Lord, we pray that we, Your people, Who Your gifts unnumbered claim, Through the sharing of Your blessings May bring glory to Your name.
This is the first hymn I have studied that has a refrain. When a hymnwriter includes a refrain, usually it contains the main point for us. That’s why we sing it four times or more! In this case, the point is this, that we pray to God for unnumbered gifts, and that we would use them for His continued glory. That like a father provides for His children, so our God provides for us. That as His children we would share with others who are His children also.
By Your Word You formed creation Filled with creatures large and small; As we tend that endless treasure May our care encircle all. Refrain
Here we sing about creation. This is logically where we should always start with stewardship, at the creation of the world. God created the world to be enjoyed and to be cared for. Many of us understand this very well because our jobs are tied to the land and the animals around us. This is an endless treasure for us, because God has made the land to be fruitful and the animals to multiply so that in this way He will provide for us and take care of our families.
In His earthly life, our Savior Knew the care of faithful friends; May our deeds of dedication Offer love that never ends. Refrain
From creation, now the hymnwriter moves to the life of Jesus. We understand here that when Jesus was hungry, some fed Him. When He was thirsty, some gave Him something to drink. When He was about to die, the woman washed His feet with her hair. This stanza is actually the opposite side of the question, “What would Jesus do?” It actually is more along the lines of “What did Jesus’ friends do for Him?” As much as they loved Jesus, and as much as we love Jesus, let us treat our neighbors just like we would treat Jesus. Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, to the poor bring the Gospel.
Heavenly Father, may our caring Bear the imprint of Your grace; With the Son and Holy Spirit, Praise by Yours in every place! Refrain
In all things, we end by praising our Lord. Knowing what God has done, providing for our lives and wives, for our children, land, and animals, we give thanks and praise to God. Knowing what Jesus has done for His neighbor, that He has laid down His life for His friends, we praise the Lord for His sacrifice and pray for our willingness to sacrifice for any who are in need. It is like the refrain reminds us,
Refrain: Lord, we pray that we, Your people,
Who Your gifts unnumbered claim, Through the sharing of Your blessings May bring glory to Your name.
You will quickly find (if you have not already) that I end each service with “Let us go forth and serve the Lord.” This hymn emphasizes this message so well. Much like the apostle James says, “I will show you my faith by my works,” this hymn clearly gives answers and examples for how we can “go forth and serve the Lord.”
Take my life and let it be Consecrated, Lord, to Thee; Take my moments and my days, Let them flow in ceaseless praise.
Each day is a chance to serve the Lord. We do not only serve the Lord on Sunday morning, but every morning and in very different ways. Sunday morning strengthens us for all that we will do throughout the week. Mission work is a daily endeavor as we live life around those who need to hear about Jesus’ love for them.
Take my hands and let them move At the impulse of Thy love; Take my feet and let them be Swift and beautiful for Thee.
In other words, “What can we do and where can we go to serve the Lord?” While the first stanza focuses on days and times, this stanza focuses us on actions and places for us to serve one another. Surely we serve each other in our church, but we also serve others in our community. As we often hear, “Actions speak louder than words.” Our example shows Christ to our community.
Take my voice and let me sing Always, only for my King; Take my lips and let them be Filled with messages from Thee.
We all know that Christians love to sing and love to praise the Lord. Singing is the joyful noise that can change the culture of any congregation. But this stanza also draws us to reflect on what we say to the people we interact with. Although most of our conversations are probably not about the promises of the Gospel, what we say to others can shape how they think about us and about the Church.
Take my silver and gold, Not a mite would I withhold; Take my intellect and use Every power as Thou shalt choose.
Usually when we sing a stanza like this one, we automatically think that the pastor and the church are “asking for money again.” But that does not have to be the case. We all know that there are many ways that we can use our money for the good of our neighbor. We can feed others who are hungry. We can clothe those who are naked. We can recycle items for use at VBS. We can support the youth for their camp each year.
Take my will and make it Thine, It shall be no longer mine; Take my heart, it is Thine own, It shall be Thy royal throne.
In these closing stanzas of our hymn this time, we remember why we do what we do. It is because our will and heart have been won by grace through faith by our Lord Jesus Christ. It is through us that Christ continues to reign as King of Kings. We are the instruments and tools that the Lord uses to pour out His love to His people and to those who are not yet His people. God always uses means, or ways, to have mercy. And we are those who show His mercy to those who need it. Take myself, and I will be, ever, only, all for Thee.
Take my love, my Lord, I pour At Thy feet its treasure store; Take myself, and I will be Ever, only, all for Thee.
Sermon on Galatians 5:16-25 Pentecost Monday 6 June 2022 Kramer Chapel Fort Wayne, Indiana
Text: “But I say, keep walking with the Spirit, and you definitely will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.”
Intro: 78 years ago today, the largest amphibious assaults in history, known today as D-Day was underway on the shores of France. The battle for control of the beaches led to the defeat of Nazi Germany once and for all. We are engaged in a more ancient war – the war between the Holy Spirit and our sinful nature. The war is already won; Jesus defeated sin, death, and the power of the devil when he suffered and died to atone for our sins and rose again to break the seal of the grave forever. Yet the battle is not over. Even though our sinful nature, the flesh, was defeated on the cross and drowned in the waters of baptism, it’s not quite dead yet. As the old saying goes, the Old Adam (and Eve!) is a good swimmer! Yet because Christ has defeated it, we no longer haveto sin. We already live our lives following the Holy Spirit and what he wants. If we keep walking around with him – when we follow his lead, our victory is guaranteed.
The war is between the Spirit and the Flesh
Easier said then done! For our sin-soaked and warped emotions are very powerful.
Our culture urges us to follow our dreams, to our own self be true, to pursue happiness above everything else, to ignore reality when it doesn’t feel right.
As if that was not bad enough, we are told that we must celebrate the choices of others – from same-sex marriage to pretending that some men are women and some women are men, to killing babies in the womb and sick people in their beds.
The flesh leads to destruction
When we compromise with these forces, we find ourselves curved back in on ourselves, dividing into ever smaller group and turn to fighting, even among ourselves.
God warns us that the works of these desires lead to destruction and ultimately to hell.
Yet the urgings of the Old Adam are a lie; He is dead.
The fruit of the Spirit comes from life in Christ
Our New Adam or Eve lives. For when Christ rose from the dead, we rose to new life.
The Holy Spirit created our new self within us when we were baptized.
He brings fruit from that new nature to us and to our brothers and sisters in Christ through us.
When our work in this battle is done, our life is hidden with God, until the battle is over and we rise glorious in his victory to live with him forever.
Rev. Robert E. Smith Concordia Theological Seminary Fort Wayne, Indiana
As we take a look at these stewardship hymns, we will be reminded that we are God’s people, souls created by Him and provided for by Him. We will pay special attention to the Fourth Petition, “Give us this day our daily bread.”
We give Thee but Thine own, Whatever the gift may be; All that we have is Thine alone, A trust, O Lord, from Thee.
This stanza recognizes the order of giving. First, God the Father gives to us. He gives to us clothing and shoes, house and home, land, animals and all that we have to support this body and life. He gives these things that we might use them, and especially that we would use all good things for giving glory back to Him.
May we Thy bounties thus As stewards true receive And gladly, as Thou blesses us, To Thee our firstfruits give!
We recognize right away in this stanza the word “firstfruits.” This phrase is as old as Abel. It is in fact related to farming, to gardening, to working in the ground. When I think of firstfruits, I always remember “Give God my very best.” He gives to us even more than we need or ask, and so we give back to Him the best that we have for Him to use again.
Oh, hearts are bruised and dead, And homes are bare and cold, And lambs for whom the Shepherd bled Are straying from the fold.
Here comes suffering. Here comes the struggles of this world. That there are needy people all around us. That there are others who are straying from the fold and need to hear the words of this most precious Gospel. This stanza reminds us about the reason for our giving. It reminds us about how God will use our treasures for His glory. He will heal hearts and warm homes for those who need. He will provide for others what He has provided for us.
To comfort and to bless, To find a balm for woe, To tend the lone and fatherless Is angels’ work below.
God’s work in the world continues even more! These words focus on the power of the Gospel and the continuation of the ministry. This is quite important for us as Christians, not just that we assist others who have serious physical needs, but that we as the Church provide for others with serious spiritual needs.
The captive to release, To God the lost to bring, To teach the way of life and peace, It is a Christ-like thing.
“What would Jesus do?” We often hear this phrase and worry that we are never doing enough for the kingdom. But this stanza reminds us that we are being like Christ when we give to others and support the ministry of the Gospel. We are stewards of God’s gifts, it is true. But here we certainly consider that we are Christ’s examples to the world to be generous to one another as well.
And we believe Thy Word, Though dim our faith may be: Whatever for Thine we do, O Lord, We do it unto Thee.
Here we have the conclusion. That everything we do, we do to the glory of God. That every penny we earn, we earn because of God’s grace and mercy. That every prayer we pray, we focus our prayers on furthering the Gospel. All of this because God has first and foremost given so much to each and every one of us.
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
The theme for this morning is this: I have come into the world and I have overcome the world.
The King of heaven and earth claims His territory. As far as the east is from the west, as far as the north is from the south, the King is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. The King who created the world has come into this world. The King who created this earth has come in order to save it. He came, He saw, and He conquered. Like a conqueror declaring the victory in the streets, our Lord Jesus Christ declared the victory over each and every one of our enemies. Over sin, we are covered with forgiveness. Over death, we have the Lord who lives and who gives life to us forever. Over the devil, we have Jesus who withstood temptation, but more than that, who conquered the wicked foe.
Our Lord has come into the world, and He has overcome the world. For we know our Lord is the Lord of hosts. The hosts are the angels who came to Bethlehem to the shepherds. The hosts are the angels who rolled away the tomb. The hosts are the soldiers of the cross who have fought the good fight, who have finished the race, who have kept the faith. We are part of these hosts, the hosts that won and never will lose again, the hosts who gather at this altar and receive the only life-giving, strengthening and preserving food for the battle in this world.
Of course, Jesus came into the world. We have celebrated it in December every year. This Incarnation Invasion brought God to earth, God with us. Mary was right; “with God all things are possible,” even a virgin birth, even the birth of God in flesh, even that his name is Jesus, even that “He forgives His people of their sins.” Jesus came into the world, came as a king, not according to earthly standards, but according to heavenly standards. Jesus came into the world, to claim His territory, the earth He created, the world He loved, the creation that needed its King.
But we just can’t wait to be king. Maybe we don’t even like Burger King, but we certainly would like to have it our way. Like Adam and Eve and the serpent before them, we forget what God says and do what we want anyway. Or David and Bathsheba. Or Peter drowning in the sea. We think we know best, or right and wrong, or moral and immoral. We want to be able to tell so-and-so to do what we want rather than let God tell us what He wants and what He says. Our will be done, and not God’s will.
This becomes especially troublesome in the church. You’re a sinner, I’m a sinner, we’re just a bunch of sinners. And we are not free to make decisions like we might in our families, or in our businesses, or in our daily lives. We have God’s Word that is what we believe, that teaches us what is true, and that is outside of ourselves. Much like the Incarnation Invasion, the Word enters our own flesh, creates faith in our souls, and sustains that faith unto life everlasting. This is the great power of the Sacrament, that Jesus enters in, and there faith within, and eternal life begin. And so what God’s Word says is all that matters, not what the world says, not what we would like, but what God has said for us to do.
And this will certainly make me unlikable, like Jeremiah, like Ezekiel, Daniel, Haggai, and Habakkuk. That I will lead our church according to God’s will and not my own will, or your own, or anybody else’s own. That I make decisions for the whole and not the most powerful parts. That I make decisions based on God’s Word and not on my preference. This humbles me, and it humbles you. At the end of the day, we just can’t wait to be king of the church, but that’s just it, we can’t be king of the church. Jesus is the King of the Church. And this will certainly make us unlikable, when we are the church and not the world, when we are believing and the world is doubting, when we are gathering around God rather than becoming gods unto ourselves.
Worried about the world? Worried about the church? Worried about the family, or the business? Let Jesus tell you today: “I have overcome the world.” As the Catechism says, this is most certainly true. Jesus has overcome the sin of Adam and even the sin of us. Jesus has overcome even the punishment of sin, death, and was raised to new life. Jesus has overcome the devil, who tempted Adam and each and every one of us, and proclaimed the victory and claimed the territory.
For the Lord Jesus Christ has overcome the world, even our own world. There is no forgiveness of sins found in this wicked world except here at the church. There is no life everlasting in a world scared to death except that which Jesus accomplished when He said, “It is finished.” There is no curb against temptation in our lawless society except that the Word of God is our sword of the Spirit against every temptation we face. Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, has overcome the world.
This is no throwaway statement that we can overlook. This is the very promise of the Gospel, that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. That God created this world and sent His Son to save it. That God’s will was done by Jesus’ death on the cross, that the Lord saved you from each of your enemies. Jesus is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Of course Jesus came into the world. He came, He saw, and He conquered for you.
This Jesus who called the disciples and sent them as far as the east is from the west, as far as the north is from the south, has worked faith in His Church. He has sent the Gospel even to us, that Jesus is Lord, even Lord of this Church. He humbles us with His Word that comforts us and His Sacraments that relieve us. The Lord of heaven and earth who lives and reigns over this congregation forever and ever has already claimed the everlasting territory, Jerusalem the golden, the mountain of Zion for you, His dearly beloved people, for whom He came, and for whom He overcame, until you shall come into the kingdom that shall have no end.
