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Christmas Eve: He Will, He Has!
For He Will: For He Has….
Matthew 1:18-25
† Jesus! Son! Savior! †
May the grace of God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ reveal to you the hope of Glory, His gift to you!
What does this Mean?
As people are driving by the church this evening, as they see the cars in the parking lo now, and later, and tomorrow morning, I prayer that they ask a simple question.
Why are these cars here??
I pray that they also seek out the answer. That they would realize the reason we are here is more than just tradition, It is more than the lights and music. It is worth delaying the gifts, and the family and friends that didn’t accept our invitations to join us.
It is here in this place, Christmas takes on a real meaning.
For this night, we celebrate the greatest blessing the world has ever known. The greatest blessing that we will ever have, and nothing else is close.
We will realize this through the eyes of Joseph this evening….as we see him twice, both times somewhat unable to put his thoughts into words. Both times unable to really understand what is going on…
Anxious Joseph…
The first we see of Joseph, he is struggling, confused, hurt, broken. Feeling betrayed and overwhelmed
His fiancé tells him she is pregnant, and he knows he isn’t the father. In fact, he hasn’t been alone with her, so how could…. what is a man to think? The story Joseph was told? How could she be so malicious, to think Joseph such a fool?
Our translation tonight used the phrase, “as he considered this,” yet the word picture behind the original is one who is breathing hard, who is out of control. Hurt and broken, feeling betrayed, shocked, he is beyond words. Speechless, he struggles through the night.
Some of us know this kind of anger, this kind of stress, we’ve felt that betrayal.
Most of us have experienced this kind of stress, this anger, hurt, betrayal, and pain. Maybe like Joseph, we cannot conceive of how someone else’s actions could be anything but evil. We can’t find a way to explain the situation in any positive way.
It hurts, we can’t figure a way to get out of the relationship with more pain, yet…can we even stand the pain any longer? He had every right to demand she pay for her unfaithfulness, but the pain was so deep, he knew that wouldn’t help.
Or maybe, it wasn’t someone else who betrayed us.
We are the one who betrayed us. I betrayed myself, you betrayed you. We fell into that one sin, we gave into temptation, we chose to do something we know we would risk becoming broken. We can’t believe we did it. We can’t sleep, we are so angry with ourselves, so full of guilt and shame…..
And in either case, we need an angel, a messenger from God to come, and make everything right again.
We end up beside ourselves, or we bury the guilt and shame, or the anger and resentment deep, where it causes so many other problems when we can’t bury any more
The Second Joseph
When the angel comes to Joseph, it changes everything.
He hears the news from an angel,
“Joseph, son of David,” the angel said, “do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit. 21 And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” Matthew 1:20-21 (NLT)
He will save, this baby that is growing in Mary’s womb. He will save Joseph, and Mary, and his family. He will save his clan and nation and all people will have the opportunity to be saved from that life of brokenness.
This message brought the news that would repair his relationship with Mary. No longer would he think her guilty of being unfaithful. No longer would he deal with the brokenness inside him.
The message of who this baby would be changed all of that. That is what He will save means.
It gave him hope it restored what was broken.
If we are to explain why we are here, in this place, if we are to ask what this ceremony means, it is the same message. For Joseph the message was He will save His people, for us it is He has saved us from our sin.
For Christ is the greatest message from God, as God comes to us, to tell us He loves us, and because of that, we are saved by Him.
Saved from our sin, our guilt, and shame, and delivered into God’s presence, saved and healed in this life, saved to see relationships restored and healed. Including our most important relationship, our relationship with God.
God coming, and making everything right, everything righteous, as Jesus goes from a wooden manger to a wooden cross. A new life which would bring life for the rest of us.
This is why this ceremony, and the one at 1115, and the one tomorrow are worth being at, this is what these ceremonies mean….for the gift is beyond all comprehension. It is a gift of everlasting peace, and joy, and the glory of God. It is knowing where we belong, and who we are, and freedom from all that is not good and holy.
Let us worship and praise Him with angels and archangels, shepherds and even wise men. AMEN!
.A Necessary Workout…to Help Us Value God’s Grace
Devotional thought of the day:
27 So anyone who eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord unworthily is guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. 28 That is why you should examine yourself before eating the bread and drinking the cup. 29 For if you eat the bread or drink the cup without honoring the body of Christ, you are eating and drinking God’s judgment upon yourself. 30 That is why many of you are weak and sick and some have even died. 31 But if we would examine ourselves, we would not be judged by God in this way. 32 Yet when we are judged by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be condemned along with the world. 1 Corinthians 11:27-32 (NLT)
72 If you are heavy-laden and feel your weakness, go joyfully to the sacrament and receive refreshment, comfort, and strength. 73 If you wait until you are rid of your burden in order to come to the sacrament purely and worthily, you must stay away from it forever.
142 If you are really fighting, you need to make an examination of conscience. Take care of the daily examination: find out if you feel the sorrow of Love, for not getting to know Our Lord as you should.
If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true and not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world
We don’t talk about it much, whether Protestant, Roman Catholic or those of us somewhere in between.
Because of the pressures of time, we don’t take the time we need for it either. This practice that would lead us to appreciate the sacraments better that would make more vivid and real what it means to be promised that our sins are forgiven and removed.
For I think we fall into two categories when it comes to sin.
We dismiss it, because, after all, our sin isn’t as great as “their” sin. I mean – look at the world, their sin is so much greater than ours, and they proudly flaunt their sin in front of all the world.
Or they are so crushed by it, they can’t imagine that God would ever notice their pitiful existence, never mind welcome them into His presence, nor spend the time and patience to create something holy and sacred, while removing all that mars the beauty He created in them.
That is where this idea of the “Examination of Conscience” comes into play. It is a time to think about our sin, and the struggles we have in our faith. Not to add to the guilt and shame, though we may shudder a bit as we really think through how much we have done wrong. But in examining our conscience, in taking the time to realize how often we push God away and put ourselves in His place, we begin to realize how incredible His love for us is. We begin to realize what He has saved us from, and then we appreciate more what He has saved us to experience. Being in the presence, sharing in the glory of God. This is what an examination of conscience leads to, as it allows us to realize our need for Christ.
I sometimes think we think of salvation, of God’s deliverance of us from sin like a lifeguard saving us from a near drowning experience. We needed the salvation, because we couldn’t calm down, we couldn’t overcome the waves of life. Examination of our conscience reveals to us that we’ve been saved from drowning, not in a simple rip current, but as we opened the front door of our submarine a mile under the ocean.
And there, in the depths, we find the cross, we find the blood of Christ, we find salvation, a rescue we so need. Even us who count on so many other things to save us, or count on them to have proven we’ve been saved. Examination of conscience removes all such illusion.
That’s why Luther advises us not to wait until we are holy enough to run to where God’s grace is poured out on us. Because if we wait, we will never be good enough, we will never be free enough, for it is at the baptismal font that we find our peace. It is at the altar we find the promise of God’s love, it is as the pastor pronounces our sin forgiven, that we realize the height, depth, width and breadth of God’s love for us. It is an awe-inspiring ride, from the depths of despair to the heights of highest joy.
This is the love of God, for you!
So take the time, examine your conscience, and know the love of God which truly rescues you. AMEN
Tappert, T. G. (Ed.). (1959). The Book of Concord the confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. (p. 455). Philadelphia: Mühlenberg Press.
Escriva, Josemaria (2011-01-31). Furrow (Kindle Locations 794-796). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Luther, M. (1999). Luther’s Works, vol. 48: Letters I. (J. J. Pelikan, H. C. Oswald, & H. T. Lehmann, Eds.) (Vol. 48, pp. 281–282). Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
Man-colds, Suffering, Resentment, and the Abundant Life
Devotional Thought of the Day
26 Look at the birds: they do not plant seeds, gather a harvest and put it in barns; yet your Father in heaven takes care of them! Aren’t you worth much more than birds? 27 Can any of you live a bit longer by worrying about it? 28 “And why worry about clothes? Look how the wild flowers grow: they do not work or make clothes for themselves. 29 But I tell you that not even King Solomon with all his wealth had clothes as beautiful as one of these flowers. 30 It is God who clothes the wild grass—grass that is here today and gone tomorrow, burned up in the oven. Won’t he be all the more sure to clothe you? What little faith you have! 31 “So do not start worrying: ‘Where will my food come from? or my drink? or my clothes?’ 32 (These are the things the pagans are always concerned about.) Your Father in heaven knows that you need all these things. 33 Instead, be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God and with what he requires of you, and he will provide you with all these other things. 34 So do not worry about tomorrow; it will have enough worries of its own. There is no need to add to the troubles each day brings. Matthew 6:26-34 (TEV)
The teaching of Christ even requires that we forgive injuries, and extends the law of love to include every enemy, according to the command of the New Law: “You have heard that it was said: Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thy enemy. But I say to you: love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute and calumniate you” (Matt. 5:43–44).
You are not happy because you make everything revolve around yourself as if you were always the centre: you have a stomach-ache, or you are tired, or they have said this or that… Have you ever tried thinking about Him, and through Him, about others?
There are a bunch of pictures on the internet this week, making fun of men who are suffering colds. Harsh and cruel to see when I am suffering with a cold. I thought I was over it, until this morning when I coughed so hard I strained a muscle under my collarbone. With a significant level of Pain, I am at work, trudging along when I came across the quote in blue above.
Ouch. Now my shoulder and my conscience hurt.
But the idea brings to light something I have been realizing more and more in the last few days.
We don’t’ take suffering well! We wil do anything avoid it, and if we can’t avoid it, we want peopel to share in it, as if their pity will somehow minimize the effect it has on us. If we complain enough, it is possible to get so addicted to the care, to the attention, that we will subconsciously make even the littlest inconveniences, critical.
It is amazing though, what can be accomplished through the suffering, even when through the times where we are ruled by our anxiety, when we pray and keep our focus on is Jesus. When we realise the love of God our Father, who cares for us. It is then we find the focus that enables us to push through, to care for ourselves, but also to care for others.
This is what the gospel reading is communicating to us. Know God cares, and if He watches out for us. more than He does for daisies, or birds or anything else. He cares for you.
Which brings me to topic #2 for the day, which is mentioned int he green quote.
We can make our emotional and spiritual injuries all about us as well, compared to being all about, well us. It may be the words stung us, or could hurt the people we care about. We wallow in the injustice like we just lie there in our bathrobe with a box of kleenex and a bottle of ginger ale, watching the movies or shows we have dvr’d months ago. Instead of being flooded with phlegm, we are overwhelmed by our hurt, anger, and resentment. We feel sorry for ourselves, and we want others to feel sorry for us as well. we go over and over the story, remembering the pain being greater with every re-telling, and we convince ourselves that this event, those words, that moment in time was why we suffer throughout our lives.
What we need is the gospel to free us, we need to look at the suffering and realize it is nothing compared to the life we have in Christ, and abundant life that resentment may cloud for the moment, but that Christ’s love and mercy burns through, healing us, reconciling us to Him, and therefore to the one who is also forgiven because of the cross.
Our abundant life isn’t wrecked by a cold (even when the cough causes us to pull a muscle. Even when the memories of injuries seem so dominant. For these things cannot separate you from the love you have in Christ.
Just look to Jesus and cry out, “Lord have mercy!”, and be confident that He has kept His promise…
Catholic Church. (2011). Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World: Gaudium Et Spes. In Vatican II Documents. Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana.
Escriva, Josemaria (2011-01-31). Furrow (Kindle Locations 531-534). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Traveling Companions of the Cross. Lesson 3: YOU Are Created for Companionship
Travelling Companions of the Cross
Lesson 3: You Are Created for Companionship
Genesis 2:18–25
† I.H.S. †
May you become more constantly aware of the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ, for they are the proof of His presence.
It’s not good…
If you read the first chapter of Genesis, you would hear God talking to Himself as He created the heavens, the earth, seas and all the creatures.
Then as He creates man and woman, He notes, this is very good!
But there is more to it than that, between the last “this is good” and the “this is very good”, there is one more phrase, the phrase that we hear in chapter two. When the Lord God notes there is something that is wrong in creation. Something that is not good.
Hear the words again,
“It is not good for the man to be alone.
Not good at all, but there is a solution
“I will make a helper who is just right for him.”
A Helper, a companion, the one who works alongside….
Remember that one, the one who works alongside.
For it is not good that we live life alone. We need to have companionship, without it, creation is screwed up.
A simple summary, everything was good, then man had no companionship and it was not good, then man did, and it was very good.
They knew no barriers… and there was no guilt/shame
As we look at the end result, what chapter 1 calls very good, we see why in chapter 2.
23 “At last!” the man exclaimed. “This one is bone from my bone, and flesh from my flesh! She will be called ‘woman,’ because she was taken from ‘man.’ ”
24 This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one. 25 Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.
What an incredible blessing, the fact that there was no guilt, no shame that divided them. No embarrassment, no division, nothing that created a barrier between them. Of course, they didn’t have a toilet seat to leave up, or trash to forget taking out.
Seriously, the Hebrew word there for naked meant there were absolutely no barriers between them, there was nothing that stopped them from seeing each other the way they truly were.
Sin of course, created those barriers, and the need for something to cover, to hide, a defensive mechanism. It is there because we don’t want to see people the way they really are, and we don’t necessarily want them to see us.
You are probably thinking just in the physical sense, but it is true for most of who we really are.
They lived perfect, sinless lives for that time, and it was very good.
Exitus-Reditus
There is a old theological thought, is Exitus-Reditus – that which leaves, returns. Theologically speaking, what returns is always that which completes, and by God’s power, it is more than what left.
A rib is taken out and it returns a helper, a companion, That action made what was not good, very good. The fellowship, the communion, the companionship that was formed ws greater than the loneliness that preceded it. That is the power of reconciliation, the power of God’s mercy, forgiveness and healing, the power of God drawing back together that which is supposed to be one.
It’s more than just the couple – they were representative of all humanity
This is true more than in the sense of husband and wife, for example that same kind of language is used as men join David’s army
1 All the tribes of Israel came to David in Hebron and said: “Here we are, your bone and your flesh. 2 Samuel 5:1 (NAB)
Though it is a different bond than that between husband and wife, all od God’s creation was meant to live together, companions of God, companions formed at the cross, when Christ’s side was opened…and because of the blood that was spilt, a new relationship – the companionship of Jesus and His bride the church was formed.
At the pastor’s conference, our district president made mention of this when he was talking about the church. One of his major points was this, “Servant leaders live in Intimate Community” He was teaching pastors that in order to be effective pastors, we can’t be apart from our people, shepherds are companions, He even used the idea that we have to know each other in a way that sounds scary, Intimately.
Not intimate as in husband and wife, but intimate because there is no division, not barriers, no shame that divides us. That we work together because we realize that God has brought us back to each other.
Another speaker made mention of it this way, “The idea of the nuclear family being the cornerstone of society has become a 100 year failed experiment” What he meant is that society is more than a dad, mom and children. That prior to 100 years ago, the extended family, that included blood relations an even long term neighbors was the cornerstone of the family. Not less intimate relationships in depth, but deeper relationships and more numerous ones. That writer noted the amount of young people striving to live in micro-communities, what we in the church sometimes refer to as small groups. But groups that live like in Acts, where the group survives together. The broken world is looking for something they can’t find, yet it is what we know so well.
It is not good that man should live alone….
Followed by God saying, “I got this, you will not be”
Adam was given Eve, and humanity was born, and one day, the ultimate Companion for each of us was born, as Mary would give birth to Jesus.
So how do we get reconcile?
Not long after that, and ever since, most of us have put up barriers that frustrate our desire for companionship. We drive away those we are called to love in Christ, As we have come alive in Christ, that doesn’t have to happen anymore. Reconciliation is not just a good idea, it is how God desires we live. Reconciled to Him, reconciled as a family.
I kind of wish it could be like Adam, where God caused sleep to fall on him, and then took the bone away from him. He then woke up, and knew the person standing before him, who would stand beside him was literally, part of him.
He recognized the work of God, that what was taken was return to make him complete, but in a way far beyond anything ever expected.
Adam was complete – he had his helper, he had the one who completed Him.
When our companion died and rose on the cross, He took away the barriers, He destroyed the things we stop us from seeing each other. Not the physical barriers, not the clothes. But God destroyed the sin, and gave us a new life, made us a new creation. He forgave all sin. The sins we’ve committed against Him and each other. And He reminds us of that each time we remember our baptism, or commune at the altar as His family, or hear those words, your sins are forgiven.
Because of Christ our companion. Because of the cross, where our companionship was forged in His blood. For He reconciles us to God, and the in Christ, we are reconciled to each other.
That is why there is peace, a peace that passes all understanding, that guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. AMEN!
Why “They” Are Wrong About Sin….
devotional thought of the day
8 And when he comes, he will prove to the people of the world that they are wrong about sin and about what is right and about God’s judgment. 9 They are wrong about sin, because they do not believe in me; John 16:8-9 (TEV)
Prayer does not fall into a void; neither is it just a kind of psychotherapy that helps us to assemble our spiritual forces and bring them once more into balance; nor is it merely a kind of pious fiction to exercise our souls and calm them. Prayer is directed to reality. It is both heard and heeded. God, then, is someone who has the power, the ability, the will, and the patience to listen to us men. He is so great that he can be present even for those who are small.
If I bring you to this point, I have also brought you to confession. Those who really want to be good Christians, free from their sins, and happy in their conscience, already have the true hunger and thirst. They snatch at the bread just like a hunted hart, burning with heat and thirst,
33 as Ps. 42:2 says, “As a hart longs for flowing streams, so longs my soul for thee, O God.” That is, as a hart trembles with eagerness for a fresh spring, so I yearn and tremble for God’s Word, absolution, the sacrament, etc.
34 In this way, you see, confession would be rightly taught, and such a desire and love for it would be aroused that people would come running after us to get it, more than we would like.
I am curious about who you thought “they” would be, when you read the title of this blog.
Maybe you were hoping I would lay into those rejoicing over the jailing of the court clerk in Kentucky. Maybe you were hoping I would chastise those who complained about her being arrested, sure that she is the bravest person under persecution in the world today.
What if both groups of people are those that are wrong about sin? What if, when they are describing sin, when they are pointing out sin in others are proving Jesus correct. They don’t understand sin because they don’t get that it isn’t about breaking this rule or that rule.
It is because they don’t trust in God, they don’t know Him. They don’t understand about sin because they don’t have the relationship where they depend upon Him.
Take away hat intimate relationship with God away from someone’s understanding, and sin can only be defined as breaking all the rules. But that can’t be what defines sin, because to do so would result in condemnation, and there would be no hope.
For hope, for relief and comfort comes within a relationship. Forgiveness, mercy, love are all words that exist withing the nature of a relationship.
And sin is ultimately, denying that relationship is the ultimate sin.
You see that clearly in the quote from Pope Benedict XVI where he talks about prayer, about what it is and what it isn’t. It is that greatness of God that He can relate to us, not in a condescending manner, but He comes to us. He listens to us, not as a king listens without empathy or interest to his serfs, (or a CEO to one of his p/t employees) but as a friend, as a Father, as one who loves us. He listens, He cares, He knows us.
Which brings us to the quote from Martin Luther, about confession and absolution. Sometimes we treat a sin, or a tendency to sin as if it is the worst thing that can happen. In the Kentucky case, she is either the greatest sinner since Hitler, or those that deny her the office she was elected to.are the equivalent of those who crucified Jesus. In either case, I will not say there is no sin, my instinct is that both groups of observers need to be called to repentance, and to reconciliation. As do the actual people involved in the case
In fact, if there is a need to be reconciled to another person, you can be pretty sure that there is a need to be drawn closer to God. Not for Him to punish, but for Him to heal. For God to be so manifested in their life that His call on their life is understood, not just a law to obey, but as the loving guidance of a parent, We need to realize His law is not punitive, bt based in wisdom. Wisdom beyond us.
That is why reconciliation, why confession and absolution are so critical. We desperately need to hear that our sin is not going to wreck our relationship with God, that He will still hear and answer our prayers, that He will comfort us as anxiety threatens, That is what absolution does. It reconciles us to Him; it assures us of His presence. It helps us to trust, to wait in His presence.
That’s why Luther says if we understand what Absolution gifts us with, we won’t hesitate to confess our sins. We wouldn’t hide in denial of them, we wouldn’t play the game of “their” sins are worse than ours. We would rejoice in the word of God, rejoice in our forgiveness, and we would plead with others to be reconciled, rather than condemn others without the intent of showing them the love of God.
May we spend our days rejoicing in God’s answers to our plea – “Lord have mercy on us sinners!”. Amen.
Ratzinger, J. (1992). Co-Workers of the Truth: Meditations for Every Day of the Year. (M. F. McCarthy & L. Krauth, Trans., I. Grassl, Ed.) (p. 286). San Francisco: Ignatius Press.
Tappert, T. G. (Ed.). (1959). The Book of Concord the confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. (pp. 460–461). Philadelphia: Mühlenberg Press.
Being Made Complete Experiencing His Love – A Sermon on Ephesians 3:11-42
Being Made Complete
Experiencing His Love
Ephesians 3:11-42
† In Jesus Name †
© Paul’s prayer for the church in Ephesus is one we can have for each other. “I pray that from God’s glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. 17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong!
The Parable of the Old Spike ©
It was found on a pile with a ton of others. Pitted, rusted, considered by most to be worthless trash.
And one day a man named Jim found it. As he stared at this piece of useless steel, he saw something in it, and carefully and lovingly gave it a new identity. What was of no value, not only was given a new identity but was transformed into a piece of art. A piece of art that testified to the skill and craftsmanship of the one who found it, purchased it, and transformed it.
Here is what the rusty pitted railroad spike now looks like, after Jim transformed it.
These railroad spike knives provide for us a picture of the work of God in our lives, a work that doesn’t just change how we appear on the outside. God’s work does all I prayed for, as I asked God to bless you a moment ago. For we are transformed much like the spike is…..
Inner strength
Several times in this passage, the concept of strength is mentioned. The words that lay under the surface mean everything from the ability to fortitude, from the capability to internal strength that will result in completing the task, the trial. It is physical and mental, psychological. It is to have the will and determination, the patience and the stubborn nature that will see you overcome the power of temptation, the power sin and Satan, and even the fear of death. ©
If we look at our lives, who can claim to be that strong? ©
Which of us looked at temptation in the eye this week, and didn’t sin at all?
Which one of us loved every neighbor as ourselves?
©Did anyone of us honor God in every single thing we did? What about in every word we said or typed? Did we gossip about others? Did we
What about in every word we thought?
Did we reach out, stretch ourselves beyond our own comfort to help those in need?
We don’t naturally have that strength.
And who has enough inner strength to out wait death…
Which of us enjoys going to the doctors, enjoys the tests and prods and pokes and blood draws, and doesn’t for a moment worry about the results?
Paul understood this well, as he wrote ©
54 So when this takes place, and the mortal has been changed into the immortal, then the scripture will come true: “Death is destroyed; victory is complete!” 55 “Where, Death, is your victory? Where, Death, is your power to hurt?” 56 Death gets its power to hurt from sin, and sin gets its power from the Law. 1 Corinthians 15:54-56 (TEV)
© I need you to note something Paul said “then the scriptures will come true.” I’ve heard this passage misused a time or two to say that we shouldn’t grieve, we shouldn’t struggle, and that is wrong.
But there will be a day, when the power of sin is so shattered, that death will no longer have the power to hurt us.
A day we need to have the strength, the ability to wait for, trusting in the promises of God that it will come.
We need that strength, an inner strength that is based on hope…
The Way God Empowers us.
One of the commentators I read this week, commented about this passage in a way that brought the railroad spike to mind. ©
As fire penetrates iron, and seems to change it into itself, so does God penetrate the soul and fill her with himself; and though she never loses her own being, yet she becomes so penetrated and absorbed by that immense ocean of the divine substance, that she remains, as it were, annihilated, and as if she ceased to exist. The Apostle prayed for this happy lot for his disciples when he said: That you may be filled unto all the fulness of God. (de Ligouri)
© Or to put it into a picture, look at this picture…
The spike is you, the red glow is the glory of God, dwelling within you, empowering you, transforming you. Think of the pictures in this incredible passage
© He will empower you with inner strength thorgh His Spirit
© Christ will make His home in your hearts
© Your roots will grow deep into God’s love… there is the sourceof your strength!
All of this pictures the presence of God invading your life, becoming part of you, even as the energy and heat of the blacksmith’s fire consumes the spike and transforms it into a strong, sharp knife…
Even more the experience that Paul describes,
© 18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. 19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully.
When God unites us to Jesus in Baptism, when we take and consume the bread and the wine, this picture of the knife, glowing because of the power it is immersed in is perfect. Where the metal and the fire have so united that you can’t tell which is absorbing and consuming the other.
This love of His is that in which we live, and even thogh we may never be able to completely put into words how incredible this love is, we will understand it far more deeply than we understand anything else.
This is the empowering that Paul tells us occurs as the Holy Spirit works within us.
It is what Aiden will grow up knowing, as he is reminded of it by Jason and Jennifer, by Tammie and Mark, and by Wanda and Kay and the rest of us.
God is not just working in us, He has made us His home in us,
This is how we are made complete. Not by any other way but experiencing the incredible, unmeasurable love of God in Christ Jesus. A love which transforms us as we experience it, a love that becomes as much us, as well…. Us.
That gloriously transforms us, as the Holy Spirit transforms us into image of Jesus.
This is how we have “inner strength” that will enable us to oversome sin and temptation, the power of Satan and even death. He dwells in us, and nothing can separate us from His love, from His glory, from Him.
This is His work, His promise to us, His children, the people among whom He makes His home,
Once again, hear the prayer of Paul the apostle, that he prayed for the people of God, that we can pray for each other
© “I pray that from God’s glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. 17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong!”
AMEN!
Yes, “she” would be welcome at my church, for all are…
Devotional Thought of the Day
19 For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. 20 So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” 2 Corinthians 5:19-20 (NLT)
32 And when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself.” John 12:32 (NLT)
. 21 I will pardon my people’s crimes, which I have not yet pardoned; and I, the LORD, will make my home in Jerusalem with my people.” Joel 3:21 (NLT)
There is a lady who’s name, face and voice have been plastered all over the internet lately.
She has been compared to Nazi doctors; she has been termed a devil, she has been called evil, her sin has been paraded all over the world.
And she is welcome to come to my church. She is welcome to come and know she is safe. Her sin will not be the only focus of the sermon and the message. People will welcome her, we might even rejoice that she has come! We want her to come to Concordia, and hear a message of hope, a message of love, a message of mercy, that all of us desperately need to hear. Not just her, not just that one sin either a mercy that covers every sin, for He died to forgive every sin.
Some may hear this in disbelief. You don’t mean the doctor from Planned Parenthood. The one who was involved in the selling of body parts? You surely wouldn’t welcome her into your church? Don’t you realize how guilty she is?
Yes, I do, Christ didn’t come to save the good people. He came to save sinners, people broken by guilt and shame, He came to save her. He came to save you and I. he came to save every one of us that has chosen evil over good at some time in our lives. Jesus came so we could be granted repentance and trust in Him, and given hope. This lady needs to know that God is still willing to reach out to her! He not only wants, He desires to bring her back to Him! Jesus died to make her reconciliation to the Father possible, as He has for every sinner.
You and I included.
For this is what the church does, it reveals hope to the sinner. It is i the church’s mission. We exist to give sinners hope. We exist to bring them into the Father’s presence. We exist to see everyone be cleansed of all sin and welcomed into the family of God.
And if God can do that for me, he can surely do it for her. For she is not a worse sinner than I am. Or for that matter Paul the Apostle who said,
12 I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength to do his work. He considered me trustworthy and appointed me to serve him, 13 even though I used to blaspheme the name of Christ. In my insolence, I persecuted his people. But God had mercy on me because I did it in ignorance and unbelief. 14 Oh, how generous and gracious our Lord was! He filled me with the faith and love that come from Christ Jesus. 15 This is a trustworthy saying, and everyone should accept it: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners”—and I am the worst of them all. 16 But God had mercy on me so that Christ Jesus could use me as a prime example of his great patience with even the worst sinners. Then others will realize that they, too, can believe in him and receive eternal life. 17 All honor and glory to God forever and ever! He is the eternal King, the unseen one who never dies; he alone is God. Amen. 1 Timothy 1:12-17 (NLT)
That is how powerful the mercy of God is. He desires that she would know His love and mercy. And fellow sinner, we need to be so in awe of God’s love for her, that we don’t get in her way, that we don’t block her way to the Father.
He can work with her, she needs to know that, as does every other sinner we know. That Jesus has done this for us, we who are of all sinners the foremost, should give them hope.
I pray she comes into one of our churches this weekend, along with every other person who needs hope. And I pray she find it.
For that is God’s desire… and it should be ours
Lord have mercy on us all!
True Confessions… A Sermon Based on Matt 16 (text only)
True Confessions
Matthew 16 13-19
In Jesus Name
May you see revealed to you, the grace, mercy and peace of God the Father, that comes from knowing Jesus, and knowing He is the Anointed One, the Son of God sent to save us!
The Confession of Peter
The Supreme Court decision on Friday will not change the bottom line of this sermon, it won’t change the fact that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God. As the Christ, He the one chosen and put in place to deliver us from sin.
But the decision on Friday did impact this sermon and what I am going to say. It did help clarify and focus the message on Peter’s confession, and what it means for us, and to us.
It will help us to know where we stand, what is our confession, what we can rely on, what we can base our life upon.
On Friday and Saturday, I heard over and over a part of our gospel reading quoted over and over. It was used with the intent to rally the church, to comfort those plagued by anxiety and fear, those feeling hurt and betrayed. It was to rally them, to give them some hope that despite an attack to what they know of life and religion, that God was still in charge.
I also hear it used triumphantly, as some Christians saw the decision as proof that God was blessing their position.
Either way, the confession that everyone pointed to as their hope was this,
upon this rock I will build my church, and all the powers of hell will not conquer it.
or to hear it the old way,
upon this rock I will build my church, and all the powers of hell will not conquer it! (KJV)
That the gates of hell can’t stand against the church, is true but it is not why we have hope, they are not the good confession.
This is the conversation that gives us hope
“You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
and knowing that, trusting in that, making that your rock, your foundation in life, is what matters.
The “other confessions”
The Prophets of Law….
It’s not that they aren’t needed…
When the people of God in Jesus day looked at Jesus, they struggled to figure out who He was. That is the first question Jesus asks, as he uses the word from which we get logic. Who do they reason I am? Not just say as in passing, but when they really think about it.
The answer the apostles gave was John the Baptist, Elijah, and Jeremiah. Three prophets, three men, it can be said, brought an uncomfortable message of hope in a time where people didn’t want to hear it, yet held out for the hope it offered.
What the people saw in Jesus, based on their answers, is someone who could be with them in the present, but also looked with great hope for the future.
Let me say that again,
What the people saw in Jesus, based on their answers, is someone who could be with them in the present, but also looked with great hope for the future.
They were hoping for a prophet that would call those sinners back to God. They were hoping for a change in their society, in their life, and those prophets promised that it was coming…
And just a promise would have been such a great thing, to hope for the fulfillment of the promise was more than they could imagine. Never mind how the fulfillment of the promise would change everything.
Even Peter and the apostles, who had revealed to them by God the Father that Jesus was the Christ, the chosen One, couldn’t understand.
That the gates of hell cannot withstand the church is something really great, really encouraging.
But it is nothing compared to the fulfilled promise, the rock on which we base everything, the true confession we need to understand.
The Confession… the Christ!
Would it have been bad if Jesus was another Jeremiah? Another Ezekiel? A second John the Baptist? Perhaps not, and we constantly need people who call us on our own sin.
But even more we need the Christ, the one chosen and anointed to deliver us into the presence of God our Father.
I guess I can put it this way. Nancy and Bob yesterday celebrated their 50 year reunion. When they got engaged, it was a good thing. But imagine if they had remained engaged for the fifty years, never getting married.
That is the difference between being those promised the Christ, somewhere in the future, to those who have a relationship with God the Father, because Jesus came to us.
He came to us, the Anointed, chosen One of God came to us. Then the Father revealed to us, as Jesus taught, as He healed, as He did miracles, that Jesus was more than just a prophet. God came to live among us, to give us life, to make us His. He came to prove to us His love, His commitment to a relationship that would survive our sin.
That is or hope, that is why we have confidence in God.
He is the Christ, the one chosen to deliver us from sin, and into the presence of the Father. He is our Savior, our Redeemer, the One who Reconciles us to the Father, our Life, the Lord who calls us His beloved, who tells us we are no longer without a home, no longer without a family.
Because of Jesus, we know our Father in Heaven, the Creator of the Universe listens when we talk to Him, when we pray.
He is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.
And it is as we know this, as we begin to understand the love this takes, the love He has for us, that we see the church being drawn together. God begins to build His home in us. His love is so strong, that it can’t stop us from raiding hell, to bring back those who sin has damaged, whom it is broken.
Because He is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.
That is our confession, that is why we have hope, that is why we plead with people to be reconciled to God. We want them to know that love, that brings a peace that passes understanding, that guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
AMEN!
True Confessions A Sermon Based on Matthew 16 (audio/video)
The manuscript for this video is posted seperately. Since this is the first time I’ve tried recording this with video and audio, I would appreciate your feedback, whether the video feed was helpful. Thanks!
