220626 Sermon on Slavery and Freedom (Pentecost 3) June 26, 2022

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Sermon manuscript:

One of the worst feelings in the world is to know that something bad is going to happen and there isn’t anything you can do about it. The diagnosis has been made; it’s terminal. The loan did not get reapproved; you’re bankrupt. The affair has been made known; the marriage is over. Such circumstances enslave a person. Nothing can be done. If only we could be set free!

But maybe we can be set free. That slavery is so awful. We shouldn’t submit to it. If we stand up and fight, maybe we can get out of it. So the terminal disease is fought against. Try this, try that, maybe, just maybe! Maybe we can get another mortgage on the house. Maybe I can lie about the affair. We want so badly to be back in control. We do not want to be at the beck and call of our circumstances. We want everything to be at our beck and call. We want to be in charge.

But, as Solomon says, this is all vanity. It is all chasing after the wind. Maybe we can defeat one disease, but another is sure to come that we won’t be able to defeat. Maybe we can keep our money for now, but eventually somebody else is going to get it. There isn’t anything that we can do to make our plans permanent.

Paul says in Romans chapter 8 that creation has been subjected to vanity, to futility. That is to say that creation has been subjected to an inevitable nothingness. He says, furthermore, that creation is enslaved to corruption. Corruption is a pretty flexible word. Lots of things can be corrupt. The thought that lies behind it is rotting and rottenness. Dead things rot. We are enslaved to this, and there isn’t anything that you can do about it.

The key word is “you.” There isn’t anything you can do about it. You are enslaved by forces much more powerful than you. God, however, is free. Paul, in this portion of Romans 8 that I’ve just referenced, says that God is the one who has subjected creation to futility in hope. He says that creation has been enslaved to corruption in order to be set free. He says that there is such a thing as the glorious freedom of the children of God. That means that there is such a thing as being a child of God. The children of God have a glorious freedom. This is the same thing that Paul says in our reading, Galatians 5:1: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.”

Everybody knows that being free is better than being a slave. Being free means that you are not bound and shackled. Could there be any greater and more grievous shackles than those inevitable ones whereby our bodies will decompose with death? The best than anybody dares to hope for is to push back the inevitability of death—forestall those shackles. Nobody dares to break those bonds because it is believed to be impossible. This is precisely what Paul is talking about, however, in Romans 8. Creation has been enslaved to corruption in order to be set free with the glorious freedom of the children of God, who will be raised incorruptible.

The children of God are those who have been baptized into Christ, clothed with Christ, as we heard last week. Christ’s status as the Son of God is given to those who have been baptized. Christ’s victory over death is given to those who have been baptized. Christ’s resurrection is promised to everyone who dies in Christ. The inevitability of death is no longer inevitable. Death is swallowed up in victory. This is a glorious, unheard-of freedom. The chains of death cannot bind us.

Speaking of chains, though, you are maybe familiar with how Paul speaks in his letters written closer to the end of his life. He refers to himself as “being in chains.” Paul ends up being a prisoner for Christ. He is arrested and goes to Rome to stand trial. Eventually he is sentenced to death. How can Paul speak of freedom when Paul ends up in chains, is imprisoned, and sentenced to death? When this happened did Paul change his mind about his Gospel? In our reading today he says, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.” But Paul ends up in chains.

Paul did not change his mind. You don’t have to take my word for it. You can read him for yourself with his little letter to the Philippians—often called the epistle of joy. It was written in chains. He did not see his freedom as being restricted by those chains. He could see that his more complete and glorious freedom was drawing near with his impending death. He is not sad, but encourages us to rejoice in the Lord always. Again, he says, “Rejoice!” Paul is looking forward to being with the Lord, which is better than anything this life might offer—no matter how good this life might be. So Paul’s freedom is not taken away by chains or death. Paul’s circumstances made it so that he could not do whatever he wanted, but Paul’s freedom was not a matter of being able to do whatever he might like.

That’s important. Understanding that Christian freedom is not a matter of doing whatever a person might like is very important for us to grasp, otherwise we won’t understand what Paul means by freedom. The way that we understand the word “freedom” is different than the way that the Bible understands “freedom.”

For us freedom is understood as the ability to do whatever we want. If we want to work at one job we can do that. If we want to change and do another job, we can do that. If there’s something that we don’t like about our life, we might have the freedom to change it. The thing that usually restricts our freedom for changing our life for the better is lacking power. We might not have the resources to compel other people to do things for us. If we ain’t got the money, honey, they ain’t got the time. Everybody understands that the more money a person has, the more freedom he or she has to do whatever he or she wants. More money means more willfulness.

According to the Bible’s way of thinking, however, doing whatever you want is not freedom but slavery. It’s basically the opposite of how we naturally think of such things. Doing whatever you want is slavery to one’s own passions and desires. Your desires are like a slave-driver, like a master. Your desires say to you, “Do this!” As a slave to those desires, you obey your master. You yourselves know full well that it is quite different when it comes to doing good. We all have experienced knowing that we are supposed to do something that’s good and right, but don’t do it. That shows that we are not as free as we imagine. If we would spontaneously, gladly and joyously do good for others, including our enemies, then I would admit that we are free. However, since we are obedient to evil and incapable of freely doing good, we are slaves when we are doing what we want.

In our epistle reading, Paul says that the Spirit keeps us from doing the things that we want. The desires of the flesh are opposed to the Spirit, and the Spirit is against the flesh. They are opposed to each other, so that we do not do what we want. Paul’s list of the works of the flesh—sexual immorality, impurity, hatred, anger, jealousy, drunkenness, and so on—are all things voluntarily done. We want pleasure, power, entertainment, and so on, and we are willing to do what needs to be done in order to attain such things. People imagine that doing what you want is freedom. It is actually slavery.

The Holy Spirit, on the other hand, leads us into a very different kind of freedom with very different fruit. The freedom given by the Holy Spirit is not an absolute freedom—beholden to no one but one’s self. The glorious freedom of the children of God is not an absolute freedom. Absolute freedom is what the serpent offered to Adam and Eve in the Garden, and it turned out to be a lie. The devil said that they would know the difference between good and evil and would be like God. That is to say, Adam and Eve were offered the freedom to do whatever they wanted. That turned out not to be a freedom, but a horrible bondage. From that point onward they and their descendants were slaves to their desires, incapable of denying themselves and freely doing what is good.

So the freedom that the Holy Spirit works is not the freedom to do whatever we want. It is the freedom of being a child of God. God is the one who is known to be in control rather than us Christians. God being in control means that goodness is bound to come for his beloved children, even if we are in very bad circumstances. The circumstances might look so bad that it looks like there’s nothing that we can do about it.

I began today by saying that it’s about the worst feeling in the world when something bad is going to happen and there isn’t anything we can do about it. Jesus knows what that feels like. Think of how Jesus prayed in the garden just before he was arrested. Three times he prayed, “Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me.” Jesus could see that something bad—something worse than bad—was coming at him. Could it possibly be changed? But he also added, “Not my will, but yours be done.”

This should help us understand the kind of freedom that we have as the children of God. God’s own beloved Son, Jesus Christ, was put through the wringer. It is not as though the Christian life is an amusement park ride. Nor is it the case that we determine for ourselves what should happen in our lives as though we knew perfectly well what is good and what is evil. Instead it is the case that God is the one who is in control. The freedom that we have is to embrace this will of God, knowing that all things have to work together for the good of those who love him.

God being in control is very, very good. We know the will of God towards us sinners in Jesus Christ. God sent his Son to redeem, to forgive, to reconcile all people to himself. The Scriptures say that it is God’s will that all people should come to the knowledge of the truth and to be saved. God is for us in Jesus Christ. God being for us is so extensive that we are even called his beloved children. What greater words or ideas could possibly be used to describe God’s loving will towards us? He did not spare his own perfectly lovable Son, but gave him up for us all. How can he not also graciously give us all things? The glorious freedom of the children of God is knowing that God is for us. He who has begun a good work in us will bring it to completion on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

On the other hand, however, this also means that we are not God. Folks assume that they know this already. Nobody goes around saying he or she is God, but within us all is our flesh. There is no more deeply felt desire of our flesh than that we should be God. We want to be in control of our own lives. We want to be able to decide for ourselves everything that might happen to us. We want to believe that we can do anything if only we try hard enough, and, especially, if we are rich enough.

This is no good, though, which we should be able to see if we are only honest enough with ourselves to admit it. We are not free in and of ourselves. No amount of effort can set us free from the inevitability of death. There’s a good chance that eventually something is going to come along which we won’t be able to do anything about: the diagnosis, the bank statement, the angry letter. Then what? Try harder? Give me a break! That’s like saying to the slave: “Work harder.” Working harder won’t set the person free.

Paul, on the other hand, has a very different message. He says at the beginning of our reading, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.” Christ has set you free. He has defeated every power that is greater than yourself that you can never in a million years conquer. The reason why Christ has set you free is for freedom. Christ wants you to enjoy the peace of knowing that God is for you. God forgives you. You are a child of God. God will eventually bring you to himself.

Since you are not God, you certainly cannot dictate to him how you want everything to go. You are foolish; God is wise. He knows best how to bring you to himself. He knows how to keep you from unbelief and despair. That probably means that life isn’t going to be one big amusement park ride. Our enemies—sin, death, demons, the devil, our own flesh, and so on—our enemies are so dreadful and powerful that life can’t be one big amusement park ride.

But God is in control, and God is for you in Jesus Christ.

220619 Sermon on Galatians 3:23-4:7 (Pentecost 2), July 19, 2022

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Laws, regulations are powerful tools. Laws and regulations can change people’s behavior. As powerful tools, laws and regulations have been used for good and for ill.

For examples of how laws and regulations have been used for good, you only need to think about how almost every area of modern life has developed best practices. Practically every industry and every service has been shaped by regulations so that things today are much safer and more efficient than 100 years ago. Licensing, accreditation, and other regulatory measures have raised standards so as to prevent incompetence and malpractice. We have become an ever increasingly regulated society because folks continue trying to solve problems.

On the other hand, laws and regulations have not always been used to do good. It is always possible to make laws and regulations that are unjust, prejudiced, and self-serving. The really wealthy people of this country have a keen interest in state and national politics because they know how laws and regulations can affect their bottom line. Laws and regulations can make them a lot of money, or laws and regulations can make it impossible for them to do business. Tax laws can make some people a lot of money or they can take a lot of money away from others. A great deal of what happens in state and national government is not for the public good. It’s for private interest. That is why there is always going to be corruption involved in the making of laws.

This does not change the fact that laws and regulations are powerful tools. To the contrary. The fact that laws and regulations are effectively used for good or for ill proves how powerful they can be. If you want to change things on this earth, there might not be any more powerful tool. It’s a way to change not only the behavior of one individual but to make other people act a certain way too. Mass movements are what history is made of. History couldn’t care less about this or that individual. History is interested in the big movements. That’s how things are in this old world.

The Gospel, however, teaches us differently when it comes to such matters. The Gospel gives us quite a different view of history: God has made me and all creatures. God gives me my clothing, shoes, food, drink, and so on. God has purchased and won me with the holy precious blood and innocent suffering and death of his beloved Son. God has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. On the last day he will raise me and all the dead and give eternal life to me and all believers in Christ. This is most certainly true.

Note that what is important in this history is not mass movements. It is the individual who is important, and, more important still, what God does for individuals. God has made me. God has redeemed me. God has sanctified me. There is no higher activity that we could be engaged in than thanking God. Thank you, God, for making me and all creatures. Thank you, God, for purchasing and winning me from sin, death, and from the power of the devil. Thank you, God, for calling me out of darkness and giving me your Holy Spirit. God’s gracious actions towards me are the highest and best things in life.

If God’s gracious actions towards me are the highest and best things in life, then that means that other things can’t be the highest and best. Other things in life are somewhat glorious as well. The way that people have been steered this way or that way, wealth, progress, power, and the other kinds of things that get written into history books are great. Laws and regulations are usually the drivers behind these forces.

Laws and regulations, although they are somewhat great, do not alter or even relate to God’s gracious actions towards us. There is no law or regulation that has had any impact on what God has decided to do with us human beings in Jesus Christ. It was God’s grace alone that made him do what he has done.

This means that those things that are somewhat glorious have lost their glory. The exploits of history, the mass movements, the laws and regulations by which things get done on this earth—these are taken for granted as being the highest and the best. However, there is a higher glory in God’s actions towards us in Christ. We are created, redeemed and sanctified. We are made into children of God. This is a greater glory. 

This greater glory is such that the old glory—the best that can be accomplished on this earth—comes to have no glory at all. The old, earthly-accomplishments-glory is like the moon shining. A full moon certainly has a wonderful glory. The new glory of the Gospel—God’s gracious actions toward us—however, is like the sun. The glory of the sun is such that once the sun has risen the old glory of the moon is no longer visible.

Not everyone is going to see the greater glory of being a child of God. Most people, in fact, are going to believe that the Gospel is a myth, a fairy tale. The only things that matter, so they believe, are dollars and cents, laws and regulations, getting what’s mine. The best that we can hope for in our lives is that we be healthy, wealthy, and wise. While this stuff is fine and good, it isn’t nearly glorious enough.

Something that is already more serious and real than these things has already happened to you. You have been baptized. Paul says in our epistle reading that as many of you as have been baptized have been clothed with Christ. You have been clothed with Christ. Through faith all of you have become sons of God.

That admittedly might sound strange to those of you who are women or girls. It is certainly not the case that Paul is some kind of sexist bigot as some foolish and lazy people judge him as being. Paul is very deliberately saying that all people—men and women, boys and girls—become sons of God by baptism in Christ. They all become sons of God because Jesus Christ is the only Son of God. Jesus Christ’s sonship is given to those who are baptized, and who hold to what is given to them in baptism by faith.

This is our history. This is our salvation and our glory. The way that we are saved is by God becoming one of us in Jesus. Jesus makes us one with him by baptism and thus we become one with God. Despite our sins, despite being male or female, Jewish or Greek, slave or free, we are altogether and all alike drawn near to God. We are drawn so near to God that the Holy Spirit in us can cry out, “Abba, Father.” We can pray, “Our Father who art in heaven,” having been tenderly invited to believe that he is our true Father and that we are his true children, so that we may ask him with all boldness and confidence as dear children ask their dear father.

This is a heavenly glory. We are raised up beyond this earth to our Creator. This earth will not go on forever. Jesus says, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.” It is widely assumed that the history books will go on with their validity and importance forever. That’s why ambitious people are so eager to be included in them—it’s a kind of immortality. On the other hand, it is widely assumed that an individual being baptized is of little importance and believing in Christ is nothing more than a quirky hobby. What is really important, however, is not whether you have managed to be wealthy or not, powerful or not, slave or free, male or female. In Christ we are all made one. This oneness in Christ, brought about by God’s gracious actions towards us, is eternal.

This greater, heavenly, eternal glory has one downside, so to speak. It’s not really a downside, but it seems like it’s a downside to us. And that is that this glory is only known by faith. We haven’t died yet. Christ has not yet come to judge the living and the dead. If either of these things should happen the glory that we have known by faith will be replaced by sight. In the meantime we have to be content with God’s promise. The Christian Church is built on God’s promises, but since this is so contrary to our nature, we are prone to turn towards things of this earth and therefore to laws and regulations.

This seems to be what happened to the Christians in Galatia to whom Paul was writing in our epistle reading. Some new teachers had come and had told these Christians that what is really important is the changing of people’s behavior by laws and regulations. It seems as though they took the truths of the Gospel somewhat for granted. The advanced stuff, the glorious stuff, is going to come about by laws and regulations.

Paul speaks against that throughout the whole letter to the Galatians, including the portion that was read for today. Paul argues the opposite of these other teachers. The Law does not have the glory that they were claiming. The Law is like a guardian or a chaperone. Chaperones are adults who accompany young people, and why? Chaperones are there to lay down the law. Young people are not allowed to do what they otherwise might do because the chaperone is there.

And what are the attitudes of the young people towards those chaperones? Do they like chaperones? If there are young people who are good, then they probably don’t care if the chaperone is there or not, because the chaperone is not changing their behavior. In that case, though, the chaperone is really nothing and extraneous—pointless.

If the young people are bad, then they have no love for that chaperone. If they had their way the chaperone would go away so that they could do what they want. Again, the chaperone isn’t able to do that much. The chaperone doesn’t change them internally. The chaperone doesn’t actually make them good. The chaperone just makes them behave outwardly, while inwardly they are filled with lawlessness.

Although laws and regulations are powerful, they cannot make anyone good. They do not have the power to make anyone acceptable to God. A church that is filled with laws and regulations for every last facet of life is not going to make anyone better. True goodness comes only from God’s gracious actions. Being clothed in God’s Son by baptism, believing God’s promises more fully, is the way that people are set free internally from their evil compulsions. The best that laws can ever accomplish is to create people who are whitewashed tombs. Outwardly they might look alright. Inwardly they are filled with death and uncleanness. No law has the ability to make anyone truly love. Love must come from God.

God makes a beginning in us with his love by our baptism into Christ, making us one in Christ, and giving us his Holy Spirit. This is only a beginning because we still carry with us our sinful flesh that the Holy Spirit fights against in Christians. The Holy Spirit fights against our sinful flesh, sanctifying us throughout our earthly life, until our sinful flesh is killed with death. Then, when we are resurrected on the last day, we will have bodies that have been purified from sin. While we live this earthly Christian life we continue to have both our sinful flesh and the Holy Spirit.

Since we have our sinful flesh we will always need that old chaperone in this life. Christians throwing themselves into situations where they know that they will be tempted is like putting fire and straw together and expecting them not to burn. The old chaperone is going to say, “Don’t do that!” The old chaperone won’t have any thanks for it. Our sinful flesh resents being told what to do.

But our true substance as Christians is not in laws and regulations. Laws and regulations have their place in this old world, but they are not that great. What is truly great is God’s gracious, saving actions toward us. Our Christian hope is not that we have or will be able to reform ourselves. Our Christian hope is that God has chosen us for salvation in Jesus Christ. In order to set us free from the Law’s condemnation God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, to redeem us who are under the Law, so that we would receive adoption as sons. This is what we set our heart upon. This is what gives us hope—God’s gracious actions toward us.

True progress as a Christian can come only from this Gospel. Changes in our behavior might be impressive to other people, but what really matters is a change of heart, which only God can really see. Our change of heart comes from embracing God’s forgiveness, embracing his accepting of us for Jesus’s sake, of his promising to be with us no matter how dark things might get. We are simply to be glad at God’s promises. He is faithful. He will surely do what he has promised.

220612 Sermon on Extremism (Holy Trinity) June 12, 2022

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Today I’d like to talk about “extremism.” We often hear of extremism and extremists. Extremism is never a good thing. Extremists go too far; they go to the extreme. That’s always going to create conflict, because not everyone is on the same page. Extremists are destructive to relationships. The conflict between the extremist and the supposed non-extremist creates violence without fail. That violence might be with words. Some extremists are even physically violent.

It would be foolish, and even insane, to want to endorse all extremism. Endorsing all extremism would involve irreconcilable contradictions. Being extreme in one direction means that you can’t be extreme in the opposite direction. For example, a so-called far right extremist cannot at the same time be a so-called far left extremist. That would be a house divided against itself. And many kinds of extremism are evil, destructive, hate-filled, unjust, altogether horrible. So extremism as extremism cannot be endorsed.

But here is something that we as Christians have to wrestle with: Jesus was and is an extremist. Jesus held extreme views and said extreme things. The Gospels are full of these extreme statements.

Jesus says: “Love your enemies, and do good to them.” “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind.” “I say to you whoever is angry with his brother is liable to judgement.” “I say to you that anyone who is divorced, except on the ground of sexual immorality, commits adultery if married again.” “I say to you that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out.” And there are many, many more. These statements are extreme because they go way beyond what ordinary folks think.

But maybe what ordinary folks think is an extremism all its own. Jesus is an extremist for the glory of the Father, for God’s commandments, and for God’s will. The great herd has its own commitments too.

A while back I spoke to you about the training in covetousness that the ungodly go to the gym in order to exercise. Too much is never enough. More for myself is always better than less. In the pursuit of happiness all that matters is that you don’t get caught. You hide, so no prying eyes may see. You lie, so that you won’t be held responsible. You’re mean, so that nobody messes with you. You manipulate, so that you only have to do what you want. Here, again, I could go on and on.

We might sum it all up by saying that it is all selfishness and and self-aggrandizement and self-worship. We can never have too much money or too much power. Nobody can give us too much honor, too many congratulations. Is not this going to extremes?

“But,” a person might justifiably say, “everybody’s like that. If everybody’s like that, then it can’t be extremism.” True enough. We are like that. The reason why everybody’s like that is because we were all born this way. If we’re all born this way then there’s nothing we can do about it. Fine, we’re extreme in our selfishness, ambition, love of glory, and so on, but it’s fine. We’re fine. We’re just like everybody else, and we’re all fine. This is an extremely powerful line of reasoning.

It’s been powerful ever since the beginning. When Adam and Eve were tempted they ended up getting convinced that they would be fine. God said, “In the day that you eat of it you will surely die,” but the devil said, “you won’t surely die,” so who’s to say? We’ll probably be fine. We’re fine.

They weren’t fine, of course. How can anyone be fine who is living in rebellion against his or her Creator? Adam and Eve sensed this after they sinned, but they couldn’t bring themselves to admit it. They just went right on ahead convincing themselves that they were fine. They tried to forget about God, and got busy living. They stitched together some clothes and set about increasing their quality of life. So long as God stayed away they could keep up this fiction that they were fine.

And that was quite a fiction, and a deliberate blindness! With the fall into sin Adam and Eve were corrupted in all the ways that we are corrupted. Lusts and greed and perversions were poured into their soul from their new master. Regardless, despite this extremism of theirs, they kept telling themselves that they were fine.

The last thing that they wanted to hear was God coming towards them in the cool of the day. That was when the lies collapsed. They weren’t fine. They looked for someplace to hide. If there was a mountain available, I’m sure they would have liked to have been covered by it. This was an extremely unpleasant experience for them. It’s like when a kid has to get a splinter removed. All that the kid knows is that getting the splinter removed means more pain than what is already being experienced, and so keep that pin or those tweezers away!

But that is actually a pretty paltry example. Paul says that it’s not just painful. A death takes place. The Old Adam in us must be drowned and die together with all sins and evil desires. You are not fine. It does not matter one bit whether other people are just like you. It doesn’t matter whether everybody validates you and celebrates you. No amount of celebrating can stand up against the truth, just as no amount of clothing was able to take away Adam and Eve’s shame.

As you Christians know, of course, God was not coming just to kill them. In a sense, God really did kill them. That is to say, God killed their hopes and dreams. Realize that before they heard God coming toward them they had been hoping that the devil was right. The devil had said that they wouldn’t surely die. “Pretty, pretty please, let’s not ever, ever think that we less than perfect.” This had to die. It’s not true.

But, as you Christians know, God also told them another truth: The Seed of the woman is going to crush the serpent’s head. That truth is just as true as the truth that you are not fine. They will be redeemed.

Realize, however, that this is not a Hallmark movie. Our sin, our debt, has not just been pretended away. Our salvation is shocking. The Son of God became a curse. The Holy One became sin and died on a cross. God goes to extremes in order to set us free from our slavery to vanity and death and the rotting of our corpse. The world is full of people who find this extremism on God’s part to be distasteful. Some feel as though God couldn’t die. It’s against the rules. Some feel that God shouldn’t die. Everybody can see that it’s violent. It’s bloody. It’s dirty. It’s extreme.

But what is this extremism all in service to? To what extreme is all of this directed? It is directed toward love. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son… God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. Jesus says, “I have come that people may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” God’s extremism is all for our good, and, at the same time, against all that is evil.

So let’s acknowledge the truth that the Gospel is extreme. Jesus is an extremist. So also our sinful Old Adam is an extremist. We are extreme about very different things. This contrasting extremism is going to make for some tense conversations. Again, do you suppose the conversation between God and Adam and Eve was intense? That’s how it is for every sinner who is saved. We don’t just have a splinter that needs to be pulled out of our otherwise healthy flesh. Admitting that you are not fine, having your shameful nakedness exposed, blushing at your extremism for ugly and harmful things—this is not the funnest thing in the world.

But it is good. It sets us free from lies. And God does not leave us naked and ashamed just as he didn’t leave Adam and Eve naked and ashamed. He forgives us with a perfect forgiveness. He replaces our fig leaves with the righteousness of Jesus. Jesus’s righteousness is your righteousness. You have been baptized into Christ. God receives us and welcomes us. He is healing us with our sanctification. One day that healing will be complete. When that happens, and when we see God, for the first time we will begin to understand what Jesus means when he says that he has come so that we may have life, and that we may have it more abundantly. This is good extremism.

But, as a message that is extreme, it is going to strike us as being extreme. In our Gospel reading there is an intense conversation between Jesus and some Jews. These Jews thought that they were fine. They had Abraham as their father. They had never been enslaved to anyone. As for this Jesus, they weren’t so sure who his father was, and he was from Galilee. They figured that anyone who would dare to say that they were not fine must be a hater or have a demon.

Let me pause to note how this rings true in all times, including ours. Anybody who dares to point out the sins of another is at best socially inept, and at worst vile and evil. Hardly anybody believes in demons anymore, but if they did, they would say the same thing these Jews said to Jesus: You must have a demon!

When Jesus responds to the Jews, it is with some heat of its own. He does not have a demon. He is glorifying the Father, while they are dishonoring him. They do not know the Father. He knows the Father. If he were to say that he didn’t know the Father, then he would be a liar… Then he tosses in: “a liar like them.”

With those last few words, “…then I would be a liar like you,” the referee blows the whistle and throws a flag: “Unnecessary roughness.” Jesus is being inflammatory. He didn’t need to call them liars. Violence like that should be condemned. It’s totally uncalled for. Otherwise how can we just go on ignoring him so that we go back to making money, watching TV, and buying stuff?

Maybe that’s why we’ve all been so thoroughly catechized that extremism is bad. The powers that be only want us to believe that money, winning at sportys, and so on are important. Everything else is unimportant ,and so nobody should ever get too excited about such things.

Think about it: if something is unimportant, why would anybody ever get upset about it? Wouldn’t it be the height of foolishness for me to get upset about what flavor of ice cream you like? Raking you over the coals for not liking double fudge brownie? That would be ridiculous! That’s what folks want to do to religion too. First of all, we’re already all fine. Everybody knows that. Second of all religion is just a hobby. Anybody who says it’s anything more than that is some kind of dangerous extremist.

So be it. Jesus is an extremist. He is extreme about everything that is good, right, and true. It’s only natural, then, that he is going to conflict with us who are extreme about selfishness, lying and getting our own way. Jesus’s extremism is good. Our extremism is evil. If anybody gets offended at Jesus’s extremism, then I say that’s a good sign. At least they are paying attention.

I, together with the rest of the human race, do not want my nakedness exposed. I want to believe that I’m fine. What God teaches me, however, is that I am not fine. I’m a liar, I’m a thief, I’m a pervert, I’m no good at praying, I’m bored by God’s Word. The good that I want to do I don’t end up doing. The evil that I don’t want to do, that’s what I end up doing. I’m not fine.

And here is what sets Christians apart from the rest of the human race: We don’t, or rather, we shouldn’t be offended when we are identified as sinners. It’s the truth! We are. But Jesus is the Savior of sinners. That’s the truth too.

220605 Sermon for Pentecost June 5, 2022

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The greatest possibilities exist wherever the Word of God is heard. The Word of God has the ability to bring about righteousness where there is otherwise only sin. It can bring life where there is only otherwise death. It teaches us who we are and who God isWe may learn what is truly good and holy and God-pleasing for our lives—the way that we should live. The truths of God’s Word are not just for this life, but carry on into eternal life. These are the most important things anyone could want to know.

There’s one more thing worth mentioning about God’s Word especially on this day of Pentecost. The Word of God is the way that the Holy Spirit works. Don’t look for the Holy Spirit apart from the Word of God. The Holy Spirit does not work in us apart from the Word of God. But in the Word of God the Holy Spirit is our paraklete.

Paraklete is the Greek word that Jesus uses to describe the Holy Spirit. This Greek word can be accurately translated with many different English words. The translation we heard this morning used the word “counselor.” This would be akin to being a lawyer. Lawyers are called counselors. Lawyers represent and speak for their clients. Most importantly, lawyers are on the side of their clients. Another word that gets across the meaning of paraklete is “advocate.” An advocate is on your side. Older translations opted for the word “comforter.” Someone on your side speaks words of comfort. The main thing with the word paraklete is that the Holy Spirit sidles up to you. Let’s say you’re walking down the street. He sidles up to you and walks right along with you. And he is your friend. He’s on your side. He helps. He speaks for you.

The Word of God is rich and full of all kinds of blessings. It teaches wisdom and the way of salvation. But to my mind the greatest of all the things that God does through the Word of God is the giving of the paraklete, the Holy Spirit, who is himself God. This friend, this comforter, sidles up to you to bring you a message of victory and peace. God is for you in our Lord Jesus Christ. This is not dependent upon you in even the tiniest little bit. This is an objective, real, and universally applicable message: God is for you.

This message is completely and entirely dependent upon the facts of God’s saving work. God so loved the world that he gave his eternally begotten Son. God redeemed sinners through his Son, who became man in the womb of the virgin Mary. God did all that he did in Jesus for the benefit of sinners. Although sinners are hateful and disgusting, enemies of God, and seemingly irredeemable, Jesus suffered in their place, and there was not a single sin which was not redeemed by this great God-man, Jesus Christ. Although he is God, the crushing weight of our sin killed him. God did all of this because he is on our side. Jesus is the first-fruits of those who rise from the dead. Through his death and resurrection we are purified to live new lives together with God.

The Holy Spirit, the paraklete, sidles up to those who hear the Word of God and testifies to you that this is for you. God has done this all for you. God is on your side. You might want to object: “But what about this or that? What about all the sins I’ve committed?” Your salvation is not dependent upon you. Your sins are not more powerful than God. God’s power and grace are such that they be like an ocean and your sins are but a spark. Do you suppose that the ocean is able to put out a spark? Rest assured. Although your sins are awful, disgusting, and embarrassing, they are no match for Jesus’s blood.

So the work of the Holy Spirit is much better than that of a lawyer, a counselor, an advocate. Lawyers and advocates are great. They are on your side, and they fight for you. But there is no guarantee whatsoever that they are going to be able to win for you. Despite the best of intentions and the hardest work they lose cases all the time. This is not how it is with the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit in the Word of God announces God’s completed salvation in Jesus Christ and says that it is for you. The verdict has already been rendered by God. You just might not know it yet or believe it fully. The verdict is that you are not guilty because Jesus, who knew no sin, became sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

This is what makes the sending of the Holy Spirit such a monumental event. The Holy Spirit announces what has already been done and accomplished. How different the message would be if only the possibility of salvation were announced: “If you play your cards right, if you don’t screw it up, then you have a good shot at winning.”

That would offer hope and despair to exactly the wrong people. It would offer some hope to those who are wrong about their own goodness and righteousness, but it would exclude hope for anyone who is honest about themselves. Those who know the truth, those who know their sinful condition, would have to believe that they are going to lose. They haven’t played their cards right.

The Gospel, however, announces that everyone wins. All have been forgiven by what Jesus has done. Therefore God will live in those who believe in Jesus, and we will live in God. We have been reconciled to him.

But what about those who do not believe? One of the reasons why folks don’t see Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit as being that great is because so many people don’t believe. Our reason thinks that the way the story should go is that Jesus works our salvation, then the Holy Spirit should make everyone who hears the Gospel be saved. That, however, is not how things go. Some believe. Some don’t. Some believe, are baptized, and saved. Some do not believe and are condemned. Why do some believe and some don’t? Why is this one saved, but that one is condemned?

This is the kind of question that is getting very close to God’s majesty, which is far above us. Does a toddler need to understand the whys and how-comes of its parents? What would even this world come to if adults were constricted in their actions by what was understandable to toddlers? How, then, can God be constricted in his actions by what is understandable or acceptable to us? Toddlers might think that they are geniuses. Does that, in fact, make them geniuses? We might think that we know the difference between good and evil. We might think we know how God should act and what he should do, but is this actually the case? Do we know better than God?

Indeed, thinking you are wiser than God’s Word is the reason why people do not believe. They are blinded by the god of this age, the devil, who is an exceedingly proud spirit. Unbelievers, following the lead of their master, are so proud of their wisdom and reasoning that if anything should ever contradict their reasoning, then it has to go. If they can’t understand anything and everything about God and his will, then that must be some kind of myth or fable.

What matters, however, is not what I think is true, or what you think is true. We could both be mistaken. What matters is what is actually true. The truth of things is true totally independent of what I or you might think.

For example, let’s say I have a 100 dollar bill. It’s perfectly authentic and legal tender. But for some reason I don’t believe that it is true. Since I don’t believe that it is true, I flush it down the toilet. That 100 dollar bill used to be mine. It was completely authentic and true. It would have bought whatever I would have wanted to buy with it. However, since I didn’t believe that it was true, it came to be of no use to me.

Now did my unbelief change the nature of the 100 dollar bill? Did my unbelief make the 100 dollar bill cease to be a 100 dollar bill? No. The 100 dollar bill continued to be as authentic and true as it ever was as it passed through the sewer pipes. However, my unbelief made that 100 dollar bill to be of no use to me.

Let’s use another example, this one from the Bible. God commanded Noah to build an ark in order to escape his waters of judgment upon the overwhelming sin of the earth. Noah and his family had God’s promise. God said the ark would work. It would carry them through and save them. But let’s suppose that one of those 8 individuals came to believe that the ark was worthless. The ark wouldn’t save them. So they jump off the ark and perish in the water. Now whose fault would that be? Is that the ark’s fault? Did it become somehow less salvific? No. The ark remained what it always was—God’s salvation.

So it is with God’s salvation in Christ. God has completely and fully saved and forgiven all people through the wonderfully rich and effective blood of his own Son. God’s grace and power is such that it is like an ocean, whereas the sin of the entire world is but a spark. God completely and totally triumphed over sin, death, and the devil so that the objective proclamation of reconciliation with God and eternal life in heaven may be made by the Holy Spirit. This proclamation is authentic and true.

Nobody’s belief or unbelief can change what God has done. However, a person’s unbelief makes it so that this objectively true salvation is flushed down the toilet so to speak, or a person jumps off the ark into the waters of damnation. Why does a person do that? Because they believed lies. Who is the great liar? That liar and murderer, the devil, who particularly specializes in spiritual things.

So how do we thwart the devil? This is a very important and practical question. The devil is our enemy. How can we not be taken in by his lies? The answer is by believing that the parakelet, the Comforter, speaks the objective truth about the forgiveness Jesus worked for all people. We must set aside our proud, toddler-ish thoughts, and believe that God knows what he is doing when he announces our salvation in Jesus Christ. Let God be true and every man a liar. Trust God more than you even trust yourself.

It is an astounding thing that you have been given the message of God’s sure and certain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. It is astounding that the Holy Spirit sidles up to you and testifies that this is yours. Though you are a sinner, you are not a sinner. Though you are mortal, you are immortal. Though you are God’s enemy, you are God’s beloved child. There is no doubt or chance in your salvation because God has done it all for you. This is a message that is of cosmic importance. It lasts eternally. No greater message could ever be given to any person.

But how easily despised and disbelieved this message can be too. So it goes. A countless multitude lived at the time of Noah, but only eight souls in all were saved. Abraham pleaded for Sodom to be saved for the sake of 50, then 45, then 40, then 30, then 20, then 10. If ten could be found who believed, then Sodom and Gomorrah would have been saved. But only Lot and his daughters were saved. Jesus says that at the end of the world it will be like it was at the time of Noah and at the time of Sodom. People will be busy. They will be buying and selling, eating and drinking, making memories, but caring nothing for God and his Word. If this doesn’t accurately describe the times that we are living in, then I don’t know what could.

That is why it is important that you do not despise God’s proclamation of salvation or put God to the test. God has done this for you. It is true, even though none of us toddlers can completely understand it. Although our salvation is so profound that no one can completely understand it—not even the angels—nevertheless, even children and handicapped people can grasp it. The simplest and least clever people can understand that Jesus is their Savior.

The spreading abroad of the Gospel that began at Pentecost and continues to this very day is wonderful. Do not be taken in by thoughts of your own cleverness or by demanding that everything is supposed to go how you think it should. What a wonderful thing it is that you have been baptized. What a wonderful thing it is to eat Christ’s body and drink his blood. What a true and objective salvation is given to you by these things! Be at peace. It is for you.

220529 Sermon on John 17:20-26 (Easter 7) May 29, 2022

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In our Gospel reading Jesus prays for unity. He prays that we should be one. Jesus says, “May they all be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I am in you. May they also be one in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me.” The unity that Jesus is praying for is of a peculiar sort. He is praying for a unity that is by faith, which is unseen. The unity that we naturally think of is one that we can see. This unity that we can see however, has never existed from the beginning. From the beginning there has not been unity when it comes to God, but rather division.

Adam and Eve became disunited with God. Their sons were disunited. Cain went one way, Abel and Seth went another. When God brought together a people at the time of Moses, they weren’t very united. Even in the leadership there was division. Moses was on top of Mt. Sinai, but what was Aaron doing down below? Fashioning a golden calf. Later Miriam and Korah rebelled against Moses.

Even after Jesus says this prayer, it can seem as though Jesus’s prayer was not heard whatsoever because there does not appear to be unity. Already at the time of the apostles there was division over what to do about the Gentiles and the Law. For several centuries after that there were divisions among the Christians about the two natures of Christ and the Trinity. The eastern church and the western church split in 1054. The Reformation, starting in 1517, brought with it more division. Today the church has been splintered into tiny pieces. It is even the doctrine and practice of our church to recognize these differences and practice closed communion. We do not join in communion with those we disagree with.

It seems as though we have failed horribly. Where’s the oneness? We are supposed to be one. So how do we fix this? One way that appears to solve the problem is just to drop whatever disputes we might have with one another and other churches and join together. Jesus prays that we should be one, so we should make ourselves be one.

There was, in fact, a very powerful movement in the 1900s that took up this very idea. It was called the ecumenical movement. At the beginning of the 1900s some churchmen started to call for greater unity. We have to get past our petty differences. If we Christians would join together we would become more powerful. This idea was immediately attractive because the more people you have the stronger you feel. Given the choice, everyone prefers to feel stronger rather than weaker. So this ecumenical movement really caught on. In the 1900s churches merged and merged and merged yet again. Church organizations got bigger and bigger.

There is nothing wrong, per se, with church mergers. It is not wrong for Christians to join together. In fact, we are duty-bound to recognize fellowship and unity whenever the Holy Spirit creates this oneness by his Word. But that is not how the ecumenical movement went about things. It takes time and a lot of teaching and hard work to bring about true unity in the Word of God. What happened with the ecumenical movement is that they ended up setting aside differences and disagreements. It doesn’t matter if one group teaches one thing and another group teaches something else. What should unite us is more important than whatever should divide us. So instead of getting to the bottom of things, discovering the truth of things, the opposite happened. Church bodies just agreed to disagree.

This may certainly sound like a good idea. We do this kind of thing all the time in life in order to create and maintain unity in other things. Here, though, we are dealing with something that is different. The unity that Jesus is praying for is not of an outward sort, but a unity of faith in him. Christians having their oneness in one another is one thing. Christians having their oneness in Jesus is another.  Jesus is not praying that there be one outward group. (There never as been one, perfectly united outward group.) Jesus prays that Christians would be one in him. He says, “May they all be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I am in you. May they also be one in us.” The unity is oneness in God. May we be one with him. May we be one with his will, just as the Son’s will is the same as the Father’s will. The only way that Christians may know the will of God is by his Word. The way we may be joined with that will of God is by the Holy Spirit working in that Word.

What happened with the ecumenical movement, however, is actually the opposite of this. God’s Word got pushed to the side. Folks might disagree about baptism, so let’s not talk about baptism. Folks might disagree about the Lord’s Supper, so let’s not talk about that. The agreeing to disagree meant that anything that was disagreed about not discussed, or was watered down. The goal of outward unity was more important than true and honest agreement in the Word of God. What God actually says was pushed further and further away.

Let me pause to point out how there is a part of each and every one of us that really likes having God’s Word pushed to the side. Our flesh, our Old Adam, never has liked God’s Word, does not like it now, and never will like it. All the way to the grave our flesh hates the third commandment. God’s Word is either extremely boring to our flesh, or, if the Word hits home and condemns us, we hate that too and say that it is meddlesome and trouble-making. It is not improving our quality of life. Which one of you likes to be condemned and shown to be a sinner?

So when the ecumenical movement comes along and says that we don’t need to study God’s Word, studying God’s Word only creates disagreements, and I’m fine, you’re fine, and everybody’s fine, let everyone believe and do as he or she wishes, and let’s all take communion together, our flesh is totally on board with all that. Who wants to tell others that they are wrong? They won’t like that! Who wants to turn people away from communion? I assure you, that’s no fun! So let’s all just agree to disagree and get busy with the things that really matter in life.

Again, however, this is not the oneness that Jesus is talking about. It is not a oneness with him, but with our own false ideas of what is good enough for being a Christian. It is not a oneness with God’s will, which can only be known by God’s Word. In fact, God’s Word has purposely been watered down and set aside so that we can pretend that we are all one. Honest discussions of God’s Word would show that we are in fact and in truth not one, so to keep up the pretense honestly looking into God’s Word must be discouraged or even condemned as unloving.

Here I hope you can see the hoof-prints of the devil. What could possibly be better for him than that the Word of God be silenced and to have churches be places where people talk about how good and loving and nice and modern they all are? Show me where God’s Word says that we are good people. You aren’t going to find it. What God’s Word does say is that we are dead and lost in our trespasses and sins. It says that we have no hope whatsoever in anything except the one Savior Jesus Christ. God’s Word is meant to make us feel uncomfortable with ourselves and with anything that we might believe in so that we become one with Jesus. He alone will not disappoint us.

When Jesus prays that we Christians would all be one, he is praying that we would all be one through faith in him. The oneness that he is talking about is not an outward political or group unity. There has never been true outward unity from the time of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, all the way through the whole Bible, up to the present day.

On the other hand, at the same time, there always has been the unity that Jesus is praying for in our Gospel reading. From the time of Adam and Eve until now there have been souls who have been converted. The Holy Spirit through the Word of God has rather impolitely convicted them of their sin and unbelief and shown them the death and hell that will be the inevitable result if they continue in their ways, but the Word of God also announces God’s saving will in Jesus. He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He is the Lamb of God who makes peace, who becomes one with us. We are one with him, and through Jesus, we are one with God. This is a unity that is not just for this life, but one that is eternal.

This is what the Holy Christian Church is. The Holy Christian Church is those who believe in Jesus. The Holy Christian Church consists of the sheep who hear the voice of the Good Shepherd and follow him. The Holy Christian Church is not this outward group of people or that outward group of people. It was not even the nation of Israel in the Bible. The apostle Paul says that not all the physical descendants of Abraham were real descendants of Abraham. The real descendants of Abraham lived by faith and were counted as righteous.

The same thing is true with our congregation. Not everyone who is a member of a congregation is a member of the Holy Christian Church. There are hypocrites and unbelievers in congregations. A person who relies upon their membership in a congregation for their salvation is terribly deceived. No congregation has that power. The only thing that is saving about any congregation is that, God willing, God has put his means of grace there. God willing, a congregation has true baptism. God willing, a congregation has the true Lord’s Supper. God willing, God has his Word in a congregation through which the Holy Spirit converts those whom he has chosen so that they put their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.

As members of this congregation it is the duty and responsibility of all of us to keep the Word of God pure and true no matter how offensive that might be to unbelievers, and that we administer the sacraments as Jesus instituted them. This is our highest and most important responsibility because it is by the Word of God alone that anybody can be turned away from false gods to the one true God to enjoy eternal unity with him. If this Word of God is present, then salvation remains possible. If the Word of God is watered down and taken away, then such a congregation is dead even if outwardly it looks vibrant and powerful.

Realize that as we carry out this high and holy duty that we are going to have trouble. Do you think that the devil wants a congregation to exist that takes away his power? Enemies from within and from without will want God’s Word to be silenced. The world, also, will not want such a congregation to exist because the world does not want to be condemned for their unbelief in Jesus. And even our own flesh will not want us to live up to our high and holy calling. Our flesh is lazy. Our flesh is either bored by God’s Word or deeply insulted by it. Our flesh does not want to suffer the troubles or scorn or condemnations of those offended by the truth. If we silence or set aside God’s Word we can avoid all of that. But, having gained some worldly peace, we will have forfeited our eternal peace.

Therefore we pray that God’s will should be done on earth as it is in heaven! In this petition we pray that the God would break and hinder every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature, which do not want us to hallow God’s Name or let his kingdom come, and that he strengthen and keep us firm in his Word and faith until we die.

God’s Word must wrestle with us, offending us sometimes, making us mad sometimes, but hopefully making us change our ways. When people are offended by the Word of God we should not be surprised. Hopefully the Word of God has offended you from time to time, otherwise perhaps your heart has been hardened! When the Word of God offends us the Holy Spirit is attacking our faith in lies, so that we may become one with the truth, who is Jesus.

Jesus’s prayer is quite needful for us, therefore. Jesus’s prayer is not that we would become one by ignoring God’s Word. Jesus’s prayer is that we would become one in him. The way we become one in him is by the Holy Spirit working through his Word. This is eternal. It is more important than anything and everything else.