Sermon manuscript:
When I give Christian instruction with the Catechism I warn
against using the phrase: “I swear to God.” Very often this phrase becomes a
kind of verbal tick. It is similar to how people can fall into the habit of
saying, “Oh my God,” or “Jesus,” when they are not in fact calling upon God for
help in their trouble. They are taking God’s Name in vain, that is, to no
purpose. It is a misuse of God’s Name when we say his Name and don’t really
mean it. God says in his Ten Commandments that he will not hold the person
guiltless who misuses his Name. So if you say, “I swear to God,” you better be
serious, saying something serious and very solemn, such as you would if you
were giving testimony in court after having sworn to God. That is the purpose
for swearing. It is to say something very serious and truthful.
So what would it mean for God to swear? That is what you
heard God do in our first reading from Genesis. We say, “I swear to God,”
because by doing so we are calling upon someone much greater than ourselves.
There is nothing greater than God, and so God swore by himself. Our reading
says, “I have sworn by myself, declares the Lord, because you have done this
thing and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will bless you greatly,”
and so on. Swearing means we are to be very serious and very truthful. God already
is always and only truthful. Then he swears on top of that. Then he makes his
promises to Abraham.
What would be the right way for Abraham to receive what God
had said? Abraham should believe it. And, in fact, Abraham did believe God, and
this was credited to him as righteousness. When God swears, you should believe
it. God wanted Abraham to believe his promises. That is why God swore by
himself. God wanted Abraham to have complete and unshakeable hope that God
would do what he has promised. And, of course, since he is God, God can and
will keep his promises.
Likewise, you should believe what God has said to you. God
has baptized you into his own holy Name. You were baptized in the Name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Recall what Jesus and the
Scriptures say about that baptism. It is a new birth, whereby you can see the
Kingdom of God. Flesh and blood cannot see the Kingdom of God. Only those born
by the water and the Holy Spirit may see the Kingdom of God. Your baptism is a
union with Christ. By baptism you are united with Christ in a death like his,
so you will be united with him in a resurrection like his. By being united with
Christ through baptism you receive everything that is his—you receive Jesus’s
victory over the devil and death, Jesus’s righteousness, Jesus’s eternal life.
All of this and more—in fact, everything—has been communicated to you in
baptism. You know God did this to you. God joined his promise to water, so that
it was not just words. It was an event. You know it happened. You need not have
any doubt.
I could speak more about baptism. I could speak very
similarly about the other sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. What tremendous
promises are given through the body and the blood! I could speak of promises
and declarations of Jesus and the Apostles that do not have the outward,
physical element of a sacrament.
So you should not foolishly think, “Wouldn’t it be nice to
be like Abraham? Wouldn’t it be nice for God to swear by himself, and then
promise to bless me?” That’s foolish because what has been communicated to you
isn’t in any way inferior to what was communicated to Abraham. If anything, you
have promises and signs that are more profound. What can be more profound than
being joined together with God’s Son or eating his body and drinking his blood?
God has made his promises to you. He has an inheritance for you that is
infinitely greater than the land of Canaan, which he promised to Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob. God solemnly and truthfully wants you to believe in this
hope.
May you be like Abraham. He believed God and it was credited
to him as righteousness. May you be like Abraham, but it is harder than it
sounds. Believing sounds like it should be easy, but, in fact, it must be
worked by the Holy Spirit if it is to be genuine. For some reason we don’t tend
to think, first and foremost, of God’s promises to us when we think about being
Christians. When, for example, was the last time that you thought about all
those riches of baptism that I laid out for you a minute ago? When was the last
time you thought about you personally being united to Christ, united in his
death, united in his resurrection, everything that Christ has is yours? Has it
been a while?
What, perhaps, have you been thinking about instead? Maybe
you’ve been saying to yourself or to God, “Well, you see, I’ve been working on
this self-improvement project, and that self-improvement project. I’ve almost
licked this bad habit, and that bad habit is next on my list.” So on and so
forth. By the way we talk to ourselves about ourselves, about our Christianity,
you might be led to believe that our hope is not in what God can do for us, but
in what we can do for ourselves—as though, first and foremost, we must be
trying harder. That is ridiculous, however, if you’ll only think about it.
Imagine if Abraham had done that. God swears by himself,
solemnly and truthfully: “I am going to bless you. I’m going to bless you like
crazy.” And then Abraham responds by saying, “Well, you see, I’ve got this
little project I’m working on for myself. I’ve made myself a list and every
morning…” If Abraham were to respond to God in such a way, we’d have to say,
“Uh, Abraham, I don’t think you’re paying attention. Didn’t you just hear what
God said? Why are you talking about yourself?”
Abraham’s strength and our strength is not and never will be
in ourselves. The strength of God’s people is and always will be in the
promises of God. God says, “I have done this and that for you. I am doing this
and that for you. I will do this and that for you.” God’s actions—past,
present, and future—are our hope as Christians. God’s actions, promised to us
in his Word, are what will make good things happen for us, and not our own
actions.
Christians, first and foremost, are receivers instead of
doers. You see this in Abraham. God chose Abraham. God made his promises to
Abraham. It was all up to God. So it is also with you. God chose you. God has
made his promises to you. Why? Because God loves the unloveable. God loves you.
God loves his Son, Jesus, who has joined himself to us sinners. God, then, accordingly,
speaks lovingly to us.
You are receivers of God’s love through his promises. I’d
like to remind you to enjoy that. God’s enemies, including our own sinful
flesh, do not want us to meditate on such things. God’s enemies want us to
think about almost anything else besides God’s solemn and truthful promises of
grace and salvation. God’s enemies would rather us think about our
self-improvement projects, if they can’t get us to think of anything
nastier—anything that will keep us from meditating on God’s message of love to
us sinners. I’m quite sure that God’s enemies are to blame for why we don’t
think often on God’s promises. But we should. And it’s good.
We will meditate on mere human words of love or human
promises. I’m sure there’s been times when someone you respect or love has said
something nice to you. We like to mull those words over in our mind. We look at
them from this angle, and from that angle. Or they’ve promised you something.
With human promises, we don’t even know if they can be delivered, and yet we
mull them over. How will it be? What will it look like?
That is what you should do with God’s promises to you. Not
only can you do this, it is, in fact, your strength as a Christian. The more
you think about God’s promises to you, the better off you’ll be. The hope you
have in God’s promises is like an anchor for the soul, as our reading from
Hebrews says. That anchor of hope holds firm and sure in God, who does not lie.
The anchor holds no matter how hard the cold winds blow. This is what we see in
Abraham and in all the examples of faith in the Bible. Their hope held firm in
God’s promise of grace to them. God was for them, they believed. Many and
various things happened to them—even horrifying and tragic things occasionally
happened to them—but God remains faithful.
So do not imagine that it is indulgent or a waste of time to
mull over and savor the goodness of God’s promises to you. The more you think
about what God has done to you and will do to you in baptism, the better. The
more you believe that the body and the blood of Christ is effectual,
beneficial, and salutary, the better. That is your strength. Hope is your
strength. God will not disappoint you when you hope in him.
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