230813 Sermon on Peter walking on water (Pentecost 11) August 13, 2023

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“Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you.”

Let’s begin by setting the scene. Our Gospel reading today picks up where last week’s reading left off. Last week Jesus fed the 5,000 with five loaves and two fish. Immediately after that, as we heard in today’s reading, Jesus sent the disciples off in a boat on the sea of Galilee. Jesus went up on a mountain by himself to pray. He was praying by himself well into the night.

While Jesus was praying, the disciples were in the boat, but the wind was giving them trouble. The wind was making big waves. The wind was blowing against the boat. The wind was whistling in their ears. They were out there all night long, battling that wind. The fourth watch of the night finally came, which in our time would be somewhere between 3 AM and 6 AM.

It was at this time that Jesus came towards the disciples in the boat walking on the water. The disciples must have been very tired, given what time it was. They had to have been frustrated that their journey was not going well. When they see Jesus they don’t recognize him. They thought he was a ghost. And that’s understandable. People can’t walk on water.

So try to put yourselves in the disciples’ shoes. This was a very unpleasant, even dangerous situation. It’s dark. The wind’s howling. The waves are crashing. They’re probably trying to keep the bow of the boat into the wind so that the bow can cut through the oncoming waves instead of being swamped by them. Then, to top it all off, there’s a stinking ghost. What else can go wrong?

Jesus’s words then break into the darkness, the wind, the confusion. He says, “Take heart, it is I, do not be afraid.” It is good to spend a little time here on Jesus’s words. The first thing that Jesus says is, “Take heart.” That means, “Be courageous.” The disciples were in trouble. Jesus tells them to have courage.

Why should they have courage? Jesus says, “It is I.” With the words, “It is I,” certainly Jesus is telling the disciples that he is no ghost. But Jesus might also be saying something more here too. What it says in Greek is: “Ego eimi.” Maybe some of you have heard that before. “Ego” is Greek for “I.” “Eimi” is Greek for “am.” So “ego eimi” means “I am.”

What is the significance of Jesus saying, “I am”? Perhaps you recall God identifying himself to Moses at the burning bush. Moses wanted to know what name he should give to the Israelites when they ask him who sent him. God responds, “I am who I am. Tell them that ‘I am’ has sent you.” “I am” is a name for God. Here Jesus says, “I am.”

So although Jesus doesn’t say many words, the few words he does say are powerful: “Be courageous. I am. Do not be afraid.” “Be courageous because I am who I am. I am God. Do not be afraid.”

It appears that Jesus’s message hit home with Peter by his reaction, which you might say is unusual. He says to Jesus, “If it is you, Lord, then command me to come to you on the water.” Remember all the stuff that is going on around them. The wind and the waves have not stopped. The wind is howling. They were shouting just to hear one another.

Peter’s mind, however, has been taken away from what was happening around him. The cares and concerns that have kept them up all night long recede into the background of his mind. He has an audacious idea. Peter believes in the “I am.” So he has the courage to step out of that rocking and swirling boat onto the tempestuous sea.

I’d like to point out that there is an obvious alternative to Peter’s plan. The alternative would be to focus on what was going on around him. He could have said to Jesus, “Can’t you make this wind stop that’s been tormenting us all night long? Can’t you see we’re suffering!? Make it stop! We loathe this worthless sea voyage, which, by the way, you put us on.” The sensible thing would be to get the wind and the waves to stop. That’s what a responsible person would do.

The responsible person seems to be proven right, also, by what ends up happening. You know how the story goes. He ends up sinking! So a responsible person might say, “See, first things first. Get rid of the waves.” But there’s more to the story than that. Peter did end up sinking. He had to cry out: “Lord, save me!” But before that he was walking on the water and was making his way towards Jesus. Maybe if Peter had sunk like a stone the second he stepped out of the boat those responsible people would have a point, but for a time Peter believed, and it was glorious.

Now when it comes to applying what we hear in this Gospel reading to ourselves, the applications are almost innumerable. This is a very rich text and could teach us many things. But I’d like to focus just on Peter’s reaction and how we might imitate him so that something glorious might take place in our lives too.

We all, like Peter had with the wind and the waves, we all have our troubles and frustrations. If we thought hard enough we could all come up with a good long list of stuff that we’d like to have different. All of us would have minor stuff. Maybe we would have some terribly, terribly big stuff too. Maybe your life is in danger of being lost—not by wind and waves, but by disease. Perhaps more important than merely surviving, though, are all the relationships in our lives. Maybe you are estranged from someone. There’s a cold war happening in your family or in your house. We all have our cares and worries of every kind, and perhaps they are so bad we haven’t been able to make headway no matter how hard we try. It’s the fourth watch of the night. When is it ever going to end?

Then, to top it all off, Jesus can show up in a sense, similar to how he did with the disciples. What I mean is that Jesus can make himself and his will known to us, and what Jesus says is not always welcome. His thoughts on life are usually not our thoughts. How he says we should live our lives can seem impractical, impossible, otherworldly—ghostly. He tells us, for example, that we should forgive those who trespass against us. What should we do with those who have hurt us? We should do good to them and love them. Love, in general, would be Jesus’s way. Can’t go wrong with love.

To which we might sensibly respond, “Don’t you know what’s been going on with me? Don’t you know the hell I’ve been through? I’m just trying to survive. How dare you ask anything more of me?” Away with you, you ghost! You’re not here to help us. You’re just making it worse!

But Jesus doesn’t remain a ghost to the disciples, nor does he wish to remain a ghost to us. He tells us who he is so that we may believe in him. He says, “Be courageous. I am God. Do not be afraid.” Faith comes first. The life of love, especially to our enemies and to those who have hurt us, would be as impossible as walking on water if faith did not come first.

And faith in Jesus is always good and gracious. All the disciples were probably relieved to hear Jesus’s voice, but Peter did something more. He also gave up worrying about himself. You will never be harmed by believing in Jesus. But believing in Jesus will mean that the other things that are going on with you will need to be pushed to the background.

Imagine if Peter didn’t react the way he did, but responded differently. Imagine if he faintly, distantly heard Jesus say what he said, but instead of taking it to heart he would have been too busy with the boat. Look! See there. The bow is turning against the wind! The wind is going to push us sideways! Look at the wave that’s coming. It’s going to sink us! Everybody on the left row forward! Everybody on the right row backwards! Row for your lives!

Can’t you see how something like that could happen? Not only could it happen, it’s what comes naturally to us. We believe that we must solve all our own problems. How are we going to solve them? How about we start by obsessing over them? That’s what responsible people do. It’s irresponsible, in a sense, to move all thoughts to the background and focus on Jesus and his words to us. But that’s what faith does.

Faith in Christ requires us to push all kinds of important and seemingly relevant thoughts to the background. You must, for example, set aside the sins that you’ve committed. Either your sins are supreme and you should worry yourself to death about them, or Jesus is supreme.

Or how about your failures? If you’ve failed at love, failed at business, failed at life, either this is going to be the supreme thing in your life or Jesus. But maybe you’re more of an upbeat sort of person. You’ve succeeded at life. You’ve take those waves head on and sailed right through!

There’s no stopping the wind though. Death must relentlessly and ruthlessly take its prey. There’s no stopping that no matter how many waves you’ve made it through. Let’s turn that on its head, though, and say, “I’ve only got one life to live so I’m going to be glorious!” All that is still just playing around with the oars and the rigging.

By nature, with our unbelief, we can’t do anything different. We can’t help but mess around with all the things in our life. We want to decrease that long list of stuff we’d like to have different. So we pull on this and move that. Patch and mend and reinvent ourselves. Motivate, educate, reinvigorate.

Or, on the other hand—and this makes up no small number—we’re tired of all that. We sit hunched on the bench, staring at the hapless rudder and the flapping of sails.

These two ways of being seem so different from one another, but really they’re not. Whether we’re busy or whether we’ve given up—it makes no difference ultimately—the boat is doomed if Jesus is not there. “Moth and rust destroy; thieves break in and steal.” But what if there were something more important, more life-giving, outside the boat?

And there is! Jesus does not come from inside the boat, from inside this life. Jesus comes from heaven. And here’s the amazing thing: We’re safer with Jesus. Peter held on to that strange thought for quite some time as he was making his way towards Jesus. All the disciples would have been safer with Jesus than they ever were in the boat. But, boy!, is it ever hard for us to believe that. It was hard for Peter too. He looked at the wind and the waves. We’re not told this by the text, but maybe there was a huge wave coming towards him, towering way above him. He shouldn’t have doubted, but can any of us blame him? We are cut from the same cloth. “Lord, save us!”

The truth remains, though, despite how we feel: You are safer with faith in Jesus than you are in any other possible place. Jesus is the great “I am.”

“Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you.”

230806 Sermon on Matthew 14:13-21 (Pentecost 10) August 6, 2023

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Jesus said, “The things which are impossible with man are possible with God.”

In our Gospel reading today we are told about an impressive miracle. There is a very large crowd. Maybe we can use our imagination to get a mental picture of this crowd. The crowd would have been about the size of all the residents of Fairmont. Our town has about 10,000 people. At the end of our reading it says that there were about 5,000 men, not counting the women and children. So if you took every last person who lives in our town, and maybe add a little bit more, then you’d have an idea of how large this crowd was.

The occasion for Jesus’s dealings with this crowd is that they heard Jesus was able to do miracles. They heard that Jesus was able to cast out demons, give hearing to the deaf, sight to the blind, preach the good news to the poor, and so on. So although Jesus had taken a boat on the Sea of Galilee, to go to a deserted place to pray, the people had followed him, going great distances so that he could help them.

So, maybe we could get a picture of this in our mind’s eye: It would be like the whole town of Fairmont were to leave their homes and walk out to a deserted place. Just so that we have the same place in mind, let’s imagine all of Fairmont walking east of town on the highway until they got to the Fairmont airport. There you have a nice, big stretch of grass. The whole town is gathered out there. When Jesus comes and sees the crowd with all their needs he has compassion. He begins to heal and help the people gathered there.

It seems that this went on for many hours. The disciples can see that there are too many people and not enough time. Night was coming and the people needed to walk back that distance to get home. So they told Jesus that it was time for the town of Fairmont to walk back home. They had to have been hungry. Once they got to town they could stop at Arby’s or Taco John’s.

Jesus must have surprised them when he said, “They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat.” What could Jesus possibly be referring to? You’re out at the airport. There isn’t any food out there. There aren’t any stores out there. There’s just a bunch of grass. “You give them something to eat,” Jesus said. Ok. How?

In John’s Gospel the apostle Philip says, “Two hundred denarii wouldn’t buy enough bread so as to give each of them even just a little.” To put that into today’s terms, “$20,000 wouldn’t be enough to give them all just half a sandwich.” And that’s quite right. There’s not just the lack of available food. There’s also the lack of funding. Tens of thousands of dollars would need to be spent for even something meager.

As it turned out, though, they did have something meager. They had five loaves and two fish. When Jesus heard that they had this, he was satisfied: “That’ll work. Bring me the bread and the fish.”

Then Jesus ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. They were going to have supper. The people probably were as baffled at that idea as the disciples were. Where’s the food? Then Jesus took the five loaves and the two fish and he looked up to heaven and said a blessing. We are not told the words of that blessing, but this is not something unfamiliar to us. Our table prayers are blessings. Essentially a blessing is asking for God’s goodness to be present. Jesus blessed the bread and the fish.

Then the miracle happened, and it isn’t perfectly clear to me how it happened in my mind’s eye. It says that “he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up twelve baskets full of the broken pieces left over.” It doesn’t sound like $50,000 worth of bread and fish suddenly showed up so that there was a mountain of provisions that were then distributed. It sounds like Jesus broke the loaves, giving pieces to the disciples, and that when they came back to Jesus he always was able to give them more to distribute.

In a way the miracle is quite humble. The actions involved are quite humble. A mountain of food doesn’t suddenly appear. There’s only breaking and giving, breaking and giving, until everyone has had more than enough. On the other hand, this miracle is arguably grander than anything that Jesus had done up to this point. Jesus had already done miracles for this individual and that individual. The feeding of the 5,000 was for a huge crowd, the whole town of Fairmont and more.

Having gone through what happened, what can we learn from this? This shows that Jesus has power and authority in his creation. We all know that it is not in the nature of bread or of fish to spontaneously multiply. In physics there is a law called the conservation of matter. The law says that if you start out with a certain amount of material, you are going to end up with the same amount of material no matter what you do to it. You might change it from one thing to another, but you can never make something out of nothing.

God, on the other hand, is well acquainted with making things out of nothing. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. This means that he made them out of nothing. In fact, the laws that we have in physics or thermodynamics or what have you were created by God too. The Creator of these laws is not bound by these laws like we are.

When Jesus creates more bread and fish than what was originally there, he is making use of power and authority that belong to God alone. That which is impossible with man is possible with God. There are other passages that are applicable here too.

When Jesus rose from the dead and before he ascended into heaven the apostles met him on a mountain in Galilee. Jesus said to them: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples, and so on.” The part I want to emphasize is that first part: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus.” This is also what is important with Jesus reigning and ruling at the right hand of God the Father. The right hand of God the Father is not so much a physical location. It is the position of authority, God’s right hand man, so to speak.

Paul in his letter to the Colossians talks about the extent of Jesus’s power and authority. Jesus created all things, visible and invisible. He is the creator of thrones, dominions, powers, and authorities. He is before all things and in him all things hold together. He is the first-born from the dead so that he might be preeminent over all things.

It is good that Jesus has this power and authority. It has always been good for him to have such power and authority. God already and ordinarily uses his power and authority in such a benevolent and life-giving way. Think of how he sustains life ordinarily and regularly. He’s like clockwork. He causes the seasons. He gives us our rain. He gives us our daily bread. In his ordinary way he provides for all the needs of body and soul for not just 5,000, but for billions.

What Jesus’s miracles reveal in addition, though, is that he can also circumvent the laws that he has put in place if he should so will it. It seems to us that the laws of physics are pretty well set in stone, but Jesus can alter them. Bread and fish spontaneously multiply when Jesus so wills it. He altered the laws involved in order to feed this great crowd of people.

Jesus can also do this for us, if need be. That’s something always to keep in mind. If we should be in need we can lift our eyes to heaven and ask him for help. We should especially be confident when we pray to him for the things we know he wishes us to have. If we pray the words of the Lord’s Prayer, for example, we should have no doubt that our prayers will be heard, because he himself taught us to pray in this way and promised to hear us. I can’t be as certain about being able to feed the town of Fairmont or the other things that Jesus did. If the need was there, though, that might be a different matter, as we see miracles being done by God for his people throughout the Bible. Laws can still be circumvented today if Jesus should so will it.

But we might not experience the kinds of miracles that we hear about in the Bible. Realize that the people who lived in Bible times did not always experience the miracles you hear about in the Bible. Sometimes many generations would pass, hundreds of years, when the Bible doesn’t record even a single miracle. It’s not the miracles that are important, but the relationship we have with God that’s important.

But regardless of whether we experience the kind of miracles you hear about in the Bible you should know that greater things lie in our future—especially in the end times. The Scriptures say, “No eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the imagination of the heart of man what God has prepared for those who love him.” Jesus has the power and authority to feed the 5,000. We can imagine that. You will experience much greater things—things beyond our imagining.

For example, you will experience Jesus breaking the law of death for you. Things that are dead are supposed to stay dead. That’s a law. Things that are dead do not have life, they have the opposite. The decompose and decay even further. Jesus, however, has the power and authority to give life to the dead. Scripture says that when he comes he will change our lowly bodies to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him to subdue all things to himself. He’s going to use his power and authority to make our worn out, crumbling, sin-infested bodies to be like his glorious, holy body.

In summary, it is right to consider Jesus’s miracle of feeding the 5,000 to be impressive. It is impressive. It was impressive to those who ate and were satisfied. They were all astounded, just as we would be too if we were gathered together with him at the airport. But better and more unusual things lie ahead for us in our relationship with Jesus. What seems to be unchangeable, inalterable, unredeemable, is not impossible with God. The dead will rise. The perishable will put on the imperishable. The mortal will put on immortality. The power that Jesus used with the 5,000 will be used in an even greater way on each of you and to your eternal benefit.

Jesus said, “The things that are impossible with man are possible with God.”

230730 Sermon on Matthew 13:44-52 (Pentecost 9) July 30, 2023

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For the past few weeks our Gospel readings have been from Matthew chapter 13. This chapter has a bunch of parables about the Kingdom of Heaven. So you heard about the kingdom of heaven being like a farmer who sows his seed so that it falls on all kinds of different soils. You heard about the kingdom of heaven being like a field that was sown with good seed, but the enemy came and sowed weed seed.

With our reading today we are at the end of this section of parables. We have three more parables about what the kingdom of heaven is like. It’s like a man who found a treasure in the field. He sells all he has so that he can buy that field. It’s like a pearl merchant who finds a pearl of great value. He sells all that he has so that he can buy the pearl. Finally the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet that pulls in all kinds of different things. Only when it’s all brought to shore is the good separated from the bad.

I’d like to begin today by talking about the parable that seems the most straight-forward, which would be the second one. A pearl merchant, who travels hither and yon buying and selling pearls, finally comes upon one that he simply has to have. He liquidates his inventory. He sells his property. He empties his bank account. He buys it.

Jesus’s parables almost always have some kind of twist, something unexpected, and the thing that is unexpected here is that this is no way to run a jewelry business. Someone has said, “The business of business is business.” This fellow no longer is interested in making money. He couldn’t make money even if he wanted to. He doesn’t have anything left except this pearl which he presumably won’t sell at any price.

The only explanation for this merchant’s strange behavior is love. He loves that pearl. He loves it so much that he sells everything that he has so as to buy it. He is willing to live as a poor person, with all the deprivations that go along with having no money, because of his love.

This might seem like a harmless little story, but that’s not how people are with money and business. There is a rule seemingly come down from heaven above that a person or a business must always be making more and more money. If you aren’t always making more money, then you’re a loser. So for this fellow to check out of the money making business because of love sounds ridiculous. It sounds like something a Liberal Arts major might do. People like that are always poor.

Since this mentality is so strong and so widespread I’m a little nervous pointing out to you that you will not find even a hint of this seemingly heaven-sent rule in the Bible. Being money hungry is not a virtue in the Bible. It’s a vice.  Other things get praised in the Bible. These other things are not talked about as often in common conversation, nor are they taken very seriously. Stuff like: Love. Wisdom. Suffering. Weakness. Righteousness. Joy. Patience. Faith. Where do these things and more all come together? In the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. There, in the cross of Jesus, are all good things.

Just as a great many people could be disgusted with the love that this merchant has for that stupid pearl, so also a great many people could be disgusted by the love a person might have for the cross of Christ. How’s that cross going to make you any money? Plus, it’s not even pretty like a pearl. It’s bloody, gory. And it sends a bad message to kids. Jesus just takes it. He passively suffers. There’s no get up and go. What a worthless thing to throw one’s life away for.

So it goes, though, with the kingdom of heaven. Those whom God chooses love the cross of Jesus. If you sold everything that you had so as to have the cross of Christ, you would not be disappointed. There’d be a happy ending. The kingdom of heaven is like a merchant who found a pearl of great price, who sold everything that he had, and bought it.

Let’s move on to the first parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” This parable is not quite as pretty, not quite as pure as the story about the pearl. The morality police know that something’s not quite right here.

First of all, what is this man doing wandering around on somebody else’s property—and with a shovel no less! This is highly improper. Then, when he finds the treasure, he doesn’t inform the landowner. He buries it someplace else so that only he knows where it is.  

He’s tricky and clever in the way that he obtains the treasure. If he would have stolen the treasure as soon as he found it, people would have wondered where he got his new-found riches. But if he buys the whole field—maybe it was rumored that there was a treasure in there—if he buys the whole field he can say, “Look, here’s that treasure that everybody’s been wondering about and it’s all mine! Sure is a good thing that I had the good sense to buy it!” Then he could spend the treasure as though it were his very own even though it really was not. He cheated.

So how is this similar to the way the kingdom of heaven works? According to a certain way of thinking, there is something “dirty,” so to speak, about our salvation, about how we are judged before God. A classic definition of justice is that each should get as each deserves. So what would each deserve if each were to be judged by God?

Depends on the person, right? Some are good. Some are bad. The good ones should be rewarded. The bad ones should be punished. The guy who owns the field should get the treasure. The guy who doesn’t own the field shouldn’t get the treasure.

But what God reveals about the way he judges is that there is a righteousness available that doesn’t depend upon how you have lived, whether you own any fields, or what you have done with your thoughts, words, and deeds. This righteousness is that available is the righteousness of Jesus—the righteousness of God himself. This treasure is given, possessed, and used by those who don’t deserve it.

There’s something of a scandal with the kingdom of heaven, with the Gospel. The scandal is that people don’t get what they deserve. Real sinners are declared by God to be righteous for Jesus’s sake. Why? Because God wants to.

This is similar to other parables of Jesus’s, such as the pharisee and the tax collector. A pharisee and a tax collector go up into the temple to pray. The Pharisee is a vastly superior human being compared to the thug of the tax collector. The pharisee thanks God that he is the way that he is. The tax collector prays, “Have mercy on me, a sinner, O Lord!” The tax collector goes to his home justified, that is, regarded by God as being righteous, rather than the pharisee.

It’s With the parable of the workers in the vineyard some workers go out first thing in the morning. Some at mid-day. Some work only one measly little hour. When it comes time to pay the workers they all get the same. Why? Because that’s what the owner of the vineyard wanted to do. He wanted to be generous. The owner says, “Can’t I do what I want with what belongs to me?”

So it is that people who truly have sinned, who have not right whatsoever to have any good thing, are given the perfect righteousness of God in Jesus.

Finally, the last parable is that the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet that pulls in everything that’s in the water no matter if it good or bad. It’s when the net is drawn on shore that the good are separated from the bad. “So it will be,” Jesus says, “at the close of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

This last parable shows us the seriousness and the importance to each individual of the kingdom of heaven. It appears so often to so many that God’s Word is at best some kind of old-fashioned hobby. We sit around and come up with interpretations and applications, but it doesn’t really matter to a person’s life. What really matters about life is making money. Or feeling good about yourself. Or having a good time. People will be serious about those things, but not about the kingdom of heaven.

What this parable points out is that whether we are good or bad, righteous or unrighteous, is of the utmost importance to our continued happiness at the close of the age. Either we will be gathered together with those who are good, or we will be cast in the fiery furnace where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.

And how is it that we will be righteous? It isn’t by making a lot of money. It isn’t by filling our life with pleasures. It isn’t even by trying our best to be a good person and never giving up. It’s by embracing the cross of Christ. It’s by believing that it is no longer you who are living, but Christ who lives within you. The life that you now live is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved you and gave himself for you. Because he did that, you have an inexhaustible treasure. That’s how a person will be judged by God as good.

At the close of the age, apart from Christ, even the most outstanding specimen of a human being will be like a piece of trash snagged up from the murky depths. On the other hand, even the foulest sinner who believes in Jesus will be righteous with God’s own righteousness that is freely communicated to him and held to by faith.

So let us be prepared for the dragnet that will pull us all on shore. Let us take refuge in Jesus our Savior.

230702 Sermon on Matthew 10:34-42 (Pentecost 5) July 2, 2023

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In the Name of Jesus

The words that Jesus said in our Gospel reading sound strange: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace to the earth, but rather a sword. I have come to set a son against his father and a daughter against her mother and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. A person’s enemies will be those of his own household.” These words sound strange. How can we understand them?

The context is important. Matthew chapter 10, which is where our reading came from, is when Jesus sent out his apostles to preach. He told them what they should preach. They should say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has drawn near.” In last week’s sermon I talked about what that message meant. “Repent,” means that you should change your ways. “The kingdom of heaven drawing near” means that God is coming. He comes to reign and rule. There will be judgement. Let the sinner sin no more, for we shall all be accountable to God for what we have done.

Already you can maybe see how this message would be opposed so as to cause division. People don’t like to be criticized. If you had done something that you wanted to do, and if I were to say to you, “You shouldn’t have done that!” You’d resent it. Maybe you’d say within yourself, “Who are you to judge? What, are you one of those ‘holier than thou’ people? Mind your own business!”

It’s amazing how deeply seated this attitude is. You can see it in three year olds. You see it in twelve year olds. You see it in eighty year olds. Our sinful flesh has this proud trait in it, which hates to be humbled and put to shame. No matter how sanctified a Christian might be, this trait is always there, ready to lash out against anyone who might suggest that you’ve done anything wrong.

So already you can see how division could happen with the apostles’ message. We don’t want to change. But there is another way that Jesus’s message, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near,” can cause even profounder divisions. It has to do with the way that we all construct meaning for our lives. Everybody has his or her own understanding of what life is all about. One might believe that life is for the purpose of accumulating wealth. Too much is never enough. Never give. Always only take.

Another might believe that what is most important about life is family. Family comes first. Often a certain look for the family is what is really meant. You have to have the perfect wedding. You have to have the perfect childhood. You have to be the perfect grandparents. Make the perfect memories, and make sure that you have the perfect pictures to prove it.

Another might believe that life is for the purpose of advancing mankind towards greatness. With continued investment in our sciences and technologies we can interface our brains with computers. Then, when our bodies wear out we can upload our consciousness to the cloud. We can live forever in some electronic form. This is but one of many such dreams that very talented people are working on.

Everybody has his or her own version of what life is for. Each seems to be tailored to what the person likes best, or is best at. These visions of what life is for are very serious. One’s view of what life is all about takes up that person’s money, labor, devotion, dreams of grandeur.

But then Christ the King comes. The kingdom of heaven draws near. And this kingdom of God claims absolute supremacy for itself. Every other view of life must bow before it. There is only one God, and there is only one Lord. The meaning of life is what you know from the Creed. God has made you and all creatures. God has redeemed you. The Son of God was born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried. He descended into hell. The third day he rose from the dead. He ascended into heaven where he sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. From thence he will come again to judge the living and the dead.

When the kingdom of God comes, when Jesus comes again to judge the living and the dead, then it won’t matter how advanced technology has become. It won’t matter if photo albums are filled with precious memories. It won’t matter how much wealth or how many computers and how many robots and how many gallons of oil we have managed to burn. Vastly more impressive things like the sun and the moon will even go wonky. There is no ruler, power, authority, or principality that will not be put under Jesus’s feet. Paul says every high and exalted thing must be torn down and be brought into submission to Christ. At the Name of Jesus every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

Does this vision of what life is all about sound ruthless? It doesn’t just sound ruthless, it is ruthless. God is unbelievably serious about the 1^st commandment: “You shall have no other gods.” How often do you think about that commandment? Not too often? And yet nobody escapes this commandment. God made you. He won’t share you with others. He says, “Behold, I the Lord your God am a jealous God.” That means that he won’t share you with any other meaning that might get constructed about life.

The Lord your God is a jealous God, but let us rightly understand that jealousy. This is not the jealousy of some petty tyrant. God’s jealousy is the jealousy of a lover. The book of the Bible called Song of Songs talks about God’s love for his church. Isaiah and Paul talk about God as a great lover too. God is a lover who ruthlessly seeks out his beloved. God woos, and courts, and loves his beloved. He’s downright obsessed. You are his, and he wants you.

And to have you, he sends his only begotten Son into the flesh. His perfect Son, whom he loves, who’s perfectly loveable, this perfect treasure who is worth more 10,000 worlds all heaped together, this Son comes in such a way where he becomes sin for us. He becomes a worm and no man, scorned by mankind and despised by all the people. God gives him into death, so that by his blood you may be presented before him without spot or wrinkle or any such thing.

God, this great adventurer, is not some apathetic bean-counter in the skies. God is the profoundest and activest lover there ever was. If we sold all we had so as to buy this pearl of great price, we would by no means be disappointed with what we ended up with.

But despite everything I have said to you about the greatness of God’s kingdom, there will still be those who reject this kingdom of heaven. The reasons for rejecting the kingdom of heaven vary and are as numerous as there are people. One will reject the kingdom of heaven because he wants to hold on to all of his money and property. You perhaps remember Jesus’s story of the rich man and Lazarus?

Another will reject the kingdom of heaven because she can’t stand the thought that a son or daughter is condemned through unbelief. Jesus really means it when he says, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” To love the created thing or the creature more than you love the One who did the creating is not allowed.

And yet, when I say this, I am not speaking as though this is just somebody else’s problem. The first commandment is our greatest problem too. We love the created thing rather than the Creator. What pulls us away from our devotion to him? What pulls us away from church? Isn’t it either the fun that we might attain for ourselves elsewhere? Or maybe there’s a school event, a sporting event, or work. And these are very important for the meaning we want to construct for our lives.

We have our Creator’s commandments, but we don’t want to change. We’re not so sure that we have to, first of all. Maybe we can get by without needing to. Plus we’re not so sure that God is always right with what he says. He’s maybe a little old fashioned? So we, the creature, will believe and act according to our own lights. It’s plain to see that we know how to despise the kingdom of God as well as anybody?

So when we hear from Jesus that he has come, not to bring peace but a sword, we should not think that he is just talking about horrible villains in far away places who hunt down Christians. The villains are much closer to home. “Your enemies,” Jesus says, “will be those under your own roof.” Maybe you can recognize the villain that is in your own heart. We shouldn’t talk about the kingdom of God only needing to come for other people, because, you see, we’re fine. We need it for ourselves. So, as we pray so often, “Thy kingdom come.”

The kingdom of God is such that he does not set out to exclude people. “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.” God wants all people to repent, come to a knowledge of the truth, and be saved.

But God also isn’t going to be embarrassed if people reject him because they love other inferior things more than they love him. Nobody is going to hurt God’s feelings by rejecting him. He has better things to do than to feel sorry for people who for whatever reason hate him and his love. He is the great lover. How could any great lover be derailed from pursuing his beloved by the bitter, sour faces of onlookers?

So we have this wonderful apostolic message before us today, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” My advice to you is that you join in on this glorious romp of our Lord Jesus’s. There’s no greater adventure in the cosmos than living under him in his kingdom and serving him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness. Lots of people can’t see this adventure. It is thoroughly hidden now, only to be more fully revealed in the last times. But it is as real and true as Jesus’s resurrection from the dead.

But if you don’t want to join in, then there’s only sad news for you. There’s no stopping this kingdom of God, even if you rage and fume like the devil so as to kill Christians left and right. It won’t do you any good! As Luther says in A Mighty Fortress, “And take they our life, goods, fame, child and wife—though these all be gone—our victory has been won. The kingdom ours remaineth.” God wins. Amen.

We stand to sing the offertory.

230625 Sermon on Matthew 10:21-33 (Pentecost 4) June 25, 2023

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“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

Our Gospel reading last week, our Gospel reading this week, and the reading that you will hear next week, is all from the same section. It is from when Jesus sent out his 12 apostles. He told them what they were supposed to do. They should tell people that the kingdom of heaven had drawn near. The kingdom of heaven has at its core the word kingdom. With kingdoms there is reigning and ruling. So with the kingdom of heaven drawing near that is another way of saying that the reigning and ruling of God is near.

That could be good news or bad news depending on what you think of the reigning and ruling of God. If you want God to come and rule over everything, then that message is good news. If you don’t want God and his ways to be uppermost, then this would be like hearing that a very powerful enemy was coming to get you.

This message that the apostles were given to preach was not unprecedented. It is very similar to the message that Jesus himself preached and John the Baptist preached. Jesus said, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near.” John the Baptist preached, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near.” They all said, “Repent,” which means, “Change your ways.” All people everywhere must change their ways. You must change your ways because you are not holy and perfect. God is coming.

But not everybody wants to change their ways. That’s an understatement, actually. The truth is that nobody wants to change their ways. The very reason why we have the ways that we have is because we like our ways. Nobody has to hold us down with our arms tied behind our backs so that we forget to pray. Nobody has to force us to roll our eyes at our parents. Nobody has to punish us and whip us so that we are forced to look at dirty things or gladly hear and learn dirty things with the latest dirty gossip. We do these things precisely because we want to do them. Nobody forces us. We even usually know what’s right and wrong, but that doesn’t always stop us, especially if no one is looking or if nobody will ever find out. We do what’s wrong because that is exactly what we want to do.

True Christian and apostolic preaching fights against what we want to do. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” is a declaration of war. The kingdom of heaven is opposed to all evil, no matter where it might be found. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” is the most serious declaration of war that has ever been spoken, cosmic in its proportions.

The declaration of war is so serious that Jesus even says outrageous stuff like: “Go, sell all that you have and give it to the poor, then come, and follow me.” Or, on another occasion he says, “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.”

The extremeness of statements like these (and there are more I could give you, by the way), the extremeness of statements like these shows how dire the situation is. Take what Jesus says about money. What good can millions or billions do you if all is coming to an end? Or take what he says about your body. What good can your eye or your other members do you if you should be cast into hell? From hell you might wish from the bottom of your heart that you had torn your eye out, that you had cut your hand off. God is coming. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

There were some more extreme statements that you heard in our Gospel reading. I’m sure you noticed them. “Brother will hand over brother. A father will hand over his child. Children will rise up against their parents so that they are killed.” Jesus says that this kind of thing is going to happen as a side effect of preaching the good news that Our Father who art in heaven’s kingdom is coming. Households will be divided. The closest social bonds will be broken.

Jesus says it. It’s all there black on white. But if we are being honest, I think this all sounds quite strange to us. Really? Families divided? People handed over to be killed? Isn’t this all too overheated? Isn’t the situation much more mundane?

I can understand folks thinking that way. It’s quite common. People don’t think that religion is very important. A myriad of things seems more important. Plus, even in churches—those places where you’d expect Christianity to be taken seriously—it isn’t too hard to find churches and preachers that promote an unserious Christianity. Don’t get to upset about anything.

And I’m not talking just about other church bodies. I’m also talking about our own circles. It’s not hard to find promoters of Christianity as a kind of side light to one’s life, as a hobby, as fundamentally optional. Their preaching can sound pretty good too. It might be a little boring, but it does at least have this saving grace: It sounds a lot more reasonable than Jesus’s teaching. No extreme statements. They don’t see preaching as a declaration of war against evil no matter where the evil might be found. For them, the customer is always right. You won’t have to quit doing what you want. You should do whatever would make you happy. After all, doesn’t the good book say God wants you to be happy? Sounds plausible enough.

But misleading people in spiritual things is the worst possible breaking of all of God’s commandments. It’s the worst because misleading people with spiritual things not only affects them in this life, but eternally. Any preacher can say easily enough that this or that is not a sin to make people happy. A church can just mimic whatever their chosen audience might want to hear, whether they might be targeting a liberal audience or a conservative audience. But let’s not forget what this is all about. Neither liberalism nor conservatism will do anything for you when you stand before God in the judgement. If a pastor says that this is that is not a sin, that you can do what you want, even though it is against God’s Law, that pastor’s reassurance won’t do anything to stave off God’s righteous judgement. You are responsible.

What’s helpful is Jesus’s preaching: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” What’s helpful is Jesus’s preaching even if his preaching sounds to you unreasonable or implausible. With Jesus’s preaching of the Gospel comes the Holy Spirit—and that’s no small matter. The Holy Spirit convinces us to believe that God is well pleased with us for Jesus’s sake. The Holy Spirit fights against our sinful flesh so that we do not always helplessly do whatever our sinful desires dictate, but we begin to live a life of righteousness. God is the one who takes hold of our will instead of being helplessly ridden by the devil from one evil to another until he rides us all the way down to his intended destination in hell.

When Jesus declares war against evil—including, especially, the evil in ourselves—this is God’s reigning and ruling. What is amazing about God’s reigning and ruling is that he doesn’t simply destroy us or obliterate us—evil though we are. He redeems us so that we may live and not die. God’s reigning and ruling is for our benefit, even as he crucifies us together with Christ. The more God takes over the better. The more that what we want is set aside, and what God wants is worked within us, the better.

God’s reigning and ruling is what is most important. It’s at the heart of the Gospel. God’s reigning and ruling is why Jesus says two times in our reading, “Do not be afraid,” even though he says stuff that probably was frightening to you if you were paying attention and believing what Jesus was saying. After all, Jesus says that divisions will take place all the way down to those who live under our own roof—and that these divisions can even be deadly. And yet Jesus says, “Do not be afraid.” The only reason why a person is able not to be afraid in otherwise very frightening situations is because God is in control.

This is of great comfort if you have the courage to accept it. When the apostles went out to preach God’s declaration of war against evil, God was in control. And when they were unjustly punished and denounced as evildoers, God was in control.

This is applicable to the preaching of the Gospel that has been given to us to do in our times too. It is enough for a disciple to be like his master. So we must simply speak the things Jesus has given us to speak. What he has given us to speak might not always sound nice. What he has given us to speak might not always appear as though it is going to work. It will work, though, because all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus. What Jesus speaks truly is helpful. If we believe him, take up our cross and follow him, then we will find that we can stand in God’s judgement. The reigning and ruling of God will make it so.

Of all possible things that could ever possibly happen, there is nothing more profound or good than this reigning and ruling of God in the souls of those who hear Jesus speak. Eternal life breaks in to this sin-sick, loveless world with the preaching of the Gospel. If it meets opposition, so what? If it is opposed even within ourselves, by our flesh, should we really be surprised? We, who are evil, are blessed by Jesus, who is good. Do you really think that this is something that should be easy?

Jesus tells us beforehand in our reading that it won’t be, but that’s alright. God will prevail.

Even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore. The kingdom of heaven is at hand.

230611 Sermon on Matthew 9:9-13 (Pentecost 2 Proper 5A) June 11, 2023

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Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.”

Are you sick? It’s not easy to say “Yes, I am sick.”

Let me illustrate. Sometimes pastors get asked to visit non-members who are terminally ill. I’ve made more than a few visits like that. I usually ask someone who is dying, regardless of membership, whether he or she believes that he or she is a poor, miserable sinner. You’re familiar with that language because we say that in church: “I, a poor, miserable sinner confess unto you…” When someone has never heard those words, or been absent for a long time, those words seem to strike them as being overly harsh. More than one such person has responded to my question by saying, “Yes, okay, I’m a sinner, but I’m not so sure about that poor and miserable part.” I appreciate these folks’ honesty. They are only saying what we all would probably say if we weren’t trained to say something different.

People usually aren’t afraid to admit that they are sinners in general. I’ve never met anyone who says that he or she is perfect. Everybody makes mistakes. But everybody wants to believe the best about themselves too. “Ok, fine, I screwed up, but now I’m on the right track.”

Maybe sometimes we feel very strongly that we are poor, miserable sinners. That can happen when sin is hot and fresh and stinks to high heaven. But with the passage of time we can kind of forget about what we’ve done. Moss grows over the sin so that we can’t see it anymore.

Plus we can usually find some other poor schmucks who are worse off than we are. I haven’t murdered anyone. I haven’t smoked crack. I drag my butt out of bed so that I keep my job. Not everybody does that good. Plus, you might think, I go to church. That’s getting rarer and rarer these days. And not only have I gone to church, I go to the right church, thank you very much. My church is in the right synod. My church doesn’t do bad stuff like those other churches. So, come to think of it, I’m doing alright! I’m not perfect. Nobody’s perfect. But I can find a whole bunch of other people who are a lot poorer and more miserable than me!

This kind of reasoning doesn’t sound too bad. It doesn’t sound too bad, if, for no other reason, it is quite common. Nevertheless it reveals that we are much worse off than any mere murderer or drug addict. Justifying yourself by always being on the lookout for others whom you suppose to be worse than you is a very serious sin. It is a sin against the first commandment. You are your own justifier. You are your own God. Thus your sin is worse than the sins of those who might just be breaking the fifth, sixth, or seventh commandment. You believing in your own goodness and righteousness means you are spiritually sicker than those whom you might be judging.

You probably have a hard time believing that, and I can sympathize because I have my common sense and reasoning just like you. If I were to put one of you fine, upstanding citizens next to troubled soul and asked people to judge which is better, they would probably pick you every time.

So it was at Jesus’s time too though. One time Jesus told a group of fine, upstanding pharisees that tax collectors and prostitutes were going to enter the kingdom of God before they ever would. The pharisees were quite diligent, lawful people. If you put one of those fine upstanding church goers next to a thug or a lady of the night, which one would appear to be godlier? Common sense gives you the answer.

But Jesus means what he says when he says that tax collectors and prostitutes will enter the kingdom of heaven before the pharisees. The outside might look as good and respectable as can be, but inwardly there can be the most devilish things—spiritual sins that common sense and reason are not so good at understanding. And there is nothing more devilish than pride. There is nothing more devilish than pointing, sneering, accusing, judging.

Something that we can see from our Gospel reading today is that Jesus is very different than us. Jesus is good and kind. He doesn’t point and sneer at the sinners. He doesn’t say, “Look how sick he is! Ack! How disgusting!”

Imagine if there were a doctor doing that—going from one room to the next in a hospital, pointing at the poor sick people and laughing at them. “Oh, how sick you are! Look how sick you are compared to me! How can you sit there and be so sick when I’m so well?” We would rightly wonder if such a physician were more profoundly sick than the patients whom he is supposed to be treating.

But Jesus is a good physician. He helps people who are sick. He isn’t disgusted by them or avoid them. He goes to Matthew and says, “Follow me,” even though Matthew was a notorious sinner. Jesus stays with some tax collectors and sinners at his house. He eats with them.

When we consider Jesus’s kind actions towards these folks it is important to know why Jesus did what he did. Jesus did not associate with these notorious sinners because he loved how tax collectors abused, manipulated, and cheated people. Jesus also doesn’t love how the 5^th, 6^th, 7^th, or any of the other commandments are broken. Jesus doesn’t like any destructive and sinful things. Jesus is the enemy of these things and wants to set them free from them. So he forgave their sin. They were sick to death with unrighteousness. They were poor and miserable. Jesus made them well, giving them his own perfect righteousness.

The pharisees were concerned that Jesus was being too nice to these people who weren’t doing right and living right. That’s understandable from a certain perspective. The pharisees were concerned about the example that Jesus seemed to be setting. It might appear to some that Jesus didn’t seem care about sins. It was like Jesus was saying that sins didn’t matter. So, the Pharisees thought, Jesus should shun them and not have anything to do with them. Otherwise everybody is going to think that sinning doesn’t matter.

As I said, the pharisees’ line of reasoning would be valid from a certain perspective. If there were no cure for what ailed these people, then Jesus should probably stay away. Imagine a doctor who can’t help. It’s impossible to help. And yet he goes and pokes and prods, slices and dices—nothing good can come from that. In like manner, if there was nothing that Jesus could do for these spiritually sick people, then all that Jesus probably would accomplish is to desensitize folks to the seriousness of sin.

But Jesus is able to help these people who are sick. Jesus can help people who are very, very sick. They can be downright poor and miserable. In fact, as Paul says in Ephesians chapter 2, your spiritual condition is so bad that you were “dead in your trespasses and sins…” Then he goes on, “But God, because he is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in trespasses.” Death is not an obstacle too great for our great physician.

If that is so, if Jesus is such a great physician that he gives life to sinners who are so bad that they are dead, then in the midst of sinners is exactly where this physician must be. The Christian Church is a spiritual hospital. Sick sinners belong here. If you don’t want to be a sinner, then you are in the wrong place, and have no business being with Jesus.

If there is one thing that I hope you take away from our Gospel reading today it is that your spiritual sickness is not an impediment to you being saved. In a way it’s true that sin doesn’t matter. Sin or the lack of sin isn’t why a single sinner will be saved. God is the justifier of the ungodly. You are not the justifier of yourself.

We can see this in our Gospel reading: Jesus called notorious Matthew, a veritable tax collector, to be his disciple. Jesus says very plainly, “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” Your salvation does not depend on you making yourself well. Your salvation depends on the skill and power of the physician. He simply says, “Follow me.” That is, “Listen to me. Believe my words.” The first task, and almost only task, that the Christian Church has is to speak Jesus’s words of forgiveness to poor, miserable sinners.

So let me conclude with the question with which I began: Are you sick? Usually we like to cheer people up. Politeness almost demands that we say, “You’re doing just fine. You’re getting better and stronger.” But we all know that being polite and being truthful are often not the same thing.

Although it might not be altogether polite, I hope that you feel worse about yourself than when you came in here today. I hope you see that your are poorer and more miserable. On the other hand, I hope that you see how good of a physician Jesus is. He is so skillful and mighty that he can even raise someone who is so sick that they are even dead. Maybe you weren’t thinking you were all the poor and miserable when you came here today, but maybe you also weren’t thinking how skillful and mighty Jesus is.

Following Jesus, clinging to him, is how we will receive eternal life. Jesus is how we will stand in the judgement and be welcomed into heaven instead of going to hell, which is what we all deserve. Jesus makes us well.

Now the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will surely do it.

230528 Sermon on Pentecost being a great Christian festival

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Sermon manuscript:

Today I would like to speak with you about why Pentecost is a great Christian festival. Pentecost is one of the three great Christian festivals. Christmas and Easter are the other two. Among these three, there is a tendency for Pentecost to be overshadowed. Every Christian knows the meaning and importance of Christmas. It’s when the Son of God was born as a baby boy. Every Christian knows the meaning and importance of Easter. It’s when the Son of God defeated death. Because he lives, those who believe in him will live also. Folks are probably not as aware of the meaning and importance of Pentecost.

So what is the meaning and importance of Pentecost? You heard about the events of Pentecost in our second reading. There was a mighty rushing wind. Something like tongues of flame appeared above the heads of the disciples. They were able to speak in such a way that people could understand them even though they spoke a different language. What they spoke about were the “mighty works of God.”

Then the Apostle Peter stood up before the crowd of Jews, many of whom were hostile to him and to Christ. At least some of those in the crowd had been involved in crucifying Jesus. Prior to Pentecost the disciples had been so afraid of these Jews that they had been hiding behind locked doors, and Peter had denied that he knew the Lord three times. After the coming of the Holy Spirit, Peter and the other disciples speak plainly and courageously. They no longer fear what man can do to them, because they know that God is for them. Many of these disciples are going to keep on preaching that Jesus is Christ and Lord until they are eventually put to death for it.

You can see, therefore, that the Holy Spirit changes the disciples. He gives them faith that Jesus Christ is their Lord. He gives them love, joy, peace, and his other fruits. He gives them courage to say things that are true, good, and right, even though the powers of darkness gnash their teeth and start plotting their revenge.

So the meaning of Pentecost is that the Holy Spirit is given to the disciples; he is given to the Christian Church. The importance of Pentecost is that the Holy Spirit causes people to believe in Jesus as the almighty king who saves sinners. The Holy Spirit additionally gives Christians spiritual gifts.

Without Pentecost, and without the coming of the Holy Spirit, Jesus’s work of salvation would lie in the dust. It would not be known. It would not be believed in. It would not spring forth into life and growth. The Holy Spirit causes life by applying what Jesus has done. The Holy Spirit brings to completion Jesus’s work of making us holy.

Because of its great importance, Pentecost deserves its place as one of the three great Christian festivals. It is just as important for our salvation as Christmas or Easter. And yet, despite my best efforts, I wouldn’t be surprised if I have failed to create any great love for this festival in you. There’s something about this festival that doesn’t capture the imagination like Christmas or Easter. Maybe it’s the stories and the customs. Maybe Pentecost just isn’t grand enough, impressive enough. After all, the main thing that Pentecost seems to accomplish is talking. Talking can be awfully boring.

So maybe if we were God we would do things differently. What if instead of causing the disciples to speak about Jesus as the Christ, as the great King, the Holy Spirit would make lightning come out of our fingertips? Or maybe he could make our eyes be like lasers, cutting through steel and stone. Then everyone in the world would be terribly impressed with us.

Or what if we could just have some of those miracles that we read about in the Bible? What if we could heal people? What if we could raise the dead? Or if all of this is too much trouble, what if we could just speak in tongues like they did on Pentecost? That sounds like it would be a lot more interesting than listening to a sermon like the one I am speaking to you today. It seems like these unusual things would make the church grow too. People might come from far and wide if we could drum up a little razzle dazzle instead of all this talking.

But all of this “I would do it differently if I were God” talk sounds familiar. I’d like to compare it to the complaining that the Israelites did in the wilderness. When God led them out of Egypt they eventually ran out of food so that they grew hungry. So each day God gave them their daily bread with the manna that would come with the morning dew. At first, they were happy enough with it. Eating manna was a lot better than starving to death. It didn’t taste too bad either. It was sweet and nutty. Each morning it came like clockwork. Eventually, though, they got sick of it. They actually say, “We loathe this worthless bread. If only we could go back to Egypt. Sure, we were slaves in Egypt, but at least we’d get a cucumber or some garlic every once in a while instead of always having this miserable manna.”

Whenever I read about the Israelites in the wilderness I am always struck by how we are just like them. If anything, though, we Christians are worse than them. The manna that we have as Christians is a much higher and better thing than what the Israelites ever had. Our manna is Jesus. Pentecost gives us Jesus.

Jesus speaks about how our bread as Christians is better than any manna that the Israelites ever ate. Jesus says to the Jews, “Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. I am the bread which comes down out of heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die.” Jesus then says, “I am the living bread that came down out of heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he shall live forever; and the bread also which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

Some of the Jews who were listening to Jesus grumbled at his teaching. Some of you might be inwardly grumbling too: “What is this mumbo jumbo? How can Jesus give his flesh for the life of the world? How does that even work?” But it is not hard to understand what Jesus is claiming. You might not agree with what Jesus is claiming or see how it is possible, but the words are clear. Jesus is greater, better, more life giving than the manna. Whoever eats of him has eternal life.

What Jesus is speaking about is the Gospel, the good news. This is what is extraordinary about Pentecost. These words about Jesus are what was spread abroad by the power of the Holy Spirit beginning at Pentecost. The Gospel is greater than any sign or miracle we might read about in the Bible. As Jesus says, he gives eternal life. This Gospel is among us.

And let me briefly mention the Sacraments which are also among us with the power of the Holy Spirit. We are given baptism. The Scriptures tell us that this baptism unites us with Christ. By this baptism we die with Christ and we rise with Christ. By this baptism we are born again by the water and the Spirit so that we may see the kingdom of God. Again, you might grumble inwardly and say, “What is this mumbo jumbo? How can water do such great things?” But that’s your problem. You aren’t believing his words. You aren’t appreciating what he says.

And on the night when Jesus was betrayed he gave us disciples his body and blood. He says, “This is my body which is given for you.” He says, “This cup is the New Testament in my blood which is shed for you for the forgiveness of your sins.” I didn’t say those words. Jesus says them. Again you might inwardly groan and say, “I hate this worthless bread. Church is so boring. Communion only makes it longer. Where’s the razzle dazzle?” Such a reaction doesn’t surprise me because we are just like the Israelites. They, too, grumbled. They, too, failed to understand what God was doing. They, too, would have done things differently if they were God instead of the Lord.

Despite their faithlessness, though, God was faithful. Jesus prayed from the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” I think we could apply those words to ourselves if we are at all lackluster about what is given to us at Pentecost. We know not what we do if we think Pentecost and the works of the Holy Spirit’s church are just words—just a bunch of talking. Sure, there is talking, but what magnificent talking it is if you will only believe it!

For example, Jesus says in our Gospel reading, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink! Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” Wow. Again, in the portion of Scripture we were referencing earlier, Jesus says: “He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life; and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I abide in him.” Magnificent.

The only way that anyone can fail to appreciate these words or to regard them as worthless is through unbelief. Unfortunately, there is nothing that comes easier or more naturally to us than unbelief, just as it came so easily and naturally to the Israelites too. If I were God I’d have given up a long time ago and moved on, but God is long-suffering, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.

God doesn’t change either. The manna that he kept sending down upon the Israelites day after day was just as sweet and nutty as it ever was regardless of whether the Israelites loved it or loathed it. So it is also with the work of the Holy Spirit, the greatness of Pentecost. It is just as forgiving, cleansing, healing, sanctifying, and eternal-life-giving as ever. It is not God or his promises that need to change. What needs to change is our faith in the stupendous things that God says and does through his Holy Spirit in his church with the Gospel.

There will always be those who will say, “We loathe this worthless food.” Not everybody was converted even on Pentecost as you heard. There were some there who said, “These disciples have had a little too much grape juice.” So it is also among us. It is not hard to find people who have so many other things that they would rather be doing than listening to a talk about Pentecost. They are so preoccupied with the cares, concerns and pleasures of life that the work of the Holy Spirit in his church is about the furthest thing from their minds.

May it not be so with you. Even if heaven and earth were to pass away, Jesus’s words will never pass away. They will always do what they promise. They will always bless those who believe in him.