Sermon Readings: 1 Timothy 6:6-19; Luke 12:13-21

This past Sunday, we celebrated Trinity Sunday. We read the Athanasian Creed and were again reminded that the Christian faith is a well-defined faith. Not all teaching done in the name of Christ is Christian, no matter how nice or comforting it might seem. We also were reminded that Christianity and eternal salvation is an exclusive reality. This means that not all people go to heaven when they die. It means that the judgement of who is saved and who is not is judged by God, and not by us. Our opinions on what is good or evil, right or wrong, do not matter on the day of judgement. All souls will be divided between heaven and hell. As the creed states, “All people will give an account of what they did in their life. Those who have done good will enter eternal life. Those who have done evil into eternal fire. This is the Christian faith. Unless a person believes this, they cannot be saved.”

Throughout the church year, each Sunday is organized to teach different doctrines of the Christian faith. The readings and prayers work together to highlight the rich variety of things to learn about God, about how He works, and about our Christian life. Starting with this Sunday, and for a certain amount of Sundays this summer, we will be having Epistle and Gospel readings from a different series. Yet, the themes of each Sunday and the doctrines taught in the readings are the same. Typically this Sunday – Trinity 1 – is the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. The rich man feasts every day on fine food while wearing fine clothes, but he does not care for or acknowledge poor Lazarus who is lying in poverty and sickness at the rich man’s door. They both die. Lazarus goes to Abraham’s side to be comforted. The rich man is turned over to Hades for punishment and suffering. The message spoken by Abraham to the rich man is simple. “You received your good things in your life, and Lazarus received suffering. But now Lazarus is comforted and you are suffering.” At the end of the parable, it is made clear that the difference between them was not their earthly wealth, but rather their faith. Lazarus believed the words of the Old Testament while the rich man did not care about God’s Word.

The alternate readings we have this morning teach the same lesson. Last Sunday taught us that the only way to eternal life is found by believing in the Holy Trinity. This faith then leads to a life lived according to the laws, designs, orders, and blessings found only in the Holy Trinity. So it is no wonder that this first Sunday after Trinity Sunday highlights some of the largest risks to Christian faith. In particular, Jesus points to the riches of this life as a great temptation for any soul. The riches of this life certainly includes money and wealth, yet it also includes more than just material things. Status, being well-liked, being accepted by the world, and honor from other people – all of these things are riches of this life as well. In our epistle reading, St Paul calls it the “love of money,” - a term specifically meaning that material wealth is has a greater priority than the will of God.

The example Jesus uses in the Gospel reading probably opens our Iowan ears more easily than the standard reading of the rich man and Lazarus. In that reading, the man dresses in fine linen and purple robes,something I doubt many of our farmers here do too often. But today’s alternate Gospel lands a little closer to home. One man is concerned with getting what he sees as his part of the inheritance, an inheritance that neither he nor his brother deserve because of their work or effort. The farmer in Jesus’ parable clearly thinks that the work of his own hands will last forever. Beyond that, he says that the things he has earned for himself will satisfy his soul for years to come. Hard work and good profits means no worries for the rest of your days.

Jesus is not concerned with any plans anyone here might have to build a bigger barn. Entrance into heaven is not based on how little machinery you purchased or how few grain bins you built in this life. The concern is the faith of the heart. The measurement that God is concerned with is the state of your soul. St Paul clarifies this for us in the epistle reading. Everyone knows the passage “The love of money is the root of all evil.” (1 Tim 6:10) Yet, just a few verses later, St Paul gives instructions for how Timothy should preach to those who have been blessed with more money than is needed for the basic needs of life. He does not say “Sell it all and keep the receipts so that you can enter into heaven.” He tells Timothy to encourage those with wealth in his Christian congregation to “do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.” (1 Tim 6:18-19)

The things we receive in this life from God’s hand are only temporary. St Paul summarizes so many different wisdom passages from the Old Testament with the words “We brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world.” Therefore, St Paul gives us our goal for this life in the preceding words – “Godliness with contentment is great gain.” “If we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.” (1 Tim 6:6,8) The words of Jesus are even more direct. “The things you have prepared, whose will they be?” (Luke 12:20)

Which things do we spend the most time preparing? God has given each of us different things to use and to care for. Some receive more and some receive less. Worldly wealth, honor, or status is no measure of the health of a soul. And yet, the soul of each individual person is the only eternal “thing” that any of us receive. Of all the things we have each been given, which of these things have we spent the most time, energy, thought, and action preparing and caring for? If all things will be consumed by divine fire and destroyed on the final day except for our souls, which things ought to receive the greatest time, energy, thought, and preparation? Jesus teaches us that the soul is the first and foremost thing which we should take time, energy, thought, and work to prepare and to care for. Your soul is the only thing which will be required of you by God at the moment of death. No other earthly or spiritual thing will be judged or taken into account at that moment. Jesus asks “The soul you have prepared in this life, whose will it be?” Does it belong to God and His will now, so that it will be God’s unto eternity? Or does your soul belong to other worries, other concerns, and other priorities?

Therefore, St Paul instructs us how to go about this proper preparation of our souls. Flee from harmful desires. Run away from the temptation to put your trust in the things of this life. It’s all temporary and does not matter at all in the end. Instead, “Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith.” Christ is our righteousness, so we pursue Him. We follow where He goes, and we seek to put ourselves where His righteousness is found. His righteousness is found in the preaching of His crucifixion and resurrection. Pursue godliness. Godliness is found in hearts that put God’s will first and arrange their lives with the ten commandments and the Holy Gospel at the center of all things. Pursue faith. Faith is pursued by putting the hearing of God’s Word as the first priority, because God’s Word alone creates and sustains faith in the heart and soul. Pursue love, steadfastness, and gentleness. These gifts of God are given as fruits of the faith which comes from true teaching and understanding of God’s Word. They flow from a well-prepared soul and a recreated heart of flesh – both of which are gifts of the Holy Spirit.

None of these things can be pursued unless we have first been called by God. We do not pursue because we figured out how to work ourselves into God’s good graces. We cannot love unless He has first loved us by revealing Himself to us in grace. We cannot pursue righteousness unless we have first received His righteousness through faith. We cannot be His own until He has called us His own in Holy Baptism.

We have been called, baptized, redeemed, and reborn into the Christian life. We have been made aware that our souls are sick and must be tended to by the divine physician through the medicine of His Word and Sacraments. These gifts are given to us by God Himself through the Church, so that when our soul is required of us, we can know for certain that it has been prepared by Him and for Him.

https://sites.google.com/view/trinityzionpaloalto/home

Sermon Texts: Isaiah 6, John 3

How can we understand the Holy Trinity? This task is, in many ways, beyond our ability. The mystery of the Trinity is not like knowledge about math, science, history, or engineering. It is not a knowledge that anyone can gain by doing experiments, observing the results, or any other human way of investigation. We just read together the Athanasian Creed, which is a series of statements that would receive a failing grade in any university level science or logic class. The mystery of the Holy Trinity is perhaps the central reality of the Christian faith. It is the reality which all other teachings of the Christian faith come from. It must be received in faith, not by logic nor by the success of even the highest levels of human reason or philosophy. It is for this reason that the appointed epistle reading for this Sunday gives us the declaration of St Paul: “Oh the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgements and how inscrutable His ways!” (Rom. 11:33)

This isn’t to say that we cannot or should not investigate what the Trinity reveal about themselves in the words of Holy Scripture. Much of the history of Christian theology is actually dedicated to the investigation of the Trinity. The early centuries of the Church produced a series of councils, letters, and books seeking to define what is and is not true about this divine mystery. In the middle ages and into the Reformation, the very first book a university student in theology would have been required to read would have been Peter Lombard’s masterful study of the Holy Trinity.

Since the beginning of our modern age in the 1700’s, both higher level theology and lower level Christian practice has diminished our wonder and awe at this central mystery of God. One Sunday sermon is not enough time to investigate the people and trends that have caused our terrible decline in reverence and astonishment about this beautiful reality. It is enough for this morning to simply say that we are all less aware, less interested, less capable, and less devoted to this incredible mystery than so many of our forefathers in the faith.

Because of this, we are more open than ever to both subtle and outright Trinitarian heresies. Mormonism denies almost all Christian truths about the Father, Son, and Spirit, and yet they are rapidly growing in our nation while portraying their false religion as Christian and Trinitarian. Whole sections of what we call the Pentecostal faith are openly anti-Trinitarian. Those Jehova’s Witnesses who come to knock on doors all over our nation do so in hopes of teaching you a Trinitarian heresy that diminishes the glory of Jesus as the only-begotten Son of the Father. Beyond these official confessions, there is no shortage of Trinitarian heretics and blasphemers creating more YouTube and other digital content than any of us could watch in a lifetime. This is nothing new. The first truly famous Trinitarian heretic (Arius) had convinced not only Christian bishops with his preaching, but common Christians the world-round by putting his heresies into popular songs and teaching them to sailors. Wherever they landed, they sang their heretical hymns and the false faith was spread.

Our collect prayer for this Sunday is helpful in showing us how we receive this divine mystery of the Holy Trinity. It reads “Almighty and everlasting God, You have given us grace to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity by the confession of a true faith.” The ability to confess any of the creeds and to believe what the Scriptures say about the Father, Son, and Spirit comes only by God’s grace. His grace first cleanses our hearts and our lips from our false ideas about God. It happens for us invisibly yet truly, just as Isaiah’s unclean lips were cleansed by fiery coal, placed upon his lips by a messenger. We are not promised such a glorious vision as Isaiah received when we are cleansed by God’s Word, and yet we practice the same thing on a more humble scale.

We are people of unclean lips. We speak all sorts of wishes, false doctrines, and common phrases about the Father, Son, and Spirit. These things are in our minds, hearts, and souls because we are born as enemies of God and His truth. So also, we live among a nation and culture that is very unclean in it’s ideas and confessions about the Father, Son, and Spirit, or about any divine and spiritual things at all. And so our hearts, minds, souls, and lips must be cleansed, just as Isaiah’s were. They are cleansed by a messenger who brings the burning fire of the Holy Spirit.

In happens in our churches in ways that we often do not appreciate or revere as we should. When you teach your children the Apostle’s Creed and the Lord’s Prayer, you are cleansing their lips by giving them the proper ways to speak both to God and about God. When the creeds take up residence in our memories and therefore in our souls, we grow more and more aware of how each member of the Trinity works for our salvation. When we gather to worship, we repeat truths about the Holy Trinity such as the Gloria in Excelsis, the ceremonies of the liturgy, and Scripturally accurate preaching from the pulpit. These things serve to form our minds, souls, and lips to not only believe the truth about the Holy Trinity, but also to prepare us to give truthful answers to whoever would ask us what we believe. Our liturgy even includes the exact words of the holy angels from Isaiah’s vision in our Old Testament reading. We sing those angelic words “Holy, Holy, Holy is the LORD of hosts,” as we prepare our souls and lips to receive the Trinity upon our lips and into our souls in Holy Communion.

It would seem fitting to us to need a glorious vision like Isaiah to receive and begin to understand this great mystery of the Trinity. And yet, as we see in the Gospel reading, the second Person of the Holy Trinity Himself chooses to reveal this mystery to Nicodemus not through crazy visions or overwhelming emotional experiences, but through simple teaching with words. Jesus speaks to Nicodemus not as a mere man, but as One of three Persons, coeternal and coequal with the Father and the Spirit. This is why Jesus does not say to Nicodemus “This testimony is mine.” Instead, Jesus says in verse 11, “We speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen.” From the mouth of Jesus, the Trinity speaks as one voice. Three persons, united perfectly in mind, will, and action, speaking in order to teach us the truth about God and about the mystery of our salvation.

No one has seen the Father except for the Son. No person can know the Father except those who hear the Son’s teaching, which reveals the Father to them. (John 6) The Spirit brings the Words of Jesus which reveal the will of the Father to us. So the Spirit teaches us the meaning of Jesus’ words. The words of Jesus teach us about the Trinity. All of this is done because it is the will of the Father and He sends the Son and the Spirit to carry this out.

Beyond being a beautiful and divine mystery, this reality of the Holy Trinity is necessary for us to know, to believe, and to confess to the best of our ability, because the message that the Trinity brings to us sinners is this: The Father loves humanity. The Father has sent His Son to become a part of humanity. The Son has given His life to atone for the sins of every person born of flesh. The Spirit has caused this glorious truth to be recorded, preached, and truthfully understood by all who hear and believe this message.

The Holy Trinity is the source and essence of true life – not only biological life, but spiritual and eternal life. As Jesus says, whoever loves me will treasure the true words that the Spirit has caused to be recorded in Holy Scripture. And whoever treasures those true words, “we will come and make our home with him.” (John 14:23) To believe and confess the truth of the Holy Trinity is not simply a philosophical exercise. To believe and confess the Holy Trinity is to receive the life of God, the forgiveness won on the Cross, and the help and comfort of the Holy Spirit. To believe and confess the Trinity is to be a Christian, a sinner whom God has declared “not guilty,” and a fellow child of God alongside the only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ.

Blessed be the Holy Trinity and the undivided Unity. Let us give glory to Him, because He has revealed the mystery of His glory to us, and without believing this faithfully and firmly, we could not be saved.

Sermon Texts: John 14-16, Acts 2

Who is the Holy Spirit? We see Him at work from the very beginning, already in the opening words of Genesis. This Holy Spirit hovered over that mysterious deep and brought all things into a righteous order. This Holy Spirit entered into the nostrils of a clay man, and turned that muddy dust into flesh and bone. It is the same spirit which departed from Adam and Eve’s souls when they turned their ears away from the instruction of the LORD.

He is the fire in the night which completes the sacrifice of 5 animals, confirming God’s covenant promises to Abraham. He is the spirit who entered Abraham’s heart and caused faith that he would have a son, and indeed many offspring. He is the fire that Abraham took in his hand to slaughter that one and only son, Isaac. He is the burning faith in Abraham’s heart which trusted in God’s command, believing that one day there would be a resurrection from the dead. He is the burning trust and faith in Isaac’s heart as he laid down to die upon the wood and stone

He is the wind caused the waters under the ark to subside, preserving Noah and his family, eight souls and all. He is the fire which Moses saw, bringing his attention to the command of God to go and preach to Egypt. He is the fire that fell from heaven, pouring God’s wrath out on the Egyptians. He is the wind which blew back the locusts, bringing the plague to an end. He is the wind which blew back the waves, parting the seas so that the Israelites could be baptized into Moses. (1 Corinthians 10:2) He is the fire which led them by night. He is the fire of God’s anger that burned and encroached the camp of the Israelites when they complained about their hardships, even as He continued to care and provide for them. He is the holy fire which burned in the holy place of the tabernacle, God’s pure presence which was so dangerous to approach that He could only be among His people hidden in the flesh-skin of the tent walls. He is the burning fire on Mount Sinai where Moses would go to receive the commandments and to plead for mercy for the people. He is the fire of God’s jealousy which leaped out and killed Nadab and Abihu when they tried to bring a strange fire into the holy place.

He is the still and small wind-voice that speaks to Elijah, telling him to get back to work of speaking the truth, even in a very difficult situation. He is the fiery chariot which picks Elijah up to carry him into the heavenly temple. He is the wind that blows from the four corners of the earth and brings life into the valley of dry bones, resurrecting them, and giving them flesh and breathe. He is the scorching wind of God that Isaiah prophesies about. He is the stormy wind of God’s wrath that He promises to send against those who teach false doctrine in His Name. (Ezekiel 13)

He is the spirit which God sent by word of a messenger into Mary’s ear and into her womb, bringing divine life into a perfect unity with all of mankind in the Man, Jesus. He is the spirit which publicly marked Jesus as the Son of God, not of Joseph, at His baptism in the Jordan. He is the spirit who strengthened Jesus in the midst of temptation by bringing words of Scripture to His mind and lips. He is the spirit whose presence makes the demons tremble as they see Jesus approach. He is the spirit which Jesus expels from His mouth from the Cross, crying out “It is finished.” He is the spirit who has, from that moment, gone out into the world to declare that the sacrifice of Jesus has atoned for the sins of all people through the death of God for His own creation.

He is the spirit who causes peace in the hearts of the disciple immediately upon hearing Jesus announce “Peace!” as He appeared to them in the upper room – resurrected, real, and living. He is the spirit who burns within the hearts of the disciples on the road to Emmaus, confirming the teaching of Jesus as He opened the Old Testament to them. Through this spirit, those two disciples believed that all things written in the Law and the Prophets are about Jesus.

We see that the Holy Spirit is not some undefined force. He is not some wandering force who goes about causing disorder. He is the dangerous yet comforting force of God and His Word. He is known and felt as the burning life of faith and trust in the soul of those who believe in the truth that He teaches. In John 14-16, just before His crucifixion, Jesus teaching the disciples at length what the Holy Spirit has come to do for us in the New Testament age. Jesus calls Him our Paraclete – the One who comes along beside us in faith in order to help us grow and persevere in the true faith. He is the spirit of truth, and the unbelieving world in not capable of receiving Him. (John 14:16-17) He is the One whom the Father sends to teach us through the Scriptures who God is. When these words and stories of the Scriptures are in our minds and souls, the Spirit uses them by bringing them to our remembrance at the appropriate times. (John 14:26)

He is our teacher, our helper, our comforter, and our aid. Jesus tells us the Spirit has three main duties – to convict us of our sin, to convince us God’s righteousness, and to confirm in our hearts that God does judge sin. He convicts us of our sin when we hear God’s Word and come to the true realization that we are indeed poor, miserable, wretched sinners. If anyone claims that what the Spirit calls a sin is not a sin, or that they are not guilty, they reject not only the Spirit, but Christ as well. Therefore, it is good for us to feel the shame and guilt of our sins as the Holy Spirit teaches us about our weakness and frail flesh. The Holy Spirit does not leave us in our sin, but calls us out of it and teaches us to leave it behind – to avoid it, to flee from it. He directs us to flee to Christ, who is our righteousness, for Jesus Christ is the righteousness of God who is revealed to us only by the Spirit and the words of Scripture. Fleeing from sin to Christ, we receive the comfort that Christ’s Cross and suffering has incinerated our guilt and demolished our shame. Yet, as the sinful and shameful world around us continues to reject the Holy Spirit, we are also comforted by Him when He reminds us that this creation is not eternal. He reminds us that the rule of this world has already been judged, indeed that all sin and all sinners are judged. The eternal sentencing of that judgement will be announced on the great and final Day, when Jesus returns in His perfect wrath and glory.

It is this Spirit, which brought the world into order, entered Adam, fled from Adam at the fall, and continued in the words of the Prophets until He resided in Christ our Lord who makes His appearance upon the heads of the disciples at Pentecost. He is not different than He was before. He still brings the fiery wrath of God against sin and sinners. He still preaches the truth of the promised Messiah. But now He has been enlarged, expanded, and sent out into the whole world, no longer confined to tents in the wilderness and the mouths of a few chosen prophets.

Now He makes His residence in the Christian Church. He makes His home – along with the Father and the Son – in the hearts, souls, and minds of those who believe the truths of the book that He has written. For every page of Holy Scripture has two authors – the prophet or apostle who preached the words, and the Holy Spirit who provided the words and guided the prophets and apostles to write them. He lives within us in the form of faith, so that we can recognize the truths of God’s Word, and live holy lives according to what His Words command. He works through memorization, instruction, prayer, and the gathered worship of Christians in whom He dwells. By these things – instruction, prayer, and worship – He comforts sinners whom He makes into saints. He teaches spiritual children, so that they might become mature in the faith. He convicts the hidden parts of our hearts and souls, so that they might be swept out and put into good and godly order.

His work within us is sometimes painful and sometimes felt as a joyful pleasure. It is painful when He works to incinerate and tear our favorite sins and desires away from us. It brings joy and great comfort when He replaces our sins and desires with true knowledge, faithful endurance, and Christ Himself. A person cannot receive the Holy Spirit and remain unchanged, for we all have dirty hearts and souls which need constant attention, care, and cleaning until we are fully remade and perfected in the resurrection at the end of all things. So also, to reject the teaching, pleading, and cleaning of the Holy Spirit is to reject the faith which He creates. Rejection of Him and His work in us leaves us outside of salvation and outside of the Christian Church, even if we remain listed as a member of a congregation somewhere. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit (Eph. 4:30) by rejecting His teaching, His comfort, and His warning of the day of Judgement. Rather receive Him for what He is – the comforter, teacher, helper, and guide who has been sent by the Father to create faith in your heart, and to keep you in that faith until life everlasting.

+The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.+ Job 1:21

The Rite of Christian Burial for Mrs Mary Ellen Benz will be held at Trinity Lutheran Church in Mallard, IA at 5PM on July 3, 2026.

Visitation will be from 4-5PM on the same day, prior to the service.

https://www.henryolsonfuneral.com/obituaries/Mary-Ellen-Benz?obId=48440137

The following are two of the many wonderful prayers found in The Lutheran Prayer Companion. This book is a collection of the great prayers for all situations in life written by our Lutheran forefathers. They teach us not only how our fathers in the faith prayed, but also guide us in learning how to pray more fervently and properly. These prayers have been graciously translated for our benefit by Mr Matthew Carver, a prolific translator of so many forgotten Lutheran resources for prayer, preaching, and liturgy.

A Prayer During a Severe Storm

O Lord God of heaven, great and awesome God, who reigns over all the kingdoms of the earth and are mighty, awesome and doing wonders: Your voice is upon the great waters: You, the God of glory, thunder: You voice is powerful; Your voice O Lord, is full of majesty, and its wrath is a consuming fire, and it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of You wrath! You touch a land and it melts, and all who dwell in it mourn. Our iniquities have earned Your punishment; yet help us in this distress, for the sake of Your name. Let not Your wrath wax greater than You fervent and sincere mercy. You are our Father; Your name is from of old. You are our hope, and You have promised us that if we will turn to You, You will repent of the evil which You thought to do us. Therefore blot out our iniquities like a cloud and our sins like a mist. O Lord, do not leave us, and do not withdraw You hand from us, God of our salvation! Take the payment for our sins from the bloody merit of Your Son, Jesus, with which He procured us and established an eternal redemption and which cleanses us from all our sins. He is the propitiation for our sins, and through Him we have peace with You. Turn back now from the hotness of Your anger, and forgive the iniquities of You people according to Your great mercy. Do not destroy Your people and inheritance which You have redeemed by Your great power and have purchased by the very blood of Your beloved Son; Keep our life and limb as the apple of Your eye. Preserve also in this great storm our house and home, goods and sustenance which Your blessing has granted us. Turn from us in Your Fatherly care all our well-deserved calamity, and help us, God of our salvation, for the glory of Your great name, for all Your mercy and for the blood of Jesus our Savior. Amen.

A Prayer Following a Severe Storm

Almighty God, heavenly Father, who said to us, “Call upon Me in the time of need, and I will deliver you; then you shall glorify Me”: we give You praise and thanks from our most inmost hearts that You have graciously heard our prayer and caused the furious tempest to pass by without any harm to our bodies or property, by which You manifested again Your Fatherly heart, not desiring to deal with us according to our sins, and not repaying us according to our iniquities. Grant us, merciful Father, for the sake of Your only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, that our lives may be constantly amended by Your earnest warnings, and that we may live in Your fear and prepare for the coming of You beloved Son, that we may go out with gladness to meet Him, enter with shouts of joy into the new heaven, in which righteousness dwells, and forever possess it with You in Your blessed sight, through the same Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

This collection of useful and beautiful prayers can be ordered from cph.org or amazon.com at the links below. It is a very useful resource that would be a great addition to any household life of prayer.

https://www.cph.org/lutheran-prayer-companion

https://www.amazon.com/Lutheran-Prayer-Companion-Concordia-Publishing/dp/0758659334

Sermon Texts: John 15:26-16:4; 1 Peter 4:7-14, Acts 7:51-60

This past Thursday, we celebrated the Ascension of Jesus. The Ascension is a departure, but only a departure from our immediate senses, not from our presence. Christ is still among us in the ways He has promised to be – in Word, in Sacrament, and in the fellowship of the Christian faith that Word and Sacrament create. The Ascension is best understood as a coronation – as the King being given His crown and being seated on His throne at the right hand of the Father. This is what the first martyr – the first witness – St Stephen saw while he was being thrown out of the synagogue and killed by the members of the local synagogue. St Luke records “Now when they heard [Stephen’s preaching] they were enraged. But [Stephen], full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.” (Acts 7:54-55) They stoned Stephen, and as he died, Stephen prayed for their forgiveness. “Lord Jesus, receive my Spirit. Lord, do not hold this sin against them. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.” (Acts 7:60)

What had Stephen preached that had offended his own people to the point that they would murder him in broad daylight? Stephen had simply preached a sermon in which he interpreted the Old Testament truthfully. He preached that Jesus was the long-promised Christ. He preached that the Jews who had the Law and the Prophets in their synagogues had not understood their very own Scriptures. “You stiff-necked people...you always resist the Holy Spirit.” (Acts 7:51) They had read the Bible. They attended the synagogues faithfully to hear the words of Moses and the Prophets. But the Christ that they looked for did not look like the Christ that the Father sent them. And so they killed the Lord’s Christ. And then they killed Christ’s servant, Stephen, simply for calling them to repentance and the truth.

Such is the heart of sinful men. Humanity has no problem believing in God, a god, or even multiple gods. It is not belief that is the struggle, but rather belief in the truths of the one true God. We are born with our hearts, minds, souls, and flesh in full rebellion against God and His truth. From the moment of our conception, we despise what He calls good, and we desire all sorts of things that He calls evil. So we redefine evil to be something we call good. We hate His definition of love, so we redefine it to fit what is comfortable or meaningful to our warped wants. He calls something evil, sinful, or damning, and we find a way to baptize it with our own water and our own sinful spirit.

The Holy Spirit is the only person who can correct this deep, inborn fault within our flesh and soul. The Holy Spirit comes alongside the holy Words of Scripture, into our ears, down into our souls, offering to help clean up the mess and dysfunction within. He enters every time we hear God’s Word preached and every time we participate in the Sacramental life of His Holy Church.

Here’s the catch. It is possible to receive the Word and participate in the Sacraments while rejecting the Holy Spirit. The Jews who so violently murdered Stephen, causing his blood to soak into the soil outside of the city, were very familiar with God’s Word. They would have been the types to attend synagogue every Saturday. They prayed. They offered sacrifices at the Temple in Jerusalem. They tithed, giving money and time to the service of God. But in all these things, they rejected the Holy Spirit. “You stiff-necked people, you always reject the Holy Spirit,” Stephen preached to them. But they did not repent. As Jesus says to the disciples in our Gospel reading “Whoever kills you will think he is offering true worship to God.” (John 16:2) They had the words and the promises of God, but they rejected the true teaching of those words, and so they confidently killed the man who spoke the truth to them.

The world we live in does not stone people outside of the city gates. The city gates were the place of judgement enacted by the community for the sake of the life of the community. We may not have walls around our towns and homes, but we do have our own city gates – our cultural places and ways of judgment. To be a Christian faithful to the truth of Holy Scripture does not put you at risk of dying by stones, but there are ways that faithfulness to the Spirit’s teaching and truth are punished.

Jesus warns “They will throw you out. They will kill you in some way while thinking they are doing the Lord’s work.” We hear it again in Revelation 12. Behold, Satan has been banish from heaven. But woe to you, dear Christian Church, for the devil has come down to you in great wrath, and you dear children of God are his target. The dragon called Satan makes war on those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus. (Rev. 12:17)

Our age does not kill your flesh. It targets relationships, families, and all manner of things that make it hard to live, to sleep, and to be at peace. Jesus said “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” The sword is His Word and the Truth that the Holy Spirit teaches about His Word. Jesus continues “I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.” (Matt. 10:34-36)

We know how this looks. Many of us know it very well. “Mom, we aren’t coming home for the holidays. We’ve decided to limit your time with the grandkids because you won’t support the sexual perversions we celebrate in our household now.” “Dad, I know you want the kids to be baptized, but we really don’t believe in that anymore. Please stop asking.” “Can’t we have a relationship without you mentioning God or the Bible all the time?” “We’ll give you the promotion, but first we need you to sign this form promising you will be inclusive of all manner of violations of God’s good order.”

Christ is King. This means He has a Kingdom - the true Christian Church. It is in the middle of a war from now until He returns in glory. You belong to His Kingdom because He is your King by faith. God’s Kingdom is among us when our Heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His grace, we believe His holy Word and lead Godly lives here in time, and there in eternity. (Small Catechism).

Believing His Holy Word in truth and living according to that Word as guided by the Holy Spirit will bring personal and communal trouble in this world. That is not a fault of God’s Word. There is no way to explain Christianity in a “nice enough way,” so that everyone you know will love and believe in it. The Spirit works through the truth of the Words of Christ spoken clearly, lovingly, and with an incredible amount of patience. You may lose family members and friends. Some may return later and thank you deeply for it. Others may continue in their rejection and hatred of Gods Word and Spirit. As a result, they may and probably will even despise you for speaking and living according to it. This is the price. This is the call of a child of God. This is a spiritual war, and by believing and being baptized, you have been conscripted. Bearing witness to the truth is not optional, even if it is painful. “I will send you the Spirit of Truth. He will bear witness about Me, and you also will bear witness,” in your life, your conversations, and your relationships with all whom God places into your life.

we deeply need the Holy Spirit as our Guide, our Paraclete, our Helper, and our Counselor. He is found only in the true preaching and true understanding of God’s Word. Thus, God has sent men to to be true preachers of that word. He has sent ministers to His dear children – to you – to explain His Words in truth and purity, so that you can be comforted and fired up for the battle that rages all around and within all of us. The ministers chief job is not to organize or to entertain, but to interpret the Bible for those who love God and His Word, so that they may be guided into the truth, and kept within the promises of eternal life.

Christ says through His preacher St Peter to you, “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice when you share in the sufferings of Christ,” who also lost family, friends, and in the end, His very life. God has not left you without consolation. He sends His Holy Spirit to you in His Word so that you, like Stephen, can speak the truth, and so that like Stephen, you too can overcome, win the victory, and receive your crown of eternal life.

Join us at Trinity Lutheran Church in Mallard, IA tonight at 6:30 PM for our service to celebrate the Ascension of Our Lord.

Acts 1:1-11

In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, ² until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. ³ He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.

⁴ And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me;⁵ for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

⁶ So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” ⁷ He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. ⁸ But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” ⁹ And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. ¹⁰ And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, ¹¹ and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

“The Ascension of Christ proclaims and celebrates our spiritual destiny as sons of God by adoption and grace. We are born of the Spirit, and therefore we are spirit; and spirit cannot ultimately be bound by worldly ends and earthly limitations. By the comfort – the strengthening, transforming power – of the Holy Spirit of God, we are to be exalted “unto the same place whither our Saviour Christ is gone before”. “Our conversation is in heaven”.

“Our conversation is in heaven,” and in the Church’s liturgy, we find ourselves engaged in precisely that conversation, “with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven”. Here, in liturgy, all the arts conspire to solicit mind and heart, to wean the soul from worldliness. A door is opened into heaven.

In a secular age, and in an increasingly secularized Church, such a liturgy as this perhaps seems anomalous, perhaps even an act of defiance. Well, so be it, and so it should be. This festival defies all our futile worldliness. Thank God for it. The Feast of the Ascension affirms, and our liturgy today affirms a destiny and a spiritual calling which can rest in nothing short of the infinite goodness and the truth and beauty which is the very life of God. We find ourselves on the threshold. Lift up your hearts! “Our conversation is in heaven, whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.” - The Rev Robert Crouse

“We must not stand to gaze too long,
Though on unfolding Heaven our gaze we bend,
Where lost behind the bright angelic throng
We see CHRIST’S entering triumph slow ascend.

No fear but we shall soon behold,
Faster than now it fades, that gleam revive,
When issuing from his cloud of fiery gold
Our wasted frames feel the true sun, and live.

Then shall we see Thee as Thou art,
For ever fix’d in no unfruitful gaze,
But such as lifts the new-created heart,
Age after age, in worthier love and praise.”

- Poem for Ascension by Rev John Keble

Sermon Texts: James 1:22-27; John 16:23-33

The life of a Christian is not passive. The language of the Scriptures makes clear that becoming a son of God is not a call to ease, pleasure, or comfort. In fact, an earnest attempt to live as a Christian will teach you very quickly how weak and incapable we are of keeping even the most basic commands of God. The Christian life is described as a rebirth – as a putting away and fleeing from desires, old habits, and patterns of sin. It is a constant struggle and a lifelong war against the flesh. It is a war that can be lost by giving in to sin, or by considering ourselves “saved” before the battle of this life is over. This is what it means when St Paul commands all Christians to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. God’s great gifts can be lost be believing incorrect doctrine or by refusing to repent of our violations of His ordering for our lives.

St Paul’s command to fear losing our salvation and to tremble at the possibility of having our names blotted out of the Book of Life is reflected in the collect prayer and the Apostle James in the epistle reading. The collect prayer directs us to “think those things are right.” But knowing the truth alone is not enough. We must also strive to “accomplish them.” Not only must we learn what is right – which is quite a large task – we must also do what is in our power to conform our lives to what is right. The prayer teaches us that we can begin to do these things only “by the inspiration of God,” and “with His merciful guiding.” Inspiration does not come mysteriously. Inspiration is found only in the words of God which reveal Him and His right ordering for our lives. So to begin to know what we must know, we must learn. In order to accomplish the things God requires of us, we must learn from His inspired Word. The Holy Spirit – who is the Teacher and Guide – comes only through God’s Word. He comes only in the truth, which means God’s Word understood correctly.

Quite a bit of what passes for Christianity in our age is not a religion, but rather only a “worldview.” A worldview is a way that a person looks at life in order to understand it. But a worldview requires no action. The Christian religion is different. While it is absolutely true that none of us can do anything to earn salvation, that does not mean that the Christian life does not require any action.

Imagine there is a special club in your town. Members of the club receive incredible benefits. Membership in the club can only be passed from father to child. Imagine that your father is not a member of the club. But your friend down the street – his father is a member. One day he tells you, “You should be in the club.” Only one problem, you are a child of your father – not his. But there is a solution. His father has offered to adopt you. His father knows how much benefit you would have by being in the club, and so he offers to legally include you in his family so that you can receive all the benefits. Only the most unthankful and selfish of people in this situation would accept the gift of adoption and all the benefits without learning the rules, customs, and practices of the club. No club of this sort would want an unthankful member who is unwilling to learn about the rich history and social expectations of such a group.

That club exists. It is called the Christian Church. The only reason anyone is in the Christian Church is by adoption. That which is born of flesh is flesh, and all flesh is outside of God’s family unless redeemed by the Heavenly Father. The rite of adoption which places any of us into the generous club of the Christian Church is called Holy Baptism. It is a real rebirth of the soul which promises a later rebirth of the body at the resurrection of all flesh. Our souls have been reborn, and we have been admitted to the club. But the club has standards and membership can be lost.

This is why the Apostle James is so clear in the Epistle: If a person only hears God’s Word preached and explained, but does nothing with the information when they walk out of Church, their religion is worthless. Hearing God’s instruction for our lives as His adopted children and then ignoring what it says to us is the same as not coming to hear His Word at all. It is like looking in the mirror to see if your hair needs fixing, but then turning around and immediately forgetting what you saw. You may as well have never looked.

So it is with our hearts, minds, and souls. Our spiritual and physical lives all fall short of the Father’s standard for membership in His divine club. We’re only here by grace, and we have much catching up and learning to do. A college student who refuses to learn, study, or grow will be accepted at university for a while – but eventually their refusal to participate will mean no degree is granted. An athlete picked for the varsity team is indeed on the team, but if there is no effort expended or practices attended, they will be removed from the roster. Jesus and the Apostles speak of the Christian faith in the same way. St Paul compares the Christian life to a race or a wrestling match – things that require constant study, practice, and effort to improve and grow. Jesus tells the parable about the talents. Those who invested and used the talents given to them with effort and learning are rewarded. The man who simply buries the talent is cast out of the Master’s presence. We have all been given a grand gift and called to a grand calling by receiving God’s Name in Holy Baptism. But if we choose to not learn, grow, or practice the life that has been given to us, atrophy will kill us. Athletes who do not practice do not win games. Employees who do not learn how to play their role in the business will be fired. No master of a club wants uninvolved members who don’t care to conform to the ways of the group.

The theme of this Sunday is prayer. The name of the Sunday – Rogate – means “to ask.” Like membership to an exclusive club or admittance to a varsity sports team, the admission grants great privileges such as repentance, forgiveness, and eternal life. But the continued use of the gifts requires continued learning and practice. To be a disciple means to be one who is learning, and a Christian who despises learning from the Father’s Words is no true disciple at all. They are only deceiving themselves like a student who doesn’t pay attention, doesn’t take notes, and yet expects to pass with flying colors.

And so we pray. We ask – as the theme of this Sunday directs us. Athletes ask their coach where they can improve. If they are good teammates, they listen to the advice given and the do the drills commanded. Students follow the direction of their wise professors and end up growing in knowledge and capability and thus pass the test at the end of the course. When we gather here to worship, this is prayer. The practice of gathering as Christians has always been called “praying the liturgy.” The things we do here are our varsity practice and our university courses in the Christian life. Our individual prayers are guided and informed by how we pray together here. Here we learn to ask our Father just what He desires His children to believe, say, and do. Here is where He, our Coach, Professor, and Father speaks to us, prepares us for the testing, and teaches the right things to think and how to accomplish them with His divine guiding and assistance.

Part of being in God’s family club of the Christian Church involves being tested. Athletes on varsity teams are tested so that their skills can improve and victory can be achieved. We are all still alive here on earth, which means that we are on the team and in the club, but the final victory of a faithful Christian death has not been achieved yet by any of us. We all must still practice, learn, grown, and push towards the final goal.

As Jesus says in the Gospel reading “I have said these things to you that you may have peace. In this world you will have tribulation,” a word that means testing. We all are being tested and tempted. Tempted by our own flesh to pursue our vile desires. Tempted by the devil to believe in lies. Tempted by the world to abandon the true faith. And all of this testing is not only allowed, but sent by God Himself. He gives us tests and allows evil to tempt us because He knows we have all things necessary in His Word to withstand and remain faithful in temptation. It is not easy. It is not painless. It is how God has designed out lives here as His children to be. We pray for strength to wrestle and knowledge to pass the tests. The Holy Spirit provides us what we need. And throughout our lives, the comfort of Jesus is always the same for those with faith. “Take heart in your struggles in this world. For I have already overcome the world, and so can you.” “For everyone adopted by God overcomes the world. And this is the victory which overcomes the world – our faith which is tested by fire, but results in glory and honor.” (1 John 5, 1 Peter 1)

Sermon Text: John 16:5-15

Jesus says “The Spirit will guide you into all truth.” In his Epistle, the Apostle John tells us that “The Spirit is truth.” (1 John 5) Jesus also says of Himself “I am...the truth.” (John 14:6) Jesus is the truth. The Spirit is truth. The Spirit guides us into the truth, which is Jesus, the truth Himself. Truth begets truth. True leads to greater truth. We could go on, of course. All of the Christian faith and life is about truth, and it is our calling to seek the truth. This is all well and good, but as Pontius Pilate said, “What is truth?”

In its bare meaning, truth is the opposite of being hidden or forgotten. In the world of philosophy, truth is the reality of all existence – it is set against the illusions we all have about the world and how it works. Imagine you have a box in your kitchen where you press a button and out comes a fresh meal. No matter what the screen on the box would show you or tell you about what is happening inside, the truth would be the reality of the process on the inside. You might believe little elves live in the box and do the work. You might believe that the box makes the wrong meal sometimes, and that you should be more involved in the process for a better result. You could believe anything about what happens in the box. But the truth – the reality – exists and works, no matter what you believe about it. No matter how the box produces the meal, we would all hopefully agree that it would be best to know in our minds the truth of how the box works if possible, rather than a false understanding. The reality in the box is the truth.

The world around us works whether we understand it or not. I do not understand electricity, and I refuse to touch it. Yet, the electric lights come on and my voice comes through these electric speakers despite my lack of knowledge. The sun rises every morning, even if only a few of us could truly comprehend the physics that cause it to burn so brightly. Reality goes on whether we acknowledge and understand it or not. As Ecclesiastes says: “Vapor of vapors, says the Preacher, vapor of vapors! All is vapor. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises.” (Ecclesiastes 1)

That is the reality – the truth – of our existence here. People come and people go, and the sun keeps rising and setting. Because of our sinful flesh, we are incapable of seeing or understanding all of the reality around us. Our flesh is easily deceived by the world. Our souls prefer lies and easier explanations about reality than what God’s Word offers us. We like stories that make us feel better about the drudgery of this life. We enjoy people who make all that is wrong with the world seem acceptable, or even beneficial for us.

Entire nations, people groups, religions, and personal convictions are built on very strong assumptions about what the world around us is, how it works, where it came from, and what our place is in it. This is why we speak of nations, groups, religions, and our own personalities as having a type of “spirit.” One people group might view time and timeliness as crucial to reality, and so a spirit of punctuality is promoted. A religion or nation might assume a natural or god-given superiority over others, and so a spirit of pridefulness would be found among them. A person might be filled in their heart, soul, and mind with strong ideas about fairness, justice, or equality, and so they might be described as having a certain type of spirit living within them. Historians talk about the spirit of revolution, the spirit of a church council, or a spirit which drives history forward.

The spirit that is within us – holy or not – is what drives our lives, our thoughts, our desires, and ultimately, our actions. This is why the collect prayer for this Sunday focuses on our desires, our hearts, and where our love is directed. “Oh Lord, you make the minds of your faithful to be of one will. Grant that we may love what You have commanded and desire what You promise...so that our hearts may be fixed where true joys are found.” As the prayer makes clear, we cannot change our desires and our passions by ourselves. We are born with selfish desire. This selfish desire to avoid suffering, reject God and His gifts, and go our own way like Cain is in our flesh from birth till death. It wages war on our soul from birth to death by tempting and deceiving us to believe deceptions about God, the world, and ourselves.

Only the Holy Spirit can teach and reveal the truth about the true God, the reality of this world, and the reality of our sinful flesh and desires. This is, in fact, the chief job of the Holy Spirit. Jesus says “When the Holy Spirit comes, He will convict the world concerning sin, and righteousness, and judgement.” (John 16:8) The Holy Spirit comes to us when we are taught by the Bible that we fall far short of the expectations for entrance into the kingdom of God. He convicts us of the sin which we inherited from Adam, and also of the sins which we have committed so frequently ourselves. This preaching against sin is what causes people to either reject the Holy Spirit or repent. For some, admitting that what God calls evil is evil is not the Spirit they desire. They prefer a spirit who calls evil good, or at least a spirit that teaches that God doesn’t mind, so nobody else should either.

We must be convicted of our sin, and of the sin that fills the land where we live. If we are not convicted of God’s truth of what sin is, then we will have no desire for righteousness. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Mt 5) To desire righteousness, we must be changed to stop desiring unrighteous thoughts, ideas, and actions. The Holy Spirit works through true, doctrinally accurate preaching to show us where we are short, and to prompt us to desire what God calls good. Faithful preaching describes reality as it truly is.

Having been convicted of our sin, the Holy Spirit convicts us of righteousness. Jesus says the Spirit does this “because Jesus has gone to the Father.” We cannot see Jesus the Righteous One with our eyes as the apostles did. So we must learn from the apostolic preaching just what the righteousness of God looked like in the fleshly human form of Jesus Christ. Because we cannot yet see Him, we must learn by hearing. “How are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? Faith comes by hearing, and hearing through the Word of God.” (Romans 10) Preaching that is accurate to the testimony of the apostles and that is in agreement with the teaching of the historic Christian faith is the primary fruit of the Holy Spirit. “In order that we may obtain this faith, the ministry of preaching the Gospel and administering the sacraments was instituted [by Jesus]. For through the Word and the Sacraments...the Holy Spirit is given, who works faith in those who hear the Gospel.” (Augsburg Confession Article V)

The primary purpose of the preaching of any Christian pastor is to describe God, the world, sin, and salvation accurately according to the teaching of the Holy Spirit. The preacher is expected to know how to read the Holy Spirit’s Words which He inspired and directed the prophets and apostles to write. The preacher is expected to be able to know the truth of what the Holy Spirit has caused to be written, and to communicate that truth clearly. Through clear, accurate, and faithful preaching, the Holy Spirit goes out to work on hearts. Through the preaching, the Holy Spirit causes faith, repentance, and life to grow in the hearts of those who hear and do not reject the truth revealed in God’s Word.

What we believe to be true about God and the world guides how we act towards God and in the world. Whatever spirit or spirits we invite into our hearts and minds in what we watch and listen to, these things will define how we believe the world to be. Without the Holy Spirit, we will not know the truth about God or anything else. Without the Holy Spirit, we will believe that there really are little elves in the magic food box, or some other lie. We will act according to whatever our chosen spirit or spirits suggest.

The truth hurts but also heals. Preaching which adheres to the truth of the Holy Spirit is not always pleasant, as it reveals our weakness, our shame, and our sin. But preaching which is true also directs towards the true righteousness – Jesus Christ, crucified for sinners. Truthful preaching promises that Satan has already been judged, and that if we repent and believe in the true God and His truths of reality, we will not be condemned.

Two sermons today. The first is mostly on the Epistle reading and is for the regular service at Zion - Ayrshire. The second is for Trinity - Mallard where we are confirming two young Christians this morning.

Sermon Texts: 1 Peter 2:11-20; John 16:16-22

First Sermon

God is holy. God has called all of us to be holy as well. “You, my people, shall be holy as I the LORD your God am holy.” (Exodus 19; Leviticus 21; 1 Peter 1) If our calling is to be holy, it would be good to know what holy means. Often we think that holy means “perfect,” or “sinless.” After all, God is perfect and sinless, and He is holy, therefore it would seem that to be holy would mean perfection.

But holy does not mean perfect and sinless. Holy means to be separated; to be totally different; to be set apart from the common things of the world. The world is imperfect and sinful, and we have been called out of the world, to be like God who is not like the world. Our call to be holy like God means that we cannot and should not be at peace with the world. It means that we bear the burden of Christ - being unlike the world but having to live in, among, and with the world. To which Christ comforts us with His words “My yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matt. 11) The Christian life is light and easy with Christ, but make no mistake, it is still a burden to be carried.

The burden of being holy – different – from the world is the topic of Peter’s instructions to us in the epistle reading. It is clear from the words that Peter uses to describe faithful Christians. Peter calls us “sojourners and exiles.” In baptism, we are given citizenship in heaven. This means that as we live now, we live where God places us as His own. He is our king. His Law is supreme over us and is to rule our hearts and minds. But the laws of our land are not God’s laws. The culture we live in is not a God-pleasing culture. We learn God’s good Law, and we are learning God’s holy culture in our worship together. But between now and our death, we are exiled from heaven, sojourning – traveling without a true home in this world.

Imagine being an ambassador from the US to a foreign country. As an ambassador, you would be expected to be very American in culture, in how you talk, and in what you consider to be good or evil. And yet, living as an ambassador in a foreign land, you would be expected to live as peacefully as possible among foreign laws and culture. If the foreign leader invited you to a meal where the American flag was burned and dog meat was served as the main dinner, you would be expected to not flip the tables and throw a fit, but also to not participate in that which would be unAmerican and offensive to our culture. Even if you were accused of breaking the law for not accepting the leader’s meal, you would be suffering as a representative of America – not just yourself. Consider the prophet Daniel, who was kidnapped from his culture, placed into the duties of a government official, but had to make special request not to eat the meat served by the king because it had been sacrificed to idols. He did not participate in the worship and culture of his exile home, but he did so with as much honor and respectable conduct as he could. Daniel was thrown into the lion’s den for his refusal to worship the teachings of the surrounding culture. But he was only in the lion’s den for “a little while.” (John 16)

As St Peter writes “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers [for practicing your Christian faith], they may see your good deeds, and glorify God on the day of visitation.” (1 Peter 2:12) Peter’s epistle was written to sinners like us. Many of his audience would have been Jews living under Roman control. The Romans begrudgingly allowed the Jews to worship and live according to their culture some of the time. But there was constant tension under Roman authority. For the whole time period of the early Church, there were many rebellious Jewish revolutionaries who sought to overthrow the government to establish their own culture and laws as supreme. Consider Barabbas, the prisoner who was set free so that Jesus would be the One crucified. Mark 15 describes him as “an insurrectionist who had committed murder in a Jewish uprising.”

Christians are not called to force heaven to be constructed on earth through violence, rebellion, or worst of all, revolution. Violence, rebellion, and revolution against authorities is revolution against God Himself. Jesus says to Pilate that his authority to crucify Jesus comes from the Heavenly Father. The catechism teaches us that governmental authority is given by God to be the father over the family of the nation. (Large Catechism, 4^th Commandment) Therefore, those in authority are to be respected and honored as fathers, because they are called to carry out the Heavenly Father’s divine duty of enforcing law and order. They are to praise what God calls good and punish what God calls evil. When leaders do not support what God calls good, they are failing at their duty. Yet we are still called to respect that God has given them their authority. When our leaders allow and enforce what God’s Word calls evil, we are called to suffer their poor leadership while still giving them honor, not because of their action, but because God has allowed them to exercise that authority.

This is not easy for our flesh, which wants to revolt and rebel against any authority that we do not enjoy or agree with. The phrases “Not my president,” “Not my pope,” or “That’s just his opinion,” are very common sentiments about authority in our age. But whoever our leader in any situation is has been allowed to be placed above us by God. In our culture and country, we prefer to choose our own leaders for ourselves – not unlike the Israelites who demanded to have kings in place of God. This practice that has had very predictable results considering all nations are filled with rebellious sinners. Our track record of choosing actively Christian and openly God-fearing men to lead us can only be described as abysmal.

St Peter says that “It is a gracious thing when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly.” Consider a legal case that was just ended in Finland – a country once considered to be 90% Lutheran. Two Lutherans – a bishop and a lawmaker – were recently charged with hate speech. In 2004, the bishop published a small book explaining Christian marriage. It was published long before so-called “same-sex marriage” was enforced in Finland. The Lutheran lawmaker who was charged had tweeted a picture of a Bible verse. The Supreme Court of Finland recently made a final ruling on their case. Both the bishop and the lawmaker were found guilty of hate speech and fined, simply for publishing a Christian booklet about marriage over 20 years ago. The ruling is unjust. It is against God’s Law and His order for humanity. And yet, the bishop, the lawmaker, and the other Finnish Lutherans with them would be wrong to rebel or incite a revolution against the government which has been allowed to exercise its authority by God.

God allows Godless leaders. Christians in any such situation are called to pray, to influence, to preach, and even to receive the authority of government if it is given to them rightly. But as long as our leaders fail at fearing God, supporting His good order, and punishing that which is evil, we are called to endure these sorrows while suffering unjustly. What will we do if the American government removes special protections from churches and it becomes monumentally expensive to have a legally recognized congregation? What will we do if our laws or culture demand speech from us that is unchristian and ungodly?

In such cases, we are called to do what Peter says in the epistle. Be subject to every human institution – not because they are good and Godly, but for the sake of the Lord’s Name which we bear. Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor. Suffer bad and ungodly leaders, because we have been made holy – separate from this world. We are called to suffer as the holy among the unholy – as Christians among God-haters.

This reality is a burden of sorrow. As Christ says in the Gospel reading “The world will rejoice, while you will weep and lament. But your burden of sorrow will be turned into joy.” How long until this sorrow and suffering is turned to joy? Jesus promises us that it will only be “a little while.” (John 16) Repent and believe, for He is coming soon to put all nations, kings, and enemies under His feet. If we remain faithful, then He will be our true and visible King, and we His sons by faith will reign with Him to eternity.

Second Sermon

Today’s Gospel reading from John 16 is only a small part of a rather long discussion between Jesus and His disciples. Beginning in John 14 and concluding at the end of John 17 – 4 whole chapters – Jesus is giving His disciples one final confirmation class before His crucifixion and resurrection. He teaches them. He answers their questions, even the ones they are afraid to ask directly. He prays with them and for them. Jesus is the greatest confirmation instructor, and all who seek to learn the truth from His Word and Spirit are His students.

It is fitting for us to have a confirmation right at this point in the church year. For quite a bit of Christian history, Lent was the time set aside to instruct those who wished to join the Christian Church. For each Sunday, there would be a portion of Christian teaching that the confirmation students would learn and memorize. They would learn the Creed and its meaning. They would learn to pray the Lord’s Prayer and what each petition meant. They would be instructed in the Holy Sacraments. They would meet with the bishop – the local pastor – and be examined by him. This was not meant as a test to pass and forget like in school. It was an instruction in the realities of leaving their old lives behind and binding themselves to the teachings and standards of the Holy Scriptures.

That was Lent. On Easter Vigil, the confirmands would be gathered at the church. In the darkness of night, all the great works of God recorded in the Old Testament would be read. And then, finally, these men and women who desired to become sons of God would be baptized and confirmed in the faith. They would partake of the Holy Communion with the rest of the believers at the Easter celebration. Joy of joys! New children of the heavenly Father! New brothers and sisters in the faith for the Christian Church!

The readings set for this entire Easter season are not disconnected from the Lent readings for the confirmands. These Easter readings were organized to teach those fresh Christian sons of God just what to expect now that they had joined the family of God. The readings during Lent teach about the reality of what must be given up and how serious sin is. The Easter season readings teach us what to expect from the world around us now that we have been born from above and remade in Holy Baptism. The Sunday after Easter teaches us not to skip the gathering of the faithful every Sunday like Thomas did after the Resurrection. Last Sunday’s Gospel taught us that Jesus is the Good Shepherd – the Good King – and that those who follow His voice and learn from His Words are safe and secure under His protection.

This Sunday begins four Sundays of teaching about the Holy Spirit – the Comforter – whom Jesus sends to His faithful Church. Considering the rest of the year our Gospel readings jump from section to section and Gospel to Gospel, it is a unique part of the year to get four readings from the same section of the same Gospel. Clearly the Christian Church thought and thinks that these chapters of John’s Gospel are important for all Christians to know – and especially Christians who may be new to the Church or otherwise young in the faith. Even mature Christians are called to be like children, so these things apply to all of us, no matter our Spiritual maturity.

These chapters of John’s Gospel record Jesus’ final teachings before His crucifixion. He does not give a clear list of minimum standards, nor does Jesus give some condensed version of “general Christianity.” Instead, these chapters are focused, as we just heard, on the work of the Holy Spirit who is sent by Jesus to comfort and guide His Church until the day He returns in judgement, wrath, and deliverance.

These teachings of Jesus about the Holy Spirit fly in the face of teaching that claims Christianity to be an easy road or a safe path. Jesus has hidden Himself in the heavens. He is ruling. He is King over all. He has sent out His apostolic preachers as messengers to spread His rule and to call new citizens into His Kingdom which is the Christian Church. By being born from above in Holy Baptism, we are placed under His rule. We become sojourners and exiles who live in and among this world of death, as St Peter puts it in the epistle reading.

Jesus warns that there will be sorrow in the Christian life. This sorrow comes from knowing His goodness from the preaching of His Word, but seeing only the evil and despair caused by sin all around us. Our sorrow comes from knowing what is promised to us in the future, while suffering through injustice, unfairness, and disorder every day of our lives. Jesus is warning the disciples and us that the burden of the Christian faith will mean sorrow, lament, and suffering as long as we breathe this earthly air.

This is why Jesus promises the Holy Spirit. In the earliest ages of the Christian Church, confirmation was not associated so much with classroom instruction, but rather with the anointing which served as a public mark that the confirmands had been given the Holy Spirit in the blessing of the bishop. It was our own Lutheran tradition that took confirmation from an anointing with oil to a recognition that the students had learned the faith for themselves and were “making it their own.”

These two traditions look different outwardly, but they are not very different in their essence. The Holy Spirit is given through words of blessing. The Holy Spirit is given through the teaching and preaching of pure doctrine. Pure doctrine, which is accurate interpretation of the Word of God, is a blessing in itself. It is a gift and mark of the presence of the Holy Spirit. After all, as the epistle reading from 1 John 5 taught us two Sundays ago, “The Spirit is the one who testifies because the Spirit is the Truth.”

Today we confirm two more young Christians into the eternal and everlasting faith. They have been instructed and examined in the basics of the faith. They have memorized the basic prayers, creed, and Bible verses. In learning and memorizing these basics, they have received the Holy Spirit, the Truth, into their hearts through their ears. This morning, we publicly acknowledge them to be Christians instructed in the faith and able to understand the core things of the Christian religion. Today, we welcome them to participate with us in the fullest expression of unity in Christ and His teaching which is the very banquet of heaven, the Lord’s Supper.

Despite the fact that confirmations have often been held around the time of school graduation, confirmation is not a graduation. It is not a leaving behind of study of the Christian faith. Instead, it is a confession and pledge that we have learned, we will continue to confess and remained pledged to. It is not the end of Christian instruction, but really the very beginning, for there is much more to be learned about the Christian faith and the Christian life than could ever be taught in a classroom for a few hours. All Christians who have been baptized are called to this same responsibility and faithful practice of continued learning about the truth of Christ.

The Holy Spirit is needed for this Christian life of learning, because learning the Christian life happens through suffering and sorrow. As Jesus says “In this world you will have sorrow. The world will rejoice while you suffer. But your sorrow will turn into joy.” It is the Holy Spirit who comforts us in ages of confusion, sadness, and trouble. He comforts us primarily by reminding and reteaching us the truths of the teachings of the Christian faith. When we sin and feel that God won’t or can’t forgive us, the Holy Spirit comforts us by reminding us of the truth that the blood of Jesus covers all sins. When the world is so disordered that we cannot help but cry out to God for relief, the Spirit reminds us that sin is the reality of this life, and that our own repentance for sin brings calm and peace to our troubled consciences. When we have nothing else to hope for, the Spirit reminds us of the promise that Jesus will return and bring us with Him to the heavenly Temple.

The Spirit instructs us in the joy of the Christian faith which these two young Christians will be confirmed in shortly. The joy of the Christian faith can seem fleeting or unfulfilled in this life, but Jesus says “I will see you again, your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.”

Thanks so much for your overwhelming support and response to this project. I have loved doing it and have many times now seen the fruits of simply making the Bible easy to ingest. The Word does the work.

We haven’t had regular readings sent out for a week now. As you might guess, Lent/Easter for pastors is similar to April 15 for accountants or planting/harvest for farmers. There’s just too much to do in the time God has allotted for each day. What this means is that during Lent, anything without a hard and close deadline gets put lower on the to-do list, usually accompanied by the phrase “That can wait till after Easter.” Well. We are solidly in the Easter season, so all of those little odds and ends need to be tended to. That is the reason you haven’t had an email in your inbox every morning. The hope was to get things rolling again this week. Depending on how today and tomorrow go in terms of getting loose ends tied up, that might happen, but it also might not.

Going forward, I have realized that providing these recordings for every day of the year minus Sunday’s might be a bit too much to commit to. I do plan to continue to do it, but semi-occasional breaks of a week or two may be necessary. It’s not the Bible reading itself which takes the time. That part is wonderful. Reading the Scriptures out loud is the center of our faith and life. It is, after all, my job, and our common calling as Christians. But the production side is what takes the time. It does add up quickly between planning, practicing, editing, putting the parts together, uploading, and scheduling each individual podcast.

Besides this, there are a few other opportunites for teaching the faith that have been put on my plate recently, so I am working to figure out a more reliable schedule for getting all of these things done and so that no corners are cut.

Long story short, there will be recordings coming your way again soon, I just need a bit more planning and organizing time to make sure it can be done well.

Thanks, and God bless you.

Sermon Texts: Ezekiel 24, John 10

When Jesus says “I am the Good Shepherd,” His words mean more than that He is better at sheep herding that others. Both of those words “Good,” and “Shepherd,” are filled with greater meaning than they first appear.

First, the word “Good.” “Good” in this use does not mean better or simply adequate. Of course, Jesus is good at His job. There is no one better at His job, or at any job than Jesus Christ. But here in John 10 and in Ezekiel 34, good does not mean competent. This “good” is the opposite of evil. To be good is to be totally in line and in agreement with God’s desires and designs. To be evil is to want things that God does not want. It is to use God’s creation in ways that go against His ordering.

In the beginning, God created all things visible and invisible. He rested on the seventh day, looked at all He had created, and “saw that is was good.” It was not only an adequate creation. It was a creation without evil. Plants grew as they are supposed to. Animals served and obeyed humans without training or resistance as they were designed to do. It all worked properly. But then the option of knowing evil was introduced. Hands designed to care for the life of the garden could now bring death through murder. Words which once only expressed pure love and blessing could now be used to deceive and to curse.

Adam had been given something very good. He had been given authority – dominion – over creation. Authority used in a good way is a blessing for everyone and everything under that authority. Authority is given for care, for protection, and for guidance. Having a good authority over you means that peace is certain and that all things needed will be provided. Good authority makes obedience not only easy but enjoyable and beneficial.

Eve’s disobedience and Adam’s failure to faithfully practice his authority rightly are what caused the struggle we all have with obedience and authority. The fruit which God had forbidden them to eat caused them and us to know how to misuse God’s creation. “Their eyes were opened to know both good AND evil.” Where before only goodness was known, now the knowledge to use God’s good things in evil ways was introduced. This is the burden of our fallen creation. All people are born knowing only evil. Nobody is born with knowledge or the capability to do “good.” As Jesus says in Mark 10: “No one is good except for God alone.” This is why we must be reborn as Children of God, and then instructed in the good ways and orderings for life designed for us by our Good Father.

Jesus is God, therefore, Jesus is good. Again, Jesus says “I am the Good Shepherd.” Now that we know what good means, we can consider what “Shepherd” means. The Old Testament reading from Ezekiel 34 shows us that shepherd means something a bit grander than someone you hire to tend the flocks. In Ezekiel’s time and in the time of Jesus, a shepherd could refer to a sort of farmhand. However, it was also commonly used as an image for a king. Consider the fact that some of our most ancient images of kings in places like Sumeria portray them as shepherds wearing woolen hats and carrying a lamb in their arms. These ancient depictions of kings as shepherds also portrayed the king as a priest, sacrificing to the gods for the good of the sheep under their care. A good shepherd protects the flock under his care from all destruction. A good king protects his nation from all that would destroy them. A good king is a high priest in faithful service to the God above him.

Jesus is the Good Shepherd. This means that He is the Good King – the King who does not practice or allow the evil misuse of His creation and His good ordering for creation. Jesus is the good priest – the priest who does not fail in His duties at the altar of sacrifice on behalf of the people under His care.

In Ezekiel 34, we see that the Shepherd is not merely a king, but God Himself. “As for you, My sheep...you are men, and I am your God.” (Ezekiel 34:31) God the Good Shepherd’s words in Ezekiel 34 make plain that the kings Israel had begged for in place of Him had all failed in their duty to be good. When God the Good Shepherd wanted to give water to His flock, Israel, in the wilderness, He had Moses strike the rock like any other normal shepherd would do. God does work with and through earthly shepherd-kings. But when God wanted to make it a miraculous water-giving through His Word alone, Moses failed and struck the rock. Later, when it was time for the kings to go to war, David did not go to lay his own life on the line. Instead he stayed at home and took another man’s wife for himself, seeking pleasure at the cost of the life of his sheep. The prophet Nathan even calls David to repentance by using a story about a sheep stolen from a poor man by a rich man. Solomon was given shepherdly wisdom by God, and yet he failed to be a good shepherd for Israel as he imported other religions and allowed the destructive worship of foreign false gods.

Of all the other kings of Israel, there are few that could be counted as faithful. There are none that can be counted as truly and totally “good.” Therefore, God speaks through Ezekiel and says “I will come and do the job myself. I hate the shepherds of Israel. I appointed them to feed my flock on my behalf, and instead they have eaten the sheep themselves. I appointed them to purify the fleece of my beloved lambs, but they have shorn the sheep and dressed themselves in the wool instead. So, because they have all failed, I will come and do it myself. I will find the sheep. I will call out for them. I will feed them. I will purify their wool so that it will be as white as snow. I will protect them from the lion and the wolf.” In other words, when God looks at the ways we use and abuse the authority and power He has given, He says “If I want a job done right, I’m just going to have come and do it myself.”

This is what it means when Jesus says “I am the Good Shepherd.” It means first and foremost that He is God. He is God Himself who has come here to search for His faithful sheep, wherever they may have wandered.

Jesus the Good Shepherd means that He is the King. King of Kings, Lord of Lords. Not “No Kings,” but instead “Only One King – Jesus Christ.” Thus says the LORD Himself.

Jesus the Good Shepherd means that in the place of kings who promise rich economies and better lives, we have a King who does provide. He provides clothing, shoes, food, drink, and all that we need to support this body and this life. Not only that, but He also gives us His own Body and Blood, not only to strengthen us in this life, but to strengthen us for the life to come, something the kings of this world can neither promise nor carry out. While the kings of this world fail to nourish, our true King feeds us, body and soul.

Jesus the Good Shepherd means that we will suffer kings of this world who care very much about tracking where all their sheep are, what they are doing, and even what they might do in the future. They do not gather and use that information to better care for the sheep under their care. Jesus the Good Shepherd means that He already has known us more fully than any king of this earth can. It means that even though He has already seen the worst of our hearts and even watched us turn these terrible desires into actions, He has mercy on us to forgive us, and cleanse us from all our sins. The kings of this world will search all they can about you, but not to defend you or benefit you. The King of Kings, the Good Shepherd, has already searched Your heart, remade it, and promised to continue to care for you, especially because of all the things He knows about you.

The kings of this world fleece their people and dress themselves finely. Jesus, our Good Shepherd-King goes naked to the Cross in our place. And in return we are clothed in the robes of His righteousness. We receive His robe of inheritance, and are therefore made kings along side Him through faith.

Praise be to our True King, our Good Shepherd, who descended from His divine Throne to die for us, His holy flock, as a perfect sacrificial Sheep. No earthly king can promise what our Good Shepherd has already promised us through faith. He alone can promise us that “the Lamb in the midst of the throne is our Good Shepherd, and he will guide us to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from our eyes.” (Revelation 7:17)

Sermon Text: John 20

We should pick on Thomas a little bit. But we should be careful not to pick on him too much. Thomas was not in our position – nor have any of us been in Thomas’s position. Thomas had seen, heard, and followed Jesus in the flesh. Thomas had been promised by Jesus – face to face – “I will be crucified, but on the third day, I will rise.” Thomas had been promised a visual confirmation of the resurrection in a way that we have not been given. At least Thomas’s promise came from Jesus directly. Meanwhile, every few years or so, a new book is released by someone who claims to have seen heaven during some sort of experience. These books have often become best sellers and even movies. Though those books and movies are often proved to be hoaxes, their popularity shows that we desire to see just as Thomas desired to see. If we only see something, then our faith will be more certain – is what our flesh thinks.

The relationship between faith and sight is addressed all throughout John’s Gospel. When Jesus meets with Nicodemus in John 3, He says “Unless one is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of heaven.” You must be baptized to be able to see with eyes of faith and to recognize the Christian Church in truth. Jesus ends His teaching with the words “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.”

In the next chapter, Jesus encounters a Samaritan woman at a well. He preaches to her about what He has come to do for all nations. After His preaching, she sees Him in a different way. She goes and tells the others in town. The other people testify that they believe “not because of what she said, but because of what we heard from Him. Because of His words, we know that He is the savior of the world.”

In the next chapter (John 5), Jesus approaches a man who is lame, paralyzed, and blind. He asks if the man desires to be healed. The man says “How can I be healed? I have no one to carry me to the water.” So Jesus speaks to the blind man and he is healed. In the dispute with the pharisees that follows, Jesus does not point to what He did, but to His own words. “If you believed the words of Moses, you would believe the words that I speak. But you do not believe the words of Moses, so how will you believe My words?”

In John 6, Jesus asks His disciples who were struggling to believe in His words “Do you take offense at this? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” The words and the Spirit are one package. The Spirit comes with the Words of Jesus to create and sustain faith. What if we were to see Jesus seated at the right hand of the Father? Would that somehow increase our faith or make it more valid? “Blessed are those who have not seen, and believe.”

In John 7, Jesus’ own brothers tell Him to go up to the feast in Jerusalem “So that your disciples may also see the works that you are doing.” But Jesus refuses to go. “My time has not fully come.” And yet, despite Jesus not being in Jerusalem to make Himself and His power visible to the crowds, many of the crowds believed in Him. When Jesus does show up at the feast, partway through, He does not perform miracles for the eyes, but rather teaches to the ears of the crowds.

John 9 is an entire chapter recording an argument of the pharisees in response to Jesus healing the sight of a blind man. When Jesus heals the blind man, it is not instantaneous. Jesus applies mud to the man’s eyes and tells him to go wash in the pool of Siloam. Thus, when the man is healed and able to see, he does not immediately see Jesus. But the man’s heart is turned toward Jesus, and he seeks to see Him that he may believe in him. Jesus says to the man “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” Jesus is not speaking of judging our vision like an optometrist. He is speaking of Him judging our faith which determines how we see things, how we act, and whether or not we repent and are saved.

John 12 records the famous words of the Greeks who had come to the Jerusalem temple festival who had heard about Jesus and His words. It is a phrase that many Lutheran churches have on or in their pulpits to remind the preacher and the people what the purpose of Christian preaching is: “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” The Greeks had heard and believed and sought to follow Jesus. The Jewish leaders had seen Him and had rejected Him. The chapter continues with the words “Though Jesus had done so many signs before them, they still did not believe in him so that the words of the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled, ‘Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” Seeing Jesus does not reliably result in true faith. Hearing the words of Jesus causes hearts and souls to believe in Him as the Christ.

The difference between seeing with faith and seeing without faith depends on the words we have heard and how we understand them. When John looks into the tomb at the resurrection, he records that he “saw and believed, but did not yet understand the words of the Scriptures that Jesus must rise from the dead.” His faith was living because of all that he had heard from Moses and the prophets, all of the Scriptures that prophesied of the Son of Man and His work. John himself is saying that he believed before he understood what he was seeing.

The seeing of Jesus, the resurrected Christ, is not a necessity for saving faith. Millions upon millions of Christians from the ascension until now have believed, been baptized, and died in the true faith without having seen the resurrected Christ in front of their own faces in this life. Millions of saints have fallen asleep in the LORD without having reached out to touch him in the exact way that Thomas did. Saving faith does not come from sight, which is a great blessing because our eyes so often deceive us. And if our eyes do not deceive us, we deceive ourselves by explaining what we have seen in false ways due to our selfishness and sin. We see the actions of others – of friends, family, world leaders – and we choose ourselves how to understand what we have seen them do.

We are tempted to do the same with Jesus. We do love to look for signs. We do, to some degree, hold Him to standards set by our eyes. Lord, we have been faithful, why have you not shown your approval in the way we would like to see. Lord, if You are true, why do you not stop the evils that we see all around us. So many of the Psalms include these sorts of laments – “Lord, can’t you see what is happening to us. It seems like You cannot or will not look at what we are suffering.”

To which our Lord responds “Look at the Cross. Look at what I suffered for you while you were still a sinner. Look at what I have done for you. See the goodness of the Father in the shameful and bloody death of His Son. See the great promise of the resurrection to eternal bliss in Christ’s resurrection.” These are the ways He has shown us His love. These are the ways He has revealed to the eyes that He desires that all would be saved and come to the knowledge of the Truth.

But none of us have seen these things. Blessed are those who have not seen these things and yet believe in them. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. And what is this Word of God? It is the record of what the prophets and the apostles saw. It is the record of their true understanding of what they saw as guided by the Holy Spirit. This is why the true Temple of the Christian Church – the Body of Christ – is built upon the foundation of the eyewitness reports of the prophets and the apostles. (Eph. 2:20) “The wall of the Heavenly Jerusalem has twelve foundations, and on them are the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.” (Rev. 21:14)

Thomas had to be shown the resurrected Christ, because Thomas was called to be an apostle – an eyewitness to all that Jesus said and did. The apostolic witness – The New Testament – is how we see the fulfillment of the Old Testament in Jesus Christ. The eyewitness testimony of God’s chosen preachers is how we receive faith and grow in faithfulness. Have we believed because we have seen? No. We believe because those who have seen have recorded what they saw and have explained it to us with words inspired and guided by the Holy Spirit. For Jesus did many other signs which were not recorded, but these things have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, we may have life in His Name. (John 20:30-31)

John 21:1-14

Luke 24:36-49

Sermon from Rev David Petersen found in Thy Kingdom Come by Emmauel Press

Luke 24:13-35

Sermon by the Rev David Petersen found in Thy Kingdom Come from Emmanuel Press