The Fourth Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Genesis 17:15-22
In Christ Jesus, who leads His people to the heavenly Zion with singing, everlasting joy upon their heads, where they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away (Isa. 35:10), dear fellow redeemed:
Abram and Sarai experienced a particular pain that many have experienced since then—they were unable to have children. This is the first detail the Bible shares about Sarai, that she “was barren; she had no child” (Gen. 11:30). Undoubtedly this caused them much sadness. As the years passed and no child was conceived, they became more and more resigned to the fact that they would have no descendants. They passed into their forties, then their fifties, then their sixties. By this time, Abram had become a very wealthy man. He had great possessions and many servants.
Then rather abruptly, the LORD told Abram to leave his country and his relatives and go to a new land. He said to Abram, “I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen. 12:2-3). If Abram had any doubts about this, they are not recorded for us. He might have wondered how his name would become great and all the families of the earth would be blessed through him. For one thing, he had no children. For another, he was at this time seventy-five years old, and Sarai was sixty-five!
But Abram obeyed. He gathered all he had and traveled to the land of Canaan. When he got there, the LORD appeared to him and said, “To your offspring I will give this land” (v. 7). A while later, the LORD repeated the promise, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them…. So shall your offspring be” (15:5). Abram believed what God said (v. 6).
But ten years passed after the LORD told Abram and Sarai to move. Sarai was now seventy-five. If she hadn’t had a child yet, how could she now? She decided to give her servant to Abram as another wife, so that if her servant conceived a child with him, Sarai would count the child as hers. Her servant did conceive and gave birth to a son named Ishmael. But Ishmael was not the child of God’s promise.
Thirteen years later when Abram was ninety-nine years old, God appeared to him again and told him, “You shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham” (17:4-5). Abraham means “father of a multitude.” At the same time, the LORD changed the name Sarai to Sarah which means “princess,” and He promised Abraham that he would have a son by Sarah.
Abraham’s reaction is recorded for us. He “fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, ‘Shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?’” Now as you know, there are different kinds of laughter. Some point their fingers and laugh when they are ridiculing a person or showing their disdain for him. Some laugh when they are shocked or surprised. Martin Luther was convinced that Abraham laughed “because he was filled with great gladness and joy” (Luther’s Works, vol. 3, p. 154).
He was filled with joy because he understood that God’s promise of a son was about more than providing him an heir. It was about making a way for all the families of the earth to be blessed (12:3). The promise the LORD made to Abraham is the same promise He made to Adam and to Noah. God would send a Savior to redeem sinful mankind. Jesus pointed back to this promise when He said to the Jews, “Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad” (Joh. 8:56).
Abraham’s laugh coincided with the name of his son. God said to him, “you shall call his name Isaac,” a name which means “he laughs.” A year later, that son was born. And the new mother Sarah said, “God has made laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh over me…. Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age” (Gen. 21:6-7). And every time they held that little baby and listened to his little grunts and coos, what else could they do but laugh?
But we can’t help but wonder: Why did God do this? Why did He make Abraham and Sarah wait until they were one hundred years old and ninety years old before they had a child? The author of the book of Hebrews writes in a very understated way that Sarah “was past the age” of being able to conceive, and in a more expressive way that Abraham was “as good as dead” (11:11,12). If this amazing birth were not recorded in the Bible, we would laugh at the possibility.
And that is the point. What we consider impossible, God makes possible. No one can say that Abraham and Sarah were the ones to keep the promise of a Savior alive. They were incapable of having children. They were very old. And God gave them laughter. He gave them Isaac. He wanted to show that this child was a gift, just as all children are. He wanted to show that His promise would neither fail nor succeed because of the work of man. God’s promises succeed because He is God.
That means we can trust His promises. What makes this difficult is our sinful tendency to trust ourselves. We act as if everything depends on ourselves instead of God. We offer weak prayers, if we offer them at all, because we are convinced that God will not give us what we pray for. Or we get impatient when we ask something of Him, and He makes us wait—maybe when we are sick or injured or in trouble. We might even attach a demand to our requests: “If You love me, You will do this by this day or this time.” What we are really doing is putting ourselves in the position of God, and by our lack of faith we are calling down His judgment instead of His mercy. When we take matters into our own hands, like Sarai did by giving her servant to Abram, we often experience unexpected and unpleasant consequences.
God’s plans are much better than ours, and His promises are rock-solid. When He makes a promise, nothing will change His mind. He fulfilled His promise to give Abraham and Sarah a son. And He fulfilled His promise to send a Savior through Abraham’s line. Some two thousand years down the road, God sent His angel to another old man, a priest named Zechariah. Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth were also old and barren like Abraham and Sarah. And the angel said, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John” (Luk. 1:13). Zechariah did not respond in faith like Abraham, and for his disbelief, God made him unable to speak until after John was born.
John was a messenger, “the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord’” (Joh. 1:23). He pointed to One much greater than he, “the strap of whose sandal [he was] not worthy to untie” (v. 27). That One was the Son of God incarnate, the descendant of Abraham and Isaac, the fulfillment of God’s promise to save the world. God sent His Son to take on human flesh because He loves you so deeply and so perfectly. Jesus came to be your righteousness, to live blamelessly under the Law in your place. He came to atone for your many sins by shedding His holy blood on the cross. He came to conquer your death by rising from the dead in victory.
He came to give you hope as you struggle with your doubts and fears. He came to give you peace as the guilt of your sins weighs down on you. He came to give you comfort in your pain and sadness. The hymnwriter Paul Gerhardt put it beautifully in his great Advent hymn:
Rejoice, then, ye sad-hearted, / Who sit in deepest gloom,
Who mourn o’er joys departed, / And tremble at your doom;
Despair not, He is near you, / Yea, standing at the door,
Who best can help and cheer you, / And bid you weep no more.
No care nor effort either / Is needed day or night,
How ye may draw Him hither / In your own strength and might.
He comes, He comes with gladness, / Moved by His love alone,
To calm your fear and sadness, / To Him they well are known. (ELH #94, vv. 6-7)
God promises to come to you through His Word and Sacraments. Through those means, He promises to forgive you. He promises to strengthen you. He promises to renew your faith, so that you have joy even when you are suffering, even when you are struggling. You have joy in knowing that you do not walk through this life alone, that there will be an end to the sadness of this life, and that Jesus will return on the last day to take you to His kingdom of glory.
The time of your final redemption is drawing near. The time will come when the joy you have in Christ will be perfected, when sin, death, and devil will no longer bother you, when you will forever forget the troubles you had here. Then we will sing. We will shout with gladness. And with Abraham and Sarah and all the saints, We Will Laugh.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture of Abraham viewing the stars from 1919 Bible primer book by Augustana Book Concern)
The Third Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Genesis 8:15-22
In Christ Jesus, who “always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere” (2Co. 2:14), dear fellow redeemed:
After Noah and his family entered the ark, rain fell for forty days and forty nights. It was no gentle rain. Genesis 7 says that “all the fountains of the great deep burst forth, and the windows of the heavens were opened” (v. 11). The water kept rising and rising until the whole earth was covered. The water covered even the highest mountains by fifteen cubits, or more than twenty feet. Every living thing on earth died. If you were to look down on earth from a satellite view, you would have seen only blue. If you zoomed in, you might eventually spy something small floating on that great ocean—the ark.
God preserved Noah and his family and two of each kind of animal on this ark. They floated on the water for five months, everyone getting used to the constant rocking of the boat. Then suddenly they heard the bottom of the boat scrape something, and the rocking stopped. The ark had come to rest on the mountains of Ararat. But it was not time to disembark. Just as Noah waited for God’s command to enter the ark (7:1), so he waited for God’s command to leave it. This command finally came more than one year after they had climbed into the ark.
It was a big boat, but one year was a long time to be in it. I imagine it felt more and more crowded as each day passed. Wouldn’t man and animal be eager to get out and enjoy the land and the fresh air again? But in the back of their minds, perhaps Noah and his family wondered, “Will we be safe? We’ve seen what God can do. We are not perfect. What if He gets angry with us? Are we safer staying in the ark in case this happens again?” God soon put those potential fears to rest. He told Noah and his family to “go out from the ark” and to bring out all the living creatures, so they might “be fruitful and multiply on the earth.”
So they went out, and not in the chaotic way we might imagine. By the guidance of God, the animals “went out by families from the ark.” As the animals fanned out in every direction, the first thing Noah did was build an altar to the LORD and offer burnt offerings from the seven pairs of clean animals that he brought on the ark. This sacrifice offered in thanksgiving and praise was pleasing to God. In wording that emphasizes the closeness of God, we read that “the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma.” It wasn’t so much the smell, as the faith by which it was offered.
Before the Flood, the LORD was grieved by the wickedness of man. The stench of their sin filled His nostrils. Now He smelled the soothing aroma of faithfulness. And the LORD said in His heart, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.” That is good news for us, but it is a perplexing statement. God is stating that the people who left the ark were not any different by nature than the people who were destroyed. Before the Flood, God saw that “every intention of the thoughts of [man’s] heart was only evil continually” (6:5). After the Flood, He still saw that “the intention of man’s heart is evil from his youth.”
Nothing about man had changed. Ever since the fall into sin, every person is born in the image of sinful Adam. His sin is passed down generation to generation. It came down through his children and their children, through Noah and his family members, all the way down to us. The Flood cleansed the earth of wickedness, but it did not wash wickedness from the human heart. So why did the LORD say He would never again destroy the earth like He did in the Flood? It is not because we are better than the people were before the Flood. It is not because we have collectively learned our lesson or somehow deserve the LORD’s goodness.
It is because God is a merciful God. Mercy means not punishing when punishment is deserved. Mercy is not earned by the one who receives it. Mercy comes from the heart of the one who has every right to punish. So a store owner might have mercy by not pressing charges against a thief. A judge might have mercy by commuting the sentence of a criminal. You might have mercy by not treating your neighbors in the hurtful way they have treated you.
You can see how mercy is tied to love. This is how God teaches us to be, to be loving as He loves us. We can certainly see the wrath of God by the destruction of the Flood. But we see His love in sparing Noah and his family, even though they were sinners too. He spared them because He had made a promise. He promised Adam and Eve and all mankind that One would come from the woman to destroy the works of the devil. No one made God make that promise, and when He makes a promise, it cannot be undone.
He could not have destroyed all flesh on the earth and kept that promise. So Noah and his family were spared. He had mercy on them. In His love for the whole human race from Adam to Noah and to the end of time, God chose Noah to be in the line of that promise, to be a forefather of the coming Christ. Just as the days on the ark must have stretched on and on, so did the years from Noah onward. But God did not forget.
Thousands of years after the Flood, the LORD sent John to preach in the wilderness. When Jesus came to be baptized by him, the heavens were opened, and Jesus was anointed by the Holy Spirit. John now testified to any who would listen, “He who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God” (Joh. 1:33-34).
Jesus showed who He was by His words and works. In the Holy Gospel for today, Jesus described His work to John’s disciples, “the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them” (Mat. 11:4-5). This is mercy work. This is God’s demonstration of His love for mankind.
This love was demonstrated even more clearly when Jesus drew all sin to Himself like the animals were drawn to the ark. All sin was sealed up in Him, so sin would no longer be counted against us. Then as God once poured out His wrath on the wicked world, He now poured out His wrath on His only Son.
The LORD said after the Flood, “I will never again curse the ground because of man.” He would not destroy every living creature. But He was willing to put the curse on His Son. Galatians 3:13 says, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.’” Jesus was cursed because God is merciful to you. You deserved the punishment Jesus received, but He accepted it for you. “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him” (Joh. 3:17).
So you don’t need to wonder if you are safe with God. You don’t need to worry that He is angry with you because of your weaknesses and sins. He knows that “the intention of [your] heart is evil from [your] youth.” He knows who you are. He knows what you have done. And He chooses to have mercy on you. He has mercy because He is full-of-mercy—merciful. This is how He described Himself to Moses: “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin” (Exo. 34:6-7).
This is how He looks upon you, with mercy and grace, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, forgiving each and every one of your sins. You hear this each week in the ark of the church, before the LORD sends you out again to be fruitful in your vocations. Whether at home or at your job or in the community, like Noah you offer sacrifices of thanksgiving and praise to God through your honest words, your good efforts, and your godly behavior.
These sacrifices of love rise up as a pleasing aroma to the LORD. He does remember you. You are His beloved child, washed clean of your wickedness by the blood of Jesus, covered in His righteousness through the waters of Holy Baptism. The LORD’s mercy toward you is as certain as the changing of the seasons, “seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night.” His love for you does not change. “The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” (Lam. 3:23). Amen.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture from Saude Lutheran Church stained glass)
The Second Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Genesis 6:9-22
In Christ Jesus, whom we will see “coming in a cloud with power and great glory” (Luk. 21:27) on the day of judgment, dear fellow redeemed:
When things are not going so well in the nation or in the church, we might find ourselves dreaming about how it would be if certain individuals were still with us. What would George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln say and do about our current challenges on the local and national levels? And in the church, what difference would Martin Luther, C. F. W. Walther, and U. V. Koren make if they were still here preaching and teaching?
For us, these men have been gone a long time. But if we lived in Noah’s day, presumably all these men would still be with us. Genesis 5 gives the ages of Adam and his descendants. Adam lived to be 930 years old. His son Seth lived 912 years. Methuselah, the oldest man named in the Bible and Noah’s grandfather, lived 969 years. So when you overlap the lifetimes of these men, you find that Adam and Methuselah lived concurrently for 243 years.[1] Methuselah’s son Lamech overlapped 56 years with Adam. Now Lamech was Noah’s father! So even though Noah was unable to speak directly with Adam about what happened in the Garden of Eden and the promise God made to crush Satan’s head, Noah’s father certainly could have.
This makes it all the more surprising that the behavior of mankind had degenerated to the point that it had. The reason this had happened is because the people of the promise, the believers, began to intermarry with unbelievers. Why did the believing men do this? We are told it was because the unbelieving women were attractive (Gen. 6:2). Examples like this are why we teach our children to seek out spouses who share the same faith in Christ. A believing spouse can have a beneficial effect on an unbelieving spouse. But the opposite can also be true and often happens, that the faith of a believer is weakened or lost when the unbelieving spouse does not encourage it.
Because of these intermarriages in that early period of history, the community of believers got smaller and smaller, until “the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (v. 5). The first man and first preacher Adam had only recently died, and yet so few cared about God’s promise of salvation. In Genesis 6 just before today’s reading, we are told that “the LORD was sorry that he had made man on the earth” (v. 6). He decided that He would destroy mankind and all the land animals. Only one man found favor in God’s sight—only Noah.
Noah was described in glowing terms—he was “a righteous man, blameless in his generation”; he “walked with God.” In short, Noah was a believer. He knew that he deserved nothing but damnation for his sins, but he believed God’s promise that a Savior was coming. It broke Noah’s heart to see all the ungodliness around him. How could so many have forgotten their Creator? How could he alone be left? No doubt, the devil attacked Noah with terrible trials and persecutions. Noah was an outcast, despised by everyone. Did he think he was so perfect? What made him so sure that his truth was the right one?
Then God gave Noah an even harder task: build a boat, a great big ark, out in the middle of a field. The ark had to be big enough to hold Noah and his family and two of every kind of animal on the earth with seven pairs of all clean animals. God told him what the dimensions of the ark needed to be: 300 cubits long or about the length of a football field and a half, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits tall which would be all of the height of our church steeple. In Iowa, we have the nice story of the Field of Dreams, but making a baseball field in the country does not seem quite as crazy as building a massive boat! And yet Noah did not question God; “he did all that God commanded him.”
Noah is one of the great fathers in the faith. He is an excellent example for us who are also surrounded by all sorts of violence and godlessness. Noah believed God’s warning even when everyone else ridiculed it. They attacked his family and probably tried to sabotage his work, but Noah kept building. Day after day, he encouraged his family by the Word of God and led them in prayer. Day after day, he did the work God gave him to do. And after a period of perhaps 100 years, the massive ark was ready.
Noah’s neighbors spent no time reflecting on their actions. They felt no remorse. Jesus said that “in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark” (Mat. 24:38). They cared nothing about crazy Noah and his boat, and even less about Noah’s preaching of repentance. But what about when animals started climbing into the ark two by two? “Must be some kind of coincidence” or “witchcraft,” they thought. Then the rain started to fall, and Noah was nowhere to be seen. Then they noticed that the door in the side of the ark was shut….
What happened next is almost too terrible to imagine. The waters rose higher and higher. People desperately looked for higher ground, young and old, rich and poor, but age, health, and position meant nothing. Could Noah and his family hear the screaming? Did anyone try to pry open the door from the outside? The rain poured down, the boat came free of its scaffolding, and then there was no sound but rain on the roof.
The same waters that destroyed all living people and land animals outside the ark saved the people and animals inside the ark. They were waters of destruction and salvation. That’s the same way we think about the waters of Baptism—they are waters of destruction and salvation. Baptism drowned your old Adam and washed away the filth of your sin—everything in you that rebelled against your Creator and separated you from Him. At the same time, Baptism gave you a living faith and raised you up to new life in Christ.
1 Peter 3 ties the Flood and Baptism together: “God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ” (20-21). You were baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection and made a member of His holy body. Your Baptism is when you stepped out of the world of darkness and destruction and into the ark of the Church.
You might think of the time we are in as the time when the ark was nearly finished and the rain was about to fall. Jesus tells us to stay ready. The day of judgment is fast approaching. But then we wonder, “How soon?” Perhaps we can eat and drink with the attractive people of the world a little longer, or at least avoid some uncomfortable interactions by keeping our beliefs quiet. And besides, being in the ark of the Church is not always the most pleasant thing. We may grow tired of the personalities around us, the little annoyances and disagreements, the criticisms and occasional coldness we feel from others. Being cooped up in the Church makes the air seem a little stale. We want to be outside! We want to breathe deeply and live fully!
Some say they don’t need the Church at all because they can worship God just fine on their own. That may be so, but when the wind blows and the waves roll, would you rather be in the large ark in good company or alone in a little fishing boat? God calls us as Christians to hear His Word together, to confess our faith together, to kneel together at His Table, to encourage one another. If we remove ourselves from all Christian fellowship, we can’t do these things.
Being together helps to keep us accountable. In love, your fellow Christians can call you to repentance when you have faltered and fallen into sin. In love, they can also point you to your forgiveness and salvation through Jesus who has redeemed you from sin and death. In love, they can help you stay alert and prepared for the Lord’s return. Jesus says that just as the people in Noah’s day paid no attention to the preaching of the truth and were caught unprepared when the Flood came, “so will be the coming of the Son of Man” (Mat. 24:37,39).
In the ark of Christ’s Church, you are kept ready for His coming on the last day. Here in this ark, there are ample supplies—His Word of absolution that frees you from your guilt and comforts you, and the rich food of His body and blood that nourishes and strengthens you and draws you closer together with your fellow believers. With these good supplies, you can weather the storms of temptation and persecution in this world. You can endure suffering because you know that your Lord Jesus Christ is with you, increasing your faith, hope, and love.
You cannot see Him now, and you cannot see how it will be for you on the other side of the storm, but you know He will carry you to safety. That is your certainty. That is your hope. Noah and his family faithfully followed the Word of the Lord and were preserved from the perils of the Flood until they set foot again on a renewed earth. You have the same promise, that your Lord will preserve you until the day of His glorious return when the heavens and the earth will be made new. When that day comes, says Jesus, “straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near” (Luk. 21:28).
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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[1] For more details about this, see “From Creation to Jacob: Communicating the Promise” by Pr. Joseph Abrahamson: https://steadfastlutherans.org/blog/2016/06/from-creation-to-jacob-communicating-the-promise/.
(picture from stained glass at Redeemer Lutheran Church)
The First Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Genesis 3:14-4:2
In Christ Jesus, the Offspring of the virgin, who was called Immanuel, God with us, dear fellow redeemed:
“The LORD God said to the serpent, ‘Because you have done this, cursed are you.’” What the devil had done was tempt the most special part of God’s creation—mankind—to sin. In the form of or inhabiting a serpent, the devil had approached the first woman with the express purpose of turning her against her Creator. He first tempted her to doubt the Word of God and then to deny the Word of God. She took fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil—the one tree God warned Adam not to eat from—, and she ate. Then she gave some of the fruit to Adam “who was with her,” and he ate (Gen. 3:6).
They did not receive what they were looking for. They were hoping to “be like God,” as the devil had promised them. They failed to appreciate that they already were “like God,” made in His holy image (1:26-27). They did receive part of what the devil had promised, the knowledge of good and evil (3:5). They learned that they used to be good as the caretakers of God’s good creation. Now they had become evil, and they viewed God as their enemy.
This is why they went into hiding when they heard Him walking in the garden. They were afraid of Him. What was He going to do to them? Adam surely remembered what God said about that one tree, that “in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (2:17). They went into hiding because they did not want to be punished for their sin. They did not want to die. In fact, they already had. They were still breathing, but spiritually, they had died. They were separated from God. They were on the devil’s side now.
But the LORD would not let the devil keep them. Their punishment would not be the same as the devil’s punishment. God extended no grace and hope to the devil, but He did to Adam and Eve. The key verse in today’s reading and perhaps in all of Scripture is verse fifteen. God said this to the devil but for mankind’s benefit: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her Offspring; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.”
Just as the devil had manipulated a woman into disobeying God, so it would be through the Offspring of a woman that the devil’s power would be crushed. Martin Luther called this verse the “first comfort, this source of all mercy and fountainhead of all promises” (Luther’s Works, vol. 1, p. 191). He also suggested that God made the prophecy purposely vague, so that the devil would have to fear every woman going forward since any of them might bear the One to destroy him.
God’s promise terrified the devil, but it gave great hope to mankind. God had not changed His mind about death entering the world through sin. But now He delivered the hope of salvation, that One would come to set everything right again, to overcome sin, devil, and death for all humanity. If Adam and Eve thought another path was open to them, that possibility was closed when God posted “the cherubim and a flaming sword” outside the Garden of Eden to keep them away from the tree of life.
There was no other way to be saved than God’s way. Immediately after this, we are told that “Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived.” They trusted what God said, that salvation would come through the woman’s Offspring. They hoped their firstborn son was this Savior. They called him “Cain,” a name that means “acquired” or “gotten” because they had “gotten a man from the LORD.” But Cain was not the promised One. The devil poisoned his mind with anger and hatred, leading to the murder of his brother Abel.
God’s promise would not be fulfilled for many, many years. Child after child would be born, grow old, and die. Women had pain in childbearing like God said they would, while enduring the imperfect rule of men. Men toiled in pain by the sweat of their face to make a living, before returning to the ground from which they were made. Decade after decade, generation after generation, brief life to certain death. Still no Savior.
God’s people might have wondered if His promise would be fulfilled, except that He reminded them with clearer and clearer prophecies as the time approached. The Savior would come from the line of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Judah (Gen. 49:10). He would be a descendant of King David (Psa. 110). He would be born of a virgin (Isa. 7:14). He would be born in Bethlehem (Mic. 5:2). God waited for thousands of years after making His promise, until “the fullness of time had come” (Gal. 4:4).
Then He sent His angel Gabriel to a virgin named Mary. “Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son,” said Gabriel, “and you shall call his name Jesus” (Luk. 1:31). “How will this be,” asked Mary, “since I am a virgin?” And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God” (1:34-35). The time had finally come! The woman’s Offspring was here. God had entered His creation, taking on human flesh. The devil was about to be ruined.
And all of that, the dark day when the world was plunged into sin, the beautiful, first promise of God, the history of every joy and sadness, hope and pain, life and death, all of it was in the background and in Jesus’ mind as He rode into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. “Hosanna to the Son of David!” shouted the people. “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” (Mat. 21:9). No one understood what had to be done. No one knew the suffering that Jesus would endure. No one knew what it would take to redeem mankind from the sin that started in Eden.
The death that was brought on the world through a tree had to be undone by death on another tree. The perfection that was lost through sin had to be regained by a perfect sacrifice. The curse of sin had to be directed against One who had never sinned. He had to pay for man’s disobedience. He had to suffer eternal punishment in every person’s place. This is what Jesus, the eternal Son of God, had to do.
He was witness to all that transpired in Eden. He walked with Adam and Eve in perfection and then found them in their sin. He saw all the wickedness that was done from that point on, all the pride, deceitfulness, abuse, unfaithfulness, violence. He was witness to everyone’s sins from Eden onward. And because He is God, He could see even the sins that stretched forward in time, including the sins done in our lifetime, the sins done by us, even our sins today.
What would you think if you had witnessed all that poisonous evil, the terrible pain and destruction, brought about because of mankind’s sins? What would you do? Would you feel compassion for sinners? Or would your anger burn hot against them? Jesus rode forward humbly to His death in every sinner’s place. We hear this Palm Sunday account at the beginning of the Church Year because it teaches us how to think about sin and salvation and Jesus, and how to prepare for His coming.
If any of us is comfortable with our sinning, then we’re not really seeing what Jesus did in Jerusalem. He was not beaten up for anything He had done. He was not driven toward Calvary for His sins. He did not cry out in agony on the cross for His wrongdoing. He was there because of Adam and Eve. He was there because of Cain. He was there because of Abraham and David and Jezebel and Nebuchadnezzar and Mary and Herod and Pontius Pilate—all the sinful people of human history, both prominent and poor, outwardly good and evil. He was there because of you and me, because of our sins.
He was there for you and me. Jesus went to the cross to make satisfaction for our sins. Adam and Eve’s selfishness, shame, and fear—“Put that on Me,” He said. Our lovelessness, our lies, our pride, our pleasure-seeking, our greediness, our despising the holy Word—“I’ll take the punishment,” He said. He paid for the sins of your past, your sins of today, and all the sins that will be done in the future.
This is what God promised right after the fall. This is what He told Adam and Eve and their descendants to look for. This is what He tells us to look to. God kept that first promise from Eden to Jerusalem. We weren’t in the crowd on Palm Sunday, but we should picture ourselves there. While we’re at it, we can picture Adam and Eve standing there in their garments of animal skin with their sons Abel and Seth; Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob looking on; David and his descendants watching with joy. We see there a great “cloud of witnesses” (Heb. 12:1), all who waited for God’s promise to be fulfilled.
And we see there all believers who have lived since that time, up to our day and beyond. We stand there, eyes fixed on Jesus, His praise on our lips. We watch Him go forward, carrying the weight of the whole world. He goes to the cross for our sins. He goes to destroy the works of the devil (1Jo. 3:8). He goes there to save us from death.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture from “The Procession in the Streets of Jerusalem” by James Tissot, 1836-1902)
The Fourth Sunday of Advent/Christmas Vigil – Vicar Lehne sermon
Text: St. Matthew 1:18-25
In Christ Jesus, who is still with us today, dear fellow redeemed:
The people of this world pride themselves on being able to use their human reason to solve all their problems. They don’t need a God. They’re enlightened. However, no matter how “enlightened” the people of this world are, there are still times when they are faced with problems that they can’t solve on their own. So, what do they do in these moments? They lift their eyes to the heavens and say, “Give me a sign!” Yes, even the so called “enlightened” people of this world, who supposedly don’t need God, are at times faced with problems that cause them to hope that a higher power really does exist that can offer them guidance. However, the “higher power” that the people of this world turn to is usually the universe. The “signs” that the people of this world supposedly receive from the universe can be found in just about anything: a book that has been opened to a specific page; a song that is being played on the radio; how the stars in the sky are ordered and what they mean. However, if they were truly looking for signs that would help them solve their problems, they would not look to the “signs” that the universe supposedly gives them, but to the signs that God definitely gives them in his Word, for God’s signs point to salvation.
In our reading for today, we are told that Jesus being born of the Virgin Mary was a sign that God would save his people from their sins. However, the context in which this sign was promised to be given appears to be a bit strange. The prophecy that the sign would happen was given long ago, and by that time, the nation of Israel had split into two kingdoms: the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. The current king of Judah, King Ahaz, had just found out that Israel had joined forces with Syria to wage war against Judah. And so, he was understandably afraid.
Therefore, God instructed the prophet Isaiah to comfort King Ahaz by reassuring him that the house of David would not fall but would be delivered. In addition to these words of comfort, King Ahaz was also told to ask God for a sign so that he would be able to attach his faith in God’s promise to something tangible. However, King Ahaz did not have faith in God, so he refused to ask for a sign, making it appear as though he piously did not want to put God to the test. But God was not fooled, so he responded to King Ahaz by saying through Isaiah, “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel” (Isaiah 7:14). This was not a sign that King Ahaz would see in his lifetime, nor would anyone who lived in Judah at that time. But, to those who believed in God, the promise of this sign comforted them and gave them hope for the future, hope that they would not just be delivered from their earthly enemies but also from their sins.
But this sign was not just meant to give hope to the believers who lived in Judah at the time. It was meant to give hope to all believers of all time, including you. The prophecy shows that it was not just the deliverance of his people in the nation of Judah that God had in mind, but also the deliverance of all his people from every nation. By preserving the house of David, God was preserving the line of the Savior, who would come from the house and line of David. That Savior would be no mere man, for a regular man would not even be able to deliver himself, let alone all people. No, that Savior would be God in the flesh, which is what Immanuel means: “God with us.” And this God-man would deliver everyone from their sins, which is what Jesus means: “The LORD saves.”
Even though we were not around to see the sign that God foretold would happen through Isaiah, God has revealed in his Word that it did happen, just as he said that it would. God inspired Matthew to write in our reading for today that “the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit” (verse 18). The Holy Spirit caused Mary to conceive, despite the fact that she was a virgin, and the baby that was conceived inside her was God in the flesh. Then, as if we needed it to be any clearer that this is how God fulfilled his prophecy to King Ahaz, Matthew goes on to say that “this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet [Isaiah]” (verse 22).
When the God-man, Jesus, came in the flesh, he experienced everything that you do. He didn’t just experience the joys of life, but also the sorrows of life. He faced your temptations and overcame them. He even experienced everything that you rightfully deserved by taking all your sins on himself, suffering your punishment of hell, and dying on the cross in your place. Through all this, Jesus saved you from your sins, and now, life and salvation are yours.
Therefore, whenever you become afraid when faced with your sins and guilt, whenever you are struggling with temptation, or whenever you are going through a difficult time, Jesus assures you through his comforting Word that he has already delivered you from your sins and that he will be there with you to help you overcome your temptations and get through your difficult times. These words of comfort should be all we need to believe in him, but he has also given us tangible signs to attach his promises to, just like he did for King Ahaz. Those tangible signs are the means by which God brings his grace to us: his holy Sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
In holy baptism, the simple means of water is applied to us as his Word is spoken. Since God attaches his Word to the tangible element of water, we know that he is truly with us to give us faith and wash away our sins through those waters. In the Lord’s Supper, the simple means of bread and wine, over which his Word was spoken during the Words of Institution, are fed to us. Since God attaches his Word to the tangible elements of bread and wine, we know that Jesus is truly with us to give us the forgiveness of sins through the bread and wine, which are his true body and blood. It is not the tangible elements themselves that we put our faith in, but they help us to remember what Jesus has truly accomplished through them and that he is still with us.
These are the tangible signs that God has given to us, and how God wants us to receive these signs is shown in Joseph. Our reading for today begins with Joseph finding out that Mary, the woman that he was betrothed to, was pregnant. Using his human reason, he assumed that Mary must have been unfaithful to him and committed adultery. We have the benefit of knowing that it was the Holy Spirit who caused Mary to conceive, but Joseph did not know this at the time. So, assuming that Mary was unfaithful to him was an understandable assumption.
Adultery was very serious in the Jewish community. According to the Old Testament law, if a woman was found guilty of committing adultery, she would be stoned to death. However, Joseph was a just and kind man. He didn’t want Mary to be exposed to public shame and be stoned, so, he decided to divorce Mary as quietly as possible instead, which was the only way to break off a marriage in those days, after which her father would look after her for the remainder of her life.
However, before Joseph could carry out his plan, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and told him that the one who was conceived in Mary was from the Holy Spirit: the promised Savior who would save his people from their sins whom Isaiah spoke of in his prophecy. Joseph now had two choices: believe what the angel of the Lord said to him and receive the sign of the virgin birth in faith or put his trust in his own human reason and divorce Mary, rejecting the sign. And Joseph, having faith, accepted the sign in faith and went through with taking Mary as his wife, as the angel of the Lord commanded him.
When we try to rely on our human reason more than God and his Word, it only causes us to doubt the words that God says and reject them. A child being born of a virgin? That’s impossible! The evangelists must have actually added this later to make Jesus and Mary seem better than they were. Baptism being a work of God through which God gives us faith and washes away our sins? That’s impossible! Baptism must actually be a human work that symbolizes the washing away of our sins and demonstrates our commitment to God. The bread and the wine in the Lord’s Supper being the true body and blood of Jesus through which we receive the forgiveness of sins? That’s impossible! The bread and the wine must actually symbolize Jesus’ body and blood to remind us of what he did to forgive our sins. And these are only some of the ways in which we can reject what God has revealed to us in his Word.
If we reject God’s signs, like King Ahaz did, then we no longer stand on God’s promises, and our faith cannot endure. Without faith, we lose all the blessings that Jesus, the God-man, won for us on the cross: the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. But when we receive God’s signs in the faith that God has given us, like Joseph did, we know that God has worked through his signs to bring us his blessings.
Because God works through these signs of Word and Sacrament to bring his blessings to us, we know that he is with us today. Jesus didn’t come in the past only to leave us when he ascended into heaven. He is with all of us today, including you. And because Jesus saved you from your sins by his innocent death on the cross and experienced your struggles and hardships, you know that he will continue to bring you the forgiveness of sins and help you through your struggles and hardships today, as well as throughout the rest of your lives, until the day when you enter eternal life in heaven, where you will never struggle or face hardships ever again. In all of these ways that God is with us, we know that God’s signs truly do point to salvation.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture from “Joseph’s Dream” by T’oros Roslin, 1210-1270)
The Third Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: 1 Corinthians 4:1-5
In Christ Jesus, who continues to carry out His mission of redemption through the efforts of His faithful people, dear fellow redeemed:
His work had started so well. The thirty-something preacher came in with tremendous energy. He maybe wasn’t the greatest looking guy, and he had some strange habits, but there was a magnetism about him. People came from all over to hear him preach—young and old, churched and unchurched; even important people in their expensive clothes came to see “what this is all about.”
He didn’t let anyone off the hook. With biting words, he exposed their sin as though he could see into their hearts. He was not afraid of anyone, from peasant to prince. He preached like there was no tomorrow. “Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees,” he cried. “Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire” (Mat. 3:10). But it wasn’t all doom and gloom. He also told them about God’s grace toward sinners. “Repent and be baptized,” he said; “receive the forgiveness of sins.” Some even wondered if he might be the promised Messiah.
But John was not the Messiah. The real Messiah came to John while he was baptizing at the Jordan River. He urged John to baptize Him, and when he did, the heavens were opened, the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove, and the Father spoke from above to His “beloved Son,” with whom He was well pleased (Mat. 3:16-17). What an experience! Preacher John now pointed to Jesus and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (Joh. 1:29).
Just imagine what these two great men could accomplish. Imagine how many people they could reach by working together. But that isn’t exactly how it went. They did work simultaneously for a little while, and then John’s disciples started to see the crowds shrinking. They realized the crowds were leaving John and going to Jesus! But John was not upset. “I am the friend of the bridegroom,” he said. “He must increase, but I must decrease” (Joh. 3:29,30).
John did decrease, very quickly. He called out the adultery of King Herod, who had taken his brother Philip’s wife for himself. So Herod arrested John and put him in prison (Mat. 14:3-4). That is where we find him in the Holy Gospel for today—in prison (Mat. 11:2-10). What good could John do there? He longed to be back out in the Judean wilderness, preaching by the Jordan. A few faithful disciples continued to visit him through his bars. Perhaps that’s why John sent them to question Jesus; he knew his time was short. It was the Bridegroom who mattered.
Would you say that John had a successful ministry? Since He pointed out Jesus as the Messiah, the answer must be yes. But if that had happened in this church, if a fiery preacher had attracted such crowds that all the pews were filled, and it was standing room only. If that preacher helped put your church on the map where it belonged, but then the crowds started thinning and the cars stopped pulling up for Sunday service until it was back to just you. And then to top it all off, that once-popular preacher ended up in prison. Would you be glad for the high point, or would it just depress you to think about what you used to have?
It is tempting to think about success in the church by numbers. You might think back to when each row of pews had people in them, when every member’s social life and spiritual life were largely intertwined and centered in the church. For example, the Young People’s Society had enough kids to raise money for Jerico’s large stained-glass windows. There wasn’t enough room in our church basements for congregational dinners. What has changed? People have more commitments away from home, more on the schedule. Families are smaller than they used to be. Fewer people live near the churches. Church attendance is falling in all mainline denominations. These things are true.
But perhaps you also wonder if the church would do better if it changed a little more with the times. Maybe if we weren’t so strict about moral issues, or if we gave a little ground on our Communion practice or our style of worship. Or maybe it seems like the pastor could do different things to connect with the members and the community—get a stronger youth program going, offer more classes, do more to reach out.
Every pastor wants to be a good pastor, but he often has doubts. “What could I be doing better? Has my presence here really made a positive difference? Would the parish be better off if I left, and someone else stepped in?” How is a congregation supposed to measure its pastor? How is a pastor supposed to assess his own work?
The apostle Paul outlines the standard. He does not mention a trajectory of growth in membership. He does not identify the level of happiness and satisfaction that should be felt by parishioners and pastor. Paul says this about how people should think of pastors: “This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.”
So the important question for parishioners is not first and foremost, “Do I like my pastor?” or “Is my pastor a really good preacher or teacher?” or “Has he brought in new members?” The important question is, “Do I recognize that my pastor, even with all his weaknesses and quirks, is a ‘servant of Christ’? Do I acknowledge that God has put him here to distribute His gifts through His Holy Word and Sacraments?” That is the true measure of a pastor, that he faithfully carries out these duties the congregation has called him to do.
And a pastor should not focus on the appearance of success through things like an increase in church activity and involvement. Paul continues: “Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy.” To be found “trustworthy” means that pastors are faithful to the Word of God. They must be faithful to the Word before they are faithful to any member of the congregation, no matter how influential those members might be. Sometimes that faithfulness to the Word requires them to confront members with their sins and call them to repentance like John the Baptizer did. A pastor’s faithfulness to the Word might even make him some enemies both inside and outside the church.
So there can be tension at times between pastors and parishioners. Paul expresses this tension by telling the congregation in Corinth, “But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court…. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore do not pronounce judgment.” The times when it is certainly proper for a congregation to judge its pastor and call him to account is if he is preaching false doctrine, if he is leading an openly sinful life, or if he refuses to carry out the duties he is called to do. But it is not proper to judge him for personality shortcomings, for unrealistic or unmet expectations, or for declines in offerings or church attendance.
Most pastors do a good enough job judging themselves without needing parishioners to do it too. Many would have a hard time saying with Paul, “For I am not aware of anything against myself.” Pastors are well aware of their mistakes and failures. So here we are: a sinful pastor preaching to sinful parishioners. What hope do we have for the future? What reasons do we have for optimism?
Today’s reading reminds us that we have “the mysteries of God.” God’s own mysteries have been revealed to us! These mysteries all have their source in the one central mystery of God. That central mystery is Christ, “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:3). It is the mystery of the all-powerful Son of God nestled as an infant in Mary’s arms. It is the mystery of this person maintaining perfect purity according to the holy Law throughout His life. It is the mystery of this perfect man willingly taking the place of all sinners under God’s wrath. It is the mystery of a dead man coming back to life after three days to declare His victory over sin, devil, and death.
These mysteries have been revealed to you and to me through the Word of God, along with still more mysteries: Jesus’ righteousness, grace, and life bestowed by simple water and His Word. Jesus’ forgiveness imparted through the Absolution. Jesus’ body and blood tied to the elements of bread and wine by the power of His Word. These gifts of Jesus all come to us through faith, which the Holy Spirit has worked inside us.
What a mystery that the Son of God was willing to suffer and die to save us sinners! What a mystery that He calls us His own, even though we are so often weak and cold-hearted! What a mystery that He remains patient with us, visits us with His mercy through the means of grace, and sends us out as His own stewards and representatives to do His work! What mysteries! What blessings!
Because Jesus is at work among us according to His promise, we are assured of success. It may or may not be success in attendance numbers, offering amounts, or admiration from the people in our community. To many people, it may appear that what we are doing does not matter, just as it may have appeared to the people around John that his work was all for nothing once he was put in prison. But that is not how God sees it at all.
Paul writes that when our Lord Jesus comes, He “will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation—his praise—from God.” God sees things as they really are. He sees the humble support and encouragement that parishioners give their pastors. He sees the often unheralded but crucial work that pastors do for the people they serve. As unimpressive as all of it seems, it all flows from the love of Christ, and it all points back to Him. That makes the work we do together in Jesus’ name the picture of success.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture from “The Preaching of St. John the Baptist” by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, c. 1565)
The Second Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Romans 15:4-13
In Christ Jesus, who has brought sinners all over the world into His holy body by cleansing them with His blood (Eph. 2:13), dear fellow redeemed:
In the Holy Gospel for today, Jesus describes what will happen in the world and in the universe before His return on the last day (Luke 21:25-36). Signs will be seen “in sun and moon and stars.” Nations will be distressed because of “the roaring of the sea and the waves,” referring to things like hurricanes, tidal waves, and floods. People will faint with fear and foreboding when they see what is happening.
And then Jesus will return in His glory. Most people will not be ready. Their focus was on other things. Their hope was anchored in the world. That day will come upon them “suddenly like a trap.” They will not escape His judgment. They will be condemned to eternal punishment in hell. You might wonder if you will avoid this fate. You might question if you are faithful enough to be gathered with God’s people in heaven.
Today’s reading from the Epistle to the Romans addresses these concerns. The apostle Paul writes by inspiration that we have something more sure to go by than our thoughts, our experiences, or even a feeling in our gut about where we stand with God. We have the Holy Scriptures. Specifically Paul is talking about the Old Testament, the record of events from the creation of the world to some four hundred years before the birth of Christ.
The Old Testament is far more than a collection of historical accounts, laws, and psalms, which are only useful for historians, lawyers, or musicians who like those sorts of things. Paul writes that “whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction.” As we study the Scriptures, we learn endurance and find encouragement, because we see the trials that God brought His people through and the many examples of His goodness and blessings.
So through the Scriptures we also learn to have hope. We are not the first to have troubles. We are not the first to have worries and doubts. We are not the first to fall short of the glory of God in our sin. We are part of a long line of sinner-saints stretching back through time, back through the Reformation, back through the early Church, back through the apostles, back through the prophets, back through the patriarchs. This is a continuous, unbroken line, because our merciful God has preserved His Church through all of history.
The way He has preserved His Church is through His Scriptures. Both God and His Word are described as giving the same thing. The “God of endurance and encouragement” gives this endurance and encouragement through His Scriptures. The “God of hope” gives hope through His Scriptures. Everything good that God wants to give us, every blessing He has planned for us, comes to us through His Holy Word.
Paul emphasized this point in his epistle to the Christians in Rome by pointing them to God’s promise that salvation was not for the Israelites only but for all people. Those who were not part of God’s chosen people Israel were called the Gentiles. They belonged to the pagan nations around Israel who did not glorify God or listen to His Word. The Gentiles had no reason to hope for God’s mercy based on who they were or what they did or what they could offer to Him. They deserved His wrath for their many sins.
And yet God planned salvation for them. Paul referenced the Old Testament prophecies recorded by Moses in the 1400s B. C., by David around the year 1000 B. C., and by Isaiah in the 700s B. C. All those prophecies show that Gentiles would join the Israelites in praising the Lord. The Israelites who had the Scriptures must have had a hard time imagining this. “The wicked Gentiles whom we are supposed to stay away from will join us in glorifying the true God? How can this be?”
That question is answered by Isaiah’s prophecy: “The Root of Jesse will come, even He who arises to rule the Gentiles; in Him will the Gentiles hope” (Isa. 11:10). The Gentiles would hope in the “Root of Jesse.” Jesse was the father of King David. Long after the glory had departed from that family, after the last descendant of David sat on the crumbling throne of Jerusalem, a greater King would rise up. Isaiah prophesied that “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit” (11:1).
That King was Jesus, a blood descendant of David through His mother Mary (Luk. 3:23ff.), and a legal descendant of David through His guardian Joseph (Mat. 1:1ff.). Jesus’ family tree contained all manner of sinners—liars, murderers, adulterers, and even some Gentiles. This human line shows what kind of people He came to save—sinful people, guilty of all sorts of wrongdoing against God.
God in His love does not make a distinction between Jew and Gentile anymore. He does not see any one group of people as better than another, and neither should we. Men are not better than women, or women than men. Republicans are not better than Democrats, or Democrats than Republicans. Americans are not better than foreigners, or foreigners than Americans. Even Christians are not better than non-Christians in the sense of being less guilty of sin.
Romans 3 says, “For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (vv. 22-23). That should give us a great sympathy toward the people around us. They struggle with sin just like we do. They probably regret a lot of things just like we do. And Jesus died for their sins just as certainly as He died for ours. Who can be below me, unworthy of my love, if Jesus, who was perfect in every way, who never did any wrong toward anyone—if He humbled Himself to be nailed to a cross and die for all my sins?
That is our hope, a hope that is clearly spelled out for us in the Old and New Testament Scriptures. Jesus died for me. Jesus died for you. Jesus died for every sinner in human history. It is His sacrifice that brings together people of various nationalities, languages, and customs into one holy body, into His body the Church.
As members of one body, God wants us to glorify Him with one voice. Some Christians take this to mean that we need to set aside our doctrinal differences, and we need to compromise the Bible’s teaching for the sake of outward unity among Christians. This is the reason why many churches in our area will hold joint worship services. They believe and teach many different things in their own buildings, but they still think something can be gained by an outward show of unity. This is a false unity that we want nothing to do with.
Unity in the church is never to be looked for outside of the Scriptures, but in and through the Scriptures. God’s Word creates the only unity worth having, as the Holy Spirit brings us to Christ and Christ to us. Unity in the church is God’s work, not ours. Paul writes, “May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” We see here that God grants harmony, and that this harmony will be built on Christ Jesus and grow through Him if it is true harmony.
So we don’t create this unity, but we certainly can destroy it. We destroy unity in the church when we put anything else before God’s Holy Word. Maybe it is our pride—we want things a certain way, and we insist that everything happen just the way we want it, or else there is going to be a big fight. Or maybe it is our passions—instead of resisting our sinful desires, we give in to them and give no thought to how our actions affect and hurt the whole body of Christ. Or maybe it is our prejudice—we think that we could never work with people who have this background, who look like this, or talk like that.
When we give in to our pride, our passions, our prejudice, or any other sins, we simultaneously give up all hope. Trusting in our own way always leads to hopelessness. But God in His mercy calls us out of our hopelessness and away from our sin. He leads us to repentance, to the humble acknowledgement that we have done wrong, and to the conviction that we don’t want to keep doing wrong.
Then the Holy Spirit through the Holy Word points us to Jesus. “That Root of Jesse came forth for you,” He says. “He came to be your King and bring you into His kingdom. He came to pay for all your sins and cover you in His holiness. You are not destined for the Father’s wrath and punishment. You have salvation by faith in His Son.”
That is the hope given to you and declared to you in both the Old and the New Testaments. It is the hope that gives “endurance and encouragement” as the world around us devolves into selfishness, hatred, and deceit. We Glorify God for His Gift of Hope. The hope we have in Jesus gives us joy in trying and troubling times, and it gives us peace in our distresses.
Jesus comes through His Holy Word to bring us this joy and peace and to strengthen our confidence that He will return on the last day. He will save us from the judgment that awaits those who reject Him. He will bring us safely to His heavenly kingdom. For this, we Gentiles praise and thank Him and extol His holy name, just as the Scriptures said we would.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture of stained glass from Jerico Lutheran Church)
(audio unavailable for this sermon)
The First Sunday in Advent – Vicar Lehne sermon
Text: St. Matthew 21:1-9
In Christ Jesus, who surpasses our expectations, dear fellow redeemed:
For children, one of the most torturous things in the world, if not the most torturous thing in the world, is waiting to open their presents on Christmas morning. They want to open them as soon as possible, but their parents always seem to find another reason to make them wait longer: the family has to go to church first; the entire family has to be gathered around the tree; dad has to find the camera so that he can take pictures. So, as the kids wait to open their presents, they pass the time by trying to figure out what’s inside them: they look at the size of their presents; pick them up to see how heavy they are; shake them to see if they can hear anything inside that could give them a clue. And sometimes, by the end of their investigation, they think they’ve found out what at least one of their presents is, and it’s something that they’ve wanted for a long time. So, when the time finally comes for them to open that present, they excitedly rip the paper off, open the box, and . . . it’s not what they thought it was after all.
Like children waiting to open their Christmas presents, the people of Israel built up their expectations for what the promised Messiah would be like when he eventually came. And, if kids think that it’s torturous to have to wait to open their presents for an hour or two at the most, the people of Israel had to wait thousands of years for the Messiah to arrive. As they waited, they looked at the prophecies in Scripture that spoke of his coming and interpreted them in an incorrect way. Since many of the prophecies described the coming Messiah as a mighty king who would save his people, the people of Israel looked at their current situation, being forced to live under Roman rule, and interpreted those prophecies to mean that the coming Messiah would be a mighty earthly king who would overthrow the Romans and give their nation back to them.
Because of the expectations that the people of Israel had, they probably expected the Messiah to come in majesty. But how did he come instead? He wasn’t born in a magnificent palace, but in a stable, with a manger, a feeding trough for animals, for his bed. Who were the first ones to behold him? Not kings, but lowly shepherds. Where did he grow up? Not in an important city like Jerusalem, but in the lowly town of Nazareth, a place that was looked down upon for being inferior in education and culture. Whom did he associate himself with? Not with mighty soldiers and the important religious leaders, but with lowly fishermen and those whom the religious leaders considered to be sinners.
But now, the Messiah, Jesus, had the perfect opportunity to finally present himself as the majestic king that he truly is. Jesus knew that this was the last Sunday before he would die an innocent death on the cross, and so, as he prepared to ride into Jerusalem for the last time, he could have done so on the back of a horse, wearing flowing purple robes and a glistening crown. But what did he ride in on instead? On a lowly donkey. And it wasn’t that there were no other animals available that he could have ridden on. Jesus specifically asked his disciples to bring a donkey and her colt to him, which he did to fulfill the prophecy that was spoken by the prophet Zechariah: “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’”
Because of the humble way in which Jesus came on Palm Sunday, as well as the humility that he lived in throughout the rest of his earthly life, it was clear that he was not showing off his majesty in the way that the people of Israel expected the Messiah to. But they had not given up their hope just yet. Even though Jesus had not yet shown his power and might by confronting the Roman rulers, he showed his power and might through the countless miracles that he performed throughout his ministry. Surely, he intended to use this power to save them from the Romans. So, as he humbly rode into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, the people of Israel praised him and shouted, “Hosanna,” which means, “Save us now!”
But then came Jesus’ ultimate humiliation. On Maundy Thursday, he was betrayed by Judas, one of his own disciples, and handed over to the Romans, who tortured and mocked him before ultimately putting him to death. Jesus did not shed the blood of the Romans; instead, his own blood was shed by them. He did not wear a glistening crown on his head; instead, he wore a crown of thorns. Where were those who were praising him on Palm Sunday now? At least some of them had turned on him and were the ones who were telling the Romans to put him to death. It had become plain to them that Jesus was not the Messiah that they were hoping for.
But little did the people of Israel know that, by his ultimate humiliation, his innocent suffering and death, Jesus gave them a far greater gift than salvation from the Romans. He gave them salvation from their sins. He may not have established a kingdom on earth for the people of Israel, which would have been only temporary, but, by the shedding of his innocent blood, he did open the gates of the kingdom of heaven to them, a kingdom that has no end. So long as the people of Israel believed in Jesus as their Savior, their promised Messiah, that eternal kingdom would be theirs. And many of them eventually did come to faith in him through the preaching of his Word.
But this gift is not just for the people of Israel. It’s also for the entire rest of world, including you. The torture and mocking that Jesus endured was for you. The sins that Jesus took on himself were your sins. The blood that Jesus shed on the cross was for you, so that the price of all of your sins was paid. He suffered the ultimate humiliation on the cross so that the gates of heaven would be opened to you. But how does Jesus bring this gift to you? He does so through humble means: the means of grace, his Word and Sacraments.
Instead of mighty angels descending from the heavens and declaring to the entire world that Jesus is the promised Messiah and that we are to put our faith in him and do as he has commanded us to do, God sends humble pastors out into all the world to preach his Word to them and teach them what God wants them to believe and do. Instead of putting us through a baptism by fire, in which we are put through a challenging trial that results in us proving our faith to him in the end, God gives us a baptism through water, in which he brings us to faith by the application of water and the speaking of his Word. Instead of preparing a magnificent feast for the entire world to eat that will satisfy all of their earthly hunger, God prepares a humble feast of bread and wine, in which, through the speaking of his Word, we feast on the true body and blood of Jesus for the forgiveness of our sins.
The world looks at the humble ways in which Jesus comes to us and thinks that they’re foolishness. If God really wanted us to believe in him, he would show greater displays of his power and might: he would end world hunger and poverty, making sure that everyone had enough money and food to satisfy their earthly needs; he would bring an end to all of the wars and violence in the world and usher in an era of world peace; he would guarantee that everyone gets to go to heaven by either wiping out all sin from the world or forgiving everyone of their sins, regardless of whether they are repentant of their sins and believe in him or not. The world expects God to behave in the way that they think he should behave, and, because he doesn’t, they don’t want to have anything to do with him and want him out of their lives.
Even we can have our own false expectations for how God should behave. We may not go as far as some of the people of this world do, but there are times when we may think that, if God is really as powerful as he says that he is, why doesn’t he give us the rain that we need in order to make our crops grow? Why doesn’t he put someone in control of the government who will actually fix our country’s problems? Why doesn’t he heal our loved ones who are suffering from pain and sickness? The apostle Paul tells us in Romans 8 that “we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (verse 28). However, we are tempted to think that, if God was really working all things out for the good of those who love him, wouldn’t he only give us good things? What did any of us do to deserve the hard times that God puts us through?
We may think that we know what is best for us, but God says to us in Isaiah 55, “[M]y thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways. . . . For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts” (verses 8–9). God alone knows what is best for us, and he gives that to us. He gives us what we need for our earthly lives, as well as for our spiritual lives. And while we are all too often focused solely on our earthly needs and desires, God knows that our spiritual needs are the most important things for us, so he makes them easily accessible to everyone by giving them to us through the means of his Word and Sacraments. As Jesus comes to us through these humble means to give us his grace, we join in singing the same words that the people of Israel sang as Jesus rode into Jerusalem to give them his grace, “Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.”
Everything that Jesus did for us is far better than anything we could expect. Through his innocent death on the cross, he paid the price for all our sins. By his resurrection from the dead, he destroyed the power that death had over us. Jesus won the victory for us, and now, that victory is brought to us through the preaching of his Word and through the Sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. The prize that awaits us is greater than anything we can comprehend, and that prize will be ours for all eternity. Jesus, our Messiah, may not have met our false expectations, but by coming to us in humility and giving us the eternal salvation that he won for us on the cross, Jesus surpasses our expectations.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture from “Entry of Christ into Jerusalem” by Pietro Lorenzetti, 1320)
The Fourth Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: St. John 1:19-28
In Christ Jesus, who “comes to judge the nations, a terror to His foes,” but “a Light of consolations and blessed hope to those who love the Lord’s appearing” (ELH 94, v. 10), dear fellow redeemed:
I imagine you have a busy week ahead. There will be gifts to wrap and food to make. Maybe there is more decorating to do and cards or letters to send. This is a time of preparation, a time to get everything ready for the big day: Christmas. Perhaps you hope to recapture the feeling of the season from when you were a child, or you want your children or grandchildren to have that feeling now. This is a special time. You want everything to be just right.
Advent is a time of preparation, but the focus is not especially on external things, what is happening around us. The focus is internal, what is happening inside us. The problem with internal things is that they are more difficult to control. I can spend hours wrapping gifts and make them just the way I want them. I can clean my house from top to bottom. I can put everything in its place around me and make it look like I have every detail covered. I can do all these things while being torn up inside by sadness, by pain, by guilt.
That might be where you are right now. That is why Jesus comes to you today. He comes to meet you in your struggle and lift your burdens from you. He comes to bring you forgiveness and hope, comfort and strength. He comes to assure you that you have a merciful Father who loves you and cares for you, and that in His Father’s house are many mansions where He has prepared a place for you (Joh. 14:2).
These are the things that Jesus, the Son of God incarnate, came down to earth to do. John was sent to prepare the people for His coming. He was the “voice” prophesied more than 700 years earlier by Isaiah, the voice who would cry out, “In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain” (Isa. 40:3-4). How exactly was that highway making—that raising of valleys and lowering of mountains—supposed to come about?
The evangelist Luke writes that John “went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (3:3). And John didn’t hold back in his Law preaching. “You brood of vipers!” he said to the crowd. “Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits in keeping with repentance” (3:7-8). Repentance was the way the people were to prepare for Christ’s coming. It was the way for their hearts and minds to become open to His gracious teaching.
And that is still the way we prepare for Christ’s coming: we repent of our sins. We repent of our valleys of doubt and despair, and we repent of our mountains of pride. But we wouldn’t know this was even necessary if God did not give us His Law. His Law is both written on our hearts and recorded for us in the Bible. There is no question what God’s will is for our lives. There is also no question that we have failed to live up to His Law—failed completely.
But the error we often fall into is measuring our holiness not against God’s Commandments, but against the lives of other sinners. And we can always find others who appear to be more sinful than we are. This is a trick of the devil to get us to think that we are not that bad, that our lives are pretty well in order. But if that were true, then why did Jesus come? Did He come to hang out with the righteous people, or to save sinners? Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance” (Luk. 5:31-32).
The holy Law of God shows us how sick we are. It shows us how bumpy our road was in the past when we disobeyed God’s commands and how bumpy it will be in the future if we give in to our sinful desires. And through the Law, the Holy Spirit works repentance in our hearts today. He moves us to contrition, to remorsefulness and sorrow, for the wrongs we have done—for the sins we have tried to hide and the sins we have committed right out in the open.
But repentance is not just about admitting sin. It is about avoiding the same temptations going forward. It is about not giving the devil an inch, because he will take a mile and usually a lot more. What good is repentance if you have no desire to stop sinning and do better? John said to the crowd, “Bear fruits in keeping with repentance.” Show in your life how sorry you are for your sin and how you want to live for the God who made you and provides for you.
The people must have trembled when they heard John preach. He was great and powerful in their eyes. They trembled even more when he told them One was coming after him, “the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.” “I baptize you with water,” said John. “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire” (Luk. 3:16,17). In other words, “Don’t ignore my warning. Don’t let this fall on deaf ears. A far more powerful One than me is coming.”
John was a serious preacher, but it was not all gloom and doom. The baptism he administered was given for spiritual comfort. God’s Law was doing its work. The people were sorry for their sins. Now they stepped forward to the Jordan River desiring to receive God’s forgiveness. They believed what John said. They did not want to be caught unprepared when the Christ came. They sincerely wanted to “make straight the way of the Lord.”
But would the way be straight enough for Him? Would He be pleased with what He saw in them? Would they be worthy enough, welcoming enough? Those would have been natural questions to ask, but they were the wrong ones. We get sidetracked in the same way. We want to live our lives for the Lord, but then we focus more on our living than on the Lord. We focus more on our work than on His work.
But it is His work that saves. No matter how well or how much you prepare for Jesus’ coming to you now, it is not enough. You have fallen short of the glory of God. That is why God sent His only-begotten Son. Jesus came to perfectly do for you what you could not do. He had no need to repent, because He was sinless. He could measure His holiness against the Law of God, and it did not condemn Him. Those valleys of doubt and despair, those mountains of pride, could not be found in Jesus. He kept God’s holy Law for you down to the smallest detail.
And He put all your Law-breaking, all your sin, on His shoulders and invited God’s wrath on Himself to spare you from eternal punishment in hell. That is where the Lord’s greatness is most clearly seen—in His suffering on the cross. That is where His glory is found, hidden beneath a crown of thorns and behind all that anguish and shame.
You have a Savior who knows sadness. Isaiah described Him as “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief” (Isa. 53:5). You have a Savior who knows pain, who knows guilt, because He took all of yours on Himself. Isaiah says again, “[H]e was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace” (v. 5). This is the peace the incarnate Son of God came to bring, the “peace on earth” that the multitude of angels sang about the night of His birth.
It is the peace He wants you to have in this busy season no matter what troubles you, grieves you, or weighs you down right now. Jesus came for your sake. He came to save you. He came to redeem your soul by shedding His holy blood and remove your transgressions from you as far as the east is from the west (Psa. 103:12).
His forgiveness of our sins is why we don’t view repentance as a chore. Repentance is a gift worked in us by the Holy Spirit which prepares us to receive God’s greater gifts—the gifts of His righteousness, peace, and life. He gives these blessings to us now and assures us that we will have them forever in heaven.
So by the power of the Holy Spirit, we “Make Straight the Way of the Lord” today. We push away all doubt. We set aside all pride. We hand over to God everything that has caused anguish and pain to ourselves and to others. And our merciful Lord says, “I forgive you all your sins. I made payment for them long ago by My precious blood. All that I won for you, all that I have, I poured over you at your Baptism. There, I made you My own.”
Your Baptism into Christ means that even though you may feel empty at times, you are not empty. And even though you may feel alone, you are not alone. The Christ, your Savior, has come, and He still comes with gracious tidings of comfort and joy for you.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture from “The Preaching of St. John the Baptist” by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, c. 1565)
The Third Sunday in Advent – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: St. Matthew 11:2-10
In Christ Jesus, who shares His righteousness, honor, and glory with us, not because of our own worthiness, but because of His great mercy and grace toward us, dear fellow redeemed:
You probably haven’t heard the name “Pheidippides” before, but I think you know his story. He was a resident of Athens when Greece was beginning to develop a democratic form of government. The Persian Empire viewed Greece’s move toward independence as a threat, and a Persian fleet was sent to attack the city of Athens. The Persians landed on the coast of Greece at a place called Marathon. Seeing that the Athenian army was on better ground for fighting, the Persian commander divided his force and sent part of it by sea toward Athens which had been left unguarded. The Athenians, realizing that time was running out, attacked the Persian army and routed it.
To let the people of Athens know that help was on the way, a messenger named Pheidippides was sent off. He ran as fast as he could, covering a distance of about twenty-five miles before the Persian fleet arrived in Athens. With his last breath, he declared “victory!” and died. His message saved the people of Athens, and his heroic effort is remembered by the 26.2 mile marathon races held all over the world each year.
There are many examples like this of a messenger becoming famous for the message he brought. Paul Revere with his “midnight ride” comes to mind. He hurried around warning the revolutionaries that the British were coming. We remember him because of his message. And this is also why we remember John the Baptist.
John’s purpose was set for him before he even existed. The angel Gabriel told his father Zechariah that he and his elderly wife would have a son whom they were to name John. John would be “filled with the Holy Spirit.” He would “turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God” and would “make ready for the Lord a people prepared” (Luk. 1:13,16,17). When he was about thirty years old, John went preaching in the wilderness of Judea. His message was this, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Mat. 3:2).
The crowds started to gather around this bold preacher. He didn’t talk like the teachers of the Law. He didn’t care whose feathers he ruffled. He didn’t appear to have any angles; he wasn’t doing this for himself. The people knew he was special—a prophet sent by God. Some even wondered if he might be the Messiah. John shut off all speculation. “I am a voice,” he said. “I am only a messenger. Don’t look to me—listen to me!”
This is what made John so great. He deflected all attention from himself to the Savior. And this is what Jesus wanted the people to understand about John. He asked them what they went out into the wilderness to see. Did they go to see “a reed shaken by the wind,” one who spoke an uncertain and weak message? Obviously not, since everyone knew how boldly and fiercely John preached. Did they expect to find “a man dressed in soft clothing”? Not at all. John was no “pretty boy.” He wore clothes made out of rough camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist. Hardly dressed to impress.
So did they go to see a prophet? “Yes,” said Jesus, “and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, ‘Behold, I send My messenger before Your face, who will prepare Your way before You.’” John was the watchman crying out that the Bridegroom has come. He was the herald announcing the coming of the King. He was important not because of his own abilities or his own credentials. He was important because of who came after Him.
It is offensive when someone acts like a “big deal,” not because he has done anything significant, but because he is related to or tied to someone significant. The spoiled children of a rich person might behave like this or the relatives of someone who is famous. John was actually famous in his own right, but he knew his place. He knew that the One who followed Him, whose message he proclaimed, was far greater. John said, “I’m not even worthy to untie His sandals” (Luk. 3:16).
This is the understanding that all of us should have about our connection to Jesus. We do not give Him something He lacks; He gives us everything that we lack. We do not make a name for ourselves; He gives His name and all His accomplishments to us. We do not deserve honor and glory for our successes; He deserves the glory. We do not tell Him what to do; He tells us.
In the kingdom of God, everything is turned upside down: greatness is found in humility; strength is found in weakness; victory is found in defeat. The unbelieving world and our sinful nature along with it, rebel at these things. We want to be great because of what we do. We want to stand on our own two feet. We want to win. We want others to bow down to us, to recognize how gifted we are.
And sometimes we even act this way toward God. We get mad at Him when things don’t go the way we want them to, as though our plans are better than His. Or we forget about Him when things go well for us, imagining that we have only ourselves to thank for our success. We complain about what we don’t have, instead of thanking Him for what we do have. We think we deserve to have more, when our heavenly Father has already given us the kingdom by faith in His Son (Luk. 12:32).
And what does the Lord do about us prideful, self-centered beings? How does He respond to our impatience and complaining? What we deserve is for every good thing we have—which God has given to us—to be taken away. We deserve to have all honor, all goodness, all joy stripped away from us. But that is not what Jesus does.
Instead He puts Himself at our service. He comes to meet us in our weakness, our failure, our sin. He brings us forgiveness for thinking that everything revolves around us. He cleanses our hearts and minds of all our pride, all our thinking that our ways are the best, that we need nothing more than ourselves.
This is why God took on flesh, to save us sinners. This is what He made clear to the disciples of John, that He was here to heal, cleanse, give life, and preach good news. “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him” (Joh. 3:17). Jesus came to take up your sins and your sorrows and carry them to the cross where atonement was made. And He still comes through the means of grace to apply His saving work to you.
This is what you have come today to hear. This is what I have been called to preach. I have nothing to give you of my own, at least nothing that can benefit your soul. What I proclaim to you is not mine, but His who sent me. Every faithful preacher is like John, a messenger pointing to Jesus. Today’s Epistle lesson speaks about the work of preachers: “This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God” (1Co. 4:1).
I am not your boss. I am not your lord. I am a servant of God and a steward who proclaims His Word and administers His Sacraments. I am not above you; I join you in receiving the rich gifts of our Savior. Each one of us is a beggar with empty hands, which Jesus fills with His perfect works, His totally sufficient life of holiness.
This is the clear message of God’s Word, and it is why we rejoice today. The rose-colored candle and bulletin, and in some churches the rose-colored cloth on the altar and pulpit, remind us that the season of Advent is not all repentance. It is also a rejoicing at what Jesus came to do and what He fully accomplished. His work shows undeniably that you matter to God. You might not feel like you matter much in the world, but the world’s glory is only temporary, and it is never enough.
You matter to God because He says so. His incarnate Son died to take away your sins. He rose from the dead to destroy the grip that death had on you. He chose you to be His own and adopted you in the waters of Baptism. And He still meets you to impart His eternal blessings to you, even feeding you with His holy body and blood.
This is the message of God. It is the message that comforts you, strengthens you, gives you hope. It is the message that assures you of your value to God. It is the message “for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself” (Act. 2:39). God does this calling through each one of us. He puts people in our lives who are hurting, lost, confused, and He calls us to share with them the hope we have. We don’t have to say everything perfectly. We don’t have to practice the exact words to use. We simply tell them who we are in Christ. We tell them what He has done for us. We tell them that on our own we are nothing, but in Him we have everything.
And if we enjoy a good reputation in our communities, if anyone speaks well of us and wants to give us credit for the good things we accomplish, we can do what John did. We point to Jesus. We are just the messengers. It is the message that matters most. Jesus is the Source; He is the Savior. With John we point to Him and say, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (Joh. 1:29).
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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(picture from “Witness of John the Baptist” by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, 1794-1972)