The Fifth Sunday of Easter & Saude Confirmation – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: St. John 16:5-15
In Christ Jesus, who spoke the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, because He is the truth, dear fellow redeemed:
Do you remember what happened the first time you told your parents a lie… and got caught? You lied because you didn’t want to get in trouble. You wanted to get away with something that you know you shouldn’t have done. But it didn’t work. Your parents found out. I am confident they did not respond by saying, “It’s no big deal.” Or, “You almost got us that time!” Or, “We’re glad to see you pursuing your truth.” You had to face the consequences, not only for the wrong thing you did, but also and especially for lying about it.
We are taught from a very young age to tell the truth. We must be taught it because it does not come naturally to us. The problem is, hardly anyone these days seems to agree on what exactly is true. We hear often enough, “What is true for you is not necessarily what is true for me.” Or, “One person’s truth is just as valid as another’s.” This makes all truth relative, totally dependent on what each individual thinks is right and wrong. But no society can actually function like this. With no truth boundaries in place, we would destroy each other.
This is why some people look to the government to establish truth. But government officials are not perfect. Laws that encourage and reward harmful activity can be put in place, and good laws can be changed by bad actors. What about the visible Christian Church? Can that establish truth? Church officials are sinful too. And what one church might call true and good, another might call false and evil because they don’t agree about what God wants them to teach and do. Should it be each household or community determining what is true? That just puts us back to truth being relative, decided by what seems right to each individual or small group.
The problem with all these options is that they start with humanity. They start with what we can do to create a peaceful, well-ordered society. If we were capable of this, or even moderately good at it, wouldn’t we see a lot more peace and order in history and a lot less violence and trouble? Jesus makes it clear that we sinners are not going to be able to raise ourselves out of the continuous conflict and suffering of the world. We need someone to come from the outside in, someone who is not held back by the same weakness and sin that we are.
Jesus was a Person like this. He did not come from the world; He made the world. John 1 says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made” (vv. 1,3). Then the evangelist writes, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
The Son of God took on human flesh by being born of the virgin Mary. Because He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, He entered the world without sin. He was “full of grace and truth,” and He came to save the world (Joh. 3:17). He came to offer up His holy life as the payment for all sin, to make satisfaction for it by His death on the cross. Jesus spoke the words of today’s reading the night before He was crucified. He knew that He would suffer, that He would die, and that He would rise again on the third day. This is what His heavenly Father sent Him to do (Joh. 10:18).
After His work was complete, Jesus told the disciples that He must return to His Father. He would no longer be visibly present with them to teach them, answer their questions, and encourage them. This filled their hearts with sorrow. How could they go on without their Teacher and Lord? Jesus had the answer. He told them He would send the Holy Spirit to guide them into all the truth, to declare to them the things that were to come, and to take what was His and declare it to them.
When the disciples heard Jesus’ words before His death and resurrection, they could not make sense of any of it. After His resurrection, they began to understand Jesus’ purpose and plan for the salvation of the world. And then at Pentecost, ten days after Jesus ascended into heaven, it all became clear. God the Father and God the Son sent God the Holy Spirit to them just as Jesus had promised.
The Holy Spirit not only guided these chosen disciples to preach boldly in the name of Jesus, He also guided them to write histories and letters, so that others after them would hear the truth and would learn how to discern truth from error. We still have those Spirit-inspired writings today. They are collected in the New Testament of the Bible, along with the inspired words of the prophets in the Old Testament. We believe that the entire Bible is given to us by God. It was written down by men, but it contains no human opinions, no human errors, and no actual contradictions. It is the Word of God, which means it is true.
This is the truth that has gone out into the world and still goes out. It has changed the world and still changes it. But you might say, “If the Word of God is so powerful, if it is true, why isn’t the world a better place?” If you filled up on food at a recent meal, why do you keep more food in the cupboards and fridge? If a cut in your skin has healed, why do you keep bandages around? You know that just because you ate today and were in good shape today, that there will be hunger and other troubles tomorrow. We live in a fallen, sinful world, and each one of us is sinful.
One of the Holy Spirit’s duties is to expose the sinfulness of the world and of our own hearts. Jesus said that at the Spirit’s coming, “He will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.” The unbelieving world does not know how lost it is, how far it has fallen from the glory of God, and how deeply it is stuck in sin. It does not understand that its best deeds and greatest accomplishments are garbage compared to God’s goodness and righteousness. It does not see that if it continues to reject the salvation won by Jesus, it will be eternally condemned along with the devil.
That’s the truth, and it’s a hard truth. It is difficult to speak this message in the world because the world does not want to hear it. No one likes to be told that he or she has a major problem. Unbelievers do not want to hear that no matter how good they have tried to be toward their neighbors, or how much they have tried to make a positive difference in their communities, that none of it counts for their salvation with God. It isn’t good enough. Unless they repent, they cannot be saved. As long as they reject Jesus’ saving work, they are on the way to hell. No matter what our culture says today, not everyone who dies goes to “a better place.”
This sounds harsh. People who hear this wonder why we Christians think we are so much better than others. They can name a whole bunch of Christians who seem to be worse people than they are. It isn’t hard to find a sinful Christian. We do not speak to others about sin, righteousness, and judgment because we think we are so good. We speak the truth of God because we know we are just as sinful as everyone else, and we know that no one can be saved apart from the grace of God.
We speak the truth because we want others to have the forgiveness and comfort that we have. We want them to know that Jesus fulfilled the holy Law of God for them and died to pay for their sins and rose again to conquer their death. He did this for the whole world, for all people of all time. He did not leave anyone out or fail to pay for anyone’s sins. Every single wrong we have done, every single unkind word or action toward others, every single lie we have spoken or lived, Jesus suffered the wrath of God for it and shed His blood to wash it all away.
This is the truth. It is not my opinion. It is not make-believe. I can tell you with one-hundred-percent certainty that your sins are forgiven because Jesus paid for them. He commanded that this Gospel message be shared with the whole world (Mat. 28:18-20, Joh. 20:22-23). The Gospel “is the power of God for salvation” (Rom. 1:16). It is powerful because it is not man’s word; it is God’s Word. The Holy Spirit works through the Word to guide you into all truth, to point you to Jesus’ work for your salvation, to take what is His—His righteousness, His perfection, His life—and declare it and give it to you.
You breathe in the Spirit and power of God whenever you listen to His Word and receive His Sacraments in faith. And you breathe out these gifts to others when you speak the same promises and blessings of God to them. You believe, and so you also speak (2Co. 4:13). When you speak the truth, you do not need to worry about how it will be received. That burden is not on you. The Holy Spirit will do all the heavy-lifting. He will open ears, He will work repentance, He will plant faith in hearts—just as He has done 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 stained glass by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, c. 1660)
The Festival of Pentecost – Pr. Faugstad exordium & sermon
Festival exordium:
These were exciting and uncertain times for the Lord’s disciples. Jesus had risen from the dead and visited with them on multiple occasions, teaching them about what He had done for all people and about what was still to come. But His appearances to them were unpredictable. He was not with them like He was before. Their interactions with Jesus had changed.
They still had many questions. What was Jesus going to do now? What part would they play in His plan? How would the Israelites as a whole be affected? They seemed to hold out hope that their death-conquering Lord would usher in an earthly kingdom. Several weeks after His resurrection, the disciples asked, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Act. 1:6).
Jesus’ response showed them they were thinking too small. He would establish a kingdom, but not the earthly kind. He said, “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (v. 8). The kingdom that Jesus would rule over was a spiritual and eternal one, and the power for expanding this kingdom was from the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit came upon the disciples on Pentecost. He came with the sound of a mighty rushing wind. He caused tongues of fire to rest upon them. He gave them the ability to speak in other languages (Act. 2:2-4). Through the Word they spoke, He worked faith in thousands who were gathered in Jerusalem, and 3,000 Jews were baptized that day in the name of the Triune God.
The Holy Spirit continues His powerful work today. He still works through the holy Word to convert the hearts of unbelievers and strengthen the faith of believers. Without the Spirit’s work, no one would believe. But because of the Holy Spirit, we gather here in faith together with countless others around the world and throughout history.
We pray for the Holy Spirit’s continued work among us when we pray, “Thy kingdom come.” This is not a prayer for an earthly kingdom but for a spiritual and eternal one—a kingdom that comes “when our heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His grace we believe His holy Word and live godly lives here in time and hereafter in eternity” (Explanation to the Second Petition).
In celebration of the Holy Spirit’s work among us, let us stand to sing our festival hymn, #399, “O Light of God’s Most Wondrous Love”:
O Light of God’s most wondrous love,
Who dost our darkness brighten,
Shed on Thy Church from heav’n above,
Our eye of faith enlighten!
As in Thy light we gather here,
Show us that Christ’s own promise clear
Is Yea and Amen ever.
O risen and ascended Lord,
We wait fulfillment of Thy Word;
O bless us with Thy favor!
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Sermon text: 1 Samuel 16:14-23
In Christ Jesus, who kept His promise to send the Holy Spirit to guide us into all the truth and to convey the gifts of the Father and the Son to us sinners, dear fellow redeemed:
Today we are celebrating the powerful coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost and the work He continues to do among us. But our Old Testament reading gives us an example of the opposite of the Holy Spirit’s blessed work. It tells us of the Holy Spirit’s departure. Not only did the Spirit of the LORD depart from Saul, but a harmful spirit also filled the void and tormented Saul.
It is no surprise that the departure of the Holy Spirit would coincide with the arrival of an evil spirit. The all-powerful Holy Spirit does not share space with demons. 1 Corinthians 6 describes the body of believers as “a temple of the Holy Spirit within you” (v. 19). But when the Holy Spirit is rejected and faith is lost, the door is left open for evil spirits. Jesus said that when an unclean spirit finds a “house swept and put in order”—a body not inhabited by the Holy Spirit—the unclean spirit “brings seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there” (Luk. 11:25-26).
What does surprise us about our reading is that the harmful spirit that tormented Saul was “from the LORD.” Even Saul’s servants acknowledged that the evil spirit was from God. This shows us that God has power even over the demons, and that He can use them for judgment as He sees fit, like He did with Saul.
Saul had started out well as king. God had sent the Holy Spirit upon him to give him courage and to lead the people (1Sa. 10:10, 11:6). But then Saul began to go his own way. He presumed to step into the position of a priest and offered unauthorized sacrifices to God (13:8-14). Later he disobeyed God’s command to completely destroy an enemy nation and all their possessions. Saul let the Israelites keep the best of the livestock and possessions and then tried to say these were kept as sacrifices for the LORD (ch. 15).
The prophet Samuel informed Saul that the LORD had taken the kingdom from him and given it to another. From this time on, Saul was troubled by the evil spirit. He had persistently rejected the Word of God. This is a warning for us that the Holy Spirit and the faith He brings can be lost. If we willfully and regularly go against what God says, the time will come when the Holy Spirit departs, and God passes the terrifying judgment that we will just get what we are asking for.
There is no blessedness apart from God. There is no love, joy, or peace. There is no patience, kindness, or goodness. There is no faithfulness, gentleness, or self-control. These are fruits of the Spirit, so they are not possible apart from the Spirit (Gal. 5:22). Saul no longer had these things because He had rejected the Holy Spirit. He became angry, paranoid, and jealous. He acted with selfishness and violence. He demanded absolute loyalty from his servants, even if what he demanded was wrong.
But it seems that some of his servants remained faithful to the LORD. They recommended that Saul employ a man who could play the lyre, an instrument like a harp but smaller in size. When he consented, they told him about David the son of Jesse. Not only was he skilled in music, they said, but he was also “prudent in speech, and a man of good presence.” “And,” they added, “the LORD is with him.” Saul was pleased with David, and his music-making was effective. “Whenever the harmful spirit from God was upon Saul, David took the lyre and played it with his hand. So Saul was refreshed and was well, and the harmful spirit departed from him.”
This underscores the power of music. I have never met someone who doesn’t like one type of music or another or have a deep emotional response to it. All music has power, but not all music is beneficial for the Christian. When music is used to convey messages or manipulate emotions for bad purposes, it is very harmful. A regular diet of music with lyrics that promote sin can eventually lead a person, like Saul, to reject the faith.
This is why our aim in the Lutheran Church is not to include music for its own sake in our worship. We don’t just sing songs that make us feel good. If that were the case, we might choose pop songs that have nothing to do with God. No, we are not just looking for an emotional high. We want to have music that conveys the soul-saving message of the Gospel, the truth that God sent His Son to redeem us sinners. It is through the message of the Gospel that the Holy Spirit brings us the spiritual gifts that Jesus won for us. Jesus said, “He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (Joh. 16:14).
I expect that when David played music for Saul, he also sang God’s promises, and this is especially what brought Saul refreshment and relief from the evil spirit. The Word of God is powerful. Evil spirits cannot stand the Word. David knew the Word well. When Samuel privately anointed him king to one day replace Saul, we are told that “the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon David from that day forward” (1Sa. 16:13).
By inspiration of the Holy Spirit, David wrote at least half the Psalms in the Bible, including Psalms like 22 (“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”), 23 (“The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.”), and 51 (“Create in me a clean heart, O God.”). Many of these Psalms are the source for our Christian hymns, like Martin Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God,” which he wrote after Psalm 46. The Word of God combined with music is a powerful weapon against the devil’s attacks and a powerful tool for strengthening faith.
Ephesians 5 says, “be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (vv. 18-20). This is what happens when we attend the divine service each week. We sing to each other what God has done for us, and the Holy Spirit uses these praises to unify us and build us up. This is also why it is good to fill our homes with “psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.” The more we are connected to the singing of God’s Word, the less vulnerable we are to the devil’s work.
The account of Saul’s affliction by a harmful spirit is a clear warning for us. No matter how faithful we have been in the past, and no matter how certainly we hold the faith today, if the Holy Spirit does not continue to move us to repentance through the Law and to comfort and strengthen us through the Gospel, we will not stand. The devil and his fellow demons are constantly looking for opportunities to get at us. They will not stop trying as long as we live here on earth.
But our merciful Lord does not give up defending and protecting us. Though we have on many occasions let down our guard and fallen into sin, He continues to call us back and forgive us. Even faithful David fell into terrible sins, but the Holy Spirit worked repentance in his heart. We join him in the words he humbly and faithfully sang in response to God’s mercy, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from Your presence, And take not Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of Your salvation, And uphold me with Your free Spirit” (Psa. 51:10-12, NKJV).
The LORD has not taken the Holy Spirit away from us. The Spirit Is Still at Work among Us through His holy Word and Sacraments. He continues to build us on the foundation of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus as the cornerstone. He continues to join us together in the unity of faith like perfectly fitted stones in a holy temple. He continues to dwell among us and in us, bringing us all the spiritual gifts we need for this life and for the life to come.
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 stained glass at Saude Lutheran Church)
(sermon audio not available this week)
The Sixth Sunday of Easter – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Judges 16:18-30
In Christ Jesus, the greater and perfect Samson, who delivered us from all our enemies, dear fellow redeemed:
There is an error about prayer hanging around some of the branches of the Christian Church. The error is the idea that if you pray with enough faith, or if you have proven yourself worthy before God by your good works, then He will give you exactly what you ask for. When people who are taught this do not receive what they pray for, they have a crisis of faith. They assume that God must be punishing them for something. They picture Him looking upon them with fierce wrath instead of looking upon them with mercy.
We see a different picture in God’s dealings with Samson. But first, a little backstory is helpful. Before Samson’s mother had him, she had been unable to have children. The angel of the LORD appeared to her and said that she would “conceive and bear a son” (Jud. 13:3). He would be dedicated to the LORD, and his parents were directed to let his hair grow. As he got older, we are told that “the LORD blessed him. And the Spirit of the LORD began to stir in him” (13:24-25).
One of the ways the Holy Spirit “began to stir in him” was by giving him tremendous physical strength. On one occasion, a young lion charged at him roaring. “Then the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, and… he tore the lion in pieces” (14:6). The same language is used later on—“the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him”—and he single-handedly killed thirty men among the Philistines who ruled at that time over the Israelites (v. 19). The LORD was using Samson to deliver the Israelites from their oppressors.
For his next act, he caught 300 foxes, tied them together in pairs and put a torch between them. Then he set them loose in the Philistines’ grain fields and olive orchards, and much was destroyed. The Philistines came after him, and with the jawbone of a donkey in his hand, Samson killed 1,000 of them. Another time, he tore out the gates and posts of one of their cities and carried it in one piece and set it on the top of a hill. Samson was a big problem for the Philistines.
And Philistine women were a big problem for Samson. We meet one of them in today’s reading, a woman named Delilah. The Philistine rulers promised her great riches if she would “seduce him” and find out “where his great strength lies” (16:5). Samson told her that if he were bound with seven fresh bowstrings, he would become weak. When he fell asleep, she bound him with seven fresh bowstrings, but when he woke up, he broke them easily. She kept trying. He told her that fresh ropes would do it, but he broke those too. Then he said if his hair were tied into a weaver’s loom, he would become weak. Delilah did this, but it didn’t work either.
It is obvious that Delilah could not be trusted, but she wouldn’t give up. She kept pressing and pressing until Samson finally gave in. “A razor has never come upon my head,” he said, “for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If my head is shaved, then my strength will leave me, and I shall become weak and be like any other man” (16:17). You heard what happened next. The Philistines shaved his head while he slept, and when they attacked him, he figured he would defeat them like before. But “his strength left him” because “the LORD had left him.”
Samson had taken his strength for granted. He felt invincible. He thought he could not be defeated. He had forgotten where his strength came from. He had forgotten to put his trust in God and follow the LORD’s will. He was full of pride, and that led to his fall (Pro. 16:18). It was a tremendous fall. The Philistines gouged out his eyes and made him grind at the mill in their prison. Then they gathered for a great feast to their god Dagon to celebrate Samson’s defeat, and they brought Samson in to entertain them. We can imagine the abuse and mockery hurled toward him. He had killed so many of their people, but now here he was—weak, pathetic, a joke.
These hardships had given Samson time to reflect. He knew where he had gone wrong. He understood how foolish he had been. He realized how arrogant he had been and how faithless before God. We see this humility come out in his prayer to the LORD: “O Lord GOD, please remember me and please strengthen me only this once, O God, that I may be avenged on the Philistines for my two eyes.”
But why should God give back to Samson what he had so carelessly thrown away? He didn’t owe Samson anything. Samson had been given a great gift from God, and he sold it for the charms of Delilah. Samson deserved to be the Philistines’ slave. He deserved their ridicule and torment. Why should the LORD listen to his prayer?
The same question might come to our minds. None of us have had the strength of Samson, but like Samson, we have taken God’s gifts for granted. We have not used our ability to think in pure and dedicated service to the LORD. We have not always used our mouths for His glory and honor. We have not always used our physical abilities to serve Him and our neighbors. We have treated these gifts as though they originated with us and not with God. Why should the LORD listen to our prayers?
The answer is not that we have somehow earned the right to have God hear us because our faith is strong enough or we have proven ourselves worthy before Him. We know this is not the case. The reason the LORD listens to our prayers is because He is merciful—full of mercy—toward us. He is not watching us and keeping a tally of all the things we do and say and think that are wrong, to see when the scale tips or the balance shifts away from His favor. If this were the case, our fate would have been sealed long ago for our sins against Him.
But as He looked upon Samson, so He looks upon us. He knows far more clearly than we do how we have sinned against Him. He sees every misdeed, every infraction, every transgression. We deserve nothing but torment from God for these sins, endless torture in the eternal prison of hell. But the LORD has mercy upon us. He saw us in all our weakness, surrounded by our enemies, unable to free ourselves, and He sent us a Savior.
Like the angel who spoke to Samson’s mother, an angel appeared to the virgin Mary and said, “you will conceive in your womb and bear a son” (Luk. 1:31). The Spirit of the Lord was upon Him because He was the eternal Son of God. As He humbled Himself to carry out His saving work, Jesus appeared vulnerable and weak, but His enemies were not able to overcome Him. The devil, the roaring lion, rushed at Him with many temptations, the unbelieving world with all its power and resources tried to bury Him, death tried to hold Him fast in its dark chains. But all of them failed. He conquered them all.
He was our Samson, the strongest Man, who stood up to our formidable enemies. He had mercy on us in our weakness. He rescued us from the devil’s prison house. He paid the price for our transgressions. He suffered and died for our sins. This is how we know God the Father loves us—He sent His Son to redeem us by pouring out His holy blood. This is how we know God the Father is not punishing us for our wrongs—He punished His Son in our place.
Jesus’ death on the cross and His resurrection on the third day is also how we know the Father hears our prayers and wants to hear them. In today’s Holy Gospel, Jesus says, “the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God” (Joh. 16:27). Because of what Jesus has done, the way is open to the Father. He urges us to pray to Him as He says in Psalm 50, “call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me” (v. 15).
He knows that it is often in “the day of trouble” that we remember to pray to Him. It is when we are weak, when we are unable to control or fix something, when we don’t have answers, that we remember to bring these troubles to our LORD. This is what Samson did. He was weak, he couldn’t see, he was the object of everyone’s scorn, and he prayed for the LORD to give him strength. The LORD did. Samson pushed against the pillars of the house, and the house fell on the thousands of Philistines gathered there, killing more in Samson’s death than he had in his life.
The LORD had given him strength in his weakness, and He had done it for the sake of His people Israel to save them from their enemies. The LORD also works in you as the Holy Spirit strengthens and builds you up through His Word and Sacraments. He leads you to repent of your sins, to set aside your arrogance and pride, and put your trust in Him alone. He applies the saving work of Jesus to you, so you are comforted and assured of His grace.
The Holy Spirit also guides you in your prayers. He graciously brings your needs and concerns and requests before God. Romans 8:26 says, “The Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.” The Lord God wants to hear your prayers, and in His mercy, He promises to answer them in the way that is best for you, both for your earthly good and for your eternal 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 stained glass by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, c. 1660)
The Festival of All Saints – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Revelation 7:2-12
In Christ Jesus, through whom we are sealed with righteousness and salvation, so that we are prepared to join the great company of saints in His eternal kingdom, dear fellow redeemed:
You can tell a lot about people by looking at their eyes. You can tell if they are happy or sad, angry or frustrated, surprised or scared. Eyes can indicate if people are telling the truth or lying, or if they have personalities that are more extroverted or more introverted. Eyes can also reveal health problems like stress, sleeplessness, allergies, even liver issues. The expressiveness of eyes is why they are often referred to as “windows to the soul”—windows to the innermost parts of who we are. But of course, what our brains are thinking behind our eyes is far more complex than what our eyes reveal.
Today’s reading from the Book of Revelation talks about a “seal” on the foreheads of believers that only God and the angels can see. Imagine if that seal were also visible to our eyes. You would know who was a believer in Jesus and who wasn’t, not by what they say but by what you see. Maybe the forehead would glow somehow. And what if the forehead would be brighter when a Christian’s faith is strong and dimmer when a Christian’s faith is weak? I think we would all be more focused on the means that God has given to make faith stronger!
I’m sure we would also be surprised to learn who is truly a Christian and who is not. Some who we thought were Christians would be exposed as hypocrites, and some would be shown to have faith who we would not expect. How would you feel about having a very visible seal of God on your forehead for everyone around you to see? Would it make you more aware of the things you say and do? Are there times you would rather keep your faith more hidden, so that you could fit in easier in the world?
It is clear from our reading that although the seal of God is not visible to our eyes, it does set us apart from the world. The seal on our foreheads marks us as “servants of God.” Just as God chose His people Israel to be separate from the nations around them, He calls us to be separate as well. We are part of the 144,000 who are sealed “from every tribe of the sons of Israel.” This is a symbolic number, as the numbers generally are in the Book of Revelation. For example, seven is the number for perfection, and twelve is the number for completeness.
The number 144,000 is gotten by multiplying the twelve tribes of Israel with 12,000 from each tribe. This number expresses the completeness of God’s elect, the holy members of Christ’s Church. You might have heard that the Jehovah’s Witnesses teach something different about this. They teach that 144,000 is the literal number of people chosen by God to be in heaven. Jehovah’s Witnesses who are not part of that select group are told that they will not be in heaven in eternity, but they will reign on a new earth. To improve their chances of a higher status after this life, they are urged to be more active witnesses to their church’s teachings. It is a man-made, works-based religion.
But the sealing spoken of in Revelation is clearly not the work of man. A number of passages speak about how God seals us to protect us from the attacks of the devil. Jesus says that “God the Father has set his seal” on believers (Joh. 6:27). Through the work that Jesus accomplished, the Father “has anointed us” and “has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee” (2Co. 1:21,22).
The Holy Spirit works through the Word to bring about this sealing. St. Paul writes that “when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, [you] were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit” (Eph. 1:13). And in another place, “God’s firm foundation stands, bearing this seal: ‘The Lord knows those who are his’” (2Ti. 2:19). You are sealed by the Holy Spirit with the righteousness of Jesus that He worked for you (Rom. 4:11). You are sealed with the forgiveness He obtained for you on the cross. You are sealed in faith as you eagerly wait “for the day of redemption” (Eph. 4:30).
God first applied this seal to many of you at your Baptism when you were called “out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1Pe. 1:29). At your Baptism, water was applied to your forehead, and the sign of the cross was made over your head and over your heart. The opening hymn referred to Baptism when we sang, “Each newborn soldier”—born again by water and the Word—“Each newborn soldier of the Crucified / Bears on his brow the seal of Him who died” (Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary #194, v. 2).
Thinking about this connection to Baptism, could it be that the seal of God on our foreheads is in the shape of a cross? Two passages in Revelation speak about the seal in a different way. In chapters 14 and 22, what the 144,000 are said to have written on their foreheads is the name of the Lamb and the Father’s name (14:1, 22:4).
Through Baptism, God claimed you as His own. He put His name on you, sealed it to you, so that you are identified both as His child and His heir. You might have doubts about yourself, such as how strong your faith is or how God could love a sinner like you. But God says that nothing has changed from His view. The commitment He made to you when He brought you to faith still stands.
It was no mistake that He set His seal on you. He wants to keep you in the faith until He brings you to the great celebration of heaven. This is why He continues to send the Holy Spirit through the Word and Sacraments to strengthen you. As the Holy Spirit works through the Word, we are reminded again who we are. Yes, we are sinners who continue to struggle and break God’s Commandments. For that, we repent, and we need to keep repenting. But the Holy Spirit also assures us that we are saints, sealed with righteousness, forgiveness, and life.
We did nothing to earn this; Jesus earned it for us. This is what the great uncountable multitude in heaven cries out in thanksgiving and praise: “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” The saints in heaven give glory where glory is due, and we do the same here on earth. In our liturgy, we join the angels in their Christmas song, “Glory be to God in the highest / And on earth peace, good will toward men” (ELH p. 44). We join them later in the service in their heavenly song of praise, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth; / Heav’n and earth are full of Your glory” (ELH pp. 51-52).
That is the beauty of the historic liturgy. It recounts God’s gifts and teaches us how to give thanks for them. It joins our voices spiritually with the saints and angels around God’s throne, even while this fellowship is hidden from our eyes. And it prepares us to join the heavenly liturgy with the saints, angels, elders, and living creatures around the throne of God.
As you sing the liturgy and hymns in our worship here in church, you might sometimes think about where members used to sit whose souls are now in heaven. Today we especially think of Nadine, Swede, and Derwin from Redeemer and Don from Jerico who were called out of this life within the last year. Those of you who are older have seen many saints of our congregations go on ahead of you. Perhaps you think more and more about how you will join them soon, and what it will be like when you do.
Today’s reading gives us a glimpse of what is coming. The elect who were sealed by the Holy Spirit in this life through Word and Sacrament now enjoy the bliss of heaven. They stand “before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands.” Their focus, the object of all their love and praise, is the Triune God. They are glad to be with their fellow saints, but their attention is on God.
They are clothed in white robes. An angel explained to John what made their robes so white: “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Rev. 7:14). In heaven, we won’t remember any sins, not the ones we have done or the ones others have done to us. We won’t remember any of the things that caused us grief or pain. Jesus’ blood washes all that away. We will stand in the presence of the holy God, and we will be holy. By faith, we are holy now—we are saints now—but the glory is hidden from our eyes. In heaven, we will be perfect saints in body and soul.
This is what you have to look forward to. This is what you are sealed for. You Are Sealed for Eternal Salvation. This is not something to try to hide, so that you can fit in better with the world. Both the troubles and the triumphs of this life are short-lived. Your merciful Lord has something much better and more glorious planned for you. He had it planned for you before you were even born. In fact, He chose you in Christ “before the foundation of the world, that [you] should be holy and blameless before him” (Eph. 1:4).
This is how we stand by faith in Him, and this is how we will stand before Him in heaven. As St. John writes: “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure” (1Jo. 3:2-3)—saints forevermore.
“Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”
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(picture from “Seventh Seal and 144,000 Sealed” by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, 1794-1872)
The Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Ephesians 3:13-21
In Christ Jesus, who carried out His Father’s loving will by suffering and dying on the cross to set us free from sin and death for all eternity, dear fellow redeemed:
What do you most want for your children or your grandchildren? When you imagine their future, how would you want it to look? About two years ago, the Pew Research Center conducted a survey of parents with children under age eighteen (“Parenting in America Today” posted online, Jan. 24, 2023). When asked what they most wanted for their kids when they grow up,
- It is probably no surprise that 88% said it is very important that their kids be financially independent as adults, and that their kids have jobs or careers they enjoy.
- It might surprise you that only about 20% said it is very important that their kids get married, and that their kids have kids.
- Around 90% said it is very important that their kids are honest, ethical, and hardworking.
- Only 35% said it is very important that their kids have similar religious beliefs to their own.
Does this match what you want for your children and grandchildren? Of course you want them to be successful and happy when they grow up. You want them to live fulfilling lives with rich purpose. You want them to be honest and kind, ready to help others in need. But is that what you most want for them, or are there things you would put higher on your list?
The Apostle Paul in today’s reading gives us a roadmap for how to think through these things. He presents here the main things he wanted for the Christians in Ephesus. He spent more time with this congregation than with the others he helped establish, so there was a close relationship between Paul and the people. He loved and cared for them as we do our children, and they looked up to him and respected him as we do our parents.
Where our reading begins in chapter three, Paul is reassuring the Christians in Ephesus. Although he has been put in prison for preaching Christ, it is all part of God’s plan to have the Gospel preached to the Gentile people. Paul recognized that his suffering was for the glory of those who heard the saving truth, so he suffered faithfully and willingly.
Instead of looking for their pity, Paul expressed his love and concern for the Ephesians. He told them very clearly what he wanted for them by how he prayed for them. He bowed his knees before God the Father asking that God would grant them “to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being.” This first part of Paul’s prayer was that the people would remain connected to the Word of God by gladly hearing and learning it.
This is how the Holy Spirit carries out His work of creating and strengthening faith—through the Word. Even as the Ephesians read Paul’s inspired letter, the Holy Spirit was powerfully working to strengthen their faith. This happens every time the Gospel (the good news) of Jesus’ saving work is proclaimed. As Paul said in another of his letters, “[The Gospel] is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:16). If the Ephesians held tightly to the Gospel, they would be strengthened by the Holy Spirit’s power.
And where the Holy Spirit was at work, the Ephesians could be certain that their Lord Jesus Christ was also present. He is not stuck in heaven since His bodily ascension; He is seated at the right hand of God who is present everywhere. This means that Jesus rules over all things and fills all things as the God-Man. When the Holy Spirit brings Jesus’ forgiveness, righteousness, and life to believing hearts, He is bringing Jesus Himself. Paul prayed for the Holy Spirit to deliver these gifts, “so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.”
That’s a comforting thought. For all the doubts we have had, for all the sins we have committed, for all the bad things we have imagined in our hearts, our Savior Jesus still wants to dwell inside us. He is not ashamed to be connected with us. He willingly poured out His blood to save our souls. He became one with us in His Incarnation, He suffered and died for every single one of our sins, and He made us one with Him in Holy Baptism. Jesus specifically prayed for this union the night before His death. He said to the Father, “The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one” (Joh. 17:22-23).
When we are joined to Jesus by faith, we are joined to His love. Paul describes it as “being rooted and grounded in love.” The love of Christ is a greater love than any we know on earth, greater than the love we have for any family member or friend. His love compelled Him to enter the world that had rebelled against its holy Creator, to suffer all sorts of mistreatment and abuse, and finally to be nailed to a cross to die. No one made Him do it. He followed His Father’s will and laid down His life of His own accord (Joh. 10:18).
The incomprehensible part of this love is that Jesus suffered eternal hell for every single wrong we have done. He suffered for our failures as parents, grandparents, siblings, and children. He suffered for our selfishness, our pride, and the bad example we have been at various times. He felt agony and anguish for all of it. With His enemies mocking Him and laughing at Him—and we should picture ourselves in that crowd gathered at His cross—He was atoning for all of our sins.
This perfect love flows into you and fills you when He dwells in your heart by faith. It replaces the guilt and shame you feel for your wrongs and the anger you have toward yourself or others. His love changes the way you see yourself and the people around you. Yes, we are sinners, but more than that, we are ones who have been graciously rescued—redeemed from our sin and death.
Jesus looked at us in all our weakness and sin, going our own way, heading toward eternal death, and He decided that we were worth His perfect life. We were worth His sacrifice on the cross. He had compassion on us in our procession of death like He had compassion on that funeral procession outside the town of Nain (Luk. 7:11-17). Paul expressed the wonder of this in his epistle to the Romans, “For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (5:7-8).
As the Holy Spirit worked powerfully in the Ephesians through this Gospel, Paul prayed that they “may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” By focusing on Christ’s love for us, we forget our love for ourselves and our desire to have things go just the way we want in this life. We empty ourselves of our selfishness and greed, so that we are ready to receive the rich blessings of God. When we “know the love of Christ,” writes Paul, we are “filled with all the fullness of God.”
You notice that Paul did not pray for the Ephesians’ financial security, for their good health, or for their happiness in this life. He did not pray that they might avoid all trouble and pain, or that the future would be brighter than the past. He prayed for the strengthening of their faith, for their joy in Christ, for their salvation.
If the survey I mentioned is any indication, that is not want parents today especially want for their children. They want their kids to be successful and happy in life and have a good reputation with others. But they are not especially concerned if God’s truth is passed on to their kids, or that their kids carry these beliefs into marriage and the raising of children.
I’ll go back to the question I asked at the very beginning of the sermon: What do you most want for your children or your grandchildren? It’s a very important question. How you answer it will shape how you raise them, how you teach them, how you guide them. To help you answer it, try changing the question to this: What does God most want for your children and grandchildren?
He wants them “to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1Ti. 2:4). He wants them to know their sin is forgiven, that heaven is open to them, that eternal life is given to all who trust in Him. He wants them to find their identity not in popularity or achievements that fade, not in possessions that fail, not in success that is quickly forgotten. He wants them to find their identity in His love for them, in His perfect, finished work to save their soul, in the blessings He promises and gives to all His children.
This is what He wants not just for your children and grandchildren, but for your other relatives, your friends, your co-workers, your neighbors. And not just for the people around you—this is what God wants for you. He wants you to have exactly what Paul prayed for.
So Paul’s prayer can be and is our constant prayer for one another, that each of us would be strengthened in faith by the Holy Spirit through the Word, that Christ would continue to dwell in our hearts, that we would stay rooted and grounded in His unchanging, incomprehensible love, and that we would be filled with all the fullness of God, both now and forevermore. God grant us these gifts for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
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(picture from the altarpiece in Weimar by Lucas Cranach the Younger, 1555)
The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Galatians 5:16-24
In Christ Jesus, who went to the cross to free us from our sin and free us for a life of service in His name, dear fellow redeemed:
Why do parents tell their young children they have to take a bath? “I don’t care if I’m clean,” a child might say. “But I care,” says the parent. “But why do I have to?” “Because you don’t smell very good right now. Don’t you want to smell nice?” Baths are good for a child’s own cleanliness and for the people in his general vicinity. That’s the main reason any of us wash ourselves. We want to look and feel clean, and we don’t want to be offensive to others.
That is something like the spiritual cleansing we have received through the Holy Spirit. We have been cleansed so that we stand righteous before God, and so that we can be a blessing to those around us. In today’s reading, St. Paul contrasts “the works of the flesh” which dirty us and the people near us, with “the fruit of the Spirit” which benefits our neighbors.
He says “the works of the flesh are evident”; they are obvious, easy to identify. He begins his list with sexual sin—“sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality.” The people to whom Paul was writing lived in a culture much like ours, a sexually permissive culture, where sexual sin was widely practiced and accepted.
Then he listed “idolatry” which could include the worship of images, objects, or people, and “sorcery,” the practice of magic through dark powers. The next eight sins are behaviors that disrupt unity and goodwill: “enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy.” Then he added the sins of “drunkenness” and “orgies” and showed that this list could go on much longer by attaching the phrase “and things like these.”
There are countless sins that violate the holy Law of God. These are all “works of the flesh,” they all come from the original sin that we inherited from our first parents the moment we started to be. They all represent our rebellion against our God who made us to be holy and to do holy things. All the sinful things that Paul lists come from our desire to be served and not to serve, from our selfishness, pettiness, and pride and not from a self-sacrificing love.
When we try to justify our sins, we don’t sound much better than little children: “But what if I don’t care if I’m dirty?” “I can do what I want!” “She started it!” “Everyone else is doing it!” Even if 99% of the population thinks something is fine but God says it is sin, then we must pray for the courage to stand with the 1%. It is no overstatement to say that our eternal salvation is at stake. Paul wrote, “I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
You and I have done these things, but they are not counted against us, and heaven is not closed to us. How come? Because the Holy Spirit has rescued us from “the works of the flesh.” He did this by opening our eyes through the Law to see ourselves as we really are—separated from God, unable to please Him, full of darkness. He moved us to repent of our sins, to set them before God and beg for His mercy.
Then the Holy Spirit shined the light of Jesus’ forgiveness into our darkened hearts. He washed us clean with the holy blood of Jesus. He covered us in the perfect robes of Jesus’ righteousness. He did all these things for us in a simple ceremony involving water and the Word—Holy Baptism.
At your Baptism, you were rescued from the works of your flesh. Your sin was washed out of you at those waters, and you were filled with holiness. Everything Jesus did for you through His holy life, His atoning death, and His resurrection was applied to you, so you became what you were not before. You became a new creation of God (2Co. 5:17). Paul points to the effect of your Baptism with the words, “And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”
That was done to the sinful “passions and desires” of your flesh at your Baptism, and that’s what must continue to be done. Our sinful passions and desires must be crucified, destroyed. If they are not resisted and repented of, then we are saying that Christ was crucified for nothing, or that other bad people might have needed to be saved but not me.
We have an example of the temptation to get complacent, to forget who our Savior is, in the Holy Gospel for today (Luk. 17:11-19). Ten lepers cried out to Jesus from a distance, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” It sounds like they all had faith; they all believed Jesus could help them. But as soon as they received what they begged for, nine of them went on their way with hardly a look back. Only one “when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice.” Only one showed his faith by his actions.
When you were baptized, you were cleansed by the Holy Spirit of something worse than leprosy—you were cleansed of your sins and rescued from eternal torment in hell. Jesus suffered and died to do this for you, and the Holy Spirit applied His atoning work to you. So you know what He cleansed you from, but what did He cleanse you for? You would be correct if you said, “He cleansed me for salvation and for eternal life in heaven with Him.” But He also cleansed you to do holy works of service in praise and thanks to God while you are here.
Paul urges us in today’s reading, “walk by the Spirit.” Walking by the Spirit means trying to live a pure life in an impure world. It means trusting God to provide all that you need for your body and life. It means helping, encouraging, and serving the people around you. This is not about following God’s Law so that He will reward you for your good behavior. It means falling at Jesus’ feet with thankfulness like the Samaritan who was cleansed and dedicating all your hours, all your energy, and all your abilities to His service.
If you feel like this is nothing more than a “have to,” you will go about it with as much enthusiasm and gladness as a pouting child taking a bath. But if this is a “get to” or a “want to,” you will give thanks for every task, every opportunity, even every trial that the Lord sets before you. Then you will be tasting and distributing “the fruit of the Spirit.” That fruit is “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.”
What do you notice about that list? It is not self-serving like the works of the flesh, and it does no harm to others. It serves for mutual good. It blesses you and those around you. These works of the Spirit are what you were created, redeemed, and called to faith to do. Delivering this good fruit is your purpose as a Christian in this world, and it is your privilege.
But as clear as this is, and as much as we want to display these fruits in our words and actions, we have to admit that it isn’t all joy with us, it isn’t all peace and patience and kindness, it isn’t all faithfulness and self-control. Paul acknowledged this struggle. He wrote: “For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.”
This is a life-long struggle, so it is a daily struggle. When it is no longer a daily struggle, when it is just a once-a-week-on-Sunday-struggle, or an every-now-and-then-struggle, then we are in trouble. By how should we stay diligent about this? How can we keep our focus? This is done day after day by remembering and returning to our Baptism.
The Catechism teaches us how to do this: “Such baptizing with water means that the old Adam in us should, by daily contrition and repentance, be drowned and die with all sins and evil lusts; and that a new man daily come forth and arise, who shall live before God in righteousness and purity forever.”
So every day, we drown the old Adam, our sinful nature, with its passions and desires. We acknowledge our sins with sorrow and repent of them. And every day, we put our confidence and trust in Jesus who died for our sins and credits us with His righteousness. We dedicate ourselves to walking by the Spirit, to honoring and thanking Jesus by everything we do, and to showing love to the people that God puts in our path.
The Holy Spirit gives us the godly desire to do these things. As our reading makes clear, He does not just walk beside us as though we are equal partners in righteousness. He leads us. He leads us through the Word. When the holy Word of God is preached, studied, or called to mind, the Holy Spirit is powerfully at work to increase our faith and the fruit that comes from it.
He has cleansed us, so that we no longer show off the filth of our flesh or carry the stench of sin. Now we pursue a humble life of service and give off the sweet-smelling aroma of salvation which Jesus won for us by His grace. This is what the Holy Spirit has cleansed us to be and do—to be holy children of God who produce the good fruit of righteousness in thankfulness to Him.
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 stained glass at Redeemer Lutheran Church)
The Tenth Sunday after Trinity – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: 1 Corinthians 12:1-11
In Christ Jesus, whom we confess as Lord by the power of the Holy Spirit, dear fellow redeemed:
If you had to decide between losing an arm or losing a leg, which would you choose? How about between your sight or your hearing? How about the ability to talk or the ability to walk? Those are difficult questions. We wouldn’t consider any of our body parts expendable, though we might give up an appendix or our tonsils if we had to (and maybe you have).
Just after today’s reading, St. Paul writes about how absurd and destructive it would be for the body to rebel against itself, so for example, for the eye to rebel against the hand or for the head to reject the feet (12:21). This would not help the body in any way. It would hurt the whole. Paul continues that “God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another” (vv. 24-25).
What he is talking about is the Church of all believers, which he calls “the body of Christ” (v. 27). Each believer is a member of the body of Christ. So it should be the concern of every one of us that we do not conduct ourselves in such a way that we do harm to the body. We are not just to look out for ourselves. We are not to elevate ourselves, as though we are more important members of the body of Christ while others are less important.
After all, we did not attach ourselves to Christ’s body by our own power or ability. We were joined to His body through Holy Baptism by the power of the Holy Spirit. Paul writes, “For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body [the body of Christ]… and all were made to drink of one Spirit” (v. 13). “[B]y the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit” (Ti. 3:5), we were brought into the body of Christ, and by the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit through the Word, we remain active members of the body of Christ.
In today’s reading, Paul speaks about the work that is done in the Church by the power of the Spirit. It is tempting to think of success in the church according to the abilities of the members. As in, “that church is doing so well because of the programs it offers,” or “that church is growing because the pastor is such a good preacher,” or “that church is successful because of the services it provides to the community.” Whatever good may be seen to happen in the church on earth, the glory must go to God alone.
Again and again, Paul connects spiritual gifts among Christians to the Holy Spirit. Whether it is the gift of wisdom or knowledge or healing or miracles or prophecy, it is “through the Spirit,” “according to the same Spirit,” “by the same Spirit,” and “by the one Spirit.” “All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit,” he writes, “who apportions to each one individually as He wills.”
As we think about the gifts of the Spirit, we need to recognize that there is no limit to what the Holy Spirit is able to do on earth if He wills it. If He wanted, He could make us a hundred times healthier or a thousand times smarter. If He wanted, He could give us the ability to jump over great distances or even to fly. He could make it so that we never feel pain or sorrow or fear and would go about our work with perfect courage and strength.
But while there is no limit to what He could do, the Holy Spirit limits His activity to what will build up the Church, what will strengthen the body of Christ. He does not act as a rogue Person of God. He operates within the Godhead in perfect conformity with God the Father and God the Son. Jesus said, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come” (Joh. 16:13). Then He added, “He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (v. 14).
The Holy Spirit employs His power to glorify Christ and the Father who sent Him, and to take the gifts obtained by Jesus and distribute them to us. Those gifts are not mentioned in today’s reading, but they are the forgiveness of sin through Jesus’ death on the cross, the bestowal of His righteousness through His perfect life, the victory over death and eternal life through His resurrection. These are the things Jesus had in mind when He looked upon the city of Jerusalem with tears in His eyes and said, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace!” (Luk. 19:42).
You do know “the things that make for peace,” because the Holy Spirit has given you faith in Jesus’ saving work. You recognize that every good thing you have from God—most importantly your salvation—comes to you by grace. You deserve punishment and eternal damnation in hell, but you receive the opposite—forgiveness and eternal life in heaven. It didn’t cost you an arm or a leg, but it cost Jesus His life which He willingly gave up for you. You believe and confess that “Jesus is Lord,” because the Holy Spirit has planted this comforting truth in your sinful heart.
But the sin in your heart does not want to give up its place so easily. The old Adam in you, your sinful nature, wants you to follow after and cling to lies. It might be the lie that the church could not survive without you—the lie that if not for your talents, if not for your efforts and offerings and gifts, all would be lost—the lie that you are a more important member in the body of Christ than all the other members. Pastors are tempted in the same way too, with the thought that the good things that happen in the congregation are because of their hard work and their abilities.
“The god of what I do” or “the god of what you do” are some of those “mute idols” that formerly led the Corinthian Christians astray. The things we sinfully put our trust in will not speak for us before the throne of God on the last day. Our bank accounts will not speak for us, no matter how full they are. Our possessions will not speak for us. Our positions of power and influence will not speak for us. Our popularity in the world will not speak for us. If we gathered all these things around us to validate that we had lived a good life and accomplished good things, they would not and could not say a word on our behalf. Their mouths would stay shut no matter how much we begged for their support.
It is no good to appeal for salvation to anything we have done. If we have done any good, it is only because the Holy Spirit has worked it in us as a gift of His grace, as a fruit of faith. These are the gifts He gives for the building up of the Church. The gifts that each of us has, whatever they may be, are not meant for our own benefit or our own glory. They are for the good of the whole body, for the Christian brothers and sisters around us and even around the world.
The work of the Holy Spirit among us may not look the same as it did in the days of the apostles when the Church was first being established. “Gifts of healing,” “working of miracles,” and the speaking of “various kinds of tongues” are not common in the Church like they used to be. They seem to have faded when the New Testament books were written by the apostles and disseminated. As exciting as those spiritual gifts may be, we have all we need today for the building up of the Church. We have God’s Word and Sacraments, the holy means of grace, for our growth in wisdom, faith, and strength.
St. Paul wrote to the Church in Ephesus that God’s Word is the foundation we are built on as “members of the household of God” (Eph. 2:19). Christ Jesus is the cornerstone in whom the whole structure is joined together, a holy temple, “a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (vv. 20-22). The Holy Spirit is just as powerfully active today as He was in the early Church. He still comes among us and works through us “for the common good.”
This is just what we pray for in the Lord’s Prayer when we say, “Thy kingdom come.” As we learn in the Catechism, “The kingdom of God comes when our heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His grace we believe His holy Word and live godly lives here in time and hereafter in eternity.” That is the purpose of the Spirit’s work among us, to increase our faith in Jesus and to help us live godly lives—lives of service and love toward God and neighbor.
This is how The Holy Spirit Builds Up the Church. This is how He blesses us here on earth, and how He prepares us for our heavenly home where we will perfectly receive, utilize, and praise Him for His holy gifts.
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 Outpouring of the Holy Ghost” by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld, 1794-1872)
The Eighth Sunday after Trinity – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Romans 8:12-17
In Christ Jesus, who shed His holy blood to cancel the immeasurable debt of our sin, dear fellow redeemed:
It must be the case that all of us here have some regrets. How can it be otherwise for sinners—at least sinners with a functioning conscience? We might regret how we hurt someone by our words or actions, how we lost our temper at people we care about, how we didn’t help when we knew someone needed it, how we said too much at certain times and not enough at others.
Along with these regrets can come a feeling of indebtedness, that we owe to others what they should have gotten from us but didn’t. That can really nag at us. We can find it difficult to be around certain people because of the guilt we feel toward them. We wish we could make up for our wrongs, but we can never take back what has been done or said. And the longer we carry these debts and dwell on them, the more they burden us.
There is also the other side of indebtedness—not what we owe others, but what we think others owe us. It is not a far step to go from feeling guilty for the wrongs we have done, to thinking about the wrongs that have been done to us. In fact, this might be the way we try to escape our guilt—trying to forget our sins by focusing on the sins of others.
The devil is ready for both situations. He is eager to magnify our own sins if that can move us to despair, or to magnify the sins of others if that can move us to bitterness or self-righteousness. In either case, the debt of sin remains. It is impossible for us to make up for our sins toward others, or for them to make up for their sins toward us. So if you want to talk about the “cancel culture” which is so popular today, not one of us can escape being cancelled because we have all sinned.
This is why St. Paul writes that there is no hope in living “according to the flesh.” There are different ways to live according to the flesh. The most obvious way is by doing the opposite of what God commands us and indulging in whatever comes to our mind and heart to do. Living according to the flesh also means thinking we can fix whatever we have done wrong. We can pay our debt of sin toward others by being good, generous, and charitable. Or we can prove by our good behavior that we are not as bad as the people around us.
This is all emptiness and vanity. This thinking shows that false prophets are not just outside us. One of the loudest and most deceitful false prophets is the old Adam inside us, our sinful nature. But contrary to the opinion of your old Adam, you can’t do yourself or others any good by staying focused on what you do. St. Paul states it plainly, “For if you live according to the flesh you will die.” You owe nothing to your sinful flesh. You can’t gain anything from your sinful flesh. The old Adam in you does not need to be fed; it needs to die. Paul continues, “if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”
But how do you “put to death the deeds of the body”? If you were in a life or death struggle against someone or something, you would apply every ounce of your strength to survive and overcome. That’s how we need to struggle against our sin. We need to stay on the lookout for temptations, fight against them with all our might, and get rid of any sin that has wormed its way into our hearts and minds. We get rid of sin by getting it out in the open—identifying it, owning up to it, and repenting of it.
This is how to address the debt of sin. We can’t pay it down no matter how hard we try. But we can hand it over to One who can. We are taught to do exactly this in the Lord’s Prayer. In the Fifth Petition, Jesus taught us to pray to our Father in heaven, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” You may have also heard another translation of this petition, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.”
This petition is an acknowledgement that we are unable to pay our debt of sin to God and to our neighbors. That’s a big thing to admit. By saying this prayer, we are saying we do not want “to live according to the flesh” anymore. We don’t want to live for ourselves; we want to live for God. And He is the One who made this possible. He is the One who makes this happen.
We pray for His forgiveness with confidence, knowing that He will and He does forgive all our sins. He forgives our sins because each and every one of our sins has been paid for. They were paid for, not by us, but by the God-Man Jesus, whom His Father sent to save us. The debt for sin had to be paid; God is just. And that debt was paid in full by Jesus who suffered and died for all our sins.
His work settles the debts we owe to others because of our sin and the debts they owe to us because of their sins. What a relief that is! No more dwelling on our failures. No more dwelling on our hurts. We promise in the Lord’s Prayer to forgive the sins of others because we know God has forgiven us every one of our sins. “[F]or all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 3:23-24).
Think of the work that Jesus did to save us like a blank check. There are sufficient funds to cover your tremendous debt of sin. The check is written and signed in the blood of Jesus with more than enough to cover the bill. But who is the check made out to? By the work of the Holy Spirit your name is included on that line, so you are certain that Jesus’ work was done for you.
Today’s reading makes it very clear that you don’t find your own way into God’s kingdom—you can’t save yourself. Paul writes that “all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.” In other words, you can’t become a son of God unless you are led by the Spirit of God. And again, “you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons.” Like any child who is adopted, you did nothing to get adopted by God. And again, “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.”
We are children of God because the Holy Spirit has joined us to Jesus. In Baptism, we were given the full payment for our sins through Jesus’ death on the cross, and we were given the free gift of eternal life through His resurrection from the dead. We became “heirs of God” because the Holy Spirit made us “fellow heirs with Christ.” All that Jesus earned, we inherit. He paid our debt of sin, so that we inherit His perfect life and eternal kingdom.
This is why Paul writes that we are not debtors to the flesh. We can take no credit for our good standing with God. All we have done is accrue more and more debt by living according to the flesh. And living according to the flesh can only end in death, both temporal and eternal death. But the Lord has redeemed us—bought us back—from our sin. So Paul writes that those who put to death the deeds of the body by the power and work of the Holy Spirit will live.
He specifically credits the Holy Spirit for our repentance and faith. He says, “if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” Our life of repentance, our life of faith, our life of love, none of it happens by our own efforts. It is a gift, a gift of the Holy Spirit through His Word and Sacraments. We are not indebted to our flesh. We are indebted to the Holy Spirit who has imparted to us all the good gifts of Christ.
In the Nicene Creed, we confess that God the Holy Spirit is the “Giver of life.” The Son of God won eternal life for us, and the Holy Spirit brings it to us. This is why we are right with God the Father. Each Person of the Godhead, the Holy Trinity, worked for our salvation.
So we are no longer slaves of sin, lugging around the debt of our wrongs. We are free people, unburdened by God’s forgiveness, living every day in His grace. The same is true for our fellow sinners. This is why when we ask for God’s mercy and grace for ourselves, we also promise to extend the same grace and mercy to others. We pray to our heavenly Father, “Forgive us our trespasses—our debts—as we forgive those who trespass against us—our debtors.”
We look at one another as God looks at us—as people who are perfectly loved by Him and who are redeemed by Jesus’ precious blood. Our Lord Jesus paid the debt for all. The Holy Spirit works through this message to bring forgiveness and faith to the hearts of those who do not yet believe, and to increase the faith of sinners like us whom He has graciously led from death to life.
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 stained-glass window at Saude Lutheran Church)
The Festival of the Holy Trinity – Pr. Faugstad sermon
Text: Romans 11:33-36
In Christ Jesus, who has revealed the Father’s love for us by becoming one with us and who has now sent us the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth, dear fellow redeemed:
In the spring of 1955, a pathologist performed a regular autopsy on a man who had recently died. But then he did something that crossed an ethical boundary. Though there had been no injury to the man’s brain or any cause to believe that something had gone wrong with it, the pathologist removed it from his skull! He was motivated by the fact that this wasn’t just another person on his table. This was Albert Einstein, a man regarded as one of the great thinkers of the 20th century.
His brain was dissected and put into slides for purposes of research and study. The hope was that some secrets of Einstein’s genius might be uncovered and used to increase human capacity for knowledge and mental capability. More recently, scientists have been experimenting with putting digital chips in the brain that could enhance memory retention or even be used to download information into the brain.
We would all like to be smarter and stronger, getting better and better. But even if we could, even if we made major strides forward from a human perspective, we would still be “know-nothings” compared to God. The apostle Paul speaks of “the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments,” he says, “and how inscrutable—how incomprehensible—His ways!”
The only reason we are able to know anything significant about God is because of what He has revealed to us about Himself. For example, human thinking could never figure out and cannot comprehend that God is Triune—one God in three Persons. Non-Christians such as the Muslims accuse us of having three gods. But that is not the case. We worship “one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity,” as we just confessed in the Athanasian Creed.
The Triune God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and present everywhere, which we remember with the three omni words: omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. God is eternal, holy, wise, and loving. He created all things that exist—the world and everything in it with all its beauty and complexity and the world’s place in the vast and ordered universe.
The evidence of creation alone is enough to show us the unfathomable depth of God. Specialists can spend their entire lives focusing on one tiny part of God’s creation and still learn or understand only a little fraction of it. In the whole scheme and scope of the universe, you and I are just small specks, temporary placeholders on a timeline that stretches behind us for thousands of years and will stretch beyond us for an unknown amount of time.
And yet, though we are certainly little more than fragments of dust in the history of the world, we are known and loved by our Creator God. We know this because He has told us so. This is how He described His approach to the human race, that He is “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. 34:6-7a).
The crown of His creation—mankind—rebelled against Him and did the one thing He commanded them not to do. But instead of pouring out His anger on them and wiping them off the face of His perfect earth, He made them a promise. He would send a Savior to free them from the grip of sin, death, and devil. That promise was kept when God the Father sent His Son to become one with mankind.
In the incarnate Son of God, we clearly see the mercy and grace of God. God could have condemned us. He could make us pay for our sins. But instead, He chose in His love to redeem us. The Son perfectly obeyed the will of His Father and suffered and died in our place for all our sins. This also is beyond our comprehension. How could sins be paid for that hadn’t even been committed yet, like our sins? And how could the Son die, but not the Father or the Holy Spirit, since these three Persons are one God?
We don’t need to make logical sense out of all this before we accept it as true. Just because something may not jive with our reason doesn’t mean it can’t be true. In fact, accepting only the things that fit our thinking makes us closed-minded, not open-minded. God wants to expand our understanding to include truths that are over and above anything the world can know. We were reminded last Sunday how He did this.
On Pentecost, God the Holy Spirit was poured out on the disciples, so that their message of Christ crucified would reach the ears and hearts of sinners “in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (Act. 1:8). In his First Letter to the Corinthians, Paul wrote, “Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit” (1Co. 2:12-13a).
The Holy Spirit continues to work through the inspired Word of the Bible, so that sinners are brought to faith and grow in the wisdom and knowledge of God. But even we believers have plenty more to learn. It is easy to forget this. After all, we are baptized, and we have been confirmed. We regularly attend church, and we know way more about the Bible than most of our Christian friends. Our faith is strong! But it doesn’t take much for us to question God.
Where is He, we wonder, when we need help and are hurting? Isn’t He all-powerful and able to change our situation? Or when we were unknowingly heading toward trouble, why didn’t He redirect our steps? Isn’t He all-knowing? Or when we were worried and had doubts, why didn’t He make His presence more obviously known, so we could be certain He is in control? Isn’t He present everywhere?
Paul writes, “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been His counselor?” Are we on God’s level? Can we see things like He does? When you have been around someone who acted like he or she knew everything, you know how irritating that is. It might be the brand new employee who on the first day of the job points out all the things the long-time employees should be doing better. Or the person who has hardly watched a sport, let alone played it, yet who thinks he knows more than the professionals.
Pretty annoying. Pretty laughable. It’s like us trying to tell God what He should be doing better. What do we know about upholding the universe and everything in it? We can’t even keep our own life and behavior under control most of the time! The Lord invites us to cry out to Him and even complain. But we have no right to criticize Him. He is never wrong. He is never unjust. Everything He does is good and right and true, even if we can’t perceive the good.
Another error we make is thinking God owes us something. Paul quoted this from the book of Job: “Or who has given a gift to Him that he might be repaid?” Many people think they deserve payment from God because of what they have done for Him. “I have made sacrifices for you, God. I have served you my whole life. I have always tried to do what was right.” But how good is a work that is done for a reward?
This is the way the apostle Peter was thinking when he said to Jesus, “See, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?” (Mat. 19:27). At another point, the mother of James and John led her sons to Jesus and said, “Say that these two sons of mine are to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom” (Mat. 20:21). Jesus’ response in these cases was, “many who are first will be last, and the last first” (19:30), and “whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave” (20:26-27).
Then He added, “even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (v. 28). If we think God owes us anything, we should recall what He has already freely given us. He has given us our very existence, including the body we have, the air we breathe, and the food and possessions we enjoy. He has also redeemed our soul, so that we will spend eternity with Him in heaven and not with the damned in hell.
He has had mercy on us when we did not deserve it. Jesus willingly took our place and shed His holy blood to wash away our sins. He paid for our sins of pride, our thinking that we are pretty good, that we have a better plan, or that we can see more clearly than He can. Our wisdom and knowledge are so small compared to His. Paul writes, “For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things.”
“From Him” tells us that God is the Source of all things. Through Him” says that God is the Giver of all that is good. “To Him” means that God is the Goal, the blessed Focus of all that we are and have and do. We can dissect the brains of geniuses and try to enhance our thinking with microchips, but we will never come close to the understanding that the Holy Spirit imparts to us through His Word.
Through the Word, we humbly learn how God Is Merciful to the Know-Nothings like us, and how He leads us more and more, deeper and deeper, into His “riches and wisdom and knowledge.” “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phi. 4:7).
To Him be glory forever. Amen.
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(picture from “Jesus Traveling” by James Tissot, 1836-1902)
The Festival of Pentecost – Pr. Faugstad exordium & sermon
Festival exordium:
When children are counting the days to their birthday, the days leading up to it go so slow. The anticipation builds and builds until finally… the day is here!
Just before His ascension, Jesus told the disciples, “you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now” (Act. 1:5). What would that baptism be like? Jesus said it was not like the baptism that John administered with water. John had said of Jesus that He would baptize “with the Holy Spirit and with fire” (Luk. 3:16).
The disciples’ anticipation grew with each passing day. Now it had been one day since the Lord’s ascension, then two, three, four, five. What did the disciples do while they waited? Filled with joy at Jesus’ promise, they together devoted themselves to prayer in Jerusalem (Act. 1:14). They also frequently worshipped in the temple, blessing God (Luk. 24:53).
Day six passed, then seven and eight and nine. Finally on day ten—a Sunday—the baptism promised by Jesus happened. They were baptized with the Holy Spirit and with fire. If the candles on a birthday cake cause excitement, this fire was infinitely more exciting. Tongues of fire rested on the disciples, but we are not told where. Artists often depict it above their heads, but it may well have flashed from their mouths.
That’s where the power was—it was in the Word, God’s Word, the glad tidings spoken by the disciples. That’s where the power still is. We don’t see the fire, but the Holy Spirit still shines the light of salvation through the Word of God, which He has recorded for us in the Bible. This light flashes forth to enlighten our minds and gladden our hearts—even more gladness than little children feel on their birthday.
In celebration of Pentecost, the birthday of the Christian Church, let us rise to sing our festival hymn, #399:
O Light of God’s most wondrous love,
Who dost our darkness brighten,
Shed on Thy Church from heav’n above,
Our eye of faith enlighten!
As in Thy light we gather here,
Show us that Christ’s own promise clear
Is Yea and Amen ever.
O risen and ascended Lord,
We wait fulfillment of Thy Word;
O bless us with Thy favor!
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Sermon text: Acts 2:1-13
In Christ Jesus, who sent out the Holy Spirit from the Father to bear witness about His saving work to the whole world (Joh. 15:26), dear fellow redeemed:
It’s amazing how the same message can be heard in completely different ways depending on who the listener is. The disciples on Pentecost were speaking in other tongues, languages they had never known or spoken before. Some who heard them said, “we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.” But others just heard gibberish. They mocked the disciples and said, “They are filled with new wine—they are just babbling incoherently!”
This statement showed their ignorance. They did not understand what was being spoken, so they immediately brushed it aside. These skeptics were the first ones Peter addressed, when he spoke just after today’s reading. “Men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem,” he said, “let this be known to you, and give ear to my words. For these people are not drunk, as you suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day” (Act. 2:14-15)—9:00am!
They were not full of alcohol at this time of day. They were filled with God the Holy Spirit. He had been poured out upon them by God the Father and God the Son. Peter continued by quoting the words of the prophet Joel, “And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh” (v. 17). The Holy Spirit had come just as Jesus promised. The Holy Spirit had come to distribute the gifts that Jesus won for all sinners.
The Holy Spirit still works among us today. He works today in the same way that He worked on Pentecost. No, not with the sound of a “mighty rushing wind” or with “divided tongues as of fire,” as awesome as that would be. He works among us through words. That is especially what got the people’s attention. They heard about “the mighty works of God” in their own language. Their hearing of this powerful Word is what led 3,000 people that day to believe and be baptized “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Mat. 28:19).
You have also been baptized in this way, and the Holy Spirit was poured out on you through the powerful Word. It is interesting to note that the evil spirits, the demons, hate the water. Jesus said, “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none” (Mat. 12:43). But the Holy Spirit has been tied to water since the beginning. Genesis 1 says that “the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters” (v. 2). And now the Spirit fills us—He is poured out on us—through the water and Word of Holy Baptism.
The apostle Paul encourages us to continue to “be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18). He wrote this in his inspired letter to the Ephesians, again highlighting the contrast between the consumption of alcohol and the pouring out of the Spirit. He writes, “Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit” (5:17-18).
“Debauchery” is a word that refers to wild parties, carousing, the excessive indulgence of ungodly appetites. That is the door that drunkenness opens. The over-consumption of alcohol impairs good sense, it dulls the conscience, it makes us more willing to do what we know we should not do. It puts ourselves and others at risk physically and especially spiritually. That is foolishness and not the will of the Lord.
The Lord’s will is that we are filled with the Spirit, and Paul outlines what this results in. He writes that those who are filled with the Spirit “[address] one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.” This is why we sing in church, even if we don’t think we can sing very well. We’re not singing to win any competitions. We sing to encourage one another. We sing the message of salvation to each other. We Lutherans have the best hymns ever produced, because we believe, teach, confess, and sing the pure Gospel by the grace of God.
We who are filled with the Spirit also “[sing] and [make] melody to the Lord with [our] heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (vv. 19-20). This has to be the Spirit’s work, because our hearts are not always filled with a song of praise toward God the Father. We do not give thanks “for everything” to God. But we should.
We were created by God the Father and redeemed by God the Son to praise Him through our actions, words, and thoughts. This praise should never stop, no matter what pain or sadness or turmoil we are feeling, because there is no goodness and no mercy apart from our God.
But as willing as our sanctified spirit may be, our sinful flesh is weak (Mat. 26:41). We focus on the troubles more than the blessings. We see what is going badly instead of what is going well. This perspective leads many to look for help in the wrong places, to temporary fixes that create lasting problems, like the bottle. These temptations only leave us more parched and more desperate than we were before. Only the Spirit can quench our thirst for help and salvation.
Jesus once told a woman at a well, a woman who had filled up her life with sin, that everyone who drinks regular water will be thirsty again. But He had a different kind of water to give, living water (Joh. 4:10-14). On another occasion, Jesus cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water’” (Joh. 7:37-38). This “living water” is the Holy’s Spirit work to bring us the salvation of Jesus.
The Holy Spirit is poured into believers through the Word and Sacraments. This is where we drink deeply of the Spirit, where we are filled with the living water of Jesus that washes away our sin. We come thirsty, parched from our wandering in the world’s wilderness, desperate for forgiveness. We come with our ears wide open and eager to hear the truth. We come to hear in our own tongue “the mighty works of God.”
We want to hear again and again what Jesus has accomplished for us, how He saved us from our foolish behavior, from our desire for what harms us, from our addiction to sin. He died for all these sins, and He rose again to declare that none of them is counted against you or me anymore.
The Spirit fills you with the forgiveness and life of Jesus. He covers you in His righteousness. Jesus said, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth…. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (Joh. 16:13,14). This is what the Holy Spirit does for you. He refuels your faith. He refreshes your spirit. He brings you the fruits of Jesus’ perfect work, so that you are comforted and strengthened in this life and prepared for the eternal life to come.
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 stained glass at Saude Lutheran Church)