John 17:20-26

Life Together in Christ

Third Sunday in Lent

National Lutheran Schools Week (Observed)

February 28, 2016

In the perfection of Eden, Adam and Eve certainly celebrated their relationship with God and each other, saying, “It’s great to be together.” Those perfectly together in the Garden of Eden were suddenly separated by sin. God and man would never be together again. Husband and wife would never experience life together in harmony with God and one another. Brokenness is seen in sibling rivalry and, ultimately, murder. We live in this world of broken relationships, knowing all too well by the Word of God and our experience, that sin separates.

God intervenes in the broken creation with the promise that there will be life together again. Noah and his faithful family are huddled together on the ark, awaiting new life after the flood. The family of Israel anticipates life together again in the Promised Land. A remnant of Judah waits for life together after exile in Babylon. God’s people knew that only He could bring about life together and that His promise would be fulfilled in the Messiah. Jesus comes as the Life and, by His suffering and death, fulfills all God’s promises and brings life now and eternally for all who believe in Him. Through the death and resurrection of Jesus, God has reconciled Himself to the world, bringing us together to Himself by faith in Christ, and therefore as His family in the Holy Christian Church.

The Church celebrates, saying, “It’s great to be togeth­er.” God has brought us here.  In 1 Corinthians 1:9 the apostle Paul celebrates that we “were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” We are together because Jesus gave His life and is alive again. Worship is the primary expression of life together, for it is here that God gives His gifts to unite us according to His Word. It’s great to be together around the baptismal font, to be together hearing and living the Word, to be together at the Lord’s Table. The message and Means of Grace and life empower every Christian to live out this life together in Christ. This unity, this fellowship comes only through Christ and His Word. 

In our Gospel reading for today, we hear a portion of Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer from John 17. Just before these words, Jesus’ prays for us by saying, “sanctify them in the truth, Your word is truth.”  This is where we are brought to our life together and from where we live that out.  By the Word, in the Word, through the Word.  There is no life together if there is no unity in faith in the Word of God.

Fifty years ago, there was a Lutheran pastor named Herman Sasse, who worked and wrote extensively on this issue of unity within Christianity.  “It is the plain teaching of the New Testament that the true unity of the church is unity in the truth. And it is the painful experience of church history, particularly during the last century, that whenever attempts have been made to unite churches without inquiring about pure doctrines – that is, without establishing what truth is, and what error, in Christianity – unity has not been achieved; and, what is worse, the divisions have always been magnified” (Hermann Sasse, Here We Stand, pgs. 186-188).

What is the solution to this division?  In short, Jesus.  The call to unity, that is the call to the one, holy, Christian and apostolic Church, is the call to repentance, the call to Christ and His Gospel.  Christ’s death has broken down the barrier between God and man, and faith now receives this benefit by the forgiveness of our sins. To have Christ made known to us through His Word and Sacraments, and so bask in His glory.  The ultimate goal of unity is not so we can simply say we are one, but it is the salvation of sinners, which is accomplished through nothing but the pure Gospel.

We live our life together in Christ when we have one Lord, the Christ who is really present in His Word and Sacrament. This unity can become manifest only when we agree in our profession of faith in this one Lord and in the one truth of the Gospel. The unity of the historical church is only achieved in joyful assurance of our faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, we are one in our understanding of what His saving Gospel is and one our understanding of what He gives us in His Sacraments. The more often and more clearly this Gospel is proclaimed, the more earnestly Christians of all confessions wrestle with for the one truth of the Gospel, and the more clearly the hidden view of the unity of Christ’s Church comes into view. 

This is our prayer, for it is the prayer of Jesus for us.  It is His prayer for our life together. A life that grounded, centered, and has its goal in Him who was crucified for the forgiveness of our sins.

This sermon is partly adapted from the LCMS Lutheran Schools Week devotions.

First there were 12, then there were 11, and the Church was faced with a problem. The perfect number 12, the number of the tribes of Israel, was lost by Judas, the one who betrayed Jesus, the one who became a guide to those who would arrest Jesus. Was the Church to enter Pentecost and the great mission of proclaiming Jesus and His resurrection now one man short?

So here they are now, the 11, trying to figure out what to do next.  How are they to keep this thing, the Church proclaiming the Gospel, rolling. So they do what is only natural to do.  They get together and talk it over. For good or for bad, Peter seems to be in charge, the who only about 2 months earlier denied Jesus three times just before He was crucified, but was again restored by the resurrected Christ not to long afterward.  So now he stands up in front of about 120 brothers in Christ.

But really. Who really wants to fill Judas’ shoes?  He set the bar is pretty low and you can’t do much worse, but still.  No one would ever live down the memory of such a predecessor. You'll always be the one who followed after Judas.  That's your claim to fame.  But Peter goes on and outlines the qualifications.: a man who have accompanied them from the beginning, the time of Jesus’ baptism until His ascension into heaven. Chosen by Jesus, trained by Jesus, sent by Jesus to proclaim Jesus. A short list it was, as only two names show up: Joseph, called Barasabbas or Justus, and Matthais. 

And so they prayed, which is always a good thing when making a big decision, but notice how they prayed.  They didn’t treat this like an election. It wasn’t a democracy. They didn’t base a decision upon who had the best speaking voice or magnetic personality or newest ideas. The disciples and others sought the will of the Lord concerning the candidate to replace Judas a leader of the Church, the new Israel.  They prayed that Christ would show them which one He had chosen.  Apostles are chosen not by consensus or vote, but by Christ. And so they cast lots, not gambling or blind luck, but trusting that God would direct their actions and decisions and their faithfulness. And the lot fell on Matthias, and the 12 were complete again.

And that’s all we ever hear of Matthias in Holy Scripture.  Now, tradition about what happens to him later on is vague and contradictory.  The two most likely stories are that he was either stoned in Jerusalem by the Jews, or that he took the Gospel down to Ethiopia where he was eventually crucified. 

Either way, for us, Matthias becomes not much more than a footnote in Biblical and Christian history. A piece of trivia as the one who replaces Judas. You would think being one of the 12 and chosen in such a way that there would be more to the story, more honor to his name, more attention paid to his life both before and after being numbered among the 12.  The unremarkable Matthias in the memory of the Church a mystery, in the mission of the kingdom anonymous, in the list of the saints, just a name, remarkable only to God.

And so it with us.  To the world and to history, even to our families. When he was alive, my grandpa did a lot or work in our family genealogy, going back over 1000 years.  Interesting reading it was, but that’s about all it is.  Go back more than a couple generations and it is just a list of names with little personal connection and no personal relationship.  In the eyes of the world, we are just names with mostly anonymous stories and legacy that we leave behind. We are the ordinary people, who are extraordinary.  We echo King David’s words in Psalm 8, “When I look at Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have set in place, what is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You care for him? Yet You had made him a lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet…”  what are we in the grand scheme of everything in the universe?  To God, we are special enough, valued enough, that He would send His Son Jesus to die for each and every one of us, personally.  Our life is so great that Jesus would give His life so that we live. 

While the memory of the world is fleeting, the Lord remembers His saints, no matter how ordinary or extraordinary. For the sake of Christ, He establishes the kingdom of God through normal, everyday sinners like you by the power of His Word. He gathers a Church that is forgotten by the world, but precious in the eyes of God, every last one of you. Because of the riches of His mercy, by the grace of God in Christ, we have been called by the same Gospel to which Matthias witnessed and proclaimed, to be about the mission that is ours to pass along to others.

Is that enough?  To be just another name to most, at best a footnote in history, appreciated and known by God alone. Apparently it was for Matthias.  But for many of us, it is probably one of the many struggles in our lives.  We are known. We are loved. We are worth the life of the perfect Son of God. We are saints by virtue of faith in Christ, for by the grace of God that is what He has made us, along with Matthias. Remembered by God and sharing in His glory into eternity.

* A portion of this sermon is modified from a sermon preached by Pr. Larry Peters on Feb 25, 2010.

Luke 13:31-35

O Jerusalem, Jerusalem

Second Sunday in Lent C

February 21, 2016

Audio only this week.

Roses are red, violets are blue… So goes the rhyme most of us learned in grade school.  We write this poem on cards, and there’s no other Hallmark holiday more valued for it’s cards than Valentine’s Day. Red is the color of Valentine’s Day, but I suspect most people don’t know why. Valentine’s Day is a time of celebrating love – especially married love – but once again, I would guess that most people don’t realize that this is an ancient commemoration of the Christian Church.

When it comes to the real reason for St. Valentine’s Day, red is not symbolic of hearts, roses, and candy. The red in this sanctuary is both a color of celebration and zeal but also of martyrdom – for it is the red of flowing blood, blood spilled for the sake of the Gospel. For the blood of St. Valentine was spilled because of his faith in Jesus and his death as a Christian martyr.

Valentine was a 3^rd century priest in Rome who gave his life for the Christian faith. Part of his priestly duties, of course, involved consecrating the holy estate of marriage among his parishioners. And in the 3^rd century Roman Empire, just like today, the government was interfering with God’s created intent for marriage, trying to mandate something immoral and unbiblical over and against what is proper and natural.

Emperor Claudius II felt that single men made better soldiers. They would have no family attachments, no distractions, and could devote themselves solely to war.  And Claudius like to wage war.  So he forbade his soldiers to marry so that they wouldn’t have such an attachment to other people or places or even to this life. 

Now, as you can imagine, this didn’t exactly go over well with many people, yet it quickly became illegal to get married or engaged if there was the possibility of being drafted or serving in the military.  Valentine considered it a sacred pastoral duty to continue to bless marriages, defending the divine and sacred institution of the joining together of one man and one woman into one flesh.  Many, especially Christians, continued to get married, though now in secret, coming Valentine in defiance of the imperial order. Valentine was eventually caught, imprisoned, and was beheaded on February 14^th, on or about the year 270.

Valentine is a reminder to us that love and marriage are not trite things, not merely warm fuzzy feelings, or forced sentimentality. Rather true love is exactly what our Lord tells us it is: a willingness of the lover to die for the beloved. The beloved is held more dear even than life itself. St. Valentine could have loved his own life more than his calling, he could have loved himself more than his flock. He could have loved his own comfort more than he loved our Lord. But he didn’t.

St. Valentine knew what our Blessed Lord said in our Gospel text: “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” That is why, even as he awaited his death, legend has it that he befriended his jailer. This man had a daughter who was blind and had asked Valentine for help.  Most legends record that Valentine was able to help her, either through medicine or a miracle, and as a result the jailer was converted to Christianity.  Just before his beheading, Valentine left a note for the daughter of his jailer on an odd shaped piece of paper confessing the Gospel and the hope He had in Christ, and signed it, “From your Valentine.”

This quickly became noteworthy to the Christians of the day, who apparently gathered up Valentines body and head and gave it a Christian burial.  By the middle ages, the idea of a “Valentines Day” started to take root, but it wasn’t until the 18^th century that it really started to look like what we have today.  So, yes, Valentine’s Day really is about love, and sending cards.  But above everything else, it’s all about Jesus.

For the perfect lover is our Lord Jesus Christ, who gives His very life for His beloved bride, the Church. Jesus sheds His red blood to save the people whom He loves, and in turn, Christians are called upon to bear their own cross in this life, to serve others the way Christ served us. Our beloved martyrs, like St. Valentine, are the living embodiment of this divine love: “whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.” Valentine acted out of love for his people and in service of matrimonial love ordained by God. He suffered imprisonment and execution for the sake of the Lord Jesus who Himself suffered death for him and for all people. For we Christians can only, truly love because we were first loved. God loved the world in this way, “that he sent his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.” He loves us enough to become incarnate and to suffer and die for us and for the “life of the world.” He loves us enough to save us though we don’t deserve it. He loves us though we do not always nor fully love Him in return. He loves us not because we are lovable, but He becomes despised and rejected, unlovable in our place. He loves us because He is love, and He is merciful.

St. Valentine is a Christian hero, a pastor who lays down his life for the people of God, because Christ laid down His life and took it back up again on Easter. It’s time we put the “Saint” back in ‘Valentine’s Day.” It’s time the Church take back this holy day from Hallmark. For we Christians know what true love is. Love’s color is red because it is sealed in blood. Love does not look like a heart, but it looks like the cross.  True love is what awaits you here in this place, because here God speaks His loving Word and He washes our sins clean, and He gives us the body and blood of Christ for the forgiveness of ours sins.

Today, we take a moment in time to honor St. Valentine, whose love was not merely expressed with a clever verse in a greeting card, but rather by virtue of his deeds and by his blood. He was a martyr to the truth of the sacredness of natural marriage, something no government can redefine or compromise.  He was committed to God’s Word, to his pastoral calling, and most importantly to His Savior. May we follow in the footsteps of this faithful servant of the Word, this humble martyr of the Church, whose name is synonymous with love itself. Amen.

This sermon has been modified from a sermon and notes by Pr. Larry Beane and The Lutheran Witness

Look around at our church building.  One of the comments we often here at Zion is how beautiful of a church we have.  Sure, things could use some upkeep and a little work here and there, but still. Now, look around at the each other, at the church of God gathered in this place.  We could say the same things: beautiful, though at times could use some work.  We are surely blessed here at Zion, both with our family and with those things which the Lord has given us.

This is always been the way God has treated His people – better than we deserve.  In our Old Testament reading from Deuteronomy, we heard a brief history of how God rescued His people and keeps His promises to them. He delivered them out of slavery and brought them into the Promised Land, blessed them with an abundance to sustain this body as they take possession and live in that which the Lord have given as an inheritance.

The offering of the first fruits serves as a reminder that the Promised Land is God’s gracious gift and it to be received with joyful thanksgiving. In the Old Testament, the Israelites were required to give of their first fruits, 10% of what God has blessed them with.  This isn’t the leftovers.  It’s not, you give whatever you have left at the end of the month after you pay your bills.  This is giving the best of the best back to God in grateful devotion for what He has given.

And so it is with us. We pass the plate every week as a reminder that God has answered our prayers, that He sustains His people with daily bread.  We receive many good things from God. We are beyond blessed in our country and in our lives, though we often take for granted what this means.  Even the Pharisees gave 10% of all they had back to God, though they thought it earned them God’s grace.  We who have been freed by the Gospel, released from the burden of earning anything from God, how can we not share our blessings with others?

Repent, you tight fisted, ungrateful people. Repent for grabbing what belongs to God and lacking trust in Him to carry you through your life. Repent for thinking that you deserve an easy life full of money and goods and that is not part of your Christian duty to share the blessings of God.  Holding onto your sin drags you away from Christ.

Notice we are not to give away all that we have.  You do not starve your children in order to feed your neighbor.  You do not give away what the Lord has not given to you, you do not overreach your blessings to spend more than have, and you don’t hoard treasure here on earth where moth and rust can destroy.

You who pat yourselves on the back, thinking that you have done more than you share, repent of your sinful pride and self-righteousness.  Your sins of greed, of selfishness, of pride condemn you.  Faithfulness to Christ does not rest in what you give to God, but in what God gives to you.  He has bought your salvation, redeemed you not with gold or silver, but with the holy, precious, blood of Christ. What is a dollar, a hundred dollars, a thousand dollars compared to the forgiveness of sins? 

Like Jesus in the desert, the devil tries to tempt us with doubt and worry, questioning if God really cares for us and if we really have enough.  He spoke to Jesus, “If You really are the Son of God,” going after His pride and His devotion to the Father.  Jesus will have none of it, none of the twisting of God’s Word and none of lies.  How easy though we fall to these same temptations, doubting our position in God’s family as His child, questioning whether He will really take care of us in our times of need, and worse of all, trying to make ourselves the god and ruler of the kingdom of our lives.

We are all tempted to make excuses.  Most of us probably wonder whether that is really possible for us to give back the way we know we should.  Perhaps we are so consumed by the practical challenges of just making it through the day that we find it difficult to imagine that our struggles could have any larger significance.  Maybe we think that only what rich, powerful, and famous people do really impacts the world in meaningful ways.  Perhaps we imagine that the little we have can never make any kind of difference. It may be that our previous efforts to grow in faithfulness have been somehow disappointing or frustrating, so we have given up.  I imagine that many of us feel as insecure and helpless as those enslaved by the Egyptians.

So we make those excuses to hold on to what we have, and to give God what we think he really wants. That we will show God our thanks devoid of any action and just by giving Him our heart. A faith that refuses to show itself through its actions is devoid of Christ.  If you think you are saved because you give Jesus your heart, you will not be saved.  It is one thing to choose Jesus as one’s Lord and Savior, to give Him your heart and commit yourself to Him, and that He now accepts you into His flock. It is a very different thing to believe in Him as a Redeemer of sinners, of whom one is the chief.  One does not choose a Redeemer for oneself, nor give one’s heart to Him.  The heart is a source of your evil thoughts and intentions. The heart is where the devil tempts, for it easily tricked and corruptible. What the Lord wants from you simply faith in Him, fear, love and trust in God that Jesus takes that blackened offering of your sinful heart upon the cross and crucify it, offering His life up as a sacrifice to the Father.

A few verses later in Deuteronomy after our Old Testament reading, we hear the truth of the matter, “And the Lord has declared today that you are people for His treasured possession, as He has promised you, and that you are to keep all His commandments, and that He will set you in praise and in fame and in honor high above all nations that He has made, and that you shall be a people holy to the Lord your God, as He promised” (Deuteronomy 26:18-19).

People of God, you are God’s treasured possession, brought from the slavery of your sin to the freedom of the Promised Land, an eternal heavenly inheritance. He didn’t give up 10 percent of what He had to save you, but He gave it all, the blood of the Son of God. Life itself and all our blessings and abilities come from the Lord.  Ever since He created us in His image and likeness, He has called us to invest ourselves in ways that enable us to flourish as His sons and daughters.  God invites us to an abundant life that bears fruit for the Kingdom, blesses others, and radiates the light of Christ. The Lord desires a cheerful giver, yes. But the cheerfulness comes only through faith in Christ who has given everything to buy you away from the slavery of your sin.

If we are to be faithful stewards, we have to begin with our lives as they are now, and it can only be as we are anchored to Christ and His Word.  To wait until all is perfect and we have time, energy, and resources to spare is to fall prey to an illusion, for life in this world will never be without its challenges.  No matter how sad, sick, frustrated, or deprived we may be, the Lord still calls us to invest our lives in holiness for the blessing and salvation of the world.  We probably will not do that on as large or obvious a scale as others have throughout history, but that is irrelevant.  Like it or not, we have the lives in this world that we have.  We cannot say a magic word and become someone else or change anything about the past.  Jesus has overcome these things.  We can, however, be faithful stewards of the present as we fulfill our identity as those blessed by God though faith in Christ as a holy precious treasure, called to become a blessing to others as a sign of His love, mercy, and holiness. 

Have you ever noticed when some people start to feel good about feeling bad?  You know what I mean.  Those that seem to revel in misery, who thrive off a sadness.  We Lutherans can sometimes get this way, especially during this time of the year.  We adorn ourselves with ashes, a cross on the forehead that is messy, but not messy enough to really be a bother, that perfectly imperfect shaped cross.  We hear the word of God’s Law. And we lay it on thick. And then we repent, hard. This is not just the normal Sunday morning confession and absolution, nor any run of the mill apology. This is where we try to feel really sorry because we know we really need forgiveness.

Lest we think too much of our suffering and Lenten pride, we are brought back to reality pretty quickly.  We hear of Jesus’ words in Matthew 6, “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them…”  Jesus assumes that these will be done, but He warns against wrong intention.  He assumes that His righteous people will be acting righteously for the glory of God, not for the glory of oneself.  Notice that Jesus says, “When you give to the needy… when you pray… when you fast.”  Not if… but when.

So tonight, we return to our Lord with all our heart. We make a new beginning this Lent in our Christian faith.  This new beginning isn’t just trying harder. Of trying to be more pious to look less pious.  But this new beginning is one of a simple faith, of repentance and the fear, love and trust in God above all things.

And so we pray along with King David, “Create in me a clean heart, O God.” There’s no doubt about it. Our Christian piety is not the problem.  Our outward actions and words reflect what is in the heart. Whether the heart is one cleansed by the blood of Christ, transplanted by God, or dead in trespasses and sins.  The problem is when we have a bad heart full of self-righteous that circulates sinful thoughts and desires throughout our body.  The Lord wants inner sincerity, not just outward show.  He wants a changed heart, a holy heart, a righteous heart, of which there is only one – the heart of God in Christ Jesus.

Consider our Lord upon the cross. Nailed through His hands and feet.  A spear pierced through His side, from which flowed blood and water by which are sins, our hearts, were cleansed. Jesus shed His blood upon the cross that our heart might be clean, might be pure and holy.  He give us a holy heart to make us the holy people of God.

This is why we consider various saints this Lenten season.  Not to look at their outward righteousness before other people as those who have a righteousness of their own. But because of the righteousness they have that comes from God, a righteousness that belongs to Christ and is received by them through faith in Christ. And then a righteousness that is done by them, as imperfect and sinful as it might be, righteous works cleansed by Christ. 

First, we thank God for their faithful service to His Church.  Second, through such remembrance our faith is strengthened as we see God’s mercy working through others.  Third, they are examples by which we may imitate both their faith and holy living according to our vocations in life.  We honor them not for their own sake, but as examples of those in whom the saving work of Jesus Christ has been made manifest to the glory of His Holy Name and to the praise of His grace and mercy.

We pray that the unity of faith between the church triumphant and the church militant may be begun in this life. We pray behind those closed doors, but we also pray in public, not as hypocrites trying to look good, but so that others might see Jesus reflected in our words and deeds.  We desire that we may progress toward and seek after that blessed communion of saints, that we should conform ourselves to it and not to the world.  We are not of this world but belong to a heavenly city. While we live in the flesh here on earth, we should begin to lift up our heads and our souls, desiring and thinking of our life in eternity with the company of heaven.

As we sit in our pews this Ash Wednesday, feeling good about feeling bad, tempted to think that by our confession and repentance we are making things right between us and God, that if we just try hard enough to be good we too will be numbered among the saints, we are deeply and dangerously wrong. The cross of ashes upon our foreheads points us, finally, to the truth of this day, this season, indeed our whole lives: “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” But also that the Son of God became man, dust like you, joined in your temptations and sorrow, suffered death and the wrath of the Father on your behalf, laid to rest in a dusty tomb, and is risen again!  Because of Jesus, when you are but dust in the grave, God will call you up and out.  Because of Jesus, and Jesus alone, we learn to love Lent for all the right reasons-the righteousness of God is ours through faith in Christ crucified for the forgiveness of our sins.

(Some of this sermon is modified from a blog post by Chad Bird, “Hurts so good, our dirty little secret”)

Deut 34:1-12; Luke 9:28-36

"Knowing the Lord Face to Face"

Transfiguration Sunday

February 7, 2016

Audio only this week