Sermon:  April 26, 2020

“Believe Quickly”

(Luke 24:25)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Apparently we can’t put off Christianity until some later, more convenient time. Apparently we need to take care of it now. For “now is the day of salvation!” (2 Corinthians 6:2). So don’t be “slow of heart to believe” (Luke 24:25). You need to be “rich toward God” right now, because tonight your soul might be required of you (Luke 12:20–21). That’s why Christ wants you to believe in him, follow him and love him right now. You could die today! – for you’re but “a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes” (James 4:14). So Jesus can’t wait – and neither should we. Believe in him right now (John 14:1).

     But there is a problem. There are so many competing claims on us circulating endlessly around us all (Galatians 1:9, 2 Peter 2:1, 1 John 4:1). So for us to decide which way we’ll go, we’d need to sift through tons of evidence and contradictory truth claims. And that can’t be rushed. So we’re caught in a dilemma. Jesus says now, and we say hold on to your horses. Has King Agrippa, then, gripped us when he disagreed with Saint Paul’s similar insistence long ago saying, “In a short time you think to make me a Christian”? (Acts 26:28).

     Well, not if Martin Luther has his way. For him faith wasn’t the end of an argument but a leap into uncertainty. Now it’s just that leap that can break the stalemate of our endless investigations! Luther therefore didn’t believe you had to be sure before you believed – adjudicating successfully all of the conflicting religious doctrines throughout the entire world. No, that’s because faith is a leap, Luther argued, “from the safe shore of life into the abyss without seeing or feeling a sure footing under us.” Wow! In that leap all we have to hold onto is “God’s supporting and saving hand” (Luther’s Works 19:66).

     So don’t be afraid and try to stay neutral, until you know more. Know the truth that Christ and his teachings are all that you need – indeed they are the “one thing needful” (Luke 10:42) – unum est necessarium, in the old Latin Bible. That is because it was Christ alone who offered up his life as a sacrifice for sin to God the Father (Luke 24:46, Hebrews 9:14, Ephesians 5:2). And so Luther called this sacrifice “the masterpiece” of Christ’s death. For even though, as sinful creatures, we “deserve everlasting death and God’s wrath,” Luther also knew that “these three words – for your sins,” make all the difference (LW 56:136–37). Unum est necessarium! That’s the masterpiece!

     So may God give us hearts to grasp these three words. Let us not worry about understanding everything before we grasp for them. Let us with Luther leap ahead and cling to them. Don’t be distracted by the things on earth (Colossians 3:2). Don’t be misled into thinking that “making a heavenly home” is not enough, but that we also need to strive to make our “home here heavenly” (“Joseph Lowery, Civil Rights Leader, Confidant of King,” The Seattle Times, March 29, 2020). Only believe now that Christ died for your sins and that a place has been prepared for you in heaven.

     But don’t hide away these words of salvation. Tell everyone who cares to listen to you (1 Peter 3:15) about them (Acts 5:32). Do this knowing that “the greatest… work of faith” is witnessing to others about Jesus – for without that outreach your faith becomes “worthless” (LW 79:243). Do this in order to fulfill the Great Commission to go and makes disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19). But do that along with Matthew 23:15 – the warning that hypocrites “traverse sea and land” to make a single believer and when they do “you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.” How bracing! No wonder this linkage is denigrated throughout the church today.

     But Martin Luther didn’t do that! No, he adopted it as a challenge to be sure to promulgate the “fear of God and… true faith in the Messiah,” and not to leave out following the Ten Commandments, as well as making sure we stay away from all “temporal honor” in our missionary work (LW 68:181–82). Without these essential elements our witnessing is phony and all subsequent conversions suspect. But American church history shows that it is just these elements that are repeatedly left out in the name of winning as many souls as possible for the Lord. We see it in the spread of revivalism, where “instead of the people being lifted up to the level of the Communion, it was brought down to the level of the people” (Leigh E. Schmidt, Holy Fairs: Scotland and the Making of American Revivalism, 2001, p. 31). American missionary movements also absorbed “successful petty capitalism and… the unique individualism of American voluntary religion” (George M. Thomas, Revivalism and Cultural Change: Christianity, Nation Building, and the Market in the Nineteenth-Century United States, 1989, p. 61). Furthermore these movements joined hands with the “entertainment of classical Hollywood,” turning witnessing into entertainment (Thekla E. Joiner, Sin in the City: Chicago and Revivalism 1880–1920, 2007, p. 224).

Hymn of the Day:  “Hallelujah! Jesus Lives!” (LBW 147)

Prayers

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn:  “Christ the Lord is Risen Today; Alleluia!” (LBW 128)

Sermon:  April 19, 2020

“Don't Doubt”

(John 20:27)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Every Easter our celebration of the resurrection of Jesus hits a solid stone wall of fear and doubt. This is the last thing we would expect – filled with the hope of praising God continually for days and weeks ahead because of the grace and mercy he “lavished” on us at Easter (Ephesians 1:8). But not so.

     Right at the beginning of Easter, the disciples are hiding for the fear of the Jewish leaders (John 20:19). This happened before – and the power of the resurrection did nothing to stop it from happening again. Because Jesus healed the sick and lame, he was persecuted (John 4:16). And because he raised Lazarus from the dead, he was hounded all the more (John 11:57). The disciples feared that the rulers of their day would now come after them – once Jesus had been taken out.

     And this fear did more than frighten them – it also made them doubt. They felt insecure under the mounting assaults – and so their hands drooped and their knees wobbled (Hebrews 12:12). They were caving in. The boldness and self-confidence that is supposed to mark our Christian convictions (Acts 4:13, 29, 31, 9:27, 29, 13:46, 14:3, 18:26, 19:8), was slipping away. Against this Jesus earlier said – anticipating the coming uncertainty – not to doubt (Matthew 21:21). And right at Easter he says the same – don’t doubt but believe (John 20:27). Against the assaults we are not supposed to back–off and hide in fear, but rather push forward. We are even to do more than that – we are to fight the good fight of faith (1 Timothy 6:12). So if you doubt, don’t accept it as something okay, but fight against it (LW 26:379). Luther did that, and so should we. He pondered this struggle against our doubts and concluded that we wrongfully want “perception and certitude as a condition for faith,” when actually grace “wants faith prior to perception.” Only when the sequence is corrected, can faith be itself and happily step out “into the darkness and follow nothing but the word and the Scriptures” (Luther’s Works 52:196). That Danish follower of Luther, hundreds of years later, rightly called this faith a “rashly risked venture” (Søren Kierkegaard, Journals, ed. Hongs, §2:1438).

     But what brings this correction about – that doubt may be stricken? Can we turn things around and straighten out the sequence from faith to certainty – as it should be? Nothing says we can. Faith is a gift (Romans 3:24) and not something that we manufacture for ourselves. The trust at the heart of faith eludes us. Why we can’t even, in this regard, count up to one “without first cutting off” nine of our fingers (Bill Knott, I Am Flying Into Myself: Selected Poems 1960–2014, 2017, p. 98). But that does not leave us sitting in a corner dazed and forlorn. No, there is another word for us – Repent and turn to God (Acts 3:19). Feel ashamed for the dishonor your disobedience of God has heaped upon him. “Weep bitterly” – if you must (Matthew 26:75).  And know all along with Luther – that you are wrong and God is right (LW 51:318). That self-indictment is at the heart of repentance. And it’s precisely what the resurrected Christ calls for (Luke 24:47).

     That is because of what it produces – what comes from it. It leads to being freed from the very shame that propelled it forward in the first place (1 Peter 2:6). Shame gives way to love and peace. That’s because it now has become clear – because of the refreshment that repentance brings (Acts 3:19) – that when our hearts condemn us, God still loves us because he is greater than that condemning voice in our hearts (1 John 3:20). At that point faith starts emerging within us as the “assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). And that is an “oscillation” for sure (Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, 3 vols, 1951–63, 3:42). It’s never finished this side of the grave. It dialectically shifts endlessly back and forth between conviction, and seeing nothing; being assured, and having nothing. So Luther, unlike our host of American evangelists down through the centuries, knew Christians repent all of the time and are converted over and over again – quottidie converti, in the Latin (LW 31:25, 17:117). This is far from “I once was lost, but now am found” (Lutheran Book of Worship, 1978, hymn 448) – but still goes a long way in explaining why Lutheranism isn’t American (David A. Gustafson, Lutherans in Crisis, 1993). Once we start believing we constantly are returning to Jesus saying – increase my faith (Luke 17:5).

     We keep returning to the source of our faith in order to keep it going. That’s because “Christ has been given to us,” Luther argues, “in order that we should take from Him, rely on Him, and believe that all He has is ours, that all He can do has been done for our benefit” (LW 30:59). Why would we want to stay away from such a one and instead rely on ourselves? – as in Cameron Esposito’s Save Yourself (2020). If we did, our mercurial being would drain the conviction of faith from it. What a disaster that would be since uncertainty is “unbelief,” which cannot make us “alive,” but instead leaves us “stranded” with nothing but a “monster” on our hands (LW 40:240, 58:211, 67:419, 26:387). How ghastly! But Jesus is far better. And that remains true even if only a few care about it. Indeed, we “must not be troubled and frightened by [the fact] that no one wants the [Gospel] [Romans 3:11]…. Therefore we should not measure the Gospel,” Luther concludes, “according to how many hear it, but according to the small group who comprehend it” (LW 77:72–73).

     So let our two or three (Matthew 18:20) gather here today with Christ, who died for us to save us from the wrath of God (Hebrews 2:14, John 3:36). Let us also exalt the crucified one who is now risen that we might also live with him when our days on earth are done (2 Corinthians 4:14). Let us rejoice in Christ who says to us today – “Because I live, you will live also” (John 14:19).

Hymn of the Day: “Thine Is the Glory” (LBW 145)

Prayers

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn:     “Savior, Again to Your Dear Name” (LBW 262)

Sermon:  April 12, 2020

“Have Fear and Joy”

(Matthew 28:8)  

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

There is a surprise on Easter that goes beyond the jolt from the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Beyond that dumbfounding and shocking surprise is the fear that was mingled in with the joy in finding the empty tomb and hearing that Jesus was raised from the dead. Fear! Unbelievable, isn’t it? The women who discovered the empty tomb had joy for sure – but mixed in with it was also fear. Why the fear? Awash in the good news that death no longer has dominion over us (Romans 6:9) – why was there any fear at all? What was to be feared amidst the joy of Easter?

     Well, we’re not told. Nothing is said about it. It just sits there on the page staring at us. The women were also afraid, it says. That's it. Can we then piece together why that was? Does fear ever follow upon good news elsewhere in the Bible? Might we find help there to understand what’s going on at the first Easter?

     Yes, at the Transfiguration we see the same thing happening. God appears to the disciples after Jesus is gloriously transfigured and tells them to listen to him. But the disciples fall to the ground in fear (Matthew 17:5–7). The fear looks like it’s connected to that command and that they wouldn’t listen to, and follow, the Lord as commanded by God. Peter had failed a little earlier and Jesus told him that his failure put him in league with the devil (Matthew 16:22–23). That’s startling to say the least. Not much leeway there. So that sort of failure is troubling because God is severe to those who disobey him (Romans 11:22).  The linkage between glory and our response to it holds out the possibility of fear – if our response isn’t one of robust obedience (Matthew 22:37).

     Martin Luther would agree. Each time we’re confronted with the glory of God we “are, have been, or can be” like the godless. Consequently we will be “struck down” and “cast as a whip into the fire” (Luther’s Works 9:103). That’s definitely foreboding. Would that no negative outcome were ever possible and that we would remain under grace and divine protection regardless of the quality of our response. But not so. God’s glory is always inseparably tied into to our response to it. God’s glory never carries us away into glory no matter what we do. So because what we do matters (John 3:36, Romans 8:17), we worry and are afraid.

     So too those women long ago at the first Easter. Would they live up to Easter? Would they honor the risen Christ as they should? Or would they abandon him after Easter as the disciples had done when he was on his way to the cross a few days before Easter (Matthew 26:56)? Would they take the grace of God in vain? (2 Corinthians 6:1). It doesn’t look good. So they are rightly afraid. Their makeup – as with all of us – is but “earthen,” or of poor quality – fictilibus, as the old Latin Bible translates it (2 Corinthians 4:7). That leads inexorably into perversion and corruption (Philippians 2:15). We end up not being able to do the good we should do, but only the evil we know we aren’t supposed to do (Romans 7:19). What a shameful state of affairs! What a burden of shame. So much for our bright and bushy Easter parade!

     But even though there is this fear of failure mixed into Easter, joy nevertheless is still around. The women were also joyous – just not only joyous. How can that be? Doesn’t the fear wipe out all of the joy? What place is left for joy when there is this debilitating fear afoot? Well, joy finds its home in faith – whoever believes and is baptized will be saved (Mark 16:16). But can I believe that when I’m afraid? Acts 14:22 thinks you can – and only then! For fear doesn’t repel faith – it’s actually the fertile ground in which it grows up. Desperation breeds faith in Christ – the philosopher, Ludwig Wittgenstein, said (1889–1951) (Culture and Value, Revised edition, 1998, p. 52). And Luther thought turmoil drives us to Christ – agitatur ad Christum (LW 16:232).  So we don’t have to wait for good days to believe in Jesus. They might even drive us away from him (Matthew 13:22; LW 45:347; and Paul Weiss, The God We Seek, 1964, p. 218).

     And faith is rooted in the Word. Luther thought we should “fix deep in our heart” Romans 4:25 – that “Christ was put to death for our trespasses and raised for our justification.” What Luther liked so much in this verse were the possessive bits – “our, our.” So he argued that “it is not enough for us to know that Christ rose.” No, you must also “go further and learn to take the benefit and fruit of the resurrection to heart and to cling to it so that it is yours.” That’s because, as Luther further says, it “applies to you so that you may rise in Christ and Christ in you. Otherwise it is all waste.” Waste?! Wow, we better then not forget that the “resurrection took place for our benefit” (LW 56:135–36)! So if we only long for this life, without any promise of the life to come after we die, we are most to be pitied (1 Corinthians 15:19; Charles Hartshorne, A Natural Theology for Our Time, 1967, p. 55). Hearing this moves us. It changes everything (Romans 10:17). Shocking, isn’t it? – that so little can do so much!

     So get out the good news of Easter – that because Jesus lives we shall also live (John 14:19). Be witnesses – bringing up Easter to all who want to know about the hope that is in you (Acts 5:32, 1 Peter 3:15). And don’t be sheepish about it. Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55) – that Danish Luther (R. F. Marshall, Kierkegaard in the Pulpit, 2016, p. 286) – thought faith was “the rashly risked venture” (Journals, ed. Hongs, §2:1438). So go for it! Luther said to “boldly press forward like drunken men” (LW 20:295)! Given Acts 2:15, there might well be something to that. Nevertheless, don’t let fear get the better of you. Remember the first Easter – and live in fear to be sure, but not to the exclusion of joy. Amen.

Hymn of the Day: “Christ Jesus Lay in Death’s Strong Bands” (LBW 134)

Prayers

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn:     “Now All the Vault of Heaven Resound” (LBW 143)

Sermon:  April 5, 2020

“Honor God's Curse”

(Matthew 27:46)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

It is fitting on Passion Sunday – the beginning of the Great and Holy Week – to remember that Christians are all tangled up with the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. That’s why Martin Luther thought a Christian could also be called crucianus – or a “Crosstian,” that is, a person of the Cross (Luther’s Works 5:274). This tight connection with the crucifixion comes from 2 Corinthians 5:14–15 which says that because One has died for all, all must die. Now how can that be; and why does it matter?

It all hinges on sin. If we were not all fallen; if we like sheep had not gone astray from God’s will and ways (Romans 3:23, Isaiah 53:6), then there would be no problem. But, alas, we instead are all seriously flawed. How so? Is saying this nothing more than empty religious jargon? Martin Luther worried about that and so he elaborated on our sins. We “live in all security,” he preaches, we “do not hear God’s Word; we do not let [ourselves] be admonished; [we] remain ungodly, proud, greedy, hateful, malicious;… [we] lie in drunkenness and lust, commit shameful vice, and do everything as if [we] intended to live here on earth forever” (LW 58:145). We live “a free, shameless, wild, filthy, and disorderly life in gluttony,… words, gestures and deeds, [working solely to] fill our weak, stinking belly and remain here in this dismal, doleful world forever” (LW 57:21–22).

Wow! that’s a mouthful. But on a good day we might well agree with the most of it, except for being malicious and wild and the implied violence. For that Bob Dylan’s new song – the dirge, Murder Most Foul – helps us see our problem here – how we all are in some sense murderers. The song sets America, and the 1963 killing of President Kennedy, in the context of Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet (1601) – I.v.27. Kennedy is King Hamlet, murdered by his brother Claudius, a stand-in for our government and other power-brokers. We are Prince Hamlet – knowing what happened but unable to set it straight as we should. Kennedy’s assassination is also linked to the 1921 massacre of 300 or more Blacks in Tulsa, Oklahoma – which is only now, 100 years later, being exposed for what it was. So while we may not have pulled the trigger, we share in collective guilt for these murders – and that’s the message of Murder Most Foul.

As for being greedy, that’s easier to see. But if you need help there also, read the remarkable, little book, Living High & Letting Die (1996) by Peter Unger – and my review of it in The Messenger, November 2016.

Today we also get a glimpse of our degradation in the lessons for Passion Sunday. There we hear that the first disciples promised to help Jesus even if it meant dying with him – but then left him high and dry when Jesus needed them the most – right at the foot of the cross (Matthew 26:35, 56). What does that add to the words of Luther, Dylan and Unger? Wretchedness, for one (Romans 7:24). Another would be – defilement (Mark 7:20). And then we also have pitiable, poor, blind, and naked (Revelation 3:17). And so we have to move aside. We have to die to the world and the world to us (Galatians 6:14).

But we will never do that on our own. Luther was right – none of us can pull it off because of our survival instinct (LW 33:58, 106). We want to hold on, at all costs, to the life that we have and like. “Take your ease, eat, drink and be merry” (Luke 12:19). That’s who we are – for ever and ever – unless someone intervenes and disrupts us. Unless we have our own encounter on the road to Damascus (Acts 26:13–18).

And in fact that has happened. We are not left to ourselves. Christ’s crucifixion disrupts us – as it did to the centurion at the cross (Matthew 27:54). There Christ draws us to himself that we may die to ourselves and live for him – that is, “live to righteousness” (John 12:32, 1 Peter 2:24). And so when we are weak, then we are strong (2 Corinthians 12:9). We also learn that from the 1918 flu. The vulnerable infants and old survived, while the young and strapping died because their powerful immune systems over-reacted and filled their lungs with fluid and dead cells. That made it “impossible for the exchange of oxygen…. That very strength [became] a weakness…. The immune response killed [them by the millions]” (John M. Barry, The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History, 2004, 2018, pp. 247, 249, 250 – also called a “cytokine storm” – Apoorva Mandavilli, “After Fighting Coronavirus, Their Bodies Betrayed Them,” The Seattle Times, April 2, 2020.)

The power that we need to live and believe doesn’t therefore come from us (2 Corinthians 3:5). Christ doesn’t come for the healthy, but for the sick (Mark 2:17). So Luther could argue that nothing is better for “understanding the words of God [than] the weakness of the human mind” (LW 33:99). Indeed, “Christ has been given to us in order that we should take from Him, rely on Him, and believe that all He has is ours, that all He can do has been done for our benefit” (LW 30:59). Amazing, isn’t it?! Self-reliance dissolves before God – and right in front of us. In fact, “everything that you have not done He will forgive you, and all that you cannot do He will give to you” (LW 57:76). Magnificent! And why? Because Jesus bore our sins on the cross so that we will not have to be punished for them. That sets us free.

It sets us free because on the cross Jesus was cursed for us (Galatians 3:13) – crying out that God had forsaken him (Matthew 27:46). But his anguish was for our glory, and His pain was for our salvation. Whoever believes this, Luther proclaims – “that his own sins… are laid on our dear Lord and that it was on account of this that He was… nailed to the cross, and there poured out His precious blood for us so that He, as the sole bearer of sins… might cleanse us from our sins and justify and save us – whoever believes that – possesses it” (LW 58:45–46). What a joy! Just think of what Jesus has done on the cross. He “became the… payment for the world’s sins through His own blood and so takes way [God’s] wrath” – something “no one” else can do (LW 77:321).

Hymn of the Day: “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” (LBW 482)

Prayers

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn:      “Ride On, Ride On in Majesty!” (LBW 121)

Sermon:  March 29, 2020

“Suffer With Jesus”

(Romans 8:17)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

     When the faithful cry out the words of Psalm 4:6 – O that we might see better times – do they know what they’re saying? Martin Luther would say No! They don’t know what they’re talking about because first they cannot define, identify and justify what better times or good days would be; and furthermore, they want better days only to ensure that no one rebukes or hinders them from enjoying the life they want (Luther’s Works 51:27, 13:43). So be warned. Those words from Psalm 4:6 are actually spoken by a fool and not by the Holy One of Israel. They should be condemned and not emulated – just as the foolish words in Psalm 73:11 and in Luke 12:19. Psalm 4:6 are foolish words because they long for a life that wouldn’t be any good.

     But how can it be that a life of our own choosing wouldn’t be any good? Doesn’t that sound crazy? Wouldn’t it be better, in our day, to have the coronavirus eradicated? Well, take a look at our own land and what do you see? Health and meaningful existence for all? Not quite. Since the 1920s something else has happened. Those roaring, experimental days after WWI, marked the end of our country’s “old rules” – and this change has lasted into the 2020s, giving us “a strange new world both gaudy and sad” (Christopher Knowlton, Bubble in the Sun: The Florida Boom of the 1920s and How It Brought on the Great Depression, 2020, p. 82). Luther knew how the easy life hurt Christians: “When there is peace and quiet, we do not pray. Nor do we meditate on the Word, but we treat the Scripture and all things that belong to God coldly or finally slip into fatal smugness” (LW 8:7).

     So no wonder that Romans 8:17 calls for a life of suffering – instead of one marked by social, cultural and doctrinal freedom and ease. That old Cole Porter musical, “Anything Goes” (1934), has no value for Christianity. No, Romans 8:17 says that we are joint heirs with Christ if, in fact – “we suffer with him.” Martin Luther thought this suffering wasn’t sporadic, haphazard, or optional – but “the chief point of the Christian life” (LW 56:321)! He also taught that it wasn’t self-chosen, but instead came upon the followers of Christ for espousing his way and Word – and as a consequence of offending people by them, endangered their “property, honor, body, and life” (LW 51:198).

     Because this suffering confirms our life with God in Christ, and also makes for endurance, character and hope – we are called to “rejoice” in it (Romans 5:3–5). Do not be afraid, Luther chimes in, but “stretch out your arms confidently and let the nails go deep. Be glad and thankful,” he continues, for “it must and will be with those who desire God’s Word” (LW 48:387)! But isn’t that perverted – even a sign of mental illness? No, because as Luther points out, the “Word of life” given us by God through this suffering “must exercise all its power in death” (LW 30:126). So the dying and suffering aren’t the goal in and of themselves – but instead that precious Word of life that flourishes in our very suffering. And this is axiomatic or certain. For “no sheep is sought except the one who is lost.” So too for strengthening, Luther goes on – it only comes to the weak, and “nothing is built except that which has been torn down.” Therefore Luther concludes that “he who is sated with his own truth and wisdom is incapable of receiving the truth and wisdom of God, which can be received only in an empty and destitute heart” (LW 25:204).

     Is that crazy talk? Is this what Herman Melville (1819–91) feared (Complete Poems, ed. Hershel Parker, 2019, p. 854)?

Hurly-burly late and early,

Gossips prating, quacks orating,

Daft debating:

Furious wild reiteration

And incensed expostulations!

     Well, I think not. First, that’s because it’s been shown that the weakness of a manic-depressive disorder can become an asset for leaders in chaotic times of social disruption (Nassir Ghaemi, A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness, 2011, p. 19 on 2 Corinthians 12:9). But second, it’s because we get in our own way. If we didn’t, we could fashion our own lives and everything would be fine. But as it is, we are desperate and cannot save ourselves (Romans 7:24). We call the good evil, and evil we call good (Isaiah 5:20). We are all mixed up. Only Christ is our light (John 8:12). He alone can rescue us from ourselves. He alone can see the way out. He alone can save us from the wrath of God (John 3:36). That wrath bears down on us for our failures and refusal to obey him (2 Thessalonians 1:8–9). But God, who is rich in mercy, sent his Son, Christ Jesus, to become poor for us on the cross, that by his poverty and suffering and dying, as a result of our sins (1 Peter 2:24), we who believe in him, might become rich, and have everlasting life (2 Corinthians 8:9). Because Christ’s sacrifice is so important, he hangs there on the cross “before God’s eyes, and is still there” (LW 76:405) – and by so doing, overcomes God’s wrath for us for all eternity (Romans 5:9).

     So believe in this and rejoice in your salvation. “You must experience unshakably that [this] is God’s Word, even though the whole world should dispute it. As long as you do not have this feeling, just so long you have certainly not yet tasted of God’s Word” (LW 36:248). Learn from this and “yield [yourselves] to God’s guidance so that he can work” in you and not you yourselves (LW 44:271). Thank God for this promise, and rejoice in your Savior Jesus.

Hymn of the Day: “Let Us Ever Walk with Jesus” (LBW 487)

Prayers

Sermon:  March 22, 2020

“Live in the Spirit”

(Romans 8:5)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Listen to this: “On frequent journeys,… danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from [strangers], danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brethren.” Whoever would say such a thing? Saint Paul in 2 Corinthians 11:26! And he adds this too – “we were afflicted at every turn – fighting without and fear within” (2 Corinthians 7:5).

     Now does anyone today buy into this? Does anyone think it describes our lives for all times? Well, there is a popular song that seems to say so – composed even in a fitting blues idiom: “Trouble in the city, trouble in the farm. You got your rabbit’s foot, you got your good-luck charm. But they can’t help you none when there’s trouble…. Trouble in the water, trouble in the air…. Since the beginning of the universe man’s been cursed by trouble…. Look into infinity, all you see is trouble” [Bob Dylan, “Trouble,” Shot of Love (1981), The Lyrics. Since 1962 (2014) p. 634.].

     And what would Jesus say about all of this? “In this life you’ll have tribulations,” he says (John 16:33)! Shocking, indeed. 

     Where does this leave us? Have Saint Paul, Bob Dylan, and Jesus painted us into a corner? No, not if we keep listening to Saint Paul. He has plenty more to say on the topic. Don’t dwell on the miseries of this life, he thunders. Instead of fixating on the danger and troubles, “live according to the spirit” and set your minds “on the things of the spirit” (Romans 8:5). Do not set your minds “on the things that are on earth” (Colossians 3:2). “Walk by the spirit, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16). Sounds pretty good – but who could ever pull it off? Martin Luther says Christians can do this – if they become “skilled artisans,” making “joy out of sadness, comfort out of terror, righteousness out of sin, and life out of death.” And this they can do when they restrain the flesh “for this purpose,” bringing it into “submission [and subjecting] it to the spirit” (Luther’s Works 27:74).

     But still we groan under the burden of this noble artistic endeavor. How can we develop this needed skill? Look to Christ, “the pioneer and perfecter” of your faith (Hebrews 12:3)! Only he can do for you what you need to get done for yourself! Do you believe that? Luther does! Christ does the works, he preaches, “that deserve to be extolled as works of God: blotting out sin, driving off death, extinguishing hell. These are different works from those trifling things [that we do]” (LW 57:176).

     So live for Christ, and not for yourself (2 Corinthians 5:15). That’s the life in the spirit. Luther can help you. He reminds you that your nature is “corrupted” so that you cannot rely on yourself to survive (LW 7:280–81). “You still stink,” he drones on (LW 7:229)! So sing out with Luther that Jesus “is my eternal life.” Do that after hearing Jesus say himself to you: “I am your life” (LW 23:130–31).

     But what about the dangers and troubles? What about the present threats from the coronavirus? They are not worth comparing with the glories awaiting us after we die (Romans 8:18, 2 Corinthians 4:17). We have to bite the bullet on this. Luther does: “I preach and you believe that you are redeemed by Baptism, not from pestilence and leprosy but from death, sin, and the power of the devil, and that Baptism works salvation and eternal life in me” (LW 22:479)! He could preach this even after his nine month old daughter, Elizabeth, died of the plague in 1528 and confessed – “so much has grief for her overcome me” (LW 49:203). Yet by her death she “escaped the power of the flesh, the world,… and the devil” (LW 50:238). Take this consolation for yourself, and then be sure to share it with others as you have opportunity (2 Corinthians 1:4).

Hymn of the Day: “Salvation Unto Us Has Come” (LBW 297)

Prayers

Sermon:  March 15, 2020

“Give Up Seeing”

(John 9:39)

Grace and peace to you in the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

John 9:39 startles us – but not because it says Christ will give sight to the blind. No, not at all! Rather, it is because it adds that Christ will also take away the sight of those who see. Well, now that’s a fine how-do-you-do! We understand why sight is granted to the blind – it shows mercy and grace to those in need of seeing. But poking out our eyes?! That only seems cruel.

     But it isn’t. God knows we look at what we shouldn’t pay any attention to, and so he helps us by diverting our eyes – by blinding us – so that we won’t waste our time any more by looking at what we shouldn’t be dwelling on. “Turn my eyes from looking at vanities” (Psalm 119:37) – fits in with John 9:39. That’s because both verses are about spiritual visual training.

     And what is that training? Learning how to walk by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7). That’s because only when we believe out of obedience, rather than because of what we’ve seen, will we be blessed by God (John 20:29). Here reason is trying to live by sight. But Luther insists faith is the better way to go – for the future life with God, after we die, is “invisible, therefore, it cannot be seen with fleshly eyes or measured with reason” (Luther's Works 57:28).

     That’s because Jesus brings it about by dying (Hebrews 2:14). That’s unheard of! It even seems impossible. If it is somehow based on God’s love for us, then surely we must sing and say it is a “love unknown” (Lutheran Book of Worship, hymn 94). That’s because this Lamb of God who dies for us to save us (John 1:29) – and in whom we are also to believe to make his glories transferable to us (John 14:1) – he only looks like the carpenter’s son (Matthew 13:55). So sight and reason miss Jesus. But faith grasps him and finds joy in him (Philippians 4:4). What faith sees, Luther says, is the Lamb of God, bleeding on the cross, and thereby making “satisfaction” for our sins by his precious blood. This he does “ceaselessly,” so that our sins no longer can “harm us” (LW 56:226–27). Glory be to God! This salvation surely takes our breath away. And it also takes the offense away (Matthew 11:6).

     Upon hearing it, believe in it. Upon believing in it, rejoice in it. And when you rejoice, let your roots sink down deeply (Matthew 13:21) by following up your faith with works. During Lent our work of choice is fasting. This we should do with joy – not looking dismal because we miss our favorite foods (Matthew 6:16) – but seeing how fasting helps us draw near to God (James 4:8). Indeed, we thank God for fasting, for by so doing we “subdue the flesh and its lust,” and thereby are “protected from the dominion of Adam” (LW 44:75–76).  That’s what it is like to be close to God in Christ Jesus.

     Pray to God that he strengthens your Lenten fast – and he will, for he wants you to fast as he commands. Pray also words of thanksgiving for Jesus, the Savior, who draws us to freedom from the punishment for sin, and that surely pleases God (Hebrews 11:6). Finally, pray to God that his Word may dwell in you richly (Colossians 3:16) – especially about losing your sight in things of little worth (John 9:39). Amen.

Hymn of the Day: “My Song is Love Unknown” (LBW 94)

Prayers

The Lord’s Prayer

Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace. In the name of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Closing Hymn “Your Kingdom Come!” (LBW 376)