Sermon: February 14, 2021

“See Christ's Divinity”
(Mark 9:2)

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

    On the mountain Jesus burned brightly as the sun (Mark 9:2, Matthew 17:2). But we don’t know why. About as close as we get is at the end when we’re told not to say anything about it until Jesus is raised from the dead (Mark 9:9). So this transfiguration must have something to do with his death and resurrection. But we’re not told what. We also don’t know anything about how it all happened. Where did this blinding light come from? And why doesn’t its burning consume him – similarly to that bush of Moses (Exodus 3:2)? Furthermore, we don’t know what the point of it all is. Why was Jesus transfigured and in this way? Why on a mountain? Why with such bright light?

In the midst of our darkness and puzzlement and wish to understand the transfiguration of Jesus, 2 Corinthians 3:7–17 shines brightly. These verses offer an explanation. They say the transfiguration’s about competing splendors. It’s about the difference between the first and second dispensations or covenants. It’s about law and gospel. That’s why when Jesus was transfigured he wasn’t alone, but Moses and Elijah appeared with him, until Jesus outlasted them and stood there all by himself (Mark 9:4, 8). In this competition the second covenant “far exceeds” the first one – represented by Moses and Elijah – and even “surpasses” it (2 Corinthians 3:9–10). The gospel wins out over the law because it “gives life,” unlike the law which only kills (2 Corinthians 3:6). And since the gospel is all tied up with the crucifixion (1 Corinthians 2:2) and resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:18), that’s why the transfiguration ends the way it does with its warning against saying anything about it until Jesus dies and is raised again (Mark 9:9).

     To make this point about the gospel surpassing the law, the divine gospel of God has to be tightly connected to Jesus. We have to see clearly and definitely that Jesus is God – that he’s “equal to God” (John 5:18). Up until the transfiguration, that isn’t clear at all. Gabriel had told Mary that Jesus would be “great and… called the Son of the Most High” (Luke 1:32) – but you couldn’t tell by looking at him. He looked like the carpenter’s son (Matthew 13:55). Or, worse yet, even the devil (Matthew 10:25). So something more was needed beyond Gabriel’s words. Jesus needed to shine brightly as the sun. That’s because bright light is a divine marker (Revelation 21:23). And this shining has to happen on a mountain top, in order to push Moses off his mountain, where he received the law (Exodus 19:3). It isn’t that Jesus wasn’t divine and the best before his transfiguration. It isn’t that the transfiguration changed him into God triumphant. What happened instead is that the veil was pulled away and we could finally see Jesus for who he truly was. “He rules over all things,… all power belongs to Him, and… he who believes in Him also has all of this power” (Luther’s Works 30:163). After the transfiguration fades, ambiguity returns. The brightness of Christ’s glory disappears from sight. It cannot be preserved in some container or booth to show others (Mark 9:5). Then Matthew 16:13–17 returns with its lack of consensus on who Jesus is. No more glorious, spectacular shining – just the carpenter’s son again, or maybe now a prophet of some sort. Here’s a case where the genie is actually put back into the bottle. His radiant glory is again hidden away in large measure.

     Even so, Martin Luther learned deeply from the transfiguration, and so should we. “Such a sure and brilliant manifestation,” he writes, is “reserved for the Son of God alone, so that the certain promise of the hope of the life to come would be revealed to the world by Him alone in this unambiguous manifestation” of his divine glory in the transfiguration (LW 67:309). And we need that because all of our adversaries try to cover it up. They try to squeeze it out of life, telling us that all that matters is “kissing in public places, bacon sandwiches, disagreement, cutting-edge fashion, literature, generosity, water, a more equitable distribution of the world’s resources, movies, music, freedom of thought, beauty, love” (Salman Rushdie, Joseph Anton: A Memoir, 2012, p. 624). But believing in the transfiguration, “faith moves undaunted” through these troubles “like a fine, well-built wagon through deep water. Dirt, of course, clings to the wagon, and mud, to the wheels; but the wagon lumbers through and does not allow its progress to be impeded” (Luther’s House Postils, ed. E. Klug, 1996, 3:303). And so the whole purpose of preaching the gospel is “to make your conscience sure and to give your heart a firm footing from which it should not permit itself to be torn, in order that [we] may be certain that we have God’s Word. For the Gospel is a serious business. It must be grasped and retained in all purity, without any addition or false doctrine” (LW 30:164). For only the light of Christ “shines and lights our way out of sin, death, and hell to God and eternal life” (LW 79:36).

     Christ does this by manifesting the glory of God (2 Corinthians 4:6). That happens when he dies on the cross for us (John 12:23). For “Christ became a sacrifice… for us… to reconcile God” (LW 76:384). That reconciliation is our glory because through it we received blessings from God. No longer does his wrath deprive us of his blessings. His sacrifice saves us from that wrath (Romans 5:9). And none of this would work for us if Jesus were only a man and not the bright, shining light of God (LW 24:108, 41:103). No wonder then that Christ also “tears us away from all other light” (LW 23:327). That’s because those lights can’t save us, and so to believe in them would hurt us (John 3:36). Those other lights leave us as we are – “potent with eyes that scold, tongues that scald” (Truman Capote, A Christmas Memory, One Christmas, & The Thanksgiving Visitor, 1996, p. 16). Many of those other lights trust in revolution where “you don’t do any singing; you’re too busy swinging [because] revolution is bloody [and] hostile [and] overturns and destroys everything that gets in its way” (Deborah Wiles, Revolution: A Novel, 2014, p. 3). So indeed “the world… is nothing else than a realm of darkness. [But] in the darkness God has now ignited a light, namely, the Gospel” (LW 30:165). And that we first clearly behold in the transfiguration.

     So take that glory with you by faith, for through it you are “being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another” (2 Corinthians 3:18). Through it Christ is living in you (Galatians 2:20). Through it Christ’s words are “dwelling in you richly” (Colossians 3:17). Through it those words are being “implanted” in you (James 1:21). So may they grow and flourish in you. Hear them and keep them (Luke 11:28). “Do not labor for the food which perishes” (John 6:27). Live like “it is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). Don’t yearn for “what is exalted among men” (Luke 16:15). “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). Treat as family those who do “the will of God” (Mark 3:35). Act like “unworthy servants” just doing your duty (Luke 17:10). Don’t doubt Jesus (Matthew 14:31). “Deny yourself daily” (Luke 9:23). “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33). As these words grow up in you (1 Peter 2:3), see in them, and also thank God for Christ’s divinity. Amen.  

Hymn of the Day:  “Oh, Wondrous Type! Oh, Vision Fair” (LBW 80)

Prayers 

Sermon: February 7, 2021

“Be a Slave”
(Job 7:2)

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

    Job knew he was a slave of God (Job 7:2). But how about you? Are you in his camp? Or do you think you’re some sort of a religious free agent, making a life for yourself, piecing together things as you go? Some even glorify this free pursuit with God’s very presence, supposing that we’re “like God’s near-equals” as we go on this journey together (Samuel E. Balentine, Job, 2006, p. 132, contra Romans 1:25). Sometimes we even boast in this freedom, saying that we never have been, nor will we ever be, “in bondage to any one” (John 8:33). We love this freedom and wrap our identity up in it. Without it we’d be robots – something none of us dream about nor long for.

     But what we know about twins calls all of this into question. Many studies have been done on identical twins, separated at birth and then rejoined as adults, only to find out how much they are alike even though they were raised very differently. The biological determinism revealed in these studies is shocking. Indeed, “if we are only living out our lives like actors reading our lines, then the nobility of life is cheapened. Our accomplishments are not really earned, they are simply arrived at…. Barring some accident of fate, our trajectory is predetermined – we’re just along for the ride” (Lawrence Wright, Twins and What They Tell Us About Who We Are, 1997, p. 144). After nearly a hundred years of published scientific research, “we now know that most measured traits have a genetic component” (Nancy L. Segal, Born Together – Reared Apart: The Landmark Minnesota Twin Study, 2012, p. 321).

     For Christians, however, Romans 6:20–22 is even more devastating. It tells us that “when we were slaves of sin we were free in regard to righteousness…. But when we were set free from sin, we became slaves of God.” So the only variance is who the master is. Years later Martin Luther bought into this (Luther’s Works 33:65) as did Bob Dylan long after him, singing that “it may be the devil or it may be the Lord but you’re gonna have to serve somebody” (Bob Dylan, 100 Songs, 2017, p. 135). There isn’t any liberty option available. We either serve God or sin. We’re either bound to sin or bound to God. But we all begin as “slaves to evil” – Luther goes on to elaborate (LW 26:40). That’s because all of us were “brought forth in iniquity,” and conceived “in sin” (Psalm 51:5). Luther delves into this saying that the “human seed, this mass from which I was formed, is totally corrupt with faults and sins. The material itself is faulty. The clay, so to speak, out of which this vessel began to be formed is damnable…. This is how I am; this is how all men are. Our very conception, the very growth of the fetus in the womb, is sin, even before we are born and begin to be human beings” (LW 12:348). Being born in sin therefore means “to be born under God’s wrath and condemnation, so that by nature or birth we are unable to be God’s people or children” (LW 47:148). So when God works on us he is like “a wood-carver [who makes] statues out of rotten wood” (LW 33:175). This “outstanding” doctrine of original sin teaches us “that we are sinners, that all of our efforts are damnable in the sight of God, and that God alone is righteous” (LW 12:350–51). This is our predicament. Just “as little as a natural sheep can help itself in even the slightest degree but must simply depend on its shepherd for all benefits, just so little – and much less – can a man govern himself” (LW 12:154). God is the one in control; he determines everything; he does all things (LW 8:116, 15:121, 21:328). No wonder he’s the master and we’re the slaves. We’re not substantial enough to further his ways or contest them – being but a “breath;” being but a “mist” (Psalm 39:5, James 4:14). We are “nothing and... Christ is everything,” Luther adds (LW 21:66). Indeed, “all human and fleshly things are condemned by Scripture when it comes to relying on them.” And why is that? It has to do with what we truly are – “a bubble that quickly burst” (LW 16:270). That explains why we are not in the same league with God. For unlike us, God is “altogether sufficient to Himself” (LW 13:91, Isaiah 55:8–9). So we “should regard God as holy and [ourselves] as not holy” (LW 30:103).

     That startling revelation about God’s dominance and our servitude, sours us. As a result “whatever God says or does finds countless judges, correctors, and critics” (LW 4:295). It even takes some Christians into other religions where they hope they can “complete, correct, and enrich the Christian religion,” all for the better (Hans Küng, Theology for the Third Millennium, 1988, p. 254). But because of the binding inequality between God and people, who are we “to answer back to God?” (Romans 9:20). Luther responds by saying “remember your situation: God is such a great majesty in heaven, and you are a worm on earth. You cannot speak about the works of God on the basis of your own judgment. Let God rather do the speaking; do not dispute about the counsels of God and do not try to control things by your own counsels. It is God who can arrange things and perfect them, for He Himself is in heaven. We express all of this in German by saying: ‘Don’t use many words, but keep your mouth shut!’ You will not impose a rule on God” (LW 15:78).

     In our rebellion, how can we then move on with joy from being slaves of sin to slaves of God? Luther rightly says that “there is no help for the sinful nature unless it dies and is destroyed with all its sin. Therefore the life of a Christian, from baptism to the grave, is nothing else than the beginning of a blessed death” (LW 35:31). But how does that blessed death get started in the first place? 2 Corinthians 5:14 explains that because Christ “has died for all; therefore all have died.” So this blessed death of ours begins at the foot of the cross of Christ. Our death follows upon his death. That happens when we “share Christ’s sufferings” (1 Peter 4:13) – and in that sense alone are his co-workers (1 Corinthians 3:9, LW 3:270, 8:94–95, 33:242). And we share his sufferings when his death also crucifies the world to us, so that we can die to the world (Galatians 6:14). Therefore between the world and Christians there is mutual disdain. The Christian “does not do, or have a taste for, the things that please the world; nor does the world do, or have a taste for, the things that please [the Christian]. To the one the other is dead, crucified, despised, and detested” (LW 27:405). And note that “in the Holy Scriptures ‘world’ means not only the obviously wicked and infamous but the best, the wisest, and the holiest of men” (LW 27:136). This makes it all the more painful for Christians to die to the world – because it’s dying to the best in the world.

     But because Jesus suffered so much for us, we find ourselves transcending that pain, much to our surprise. Just think of it, Luther says. “You suffer,” he explains, “on the earth, in the sea, and in all creatures. Everywhere and in all things you have no hope of help until by hope and faith you leap over everything and grasp Him who dwells in heaven. Then you also dwell in heaven, but through faith and hope. Here we must throw out the anchor of our heart in all tribulations. In this way the evils of the world will be not only light but even laughable” (LW 14:322). Such power comes only through Christ’s crucifixion (1 Corinthians 1:23–24). It alone can save us from God’s wrath (Romans 5:9). It alone makes peace with God (Colossians 1:20). So Luther has Jesus say while dying on the cross: “You are no longer a sinner, but I am. I am your substitute. You have not sinned, but I have. The entire world is in sin. However, you are not in sin; but I am. All your sins are to rest on me and not on you” (LW 22:167). Believe in this and it’s all yours. For “God himself cannot give heaven to him who does not believe” (LW 32:76). But if we believe, then God will surely transfer even “the unworthy and condemned from the power of death and hell into the kingdom of eternal grace and life” (LW 78:11). So be sure that you “do not think too lightly of faith, for it is the most excellent and difficult of all works” (LW 36:62). Just think of what faith is supposed to grasp! – that Christ is the one who “stepped into the place of our sinful nature, who loaded onto Himself all the wrath of God which we deserved with all our works, and who overcame it. He did not keep all that for Himself, but gave it to be our own, so that all who believe this in Him and about Him will certainly be redeemed through Him from that wrath of God and be received into His favor” (LW 76:19). Now just try that on for size and you’ll see how difficult faith in Jesus is. That has led other Christians to a different cross, construed “as an inspiring instance... of divine-human altruism that conducts the evolving human species through death to the possibility of an ever closer communion with the divine life” (Jack Mahoney, Christianity in Evolution, 2011, p. 146). Luther, for one, would probably say of that possible inspiration – “What newfangled rubbish!” (LW 44:276).

     Be that as it may, having the gift of faith in Christ, don’t stop there but also sing out – “set my people free” (Exodus 5:1). As slaves of God it follows that we shouldn’t be “slaves of men” (1 Corinthians 7:23). Being slaves of God isn’t supposed to set us up to be enslaved by other sinners. No, fearing God includes more than falling on your knees before him, it also includes fearing “no one and [trusting] no one except God” (LW 51:139). So work to end slavery on earth. But note the Christian qualification. “Whatever outwardly remains of… freedom is neither sin nor virtue but only outward tranquility or trouble, joy or suffering, as is all other bodily good or ill, in both of which we can live freely and without sin” (LW 28:45). So we won’t work against slavery on earth to promote salvation in heaven. That’s because salvation is based on the inward freedom faith gives, and not on the outward freedom social, political and economic liberation gives. In Christ “all things are common to all.... For this reason the Christian or believer is a man without a name, without outward appearance [Galatians 3:28], without a distinguishing mark, without status” (LW 27:280). “Christendom is a spiritual community which is to be numbered with the worldly community just as little as minds with bodies and faith with temporal works” (LW 39:68). “Faith knows nothing about... laymen or priests, cobblers or tailors,... owned and free.... In short, godliness and salvation depend on none of these,.... For faith can remain the same in all these ways of life” (LW 76:27, 22). So be a freedom-fighter, but don’t let it go to your head. Pursue it, by all means, but never by forgetting what matters more. That’s why the church has called us to sing, “make me a captive, Lord, and then I shall be free” (Service Book and Hymnal, 1958, hymn 508), and “firmly bound, forever free” (Lutheran Book of Worship, 1978, hymn 257). So befriend the enslaved and work to set them free – but in the process don’t forget what Job knew, that above all you may become slaves of God. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “Holy Spirit, Truth Divine” (LBW 257)

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:  “From God the Father, Virgin-Born” (LBW 83)

Sermon: January 31, 2021

“Follow God's Commands”
(Deuteronomy 18:20)

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

    God’s law has hands but no feet, Luther says. How weird is that? He says this because the hands of the law direct us to “the right road,” pointing us forward – but because it doesn’t have any feet, it can’t “conduct [our] steps along the way” of that right road (Luther’s Works 22:143). So it can show us what to do, but it can’t help us do it. Therefore “the law says, ‘do this,’ and it never gets done” (LW 31:41). Does that make it useless? Not at all. No, we still need to know where the road is and the law can show us that. We need God’s law to show us what the good is. Left to ourselves, we only mix up the good and the bad, confusing one for the other (Isaiah 5:20). Just look at how we’ve handled wealth and poverty, war and peace, freedom and slavery, sex and marriage, water, earth and air. So it’s no surprise that the law is “a sermon which points me to life, and it is essential to remember this instruction; but it must be borne in mind that the Law does not give me life” (LW 22:143). By implication we also need the law “to furnish knowledge [of sin] and how great a weakness” it is that plagues us (LW 33:127). The law shows us that “we are stunted human beings and utterly corrupted” by sin, so that “we are not the kind of people that the Law requires” (LW 73:181). That’s because “the desire of man is the opposite of the Law, [he] even hates it and flees from it” (LW 14:295). That’s devastating! But it’s exactly what we need to hear. And the law makes sure that we learn it. Its function is “to makes us guilty, to humble us, to kill us, to lead us down to hell, and to take everything away from us.” For this reason God’s law “cannot be measured by any price” (LW 26:345). It’s that valuable, because nothing else can do what it does for us. Luther even could sing about this (LW 53:279, Lutheran Service Book, 2006, Hymn 581):

                                      You have this Law to see therein

                                      That you have not been free from sin

                                      But also that you clearly see

                                      How pure toward God life should be.

     So God clearly wants us to keep his law – and also make it known throughout the whole world (Deuteronomy 18:20). We are not to tamper with it or reduce it in any way (Matthew 5:17–20). Jesus is emphatic about this. People are always trying to cut out parts of the law – so that it’s easier on us. But Jesus says keep it altogether and intact. We need it bearing down on us if we ever are going to become followers of Christ. And so “the teaching of the Law is necessary in the churches and must be retained in its entirety, for without it Christ cannot be retained” (LW 73:66). God’s law must attack us if we’re going to see the light of Christ (John 8:12). We are lazy rascals who need the “stone tablets [of the law to] beat that donkey with them so that he has to move” (LW 78:136). Without those attacks we wallow – unmoved – in secular security which “removes faith and the fear of the Lord” (LW 73:65). Those attacks are very difficult for us to put up with. We would rather flee from the law – and be left alone in our sin which we love (LW 22:390). “Nothing is easier than sinning,” and so “we sin and err constantly” (LW 30:273, 37:233). That’s because it is grounded in our presumption of righteousness which is a “huge and horrible monster” dwelling within us. “To break and crush it, God needs a large and powerful hammer, that is, the Law, which is the hammer of death, the thunder of hell, and the lightning of divine wrath” (LW 26:310). When that law strikes us, it “renders sin alert and strong and prompts it to cut and to pierce. If it depended on us, sin would very likely remain dormant forever. But God is able to awaken it effectively through the Law. When the hour comes for sin to sting and to strike, it grows unendurable in a moment…. Then one begins to lament and wail: ‘Alas! What did I do? What will become of me now?’” (LW 28:209).

     Well are you ready for a surprise? Do you want to hear something you thought you’d never hear? “God is not subject to the law and often acts contrary to the law, in order that we may respect His works, wisdom, counsels, and wonderful judgments and thus walk in humility before Him. [And so] grace makes an exception and is superior to the Law” (LW 8:160–61). And that grace is that while we were still sinners and deserved nothing but condemnation, “Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). That’s grace because it’s undeserved which is what it is by definition. For it says that “everything that you have not done He will forgive you, and all that you cannot do He will give to you” regardless (LW 57:76). For when Christ died for us he “fulfilled in us… the just requirement of the law” by condemning sin and offering up his life to God the Father as a sacrifice “for sin” (Romans 8:3–4). He then saves us from God’s wrath against us when we rejoice in his death for us (Romans 5:9, Galatians 6:14). And so we are not left speechless when our newly awakened sin terrifies us, assaults us, and gives us nightmares. No, when sin wants to slay us and thrust us into “the jaws of hell,” we sit up straight and say that it’s “unfortunately true that I am a sinner and that I have surely deserved death. So far you are right. But still you shall not condemn and slay me. Another, who is named my Lord Christ, shall stay your hand. You accused and you murdered Him innocently. But do you remember how you vainly dashed full tilt against Him and burned yourself and thereby forfeited all your rights to me and to all Christians? For He both bore and overcame sin and death not for Himself but for me. Therefore I concede you no rightful accusation against me. I can, rather, justly assert my rights against you for trying to attack me without cause and despite the fact that you were already condemned and overcome by Him, which deprived you of any right to assail and accuse me. And although you may now attack and devour me according to the flesh, you shall not accomplish or gain anything by this. You must eat your own sting and choke to death on it. For I am no longer the man you are looking for; I am no longer a child of man, but a child of God, for I am baptized in His blood and on His victory, and I am vested with all His possessions” (LW 28:211–12).

     With this great acclamation of faith and salvation in Christ Jesus, how shall we now live? What shall we do from here on out? Well, “if the Gospel is truly in the heart,” then we would not “wait a long time until the Law comes but [being] full of joy in Christ, and [having a] desire and love for what is good,” we would gladly help everyone “out of a free heart” before ever once thinking about the law (LW 78:136). Christians would be “showing love toward their neighbor, by helping him with words and deeds, teaching and example, and by taking an interest in what he needs. Specifically, they should be rebuking him when he sins, showing him where he errs, bearing with him when he is weak, comforting him when he is distressed, and serving and helping him when he is needy” (LW 78:369).  But what if “I can certainly preach, speak, write, sing, and read, but I cannot get into my heart such a strong, living faith and ardent love” for my neighbor (LW 78:368)? What then? What if we are not yet “fine Christians,” but still sinful and “addicted to greed, to wrath, to lust, [and] to reviling?” Then we’ll need to hear “that the destruction of Sodom by fire is to be set before all succeeding generations and indeed before the very church of God, in order that men may learn to fear God [so that] those who are frightened in this way by the judgment and wrath of God practice justice and discernment” (LW 3:223–24).

Hymn of the Day:  “O God, My Faithful God” (LBW 504)

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)

Sermon: January 24, 2021

“Learn from Jonah”
(Jonah 3:3)

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

    “Certainly Jonah is a strange prophet” (Luther’s Works 19:30). O Luther, did you ever get that right! For Jonah’s the only prophet who runs away when God commands him to prophesy. Some prophet. And when he does refuse to prophesy, God doesn’t kill him like he did King Saul when he disobeyed God (1 Samuel 15:9–35, LW 19:6). As a rascal, it’s quite shocking that Jonah is the most successful of the prophets, converting the whole city of Nineveh – including the animals – with a teeny-tiny, and strikingly negative, sermon (Jonah 3:4–8). How weird that is. No wonder preachers shy away from Jonah and his “most sobering truth” about the “enormous quantity of pretentious romanticism in the pastoral vocation” (Eugene Peterson, Under the Unpredictable Plant, 1992, p. 10). Furthermore, as “a servant of the true God and a member of the holiest land and nation,” Jonah is “worse than the idolatrous heathen” on the ship he sails away on when trying to escape God’s command (LW 19:64). So this prophet is hardly on the side of righteousness – even when he complies! From this we learn that “no matter how God deals with us, we are obnoxious.” That’s Luther’s devastating judgment and it should be ours as well. For if God is lenient, Luther goes on to explain, we are “insolent, bold, arrogant, and saucy.” But if he punishes us, “we grow so dejected and despondent that no consolation, no kindness, no mercy is able to revive our courage and to strengthen us” (LW 19:73). So we’re dead in the water – rather than renewed in our faith. In addition, Luther finds it remarkable that “Jonah was able to count the days” he was in the whale when he “neither saw nor heard anything when he was shut up” in its belly (LW 19:16). And most peculiar, indeed, Jonah points us to Christ, in whom we learn, that “death has become the door to life for us; disgrace has become the elevation to glory; condemnation and hell, the door to salvation” (LW 19:31). How miraculous is that?

     And just how does Jonah pull that off? How does he put death, disgrace, condemnation and hell into such a good light? He does so by being a living illustration of Acts 14:22. In that verse we learn that we can only enter the kingdom of God “through many tribulations” – a verse that the early church thought was first spoken by Jesus himself (Jaroslav Pelikan, Acts, 2005, p. 167). What a chilling word! It says that if we don’t have plenty of trouble because of Jesus, then we’re phony even if we think and say that we are not (LW 51:112, 207, 52:119). And of course we are tempted to lie about this, in order to fashion an easier life for ourselves (Luke 12:19). But nothing else will work. Only troubles help. The Christian “must be tested, tried, and refined” (LW 60:335). That’s because, as Luther shows, “the heart is slippery and vacillating when taking hold” of the Gospel (LW 5:146). Without suffering, we would “bumble along with our early, incipient faith. We would become indolent, unfruitful and inexperienced Christians” (LW 24:150). That’s where Luther’s refinement comes in. Therefore we need the glue of suffering to keep us connected to God’s saving ways (Romans 8:17). Indeed, “we cannot grasp the Gospel unless the conscience is previously distressed and miserable” (LW 79:261). How does our distress and misery do that? It makes us ready for God. It prepares us. “The terrible judgment of God” makes us “quail” in order to “soften [us] up” so that we will “sigh and seek for the comfort” that God alone provides (LW 35:18). Without those troubles we would never despair of ourselves and look to God for help. That’s what it takes to point us in God’s direction. “The point of making death and wrath manifest [is that] you might flee to Christ,” that is, ad Christum confugias, in Luther’s original Latin (LW 73:207). Confugias! Of course! Why? Because only God can help us. “For it is His special work to make the dead alive, to render those who are completely confused peaceful and tranquil, and to make those who are wretched happy and those who are in despair joyful” (LW 6:104).

     But what if we keep running away? What then? What if our lives remain “shaped by comparative pricing and commercial comforts” (Peterson, Under the Unpredictable Plant, p. 27)? What if we set aside the content of God’s word, rejecting its power to change us into new and better disciples (2 Timothy 3:5, 2 Corinthians 5:17)? What then? The temptation will be to appease the discontented and celebrate the way things are. Giving in, we “prefer what is easy and nice” (LW 78:339). We settle for the course of least resistance and miss out on the aspiration that “in testing times we become the best of beings” (Amanda Gorman, “The Miracle of Morning,” April 2020). Lutherans have tried to head off that train wreck with their venerable confession that opposes “a nice, soft life without the cross and suffering” (The Book of Concord, ed. T. Tappert, 1959, p. 392). But standing up for the difficult way won’t be easy (Matthew 7:14). Luther thought that “if we Lutherans... were only dead, then the world would immediately cry ‘Victory!’” (LW 79:351). But we have no choice in the matter – the decision is made for us on high (2 Corinthians 13:8). “At every moment the life of your body as well as of your soul is in the hand of God alone” (LW 67:106). He hurls us into the fray – “where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten, where black is the color, where none is the number” (Bob Dylan, 100 Songs, 2017, p. 7). That is the lot of the Christian. And so with Saint Joan of Arc “we must serve God first” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1994, 1999, §223). And if we don’t, we can’t be accommodated. With Luther we must dig in and say “if someone is so stiff-necked... that he will not accept directions, then let him go his own way” (LW 78:292). We must remember, after all, that “only a few are struck by the Law... and obey the Gospel” (LW 73:105). How terrifying!

     But God doesn’t give up. He stays on the cross for us (LW 76:405). There his dear son offers up the fragrant offering of his death to him (Ephesians 5:2). And at that point we’re spared condemnation when we believe (Colossians 2:14, John 3:16). That’s because the “punishment” we had coming because of our disobedience, Jesus suffered “for us” instead (LW 26:284). That’s because “God cannot be... gracious to sin... unless sufficient payment is made for it” (LW 77:96). Indeed, “the only Son of God had to take our place and become a sacrifice for our sin, through which God’s wrath would be appeased and satisfaction would be made” (LW 78:50). Jonah shows us this connection between death and wellbeing, payment and salvation, punishment and satisfaction, when he calms God’s wrath by jumping overboard in the midst of the punishing storm against him (Jonah 1:15). “I must die or the sea will never again grow tranquil” (LW 19:65). And so, too, Christ must die or there will never be peace with God (Romans 5:1, Colossians 1:20).

     Even though this message is “clear and winsome,” it still is unacceptable to many because “it mows down and castigates whatever is not centered on Christ. In unadorned terms it states that there is no possible way to escape sin and death, to be saved, except by clinging to this man, the crucified Jesus of Nazareth” (Luther’s House Postils, ed. E. Klug, 2:173). Because of this, “the would-be-wise [will try] to master and remake Christ” (LHP 1:163). But this is a fool’s errand and won’t work because God’s word won’t cooperate. We instead should pray that God increases our faith (Luke 17:5), because without that merciful gift, faith is impossible (Luke 18:27) and we lose him. For “faith.... consummates the Deity,... it is the creator of the Deity, not in the substance of God but in us” (LW 26:227).

     Having been rescued from our sin by faith in Christ, let us then live lives sharing in the sufferings of Christ (1 Peter 4:13). Let us supplement our faith with that virtue (2 Peter 1:5). Why? Because of what Luther thought Christ, in effect, says to us. “I want to be,” he says, “the mediator between God and you, and represent you before him, so that he does not rebuke, judge, and condemn you on account of your sin. But when you are now reconciled with God and your sins are remitted, then set out on the way and begin to do what God has commanded” (LHP 2:420). How should we then go about sharing in Christ’s sufferings, as we are commanded to do? Well, “if one will make the afflictions of Christ and all Christians his own, defend the truth, oppose unrighteousness, and help bear the needs of the innocent and the sufferings of all Christians, then he will find affliction and adversity enough” (LW 35:56). And yet by this suffering faith we will also draw in other people, which is “the nature of faith” to do (LW 79:243). And all of this will come about from having amply learned from Jonah. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “Come Follow Me,’ the Savior Spake” (LBW 455)

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: “Rise Up, O Saints of God!” (LBW 383)

Sermon: January 17, 2021

“Divest Yourself”
(1 Corinthians 6:19)

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

    The Bible says we are not in charge of our lives. We instead belong to God who bought us (1 Corinthians 6:19–20). This flips our lives upside down – putting the lie to the old conviction that, like the village blacksmith poem of 1840, we look “the whole world in the face [and owe] not any man” (Nicholas A. Basbanes, Cross of Snow: A Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 2020, pp. 301, 308). No, the truth is we’re dependent creatures, not independent ones. But this point is hard to make since we think we struggle to take care of ourselves on our own. And so when Martin Luther tried to undergird this Biblical point he used the image of a beast of burden. That’s who we are. And as such our lives are made up of being ridden – as a beast of burden – by God or the devil. None of this has anything to do with the exercise of our own freedom or the exertion of our own will  (Romans 9:16). We are but clay in the hands of the divine potter (Jeremiah 18:6). As a beast of burden we cannot “choose to run to either of the two riders” – God or the devil (Luther’s Works 33:65). So we shouldn’t say we’re planning to “go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and get gain.” No, we should instead say – “If the Lord wills [deo volente], we shall live and we shall do this or that” (James 4:13–15) – “whether we like it or not” (LW 45:254–55). By deferring to God, we will be divested of the illusion of all self-determination.

     But what kind of a life would that be? It surely isn’t one spent struggling over the best use of our individual freedom – as in George Orwell’s classic novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949). No, it would be quite different from that. It would be to construe life as one of slavery. Yes, you heard that right – even though this spiritual slavery doesn’t mimic slavery on earth between masters and serfs (Catholic Biblical Quarterly, January 2021, p. 151). Romans 6:20–22 spells this out clearly. It says we’re either slaves to God or slaves to sin. No other outcomes are possible. When we’re slaves to sin we are free when it comes to righteousness and can live anyway we wish. But that leads to death. The only life that leads to salvation is slavery to God. Then we no longer live however we wish – “without hindrance or rebuke, without shame or fear, and with honor and glory” (LW 13:43). Instead of that we have to be on the straight and narrow. We have to hear the word and keep it (Luke 11:28). There’s no wiggle room. If there were, it wouldn’t be slavery to God. As slaves, obeying matters more than figuring things out on our own and being creative. As obedient slaves, we won’t “desert the battlefield but stick it out [and] commit the outcome to God” (LW 15:106, 153). This obeying will put an end to looking out for ourselves. And that’s what “pleases God.” For that springs forth from faith in God “as from a fountain” (LW 73:106, 291, 398).

    That generation is what makes it true. It comes from God. Our faith, our obedience, our slavery all come from God. We’re not making it up. These words that communicate it were written down by people but “inspired by God” (2 Timothy 3:16) – making them from God, then, rather than from us (1 Thessalonians 2:13). Some dispute this, arguing that the words, though inspired, are still unreliable (Morgan P. Noyes, Pastor Epistles, 1955, IB:11, pp. 506–507). Alas, it has always been the case that the ungodly “avoid Scripture like they avoid the devil” (LW 79:66). But not Luther. He believed that the Bible “is the vehicle of the Holy Spirit” and so is reliable – even when Moses writes about his own death in Deuteronomy by precognition (LW 30:3321, 9:310). He therefore encouraged us to always work with God’s word, “gladly hear it, be occupied with it, and remember it day and night” (LW 79:205). Lutherans – against the naysayers in the church – have taken a stand with Luther on this conviction, confessing that all Scripture is indeed inspired by God (Book of Concord, ed. T. Tappert, 1959, p. 618). And we do that knowing full well that “by Scripture we are led to believe things that are absurd, impossible, and contrary to our reason” (LW 16:183). It therefore “requires real mastery to avoid judging the Word according to human reason” (Luther’s House Postils, ed. E. Klug, 1996, 2:87).

    With such a challenging and divinely inspired word, how can we take up this life of faith – even of slavery to God? We, after all, would rather be free to do whatever we like. How will we trade that wayward yearning for a life of slavery to God? It’ll take Christ changing our hearts by abiding in us through his word (Galatians 2:20, James 1:21). That’s what’s needed – having Christ “live and reign” in us (LW 42:40). By so doing, he shows us that the greatest freedom of all is to be free of God’s wrath – which comes when Jesus sheds his blood on the cross for us (Romans 5:9). That is the penalty Christ pays to divert God’s wrath from us. That’s how we are bought (1 Corinthians 6:20, 2 Peter 2:1). Only then are we “absolutely free of God’s wrath and judgment.” And then God will say to us – “My dear son!” What a thrill it will be to hear those words. And then we are changed further so that we can say to God – “My dearly beloved Father!” (LHP 3:109).

    With that exchange, we’re reconciled to God – and we have peace with him by the blood of the Lamb (Colossians 1:20). Indeed, “Christ has stepped into the breach as the Mediator between two utterly different parties separated by an infinite and eternal division, and has reconciled them... So He is not the Mediator of one; He is the Mediator of two who were in the utmost disagreement” (LW 26:325). This freedom is deep and abiding which Christ earns for us, and so it doesn’t dissipate over time. That’s because it’s not freedom from “some human slavery or tyrannical authority but from the eternal wrath of God.” That makes it “greater than heaven and earth and all creation.” This “spiritual freedom” makes us free and joyful and “unafraid of the wrath to come” (LW 27:4). For on Judgment Day we’ll pass through judgment as if we weren’t judged at all (Judges 5:24) – since by faith we’re miraculously “straightaway the kingdom of God” (LW 67:170). Straightaway? Yes – it’s that abrupt a leap into the kingdom. No wonder Luther sings out that Christ is “my help, my strength, my life, my joy” (LHP 1:474). Glory be to God!

Hymn of the Day:  “Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart” (LBW 486)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiQ_R-s6h00

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: “As With Gladness Men of Old” (LBW 82)

Sermon: January 10, 2021

“Honor Jesus”
(Mark 1:11)

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

    At the baptism of Jesus we learn that God is pleased with him (Mark 1:11). And so should we. We learn that Jesus is good enough for God. And so he should also be for us. But we’re not told why. We’re told that God delights in Jesus but we’re not given any explanation for this. In John 10:17, however, there’s an explanation. There Jesus says that God loves him – is delighted in him – because he dies so that he might live again. What then is said at Christ’s baptism is explained with his crucifixion and resurrection. Some say we shouldn’t do this. We shouldn’t look to John’s Gospel to explain Mark’s Gospel (James D. G. Dunn, Unity and Diversity in the New Testament, 3rd edition, 2006). They’re too different – Mark from John. But Martin Luther disagreed. ‘There is only one gospel,” he argued, even though it can be “described by many apostles” (Luther’s Works 35:117). So mixing and matching New Testament verses is fine – just as I have done with Mark 1:11 and John 10:17. Such cross-pollination is what brings “refinement,” or an overall reliable perspective on Holy Scriptures as God’s saving revelation to us (LW 41:219). Without that refinement they’re a mess – and in our hands “the Bible means nothing. It is Bible–Booble–Babel” (LW 40:50).

     But the baptized Jesus matters – only, however, because he was crucified and raised from the dead. That’s what makes him worthy of praise – not his being dunked in the Jordon River. “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing” (Revelation 5:12). That’s our song and it’s not about the Lamb who was baptized, mind you. No wonder Saint Paul wants to know nothing among us but Christ crucified (1 Corinthians 2:2). Never just Christ baptized. While Luther definitely stands with Saint Paul on this, he adds that the baptism of Jesus itself drives us to the crucifixion and resurrection. For baptism points to dying. In baptism “the old man and the sinful birth of flesh and blood are to be wholly drowned by the grace of God” (LW 35:29). This drowning points to a dying. So “by His suffering and death as our Priest,” Jesus gains for us “the state of being forever His elect children.” On the cross he frees us “from wrath” and finally shows us “a gracious God” (LW 57:174, 172).

     We need this witness especially now when Jesus is being spread out thin as some sort of christic principle. He’s construed as what’s behind the “sacred everything” – in “stars, galaxies, whales, soil, water [and] trees” (Matthew Fox, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, 1988, p. 8). This is supposedly needed because “Christianity has become clannish.” So Christ has to expand beyond Jesus of Nazareth by becoming “much more immense, even cosmic, in significance” – beyond all distinctions “between the natural and the supernatural, between the holy and the profane” (Richard Rohr, The Universal Christ, 2019, pp. 19, 3, 15).

     But then the focus on the suffering of Jesus is lost (1 Corinthians 2:2). We lose his telling question in Mark 10:38 – “Can you drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” That cup of suffering – that crucifixion – is the real baptism of Jesus. It’s what makes him indispensable for salvation. For if we have God without the crucified Christ, “we find no comfort but only righteous wrath and displeasure” (Luther’s House Postils, ed. E. Klug, 2:148). “For in the Son of God I behold the wrath of God in action” (LW 47:113). We see it in the fact that Jesus was “crucified for us, shed His blood and died, and thus paid for our sins and appeased and warded off God’s wrath.” This matters so much because by so doing Jesus shows us that we no longer have to doubt but can be certain that he is not angry with us sinners but is our “dear Savior” (LW 77:128). His sacrifice on the cross proclaims this loud and clear. That makes it “far, far superior to all other works of creation!” (LW 54:327). The birds and the bees, the rocks and the trees, cannot “carry you across…. into yonder life.” Neither can a christic principle. Only Christ, the sacrificed man, who is our bridge to yonder life – to heaven – can do that for all believers. And so “all that is necessary is that you unhesitatingly set your foot on [Jesus], wager boldly on [him], go cheerfully and happily, and die in [his] name” (LW 24:42). That’s what believers in Jesus do. And be duly warned about this. For God has given Jesus “dominion over all. His power is certain and endures. [And so] woe to him who does not accept this by grace. He will encounter this power coupled with wrath in all eternity” (LW 15:279).

     Luther doesn’t talk this way because he had an easy life. That’s not why he rejoices in Jesus and presses people to believe in him. No, his life was tough. He had many who hated him (Mark U. Edwards, Jr., Luther’s Last Battles, 1983). And he also had severe health problems – but still he trusted in Christ in spite of it all. There’s no doubt that he knew that “Christianity is surely a constant sobbing” (LW 16:20). Therefore “all those who do not trust God at all times and do not see God’s favor and grace and good will toward them in everything they do and everything they suffer, in their living or in their dying, but seek his favor in other things or even in themselves,... practice idolatry” (LW 44:30). So in his letters Luther says that “the Lord has afflicted me with painful constipation. The elimination is so hard,” he explains, “that I am forced to press with all my strength, even to the point of perspiration…. Soon I had some relief and elimination without blood or force, but the wound of the previous rupture isn’t healed yet, and I even had to suffer a good deal because some flesh extruded” (LW 48:217, 268– 69). No rose garden there. So suffering is part of every Christian life with untold variations on the theme.

     That suffering, however, isn’t just social and physical, but spiritual as well. And that’s in part why we have to be baptized along with believing if we’re going to heaven when we die. Belief needs to hold on to baptism to strengthen it. It’s a work of God in you. Those works are “firm, certain, unchangeable and eternal. Therefore, they stand and abide, firm and unfailing, and never become something else, even if they are completely misused” (LW 57:181). That durability makes baptism your ace-in-the-hole. It’s what baptism promises you. Baptism can sustain you even if you neglect it – and have forgotten when and where it happened. So be sure to hold onto it as you battle all of the spiritual temptations that come your way. It promises to stabilize your faith. Chief among those temptations will be “the repose, ease, and prosperity of this life…. For in the easy life no one learns to suffer, to die with gladness, to get rid of sin, and to live in harmony with baptism. Instead there grows only love of this life and horror of eternal life, fear of death and unwillingness to blot out sin” (LW 35:39).

     So dig in with your baptismal certificate clutched in hand, as it were. Fight the good fight of faith (1 Timothy 6:12) – aided by your baptismal promises. And building upon all that it means that God was pleased with the sacrifice of his dear Son – which is his true baptism – may we also honor Jesus. May we too be pleased with him and his death for us. “But you must listen to God; it is He who must teach you [for] to proclaim the message and to impart faith depends on Him.... Without this all will fail. [So] do not give wing to your own ideas, and do not soar to God otherwise than through Jesus Christ. For Christ is the bridge and the way. Resolve not to teach a Christian anything beyond and above Christ” (LW 23:103). That admonition is also our song – but unfortunately not all Lutherans sing it. Very prominent ones down through the ages, like David Strauẞ (1808–1874), argue that the Bible is too faulty to help Christians and so it should be replaced by a humanism based on “reason and experience” alone (Frederick C. Beiser, David Friederich Strauẞ: Father of Unbelief, 2020, p. 215). May we not cave into that temptation. May we return to Luther’s song about listening to God and not soaring to him otherwise than through Jesus Christ. May we take that song to heart in all that we say and do, as each one of us struggles to honor Jesus. Amen.

Hymn of the Day: “To Jordan Came the Christ, Our Lord” (LBW 79)

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: “All Who Believe and Are Baptized” (LBW 194)

Sermon: January 3, 2021

“Open Your Eyes”
(Ephesians 1:18)

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

    Here’s the Christmas message, that “the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light” (Matthew 4:16). And that great light is Jesus. So glory be to God for Jesus who comes into the world to save us from our sin (John 8:12, Matthew 1:21). But there’s also a second Christmas message that’s often overlooked. And it’s that “the darkness has not overcome the light” (John 1:5). So right on the heels of Christmas glory and light there’s Christmas gloom and darkness. “His own people received him not” (John 1:11) is the darkness that comes from rejecting him. Those sitting in darkness apparently preferred to stay there. Just think of it! “Men loved the darkness rather than the light” (John 3:19). And we also would rather “labor for the food which perishes” (John 6:27)! Rather than praising God for Jesus, we’d rather “mutter” about him (John 7:12). We’re all ready to settle for the darkness, in spite of the glory and light that has come to us at Christmas. We want to remain “of this world” and “judge according to the flesh” (John 8:23, 15, 15:19, 17:16, 18:36). We’re still trying to climb into heaven “by another way” (John 10:1). We still see nothing wrong with loving ourselves (John 12:25). We haven’t stopped working on ways to be greater than Jesus – enjoying a life better than what his suffering brings (John 13:16, 16:33, 18:11). We still can’t see how a man could be God (John 14:10). We still only want worldly peace (John 14:27). We like our independence (John 15:6). We like being free to doubt (John 20:27). So, as you can see, there’s plenty of Christmas darkness generated from that first Christmas day. In that darkness – living without God’s glory – there’s no “sovereign in heaven; the wide world [is] a playground for the wild pandemonium of life; there [is] no ear that [brings] the confusion together in harmony, no guiding hand that [intervenes]” (Kierkegaard’s Writings 5:94). “Nothing is right; only denial of instinct is wrong” (Patricia Bosworth, The Men in My Life, 2018, p. 34).

     So what’s up with Christmas? Why doesn’t its brightness dispel all of that darkness? Why isn’t it like the noonday sun that puts an end to the black midnight skies? It’s because “you are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires” (John 8:44). There’s your answer for you! There’s enough darkness in that verse to cover the whole world until the end of time. And that darkness strikes us by blinding us (2 Corinthians 4:4). So we don’t see the light that has come to dispel our darkness. Can you believe that? But note carefully – “The darkness has not overcome the light” (John 1:5). That means there’s still a chance to see the light. There’s still a chance to have eyes that see (John 9:30, 12:40). But get this – you’ll first have to poke out your eyes to get new eyes that see the Christmas light (John 9:39). Then the eyes of your heart will be “enlightened that you may know what is the hope to which God has called you” (Ephesians 1:18). So as surely as darkness follows the Christmas light, darkness also is needed before you can see that light.

     But how’s that possible? Doesn’t light beget light, and darkness, darkness? How does darkness enable the light to shine? What sense does that make? The sense is in Psalm 119:37 – “turn my eyes from looking at vanities.” There’s the darkness – turning our eyes from looking at vanities – that covering of our eyes, that darkening, goes before any of us can see the Christmas light and sing for joy because of it. There’s the deprivation – the darkness – that precedes fulfillment. But in an age saturated with immediate gratification, this prerequisite goes begging. It’s lost on us. That’s because it’s “apparently not known that desire must be dammed up to be self-renewing” (Jacques Barzun, From Dawn to Decadence, 2000, p. 790). None of this, however, was lost on Luther. He knew that before we can see the light we must first be like those who are “wasting away from hunger and thirst in the desert after they have been cast out of their home and country, who sigh and cry to the Lord and are now at the point of despair” (Luther’s Works 4:49). Luther knew that this is the only way to stop us when we’re “intoxicated with [our] own ideas” which keeps us from celebrating the Christmas light (LW 16:242). So as long as we’re blind, “so great is the hardness of the human heart that it is moved by no signs and wonders, is affected by no words, and is shaken by no threats” (LW 9:272). In that state “we have soundly sleeping eyes,” and we despise the Christmas light “as something ordinary and paltry” (LW 3:155). No big deal. Take down the decorations. That’s what it’s like to be “a people contrary to the Word” (LW 17:91). We suffer from a “miserable admixture of the filth of our arrogance” (LW 13:150).

     So are we left hip-deep in that filth? Is this the last word for sinners? Not if the darkness hasn’t overcome the light (John 1:5)! Then, even though we’re sinners, help is still available (Romans 5:8). We’re not automatically disqualified. After all of this judgment against us and our rank sinfulness, there’s still hope. Even thirty years after the passionate and articulate argument in Michael Martin’s classic, The Case Against Christianity (1991) was published, a remnant of followers of Jesus are still around. And that remnant is enough to keep alive the testimony to the Christmas light. The darkness has not overcome it. And being small even – being just a remnant – has the advantage of being “much less likely to be seduced into the pursuit of worldly conquest” (The Emerging Christian Minority, ed. V. Austin & J. Daniels, 2019, p. 52). The same was the case in Biblical times. Even then the good wasn’t displaced by the bad. Good news could follow upon the bad – without any softening up of the bad beforehand (contra Karl Barth, The Faith of the Church, 1943, 1958, p. 70). Luther explains this. “The apostles first judged, rebuked the world, and proclaimed God’s wrath against it, and then preached the forgiveness of sins in the name of Christ [and] so must we also do” (LW 78:179). This rebuking sets up the forgiving. The bad news leads to the good news. That’s because after the rebuking, the big guns fire. There’s something greater than the Christmas light to save us.

      For Jesus, long after he was born in Bethlehem, tells us that when he is lifted up on the cross, then he will draws us to himself (John 12:32). Then the impossible happens and we finally rejoice in the Christmas light. This didn’t happen at Christmas. Don’t forget that darkness. This is the second glorification of Christ that happens only on the cross (John 12:28). For on the cross – unlike at Christmas – our faithful mediator (1 Timothy 2:5) removes “all of God’s wrath and hostility and makes hearts certain of His fatherly grace” (LW 77:363). Then we can believe and rejoice. And he does this by being punished for our sins (1 Peter 2:24). Could it be that this is why “his ribs stuck out” while hanging on the cross, because he was being filled up with the sins of the world (1 John 2:2, Sean Gandert, American Saint: A Novel, 2019, p. 175)? Be that as it may, Christ saves us by offering up his life on the cross as “a fragrant sacrifice” to his Father in heaven (Ephesians 5:2). This sacrifice clearly shows us God’s “glowing love toward all miserable, damned, and sorrowful sinners” (LW 12:207). When we have faith in this sacrifice we won’t be punished in hell for our sins (John 3:16, 15:16). When we “make a total commitment, commend [ourselves] to God’s governance, and not trust [our] own reason at all,” then our “Father’s hand” holds on to us tightly (LW 44:73, John 10:29). Then we can finally sing “of joy illimited” (Thomas Hardy, The Complete Poems, ed. J. Gibson, 2001, p. 150). Then “Christ tears us away from all other lights, teachers, and preachers, so that we may remain with Him alone and cling to Him, lest we perish and die in eternal darkness” (LW 23:327). Here we see our “frightening Christ” – tearing us away from what damns us (LW 77:85). But what if we don’t want this frightening, yet salutary ripping away? What if you refuse to sing with joy and instead still want that Christmas darkness? What then? “The separation is easy for us,” Luther again explains, for “we cannot keep you; [since] you do not want to be kept” (LW 60:15). For indeed “the world takes delight in remaining in darkness.... [It even labors] harder to earn hell than Christians work to gain heaven” (LW 23:327).

     How do we then live with this resounding faith that finally opens up our soundly sleeping eyes? Doubt will surely have no place in it (Matthew 14:31). But “our nature does not want to believe before it has the evidence in hand that the loft is full of grain and the cellar is full of wine – only then does it believe that it has enough to eat and to drink.... But a Christian, provided that he wants to be a real Christian, must say truly that he has and believes in a God who can pay money out of an empty purse and give everyone enough to drink from an empty cup” (LW 56:353). Therefore awakened Christians will be “vigilant [and not say], ‘It seems to me,’ etc. Rather [they’ll say], ‘I know for a certain truth that it is so’” (LW 58:366). Christ is the light! Christ is the mediator! Christ saves us from our sins (1 Corinthians 15:2–3)! Where this steadfast, certain word “enters the heart in true faith, it fashions the heart like unto itself, it makes it firm, certain, and assured. It becomes buoyed up, rigid, and adamant over against all temptation, devil, death, and whatever its name may be, that it defiantly and haughtily despises and mocks everything that inclines toward doubt, despair, anger, and wrath; for it knows that God’s Word cannot lie to it” (LW 15:272). No wonder Luther believed that “the first, highest, and most precious of all good works is faith in Christ” (LW 44:23)! May that “boldness” and prominence of our faith mark us well these days of Christmas (Acts 4:31, 9:27, 19:8). And may Christ, and the certainty of faith that he gives us, awaken us and keep our eyes wide open. Amen.

Hymn of the Day:  “Of the Father’s Love Begotten” (LBW 42)

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: “Angels We Have heard on High” (LBW 71)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHWqj6gKS9g