Month: February 2019

Posted on

Sexagesima (Luke 8:4-15)

Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Lebanon, OR

Sexagesima (60 Days to Easter) + February 24, 2019

Text: Luke 8:4-15

In America, it’s fairly easy to “do” the Christian lifestyle.  It goes long back in Western history, but especially in our land.  Here, even the staunchest hubs of progressivism are dotted with numerous churches.  We’re proud of our beautiful houses of worship, so much so that people look to get married in a church, even if it’s the last time they step foot in it afterward.  If you do want a church to worship at, a Google search (“church Lebanon, OR”) or a look in the phone book will yield 47 different ones!  It would take you just shy of a year if you went to a different one each Sunday!

There’s no shortage of media for the Christian lifestyle.  You can go to Christian bookstores and fill up on Bibles, daily devotionals, topical books.  You can find a coffee klatch and talk Christian things with them.  You can find a book by a popular author and delve into a Christian self-help program.  In the car, you can listen to no less than 7 Christian music/talk stations.

To accessorize your Christian life, you can go to Hobby Lobby or TJ Maxx, and find all kinds of wall crosses, decals, iron work, and other faith-based knickknacks.  You can wear crosses on your neck, on your purse, even in studs on the butt pocket of your jeans.

These are all things you can do.  Of those 47 churches, you could bring your spouse, invite your friends, and if you really feel it offers something, bring your whole family.  But so far, these are all things man does toward God.  But none of them promises to actually make a Christian.

4 And when a great crowd was gathering and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable, 5 “A sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell along the path and was trampled underfoot, and the birds of the air devoured it. 6 And some fell on the rock, and as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture. 7 And some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked it. 8 And some fell into good soil and grew and yielded a hundredfold.” As he said these things, he called out, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

Despite all of the evidence that seems to say being a Christian is merely lifestyle choice, the Word of God teaches that it is actually something that happens to us, because it is God’s work.  It’s very important to understand why the Lord tells the parable like this: The seed is the Word of God—preached, shared between people, taught, delivered in the Sacraments—He is the sower (or His servant).  But what are you?  You are the ground, the dirt.  What does dirt do?  There is no action dirt can do; it’s always acted upon—the dirt is moved, tilled, seeded, watered.  By whom?  The Sower of course.

That tells us that being a Christian has more to do with being the plant which grows from a seed than being the gardener who built the raised bed, laid neat lines, selected the seeds, planted, watered, and weeded.  All those things are necessary, but understanding when and how God does His work has to be something we leave in the Lord’s hands.

But this is terribly frustrating.  We bring our kids to church their whole lives, encourage them toward confirmation, we drag them out of bed in high school when they were up late on Saturday night, we pray for them to meet a nice Lutheran girl.  And yet for all that doing, it’s ultimately not up to us to see if the Word which was planted in them will bear abundant fruit, or—God forbid—they lose their faith.

The other place this is frustrating is apologetics.  How can we convince unbelievers that we follow the one true God, who created heaven and earth and gave up His Son as the only Savior of this sinful race?  Throughout the centuries, Christians who were gifted and so inclined have gone to great extremes to evangelize the pagans.  Today we’re gifted with information that supports the Bible’s claims—archeological evidence, hostile witnesses that confirm the historical facts, and manuscript evidence of the reliability of the Old and New Testament.  So why won’t the unbeliever be convinced?

This week of Sexagesima, we learn that grace is passively received, like the rain coming down and watering the earth.  Last week, we learned how undeserved this grace is, and this week, we hear how God makes His grace effective in a person’s life: It is received like water poured into the earth.

But if we are to be compared to plain old dirt, then we must be curious why that same Word has vastly different effects on the hearers.

11 Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God. 12 The ones along the path are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved. 13 And the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy. But these have no root; they believe for a while, and in time of testing fall away. 14 And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature. 15 As for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience.

Anyone who’s raised plants knows there’s more to it than just seeds, dirt, water, and sunlight.  There are external, often harmful factors that inhibit the seed from becoming a mature plant.  Here, the birds correspond to the devil, whose foremost desire is to blaspheme God and make people despise His Word in their hearts.  But we can’t blame everything on the devil, because there are also those who receive the Word with joy for a time, but when the troubles of life come or when they are unpopular for being associated with Christ, they depart.  Others become enamored with this life, so that earthly life glitters more than a God who they cannot see.

Yet, in spite of all that stands against the Word, there are those in whom it bears fruit.  It accomplishes the purpose for which God sends it—to save and to keep us in His grace.  “God’s will is done when He breaks and hinders every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature, and when He keeps us firm in His Word and faith until we die.” (SC, Lord’s Prayer, 3rd Petition)  The one who has ears that hear—in spite of the devil, the world, and their own sinful heart—has those ears because God’s will is done.

But is the whole Christian life passive?  Didn’t God created us with not only ears to receive His Word, but also with a heart and will that are meant to be conformed to it?  Often Lutheran Christians are accused to focusing too much on being justified by grace through faith and neglecting what it means to live as a Christian.  This parable shows that the ones whose faith proved unfruitful were actually the inactive ones, or rather the ones who “let life happen” to them.

The ones who spring up with joy experience a temporary high.  But as we all know about great times, they can also be followed by great sorrow.  Because they thought Christianity was a cakewalk or an easy one-and-done solution to life’s problems, they never delved deeper into their faith.  They thought the purpose of worship was to get them juiced for the week, they neglected any Bible study once Pastor’s class was done, they neglected daily prayers and Scripture readings.  So, when a time of trial came (as it always does), their faith proved to be a fad, a passing season in their life.

Those in whom the Word was choked, took the Word seriously enough.  But as they go on their daily life, they neglected Christ’s call to renounce the world and divorce ourselves from it. When a person is saved by grace through faith in Christ, they cannot hold affection for the ways and the things in the world.  The Apostle John writes to us, “15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.” (1 John 2:15-17)  Faithless anxieties, riches, and pleasure are all dangerous to the Christian’s heart because our flesh is still weak.  We must be ready to leave all of this whenever He takes it from us or takes us from it to His eternal dwellings.

Yet the Word does mature in the good soil—in the heart where the Word has its proper effect.  But even in this heart, the emphasis never becomes what this one has done better than the others.  This one continues to hear the Word and receive it gladly, thanking the Holy Spirit that He has called me by the Gospel and enlightened me with His gifts. This one by the power of the same Spirit holds that Word in his heart through thick and thin, riches or poverty, popularity or insult.  They hold it with a heart that God has begun His good work in, and they gladly comply.  They don’t do it perfectly, and their life may be filled with as much trouble as someone who has lost their faith, but in spite of that, they are convinced that God is at work in their life.  They acknowledge that He has redeemed them, that He promises to be with them, and that He has called them to a life of free service.

“I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him, but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith.”  This part of the Small Catechism speaks volumes against our sinful nature which wants credit for getting where we are with God.  But it also speaks amazing power and comfort when we realize that God undergirds our life with His Word and Sacraments to keep us in the faith no matter what happens to us.  God is at work in every kind of soil, and His desire for us is to be strengthened in His Word, not stumble or be stolen by the devil. By His grace, may we persevere in this true faith throughout our days.  Amen.

Posted on

Septuagesima (70 Days to Easter) (Matthew 20:1-16 NKJV)

Bethlehem Lutheran & Bethel Lutheran Church, Lebanon & Sweet Home, OR

Septuagesima (70 Days to Easter) + February 17, 2019

Text: Matthew 20:1-16 NKJV

As you’ve already probably noticed from the bulletin, there’s something different about this season in between Epiphany and Lent.  Easter is still over two months away, but already we begin our countdown to it.  For starters, these next three weeks, we will meditate on God’s grace in Jesus Christ.  Every Sunday of the Church year is centered around the themes in the Gospel reading.  As the saints who went before us chose the readings, these next three Sundays form a sermon series on grace.  First, we hear from the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard that Grace is undeserved.  Next week, in the Parable of the Sower (Luke 8:4-15), we will learn that Grace is received passively.  Finally, and right before we intensify our focus on the cross of Christ, we learn from the story of a blind beggar (Luke 18:31-43) that Grace is spiritually discerned. All of these teachings, put together will better prepare our hearts for our devotion to our Savior, who in great love, willingly offered up His life that sinners might live eternally through Him.

There’s the way of the world, of daily life, the way things should be.  We are so deeply inculcated with those things.  And we should be, when it comes to our dealings in the world.  Workers should get fair payment for their time and labors.  The story of Jacob working for Laban is true: It was unjust for Laban to renege on what he had promised Jacob, forcing him to work another 7 years for Rachel and repeatedly changing his wages after that (Genesis 29:1-30, 30:25—31:9).

But the Kingdom of Heaven is an altogether different matter.  Yet, couched in the terms of wages, Jesus explains: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a landowner…”  Notice how our Lord does not say the Kingdom of Heaven is like an organization—a non-profit or a corporation; it is like a man who owns land, and that’s the first clue that this is going to shift the way we think of how God deals with men in His Kingdom.

This landowner goes out to hire laborers for his vineyard, and with the first, he agrees with them for a set wage (a denarius was a standard pay for a day’s work).  These work 12 hours.  Next, he goes out at the third hour and hires others, promising more vaguely, “whatever is right I will give you.”  These work 9 hours, but their pay isn’t explicitly stated.  Next, he goes out at the sixth and ninth hours, and sends them into the vineyard without a promise of payment at all.  They work 6 and 3 hours respectively.  Finally at the eleventh hour, 1 hour before the end of the work day, he hires those who have been idle all day and sends them.

Now, before we get to the time for them to “pick up their checks,” notice who he has hired: The diligent who were out there first thing, the less fortunate who were late to the marketplace, and the total slackers who—if they had mom’s basements then—would have been crashed in them, playing video games until 4 in the afternoon.

8 “So when evening had come, the owner of the vineyard said to his steward, ‘Call the laborers and give them their wages, beginning with the last to the first.’ 9 And when those came who were hired about the eleventh hour, they each received a denarius. 10 But when the first came, they supposed that they would receive more; and they likewise received each a denarius. 11 And when they had received it, they complained against the landowner, 12 saying, ‘These last men have worked only one hour, and you made them equal to us who have borne the burden and the heat of the day.’

When it comes time for the payout, every one of these gets the same wage—a denarius.  This is where your blue collar grandfather—who worked his whole life from nothing, who went without the finer things when he couldn’t afford it, but loved his family enough to work 12 hour days—wants to spit on the ground in disgust.  How can it be that the undeserving slobs get the same as those who toiled and sweated for the long haul?

But hear the Master’s response: “Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? 14 Take what is yours and go your way. I wish to give to this last man the same as to you. 15 Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with my own things?”

What he speaks of isn’t a wage gap or unfair practices.  He exposes a fundamental error in the complainer’s heart: You think your work entitled you to a greater share than others.  The Master has every right to pay generously and even at His own expense, without partiality.  But the next part of verse 15 gets to the heart: “Or is your eye evil because I am good?”

I chose to use the New King James version over the ESV because of this direct translation from the Greek.  Where does the problem really lie with the Master paying the slacker the same as the hard worker?  The evil is in the eye of the beholder, because it’s the hard worker who thinks God owes him more.  It’s the sin of covetousness, not being content with how God distributes His goodness.  With our evil eye, we look in judgment on our neighbor say, they’re getting far more than they deserve.  But the truth is that if any of us got what we truly deserved, then “this poor wretched soul of mine, in hell eternally would pine.”[1]  Or as the Apostle Paul writes, “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23)

What is God’s goodness?  With evil clouding our hearts, we can scarcely understand it, but suffice to say, God only loves unworthy people.  As the Proverbs say, “Surely He scorns the scornful, but gives grace to the humble.” (Prov. 3:34)  To those who boast in themselves, God will be intolerably foolish, wasteful, and extravagant.  Is your eye evil because God is good?

The latest issue of the Lutheran Witness has an article about mercy in the early church.  One particular sermon by John Chrysostom in the late 300’s AD is cited:

“Today, I stand before you to make a just, useful and suitable intercession. I come from no one else; only the beggars who live in our city elected me for this purpose, not with words, votes, and the resolve of a common council, but rather with their pitiful and most bitter spectacles. In other words, just as I was passing through the marketplace and the narrow lanes, hastening to your assembly, I saw in the middle of the streets may outcasts, some with severed hands, others with gouged-out eyes, others filled with festering ulcers and incurable wounds…

I thought it the worst inhumanity not to appeal to your love on their behalf, especially now that the season [of winter] forces us to return to this topic…During the season of winter, the battle against [the poor] is mighty from all quarters…Therefore they need more nourishment, a heavier garment, a shelter, a bed, shoes, and many other things…their need of the bare necessities is much greater, and besides, work passes them by, because no one hires the wretched, or summons them to service.”

The article’s author continues: “If his congregation didn’t step up, he told them, they would be guilty of dereliction of duty towards their neighbor. And there was to be no investigating whether or not a poor person was worthy of the generosity he received. Jesus’ own words encapsulated the motivation for this generosity: ‘Freely you have received. Freely give.’ (Matt. 10:8).”

The very grace we have received is the reason Christians show grace toward others, and grace doesn’t ask questions of worthiness.  But, the evil eye presumes, “They’ll just waste it; we’re enabling them; or what are we going to get in return?”  If you don’t understand grace, you will find soup kitchens abhorrent, you will want homeless shelters nowhere near your house, and you will hoard your hard-earned income with a tight fist and only dole it out to those who can demonstrate they’ll use it to your standards.

Is your eye evil because God is good?  If so, the early Christians should rise up at the judgment and condemn us proud, wealthy Americans because we have outsourced charity to the government—and what a wasteful and impassionate job they do of it—and we outsource to other Christians the job of showing mercy that middle-class Christians don’t want to do themselves, because it might get them dirty and infringe on their worldly luxuries. 

If you are humbled by this, now you’re ready to learn (or re-learn) what grace is.  You are evil, but God remains good. “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  In His goodness, He has delivered up His Son for you to be received as a gift.  Do you now see that none of us has a reason to boast in the presence of God?  It is in fact part of God’s essence that He shows His goodness to the evil like you and me.  Yes, we take it for granted, we turn His Word into a weapon to use against others and feel better about ourselves, we presume on His kindness.  Yet that doesn’t stop Him from giving to us a goodness we are unworthy of.

That’s what this parable teaches us: Grace is shown without partiality.  When Jesus goes to the cross, He goes there without doing the math to make sure it’s worth it.  His love impelled Him to do it.  He did it long before any of us took our first breath, so that we might receive not the wages for our sins, but the free gift of eternal life in Him.  What is a denarius or any earthly treasure in comparison with that?

I pray that God increases the effects of that grace in His Church, in you and me.  May what we have freely received also inspire us to freely give.  Like the example of Christians who have come before us, may the grace shown to us overflow in grace toward others, so that our lives are a testimony to what He has done. May it be that our congregation is a place not known for its looks or its history, but for its works.  I hope that each of you who have received grace with your hearts will pray this with me. Amen.

[1] “If Your Beloved Son, O God” (LSB 568:1)

Posted on

Thrown into the drink or delivered, God is faithful to accomplish His good purpose! (Jonah 1:1-17, Matthew 8:23-27)

Bethlehem Lutheran & Bethel Lutheran Church, Lebanon & Sweet Home, OR

Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany + February 3, 2019

Text: Jonah 1:1-17, Matthew 8:23-27

One of the great myths about our life is that we’re safer at some times than at others.  The disciples were under the impression that they were safer on land than when they were on the stormy sea.  It’s only when the waves are crashing into the boat that they realize how fragile their existence is.

Jonah thought that he was free and clear if he just fled to Tarshish, in the opposite direction from where God would have him be.  But on the way, God intervened and caused a great storm. And Jonah, even though he was resting secure in disobedience to God, was awakened and called to account.

On the other hand, the disciples in Matthew 8 were doing the Lord’s will, and they still suffered near disaster.  What gives, God?

This is the great question of Christians: I did everything right, so why am I suffering?  I know that Jonah fled from the will of the Lord, and he was driven back by the will of God to preach to the Ninivites. But what had the disciples done that this terrible storm came upon them?

The answer is, we don’t know.  If we look for God in the chances and changes of this life, all we will find is uncertainty and doubt, “Perhaps the god will give a thought to us, that we may not perish” (Jon. 1:6)

But let’s explore this in what we might say to either Jonah or the disciples.  Jonah, though a professed Hebrew “who fears the Lord who made the sea and dry land” (Jon. 1:9) did a very foolish thing by disobeying the Lord’s call.  If you read on through chapter 4, you find out that Jonah did it because God doesn’t give people what they deserve. He relents over disaster for those who fear Him. (4:2)  He demonstrated this not only for the mariners but also for the people of Nineveh.  So, Jonah, if you believe God should give people what they deserve, what would happen if that judgment were applied to you?  Do you believe that suicide at the hands of the sailors is the last word God has for you?  What is your faith, Jonah?

Jonah, the God you fear and serve is indeed “a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.” (Jon. 4:2)  You did a foolish thing fleeing the presence of the Lord because you disagreed with His ways.  But repent of your evil and believe that He is a God gracious and merciful to you also, and His intent has always been to save you from disaster. “He will not always chide, nor will he keep His anger forever.  He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high and the heavens are above the earth, so great is His steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does He remove our transgressions from us.” (Psalm 103:9-12)

What would we say to the disciples?  Remember, they are following the will of the Lord; they got on the boat in the right direction.  Yet, disaster still visited them.  The fishing boat is being swamped by the waves, and even worse, Jesus is the one sleeping this time.  They wake him with a prayer: “Save us, Lord; we are perishing!”

Peter, James, John, and the rest, who do you have in the boat with you?  Jesus awakens with a question, “Why are you afraid; O you of little faith?”  You rightly fear the God who made the sea and dry land. You are right to call on Him to save you.  But why are you afraid?  Won’t He will care for and protect you as much on the sea as on the dry land?  Why do you fear this circumstance more than the God who made heaven and earth?

What is your faith and where is your faith?  They’re both important questions to ask, especially, if like Jonah, we’re called to be witnesses of this God and Savior.  We learn what our faith is when we are exposed as sinners and have to learn anew who God reveals Himself to be.  True knowledge of the Gospel is not learned by memorizing doctrines and Bible passages in confirmation class—no matter how demanding your pastor was; it’s “taught by the Holy Spirit and the school of experience”[1] as one pastor put it.  That means you need to be made a real sinner before you can know a God, gracious and merciful.

The other question is, once we poor sinners know a gracious and merciful God, what does that look like in the dangers and disasters we face in life?  What did we confess in the Creed? “I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.”  It does no good to compartmentalize where God works—whether sea or dry land, on Sunday morning or five minutes before closing when your supervisor tells you you’re being laid off.  The God who made both visible and invisible is also our strong defense against all spiritual dangers.  “The waves and winds still know His voice who ruled them while He dwelt below”[2] as much as the demons obeyed when He commanded them.  This is the God who holds your life at every moment!  Repent of your little faith and the fruit of fear it bears!

What damage can be done to our calling as disciples by little faith.  Through fear of temporal things—the church running out of money, the lies of the devil and the narrative of the world gaining ground, the future of the nation in which we live.  All of these things are temporal, and we believe in theory that they’re all going to pass away.  But God help us to believe His holy Word, that He cares for us and gives us and the whole world our daily bread.

In the boat, it was not time for Jesus or His disciples to die.  But the time came when this same Jesus, fully man and fully God, was offered up on account of your sins and those of the whole world, that whoever believes in Him should not cry, “We are perishing,” but have forgiveness and eternal life.

Take a moment to let these words soak into your heart again: “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. 29 Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. 30 But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. 31 Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.” (Matt. 10:28-31)

God revealed His will to Jonah—go and preach to these pagans so that they might be saved.  And they were.  So was Jonah, perhaps the biggest unbeliever of the book until the end.  He revealed His power to the disciples in calming the stormy sea.  But the lesson for both is that God’s saving purpose will be done, even if for the moment it looks like He’s changed His mind.  Every person who believes in Him, He chose from before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:3-6), and as God does not lie, we can be sure that “nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord.” (Rom. 8:39)  This is not a license to put our faith to the test, but a reason to fear the God who made the sea and dry land, who is a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from disaster; through Jesus Christ. Amen.

[1] C.F.W. Walther, “Proper Distinction Between Law and Gospel” Thesis III. http://lutherantheology.com/uploads/works/walther/LG

[2] “Be Still, My Soul” (LSB 752, st. 2)