The Seventh & Eighth Sunday's after Trinity July 18 and July 25, 2010

I was on vacation for these two Sunday's.  I thank God for the opportunity to be renewed and refreshed while away.  I thank God to be back again to serve the people of God at Our Savior Lutheran Church.

The Sixth Sunday after Trinity - July 11, 2010

The Church Season of Pentecost
The Sixth Sunday after Trinity, One Year Series
Our Savior Lutheran Church, Midland, MI (July 11, 2010)

“The Father’s Love”

Readings:  
    Psalm 19
    Exodus 20:1-7
    Romans 6:1-11
    Matthew 5:17-26

Sermon Form    Deductive

+INI+

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from the Father
and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen

The text for today is as recorded in the Gospel Lesson from the 20th chapter of Exodus, especially the following verse:

Exodus 20:1-7
 1 And God spoke all these words:  2 "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.  3 "You shall have no other gods before me.  4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand {generations} of those who love me and keep my commandments.  7 "You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit

Our Old Testament text, this morning should be familiar to you for this is the record of the Ten Commandments just as they appear in Scripture.  And the first thing that you might say is that something is missing from this text, because these are not the whole Law of God.  If you read the verses following these, you will find that God goes on at length with the other commandments.  These are simply the first words God spoke to the people of Israel, and He spoke them directly to all of the people.  

When they first heard these words, the sound of God’s speaking so terrified the people that they pleaded with Moses to be their mediator.  They named Moses to hear God and for him to speak for them to God, so that they would not have to listen to the terrifying voice they had heard from Mt. Sinai.  Not so much anymore, as those verses were read a few moments ago neither the reader nor any of the listeners so much even squirmed in their seats.  

But it would appear from the verses following our text, that God’s intentions were clear.  He was, and is, very serious.  He wanted the Israelites to hear Him and He wants us to hear Him too.  God wanted them to understand that He was real in a way that none of the Gods of the other religions were or could be real.  Again, He wants the same for us too.  And maybe we’re not dancing around some Ashtoreth poles or bowing to gods named baal.  No those gods are long gone or forgotten, now the gods have newer names usually attached to a new car, or some kind of new gadget, or something we have that our neighbor can’t afford.  

And, according to the verses that follow after our text, God’s Word worked, “all the people perceived the thunder and the lightning flashes and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking; and when the people saw it, they trembled and stood at a distance.  Then they said to Moses, "Speak to us yourself and we will listen; but let not God speak to us, lest we die."  And Moses said to the people, "Do not be afraid; for God has come in order to test you, and in order that the fear of Him may remain with you, so that you may not sin."

And God’s purpose was not to terrify and 'boss around' a primitive people, but rather it was to guide them, and protect them against the pressures and temptations that they would face.  Jesus Himself gives us the summary of the law, and the summary of the Law is love.  Kind of hard to believe isn’t it?  We know the Law kills and yet that is out of love?  

But to understand God’s love one must first understand that love is not a feeling, at least, love is not only a feeling.  While there is an emotional component to it, real love acts out, it does things, in fact it does something very real.  In that regard, love is different from infatuation, infatuation is pure feeling.  We can be infatuated with cars because they’re fast or slow, or money because someone else has it and we don’t, or we can even be infatuated with people.  You’ve heard it before, "I love this person because they make me feel so good.  How long does a marriage last if we must feel good 100% of the time, not long I’m afraid.  A crush, or infatuation, is often attributed to the young, but older people have them too.  But true love is focused on the One who is loved.

God's love for us is like that.  We don't make God feel good.  He is focused, rather, on us and on our welfare and well-being.  He saw our condition in sin - from eternity, before we were even created - and He planned our salvation.  He sent His Son into the flesh, to become human and to fulfill the law for us, and He sent Hs Son to suffer horribly and to die for our guilt and sin to redeem us.  That was love, that is love.  God got nothing for Himself out of this, but He saved us.  Just the same, God forgives us for Christ's sake and pours out on us resurrection and everlasting life spent in glory with Him.  God’s love is focused upon us, and upon Christ for us.

The Ten Commandments teach us how that love looks when it flows out for us.  It speaks about truly loving God - with all your heart and soul, with all your strength and mind - and loving your neighbor, other people, with a genuine and Godly love.  Human life lived in love will look like what these "commandments" describe.  For example, when one truly loves God as God, there is no other God in their life.  As Luther described it, we fear, love, and trust in God above all things.  That is a large order.  We can imagine that God is the center of our lives, but to trust God so much that nothing else is required, to love God so that we desire nothing more than to please Him, or to fear God in such a way that nothing can frighten us into forgetting God or His will - even for a moment – well that is beyond our human abilities.  But that describes what a true and complete love for God would be like.

But the challenge of God’s love is the challenge of God’s commands, “Do this.”  There is no wiggle room in God’s Words, no do this next week, or during the next commercial.  Do this perfectly, do this without fail, every minute, every second of our lives, “Love the Lord your God above all things.”  Always, and that is how Jesus summed up the first three commandments too.

And the other seven commandments focus on how we would live out our love for God by loving those He has given to us to serve and to care for.  Once again, we are reminded that love is not just a feeling.  Hopefully, the feelings come with the behaviors, but the love of God flows from us toward others in what we do, in how we deal with another, not just in your thoughts or emotional responses.  The love for God shows itself in love for one another, and compassion toward others - all others.  Of course, it starts close to home.  Parents, for example, have been placed in God's place in the life of their families.  They are called on to seek the welfare of their children and provide for them and others placed by God under their care.  We are, by this fact, obligated to honor and serve our parents much as we would serve God.  If you cannot love those whom God has placed over you in His stead, how could you possibly love God?

Well as you know from the catechism, the Law always accuses us, it makes us die, it makes us fear, it drives us to worry, it drives us to despair.  The Law shows us that we are called to repentance not just every Sunday, but every day and truthfully every waking hour.  There is no escape from the Law, it clings to us closer than our shadow on a sunny day, but it is much closer and much more real than a shadow, it is what we are by our own actions and accord.

But, thanks be to God, that He has loved us and redeemed us and rescued us, and given us a marvelous hope.  And that is what always must be with the Law and that is the Gospel.  The two cannot be separated, for the Gospel literally means “The Good News.”  And that is the Good News of Jesus Christ.  The Law tears us down and we see ourselves for what we are, the Gospel pulls us up out of this sin filled world and God sees us through Jesus Christ, and God sees us for what Christ has done for us.  Not in abstract ways, but ways b which we can understand with our frail minds, and see with our dimmed eyes.  For God has given us Holy Baptism, His Word and Water combined to touch us and make us die before our time so that we live to Christ.  Thank God that He has provided us with the Holy Supper of our Lord as we receive Christ’s Body and Blood as reminder that we may trust in Him even in the face of our daily failure to love Him or to love one another as we know we should.  God’s love never fails you.  His compassion for you never ceases.  Even in the face of the law of God, which stands accusing us in our sin, we can see the great love of God for us.  God gives us this constant reminder of our need for a redeemer.  God provides gives us each moment, each day, each week a wonderful message that He has provided the Redeemer whom we need, and that is His Son Jesus Christ.

The ten commandments accuse, and our God forgives.  Your sins, whatever they may be - and these commandments remind us how many and how serious they are - your sins are forgiven.  The Lord our God, is the one who gave us the Law and He said, "Thou shalt not . . .", He is also the Lord our God who gave us His only begotten Son who said, "It is finished.”   And that is the greatest love of all, a love of the Father for His Son, and the love of God’s Son Jesus Christ, for you.  Amen.

+SDG+

The Fifth Sunday after Trinity - July 4, 2010

The Church Season of Pentecost
The Fifth Sunday after Trinity, One Year Series
Our Savior Lutheran Church, Midland, MI (July 4, 2010)

“Lord, I am a Sinful Man”

Readings: 
    Psalm 16
    1 Kings 18:11-21
    1 Cor 1:18-25
    Luke 5:1-11

Sermon Form    Deductive

+INI+

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from the Father
and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen

The text for today is as recorded in the Gospel Lesson from the 5th chapter of St. Luke, especially the following verse:

Luke 5:1-11 (NIV)

1 One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the people crowding around him and listening to the word of God, 2 he saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat. 4 When he had finished speaking, he [Jesus] said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.” 5 Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.” 6 When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. 7 So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink. 8 When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” 9 For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken, 10 and so were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, Simon’s partners. Then Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t be afraid; from now on you will catch men.” 11 So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit

It is worth repeating, Simon Peter said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!”(v. 8)  Ironic isn’t it?  Simon Peter was with Christ from the beginning of His public ministry, yet it seems that Peter was still not ready to believe.  Well at least that is how some might view Peter’s actions.  Some might say Peter was not spiritual enough, that he had not yet reached the age of reason, that he had not yet seen enough, or had not yet learned enough to believe.  But that kind of thinking is backward and quite wrong.  And Jesus proves it is wrong too, and Jesus shows Peter in a way which Peter could understand.  Jesus showed Peter that no action of his own would bring him success on that day.  At the same time Jesus was teaching a lesson of salvation too.  So Jesus stands in a boat and directs another boat to go to deep water and fish.  In fact, Jesus told them to fish where the fishing was no good, to fish the spot that was fished out.  Jesus told Peter to come to the place where Jesus would lead him rather than the place where Peter’s reason would lead him.  And so, at first Peter balk, but then he relents and does as he is told.  Peter put out into deep water, because Jesus told him to do so.  And the results?  Well, Peter does not get to say I told you so, because his boat is overwhelmed with success, and Peter admits that he is just,

 “A Sinful Man”

Peter had heard the Word of God from Jesus, the Word of God.  So, when Peter had let down his nets and they soon were filled to capacity, even to overflowing.  The nets were so full that they were straining and breaking from the weight of all the fish.  At Christ’s direction, Peter and the other disciples had moved out into deeper water and they had a miracle catch of food that would nourish their bodies for just a day.  Unknowingly Peter, and the other disciples there that day, had become the subject of a teachable moment.  What does that mean?  Jesus was using an object lesson is a lesson in which a teacher uses actions familiar to all the students to help them understand the deeper meaning of a more important lesson.  So on the shores of the Lake of Gennesaret, which is to us known as the Sea of Galilee, became the perfect setting for a deeper lesson set in a miracle.

Christ ordered the disciples out into deep water for that lesson.  And when the great catch of fish occurred Peter was astonished.  Yet Peter did not revel in the magnitude of that catch.  Nor did he gather the fishing team together to do a victory dance, or try to multiply this one day success into a sales pitch for their fishing groups. There is no puffing out of the chest as a result of worldly accomplishments and victories.  Rather, Peter does what we do to this very day, he falls on his knees in reverence the miracle which has been performed before him. And upon his knees he makes that confession, saying “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!”(v. 8)

Peter had seen the great catch and he made an instantaneous response.  A deep response with clear and reverential body language, and with clear language in the words he spoke.  He kneeled before Jesus and admitted that he was a poor miserable sinner.  It is acknowledgment of sin in words similar to those which we still confess to this very day.  Words like that of the Psalm written by King David, “Where does my help come from? 2 My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.” (Ps. 121:1-2)  He acknowledged that he was a slave to sin.

On this day of American Independence, we proclaim our freedom, we celebrate our freedom, we are proud of our freedom.  And certainly we have the right to do that, many people have given their lives so that we can still live in a place called the United States of America.  We have a Bill of Rights, our freedom is the envy of the world.  As a nation we are very blessed and if someone would scoff at that remark, then you have never been to a third world country to see just how much we have.  Yet, to some, it would seem that all that we have done is toiled in vain throughout many a dark night and that our nets are still coming up empty.  And thoughts of emptiness, self-pity, doom and gloom make us think that we have toiled in vain.  Why can’t we work our way out of all this?  Our pain is real if only somehow we could gain our freedom from this crazy world.

From all these thoughts and actions we are called to repent.  For those shallow thoughts are really thoughts of self salvation.  But by hearing the Good News, that is the Word of Christ, these thoughts give way to the deeper lessons.  Lesson like the one that applied to Simon Peter and the disciples and still apply to us this very day.  For though we would like to think it so, “success does not come through our own effort, skill, or diligence “(Luther’s Church Postils 2:2:151) People are not freed by their own actions from the various things that attack us in this world.  It is by the Word of God alone.  We the People, are drawn to Christ by the work of the Holy Spirit, in the proclamation of God’s Holy Word.  Scripture even tells us so for, “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.”(Rom. 10:17)

Yesterday, today, or tomorrow, you may hear the loud beautiful explosions of fireworks celebrating our Independence.  Enjoy the occasion, many Americans have earned you that right.  But also know that even greater still, Jesus Christ earned for you eternal salvation by His death upon the cross.   And there Christ brings you freedom from what ever weighs heavy on your minds.  You have heard the Word of God, you have received Christ’s blessing in baptism, and when you receive Holy Communion. 

God is here with you in this place, and He reminds you that your sins are forgiven.  Your eternal freedom is assured, it’s all been accomplished for you, by Jesus Christ who died for you on the cross.  Jesus not only gives you freedom for your days on this earth, He gives you everlasting freedom.  And that freedom is an eternal free gift for you, Amen.

+SDG+