Month: November 2013

Text: Luke 23:43
Date: Last Sunday Proper 29 + 11/24/13

On the last day of the church year we are taken to the cross to hear the last word concerning the entire Gospel we have heard and rehearsed in the past twelve months. We do not repeat the entire great and holy week nor even of the entire six hours of the crucifixion. Rather, today we join in with the weeping women following Jesus in procession. “Daughters of Jerusalem,” He says, “do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.” Here He was already declaring the fact that the death He was about to experience would not be strong enough to hold Him. He was already relying on the prospect of His resurrection from death and by His resurrection breaking the hold of death for all who believe in Him. So, “do not weep for me.” Then when He says, “but weep for yourselves and for your children,” He shows that life in this world, as long as we carry this body of sin and death, we will experience all sorts of troubles. But for those Christians whose bodies finally give out and die the scriptures say at that moment the soul is completely free of sin. The idea of a purgatory is pure invention. On this truth Martin Luther therefore called death the last “purgatorium” of the soul. The old American Negro Song by J. W. Work which Martin Luther King, Jr. made so memorable is true:

Free at last, free at last
I thank God I’m free at last
Free at last, free at last
I thank God I’m free at last. Continue reading “In Paradisum”

Text: Luke 21:5-28
Date: Pentecost XXVI + Proper 28 11/17/13

The Day of the Lord Comes. Today is the Day of the Lord, O come let us worship Him. When the Lord Jesus first came on the scene, as He approached His final week—His final offering, goal and purpose—He first warned of the coming destruction of the Jerusalem temple—“The days will come when there will not be left here one stone upon another.” Then He spoke of the destruction of Jerusalem itself—“These are days of vengeance, to fulfill all that is written.” And finally He spoke also of the end of the world, judgment day when “they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.” These are the three events He speaks about in today’s gospel reading. However, these otherwise fearful words are, rather, the occasion of joy and comfort for the believer, for faith that says, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!” Continue reading “The Day of the Lord Comes”

Text: Luke 20:27-40
Date: Pentecost XXV X 11/10/13

To faithfully say, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord,” you first need to see Him coming. The first human eyes to see Him, of course, were those of His mother the Blessed Virgin Mary and her husband Joseph. Then there were the teachers in the Jerusalem temple when He was about twelve years old, though they didn’t realize that they were gazing upon someone more than merely a very smart child. The first public eyes that looked at Him were of the crowds whom John the Baptist pointed to Him saying, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” Since His sacrificial death, resurrection and ascension back into heaven, now only the eyes of faith see Him. Your eyes of faith first saw His arrival in your Holy Baptism. Then they are enlightened to see His coming through the holy Word of the scriptures as explained by the little catechism. Then, every year in the quickly approaching end of the Church Year and the beginning of a new one with the season of Advent, the ears of faith hear our Lord’s command to see, to be watchful, “watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour” (Matt 25:13). Watch for what? Well, for the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Today we address that not-so-little phrase of the Nicene Creed which the Sadducees of every age reject, “I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.” And talk about eyes! On that day of our Lord’s final return not only the eyes of faith but, as my most beloved hymn says it, “And then from death awaken me, That these mine eyes [my physical eyes!] with joy may see, O Son of God, Thy glorious face, My Savior and my fount of grace” (LSB 708:3). Continue reading “I Look For the Resurrection of the Dead”