Author: Al

Text: John 12:12-19
Date: Palmarum Sunday + 4/1/07

      He arrived just as he was supposed to arrive, just as it had been written by the prophet Zechariah. “Behold, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt!” (Zech. 9:9). So here he is. And at first it appeared that they remembered this prophesy because they went out and greeted him with the kingly shout, the words of the Psalm, “Hosanna!” that is, “save now,” “blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” (Psalm 118:25-26). They even called him “the King of Israel!” But John tells us it wasn’t a cry of faith at all. He tells us “His disciples didn’t understand these things at first.” John should know for he was there. Furthermore he says the real reason why the crowds went to meet him was only because they had heard of his most incredible and final miracle of raising Lazarus from the dead. So it had to be either faith in the Word of God being fulfilled or some other enthusiasm at work because Jesus looked like anything but a king. Earthly kings come riding into town on a powerful galloping steed with impressively dressed saddles, girths and browbands, accompanied by a military entourage, with uplifted fist receiving the accolades of the crowds. Well, the accolades were there, but Jesus rode slowly, bareback on a young donkey of all things, not even acknowledging the crowds. “Lowly,” “humble,” that’s the way of the kingdom of God.
Continue reading “Hosanna!”

Text: John 8:42-59
Date: Lent V + 3/25/07

     There are three main things in this Gospel appointed for Judica, the Fifth Sunday in Lent sometimes called Passion Sunday. And they are these: “Whoever is of God hears the words of God;” “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death;” and “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.” It starts with the importance of hearing God’s Word. For apart from God’s Word the inherent disorder, chaos and confusion of life as we know it only increases and we remain only in the realm and under the control of the devil. The devil, being “a murderer from the beginning, having nothing to do with the truth, the liar and father of lies,” convinces us of the lie that we are hopeless against the inequities and unfairness of life, and worse, that we go down to our last gasp of death cursing God for his righteous decree that the wages of sin is death. Our only hope, then, is not the devil nor in any power in ourselves, but only in God if, indeed, God is at all for us, in our corner; only if it is true as he said through the prophet Ezekiel, “I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live” [Ezekiel 33:11 (ESV)], and, “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son” (John 3:16). It is only in Jesus Christ that the sinner can discover that God is love, that He is for us and not against us, that He has not written His world off in wrath but, rather, has written His Word in grace and in the flesh and blood of the Incarnate Word, Jesus our Savior for the life of the world. Continue reading “Before Abraham Was, I AM”

Text: John 6:1-15
Date: Lent IV + 3/18/07

     This is Laetare Sunday, “Rejoice” Sunday: “Laetare Jerusalem,” “Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad for her, all you who love her.” With the lightening of Lenten purple to a rejoicing rose hue, it is a little like a rest stop about halfway along the freeway in the long, forty-day penitential journey of Lent. We could also call it the original Mother’s Day according to a related ancient tradition that, on this day, Christians would make a return visit or pilgrimage to their “mother church” where they were baptized. More important than where you were baptized, however, is what happened then and there. For there and right then God claimed you for his own, washed you with his forgiveness, dressed you in the white robes of Christ’s own righteousness, made covenant-promises with you of eternal life and equipped you with the mighty gift and “shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one” [Ephesians 6:16 (ESV)]. It is that struggle and battle of faith that we’ve been hearing about in these Sundays in Lent, beginning with the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness, then the testing of the Canaanite Woman’s faith and, last week, the accusation that Jesus was in league with the devil. Today, with the account of the feeding of the 5,000 in the wilderness, we are to learn the real difference faith in Jesus makes both when we are confronted with our daily trials but especially when the question is about our eternal destiny. For a lot of times we have our priorities backwards, fretting more about daily bread and less about being saved from sin and death. As a wise Christian man once said, “Our chronic weakness is not that we expect too much from God, but that we trust him for too little.” Continue reading “Passover Prediction: A New Moses”

Text: John 15
Date: Lent Midweek III + 3/14/07

     We are still in the Upper Room with Jesus. It is the Passover, the night in which he was betrayed. But this has been a Passover like no other. Some mighty strange things have happened. First was the embarrassment of Jesus doing what we knew one of us ought to have done, washing the feet before coming to the table. Then were the usual prayers and the recitation of the story of Moses and the Exodus from Egypt and the Passover meal. But even then we are still wondering what Jesus meant when, before supper, he gave us the bread and said, “This is my body,” and, after supper, the third Passover cup of wine, saying, “This is my blood.” We still don’t know where Jesus had Judas Iscariot hurry off to. Then Jesus talked about going away somewhere where we can’t go. Anyway, when he said, “Rise, let us go from here” (John 14:31) we all got up from the table. But before we left he had a few more things to say as we stood around him.

     Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, even as Jesus had promised, some time later John wrote down Jesus’ words. We now hang on those words. We read and reread and hear them again and again, because he was there telling us ahead of time what our situation would be after his death. Two things. He told us how we must and would ever remain in connection with him and he with us and, secondly, how the world around us would continually be hostile toward us because of our connection and loyalty to him. Continue reading “Life Line”

Text: Luke 11:14-28
Date: Lent III + 3/11/07

      In the little catechism we are taught that when the Christian prays “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” we are there asking God to break and hinder every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature that would get in the way of our preaching, hearing and believing God’s Holy Word by which alone we are saved. Again, the other side of the coin is when the Christian prays “And lead us not into temptation.” For there we pray for Godly defense against the devil, the world, and our sinful nature that wants to deceive us or mislead us into false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice. These three—the devil, the world, and our sinful nature—describe all that would keep us or tear us away from the salvation and life of God. Certainly the devil, Satan, is the personal, powerful force behind it all with his murderous lies bent only on destroying us and all mankind. The world is his realm, his kingdom where he tempts people to worship and serve created things rather than the Creator. But ever since the fall into sin each and every person has even within his or her own flesh that rebellion against God that results in words, thoughts and actions like those listed in today’s Epistle. St. Paul calls our sinful nature “darkness” and the salvation of Christ “light.” In today’s Gospel we see what St. John called the Light shining in the darkness (John 1:5) or to use a different metaphor, a Voice speaking into silence as Jesus casts out a demon from a man who could not speak. What’s interesting is that not everyone who witnessed this miracle was at all glad about it. What is interesting is that, while the devil and his demons obeyed the mighty Word and command of Jesus who casts him out of a possessed man, among those who witnessed the exorcism, some remained firm in their unbelief and darkness and opposition to Christ. Today’s Gospel describes the depths of the slavery of sin within us from which only Christ can redeem us and set us free. So you see that, while the devil and the world are external forces “to keep [us] from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ” (2 Cor. 4:4), our own sinful flesh also must be conquered, that is must, to speak in baptismal words, “by daily contrition and repentance be drowned and die with all sins and evil desires, in order that a new man daily emerge and arise to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.” It is the power of being baptized into Christ that we are given the faith and the armor with which to stand against the temptations and onslaughts of the devil, the world and even our own sinful flesh. Continue reading “The Finger of God”

Text: John 14
Date: Lent Midweek II + 3/7/07

     When our Lord Jesus Christ—on the night in which he was betrayed, around the Passover table in the Upper Room—said, “Let not your hearts be troubled,” his own heart was troubled. That is, he knew what was about to take place, and the agonizing reality of it all. He knew that the greatest pain of his innocent, bitter torture, suffering and death would not be the bloody, stinging flogging, nor the crown of thorns smashed onto his head, nor the exhausting task of carrying his own cross to the place of execution; not the nails, the spear, the mockery, the manifold disgrace of it all. The essence of sin is separation, being cut off, isolation, rejection, being absolutely alone and forsaken. He would give expression to the greatest suffering of it all and the essence of the sin of the world that killed him when he would say, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Sin is separation.

     If sin is separation, then salvation from sin is reconciliation, fellowship instead of alienation, unity instead of division. At Christmas we recall with joy the words of promise of the prophet Isaiah that the virgin-born Savior would be called “Immanuel,” which means “God with us” (Is. 7:14). On the night in which he was betrayed his heart was troubled because he knew the only way to break the bonds and isolation of sin and death was to take it into himself, bearing in his body the ultimate cause of our separation, that he might then bring the ultimate reconciliation of the creation back into unity and fellowship with its Creator. Continue reading “Troubled Hearts?”

Text: Matthew 15:21-28
Date: Lent II + 3/4/07

      At first you may think that today’s Gospel is about prayer and encouragement to persistence in prayer. And you’d be right. But if you take away from this story that it is your persistence that makes for successful prayer, you’d only be half-right. For, while this text has something to teach us about faith, it has much more to teach us about God and Christ, the object of faith.

     You can identify with the Canaanite woman in our text, first, because she’s a Canaanite, that is, a Gentile, not among God’s chosen people. Indeed, none of us have any inherent right or worthiness in ourselves that we should expect God to hear our prayers much less answer them. Then you may identify with the woman when it seems that God is ignoring you, deaf to your prayers. Twice she begs the Lord to have mercy on her demon-possessed daughter. And even though she is quite earnest and sincere in her prayer and in her faith, three times the Lord turns his back on her. This sequence of events strikes us as rather odd. For Christ not only appears to ignore the woman, he even seems to insult her. First, Jesus just stands there not even acknowledging her presence. Next, his disciples encourage Jesus to call security and send her away. Jesus seems to agree, saying, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” In other words, we get the impression that Jesus is saying, “I’m not for you.” Then, as if that put down wasn’t enough, when the woman barges in and kneels before him Jesus adds, "It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs." Did we hear that right? Did he just call the woman a dog? This is odd, indeed! Continue reading “Great Is Your Faith”

Text: John 13
Date: Lent Midweek I + 2/28/07

     We learn about the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper from the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, and from St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians. St. John, in his Gospel, does not have an account of the institution of the Lord’s Supper primarily because he knows that you’ve already read Matthew, Mark, Luke and Paul! Though John does not have a narrative of the institution of the sacrament of Christ’s Body and Blood, what he does have is no less than five chapters of everything else Jesus did and said that Maundy Thursday, that night in which he was betrayed. Furthermore, because we never hear but only a few snippets from John chapters 13-17 in the lectionary, we are taking the time to hear all of it during our Lenten midweek services this year.

     It was a long night, that Passover night. Jesus gathered with his disciples in the Upper Room for the annual Passover Seder meal. John relates what happened and what was said before, during and after that meal with its prayers and scripture readings, its symbolic use of unleavened bread and cups of wine, and the meal itself.

     At every Eucharist we hear the Words of Institution beginning with the phrase, “On the night in which he was betrayed.” Why that designation? So many other things were done and said that night. It was the night he washed his disciples’ feet; the night he promised the coming of the Holy Spirit; the night he prayed his high priestly prayer; the night of the new commandment and of the institution of the sacrament of the altar. Yet that night is always referred to as “the night in which he was betrayed.” Why? It was the betrayal by Judas that set everything else in motion. Like the firing of a starting gun, once the betrayal took place nothing could stop what was to follow. Continue reading “A Clean Getaway”

Text: Matthew 4:1-11
Date: Lent I + 3/5/06 – 2/25/07

     That our Lord Jesus Christ was “led by the Spirit” into the wilderness immediately after his baptism in order to be tempted by the devil indicates two things that are actually one thing. First, it indicates that his fasting and temptation were according to the will of God. Like a preemptive attack with laser-guided missals, Jesus’ active earthly ministry begins by addressing the very root of the problem from which He came to free us, namely, the rule of Satan, sin and death. First He disarms and “binds the strong man.” Then He “plunders his house” (Matthew 12:29) by proclaiming good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind and the setting at liberty those who are oppressed (Luke 4:18). Jesus, not Satan, was in charge from the beginning to the end. Even Satan’s seeming victory in Jesus’ betrayal, arrest and trials, his suffering and death on the cross was according to the plan and will of God. As our Lord said, “I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord” [John 10:17-18 (ESV)].

     Secondly, this text teaches us that to be “led by the Spirit” means not by some direct, immediate communications of exotic or “new” revelations, but, as for Christ in his state of humiliation and for us, it means, simply, to hear, know, and believe the Word of God, the Holy Scripture that reveals God’s good and gracious will for us and for all people. Having met his decisive defeat in the wilderness and through the cross and empty tomb of Jesus Christ, now those who belong to Christ have the armament to fend off the devil’s attacks, to persevere in faith and to look with faith and good hope to our final victory in the day of resurrection. The operative power for Christ in his state of humiliation, his earthly ministry, and for us who take up our cross and follow Him is the mighty Word of God. Continue reading “Led By the Spirit”

Text: 2 Corinthians 5:20b—6:2
Date: Ash Wednesday + 2/21/07

     Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the annual 40-day season of Lent; an extended time of meditation on our sin and need of God, a season of repentance in preparation for the Great and Holy Week wherein we celebrate the Passion of the Christ. The thing is, we’ve done this before! It happens every year. Of course, without Ash Wednesday and Lent there would be no Mardi gras, no “Fat Tuesday,” no Paczkis! But more seriously is the fact that, since this does happen every year, you may get the impression that, since we’re never really done with or rid of sin in this life, the forgiveness of sin and salvation from death we talk about is not really real but only something reserved for the future of heaven. In this way some see Lent to be little different than the occasional interruption of radio or TV broadcasts, you know, with that annoying electronic pulse signal followed by the explanation, “This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. This is only a test.” No need to get too excited or concerned because “this is only a test.” Continue reading “This is Not a Test”