Sermons

What is preaching? St. Paul writes in Romans: “Whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved. How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?” (Romans 10:14-15)

Therefore our Lutheran Confessions state: “It is also taught among us that one holy Christian church will be and remain forever. This is the assembly of all believers among whom the Gospel is preached in its purity and the holy sacraments are administered according to the Gospel.” (Augsburg Confession VII:1-3)

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Advent 2 Midweek “Diakonia” – Luke 1:54-55; 1 Peter 1:3

07. December 2011
Advent II – Midweek
Mercy (diakonia)

A preaching series based on and drawn from John Pless’s outline and Al Collver’s Bible study materials. 

This year’s midweek Advent services will consider the latest emphases from the praesidium of our Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod: Witness – Mercy – Life Together. These are helpful tools for us to consider what it means to be Christ’s church. This time of Advent is a time of preparation as the bride for her husband, a time of waiting as those virgins for bridegroom, and a time of hopeful expectation like Simeon in the temple. Our Lord has come, He is yet coming, and will come again.

During this time of waiting, our life is conformed to the way of the Father’s Son. Our life is transformed by the great gift of Christ’s justification, begun in the promise to Eve, incarnate in Mary’s womb, and finished with death at the Cross. This is the source and foundation of who we are in Christ. We are bearers of Christ, the very ones who delivered Him unto death but who now bear witness to Him unto eternity. This truth is not self-evident. It must be spoken, verified, and heard before it is believed. Thus, we spoke of nothing else than Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Just as our witness must be learned, so must also the life of mercy. Mercy is not natural but comes only in the life lived in Jesus. Christians are therefore different; they are known by the work of Christ in them. When Christians see someone in need, they don’t ignore the person. Rather, Christians have compassion, going to their neighbor and helping him. Whenever people came up to Jesus and said Kyrie eleison (“Lord, have mercy!”), Jesus had compassion on them. Jesus fed, healed, and consoled those in need, proclaiming to them that the kingdom of God was near. Like Jesus, Christians hear their neighbors’ cries with compassion and respond by providing for them.

The word for mercy is diakonia. The Greek word diakonia is usually translated as “service” or “ministry.” Service and even ministry are loose terms with little meaning of themselves. They do not describe specific kinds of service. Diakonia is not another word for the Office of the Holy Ministry, that special office instituted by Christ for the church that she would have a man in each place whom He has chosen and sent for preaching, catechesis, and pastoral care. Diakonia is properly associated with mercy.

The word mercy is firmly rooted in the forgiveness of sins that Jesus won on the cross. In Jesus we see true mercy, that God would forgive us by the death of His own son. Mercy, diakonia, means feeding the poor, taking care of the sick, and caring for orphans and widows. Diakonia is caring for our neighbor in concrete and effective ways because of what Jesus has done for them—and for us. Filled with Christ’s love and Spirit, Christians serve their neighbor mercifully.

As the theologian Oswald Bayer writes, “Mercy is not self-evident… On the contrary mercy is actually something that is won and something that, emerging, happens unpredictably. And as this justifying God is not simply and in principle merciful, so also is sinful man not simply and in principle on the receiving end of mercy.”

Mercy was not self-evident to the virgin Mary in tonight’s Gospel. She was “greatly troubled” (Luke 1:29) until the angel comforted her with the good news that the son she would conceive and bear is the Son of God. Only then were Mary’s lips unlocked to magnify the Lord, declaring the scope of His mercy for all who “fear him from generation to generation” (Luke 1:50). Having received mercy, Mary was enabled to confess her God and Savior who helps “His servant Israel in remembrance of his mercy, as He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his offspring forever” (Luke 1:54-55).

It is this Lord who has “According to his great mercy… caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3). Mercy is not self-evident for sinners; it is not something that the guilty expect, even to His servant Mary. Mercy comes only by God’s doing in the crib and on Calvary.

Can a holy and vengeful God come and dwell among sinners? Thomas Aquinas said that “Christ cannot enter into living communion with a sinner.” Yet, Luther argued on the opposite: “Christ dwells only among sinners.” At the core is a difference in understanding God’s mercy, His diakonia.

The great 20th century Lutheran theologian Hermann Sasse said: “Every page of the New Testament is indeed testimony of the Christ whose proper office it is ‘to save sinners’ (1 Timothy 1:15), ‘to seek and save the lost’ (Luke 19:10). And the entire saving work of Jesus—from the days he was in Galilee and, to the amazement and alarm of the Pharisees, ate with tax collectors and sinners, to the moment when he, in contradiction with the principles of every rational morality, promised paradise, to the thief on the cross—yes, his entire life on earth, from the cradle to the cross, is one unique, grand demonstration of a wonder beyond all reason: the miracle of divine forgiveness, of the justification of the sinner.” Advent announces the arrival of this Christ who makes divine mercy certain for sinners. Thus, it is true, that “Christ dwells only among sinners.”

Jesus’ actions demonstrate the love of God for humankind. “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Out of love for us and in obedience to the Father, Jesus suffered and died; “love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be” (LSB 430:1). This is a transformative love. First, God the Father forgives our sins for Jesus’ sake and credits to us Christ’s righteousness; we apprehend these gifts through faith. Then, through the Means of Grace, the Holy Spirit makes us lovely to those whom we show love, mercy, and compassion in their time of need.

The apostle John writes in his first epistle: “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:16-18).

A unique word is used in verse 17, splánchna. Originally, spláchna meant the internal organs of an animal used in ritual sacrifice. In ancient Greek temples, these internal organs would be “read” in order to “tell the future.” Spláchna is onomatopoetic, meaning it sounds similar to what it means. When the internal organs were removed and thrown to the ground, they made a “splat,” hence splánchna. By the New Testament era, the world spláchna has become associated with compassion or mercy. Our English phrases “butterflies in the stomach” and “gut reaction” convey somehow how our emotions affect our bodies.

The love of God is known chiefly in mercy. His mercy is known by His compassion. All throughout the Gospels, the love of God that leads Him to mercy is show in Jesus’ compassion. He has compassion on them for they were sheep without a shepherd (Mt 9:36-38). He had compassion on them and fed the five thousand and four thousand (Mt. 14:13-21; Mt. 15:32-39). He had compassion on the two blind me (Mt. 20:29-34), on the leper whom He cleansed (Mk 1:40-45), before casting out the deaf and mute spirit (Mk. 9:14-29), and raising of the widows son (Luke 7:11-17). Two of the most beloved parables feature love yielding mercy that begets compassion. The Good Samaritan had compassion, splanchnidzomai, on the man in the ditch (Lk. 10:29-37). The father ran to his prodigal son and had compassion on him (Lk 15:11-21).

Diakonia, mercy, is really all about service. In Christ, we see diakonia take a most real and concrete form. It is most clearly seen in His sacrificial death for you. It is seen in His great acts of compassion. It will been seen on the last day when in He welcomes you into the eternal paradise. And it is being seen as the Lord serves the church now. In His Divine Service, He serves us and delivers to us the forgiveness of sins. Sunday morning is primarily about the Lord serving us and then our response of praise and thanksgiving.

Compassion, service, and mercy begin with Jesus. The Lord came to redeem the entire person, body and soul. Forgiveness of sins is about the here and now and it is about the life to come. The ailments of the body—even death—are the result of sin. Jesus forgives sins and then shows compassion on those who are in physical need. In His earthly ministry, Jesus healed the lame, made the blind to see, and raised the dead. He undid the effect of sin both by forgiving and healing. Living forgiven in Christ, we have compassion first on those nearest to us and then on others as we encounter them in our day-to-day lives.

The Lord serves His Church. Having been served by the Lord, we go into the world wherever the Lord has placed us and serve Him by caring for those He has put in our lives. Thus, our lives are living witnesses of God’s own mercy in Christ for us and for the sin of the whole world.

In Name of the Father, + Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Rev. Christopher R. Gillespie
Grace Lutheran Church
Dyer, Indiana

Advent II 2011 – Luke 21:25-26

04. December 2011
Advent II
Luke 21:25-26

Hope is a fickle thing. I hope I win the contest I entered (despite the fact that the odds are overwhelmingly not in my favor.) I hope to get a raise next year (despite the fact I’ve done less work and was generally less cooperative.) I hope to lose some weight (even though I can’t resist the chocolate.) I hope for this or that.

Hope is often built upon shaky sand or crumbling foundations. Most people hope without any ground for that hope. Most people don’t win anything in contests. It doesn’t look like anyone will get a raise next year, even if they deserve it. Weight loss does not come through magical hopefulness, but attained through hard work and discipline.

The weather is the worst. My hope for rain doesn’t make it happen. I hope it doesn’t snow like the NOAA predicts but I have no grounds for this hope. I hope the big earthquake that’s been predicted for decades never comes, but in reality it will eventually. I hope for such things but have no reason for hope.

Our faithless hopes fade when faced with great tragedy. When an earthquake devastates a people, we faint with fear. Maybe this could happen to us? When the tsunami wipes out the coast of a far away land, we despair that so many lives were lost, homes destroyed, and a land ruined. Why do such tragedies and disasters bother us? Why do they cause such great distress?

We wonder. We fear. We worry. We ought not be surprised when these things come. Jesus said, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Why worry? Because we do not know if the next disaster is the last. When we look to the earth, we despair because we wonder where God is in all this. We wonder how a loving God could allow such destruction and despair to persist.

By looking to fallen creation we do not know that God loves us. From wind, sea, earthquake, and flood, we know only a God whose wrath against this fallen world is great. If we look to creation, we tremble and fear, wondering if the next day may be our last. If we look to the earth or the sun, moon, and stars, we have no reason for hope. The course of this world is without hope.

These things are signs of God’s wrath against sin. This creation which he so carefully and wonderfully made is daily corrupted by our wickedness and perversity. The wages of this sin is death. Everyone dies as a consequence of their trespasses. Everyone dies and everything dies.

For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now (Romans 8:22). For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God (Romans 8:19). The great distress of the creation testifies that it needs to be delivered from bondage of corruption with us, unto the glory of eternal life with us.

The great distress of man at the signs of this earth are the same as the lesser distress we each experience at death. When we see what comes of a beautiful life, of a beloved spouse, of a loved aunt, of a close friend, we mourn. We mourn because we see what will come of our own life. We too will wither and fade, groan and die.

Worst yet, on the final day all will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. Such an appearance, when the glorious Lord appears to judge all the living and the dead, will be a great and terrifying day. All who have not learned to love Christ will always dread His appearance. Those who have not learned of His love will fear the roaring of the sea and the waves.

Yet, we Christians do not mourn as they who have no hope. Nor do we panic when see the signs. No, we have hope. We do not fear the final day, whether six feet under or while we are yet awake, but rejoice in that day.

That which makes the unbelieving world tremble in fear and shudder with despair, are signs of hope for believers. These signs, whether the end of our life or death of the world, must pass before the new life and new heavens and earth will come to be.

Jesus tells us, now when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near. We see the signs and are inspired to an eager hope. We look up and and not look down. We don’t look to the world but we look to heaven to come.

While we see death and destruction, we ought to see sleep and recreation. Jesus tells us a parable: Look at the fig tree, and all the trees. As soon as they come out in leaf, you see for yourselves and know that summer is already near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. Signs of doom and gloom are for the Christian cause for hope and rejoicing, for we know our redemption is near.

These things must take place. They are not signs of the end but of the new beginning. Consider Jesus. Last week we recalled His triumphant entry into Jerusalem. Such an entry is exactly what was hoped for. A new David. A new Solomon. A Christ to rule Israel and the world. A king who would reign forever and ever.

This is Jesus but not in the way the people hoped. He enters not as the tree about to bloom. First His leaves will fall, like crimson droplets of sweat. He will wither and fade, his life given for the sake of the world. This tree will be cut down at the root. Burned and ashes entombed in the ground. Yet, these are signs of hope and rejoicing.

On the third day, the sun rises. The earthen tomb opens and a shoot appears. The tree of Jesse rises from the ashes, from the stump. This resurrected tree reveals Himself in splendor. He rises all glorious and triumphant. His leaves begin to appear. Eleven new branches appear, grafted onto this tree. Then another, then 500, then the new branches from the four corners of the earth.

We are not surprised but wait in hope. Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all has taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. We know that storms sweeping across this earth, the earthquake and the tempest are the gales that usher in the spring and then summertime of God’s eternal kingdom and sunshine of Christ’s presence. When we see these things begin to take place, look up not down, because your redemption is drawing near. 

This is a certain hope. This is not a fickle thing. It is as sure as the Word of Christ. All else will pass away, but my words will not pass away. Generations grafted into the tree have and will find them true, until He comes again. The Holy Scriptures give us a calm confidence. It teaches us to see the worst and find hope that it is for the best.

We never look down to this earth but look up to the Kingdom to come. This kingdom came when the true King of all nations sprang forth from His rest in the tomb. We are members of this kingdom when the Spirit carried us from death to life through our Baptismal waters.

This kingdom comes in Christ’s own body and blood, the root and sap of our new life. This kingdom will come when the Son of Man appears with power and great glory. We look forward to this kingdom that cannot be shaken, looking full of faith in Him who is “the same yesterday, today and forever.” Come, Lord Jesus.

In Name of the Father, + Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Rev. Christopher R. Gillespie
Grace Lutheran Church
Dyer, Indiana

Advent 1 Midweek “Marytria” – 1 John 1:1-8ff

30. November 2011
Advent 1 Midweek
1 John 1:1-8ff

A preaching series based on and drawn from John Pless’s outline and Al Collver’s Bible study materials. 

This year’s midweek Advent services will consider the latest emphases—systematized, packaged, and illustrated—from our Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod. Witness-Mercy-Life Together. You may recognize them as I introduced them last year and used these emphases to provide focus to our 2012 budget and its proposal. We are not considering them because they are Scripture. Nor are we considering them because they are a full summary of our faith. They are not another catechism. They are simply another set of memory tools to help us teach and learn what the Scriptures teach, specifically aimed toward refocusing the Missouri Synod and her member congregations on the Biblical doctrine of the church. Will they work? Only the Spirit knows, when and where He blows.

Tonight we begin with the first emphasis: witness. In 1872, CFW Walther preached to the Synodical Conference, that “the chief object of [our] joint labor” in the kingdom of Christ is “the salvation of souls.” That is not to say that this is our work. No, it is the Lord who saves souls by the witness of His Gospel. He locates this Gospel in the church and the people of His church are used as instruments of the Gospel to save others. Or, to put it another way, the Holy Spirit creates and sustains saving faith through the witness of the Gospel by others in the church. This good news, this Gospel, is the persona and work of Jesus Christ, who through His life, sufferings, death, and resurrection earned for us forgiveness of sins and eternal life. (Collver)

The Greek word martyria is a term taken from the courtroom; it originally meant something similar to “eyewitness testimony.” In the New Testament, martyria describes eyewitness testimony made by the apostles and others who saw and heard Jesus preach, teach, and heal. At His ascension, Jesus told His apostles, “You will be my witnesses” (Acts 1:8, cf Is 43:12). The testimony about Jesus and His Gospel began with His eyewitnesses and expanded to include those who came to faith through their preaching and teaching. We Christians today are beneficiaries of their witness. As the body of Christ, the church continually bears witness to Jesus. Likewise, every Christian bears witness and testifies about Jesus in the vocations to which God has called him. Further, in the Early Church, those who gave their lives for the sake of the Gospel, that is, bore witness about Jesus through their deaths, were called martyrs, derived from the Greek word martyria. (Collver)

“Bearing witness” says Luther “is nothing but God’s Word spoken by angels or men, and it calls for faith” (AE20:213). In Acts 1:8 the risen Lord says of His apostles that they will be His witness in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and beyond those borders to the end of the earth. It is the apostles who with their own eyes have seen the Lord, touched Him with their own hands, and heard His voice with their ears who are designated witnesses. We are witnesses only in a derived sense that our words echo the reliable testimony of the apostles. To bear witness is to speak not of ourselves but of another—Jesus Christ. (Pless)

[St. John writes in his first epistle: “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life— 2 the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us— 3 that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. 4 And these things we write to you that your joy may be full” (1 John 1:1-4)]

The great witness of Advent is John the Baptist. “The prologue [of the Fourth Gospel] says that God sent John to be a witness (1:6-8). A witness speaks in contexts where the truth is disputed. If everything is clear, there is no need for testimony” (Koester, The Word of Life, p. 34). The witness of John the Baptist is twofold. He bears witness to human sinfulness which separates man from God. In no uncertain terms he names sin for what it is, showing his hearers their inability to recognize the One who stands among them is their Messiah. [John answered them, saying, “I baptize with water, but there stands One among you whom you do not know. 27 It is He who, coming after me, is preferred before me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to loose” (John 1:26-27).] (Pless)

John is not sent to bear witness to himself; he is the voice crying in the wilderness. [19 Now this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” 20 He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.” 21 And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the Prophet?” And he answered, “No.” 22 Then they said to him, “Who are you, that we may give an answer to those who sent us? What do you say about yourself?” 23 He said: “I am ‘The voice of one crying in the wilderness: “Make straight the way of the Lord,” ’ as the prophet Isaiah said.” (John 1:19-23)]

John is neither the light of the world (John 1:6-8) nor the Christ (John 1:20) but the one sent to bear witness. Thus he proclaims Jesus Christ as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Our witness is always this same confession of Jesus Christ.

32 And John bore witness, saying, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and He remained upon Him. 33 I did not know Him, but He who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, this is He who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ 34 And I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.” (John 1:32-34)

This first-hand testimony reveals the truth, because John saw and heard and now bears witness. The Holy Trinity are all active in Jesus’ Baptism. The Holy Spirit specifically points to and directs us to see Jesus, the Son of God. This cannot come by our own reason or strength, as we confess in Luther’s explanation to the Third Article, but “the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel.” The Holy Spirit directs us through the Word of testimony, of witness, to see Jesus. This Word of Jesus creates faith in you when it is heard. By the working of the Holy Spirit through this Word, with John, we recognize Jesus is the Son of God.

We need the witness to believe and to remain in this faith until the end. St. Paul says: 14 How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? 15 And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, Who bring glad tidings of good things!” 16 But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?” 17 So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God (Romans 10:14-17).

Some think that only those who have never heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ should receive the Church’s witness. However, people in the Church and people in the world need the Church’s witness! [We need to be converted, yes, but we also need this witness to keep us in the faith.] What is the chief content of that witness? God’s gracious and free forgiveness of our sins for Jesus’ sake.

St. John writes in his first epistle: This is He who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not only by water, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth. 7 For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. 8 And there are three that bear witness on earth: the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree as one. 

All three, the Spirit, the water, and the blood testify, or bear witness, to Jesus. Or to put it another way, the preaching of the Word and the administration of the Sacraments bear witness to Jesus. For the sake of Jesus, God forgives our sins through the Word, both preached and in Holy Absolution; and through the water of Holy Baptism and the body and blood of Jesus in the Lord’s Supper. In order to witness what the Lord has done for us, we Christians need first to be fed by God’s Word and be forgiven our sins through these means of grace. (Collver)

Thus, we, too, are witnesses with the apostles. We have heard and we see by the testimony they have given and the work of the Holy Spirit. Our duty is to bear witness to Jesus, true. But first, let us receive this witness through preaching, instruction and catechesis, and through the receiving of Christ’s forgiveness in the blessed sacraments. This is precisely where Jesus, the Word, locates Himself for you, His people. By receiving, we testify to Jesus. By the work of the Holy Spirit, by the water of Baptism, by the confession of Christ’s death and resurrection for us, and by the Lord’s Supper, the world will know what Jesus has done. “For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes” (1 Cor 11:26). Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.

In Name of the Father, + Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Rev. Christopher R. Gillespie
Grace Lutheran Church
Dyer, Indiana