Freed to Love As We've Been Loved

[Below you'll find the message prepared for worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, on Sunday, August 28.]

Luke 14:1-14

In today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 14:1-14, Jesus tells us: “...all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” (Luke 14:11) Jesus here teaches us an important truth: The Gospel given to us in the crucified and risen Jesus Christ, achieves what God’s Law cannot. And humility receives what pride cannot. Jesus is going to tell us this three times over in our lesson. Let’s pay attention to His words.

The lesson begins: “One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched.” (Luke 14:1) It’s important to note that the wedding feast is happening on a Sabbath day. Our translation says that it takes place at the house of a “prominent” Pharisee. The Greek in which Luke, like the other New Testament writers composed his Gospel, says that the owner of the house was an ἀρχόντων (archonton), a ruler of the Jews. This guy was a leading Pharisee. Pharisaism, you’ll recall, was a sect of Judaism that effectively taught people they could be right with God if they obeyed God’s Law. Jesus had already had run-ins with the Pharisees over the Sabbath. Now, every Pharisee in the room is watching Jesus closely, looking for Him to violate God’s Law, giving them a reason to seek Jesus’ execution.

Luke tells us that in front of Jesus was a man suffering from dropsy, an “abnormal swelling of his body.” Jesus asks the Pharisees and the teachers of religious law (the Scribes), “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” (Luke 14:3) We could rephrase Jesus’ question as, “Will God damn a person to hell for showing kindness to someone, praying for them, sharing the Gospel with them, feeding them a meal, on the Sabbath?” The answer should be obvious. Both the Old Testament and Jesus Himself summarized God’s Law as loving God completely and loving our neighbor as we love ourselves. This is the point of the Ten Commandments, God’s basic moral law. It shows you how completely sinful we are at birth that God has to command us to love. And even when He does, we can’t in our own power love God completely or love others with the same commitment with which we love ourselves. With the apostle Paul, we’re bound to say, “...I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.” (Romans 7:18)

The Pharisees thought otherwise. They were sure they kept God’s Law scrupulously and just to be sure, had created more than 600 additional laws by which they were certain they proved themselves righteous and worthy of life with God. In the process, they pitted God’s Law (or their version of God’s Law) against God’s love. There are times in their previous confrontations with Jesus that they condemn Jesus for acting lovingly on the Sabbath. After Jesus poses His question today, the Pharisees and Scribes, “remained silent.” (Luke 14:4) So, Jesus heals the man of his dropsy, then confronts the Pharisees and Scribes again, asking them: “If one of you has a child or an ox that falls into a well on the Sabbath day, will you not immediately pull it out?” Now, only a monstrous parent or a stupid owner of livestock would wait until after the Sabbath to rescue their child or their ox. But now, Luke says, the Pharisees “...had nothing to say.” (Luke 14:4)

Jesus, as God the Son, is the Lord of the Sabbath. He created the Sabbath not to provide an excuse the self-righteous can use for not loving God or neighbor one day a week. God gives us the Sabbath so that we can hear and learn His Word. You and I are born with a debt to God that we, in our own goodness, cannot repay. Jesus offered His sinless life on the cross to cancel the debt we owe to God for our sin and to give us everlasting life with God. He gives all this to us as a free gift we cannot earn. So, it’s OK to be compassionate on the Sabbath…or on any other day of the week. We don’t have to love God or neighbor to be saved from sin and death. Jesus has destroyed the power of sin to condemn us and separate us from God. In the Gospel, Jesus has set us free from sin and death–that’s the Gospel. With this gift then, He sets us free to live lives of love. Proud people, certain of their own goodness, can never be right with God or have life with Him. The humble, on the other hand, realize their salvation is entirely the work of God in Christ and, their pride broken, receive life from Him!

Now, the Pharisees and the Scribes aren’t the only ones who are watching in our lesson. Verse 7 tells us that Jesus is observing how everyone is seeking places of honor at the feast. Jesus tells His host and fellow guests not to push themselves forward like this. If someone higher on the ladder shows up, Jesus says, your host will be forced to tell you to take a seat at a lower spot. Instead, Jesus says, take a seat in the lowest place. Then the host may approach you and say, “Come on up to a higher place, a place of honor.”

Now, don’t misunderstand Jesus here. He isn’t establishing a new law. Jesus isn’t saying that we’ll earn better places at the heavenly banquet to which all His saints will go when they’ve been raised from the dead. Instead, Jesus is telling us to face facts, like the sinful tax collector in one of His parables. Remember, Jesus said, the tax collector entered the temple and didn’t dare come close to God, aware that he didn’t merit even being in the presence of God. Instead, from a place of lowliness, he cried out, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” (Luke 18:13) The humble know that, sinners though we are, it’s only through Jesus that we have a place in His kingdom. I don’t know about you, but knowing that I don’t deserve the forgiveness of my sins or everlasting life with God, I’m not going to be particular about the seating arrangements in heaven. Wherever Jesus puts me in His Kingdom, I won’t deserve it. I’ll just be grateful that He died and rose for someone like me! The psalmist writes, “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.” (Psalm 84:10)

Lastly, Jesus tells the Pharisees and Scribes that when they host a dinner, they shouldn’t invite people who can repay them. Instead, Jesus says, “...invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” (Luke 14:14) Now, again, Jesus isn’t giving us some new law. He isn’t saying, “If you’ll invite the riff raff, the drug dealers, the thugs to your house, I’ll invite you into My kingdom.” Jesus is saying that because by God’s grace through faith in Jesus, we already have a place in the Kingdom of God, we don’t need to play the world’s games. The proud want to have an in with powerful, important people. The humble know that even the powerful and important of this world are mortals and sinners in need of God’s grace. This is why God’s Word tells us, “Do not put your trust in princes, in human beings, who cannot save…Blessed are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God.” (Psalm 146:3, 5) When you know you have the favor of God, you needn’t seek the favor of the world’s kings, queens, bosses, big shots, or pop stars. Jesus gives us the confidence to love others without thinking of repayment because we know He has already loved us and given us an eternal place with Him!

The Gospel gives us what God’s Law cannot. And humility receives what pride cannot. A place in God’s kingdom doesn’t belong to those who self-consciously perform good religious works, who, in their heart of hearts, harbor the belief that their goodness and achievement make them worthy for life with God. A place in God’s kingdom belongs only to those who know with Saint Paul that, “...it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9) Friends, our only boast is in Jesus. He is the One Who calls us to life with Him in His kingdom, the highest and best place anyone could be, no matter what the world may think of us. Jesus calls out to you again today, “Friend, move up to a better place,” the place where Jesus is our saving King and we are His people forever. Amen

The Narrow Way

[Below, you'll find the sermon from yesterday's worship services with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, as well as the live stream video of both services. Have a good and blessed week!]

Luke 13:22-30

Today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 13:22-30, begins with a question from a member of a crowd surrounding Jesus: “Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?”

Jesus’ answer is shocking!

He doesn’t give the man a number.

He doesn’t tell the man that good people who do good things will be saved.

Instead, He tells the man in Luke 13:24: “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.”

What is Jesus saying?

What’s the effort He’s talking about?

And what is the narrow door?

When Jesus says “make every effort” or, as other translations put it, “strive,” He is not joining the chorus of the first-century Jewish teachers or all the other religions of the world besides the faith commended by the Bible in saying, “You’ll get saved if you try really hard.” Jesus is not saying that we’re saved by our good works.

If Jesus were saying that it would represent a whiplash-inducing flip flop from what, just a few verses before, He taught.

In Luke 13, starting at verse 18, He tells a parable about the Kingdom of God, saying that it’s like a mustard seed which a man planted in his field, which later became a tree in which birds perched.

Starting at verse 20, Jesus says the Kingdom of God is like a bit of yeast a woman put into sixty pounds of flour until it permeated and expanded the size of the bread dough she made.

In these two parables, the mustard seed and the yeast represent God’s Word coming from outside ourselves–the Latin phrase that Luther used here was extra nos–to bring God’s grace, faith, salvation, and His Kingdom to human beings who could not do anything for themselves. The soil couldn’t grow a mustard tree apart from the seed and the agency of God and the farmer. The flour couldn’t become bread apart from the yeast and the agency of God and the woman.

The Kingdom of God comes to us from outside ourselves God the Father sends His Son Jesus to save us from sin and death. The Holy Spirit sends the Word of God, seemingly small and inconsequential, into our lives and it produces saving faith in Jesus that, alone, makes us fit for entry into God’s Kingdom!

In our Gospel lesson, Jesus doesn’t contradict Himself.

The root word translated from the Greek in which Luke wrote his gospel as “make every effort” or, in some translations, “strive,” is ἀγωνίζομαι (agonizomai) from which we get the English words, agonize and agony.

It was a word the Greeks used of the struggle and discipline employed by athletes to train and compete. The disciplined athlete strives for a prize, a trophy, or a reward, sometimes money, which she or he had nothing to do with creating.

The athlete’s job is to lay aside things like not getting enough sleep, eating too much, eating the wrong things, or using harmful drugs, habits that may keep them from attaining the prize created for them by others.

Jesus is saying that the free gifts of salvation–including God’s forgiveness of our sin, new and everlasting life with God, and being with Jesus at the heavenly banquet that never ends, gifts achieved for us by God through the cross of Jesus–is available to all who turn from sin and trust in Jesus to be their God and King!

This is what the preacher of Hebrews said in last Sunday’s second Bible lesson: “...throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles…run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith…” (Hebrews 12:1-2)

Jesus once said that it would be harder for a rich man to enter heaven than it would be for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. The worship of and reliance on wealth to which the wealthy are especially tempted needs to be jettisoned if the wealthy are to be part of God’s kingdom. They must trust in Jesus above all else! Listen: We all have gods and sins we need to let go of in order to follow Jesus alone into the Kingdom of God! The discipline of that may cause us agony. We are in love with our favorite sins. But nothing this dying world has to offer compares with being set free by God to grasp the outstretched hand of Jesus for all the blessings He offers us freely!

We live in an age when people, if they ever think of God, see Him as a nice guy, a pushover. They figure God won’t let anyone to hell.

Let’s be clear: Jesus, God in the flesh, did die on the cross for everyone. But He doesn’t force salvation on anyone.

The doorway to a life with Jesus is wide open to everyone even though our inborn sinful nature, our inborn desire to be like God, along with the world and the devil, work to push us away from Jesus. 

Jesus says that there’s only one way to life with God. It’s the narrow way. And that narrow way is Jesus. “I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved,” Jesus says in John 10:9. 

Jesus expands on this theme in the next verses: “Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’ Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will reply, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’” 

There will come a time when the door allowing people to have eternal life with God, the narrow way, will be closed. The door may close at death, when it will be too late to enter eternity with God through repentance and faith in Jesus. Or, if people are alive when Jesus returns to the world, to bring judgment, it will be too late for people to take shelter in His grace and forgiveness. In those moments, no matter how much people may pound at heaven’s door, those who haven’t turned to Christ in repentant faith in this life will pound in vain. 

And it won’t do these people any good to say, “We made big offerings to the Church. We sang hymns and praise songs. We volunteered for outreaches.”

To people like this, the owner of the house--Jesus--will say at the Judgment, “I don’t know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!”

Jesus goes on to say of those around Him who think they’ll be saved by genetics or good works, left outside of God’s kingdom: “There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.”

Those who turn from Jesus or who take Him for granted or who keep him removed by an arm’s length in this life, will have an eternity of pain and regret. 

But Jesus doesn’t end His answer at that. There is good news!

He says in verses 29-30: “People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God. Indeed, there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.”

You can take great comfort from these words from Jesus, friends!

People from the world over are already part of God’s kingdom through the crucified and risen Jesus.

The Gospel Word has come to them: preached, taught, imposed by water in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and given to them as bread and wine that is also Christ’s body and blood.

And through that Word, they have saving faith in Jesus. All believers can cherish the Gospel promise in Romans 8:1 (along with countless other places in Scripture): “...there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…”

“But, Lord,” we might say, “I sinned this morning.” “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

“But, Lord, I’ve taken Your name in vain, stolen, lied, committed adultery, coveted what my neighbor owns. Just this week.” To those to whom the Word of God has given repentant faith, the answer is, “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

“But, Lord, I’ve never been good at sharing my faith with others.” “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

Jesus opens the door to the kingdom of God to everyone!

As a sinner who deserves nothing from God, a rebel against God’s law of love from the moment I was born, I’m grateful that Jesus gives His righteousness to all who repent and believe in Him.

I belong to God not because I’m good; I’m not.

I belong to God not because I have the right genes; I don’t. (You can tell I lack perfect genes with one look at my oversized nose planted on an undersized head!)

I belong to God–you and I belong to God to God----because God is good and by His grace through the faith in Jesus that His Holy Spirit gives to us at our Baptism and offers to us whenever His Word is shared, He covers us with Jesus’ goodness and the power of His victory over sin and death.

Shortly before He set His eyes for Jerusalem and His cross, Jesus said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23)

Jesus leads those who take up their crosses–that is, who daily turn from their sin that God rightly condemns–and follow Jesus–meaning, those who trust in Jesus as their Lord, King, God, and Savior–into eternity with God.

Like Joshua, who God used to lead the ancient Israelites into the promised land, Jesus leads those who believe in Him through the open door of God’s grace.

One day, when Jesus returns, that door will be shut.

But today, while the door is open wide, let us turn from sin and death, from pride and arrogance, from the temptation of thinking that the the things of this world can set us free from sin and death, and turn instead to forgiveness, peace, hope, wholeness, and life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Jesus the Divider

[Below is the text of the prepared message for worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville Ohio which happened earlier today. Also below are the live stream videos of both worship services. God bless you!]

Luke 12:49-53

Today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 12:49-53, may leave us wondering what is going on? Jesus’ words are jarring. Especially when He says, “Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division.” (Luke 12:51)

Yet we remember that on Christmas night when Jesus was born, the angels sang: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” (Luke 2:14) We remember too that on the evening of the first Easter Sunday, the resurrected Jesus told His fearful disciples, “Peace be with you!” (John 20:19, 21)

So, which is it: Does Jesus come into our lives to bring us peace or division? The answer is, “Yes.”

Here, we must remember again a fundamental principle of Biblical and of Lutheran theology. In His Word, God speaks to us in two ways. You know what they are. God speaks to us in His Law and in His Gospel. The Bible remains baffling to us until we understand that God always speaks to us in these two different ways and we must never confuse one for the other. We must learn to discern the way in which He speaks to us at any given time.

Sometimes, God speaks the Law to us. In His moral Law, God demonstrates that you and I are sinners incapable of qualifying ourselves for eternity with God. The Law shows me that I can’t make myself righteous. The moment I hear God’s command, “You shall not bear false witness,” for example, I’m reminded of the countless ways, big and small, that I’ve lied to others and I’m filled with despair because I know that I can’t work to completely free myself from this sin of false witness. God’s Law shows us that we are sinners who deserve condemnation and death and that there’s nothing we can do about it. This Law shows that, left to our own devices, including all our efforts to be or act religious, we are divided from God. There’s no peace in that!

At other times, God speaks to us in His promises, His Gospel. God isn’t content to see His children separated from Him, consigned to an eternity of condemnation. So, Jesus, God the Son, sinless though He is, takes all our sin into Himself, taking the condemnation for sin we deserve, so that all who turn to Him in faith receive His righteousness. This gracious Gospel Word brings peace–everlasting peace, peace even in the middle of chaos–to those who receive the Holy Spirit’s gift of faith in Christ, offered in the Gospel Word and in the Sacraments of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion. Christ has come into our world to make God’s peace with the rebel human race; but we can’t know the peace of God apart from faith in Christ.

All of this helps us to make sense of Jesus’ words to us in today’s Gospel lesson, I think. Jesus says: “I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” (Luke 12:49)

Jesus, of course, is God the Son. Of God, the preacher of the New Testament book of Hebrews, along with Moses in the Old Testament book of Deuteronomy, says, “our ‘God is a consuming fire.’” (Hebrews 12:29; Deuteronomy 9:3)

In the Bible, fire is associated with the wrath of God. The wrath of God isn’t God actively seeking the destruction of sinners. God’s Word says that God doesn’t want “anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9) But when people choose to unrepentantly violate the will of God, crossing the lines God establishes in His Law, they meet God’s wrath. They are consumed. That’s just how God has designed His universe. (And by the way, without the Holy Spirit bringing the Word about Jesus to us and creating faith within us, the only choice we sin-bound human beings can make is to unrepentantly violate the will of God. Without the freedom of God’s grace in Christ, sin is our human default position.) This is why, in the Bible, hell is often portrayed as a fiery place.

But here today in our lesson, Jesus is telling us that He Himself is going to incur the fire of God’s wrath for our sin on the cross. His righteous life will be consumed as He voluntarily accedes to separation from God the Father at Calvary.

This is underscored by what Jesus says next in our lesson: “I have a baptism to undergo, and what constraint I am under until it is completed!” (Luke 12:50) Jesus, of course, was already baptized in the Jordan River. But here, He references the baptism He will endure on the cross. From the cross, He will cry out to God: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46) Jesus will be divided from God the Father and God the Holy Spirit, just as human beings without repentant faith in Jesus are divided or separated from God.

Jesus next says, as we’ve already noted, “Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division.” (Luke 12:51)

Jesus is the divider of history. He has come, first of all, to divide us from the condemnation of sin and from death.

But Jesus divides in other ways. Some people, for example, will receive His forgiveness, salvation, eternal life, and peace. Others will not.

Those who receive the gift of the Holy Spirit will be enabled to confess Jesus as Lord and have God’s peace.

Those who refuse the gift and remain enslaved to sin and death will remain divided from the peace of God.

This will bring division even to families and friends. Jesus says, “From now on there will be five in one family divided against each other, three against two and two against three.” (Luke 12:52)

Probably every one of us here is experiencing precisely what Jesus talks about here. You, like me, are a sinner with whom Jesus has made His peace. You have been justified by grace through faith in Him. He’s given you the support and the fellowship of Christ’s Church. You’re grateful for all of this.

But you also likely have family members, friends, classmates, and co-workers who want nothing to do with Jesus Christ or His Church.

They don’t believe that their sinful nature or the sins they commit because of that nature will separate them from God.

Or they don’t believe there is a God and are simply consumed by the desire to get ahead in the world.

Maybe they’ve become involved in some addictive behaviors, habits, or pastimes that have become their gods.

Or maybe they bear a grudge against God because someone they prayed for died.

When you have people like that in your life, it hurts. You want them to know peace with God. You want them to know Jesus as Lord, God, Savior, and Friend.

It can also be painful for us disciples to daily submit to being divided from our favorite sins in order to follow Jesus.

It can be painful too, to face rejection or indifference when we share Jesus with others.

But, friends, even as I urge you to keep praying for those loved ones and friends divided from God to come to faith in Jesus, I want to encourage you right now in the peace of God, the peace Jesus gives believers.

In our second lesson, the author of Hebrews tells Christians that all believers in the God revealed in Jesus who have died and are now with the Lord, now surround us as “a great cloud of witnesses.” (Luke 12:1) And they are cheering on we believers in Jesus still on earth, that we will be faithful in following Jesus, “the pioneer and perfecter of faith.”

Jesus, the writer of Hebrews says, ignored the temptations to avoid the cross and endured separation from God so that all who believe in Him need never be separated from God. Jesus counted it joy to be briefly separated from life itself, dead in the tomb, in order to give peace with God to you and me!

All who trust in Jesus have the peace of knowing that one day we will join Jesus and this great cloud of witnesses in eternal joy. Jesus promises that “the one who stands firm [in believing in Him] to the end will be saved.” (Matthew 24:13)

And, because the Gospel Word of Jesus is so powerful, it’s just possible that all those people for whom we’ve prayed and with whom we’ve shared  Jesus will join us in God’s peaceful eternity. God can use the witnessing and the prayers of the Church to reach those who seem intent on being eternal separated from God and His peace!

We don’t know how everything will turn out.

But we do know that Jesus is the way and the truth and the life and that all who believe in Him have life with God. They will have peace with God.

May we ever rejoice in this truth and in the peace Jesus freely gives to those who believe. Amen!