The Good Christ Gives

[Below is the text of today's message shared during worship with the people and friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, as well as live stream video from both the traditional and modern worship services.]

Romans 8:28-39

Our second lesson for today, Romans 8:28-39, is one of the most inspiring passages in the whole Bible.

God inspired the apostle Paul to write these words to comfort those who are baptized into and who believe in Jesus Christ as their God and Savior.

God wants these words to be Gospel words of promise secured by Jesus through His death and resurrection for sinners like you and me.

But, even though we know we’ve been set free from the power of sin and death at our Baptism, have come to trust in Jesus, and that God has made us His saints, we still are sinners. Until we physically die and are physically raised from the dead by Jesus, we saints will also be sinners.

And because we are sinners, we sometimes read the Word of God as sinners rather than as saints, as the hopeless and the dead rather than as the hopeful and the living. This can lead us away from the clear Word of hope and comfort God wants to give us through Jesus.

Take the first verse of our second lesson. Paul writes: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28)

You were summoned or called to salvation by God, at the waters of Holy Baptism. Paul says, if you love the God Who died and rose for you in Jesus, meaning, if you believe in Jesus, then you know that, in all circumstances, God works for your good! These words are meant to comfort us.

But, we may think, not everything seems to be working together for my good in life.

My family is troubled.

There’s cancer or diabetes or dementia or depression in our household.

My spouse and I are arguing.

My kids are rebellious against God and me.

I may lose my job.

My grades are terrible and I’m afraid I may not get ahead in life.

That person who I thought loved me has dumped me.

In such circumstances, we hear or read these words of comfort and hope–”all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose”--and we wonder: Am I not really a believer? Do I not believe enough? Is God punishing me? Is God trying to teach me something? Why aren’t things working out for my good?

Listen, friends: God didn’t inspire Paul to write these words to discourage you or to question your salvation.

First John 4:15 tells us: “Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.” (ESV)

The bad things–and death itself–that come to us in this life have nothing to do with whether God loves you or forgives you or has saved you.

If by the means of His grace–His Word and His Sacraments, Holy Baptism and Holy Communion–you can affirm your faith in Jesus. You know that the bad things that come your way aren’t from God.They result from the sin, decay, and death of this dying, fallen universe. And Jesus tells us that both repentant saints and unrepentant sinners are subject to the bad things that come in such a world.

So, how will all the bad of this world work for the good of those who trust in Jesus? Our lesson goes on to say: “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.” (Romans 8:29)

Don’t let the devil twist these words in your mind. (The old jerk will certainly try to do that!)

The Bible does not teach what’s called “double predestination”: the false idea that before you and I were even born, God destined some to go to heaven and some to go to hell. God’s Word tells us that “God our Savior…wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” (1 Timothy 2:3-4)  And Jesus told Nicodemus that God the Father sent Him because God so loved the whole world! (John 3:16) As you’ve heard me say before: God is not a monster; He will not force salvation on us, but He doesn’t pick out winners and losers before we’re born.

The word translated as predestined in our lesson is, in the Greek in which Paul wrote, is, προορίζω, the second part of which gives us our English word, horizon. It literally means to mark out beforehand, to clear the horizon.

What Paul is saying is that God, through His pioneering work, Jesus goes ahead of us and predestines those who, by the power of the Gospel Word, believe in Him, to become His brothers and sisters in the new and eternal creation He will fully usher in on His return to the earth.

Jesus Christ clears a path for us through the sin, suffering, challenges, and death of this world to lead us to the destiny that belongs to all who trust in Him: everlasting life with God.

Paul then tells us how we, as disciples of the crucified and risen Jesus, can view the sad and tragic things that happen to us in this life. He writes in words I can’t improve upon:

“...If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:

‘For your sake we face death all day long;
    we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.’

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:31b-39)

The God we know in Jesus is for us, friends!

He is for you.

He brings you the forgiveness of your sins.

He conquers all the sadness, difficulties, and death of this life so that they will not have the last say over your life.

He gives you an eternity with God that cannot be taken away from you.

This is the good that belongs to all who daily turn from sin and daily follow Jesus, the good that belongs to all who confess “I believe in God the Father almighty…I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son our Lord…I believe in the Holy Spirit.”

This is the good of knowing the Savior Who promises to be with us always, here and now, and that one day, will call us from our graves into a life in which sin, sadness, difficulty, and death will be no more.

On the day when angels sound forth the trumpets of heaven and Jesus descends again to the earth, Jesus will call us to rise in our glorified bodies that no longer bear the pains of this fallen universe, and will call us to come face to face with Him Who “will wipe every tear from [our] eyes. [And] There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things [will have] passed away.” (Revelation 21:4)

It’s then that the new day that can never die will arrive.

This is the good from which nothing in this world can separate you, the good that Jesus died and rose to secure for you. 

In Christ, dear friends, you are justified by grace through faith in Him.

In Christ, you have an eternity with God that belongs to all who believe.

In Christ, you are more than conquerors.

You are God’s own dear child.

This is, no matter what may happen to you today or tomorrow or at any time in this life, this is the good that God has worked for you in Christ.

Turn to Him.

He will give you the faith and the blessings you need now and for all eternity.

Amen

The Old Testament Book of Ezekiel, Part 39

The Old Testament Book of Ezekiel, Part 38

Wheat, Weeds, and the Harvest

[Below, you'll find the text of the message shared during both worship services of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio today. You'll also find live stream video of both the traditional and modern worship services.]

Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

I once heard the pastor of a megachurch describe two questions he used to prepare all of his so-called “sermons”: “What do I want them to know? What do I want them to do?” It’s no surprise then, to learn that his messages were basically TED TALKS, motivational speeches with an occasional side of Jesus. He saw himself and the Church as being in the business of telling people what they would look like if they were holy disciples of Jesus and then giving them the steps, the ladder they could climb, to make themselves look like holy disciples.

There are at least three big problems with this approach. The first problem is that the focus isn’t on Jesus Christ and what He has done for us through His death and resurrection. And the focus isn’t on what He’s doing for us today–the means by which He promises to come to us and give us saving faith in Him–in His Word, in Holy Baptism, in Holy Communion, or in the fellowship of believers.

The focus in this approach, which is endemic to the United States these days, is turned away from the God revealed to us in Jesus and instead, is put on us: what we’ve done, what we’re doing, what we’re accomplishing.

But, friends, if we could attain the forgiveness of our sins or a holiness that would make us fit for eternity with God, then Jesus would not have needed to go to the cross to pay the penalty for our sins.

Christian faith isn’t a self-improvement project. It is not about becoming or being a moral person, because none of us is capable of obeying God’s moral law perfectly. Is that not correct.

Christian faith is about God coming to us in the crucified and risen Jesus to give us His forgiveness, His life, and His righteousness even though we don’t deserve any of these things.

The apostle Paul reminds us of this: “When we were still helpless [that means unable to save ourselves or make ourselves holy], Christ died for the wicked [that’s you and me] at the time that God chose.” (Romans 5:6, Good News Translation)

We are saved and we are made holy by Jesus alone and not by our Christian self-improvement efforts!

Quickly, the two other problems that this approach leads to must be clear. It leads either to spiritual pride or to spiritual despair. 

People who take this false preaching to heart will either be certain that they are holier than others because of all the good things they think they do or they will look at their repeated failures to free themselves of sin and temptation and give up on the Christian life altogether.

Either way, they are driven away from Christ and the life of righteousness only He can give to us. And that’s eternally tragic!

Jesus tells us in today’s Gospel lesson that it is the evil one himself, the devil, who works to delude us through the false gospel of Christian self-improvement and thereby, turn us away from reliance on Christ alone for our forgiveness and life with God.

In the lesson, Jesus tells a parable, which He leaves obscure and uninterpreted for the crowds looking for a religious how-to lesson. He then explains the parable to the disciples, people like you and me who turn to Jesus for forgiveness and new life with God.

In the parable, Jesus talks about the Kingdom of Heaven, that is, the Church, where the Gospel is rightly proclaimed and the Sacraments rightly administered. Until the day of Jesus’ return, what the Bible calls the Day of the Lord, the Kingdom of Heaven comes to us in God’s Word and the Sacraments, within the fellowship of the Church. 

In Jesus’ parable, a Sower, who is Jesus, the Son of Man, plants good seed in the world.

The good seed are disciples who trust that, Jesus is the way and the truth and the life and that there is no other way to forgiveness and life from God but through Jesus. (John 14:6)

The weeds are people on the membership rolls of Christian, even Lutheran Christian, churches who are like that megachurch pastor; they think that being holy is all about doing religious works which they’re sure they do.

Weeds are like the Pharisees who were horrified that Jesus spent time with sinners, proclaiming God’s forgiveness of their sins.

Weeds have been the cause of much evil in Christ’s Church. They start church fights, accuse fellow members of not being real Christians, work to rid their churches of what they regard as undesirables.

The enemy who plants these weeds among the wheat, of course, is Satan. 

In this parable, Jesus is warning Christians of a truth: The devil’s number one target for chaos, division, and false teaching is the Church, the Kingdom of heaven on earth.

Also in Jesus’ parable, servants, concerned that the Master has allowed his enemy to plant weeds among the wheat–that is, false disciples among the true–ask if the Master–Jesus Himself–wants them to pull up the sprouting weeds.

If the megachurch pastor were asked that question, he probably would answer, “Yes.” But, Christ the Master says, No. There’s no need for you to be vigilante harvesters, He basically says, “because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest.” (Matthew 13:29-30)

Jesus later explains that there will be a harvest. On the Day of His return to usher in the new heavens and the new earth, His angels will be the harvesters of His Church. They will yank up all the weeds, those who have trusted in their own righteousness, rather than trusting Christ’s righteousness, and send them to the fire of hell for all eternity. The angels will also bring the wheat, Christ’s disciples, sinners, like you and me, made righteous through their faith in Jesus, into eternity with God!

So, what are we in the Church to do about the weeds in our midst within the Church?

Sometimes, we’ll have to fight against their false teaching and point to Jesus and that He gives His righteousness to those who trust in Him.

Sometimes, we’ll leave one church or church body to be united with Christ through a different church or church body.

But, Jesus tells us today, our call isn’t to rid the Church of those we suspect of being fake Christians, weeds.

You see, even if a church is forced to excommunicate someone for spreading false doctrine or living in unrepentant sin, the excommunication should be done in the hopes of bring such folks back into the fellowship of Christ’s Church.

Why is that?

For one thing, we could be wrong in our judgments about our fellow church members. We may mistake wheat for weeds. God told the Old Testament judge, Samuel: “People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” (1 Samuel 6:7)

Another reason we shouldn’t presume to tear those we think are weeds from the Church is that the Word of God–faithfully given in preaching, teaching, witnessing, Holy Baptism, and Holy Communion–can change weeds into wheat. (Isn’t that what He’s done and is doing to you and me? I know that I can be more weedy than wheaty sometimes.)

The Gospel Word of Jesus can leave even notorious weeds to confess, as The Small Catechism confesses: “I believe that Jesus Christ–true God…and also true man…has redeemed me, a lost and condemned creature, and has freed me from sin, death, and the power of devil…with His holy and precious blood and his innocent suffering and death…” It all depends on Jesus alone!

Until Jesus returns, our call as the Church is to proclaim the Good News, the Gospel, to wheat and weeds within and to the world outside the Church.

We share what the apostle Paul told his fellow Jews in Antioch: “...through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses.” (Acts 13:38-39)

We are made righteous not by anything we do, but solely by what Jesus Christ has already done for us. Jesus promises in today’s lesson that those made “righteous [by Jesus and His grace] will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” (Matthew 13:43)

Friends, in Jesus Christ, you are eternally right with God. You are right with Him now!

I declare to you that, through Him, all your sins are forgiven, eternally buried by Christ.

By grace through faith in Jesus, you are righteous.

Don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise!

Those who have ears, let them hear.

Amen

The Gospel of John, July 23, 2023

The adult Sunday School class of Living Water Lutheran Church started a study of the Gospel of John today.

The Old Testament Book of Ezekiel, Part 37

The Old Testament Book of Ezekiel, Part 36

God's Law and Gospel, July 16, 2023

The Powerful Seed of God's Word

[Below is the message from both of today's worship services from Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio. You also will find live stream video of both services. I hope you find it helpful. Have a good week!]

Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

I want to begin with two words of promise, of gospel, for you.

First, Romans 8:1: “...there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…”

Second, Romans 10:9: “If you declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

If, by the power of God’s Word, given to you by the Holy Spirit in Scriptures and in Holy Baptism and in Holy Communion, you trust that Jesus, by His death and resurrection, has conquered sin and death for you, you are saved for life with God that never ends.

As the old hymn puts it, “The strife o’er, the battle done!”

You belong to Jesus!

I begin this way because I want to inoculate you against the second-guessing of your salvation that so many preachers, including this one, may have planted in your minds over the years in our preaching on today’s gospel lesson. In fact, I became so convicted about this that last night, I deleted all the sermons I’ve preached on this text from my blog. (I think I got them all.)

So, I want you to know that if you believe in Jesus, you can know that you have been saved–justified–by God’s grace through faith in Jesus. You need not doubt that!

We will then take great care in considering the parable in our gospel lesson today because our familiarity with it may prevent us from understanding it and because the parable deserves careful consideration.

The parable Jesus that teaches there, along with the explanation of it that He offers privately to us disciples, is familiar. Matthew says that Jesus tells the parable not in “the house,” that is the Church. Instead, He goes out by the lake and climbs into a boat in order to preach to the crowds surrounding Jesus. This is key to understanding the parable.

The crowds to whom Jesus goes to teach aren’t following Him out of conviction. They do so from curiosity or in the hope of getting something out of Jesus. They want blessings without discipleship; salvation without repentance; assurance without faith. They want to keep their options open in case some other savior comes along with a better offer.

Most in the crowds will hear Jesus’ story, yawn, and move on.

In fact, the truth that may shock you is that Jesus intends precisely this reaction from those who refuse to listen or believe in Him. And while Jesus teaches the parables with the desire that some would have their curiosity piqued and might come to repent and believe in Him, He doesn’t teach them directly, but obliquely, symbolically, in this parable. That’s because, as He puts it elsewhere, Jesus doesn’t throw pearls to pigs. Those who do not want to hear Jesus usually won’t.

Later though, Jesus freely explains the parable to the Church, to the disciples, to those in whom His Word creates a desire to hear His saving Word.

In Jesus’ parable, there is a Sower. This is Jesus Himself or any disciple who seeks to share His Word–the seeds of life in God–with others.

And the soil, the dirt? That’s me and you.

Now, our Old Testament lesson for today, from Isaiah, reminds us of the power of God’s Word: “As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” (Isaiah 55:10-11)

God’s Word always does what it sets out to do. There are no exceptions.

According to Genesis, God unleashed His Word on chaos and brought life into being. In New Testament days, Jesus, God the Son, the Word of God, gave His life as the sinless sacrifice for our sin and rose from the dead so that He could by His crucifixion and resurrection, speak eternal life into all who repent and believe in Him, into you and me.

Now, remember that God speaks two words to us, as you know:

His law that convicts and condemns sinners and

His Gospel about Jesus that sets sinners free of condemnation now and forever.

Keep that in the back of your mind.

In the parable, a sower liberally scatters seeds on the dirt.

Some seeds fall on the path and are immediately eaten by birds. Jesus later explains that the birds represent Satan.

Many people have never heard the good news of new and everlasting life through Jesus because Satan, still desperately at work in our world, sweeps it away from them before they ever have the chance to have the gospel about Jesus grow into faith within them.

And I have seen this so many times. So many times, I’ve been with people who were spiritually-disconnected, who did not know Jesus Christ. They’ve known I was a Christian and a preacher and they ask me what the Christian faith is about. And just as I’ve been ready to tell them about Jesus, something happens. A phone rings. A child screams. Some distraction comes along. When that has happened, it was never an accident. Satan is always trying to distract unbelievers from hearing the Word of God that might save them from sin and death.

This is why we need to be consistent and persistent–all of us, clergy and laity–in sharing the gospel and scattering its seed everywhere.

Every time we scatter that seed, it may not grow. But we need to keep on spreading the good news of Jesus because people need Jesus, don’t they? They need Jesus for everlasting life!

And Satan is our implacable enemy.

Some seeds fall onto rocky ground. Jesus says this pictures those who receive His Word and initially believe, but when they go through tough times or opposition to their faith, they leave Jesus and His gospel behind. They figure this whole gospel about Jesus is a made-up thing because it doesn’t prevent the hard realities of this world from falling onto them. But, in fact, the gospel gives us the power to face life’s hard realities: to face grief, to face death in the certainty that beyond grief and death, all who believe in Jesus will live with Him in His perfect kingdom forever.

Some seeds fall onto thorns. This describes people who initially receive the Gospel Word with faith but then let this life’s distractions or wealth lead them away from life with God.

Finally, Jesus says, some seeds fall on good ground. Some people receive the Gospel, the good news of how Jesus, God in the flesh, died for their sins and brings forgiveness and everlasting life with God to all who trust in Him. They receive the gift of faith. God lives in them, Jesus says, and through them, God blesses not only them, but all the people whose lives they touch. He even uses them to spread the seeds of His gospel to family members, friends, and others.

Now, when we hear that parable, the first thing we’re likely to think is, “I hope I’m good soil. I don’t want damnation and hell. I want to be with God forever. I hope I have a saving faith.”

And preachers, like me, God forgive me, have even preached sermons on this text in which they–and I–end the sermon by saying, “Be good soil.”

Now, friends, let me ask you a question: Can soil change itself?

The answer is, No!

So, why does Jesus tell this parable?

The first disciples wonder the same thing.

In the verses that fall in Matthew’s gospel between the two blocks of verses in today’s lesson, Jesus answers that question: Why does He tell these parables?

Jesus quotes words spoken by God to the prophet Isaiah back in the eighth century BC, when He first called Isaiah to be a prophet.

God tells Isaiah that He’s calling Isaiah to preach His Word, to call people to turn from sin and to trust in God, and then He tells Isaiah that most people to whom he gives God’s message, the vast majority of Isaiah’s hearers, will never repent and never believe. “Isaiah,” God effectively says, “I’m calling you to be a prophet and you are going to be an abject failure!”

Now, as I approach the end of my time as a full-time pastor, I sometimes wonder, “What have I accomplished in the past forty years?” I have to tell you that when I think about that question, I haven’t been able to even list the first accomplishment.

But the reason for that is simple. I wasn’t called to accomplish great ends. I was called to preach the Word of God, in season and out of season, to scatter the seeds of the Gospel and leave the results to God.

Churches, as well as pastors, get hung up on all sorts of programs and activities rather than focusing on its one mission: making disciples by sharing the Word of God.

And so, God tells Isaiah at the beginning of His ministry as a prophet to proclaim His Word and to know that most people will reject the Word he preaches.

God says to His unwelcoming people through Isaiah (and Jesus quotes these words in that section between the two blocks of Scripture that make up our gospel lesson): “You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving. For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.” (Matthew 13:14-15; Isaiah 6:10-11, LXX)

During his ministry, Isaiah would, in words we cherish in the Church today, often call people to repent and believe in God, to turn to the God we all now know in Jesus and live with God forever. Some did so. Most didn’t.

Listen: The only thing that can turn exposed, rocky, thorn-infested soil–the only thing that can turn the hard-hearted, the self-obsessed and the worldly, the worried and the self-satisfied–into good soil, into sinners receptive to the grace of God given in Jesus Christ that makes us saints…the only thing that can make us good soil is the Word of God.

You can’t make yourself good soil.

But God’s Word can and does!

Your being good soil and your salvation doesn’t depend on you. It depends wholly and completely on the Word of God that you receive from outside yourself.

If, friend, you believe in Jesus, you know that God’s Word has made you good soil, that God is living in you even when you don’t perceive Him, and that He is doing good, God-honoring things through your life.

The miracle of new and everlasting life belongs to you because Word and Sacrament empower you to say, “I believe Jesus is my God and Savior!”

In today’s gospel lesson, Jesus told parables to bad soil in the hope that some might turn to Him and live, but also to speak a condemning Word, a Word of Law, to those who refused to believe.

God’s Word never returns empty!

His Word of Law condemns the unrepentant.

And His Word of Gospel gives everlasting life to those who receive it with faith!

Friends, by the power of the Gospel Word, I get to tell you again this morning what I love to tell you, that in Jesus Christ, your sin is forgiven and you have life with God that never ends. It belongs to you.

Certain of this truth, I urge you to scatter the gospel liberally and indiscriminately and trust Jesus and the Holy Spirit to do with that seed what He wills.

Amen