“Endings and Beginnings” Isaiah 51.4–6 New Year’s Day Jan. ‘25

 

1.                Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Heavenly Father, and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The message from God’s Word as we celebrate this New Year is taken from Isaiah 51:4-6, it’s entitled, “Endings & Beginnings,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.

2.                When one thing begins, another ends. When a church season or church year ends, we mark the time by changing the colors on the altar and on the pastor. The music, the hymns we play, reflects a new emphasis, a new focus on the Word of the living God. Now that the calendar year has ended, a new one has begun. We have had parties, noisemakers, watched the ball drop in Times Square, and maybe a bit of overindulgence. Tonight, we take time to mark what we’ve gained and what we’ve lost, to share tears, laughs, and stories. A new year is upon us, and we mark the time.

3.                We love to mark the days as they go by. But, can you imagine living as if tomorrow will never come like Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day? I would either devolve into whatever indulgent activity seems like fun at the moment or turn into a useless blob sobbing on the floor and waiting for the end to put me out of my misery. Humans are designed to operate with the idea that life is an ongoing concern. We live with what God promised Noah in Genesis: “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease” (Gen 8:22).

4.                But as this past year has come to a close, the prophet Isaiah reminds us that a different day is coming. Our text tells us about the day when Christ will “come again with glory to judge both the living and the dead.” You might describe this day by saying, “When he comes, everything goes.” Everything that humans covet, fly, drive, sail on, or fight over will be gone. The earth and everything in, on, above, over, or under it—all time, space, matter—gone.

5.                This is not like what happens when you clean out the basement or the garage. You can get rid of all the stuff you have, but it’s not really gone. You take it to the curb or call a junk removal company, or you take things to Goodwill or some other donation site. Your stuff isn’t really gone. It’s just not in your space anymore. It’s either in a dump, in a resale shop, or in someone else’s home. It’s their junk now. It’s not gone. It’s just somewhere else.

6.                But Isaiah describes this day as everything going away: “The heavens vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment, and they who dwell in it will die in like manner” (Isaiah 51:6b). Things in our lives wear out, and we replace them—cars, dishwashers, computers, hips, and knees. But this is a day when the earth goes hollow and dry like an old piece of paper. It just falls apart.

7.                On that day, a day of ultimate endings, everything that seems so solid in this world blows away like useless chaff. On that day we’ll find out what “gone” truly means. There’s a difference between sky and nothing overhead, between space and nothing, between time and nothing. That day will make that difference plain.

8.                For today, though, we look around us, we take another breath, and we drive our cars and plan to go to work after our holiday celebrations. Today a time of ending seems far off and maybe even far-fetched. Being the twenty-first-century, enlightened, educated people that we are, we’ve come to rely more on ourselves than on the Word of the living God. Instead of lifting up our eyes, we lift up our telescopes to the heavens. And even in the face of all the wonder and vastness of the universe, we dare to think, “I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul.” Astronomy is a beautiful science, and if anything, it shows us just how small and fragile we human beings really are. The universe is vast beyond our minds, as we lift our eyes to the heavens. As we look to the earth beneath, the wonders never cease. The miracles of rainforests and oceans are still being explored, and we still don’t know it all yet. It is all so complex.

9.                Without a doubt, we take the heavens above and the earth below for granted. Maybe human pride will even think we’re in control of it all or that we can bend it to our will. Instead, we should wonder at the stability of God’s preservation of all things for us. His hands contain the whole universe, and no nation, no person, and even no hell-bent terrorist group can change that. Nobody with a bomb controls the future. God does. That stability should strengthen us. And yet this world is so fragile. How dense we are for forgetting that! Our world and everything in it is held together by God’s powerful Word. All the while, we sin and come up with new and inventive ways to break his commandments. We giggle at the idea of holiness: “What do you mean, no sex outside of marriage? Nobody lives like that anymore. Come on, you only go around once.” God the Father keeps the oceans in place, keeps asteroids from pounding us into another ice age, keeps the very breath in our lungs, and we dare him to call our bluff of unbelief. Isaiah reminds us that we are ripe for the ending of it all.

10.             Our fallen world of sin, death, and shame will meet its end one day. God himself will come with his justice and his righteousness to this sin-beaten world. And we would do well to remember, as the day draws near, that what we confess with our mouths and what we believe in our hearts will determine our eternity before him who judges with perfect righteousness and justice.

11.             On the Last Day, it is the justice of God that prevails, not human strength, wisdom, bombs, or bullets. On the Last Day it is the righteousness of God that will win. The things of this earth may disappear like smoke or fall apart like an old garment. But the Lord goes on to say in our text, “My salvation will be forever, and my righteousness will never be dismayed” (Isaiah 51:6c).

12.             This is good news beyond belief. Even when the great Day of Ending comes to pass, God’s salvation remains. His righteousness, even when sky, land, and sea have disappeared, will still be here, and it is for you. To get your mind around what God’s salvation means, just think about this: Imagine everything that has ever gone wrong; God will make it right again. Broken lives are rescued. Addictions beaten. Relationships healed. Sick and broken bodies restored. Violence, a thing forgotten. Holy lives abound. All your sins forgiven, and people forever alive.

13.             Sounds good, right? See, the same power that brings the world to its end will bring about a new beginning. A new beginning of remade humanity. That new beginning seeks you out and brings to you as a gift the salvation of God. It seeks you out and finds you even when—especially when—you are lost and hurting over your sins.

14.             Jesus has come near to us. He is the Word that holds all things together, and he is the one who died for you and for me. His blood was shed and his body was broken for sinners. And in him every sinner has a new beginning. You don’t have to fear the justice of God. Jesus fulfilled it. No longer do we have to fear any person, fear that our sins will remain, or even fear the ending of all things. Christ has died, and Christ has risen from the dead. It has all been done for you and for me. God’s own righteousness given to you, God’s salvation promise sealed in the blood of the Lamb, lasts forever.

15.             Out of love, joy, and thanksgiving, I pray you be renewed daily in your Baptism. Every day, God’s mercy is new. Every day is grace; every breath is a new beginning in the life of faith. Salvation’s name is Jesus. So, until the end, we wait in hope for his coming. Jesus says in Mark 13:37, “Stay awake”! Stay awake in your life of faith. Don’t let the enemy lull you to sleep. During times of trial, don’t lose heart. God does not change, and his salvation is forever. Take to heart those words from the book of Jude. Build yourself up in faith. Pray in the Holy Spirit. Keep yourself in the love of God. Have mercy on those who doubt, and show mercy without fear (cf Jude 20–23).

16.             My brothers and sisters, another year has ended and a new one has begun. Who knows what triumphs or tragedies we’ll encounter and endure this new year? Some things in our lives will stay, and some things will go. We may enjoy times of stability or endure things that will shake us to our very core. But know this: Our world is passing away, and one day this world will come to its end, but God’s salvation in Jesus Christ has no ending. The salvation of God, the righteousness of God, lasts forever. You have a new beginning every day that will last forever. His name is Jesus Christ, and he is for you. Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.

 

“Soaked & Bloody- Our Lord and You” (John 2.1–11) Epiphany Jan. ‘25

 

 

1.                Grace, mercy, and peace to You from God our Heavenly Father, and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The message from God’s Word, as we observe the Epiphany of our Lord, is taken from John 2:1-11 and is entitled, “Soaked & Bloody: Our Lord & You,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ. Let us pray: Praised be you, O God, and blessed in eternity, who with your Word comforts, teaches, exhorts, and warns us. May your Holy Spirit confirm the Word in our hearts, that we may not be forgetful hearers but rather daily grow in faith, hope, love, and patience unto the end and be kept unto salvation, through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord. Amen.

2.                Soaked and bloody. Soaked in water and steeped in blood, soaked and bloody is our Lord. Recently baptized in the Jordan River, his hour has not yet come, but soon he will drench the earth with his blood shed from the cross for the sins of the world. Soaked and bloody is our Lord. Soaked and bloody is his Word throughout. Soaked and bloody is all of God’s story with and among his people.

3.                It’s all about water and blood. The Epiphany of Our Lord—we see Jesus revealed, manifested, in a star, in the coming of the Gentile Wise Men and the gifts they bring. Yes, but the manifestation of Jesus, the revelation of his person and his work, his epiphany, is ultimately all about blood and water. It’s all about water and blood, blood and water.

4.                Fast-forward from gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Christ turns water into wine for his first miracle and he turns wine into blood at the Last Supper. The Spirit hovers over the waters, and Cain murderously sheds Abel’s blood at the beginning, and at the end the river of life runs through the streets of the heavenly Jerusalem as we will be gathered around the Lamb from whom it flows and who was slain from the beginning of the world, whose robe is still then dipped in blood (Rev 19:13).

5.                And you—you entered this world through the water and blood of your mother’s womb, and you were born again unto new life in the water of Mother Church’s womb at the baptismal font and are nourished by your Father who provides his Son’s blood for your sustenance at the Lord’s Supper. And that initial, rebirthing water, like mighty waves, will carry you home to its last act, its final baptismal-raising resurrection on the great day when you see your Lord face to face, including his still red, blood-scarred hands, feet, and side—from which flowed water and blood on that Last Day of his holy work week, the afternoon after he washed his disciples with cleansing water two thousand years ago and still does the same for you today. Again, still early in his epiphany, his first revealings, at Cana of Galilee Jesus attends a party. And, you do know, Jesus was eventually accused of being a winebibber and a glutton, a drunkard and partier, a friend of tax collectors, outcasts, sinners (Lk 5:33; 7:34).

6.                Have you ever been accused of something so outrageous, so far-from-reality that you felt like responding, “Oh, yeah, you think so, huh?! You think I’m this way or that. Well, I’ll show you! I’ll show them!—and then you take their accusation and put it into hyperdrive? You take what they’re saying about you, and you embrace it and expand it. You flip it on its head and put three big exclamation points to it, to make a point. Well, as if to make a point—and, nothing our Lord does is by mistake. It’s all very intentional—so, to make a point, after repeating this accusation against him of feasting, partying, and hanging out with all kinds of undesirables, he then goes to another party (Lk 7:36–50).

7.                A dinner party, given by a Pharisee. And there he allows—no less than a prostitute to wash, to anoint his feet with her tears—“the heart’s blood,” St. Augustine calls these tears of repentance—and also with ointment, as she wipes his feet with her hair. This was scandalous: a Jewish woman who let her hair down in public could be divorced. It was a sign that she was available to other men. What’s more, when a ceremonially impure person such as this woman touched a Jew, he would also therefore be considered unclean and would not be permitted to enter the temple area, to celebrate festivals, or to offer sacrifices (see TLSB, p 1724).

8.                But now one greater than the temple is here (Mt 12:6), the one who offers himself as the greater sacrifice to cancel her guilt and sin, the one who offers himself to her as her true Bridegroom—for he loved her and gave himself for her, that he might sanctify and cleanse her with washing of water, that he might present her to himself a glorious Bride, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish, pure. “This mystery is profound, [but] I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church” (Eph 5:32; cf 5:25–32); I speak concerning you sinners and Jesus. Remember, at the wedding in Cana “there were six stone water jars there for the Jewish rites of purification” (Jn 2:6). It’s no accident, you see then, that Jesus changes them to wine and that he later changes wine to blood and that the blood of Christ crucified cleanses you from all sin.

9.                So this prostitute, by her repentance, does make herself available. Her heart, mind, soul, her all—she does make herself available to another man, to the God-man, Jesus. By his merciful Word he makes himself available to her, saying, “Your sins are forgiven. . . . Your faith has saved you; go in peace” (Lk 7:48, 50). “For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart” (1 Sam 16:7).

10.             What a party for her! What a celebration! And of course, this type of party, and this type of feast (altar), this should not come as a surprise, since Jesus’ very first miracle, his first sign, was to turn water into wine at a party. Now, don’t get me wrong. Neither Jesus nor I am saying that Jesus ever engaged in any kind of hedonistic debauchery or depraved, self-indulgent pleasure-seeking. Of course not! It’s not that kind of party. No, this has nothing to do with self-centeredness or selfishness or loss of control, not at all—for though you know that kind of self-appointed partying on your terms in many and various ways all too well, our Lord knew no sin.

11.             No, at the party at Cana Jesus was truly rejoicing in the love of a young couple—even more so, rejoicing in his heavenly Father’s love, which makes them one through this wedding. And wine was customary and desired in order to complete the celebration. And so our Lord, through that same thoughtful and generous love, while thinking not of himself but of the others, miraculously provides the wine too.

12.             And what Jesus was ultimately revealing in both word and deed? Already at Cana, and also especially with the sinful woman, and most certainly on the cross and coming out of the grave, and in your life here and now. What Jesus brings is the kind of party by and at which you can celebrate, lose yourself in the generosity and happiness of measureless mercy and free forgiveness, by which he fills your emptiness, completes and fulfills your joy and your needs, and restores you to your true self as created and redeemed to be by and in him through water and blood. Water and blood. Oh, joy indeed! After all, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them?” (Mt 9:15). No, they celebrate, they feast, they rejoice.

13.             Whose wedding was it at Cana? It was actually Christ’s—for he is the greater Master; he is the true Bridegroom. It’s his unending feast. From the blood of the Passover lamb on the doorways in Egypt to the Last Supper, which is the final Passover and the first communion of the new covenant in Jesus’ blood. To the Lord’s Supper here and now, to the heavenly marriage supper of the Lamb—it’s always his wedding and feast and party. It’s always him, all his, always, all gift! Water, wine, blood, washing. Maybe that’s an epiphany for us.

14.             Now, and still more to come, for as the prophet Joel proclaims: “It will come to pass in that day That the mountains shall drip with new wine, The hills shall flow with milk, And all the brooks of Judah shall be flooded with water; A fountain shall flow from the house of the Lord and water the Valley” (Joel 3:18 NKJV). “The blood of Jesus . . . cleanses us from all sin” (1 Jn 1:7). Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds + in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.

 

“Idols and Lies, Word and Flesh” John 1.1–18 Xmas Day Dec. ‘24

 

 

1.                Please pray with me. May the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts, be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock, and our Redeemer. Amen. The message from God’s Word as we celebrate the birth of our Savior Jesus this Christmas Day, is taken from John 1:1-18, it’s entitled, “Idols and Lies, Word and Flesh,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.

2.                In the ancient Christmas hymn “A Great and Mighty Wonder,” the last stanza speaks of the end result of the incarnation of the Son of God: “All idols then shall perish And Satan’s lying cease, And Christ shall raise His scepter, Decreeing endless peace” (LSB 383:5). At Christmas, the Word became flesh to replace idols and Satan’s lies with endless peace.

3.                It is the idols, the false gods, and the lies of Satan that Jesus has come to destroy, to bring them to nothing, to drive them away from you by his Word. He is the Word, the Word made flesh. John the Apostle writes, “He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:10–13). This world is in darkness, but into it Christ comes. The world he made, the world he loves.

4.         The Word made all things in perfection and holiness. But Satan came with his lies: “You will be like God.” Man fell for it, fell into idolatry. And so there is the curse: “In the day you eat of it, you will surely die.” (Genesis 3:5; Genesis 2:17) Death has been with us ever since. But a promise was made. The woman’s offspring did come. He came to restore mankind and to undo the curse, to undo death and tear down the idols of man.

5.         Psalm 115:4–8 speaks of idols of the nations: “Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see. They have ears, but do not hear; noses, but do not smell. They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat. Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.” The end of idolatry is death. And that is the situation of the world and the darkness. Satan is still the father of lies, begetting new children even at Christmas: “Things you buy, things you receive, will make you happy.” “Here you are, all alone. The world celebrates; you’re forgotten.” And some of Satan’s best lies tempt us to trust those idols. They’re as present as ever. People, money, all those things—these are the idols or false gods that are all around us. You can see them. You are constantly tempted to put your trust in created things you can see, to love them more than God, to find contentment in them. Just like the idols of the ancient nations, today’s idols are inanimate; there is no life in them. They are made by men and can’t save. They might look good, but they can’t see, they can’t hear, they can’t smell or feel or walk, and, especially, they can’t speak—not truth, anyway.

6.         But your God, your incarnate God, the Word made flesh, can speak, and he does. He was born with mouth, eyes, nose, hands, feet. From the mouth of the Virgin’s Son comes all truth. He sees your great need, your need for salvation even right now. He hears your prayers of repentance, begging for mercy, for he smells the stink of sin and death that covers the world. The Word was made flesh with hands and feet to feel the sting of the nails. Having touched and healed and fed and walked amongst a people in darkness, he did die.

7.         And that was what was needed—for him to die for you, in your place, for your sins. What was needed was his resurrection to destroy death for you. He did what was needed. The Word was made flesh. He joined himself to your humanity to keep the Law. He died a perfect death. His death was the perfect atoning sacrifice in your place, for you and for all the world. And he was raised again for your justification. The Word was made flesh for this, for this work.

8.         At the end of John’s Gospel, Jesus speaks: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (Jn 20:29). You live by faith in the Gospel, that the Christ Child is full of grace and truth, and you love those things not seen. The reality of his incarnation and birth, his precious death and burial, his glorious resurrection and ascension, his presence in the Sacrament of the Altar, his very body and blood born of the Virgin—these things are not seen, but we adore him for them all, for these gifts bring life to you, eternal life. You are to love things that aren’t seen. That is what a faith strengthened again at Christmas does. Faith loves things not seen. And so we pray during this holy Christmas that God would give us a love for those things not seen. And we do, believing that grace upon grace is revealed in the giving of the Child in the manger. The Child shows that your Father in heaven would have you be his child, born of his own will.

9.         “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). That perfect flesh once lay in a manger—and then lay in a tomb. But only for three days. The Word made flesh lives! He lives for you, that you would be raised up in him for life eternal, born anew, born of God. And so you are. In holy baptism, born of God, by water, Spirit, and blood, to live as his children, without fear, not of sin or death or the darkness of this world, but in endless peace. Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.