“Remember the Lord Who Provides” Deuteronomy 26.1–11, Lent 1C, Feb. ’16

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 this 1^st Sunday in Lent is taken from Deuteronomy 26:1-11, it’s entitled, “Remember the Lord Who Provides,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. Come with me to the world’s most oppressive prison. Just ask the inmates, they will tell you. They are overworked and underfed. Their walls are bare and bunks are hard. No prison is so populated, no prison so oppressive, and, what’s more, no prison is so permanent. Most inmates never leave. They never escape. They never get released. They serve a life sentence in this overcrowded, under-provisioned facility. The name of the prison? You’ll see it over the entrance. Over the gate are four cast-iron letters that spell out its name: W-A-N-T, the prison of want. You’ve seen her prisoners. They are “in want.” They want something. They want something bigger. Nicer. Faster. Thinner. They want. They don’t want much, mind you. They want just one thing. One new job. One new car. One new house. One new spouse. They don’t want much. They want just one. And when they have “one,” they will be happy. And they are right—they will be happy. When they have “one,” they will leave the prison. But then it happens. The new-car smell passes. The new job gets old. The neighbors buy a larger television set. The new spouse has bad habits. The sizzle fizzles, and before you know it, another ex-con breaks parole and returns to jail. Are you in prison? You are if you feel better when you have more and worse when you have less. You are if joy is one delivery away, one transfer away, one award away, or one makeover away. If your happiness comes from something you deposit, drive, drink, or digest, then face it—you are in prison, the prison of want. . . . Are you hoping that a change in circumstances will bring a change in your attitude? If so, you are in prison. Learn this secret: What you have in Jesus your Savior is greater than what you don’t have in life.  In our text today from Deuteronomy 26 we are called to remember the Lord Who provides for us.
3. Here in Deuteronomy 26 God reminded the Israelites how he had faithfully provided for all their needs. They were also instructed to give the first portion of each harvest to God, and He would bless them in the land. God’s Word reminds us to honor Him by giving back a portion of what He has provided for us. When we are willing to give back, we show that we understand that God is the source of all that we have and that only in Him can we truly find contentment and joy. As we begin the season of Lent our Gradual for this season urges us to fix our eyes on Jesus, who focused on the joy set before him rather than the earthly joys around him. 
4. Our text from Deuteronomy 26 may seem out of place during Lent. Lent is a time we think of the dangers and perils to which we are exposed on our journey to the “promised land.” This text tells what the people of God are to do after they are safely settled in the Promised Land. But, even when we are safely in the promised land, we will still remember what it took to get us there—Jesus’ death and resurrection.  In fact, in our Gospel reading today Jesus reminds us that, “man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” True contentment and happiness in life comes from God and God alone who provides for all of our needs of body and soul.  In fact, when the devil tempts into sin, he is always trying to show us what we lack and not to be content and happy with what God has given to us.
5. In Deuteronomy 26 we see that God had set apart Israel as a holy nation, and they responded.  They came from humble beginnings among the nations.  They were few in number, homeless, and oppressed.  It was only by God’s grace that they survived and became strong and numerous.  When the people of this nation were in misery, they cried to God for help.  The Egyptians mistreated them and made them suffer with hard labor. It wasn’t only physical pain, but also humiliation that made their lives miserable.  In their suffering they cried out to the God of their fathers.
6. When they cried to God for help, he brought them out and set them in their own land.  The Lord brought them out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror, and with miraculous signs and wonders.  He brought them into their own land flowing with milk and honey.  In response to this deliverance, they brought gifts to God and worshiped him.  They bowed and brought the firstfruits of the land before the Lord.  Their offerings worshiped God by serving those among them in need.
7. So too God sets apart us Christians apart as a holy nation, and we respond.  We are also of unremarkable origin among the nations of the world.  Paul notes, “Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth” (1 Cor 1:26).  The same is true of Christians today and has been true throughout the history of Christianity.  All the more reason for us during this Lenten season to remember the God Who provides for us with all of our needs of both body and soul.
8. We are a people who cry to God when we need help.  Just as the devil tormented Jesus, so the devil torments us. As Luther notes in the Small Catechism, the devil attempts to lead us into “false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice” (explanation of the Fifth Petition).  On our own we cannot stand up to the devil’s schemes, so we cry to God for help.
9. The Lord’s outstretched arm, signs, and wonders set us apart from the sinful world as holy.  We are set apart as those possessing the very holiness of Jesus’ success against the devil in today’s Gospel.  We are set apart as holy by the forgiveness Jesus earned when he literally stretched out his arms on the cross to save us.  God’s mighty acts continue through his ministers: The Gospel proclaimed and carried out is powerful beyond any earthly might. Our Baptism sets us apart as holy, and the Holy Meal sustains us in Christ’s holiness.
10. In response to his deliverance, we bring him gifts and worship him.  We remember the God Who provides for us.  This is the holy purpose for which we have been set apart: we are God’s, and we live in service to him and to our neighbor.  Our lives of offerings—of all kinds—do serve God and our neighbor.
11. Though on our own we are anything but holy, our holy God has set us apart for himself, just as he did Old Testament Israel. Living as a holy nation, then, giving to God and our neighbor our lives of service, is simply being what in Christ we are.  Amen.