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 today comes from
2 Kings 23.1–7, 15–18, 21–25 (READ TEXT).
It’s entitled, “The Church Always Needs Rebuilding,” dear
brothers and sisters in Christ.
2.
When people hear talk of “building the
Church,” they often think of bricks and mortar. But, constructing church
buildings is the least thing we can mean when we talk about “building”
the Church. It’s far more important to build the real Church, that is, God’s
people gathered around his Word and Sacraments. In this sense, only the Lord
can build the Church and only the Lord can rebuild it. In this world the Church
always needs rebuilding because we have more sin than we realize, because we
have better guidance than we remember, and because God has more grace than we
can imagine.
3.
We do have more sin than we
realize, and we are not alone. After Hezekiah, who was a good and faithful
king, Judah endured 2 exceptionally bad kings. Then young Josiah took over as
king at age 8. Josiah feared the Lord. During the 18th year of his
reign, when the temple was undergoing repairs, the high priest found the Book
of the Law inside. It was taken to the king, who was shocked when he read
it. For in it he could see how far Judah had departed from the Lord’s ways. The
very fact that the Book of the Law had been lost shows how bad things
had become. So, Josiah ordered a major remodeling. It started with rooting out
lots of stuff from the temple itself, the Lord’s house, including idol worship.
Didn’t people in Judah realize how bad these things had grown to be?
4.
The story is told of a man on his
way to a costume party dressed as the devil. The night was dark and stormy, and
his car went off the road into the ditch. After hiking across a field in his
red devil suit, he went to seek help at a nearby church where the lights were
on and a service was underway. Just as he opened the church door, there was a
crash of lightning and a clap of thunder. People looked back and saw this
devilish-looking figure standing in the doorway. They made for the exits in
droves, except one little old lady. Standing with her cane, and shaking a bit
as she spoke, she said: “Mr. Devil, I don’t know what you want here, but
I’ve got only one thing to say. I’ve been a member of this church for forty
years, but I’ve really been on your side all along.”1 Each of us has an old
Adam like that, on the side of the devil. 1 See
The Concordia Pulpit for 1978 (St. Louis: Concordia, 1977), 11, quoting D. L.
Deffner, The Possible Years: Thoughts after Thirty on Christian Adulthood (St.
Louis: Concordia, 1973), 83.
5.
Therefore, we have more sin than we
realize. Years ago, people used to talk about “the seven deadly sins.”
In fact, these aren’t the only sins that prove deadly. All sin kills.
But these seven give us an insight into the sin that fills all human lives,
Christians too. They are pride, greed, envy, lust, anger, gluttony (or
over-indulgence), and laziness. Can we honestly say our lives are free from
every trace of these? Can we even begin to claim that we have none of these
because we’re so filled with God? No, we also have a lot of remodeling to do, a
lot to get rid of. How unwilling we can be to put ourselves out, even for
spiritual things! We have bought into the idea that there’s a Christianity
without a cross, without self-discipline and crucifying the flesh. Olympic
athletes put themselves through rigorous training, giving up all sorts of
side pleasures for the sake of their sport, but we Christians seem capable of
thinking we can accumulate all sorts of bad habits and sins and never be
called to give any of them up! Yet all
sin kills, and we have more sin than we realize.
6.
That’s one of the reasons why the
Church always needs rebuilding. But, it also needs rebuilding because we have
better guidance than we remember. In the text, King Josiah’s study of God’s
Word showed him his sin and that of the nation as nothing else could. What he
had remembered of God’s Word was incomplete. For us, too, there’s no substitute
for God’s Word, certainly not the occult influences that Josiah wisely rooted
out. These attempts to get guidance from the spirit world are still
around in the form of séances, Ouija boards, even the innocent-looking horoscope
column in the newspaper. If you’re a Christian, Jesus is your Lord, and you
have no business messing with any of that stuff. He gives us far better
guidance than any of that. In his Word he shows us our sin, and that’s always
uncomfortable. 300 years before this text, as Jeroboam, the first king of the
Northern Kingdom, was starting Idolatrous worship in Bethel, the Lord had sent
a man from Judah who predicted that Josiah would put an end to all sacrifice on
the illicit altar there. Prophetically, this man even gave Josiah’s name! When
Josiah actually did what was predicted, he didn’t even know he was fulfilling a
prophecy. The local people told him about it. How absolutely accurate the
Lord’s Word had been, even though it was forgotten by so many! 2 See
The Concordia Pulpit for 1977 (St. Louis: Concordia, 1976), 268.
7.
God’s Word remained every bit as
accurate when a prophet like Isaiah foretold that a virgin would conceive and
bear a Son, and call him “Immanuel,” God with us. This accuracy held
when Isaiah gave details of Christ’s substitutionary suffering as the Servant
upon whom the Lord laid the iniquity of us all, and it continued when Isaiah
predicted this Servant’s restoration to life and victory. God’s Word was
accurate, too, when Isaiah brought the message of people streaming to God’s
Church for peace and blessing in the future. All of this is better guidance
than we often remember.
8.
So, we need to remember it, and we
devote ourselves to learning it. We Christians ought to know God’s Word at
least as well as we know about our favorite hobbies or sports teams. But,
beyond mere mental exercise is deeply drinking God’s Word in and depending on
it. Years ago, there was a devastating earthquake in Managua, Nicaragua.
6,000 people died, largely because their homes had been poorly constructed, and
built right atop on fault lines. People knew the construction was flimsy and
the locations iffy. They knew these things, but that was all. We have great
guidance from God in his Word, and much more than simple guidance. In it, we
have the Christ upon whom we depend. The Church always needs rebuilding,
and we have the best foundation on which to build: the foundation of the
apostles and prophets, with Christ himself as the cornerstone. In God’s Word we
have better guidance than we remember.
9.
In Christ, the Lord has more
grace than we imagine. This stands out as the best reason for the Church’s
constant rebuilding. God’s Word always points us to our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ, God made Man, who lived for us, suffered and died for us, and rose
again. Yes, we have sin, more than we realize. Yet he always has more blessing
than we can even imagine. Where sin abounded, the Bible says, grace abounded
still more. As much sin as we have, Christ has more forgiveness. As much as we
are beset by the devil, Jesus has completely overcome the world. As much as we
are hounded by death, our Lord gives us life. He always has plenty more where
that came from, mercies new every morning, grace upon grace.
10.
He has more than one way of bringing
this grace to us. That’s why at the time of the Exodus the Lord had
instituted the Passover, which had been in disuse for centuries and centuries
before Josiah revived it. No wonder the people had strayed religiously! They
had taken their attention off the Lord, off of his forgiveness, off of the
coming Christ. For the Passover was all about Christ. A Passover lamb
was to be perfect, with no broken bones, yet killed and its blood applied in
order to save people from death. The Passover was all about Christ, the
sinless Man who is also God. He was deliberately killed, yet no bone of his was
broken, not even on the cross. No less than the blood of this risen Christ is
applied to us all these years later in the Lord’s Supper. We drink the cup
which is the new testament in his blood, poured out for us for the forgiveness
of sins. We eat his body given for us, and so we have life from him.
11.
The Lord knows that we have much sin.
But, he remains so rich in his grace that he provides us counsel and help
against sin in a number of ways. He does this through the spoken Word,
through Baptism, through the Lord’s Supper, through the power of the keys, and
through what has been called “the mutual conversation and consolation of
brethren.”3 Smalcald Articles III iv (Concordia,
278). © 2010 Concordia Publishing House.
12.
Christ himself gives us the
privilege of being involved in rebuilding his Church as we speak his Word to
one another. For really, it is God’s Word—not various forms of entertainment or
social gatherings—that builds God’s church.
In this sinful world, the Church always needs rebuilding.
The rebuilding is necessary because we have more sin than we realize.
This rebuilding is always possible because we have better guidance than we
remember in God’s Word of Law and Gospel. Especially can the Church
constantly undergo rebuilding because in our Lord Jesus Christ God has more
grace than we can imagine. Let the building continue! Amen. Now the peace that passes all
understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus until life
everlasting. Amen.
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