Pentecost 25 - 2Thessalonians 3:1-13

It seems that over the past week, every time you turned on the tv there was some news about the big game – It was all over the local news channels. They were reporting all of the things that were going on around town as people were anticipating the game, what was going on in Ann Arbor and of course there were reports from Coach Tressel about what his team was doing to get ready for what is for the Buckeyes the biggest game of the season. He talked about the Wolverines and the kind of things he was anticipating that they would come up against in the game as well as some of the things he was hoping that his players would accomplish both offensively and defensively. The over all message was that he felt if the Buckeyes would stick to their game plan and be successful in the things that they were trying to accomplish they would have the opportunity to come out of the game with a victory. As you are all aware, they did. They Buckeyes beat the Wolverines by a score of 14 to 3, for all practical purposes dominating every area of the game. The planning and preparation worked. The team carried out their game plan and they were successful in gaining the victory.

In our Epistle lesson for today, the Apostle Paul discusses his game plan for the Christians in Thessalonica. As we saw last week, one of the occasions that Paul mentioned in writing this letter was preparation for the end times. He talked to them about the events that would occur as they waiting for Jesus to come back. He mentioned the coming of the man of lawlessness. He talked to them about the great apostasy or rebellion. These things were mentioned in the interest of preparing the church for the things that they would face as they lived out their lives waiting for their eternal inheritance in God's heavenly kingdom. Paul had the enemies play book. In fact, God the Father had already set into motion and had planned for the outcome of the game. He knew what would happen and he was warning these Christians so that they would know and be prepared.

After laying out the plans of the enemy, Paul encouraged the Christians to be faithful. Satan would attempt to infiltrate the church so that he could lead the faithful away from God's revealed truth in his word. He would establish a rebellion. Paul encouraged the Christians to stand firm in their faith and hold to the game plan. In our text today he reminds them of what that game plan will be. He says: “Finally, brothers, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored, as happened among you.”

Paul's command to the church, his “game plan” as they look ahead to their inheritance in heaven is that the church in Thessalonica be “diligent in prayer”. He commanded them to pray. And he informed them as to what they should pray for. They should pray for Paul and those who were with him. And this prayer for Paul was not merely a general prayer that he be protected or that he be okay or that God bless him. Paul's command for prayer was not so much even for him. His prayer was for the Word of God; that “the Word of the Lord would speed ahead and be honored.”

From time to time people will submit prayer requests of various kinds. We pray for specific things, such as illnesses, comfort for those who are mourning some loss, strength for those who are undergoing some kind of a trial. These things are all good things to pray for. It is good when we come before God in faith to let him know the things that we need.

Yet, often these things for which we pray are reflections of our human will. We pray for the things that we want, the things that concern us in our small corner of the world, the things that provide for us comfort. These things are certainly good things that God is concerned for, however they are limited in their reach. They are limited by our fragile human understanding of what is good and what is necessary. On the other hand, God's will is much greater and God's will is much better.

In the explanation to the 3^rd Petition of the Lord's Prayer, the Catechism reminds us that “God's Will is done when he breaks and hinders every evil plan and purpose of the Devil the world and our sinful nature, which do not want us to hallow God's name or let his Kingdom come and when he strengthens and keeps us firm in His Word and faith until we die. This is His good and gracious will.”

There are basically two things that the Catechism identifies as the Will of God. 1. God breaks and hinders the evil purpose and plan of the devil. The Devil's plan is to devour and to destroy the church. The devil's plan is to infiltrate the church and water down her faith. (That is the work of the Antichrist who we heard about last week. He will lie to us hoping that you and I will believe that he is the true god and that we should set aside the true doctrines of the church and believe in him.) The world around us and even our own sinful nature works against God and doesn't want to obey him. Yet Jesus works in the world to destroy evil. He accomplished this when He died on the cross to save us from our sin. Jesus death destroyed the work of Satan. All of the sins that we could commit had been paid for with one decisive action. Satan's greatest act had been undone. Jesus continues to oppose the work of Satan. Every time an unbeliever hears the true Word of God preached and comes to faith, every time a baby is baptized according to the Word of God, every time you and I sing the Words of scripture in our hymns and songs of praise to God the work of the devil is broken. God does this through his Word. As our text reminded us last week, when Jesus comes again in glory, the work of Satan will be destroyed once and for all when he is judged by Christ and when he receives his final punishment in hell. This is the first aspect to the will of god. 2. The second is that He strengthens us in our faith and he keeps us strong and firm in our faith. Jesus does this again by means of His Word, he does it through the Bible. When Christians hear the Word of God preached to them, the Jesus is at work keeping us secure in the faith. He is strengthening us and he is encouraging us so that we do not fall away, so that we don't turn our backs on him and become someone who used to be a Christian. In the Lord's Prayer, God calls us to pray for these things.

The prayer that Paul commands the Thessalonians to pray – that they pray that the Word of God would speed ahead and be honored, there is no difference between that prayer and the prayer that Jesus commands us to pray in the Lord's Prayer. We pray for God's kingdom to come – it comes in his Word – we pray for God will to be done – God's will is that his word be preached and proclaimed – Paul's commands to the Thessalonians to pray is only an echo of the prayer that Jesus commanded his disciples to pray. Paul is commanding them to pray for him that he continue to preach the Word of God, that he continue to preach Jesus crucified and raised again for forgiveness for us sinners.

Last month it was published in the Newsletter that October was Pastor appreciation month. During that month, I was privileged to receive many very nice cards and gestures of your gratefulness and thankfulness to me and to my family for our service among you. I was very appreciative of those notes that were sent. It is always encouraging to know that your efforts have been appreciated.

But if I may be so bold, I would ask that you continue to pray for me even beyond the month of October. Just as Paul commanded the church to pray for him that he preach the Word of God and that it be honored, you also pray for me, your pastor who is called here to preach the Word of God to you. Pray that I preach faithfully. Pray for St Paul's, yet do not that it would grow in its reputation and respect among the community – while this is good, what is better is that God's Word would grow and be honored in the community.

The word of God proclaims Christ. It preaches Jesus who died on the cross for sinners. When the Word of God is honored, that means no more and no less that than Jesus has been preached as the Man who came from heaven, who was God himself in the flesh to die on the cross to save sinners from their sin. There is no better word to be spoken and there is no better sermon to preach. A sermon that delivers Jesus is a sermon that prepares Christian hearts for the struggle that they are sure to face as they spar with the devil and with the spirit of lawlessness, the Antichrist.

Paul, while he writes to command their prayers for the preaching of the Word of God, he also writes to commanded them regarding a secondary concern. It seems that as a result of the false belief that Jesus had already returned, there were some Christians who had taken that as an excuse to quit working. They were lazy. They thought to themselves, “if Jesus is here, than I won't need money, I won't need to continue on in my job. I can quit doing all of those things in my life that I didn't really want to do anyway and I can sit around and wait.”

Paul was highly critical of this attitude. To begin with, this attitude was lazy. God wants us to work. God has planned for us to work. Even when Adam and Eve were in the garden of Eden they had a job to do. They were caretakers of that garden. Certainly in the world as we know it, every single person has a job that they have to do. If you don't do your job, it is left undone. While you have the strength and the energy to work, it is pleasing to God that you use your god given strength to do your job.

Paul used himself as an example. When he was with the Thessalonians even though it was not necessary for him to do so, he found a job. He earned money to pay for his room and board. Paul was a pastor in the church. It was certainly within his right to accept from the churches that he served some kind of an income, but he refused it. Paul did not want anyone to be able to make the claim that he was a preacher who was only interested in making a dollar, that he only cared about money. Since Paul earned his own living this was an accusation that simply could not stick. Sticking to Paul's example, the church was to also be diligent in doing their work and not give in to an attitude of laziness.

Instead of laziness or “idleness” what Paul suggests to the Thessalonians is that they never weary of doing good. That they always be ready and active and willing to dive in and do whatever good work needs to be done.

Now I need to commend the members of our congregation. There is a spirit and an attitude of willingness to pitch in and to do the work that needs to be done. There are lots of examples of this.

Only last week we finished up our final home game for the 2007 football season at the concession stand down at Ohio State. That fund raiser is a tremendous commitment. It requires the efforts of a lot of people. And those people were there. Many of you willingly gave up your Saturday to go down to the stadium to help. You worked hard and put in a good days work for the benefit of the school and the church.

And of course there is the turkey supper. Only one week ago our congregation was busy with activity as every one of you pitched in and did your part., working along side each other to serve a turkey dinner to somewhere in the neighborhood of 700 people. That is astounding. That too is a tremendous commitment and it takes a lot of work, yet the workers were here: planning and preparing, setting up, cooking, serving, cleaning up, putting everything back in its place. The turkey supper is a success because of the hard work of the members of St Paul.

Yet despite our many successes, we are still sinners. We still struggle with that attitude of idleness or perhaps entitlement. At times we will tell ourselves that we have done enough and that we shouldn't have to work any more or any harder. Sometimes we do our work but then begrudgingly look around at those who have not done as much as we feel like they should have. At times we are critical of the work that others have done and we feel like they should know better and work harder. God doesn't call on us to be critical, to offer any kind of judgment or evaluation of our neighbor's work. God simply calls upon us to be willing servants, to do the work that is presented before us and to gladly do the Good works that we are able to do.

Along these lines and because of the tendency that we have to struggle with our own sinful flesh and sinful nature our board of Stewardship has offered to us the opportunity to make commitments this Sunday. We have all received in the mail cards to fill out, that we can take to church and keep here in our sealed envelopes for the year, we have the cards that we have filled out to keep with our weekly offering envelopes. All of these things have been prepared for us so that we don't falter in our willingness to do good, so that we don't make excuses for ourselves towards inactivity and idleness, so that we continue to tirelessly do good without growing weary of it.

The message here in our text is quite plain. As we plan for and anticipate the coming of our Lord on the last day, we need to be ready. He has made us ready as we have received from him the forgiveness of sins that he won for us when he died on the cross. That gift has been given to us through the faithful preaching of his word. It is our prayer the faithful preaching of God's Word continue to those who need to hear so that it might receive the honor and glory that it deserves as God's holy Word. In the mean time as God's word is being preached we are to continue on in our faithful service to him – being faithful in our administration of the duties that god has given to each of us as workers in his heavenly kingdom.

Amen.

Pentecost 24 - 2 Thessalonians 2:1-8, 13-17

With our readings today we are reminded of the fact that we are in the last times.

Our Old Testament and Gospel readings remind us that there is a Resurrection from the Dead. Those who die in the Lord are not in fact dead – they are alive, (although their souls have been separated from their bodies).

When The Lord said to Moses, “I AM the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” He was using a present tense verb. God did not say, I was the God, of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He said I AM. I have been, I still AM, and I always will be the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob who are not dead but are alive. They are in heaven. They are waiting for the Day when the Lord will return in power and glory to judge the living and the dead.

Jesus echoes the promise of the resurrection in the Gospel reading from Luke 20. The Sadducees, who did not believe in the resurrection, came to Jesus to try to trap him and trip him up in his teaching. Jesus scolded them for their disbelief and then proved the doctrine of the resurrection from using the text from our Old Testament lesson.

The resurrection is coming. There is a day in the not too distant future, a day that the scriptures say is “very near” when the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised from death and Christ will come to judge both the living and the dead. This day is coming.

This theme of the last days is present in our Epistle lesson as well. It is a text from 2 Thessalonians. God had given to Paul a revelation regarding the last days. God had revealed to Paul events that would occur as the day drew near. Paul shared this teaching with the Thessalonians.

After Paul had moved on from Thessalonica there were some Christians who were not clear regarding Paul's word and his teaching on what God had revealed about the coming day of Judgment. They mis-understood. They had drawn false conclusions. Their false conclusions lead to some rumors that were floating around – things that were reported to have come from Paul, that Christ had already come back. The day of Judgment came and went.

You could imagine the shock that ensued. If you were waiting for Christ to come and take you to heaven; if you were waiting for the trumpet to sound and to raise from the dead all of your deceased loved ones and so that you could spend eternity with them and with God in paradise, to hear that it had already come might be a bit of a blow. To hear that you had missed the day that you were counting on in faith would shock you.

We panic when we think that our flight on an airplane is going to take off without us, all the while knowing that there are a hundred others standing by to get us to where we need to be. If you miss your spot in heaven, you can't wait at the station for the “5 o'clock flight”. The Christians at Thessalonica were dismayed at the idea that reportedly came from Paul indicating that they had missed out on heaven, or else heaven had already come and this is all that there was.

Paul did not want them to be un-necessarily stressed out. This wrong headed idea that Jesus had already come was causing the people to be anxious and afraid. So that he might alleviate their stress, Paul wrote 2 Thessalonians to correct the error. He reminded them of what he had told them The coming of the Lord would be like. “Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, [2] not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed.”

In order to correct the error, Paul reminds them of the things that he taught them when he was still with them. He had given to them God's promise of the things that would occur as the end drew near. If they kept this direct Word from God in mind, they would not be so easily mislead when they heard all kinds of misleading information about these coming events.

This is a helpful thing for us to remember, especially when we see that there are plenty of people who assume that God gave to us this revelation through Paul so that we could have some sort of secret information that no one else knows. These interpreters will look for special codes in the words or secret messages that are hidden there.

God speaks plainly. He uses human words and language to speak, but he doesn't play games with us. God wants us to know what we should expect as the end of days will approach. And the reason that he wants us to know is illustrated precisely by what had occurred in the Thessalonian church. Due to false reports the people panicked and were afraid. God wants us to be calm and assured. He gave these revelations for our comfort. God is graciously reassuring us that yes, these things will happen, but when they do happen, when you see them happening, don't be afraid. Don't be alarmed. God has not abandoned you. He is faithful to you and he will save you.

In our text Paul refers to two parts of this end times revelation. He talks about the coming of the Man of Lawlessness and he talks about the great apostasy. These events are linked, they happen one as a result of the other. They are events that must happen before Christ returns.

The first of these events is the coming of the Man of Lawlessness. Elsewhere scripture refers to him as the Anti Christ. Those who try to interpret end times prophecies have come up with lots of ideas of who this Antichrist will be and what he will do. Some see him as a world wide political figure who will establish an earthly kingdom. Some will refer to the Antichrist as an institution or idea. There are many people who even believe that the Antichrist is already here and is already working.

As far as understanding who the Antichrist is or who he will be, we can see plainly what Paul has written to us. Paul writes, “Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, [4] who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God.”

The Antichrist will seat himself in the temple of God. He will come from the church. He will have the appearance of being a Christian. He will say things that sound Christian. He will claim that Jesus is God and that the Father is God, but he will then claim for himself that same authority. He will say that he is god, that he has god's power and authority. He will say that there are no other gods besides him. He will condemn the gods of the Hindus, the Buddhists, the god of Islam and all the other world religions. He will say that the only true god is the god of the Christian church, which will sound so good to so many, but then he will claim that he is that god. In this lie will come the second event that Paul mentions, the great deception, or the apostasy.

The Antichrist will be so convincing that many will believe him. Many will fall into the trap of believing his lies. He will be so convincing and at the same time, so subtle in his lies that even faithful Christians will be tempted to believe him. Jesus says he would deceive even the elect, if that were possible.

Friends, when the Antichrist comes he will challenge the faith and belief of the church. Christians will be lead astray, church leaders will be lead astray. They will believe the lies, they will refuse to see the subtle twists of the truth and they will be deceived. Let us not be among them. Let us carefully read and interpret and understand and believe the Word of God. It is so important that we study in our homes and here in our church. That we hold on to it as the only true revelation of God for his people the church.

Jesus says that this deception will be cut short for the sake of the elect. That resisting the lies of this deceiver will be so difficult that Christ will return for the sake of preserving those who he loves. Likewise our text tells us that Jesus will come, he will meet the challenge, he will call the bluff of this Antichrist and he will destroy the Antichrist with the breath of his mouth.

There are a couple of things that are good to keep in mind here. First of all, it is helpful to understand what Paul means when he talks about “the breath of his mouth”. The word for breath in Greek is the same as the Word for spirit. The scriptures take advantage of this nuance to show that when Jesus opens up his mouth to breath he sends forth his Holy Spirit. The spirit of God is given and revealed through the mouth of Jesus. The Holy Spirit proceedes out of the mouth of Jesus by means of His Word. When Jesus speaks, he gives to us His Holy Spirit who comes to us and enters us as our ears hear those divine words and we believe. That breath is a divine breath, that Word is a divine Word. It comes with power that gives life to the believer but kills and annihilates those who oppose God. The Antichrist opposes God and is therefor destroyed. He is brought to nothing with a word.

It is also helpful to keep in mind that Jesus is closely guarding his church. We are His people. He made certain of that when he died on the cross to pay the price for our sin. Now that we are his he is not going to loose us to the lies of the devil and his servant: this Antichrist. As these lies mount and as they become more and more difficult to resist, Jesus will time his return perfectly so that no one is lost. We are too weak to resist but His love for us is too strong to let us go.

Paul's revelation is God's gift to us. It warns us ahead of time the things that will happen. God does not give us great detail so that we know the dates and the times and the names and the faces, but he gives to us enough information so that when it happens we will know. We will recognize the Antichrist for who he is and we will not be deceived or mislead. We will perceive the lie and stand firm in the truth. Thank you God for your faithfulness to us, in not leaving us to ourselves to solve this coming dilemma.

God also gives to us comfort. When this challenge to the faith and life of the church comes, when we see those being lead astray that we respect for the faith we thought they had, let us not be dismayed or frightened, when the challenges to us and our faith seem to be greater than what we can bear, let us not loose heart. Our God is faithful. He has told us ahead of time and he will see us through. He will not let us be taken from his hand. The god who sent his son to die for us and to cleanse us from our sin will keep us in the faith through his almighty power. He will bring us through to the day of salvation.

Amen.

Now may the peace that passes all understanding keep your hearts and mind in Christ Jesus. Amen.