Palm Sunday - April 17, 2011

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Today is confirmation Sunday. Our three students have been studying these past few months under the watchful tutelage of Vicar Sprague, and prior to that I took full advantage of the opportunity to teach them and train them in the Catechism and the Christian faith. They have been preparing, by way of this studying, for their confession of faith and promise that they will make in a few moments.
Gentlemen, have spoken at length about this promise. We have gone over in detail the pledges and vows that you will make before God and his church. You are about to promise that you will suffer all even death rather than fall away from this faith.
You are about to promise that you will make regular use of God’s Word and Sacraments as you attend the Divine Service and as you take time throughout your day for personal prayer and study of the Bible.
You are about to promise that you will be faithful even to this Lutheran confession of faith and to this specific congregation.
These are all very significant promises, but each of you, as we have discussed them, have been very resolute and determined in makings just such a promise. I commend you for that. These days, most kids your age are most interested in entertainment and self indulgence, as are many adults for that matter. And here you are, still in your youth and making choices that are very mature. I commend you for that.
In light of your promises, and the pledges and vows that you are about to take, it is important to put these vows and these promises in their proper context. It is helpful to look at our Gospel text for today. For there in the Gospel of Matthew we see before us a good many promises. Promises that are made, promises very similar to yours in fact, and promises that are kept. Vows that are taken and vows that are fulfilled. And what is important to note is that the promise that is most sure and most certain and most valuable is the promise that Jesus made and kept as he gave up his life as a ransom for you.
This is important because the devil, who is out in this world prowling around is seeking to devour you. He is seeking to drive you to despair. He hopes to harm you and ultimately he hopes to destroy you. And he knows that he has no hope of accomplishing this unless he can separate you from these promises. And so he tries his hardest and does his best to do just that. One of your first promises is to renounce the devil, and all his works and all his ways. Take this promise very seriously.
But you will make others. Other promises and other vows. Let’s take a moment and review those promises. Everyone get out your hymnal and open to page 205.
You will begin with the creed.

Do you believe in God the Father Almighty?
Do you believe in Jesus Christ his only Son?
Do you believe in the Holy Spirit?

You will have the opportunity then to confess the Apostles Creed, the exact creed that was confessed on the day you were baptized. The church has been doing this since the earliest days of the church, as far back as the time of the Apostles, who knows, perhaps John or Peter or Paul might have even spoken this creed. It was spoken for you when you were baptized. Today you will speak it for yourself.
Do you intend to continue steadfast in this confession and Church and to suffer all, even death, rather than fall away from it? I do so intend with the help of God.
Do you hold all the prophetic and apostolic Scriptures to be the inspired Word of God and confess the doctrine of the Evangelical Lutheran Church drawn from them as you have learned to know it from the Small Catechism to be faithful and true? I do.
Do you desire to be a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church and of this congregation? I do.
Do you intend to faithfully conform all your life to the divine Word, to be faithful in the use of God’s Word and Sacraments, which are his means of grace, and in faith, word and action to remain true to God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit even to death? I do so intend by the grace of God.

Dear people of St Paul, do you remember making those promises? Do you remember the day that you were confirmed and joined the Lutheran Church? Do you remember these same promises that you made? Have you kept them? Have you been faithful to these vows that you made so many years ago?
Have you waivered in your Confession of Christ and in the face of suffering have you doubted this confession?
You pledged and promised that you would be faithful to the Lutheran Church, yet have you flirted with churches and congregations that have a different confession of faith?
Have you been faithful in going to church? That is to say, have you been faithful in your promise to make faithful use of God’s Word and Sacraments which are his means of Grace? Have you conformed all of your life to the Word of God? Have you been true to God, Father, Son and Spirit?
Take a moment to reconsider these promises. Have you kept them? Have you been faithful to the promise that you made on the day that you were confirmed? Which have you broken? Are there any that you haven’t broken?
No. Not a one. To a person, each one of us who has stood up on the day of our confirmation and taken these vows, we have broken them. We are not men and women of our word. We are promise breakers.
I would like to take just a moment to back up. I want to go back and reconsider that promise that you will make that we mentioned briefly just a moment ago. That promise to renounce the devil and all his works and all his ways. That is an important promise.
Now we know that the devil is bad. That he is evil and that we should want nothing to do with him. But I want to help you to understand why this promise is just so important.
Of all the things that the devil does, of all the tricks that he plays and temptations that he conjurs, the worst temptation the one that is the most damaging and destructive is the temptation to doubt, and particularly the temptation to doubt God.
Satan has been playing this trick since the beginning. When he was tempting Even in the Garden, do you remember his strategy? He said to her, “Did God really say you shall not eat of the fruit.” He was trying to get Eve to doubt the Word of God.
And then when Jesus was being tempted, we get to look in on the temptation from the other side. Usually we can’t see the spiritual realm but in these two places we get that rare glimpse, and we see that Satan is using that same trick, and this time, with Jesus in the wilderness, he is trying to get Jesus to doubt God’s Word and God’s promise that he gave to Jesus at his baptism. When Jesus was baptized, the Lord said from heaven, “This is my Son, with whom I am well pleased.” And so what does Satan do? When he is tempting Jesus he attacks that Word. “If you are the Son of God.”
Satan will do the same with you. He will try to undermine the promise that God gave to you on the day that you were baptized. Because he knows if he can do that, he knows if he can separate you from that Word of God, then he can destroy you; just like he destroyed Judas in our Gospel text. We are promise breakers. Judas was a promise breaker. When Judas saw what he had done he despaired. He doubted God’s promise to him, God’s word of faithfulness to him and he went out and he hanged himself. Where Judas was concerned the Devil won.
But this Gospel text is hardly about the devil’s victory. The Lord permits us to see that the Devil does win from time to time, that he successfully draws Christians away from His Word. We receive this as a warning. When you make your promise today, make sure you keep it.
And for the rest of you, when the Confirmation class makes these promises, recommit yourself to your promise. Your promise to cling to Jesus even if it cost you your life. Your promise to take advantage of the gifts of Jesus, his means of grace. Your promise to go to church, where you can receive those gifts. Recommit yourself to that promise. And keep it. Hear the warning in our text and keep it.
Let’s return to our text. Follow along as I read Matthew 26, beginning at verse 30.
[30] And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives. [31] Then Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away because of me this night. For it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.’ [32] But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee.” [33] Peter answered him, “Though they all fall away because of you, I will never fall away.” [34] Jesus said to him, “Truly, I tell you, this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” [35] Peter said to him, “Even if I must die with you, I will not deny you!” And all the disciples said the same.(Matthew 26:30-35 ESV)

Confirmation class you will take a vow to be faithful even to death. Peter, the disciple of Jesus and the Bishop of the first Christian church took that same promise. “Even if I must die with you, I will not deny you!” How long before he broke that promise?
Jesus had it right. He said, “Before the rooster crows three times Peter, you will deny me.” Peter would hear nothing of it. But then, after the events of that night unfolded, it was just as Jesus said. When Peter heard the rooster he was reduced to tears. To weeping. To sorrow. What do you suppose Satan was whispering in his ear? Probably the same thing whispered in ours.
And so we repent. In tears we come here to church, where Jesus has promised to be, and we repent. We look to Jesus and we recall, not our promises, but His. Because this text isn’t about us or our promises, it is about Jesus and His promises. His promise first of all, to His Father, our Heavenly Father, the promise that Jesus made to keep the will of his father. Jesus promised to obey his father even unto death. “Even if I should have to suffer all even death. Yet not my will but thine be done.” said Jesus.
And Jesus kept that promise. It was the will of the Father that Jesus should suffer all, even and especially death. It was the will of the Father that Jesus suffer that thing that we vow to do, that he suffer everything; torture, pain, mockery, ridicule, death – even death on a cross. He kept that promise for you. Where you have broken the promise, Jesus has kept it. Where you have been faithless in your Word he is faithful to His. Where you have succumbed under the pressure to given in, he has stood firm and resolute so that you could be forgiven.
Dear friends. Dear Christians, Dear confirmands, past and present. There are 3 messages that I want to leave with you today.
The first is this. Remember your promises. On this your confirmation Sunday, you will make, or perhaps you will make again promises to God; Father, Son and Spirit, that you will be faithful to him. Keep this promise. Commit yourself to this promise. You will live the remainder of your life in this world in the midst of a world that will do everything it can to separate you from that promise. It will tell you that the thing you promised yourself to, that God and his forgiveness earned at the cross and delivered in your baptism are worthless, unnecessary, that they get in the way. You know better so don’t listen. Hold to that promise. That’s the first. Here’s the second.
The Devil wants nothing more than for you to let go of that promise. And here’s why. The devil is no fool. He knows that you are weak and he can dislodge you from your Word easily. He’s not worried about that. What scares him is God’s promise. And so he knows that if he can weasel his way in between you and the promise given at your baptism, the promise given in the supper, the promise given here in Holy Absolution, then he can do to you what he did to Judas. Don’t let him. Don’t be fooled. Be faithful.
And finally. The third thing. These promises are not about you. They are not about your promises and your faithfulness. They are about God. You, I everyone. We are promise breakers. We are faithless. We are here today because Jesus is faithful. Because he made a promise and he kept it. I will close with the Epistle text.
[5] Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, [6] who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, [7] but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. [8] And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. [9] Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, [10] so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, [11] and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
(Philippians 2:5-11 ESV)
Amen.