Easter 6

This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you.

Romeo and Juliet, Wuthering Heights, Anna Carinena, Gone with the Wind, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Pride and Prejudice, and Casablanca. Sleepless in Seatle, When Harry Met Sally, The Notebook, The Bridges of Madison County, The Princess Bride, not to mention a few of the current favorites in the Schlueter household Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid.
What draws these stories all together, the common thread that runs through each one is that each is a love story. A story about the formation and implementation of romantic love, classic stories about endearing and enduring romance between a man and a woman. The stories are often tragic, always heartfelt, and each one seeks to contribute some piece, small as it may be, to the over all discussion and understanding of Love.
Love! What is it?
How do you find it?
What do you do when you are caught up in it?
These are the questions of our day. And as much has been written, as much ink has been spilled and as many stories as have been told, there are always more to tell. Characters are redrawn, plots are reconstructed and tales are re-woven to once again tell the story of love.
These are the question of our day. And increasingly more so. With romance filling the airwaves and painting pictures on our television screens, and streaming on the Internet, with initiatives on ballots for who can and can not love and criticism and accusations of bigotry in print and flowing from new sources, questions of love are ever before us. How to answer them? That is the question.
The answer to the question of love is to examine the topic under the cross. God is love. If you want to know the character of love, if you want to know what it is and how it works and what it does the place to begin is with the Word of God. The place where God has revealed himself to us and the place where God has written a record that answers these questions as we need to know them.
If you want to know love, know God.  because God is love.
“As the Father has loved me”, said Jesus, “so have I love you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments you will abide in my love just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you that your joy may be full.”
With so many people looking for love, with so many people wanting to be loved, Jesus here offers to us the key to love and to where it begins – love begins in God. Because God is Love. God the Father who sent to us Jesus, who gave to us his commandment, who offers to us the fullness of the Joy that comes through receiving His love; He is love.
“In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” 1 John 4:10 (ESV) That was our text last week. It really couldn't be any more clearly put. Love is what God does to give us Jesus who is the sacrifice for our sin. Last week we talked about propitiation. A word found in the Bible, that we don't really use anywhere else, but that tells us about God's mercy that fulfills his right and righteous judgment by means of His own perfect sacrifice – Jesus on the cross for our sin.
That is so different from how we think about love. It doesn't matter how else you would define it: Passion. Chemistry. Emotion. Feelings. Desire. Sex. Whatever... These things, to find them, you look inside yourself. You look into your heart. Popular ideas about love all have to do with attraction, whether or not someone stimulates you, makes you feel a certain way when you are around them. This is not love. This feeling can be a by-product of love. But it is not love. Love. Real love. True love is a conscious decision, an act of the will, something you do because you can do no other. Last week we also talked about moms. We have all heard the expression, “He has a face only a mother could love”. That's about as close as we can come in a sinful world to understanding what love is. It doesn't matter how badly you disappoint her, you mom still loves you. You're still her precious baby whether or not you deserve to be.
Love is what love does. Love surrenders. Love sacrifices. Love dies. "Greater love has no one than this, than that he lay down his life for his friends." You want to see love. You want to know a love story, you want to see the greatest love story ever told, ever written, ever conceived? It didn't come from a human mind, a human heart. Romeo and Juliet is a tragic love story about a young couple who give up their lives for their love. Romeo and Juliet has nothing on this story, on God's story. God's love is far more radical, far more sacrificial, far better, more beautiful. To see and understand God's love, look at the cross. There has never been a greater love, a more perfect love, a purer and yes even more “passion”ate love than the one we see in Jesus on the cross. Jesus who gave all so that you could live. Jesus who made himself the sacrifice, the scape goat, the God in human flesh who came to die for the sins of the world. This is love. Jesus is love.
Love might create feelings. Love might foster emotion. But the stuff you feel in your heart, the butterflies you feel in your stomach – that is not love, not true love, not love that in the end is worth something. Love is sacrifice. Love is dying, laying yourself down for your friends, stepping in to take the punishment that you don't deserve. That is love.
Have you loved?
No. You haven't. I haven't. Not like that. Not like God has loved. Not the way we should love. Or didn't your realize that was the standard.  Jesus said, “This is my commandment: that you love one another as I have loved you.” We have seen His love; love that is so complete that He literally died for us on the cross, that he suffered unspeakable tortures at the hands of the Roman soldiers but especially at the hands of God.  This is how Jesus has loved you; now, says Jesus, you show that same love to your neighbor. 
We have come nowhere close. Not to that kind of love anyways. The best human love we find example of, the purest love a human heart can muster is a mother's love, but even that is partial and impure.  Mom's, just think about the things that go through your heads when you pick up the same toys and the same dirty clothes from the floor for 87th time in one day.  Are the thoughts in your head thoughts of love, or are they influenced by frustration or even anger? Is your love at times given begrudgingly and unwillingly?
The best love that we can muster, the most complete and consistent love that we produce is the love we have for ourselves. We are always looking to further our own ends, to achieve our own goals, to promote our own agendas. We are always concerned to preserve what we need, what we want, what we think our lives should be.
That's why love in the world is such a mess. Consider divorce. These days it is acceptable, both culturally and legally, for a husband or wife to come home announce to their spouse they have fallen out of love, causally make an appointment with an attorney and dissolve what God has joined together. In our day, marriage means nothing. Love means nothing. Marriage is a small flame that burns for a while, whose flames provide a passing entertainment, but when that flame grows dim, putting it out all together is a quick and easy process.
With the way we treat marriage, with the dishonorable way we conceive of God's greatest gift for human love and relationships, is it a wonder that so many states are considering initiatives to allow marriage between two men or between two women. Is it any wonder that when marriage is nothing more than a party with some gifts and nice vacation afterward that our popular culture has come to understand this as disposable. Of course not. We are sleeping in the bed that we have made with our own poor choices. And since this is the bed we have made, there's no stopping who can get in or out of it.
So how do we stop it? Return to love. Look to your first love. That is to say look to the One who has loved you first, who has loved you first and best. Look to Jesus.
God is love. God has demonstrated love by living that love. He lived that love by living to first to obey and second to die.
Jesus lived to love and he loved to obey.
Jesus tells us that we love God when we obey his commandments. He gives us ten. He sums them up into two and then to one. Love God. Love your neighbor. Love. Obey this command.
Emotion is not love because emotion serves the self. You can fall in and out of love a hundred times a day. Love must be greater than that.
Adultery, be it same sex or opposite, is not love because love is faithfulness, faithless sexuality is self serving. Christian sexuality is never self serving it is God's gift of you to your spouse.
Chemistry is not love because love never fails. Science experiments burn hot and then burn out.
As those redeemed by Christ under the cross, we aught to confess those sins. We aught to acknowledge to God and then to each other that we have not loved. Husbands have not loved their wives. Wives have not loved their husbands. Parents have not loved their children. Children have not loved their parents. Brothers and sisters have not loved one another. We are guilty of self-love. We need to confess that misguided love and instead love each other the way we love ourselves.
And when we have obeyed that commandment, our hearts are ready and prepared. We have seen our fault, we have confessed it and God is ready with his forgiveness. He has chosen us. He has moved us, our heart to this confession. He has turned us outside ourselves to begin learning to love him.
Love is what love does.  Love is what God does.  God gives.  God surrenders.  God sacrifices.  God does this all for you.
Because God has done this you are forgiven. God's love has driven out your sinful love. God's love has replaced your impartial love. If some have a face only a mother could love, we all have a heart that only God could love. He has loved. He has loved you. Go in His peace.

Easter 4

Do you suppose they just didn't know?
Shortly after the Holy Spirit was given on Pentecost, Peter and John went to the temple. While they were there they met a man who had been crippled since his birth. The man was a beggar and he asked the two companions for a few coins so he could buy a meal. “Silver and gold we do not have,” said Peter. “But what I do have I will give you. In the name of Jesus get up and walk.”
The man got up and was leaping up and down in the temple, praising God and attracting a good deal of attention so that Peter and John were compelled to give witness to the death and resurrection of Jesus as the author of life for the forgiveness of sins.
This is the background for our first lesson from Acts. As the narrative begins here in our text, we discover that the rulers of the temple took issue with Peter and John for their preaching. They arrested them, put them in Jail, and tried them for their crime of healing a lame man and preaching the crucifixion of Jesus.
Peter and John were in the temple, the headquarters for the men behind the murder of Jesus. The crucifixion had been only weeks before – still fresh in the minds of everyone in Jerusalem. Wouldn't you think Peter and John would want to lay low for a while? Wouldn't you think they would wait a while longer? Maybe move to a new town? Maybe begin their ministry in quiet places, back alleyways, out in the countryside? Away from the temple. Do you suppose they just were not that smart, that shrewd to be able to discern their very real danger?
That would seem to make sense. Why else would they take such a risk? But these men were no fools. They knew what they were doing. They knew the risk they incurred. Yet they did it anyway. These men understood, they knew, the reality of the Love of Jesus.
This same John who went walking with Peter in the temple, who was arrested by the temple authorities and on trial here in our New Testament Lesson is the very same man who penned the words of our sermon text.
“By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.”
Peter and John knew the love of Jesus. They knew that this love was real love. Not just words, not just noble ideas, not just philosophies and feelings. This was love that compelled Jesus to give up his very self for you and me so that we could have life. This same love compelled Peter and John to heal a man, to reach out to a man who had needs that they were able to meet. This same love compelled Peter and John to preach about Jesus even when it cost them dearly. This love of Jesus also aught to compel us to similar works of sacrifice.
“Little Children,” John writes, “let us not love in word or talk but in deed and truth!”
Just as Jesus sacrificed himself for us, just as Peter and John sacrificed themselves for this lame beggar, in the same way, we ought to sacrifice ourselves for each other. Jesus has shown us what it means to love. We ought to show that love to each other – freely, liberally. Without restraint.
Peter and John are a great example. They had received the love of Jesus. Because of Jesus self sacrifice they had the promise of heaven. Therefore they did not hesitate to lay down their lives for this total stranger.
Have we done the same? We would like to tell ourselves that we have. We would like to believe that we do love our neighbors, our Christian brothers and sisters as Jesus has loved us and Peter and John loved this lame beggar. But we have not. We aught to love them with our very selves, we aught to be willing to surrender our health, our well being, for the good of our neighbor. But we don't even want to surrender our stuff!
God has given to us everything that we have. God gives us our bodies; our eyes and ears, a sharp mind, hands and feet to work and he rewards that work with the things we need to care for our bodies. He gives us food and shelter and transportation, clothing and even things for our comfort and pleasure.
It is because of the goodness of God that have not just food on our table, but food that fills our cupboards and food that tastes good so that we enjoy eating it.
It is because of the goodness of God that we have not just a roof over our head, but also walls with windows and insulation and heat and air conditioning and furniture.
It is because of the goodness of God that we have not just clothes to cover our bodies but many changes of clothes of various styles and colors.
It is because of the goodness of God that we have not just a bed to sleep in but also a couch, a table, an entertainment center, china cabinets.
It is because of the goodness of God that we have not just transportation, not just a car to get us from point a to b, but two, three or more cars. And not just beat up clunkers, but nice with climate controlled environments, comfortable seating, little gadgets to play your music tell you the weather forecast and how to get to your destination.
God has given to us, to you so many good things. He has given to you, your self, your body and he has given to you all of these other things for the care and the enjoyment of your body.
While these things are so good, while they are all gifts from God, if God would have us to lay down our self, surely we should also lay down also all these other things. Surely we should also gladly surrender our worldly goods, these extra things that God has given. Yet because of sin, we have not. We have refused. We have instead chosen to hold on to these things, to horde these things, to selfishly and sinfully keep them for ourselves.
Our text says, “If anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him?” We have the world's goods. There is no questing that. The question is, have we closed our hearts against our brothers and sisters in Christ.
Oh and we have. WE have kept our things for ourselves. We have held on to our cash. We have protected what's ours. WE have refused to give. Refused to share. Refused to help. God has given us greater wealth than the world has ever seen in its entire history. We have nicer things, greater comfort, more amenities and we have seen these thing not as a means to set us free for greater service but as the goal, as an ends to themselves, as something to be held on to and protected and defended. Maybe its when you plan your schedule and won't give up an afternoon to help a brother so you can earn more money for yourself. Maybe its when you place your money in the offering plate on Sunday morning. Maybe its when you haven't stopped to lend a hand to that person in need.
“Little children. Let us not love in words or talk, but in deed and truth.”
Children of God. Know this. As you confess this sin, it has already been forgiven. Jesus has already washed it away. You are already clean. Your sin is already gone. The same God who loved the world so much that he gave his only son has loved you. He has forgiven you for this sin because of the innocent death of Jesus.
As we have been counting costs and tallying up our pennies, he has been piling on the forgiveness and tallying up his grace.
While we have been collecting the World's goods he has been collecting our sin so that he could die for it all.
While we have been turning our hearts away from our neighbors in sin and selfishness he has been opening up his heart to us in love. Your sins have been washed away because Jesus bought and paid for your sin with His own perfect and righteous life and with his own blood.
When Peter and John made their way to the temple on that day they were met with a man who had a great need. He was lame, he could not work and he had to beg. They did not have the worlds goods. They were poor in possessions but what they had to give was by far greater than only a few coins. They had healing for the mans body, and what was even better than strength for his legs was the strength they had for his heart. They offered to the man the forgiveness of sins that comes through the knowledge that Jesus died for me.
Just as your hearts are crippled and lame with sin, the pronouncement of God's forgiveness has healed you. Your hearts are strong.
The beggar used the newly given strength in his legs to leap for joy and for praise to God. May you use the same strength given to your renewed hearts to love and to serve your neighbor.
Amen.

Easter 3 - 1 John 3

See what kind of love the father has given to us so that we are called children of God and that is what we are.

Russian orphanages can be despicable places. They are overcrowded. They are underfunded. And they are understaffed. Unwanted and unloved children are deposited in the orphanages where the attendants offer only the minimum of care. Infants are often diapered and fed twice daily and spend the rest of the day confined to a crib with no one to hold them when they cry, to cuddle them when they are afraid, to nurture them and care for them.

Victoria was born to a Russian alcoholic mother. Her mother could not keep her, did not want her and so gave her up as a ward of the state. The state deposited her in one such orphanage. Victoria's hopes for her life were abysmal. No one to love her, no one to care for her, only her most basic needs were met and once she turned 18 she would be turned out on the street, on her own with a minimum of education, no support, no career, no future and likely to follow in her mother's footsteps.

But Victoria's story was destined to take dramatic change. A young couple came one day to the orphanage where Victoria was housed. The warden at the orphanage directed the hopeful man and wife over to Victoria's crib. They picked her up, they held her, the cuddled her, they brought her into a room where they played with her, put her on their lap, passed her between them with loving embraces. They fell in love with little Victoria. They couldn't leave her in this horrible place. They were not able to take little Victoria home with them at that time. The left the orphanage and returned home to Indiana. But a month or so later they returned to Russia, came back to the orphanage, signed all the necessary papers and claimed little Victoria as their own child. Victoria's life had suddenly changed. She was someone's child, a daughter, beloved, cared for, fed and nourished, loved and nurtured, someone to hold her when she cried, someone to laugh when she smiled, someone to take pride in her, someone to find joy in her.

“My Children, do you see what Love the Father has for you so that we are called children of God. And that is what we are!” says the apostle John about you and me.

For just like little Victoria we were born to be orphans – without a home, without a Father who would love us and care for us and provide for us. Without an inheritance and a future. Without a family. That is not to say that God has not placed us in our earthly homes and communities with relationships and friends and neighbors and relatives and reunions and parties and get-togethers and all of these are good things, things that God has given. Yet they are not enough.

We are sinners. Through and through, right down to the very core, through to the heart. It is not just that we have committed sins. It is not just that every once in a while we have done something wrong, like your own children who disobey you from time to time but still get live in your house and eat at your table. We are out and out slaves to the devil and sin. Spiritual orphans without hope. We are turned in on ourselves so that our self is our “number one”.

But we are loved by God. So much that he calls us His children. Born under sin, born under the law and condemned to His judgment. But he came to us in our sin. He found us in our hopelessness and wretchedness and he adopted us to be his own dear children. So that he could be our own dear Father. So that we could live under him in His eternal household.

Brothers and Sisters in the household of our Heavenly Father, your adoption was not cheap. If you were to travel to Russia or some other country to adopt a child and bring her home as your own it would cost you. You would accumulate thousands of dollars in adoption fees not to mention travel expenses. Adopting a child is costly.

How much more so, then, did your Heavenly Father pay for you. How much more did you cost him? If you were dead in tresspasses and sin. If you were guilty beyond measure, if you were turned away from the one who would love you, if you were guilty of sins against him that demanded punishment, then the only recourse for Him if He were to truly adopt you would be for Him to send His only Son, Jesus, who would be our brother. Jesus came at the command of His Father to suffer your punishment so that you could go free.

Imagine demanding that of one of your children – the youngest gets in trouble and you command the oldest to pay the penalty. How well would that go over. It wouldn't. It wouldn't be fair. Your oldest would argue and complain, Your oldest would resent you for your favoritism. Your oldest would hate the youngest. Dr Phil would think you to be a dysfunctional parent. Yet this is what your spiritual family has done so that you might be included.

While you were yet a sinner, Your Heavenly Father to be sent His only Son to pay the price for your sin so that you could be His child and live in his eternal mansion for all eternity. While you were his enemy. While you hated him and despised him and wanted nothing to do with him he loved you and sent Jesus whom He loved more than anything to be the sacrifice for your sin. Can we even begin to imagine such a love?

And that Jesus would do it. Remember Jesus in the garden on the night he was betrayed, sweating great drops of blood, pleading with His Father that there would be found another way, yet willing to acknowledge the will of His Father. Can you imagine the love of Jesus to share His heavenly inheritance with those who would kill him, with those who hated him and spit upon him and despised him? Can you imagine Jesus loving even you and even me? It is too great, too deep, too far to conceive. Yet this is what our Brother Jesus has done to obey the will of His Father and to make you His brother.

“Do you see what sort of love the Father has given to us so that we might be called children of God and that is what we are.”

Could you imagine if little Victoria were to one day go up to her new mother and father, who had given up so much to have her and who had fallen so deeply in love with her, could you imagine that this little girl, whose life changed so drastically and completely for the good were to say to her new mother and father, “Mom, Dad, it's really nice of you to rescue me from that orphanage where I sat in my own filth and never had enough to eat and where no one cared if I lived or died, but I have decided that your house, your love, your care and provision for me is just not my cup of tea. If you don't mind, I'm gong back to Russia to strap on my dirty diaper and climb back into my old crib in my old crowded, cold institution. I am going to go back to being an orphan.”

That would never happen, you say. Once a child has been saved from such hopelessness she would never go back, never even think of going back. To go back would be senseless. You are right. It would be. So then why do you?

John explains, “You know that Jesus appeared to take away sins and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in Him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or knows him.”

If you have been rescued from your hopeless life of sin, then why do you continue to go back to it? Why do you choose your filth over his purity? Who do you choose your lawlessness over His righteousness? Who do you choose your poverty over his wealth? Why do you choose your loneliness and isolation over his love and nurture? Is it anything other than absurdity? Foolishness? Why do we continue to insist on our own sin?

Brothers and sisters we ought not. We have been rescued from such things. We have been purchased and won from such things. We have been set free from such things. We do not need them. We have no use for them. They pull us away from our Father and they forfeit the inheritance that He has set aside for us. Let us not be so foolish.

A week ago, the epistle from the John the disciple of Jesus reminded us that we have only lied to ourselves and denied God's truth when we claim that we are without sin. But that God in his faithfulness and in His love for us has promised to wash away that sin and cleanse us from our unrighteousness, to cleanse us from our filth through his pronouncement of forgiveness. He promises that each time we confess that we have soiled ourselves he will clean us without exception, without limit. Unconditionally restored as children and heirs in His heavenly House.

My Brothers and My Sisters, the love of God our Father and our brother Jesus is great. We are children of the Father and Jesus is truly our brother. We are called children of God, but that is only the beginning. As wonderful and as great and as unbelievable as that is, the fullness of God's gifts to us has not yet even been revealed. As much as you have already received he has more to give. As much as you already enjoy, you have yet to even tap the bare surface of His blessings. If this is the introduction, if this is the foyer of God's mansion, imagine the treasures that will lie ahead once we have experienced the Resurrection of the Dead, once we are allowed inside the Father's Mansion once and for all with the freedom to run throughout and explore. Untold glories of Heaven await us.

God has set those things aside to be given on the last day. They are yours now, yet incomplete. Let us lay aside those sins that would distract us and entangle us and would move us to surrender our inheritance. And let us live as children of our Father. For that is what we are.

Amen.

Easter 2 - John 20:19-31

The breath of God gives life. It happened in the Old Testament, it happens here. When God intended to give life to the Human race, he did it differently than with the rest of creation. With the rest of His creation God gave life by speaking it into being.
Genesis says,
And God said, "Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens." So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. Genesis 1:20-21 (ESV)
And God said, "Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds—livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds." And it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. Genesis 1:24-25 (ESV)
But when God created Adam he used a different mode. He took a lump of clay, formed it into a man and he breathed on it. From that moment Adam was a living being. I[n Hebrew the man had a
in Greek yuch.n zw/san] a living soul. Man had flesh, human dna, a body with a heart and lungs and similar physical structures to the animals God made in His creation. But man had something that the others did not, a living soul, the breath of God. A spirit that God designed to live forever in conjunction with that lump of flesh; that God infused with His own image so that the man and his offspring would be like Him and so that the man would have dominion over God's Creation; so that the man and his offspring would serve God and each other in this new and beautiful world that God created.
But the man had other plans. God's idea was that man live forever in His perfect creation. The man wanted to rule it for himself. Yes this was a beautiful world, and God made him as the greatest and best in this world, but he was not content to serve. Rather he thought to serve himself, to be better than just the greatest among created things he wanted to be God. And so , in an act of mutiny and rebellion, God's greatest creation turned against God. Adam, the man, and Eve his wife exchange God's image for God's knowledge, for knowing good and evil.
In so doing the man came to know death. In his act of disobedience and sin, as he mastered the discipline of evil and sin, he was rewarded with his just wages. The man, Adam, and Eve his wife came to know death. The breath of life was strangled in sin. God's good world became spoiled and wrong.
Brother and sisters in Christ, you are guilty of this sin. You are sons of Adam. You are daughters of Eve. You have made this knowledge, this knowing evil (as well as good) your god. You have not been content to serve your neighbor, you have not been content to obey the commandments. You have wanted more. You have sought after more. You have wanted to know and to experience those things that the world has to offer – worldly wealth, worldly power, worldly glory. You have sinned just as Adam sinned, just as Eve sinned and you are guilty of their disobedience and you are deserving of death.
But God gave to you Jesus so that you might have life.
The first breath that gave life was set aside by our first parents so that they might know evil. God gave a re-breathing of a new life when he gave to us Jesus.
Adam came into being when God formed a lump of clay into a man and breathed into him the breath of life. Jesus came into human flesh when God sent His angel Gabriel to speak His Word to Mary and through that preaching of the Word of God the Holy Spirit came upon her and Jesus was conceived in her womb. The power of the Holy Spirit created life where there was no life. And so Jesus was born as a child of Adam like us in every way, yet at the same time a child of the promise, born by the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus was born how we should have been born.
And now in our text John tells us that these things, the things that he has written and the things that we have read, that these things are written so that we may have life. Sin has taken away from us the eternal breath of God, through faith God restores that breath so that we once again have life.
And what is that we believe? We believe the things that we have read.
Throughout his gospel, John records for us the works of Jesus. John tells us of the wedding at Cana where Jesus turned water into wine. He tells us of the healing by the pool of Bethesda, the healing of the official's son, the feeding of the 5000, the blind man, the resurrection of Lazarus. He records for us many of Jesus' words and His teaching. There is much that could be written and much that could be told. John even admits that the world would be filled with books if it all were to be written. But these things that John has recorded have been written so that you may believe them and that by believing you my have life.
After John is content to tell us of Jesus' teaching and His miracles he tells us what he really wants us to know, he tells us that thing that is of greatest importance for us to believe and that is that this Jesus who was born by the power of the Holy Spirit apart from the sin of Adam died for you on the cross. God so loved his world that He sent this one and only son so that whoever believe on him might not die but have life. The death of our disobedience is overcome by the death of Jesus' obedience. And so faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word.
The death of Jesus is able to give life because Jesus himself is alive. His death was for us and in our place, yet he is no longer dead. He has paid the full penalty for death and so He is alive. When we believe that His death was for us, God gives us life.
In our text, Jesus, who is fresh from the grave, who has just conquered death and is now alive appears to his disciples. He sees them for the first time. They were locked up and shut away from the rest of the world. They were paralyzed with fear, fear of death, death that comes by sin, and he spoke to them words of comfort. Peace to you.
Jesus gives peace. To those who were dead in sin, Jesus restores to them the breath of life that the human race lost when Adam and Eve sinned. Jesus breathes on them. He rebreathes that breath that gives life. These sons of Adam are now sons of God and brothers of Jesus.
But Jesus does not intend for this breath to be limited, to stay only with these 10 men gathered here in the upper room. Jesus wants His breath to be breathed out all over the world. So with his breath he gives a command. Forgive sin. “If you forgiven anyone his sin they are forgiven. If you do not forgiven them they are not forgiven.” Jesus appeared to the 10 who were gathered there so that he could breath life to them, so that they would believe and that by believing they would have life. Jesus commanded them to preach and proclaim his forgiveness, to announce to sinners that they were forgiven because of the death and resurrection of Jesus and so that by believing this they would have life.
For you who are children of Adam, who are born into the death of sin, the breath of life is vitally important. The breath is breathed on you. Christ's command to forgive sins is carried out. Sin is confessed, absolution is spoken, the breath of God is restored where it had previously been surrendered. Your sins are forgiven.
The risen Christ gives peace. This is peace that can only come with forgiveness. Your sins are forgiven. Go in peace.
Amen.

Lent 5 - Hebrews 5:1-10

In Matthew 18 Jesus tells a parable about a shepherd who goes after one of his sheep. “What do you think?” he says, “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? [13] And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray. [14] So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.”
Now Jesus' parable is a little weird. Let's admit it. If one sheep is lost you cut your losses and thank God for the 99 that you still have. Would you really leave the 99 that you still have and risk loosing them by leaving them to fend for themselves out in the wilderness while you went off in search of that one stupid little sheep that got himself into trouble in the first place. It really doesn't makes sense.
And that is the point that Jesus is trying to get across. The actions of Jesus our Good Shepherd are (in our mind) a bit reckless. What he does defies explanation. What he does defies logic and reason. He does things that smart businessmen wouldn't ever think of doing. He takes risks that you and I could not imagine. Yet that is who he is and that is what he does. He would have no risk be too great that it would keep him from doing all he could to keep from loosing even one of his little lambs. This is Jesus. This is our Good Shepherd. And This is profoundly comforting.
This is comforting especially after the text I preached on for last week's sermon. Do you remember? The text was hard. It was hard. Hard for you and me to get our heads around. Hard for you and me to understand. God sent snakes. He sent them. He didn't stand back and let them come. He didn't turn his head for a moment to pretend he didn't know what was happening. He sent them. He bent down and whispered in the ear of those snakes, “Do you see those Israelites there? Go bite them.” God motivated them to do what was not in their nature. Snakes are frightened of people. They hide from people. The slink away under a rock when people walk by. God caused these snakes to come. It is the same thing he did when he sent Satan to afflict Job. It is the same thing he did when he sent Nebuchadnezzar to march his armies against Jerusalem and tear it to the ground. God sent bad things to afflict his people. That is challenging. That is hard to wrestle with. That is hard for us to understand.
In our minds, in our shallow understanding of ourselves and of god, a loving god should not do that. He should not cause pain. He should not create suffering. He should not be the one who is stirring the pot and causing the strife, he should be the one who brings peace and calm and prosperity. He should bless, not curse. Last week, you might have been tempted to think that you heard me wrong, that I did not say God sent the snakes or that God sent the disaster. Or if you heard me correctly, you might have been tempted to dismiss what I said. “I think our pastor has gone a little too far – perhaps he is spending too much time watching the Spartans in the NCAA tournament and not enough time studying his bible. We'll cut him a little slack here and hope he brings it back around after the tournament is over.”
It's not me. Your struggle is not with me, with what I have said, your struggle is with God. That is what the text says. You can read it for yourself. In the Hebrew text it is the same word used when God sent Adam and Eve from the Garden after they sinned. He drove them out, cast them out. Or when Noah sent the dove out the window of the ark to see if there was any dry land. There is purpose and intention with this sending.
We are tempted to believe that this truth is a horrible truth. We are tempted to believe that this undermines everything we have ever learned about God's love and his goodness and his kindness and his mercy. We are tempted to believe that this must mean that God is extreme. Remember what we have said. God is reckless. God is drastic. God is extreme. But not because he wants to be. God is reckless and drastic and extreme because he has to be. Because he needs to be. God is simply doing what he needs to do so he can get us to turn from our sin and repent.
You see, we are tempted to believe that the more serious sins are the sins of adultery, theft, abuse - you know, those things that other people do, those things that we look down on other people for doing, those things that we love to gossip about. Those things are sin. But we know they are wrong and most of the time when people commit those sins they are ashamed of them and want to confess them. Most of the time the sins that damn us to hell are not those sins. Most of the time the sins that damn us are the sins of pride, the deepest sin that lives in the human heart is the sin that says “I have done nothing wrong. I don't need forgiveness for what I have done.” Remember what John writes in his epistle. If we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
It is God's will to break us of that sin. It is God's will that we confess our sin, all of our sin, even the sins that we have hidden away deep in our hearts that no body else knows about, even those sins that are so deep we do not know about them ourselves. God knows those sins are deadly and because he loves you so greatly he will not let those sins take you away from him. He loves you so greatly He will not be content to stand by and watch as those sins take you to hell.
My friends, don't be foolish. We all know human nature, we all know how deep our sins lie. We all know the pride that live in our hearts. It is our own foolishness that will look around at the suffering of other people, it is our own foolishness that will measure one suffering against another and say – “Ooh! Look! This person is suffering a lot. I wonder what sin he has committed. It must be really bad if God has got to strike him so hard.” That's what Job's friends did and God rebuked them and called them the fools that they were. That very thought grows from pride. You ought to confess it and all its ugly friends that live in your heart and beg God for mercy.
Our text this morning is from Hebrews. Chapter 5, the first 10 verses. The Epistle of Hebrews connects the Old Testament covenant with the temple, the priests and all the sacrifices with the work of Christ, with Jesus and who He is and what He has done for us on the cross. As our text says, God gave priests to his people to serve as the go between, an intermediary, or an ambassador. Someone to go before God on behalf of the people and bring their gifts of repentance that were requests for forgiveness. The Israelites would come, bring with them their sacrificial lamb, perfect and spotless, and the priest would take this gift into the temple and slaughter it before God and burn it on the altar. God accepted this sacrifice – God gave his Word that whenever His people came to the temple, whenever the people came close to where God was, in spite of their sin he would permit them to live and he would accept the life of the lamb in their place.
This was a good system. The people were sinners. People have been sinners ever since Adam and Eve. It is risky and dangerous for sinners to be anywhere near where God is because God is just, he sees those sins, even the ones that we have hidden away in our hearts that we are not even aware of and he knows that they must be punished. The sacrifice was a substitute, a stand in that suffered God's wrath so the sinner could be forgiven. And when the people brought their sacrifices to the priest, the priest did not look down his nose at them, the priest did not judge them or deal harshly with them. The priest did not say, “Didn't I just see you here a few days ago? What kind of trouble have you gotten yourself into that you need to come back so soon?” Because the priest himself was a sinner. The priest was weak, and wandering just as the people were weak and wandering. That' what our text means when it says, “He was able to deal gently with the ignorant and the wayward because he himself was beset with weakness.” It was the job of the priest, every day, before he could sacrifice for anyone else, he had to to sacrifice for himself.
While that made the priest gentle, it also made him weak. It also made the entire system weak because as an imperfect priest, he could only offer imperfect sacrifices. As imperfect priest offering imperfect sacrifices, he had to sacrifice every day, multiple times every day. The temple was, in effect a slaughter house where the blood of lambs and bulls ran freely.
So God gave us a new priest, a better priest, a priest who experienced human weakness, in all its frailty and in all its limitations. God gave us a priest who suffered with every temptation that we undergo, with every trial and tribulation, with every pain that we feel. God gave to us Jesus. And because Jesus has suffered the way that we suffer He deals gently with us. He doesn't ever say, “I saw you here just last week.” He doesn't ever say, “I have forgiven you for that sin already.” He doesn't every say, “You don't deserve my forgiveness.” He doesn't ever say, “I forgave you last time, this time you're going to have to earn it.” He just simply forgives.
But that forgiveness is not free. It never is. Forgiveness always comes with a price. There is sin and that sin needs to be satisfied. It needs to be paid for. But not by you. Jesus the new priest, the better priest, the gentle priest takes your sin and for it he offers a sacrifice. Not an imperfect sacrifice, not a sacrifice that will need to be repeated the next time you sin, but a perfect sacrifice, an eternal sacrifice, a comprehensive and complete sacrifice. A sacrifice that covers all your sin for all time even for all ages, even until the end of the age.
And so here's the thing: our sin has been forgiven. It has been washed away, it has been covered, it has been taken away from us and it is gone. We are no longer guilty of it. There is no price that we need to pay. That doesn't mean that you are not a sinner, that doesn't mean that you and I have stopped doing things that are worthy of punishment, it means that we do not have to suffer the punishment for it. There is no punishment for sin. Therefore when you suffer, God is not punishing you.
God is teaching you. God is teaching you to repent. God is teaching you to know your own heart and to know your own sin. God is teaching you to know how far you have fallen, but this is not so to make you feel bad, this is not to make you worry or panic, this is to make you see how deeply he loves you. This is to confront you with how far you have fallen so that you can see how far he has gone to save you.
Remember, we are like those wayward sheep. We wander off. We get lost. We are so lost that we don't even know we are lost we just keep going and getting ourselves more lost and further away from home. But he finds us. No matter what it takes, no matter what the cost, he searches us out, he brings us back because he would have it no other way.
Amen.

Lent 4 - Numbers 21

How could God do such a thing! It is so hard for us to understand. Yes, the Israelites complained. They were whining against God and against Moses. What they had done was a sin. But how in the world could God do such a thing?

He sent serpents, snakes, poisonous and painful, God sent them to bite the Israelites. God sent the snakes even to kill a large number of the Israelites. How could he do that? Why would he do that? What kind of a god is this anyway?

These days people who are looking for an excuse to bad mouth Christianity and religion point to this exact sort of thing. Richard Dawkins an evolutionary biologist and best selling author as well as an outspoken atheist has written in his book, The God Delusion that “The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.” (He has certainly gotten his money's worth out of his thesaurus.)

But he is not alone. Entertainer and comedian Penn Gillette is quick to point out that so much violence has been done in the name of religion. Bill Mahr has claimed that Christianity and religion in general is harmful to a society and should be regulated by the government . And Bible texts such as the one we have before us right here today give them ample ammunition.

We say God is love. Yet here in our text God afflicts his own people with poisonous snakes. We say God cares, but here God deliberately kills his own people. We say God is gracious and merciful and abounding in steadfast love, yet what kind of a loving God unleashes suffering and death on those who believe in him? Perhaps the naysayers and the atheists are right. Perhaps you and I are as they say, a deluded bunch of weak-kneed idiots.

Oh and we are. We found that out last week. “God chose what was foolish in the world to shame the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, even the things that are not to bring to nothing the things that are so that no human being standing before the face of God can boast.” (1 Cor 1:18-31) We weak. We are idiots. And we are proud of it.

Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men and the and the weakness of God is stronger than men. And the weakness and the foolishness of God is seen in no greater clarity than when he sent his own Son Jesus to be the sacrifice for us and for our sin as He died for us on the cross. He who has all power in heaven and on earth controls the bite of the serpent, he controls the sting of death and he has died for you and for your sins on the cross.

By earthly standards we are fools, but that is okay. We don't plan on spending much time here on this earth. Oh sure, if 80 years was all you had to expect out of your entire existence then maybe you should go for the worldly wisdom and the worldly strength, but we are planning on living forever. That tends to change your perspective a bit. 70, 80 years of foolishness and weakness can be tolerated in exchange for an eternity of blessing and joy in the new creation. There is no comparison. The world can call us fools as much as they wish, and we will wear that label as a badge of honor. Because our wisdom is God's wisdom and our strength is God's strength. We depend on him.

The thing that makes this such a challenge is that while we are busying ourselves trusting and depending on God, the foolishness of men is quick to point out the many evil things that happen in this life and in this world. The foolishness of men loves to harp on these things because in their mind it is proof that there cannot be a god, it is proof that if there were a god he would be all of those things that Richard Dawkins says he is. After all, look at our text. God sends snakes. There is no way around that. The text says he sends the snakes. The snakes who come to bite and to kill. The snakes who cause suffering and pain; they were sent by God. Just like God sent the Manna from heaven that they grumbled and complained about as food for them to eat, God also sent the snakes. We struggle with that. We have such a difficult time with that. How could God do that?

We don't understand. We don't understand at all. How could this be?

What is even harder to come to grips with is the greater reality that this then turns us on to. If God sent the snakes on the Israelites, what else has he sent? The recession? The bursting of the housing bubble? The loss of income and livelihood? Or perhaps worse than that, what about September 11? Or Katrina? Or the Tsunami? If God sent the snakes, then does that mean that God sent these other tragedies as well? Does that mean that God is somehow responsible for the great loss of property not to mention the great loss of life?

In our text God sent the snakes with the intention that they bite the Israelites to cause them pain and suffering and even to take from them their life. But God had a greater plan in mind. God was working to accomplish something more, something bigger and better in the lives of those people. Yes they were on their way out of earthly slavery in Egypt and into an earthly promised land in Canaan, but God was working out their salvation from spiritual slavery to sin so that he could take them to a spiritual promised land, so that he could take them to an eternal promised land in the new heaven and the new earth. Their grumbling was getting in the way of that.

When we deal with these questions of God's actions in human suffering, the one piece of information that is always left out is sin. We see the evil in the snakes, we see the evil in the economic hardship, we see the evil in natural disasters or terrorist attacks or in war and bloodshed and we assume that the evil in those things comes from sin. We forget that we live in a sinful world and we forget that we are a part of the problem.

The world is a dung heap. It is a festering, oozing, stinking, pile of sin. Sin that we create with our own actions born from our own evil hearts. A newspaper once asked its readers to write in with answers to the question, “What's wrong with the world today?” Christian apologist G.K Chesterton wrote in simply, “I am.” Brilliantly put, he was simply stating the biblical and theological reality that we are sinners in a sinful world. We are merchants of refuse living in a dung pile. We pile up the dung to make ourselves king, but we are then only kings of rot and stench. Worse than worthless.

The Israelites had forgotten. They had gotten used to the smell, they forgot that the world stinks and so they became upset that their dung pile wasn't a little larger, that they weren't standing a little taller on top of it. God didn't create the stink, they did. God simply reminded them of its smell.

So there it is. Do you see it now? Do you see the foolishness of men? Men scrape and fight and scratch and kick to be lords in this sinful world. Their sin and their greed, their lust for power and domination leads them to pile up for themselves the trash that a sinful and evil world has to offer. Christians have seen God's salvation. Christians have seen the trash pouring forth from their own hearts and coming out of their own mouths. Christians have seen their own evil and have wept because of it. Christians have smelled their own stink.

And so look. Look what God does. He gives them a sign. After reminding them of their stink, after driving them to repentance He reminds them of the master plan. He remind them of what he has got cooking behind the scenes. A savior. One who will come to rescue them from stench and give them a new life. One who will suck into himself the sin that we have spewed out, one who will take from us our guilt from all of the evil that we have done. God had plans to send His one and only son to become the poison and sin that is ours. God commanded Moses to make a snake and put it on a pole as a sign that he would send a savior. Moses did this. The repentant Israelites looked to this sign, this reminder of Jesus and they lived.

If a bronze snake that pointed as a sign to Jesus on the cross can save from the poison of snakes, how much more can Jesus on the cross save us from sin? Jesus is the real thing. No signs, no symbols, no marker of indicator – Jesus was the real thing, the real savior who came to really save us from real sin. If we are truly evil inside and out, if it is true what GK Chesterton had to say about us being a part of the problem then we need to be saved, we need to be cleaned and cleansed and scrubbed and purified and if all that is true than Jesus on cross is the answer to that problem of problems, Jesus is the answer to not just the symptoms, but the actual sickness. Jesus takes it away so that we can live – and not just as kings in the dung pile, but as princes in heaven.

Baptism. Baptism plays so prominently into this whole thing. This morning were baptized. Today Jesus himself washed these two boys clean from the sin that lives inside of them so that as they stand in the mud and the muck of a sinful world God see them dressed in gleaming white. But more than that, they are sealed. They are set aside. They have been given Christ's promise that he will save them out of this refuse. As with any change is wardrobe, we are free to take off the robe of righteousness that Christ has provided. If we prefer to be kings here, God won't stand in our way. But we can't have it both ways.

So, from time to time, God send snakes, snakes that bite, that sting and that might even kill. But these snakes are not with evil intent, the evil does not reside in God's heart but in ours, the snakes simply drive us to the cross. The snakes chase us back to Jesus where we look to him and are healed. Where we look to him and are cleansed. Where we look to him and we are saved, not for this life, but for the next.

May you rejoice in the salvation that God has given to you in his death, his resurrection and in your baptism.

Amen.

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

Amen.

Lent 3 - 1 Corinthians 1:18-31

For Jews demand signs and Greeks demand wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to gentiles, but to those who are called, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.


Well, There you have it folks. That right there - those few simple verses, that's the whole deal, the whole kit and caboodle. The reason we go to church. The very purpose for our existence, the reason we are here. St Paul Chuckery Lutheran Church. Any Lutheran Church, and any Christian Church. Christ Crucified for sinners.
That is our message. That is what we preach. Sunday after Sunday, year after year, the same old thing. But that same old thing is “the power of God for salvation for those who believe.” That truth, that single piece of information is the thing that draws us together. IT is the sum and substance of the Christian faith. It is the thing that saves us. It delivers us from sin, from the devil, and it gives to us eternal life. Christ on the cross crucified for me is the single most important thing in the whole entire world.
Sadly however, for most of the world, this one thing that is more important than any other thing. This one thing that offers them eternal life and salvation is so often dismissed, cast aside and thrown away as foolishness, a stumbling block. Not good enough, not powerful enough, not entertaining enough, it doesn't get me what I want for the here and now so it is put away and it is forgotten.
How many ways have you forgotten the cross of Jesus?
Oh, we all have. We are all guilty of it. One way or another we find a way to discard the cross. Paul talks about it in our text. He talks about how the Jews and the gentiles of his day forgot the cross.
According to Paul, there were those who said it was “foolishness”. Instead, he claimed they searched for wisdom. “Where is the wise?” Says Paul, “Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age?” Because of the influence of Greek philosophy on the Ancient culture there was a strong emphasis on rhetorical style and the ability to form an argument in public discourse. There were many who were trained in public speaking. Therefore, they had sophisticated tastes when it come to preaching. And according to many at Corinth, Paul didn't fit the bill. He was criticized Paul because he was a lousy preacher. They were looking for power. They were looking for polish and pizazz. These days churches have become quite good at polish and pizazz. Things like fancy light shows, computer graphics, music and sound – multi media. Power Point – as though the power of the points is in the presentation style. That extra visual spice. That's what brings them in, that's what keeps them coming back. That's what we need, people will say.
No said Paul, Not bright and flashy. Not sparkle and shine. Not worldly wisdom. Just Jesus dead on the cross. There for you and your sin. Is that you? Have you lost sight of Jesus because the glitz of polished presentation has dazzled your eyes?
Or maybe you are like the Jews. Paul tells us that they demanded signs. (The Jews always demanded signs) They followed Jesus around asking him to prove his authority through some miracle. “Part the sea, give us bread from heaven, heal the sick.” When the Jews demanded signs, all he offered them was the sign of Jonah – shut him up in a tomb and he'd be back in three days – (there we go again pointing to a dead Jesus). We like signs too. We look for them all the time. We are eager for a “coincidence” that we could attribute to the work of the Spirit. We want there to be some proof or evidence or miracle where we could hang out hat. The only thing God promises for certain is Jesus on the cross. The stumbling block, the fool. Crucified? Dead?, buried? Yes. But crucified, dead and buried for you.
So perhaps you are like the Jews. Perhaps you are like the Gentiles. Perhaps you are pragmatic and just looking for something that works for you. Whatever the case may be, the faith that God has given to us is Christ on the cross for sinners. A message that doesn't appear to be powerful or polished, it does not appeal in any significant way. But to those of us who are being saved it is the power of God.
You see, Paul draws a distinction. He separates two categories of people, those who are perishing and those who are being saved. The cross is foolishness for those who are perishing. But for those who are being saved it is the power of God. This only makes any sense to us at all if we first understand sin.
The trouble we so often have is that we forget the reason why we come to church in the first place. We forget the reason why we peal ourselves out of bed on a Sunday morning to help fill a room of people to sing some songs and listen to some guy in a white robe talk. Blah Blah Blah. It's not for a pick me up. Its not for help. Its not for good advice. It's not to get on God's good side so He'll give you what you want.
The reason we do this, the reason we come here is because we are sinners. Through to the core. Because of our sin we are perishing. It's like we are in the middle of the ocean without a life preserver. It's like the doctor has just come in and told us we have only weeks to live. It's like we are face to face with a freight train that is bearing down on us. We are perishing. Because of sin we are dying. Because we are dying we need to be saved. We need Jesus.
We come here to church because this is where Jesus has promised us that he would be. If you're hungry you go where you can get food. If you are thirsty you go where you can get a drink. If you are sick you go where you can get medicine. If you are a sinner you go where you can get forgiveness. You go to church. Because it is right here where God has promised you that he will show up to offer to you forgiveness of sins life and salvation.
And so you come here on Sunday morning to listen to your own lousy preacher, going on in a decidedly un-miraculous sort of way, without any polish or pizazz. But you put up with it because you haven't come here to see me. You have come here to see Jesus. And Jesus is here to forgive you for your sin. To rescue you from death. And to offer to you life that never ends.
We preach Christ crucified. Yes, foolishness. Yes a stumbling block. But we preach Christ crucified because that is what we sinners need.
Jesus died on the cross. The God/man. The second person of the trinity. The “wisdom of God” as the Father created this world from nothing only a few thousand years ago gave himself up to be treated shamefully and violently so that he could suffer for you in your place. God gave his only Son to die for you as the perfect sacrifice for the sin of the whole world. And die he did. Jesus was arrested, beaten, whipped, shamed and humiliated. And the worst of all his suffering was that he was abandoned by God to suffer hell, left to himself to be punished in our place. The cross is our altar of sacrifice where God eliminated our problem of sin, where God heaped upon Jesus our guilt and shame. Even our shame and embarrassment at worshiping a god who would be nailed to a cross – Jesus died for that. Even our pride at thinking we could dress up the cross and make it more appealing to ourselves and to others – Jesus died for that sin too. Jesus died for all of our sin, he paid for them all on the cross.
So that is why we are here. That is why we have come to church. Because this is the palce that Jesus has promised he would be. This is the place where he has promised we could return Sunday after Sunday to once again be forgiven for our sin. This is the place where he would once again wash us and make us clean. This is the place where he would hand out his gifts of forgiveness and salvation. This is the place where he would administer the antidote for death.
God did the work for our forgiveness and salvation when He sent his son to die for us on the cross. The place that God hands out this salvation is right here. The means that he has chosen to deliver this gift to you is His gift of preaching.
The most important thing about your preacher is his mouth. There are lots of things that people expect from preachers these days. Some look for a good administrator who can help run the church in an efficient and productive way. Some look for a good preacher who can catch your interest and hold your attention. Some look for a compassionate and loving demeanor. Some just want someone who can remember their name. Every preacher you ever get will have some strengths and a lot of weaknesses. Every preacher will appeal more to some and less to others for some reason or another. What is important about all of them and the thing that you should treasure about all of them is their mouth. The job of your preacher is to accomplish the thing that Paul sets out here for you to know and understand. He says, “We preach Christ crucified.”
In other words. Paul was saying, “Our mouths speak of the Jesus who was nailed to a cross, who bled and died for you and for your sin so that you could have life.” God has given to you the forgiveness of sin through this Word of truth.
The way a Lutheran preacher has traditionally dressed is designed to preach to you a sermon. Believe me, this outfit is not just for the sake of fashion. It's not about polish and pizazz.
The pastor wears black – a color that reminds us of the darkness of our hearts that are filled with sin and death. Your pastor is a sinner.
The pastor wears a white robe – a reminder of the righteousness that God has given to all of us in baptism to cover over our sin.
The pastor wears a collar that is white here at his voice box – because Christ himself has sanctified the voice of your pastor to be His voice. When your pastor preaches to you, when he speaks to you about the death of Jesus for you on the cross, when he absolves you for your sin, you hear his voice. You hear my voice, but the voice is the voice of Jesus in heaven telling you that your sin has been forgiven. Telling you that he died for you. Telling you that he suffered on the cross for you.
Jesus died for you. Your sins have been forgiven. GO in peace.
Amen.