Hope Arrives in Bethlehem - Sermon for the 18th Sunday after Pentecost

Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost               
October 12^th, A+D 2025
Our Savior’s and Our Redeemer Lutheran Churches
Hill City and Custer, SD
Hope Arrives in Bethlehem
Ruth 1:1-19, Luke 17:11-19

 Audio of the Sermon is available HERE.

     I wonder what they’ll do in Bethlehem?             

     The book of Ruth tells a great story, full of faith, hope, and love.  We heard just the first part this morning, which concludes with the display of Ruth’s remarkable love and faithfulness to her mother-in-law, Naomi.  The end of our reading rings out a grace note of hope, as the two women make their way toward Bethlehem. 

     Bethlehem.  Everybody knows that name.  Bethlehem is perhaps the most famous small village in the world.  I wonder what Naomi and Ruth will do there? 

     Do you know the connections that our Old Testament reading only hints at this morning?  If you don’t remember the connections, this story may seem a bit random, and out of place. 

     It is a lovely story, to be sure.  Even unbelievers love the book of Ruth; it is simply gorgeous literature.  And Ruth is certainly a praiseworthy figure, who will not give up on tragedy-struck Naomi.  But, what does our Old Testament reading have to do with the story that normally occupies our time here, as we gather in Jesus’ Name?  Jesus Christ is the object of our faith, the One who has loved us, the Risen Savior who gives us hope.  But how do the opening verses of Naomi and Ruth’s story connect to the story of salvation?  It’s just about two women, their struggles in this dying world, and of course, the faithfulness of Ruth.  If you don’t know the connections, be patient.  God will bring all things back together before the end.  Be patient.  Be patient, and start by considering the things everyone loves about this story. 

     I pray that you can relate to the love shared between Naomi and Ruth.  I pray that into your life God has brought people whom, even though they aren’t blood relatives, you have come to love and cherish as much as you love and cherish your parents, your siblings, your children.  Such love between former strangers is a beautiful thing.  How common do you think it is? 

     I know many of you can relate to the suffering of Naomi and Ruth, maybe all of you.  Eventually, all of us will.  All of us, if we live long enough, will in some measure relate to the great sadness that fell on Naomi and Ruth.  I imagine these women trudging out of Moab, sadness weighing them down like a lead suit, making each day, each step, heavy and painful.  The death of loved ones is a tremendous burden.    

     Naomi had been dealing with the brokenness of this world for many years.  Drought and famine drove her and her husband Elimelech away, away from Judah, away from their hometown of Bethlehem.  The name Elimelech means “My God is King,” but I imagine that was hard to believe, as the threat of starvation drove them to a foreign and unappealing place: Moab. 

     The Moabites had food, that was good.  But, they were also ancient enemies of Israel.  And, if Elimelech and Naomi had been listening closely when Genesis was read to them, they would know that the founding of Moab was a scandal.  Faithful Israelites would not wish to live in Moab. 

     But all that history became unimportant, because there was a famine in Judah, but in Moab they could find food to live.  In Moab they could survive.  And so, with their two sons, they left for Moab, trying to make the best of a bad situation. 

     Then the LORD took Elimelech.  Now Naomi is a widow, a single mother of two sons, a foreigner in a strange land, facing very difficult circumstances.  Not much time for grieving; it’s time to act, to make adjustments and accommodations.  “Boys, Mahlon, Chilion, find yourselves wives.  It doesn’t matter that your wives will be Moabites; the LORD has left us here.  Following His command to only marry other Israelites is impossible.  We must eat, we must live, you must marry.”  So they do.   

     Then comes the unwritten suffering.  Ten more years they lived in Moab, Naomi, Mahlon, Chilion, and their wives, Orpah and Ruth.  Ten years of waiting, but no children, no grandchildren for Naomi to spoil.  Is this the unkindest cut of all for Naomi?  Is this the final straw?  She would soon wish a lack of grandchildren was her biggest problem, because worse is coming.  Suddenly, Mahlon, and Chilion, her two boys, both of them die.  Naomi’s hopes are dashed.  She is bitter, her faith in the LORD God of Israel is hanging by a thread.  Still, Naomi manages an attempt at loving her daughters-in-law, or so she thinks. 

      Rain and grain had returned to Judah, so Naomi, embittered by all her suffering in Moab, decides to return home.  Orpah and Ruth are both willing to go with her; it seems their struggles have bonded them together.  But Naomi knows better, she claims.  She tells her daughters-in-law to go home to their mothers, to go back to their former gods.  Maybe they can find new husbands, and forget about Naomi. 

      Orpah reluctantly agrees, kisses Naomi and returns to her mother’s house.  But Ruth will not leave her mother-in-law.  Naomi urges her to go, but Ruth will not be swayed, finally convincing Naomi with one of the most beautiful professions of love and faithfulness ever spoken by a human being: "Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.  Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you."    

      Anti-Christian critics, many speaking from positions within nominally Christian institutions, have proclaimed for decades that the Bible is misogynistic, that is, woman-hating, and oppressively patriarchal.  It sure is strange how often the supposedly women-hating Biblical writers record marvelous things being spoken by women. 

      Like Ruth’s profession of faithfulness to Naomi.  Or Hannah’s song of joy at the birth of Samuel.  Miriam adding to the victory song of her brother Moses, after they crossed the Red Sea.  Elizabeth and Mary rejoicing over the conception of Jesus in Mary’s womb.  Or Mary’s final words recorded in Scripture, when she tells the servants at the wedding in Cana to “do whatever [Jesus] tells you to do.”  Good advice, indeed.   

      From where do such faith, hope and love spring?  In particular, how can Ruth express such marvelous commitment?  She too, has been through a lot.  No one, least of all Naomi, would have faulted Ruth for returning home.  And yet, faced with leaving her home, facing the prospect of living in a foreign land as a hated outsider, and with little reason to expect great things in Judah, Ruth nevertheless reveals tremendous love, commitment, and undying faithfulness.  She makes a confession of faith we should all envy.  How?  Can you and I ever know such love and faith?  How did these things come to this woman, and she a Moabite, not even a member of God’s chosen people? 

      Jesus asks a similar question concerning the Samaritan leper who came back to thank Him for healing his wretched, sore-covered skin, the only one of the ten healed lepers who returned to give thanks to Jesus.  Rhetorically, our Lord asks:  "Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine? Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?"  Jesus knows the answer.  But He’s trying to teach, to teach His disciples, and us, about faith, and the love, hope, joy and confession that flow from true and saving faith. 

      Jesus knows.  He’s known all along that faith comes by hearing about Him.  Faith comes from being wrapped up in His story, the story of the Messiah, the Christ, the promised Savior.  Faith comes by hearing the Word of Christ, faith that believes in the promise of a Savior who loves the whole world, who offers hope to all who suffer.  Jesus asks His question to teach us, to make us ponder and think about what it truly means to be a Christian.  But He knows, and now you know, that the Samaritan leper’s faith, like the faith of that other foreigner named Ruth, came from Jesus.  Faith comes when the Spirit of Christ reveals the glorious truth of the Gospel, life-giving truth spoken into the heart of a dying sinner. 

      God wills to work out His plan for saving faith through the lives of sinful people who also need that faith in order to be saved.  God chooses to work faith in and through desperate people, without regard to their pedigree, where they’ve come from, or what they’ve done in the past. 

      In the mystery of God’s plan and foreknowledge, in the mystery of God’s faithfulness and love, God chose and moved Ruth to love and serve Naomi, in order to bring this woman of faith to Bethlehem.  There God, through Naomi’s matchmaking, brings her to Boaz.  Boaz was an important man, a faithful Judahite who married Ruth in large part because he saw her faithfulness to Naomi. 

      And from this swirl of God-caused human goodness, the Lord brought forth fruit: a son, named Obed.  And Obed would have a son, named Jesse, who would have a son, named David, who would be the King of Israel, and much more.  David, shepherd boy anointed to be King of God’s people, is a forerunner of the Christ, the promised Savior.  Like he promised to his ancestors Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Judah, the LORD promises that the Seed of the woman, the serpent-crusher, would come also through King David.  God loves David.  He even calls David a man after His own heart.  And David’s imperfect but ultimately faithful heart got its start, because Ruth clung to Naomi.

      So, we see how God goes to extravagant lengths to work out His plan to save sinners.  Like He did for Naomi, the LORD even overcomes the weakness, doubt and bitterness of sinners, to move His plan forward.  God held onto and worked through bitter Naomi, in order to bring Ruth to Judah and her husband Boaz, so the LORD could bring to completion His plan for the human ancestry of Jesus Christ. 

      Some refuse God’s plan.  Naomi seemed to be on the brink of rejecting her LORD.  Nine of the lepers didn’t believe they should return and thank Jesus for healing them.  They didn’t understand that the true temple, the true dwelling place of God with His people was now in the flesh of the man Jesus, the Son of God, and the descendent of Ruth, and David, the Son of the Virgin Mary. 

    Many people suffer great pains and sadnesses, and end up cursing God, or forgetting Him.  You have suffered, and you will suffer many more pains and sadnesses.  But hear Ruth’s story, hear David’s story, for these are also your story.  Hear God’s plan of salvation, bringing blessing and a future out of suffering and desperation.  Hear God’s plan for you, worked though faithful Ruth, so that you will not think to curse God when you suffer. 

    You will suffer, and it will be hard.  Maybe you are suffering right now.  Suffering stinks.  But when you suffer, do not curse God.  Instead, follow Ruth to Bethlehem.  Know that the Lord who gave Ruth blessings she never expected has also given these same blessings to you.  Cry out in your suffering to the Master, Jesus; ask Him to help you.  Hear, see, and believe that He has become your salvation, in the most unlikely way, through suffering, through His death on a tree, by bleeding and dying for you.  Believe in His plan, which was to fulfill the law for you, right down to keeping the Sabbath rest in the tomb, so that upon His resurrection He could share all His glory with you.  Jesus can share the Father’s glory with you because your sins are forgiven, your suffering has been overcome, and your future is full of hope and love. 

     All these things are yours in that Descendent of Ruth, your Savior and her Savior, Jesus of Bethlehem, Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus of the cross and empty tomb.  The same Jesus who is right now praying for you at the Father’s side.  Jesus, who is preparing a place for you, in His heavenly home.  He is the object of faith, the reason to believe, the hope that you have, the hope that never fails.  Rejoice, His love is for you, Amen.     

Forgiveness: The Beating Heart of the Church - Sermon for the 17th Sunday after Pentecost

Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
\October 5^th A+D 2025
Our Redeemer and Our Savior’s Lutheran Churches
Custer and Hill City, South Dakota
Forgiveness: The Beating Heart of the Church
Luke 17:1-10, 2^nd Timothy 1:1-14, Habakkuk 2:4

Sermon audio available HERE.

Forgive…   Forgive…   Forgive…   Forgive…   Forgive…   Forgive…   Forgive…

    That seems like a lot, no?  Forgive, spoken seven times.  And that only scratches the surface of our Lord’s teaching this morning.  Closer would be to repeat: I forgive you for what you did to me.  I forgive you for what you did to me… I …  I’ll stop. 

    Or, we could rehearse the whole scenario Jesus describes:  Your brother sins.  You rebuke him.  He turns to you, crying out: I repent!  And you must forgive him.  And then again, your brother sins, you rebuke him, He turns to you, crying out: I repent!  And you forgive…  Again, and again, and again. 

    This passage in Luke is certainly part of the basis by which Luther said what we recited for our catechetical review this morning.  From Luther’s Large Catechism, in the section on the 3^rd Article of the Creed, the Reformer says:  Everything, therefore, in the Christian Church is ordered to the end that we shall daily obtain there nothing but the forgiveness of sin through the Word and signs, to comfort and encourage our consciences as long as we live here. 

    Everything?  Luther was never shy about making categorical statements.  Everything in the Church is ordered toward delivering forgiveness…  As he tried to teach the Saxon Germans the glorious, life-giving promise of Jesus and His death and resurrection for our salvation, Martin did not hold back.  He wanted people to hear, so they could believe.  Because, contrary to what the Church was teaching in the 16^th century, Luther had learned from his study of Bible that God’s salvation is not based in our works, nor in our goodness.  Salvation is not based on the works of sinners, but rather, it is based only in the forgiveness of sins won at Calvary by Jesus.  In Christ there is forgiveness sufficient for every sin of every sinful man and woman.  Forgiveness saves an individual sinner when he or she hears and believes, when my heart has faith that what Jesus did washes away my sins.  And it does! 

    Only faith in Christ’s forgiveness saves.  And so, everything in the Christian Church is ordered toward delivering Christ’s forgiveness, through the Word and signs.  By signs, Luther means Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, the physical things ordained by Christ to serve as pointers to the Gospel, and which also, in a mystery, contain and deliver Christ’s forgiveness, by delivering Christ Himself to us.  In later years, Lutherans would come to call this Word and Sacraments.  In either phrasing, it means all the ways that God delivers His forgiveness to us sinners.  This is what the Church is all about.   

    Luther does not mean that literally there is nothing other than forgiveness in the Church, that all we do is walk around forgiving one another, and nothing more ever happens.  Rather, he meant that everything worthwhile that exists in the Church, like praise and thanksgiving, training in righteousness, good works done in love for the neighbor, joy, eternal life, fellowship, paraments, music, potlucks, all these good things rightly depend on and flow from the main thing, which is forgiveness. 

    With forgiveness, we have it all: holiness, heaven, glory, a good relationship with God the Father.  We have these now, not yet perfectly, but truly.  And one day soon, we will have them, fully, completely.  With forgiveness comes every good thing. 

    Without forgiveness, we are lost.  No matter how impressive she may look, a church that has lost her focus on forgiveness is, in reality, merely a house of cards, which will fall at the first gust of Satan’s resistance. 

    Except that Satan doesn’t try to destroy congregations that have lost their focus on forgiveness.  The evil one loves such congregations, full of souls who think they are staying close to God.  In reality, without repentance and forgiveness at the center, they are cutting themselves off from God, potentially forever.  Lord, protect us from such folly!        

    Seven times daily, we are to forgive the same sinner.  That seems hard to do, hard to even believe.  But it is a completed reality in Christ Jesus, a finished work, revealed to be our life and our glory, in His Resurrection.   By faith in Jesus, forgiveness and the new life it brings become reality also for us.  For the righteous shall live by faith. 

    Faith, trust of the heart in Christ Jesus and His perfect forgiveness, is mighty and powerful.  If we have faith even as small as a mustard seed, still, it gives us the power to move mountains, or to command a mulberry tree to be uprooted and throw itself into the ocean. 

    As we consider ourselves, clearly the power of faith is not found in the vessel that receives the gift.  The strength of faith is not found in us Christians.  The one who hears the Gospel and believes is simply a forgiven sinner.  Which is worth celebrating, for sure.  But the size and intensity of our faith is not the source of its power. 

    Faith is wonderful, necessary and mysterious.  As wise Christians, we seek to deepen our faith by growing in the Word.  And the Word teaches that it is not the quality and fervency of our faith that saves.  No, our hope of salvation lies in the object of our faith, the One in whom we trust.  The One who gave up His life, in order to share true life with you. 

    Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, sitting at the Father’s right hand, still bearing the scars of His self-sacrifice on the Cross, He is the object of our faith.  He alone empowers our faith to be strong, endure great trials, and do mighty things.  Faith does great things, precisely because the faithful soul receives and knows that it is righteous, that is, declared holy and just and good before God, for Jesus’ sake.  The believer is then free to live, love, serve, and rejoice, which the joy of the Gospel makes us want to do.  And we can pursue these good things, because faith means no worries.  Why should a believing Christian worry, when God Almighty has declared all baptized believers to be His own, holy, precious, eternal children?   

    Faith in Christ is a powerful, busy, wonderful thing.  So, why then would we ever be ashamed of our Christian faith?  The Apostle Paul, as he begins his second letter to his colleague, friend and student Timothy, starts with a strange theme: “Do not be ashamed of the Gospel.”  He says something similar at the beginning of Romans: For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, (1:16). 

     In our Epistle this morning, Paul encourages Timothy with these words: Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God.  Later, he declares of himself: But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard, until that Day, what has been entrusted to me.   Clearly, Paul is concerned that Christians might feel shame about the Gospel, and so change how they speak or act, in ways contrary to God’s way.  But why would we ever do this? 

    One reason is clearly suffering.  Sometimes being a Christian, maintaining the truth that Jesus revealed, will bring suffering into your life.  Satan hates the Gospel, and so seeks to persecute and injure anyone who remains faithful to it. 

    Another challenge is the fact that the starting point for the Good News of Jesus is the decidedly bad news that all have sinned, and lack the glory of God.  All people, apart from Christ, deserve God’s anger and punishment.  Unbelievers, including the unbeliever that in this life remains in each Christian, unbelievers hate this message.  The Gospel leaves no room for human pride, for taking satisfaction in ourselves.  Repeating and proclaiming such a teaching does not always win you friends.  

    So, the faithful can face direct persecution, rejection and ostracism by the world, or a struggle within ourselves, between the new creature born of the Holy Spirit and the old man who still loves sin.  All these troubles tempt us to be ashamed of the Gospel and downplay it.  Or even outright deny it.  Paul, along with the whole Bible, warns us against this temptation, and encourages us to steadfastly resist all anti-Gospel ridicule, resistance and hatred. 

    How can we hope to succeed?   By remembering in Whom we have believed, like Paul did.  Paul remembered the One in whom he believed, the One who suffered all the shame and hatred the devil and the world and His own people could dish out.  You can avoid the temptation to be ashamed of the Gospel precisely because the Good News of your forgiveness rises out of the place of greatest shame.  Jesus’ death-defeating death on the Cross reverses everything, turning shame into honor, suffering into blessing, and guilt into holiness.  When once we sought to claim pride in who we are and what we have done, now our pride is Jesus, the Suffering Servant who now rules over all things.  

    Shame of the Gospel is a threat to saving faith.  As is true so often, this threat has an opposite danger.  It’s like two ditches alongside the Way.  Avoid the ditch on this side, but be careful as you guide yourself back onto the road.  Don’t overcorrect, and veer into the opposite ditch.  The opposite ditch to shame is pride of self.  This danger exists because Christian faith, even as small as a mustard seed, will lead the Christian to do good, even great things.  Christians are set free to do great things, precisely because “the righteous shall live by his faith.”  But we are not to become infatuated and puffed up by our works.  So, Jesus gives His disciples one last warning this morning, in a way that might sound strange to our ears, but which in reality sets us free from any anxiety about our salvation. 

    In Luke chapter 12, Jesus made an astounding promise.  Speaking of His final return, Jesus commands His future Apostles to endure in their calling to serve:  “Let your waist be girded and your lamps burning; ³⁶ and you yourselves be like men who wait for their master, when he will return from the wedding, that when he comes and knocks they may open to him immediately.  ³⁷ Blessed are those servants whom the master, when he comes, will find watching. Assuredly, I say to you that he, (that is the Master, Jesus Himself), will gird himself and have them sit down to eat, and will come and serve them. (Luke 12:35-37)  In heaven, visibly, personally, face to face, God Himself will honor and serve His faithful disciples. 

    Here in Luke chapter 17, Jesus says just about the opposite:  “Will any one of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, 'Come at once and recline at table'? ^[8] Will he not rather say to him, 'Prepare supper for me, and dress properly, and serve me while I eat and drink, and afterward you will eat and drink'? ^[9] Does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded?”   In the first century world, servants, or more literally slaves, were not to imagine that they merit special treatment, just for fulfilling their callings, just for doing their work.  Jesus then specifically applies this worldly reality to His future Apostles.  “So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.'” 

    Jesus specifically teaches His future Apostles about how they are to act in this life, on this earth, as they fulfill their special calling as the builders of Christ’s Church.  None of us are Apostles.  But these words certainly have an application for all of us, for all preachers, and hearers, for all the members of the Body of Christ.  Even when we seem to have well completed the work God has prepared for us in this life, we are to consider and call ourselves unworthy servants. 

    What are we to make of this?  Does this mean that Christians should be continually dour and down in the mouth, never taking joy in anything in this life?  That doesn’t seem right.  Jesus went to the Cross for joy, after all.  And we do find great joy in this Christian life, even amidst sorrows and difficulties. 

      Or is it that our Lord is encouraging us to become “humble braggers?”  Are we to fake humility, in order to draw more attention to how well we have performed our Christian duties?  No, of course not. 

    The righteous shall live by his faith.  Calling yourself an unworthy servant, even when you have done all things well, is Jesus’ way for Christians to celebrate the true freedom we have in the Gospel. 

   Regardless of what we achieve in the Name of Christ, our pride, our confidence, is always and only in the free forgiveness we have received by faith in Jesus.  We never have to point to or celebrate our own works, because the LORD has already done all our works for us, and this is what makes us right with God.  This is what makes our futures eternally glorious.  

   There is a great difference between the reality of life as Christians on this earth, and the perfect, pain-free, sin-free, glory-filled future that Christ has won for us in the new heavens and the new earth.  For the sake of our salvation, for the good of our neighbors, and for the sake of God’s Mission of drawing more sinners to His Son, we are called to wisdom, to work, and to patient waiting.  There is much God would do through us.  Sometimes it seems that all things go well, that our faith is moving mountains.  Sometimes it seems that we can accomplish nothing.  But our eyes, our faith, are fixed where true joys are found, on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith. 

   And we keep our eyes fixed in the right place through the blessed reality that Jesus is getting ahead of Himself.  He promises that in heaven He will serve us at table, but for now, we are to serve, we are to be about our Christian work, and call ourselves unworthy servants, even when we have done everything. 

   But Jesus can’t quite wait to serve us.  Invisibly, hidden under simple words, and simple elements, your Lord and Savior daily girds Himself for service, and invites us to recline at table, to receive His blessings, through the Word and Signs.  What we will one day rejoice to receive in unapproachable glory and light, we now truly receive, hidden under Words, Water, Wheat and Wine.  And so we rejoice as unworthy servants, who are well served by the Master, forgiven, restored, redeemed and loved, in Jesus’ Name, Amen.