Who Are You Listening To?

Sixth Sunday of Easter                                  May 13^th, A+D 2012

Trinity and St John Lutheran Churches           Sidney and Fairview, MT

For the second time I am the parent of a High School graduate, so the annual question is a little more intense for me this year.  How will our graduates do?  Who will our graduates listen to?  As they head out into the next phase of their lives, as they exercise their independence and face new challenges, opportunities and temptations, who will they turn to for advice?  Who will they believe?  Where will they find their truth? 

To tell the truth, this question is always with me.  And not just about Madeline, or about our graduates.  Day by day and week by week, I ask this same question, about you, because I have been called to preach the truth to the members of our churches, and anyone else who happens to listen in.  I pray that God keeps me preaching the truth, and I pray that He will work through His Word.  Above all I rely on the promise that He will build and care for His Church.  But still I worry.  Who are you listening to?  Whose testimony do you consider true?

I worry, because even at our most faithful times, we get just a few hours together every week.  An hour on Sunday, if you make it, maybe another hour of a Bible Study.  Perhaps you use the devotions that come with the readings insert, or Portals of Prayer.  At best, you hear a couple hours of faithful testimony each week.  But whether you make it to services or not, you hear a lot more preaching than that. 

Outside of church, you hear the constant proclamation of a world under the influence of the devil.  You turn on your radios and your T.V.’s, you open your newspaper and your magazines, you head down to the coffee shop, and you hear other preachers, impressive preachers.  Some of them admit they are peddling their religion.  Others are sneakier, pretending to just be giving you the news, or opinion, or entertainment, or advertising their merchandise in hopes you’ll buy, but also proclaiming a message.  Knowingly or not, there are a multitude of preachers trying to get your ear, trying to tell you all about life, how you should live, what you should believe.  And they preach a different message than Jesus.  They proclaim a different way of life than the Holy Spirit.  And so I worry.  Who are you listening to?

What is the most important thing in life, according to what you hear outside these walls?  Being a good person?  Living a good life?  Having a little time and money to indulge your pleasures?  Not having to fear for tomorrow? 

 

Now it's not that the world is all against religion.  Indeed, the world often happily encourages you to have a little spirituality; everybody’s gotta have faith.  Just don’t go overboard.  Don’t live like God is the most important thing in your life; that’s no fun and you’ll make other people uncomfortable.  And absolutely don’t suggest that there is only one right way to be spiritual, because that would mean other people don’t have it right, and we don’t want to disturb anyone.  That’s not nice.

The world, at the devil’s behest, preaches to us that we should focus our time and energies not on God and His Word, but on living a good life.  We should try to get along with people, and not rock the boat.  Religion is fine, in small doses, but really, don’t you think there will be time for that later?  Besides, who wants to be a fanatic? 

That’s the world’s testimony.  But what is God’s testimony to us?  What does He say life is to be all about?  Jesus says you are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and you are to love your neighbor as yourself.  (Luke 10:27)  And furthermore, Jesus says that we are not to relax the law of God, not even a little bit.  (Matthew 5:19)  Love God, totally, with your whole being.  Love your neighbor, as you love yourself.  Period.  There’s nothing in there about enjoying a good life, nothing about getting a good job, or preparing for retirement, nothing in their about indulging your pleasures, not even about being comfortable. 

Now, now, counsels the world.  Take a breath, don’t get so worked up.  Do the best you can, but don’t let all that God talk run away with you.  Be nice to people, that’s enough.  At least, be nice to good people.  And whatever you do, don’t start to wonder about what comes after this life.  After all, who knows?  Lots of scientists think nothing happens, and lots of religions say nice things happen to everybody.  So why should we be so radical about what Jesus says concerning eternal life and eternal suffering?    Just relax, watch another TV show, play another video game, work a little longer on your garden, drink another beer, and forget about what the Bible says.  Nobody seems to agree about that anyway.  It’s just another book, isn’t it?  Besides, says the world, you can’t do it.  You can’t love the Lord with all your heart, you don’t love your neighbor as yourself.  So just forget about it. 

That’s what the world says, on behalf of the devil.  Who are you listening to? 

The world is right on one point, at least.  You can’t do it.  You have not and will not ever in this life love the Lord with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself.  But that’s no reason to ignore God’s testimony, for His testimony is still true.  Our failures to live in accordance with God’s truth do not change that truth.  Those who ignore God’s testimony cut themselves off from Him, both now, and for eternity.  You need to listen to God’s testimony, because it is true. 

Even though we fall short, we do well to listen, we need to listen.  Because God has more to say.  His demands for your perfect love are part of His testimony, but they are not His final Word.  This first part of God’s testimony is His Law, how He expects us to live, in relation to Him, and in relation to our neighbors. We must hear the Law.  But thanks be to Jesus, in the end we are a church of the Gospel, we are gathered in this place to hear Good News. 

As we consider our struggle in the world, as we consider the battle for our souls that we find ourselves caught up in, the Gospel is good news indeed.  For instead of leaving us only with instructions for a good life that we can never accomplish, God’s final word is the promise of a good life that He gives to us, freely, as a gift.  It is as John teaches us in our epistle.  Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, …  and   everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world— our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

Now this is a different word, a different testimony, a testimony that promises victory over the world. A testimony not about what we are supposed to do, but rather about what God has done, which He calls us to believe.  This is the testimony about Jesus, which calls us to faith in the heavenly One who became one of us, living to die, and rise again, for the sake of giving us good lives, real life. 

Jesus is the One who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only but by the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. For there are three that testify: the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three agree. If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater, for this is the testimony of God that he has borne concerning his Son.

God’s testimony concerning us, concerning our love toward Him and our neighbor, is not good news for us, for we do not meet His standard.  But the Spirit, the Water and the Blood proclaim a better testimony, about a better Man, the Man Jesus who came by Water and by Blood.  Jesus came, sinless and good, and was baptized in water to enter into a ministry of service and sacrifice.  In His life Jesus loved God, and His neighbor, perfectly, with His whole being.  He did that for you, in your place, in order to be able to share His good works with you.  And, Jesus did not come to only keep the Law.  Jesus also came by blood, that is He came and bled, on the cross.  He was crucified into a death which wins eternal life for you because it pays for all the loving that you have failed to do.  The blood of Jesus covers all your sins. 

 

You have not kept God’s Law.  But despite your sin, God still wants you, and so Jesus, God’s Son came, into human flesh, into water, into blood, to win the forgiveness of the sins of the whole world.  And today, God continues to love you by testifying to you of Jesus and His love, by the Spirit, the Water and the Blood. 

The Spirit, the Author of the Holy Scriptures, speaks this truth through His Word, written, spoken and sung:  God in Christ has reconciled you, and the whole world, to Himself. 

          The Water of Holy Baptism testifies, publicly, that God has adopted you, through Jesus Christ, washing away your sins and joining you to His life, His death and His resurrection. 

          The blood of the Supper testifies, week after week, that God continues to love you, continues to forgive you, and strengthens you to resist the lies of the world, which deny the grace of God found in the flesh of Christ. 

          This is the testimony we all need to hear, the testimony of God, through the Spirit’s Word, and through Baptism, and through the Supper.  When you receive this testimony, you are abiding in the love of Jesus, poured out for you.  Through this testimony Jesus joins Himself to you and goes with you out into the world. 

And then a funny thing happens.  When you abide in Jesus, you live differently.  Driven not by fear of failure and punishment, but rather moved by joy at your good fortune, receiving the testimony of Christ leads you to love your neighbor, and look at life differently.  You may still watch a TV show, or play a video game, fix up your garden or even drink a beer, but you do so secure in the knowledge that God in Christ has called you to be His own.  You do so knowing that every good gift comes from God, and so you give thanks.  Joined to Jesus, you do and enjoy many things, but you are not fooled into living for things.  Rather you learn to live from Jesus.  Joined to Jesus, you live in the freedom of forgiveness, which also frees you to love your neighbor selflessly, for God in Jesus has met all your needs. 

Madeline, Nichole, and all of you, hear this word of counsel:  Today, and for the rest of your life, listen to the testimony of the Spirit, (found in God’s Word), and the testimony of the Water, (with which you were baptized, in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit), and the testimony of the Blood, (shed for you to drink, for the forgiveness of sins).   These three testify, these three agree, that God in and through Jesus Christ will always love and care for you.  Listen, rejoice, and live from this testimony, today, tomorrow, and forever and ever, Amen. 

Abiding in the Vine

Fifth Sunday of Easter, May 6^th, Year of Our + Lord 2012

St. John and Trinity Lutheran Churches, Fairview and Sidney, Montana

John 15:1-8

I really love this text, about the Vine and the Vinedresser and the fruitful branches.  It offers so much for preaching, opening up new ways of understanding the teaching of Christ, along with plain statements that cement the way things are on a number of different doctrines.  From the efficacy of God’s Word, already you are pruned clean because of the word that I have spoken to you, to the necessity of continuing to hear the Word to keep faith alive, which is why Jesus says abide in me, and wills that my words abide in you, from the truth that to do good works and play a part in God’s mission we must remain connected to Christ, for apart from me you can do nothing, to the mystery that as we abide in Christ, our prayers will be answered. 

Yes, this is a great passage from the Word of God, a passage which teaches much and helps us understand many other parts of Scripture.  And because, as in this passage, Jesus is always using such down to earth, concrete metaphors, the Word of God also helps us rightly understand our daily lives.  Filtering the things we see and experience through the Word of Christ is the task of every Christian and of the Church collectively, a task which exercises our faith and helps us discern truth from error and lies.  This Vine and Branches text has served very well in this task recently, interacting with current events in the life of the Church, opening up yet another perspective on life in the Vine.  

The specific earthly event that I’m referring to is the birth of Hannah Grace Baikie.  We have been praying for Hannah for some weeks now, along with her mother, Tiffany Baikie, wife of Pastor Marcus Baikie of Concordia Lutheran in Forsyth.  In a perfectly healthy world, Hannah would still be in Tiffany’s womb today, growing and developing for another month and a half.  But our health is not perfect, and Tiffany was having problems, leading to her assignment to bed rest several weeks ago, in an attempt to get her and her baby as close to full term as possible. 

It was not to be.  Tiffany was rushed into the hospital on April 25^th, and the doctors delivered Hannah Grace by C-section.  You should have her picture on one side of the extra insert this morning.  Two pounds two ounces, wrapped in plastic to keep her warm for her first photo shoot.  The picture on your half page insert is just smaller than her actual size.  And yet still, what a beautiful little girl.  We could just stop right here, couldn’t we?  Certainly, there is a lot of good news and Godly joy to be found in gazing at little Hannah.  But I want to tell you more good news, good news about how this down to earth event connected to and was interpreted by various readings we have recently heard. 

In these last few weeks of Catechism class for the spring, I have been teaching on God’s love for life, from the womb to the tomb, a topic with which Tiffany and Hannah Grace’s struggles coincided amazingly.  The kids and I have talked about the miracle of life, and about the horror of abortion. In worship and class, we’ve talked about and prayed for Tiffany and Hannah.  And, just the week before she was born, I brought out the fetal development dolls to show my students roughly how big Hannah was at that point in time. 

 

This past Wednesday in the service that begins our Catechism class, I was able to use the Good Shepherd texts from last Sunday, talking about how the Good Shepherd is still at work, calling and gathering His sheep to Himself.  He has saved His sheep, both in the case of tiny Hannah, and also Dale Hill, our Trinity member whose battle with melanoma has come to its end.  Dale was called home to his eternal rest last Thursday.  Dale’s last days were difficult, but he lived them surrounded by family and friends, and by the Word of the Shepherd, being read and prayed and sung around his bed. 

And not only did the Good Shepherd safely bring Hannah into this world, but also, as you see on the other side of the extra insert, through the ministry of her earthly father, Pastor Marcus Baikie, God the Father claimed Hannah as His daughter through Holy Baptism right in the hospital, washing her in three drops of sterilized water, in the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.        

All through these last two weeks, I was also pondering another intersection between Scripture and earthly life, the intersection between Hannah Grace’s early arrival and today’s Gospel, about the Vine, Vinedresser, and the branches.  With Pastor Preus covering for me last Sunday, I carried around this Sunday’s readings for an extra week.  As I heard of Hannah’s premature delivery, and saw her first photo album on Facebook, I was struck by a similarity, between her tiny life, and the life of abiding in Christ that Jesus teaches us today. 

The comparison that struck me is between a branch abiding in the Vine, and all the doctors’ efforts to allow Hannah to abide in her mother’s womb, surrounded by her mother’s protections, and connected to life by the umbilical cord until her due date.  We pray that in His grace, the Lord will protect Hannah and help her to develop and grow and become a healthy little baby who grows up into a healthy woman, who one day may be a mother herself.  But we also know that her connection to her mother was cut off far too soon, the medical problems that necessitated her early delivery meant that she would no longer be protected in the safety of the womb, no longer fed through the cord which connected her to Tiffany, and now she must spend her first weeks in a hospital.  She’s doing o.k., but her situation is far from ideal. 

Your place in God’s Church and your need for connection to Him through the Word of Christ are like a preborn infant’s place in the womb and need for connection to her mother through the umbilical cord.  In fact, drawing on Biblical imagery, for 2,000 years the Church has been referred to as the mother of Christians, although this way of talking has fallen out of favor in our circles because it’s perceived as a Roman Catholic idea.  We should, with a right understanding, reclaim the language of Church as mother, because it fits. 

It’s dangerous and difficult for a baby to be prematurely outside of the womb, the safe place God has created just for babies, dangerous to leave before the fullness of time.  And a baby in the womb must be fed by her mother through the cord, there is no chance of life without this connection.  So also you, Christian, need to be in the Church, God’s safe place for you, abiding in the Vine, being fed and made clean by the power of His pruning, cleansing Word, until the fullness of your time, that is until your earthly life comes to its end and your soul is delivered into heaven’s eternal joy.  

 Your Christian life in this fallen world will wither and die if you don’t stay connected.  It’s that serious.  You may not like this image, this picture of radical dependence, as if you are helpless apart from God’s intervention.  We despise helplessness in our daily lives, thinking that to be and remain helpless in the world is the worst of earthly fates.  We work hard to become capable, self-supporting, independent and competent people.  And that’s good, for this life, although we would be wise to realize that even our competence and ability in this life is only ours as a gift and stewardship from the Lord.  None the less, in earthly matters, in life before our fellow man, we have some ability, some independence. 

But not in life before God.  We hate to think that in our standing before God we are and remain totally dependent on His grace and good will.  Indeed, Adam and Eve declared their independence from God and His Word, and have passed down their sinful rejection of God’s grace to all of us.  We don’t like to hear that in spiritual matters we are helpless, but this is exactly the picture that Jesus paints for us today.  Abide in me, and I in you, says Jesus.  Abide in my Word, for apart from me you can do nothing, apart from my Word you will wither and die.  Abide in me, and you will live, and bear much fruit. 

It’s not that God wants us to be helpless.  The problem is that we are sinners, by our nature resisting the good that God wants for us, instead seeking harmful and hurtful things.  God must come to us and bring us back to life.  God must overcome our sin, and grant us forgiveness.  God must continue to feed us for salvation.  God must keep us in the Vine, if we are to live and grow. 

And these things that must be, God does.  The Vinedresser, God the Father, has given the Vine, Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, given Him into our death, so that He could destroy death and sin, and give us His life in return.  The pruning cleansing Word is the Word of forgiveness, delivered to you by your true Vine, delivered to you in Water, Word and Wine.  God has good news for you, your sins are forgiven and in Christ you have eternal life.  This free gift God delivers to you, wherever His Gospel is preached, wherever His Supper is served, wherever sinners are brought to Baptismal fonts.    

A baby in the womb would never willfully try to disconnect herself from the life-giving cord through which her mother gives her life.  Sadly, amazingly, we Christians all too often chop away at our connection to Christ.  Like branches taking ax in hand to chop away at their own base, we fill our time with sins and our heads with worldly teachings.  We so often fill our time with everything but gathering with fellow believers around the Word of God and His Sacraments.  Baptized people who profess to be Christians regularly neglect the Way God has made to keep us in the Vine, sometimes because of shame, that we have fallen into sin, again, sometimes for boredom, because we think we are so interesting, sometimes simply because of pride.  Whatever the reason, when we do this, we are cutting ourselves off from the Vine.

Repent.  Return, hear the cleansing, pruning Word again.  As we will sing in a few minutes:  Chief of sinners, though I be, Jesus shed His blood for me, died that I might live on high, lives that I might never die.  As the branch is to the vine, I am His and He is mine, Amen. 

Life with the Shepherd

4th Sunday of Easter 

May 3,  Year of Our + Lord 2009                                          

Trinity and St John Lutheran Churches

Sidney and Fairview, Montana

(This sermon is from three years ago, as I was on vacation this past weekend!  Your Good Shepherd, thankfully, never takes vacation.)

It’s Good Shepherd Sunday.  Today, along with King David, we express remarkable confidence in God.  “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.”  

This most famous of Psalms has offered great promise and great comfort  in times of trouble to the children of God for 3,000 years.  The prophet Ezekiel draws on the same imagery in his preaching against the religious leaders of Israel, who instead of caring for the flock entrusted to them, were preying on the flock themselves. In response, the LORD makes this promise through Ezekiel.  

 ' For thus says the Lord GOD: "Indeed I Myself will search for My sheep and seek them out. 12 "As a shepherd seeks out his flock on the day he is among his scattered sheep, so will I seek out My sheep and deliver them from all the places where they were scattered on a cloudy and dark day.   "And I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land; I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, in the valleys and in all the inhabited places of the country.

These wonderful promises of God our Shepherd have sustained the faithful for many generations, and they continue to do so today. 

This is not to say that the faithful always are perfectly content, frolicking like lambs on a warm spring day.  We do not always wait patiently and happily for the LORD to come and care for us.  We are not always at peace.  Throughout the years the faithful have faced great evil: invasion by foreign powers, civil war, famine and disease.  We too face danger and evil, from financial crisis to moral decay, from AIDS to Swine flu.  The world is a difficult place, it’s hard to keep the faith. The prophet Ezekiel despaired in the face of the persecution he suffered, even begging God to take his life.  And sometimes we too, with David and the faithful of every generation, cry out, “How long, Oh LORD, how long?”  How long until You deliver us? 

We don’t face the fierce persecution and severe trials of King David and the prophet Ezekiel, but we do struggle.  A sober look at our situations, of the world and our place in it, may lead us to doubt that the promises of  Psalm 23 are true.  Christianity, we are told, is declining.  Life today seems very uncertain.  If the promises of God are true, we may think they are meant for someone else.  For we do not always see green pastures.  We sense that we are passing through the valley of the shadow of death, and we fear.  Sometimes we feel content, well fed and safe.  But sometimes we are afraid of being sheared, of being robbed of our warmth and comfort by illness, injury, and the ravages of time. 

Worse yet, we may feel like fools, trying to follow the Lord our Shepherd.  For we sheep look around us and see a world where it seems looking out for #1 is the name of the game, for everybody.  It’s a dog eat dog world, and the wolves are eyeing the sheep.  Friends betray friends, the words of your family members so often cut you deeply.  You try to open yourself up to others and end up wounded.  Why should we even want to be sheep, when we sense we may be slaughtered for someone else’s benefit?  Can we really trust in the LORD, our Shepherd?  Is there a place where we can we look to gain the confidence that David had?

We are not sure, so sometimes we try to hide from it all.  We try to carve out a safe existence behind high walls and quick defenses.  But God has not made us to live this way, we are made for relationships.  And besides, it doesn’t work.  We can try to make for ourselves a safe place, away from the danger and evil of the world, but we will find that evil and moral decay and dangers follow us into our safe places.  Because it’s not just the world around us that is evil.  Evil follows us into our safe places because we are evil. 

I know, we all appear to be civilized, good people.  We are here in Church, for goodness sake.  We may never act on our most wicked thoughts, but they are in our hearts and minds.  We are not so different from David, who was an adulterer and a murderer, in thought and in the actual deeds. 

And yet this same King David, an adulterer and a murderer, trusted that the Lord was truly taking care of him.  David knew his sin and guilt.  David dealt daily with evil people who tried to take away everything he had.  Yet he could still declare with confidence, “the Lord is my Shepherd.”  How is this possible? How can it be that we can know the truth of our own sin, and the reality of our world, and yet still have faith in a loving God who promises to be active in our lives?  Where can we look to gain the confidence of David? 

In a Word, look to Jesus. It was the promise of a Savior who would come with healing and forgiveness in His hand that sustained King David.  Look with David, to our Lord Jesus, who came from heaven seeking His flock.  Look to the Christ, who took on your humanity, and walked among us scattered sheep, seeking and saving.  Look to Jesus, who knows your pain and fear, because on a cloudy and dark Good Friday He suffered the ultimate persecution and evil, in order to be your Good Shepherd who delivers you.  Listen again to His words:

I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.  He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.   He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.   I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me,  just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.  And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again.   No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father." 

Yes, there is great evil in the world, all around us.  Yes, you suffer real pain.  And yes, you are a sinner, there is evil in you that you cannot control by your own power.  But your salvation does not depend on your power.  You do not walk alone, you do not face evil unprotected.  The Good Shepherd is with you, listen to His voice.  He has removed the power of evil and suffering.  They cannot cause you permanent harm.  When He laid down his life, and when he took it up again, that is when He died on the Cross and when He rose from the dead, Jesus destroyed the power of all the wolves.  In His victory over them, Jesus also forgave you all your sins.  They can no longer destroy you.  Jesus has anointed your head, with his river of living water, which bubbles up to eternal life, the prize He won for you, at Calvary.  He fills your cup to overflowing with His life-giving blood, poured out on the Cross, now given for you to drink in His Supper, for the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. 

This is the table which he prepares for you here, now, in the presence of all the enemies of this world.  This little feast, a mysterious meal with the power to destroy evil, points us to and qualifies us for the heavenly feast to come, where your enemies, which today still prowl and seek to hurt you, will be forever cast out.  Yes, the evil and suffering of this life is real, and on our own we cannot face it.  But you are not alone.  In the midst of your suffering, in the midst of trial, your Good Shepherd is with you, to comfort you, and point you again to Himself, in whom all suffering and evil is forever gone.  In Jesus Christ, Crucified and Resurrected, goodness and mercy shall follow you all the days of your life.  It is through and with Jesus Christ that you shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever, Amen.