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“Come, Lord Jesus”
Mark 13:24-37

 In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen. 

            They (whoever “they” are) say that “a watched pot never boils.”  As you know, that just means that if we sit and stare at the water in the pot, it will seem to take a lot longer to reach the boiling point.  We say “never,” but we know that, eventually, every pot boils on the stove (usually when you’ve gone out of the room to do something else).  In the same way that we grow impatient waiting for water to boil, the Church seems to have grown weary of waiting for Jesus to return; become a little too comfortable with the present state of affairs; forgotten that we are strangers and sojourners in this place.  It has been close to 2,000 years since His Ascension.  Some have already said “never” about the Lord’s return.  It has taken so long that it seems as if it will never happen.  But just as the water eventually boils, even in the face of our “never,” sooner or later your Lord will come back, even though some say “never.”  Jesus says, “Watch, be alert; for you do not know when the time is” (Mark 13:33).  “Stay awake, then.  For you do not know when the Lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or in the middle of the night, or when the rooster crows, or early [in the morning], lest, when He comes unexpectedly, He should find you sleeping.  What I say to you I say to all: ‘Stay awake’” (Mark 13:35-37).  Watch, be alert, stay awake.  You and I are in the same position as all of creation, including the angels, including even Jesus in His human humility: we don’t know when He is coming.  But when He does come, it won’t be a secret.  When He does come, everyone “will see ‘the Son of Man coming in clouds’ with great power and glory.  And then He will send the angels and He will gather together His elect from the four winds, from the end of earth to the end of heaven” (Mark 13:26-27).  That much is certain, as certain as water boiling over high heat, as certain as summer following spring.  The only uncertainty we have is when it all will happen.  But Christians know that Jesus is always near, always at the door. 

When that eternal door opens, it will be a terrifying day for those who have rejected Jesus and His Word.  But who are we to be afraid?  Who are we to worry?  “[W]e are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls” (Hebrews 10:39, ESV).  We are those who watch.  Brothers and sisters, beloved members of the one Body of Christ, these things are a call for the endurance of the saints.  The continuing and increasing call to stay alert and watch is a call to return again and again to the One who is coming to gather you, His elect and chosen ones.  We know who that One is.  He has stood among us in the flesh.  And in His flesh the end of all things, the eternal judgment of God on sin and death, fell upon Him.  While He hung on the cross, “when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour” (Mark 15:33, ESV).  The sun and the moon and the stars were darkened; they hid their faces and refused to shine at the death of their creator.  The powers were shaken; the earth shook and the rocks were split (Matthew 27:51).  But the dawn of the new creation came on the third day, when the Sun of Righteousness rose with healing in His wings (Malachi 4:2).  That same Jesus will come again in His glorified Body to gather every person the Father has chosen in Him before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4).  That is the great hope and expectation of the Church.  From the very beginning, the Church has gathered around her Lord on the day of His resurrection and prayed her common Table prayer, “Maran atha Jesus!  Come, Lord Jesus!” (1 Corinthians 16:22; cf. Revelation 22:20). 

This is how the Church lives between the resurrection of Christ’s body and the completion of our baptism when He raises our bodies.  This is how the Church watches: in and with Christ, her Lord, as He speaks to us and feeds us.  We do not watch by standing around looking into the sky.  Remember what the angels said to the Apostles at Jesus’ Ascension: “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven?  This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven” (Acts 1:10-11, ESV).  The Church has always trusted that word of Christ’s messengers.  We do not look into the heavens for comfort; they will vanish like smoke and pass away.  We do not look around the earth for certainty; it will wear out like a garment and pass away.  We do not look at the inhabitants of the earth and their rulers; they will die like gnats and pass away.  No, we look at Jesus where He has promised to be; His Word will never pass away.  From the time of the Apostles, the Church has watched for her Lord in this way: by being “devoted to the teaching of the Apostles and the fellowship, the breaking of the bread and the prayers” (Acts 2:42); and by giving to those in need what was first given to them.  So we, too, gather week by week around that Apostolic Word, which is nothing other than the Word of Jesus; we gather in the fellowship of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church; we gather around this Table, where the bread is broken and we eat the Lord’s Body; and we gather to pray the prayers of the Church’s liturgy.  And then we go out from this place to do the Lord’s work in fervent love for one another.  Jesus is not absent from us, off in some heaven where He cannot speak to us.  No, He said, “See, I Myself am with you all the days until the completion of the age” (Matthew 28:20).    

Until the completion of the age, Jesus continues to work through His Church.  He says, “Make disciples, and here’s how you do that: baptize them into the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to keep and observe everything I have commanded and given to you.”  And He says to us, as to His closest friends in the Garden, “Stay awake and pray, in order that you might not come into temptation.  Indeed, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak” (Mark 14:38).  Impatience, sloth, misplaced priorities, and all the weakness of our flesh conspire with the world and the devil to lull us into a sleep untroubled by the lateness of the hour.  How often we lose the urgency of Jesus (if we ever had it)!  How often our eyelids become heavy and our muscles slow with the narcotics of this world.  The sedatives are numerous and easily available: entertainments and distractions, drugs and alcohol and skin.  But Jesus is shaking us awake again today: “Are you still sleeping and resting?  It is hindering [you]” (Mark 14:41).  He says it week after week, but we cannot seem to keep ourselves awake; we must pray for the strength of the Lord.  “Watch therefore, and pray, that you do not sleep unto death” (Apostolic Constitutions, Mark, ACCS, 186).  Watch, be alert, stay awake, pray.  Do the work which He has given to you, whether husband or wife, father, mother, son, or daughter; teacher, student, employer, or employee.  During the time when He is not visibly with us, He has left us each to our own work, commanding the doorkeepers of His House to stay awake and watch for His coming.  As a doorkeeper of His House, I say to you the Word of the Lord through St. Paul: “For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.  While people are saying, ‘There is peace and security,’ then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.  But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief.  For you are all children of light, children of the day.  We are not of the night or of the darkness.  So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.  For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night.  But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.  For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him” (1 Thessalonians 5:2-10, ESV).  Every created thing, infected with the sin of Adam, will pass away, but the things of God in Jesus Christ will never pass away.  His salvation is forever, and His righteousness will never be dismayed.  “The heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed” (2 Peter 3:10, ESV).  “But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:13, ESV).  As we wait and work and watch, we continue to pray the Table prayer of the Church of God in Jesus Christ: “Come, Lord Jesus!” (Revelation 22:20).  Amen.  Come quickly. 

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7, ESV).  Amen.

                      — Pr. Timothy Winterstein, 11/18/09

From the Pastor

The Augsburg Confession, Conclusion of Part I

Article XX of the Augsburg Confession is the longest and most involved because it was and is at the heart of confessional differences between the Roman Church and the Evangelicals.  Its title is “Concerning Faith and Good Works.”  The question is, what is the relationship between faith and good works, and how are both related to salvation.  The Evangelical (Lutheran) position is that the faith that trusts Christ’s life, death, and resurrection for me is the only thing that can and does justify, or “make right,” with God.  The Roman position is that faith is perfected or completed by love (shown in good works), and, therefore, it is faith and love together that makes a person right with God.  We should be clear that the Roman position is not crass “works-righteousness,” in the sense that they believe they do those good works apart from the grace of God.  They believe that good works are also a result of God’s grace “infused” in us, so Roman Christians confess that a person is saved only by the grace of God.  We confess that good works do and must follow necessarily from justification; the difference is that they are not part of justification, as in the Roman system.  Next to Article IV, then, Article XX is the most significant point of disagreement between Lutherans and Roman Catholics. 

The contention of AC XX is that the Reformers required and encouraged good works in a better way and without detracting from the glory and merit of Christ.  “That is why this teaching concerning faith is not to be censured for prohibiting good works.  On the contrary, it should be praised for teaching the performance of good works and for offering help as to how they may be done.  For without faith and without Christ human nature and human power are much too weak to do good works: such as to call on God, to have patience in suffering, to love the neighbor, to engage in legitimate callings, to be obedient, to avoid evil lust, etc.  Such lofty and genuine works cannot be done without the help of Christ, as he himself says in John 15:5: ‘Apart from me you can do nothing’” (AC XX:35-39). 

The final article in the first part of the Augsburg Confession is on the “cult of the saints,” or how people should think of the saints.  “Concerning the cult of the saints our people teach that the saints are to be remembered so that we may strengthen our faith when we see how they experienced grace and how they were helped by faith.  Moreover, it is taught that each person, according to his or her calling, should take the saints’ good works as an example” (AC XXI:1).  (That is a fitting quotation for November 1, which is the Festival of All Saints!)  At the same time, the confessors say: “However, it cannot be demonstrated from Scripture that a person should call upon the saints or seek help from them” (AC XXI:2).  In other words, we believe that the souls of the faithful who have gone before us are living and with Jesus.  They are not dead, and they rest with Jesus as they await the resurrection of their bodies.  However, we do not pray to them, first, because we can pray directly to Jesus, who intercedes for us with the Father.  Even though we ask other saints here on earth to pray for us, and even though we have always confessed that the saints in heaven pray for us, we do not know for sure that the saints in heaven can hear us.  And if there is any doubt, then our prayer would not be from faith; and St. Paul says that whatever does not come from faith is sin (Romans 14:23). 

“This is nearly a complete summary of what is preached and taught in our churches for proper Christian instruction and the comfort of consciences, as well as for the improvement of believers” (Conclusion of Part One, 1).   

Pr. Winterstein

*St. Augustine (354-430 AD), Bishop of Hippo in North Africa, said, “For you I am a bishop [overseer]; with you I am a Christian.”

From the Pastor

The Augsburg Confession, pt. 7

Though it is an unpopular belief, the Augsburg Confession in Article XVII teaches what the Church has always taught with regard to “eschatology” (es-ka-tall-o-jee), or the Last Things: resurrection, judgment, heaven, and hell.  “It is also taught that our Lord Jesus Christ will return on the Last Day to judge, to raise all the dead, to give eternal life and eternal joy to those who believe and are elect, but to condemn the ungodly and the devils to hell and eternal punishment” (AC XVII:1, German).  This has always been a hard position to hold.  Some Church fathers, such as Origen, as well as teachers at the time of the Reformation (not to mention people and churches today!) believed that everyone would be saved in the end.  But the Evangelicals held that God would not save people who refused the Holy Spirit’s converting work.  This, we believe, is the sin or blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, of which Jesus says in Matthew 12:32: “whoever speaks against [blasphemes] the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come” (ESV).  Despite attempts to remove the teaching of eschatology from the Church, resurrection, judgment, heaven, and hell are clearly taught in the Scriptures, in both the Old Testament and the New.  That is what the Augsburg Confession teaches as well.

The Eighteenth Article is perhaps one of the most difficult to defend in every age of the Church’s existence, especially when many within the Church deny it.  It is the confession of free will, and particularly the limits of free will.  The Augsburg Confession teaches that humans have free will with regard to the things of this life, such as what to eat, what to wear, where to work, etc.  Further, humans can lead an “externally honorable” life (e.g., keeping human laws).  What they cannot do is please God in any way without the Holy Spirit: “without the grace, help, and operation of the Holy Spirit a human being cannot become pleasing to God, fear or believe in God with the whole heart, or expel innate evil lusts from the heart” (AC XVIII:2, German).  This applies especially to faith and conversion.  Though many Christians believe that a person must “make a decision for Christ” or “willingly accept Christ into one’s heart,” we confess that this is impossible for the person to do.  It may appear, from our perspective, that we have made that decision to believe in Jesus, but we believe that “I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith” (Small Catechism, Explanation to the Third Article of the Creed).  It is all gift, all the time.  It is necessary to confess this so that all glory goes to Jesus and His merit, which is an absolutely sure and certain foundation for our faith and hope.  Anything else, especially our own decisions and work, cannot be the basis for faith or salvation without creating doubt and uncertainty.

Connected to Free Will, Article XIX simply and succinctly makes clear that the cause of sin is not in God and His good creation, but in “the perverted will [of humans, which] causes sin in all those who are evil and despise God” (AC XIX, German).  “As soon as God withdrew his hand, [the will] turned from God to malice….” 

Next month we will cover the final two articles of Part 1.   

Pr. Winterstein

*St. Augustine (354-430 AD), Bishop of Hippo in North Africa, said, “For you I am a bishop [overseer]; with you I am a Christian.”

From the Pastor

The Augsburg Confession, pt. 6

We have discussed God, sin, the Gospel, the Office of the Holy Ministry, the New Obedience, the Church, Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, Confession, Repentance, and the use of the Sacraments.  There is a very observable progression from the Creator and how He chose (chooses) to deal with His sinful creatures by the free gift of grace through the Son.  That free grace is delivered in the Church, by the means of the Word, Baptism, and the Supper.  It is through the “office of preaching, giving the gospel and the sacraments” (AC V:1) that God has chosen to grant faith by the Holy Spirit.  But how can we know if God has indeed chosen this man to be His secondary means of delivering forgiveness of sins and salvation?  Article XIV answers that question.  It is one of the shortest articles: “Concerning church government it is taught [by the Evangelicals (Lutherans)] that no one should publicly teach, preach, or administer the sacraments without a proper [public] call” (AC XIV, German).  In other words, if a particular man (or woman!) claims to have a call from God, it should only be recognized in the Church of God if the call has been publicly affirmed by the Church.  It is good that a man should feel the “inner call” to serve God’s people, but if there is no “external call” through the Church, then that person should not preach, teach (i.e., teach the Faith publicly), or administer the sacraments.  This is to ensure that the person teaching the Faith knows the Faith and is competent to hand it on, as well as fitting the criteria St. Paul lays down in 1 & 2 Timothy and Titus. 

Articles XV speaks about regulations within the Church, especially human traditions.  “Concerning church rites they teach that those rites should be observed that can be observed without sin and that contribute to peace and good order in the church, for example, certain holy days, festivals and the like” (AC XV:1, Latin).  However, the AC is quick to say that such rites and regulations are not necessary for salvation, and they should not “burden consciences.” 

Article XVI turns to the State and “civic affairs,” on which “they teach that lawful civil ordinances are good works of God and that Christians are permitted to hold civil office, to work in law courts, to decide matters by imperial and other existing laws, to impose just punishments, to wage just war, to serve as soldiers, to make legal contracts, to hold property, to take an oath when required by magistrates, to take a wife, to be given in marriage” (AC XVI:1-2, Latin).  Because of this, the Gospel does not infringe on or overthrow existing orders, but “intends that a person keep all this as a true order of God and demonstrate in these walks of life Christian love and true good works according to each person’s calling” (AC XVI:5, German).  Everything that does not fall in the Church’s realm of Gospel, forgiveness, Jesus, sacraments, grace, etc., falls in the realm of the secular order, which is also a gift and institution of God.  In this realm, Christians live out their particular vocations within the established order, loving their neighbors and doing good works.  For Lutherans, the Church and the State are distinct, yet both created by God.  They also are connected and intertwined because Christians live in both realms at the same time. 

In the next two months, we will discuss the last five articles of Part I of the Augsburg Confession, and then take a break until next summer.

Pr. Winterstein

*St. Augustine (354-430 AD), Bishop of Hippo in North Africa, said, “For you I am a bishop [overseer]; with you I am a Christian.”

From the Pastor

The Augsburg Confession, pt. 5

Once a sinner has entered the Church of Christ by baptism, the rest of one’s life is lived under the sign of that baptism: “[Such baptizing with water] signifies that the Old Adam in us should, by daily contrition and repentance, be drowned and die with all sins and evil lusts, and, again, a new man daily come forth and arise, who shall live before God in righteousness and purity forever” (Small Catechism, Baptism, part IV).  The new life that is given in baptism and received by faith is fed by the same Christ in the Supper that He gave as a continual remembrance of His suffering and death.  So Article X of the Augsburg Confession confesses very simply: “Concerning the Lord’s Supper, it is taught that the true body and blood of Christ are truly present under the form of bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper and are distributed and received there.  Rejected, therefore, is the contrary teaching.”  As Luther later said, “I regard them all [the deniers of Christ’s true presence] as being part of the same cake, as indeed they are.  For they do not want to believe that the Lord’s bread in the Supper is his true, natural body which the godless person or Judas receives orally just as well as St. Peter and all the saints.  Whoever (I say) does not want to believe that should not trouble me…and should not expect to have fellowship with me.  That is final” (quoted in Formula of Concord, Solid Declaration, 33). 

This Supper is the Christian’s food until he reaches the full Feast of the Lamb and His Bride, the Church.  Baptismal confession and repentance are like the air in the Christian’s lungs.  So Article XI holds firmly to the comfort of private confession and absolution “because of absolution (which is confession’s principal and foremost part) for the comfort of terrified consciences and because of other reasons” (AC XXV, 13).  Confession and absolution find their place under Article XII: “Concerning Repentance.”  “Now, properly speaking, true repentance is nothing else than to have contrition and sorrow, or terror about sin, and yet at the same time to believe in the gospel and absolution that sin is forgiven and grace is obtained through Christ.  Such faith, in turn, comforts the heart and puts it at peace” (AC XII, 3-5).  So repentance includes both confession and absolution, or sorrow for sin and assurance of forgiveness for sin.  In Greek, the word for repentance means to have a “new mind,” or to make a 180-degree turn.  To turn away from sin and toward God in Christ.  The whole of repentance is the work of God; when repentance is accomplished in a sinner, “improvement should also follow, and a person should refrain from sins.  For these should be the fruits of repentance…” (AC XII, 6).

This true repentance is the purpose of the right use of the Sacraments (AC XIII).  The Sacraments are not only signs of where someone can find Christians, but they are primarily “signs and testimonies of God’s will toward us in order thereby to awaken and strengthen our faith” (AC XIII, 1).  Faith runs through all of this, which is created and strengthened through the baptismal life, fed by Christ’s body and blood in His Supper, lived out in true repentance consisting of confession and absolution.

Pr. Winterstein

*St. Augustine (354-430 AD), Bishop of Hippo in North Africa, said, “For you I am a bishop [overseer]; with you I am a Christian.”

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“The End is Near”

Mark 13:1-13

            In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

            It must have been hard to believe, coming out of the Temple.  Walking past stones twice as tall as a man and 37 feet long, it must have been hard to believe that anything could take those stones down.  Not one stone left upon another that will not be thrown down?  These great stones and great buildings reduced to rubble?  It must have been hard to believe.  And yet it happened, some forty years later, in 70 AD, when Roman armies conquered and destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple in the midst of her.  Jesus told His disciples ahead of time, though we don’t know how many of them, other than John, were still alive in 70.  But they were brought before councils and synagogues; they were beaten and killed for the witness they gave.  The Holy Spirit spoke through them and their words were blessed by those who trusted Jesus and hated by those who did not.  But Jesus was painting a much bigger picture than just the next 40 years.  He was laying out on the canvas the life of the Church from the time of His ascension to His return in glory.  In His painting, the end is telescoped into the now.  But even though these few verses from Mark 13 compress the Last Day, our day, and 70 AD all together, there are three distinct things in this painting: first, you can see Roman armies descending upon Judea, and burning everything to the ground except three towers and part of one wall.  September 26, 70 AD, Jerusalem fell to the Roman Caesar, Titus, just as Jesus had prophesied.  Second, you can see Jesus descending to the earth with the armies of heaven to put an end to all hatred, murder, war, and every natural disaster that results in death.  Third, you can see the time in between those two events. 

What the painting does not reveal is the timing of the last Day, whether it is close or far.  “Tell us, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are about to be accomplished?” (Mark 13:4, ESV).  He does give us signs, just as He gave His disciples.  He doesn’t tell us how long this time will last, but He does tell us that we are living now in the end of time.  Even though it has been 1,939 years since the stones of the Temple were thrown down, the words of Jesus still echo through time to us: “See that no one leads you astray.  Many will come in My Name, saying, ‘I am [He], and they will lead many astray” (Mark 13:5-6).  Even in the first 25 years after Jerusalem had been destroyed, St. John wrote: “Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come.  Therefore we know that it is the last hour” (1 John 2:18, ESV).  We know that this, too, is the last hour, because people still oppose Christ and put themselves in His place.  That is the definition of “anti-christ.”  More signs: “[W]hen you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be disturbed.  It must happen, but the end is not yet.  For nation will rise up against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines.  These things are the beginning of birth-pains” (Mark 13:7-8).  Do we hear of wars and rumors of wars?  Do we have earthquakes?  Are there famines?  All of those things mean the end is near, just as they did when they happened in the first century.  But, as of this moment, the end hasn’t come yet.  We know that labor-pains mean the birth is near, but no one knows how long the labor will last.

And so we are in exactly the same position as the disciples in Mark 13.  There is nothing to do in these end-times but what Jesus told the disciples to do in those end-times: See that no one leads you astray to any other Jesus or any other Gospel.  Do not be alarmed at all the things that you hear and see; this is what it looks like to watch a world die.  Be on your guard; you will be given opportunities to bear witness to Christ during your life in this world.  Maybe not in synagogues, or before kings and emperors, but certainly in schools and in families, in fields and offices.  Do not be anxious about what you will say, whether you are asked about Jesus individually or brought to trial before judge and jury.  The Holy Spirit is within you, and He will bring to your mind the particular Word of Jesus fitting to the time.  It will not be easy; it never has been.  Perhaps physical persecution will come to us.  If not to us, than to our children or grandchildren.  If not physical persecution, then mental and spiritual persecution to drive us away from Baptism, and the Word, and the Supper—to cut us off from the Vine.  Sometimes that persecution will simply be the slight but steady pressure of living life in this world.  Satan aims to take your eyes off the Christ whose painting this is.  He will tempt you to get caught up in all the speculation about greater and lesser signs, times and seasons.  If that doesn’t work, he will tempt you to think that everything is fine, so you no longer need to watch and be on guard.  It can be hard to believe: all this talk about the end of the world is vague and indefinite.  It can seem as if there is nothing firm, nothing sound, nothing solid.  But there is One.  There is One who is absolutely trustworthy, absolutely believable, because He has never lied.  He promised His disciples that Jerusalem would mean His end—death and resurrection—and He died and rose again.  He promised that they would face persecution and death because they bore His Name, and they did.  He promised that the Temple would be destroyed, and it was.  He promises that the end will come, and it will; and He promises that He will grant the strength and power to endure until the end.  You who have Jesus for your Lord will endure to the end, because Christ endures forever—He is the steadfast love of Yahweh.  And you will be saved.    “He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it” (1 Thessalonians 5:24, ESV). 

But until that promise is fulfilled, things are not going to get better or easier.  There will be no secret rapture of Christians so that we do not have to experience suffering and persecution.  No, we, too, will have to be on our guard.  We, too, will have to see that we are not deceived by counterfeit christs and Jesus-imposters.  Many will come with His Name on their lips, but what they will say about Him will not match what the prophetic and apostolic Scriptures say.  If they say that He did not rise from the dead, or that the cross was unnecessary, or that He is not returning in the clouds to raise our bodies from their graves, they are antichrists.  Be on your guard.  Fortify your position with the very Word who is Christ, as you hear Him today and in the written Scriptures.  Strengthen your bodies and your souls for the time when the labor pains reach our part of the Body.  The only way to do that is for Christ to give you His Word and His Supper, to strengthen and preserve you in both body and soul until life everlasting.  It is to not give up meeting together around the Risen Christ, as some are in the habit of doing (Hebrews 10:25).  And it is to know that Jesus is Faithful and True (Revelation 19:11).  Even in the midst of death, even if all these stones are thrown down, know that your Lord is risen, and so you will rise, too.  Do not be alarmed or disturbed by what you see and hear; it is only the beginning of the end.  At the same time, do not be alarmed or disturbed by the fact that the end is coming: it comes for you.  Jesus is your Lord by the blood He shed for you and poured over you and gives you to drink.  It is that Lord who is coming to save you.  You will not need to wonder if it is Him; when every knee bows before Him and every tongue confesses Him to be Lord of heaven and earth, He will call you to Himself, and you will know and follow His voice to your true home.  “O Jesus Christ, do not delay,/But hasten our salvation;/We often tremble on our way/In fear and tribulation/O hear and grant our fervent plea:/Come, mighty judge, and set us free/From death and ev’ry evil” (LSB 508, st. 7).            

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7, ESV).  Amen.

                      — Pr. Timothy Winterstein, 11/10/09

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“The Economy of God”

Mark 12:38-44

            In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

            Everything is reversed.  The rich go away sorrowful, and the poor rejoice in God’s blessing.  Whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for the sake of Christ and the Gospel will save it.  Little children and blind men and lowly servants—the last—are welcomed into the Kingdom ahead of those who would claim the first and honorable seats.  A poor widow silently throws in two small, copper coins and is held up as the one who loves God with her whole life; the rich throw in many coins with a loud clatter, but they give much less than the widow.  Jesus sits in the Temple watching this during the last week of His life on earth, and, for those who have eyes to see, He never stops drawing the picture of the Reign of God.  He says that the leaders of the temple and synagogue had reversed God’s economy to their own advantage.  They were acting in ways directly opposed to the ways God acts.  The whole system had gone fundamentally wrong.  And the illustration of this is the widow, in sharp contrast to the scribes—perhaps the very scribes who had devoured this widow’s house.  So Jesus calls His disciples to Him, and teaches them, once again, what the Reign of God looks like.  It looks like—well, like something that could easily be missed: a widow giving her last two pennies to the poor.  God’s Reign doesn’t work like the machinery of this world, well-oiled with wealth and power.  It doesn’t come in with long robes, to be recognized and greeted in the marketplaces of this world; it doesn’t care about sitting where it can be seen; the Reign of God comes in on a donkey, welcoming widows and blind men and all the other spiritual and financial nobodies.  It doesn’t need money or influence or even success.  It doesn’t need to win votes by shaking hands and kissing babies and flashing gold-toothed smiles.  Under the Reign of God, everything is reversed.

Under the Reign of God, if you have a little you give a lot, and if you have a lot (and in this country, there are very few of us who don’t) you give more.  Now, only Jesus and you know what percentage of your income you give away.  Only Jesus and I know what I give away.  But we all know, Jesus included, that we’re not very good at it.  I worry whether I’ll have enough to cover my automatic bill pay.  When I receive extra money, I’m not looking to give it to my neighbor who needs it, I’m looking at what I can buy.  Oh, I might have good intentions some of the time, but what Jesus sees in the Temple shows me just how far I am from trusting Him to provide for me.  Just how far I am from being selfless and the servant of all.  We may think that giving 10% is a lot.  But the math says otherwise.  100% minus 10% is still 90% that we spend on ourselves, or that goes to pay off what we’ve already spent on ourselves.  90% that tightens its hold on us each month and each year.  90% that seems to please us less and less, even as the actual dollars increase.  90% or 80% or 70% that feeds our technological and material addictions.  “And Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, ‘How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!’  And the disciples were amazed at his words.  But Jesus said to them again, ‘Children, how difficult it is to enter the kingdom of God!  It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God’” (Mark 10:23-25, ESV).  In fact, it is impossible for a rich person.  It’s impossible for a poor person, for that matter.  But not for God.  All things are possible for God, even being born as a Man from the womb of a virgin; even the Creator serving the creatures as one of them; even God dying to give life to the poor, and the wretched, and the blind.  Because everything is reversed in the economy of God: greatness in the eyes of people means nothing to God.  God can destroy kings, and governments, and economies in an instant.  Cash, stocks, bonds, and 401(k)s mean nothing to God.  He can take them away or give them as He chooses; all creation, including the wealth of nations, is His.    

Which makes it all the more shocking, then, that the greatest, the One who actually deserved to be greeted and welcomed and sit in the best places and to be heard—He appears as nothing, without a place to lay His head.  He dies naked and without a single copper coin to His Name.  And He did it so that the poor in spirit could be blessed with the richness of His mercy.  He did it so that the rich might recognize their poverty before God and follow Him.  He did it so that our money, every single cent of which He has given to us, would no longer have any hold on us.  What do dead men have to do with money?  And that is what you are.  Dead to this world and its economy, and alive to God in Jesus Christ.  Your flesh, which, if it is like mine, loves all the things money can buy, was crucified with Christ.  Because of your baptism into Christ, it is daily drowned and dies with all sins and evil desires, including the evil desire to have more and give less.  The great reversal that we see at the heart of God’s economy in Jesus is why Jesus points out the widow to His disciples.  This Gospel reading is not ultimately about how much money we should give, although that is clearly there.  We do need to learn to make such a habit of giving that it becomes a practice, which will form the virtue of generosity, which will help to form our character in this world.  It is only a person with a particular sort of character who can give her last two pennies to the poor.  But God could tell us all that without Jesus, and even without the Bible.  In the law written on our hearts, we know that it is right and good to give to those in need.  Jesus points out the widow not because she is primarily an example for us, but because she is, above all, a picture of Him in the week before He goes to the cross.  She does with her money what He does with His life.  She gives all her money for the poor.  All the way to His last breath, He gave His life for your death, His righteousness for your sin, His Body and Blood into the hands of poor sinners—everyone, whether rich or poor.  In the economy of humans, where you have to give in order to get, this is impossible.  In the economy of God, where we do not choose Him but He chooses us, even this impossible mercy is not just possible, but finished.  It still looks like nothing, these words, that water, that bread and wine.  But it is still worth more than all the money in the world.  It’s worth more than you have and more than you could ever give.  And it’s free for the taking, free for you and me and everyone.  Because that’s how the economy of God works.  You have been bought out by the Son of God; He’s put His Name on you and He owns you and all you have.  And to those on whom He has put His Name, He gives freely and generously.  “Almighty and ever-living God, You have given exceedingly great and precious promises to those who trust in You” (Collect for Pentecost 23).  This is our God, who gives freely to all His people through Jesus Christ, and who uses you and me all His people to give freely to those in need.  “Oh give thanks to [Yahweh], for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!” (Psalm 107:1, ESV). 

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7, ESV).  Amen.

                      — Pr. Timothy Winterstein, 11/04/09

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“What We Are, What We Will Be”

1 John 3:1-3

            In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen. 

            “Something’s gone terribly wrong/everyone, all the world is mad” (Thrice, “All the World is Mad, Beggars).  Everything is infested and infected with multiplying sin, like a house overrun with rats or roaches, or a body with a fatal disease.  Every hidden thought contaminated with prideful judgment or faithless despair.  Every smiling word polluted with hidden motives or secret scorn.  Every good action spoiled with selfishness or a desire for praise.  Anger, bitterness, gossip, arrogance, sexual abuse, emotional abuse.  And that’s just in the Church!  “It has not yet been revealed what we will be” (1 John 3:2).  It’s a good thing, too.  But that’s not where the problem is.  The problem is in the first part of the sentence: “Beloved, we are God’s children now” (3:2).  I think the reason why the Church began to speak only of the faithful departed as saints is because the faithful who have not yet departed simply don’t look the part.  If we have white robes, they must be stained and ripped.  If we have the palm branches of victory, they must be a bit ragged.  And that gap—no, canyon—between what we appear to be and what we will be has caused people to reject the Holy One who calls His people to be holy.  It has caused people to blaspheme the Name of our God.  Worse, it might cause us to doubt the Word of God that we are His children now; that we have been bought back from the devil’s lordship, set free from the tyranny of sin and death, and separated from the unbelieving world; that we, who are so far from what we should be, might not really be what He says we are.  Some see the gap and try to take matters into their own hands.  Maybe pharmaceutical companies who sell the good life in tablets and pills.  Maybe politicians who try to implement saintly standards of health, and wealth, and an American dream.  Maybe educators who try to instill the holy virtues of tolerance, self-esteem, and good feelings.  Maybe theologians or pastors who feed the spiritual-but-not-religious with the Pablum of positive thinking, with “faith” that makes one feel enlightened but actually believes nothing, with a “holiness” devoid of either content or conviction.  But: “We can’t medicate man to perfection again/we can’t legislate peace in our hearts/we can’t educate sin from our souls/it’s been there from the start” (Thrice, “All the World is Mad”).  All attempts at such secular sainthood are doomed to failure because they try to make the sinner a saint with reference to himself or to other people. 

Even our Christian ideas of sainthood are tainted if we think holiness of life or miracles granted make someone a saint in the most basic sense.  Saints do live holy lives, and God does grant extraordinary requests to His holy ones; but neither of those things makes a saint.  When St.  John writes, “Everyone who has this hope in him sanctifies himself, just as that One is holy” (1 John 3:3), he defines sainthood with reference only to God.  God alone is holy in Himself, but whatever belongs to Him is holy also.  Beloved, we are God’s children now, we are saints now, we are holy and pure now, because He has made us His own by the holy and pure blood of Jesus on the cross.  God alone is holy in Himself, but we belong to Him and so we are holy also.  He has planted in us this utterly super-rational hope that when Christ is revealed before all creation, we will be like Him, because we will see Him as He is (3:2).  But we know the truth about Christ and ourselves only by faith.  Everything we see in the world and in ourselves says that Christ does not reign, that He is not Lord, that He is not our Lord.  And yet, John says, “See: how great a love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and we are!” (3:1).  See.  Look.  But don’t look at yourself.  Don’t look at medications.  Don’t look at the government.  Don’t look at schools.  Don’t look at pastors and theologians.  Look at Christ!  Look at the Son of the eternal God, who is holy in Himself.  Look at Him in real flesh, with real blood running through His veins.  Look at that flesh torn and that blood shed.  Look at Him, no longer in the grave, but alive forever and interceding for you (Hebrews 7:25).  Those are things that we do not see with physical eyesight, but with the eyesight of faith.  And only Christ can open eyes of faith; only Christ washes each and every one of His poor, sightless creatures and makes the scales fall from their eyes into the baptismal water. 

And so it is that we now see what great love the Father has given to us, first that we should be called the children of God—and not only are we called His children, but we actually, really are: children of the heavenly Father, who cannot die anymore, because we are “sons of God, being sons of the resurrection” (Luke 20:36, ESV).  It is to children of heaven, sons of the resurrection, that God brings heaven here and now.  When Christ speaks His Word over that very ordinary bread and wine, what we do not see is far greater than what we do see.  We do not see heaven being opened and Christ descending with angels, archangels and all the company of heaven to surround us here on earth: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth, heaven and earth are full of Thy glory.”  The communion of saints in the holy things is not just a nice metaphor in an old creed; it is a hidden, yet very real, fact every time the Lord feeds us His Supper.  Remember, to be holy is to belong to the Holy God.  And if the Holy God is here to feed us His own Body and Blood, then all those who belong to Him are here as well.  Wherever Christ is, there is His Body, all of it—including the souls of all who have died in Christ.  But they are not dead now; just unseen by us.  They wait with us for the revealing of our one Lord, who joins us to each other in one faith by one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.  With them we confess that “our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body” (Philippians 3:20-21, ESV).  Come to think of it, maybe the Church had a point when it spoke only of the dead as saints.  According to St. Paul: “you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.  When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:3-4, ESV). 

“Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet been revealed.  We know that when He is revealed, we will be like Him, because we will see Him as He is” (1 John 3:2).  Whatever sin you see in yourself or in the world, know that Christ has already conquered on the cross; this mad world is not the reality any more.  The Son became a Man to make you holy, to join you with Himself and His Father in the communion of the Holy Spirit.  It is in that “union with God, the Three in One,” that we celebrate the Feast of All Saints!  Around that altar is the closest we will ever come in this life to being reunited with all the saints and martyrs who have gone ahead of us.  Yes, “Blest communion;” yes, “fellowship divine;” but it is only a foretaste.  It is the modest feast of saints who are on their way to the full marriage feast of the Lamb; robed in white, holding the palm branches of victory, coming out of the great tribulation with the cry of all the saints: “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Revelation 7:10, ESV).  Blessed are you, with hearts purified by the pure blood of Christ: “Therefore [you] are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will shelter [you] with his presence.  [You] shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike [you], nor any scorching heat.  For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be [your] shepherd, and he will guide [you] to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from [your] eyes” (Revelation 7:15-17, ESV).

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7, ESV).  Amen.

                      — Pr. Timothy Winterstein, 10/27/09

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