Sermons

October 9, 2016                                                                     Text:  Luke 17:11-19

 

Dear Friends in Christ,

 

How do you feel about your place in society as you sit in the pew this morning?  Is your voice and actions making a difference?  Are you being swept over by the opinions and loudness of those seeking changes – and not for the better?

Today in our text we have mass groupthink.  A problem many of us deal with on a daily basis.  How can we break away?  Where is the answer?  Majorities impress us too much.  It is still true that God and one make a majority.  Let that sink in.  God and one make a majority.  The Samaritan comes back with thanks.  The other nine are comfortable together in not returning thanks.  What to make of the Samaritan is he . . .

“A LOUD MINORITY – OR MAJORITY?”

Let’s first get at what these men were suffering from –leprosy.  It starts with discoloration of a patch of skin white or pink and it spreads to others parts of the body.  Spongy, tumor-like swellings grow on the face and body.  The disease starts to affect the internal organs along with the skin.  Marked deformity of hands and feet occur.  Sensory nerve endings no longer respond to heat or injury.  Remember biting your lip before the Novocain wore off and then regretting it later?  Leprosy would last from ten to twenty years before death.  The disease was emotionally and spiritually devastating.  These men were isolated – they were in the minority.

Yet, they do have some belief in Jesus.  “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.”  Were they aware of previous healings?  Was Jesus the conduit to leaving their miserable existence?  Was He a miracle worker and nothing more?

Jesus heals – but not in an instant.  He allows some time to pass.  He wants their faith to grow.  What about your infirmities?  Ever get anxious, impatient?  “This too shall pass” make take years.  God wants our faith to blossom and strengthen in might.

After the healing, they do something as a majority.  All ten go to the priests to show them that they are healed.  Jesus healed in different ways according to the condition of the sick person.  These men only believed in His healing power.  Jesus desired to advance their faith to something better.  Jesus feeds their faith with His Word.  They would have been fools not to act on his word, to stand around and debate about it.

Now comes the defining moment in the text.  Who will turn back to give thanks to the Healer for the healing?  Nine are happy for the return to health.  In the heart of one, out of faith, he shouts his praise and falls at Jesus’ feet.  He looks like the minority but remember – God and one are always the majority.  For this foreigner, his faith has made him well.

The nine lepers who didn’t return were spiritual, calling Jesus “Master” and looking for him to dispense a favor; it was all about them.  American remains highly spiritual, it’s just that more and more are practicing their spirituality apart from the institutional church.  You can’t miss it in our pews on Sunday morning.  Like the nine, people claim to have faith but it is self-centered and self-determined, not the obedience of faith.  Jesus’ praise for the Samaritan, “your faith has made you well” has a double meaning – health and salvation.  “Your faith” is not the hearer’s subjective feeling but outwardly directed trust in Jesus.

Like the nine, many spiritual Americans see faith as a means to a better place in earthly life, with Jesus the master dispenser.  Yes, faith does improve our earthly lot but the deeper meaning is the eternal salvation that Jesus gives to those who trust in Him.  Many spiritual Americans acknowledge Jesus as “Master” seeking a better life in this world, but do not bow their broken lives and empty hearts before Him.  “Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?”

You too have been healed.  Sin has invaded and made a mess of your body and your mind and your actions.  It eats at you little by little by little until you stand deformed before a Holy God.  You need to call to the Master, “have mercy on me.”  And He responds.  He heals.  He forgives.  He cleanses you from your disease.  The weight of your transgressions is released from your body.  Now, what will your reaction to this good news be?

What would you have done if you had stood alone against nine?  Through the Holy Spirit you can turn against the self-serving spirituality of many Americans to the true Church’s outspoken witness to Jesus Christ.  Then we will be the loud majority, not because we shout it over others, but because with God on our side we are always in the majority.  The few will be the exalted.  The narrow door has our Lord.

I completely understand the Samaritan.  Being in the minority does not bother me.  I can go into a crowded room and sit on the other side and I am comfortable.  I know who I am, the Lord made me left-handed for a reason.  Peer pressure is no problem – a different uniform as a 6^th grade baseball player because I made the 8^th grade team, passing on the marijuana cigarette as it is passed around a room at my fraternity, not communing at a visiting church because I didn’t talk with the LCMS Pastor.  I know the Samaritan.  But I also understand that for many of you, looking my way right now, don’t know if you could do what this foreigner did?  You’re comfortable not rocking the boat, not offending; you want to live in your little PC world.  In today’s world, for the Christian, that just doesn’t fly.  Now you speak volumes by being here in worship.  You have come to worship your Healing Creator.  Now we take that message to “spiritual” America, the ones who are healed but want to keep walking to their eternal doom.  They are walking by or driving by the Healer, the One who can eternally heal.  Never feel like the minority.  God and you are always the majority.  “Rise and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

Amen.

October 2, 2016 – LWML Sunday                            Text:  John 1:43-46

 

Dear Friends in Christ,

Have you been surprised or been part of a surprise?  You as a congregation surprised me when I turned 40.  “Toni, why are all these cars at church on a Saturday morning?”  Toni and I surprised my parents, when Toni became pregnant with Karson.  We set “baby things” around our condo until they figured it out.  I still remember the excitement of my mom.  I got to surprise a friend who I hadn’t seen in a few years.  Toni surprised me with a golf outing with friends.  Surprises can be quite enjoyable.

Surprises can also be heart wrenching.  Being blindsided by a divorce.  Hearing news from your child about a lifestyle choice.  A doctor with news that will completely change your life or mortality.  Being sure you are getting a job after a great interview and then being crushed again.

All surprises by definition are unexpected.  People can have different reactions to the same surprise.  How will you react the morning of November 9 after the election?  Surprise?  Depression?  Apathy?  Same surprise.  Different responses.

This is what we encounter with Philip and Nathanael in our text and they see and hear of Jesus for the first time.  Same surprise.  Different responses.

“COME AND SEE”

After calling Andrew and Peter, Jesus found Philip and called him to be His disciple too.  “Follow me!”  Philip learned about this man from Galilee and shared his good news with Nathanael.  He was surprised and excited.

How does Nathanael react?  He is not excited at all.  In fact, he has suspicions about this Galilean Jesus:  “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”  Nathanael does not have a joyful attitude but a guarded posture.  Cautious and doubtful.

Can anything good come out of Nazareth in Galilee?  It’s too close to unclean Gentiles and too far from holy Jerusalem.  These people speak with strange accents and they are not very learned people.  Can God work out His plan of salvation for a place such as this?

God surprises us as He always does.  We look for His power and wisdom in all the wrong places.  We usually look to ourselves, our holiness, and purity, and righteousness.  I’ve got a handle on this God, but you know I may need an assist from you.  We need to turn away from our inward selves and our perceived holiness and look to the holiness of Jesus.  You and I are not the light; Jesus is the Light of the world.

Jesus invites the surprised and perplexed, the cautious and the guarded, the unbelieving and doubting:  “Come and you will see.”  If you follow this story beyond the words of our text we see that Jesus knew things about Nathanael that even surprised Nathanael.  Nathanael made his confession:  “Rabbi, you are the Son of God!  You are the King of Israel!”  Good things do come out of Nazareth.

God works out His plan of salvation in the most unexpected place.  In Galilee with the Galileans.  Who are the Galileans of today?  Who are people in our neighborhoods who speak differently from us?  Who do we know that doubts so much about Christ and His work that they could never come to faith?  If we think like this we live in the darkness.  We only see with the eyes of the flesh.  We close our hearts to the surprisingly gracious ways in which God reveals His great love for all people, near and far through His Son.

God surprises us again and again to see with the eyes of the Holy Spirit what mighty deeds He can do in the most unlikely places and among the most unlikely characters.  Our invitation to those around us is the same as Philip, “Come and see.”

We are Galileans.  Marginal people called out of darkness into the light of the Son.  A people once dead raised to new life through faith in God’s Son.  Through strangers in our midst, God reminds us that the church is a bunch of strangers in a foreign land.  To the world, we are complete strangers, speaking with strange accents, walking and living our lives to a strange beat.  We speak the language of Holy Scripture.  We initiate people into the church by sprinkling them with water at our fonts.  We eat the body and drink the blood of God’s Son at our altars.  Our Pastors forgive us our sins.  We even love our enemies.  How odd!  How surprising!

On this LWML Sunday, we rejoice in Jesus’ calling and invitation to come and see once again what He has graciously done in our lives.  We extend God’s Kingdom to the strange Galilean neighbors in our midst.  We ask the Lord to open our eyes to more opportunities with brothers and sisters in Christ from different ethnic and language groups in the United States and abroad, so that together we might invite even more neighbors to meet Jesus, the man from Galilee, our Light and Life.

Hey Philip!  Can anything good really come out of Nazareth in Galilee?  Yes indeed, Nathanael, Jesus, God’s greatest gift has surprisingly come out of Galilee for our salvation.   Hey Philip!  Can God work out His salvation in lowly places and among strangers today?  Yes, indeed, Nathanael.  “Come and See!”

Amen.

September 18, 2016                                                              Text:  Luke 16:1-15

 

Dear Friends in Christ,

 

Who here doesn’t like to get a good deal?  I don’t mean an extra donut in your dozen or more off that blouse than you anticipated.  I mean a deal that through your shrewdness you planned for.  To me with my sportscentric background everything is a game.  With shopping it is my goal to beat “the man.”  At Kroger when you get your cash register receipt they tell you what your savings are.  I have my top three savings amounts on my desk at home.  On a recent shopping trip I came close to adding another one to my top three.  Between their deals, coupons and my shrewd shopping our family saves money which can then be used for things like college tuition and the like.

The opposite can also happen which prompted a recent e-mail from me to the company.  Toni purchased what was supposed to be an eight-piece grilled chicken.  When it was opened at home it only had 7 pieces, a thigh replaced a breast and the legs had to be from the littlest chicken that ever roamed the earth.  That evening I was on my computer letting the company know they had failed to provide what they had promised.  We do not get what we paid for.

The parable of the unjust steward reminds each of us today that God always gives infinitely more than we pay for, and his blessings motivate us to share His grace.  As the Master has been merciful to us, we can now extend His Kingdom by being . . .

“SHREWD IN FAITH”

Let’s get something out of the way, right away.  This is one of the hardest parables in Scripture to understand.  We studied it at the Bloomington North Pastor’s Conference this past week and even these learned men have a hard time with the meaning the Lord is trying to convey.  So let’s not get bogged down in semantics here this morning.

The steward in the parable has been unfaithful.  He has squandered his master’s wealth.  When confronted, he has nothing to say.  He was given great responsibility and he squandered it.  As a result of this unfaithfulness, he is being removed from his position.

How many times have we squandered the blessings the Lord has given to us?  We have been given great responsibility and sometimes we throw it all away to chase the dream of great wealth that never materializes.

The master could have put the unjust steward into prison until the debt was paid, but he chose to be gracious and let him go.  Mercy moved him to take the action that he did.

Don’t we have a merciful God who acts the same way?  We owe a debt we could never pay.  Our sins pile up into one big pile of unpaid loans and there is nothing we can do it about.  We deserve an eternal prison for our misdeeds.  Yet God is merciful and grants us forgiveness.  While forgiveness is free for us, it was not free for God.  In the parable, the debtors received the benefit of the master’s forgiveness of their debt.  In our lives, God was willing to make the sacrifice of His Son on the cross that our debt might not just be reduced but erased totally.  The loan officer can’t find that we owe anything!  This forgiveness won by Jesus means we are no longer accountable for the sins we’ve committed.  You and I can celebrate living in the freedom of the Gospel, with the assurance of eternal life.

With this freedom comes great privilege.  We can live through the Spirit shrewd in faith.  When looking up synonyms for the word “shrewd” some take on a negative tone, words like cunning, sly, wily, and crafty.  Other synonyms are more positive, words such as astute, sharp, keen and discerning.  In our text when Jesus uses the word shrewd He means it in a positive way.  Our Savior knows that being shrewd can be a good thing in the right context.

The words of Jesus in verse 9, “And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into eternal dwellings.”  This directs our attention to the purpose of our earthly blessings received from God.

The steward of the parable used physical possessions shrewdly to obtain a physical place to dwell.  Jesus turns this idea around and tells us to use our physical possessions shrewdly to obtain eternal dwellings.  That is being faithful!  Shrewd in faith.  What is the purpose of receiving abundance from God if not to use it to extend His Kingdom?  The generosity of the master and the mercy he showed reveals to us what it means to be used by God to share His blessings with the people of this world so that the Spirit might have opportunity to work through us to touch the lives of people who do not know God.

Because of what Christ has done for us we are saved at 100%.  Now that is a deal we all want.

Amen.

(Video Unavailable)

Sept. 11, 2016 – Christian Education Rally Sunday              Text:  2 Peter 3:14-18

 

Dear Friends in Christ,

 

There was a little elementary school child who took a test on human anatomy and failed it.  She was the only one in the class who failed the examination.  This is how her test read:  “The human body is composed of three parts:  the branium, the borax, and the abominable cavity.  The branium contains the brain.  The borax contains the lungs, the liver, and the living things.  The abominable cavity contains the bowels, of which there are five:  a, e, i, o, and u.”

If this child is planning to be a doctor, a scientist, or a biology teacher the foundation is simply not there.  With this knowledge the goal is not going to be reached.  Our goal as Christians is our heavenly home.  Until this permanent stop in eternity we are learning more about the faith we possess.  The Lord is giving us the time, what are we doing with it?  Today is Christian Education Rally Sunday and the question is put before you – are you . . .

‘TWISTING IN THE WIND OR GROWING IN KNOWLEDGE?”

Somehow, we have this idea that our Christianity has no real relation to the realities of living.  Many approach gaining in knowledge of Scripture like the little girl who said “the abominable cavity contains the bowels, of which there are five:  a, e, i, o, and u.”

God is not impressed if we demonstrate that His Word is not important to us.  The most important literature in all the world is the Holy Bible, where God gives us the record of His mighty deeds in Christ, and where He further tells us how to live as His people down here.  One Lutheran Pastor said it this way:

“Our life is divinely planned.  God still rules the world today, just as He has guided the events of the world in all past centuries.  We cannot teach our children about the world without teaching about Him!  We dare not teach them how to live without taking His will into account.  It is wrong to give them a goal and purpose in life without giving them at the same time a knowledge of their final goal in heaven.”

During Peter’s time the people were twisting the Scripture by their misunderstanding of God’s grace.  They thought they could sin boldly because this would give further opportunities for the grace of God to be demonstrated.  Today the twisting is done by not believing in sin and certainly the fact that no one needs a Savior.  Sin boldly is still the moniker – even when sin is hidden from their eyes.  We can buy into both paths of damnation.  “I am going to do this because Christ will understand and forgive.”  Or it becomes, “I don’t want to go to worship and Bible Class and hear Pastor talking about that sin, because I don’t think it’s wrong.”  There is the sin, it has become about you.  Your mind triumphs over God’s mind and what He had the sacred writers put down on paper.  Congratulations you have just made yourself God – have fun with that!

All of this leaves us twisting in the wind, not sure where we are being carried.  This reminds me of a phone call I was once received from a member upset about something they had read.  This member rarely came to worship and never to Bible Class.  I brought them in off the ledge and reminded them we talk about the issue before them and many others in our service and Bible studies.  Unfortunately, their patterned continued.  We can’t grow in knowledge if we don’t plant ourselves where the knowledge is being dispensed.  It is not a hard concept.

The only sure way to remain on guard in the stability of salvation is to remain in all of God’s Word.  Believers keep themselves fortified in and by God’s Word so that they will not fall away.  A student once asked the president of his school if there was a course he could take that was shorter than the one prescribed, “Oh yes,” replied the president, “but it depends on what you want to be.  When God wants to make an oak, He takes a hundred years, but when He wants to make a squash, it only takes six months.”

“Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” (v. 18a)  Martin Luther wrote on this verse:  “This teaching is not learned all at once, nor can it be understood speculatively.  It must be learned by daily use and exercise amid the temptations of the world, the devil, and the flesh, amid despair, distrust, and innumerable horrible other things.  And without these exercises it cannot be kept.  Foolish people, therefore, are taken in.  After reading one or more pages of Holy Scripture and hearing maybe one sermon, they think they have already learned this teaching of Christianity completely.  They can see that in other, lesser arts we do not immediately become masters.  Much less it can happen in this greatest teaching of all, that we immediately trust in God from the heart and despise all the perils of the world, death, and the devil.  These things cannot be learned in one day, but practice and immense exercise and a singular gift of God are required.”

You can exercise your faith here at Good Shepherd.  You are growing from the ten-minute sermons and the worship itself.  That growth of knowledge can be substantial when you add an extra hour of in-depth Bible study.  We have Sunday School, Small Group Bible study, Ladies Bible study, and this fall an Adult Instruction class for those wanting to join or as a refresher in Lutheran doctrine.  All of these opportunities help us to stand against those twisting God’s Holy Word.  Our added knowledge given through the Holy Spirit allows us to stand faithfully for the truth of God’s Word.  They help us to “take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people” as Peter reminds us in our text.  We bear witness to the Word through our lips and our lives.

Our Lord is patient and giving us time to repent.  Do we use the time allotted to us to take sin and salvation seriously?   Do we twist in the wind by neglecting growth in God’s Word?  Daily repentance is what we need.  The patient Lord is working through Word and Sacrament to restore fallen sinners and to strengthen them in the stability of their salvation.  “To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity.” (v. 18b)

Amen.

August 21, 2016 Text: Luke 13:22-30

Dear Friends in Christ,

Years ago Crosby, Stills & Nash sang a song entitled, “Wasted On The Way.” One line from that song is as follows: “I am older now, I have more than what I wanted . . .” Those words probably sum up life for a lot of us. More than what we wanted. More living…more running…more accumulation…more conflict…more hurts…more pains than we ever thought when we were children.
Life gets heavy for some of us. Then the day comes, a quiet time alone when we look at where we’ve been and where we are going, and some of us are convinced that if we had to do it over again there would be changes in our lives. Can you sing it: I am older now, I have more than what I wanted?
Life can be full of questions and thoughts that run through our head. Today in our text a question is posed to Jesus – a curious question. Let’s see how Jesus handles it.
“THE JESUS ANSWER TO THE QUESTION”
Let’s get right to it. “(Jesus) went on his way through towns and villages, teaching and journeying toward Jerusalem. And someone said to him, ‘Lord, will those who are saved be few?’” (vs. 22-23a) What’s fascinating about this scenario is that Jesus doesn’t fully answer the question. At least not here. He does in
Matthew where he says, “But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” (Matt. 7:14)
Only a “few” find it. That is a little chilling. In this moment of our text no specific answer is given. And there’s a reason. Remember when you were young and you tried to reason with your parents about how other parents let their child do this or that? And what was the answer: “You are not other children.”
That’s the issue. Not how many are going to be saved, but whether you or I will be saved. All the other “why” questions are wasted diversions. Michael Green relates a story that contains a serious truth mostly ignored:
“An atheistic barber was conversing with a minister…Said the unbeliever, ‘If there is a loving God, how can he permit all this poverty, suffering, and violence among these people? Why doesn’t he save them from all this?’ Just then a disheveled bum crossed the street. He was unshaven and filthy, with long scraggly hair hanging down his neck. The minister pointed to him and said, ‘You are a barber and claim to be a good one, so why do you allow that man to go unkempt and unshaven?’
“’Why, why…’ the barber stuttered, ‘he never gave me a chance to fix him up.’ ‘Exactly,’ said the minister. ‘Men are what they are because they reject God’s help.”
“Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.” “Many” will try to get in, but “few” will enter. How does that fit with the world’s thinking that if there is a God and people do their best they will go to heaven or whatever they want to call it? It doesn’t square at all. Doing your best isn’t the answer. Most won’t make it.
Can you imagine Christ the Judge looking at people and saying, “I don’t know you.” What a horror to become eternally unknown. Hebrews 11:8a reads, “And without faith it is impossible to please God…” Faith. Paul writes, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.” (Eph. 2:8,9) Do you really believe God is going to cave to the sentimental demand that God would surely not send a “good” person to hell – since no-one can be good enough? And what about all those celebrities who have died and, we’re told, are “looking down on us.” You know, from heaven. They’re in heaven because why – they’re celebrities and they entertained us? You think, maybe, some are looking up?
So where is the answer? In the Scripture of course. God’s Word always has the answer. Know this and don’t let anyone downplay it. “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12) The Jesus answer to the question is: JESUS. Your good works will not get you through the narrow door. Confess your sinfulness before a Holy God and believe that Jesus suffered, bled, and died to pay for all your sins! That has always been the message from this pulpit. God’s love is yours – now – through Jesus Christ. And if you don’t understand that message – if you are not sure – you should get in touch with me as soon as possible.
On the other hand, if you are sure of the Gospel message and the answer to the question then with the Holy Spirit we work to tell others what we already know. Christ crucified and risen. Dwight L. Moody the evangelist once said a cherished epitaph on his tombstone would be: “A young man walking about the streets witnessing to Jesus.”
People all around us have questions. We have the grand answer. The Lord provides it because it is Him. Share it. Live it. “The Jesus Answer To The Question.”
Amen.