April 7, 2024 Text:  John 20:19-31

Dear Friends in Christ,

If you are a parent, there is one moment that stands out.  The first time you got to touch your baby boy or baby girl.  The skin, the warmth, your flesh and blood in your arms.  It’s emotional.  It’s life-changing.  You can’t forget that time.  I couldn’t stop kissing the boys.  That touch that started in Overland Park, Kansas and Normal, Illinois delivery rooms continues to this day.

Touch is so important.  The disciple Thomas was a toucher.  It was a moment in his life he won’t soon forget.  

“THE TOUCH OF THE LORD”

The research is clear, people, especially children need touch.  If children are not touched, they grow at a slower rate, they are sicker, they have more trouble socially and they display more angry and depressed emotions.

It doesn’t stop there.  When you meet that special someone, you want to hold hands, put your arms around each other, sit close.  Do you married couples have that secret touch between the two of you that says, “I love you.”

We need that kind of touch.  The one that says love, assurance, closeness, comfort, happiness.  Touch says the other person is there, alive, real – and so are you.

We get to Thomas.  He’s a doubter.  A little skeptical.  See, he wasn’t there when Jesus first appeared risen from the dead.  He would not believe unless he touched Jesus.  “Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.” (v. 25)

It is over a week later that Jesus appears.  Jesus must know that Thomas is doubting because it is Jesus who says these words, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side.  Do not disbelieve, but believe.” (v. 27)  Just the right touch.  He gets to touch the Lord and Thomas says, “My Lord and my God.” (v. 28)

In Jesus’ lifetime there was a lot of people who needed to see him.  There were people who needed to touch him and be touched by him.  When he blessed the children in Luke 18.  When he placed the mud on the eyes of the man born blind in John 9.  The woman who needed to touch his cloak in Luke 8.  The washing of the disciples’ feet in John 13.  Those are just a few of the many times that the touch of the Lord was important.

We need the touch of the Lord.  The sign of the cross on our forehead and hearts and then the water touching our head in Baptism.  Jesus is there.  At the baptismal font, we touch and have been touched by Jesus in just the right way.

As we come to the altar the touch of the Lord is here.  He has promised to be in that piece of bread and sip of wine.  His body.  His blood.  The living Jesus, right there.  Among us.  Touching us.  Jesus is close to us and saying, “I love you.”  He is giving assurance, comfort, and joy as he purifies us from all sin.  He is real, present, and alive – and so are we when we touch that bread and wine, that body and blood.

When we are touched by the Lord, we then extend that touch to others.  In ministry touch is so important.  The sick and the dying and the struggling want to know that someone is there.  As members of Christ, we give hugs to our fellow brothers and sisters.  We give mutual consolation to each other.  In a way, that’s Jesus touching us through his Church.

One day we will have the same joy and wonder of touching Jesus as Thomas did.  His resurrection says our hope is that touch and being touched will not end at the grave, but will be ours again on the Last Day and for all eternity.  The leper, the abandoned child, the brokenhearted, the grieving parents, the son who remembers – all need the touch of the Lord.  Jesus incredible gift to us is that we are, and we will be touched by the Lord.

Amen.      

March 31, 2024 – Easter Text:  Mark 16:1-8

Dear Friends in Christ,

Last March actress Gwyneth Paltrow and optometrist Terry Sanderson went to trial over a ski crash.  They both blamed each other.  He sued for damages, and she sued for defamation.  The jury decided for the actress.  The headline read “Gwyneth Paltrow gets vindication at ski collision trial.”

A few months before that, here in Illinois, a man was released from prison after serving almost 30 years for murder.  DNA evidence proved he was not the killer.  “I feel vindicated,” he said.

To be vindicated is to be cleared of guilt or to be proven right.  Today we conclude our Lenten Series “God On Trial” with our Easter theme . . .

“VINDICATION”

Who needs to be vindicated?  For starters, Jesus.  After Good Friday it sure looked like Jesus was wrong.  Put on trial, declared guilty of blasphemy, sentenced to death.  Pontius Pilate was judge and jury and with a little peer pressure from blinded souls, he handed down the sentence:  death by crucifixion.

Jesus was hanging there between two criminals, bleeding and dying, he looked so weak and powerless.  If he were who he claimed to be why wouldn’t God rescue him?  If he were God, couldn’t he escape?  Like every other person who hung on a cross, he breathed his last.  His lifeless body was buried in a tomb.

How could his followers process everything?  As darkness settled on the land they had a bitter mix of sadness, confusion, doubt, and fear.  

Maybe you can relate.  Some you love has died.  After all the funeral planning, the funeral and burial, friends and family head home.  Darkness settles, it’s quiet in the house, you feel alone.  “Lord, I am lost and confused.  I just don’t understand.”

It is not just the death of a loved one that leads to these thoughts.  Death reminds us that our time is running out.  Bodies failing, minds fading.  Even the young have their anxieties about making the right choices – friends, relationships, college, and career.  It’s the vertigo of a million possibilities.  We may wallow in guilt as mistakes are magnified in our minds.  How we have let down our Savior.

We may not know what the women were thinking on Easter morning, but we know what they were doing.  They went to the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body – one final act of love.  Then a young man in a white robe says, “Do not be alarmed.  You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified.  He has risen; he is not here.  See the place where they laid him.”

It is too much to process.  They fled trembling and in astonishment.  But it would sink in.  Jesus would appear to them and many others.  The reports were corroborated again and again.  The good news was true:  “Victory!” was the headline.  Vindication!

Jesus didn’t come down from the cross to prove he was the Son of God.  He did something better; he rose from the dead.  On Easter, Jesus was proved right:  he is the God-man, the Messiah that he claimed to be.

Easter is vindication.  Do you ever wonder what his enemies thought?  Jesus took their sin, He took your sin, He took my sin and he died for it on the cross.  The exclamation – “It is finished.”  Vindication!  All those sins are paid for.

Easter is vindication for the prophets of old who told of the coming Messiah.  People like Job who placed their hope in Jesus, “I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth…yet in my flesh I will see God.”  Jesus’ resurrection is proof that Job was right.  It is proof for us too.  With Christ raised from the dead, we have hope beyond this life.  Jesus’ resurrection is the promise of the resurrection for all people.  That day will be our ultimate vindication. 

Easter is vindication for us as we live as people judged by this world.  Yes, the Christian Church is in decline in the United States.  Less people follow Jesus and worship in our churches.  Citizens are becoming more secular.  Even Christians might say, “The church is dying.”  Is that possible?  How can the church be dying when it is the body of the risen Christ?  Some churches may close, some Christians may fall away, but as long as Jesus lives, so does his church.  It may not be growing here, but in parts of the world the Christian Church is exploding in numbers.  People will always be hungry for the Gospel and the message of a Risen Christ.  We are vindicated!

We are on a triumphal march to glory.  We testify to the truth as we humbly and simply sing the victory song with saints and angels in heaven.  Sin is forgiven.  Death is defeated.  Jesus is Lord.  Christ and his people have been put on trial, and Easter brings the victorious verdict:  Vindication.  Alleluia!

Amen.     

March 29, 2024 – Good Friday     Text:  Matthew 27:38-54

Dear Friends in Christ,

Imagine standing at Calvary as Jesus is crucified.  There is a lot take in – different sights and smells.  For now, focus on the sounds.  What do you hear?

You first hear this, “If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.”  Then the Jewish leaders, “He saved others; he cannot save himself….let him down from the cross and we will believe in him.”  The Gospel of Luke tells us that the soldiers and those crucified with him also said similar things.  Different voices.  Different tones.  But one diabolical chorus with a clear theme:  “Prove it.  If you are really God, show us.”

“EVIDENCE”

Today we still hear the echoes of voices directed at God or his people.  “If there is a God, show me the proof.  Why does it seem the devil has free reign in the world?  Why do prayers go unanswered?  I want a sign so I can believe.”

Like at Calvary, the voices come from different places.  People who hate the Christian Church and a God they can’t stand.  Some are natural skeptics who don’t believe in much of anything.  Some are desperate in their words and want to be proven wrong.   People still put God on Trial.  They want to see the evidence.  Does any of this affect you?

Do you get angry at the voices?  Are you frustrated about what they say about your faith?  Does Satan ever push a doubt into your cranium?  Could they be right?

Don’t ignore the voices.  In fact, in these voices, part of what they say is correct.  “He saved others.”  If they could have seen past their spiritual blindness, they might have noticed why he didn’t save himself.  He was refraining from using his power for a reason.  Why didn’t the man who could raise the dead save his own life?

Jesus had his own why question, but his question is meant to be an answer:  “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  He cries to God not in unbelief but in agony.  It reveals what no one standing there could see.  The man in the middle cross wasn’t just suffering from lacerations, nails, thirst, and suffocation – on top of the ridicule.  This man, who had done nothing wrong in the court of humankind or the court of God, was suffering God’s wrath for the sins of others.  His question came from the depths of torment we deserved.  The one who saved others didn’t save himself.  Why?  Because he loves us.

That’s the answer to all the why questions that plague us.  “Why doesn’t Jesus do ____?   Why would he allow ___?”  Would he be abandoned by God for us only to later abandon us?  Would he follow every commandment, fulfill every prophecy, and forgive every sin only later to make a mistake in our lives?  He must love us.  He does love us.

Some voices were changed that day on the hill.  Luke speaks of a thief who went from mocking him to defending him.  A voice who wanted to be with Jesus in paradise.  The Holy Spirit working through a Suffering Servant.

Jesus works in us the same way.  A simple washing at a font and his Spirit is put in us to convince us he is our Savior.  Through eternal words, he speaks to us of the same forgiveness, the same promise of paradise.  In an unassuming meal, he lets us touch and taste Exhibit A:  the very body and blood he gave for us.  These means bring Jesus’ death to us to forgive our doubts – and put them to rest.

There is one more voice that should give you hope, especially if you have family or friends who look to the cross and their soul is blank.  They see and hear no Savior.  They are so deep in their sin that they are just a skeleton of bones with no purpose.  Remember how earlier we said that the enemies of Jesus spoke the truth – “He saved others.”  Nothing has changed.  If these dry bones didn’t think there was a God, then they would have no reason to get rid of him.  Do you ever try to destroy something that you don’t believe in or is not there?  

At the bottom of the cross was this type of man – a doubter, a skeptic, someone joining the mob mentality of why he won’t save himself.  He represents your child, your loved one, the one you pray for all the time.  He utters one of the greatest hopeful lines recorded in all of Scripture:  “Truly this was the Son of God!”  Whoop, there it is!  Walk past the cross tonight knowing that dry bones can be made alive again. 

On Golgotha, Jesus gives us all the evidence we need.

Amen.