June 14, 2015 Text: Mark 4:26-29

Dear Friends in Christ,

Dr. Fred Craddock was a professor of New Testament and Homiletics at Emory University in Atlanta. He tells this story about his father.
Dr. Craddock’s father didn’t go to church and was extremely critical of the church. Every now and then a minister would come to their home and talk to the father about the church. Mr. Craddock would always say, “I know what you fellows down there at the church want. You want another name and another pledge. Right? Isn’t that the business you’re in? Another name and another pledge.”
This always embarrassed Dr. Craddock’s mother. She would withdraw to the kitchen and cry. Sometimes another person would come with the minister. But the father always held his ground. “You don’t care about me! You want another name and another pledge. That’s how the churches operate. You don’t care about me.”
He said that countless times. However, there came a time when he didn’t say it. The last time Dr. Fred Craddock saw his father was in a Veteran’s hospital. He was down to 74 pounds. They had taken out his throat and he was badly burned by radiation therapy. The story goes on to read . . .
“Around the room flowers were everywhere – on the table, in the windows and even on the floor. There were potted plants, cut flowers, and every sort of arrangement. They even had flowers on the table that you swing out over your bed on which you put food. That was just as well since he couldn’t eat anyway. Little cards were sprinkled in all the flowers and every one of them read something like this: Men’s Bible class, Women’s Fellowship, Children’s Division, Youth Fellowship. Every organization you could imagine in the church had sent flowers along with stacks of cards from persons in the church.
“Craddock’s father saw him looking at the cards. Unable to speak, he picked up a pencil and wrote on the side of a Kleenex box a line from Shakespeare’s Hamlet: ‘In this harsh world, draw your breath in pain to tell my story.’
“Fred Craddock read it and asked his father: ‘Dad, what is your story?’ The speechless old man took the Kleenex box back and wrote a confession: ‘I was wrong! I was wrong!’”
We’re looking at the Parable of the Growing Seed. We’re looking at the direction the Christ gives His people in a dying world. We’re looking at how . . .
“THE WORD PRODUCES BY ITSELF”
I know that sermons talking about everybody being a witness to Christ are not the most popular. Maybe it’s that uncertain fear that unbelieving family and friends will disown us. Well, maybe they will. Or maybe it’s the excuse that we just can’t do it. And the question is “Why?” Or, maybe, some just figure – or, at least, hope – that someone else will pick up the slack. Not necessarily. If we don’t do it, who will?
After all, there are a lot of desperate people out there in every conceivable kind of pain. God doesn’t ask us to be their critics. Actually, Jesus said it best of all: “God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.” (Jn. 3:17) And this: “…whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” (Jn. 3:18) The world is already judged, whether it knows it or not. The world is already condemned by its sin.
And listen, God does not appoint us to be keepers of nit-picking issues. He asks us – His church – you and me – to scatter seed. That’s all. Scatter. The growing is strictly His business. To put the seed – the Word – out there, trusting that it will do what God wants it to do.
And so our text: “(Jesus) said: ‘The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how. The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.’”
The point of the parable is rather simple. The seed is the Word of God. We are to consider the power of the Word. The Word produces by itself. God does with the Word as He pleases – not as we envision. The writer of Hebrews says, “The Word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword…”
Peter writes, “For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.” (1 Pet. 1:23) It’s the Word…period. As the parable says, “Produces by itself” without the absurd innovations of humans…the seed sprouts and grows, though (the man) knows not how.
And the “man” in the parable is equally simple to figure out. The man is just a man, in one sense. And in another sense the man is you and I. We are the ones who scatter the Gospel seeds – the glorious news of sin forgiven and the promise of eternal life through faith in Christ.
As we consider the parable and it’s meaning for us you can hear those familiar words in the background: “…let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” (Matt. 5:16)
So how honest should we be with ourselves this morning? Maybe the seed some of us scatter is the seed of constant complaint and criticism. Or maybe the seed of gossip and slander. Or maybe the seed of discontent. I’ll tell you what, friend, no matter what you think or how you see it, you and I are scattering seed – of some sort.
Eugenia Price said, “If Christ lives in us, controlling our personalities, we will leave glorious marks on the lives we touch. Not because of our lovely characters, but because of his.”
Of all the stands we take – of the pleas we make – there is none more important and urgent than scattering the seed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ – the Good News of forgiveness of all sin. The Good News that God does love us and has given us the gift of eternal life. There are many Mr. Craddock’s in the world just waiting to hear this glorious news. And always remember: The Word Produces By Itself so scatter seed.
Amen.

June 7, 2015 Text: 2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1

Dear Friends in Christ,

There is nothing as devastating as division. It was a great burden for the Apostle Paul. The Church of Corinth, which he had helped start, was divided. Some followed Cephas, some followed Apollos, some followed Paul. Another group wanted certain freedoms. This all led to everything being questioned. Can’t a man marry his father’s wife? Can’t we divorce? Can’t we sue in court? Can’t we believe whatever we want about the Lord’s Supper? Issues like this can destroy and divide churches. People then begin to resign themselves to the inevitable, “The world is getting worse. Evil wins all the battles. What’s the use?”
Yes, the devil is winning battles. Yes, afflictions weigh heavy on us. However, these things are temporary. They are not eternal. Is that how you see them? Today is an optometry lesson wrapped in a sermon.
“THROUGH WHAT LENS DO YOU SEE LIFE?”
First of all, our focus is on the faith that has survived for generations. We have the same faith, we believe, as the saints who have gone before us. Paul saw through the lens of faith just like Noah, Abraham, David, Isaiah. We have that same lens of faith as Paul and as our Lord Himself. They – even Jesus – looked for things they didn’t yet see with their own eyes. We have God’s promise that God raised Jesus from the dead and He will raise us also.
Faith that God raised Jesus and that He will raise all his believers moves the saints to speak. Paul and his cohorts just couldn’t keep silent. They traveled everywhere and even went to their deaths spouting the resurrection.
Can’t we not do the same? Think of all the people in our world whose lenses are fogged up by political correctness, moral relativism, and spiritual apathy. They can’t see any farther than the next worldly thrill, the mind-numbing group think, or right past the Creator God that stands in their midst. Their vision is nowhere near 20/20. It has slipped completely off the eye chart of sanity. We have a clearer vision and we need to speak that to them. God’s grace can reach those who are blinded by their sin.
There is perhaps no greater evidence of the faith of the early Christians than that they were willing to suffer for it. Paul and many others Christians could have saved their lives by renouncing Jesus, but they wouldn’t do it. They went to crosses, flames, the arena, the sword. And why? Because they were that certain Jesus had risen and He would raise them.
Today, we face some of the same sufferings. We live with the consequences of our sins. The forms can be many: sickness, death, persecution of Christian brothers and sisters around the world, struggling and broken relationships, financial struggles. As Christians we are not exempt from this reality. Even though real, they are transient. They are not going to go on forever.
The other reality is God’s future reality for His people brought to us in the present by means of the Spirit, namely the resurrection hope. God delivers this to us through His Word and Sacraments. The verb “renew” does not appear often in Paul’s epistles, but it is used here to remind us that we are being “renewed” day by day through the work of the Holy Spirit in our life.
Now the optometry lesson wrapped in the sermon. What lenses do you see through and therefore live out life? With what lenses do you examine and discern current reality? Are you focusing on the temporal transient realities of this world alone? Are you near-sighted? Only seeing what is right in front of you? I pray not because this is what Satan uses to blind and veil a believer’s focus.
Are you far-sighted? You view life by gazing into God’s eternal promises. The world’s present reality is seen with eyes. The unseen world of God’s rule and reign is seen through faith in Christ. As Christians, we must live our earthly lives in this fallen world. Paul did not trivialize this, and neither should we. We face our realities as resurrection Christians who experience God’s mercy and grace. Our earthly home and troubles are but momentary. God was raised from the dead to overcome our sin and the wiles of Satan and to give us an eternal home not made with hands. The lens of faith is ours through our Savior Jesus Christ. I can see clearly now.
Today, whether you have been a long-time wearer of glasses or have never had your eyes checked like your Pastor, we have all been fitted with God’s glasses. This allows us through faith to see God’s eternal reality, even now in the present.
Amen.

May 31, 2015 – Holy Trinity Text: John 3:1-17

Dear Friends in Christ,

Have you ever had those moments when you just weren’t being yourself? Something or someone made you grumpier than usual. Maybe it was lack of sleep, a bad review at work or your favorite team lost. At our house we have a little code phrase, “You are a little salty.” We all have said or been told, “Hey, that’s just not like you”? We know who people are by what they do. What we do expresses who we are.
This is true of God as well. We know God by what He does. We can’t travel to find God and then study his habits and write a paper on what He’s made of. No, we know Him by what He does, by His actions. He reveals himself to us in His saving work. Today we focus on the doctrine of the Holy Trinity and as we do we focus on the love of God Himself.
“THE TRINITY OF LOVE”
I find it crucial in life to be true to who you are. One thing that bothers me in life is “fake” people who are not being themselves. A local couple I recently read about were being true to themselves. In the local anniversary announcements for their 35th Wedding anniversary it didn’t say they were taking a cruise or having a family dinner like so many others. It said this: “(They) celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary by monitoring the calving barn for their beef cattle operation.” Now that is being who you are.
That’s a picture of God. God is three persons who love. Jesus leads Nicodemus to see that in our text. This one God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Nicodemus understands that Jesus comes from God. “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” (v. 2) In verse 13 Jesus hints to Nicodemus that He is the Son. Verse 5 completes the Trinity. “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” What binds these three together is love. John writes, “God is love” (1 John 4:8). At the baptism and transfiguration of Jesus, the Father says, “This is my Son, whom I love.” The God who is a Trinity is a God of love. Thus He is “being himself” when He sends his Son to die on the cross, and we can trust and rejoice in his never-changing love. God loves us!
Unfortunately this has never been enough for sinful man. One of the great architects of the American Republic in its founding years was Thomas Paine. Some might think that Paine was a Christian from things he said or wrote. For example, in The Age of Reason (1795), he wrote, “I believe in one God and no more.” If you read some of his other writings or read even further in The Age of Reason, you see that Thomas Paine was a Deist who believed in God, and nothing more. That is, he believed in God’s existence, in a general sense, but he would affirm no particular God as the true God, nor any particular doctrines revealed by or about that God.
How many today believe that way. They believe God exists in some way but nothing more. Some don’t even go that far. Pagans in Touch, a local group that made the paper, had this to say. The pagan belief system has them worshipping an array of gods, which have been purposely chosen to suit their needs.
Nothing new here. People worshipping God how they want Him. But if all one knows about God is that He exists, one will never know what is necessary for eternal salvation. It is a pity, because it is very simple. It was true for Old Testament Israel when they confessed the one and only Lord (Deut. 6:4). It was true as Jesus spelled it out, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” (v. 16) The Trinity of Love is all we need to be saved.
Math in the Bible is not always the same as our math. Take marriage as an example. The Bible says that because of the God-given love in marriage, the two partners become one. So it is with God Himself. Because of divine love, the three persons are united in one God.
On this day we give thanks for the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. We are assured that The Trinity of Love is not temporary but is eternal. Jesus was sent by the Father not to condemn the world but to save the world. The Holy Spirit is part of that.
You have the love you need from those being true to themselves: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. When it comes to your eternal destiny and eternal happiness, The Trinity of Love is a blessing for you.
Amen.