May 23, 2021 – Pentecost                                                                Text:  Acts 2:1-21

Dear Friends in Christ,

            A medical technician was asked about his most unusual emergency experience.  He chose to tell about a call from an usher at the Lutheran Church.  The usher said, “We have a man who slumped over in his pew during the sermon and we think he has expired.”  He relates, “When we got to the church, the preacher just kept preaching, so we carried the man out as quickly as we could.”  “What makes that so unusual,” he was asked.  He replied, “We carried out four other men before we found the one who had died.”  Welcome back Pastor.

            Today is Pentecost and we pray we have your attention just like the Apostle Peter had when the Spirit enabled him to preach on Pentecost.  No one fell asleep when He was speaking.  Today …

“THE HOLY SPIRIT IS POURED OUT ON JESUS AND US”

            As Peter preached he reminded the people of all the things that God, the heavenly Father, had put on Jesus, his Son.  Heaviest of all was the weight of the cross the Father placed on His Son’ shoulders.  While evil men played a part in the passion of Jesus, it was the divine plan of the Father to sacrifice His Son for the sins of the world, just like Isaiah had written in prophecy, “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” (Is. 53:6)

            The Father also put new life into Jesus when He raised Him from the grave.  Following this Jesus was called home to heaven where He was exalted to the highest degree. 

            The Spirit of the Lord was upon Jesus and He could pour it out upon all people.  Isaiah foretold it this way, “Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him and he will bring justice to the nations.” (Is. 42:1)

            Because the heavenly Father put all those things on Jesus, our Father now puts His blessings on us, His children by faith.  “And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh . . . even on my male servants and female servants, in those days I will pour out my Spirit.” (vs. 17a, 18a)

            We are God’s children and He blesses us by putting things on us.  Think of all the things you have put on your children.  I was privileged to put water and the Word through the Holy Spirit on the boys at their baptism.  I put on diapers and their first helmet.  I put on shaving cream for their first shaving experience and numerous times I got to tie their tie around my neck and put it on theirs.  I put on skates and bicycle helmets.  I was privileged and blessed to place a confirmation stole on them and then to put my hand on their head as they were confirmed.  I put on silly outfits to make them laugh and some times I put on the face of comfort and faith when they had worry or anxiety.

            The Lord has done the same for us.  When dead in original sin the waters and Word of the Triune God put us on a path of Christian faith.  The Lord put on the Word in our hearts as we attended Sunday School and worship.  We sang songs and hymns and heard bible stories and the Holy Spirit was pouring all of this onto us.  We needed the Spirit’s help to memorize the catechism and make our public confession of the faith.  And the Lord has provided us with comfort and peace when life doesn’t go the way we think it should or how we had it planned.  He puts on the robe of righteousness, which we will wear into eternity.  “And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

            Another experience many of us parents have had or will have is when we drop off our son or daughter at college or we leave their first apartment as they start in a new job in a different town.  We will no longer be there to put on everything they are going to need.  But we trust, don’t we?  We trust that the Lord is watching over them.  We trust that the Holy Spirit will keep them in the faith.  We trust that what the Lord allowed us to do will carry them the rest of their days.  We drive away confident that we have given them everything they need to make it on their own.

            Our heavenly Father has done the same.  Because of everything that His Son Jesus handled for us – the burden of our sin, His presence in turmoil, the joy of salvation that is on us – we are confident of our place in His family.  He put His Spirit in us to be with us . . . always.

                                                            Amen.        

May 13, 2021 – Ascension                                                               Text:  Acts 1:1-11

Dear Friends in Christ,

            “You don’t know about me without having read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer…That book was made by Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly.  There were things which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth…Aunt Polly – Tom’s Aunt Polly, she is – and Mary, and the Widow Douglas is all told about in that book, which is mostly a true book, with some stretchers, as I said before.”  Page 1 of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

            “In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day He was taken up to heaven.” (v. 1)  Our text this evening is the 2^nd book Luke wrote to a man named Theophilus.  The first book is the gospel of Luke.  In it, Luke described in detail the life of Jesus.  It only began to tell what Jesus did.  Like all good authors Luke left the door open for a sequel.

            Luke’s Book II is the Book of Acts.  Book I is what Jesus did for us.  Book II is how He continued to act through us.  Book I the story of the Gospel.  Book II what God’s people have done with the Gospel.

“THE STORY OF JESUS CONTINUES WITH US”

            To understand this Book I is an absolute prerequisite.  Luke wants us to see the two books as a unit.  If we didn’t have the basic facts of what Jesus did and taught in the Gospel of Luke then Book II would make no sense.  When Mark Twain wrote Huckleberry Finn, he assumed we knew Huck and Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher.  Without the Gospel, we wouldn’t know the characters in Acts – Jesus, Peter, and the rest.  More important, without the Gospel, there would be no Book II.  Jesus’ death means forgiveness.  Jesus resurrection assures eternal life.  Jesus’ teaching about the grace of God rules our hearts.  In Book II Luke assumes we know and believe this:  “After His suffering, He showed Himself to the apostles and gave many convincing proofs He was alive.  He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.” (v. 3) 

            Luke’s gospel is required reading in order to move to Book II.  Without Jesus’ teachings, there would be no Word to proclaim.  Without Jesus’ suffering and death, there’d be no reason to speak.  Without Jesus’ resurrection, there’d be no hope; no story to tell.

            The ascension ends Jesus’ earthly ministry, yet our text is not an ending.  Jesus’ resurrection continues in Book II.  For forty days He appeared frequently to the disciples and other men and women.  Easter wasn’t just one chapter in an ancient book.  Jesus is alive and this is the hope.  Why else would they share His Word? 

            “While He was eating with them, He gave them this command:  ‘Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift My Father promised, which you have heard me speak about.  For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’” (v. 4-5)  Pentecost.  The disciples would proclaim Jesus boldly in a whole United Nations of languages.  Where the Holy Spirit is at work, Jesus’ story continues.

            The same story continues with us.  The Holy Spirit has baptized us.  This is not an isolated event in our scrapbooks.  It is a continuous writing of our life story.  In the faith, forgiven, sharing the Good News of Christ.  We are the witnesses to Judea and Samaria and the ends of the earth.  The Book of Acts is a book of acts.

            Book II continues with us.  We are the characters in Book II.  We have our Jerusalems and Judeas and Samarias.  They are our children and the people we work with and golf with.  They are the millions in the state and billions in the world who need the saving message of Jesus. 

            Jesus ascended to God’s right hand.  This is no distant place.  It’s really no place at all.  He is still exercising God’s power on our behalf.  Not only His divine nature with us but his human nature as well.  True God and true man are right here with us.  The Lord is praying for us, guiding us, protecting us.  Jesus is continuing to write the story of our lives, our Book II’s.

            Book II will continue until the end of time.  The Greek forms Luke uses in v. 1 of our text might suggest a third book – a trilogy.  We don’t have this third book but it might complete the story of Jesus forever.  “They were looking intently into the sky as He was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them.  ‘Men of Galilee, why do you stand here looking into the sky?  This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen Him go into heaven.’” (vs. 10-11)  If there would  be a Book III, it would begin when this same Jesus returns as we have seen Him go.  Christ has ascended into heaven as our forerunner, with the promise to return and take us there.  That . . . Book III. . . will never end.

            But that’s another story.

                                                            Amen.