Behold: Jesus is Baptized - Matthew 3: 13-17

 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

“Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John to be baptized by him.”

Why? Why does Jesus need to be baptized? John didn’t understand it. His baptism was for repentance, for sinners. We baptize for the same reason. You read it from the Small Catechism: “It works forgiveness of sins, delivers from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this.” Lest anyone think Luther was merely playing in a water fountain, he cites the word of Christ: Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.” In the gift of Baptism, water and word are combined by the power of the Holy Spirit to kill the old Adam, the old Eve, the sinful nature that is within each of us, and bring a new, spirit-filled child of God, to life. Baptism drowns; Baptism births new life; Baptism buries; Baptism raises.

John baptized sinners who were reptant because the Holy Spirit was at work through John’s message, but there stood Jesus, wanting to be baptized. John was right: Jesus is the sinless Son of God, the Lamb of God who has come to take away the sins of the world, but He is asking to be baptized? John argues that he should be baptized by Jesus, not the other way around; John realizes he’s not worthy of untying Jesus shoes, yet Jesus comes to him to be baptized?

Jesus says it is necessary to fulfill all righteousness. Isn’t that an interesting phrase, “to fulfill all righteousness”? If you were to chase the word “righteousness” through the Scriptures, you would discover that righteousness is not something that is demanded or commanded by God of His people. It is in fact that exact opposite: righteousness is a declaration, something given by God to His people. In the Old Testament, and especially in the Psalms, righteousness is the saving deeds of God that HE does on behalf of His people. The Germans have a wonderful word for this – heilsgeschichte – that loosely means the story of salvation. Over and over the story of salvation is grounded in the righteousness and saving acts of God. These are so closely related that it’s as if Jesus is saying, “Do this, John, to fulfill my Father’s plan of salvation.”

Jesus must submit to John’s baptism, not for Himself, but to save the very people John has baptized, that the Church has baptized, that have been baptized in this font. In that Jordan river moment, you see a picture of how Christ will save His people from their sins: He stands among us, with us, and for us. He takes our place, and in receiving the sinner’s baptism from John, Luther says it’s as if all of the world’s sins that have been washed away from us are washed onto Him. For us, Baptism is “a washing of renewal and rebirth by the power of the Holy Spirit, but for Jesus, that in that moment, “God made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us.”

This baptismal picture is a foretaste of what is to come. Jesus doesn’t stop standing among us, with us and for us when he leaves the river. He continues in our place all the way to the cross. Ultimately, that is where all righteousness is completed and fulfilled, where and when the innocent Lamb of God is offered as the once-for all, one-for-all sacrifice in the place of many. That is why it is fitting for Jesus to come to the Jordan and be baptized to – literally and spiritually – stand in the place of many.

Still dripping from the baptismal washing, Jesus climbs out of the water. The first word is “Behold.” That’s the Gospel writers way of saying, “Look at this! Pay attention! This is important!”

“Behold, the heavens were opened to Him and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on Him.” We speak of once-in-a-lifetime event; usually those are milestone firsts – a first kiss, a first step, a first child’s birth. This isn’t as much a first, but an end-times event: the heavens are opened, the Spirit descends as a dove. It’s as if the Father is answering any questions even before they are answered: “Who is this guy, and what’s all the fuss from John about baptizing him?” Jesus, who is the perfect Servant of God, having now received the Spirit of God, will perform the work of bringing righteousness to the nations, ministering to the crushed reeds and smoldering wicks – the repentant, contrite and faithful - remaining in Israel.

A second call, “Behold,” this time alerting us to the Father’s voice: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” The voice of the Father identifies Jesus as His Son. I think this is a bit of a Divine play on words here. Not only is Jesus God’s Son by virtue of the Virgin Birth conceived in Mary by the power of the Spirit, but He is also the entire summation of all of God’s people reduced into one. In other words, Jesus, the Son, embodies all of God’s people. Christ, the sinless Son of God, stands in the place of God’s son, the Church, that needs saving. The One who has come to be baptized in the place of sinners does so as God’s sinless Son by right, so that He can save God’s sons and daughters that are lost in sin. Jesus is truly the Son of God who fulfills all righteousness for His Father’s people.

Matthew used the word, behold, two times. Behold means to look at something, to see something, and to do so with great attention for detail. So, let’s do that very thing: let us behold what this means for us. Close your eyes for a moment: Behold! See Jesus, standing in the river with water cascading down his face. Behold! Look closely – look at features, face, hands, body. Zoom out just a bit. Behold! Do you see the Spirit descending, the dove alighting? Behold! See the heavens parting? Now, zoom back in at the face. Do you see Jesus? Now, I want you to let His face morph and change so that you see your own face. See your own face standing in the Jordan. Behold! Christ stands there for you! Behold! Christ stands in your place! Behold! Christ takes your sins onto and into Himself and, in your baptism, His holiness and righteousness is washed onto you. Behold! You are made holy. The transformation is so complete that – Behold! – as you look upwards, even with water dripping in your eyes, the heavens are opened for you. Behold, the Spirit of God comes upon you and delivers all of the blessings of God upon you, the baptized, creating, strengthening and enabling faith to believe these gifts of God. Behold! The Father speaks, this time to you, “You are my beloved, my Son, my Daughter, and with you I am well pleased.” Hold that picture, for just a moment.

Behold…  Now, open your eyes.

There is one unfortunate thing about your baptism: the water has long left your head. There is no tangible evidence that remains. For most of us, who were baptized as children, there isn’t even a memory. Yet, Baptism remains. It never needs to be re-done, renewed, or remodeled. The cleansing, saving water of Holy Baptism never evaporates. The sign of the cross, made on your forehead and over your heart, stands as a sign of Christ’s eternal victory. The water, once poured over your head, continues to give life. The Triune name of God, spoken over you, does not fade into history. Any time, every time, you doubt; any time, every time, you are repentant; any time, every time you feel the devil’s hot breath and hear his lying words; any time, every time you wonder, “Is Christ for me?” return to God’s promise in your Baptism. With the sign of the cross, with the words of absolution, with bread and wine, with the Word preached and read, Christ returns you to your Baptism.

Behold: the word of your heavenly Father: You are His beloved. With you, He is well pleased.

God Blesses with a Good Word - Numbers 6: 22-27

 

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text is the Old Testament Lesson from Numbers 6.

True story…and, for the record, it wasn’t my wife or kids. 

A mom came to church with her two young kids, probably 2 & 4 or 5 & 3, something like that. They had done pretty well throughout the service, but I saw that the kids were about done and so was mom. After the prayers was the offering and, soon after that would be the conclusion of the service. While the offering was being taken, I saw that the mom was gathering her things and the kids toys, ready to head out the door as soon as possible. Then, just loud enough that I could hear, one of the kids shushed mom and told her to stop because church wasn’t done yet. The mom, slightly chagrined, stopped to wait for the service to finish. As the pastor turned and began to speak the benediction, “The Lord bless you and keep you,” one of the kids loudly announced, “Now we can go, Mom; the Pastor said depart down the aisle, first that side goes and then our side.”

For many, the words of the benediction aren’t much more than the signal that the service is mere moments from being done freeing worshippers for another week. Depart down the center aisle, this side first and then the other, indeed.

A benediction is much more than final instructions on how to leave a worship service. Benediction is a compound Latin word meaning “good word,” or to be a little less literal, a word of blessing.  That begs the question: what is a blessing? Of course, it’s used in church, but we hear it elsewhere, too. Ask someone how they are doing and you hear back, “I am so blessed.” You wonder what they mean, since you know they don’t go to church, but you’re a bit embarrassed to ask. It seems to be connected with wealth, wealth and happiness – people are blessed to get a new car or a nice home, or a good medical report, or when everything is going swimmingly. On the other side of the coin, you hear me say it in hospital rooms, “May I offer a prayer and a blessing?” Is a blessing just a fancy, pastoral way of saying “Adios”?

Benedictions and blessings deliver exactly what they proclaim. Specifically, in the Biblical context, through these “good words,” God gives good gifts to His people and empowers His people to act on His behalf with others. God’s blessings frequently invoke His name as He places it on His people. In the case of this benediction from Numbers 6, this deliver God’s name in triplicate. Where God’s name is, He is. Because there are several different blessings and benedictions in the Bible, this one from Numbers 6 is usually referred to as the Aaronic Benediction because, in context, God gave this benediction to Moses to deliver to Aaron and his family. As priests, they were to speak this benediction over the people of Israel. “So shall they put my name upon the people of Israel and I will bless them.”

It's also worth mentioning what a blessing is not. A blessing isn’t God accepting or condoning something. For example, God cannot bless an abortion clinic nor will He bless medical professionals doing such things; but He can and will bless those who gently, lovingly stand outside the clinic, pray for the women and unborn children entering, speak truthfully and lovingly to them, and seek to softly redirect them from committing murder.

So, what are these words God gave to Aaron? And, if they were to be spoken over the Children of Israel, why is it that the Church still speaks them today?

“The Lord bless you and keep you…” The benediction begins with the declaration of what this is – a blessing. This is almost an invocation with His greeting His people. It’s God’s promise. The verb, bless, is unique in its grammar; it means not only is the Lord blessing presently, but He will continue to do it every time this blessing is spoken. That’s how God’s Word works. When He says it, it happens. It’s not “May the Lord bless you,” as we might say in a prayer, nor is it “the Lord will bless you,” as Jesus says in the Beatitudes, “Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted.” It’s declarative: The Lord bless you. It is spoken and it happens in the immediate with an ongoing, continual gift. That sounds like it's just an academic exercise, but there is some wonderful theology going on here in this verb tense. It happens with God’s Word and we don’t even realize it. For example, in the absolution you received this morning, when God’s Word is spoken by the pastor, forgiving sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, you are forgiven immediately. Or, when the pastor speaks over a newly-wed couple, “I now pronounce you husband and wife,” that declaration makes it so. So, as the Benediction is said by Aaron and the priests of the Old Testament, or a Christian pastor in the New Testament era, “The Lord bless you,” the Lord continues to bless those who receive it in faith.

The blessing itself is most extraordinary. The Benediction is three lines, with two parts in each line. The first item in each pair deals with God’s engagement with His people. First He greets them, then He looks upon them with approval, and finally pays close attention to them. The second item in each pair covers the result of those engagements: keeping safe from evil, access to His grace, and the gift of peace and restoration.  Not merely a one-time gift, the gift is repeated by God each time His representatives speak it. And, each gift is connected with His Name. In our English Bibles, this simply says, The Lord, and the name Lord is printed in a unique way: with a large, capitol L and slightly smaller, subscript capitol ORD. Anytime you see this in an English Bible, this is the editor’s way of telling you this is the Divine name of God, Yahweh. This isn’t just some God, this isn’t any Cannanite God, this is Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob speaking, the God who called Israel into existence as His people and gave Himself to be their God, the God who spoke to Moses from the bush and lead the people from Egypt toward the Promised Land, and He is placing His name, with the gifts the Name delivers, upon His people.

I have to wonder, though, what Moses thought as he delivered these words to Aaron, especially the Lord making His face shine and His countenance lift up on the people. This reading is from Numbers. Back up to Exodus for a moment. When Moses went up Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments, his one plea was to see the face of God, but God said that no one – not even Moses – could see the face of God and live. Sinful man cannot survive the sinless holiness of God. What God allowed was that He would pass by and Moses would be able to see God’s back – not God’s countenance, not His face; that would remain hidden. All Moses could see was God’s back. God’s countenance must be hidden from the eyes of man, lest sinful man be destroyed. So, did Moses wonder about this word of God? Did he wonder how on earth and when God’s people would ever see God’s countenance and live?

Today is known as the Circumcision and Naming of Jesus. On the 8^th day of His young life, Mary and Joseph took Jesus to the temple where He was circumcised and given His name. Circumcision was the mark of flesh that separated the people of Israel, identifying them as people of God. It was a physical mark that they had the name of Yahweh, the Lord God, placed on them. They were also given their name. Usually the name was a family name. In Hebrew, boys often named in conjunction with their father. Simon Peter, for example, is named Simon Bar Jonah, literally, Simon son of Jonah. But Jesus’ name was different. He would not be Something, son of Joseph. He was given the name of Jesus by the angel. Names mean things: Jesus means Savior.

If you want to see the countenance of God, the face of God, and live, then look no further than that 8 day old Baby whom Joseph and Mary obediently named Jesus. There, in flesh, was God dwelling with His people, becoming a human to live among and like us; remaining God so He could be sinless and perfectly resist the temptations we face. Later, one of Jesus’ disciples would ask of Him, “Show us the Father” – we want to see God! Jesus would reply, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.” And, what the disciples saw, what the world saw, what you see is the love and mercy of God. Through His ministry, Jesus will continually show the Father’s countenance of grace as He restores sight, as He heals the lame, as He strengthens the weak. He shows the Father’s face as He looks into the eyes of sinners and calls people to repentance, as He proclaims forgiveness, and as He brings life to the dying and the dead. He reveals the Father’s countenance as His own baptism, where the Father’s voice thunders, “This is my beloved Son whom I love; listen to Him.” But the one place where you do not see the Father’s countenance through the Son is at the cross. There, having become sin for us, Jesus was so repugnant, so repulsive that the Father turned His back on His own Son who pleaded, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” The Father turned His back against the sin of humanity. That’s the opposite of a benediction, a blessing, a good word: a curse. The greatest, or the worst, curse of all is the curse of death and that is what Jesus received: death.

Through Jesus’ substitutionary and saving death, the world would again know the Father’s countenance through Jesus. On Easter morning, Jesus made His face seen again, speaking words of grace, peace, and mercy – first to Mary, then to the disciples journeying to Emmaus, then those in the upper room. Again and again, the resurrected face of Jesus showed the Father’s love for His own.

And, so there is no doubt of God’s countenance shining brilliantly and lovingly over you, just as God gave His name to Israel, He gives it to you as well – a name you know more fully and wonderfully than Israel ever did. To Israel, God was Yahweh, hidden in fire and cloud and behind veils. You know God as the Father, revealed in the Son, whom you know through the Holy Spirit. A mysterious Trinity, in that we will never fully understand this side of heaven, yet wonderful in Divine fulness. That Trinitarian name, foreshadowed over Yahweh’s three-part benediction to Israel, is delivered to you when you were baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. As God’s people, we gather in His name and by His command. It’s repeated as we begin worship, when we hear sins forgiven, and when we hear the blessings of His Word read and preached to us. Over and over, in the Lord’s House, the name of God is spoken over us and we receive His blessings through His name.

But why, if we are New Testament people, who know God through Jesus’ live, death and resurrection, why do we leave under an Old Testament benediction?

In English, we call the 4^th book of the Bible, the 4^th part of the Torah, the book of Numbers. In Hebrew, the name of the book is actually Ba Midbar, “In the Wilderness.” It’s taken from the first sentence of the book, “Then the Word of the Lord came to Moses in the wilderness…” It’s in the wilderness that the Lord spoke the Benediction; it was in the wilderness that the people received God’s blessings. The wilderness was a difficult place then, and it is a difficult place today. To use wilderness as a metaphor, God’s baptized people, the church, continues to journey through the wilderness of this world, constantly under attack by the devil, the world, and yes, even our own sinful flesh. We should expect no less. When Jesus was baptized, literally with water still dripping off of Him, the Spirit lead Him into the wilderness to be tempted. We follow in His footsteps from the font to the wilderness. In the wilderness, we need the blessing, the Good Word, the benediction of God. So, God delivers His blessing to us. The Church is the New Israel. We receive the same blessing as did Israel of old, from the God whom we know more intimately and fully through Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit. And the blessing still does that which God said it would do.

It does mean that it is time to go, but not merely go home. We go as His people with His name is placed on us. He sends us from this place out into the wilderness, armed and protected, sealed, covered, and baptized in His name. He pledges to bless us and keep us in His love. He promises to place His Divine pleasure upon us, to look upon us favorably with grace and forgiveness. He promises to look upon us with peace. Amen.

Beautiful Christmas Feet! - Isaiah 52: 7-10

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

The text is the Old Testament Lesson, Isaiah 52, especially these words, “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”

There is great beauty and wonder in a newborn’s feet and hands. I wonder if Mary and Joseph sat there, in the stable, counting Baby Jesus’ fingers and toes. I have an honest curiosity that is probably greater than most, you might say. Even after the sonogram technician assured us with each of the three kids that each had ten fingers and ten toes, no more and no less, I still counted for myself. I remember sitting there holding the children, having just witnessed the wonderous birth event – technically, perhaps, not a miracle in that the laws of physics and nature were not changed, but nevertheless often considered as if it were a miracle in that it was the gift of life brought into the world – sitting there, holding this wonderous baby but being most particularly fascinated at their teeny tiny feet. It was as if the wonder were reduced down to just two feet, ten toes. Do you know that a normal foot has 26 separate bones with 33 separate joints and 19 muscles that work together to make that magnificent appendage work? I rubbed the arch and the foot curled slightly, the toes wiggling in their new-found freedom, already seeking for space to move, to crawl, to walk. Beautiful feet, indeed.

It doesn’t take long for feet to become something less than attractive. Perhaps that’s why our feet spend most of their lives covered up. A whole industry exists to try to beautify those wonderful instruments of peripatetic propulsion – peripatetic is your word of the day; it means walking. What is it that makes feet beautiful? We buy pumice stones and sanding blocks to sand down calloused heels. We use emory boards to smooth sharp toe nails and coat them with enamels and laquers to make them match our clothes. We surgically straighten bunions and correct hammer toes and get rid of bone spurs. We eliminate athlete’s foot. We topically coat with lotions and potions all with the notion that we, too, can have feet just as beautiful as those of models that we see on television.

But, the fact is that there are feet that no amount of work will make beautiful again. Have you ever seen photos of a veteran ballerina? Their feet are wrecked from the decades of being tightly wrapped into their toe shoes and dancing, pirouetting, and leaping with their toes. Ranch hands and farmers rarely have pretty feet after being tenderized by livestock and machinery. If you want to see ugly feet, look at a soldier’s feet, especially if they have been in the Infantry. And there are the feet that exist in the fallen world: feet traumatized by disease, broken by accidents, shattered by man’s inhumanity to man, and even those that are malformed and deformed because of genetic failures from birth.

Do this: move your feet just a bit. Roll the ankles a wee bit. Tense and relax the foot muscles. Wiggle the toes. If that’s too much, just give them a little bit of a lift, maybe a soft tap on the floor. How do they feel? Were they achey this morning from the cold of the past 2 days? Maybe you ate a little too well and the gout is acting up, or arthritis had you reach for the Tylenol this morning. Maybe you stood for too long last night and your feet still burn. Did you stub your toe last trying to help the grandkids with their presents? Or, worse, on the way to the bathroom at 3am, did you step on the dreaded Legos hiding in the carpet?

In your feet, there is a microcosm of the entire fallenness of the world. The aches and pains, the hurts and the struggles your feet experience, they are in miniature of what the world knows since the fall. The cracked heels, the ingrown nails, the fungus, the flat arches, the neuropathy – these are reminders that we live in a fallen world, reminders that are very real and very painful.

Jesus came into that very world to redeem you, all of you, whole and wholly – body, soul, eyes, ears, mind, heart, head, shoulders, knees and toes. And feet. 

Close your eyes for just a second. I want you to imagine for a moment the Nativity: Mary and Joseph holding their newborn Son. See the joy in Mary’s gaze and the wonder in Joseph, how the Son of God was born? Do you see their loving caress? Now, zoom in a little bit. Look more closely at the Swaddled Baby squirming and wiggling just a bit and…oops – there it is. Freeze frame. Look closely. Did you see His foot pop out? There is His foot. Zoom in a little more in your mind. Look closely and there it is…a shadow on His foot. Can it be? Why, that shadow looks like the shape of a cross. 

Open your eyes. I don’t know that is true – in fact, it is highly doubtful. What I want you to see, though, is that those newborn feet will begin a journey from that manger down the same path that you and I know and down which you and I journey. Jesus’ feet will take Him places where He will experience our sorrows and losses. He will be lead out into the wilderness where He will be tempted to leap from the top of a mountain. He will walk into a temple where He will experience anger at what God’s people did to the Father’s house. He will stop a funeral procession and speak with a grieving mother. He will enter the home of a Gentile soldier whose son is critically ill. He will attend a wedding and turn water into wine and He will stand on a hillside and feed 5000 with a boy’s lunch. He will stand outside Lazarus’ tomb and weep. And then those beautiful feet will make the slow climb up the road to Jerusalem, down the path where palm branches and cloaks were strewn, to an upper room where He ate with the disciples, declaring His Body and Blood in, with and under bread and wine. His feet will lead Him and the 11 out to the Garden of Gethsemane where soldiers will, first, fall at His feet, only to rise up and arrest Him. He will stand in the court of Herod and Pilate, and then be led out to be crucified. Nails would pierce those beautiful feet, pinning Him to the cross where He would die. Those feet would be wrapped up and lovingly buried. And, on the third day, those feet would rise from the grave, and Jesus would stand, risen and alive, next to Mary; they would journey to Emmaus with three disciples, He would stand suddenly behind locked doors with the Disciples, and He would declare peace.

I said Jesus follows the footsteps of humanity. As His disciples, we also follow after His footsteps. We follow His footsteps under the cross, this side of heaven. This side of heaven, there are aches and pains, sorrows and sadness. There are also moments of joy and happiness, filled with peace and Hope.

I want you to know that no matter how embarrassed you are of your feet, your feet are beautiful because of Jesus. That’s how God sees them: beautifully forgiven in Jesus. That sounds weird to think of feet as being forgiven, doesn’t it? But it’s true. With the bunions and hammer toes and athlete’s foot and cracked heels and missing toes and dwarfed feet – God sees your feet as beautiful in Christ.

There will be a day when your feet will be truly, wonderfully beautiful and all of the aches and pains of your feet – and all the aches and hurts of this world – will be gone. In the resurrection of all flesh, your feet will be completely recreated in the perfection God intended them to be. And for those of us whose feet are less than perfect now, that are missing pieces, that have been I think they will be whole. I admit this is a goofy picture, but I imagine myself in the resurrection, sitting in the grass, just staring at my feet and toes, wiggling them like crazy, and feeling that wonderful tingling burn up into my calves. Then, in my imagination, I see a pair of nail-marked feet walk up next to me. The things is, they look the same – minus the marks, of course - His feet are mine; my feet are His.  Will it happen that way? I don’t know. But I’m looking forward to the day of finding out.

In a few minutes, your feet will pick you up and leave this place. You’ll go to your homes and, in the days ahead, you’ll get back to your normal routine. But, you leave this place with beautiful Christmas feet. Use your beautiful feet to share this Christmas message with those whom you encounter today, and tomorrow, and Thursday. Christmas doesn’t stop on the 25^th, remember? The Christmas season continues until January 6, Epiphany. Tell them about the feet of the One who died. Tell them about the One who redeems their feet. Tell them about the promise of resurrection feet. Tell them they have beautiful feet because of the Good News of Jesus.

"And Mary Laid Him in a Manger..." - Luke 2: 7

In the name of Jesus, our newborn King. Amen.

“So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.”

“Away in a manger, no crib for a bed, the little, Lord Jesus laid down His sweet head…” We sing it so romantically, that it’s easy to overlook what the words say: Mary laid her firstborn son, God’s Son, in an animal’s feed trough. That’s what a manger is: a vessel for feeding livestock.  I wonder: was it wood, assembled with hand-cut nails and wood pegs, or was it cut stone? Did Joseph have to wipe out calf slobber or move a couple of chicken eggs before placing Jesus in it? Were the edges worn smooth by the necks of goats and sheep and donkeys? Was it cold limestone or was it warm cedar? Did he find some straw for cushioning and warmth? Did it look like this, or was it merely a box? Was there a pang of shame when they looked at that feed trough, wishing there was some place better, something more worthy, where they could place their son and their Lord? Regardless, it’s all that Mary and Joseph had: “She laid Him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn.”

The contrast is stunning: Jesus who, as God, was present when all things were created, speaking all things into existence, through whom all things were made and without whom nothing could have been made, Jesus becomes a human boy. When the Temple was dedicated, Solomon proclaimed that God cannot be contained by heaven or earth or house, but there He was in a stable, contained in flesh, wrapped in swaddling cloth, and placed in a manger. Truly, a Divine miracle; truly an act of Divine mercy: God sent His Son into the world, through human birth, to live as us to be our Savior. Jesus set aside His full divine nature to take on human flesh to dwell among us. Promised by the angel Gabriel nine months earlier, Mary gives birth to God’s Son. He, who is God over everything, is so humbled as to be reduced to sleeping among the animals of creation. The Virgin-born Child is the Messiah, the One Isaiah proclaimed centuries earlier to be Immanuel, God with Us. But that night, though heralded by angels, the world largely ignored Him who slept in an animal’s feed bunk. All, that is, except shepherds, to whom the angels sang, who were told to seek Him out. What they found was that a manger was the bassinette for Baby Jesus, the Son of God swaddled in a piece of cloth.

Tonight, through the Scriptures, you have taken a journey; brief in our evening’s time, yet spanning millennia. It began in a Garden with two people who destroyed a perfect creation and a perfect relationship with the Creator. Iin His love, God pledged to them a Savior. He spoke of a Seed who would crush the Serpent’s head after he first bruised the Seed’s heel. Rather unclear, yet it was a promise and Adam and Eve trusted God’s Word. The promise was extended to Abraham for a son. Then there was foreshadowing of God’s own sacrifice in Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his only son, Isaac, trusting the Lord would somehow keep His promise of a descendant. Isaiah’s description of the Child’s name would move people to tears, first, to those returning to Jerusalem; later through Handel’s musical interpretation of those same words. And little Bethlehem, out in the backwoods hill country of Judah, would be forever honored as the birthplace of Child who would stand and feed God’s people with His strength.

From the first Gospel promise to Adam and Eve that a Seed would crush the Serpent’s head who would, first, bruise the heel of the Promised One; through Abraham’s trusting the promise of God for an heir and descendants even as God demanded that very son back; through Isaiah who promised the Child would be God With Us; even through Micah declaring that the little town of Bethlehem would be the birthplace of an even greater ruler in Israel than David, God’s promises, His Word, endured, repeated from generation to generation.

That’s where the journey concludes: at the manger, where the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth. In the fullness of time, God sent forth His Son, born of the woman, born under the Law to redeem those under the Law. The manger held God’s plan of salvation: When Mary gently, lovingly, tenderly laid her Son, God’s Son, in the manger, the manger contained that which otherwise could not be contained: Jesus, God in flesh, born of Mary, born to be the Savior, Christ the Lord.

Well, I said the journey concludes at the manger, but that’s not quire right, is it? The journey is only beginning for Jesus. He had to be born so He could be human, so that in His life and ministry, He will be familiar with our joys and sorrows, our struggles and our temptations. He will stand in the place of Adam and Eve and each of us who have ever surrendered to the devil, the world, and our sinful flesh. He will be laughed at, scorned and rejected by those whom He came to save. In fact, if you look closely in the manger, you see the shadow of the cross looming large on the horizon. 

He will be murdered by those who, of all people, should have welcomed Him as Messiah instead of a personal, political threat. He will die, the innocent for the guilty. Immanuel, God with us, will die alone, even forsaken by His own Father. And then there will be another Joseph, this time from Arimathea, who will take Jesus, wrap Him in swaddling clothes, and lay Him, gently, lovingly and tenderly not in a manger, but in a tomb because there was no room for Him among the living.  As the manger could not hold Him, neither could cross and grave. After a three-day’s rest in the tomb, Jesus arose, victorious over sin, satan, and death. The echoes of His Good Friday cry, “It is finished,” continue to echo through the centuries as He completed the purpose for which He came: to be Jesus, to save His people from their sins.

Tonight, for many, perhaps even most of you, we gather at the foot of the manger, in awe and wonder, in praise and thanksgiving, and receive Him whom angels sing and anthems ring. But for others, perhaps even some of you, that doesn’t fit your place in life, right now. The weight of the world is on your shoulders and your heart is filled with anything but peace, joy, and wonder. The death of a loved one, an unexpected, broken relationship, illness slowly consuming the life of a family member, unemployment and bankruptcy, family who can’t – or who refuses – to come home for Christmas, the guilt and shame of what you said or didn’t say, what you did or didn’t do – all marks of this fallen world we live in, all used by satan to try to separate us from the reason Jesus came.

Jesus didn’t come for a tree laden with lights and presents packed to the ceiling. He didn’t come to hear three generations singing carols in perfect harmony while gnoshing on cocoa and cookies. It wasn’t for Charlie Brown and Linus, or Jimmie Stewart, or Charles Dickens. Jesus came for you, with all of your sins, with all of your ugliness that a sweater can’t cover up, with all of your hard words that Christmas cards can’t sweeten or erase, with your heart harder than peanut brittle and thoughts more crooked than a twisted candy cane, for tears that run unwanted down your face, for the stress that overflowed and blew up, for all of your ugliness, Mary gave birth to a Son, God’s Son. He was born for you; He lived for you; He died for you; He rose for you, to redeem you and make you His own.

The Little Drummer Boy played his best for Jesus, the song sings. Pa rum pum pum pum…  Don’t worry about your best tonight. Instead, repent of your worst this evening and leave all of your guilt, your shame, your worry, your failures, your sins in the manger. Parents – this is especially for you, whom the world says that if you don’t have that perfect tree, and perfect presents, and perfect Norman Rockwell family you’re somehow a Christmas failure. We get so wrapped up in the fable of a perfect Christmas that it’s easy to forget Jesus came for imperfect people. So, dump them all here, each and every guilt and shame ridden thought, word and deed and leave them here in the manger. That’s all Jesus wants from you this Christmas. That’s what He came for – to save from your sins. So, give them to Him and receive forgiveness, life and salvation in their place.

Remember, the manger is empty. So is the cross. So is the grave.

But your Savior, Jesus, whom Mary once laid in that hallowed manger, He is very much here. He is here for you. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth. 

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

When Merry Christmas and Bah Humbug Collide - Reflection

We enjoy watching re-runs of MASH, so much so that we're watching them again, to borrow from Kellogg's corn flakes, watching them again for the first time. It's not the first time, of course - I know scenes, even lines by heart. That's handy, at times, because the writing was fantastic. They had real doctors as advisors so the medicine part was accurate, relatively speaking. But I have always suspected they had a clergyman hiding somewhere in the writing room because Father Mulcahey was written very well as a man of the cloth, with depth and value, always ready to slip in with some "cross-action” as Trapper would say, offering prayers and blessings in the goriest and most intense of moments. 

There is an episode that comes to mind this time of year. I don't remember the title, or even the season. If you're also a fan, you'll recall the episode. It's Christmas, the 4077 is putting on a little Christmas party for Ouijambou families, and a soldier is brought in, mortally wounded, shot to hell. While Hawkeye, BJ, and Margaret look at his inside-out chest cavity, one finds a photo of the unnamed soldier and his young family back home. Determined not to let that family have Christmas be the day remembered as the day the soldier died, the trio set about to keep the man alive, fighting the clock, blood loss, and Death. 

Hawkeye, in another episode, personified death as his personal enemy, yelling over a dying patient, "No, you sonofabitch, you can't have him yet," trying to hold death at bay. In that episode it worked. In this episode, BJ, with a young daughter of his own at home, takes this one personally, going to extraordinary, heroic measures to temporarily save the unknown husband and father - just for a few more hours. 

But, finally, Death wins the duel. People say they want to stop time; they needed it to speed up. It didn't, and the soldier died, shortly before midnight on Christmas. It would forever be the family's curse. So Hawkeye, grim, opens the clock face and moves the hands ahead 45 minutes or so. "We'll, whaddayaknow," he says with a fatigued voice. "He made it." Margaret, wiping blood off her hands, comments on falsifying a death certificate - something she never would have done in the civilized world. I forget if it was Hawkeye or BJ who then said something about there is nothing in the war that is normal, but at least the family of the soldier can have Christmas. 

Chances are, you know someone like that soldier's family, who lost a loved one at or around Christmas. While all around, Andy Williams croons how wonderful this time of the year is, for those folks, it is heavy with memories, sadness and loss. There may be Joy to the World, but for those families, it's the silent night - not the holy night, mind you, but the absence of a loved one's laughter, singing, and presence - that hurts. Elvis sang about having a blue, blue Christmas without you. He gets close, but there's too much bounce, too much lilt in the song - especially with the doo-wop singers in the background. 

May I offer a word of encouragement to you, dear reader. If you know someone who is having a blue Christmas, who mourns the death of a loved one, whose mother or father, husband or wife, son or daughter, will never again - this side of heaven - laugh with the kids opening presents, or offer to help make Christmas cookies, or carve the ham, or hang the star, or do whatever else he or she did as part of the family story, then may I encourage you to pick up a phone - or better yet, stop by - and spend some time with them. 

People say, "I don't want to make them sad." You won't. They're already sad. That's why they need you. They need you to be present and, for a moment, help speed up time as they wrestle with death's curse. That is what it is, you know - sin's curse against man. It is the last enemy to be defeated. While God uses it as a means to take us from the suffering in this world, it is still not what His original plan was to be: life, joy, and peaceful union between God and man. 

People say, "I don't know what to say." Start with this: "I've been thinking of you and imagine this is a difficult time. Could I spend some time with you?" Then, listen and visit. Don't dominate the conversation with idle sound-and-space-filling chatter. Silence is ok. They may need to warm up a bit to the idea. I had a lady tell me once, after a family member suddenly died, "I have nothing to say." I told her that was fine, and I just sat and sipped my tea. After a few minutes, she started talking and she didn't stop for an hour. Finally, realizing it was dark outside and we had spent that much time, she chuckled, "I guess I did have something to say." 

Then, open a Bible to Luke 2 and read verses 1-21, the Christmas narrative. Or, better yet, let them read it. Remind them of the reason Jesus came - His name means "Savior," after all - and His birth into humanity was to rescue it. Remind them of the Resurrection, that sin, death and the devil met their match in the Bethlehem Boy and His victory is eternal. Remind them that even Mary knew sadness and loss - Jesus was her son, and she watched Him die. But, while sadless and sorrow remain in this world, they are not forever. There is hope, promise, and - yes - joy even through tears because of Jesus. 

I'll be visiting with a family tonight whose dad died last week. They purposely planned the funeral before Christmas for that reason. That in their loss, there will still be the joy of Christ's birth to look forward to, and that, then, is a reminder of an even greater new birth they will receive when He returns. 

That scene in the MASH hospital ends with Col. Potter entering, holding the last pieces of the homemade fudge that BJ's wife, Peg, sent for Christmas. The three, joined by Mulcahey who had pronounced last rights, found a small taste of joy in their shared experience and love for each other. With the soldier's blood still on their clothes, they toasted each other with the fudge and a bit of a smile: "Merry Christmas." 

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, that you may overflow in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." Romans 15:13

Merry Christmas. 

Christmas Is Almost Here, So Sit & Listen - Matthew 1: 18-25

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

I think most of us feel it, to a greater or lesser degree, that feeling that Christmas, with all of its expectations, responsibilities, get-togethers, family tension, and drama is almost here. For me, and I admit this may be more of a pastor’s thing, there’s a certain sadness and melancholy at how Christmas has been so secularized and commercialized that it has lost its core message. I’ve said on more than one occasion, I love the Nativity of Jesus, but I have grown to dislike much of the celebration of Christmas. Don’t get me wrong – I enjoy the exchanging of gifts and watching the surprise on the faces of family and friends when I give them this year’s bag of assorted sawdust and scraps from the shop. But the simple message of Jesus’ birth can very easily be overwhelmed by everything else going on so that we forget the Gift is Jesus.

 So, if you are almost to the end of your proverbial Advent rope and you are ready for Christmas, just to be done with all of the hectic goings on that surround it, then today is for you. For the next twelve minutes or so, I want you to put the part of your brain in neutral that is trying to keep track of everything that has to be done this week. Mentally set aside the shopping lists, the calendars, the events, and simply listen. So, let’s do this: everyone take a deep breath, shrug your shoulders just a bit, roll your head and neck, take another deep breath and allow the Spirit to work in an uncluttered mind and space. “Accomplish Your purposes among us, O God. Tune our hearts to the voice of Your Spirit. Amen.” [1]

There are many wonderous things that happen throughout the Scriptures when it comes to the fulfillment of God’s plan of salvation, so many that it is almost impossible to name them all. Some are obvious, some are subtle; some have only an immediate importance, others are further magnified through the generations; some are easily understood, some can only be grasped by faith.  I submit that one of the greatest wonders of all is in this sentence:

“Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.” 

We cannot go to God, so God comes to us in the most extraordinary, yet also the most ordinary way. Extraordinary, that Jesus, the Son of God, becomes flesh for us. Extraordinary that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. Extraordinarily, spiritually possible; ordinarily physically impossible. Ordinary, that His was an otherwise normal, human birth similar to what takes place daily in hospitals and homes all across the world. Even the scandal of Joseph’s initial plan to divorce Mary after finding out she was pregnant with a child that wasn’t his, even this is ordinary, sadly. But, again, the extraordinary happens – an angel, a messenger, sent from God to Joseph explaining to him what was happening. An extraordinary proclamation to a man of extraordinary faith: he would be, in modern terms, a stepfather to God’s Son whom he would name Jesus.  All of this was to fulfill an extraordinary prophesy spoken by Isaiah that the Virgin shall conceive and bear a son, calling His name Immanuel.

Now when Isaiah said these words to King Ahaz while he was inspecting the aqueduct in Jerusalem, he probably didn’t have a pregnant virgin in mind.  Isaiah was giving a sign to the nervous king not to worry about his two enemies, the king of Syria and the king of Israel, because in nine short months, the time it takes for a young woman to conceive and bear a child, Ahaz would know “Immanuel” - God is with us.  But Isaiah said it in such a way that it left room for something more.

And Matthew, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, looking back 750 years after Isaiah, saw something more.  A virgin actually did conceive and bear a Son who is “God with us” in a way that God had never been “with us” before.  The child of a pregnant virgin, conceived by the Spirit of God is Y’shua - Yahweh in the flesh come to save His people.  And He saves us by being Immanuel - God with us in our life and in our death.  He is our Savior from cradle to grave, literally from womb to tomb. He is the Christ, the Messiah, the Annointed One, who is our Savior.

Jesus entered our history the same way we do, conceived in a mother, nine months in the womb, and then born.  And so He embraces in his own humanity all of humanity.  Jesus is the entire human race in one Spirit-conceived, Virgin-born man who is God.  He is the second Adam, the new head of humanity, who came to save not only the sons of Abraham but all the sons and daughters of Adam, the entire human race.  Yet, He embodies our humanity all the way through, from conception to death with nothing left out.  You might say that when Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, the whole human race was re-conceived in Him, restored to what God intended when He first made Adam and Eve in His image.

Here in the human flesh of Jesus is sinless humanity, without the inherited disease of Adam’s death.  Here is our humanity in its full dignity intact, the image and likeness of God restored to us.  Jesus is God with us, God in our flesh dwelling among us, who takes up our sin into His own sinlessness, who takes up our death into His death so that we might live in Him and be perfected in Him.

There is one other sentence that grabs my attention, the last one we read. “And Joseph called His name Jesus.” With all of the extraordinariness swirling ‘round him, Joseph believed the Word.  He trusted what the angel said.  He got up from his nap, forgot about the divorce plans, and took his pregnant virgin fiancé into his home to be his wife.  And he did it with nothing more than the Word of God through an angel in a dream.

I think about Joseph every year about this time just before Christmas.

As a father, I think about this quiet, godly man.  We don’t hear a single word from Joseph recorded in the Scriptures.  His actions speak louder than his words.  I think about how those nine months of Mary’s pregnancy must have been, and how Joseph must have stared at his wife’s belly every night, how he reached out his hand to feel the kick of little feet and wondered in silence, “Can it really be true?  Can a virgin conceive and bear a Son?”  How many nights did he spend awake wrestling, wondering, doubting?  And yet he did what the angel told him to do.

As a pastor, I think about Joseph when I stick my hand in baptismal water, and pour it on a baby’s head.  I think about Joseph, when I stand at the altar holding out bread that barely looks like bread, and wine that makes a sommelier sneer, and hear the words, “This is my body,” “this is my blood.”  I think about Joseph, every time I speak the words of absolution, knowing full well you’re going to do the same stuff all over again, and you’re not nearly as sorry as the liturgy makes you say that you are, and you’re only telling half the truth about your sin anyway.

As a human, I think about Joseph every time I look at my own life with all my shortcomings and failings, my doubts, my sins, wondering, “How can I be justified?”

And then I remember Joseph, quietly taking God at His Word without so much as a shred of visible evidence, and doing what he was given to do all because God said it was so.  And I realize that this isn’t about what I see or feel or even think.  It’s about trust in God’s Word, that with God nothing is impossible, that by the Word a virgin girl conceives a son.  Baptismal water really is birth and life.  Bread and wine really are the body and blood of Jesus.  Sinners are forgiven, and the dead rise to life in Jesus - all because God says so.

And the greatest truth about us turns out not to be about us at all. It’s about that Jewish kid named Y’shua with the Virgin mother who happens to be “God with us” come to save His people from their sins by dying and rising, and who isn’t ashamed to call anyone, including even us, “His people.”

In the name of Jesus, Amen.

 

---

[1] From “A Liturgy for Purposeful Gathering,” Every Moment Holy, Vol. 1

Preparing to Meet Jesus in Advent - Matthew 3: 1-12

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

When I was a kid, we got an above ground swimming pool. It was about 3’ deep and about 16’ across. It was going to be my job to do the site prep: remove the sod and level the ground at the place where the pool would sit in the yard. If it’s not flat and level, at best, you won’t get a full 3’ of water across the pool; at worst, a side could collapse from the uneven pressure.

If you are curious, a fifteen foot circle has an area of just a shade over 200 square feet. It was also about 3” high on one side. It was hot, and the ground was hard, and Dad had to help me finish it that evening, putting a straight edge across the surface so we knew where to scrape a little more here and add a little there. The next day, we laid in a couple inches of sand and stretched a tarp across it, set up the pool walls, put in the liner, and began filling with water. When it was all said and done, it wasn’t quite perfect – as I recall, one side was still a bit higher than the other – but it was close enough for a bunch of kids to cool off in on a hot summer day and get us out of our moms’ hair.

John the Baptizer was not talking about site prep for swimming pools, or sidewalks, or even the foundation of a house when he was quoting from the prophet Isaiah when he said, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight.” The Baptizer was speaking to the people of Israel and he was calling them to repentance.

We’ve spoken of repentance before. You remember, the Small Catechism defines repentance as sorrow for one’s sin and faith that trusts in the forgiveness of sins through faith in Christ.  Christian repentance is grounded in the cross of Jesus – His complete work and His complete and free gift for you, His beloved. There is change involved – repent means “turn,” after all – changing one’s behavior to be in line an in tune with the footsteps of Jesus. But, generally, I think we have a rather soft idea of repentance.

Do not think of John’s preaching of repentance in this way. John would have a much more radical, severe changing of heart. A better way to understand the Baptizer’s call is “Be converted!” It’s the equivalent to Hamlet saying, “there is something rotten in the state of Denmark.” Both Israel and Jerusalem are corrupt from top to bottom, and that includes you, Pharisees, and you, Saducees, and all who are following after you thinking you are good enough, holy enough, and righteous enough to march into the Kingdom of God on your own merits. Want to play the “son of Abraham card”? That’s not going to get you there. Remember, Abraham lived by faith in the promises of God; you, you all are placing your faith in your own way of living.  You are lost – so lost, you are in danger of eternal separation from God in the fires of hell. Change your life, change your thinking, change where you place your trust and faith.

You have forgotten the commands of God and, more important, you have forgotten the promises of God and unless you repent, unless you are completely changed in your hearts, minds, and lives by the Spirit of God, you too shall likewise perish. Prepare the way of the Lord, you brood of vipers; make His paths straight, you slithering snakes in the grass, because the Kingdom is at hand and He is coming with a vengeance, with fire and pitchforks and wrath that knows no limits. You need to get yourself out to the Jordan. Repent and be baptized. You need to redo the Red Sea. You need to redo the Jordan. You need to redo the return from Babylon. You need to re-turn to the Lord your God and prepare because the reign of God stands near in the work of the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth.

St. Matthew does not tell us know the message was received. Did John succeed? Did the Holy Spirit drive the words of his preaching, penetrating their unconverted hearts and minds? Did they listen? Did they repent? The text does not say. We are left wondering – wondering why Matthew doesn’t tell us this piece of information, but also wondering what of the faithfulness of these being-lost ones. Others were coming; others were repenting; others were being baptized; others were believing. But these – these, there is no story and no happy ending. So, the question remains: did they repent?  We don’t know.

There is another question here, one that lays below the surface. Do you hear the voice of the Prophets that echoes through the centuries. John and Isaiah continue to call to God’s people of every epoch, age, eon and generation: “Prepare the way of the Lord: make His paths straight.” To be sure, unlike Isaiah, we know that Christ has come. Unlike John, we know that Christ came, not as an axe-wielding, pitchfork-bearing fire-breathing bringer of damnation. Instead, He bore the sins of the world into His own body, receiving the wrath of God Himself, reconciling the world to God with His own death. He was numbered with the sinners, broke bread with transgressors, touched lepers, forgave prostitutes, called tax collectors to follow. He even absolved those who killed Him, and the one who mocked and then confessed faith while hanging next to Him.

But, the words still call us to prepare. So, if the camel-haired, leather-strapped, wild-haired Son of Zechariah suddenly appeared, picking a grasshopper’s leg from between his teeth with a dirty fingernail while honey glistened from his bushy beard strode down the aisle, turned, and the voice cried from the wilderness of Mount Zion of Mission Valley, “Prepare the way of the Lord: make His paths straight,” what would he mean?

Repent, of course. In Advent, there is plenty to repent of: the materialism of the world around us, our desire for always more, for not being content with what we have, for being jealous of what some have, for a bit of arrogance in having more than what others have. Repent for being too busy to find time with Jesus in His Word, for being too tired to be present when He invites us to His table, for being too proud that instead of pretending to be strong, we need to be weak among the body of believers for help and care.  And, both our repentance and our being baptized are grounded in the fullness of our salvation by grace through faith. Because you are forgiven, because you are redeemed, because you are united with Christ, because you are sanctified, because you declared holy by the Father, I dare not call you broods of vipers, nor do I call you snakes, Pharisees or Saducees. That is, at best unfair; at worst, it is completely inaccurate.

If John were here, what would his message mean? It would mean this: strip away anything that would get in the way of Christ’s coming to you right now. Prepare the way; make the paths straight. Knock down mountains of business that prevent you from welcoming the Christ today. Fill in the potholes of  foolishness, there’s always time to prepare. Straighten the curves of arrogance, “He’s waited this long…why the fuss now?” Get rid of the boulders that trip you up with distractions. Instead, with faith, with longing, with anticipation, with prayerful mindedness and with Advent anticipation, know that the Kingdom is here. He is at Hand. Repent. Come to the Table. Christ is here, Sacramentally present in bread and wine, in body and blood, to strengthen you on this Advent journey as you await the day He comes, not merely in bread and wine, but in His risen Glory and you see Him as He is. 

Enriched with that spiritually-strengthening food and drink, empowered by the Spirit of God, enlivened by His word, every day prepare that Jesus comes today – not tomorrow, not next week, month, year, or decade – He comes today. Knock down the mountains and fill in the potholes that get in the way of you welcoming Him with faith, hope and love. Amen.