The Festival of the Reformation (Transferred) - Romans 3:21-31

 

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

Being a pastor is an interesting vocation. If you ever want to kill a conversation fast, when a person meets you for the first time and asks what you do, tell them you’re a pastor and watch their face. One of two things happens, usually: either they freeze, trying to remember if they have “sinned” – usually in the form of an off-color joke – since they were near you, or they decide they’re going to play “gotcha” and ask you some question like, “So, preacher, just how many angels can dance on the head of a needle,” or “If God is all powerful, can he create a rock so big he can’t lift it?” The answer to both questions, by the way, is God doesn’t engage in foolishness and waste the time He created.

But every now and then, that person has a serious question to ask: tell me about God; does God really forgive sinners; what does it mean that God is merciful; if the church is for sinners, why is it so hypocritical; if God is love, why did He kill His own son? Good questions, hard questions, questions of the soul that I’m happy to try to answer no matter where I am. Often I ask my own question – why do you ask? Maybe they had a really negative experience at a church, or a pastor once publicly berated them, or they were shamed so terribly by well intended parents or teachers, “You better tell God just how sorry you are, and don’t come out of your room until you are. Or, perhaps worst of all, “God’s going to remember that for a long, long time.”  

“How do you see God?” That’s an important question that I ask. A person’s view of God gives me a lot of information. Some see God as a stern and demanding disciplinarian, always with the old “Uncle Sam” frown and scolding look in his face. Others see God as something akin to Santa Claus, he gives you what you want when you want it, as long as you’re a good boy and girl. Others see God as a fickle being, depending on his mood. Others see God as angry, disappointed, and always ready to punish at the drop of a sin-stained hat.

Sometimes I invert the question to, “How does God see you?” That is often an eye-opener, too, as people start to open up and drag the skeletons out of the closet with sins clicking and clacking, guilt moaning and groaning, shame squeaking and creaking, and fear making the teeth rattle and eyes twitch back and forth. Here, I hear words like failure, broken, mess, stained, guilty as charged.

And, when I hear words like these, descriptions like these, and they come from the mouth of a Christian whom Jesus died to redeem, a soul that believes Christ is their Lord and Savior, in that moment I see a soul that is burdened by the weight of sin, guilt, and shame; a conscience that is turned in on itself and away from the good news of Jesus; and a person whom satan is lying to with everything he’s got.

The Christian conscience is the voice in the head and it is to be like an umpire, but instead of calling balls and strikes, it allows you to see yourself as a baptized, forgiven child of God and makes decisions and determinations based on that fact. And, the Christian conscience also serves as a reminder that you are always and still a baptized, forgiven child of God even when you make decisions that, in hindsight, weren’t the best of choice to make.  

There is nothing – nothing – that makes the devil more exited than when a Christian starts to doubt God’s grace for them in Christ Jesus. If he can twist the Christian conscience into believing that they have finally stepped over the line, that they have outstripped God’s grace, that the seventy times seven literally applies to them and they just hit seventy times seven plus one, that there is doubt that Jesus can, indeed, forgive. When it gets really bad, the inner voice actually becomes the voice of the devil, using his words of judgement, damnation, and hatred. Through it all, satan does his happy dance and it is ugly. It’s ugly because he’s rejoicing that someone is in danger of joining him into damnable eternity.

To be sure, their conscience was right – they truly were sinners, very well qualified, at that – who had fallen quite far short of the glory of God. That’s all they could see. They were seeing the truth of God’s Law that does, indeed, demand holiness and show how far we come from that mark. But that’s all they could see. They were missing something, a part of the picture that was hidden in the fog of satan’s lies and twisting of the truth.

What they were missing was God’s righteousness. His righteousness is not anger at the sinner, but rather a declaration that the sinner is now declared righteous. It’s a divine acquittal writ large – not just “not guilty,” but declared holy and restored.

Long promised throughout the Old Testament, both foretold in words of the prophets and foreshadowed in the actions of God in His people, God’s righteousness is a gracious and undeserved gift given to His people. God gives it freely out of His love; He gives it out of His own righteousness. He gives it in the propitiation of His Son, Jesus.

Propitiation – we don’t use that word. In the Old Testament, sacrifices were made on a daily basis. The great annual sacrifice was made on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. On that day, the High Priest would enter the Holy of Holies, a basin of sacrificial blood in hand. He would pour the blood out on the lid of the ark of the covenant. That lid was called the mercy seat. God would receive the animal’s blood in exchange for the sins of the people. That act was called propitiation – a redeeming act of God, receiving the innocent death of one for the sake of the guilty. It was a foreshadowing of Jesus’ own death. No longer hidden behind the curtain of the temple, Jesus’ death outside the city gates was for all to see. Even Satan himself witnessed the event of Jesus shedding His blood, surrendering His life, the Innocent for the guilty, the righteous for the unrighteous.

The Old Testament priest did something else with that blood – he would sprinkle it over the people. It was a visual mark that the animal’s life was traded for them and they were marked with its blood. They were redeemed and made righteous. You, too, have been marked with Christ’s blood. In baptism, the holiness of Christ covers your sins. God declares you righteous in Christ. By God’s grace, through faith, your conscience enables you to see yourself as God sees you: forgiven, whole and holy. And, when you see yourself as righteous in the eyes of God, you are set free from satan’s lies that you are anything else.

Earlier, I said the vocation of the ministry is an interesting one. Our calling is to comfort the afflicted with the good news of Jesus. Sometimes, we even get to do this for ourselves. 

The novelist Shusaku Endo tells the story of a Portuguese Roman Catholic priest sent to Japan in the mid-1600s. Ancient, feudal Japan was not friendly to Christians and when these priests were discovered, they along with their flocks were arrested. While the members of the church were tortured, the priests were forced to listen to their cries and prayers for help. The Japanese official offered a deal: if the priest would apostacize by stepping on a wood and brass relief carving of Jesus, the people would be freed from their torture. Endo writes:

The priest raises his foot. In it he feels a dull, heavy pain… He will now trample on what he has considered the most beautiful thing in his life, on what he has believed most pure, on whaat is filled with the ideals and the dreams of man.  How his foot aches! …The priest placed his foot on the [carving]. Dawn broke. And far in the distance, a cock crowed.

Later, when the disgraced priest had been returned to his residence of house arrest, one Christin man who escaped the Japanese soldiers snuck to the priest’s window and whispered, “Please hear my confession…please, give me absolution for my sins.” The priest reflects. “I, too, stood on the sacred image. For a moment, this foot was on His face. It was on the face of the man who had been ever in my thoughts, on the face that was before me in the mountains, in my wanderings, in prison…on the face of him whom I have always longed to love. Even now that face is looking at me with eyes of pity from the plaque rubbed flat by many feet.” As the priest imagines the feet touching the carving of Jesus, in his mind’s eye the feet change…they no longer are the feet of the Christians who stepped on the plaque; they are the nail-marked feet of Jesus. In that moment, Endo writes, “the priest could not understand the tremendous onrush of joy that came over him at that moment.”

That story is why the Reformation is of such great importance: seeing ourselves only through the lens of Jesus’ death and resurrection and hearing the voice of God declaring us righteous, not by what we do or don’t do, but through faith in Jesus.

 

 

 

Render to God That Which is God's: Matthew 22:15-22

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text is the Gospel reading from Matthew 22.

In sixteen days, you will go to the polls and cast your ballot for the President of the United States down to local city and county officials. In seventeen days, I’m afraid, the mudslinging will amp to new heights as one side claims a victorious mandate while the other side casts aspersions on the victor, and neither party wins nor concedes with grace. I pray that I am wrong, but there is nothing that I’ve seen thus far to make me believe that Wednesday, November 4 will usher in peace, harmony and happiness across the aisle, let alone across main street America.

First, I want you to know that, in the strict sense of the word, God does not care if it is Trump or Biden at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, if the donkeys or the elephants have the majority in Congress, whether Judge Barrett is or is not confirmed. The beautiful irony is that God both establishes and uses governments and authorities– even those that refuse to recognize and honor Him, and whether they like it or not! – for His purpose. Regardless the relative foolishness or intelligence of the American voter and politician, God will use whomever is elected for His purpose. He is God; I assure you, He is in control.  He does care how government is run, that it governs fairly, in justice, for good order, with eyes toward the weakest and most feeble. He cares that citizens show love, mercy and compassion to each other in word and action. It concerns Him greatly when people’s reputations and good names are destroyed for the sake of expediency and when governments become corrupt and those First Article, daily bread gifts cannot be delivered.  These can be demonstrated from the Scriptures.

It is timely that this morning’s Gospel and Old Testament lessons both seem to speak to God’s First Article gift of government. A few weeks ago, we heard St. Paul speak of this in Romans 13 – I encourage you to re-read Romans 13 this afternoon; it, too, is most apropos for these days ahead. Today, Isaiah prophecies that years later, God will make the wicked, heathen King Cyrus of Assyria be His instrument for the good of His people. Jesus also lends His Divine words that we know so well, “Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s.” Given the givens, it seems like it’s a perfect recipe for a sermon on stewardship of our American citizenship, giving thanks to God for our government officials, even though they are less than perfect, and celebrating the freedom we have as Christians in America.

Or not.

For centuries, Jesus statement, “Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s” has been used to define and explain a church doctrine of separation of church and state.  Even Luther used it in that sense, developing what we refer to as “the theology of the two kingdoms.” He called God working in time through civil government the “Left hand kingdom,” and God’s working into eternity through the church the “Right hand kingdom.” He also argued that the Roman Empire should keep it’s nose out of the Church while at the same time affirming God gives the gift of government for the purpose of establishing good order so the church can function in society.

But this is not the intent of Jesus’ words against the Pharisees and Herodians. This phrase is not really about the government, per se. It’s not about giving ten percent to the Lord and fifteen percent to Uncle Sam. It’s not about separation of church and state. It’s funny, if you stop and think about it. We focus on the “Render to Caesar,” part of this. In so doing, we forget the latter part. Jesus’ focus isn’t on Caesar; the focus is on God and paying to God that which is His.

Remember, we’re reading Jesus’ interactions with the Pharisees and Herodians. The last few Sundays, you’ve followed along as every day of Holy Week the tension ratcheted up another notch as the Jewish leaders realized Jesus was speaking of their unfaithfulness, their loss of the blessing of God, their failure to be good and faithful servants, all leading to the mighty crescendo of Maundy Thursday. You heard how they falsely flattered Jesus, gave hollow complements they themselves did not believe about His truth and His teaching. Their purpose, I believe, was to lull Jesus into a false sense of congeniality and sociability, so that He might slip up in the proverbial question of the legality of taxes. If Jesus said, yes, pay the tax, the Pharisees would jump on Him for supporting a government opposed to Israel; if He said no, do not pay the tax, the Herodians could accuse Jesus of anarchy and insurrection. It seemed Jesus was painted into the proverbial corner.

Jesus’ answer, “Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s,” is really a non-answer regarding taxes. Jesus is not placing Caesar on one side of the spectrum and God on the other, then asking people to decide whether your dollar goes to one place or the other. To put Caesar on the same plane as God is a ridiculous impossibility. Caesar does not own anything that does not first and foremost belong to and come from God. But Rome certainly tried. If you were to look at a denarius, the coin of the realm at the time of Jesus, it would have been struck with Caesar’s profile and a Latin inscription that, translated, reads “Caesar Augustus, Son of a god, Father of the Country.” The coin demonstrates the idolatry of Caesar, claiming godly authority and power. No - all things belong to God – not Caesar - whether in this world or the life of the world to come.

So, if “Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s” isn’t about the separation of church and state, or taxation, or even God working through the government, then what is Jesus speaking about? 

To pay to God what belongs to God is to behold Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God who has come into the world to redeem the world. To pay to God what is God’s is to follow Christ, who is God enfleshed. To pay to God what is God’s is to follow His Son in obedient, faithful discipleship. In a word, “pay to God” means repentance. The Jewish leaders and the Herodians missed it – they were too busy trying to trap Jesus to receive Him as Messiah. I submit that we often miss, or at least forget, who Jesus is because we are too busy seeing the government as our god. 

Repent – pay to God – for overpaying to Caesar. I don’t mean taxes. Repent of making the government out to be equal – or, even at times, greater - than God and His Word. Honor and respect the government and our officials, yes; but repent for seeing the government as the answer to all of man’s problems and of seeing a candidate as a savior. Repent of the abuses of government that we tolerate for the sake of expediency. Repent of tolerating political foolishness for our economic benefit. Repent of misusing power and authority, particularly over and against the poorest, the weakest, and the neediest members of our society. Lest you think I speak only of those who are in a political office, this applies to each of us. If you have spoken ill of candidates or their supporters, shared social media posts of one party in derogatory terms, gossiped and spun what “those” people represent, then you repent.  Repent of the politicizing and polarizing language where we brand and label, slander and defame simply to prove our point and win a war of words. Repent of seeing elections merely as how to gain the most benefit instead of how a vote can help preserve and protect the life and wellbeing of my neighbor, particularly the least in the Kingdom who, you remember, are actually the greatest. Repent of mistaking the power of man as the authority of God.

Give to God what is God’s. The Pharisees, the Herodians didn’t see that God was breaking into human history. The Kingdom of God had come and was about to be revealed with Christ reigning from His throne of the cross.

Jesus had asked for a coin, remember, and asked whose likeness and name was on it. Now, turn the question. Where has God put His name? On His Son, “This is my Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Where has God placed His likeness? “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father,” Jesus said. You see God in the person of Jesus, Immanuel, God made flesh to dwell among us. You see God’s mercy at the cross, where the innocent Son of God dies in your stead. There, God used Pilate – a corrupt instrument of the Left-hand kingdom of God – to record His inscription: “Jesus of Nazareth: King of the Jews.” You see God’s grace at the open tomb, where Christ rises, conquering the grave.

God does these things, not only in Christ, but also in you. In your baptism, you are clothed with Christ – your new Adam, your new Eve is in the image of Christ, so closely connected to Jesus that you are baptized in His name and given His name, Christian. So you never forget the blessings and promises of God, chiefly the forgiveness of your sins by grace through faith in Christ Jesus, God continues to place His inscription to you in His Word, and gives you the church to share that Word of faith, hope and love with you and the world.  

In sixteen days, your fellow Americans will render unto Caesar. Cast your ballot, and then live in peace and harmony praying, “Thy will be done.” In sixteen days, and seventeen days, and today and tomorrow, and every day of your life, return to the Lord in repentance, and in faith see Jesus. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

We're Looking Forward to the Feast! - Isaiah 25:6-9

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

I can’t speak of other Christian denominations, but Lutheran funerals seem to consist of three parts. The first part is the funeral service that takes place in the sanctuary or the funeral home chapel as the bereaved gather for reading of Scripture, preaching, hymns and prayers all the while thanking God for the gift of the loved one who has fallen asleep in Christ. It’s a proclamation of Christ Jesus, pointing the bereaved to the Lord of Life, Who alone is able to make sense of death and loss. The hymns, the Scriptures, the sermon all pointed to Christ’s own death and resurrection as the answer to death’s question, the confident hope against death’s confusion, the victory against what seems to be only loss. The pastor, hopefully, led you from Christ’s cross to His grave and spoke of both as being empty. Christ the victor over sin, death and the grave; Christ, the firstborn from the dead. And, your loved one, having been baptized into Christ, the dear Christian has already died and have been raised with Christ. This is what is confessed every week in the Creeds: we believe in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.

After the benediction is spoken, the casket and remains are escorted to the hearse and transported to the cemetery for the second part, the burial, where the body, created by God, redeemed by Christ, sanctified by the Holy Spirit, is laid to rest until the resurrection of all flesh. This commendation of the body, the burial, puts into practice what was preached. The one who died, Christ died for him; the one who is buried, she is buried with Christ. We lay the body to rest – temporary rest – for that body, a fallen and sinful human being redeemed in the blood of Jesus, will also be raised in Christ.  And, in the resurrection of all flesh, that body will be raised whole and holy. The baptismal blessing will be consummated: Sin will have been buried with the body but not raised. The new Adam and the new Eve will be restored to new life with Christ into eternity. Christ, the first-fruits – yes! But those who die in faith will likewise be raised. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! We are risen! We are risen indeed, Alleluia!

Do you ever wonder what is the resurrection going to look like? Too often, we hear descriptions like this: “I bet Grandpa is fishing, catching the biggest catfish he’s ever seen.” “You just know Grannie is whipping up a pie for St. Peter this afternoon.”  “He’s one under par on every hole.” “She’s floating in the clouds with the angels.” Respectfully, none of those are Biblical. At best they are sappy and sentimental; at worst, they are a complete misunderstanding and total displacement of what the joy of eternity with Christ is.

When you want, when you need a glimpse of what the resurrection will be like, look to Isaiah. He gives us a heavenly picture, a Godly promise of what the feast of victory will look like.

God’s people of old needed a glimpse, a picture, a shadow of God’s mercy to cling to in their world of death and chaos. The chapter previous, Chapter 24, is strong and it is stern as God describes the consequences that He will deliver upon Israel for their unfaithfulness. It’s as dire and dark of any Word of the Lord. It begins, “Behold, the Lord will empty the earth and make it desolate, and He will twist its surface and scatter its inhabitants,” (v1). Layer upon layer, the words and sentences build, describing curse upon curse as the Lord makes clear of His wrath at the people’s sins. “A curse devours the earth, and its inhabitants suffer for their guilt…the wine mourns, the vine languishes, all the merry-hearted sigh,” (v. 6a, 7). If that’s all Isaiah said, it would be a terrible situation for people trapped in their a hopeless, hapless situation of their own doing. How could – how would! – their God save them from the doings of their own damning fault?

In the midst of death and decay, God’s people need that picture, that shadow, that glimpse of God’s graciousness and His mercy. Those destroyed cities and conquered nations? God will use them as a foundation for what is to come. “On this mountain, the Lord of hosts will” act (v. 6). In glowing, brilliant contrast to the darkness of the previous verses, God speaks of what is to come for His beloved. The remnant will celebrate with feasting, food, wine, and rejoicing. He will not abandon but will rescue and save a remnant of the faithful. God’s promises, made to previous generations, to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David, will endure. It’s the description of a victory celebration. All of God’s enemies, and all the enemies of God’s people – including death – will be destroyed.

The act of rescue will not happen on a mountain, but a short, stubby hillside called Golgatha outside the city of David. No food will be offered to the dying Man, and Jesus will be given only sour wine vinegar to drink. The Son cries against the reproach of His Father: My God, My God, why have you forsaken me? Tears will flow as His friends and even His own mother hears His final words.  Death seems to swallow Jesus as He breathes His last.

But death cannot stomach the power of Jesus. In His resurrection, as the great fish spat up Jonah, death and the grave gives up a living, breathing Jesus from the tomb. Jesus swallows up death! It’s no small thing that on Easter evening, after His resurrection, Jesus’ appearances are connected with food. When He appears, resurrected and whole, to the disciples in the locked, upper room, He asks for food. When He appears to the disciples on the shoreline, He provides fish. When He appears to the Emmaus disciples, He breaks bread, blesses wine. Food gives life; Jesus is the bread of life; Jesus gives life. And, in the resurrection, you will sit at a mountain-top table with He who is the Lord of Life. Death destroyed, tears dried, reproach replaced with holiness and peace. Ah, this is the feast of victory for our God, Alleluia!

Christ’s resurrection stands as a promise of the resurrection of the faithful, a reunion festival and feast the likes of which we can only begin to imagine. You look forward to this feast. To sit at table with Jesus, and Isaiah, and all the faithful who have gone before you. If you want to know what this feast looks like, Christ gives you a foretaste of it, Sunday after Sunday, to encourage you and sustain your faith. A bite of bread and a sip of wine doesn’t seem like much of a feast, but to this humble meal Jesus attaches His blessing: Take and eat; this is my body. Take and drink; this is my blood. And, with sins forgiven, your eyes of faith look towards that blessed day of resurrection.

Earlier, I said that there are three parts to the Lutheran funeral. You, perhaps, have noticed I spoke of the first and second parts, the funeral and the burial, but not the third. The third part is when the family and friends return to the church to gather for food and fellowship, to visit, laugh and cry.

There is something resurrection-worthy in the feast known as the funeral luncheon. I’ve been to probably forty or fifty post-funeral luncheons. While they are all somewhat different, they are all somewhat the same: the ladies of the church gather in the kitchen over what’s been brought and they will all wonder if there will be enough. They put out plates of ham and friend chicken, several casseroles, a meatloaf, maybe a brisket, sausage, potatoes – mashed or scalloped, potato and macaroni salad, trays of sandwiches, several different vegetables, and bread, all spread out over three or four folding tables. Desserts will occupy their own table. It smells like a Luby’s cafeteria, with the scent of coffee joining in the background. The ladies give directions, the pastor prays the meal blessing, and plates get loaded and chairs squeak while the conversations begin. There will be comments about how good this is, needing to get the recipe for that, wondering who made what was in the blue bowl, and a warning that the cobbler was almost gone, better get it now.

You, too, have been to many of these meals. You have brought food, you have visited, you have consoled, you have set up and taken down tables and chairs, you have promised to call. It’s what the Body of Christ does – it gathers together to support one another when one is weak, to console one another when one grieves, to encourage one another when hope is needed, to love one another when it seems all is lost.

And, for many of us, we have also been the family whose loved one was laid to rest and who is being honored and remembered at the meal prepared for us and our family. We have been the guests of honor, so to speak, not serving but being served. In the midst of loss and sadness and pain, there is something comforting in that hour or two, gathering with friends and family around food. Even if it’s only for a short time, the sadness is dulled, the hurt isn’t quite so strong, the pain is lessened, and there is an inkling of joy. This is the body of Christ in action, as other Christians bear your grief with you, walking along side you, sitting next to you, speaking a word of Christ-centered hope with a smile and, yes, with a tear.

But, gradually, one by one, and couple by couple, the crowd slowly breaks up to go home. The feast is winding down. There are handshakes and hugs with the bereaved, comments about how we need to get together for celebrations, not just funerals, and promises to call soon. The leftovers are packaged, divvied up, and sent home. With a final wiping of the counter, the ladies give thanks to God for a modern version of feeding five thousand with a few loaves and a few fish. As lights go off and the doors close, the air conditioning spools down, a chair creaks with relief, and the building again waits in near silence.

The building might be silent, the meal may have ended, we may have gone back to our separate homes, but the song of the church goes on, in faith and in the sure and certain hope that we shall soon see Isaiah’s feast of victory that knows no end. “For the Lamb who was slain has begun His reign, alleluia.”

 

Finding Your Rest in Jesus - Isaiah 55:6-9

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

I like listening to audio books while I drive. Helps pass the time. Last week, I was listening to a mystery. A man had been killed and the case was drawing a lot of interest because the victim was a suspect in another criminal case. Between the two events, many people’s lives were impacted, directly and indirectly, by the whole sad narrative. The local newspaperman was interviewing the county sheriff asking about details. Even the reporter seemed melancholy and pensive by the whole sordid affair and, as the interview ended, he asked, “Does it ever seem to you that the world is getting tired? [1]”

Does it ever seem to you that the world is getting tired? I’ve thought about that question all week. Given all that has happened, is happening, and continues to happen all around us – and by “us” I mean all of creation, not just Mission Valley – I imagine that the world is growing weary.

Covid-19 continues to be in the headlines, both because of what it has done and because of the concerns of what it could do. We are in the high peak of hurricane season and the Atlantic Basin is doing its best to teach you all the Greek alphabet. While the upper Gulf Coast from Louisiana to the Florida panhandle struggles with record flooding and power outages from their own hurricanes, an unwanted Beta is scheduled to knock on our door in the next day or two. The West Coast is battling wildfires that turn the midnight sky into a smokey, eerie orange. Violence continues in major cities across not only the United States but the world. Accusations of sexism, favoritism, racism are levied against people – some rightfully, some wrongly, and some sheerly out of spite and vitriol. Innocent people, in the wrong place at the wrong time, have their names, reputations, vocations and even their bodies ruined by hate-filled actions of others who forget that all lives matter. And, that’s all by the end of the 6am news.

In the meantime, for all of us with children and spouses in school, we’ve wrestled with in person or virtual learning and we’ve learned what synchronous and asynchronous means. We see the anxiety and stress in their eyes and voices every day as they leave for class and the frustration as they come home with ever more work to do. We go to our own jobs and struggle with declining revenues and shrinking markets. Meanwhile, our bodies are continuing to age. The knees hurt more and the back doesn’t straighten out as quickly and the eyes can’t see quite as well to thread that needle or to read the spec sheet. The doctor tells us our blood pressure is up and our triglycerides are down and we need to exercise more, but not how to find the time to take care of ourselves, let along everyone else who needs a piece of our time. We go to bed exhausted and wake up not fully rested and turn on the 5am news and it all starts again. Coffee just doesn’t quite fight away the tired that remains in our body, in our mind, and in our heart.

Tired. That’s a good word, isn’t it? We’re tired, our families are tired, and yes – even the world seems tired. And, as God’s people, we know the answer to our fatigue: we seek rest in the Word of God in the Holy Scriptures. This morning, Isaiah invites us to seek the Lord, to search for Him, to pray to Him who is our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble, and to call upon Him while He is near. And we do. We lift up our weary eyes to the hills, from whence cometh our help (Ps. 121), but even the hills seem to be groaning under the strain of it all (Romans 8:22). Our cries, uttered in faith, echo the Psalmist, “How long, O Lord, how long” (Ps. 13)? Maybe we even find the words of Job echoing in our own prayers, “I cry to you for help and you do not answer me; I stand, and you only look at me. You have turned cruel to me” (Job 30:20-21). It seems there is only silence amidst fires, flood, famine…fatigue.

But Isaiah would not allow us to merely offer up a grocery-list of laments and complaints. He is not content to leave us grounded in the foolish notion that we should, somehow and someway, be exempt from such sufferings this side of heaven because of our goodness, our “innocence,” our self-righteousness, our Christianity. Isaiah will not let us stand on our own terms. Rather, Isaiah rightly places us before Almighty God. He is God; we are His people, the sheep of His hands.

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” God uses the tiresome, wearisome things of this world to draw us back to Him. In these things that take place around us, that we see on the screen or in the paper, that we hear of from friends and family, God is at work, even in these moments that seem so out of His control, to lead us to repentance.

When one hears the word, it's often met with resistance – especially over and against things out of our control. Repent is neither a popular nor easy word. It implies guilt – that there is something to repent of. Our culture much prefers self-defense of innocence or, at least, it's not my fault – it’s someone else’s. How do and why should I repent for the riots in Minneapolis, or sexual harassment in Hollywood, or for fires burning in Oregon?  The entire Christian life is one of repentance, the recognition and acknowledgment that we are sinners living in a fallen world. We repent for that which we have done and that which we have left undone in our lives. We repent of misrepresenting ourselves as co-equal with God, as if He owes us a reply. We repent of breaking our relationship with God in our sinfulness. We repent of our demands for answers. We repent of our expectations that all is fair. Repentance humbles, not defends. It is reflective on God’s voice, not defiantly raising ours. It is admission that we need help, not a spotlight.  So, our Lord through Isaiah calls us to return to the Lord. Our cries join that of creation, creation calling to Creator, and we seek the Lord: “Lord, have mercy.”

Repentance has two aspects. The first is sorrow for our sins. That’s the plea for mercy, that we do not receive what we deserve. The second is faith that trusts that God is inclined to show mercy to us because of Christ. I suspect we forget that part, that repentance includes faith.  The entire life of the Christian is one of repentance, remember – sorrow for our sins, yes, but more than that, it’s the faith that trusts Jesus died to rescue and redeem this fallen world and all of us who are in it.

Faith seeks the Lord where He has promised to be: at the cross. At the cross, Christ carried the unrighteousness and wickedness of the world into Himself. He was separated from His Father so that we would never be isolated from God’s grace. Jesus suffered hell on earth so that our sufferings would be only temporary and not last into eternity. Jesus died as a condemned sinner, not only for you and me, but even to redeem creation. The heavens marked His guilty-as-hell death by cloaking the mid-day sun with darkness and with the ground shaking in fear that the God of Creation died, the earth swallowing His body into the burial chamber for a three-day rest.  

On the third day, Christ arose, living, breathing, triumphant. His resurrection declares that sin, death and the devil have been conquered, and that the fallen world and our own fallen selves have been rescued and redeemed by Him.

So, when you are world-weary and sin-worn, turn to the One who knows full-well about being world-weary, sin-worn, and He knows the need for rest. But He not only knows the struggle, He gives the victory. In His resurrection, He invites us to “Come to me who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest” (Matt 11:28). Seek Him where He has promised to be: here, in His house; in Water and Word, in Bread and Wine. He is present in the fellowship of the saints who speak Christ’s own words of comfort and blessing, and when a brother or sister helps you, in the name of Jesus, when you are weak and struggling.

“Does it seem like the world is getting tired?” This side of heaven, we will continue to struggle and we will have those days when we feel oh, so tired and not sure that we want to know what tomorrow will bring. Those days make us yearn for the promised day of resurrection when our rest shall be perfect and the fatiguing factors of this lifetime are forgotten. Until then, do what is in front of you and do it to the best of your ability. Repent of your sins and in faith that you are already forgiven in Christ. And then rest – rest your body, your mind, your soul – in Christ Jesus who died and was buried for you, knowing that His three-day rest in the tomb sanctifies your rest. And, then, when you awake, make the sign of the cross as a reminder that Christ is near and with you. Go about your day, renewed in Christ Jesus.

Amen.

 

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[1] Johnson, Craig. The Cold Dish. I was listening to an audiobook, so I don’t have a page citation.

When You Get What You Ask For - Matthew 18: 21-35

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

Be careful what you ask for – you’ve heard that sage advice, haven’t you? But, do you know there’s more to it? The full quote continues, “Be careful what you ask for; you just might get it.”

Be careful when you ask a question of Jesus that is based in the Law. When you ask a Law question, be careful because you may get a Law answer.

How often will my brother sin against me and I forgive him? It’s another question of Law, and it comes hot on the heals of Jesus’ instruction “If you brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and he alone. If he listens, you have won a brother. If he does not listen, take another with you…” (18:15ff). You notice Jesus didn’t give restrictions, conditions or exceptions – he simply says, “if he sins against you.”

I suspect Peter is realizing that this process of forgiving could become rather burdensome and most certainly repetitious. Peter wants some clarification, a limitation, a boundary on how often forgiveness is to be doled out. After all, isn’t there a time of accountability, a point where enough is enough, where forgiveness ceases and justice prevails? How often, Jesus? Peter proactively makes a rather generous seven-time offering – seven is a perfect number, a holy number, a number of fullness and completion, an offer of forgiveness that is twice what the Jewish rabbis taught. Forgiving a repeat sinner seven times seems rather generous.

How many times do I forgive? Remember: a Law question merits a Law answer. Peter wants a quantity, so Jesus gives Peter a quantity, but not what is expected. Jesus ups the ante: seven isn’t sufficient; even seventy is not enough. How often do you forgive, Peter? How about seventy times seven.

People ask me frequently how to forgive someone who has sinned against them – a terrible, grievous sin, one that hurts at the deepest core and is hard – almost impossible – to forgive. How do you forgive the drunk whose decision to drive cost your wife her life? How do you forgive the man who sexually assaulted you? How do you forgive your classmate who posted ugly lies about you on Twitter and Instagram, making you the laughing stock of school? How do you forgive your spouse, son, daughter, or parent, that person who violated your trust and love?

If you think forgiveness is yours, it is something you do, if it is within your power, your ability to give to someone else, you will never be able to forgive. You will always have limits, exclusions, restrictions on your forgiveness. It might be in quantity: I’ll forgive you seven, or seventy, or seventy-times-seven times, but not one more. It might be in quality: I can forgive everything else, but this? It becomes selective: I’ll forgive you and you and you, but you…nope. It can also be dismissively self-righteous: it’s OK for someone else to forgive you but not me…no, sir. If you think forgiveness is yours to meter out and dole out as you wish, you are always under the burden of the Law. If you think forgiveness is what you do, you are like the servant when he encounters another servant – I’ll forgive you, but only when payment is made in full and I get my pound of flesh in the process.

And, if you think forgiveness is yours to meter out, you are in danger of following the footsteps of the first servant who encounters the second servant.  One hundred day’s wages is too much to pass by, so the first throws the second into jail because he can’t pay up. That’s dangerous thinking; foolish thinking. Remember: this is the way of the Law. Be careful what you ask for…you may get what you’ve asked for. When restitution is demanded of someone else, it then is also demanded of you. He who had been set free is jailed and tortured; he, who refuses to forgive the one who owes him, has his own forgiveness nullified.

Now, I want to help you to turn the question. We’re going to change it from “how often do I forgive?” to “how often do I need forgiveness?” In other words, stop looking at the other servant and see only yourself. Suddenly, you have a completely new perspective. Rather than we being the ones giving out forgiveness in a limited number of drips and drops, we realize our own need for forgiveness is vast, beyond limit and number. Our own debt – or, as we pray in the Lord’s Prayer, our trespasses - are beyond number. “For I daily sin much and indeed deserve nothing but punishment,” the Catechism says (5^th Petition of the Lord’s Prayer, Explanation).  How often do I need forgiveness? Constantly, frequently, daily, hourly. What do I need forgiven? Everything.

But, how do you repay a debt you can’t repay? Both servants thought they could negotiate. One owed ten thousand talents. Given a talent is about 20 years wages, he had accrued 200,000 years worth of debt. The other servant owed 100 denarii. With a denarius being a day’s wage, it would be three and a half months’ work. Both men argued they would repay it, given a little more time, a little more grace, a little understanding. But, in reality, neither could afford the repayment price. All they could do was ask for mercy.

When we see ourselves as a servant with an insurmountable debt, that we are the ones who need forgiveness, that our sins far outweigh and outstrip any hope we have of repaying the price ourselves, the parable comes to life. You are the servant whose sins are an insurmountable debt; you are the one who needs forgiveness; you have accumulated a sin-debt that far outweighs and outstrips any hope you could possibly have of repaying the debt accrued. You are not the King who decides how often to forgive but as the one who oh, so often stands with the servants and implores, “King, have mercy on me a sinner.” All you can do is stand at the foot of the King’s throne and ask for mercy with your hands open and empty.

The ironic thing is that we ask for mercy from the very One against whom we have accrued our sin-debt. We confess this: We have sinned against God in thought, word and deed, by what we have done and what we have left undone; and we have sinned against our neighbor by not loving him and her as ourselves. We ask the King of Kings for mercy; we ask God to forgive us.

I’ve had people argue with me that forgiveness is too easy. Someone sins and then asks God to forgive.  Tabula rasa: the slate is wiped clean. Easy, peasy, lemon squeezy. No consequences, no problem, good to go. The issue with that thinking is that it forgets that sin is a debt that must be paid. In the parable, the master forgives the servant’s debt of 10,000 talents. Literally, by cancelling the debt, he is paying debt himself; that is, it costs him 10,000 talents. When God forgives your sins, it is because the debt has been paid in full. Not with gold or silver, or with the stroke of a pen on a receipt. Your sin-debt is paid with the holy, precious blood of Jesus and His innocent suffering and death. He doesn’t count: how often have you sinned…seven sins, seventy transgressions, seventy seven violations of the Law against God and Man! You asked for it – Lord, have mercy on me a sinner! – and God, for the sake of Christ Jesus, gives you what you need. Jesus pays your entire debtor’s price in full so that you do not carry the burden into eternity, His one death for the sins of the world. Your sins have been atoned for, covered in the blood of Christ, and you have been redeemed, purchased and set free.

In your baptism, you were marked with the sign of the cross on your forehead and heart. The cross of Jesus marks your entire body. Those hands that were once empty, reaching out for the King’s mercy, are now marked with the cross of Jesus. You are released from your debt, the bill stripped from your hand, and you are forgiven all of your sins. Your idolatry, your misusing God’s name, your laziness in the Word and in prayer, your ugly words spoken against your parents, children, spouse, and elected officials, your mismanagement of company time, your wandering eyes and wondering mind…all of it, forgiven in Christ. You stand before the Master transgression-free. So there is never any doubt, absolution is spoken again and again, you are reminded of your baptism again and again, you receive Christ’s body and blood again and again so that you are constantly reminded that you, having sinned much, have been forgiven even more.

Earlier, I asked how do you forgive someone who it seems impossible to forgive? You don’t. Forgiveness is not yours to do. But Christ forgives, fully and perfectly. And that includes the other servant who has hurt you. Your fellow servant also stands before the King, also imploring His mercy. They are fellow servants of the King, whose transgressions have likewise been taken from them. They are servants for whom Jesus died, servants who have likewise been marked with the sign of the cross on their forehead and heart and washed in the water of Holy Baptism. Do you see their hands? Empty, emptied by Christ and marked with His blood. Your hands, empty; their hands empty. By God’s grace, through faith in Christ, you – plural – are forgiven.

In being forgiven, you are then enabled to share that forgiveness with other sinners. Christ has forgiven you and set you free so that you become a forgiveness sharer, sharing Christ’s forgiveness with those around you. It begins with humility, seeing your own sin-burden and knowing you, too, stand in front of the King of Kings asking for your own measure of mercy.

Knowing, believing, trusting and relying that you have been mercied much, you pray that the King enables you see that person who hurt you as a fellow servant who likewise has been forgiven by Jesus. With deepest of humility, instead of clenching your hands into fists of anger, hold out that cross-marked hand and extend it in compassion and love to your brother or sister in Christ. Now, remember  - be careful what you ask for because you may get it! Your heart begins to soften and you start to see him or her as a fellow redeemed servant. And, in that moment Satan will do everything he can to stir those old feelings again. Repent, be forgiven, and deliver forgiveness again. This side of heaven, the gift of forgiveness between sinners may never be perfect; it may need to be repeated every time you see that person. That’s life under the cross, as one sinner who has been forgiven much to another sinner who also has been forgiven much.

Be careful what you ask for. “How often do I have to forgive?” That’s a question of law with limitations and restrictions. When you see yourself as one who daily needs forgiveness, and who daily receives the forgiveness of God in Christ Jesus, the question changes. It’s no longer how often do I have to forgive, it becomes “How often have I been forgiven?” The answer is, simply, always.

In the name of Jesus. Amen.

The Greatest are the Weakest and the Weakest are the Greatest - Matthew 18: 1-6

 

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

“Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” That was the disciples’ question. The text doesn’t say if the disciples were referring to themselves – who among us is the greatest – or if it were a more general question – who among all of Your followers, Jesus, is the greatest – but inquiring minds wanted to know. I think I understand that question. It’s a natural inclination, wondering who the best is. Speaking for myself, every time I go into a pastor’s conference, I look around and I’m critiquing myself over and against the other pastors in the room. You know what I’m talking about – you do it, too. That’s why we have competitions, from elementary school jump rope contests to company employee of the month. Speed, skill, talent, knowledge, ability – all of these come together to that pinnacle moment when a person is declared the best with the honor and glory, recognized with a laurel and a hearty handshake or something more tangible. Everyone, it seems, wants to be the best. But, are you willing to do what it takes to get there, to do anything to become the greatest?

“Who is the greatest in the kingdom?” Once upon a time, Dr. Benjamin Franklin Pierce was working emergency triage – where medical staff determine who needs help first and fastest – when someone grabbed his arm. “I’ve been waiting here for hours! You keep taking people who came in after me! Don’t you recognize me – I’m a Very Important Person! When is it my turn!” Dr. Pierce looked at him and said, “This is the only place in the world where the most important person is the one who is hurt the most, who is losing blood faster than the other, whose body is more broken than the next.” He was speaking of a hospital ER, remember, but without knowing it, Hawkeye’s description of the MASH 4077 perfectly fits the church as well.   

Too often we act as if we are that Very Important Person. We come to the Lord’s house all dressed up in our finest. I don’t mean our clothes; I mean our finest façades, our best masks, our best disguises that cover up all of our shame and all of our guilt so we can present ourselves in the best possible light. After all, we want to be the best. We’re just fine, we say; everything is just peachy keen. But, inside, our conscience is weeping, as we remember what was said to our spouse the other night, how we reacted to our kids when they didn’t complete their homework, what happened after work that night, those lust-filled thoughts that continue to race in the mind. Truth be told, we know how far we are from being the best, but we want others to see us whole, healthy and strong. Even as satan holds these into the light of our memories, we try all the harder to present ourselves as being a good Christian.

“Good Christian:” there’s an oxymoron if there ever was one. The common perception is that a “good Christian” has his or her stuff together. They have no doubts or fears. Their family life is as perfect. They know every answer to every question in Sunday school. They even have a monogrammed Bible cover.

This is backwards thinking; in fact, it’s wrong, plain wrong. A “good Christian” has nothing in and of himself or herself to boast about. If you are looking for a definition of “good” Christian, it’s nothing more than this: a sinner who realizes just how weak he is and just how desperately she needs Jesus for rescue, and turns to Him, in faith, trusting that He will hear the cry, “Lord, have mercy.” That’s the point Jesus is making when He refers to a child.

Our North American culture still holds onto the Romantic idea that children are innocent, priceless, angelic treasures. Put that away for a moment. In Bible times, children were tolerated as adults waited for them to grow up to become a productive part of the culture and society. Boys were to be put to work in the family business, be it a rudimentary industry or agriculture; girls would help their mothers cook, clean, and help tend some animals until they were old enough to marry and become another man’s problem. So, when Jesus brings out a child and uses a child as a model of what it is to be great, it would have seemed totally backwards to those gathered.

Jesus says, “Unless you turn and become like children you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom.” The child is the greatest among them because the child has the greatest need. The child is completely dependent upon the parents for food, shelter, care – all of the first article gifts included in “daily bread.” It is this very dependence that makes the child the greatest.

But Jesus is using the child to illustrate that the greatest in the Kingdom isn’t a “good Christian,” the strongest, the most powerful, the richest, or those who are closest to Him. Rather, the greatest – the most important person in the kingdom – is the one who, like a child, is totally dependent on someone else, someone whom the world sees as the weakest. In other words, to borrow from Dr. Pierce, in the church the most important person is the one whose soul is hurt the most, who is in danger of losing their faith, whose conscience has become so twisted that they are trapped in their sins and can’t find their own way out.

But, there is a way out. Jesus says one must turn and become like children. “Turn” is a Hebraism for repent. Repentance is turning away from ones sins and, in sorrow for what was done and in faith in Christ alone, to the cross of Jesus. The family fight, the lustful thoughts, the foul language, the words used as weapons, repent of them: confess them to Christ and receive His forgiveness. And, then, stop trying to carry them, stop trying to hide them behind a façade, stop pretending to be “good Christians.” For that matter, repent of being a good Christian. Instead, be as dependent as a child, repenting of all of the foolish thinking that you have something to offer, that you are great in and of yourself, and instead turn only to Jesus.

Martin Luther once said that the church is a hospital for sinners. It’s where the child of God receives grace, mercy and forgiveness for wounding other Christians. It’s where the soul finds healing, restoration, and strength from being wounded during the week. The term “safe place,” has become popular in today’s culture. It usually has something to do with not having your feelings hurt. The church isn’t a safe place – in fact, part of the church’s responsibility is to proclaim the Law that cuts to the heart of the sinner. It’s going to hurt. The church isn’t a safe place; it’s a sanctuary. You hear the word “sanctus” hiding there; it means holy, a place that’s set apart. What sets it apart is it is God’s house, where He promises to abide. But, He never lives alone and by Himself. He dwells among sinners. He dwells among the weakest, the most broken, the ones who need Him most.

I think we forget that sometimes, the truth that God dwells with sinners. That was the very reason Jesus became enfleshed in the womb of Virgin Mary: so that He, filled with grace and truth, could become Immanuel, God With Us. Jesus dwells among the sinners, lives with tax collectors, eats with prostitutes, and associates with those whom society cast out. Your Lord comes to spouses, and children, and students, and employees and employers and retirees and, yes, even pastors who are so caught up in being the greatest and the best, and He calls out and says, “turn…become like a child. Stop trying to be the best and the greatest and instead, repent.”  Jesus, the Great Physician of Body and Soul, said “It’s not the healthy who need a doctor but the sick.” He wasn’t just referring to palseyed limbs and blind eyes and deaf ears – He was speaking of sin’s illness that cannot be cured by human medicine. Only Christ’s healing is into eternity.   He brings us to His house, this sinner’s hospital, and here He cleanses us with Baptismal water, He wraps us in the balm of the Good News of sins forgiven, He feeds us with His Body and His Blood. The bill, paid in full, signed with simply a cross.

If you want to see the greatest in the Kingdom, He was there, on the cross for you. Stripped of His clothes, and wrapped in the sins of the world, Christ’s weakness was on full display. When His dry, raspy throat cried out “It is finished,” Satan and his minions thought they had won the victory. But, remember, Jesus said, “My power is made perfect in weakness.” From the weakness of His death on the cross to the greatness of Easter resurrection comes the full gift of forgiveness.

In my office is a wooden crucifix – a cross with the body of Jesus on it. It was given to me by Godfrey. Godfrey was an old man. He was nearly blind by the time I met him, only able to read the largest of large print on good days. He would come to the Lord’s Table to receive the Lord’s Supper, and tears would be streaming down his cheeks. They would stop as He received Christ’s gifts for Him hidden beneath in bread and wine. As the blessing was said, he would raise his face toward my voice and he would smile, a big, goofy grin and tears would again form in his eyes.  One day, visiting with him in his living room, I asked why he cries every Sunday when receiving the Sacrament. “Pastor,” he said, “you know how St. Paul called himself ‘chief among sinners’? He was an amateur! He had nothing on me. Yet, Jesus invites me to eat with Him at His table? I’m so unworthy. Some Sundays, I’m afraid there will be a voice that says, ‘Take and eat…but not you, Godfrey…not you.’ But, every Sunday, I come to the Table and I kneel and every Sunday Jesus says, “This is my body and my blood for you. Take and eat.” And I do. And in that moment, Christ is for me – who else can stand against me? And my tears become tears of joy because I am forgiven. Me…Christ forgives me.”

That’s what it looks like when the greatest becomes the least, and when the weakest becomes the greatest in the kingdom of God. Amen.

Mary, Martha and Marge: Servants of Christ - John 11: 17-27 (Funeral sermon)

Sermon: The Funeral of Marge H., widow of LCMS Pastor, Rev. H.

Text: John 11: 17-27

Dear family and friends: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

At a pastor’s funeral, he is traditionally dressed in his alb and stole and he is buried with the full rites of the church – if possible, at the congregation he served as a servant of Christ. There is solemn pomp and circumstance as district officials and pastors – also dressed in white albs and red stoles – accompany the casket from altar to the graveside. It’s a reversal of the rite of ordination into the office of the ministry from serving the church militant to joining the church triumphant at rest, awaiting the resurrection he preached and taught to Christ’s people.

But we don’t do that for his wife. For a pastor’s wife, it’s different. It’s even more marked today. Instead of being in the sanctuary among the people her husband served, we are at the cemetery among the tombstones. A filled sanctuary is reduced to the two dozen of us, and pews of white-and-red clad pastors are notedly absent. But even if things were “normal,” the reality is that the church doesn’t do such things for a pastor’s wife. It’s a sad commentary because the pastor’s wife stands alongside her husband in so many ways that her service, too, should be recognized in some way. And, if a pastor is honored for service in the apostolic ministry, then the faithful pastor’s wife ought to be honored for her service in fulfilling the role of both Mary and Martha.

But, if a pastor is buried with his alb and stole, what should his wife be buried with?

If we needed a symbol of her role as a Martha, I suppose we could use a church apron. A pastor’s wife certainly knows something about service. Marge spent plenty of time, over the years, helping make coffee, set out the pot luck dishes, iron clerical shirts, take care of you, [daughter], while your dad was at a church meeting, and managing the parsonage on a pastor’s salary. She joked that some nights, as she fell asleep, she prayed, “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, that’s one less cake I have to make.” Even after your dad passed, she still served: I watched her help set up communion and get things ready for Sunday school. And you told me that after she moved into the nursing home she still helped care for others as long as she was able – “ever the pastor’s wife,” you said.

But, if we needed a symbol for her as a Mary, we could use a footstool.  A pastor’s wife knows what it is to sit down at Jesus’ feet and hear His Words for her. Marge knew, believed, trusted and relied that Jesus didn’t just die for the world, or for the congregation her husband served, but specifically for her. A baptized child of God, she firmly believed that Jesus died for her, forgave her, blessed her, and carried her through those great and challenging moments in the valley of the shadow. I know this because I heard her confess it Sunday after Sunday. Even as her memory began to fail, even as names and places started slipping into the fog of lost memories, she knew her Savior, and she knew Him by name: Jesus, the Good Shepherd, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.

Marge knew: there is a time and a place for Martha-like service and there is a time and a place for sitting quietly and listening like Mary.

There’s another time in the Scriptures when Mary and Martha are mentioned. The sisters sent a message to Jesus that Lazarus, their brother, was dying. The message, part prayer, part demand, filled with expectation for a rapid response: “Come Lord Jesus, come!” He didn’t hurry; Jesus didn’t hustle. In fact, John noted that Jesus deliberately delayed. That delay cost Lazarus his life. When Martha saw Jesus in the distance, she hurried out to greet Him: if He had only hurried, if He had come when asked, Lazarus would not have died. But, she quickly added, even in the face of death, “I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give.” Her confession showed her faith rested solely in Jesus, not in her work, in her service, in her best-of-intentions. Her sure and certain confidence in Christ and the promises of God, even in the face of death, allowed her to say, “I know that Lazarus will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.” Jesus, the Lord of Life and death, answered with the words we know so well and, on days like this, you hold dear, trusting in His promise for not only Lazarus, but for our loved ones who die in the faith: “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall live. And everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

“Do you believe this?” If you asked Marge that question twenty years ago, she could have answered with Martha, “Yes, I believe you are the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God.” She could have said the Apostle’s Creed, that we believe in the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life of the world to come. She could have spoken of what it is to receive the body and blood of Christ for the forgiveness of her sins, and she would have remembered the resurrection promise of Christ for herself. She could have prayed the Lord’s Prayer and the 23^rd Psalm as she saw herself entering the valley of the shadow of dementia and memory loss, knowing her Lord would never leave her alone.

Over the last fifteen years, Mary and Martha’s prayer of Jesus, “Come, Lord Jesus,” took on a new meaning for you and for Marge. It was no longer just a table prayer, asking the Lord’s presence during the meal, but a true request for His return to release her from this veil of tears. As age and illness robbed her of the memory of those words and confessions, Christ’s promises for Marge never changed. “I am the resurrection and the life,” Jesus said. “Everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.”  Faith rests in Christ, not on our ability to explain it, to be alive and active. As surely as an infant believes, by the power of the Holy Spirit, so also an elderly saint, by the same Holy Spirit, clings to faith. And nothing, not even dementia, is able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Christ has destroyed death with His death; His empty Good Friday cross and open Easter grave stands as visible promises of our own death-to-life story. Even if we cannot remember because the knowledge is stripped from us, the power of the empty cross and empty grave does not change. Baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection, Marge has received the full adoption of God as His dearly beloved child. God’s love for His children does not fade.

And, when Marge fell asleep in Christ last week, I want you to know that she was not alone. Christ Jesus was at her side attending Marge in her last moments. That evening, she fell asleep in Christ, accompanied by the angels of God. Our Lord brought Marge through this veil of tears, with all of its struggles and hardships and losses, to her time of rest. “Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of the Lord.” Her time of service in the footsteps of Martha has ended; it’s now time for rest along with Mary. Marge waits, with her husband – your father – and with the saints of old, awaiting their own Lazarus moment when Christ will return and with call “Marge, come forth.”

On that day, when the trumpets sound and the dead in Christ are raised, Marge shall step forth, body, mind and soul, whole and holy, strong and sound. And you shall see her again. And, when you do, I have a good guess what she – a good Greek woman - will say: Christos Aneste! Alethos, Aneste! It was her Easter cry, and on that day of Resurrection I have no doubt she will speak it clearly and loudly. And you, with all the saints, will join the eternal celebration. Christ is risen. He is risen, indeed! We are risen. We are risen, indeed! Alleluia.

In the name of Jesus, our resurrected Savior. Amen.