God’s Covenant in Flesh and Blood

You know that it was not Abraham who chose God.  It was not Abraham who first called upon God, but rather God who called upon Abraham.  When he was living in a foreign land with his family, and though his family was worshiping idols, the Lord our God called Abraham to Himself.  He called him by name, and He gave him promises.  He called him to go to a place that Abraham did not yet know — yet, he heard and believed that Word of the Lord.  By the grace of God, he was a man of faith, indeed, the father of all who believe and trust in the Name of the Lord.

The promises that God gave to Abraham by His grace and mercy, for peace and life, were not only for Abraham, nor only for his own immediate children, nor only for his own descendants after the flesh.  Rather, God called Abraham, and blessed Abraham, and gave Abraham promises, and sealed those promises with a Covenant, also for your sake, and for all the nations of the earth; that all might call upon the Name of the Lord, who has mercy on all who call upon Him.

When God gave Abraham the Covenant of Circumcision, it was to seal with certainty the promise that God had given, the promise that He would fulfill in the Flesh and Blood of His own Son, born from the family of Abraham in the fullness of time.

What made Abraham faithful and the father of all who believe was the faith in his heart, which was by the Word and Spirit of God.  But even aside from Abraham’s faith, there would be given, from his own flesh, his own Seed, the Savior, who is Christ Jesus.

And so this Covenant of God with Abraham is given in his very flesh.  And it is utterly absurd.

God does such very strange things.  That Abraham and his sons, and all of his many sons who would come after him, should have a portion of the skin from their genitals cut off; and this would be God’s Covenant with Abraham and his family!  That is very strange.  It is painful.  It causes embarrassment and shame.  It causes blood.  And yet, this is God’s Covenant, sealed in flesh and blood, and attached to Abraham’s body, as surely as God’s Word should be held within his heart.

Among Abraham’s descendants there would be those who walked in the faith of their father, and those who did not.  But even Abraham himself was not always in all things faithful.  Nor Judah.  Nor David.  Those men of God lived by faith, by the grace of God, but it was God who always remained faithful to them and to His Covenant with them.

So from Abraham’s family there would come the One who fulfilled this Covenant of Circumcision, this Covenant of God’s gracious blessing, His promise that from Abraham would come a Blessing for the nations.  It was attached to the flesh of this family, until it should appear in the Flesh of God Himself, conceived and born of Mary, and on this Eighth Day circumcised according to the Law.

The Law itself was God’s Covenant with the sons of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with the sons of Israel.  For having brought them out of Egypt by His powerful arm and with His outstretched hand, He established His Covenant with them, again with flesh and blood, that is, the blood of bulls and oxen, there at Mt. Sinai.  There God appeared to them, and He sealed His Covenant with them with that blood which was sacrificed.  Not their own blood in this case, for they were spared, but blood nonetheless.  It is by blood that God forgives sins, and with blood that He gives life and salvation.

Thus, with blood He sealed His Covenant with Israel at Sinai, and He gave them His holy and righteous Law to set them apart.  As Abraham was set apart, both in his heart and in his body, so was Israel set apart to live by faith and by love.  Their lives and relationships would testify to the presence of God among them.  For they would be distinct from all the nations of the world.  They would worship the Lord in fear, love, and trust.  They would hear and heed His Word and call upon His Name.  They would be holy and perfect, as the Lord their God is holy and perfect.

So it was that He gave them His Law to discipline their flesh, to show them the way they should live and walk before Him.  But in this way, it also exposed and made clear their sins.  And it never would be fulfilled in the lives of the people, but only in the Life of Christ, who is God in the Flesh, in whom the Law is most surely written and fulfilled and completed.  Hence, even in showing them their sins, the Law also described that One who would be their Savior, the One who lives in perfect faith toward God and in perfect love toward both God and man: the Son of God, Christ Jesus.

It is to Christ that the Law has always pointed, and it still does.  True, the Ten Commandments per se were given to Israel, as part of God’s Covenant with those ancient people.  But those same Ten Commandments summarize the good and gracious Will of God, what is His good and acceptable Will, also for you.  In showing you how to live, His Commandments guide you in the way of faith and love.  They point you to your neighbor, that you should serve your neighbor as the Lord your God serves you.  And His Ten Commandments are also your tutor, pointing you to Christ Jesus.  To be sure, you are not under the Law in the way that ancient Israel was, for Christ has come, and you live under grace by faith in Him; but the Law does tutor your flesh in this poor life of labor.

A tutor in the ancient world was a trusted household slave who would take the children of the family, the sons of the father, and lead them to and from school, and help them with their lessons, and make sure they learned what they needed to know in order to live, in order to receive and use their father’s inheritance rightly.  So the Law serves this purpose for you.  It is your tutor.  It is not your salvation, but it points to the One who is your Savior.  It trains you in the way that you are to go in order to inherit the Treasures of your Father in heaven by the faith which is in Christ Jesus.

You are no doubt familiar with the way that we Lutherans have confessed the Ten Commandments, that they function as a mirror, as a curb, and also as a rule or guide for those who are reconciled to God in Christ, for those who are redeemed and righteous by faith.  The Ten Commandments are a tutor in this way.  They show you how to live.  And I suppose that is fairly easy to understand when it comes to loving and serving your neighbor.  You are not to hurt or harm your neighbor in his body, his possessions, his family, his income or reputation.  Rather, by your words and by your actions, you are to help your neighbor in all of these aspects of life.  Help him to protect his body.  Help him to keep his stuff, his wife and children.  Help to defend his name among his neighbors.

But the first three Commandments also serve as your tutor.  And this, not for your neighbor’s benefit, nor for God’s protection, as though you were going to hurt or harm Him.  No, the first three Commandments rule and guide and tutor you for your benefit, for your protection.  They direct you and even require you to do those things which are for your own good before the Lord.

Those first three Commandments direct you to look to the Lord your God; and in that command there is the certainty that He desires to hear you.  They command you to hear His Word, because it is by His Word that He gives you grace and every blessing.  It is by His Word that He names you with His own Name.  And because He has named you with His own Name, the way in which you speak and the way in which you live are a confession of who your Father is, of who your God is.

So the first three Commandments command you — with all your heart, with all your mind, with your body and your voice — to fear, love, and trust in the one true God above all things.  Not because He needs you, but you need Him.  He calls you to Himself in love, because He is your Life and your Salvation.  It is by faith that you receive all of His gifts.  It is in prayer that you call upon Him.  And it is with His Word that He serves you and answers all your prayers and all your needs.

His Word, ultimately — from before the foundation of the world, and even into eternity — the Word of the Lord is the Son of God, your Savior, Jesus Christ, whom the Father has given in the flesh and blood of Abraham.  He is the Seed of Abraham, the promised One in whom the nations of the world are blessed; in whom you also are blessed through the forgiveness of all your sins.

In Christ Jesus the Covenant that God established with Abraham has been satisfied and fulfilled.  And not in some abstract, general sort of way, but this Son of God, Christ Jesus, born of Mary, actually receives in His own flesh, in His own genitals, the Covenant of Circumcision.  He bleeds.  He hurts.  He suffers, already as an Infant, in keeping with the Law of God, which neither Abraham nor any of His other sons or daughters, nor you, could have kept or fulfilled.  But Jesus does it all.

Already as an Infant, and into His childhood, and into His manhood — throughout His Life, even unto death, and in His Resurrection from the dead — He has kept the whole entire Law of God.  Every jot.  Every tittle.  Every Commandment, He has kept.  And all that you have broken, He has repaired and rectified in His own Body, by His innocent suffering and death upon the Cross, and in His glorious Resurrection.  He has atoned for all of your sins by the shedding of His Blood.

In perfect faith and love He has lived.  In perfect faith and love He has died.  And so it is that, by His Cross and in His Resurrection, He has redeemed you from sin, death, the devil, and hell, and He has reconciled you to the Lord your God in His own Body, in His own Flesh and Blood.

This incarnate Son of God, Christ Jesus, is the Lamb.  He is the One whom God the Father has provided for Himself in the place of Abraham’s beloved Isaac.  He is the Lamb who is given in place of all the sons of Israel, while God humbles Pharaoh under His thumb.  He is the Lamb who is given for the sins of the world.  He bleeds and dies that you might live.  And He feeds you with Himself, with the Passover Feast of His own holy Body and precious Blood, so that you may live.

Not only that, but everything that He has done and accomplished, for you and for all people, has also been given to you by His Word and with His Name in the Sacrament of your Holy Baptism.

St. Paul calls Holy Baptism the Circumcision made without hands.  It is the Circumcision of your heart, mind, and spirit.  It is the Circumcision worked by the Word and Spirit of the Lord, who cleanses you, who purifies you through the forgiveness of your sins by the blood of Jesus Christ.

In the dying and rising of Holy Baptism, it is not only that the Law disciplines you by the way of the Cross, but all the more so does the Gospel forgive you by the Cross and in the Resurrection of the Lord.  It does so by laying Christ Jesus on your heart with the gift and promise of His grace; and not only on your heart, but on your flesh.  For the Word of Baptism is combined and included with the water of Baptism that washes over your flesh and cleanses you inside and out.  It cleanses your conscience before God, and it cleanses your flesh for the Resurrection unto everlasting Life.

In Holy Baptism, the Name of God, which Jesus has received and bears forever in His own Body of human flesh and blood, has been given to you in your flesh.  It has been written by His Cross and with His Blood upon your forehead and your heart, upon your body, soul, and spirit.  So, then, in the Resurrection of your body you shall be glorious in Christ, and you shall see Him as He is.

You are named by God.  And with His Name God has given you Himself.  And with Himself He has given you His Life.  You belong to Him.  You are a child of Abraham by faith in this God.  Even better, you are a child of God in Christ Jesus.  You are an heir of the Father.  You are a son most beloved.  Everything He has belongs to you.  With His Name He has given you everything.

With His Name, through the forgiveness of all your sins, He has cleansed and purified your heart.  He has also cleansed and purified your lips and your life in the flesh, so that you are able by His grace to sing, to pray, and to keep the Feast at all times and in all places, to the glory of His Name, because you belong to Him.  You are in Christ Jesus.  That is your identity.  That is your sonship, be you boy or girl.  That is your salvation of body and soul, here in time and hereafter in eternity.

All thanks and praise be unto God through this Savior, Jesus Christ, who has fulfilled God’s holy Law and given you Himself in peace and love, unto the Resurrection and the Life everlasting.

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

This Is the New Testament in the Blood of Jesus Christ

The New Year forces you to think about time, how it’s always slipping away, and how you strive so desperately to hang onto it, not to waste it or lose it, that you too often fail to enjoy it or make use of it.  Time itself, like the rest of creation, has been warped and burdened by the bondage and curse of sin.  And the one thing that is certain for you and all of yours, as time keeps on ticking into the future, is that one day your time in this world will be up, and then you are going to die.

With each birthday that comes and goes, and with every year that passes, you know you’re that much closer to the grave.  And as you grow older, you may become more desperate to hang onto the time you have, or else despair at the seeming futility of life.  The parties and celebrations, such as many enjoyed (or tried to enjoy) last night, are often as not an attempted escape, or a pretense that everything is just fine.  But in the light of day, most everyone knows better (or they should).

It hasn’t always been that way, not from the very beginning when God created the heavens and the earth.  Nor did He intend for time to be a burden and a curse.  It was — and by His grace, it still is — one of His many blessings, a significant part of His good creation, designed to give your life structure and purpose and meaning.  The sun and moon and stars mark the days and years of a life and a world that God the Lord has given for you to enjoy in His gracious presence.

It is possible for you to live that way, by His grace, because the coming of Christ Jesus in the Flesh — His coming into this world of history and time — has restored God’s gift of time to its original purpose and blessing.  Every minute that Christ our Savior lived as the true Man here on earth, from infancy to adulthood, from the womb to the tomb, was thus given the divine significance of God Himself.  In Him every minute counts, no longer in desperation, but in the joy of real life.

And so it is that your time as a member of His Church has been redeemed and sanctified by Christ Jesus; indeed, your time already here and now is really the beginning of eternity with Him.  Which means that you can mark the passing of time — not with sadness and regret for the past, nor with false hopes and your own resolutions for the future — but with confidence in your Savior.

Even so, we are not here today to celebrate the secular New Year.  There’s nothing wrong with New Year’s celebrations, for Christ has redeemed such occasions by His grace, and you are free to enjoy the many good gifts that He bestows upon you in this body and life.  But as a congregation of His Church, we celebrate Christ Jesus Himself, who He is and what He has done to save us.  Only then, having celebrated Christ and His great Salvation, are we able to celebrate anything else.

In particular, the Holy Gospel appointed for this Eighth Day of Christmas has set before you the Name and Circumcision of Jesus, thus declaring God’s great love for you in the sending of His Son into the Flesh, born of the Woman under the Law, in order to redeem you for everlasting Life.

By faith in His Word, we recognize that, in the Circumcision of our Lord Jesus, God Himself was already submitting Himself to the demands of His own Law on behalf of all the children of men, accomplishing divine righteousness in His own Body of flesh and blood like yours, in order that you should be justified in Him and share in His divine, eternal Life.  In fact, everything that Christ the Lord came to do was already underway and being established in His Circumcision.

There was, first all, His obedience to the Law on behalf of fallen man.  As the sinless Son of God, our Lord did not require for Himself the promise and forgiveness of the Covenant.  But He was obedient to the Law from the very first — and as He grew, He was obedient to His human parents in keeping with the Fourth Commandment — that He might obtain the righteousness of God for you and all people.  Thus was He subjected to the Law of Circumcision in His own holy Flesh.

In this way, also, the Lord was at work to bring about the New Creation.  For in His Circumcision there is already the first shedding of the Savior’s Blood — His Blood of the New Covenant — by which He makes Atonement for the sins of the whole world, and so also cleanses you of all sins.

Indeed, it was entirely appropriate that the obedience and suffering of Christ Jesus should begin with His Circumcision, since Circumcision was given to Abraham by the Lord God Himself as the sign and seal of His Covenant, a Sacrament of His Word.  It was a tangible promise of the Savior who would come from the loins of Father Abraham.  And so it was that, by His Circumcision, in His own Flesh and Blood as the Seed of Abraham, the Lord God fulfilled this sacred Covenant.

Leave it to the Lord to establish His Covenant in such a flesh-and-blood, painful, and embarrassing way!  For this is how He loves to work, to reveal and give Himself to you in the most down-to-earth ways and means.  As He created Adam out of dirt, and as He entered into His Creation by His conception and birth of the Woman, St. Mary, He gets right down into it with all of us on earth.

Not so different is the way that He promises truly marvelous things, but then lets you wait for what seems like forever — until it all seems lost and hopeless — before He does what He has spoken.

Consider the history of Circumcision: Abraham was ninety-nine years old, and after many years of promises from God, his time was running out.  He was old, and he was tired.  He was nervous and scared about the future.  But just then, when it surely must have seemed as though it were already too late, the Lord God appears with yet another Word of promise.  And such a Word it is!

Everything God says to Abraham seems ludicrous, like so much foolish nonsense!  Cut off the foreskin from your genitals, and do the same with all the males of your household, and that will be My Covenant with you.  And as for you, old man — your own body as good as dead, and your wife a barren old woman — you will yet become the father of countless children.  Indeed, the day will soon be here when you must circumcise the son whom I have promised, a son of your own flesh and blood, conceived and born of your own wife according to My Word.

Such a Covenant as that is almost as hard to believe as the Words and promises of God concerning the waters of Baptism, that these are a gracious water of life, a rich and full washing away of sin; or the Absolution of a sinful human pastor, that by it your sins are forgiven before God in heaven, as by Christ your dear Lord Himself; or the tiny piece of bread and the little drink of wine in the Lord’s Supper, that these are His true Body and Blood, given and poured out for you.

Yet, as wild and crazy as the promise seemed, Abraham believed the Word of God, and he lived by faith in that Word of promise.  And the Lord God was indeed faithful in doing all that He had spoken, in fulfilling His Covenant with Father Abraham.  He gave to him a son in his old age; He multiplied his descendants; and when they were enslaved in the land of Egypt, He brought them out of bondage with a mighty, outstretched hand, and He confirmed His Covenant with them — by the blood of the Passover Lamb, and by the sacrificial blood of bulls and goats at Mount Sinai.

And finally, after many hundreds of years, when the time had fully come, God sent forth His Son, born of the Woman, the Blessed Virgin Mary.  And thus He came, the promised Seed of Abraham, conceived and born according to the Word and promise of God — born under the Law to redeem those who were under the Law — born to redeem you, that you might become a child of Abraham by faith; and even better, that you might be adopted as a son of God in Christ Jesus, your Lord.

Indeed, the Covenant Law of Circumcision was a tutor preparing for the Christ; and with His own Circumcision on the Eighth Day, His Flesh & Blood became the New Covenant, replacing the Old.

Now, for the Jews Circumcision on the eighth day was also the time when a newborn son would be named — just as “Abraham” himself was given that name, “the father of many nations,” when he received the Covenant of Circumcision.  So also did the Christ then receive that Name which was given by the Lord to Mary and Joseph through the Archangel Gabriel.  The Church therefore remembers and celebrates both the Name and the Circumcision of Jesus on this Holy Day.

This Name, Jesus, means “Yahweh Saves.”  For He is born to save His people from their sins; and His Name is a confession of the Gospel, that in Him God is reconciling the world unto Himself.

Everything has been fundamentally changed, forever and for better, with the coming of this Son of God in His own human Flesh and Blood.  Indeed, the entire history of the world and the daily passage of time have new and real meaning in Him, in His Body crucified and risen from the dead; no less so than the entire Old Testament has reached its true meaning and fulfillment in Him.

By way of one significant example, especially appropriate to this day and the occasion before us, the Old Testament Covenant of Circumcision has been fulfilled in Christ Jesus, in such a way that it has been forever replaced — for you and all believers, boys and girls alike, adults and children — with the New Testament Sacrament of Holy Baptism.  So does St. Paul write to the Colossians, that “in Him you were also circumcised with a Circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the Circumcision of Christ, having been buried with Him in Baptism.”

So, too, it was in that washing of the water with His Word and Holy Spirit that God the Lord put His Name on you — the Holy Name of “Jesus.”  For just as He received His saving Name at His Circumcision on the Eighth Day, so have you received His Name by your Baptism into His Cross and Resurrection.  And His Name, “Jesus,” bestows on you the very Salvation He has won.

Consequently, each and every Sunday — on the “Eighth Day,” as the early Christians understood it to be — the people of God leave behind the cares and worries of the workaday world and the seven-day week, and in the Liturgy of the Gospel they enter with confidence and peace, with faith and thanksgiving, into the everlasting Life of the new Heavens and the new Earth, the Home where the Righteousness of Christ abounds in the neverending Day of His Resurrection from the dead.

The passage of time in this life on earth with all its griefs and sorrows has been superceded by the fact that you have been re-created for eternal Life with God in Paradise.  You are no longer trapped by the daily grind of this world, by the endless cycle of week-after-week and year-after-year, with nothing much to hope for, but only more of the same-ol’ same-ol’ thing and a string of short-lived resolutions.  All of that is temporary; it doesn’t define who you really are, nor what you will be.

By your Baptism into Christ you already participate in His New Creation.  By faith in Christ Jesus — who circumcised your heart and gave to you His Name in those holy waters by His Word — you are living already with Him in the Garden of Paradise, walking with your Lord in the pleasure of a Day that never ends.  And for that reason, you are able to enjoy the days and weeks and years that you live on this earth, as well; because you do so in the confidence and the sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to the neverending Day beyond all trials, tribulations, and temptations.

So also on this Day, we all together as the Church participate in the everlasting Life and Salvation of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Not by way of self-imposed resolutions to try harder and do better, though we surely ought to do both; but we enter into Life by receiving the Gift of Christ Himself, who gives meaning and purpose to this day and every other day, to this New Year and to every other year.  As we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, and as you receive His Holy Communion, you are intimately united with Him — in His Body and His Blood — unto the Life everlasting.

It is was precisely for this reason and this purpose that He was conceived and born of St. Mary.  And so, too, it was for this reason and this purpose that He shed the Blood of Circumcision, and that He was given the Name Jesus.  For so has He brought completion and fulfillment to the Old Testament, and so does He bring to you the New Testament in His Blood, as surely as He has given you the new birth of Holy Baptism, and put His Name on you, and granted you a permanent place of Peace and Rest in the Kingdom of His God and Father, in the City of the Living God.

The One who calls you is faithful, and at exactly the right time He does all that He has promised.

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

The Lord Grants You His Peace in the Liturgy of His Gospel

What you long for above all else is Peace, such as the world does not know and cannot give, and you cannot get for yourself.  All of your past regrets over this past year and over the course of your life — all of your present resolutions — and all of your future hopes — all center in a longing for true and lasting peace.  For there is this deep hunger and thirst within your soul which cannot be satisfied, a restlessness of heart and mind that cannot be stilled, until you are at peace with God.

Death is not the answer or the solution, in case you have contemplated that possibility.  Suicide is not a means of grace but a grave sin of despair.  Dying of natural causes won’t bring you peace, either, not the peace you’re looking for — not if it is already lacking in your heart and life now.

You want your burdens to be lifted, but peace is not found in retirement, nor in a day off, a long weekend, or even an extended vacation.  A sabbatical from work brings no real rest without peace, whereas true peace enables you to rest and rejoice even while you’re working long hard days.

You want your enemies to give up and go away.  You want your foes to stop fighting with you.  You want your persecutors to stop picking on you.  You want the world to leave you alone.  But there is no true peace in such a cease fire, nor in a stalemate or a tense truce.  “World peace” may be measured by periods of time without any wars, but the true peace that you need is more than avoiding confrontation, it is more than managing to make it through the day without conflict.

You want comfort and confidence.  You want safety and security.  There is no peace without these things.  But none of this is found in the temporary institutions and investments of this world.  Life on earth itself is fleeting, it is perishing, it is temporary.  There is no safety and security in that.

Money will not buy you true or lasting peace. Your house and home cannot keep you safe and secure against your real enemies lurking within and without.  All the creature comforts in the world will not prevent your death.  Family and friends are no more helpful than earthborn mortal princes in protecting you from the grave and preserving your life.  Then again, simply to go on living, in itself, offers no peace or rest, whether you are active, bedridden, comatose, or driven to extremes.

The Law has an appearance of an answer, because the Law of God is good and wise.  It seems to offer a solution to your restlessness: Simply do what it commands, and avoid what it forbids, and you’ll have it made.  Keep you nose clean and stay out of trouble, and you’ll have nothing to fear.

To be sure, you can and should discipline yourself to live according to the Law of God.  You can and should train yourself in such outward righteousness.  You can stay your hand from hurting, you can extend your hand to help, and your neighbor’s life on earth is better for it.  That is a good thing.  But it still isn’t peace.  It does not satisfy the Law, nor can the Law satisfy your heart.

The Law demands perfection, and there is no such perfection in your fallen flesh.  Despite your best of intentions and firm resolutions, you are weak, and you fail.  No matter how hard you try, you can’t make up for all your past mistakes, you can’t undo the wrongs you have done, and you cannot pay back all the debts you owe.  Nor do all your efforts to keep the Law bring any peace or rest to your anxious heart and troubled mind; they rather add to your burdens and your stress.

The Law requires that you exercise divine perfection in all your thoughts, words, and deeds, in all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.  But to be honest, what you find within yourself is laziness and selfishness, a battle between pride on the one hand and despair on the other, and a sickness unto death far worse than any plague or pandemic.  The fall into sin resides not only in your mortal flesh with all its flaws and blemishes, but in the way that you think, in the way that you feel, and in the way that you really want to speak and act, even if you restrain yourself from doing so.

Religious rites and ceremonies are not the answer, either, whether they be sparse and simple or grand and formal.  They are neither the problem nor the solution in themselves, though they may indeed be beautiful and meet, right, and salutary as vehicles for the Word of God and prayer.  In so far as they are human works, they cannot obtain the peace that you are looking for.  Which is to say that your own piety and religiosity will not (and cannot) save you — not from the war in your members, not from the conflict in your heart, and not from the restlessness of your thoughts.

Not even the God-given Covenant of Circumcision could save anyone apart from the fulfillment of that divine promise in Christ Jesus.  He is what the Law demands.  And the same Lord Jesus is what the Gospel now gives you.  For He has come to save you, as His Holy Name confesses.  He is Yahweh in the Flesh, who saves you from sin and death and gives you divine, eternal Life in and with Himself.  This is the grace of God, His good and gracious Will for your salvation, which is done when He keeps the Law, defeats your enemies, and preserves you in His Word and faith.

In Christ Jesus is finally found and realized the perfect Life of God in the perfect Man, in flesh and blood exactly like your own, save only without any sins of His own.  Even from the womb, from childbirth and infancy, He is the one true God who is also the one true Man.  He even has private parts, which He exposes to the knife and to the Law — and on the Cross in humility and shame.

All of this because, not only has He become a true Man of flesh and blood, but He has voluntarily assumed the circumstances of fallen man, all the curse and consequences of sin and death.  Though He has no sins of His own, He assumes the sins of the world and takes them upon Himself, into His flesh, into all of His members; He owns them as though they were His own faults and failings.  So it is that He will be condemned by God and man as a lawbreaker and crucified as a criminal.

Because He does it all as true God and Man, perfectly united in His one Person, in His relationship of perfect faith and love with His God and Father — voluntarily, in righteousness and holiness, innocence and blessedness — His sacrificial death upon the Cross is the perfect satisfaction and fulfillment of the entire Law.  Here is true faith and real love.  Here is the right worship of God.

In Christ Jesus, in His Person and His good work, all of the Law’s demands are met and kept.  And at the same time, in His death and in the shedding of His precious Blood — beginning already on the Eighth Day in His Circumcision — with His death and bloodshed, all the Law’s punishments are completed, and all of its debts are paid in full.  There is nothing lacking, nothing left undone.

That is how and why He now preaches, not punishment, but Peace to His people.  So does He speak tenderly to the heart of Jerusalem, that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned.

And so does He speak Peace to you and to your heart, with such tenderness, with such grace and mercy.  And with such speaking — as God has ever chosen to work — by the preaching of His Gospel, by His Word of Absolution — He names you with His own Holy Name, and He blesses you with that very Peace which He speaks, such as this world neither knows nor can it ever give.

For not only has the Lord your God taken your place — under the Cross, under the curse of sin and death, in flesh and blood just like your own — not only has He taken your place and resolved whatever was amiss in your heart, mind, body, soul, and spirit, but He has done so in order to give you His place in your own flesh and blood, cleansed and purified of sin and death forevermore.

He has given you His Name, His Spirit, and His Sonship; and with His Sonship, He has also given to you His inheritance as the beloved and well-pleasing Son of God.  Everything that is God the Father’s is His, and everything that is His is now also yours.  For you have received the adoption of sons.  In fact, you are all sons of God in Christ Jesus — whatever sort of body parts you have — for your Sonship is that of Jesus, the Christ.  And everything that belongs to Him is now yours.

Indeed, Christ Jesus Himself is yours, and there is nothing lacking in Him.  He is your Savior and dear Friend, and He is your own Brother, not only in the flesh, but in the Household and Family of God.  His God and Father is your God and Father, as He has also taught you and invited you to pray with all boldness and confidence.  And He has poured out His Spirit generously upon you by the Ministry of His Gospel, unto righteousness and holiness and the Life everlasting of your body and soul in the neverending “Eighth Day” of the Lord’s own bodily Resurrection from the dead.

It’s not by accident that Jesus was circumcised on the Eighth Day, but in accordance with the Law of the Lord and the Covenant that God established with Father Abraham.  And from the earliest days of the Church, that Eighth Day was understood to be significant of what the Lord would do and accomplish in Christ Jesus, the promised Seed of Abraham.  It points beyond the days and weeks of this life on earth, beyond the sun, moon, and stars with their seasons.  It points to the Day of the Resurrection, in which there is no longer any night; and there is no longer any death; and there is no longer any sadness, any weeping or sickness or fear, but Peace and Rest in Christ Jesus.

Instead of all your guilt and shame, instead of all your sins and iniquity, instead of all your griefs and sorrows, now there is the Lord’s free and full forgiveness, and with it His Life and Salvation — not just existing, slogging forward day after day, but living at peace with God in faith and love.  For God has reconciled you and all the world to Himself in Christ Jesus.  And He has called you to be at peace with Him, to be reconciled to Him, by faith in His Gospel.  That is the heart of real Peace, that you have a friendship with God; that you are close to Him, and He is close to you; that you are His own dear child, a beloved member of His Family; and that you are at home with Him.

Instead of enmity and alienation, instead of running away and trying to hide because you’re afraid of being punished, the Lord has prepared a place of real Peace and Sabbath Rest for you within His House.  Here you are safe.  Here you are loved and forgiven by God.  Here you live, come hell or high water against you, because here you abide in the Body of Christ, in the Bosom of His Father.

“Take they our life, goods, fame, child, and wife.”  Perhaps that’s what the New Year has in store for you.  Especially after this past year, we all know how precarious and scary this world can be.  But, come what may, you remain safe and sound in Christ Jesus, in whom you have real security, even in the face of death.  For safety and salvation have been granted to you — with the Lord’s own Name — in the waters of your Holy Baptism, which St. Paul describes as “the circumcision made without hands.”  That Sacrament is and remains your “Eighth Day,” no matter your age, because it is your participation in the Resurrection of Christ Jesus by His Word and Holy Spirit.

By the washing of the water with His Word you were given the Name of Jesus, which is the Name of God, the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  So has He bound Himself to you, and you to Him, for all the days and weeks and months and years of your life on earth, unto the Resurrection and the Life everlasting.  Never will He leave you or forsake you.

Indeed, as you are baptized into Christ Jesus, a member of His Body and Bride, the Church, so does He nurture and sustain you in the Holy Communion of His Body and His Blood, given and poured out for you and for the many.  It is a holy Communion indeed, for you are what you eat, of one flesh and blood with the incarnate Son of God.  Intimately united with Him in body and soul, you are united with His Father and the Holy Spirit.  And here in that fellowship of the Holy Trinity you are united with all your brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus, not only those here, but those who are far away, and those who have lived and died before you, and those who shall come after you.  For you belong to this holy Communion in the Body of Christ, in the New Covenant of His Blood.

These rites and ceremonies of the Divine Service — the rites and ceremonies of the Holy Liturgy in the Word and Sacraments of the Gospel — these do give you Peace.  Not because they are your work, but because they are the good Word and Work and the gracious Gift of God in Christ Jesus.

Consider how often the Liturgy declares to you the Peace of the Lord in and with His Name, and take it to heart that His Word does and gives exactly what it says.  Here is the Peace that you long for, the Peace that surpasses all human understanding.  It is your Peace with God and with each other in the Gospel of Christ Jesus.  It is the perfect Peace of His “Eighth Day,” which is yours in Him today, tomorrow, and all year long, unto the end of your life, even unto Life everlasting.

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

Entering the Eighth Day by the Name & Circumcision of Jesus

Some days are longer than others — but that can mean very different things.  Most of us prefer the long sunny days of summer to the short dark days of winter.  But when we talk about a “long day,” it usually refers to one that has been difficult and tedious.  Such “long days,” when they pile up, tend to become long weeks, long months, and sometimes long hard years.

There is, however, yet another Day which actually goes on forever, one that is not “long,” but eternal.  Not difficult, tedious, or painful, but full of light and life and love and peace.  A Day that never ends, in which there is no more night, nor darkness anymore; no hurt, no fear, no sadness.

Your days on earth can be long and hard, and they often are, because they are burdened by sin and death.  Since everything is dying, and there are limited hours of daylight, there is a constant battle to grow and gather food while you can, and to shore up your life against the encroaching night.

But now, the Circumcision of the Lord Jesus points you to the Eighth Day — not the beginning of yet another week, another month, or another year, but the never-ending Day beyond all blood, sweat, and tears.  The eternal Day of life with God in the New Creation of the Lord’s Resurrection.  The dawning of the new heavens and the new earth, in which there is no more nighttime, and no more darkness or death.  The Day that doesn’t require any alarm clocks or time clocks, or watches or schedules, because work is no more cursed by sin, neither is it a battle to the death, but work and play alike are simply part of living the Life that is yours by the grace of God in Christ Jesus.

So shall it be, because Christ Jesus has redeemed and sanctified all of creation, man in particular, by His becoming flesh of our flesh, by His innocent death and holy bloodshed.  And, behold, all things are made brand new in His risen Body.  For He has taken your flesh to be His own, and He has taken your sin and death upon Himself to bear it in His Body to the Cross.  So it is that, in His Resurrection from the dead, your sin and death are left behind, as He enters into heaven for you.

As He has thus entered upon the eternal Eighth Day on your behalf by His Cross & Resurrection, so have you also entered upon that Eighth Day by your Baptism in His Name.

In his Letter to the Church at Colossae, St. Paul describes Holy Baptism as a “circumcision made without hands.”  In doing so, he identifies your connection to the Circumcision of Jesus, which is the fulfillment of the Covenant of Circumcision that the Lord made with Abraham and his Seed.

Circumcision was both the Law and the Gospel for Abraham and his heirs.  It was commanded and required, and there were serious consequences for males who were not circumcised.  Without this cutting of the flesh, they were cut off from the fellowship of Israel.  But circumcision itself was indeed a cutting.  It was painful and bloody.  For adult men, it was debilitating for several days.

Yet, however odd or embarrassing it might be, circumcision was God’s Covenant with Abraham, and a promise that was given to Father Abraham and all his children.  Not the cutting in and of itself, but the cutting included in God’s command and combined with God’s Word.  Thus, it was a divine promise signed and sealed in the very flesh of the Patriarch and his sons.  For the Seed of Abraham would inherit the earth, and in that Seed of Abraham all the nations would be blessed.  In Him, Abraham would become the father of many nations, according to the promise of God.

Now that Covenant and its promise have been fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ.  In submitting to the Law of Circumcision, He has taken the burden of the entire Law upon Himself, as well as the curse and consequences of sin and death.  So has He also received the inheritance of Abraham, that is, the blessing promised to his Seed forever.  For the Son of Mary, Jesus, is the Seed of Abraham.  His holy Body is of the flesh and blood of Abraham, and in that Body of His, in His own flesh, He bears — and bears away — all the sin and death of all mankind.

His Circumcision signifies all of these things, and so does it mark His Body for all of these things.

So does the Name that He is given signify and mark His identity and His vocation as the promised Seed — of Abraham, of Judah and David, of the Woman Eve, and of the Blessed Virgin, St. Mary.

To be named “Jesus” is to be called the Son of the Most High.  Indeed, it is to be the true God, Yahweh, in the flesh, who saves His people from their sins.  For He is Immanuel, God with us.  He is the Everlasting Father, the Patriarch of a new Israel, who surpasses even the great Father Abraham.  He is the true Prince of Peace, surpassing even the great kings, David and Solomon.

He is a new and better Joshua, named by God, who truly fulfills what the Lord promised through Moses, but which Moses himself could not do or accomplish.

The Law was a custodian and a tutor, leading the people out of Egypt by the staff of Moses, through the Red Sea and the wilderness, to and from Mt. Sinai, to the border of the promised land.

But now this Joshua has come, who goes ahead of the people into the waters of the Jordan River.  And He brings them, one and all, into Canaan, into the good land flowing with milk and honey.

That is what this little Lord Jesus has done for you, and for all, by receiving Circumcision in His flesh, and by receiving the Name with which His God and Father has named Him from heaven.

He has gone the full distance — from the waters of His Baptism in the Jordan River, to the Blood and Passion of His death upon the Cross.  And so also, in His Resurrection from the dead, you are brought into the true and everlasting Promised Land, which God swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, and to all who share the faith and confession of Father Abraham.

He brings you into that good land through the waters of your Baptism.  Not as a slave or a captive, but as a beloved son — a son of Abraham by faith, but so also a son of God in Christ Jesus.

Whether you are male or female, young or old, rich or poor, Jewish or Gentile, employed or un-employed, a student or retired, still very young, or already very old — you, dear Christian, are a son of God in Christ, by virtue of your Baptism into Him.

By your Baptism into Christ Jesus, His Circumcision and all that it signifies avails for you, for the removal of sin and death from your flesh and blood, from your heart and mind, body and soul; and for your resurrection to a new and everlasting Life, as a new creature living in the New Creation.

So it is that your Baptism has also named you with the Name of Jesus.  Not that each and all of you are called “Joshua.”  (How confusing would that be!?)  But everything the Name of Jesus testifies concerning Him, is now also credited to you.  It declares that you are saved by Him, who is your own true God in the flesh.  It certifies that His God and Father is now also your God and Father forever; and Christ Himself is your King, who reigns over you in peace and love from His Cross.

With His Holy Name, which He has invoked upon you and given to you, He binds Himself to you and blesses you for life.  He has done this for you in your Holy Baptism, and that is permanent.  But He also continues to do so, day by day throughout your life on earth, unto the life everlasting: by the speaking of His Word, by the preaching of His Gospel, by His absolving of your sins, and by the giving of Himself to you, His Body and His Blood, for you to eat and drink in His Supper.

Just as a father begets children, and a mother gives them birth, but then both parents continue to “name” their children with loving care for them, by teaching them, by conversations with them, by forgiving them, and by praying and confessing the Word of God with them and for them.  Each time a father calls his child by name, by the name that he has given, he calls that child his own.

So does the Lord continue to name you His own by speaking His Word to you; and with that Word He blesses you with the gift of His Spirit, who is life and health, and peace and strength, and love.

Naming you with His Name, by His Word, He guards and keeps you in body and soul.  In this life, yes, but so also for the life everlasting — for the eternal Eighth Day of life with Himself in heaven.  With His Name He claims you as His own, He identifies you with Himself and His family, as His beloved child and heir.  He is gracious toward you, compassionate and patient, because He loves you.  He delights in you.  He smiles upon you, and His countenance is bright with joy over you.

As you are named with the Name of Christ Jesus, anointed by His Spirit as a Christian, the Lord your God, your dear Father in heaven, is pleased with you and proud of you.  He is not angry or unhappy with you.  Far from it.  He reigns over you with grace and mercy and never-ending love.

That is your peace, through Jesus your Savior.  It is solid, sure, and certain in His Body, in His flesh and blood, in His already-accomplished and completed-once-for-all Cross and Resurrection.

And this is already yours, here and now; for Christ is yours even now, in your Baptism, which has left its indelible mark on you, and in this preaching of the Gospel, and in this Holy Communion.

By this grace of God in the Gospel, by this flesh and blood of Jesus, given and poured out for you at this Altar, you already live and abide with Him in the eternal Eighth Day of His Resurrection.  It is not a long hard day, but a brilliant and beautiful Day of divine Light and Life and Love.

For now it is by faith, and not by sight.  There are still days and nights, some of them longer than others, difficult and tedious.  But the Eighth Day has already dawned for you, and for all people, in the Incarnation of the Son of God, and in His bodily Resurrection from the dead.  As you are baptized into Him and named with His Name, so shall you also rise and live forever in body and soul, immortal, imperishable, and glorious, like unto Jesus Himself.

Then there shall be no more days and nights, no more weeks and months and years, but only one great and glorious Day, and only the Light of your Savior, Jesus Christ, shining upon you forever.

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

The Lord Grants You His Peace

What you long for above all else is Peace:
such as the world cannot give, and you cannot get for yourself.

All of your past regrets, all of your present resolves, and all of your future hopes revolve around a longing desire for peace.  There is this deep hunger in you, which will not be satisfied until it is satisfied in peace; a restlessness that will not be calmed and quieted until you rest in peace.

Death is not the answer or solution, if perhaps you have contemplated that possibility.  Suicide is not a means of grace, but a grave sin of despair.  Dying of old age, illness or accident will not bring you the peace you long for, either; leastwise not in itself; not if you lack peace in your lifetime.

You want your burdens to be lifted, but peace is not found in retirement, nor in a day off, a long weekend, or even an extended vacation.  A sabbatical from work brings no real rest, not without peace; whereas true peace is able to rest and rejoice even while working long hours and hard days.

You want your enemies to give up and go away.  You want your foes to stop fighting you.  You want your persecutors to stop picking on you.  But there is no genuine peace in such a cease fire, stalemate or truce.  World peace may be measured by moments without any wars, but the peace that you long for and need is more than avoiding confrontation and managing to make it through your day without conflict.

You want comfort and confidence, safety and security.  There is no peace without those things.  But none of this is found in the temporary institutions and investments of this life on earth.  Money will not buy you true or lasting peace. Your house and home cannot keep you safe and secure against the real enemies of peace, which lurk within and without.  All the creature comforts in the world will not comfort you in the face of death.  Family and friends are no more helpful than earthborn mortal princes in protecting you from the grave and preserving your life.  Then again, simply to go on living provides no peace or rest, either, no matter whether you keep yourself busy and stay active, or find yourself bedridden, comatose, or driven to extremes.

The Law has the appearance of an answer, because the Law of God is good and wise.  It seems to offer a solution to your search for peace: Simply do those things that God commands, and avoid those things that He forbids, and you’ll have it made.  Keep you nose clean and stay out of trouble, and surely you’ll have nothing to fear.

So you mind your p’s and q’s, you keep your checklist of good deeds, and you dutifully make your resolutions to try harder and do better than you have so far.  You can, and you should, discipline yourself to live according to the outward demands of the Law.  You can, and you should, train yourself in such outward righteousness.  You can stay your hand from hurting and extend your hand to help, and your neighbor’s life on earth is better for it; so is yours, for that matter.  That’s a good thing, but it still isn’t peace.  It does not satisfy the Law, nor can the Law satisfy your heart.

The Law demands perfection, and there is no such perfection in your fallen flesh.  Despite your best of intentions and firm resolutions, you are weak, and you fail.  No matter how hard you try, you can’t make up for your past mistakes; you can’t undo all the wrongs you’ve done; and you can’t pay back all the debts and obligations that you’ve racked up over the years.  And what good is the outward keeping of the Law, when you’re heart remains anxious and afraid?

The Law demands the perfect life of God in you; in all your thoughts, words, and deeds; in all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.  But what you still keep finding in yourself, if you are honest, is laziness and selfishness, a battle between pride and despair, sickness unto death, disease and decay.  Not only in your mortal flesh with all its flaws and blemishes, but in the way you think, the way you feel, and the way you really want to speak and act, even if you manage to restrain yourself.

Religious rites and ceremonies are not the answer, either, whether they be sparse and simple or grand and formal.  They are neither the problem nor the solution in themselves, though they may indeed be beautiful and meet, right, and salutary as vehicles for the Word of God and prayer.  In so far as they are human works, they cannot purchase the peace that you are looking for.  In other words, your own piety and religiosity will not save you from the war that rages in your members, the conflict in your heart, and the restlessness of your thoughts.

Not even the God-given Covenant of Circumcision could save anyone apart from the fulfillment of that promise in Christ Jesus.

He is what the Law demands — and He is what the Gospel now gives to you.  For He has come to save you, by His grace, which is the good and acceptable will of God and His great glory.

Here is the perfect life of God in the one true perfect Man, in flesh and blood exactly like your own, only without sin.  Even from the womb, from childbirth and infancy, here is God made Man.  He even has private parts, which He exposes to the knife and to the Law — and, in time, upon the Cross in humility and public shame.

Not only has He become true Man of flesh and blood, a part of His own good creation, but He has voluntarily assumed the circumstances of fallen man, the curse and consequences of sin and death.  Though He has no sins of His own, He assumes the sins of the world and takes them upon Himself, into His own flesh, into all His members.  He owns them as though they were His own faults and failings.  Therefore, He is condemned by God and man as a lawbreaker, and crucified as a criminal.

Because He does so as true God and true Man, perfectly united in His one Person, and within His relationship of perfect faith and love with the Father — because He goes to the Cross voluntarily, in righteousness and holiness, innocence and blessedness — His sacrificial death is the perfect satisfaction and fulfillment of the Law.  In Him, in His Person and good work, all of its demands are kept and satisfied.  At the same time, in His death and in the shedding of His blood, all of the punishments of the Law are completed, and all its debts are paid in full.  Nothing is lacking.

It is for this reason that He now preaches Peace to His people, and He speaks tenderly to the heart of Jerusalem, that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned.

And so it is that He speaks Peace to you, as well; and with His speaking — in and with His Name — He gives to you this blessed divine Peace, which the world cannot give.

Not only has He taken your place and resolved all that was amiss, but He has done so in order to give you His place and all that is His: His Name; His Sonship and inheritance; His Father and His Spirit; and His Life everlasting in the neverending “Eighth Day” of His bodily Resurrection.

This Resurrection of the Body of Christ, which was circumcised and crucified for you and for all people — this Resurrection of His Body is your Peace with God in body and soul, and on earth as it is in heaven.  It is the Peace which is preached and given to you in the Gospel of Christ Jesus, in which you have the forgiveness of all your sins (instead of guilt and shame), and reconciliation with God (instead of enmity and alienation).

This is the true Peace of contentment, in and with Jesus, your Savior.  It is safety and security, even in the face of death; because the Resurrection of the Body of Christ is the pledge and guarantee of your own resurrection from the dead.  There is nothing that anyone can do to rob you of that life.

Indeed, His Cross and Resurrection, and His Life everlasting in body and soul, all of these things are already given and bestowed upon you — by and with His Holy Name — in the washing of the water with His Word and Spirit in Holy Baptism.  For in that Sacrament, “the circumcision made without hands,” the Holy Triune God has put His Name upon you and blessed you with Himself.

The same Covenant of divine, eternal Life in Christ, in which God has pledged and given Himself to you, and bound Himself to you, is also now realized for you, and it is sealed and renewed in you, in the Holy Communion of Christ: His Body given for you to eat, and His Blood poured out for you to drink, for the forgiveness of all your sins.  For in this Sacrament of the Altar, all the fruits and benefits of the Cross and Resurrection are given into your body, into your frail mortal flesh, in such a way that you are perfectly united with the Holy Triune God in the Body of Christ Jesus; wherefore death shall not be able to claim or keep your body forever, but it shall be raised in glory.

These Holy Sacraments are the rites and ceremonies of the Lord Jesus Christ, which, by His Word and Holy Spirit, save you from this present evil age for the divine eternity of Paradise with God.  These means of grace are not your work, but His.  They are not a purchase, but His free gift to you.

Throughout the Divine Service, year out and year in, the Church on earth prays repeatedly for the Peace of the Lord, which surpasses all human understanding.  So do we pray, for so has He taught us to pray; and while we are yet speaking, He is already answering and acting.  For the Liturgy of His Gospel, of His Holy Word and Sacrament, grants you that Peace which the world cannot give.  Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.  For the Peace of the Lord is with you, here and now, and forever and always.  In the Name of Jesus.  Amen.

Always More Gifts in the Name of Jesus

When Dr. Norman Nagel was asked, back in 1980, what the coming decade would hold for the Lutheran Liturgy, he answered in a way that was so typical of his whole evangelical theology: As always, he said, there would be God’s giving of His gifts.  Always more gifts; sometimes more than we can manage, an embarrassment of riches.  But still God keeps on giving, and what He bestows upon His people is nothing less than Himself.

Anything can be turned into a cliché, and all of its contours flattened into abstract generalities. But Dr. Nagel has it right.  For such is the grace of God, that He pours Himself out — the Father in the Son, the Spirit by the Savior — so that His divine eternal Life becomes yours, that you might live forever in His Love, and that you should be a son of God in Christ.

Though it does not yet appear what all this means, and though you cannot fully comprehend its significance, because it exceeds your imagination, hopes and dreams, there is nothing abstract or generic about this Life and Sonship, which you have been given in Holy Baptism.

St. Paul, elsewhere, describes your Baptism as a circumcision made without hands.  And today you have heard him say that, by your Baptism into Christ, you have become a descendant of Abraham, an heir of all the promises that God gave to Abraham — the promises he sealed unto him, in his flesh, by the covenant of circumcision.  Thus are you blessed by God, and you inherit, not simply a plot of land in Palestine, but a sure and certain place in Paradise with all the saints in Light.

For your Holy Baptism unites you with Christ, in His Cross and Resurrection, and clothes you with His righteousness and holiness, so that everything that belongs to Him now also belongs to you.  Just as He, first of all, by His circumcision, became the recipient of God’s promises to Abraham.

He lives by faith in those promises, as true Man, but He is also their fulfillment, as the promised Seed of Abraham.  He is the very One to whom the covenant pointed: God’s Word made Flesh.  The humiliation that He suffers, and the blood that He sheds, in His circumcision, culminates in the suffering and death of His Cross.  Then and there He makes Atonement for the sins of the world, and He reconciles the world to God; so that, in His Resurrection, God justifies the world with the righteousness of His Son.  That is what He gives to you, by grace, in your Holy Baptism.

Neither your Baptism, nor circumcision, were ever intended as works by which man would justify himself before God.  These are, rather, the sacramental signs and seals of God’s Word and promises, all of which are fulfilled in Christ Jesus.  He is subject to the Law of circumcision, so that, in His own flesh and blood, the covenant is completed and established for you and for all.  That is to say, He is the Son of Abraham who receives everything God swore to give to Abraham, and in His Resurrection those gifts become the possession of all who are baptized into Him.

The promise is there, already, in the Name of Jesus, which God gave by the angel Gabriel.  Like the Son of God Himself, this precious holy Name is also a pure gift of divine grace.  It confesses that Yahweh saves His people from their sins; and that the Baby conceived and born of St. Mary is Yawheh in the flesh.  Both God Himself and His promise become flesh and blood, for the Word of God from all eternity, now in time becomes true Man.  Therefore, not only in Holy Baptism, but also in the Holy Communion, the promise of salvation is given to you in the flesh of Christ Jesus.

As the promise and the flesh of God are one and the same, in the Person of Christ Jesus, so are you redeemed and saved in both body and soul, in your flesh and blood, as well as in your soul and spirit.  That has significance for the way in which you love and serve your neighbor with your body, in view of the fact that your body shall be raised from death and the grave to the life everlasting.  What you receive and do with your body matters, because your body shall be raised up and glorified forever in the Body of Christ Jesus.

As He received His Name at His circumcision, so have you received His Name in your Baptism.  Not that you are called “Jesus,” but that He and His salvation have become yours, by His grace.  For, in naming you with His own Name — that of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — He truly conveys Himself to you.  In this, His face shines upon you (without scaring you to death!); He blesses you with His Glory (not for destruction, but for Life); and He grants you real Peace through His forgiveness of your sins.  For where sins are forgiven, and God Himself does not condemn you, there is no longer any fear of death, but only grace, mercy, and peace, and life and salvation.

This is, indeed, what the Lord Jesus has accomplished for you.  He is as good as His Name: By His Cross and Resurrection, He has saved His people from their sins, and He brings them into the safety of eternal Life with His God and Father in heaven.  This is what your Baptism has given to you, to start with, and no less so the preaching of the Gospel.  It is through such speaking of His Word that the Lord your God blesses and keeps you in His true Peace, both now and forever.

It is through this speaking of His Word that He keeps on giving more gifts, which culminate and center in this Holy Sacrament of His Body and His Blood.  In this eating and drinking of Christ, you are living already in the eternal Eighth Day of His Resurrection and of the Life everlasting.

Which puts this New Year of His grace, and each and every day and night of your life on earth, into the proper perspective of eternity.  For you are the Lord’s, and your Life and Salvation are safe and secure in Him, today, tomorrow, and forever.

In the holy Name of Jesus. Amen.

Entering the Eternal Eighth Day by the Name & Circumcision of Jesus

Some days are longer than others; but that can mean very different things. Most of us prefer the long sunny days of summer to the short dark days of winter. But when we talk about a “long day,” we usually mean one that has been difficult and tedious. Such “long days,” when they pile up, become long weeks, long months, and sometimes long hard years.

There is, however, yet another Day, which actually goes on forever: one that is not “long,” but eternal. Not difficult, tedious or painful, but full of light and life and love and peace. A Day that never ends, in which there is no more night, nor darkness anymore; nor hurt, nor fear, nor sadness.

Your days on earth can be long and hard, and often are, because they are burdened by sin and death. Since everything is dying, and there are limited hours of daylight, there is a constant battle to grow and gather food while you can, and to shore up life against the encroaching night.

But now, the Circumcision of our Lord Jesus points you to the Eighth Day: not the beginning of another week, another month, or another year, but the never-ending Day beyond all blood, sweat and tears. The eternal Day of life with God in the New Creation of the Lord’s Resurrection. The dawning of the new heavens and the new earth, in which there is no more night; no more darkness or death. The Day that doesn’t require any alarm clocks or time clocks, or watches or schedules, because work is no more cursed by sin, nor is it a battle to the death, but work and play alike are simply part of living the Life that is yours by the grace of God in Christ Jesus.

Because He, Christ Jesus, has redeemed and sanctified all of creation — and man, in particular — by His becoming flesh of our flesh, by His innocent death and holy bloodshed. And, behold, all things are made brand new in His risen Body. For He has taken your flesh to be His own, and He has taken your sin and death upon Himself, to bear it in His Body to the Cross. So, then, in His Resurrection from the dead, your sin and death are left behind, and He enters heaven in your flesh.

As He has thus entered upon the eternal Eighth Day on your behalf, by His Cross & Resurrection, so have you entered upon that Eighth Day by your Baptism into Him (into His dying and rising).

In his Epistle to the Colossians, St. Paul describes that Holy Baptism as a “circumcision made without hands.” In doing so, he identifies your connection to the Circumcision of Jesus, and to the fulfillment of the Covenant of Circumcision that the Lord God made with Abraham and his Seed.

Circumcision was both the Law and the Gospel for Abraham and his heirs. It was commanded and required, and there were serious consequences for males who were not circumcised: without this cutting of the flesh, they were cut off from the communion of Israel. But circumcision itself was indeed a cutting. It was painful and bloody. For adult men, it was debilitating for several days.

Yet, however odd or embarrassing it might be, circumcision was God’s Covenant with Abraham, and a promise that was given to father Abraham and all his children. Not the cutting in and of itself, but the cutting included in God’s command and combined with God’s Word. Thus, it was a divine promise signed and sealed in the very flesh of the Patriarch and his sons. For the Seed of Abraham would inherit the earth, and in that Seed of Abraham all the nations would be blessed; for in Him, Abraham would become the father of many nations, according to the promise of God.

Now that Covenant and its promise have been fulfilled in Christ Jesus. In submitting to the Law of Circumcision, He has taken the burden of the entire Law of God upon Himself, as well as the curse and consequences of sin and death. So has He also received the inheritance of Abraham, that is, the blessing promised to his Seed forever. For the Son of Mary, Jesus, is the Seed of Abraham. His holy Body is of the flesh and blood of Abraham, and in that Body of His, in His own flesh, He bears — and bears away — all the sin and death of all mankind.

His Circumcision signifies all of these things, and so does it mark His Body for all of these things.

So does the Name that He is given signify and mark His identity and His vocation as the promised Seed — of Abraham, of Judah and David, of the Woman Eve, and of the Blessed Virgin, St. Mary.

To be named “Jesus” is to be called the Son of the Most High. Indeed, it is to be the true God, Yahweh, in the flesh, who saves His people from their sins. For He is Immanuel, God with us. He is the Everlasting Father, the Patriarch of a new Israel, who surpasses even the great father Abraham. He is the true Prince of Peace, surpassing even the great kings David and Solomon.

He is the Joshua, named by God, who truly fulfills what the Lord promised through Moses, but which Moses himself could not do or accomplish.

The Law was a custodian and a tutor, leading the people out of Egypt, by the staff of Moses, through the Red Sea and the wilderness, to and from Mt. Sinai, to the border of the promised land.

But now this Joshua has come, who goes ahead of the people into the waters of the Jordan River; and He brings them, one and all, into Canaan, into the good land, flowing with milk and honey.

That is what this little Lord Jesus has done for you, and for all, by receiving Circumcision in His flesh, and by receiving the Name with which His God and Father has named Him from heaven.

He has gone the full distance — from the waters of His Baptism in the Jordan River (such as we shall hear and celebrate next Sunday), even unto His death upon the Cross. And so also, in His Resurrection from the dead, you are brought into the true and everlasting Promised Land, which God swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, and to all who share the faith of Abraham.

He brings you into that good land through the waters of your Baptism: not as a slave or a captive, but as a beloved son — a son of Abraham by faith, but so also a son of God in Christ Jesus.

Whether you are male or female, young or old, rich or poor, Jewish or Gentile, employed or un-employed, a student or retired, still very young, or already very old — you, dear Christian, are a son of God in Christ, by virtue of your Baptism into Him.

For by your Baptism into Christ Jesus, His Circumcision and all that it signified avails for you, for the removal of sin and death from your flesh and blood, from your heart and mind, body and soul; and for your resurrection to newness of life, as a new creature living in the New Creation.

So, too, your Baptism has also named you with the Name of Jesus. Not that each and all of you are called “Joshua.” (How confusing would that be!?) But that everything the Name of Jesus testifies concerning Him, is now yours. That you are saved by Him, who is your own true God; and that you are His very own dear child. That He is your Father forever, and your true King, whose reign is one of peace and love, of joy and gladness.

With His Name, which He has invoked on you and given to you, He binds Himself to you and blesses you. He has done this for you in your Holy Baptism, and that is permanent. But so does He do it, daily, and throughout your life on earth (unto the life everlasting), by the speaking of His Word, by the preaching of His Gospel, by His absolving of your sins, and by the giving of Himself to you, the Word-made-Flesh, for you to eat and drink.

As a father first begets a child, and a mother once gives birth, but then both parents continue to “name” their children with loving care for them, by teaching them, by conversations with them, by forgiving them, by praying and confessing the Word of God with them (and for them). Each time a father calls his child by name, by the name that he has given, he calls that child his own.

So does the Lord continue to name you, by the speaking of His Word; and with that Word He blesses you with the gift of His Spirit, who is life and health, and peace and strength, and love.

Naming you with His Name, by His Word, He guards and keeps you in body and soul; in this life, yes, but also for the life everlasting — for the eternal Eighth Day of life with Himself in heaven. For with His Name, He claims you as His own, and He identifies you with Himself, as His own beloved child and heir. He is gracious toward you, compassionate and patient, because He loves you. He delights in you. He smiles upon you, and His countenance is bright with joy over you.

As you are named with the Name of Christ Jesus, anointed by His Spirit as a Christian, the Lord your God, your dear Father in heaven, is pleased with you and proud of you. He is not angry or unhappy with you; far from it. He reigns over you with grace and mercy and never-ending love.

That is your peace, through Jesus, your Savior. It is solid, sure and certain in His Body, in His flesh and blood, in His already-accomplished and completed-once-for-all Cross and Resurrection.

And this is already yours, here and now; as Christ is yours, even now, in your Baptism (which has left its indelible mark on you), and in this preaching of the Gospel, and in this Holy Communion.

By this grace of God in the Gospel, by this flesh and blood of Jesus, you already live and abide with Him in the eternal Eighth Day. It is not a long hard day, but a brilliant and beautiful Day of light and life and love.

For now, it is by faith, and not by sight. There are still days and nights, some longer than others. But the Eighth Day has already dawned for you, and for all, in the Incarnation of the Son of God, and in His bodily Resurrection from the dead. So shall you also rise, and live forever in body and soul, immortal, imperishable, and glorious, like Jesus.

Then shall there be no more days and nights, no more weeks and months and years, but only one great and glorious Day, and only the Light of Christ Jesus, your Savior, shining upon you forever.

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