The Kingdom of God Has Come Upon You

So enthralled are you with sin, death, and the power of the devil, that, apart from Christ, you can neither pray as you should nor confess what is true.  You are helpless and hopeless, and you cannot even cry out or ask for help.  Whatever you might say would be blasphemous and wrong.

But Jesus has come down from heaven to release you from the bondage of sin, death, and the devil.  In fulfillment of the words and promises of God, He has entered into your Egypt in order to set you free; He has gotten glory over Pharaoh by His Cross, and has brought you out of slavery through the Red Sea waters of your Baptism into the glorious liberty of life in the Kingdom of God.

Thus has Christ Jesus, the Stronger Man, overcome and plundered Satan, obtaining victory for you over all the devil’s wily works and wicked ways.  He has gotten forgiveness of all your sins by His atoning sacrifice.  He has made death powerless over you, since He has already suffered it for you and overcome it by His voluntary suffering and death in your stead.  That is why His Resurrection is also your release from death and the grave and your Righteousness in the presence of God.

So, too, by His preaching of the Gospel, by His Word and Holy Spirit, He opens your ears to hear, and He opens your lips to show forth His praise, to confess and call upon His holy Name in faith.

Now, the devil is mad as hell about all of this, and he is restless and out of his mind to undo it all.  In bitter envy and resentment he prowls around, desperately seeking to devour and destroy you.  In particular, he watches and waits with eager desire to catch you in the “waterless places” away from your Baptism, that is, outside of repentance and faith, apart from the Word of Christ Jesus.

This is precisely what happens in far too many cases, especially where parents have their children baptized apart from the ongoing fellowship and life of the Church.  It is the tragic downfall of those who are baptized but then do not continue to be catechized in the Word and works of God, in the Law and the Gospel, in daily contrition, repentance, confession, and faith in Christ Jesus.

For you cannot and do not remain in the waters of your Holy Baptism apart from the faith and life and prayer that are born of all that Jesus has commanded, that is, the preaching and teaching of His Word and the administration of His Supper at His Table in His Holy Christian Church.

Where and when you depart from the waters of your Baptism to the waterless places of the world, you place yourself in grave danger, perhaps without even realizing it.

For the devil is ready and anxious to pounce upon your body and soul, to move right back into your heart and life, and to take over again, setting up house with seven other unclean spirits.

The end result is worse than even it was to begin with!

Thanks be to God, therefore, that He has not left you to fend for yourself, but in His mercy He has blessed you by His Holy Spirit to continue hearing and believing His Holy Word and to live according to it.  For such faith and life are not by your own reason or strength, nor by your own resolve or ingenuity, but by the Lord’s preaching and Ministry of the Gospel.

Take heart, that He has not left you defenseless or in the dark.  No, He who began His good work in you, in the waters of your Holy Baptism, is still at work to continue it, to bring it to completion in the Body of Christ Jesus.  To that end, He calls you daily by His Gospel, enlightens you with the gifts of His Holy Spirit, and strengthens and sustains you in the one true faith, here and now in His Church on earth, even unto the life everlasting in the resurrection of your body.

Blessed are you, therefore, who hear the Word of God and keep it!  For it is by His grace.

By yourself, you would be easy prey for the devil, all his works, and all his ways.  But you are not your own, you are the Lord’s.  And, as we have heard this past Sunday, He fights for you.  Thus are you armored with Christ and sheltered safely within the Mighty Fortress of His Church by His preaching of repentance, by His Word of the Gospel, and by His forgiveness of all your sins.

Blessed are you, who are fed and nourished unto life by the Supper of the Word-made-Flesh, whom St. Mary bore and nursed at her breast.  For His flesh and blood have conquered the devil, and so do they protect you here and now and forevermore from all the devil’s tyranny and spite.

Blessed be the Name of the Lord your God, whose Kingdom is upon you in Christ your Savior.

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

The Word and Will of God in Christ

The Ten Commandments summarize the good and gracious will of God for His children, and so also for you in particular.  They reveal and describe, in short, how He would have you live.

In relation to the Lord your God, the Holy Trinity, the Creator of the heavens and the earth, you are to live by His grace alone, by faith in His Word.  That is, you are to look to Him for all that you need, to expect good things from Him, and to receive whatever He gives you with thanksgiving.  By the same token, it also means that you fear Him alone, as the only true God, and that you love Him as your highest good, in comparison to which everything else in all of creation is nothing.

And in relation to your neighbors, including everyone the Lord has set before you and beside you in this world, you are to live in love — to do no harm, but to serve and support them in every need.

This good and gracious will of God, this way of life in faith and love, is here conveyed to you in the form of His commands and prohibitions.  He tells you what to do, and what you must not do.

This summary of His Law has also been written on man’s heart, and for this reason it is also found to a large extent in the civil laws and regulations of the nations of the world, albeit imperfectly, at least with respect to your neighbor.  Murder, theft, and false witness are all crimes.  Disobeying your parents and other authorities and cheating on your spouse are recognized as wrongdoing.

By these ways and means, both by the special revelation of the Law and by the natural revelation of the created conscience, the Lord curbs outward evil and protects both you and your neighbor from anarchy and blatant outright wickedness.  To say it bluntly, He protects your neighbor from you, and He protects you from your neighbor, especially by threats of punishment, consequences for sins, and the promise of rewards to those who do what is right in this temporal life on earth.

But the actual demands of God’s holy and righteous Law go far deeper than outward behavior and civil righteousness.  Indeed, His discipline and right ordering of this body and life are aimed at a higher purpose, namely, that there should be sufficient freedom and opportunity for the preaching of His Word, so that you and your neighbor might be called and brought to repentance and faith.

The Lord wills that you are to fear, love, and trust in Him, not only from the heart, but with all of your heart, and with all of your mind, soul, and strength, indeed, with all that you are and have.

So must you also love and serve your neighbor from the heart, for God’s sake, in faith toward Him.  Thus, again, you are not simply to refrain from hurting your neighbor, whether by word or deed, whether in his body, his family, his possessions or reputation; but you are to help him in every way that you can, gladly doing good, however you are able, even to those who sin against you.

That is what the Lord your God commands.  That is how you are to live.  But you do not do it.

You do not fear, love, and trust in God above all things.  You do not hear and heed His Word, and you do not call upon His Name in prayer, praise, and thanksgiving at all times, in all places, and under all circumstances.  You do not live by faith.  You do not trust that God loves you and that He is and will be doing you good.  And so you do not love your neighbors, either.  You envy and resent them.  You curse and criticize in your heart and mind if not with your lips or on the internet.  You do not gladly help and support your neighbors, but you do hurt them at times, in big and little ways, when you think you are getting away with it, as though there were no harm in such evil.

Consequently, as you consider your place in life according to the Ten Commandments — which summarize the good and gracious will of God and His way of life for you — you are accused and condemned and sentenced to nothing but punishment, to temporal death and eternal damnation.

From this condemnation of the Law you cannot save yourself.  You cannot make up for the wrong you have already done, nor are you capable of pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps to fear, love, and trust in God as you must.  You cannot do it.

If you imagine or suppose that you have been doing pretty well, and if you think for one minute that you have even come close to living in accordance with God’s holy Law, then you are lying to yourself, and you add sin upon sin with your prideful and presumptuous self-righteousness.

But He will not leave you in your pretense for too long.  His Law will have its way with you and do its work in you, whether by convicting your conscience and calling you to repentance in this life, or by condemning your body and soul to death for your unbelief, idolatry, and lack of love.

The problem is not with God’s Law, which is in fact holy, wise, and good, whether you agree with it and understand it or not.  Actually, you cannot comprehend His wisdom, His holiness, or His goodness, nor can you consent to His will, until you have been broken of your own conceit and self-righteousness and brought to fear, love, and trust in Him.  The problem is with you, because you are a sinner through and through, from the inside out, in your heart and mind, body and soul.

What you need, therefore, if you are to live, is a Savior from your sin, from your false belief and hardness of heart, and from your death and damnation.  You need the Lord your God to save you.

Thanks be to God that, while His Law condemns you, it has also been fulfilled for you by Christ Jesus, who has indeed become your Savior from sin and death.  God’s good and gracious will for your salvation and your life has not been thwarted by your unbelief and your unrighteousness.  For this dear Lord Jesus Christ has accomplished and fulfilled the entire Law on your behalf, in love for you, His neighbor (which is, of course, precisely to the point).  When that same Law now puts you to death because of your sin, it is so that you should then be raised up to a new life in Christ.


Your true and lasting life is in Him alone, because the faith and love that the Ten Commandments require of you, Christ Jesus has lived for you and established for you and for all in His own Body of flesh and blood.  He has thereby obtained the righteousness that is yours by grace through faith in Him; and He has opened the way of life to you, which is likewise by grace through faith in Him.

Really, this is what the Ten Commandments and the entire Word of God have always been about, that Christ, the incarnate Son of God, is the fulfillment of the Law unto the righteousness of faith and life with God.  It has always been the point that God Himself would thus give life to His own.

Therefore, Christ in His own flesh has lived in the fear, love, and trust of His God and Father, and by the faith and confession of His Word and promises, as we heard for example this past Sunday in our Lord’s rejection of the devil’s temptations.  He has sanctified the Name of the Lord in all of His words and actions, and has perfectly fulfilled the Word and Will of God for your salvation.

So, too, all that the Law requires in love for the neighbor, Christ Jesus has done in love for you.  That is to say, not only has He kept the Law on your behalf, completing what you have not and could not do, but He has also loved you, and He does love you, in all the ways the Law requires.

He does not murder you, nor harm you in any way, but He gives you life in body and soul, both here in time and in the Resurrection.  As your heavenly Bridegroom, He is faithful to you in all things; yet He also calls you back and reconciles you to Himself when you have gone astray and cheated on Him.  He does not steal from you, but He daily and richly provides you with all that you need for now and forever.  Instead of testifying against you, He pleads for you with His own blood and defends you with His very life as your great Advocate, as your merciful and great High Priest.

He does not covet what you have, but though He was rich beyond measure, for your sake He made Himself poor, so that you should thus receive the riches of God and participate in His divine life.

Everything that God says about all of these Commandments finds its meaning and fulfillment in Christ Jesus.  He has lived the good and gracious Will of God in His own Body and Life, even unto death upon the Cross, and He has done so for you and your salvation.  In His rising from the dead, therefore, you also rise and live with Him by faith in His Gospel.  Your sins are all forgiven by His atoning blood, and you are reconciled to the Lord your God in His faithfulness and righteousness.

All the love and mercy and forgiveness that His Law requires of you for your neighbor are granted to you by the Lord Jesus Christ.  Not because you are so good (you’re not), but because He is good.  He is love.  He is mercy.  And, for His own sake, He forgives you all of your sins.

His perfect righteousness is credited to you; His perfect holiness is bestowed upon you as your beautiful and glorious dress; and His own life is given to you, so that you now live in Him, and He in you, in faith toward your true God and Father in Christ, and in His own love toward others.

It is in Christ Jesus, therefore, that the first three Commandments direct you to live by faith, to find your life, your peace and health and rest, in the Word and promise of His Holy Gospel.

The God whom you are commanded to fear, love, and trust above all things is the Holy Trinity, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who has loved you from the very depths of His Being to the Cross and Passion of the incarnate Son.  The Name you are commanded to hallow is the very Name that you have received from the mouth of the Lord in the waters of your Holy Baptism.  And as the God and Father of your Lord Jesus Christ is now your God and Father in Him, so does He hear and answer your prayers, and He gladly accepts your sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving with great pleasure.

When you thus sanctify the Holy Day by the Word and Spirit of God, as He has commanded you to do, you find that He has called, gathered, enlightened, and sanctified you as a beloved member of His Body and Bride, the Holy Church; and that He gathers you here to Himself within that holy fellowship, with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven, in order to serve you, to love you, to feed you at His Table with the Body of Christ and His Cup of Salvation, and to give you His own Life in body and soul, now and forever.

So does He strengthen your faith with His forgiveness of your sins; and He keeps you steadfast in His Word by His preaching, day by day, week after week, from one year to the next, until He shall call you at last from this vale of tears to Himself in heaven.

And so it is, beloved of the Lord, that by His Ministry of the Gospel, by His gracious Word and divine work of forgiveness, of mercy, and of steadfast loving-kindness, He gives to you the true Sabbath Rest from all your labors and the perfect Peace that surpasses all human understanding.

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

Christ Jesus Is Your Champion

The life of the baptized in this world is one of constant warfare and of daily trials and temptation.  For Satan prowls around like a roaring lion seeking to devour you.  That wicked foe of God and man calls into question the divine Name with which you are named and the gracious adoption of your God and Father in heaven.  The evil one entices and deceives you with his lies.  With vicious hatred and great wrath he attacks and accuses in order to undermine your faith and life in Christ.

Such is the desert warfare into which you have been driven and are led by the Holy Spirit from the waters of your Baptism, as Israel was led by the Cloud and Fire of the Lord into the wilderness, into conflict with Amalek, the Amorites, Midian, and Bashan.  And despite the devil’s purposes, the Lord your God uses this battleground to accomplish His good and gracious will for your life and salvation.  It is the time and place of repentance, so that you should be strengthened in Christ.

Left to yourself, relying on your own powers, you would never be able to cope or survive with all that is set against you.  But now — as you have heard, so also believe — the Lord Jesus Christ has entered the fray as your Champion.  He is with you on the battlefield, on the front lines, actually.

In the waters of the Jordan River, and from His Baptism into the wilderness, led by the Spirit of His God and Father, He has set Himself against all your enemies of sin, death, the devil, and hell.  He has been subjected to every temptation that you are faced with, and yet, He commits no sin of heart, mind, body, or soul.  Rather, in taking your predicament upon Himself, in bearing your sin and death in His own flesh, in taking on your trials and tribulations, He perseveres in holy faith and perfect love, even unto death.  Thus has He opened the way and blazed the trail of repentance for you and for all the fallen children of man.  Not for destruction, but for life in His Resurrection.

By steadfast faith and unswerving faithfulness, He has become the Author and Perfecter of your faith and life.  Everything to which you are called, He has accomplished and established for you.

The most basic temptation with which you are faced, therefore, is to put your faith in any other lord or any other god than this one Man, Jesus Christ, who is alone your Savior.  To fear, love, and trust in anyone else or anything else, no matter who or what that might be, is to pursue death and hell; it is to worship the devil instead of the one true God, to your own eternal hurt and destruction.

That deadly temptation takes many and various forms, so be on your guard and armor yourself against it by the Word of God.  Do not attempt to feed yourself with what the Lord has not given you, but look to Him and wait upon Him in patient hope, to be fed by Him from His open hand.  Hunger not for the food that perishes, but rather for the living and life-giving Bread from heaven.  Likewise, seek not the kingdoms of this world, nor put your trust in mortal princes, but pray for the coming of the Kingdom of God, and recognize that His Kingdom is at hand in Christ Jesus.

Cling to the Cross of Christ in the confidence of His Resurrection, instead of chasing after the power and glory of sinful man.  Do not bow down and pray to the gods of popularity and success, of pleasure and prosperity, of comfort, ease, and entertainment.  But call upon the Name of the Lord, who was crucified for your transgressions and raised from the dead for your justification.

Beware that the most pernicious temptation of all is to regard and treat the Temple of God as a license to live unto yourself — to live recklessly, foolishly, and dangerously in pursuit of your own ambitions — instead of living unto God by faith in Christ.  That is to cast yourself down from the heights of the Temple in daring defiance of God.  It is a damnable misuse and abuse of His Holy Word and Sacraments, as though such gracious gifts of God were really grounds for continuing in your sins.  So would covetous idolatry and self-serving greed hide behind a mask of piety and a pretense of faith.  But the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His Name in vain.

There is all the difference in the world — as different as heaven is from hell — between trusting God as you proceed on the way that He has set before you, on the one hand, confident that He will raise you up from death to life in Christ Jesus — and on the other hand, tempting God, testing Him, and even daring Him to protect you from all consequence and danger and to provide you with all that you want on your own self-chosen path and in your own selfish pursuits of fortune and fame.

The Lord your God is to be worshiped and adored by faith in His Word; by the presentation of your best gifts and the first fruits of your labor in thanksgiving for His gracious providence in Christ; and by the living sacrifice of your whole body and life to the glory of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  For He alone is God, your Creator and Redeemer.  He is not your gopher or your go-to guy, at your beck and call to do your bidding while you serve yourself and worship your own desires.

Repent of your idolatry and false belief, while there is still time and opportunity to do so.  Put to death your covetous lust and selfish greed.  Resist and deny your ravenous appetites for that which God has not given you.  Stop living for that which is not the Lord Jesus Christ.

It is in Christ alone that you have true and everlasting life with the true and only God.  It is in Him alone, in His crucified and risen Body, that you have health and strength and every good.  For He alone has hungered for God above all things, and thirsted for the righteousness of God, and lived by every Word that proceeds from the Mouth of God.  Indeed, He is that very Word, who has become Flesh, by whom His God and Father speaks to you in the Ministry of His Holy Gospel.

As surely as He has come down from the Father in heaven, into the depths of the Jordan, and into the desert wilderness, in order to be with you in the trenches, so surely has He given Himself up entirely to God in holy fear and holy faith.  And so surely has He given Himself entirely for you, His neighbor, in self-sacrificing love — in order to atone for all your sins, to conquer all your enemies, to reconcile you to His God and Father, and to give you life in place of death.

Though He is Himself true God from all eternity, and the only-begotten Son of God by nature, He learned obedience in your stead by suffering on your behalf, in order to bestow His own Sonship and His divine, eternal inheritance upon you, by grace through faith in His Word of the Gospel.

He did not presume upon His status, nor upon the promises of God, but in humble obedience He went the way His Father set before Him — the way of sacrifice, suffering, and death — in the confidence that His Father would also raise Him from death and the grave, in keeping with the Word and promise of His Baptism.  He knew that He was loved and pleasing to His Father, and so He trusted that His Father would deal with Him in steadfast loving-kindness and deep mercy.

So it is that, by His Cross and Passion — and in His Resurrection from the dead — His God and Father has established the Body of Christ Jesus as the true and everlasting Temple of God among men, in heaven and on earth.  And so it is that His Body is your Refuge and Strength, your Hiding Place in the day of trouble, your Peace and Rest, already here and now, and hereafter in eternity.

This Temple of the Lord, the Body of Christ, is not a robber’s den where you might hide while continuing to sin; nor is it a marketplace, where you might pick and choose and purchase what you want.  It is rather the place where the Lord your God has chosen to establish His Name and Glory, where you now find Him and abide with Him by faith in His forgiveness and His righteousness.

This Gospel of Christ Jesus is the Word of faith that He preaches into your ears and into your heart, by which He also opens your lips in confession and prayer, that you should call upon His Name, receive His good gifts, and be saved from every evil of body and soul, both now and forever.

By this Ministry of His Gospel — by the Word and promise of His Baptism, by the preaching of His Word, and by His Body and His Blood, given and poured out for the forgiveness of your sins  — He draws near to you, and He abides with you in the wilderness as your Champion against the devil, death, and hell.  For He is your Righteousness and Holiness; He is your Life and Salvation.

As you have entered by your Baptism into the wilderness of daily repentance, into open conflict and harsh warfare with the devil, the world, and your own sinful flesh, so have you entered into the closest possible union with Christ Jesus.  And in Him none of your enemies can harm you.

Though you daily sin much and surely deserve nothing but punishment, there is no condemnation for you in Christ Jesus.  He does not accuse or condemn you; therefore, no one else may do so.

Though the devil rages and storms against you, seeking with all his wily cunning, and by all his might and mane, to devour and destroy you, he cannot harm you while you abide in Christ and Christ abides with you.  Oh, to be sure, Satan may be permitted to cause you pain and sorrow, to hurt your body, to take your possessions, perhaps even to end your mortal life on earth.  But that is all, and nothing more.  Even death will not rob you of your life in Christ, both body and soul.  And all that you suffer in the meantime must serve the purposes of the Lord for your salvation.

Although the world entices you with all of its deceitful pleasures, with all of its false gods and lying vices, the Lord Jesus Christ remains your priceless Treasure.  In Him, the Kingdom of God is yours, and there is nothing else you need.  Your heart and life, body and soul reside in Christ.

Now, let us be honest.  It is true that your faith and your faithfulness are wobbly and uncertain.  But your great Champion is steadfast, sure, and certain; and He remains by your side forever.

Your obedience is frail and faulty, but Christ is your Righteousness — He is your perfect Holiness — who has been obedient unto death, even death upon the Cross.  So there is nothing lacking.  Not only are you are safe and sound in Christ, but you are loved and pleasing to God the Father in Him.

Christ Jesus is the Armor that covers and protects you.  He is the Shield that surrounds you, round about, within and without.  He is the Sword that fights for you forever, and He shall never yield.

The Lord allows you to be tempted, tried, and tested by the devil, so as to break you of your self-reliance, and to strengthen your faith and trust and confidence in Christ alone.  So does the Lord likewise allow you to hunger in the wilderness, so that you might learn to hunger for His Word, to call upon His Name, and to pray for your Daily Bread from His extended arm and open hand.

And so it is that Christ Jesus, your Champion, the incarnate Word of God, the true and living Bread from heaven, feeds you with Himself, His Body and His Blood, unto the life everlasting.  For in Him you have entered the Land of Milk and Honey, and here at His Altar you live by His grace.

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

The Lord Has Come Down to Raise You Up

Jesus has come down from heaven, and He has come down from the mountain, in order to set you free and deliver you from sin, death, and the power of the devil.

Although you are attacked by all of these things, it is also the case that you are a willing victim.  Indeed, you are your own worst enemy, for you are sinful and unclean, perverse and unbelieving.

And yet, in love, the Lord Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, has come down to save you — to cleanse and heal you, and to give you new life in and with Himself, with the Father and the Holy Spirit — through His free and full forgiveness of all your sins.

He has become true Man, born of Mary, flesh of your flesh and blood of your blood.  Not only that, but He has subjected Himself to all the trials, tribulations, and temptations that you are faced with, only without any sins of His own.  But He has borne all of your sins, and the sins of the whole world, in His own Body to the Cross; and there He has suffered all the curse and consequences of your sin, including the righteous wrath and judgment of God, so that by His innocent suffering and death in your place, He has destroyed the power that death and the devil held over you.

Here, then, in the Cross and Passion of the Christ, is the greatest Glory of God.  It is nothing you could ever do or accomplish for yourself; nor could you even begin to comprehend it by your own reason or strength.  Indeed, it is the Cross, above all else, that amazes you — and scares you!

But it is by the Cross of Christ that God has redeemed you and rescued you from your enemies and from every evil of body and soul, in order to make you His own and bring you into life with Him.

And to that end, it is from the Cross that Christ Jesus speaks His Word of forgiveness to you and feeds you with His own holy Body and precious Blood.

Thus, He who has come down from heaven, who has come down from the mountain and entered the valley of the shadow of death, who has been lifted up on the Cross for your salvation, now draws you to Himself by His Gospel; He raises you up in His own Resurrection from the dead; He lifts you up from the earth, and He brings you in Himself to your true God and Father in heaven.

Therefore, let these Words sink into your ears and into your heart: That the Lord Jesus Christ was delivered into the hands of sinful men, and handed over as a willing Victim to the Cross, in order to deliver you into the loving hands of God the Father.  And so does He hand Himself over to you now, and He places Himself into your hands and mouth and body in this Sacrament, so that He should thus abide in and with you, and you abide with Him in the bosom of the Father forever.

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

Entering into Glory by the Cross of Christ

This is what such baptizing with water indicates, what it means, and what it does for you.  It bears the Glory of God and bestows it upon you in the Body of Christ Jesus.  It opens heaven to you and brings you into the presence of the Holy Trinity.  It makes of you a beloved child of God.

All of this is yours by your Baptism into Christ.  And it is all by the way of His Cross.  It is through suffering and death that you enter into His Glory.  And to that end, your Baptism has set you on a journey, on a pilgrimage through the wilderness into the Paradise which the Lord has sworn by His own Name to give you.  It is a pilgrimage of repentance, a journey through death into life.

As you make your way on this trek between the Red Sea and the Jordan River, bearing the Cross upon your forehead and your heart, upon your body and your soul, hold fast the hope that is set before you in the Body of Christ Jesus, and do not lose heart.

Consider this Lord Jesus, who has called you by Name to be His own, to bear the Cross and follow Him both up and down the Mountain.  He is the Christ, as St. Peter has so recently confessed by the revelation of the Father and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.  But what does this mean?

He is anointed by the Father with the Spirit for the Cross.  For it is necessary that the Christ should suffer all these things and thereby enter into His Glory as the Savior and Redeemer of Israel and as the Light of the Revelation of the Glory of God to all the nations.  It is by His Cross and Passion that He will accomplish and fulfill His Exodus in Jerusalem and liberate all of the people of God.

Make no mistake about it, He is greater even than Moses and Elijah and all of the Prophets, for He is the One of whom they preached, to whom they pointed.  He is the One who fulfills their words.

Moses performed great signs and mighty wonders against Pharaoh and in the presence of Israel, all in the Name of the Lord.  So do the Holy Scriptures testify.  He led the people out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, across the desert, unto the Mountain of God.  And he was the minister of the Lord’s Covenant with Israel.  That is no small thing.  Indeed, he alone in days of old spoke with the Lord face to face and taught the people the Word that he heard from the very mouth of God.  By his hand, God gave to the people His holy Ten Commands.  And of supreme significance, it was Moses who constructed the Tabernacle in the wilderness according to the pattern revealed to him on Mt. Sinai, by which the Gospel and Glory of the Lord dwelt in the midst of His people.

Yes, Moses was faithful in all God’s House as a servant, and he served that way for many, many years.  But in his frailty and weakness, and by the judgment of the Law that he himself taught, he was not permitted to enter the Land that God had promised, nor would he lead the people into it.

It is Jesus, the new and greater Joshua, who brings the people out of the wilderness through the Jordan River into the Promised Land.  No other creature in heaven or on earth could do this thing, no other prophet, priest, or king, but the Lord Jesus Christ and He alone has done so.

By His Baptism He brings you and all His people out of slavery into freedom, through death and the grave into the Resurrection and the life everlasting.  For He is the true Passover Lamb, who not only takes upon Himself and takes away the sins of the world but also feeds you with His own flesh and pours out His Blood for you as the New Testament.

By His Cross and in His Resurrection, His Body has become the true and permanent Temple of God, the Tabernacle of God among men.  He bears the Name of God in His own flesh and blood; the Holy Spirit rests and remains upon His Body; and the Glory of God abides forever in and with Him, that is, the divine Glory that you receive and share with Him in His crucified and risen Body.

The Lord Jesus has accomplished this great Exodus, for you and for the many, by bearing all your sins, your death and damnation in His own Body to the Cross — in order to atone for your sins, to release you from death and the grave, and to bring you in and with Himself, in His Resurrection and Ascension, up the Mountain to His God and Father in heaven.

In this He is greater and more glorious than Elijah, also, who precedes Him and points to Him but is not able to achieve or accomplish what only Christ, the Son of God, could ever do.  For that holy Prophet did not pass through death into the life everlasting, but in the righteousness of faith he was taken instead by a whirlwind into the presence of God.  But the Lord Jesus, by His Sacrifice for you upon the Cross, entered into that darkness of death in order to bring you out, to save you by His grace alone.  This, indeed, is the great Glory of God, that He lays down His life in love for you.

He is the Apostle and High Priest of the faith.  He is the One who goes before and follows after, your Pillar of Cloud by day and your Pillar of Fire by night.  He is the One who does it all.  He is your hope and your salvation, your strength and your song, upon whom the Father has set His seal.

He is sent by the Father to preach to and from the Cross, to and from the Resurrection.  He is sent by the Father to be baptized; to be tempted in every way that you are tempted, save only without sin; to live by faith as the true Man; to fast and pray in the Spirit, in the confidence of the Father’s pledge and promise; to suffer, die, and rise again for your forgiveness and justification.  So has He done.  And so does He ever live to intercede for you before the throne of His Father in heaven.

By His Sacrifice of Atonement, and by His prayer and intercession as your merciful and great High Priest in all things pertaining to God, you also pray and come to His God and Father through Him — by virtue of your Baptism into Him, and as a disciple who follows after Christ in holy faith.

Beloved of the Lord, listen to Him.  Trust His Word, and live according to it — in faith and love.

Take up the Cross that you have received in Baptism, and follow Christ Jesus through suffering and death, through the wilderness, into the Glory of His Resurrection and His Righteousness.

Do not be overcome by the weariness of the journey you are set upon, though it is long and hard and you are tempted to give up.  Wake up from your sleepiness.  Watch and wait upon the Lord.

Do not speak in your own ignorance and confusion, for your reason is fallen, your senses are befuddled, and your opinions are not the will or wisdom of God.  Rather, hear and heed the Word of Christ, the Son of God.  For by His Word alone are you given the mind and Spirit of the Lord.  And then speak the Truth of God by speaking as you are spoken to.  That is to say, confess and pray the Word that God the Father speaks to you by His Son, by the preaching of His Gospel.

Find your house and home and family in Him, in His Body, and hold fast the confidence of your hope in Him.  That Hope shall not disappoint you, and you shall not be put to shame in Him.

Christ Himself is your Tabernacle in the wilderness, and His Body, the Church, is your place of Peace and Rest, in anticipation of the Paradise He has prepared for you in the Resurrection of all flesh.  For He has come down from heaven, and He has come down from the Mountain, in order to be and abide with you here, that you should thus abide with God the Father in Christ the Son.

He has become like you, and He has borne your sin and death in His own human flesh and blood, that you should become like Him; that you should bear His Cross and so also share His Glory.  As He was transfigured by His Cross and Passion into the Glory of His Resurrection and Ascension, so are you also conformed to His Image by your Baptism into Him.  And as you are a member of the Body of Christ, a son or daughter of His Father, so do you also partake of His Holy Spirit and share in the fellowship of His Holy Altar, in which you are given a foretaste of the Feast to come.

Listen to Him, and hold fast the confidence of your sure and certain hope in the Ministry of His Holy Gospel.  It is sure and certain, because He has fulfilled His Exodus for you in Jerusalem.

Behold the Glory of His Kingdom by faith in His Word, in the Fruits of His Cross, in the pledge and promise of His Resurrection from the dead.  Hear and receive the Glory of His Kingdom in His preaching of forgiveness, in the waters of your Holy Baptism, and in His Body and His Blood, which are given and poured out for you to eat and to drink with thanksgiving.

Bear His Cross in peace and joy, knowing that you enter into His Glory through suffering; you pass through the long, hard wilderness into Canaan.  For heaven has been opened to you in Christ Jesus by His Baptism, even unto death, and by your Baptism into His Cross and Resurrection.  It has been opened to you in Him, and as surely as He is risen from the dead and lives and reigns to all eternity, so shall it never be closed again.  You cannot see it from here, but you enter it by faith.

It is the Word of God, in and with the water, which does these things.  And that Word remains.

Even now, within His Church on earth, the Father speaks to you and pours out His Spirit upon you in the Body of Christ Jesus, the beloved Son.  And here by His Gospel He clothes you — neither in fig leaves nor with animal skins, but with the Glory of the holiness and righteousness of Christ.  For He has chosen you in Him, and He loves you in Him with an everlasting Love that never dies.

For now, it is not yet visible to your eyes.  Indeed, it is hidden under the trial and tribulation of the Cross, and all that you can see in this valley of sorrow is the shadow of death.  But the salvation that Christ has accomplished is already yours, and it is ready to be revealed at the proper time.

In that Day which has no end — in that eternal Eighth Day of the Resurrection — in the dwelling place of Yahweh Sabaoth, in the Holy of Holies made without hands, eternal in the heavens — there shall you see the Lord who loves you face to face, and you shall know Him as you are known, and you shall be glorious with His own Glory in both your body and your soul, forever and ever.

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

The Christ Is For You and For Your Children

You and your whole body and life, all that you are and have belong to the Lord your God, your Creator and Preserver.  You cannot live without Him.  But neither can you live with Him in your sin, which separates you from God and from His Life, and drives you to death and damnation.

The Lord who created you in love must redeem you and reclaim you for Himself, if you are to live and not die.  And this He has accomplished in the Person of the Incarnate Son, Christ Jesus.  He has fulfilled the Law for you, which always was concerning Him, His Redemption and Salvation.

For He is the promised Seed of the Woman, who has come and crushed the devil’s head by His own sacrificial death upon the Cross.

He is the Firstborn Son of God, given as the Passover Lamb for the redemption of the firstborn sons of Israel, and for all the children of man.

And He is the great High Priest, whose entire body and life, flesh and blood have been dedicated to your salvation; who has atoned for all your sins and reconciled you to God in Himself.

Everything depends upon this dear Lord Jesus Christ.  It all hinges on His Incarnation, Cross, and Resurrection.  And so also do all of God’s purposes and promises continue in the Body of Christ, crucified and risen, in the Ministry of His Holy Gospel, in the Temple of His Church on earth.

To be righteous and devout, therefore, like Mary and Joseph, Simeon and Anna — which is to say, to live by grace through faith in the Word and promises of God — is to look for and wait upon the Consolation of Israel within the courts of the Lord’s House.  It is to watch and pray, and to wait for the Lord Jesus Christ, by whom you do not see death forever, but you rise and live with Him.

To be in His Temple, to Hear His Word and call upon His Name, to give attention to the rites and ceremonies of His Gospel, and to receive His gifts — these are the most essential activities of all.

To be about these holy things of Christ, your Lord, is the most important thing in your whole life, and so also the most important thing for your children, who likewise belong by right to the Lord, their Creator and Redeemer.  It is therefore your responsibility, if you are a father or mother, to bring your children to the Lord’s House, as Joseph and Mary presented the Lord Jesus Himself.

It is the Lord alone who releases you and your children from the bondage of sin and death, and He alone who grants to you and to your children the true and lasting Peace of His Life and Salvation.  And this He does, for you and for them, by the revelation of His Holy Gospel and by the blessing of His Body and His Blood.

Bear in mind that neither you nor your children are able to receive these gifts rightly, that is, in faith and with thanksgiving, except by the Holy Spirit, who is actively present and at work in the Word of the Law and the Gospel.  By that Word and the preaching of it, He calls you and brings you to repentance.  He puts you to death and raises you up to newness of life.

Indeed, He has done so for you and for your children in the waters of Holy Baptism, whereby you have been crucified, put to death, and buried with Christ Jesus, and whereby you are daily made alive with Him through the forgiveness of your sins.  That is what your Baptism continues to mean — and what it continues to do — throughout your life on earth.

So do the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit continue to deal with you within His Holy Christian Church.  For having called you by His Name and made you His own dear child in Holy Baptism, He does not let you go or let you get away from Him.  He would have you live with Him in His Kingdom, here in time by faith in His Word, and hereafter in eternity in your own risen and glorified body.

That is why the Holy Spirit has called you by the Gospel and brought you here into the Church, the Body of Christ.  And it is why you have brought your children here with you, that they also may have life in His Name, both now and forever.

Here, in the Ministry of the Gospel, you are purified of your sins by the forgiveness of Christ, by His holy and precious Blood.  And here you eat and drink the Feast of the true Passover Lamb, who was sacrificed for you, that you should live and not die.  Here you abide in the House of the Lord all the days of your life, and so shall you abide in His House forevermore.

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

He Comes with Authority to Love You

You are accustomed to thinking that the reason Jesus came, the purpose for which He came, was to die on the Cross and rise again.  And, to be sure, you are not wrong in confessing His Cross and Resurrection!  But, right along with that, Jesus says today that the purpose for which He has come is to preach the Kingdom of God in every city.  Indeed, He is still doing that very thing, even to this day and place.  He preaches the Kingdom of God in and with His Cross and Resurrection.

He is the Son of God, the Holy One, the Christ, anointed by His Father with the Holy Spirit at His Baptism in the Jordan River.  He has come down from heaven to earth, conceived and born of the Blessed Virgin Mary for the life and salvation of the world.  And as He enters in with His Word, God in the Flesh, the Kingdom of God is at hand in His preaching and in His works of mercy.

His preaching has authority.  Even then the people recognized that and marveled at His authority over demons, high fevers, diseases of all kinds, and over all of creation.  Of course, He is the very Word of God by whom all things are made, so in that respect it is no wonder that all things must submit to His authority.  But in particular He comes with the authority that He obtains and receives from His Father by His fulfillment of the Law, by His innocent suffering and death for all of us.

He comes with this authority of His Cross and Resurrection to give Sabbath Rest to His people by the preaching of His Gospel, by the forgiveness of all their sins.  That is why it is His custom to be in the synagogue on the Sabbath Day.  And He is here today to give His peace and rest to you.

Now, the demons are quite right, on the surface of it, when they declare that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.  They cannot help but recognize Him, for He is indeed the Lord before whom every knee must finally bow.  In that sense, they do know who He is.  And yet, they do not know Him.

They are afraid of Him, and they recoil at His presence because He preaches the Kingdom of God.  And when He comes in with that preaching, demons are cast out, Satan is thrown down.  The devil cannot stand in the presence of Christ.  Demonic unclean spirits cannot speak when He says no.

The Lord Jesus sets Himself, His whole Body and Life, and His holy Word against sin, death, the devil, and hell.  He is the Enemy of the evil one.  For Jesus is the Holy One of Israel, the Holy One of God.  He must oppose all unrighteousness and every wickedness of thought, word, and deed.

But more powerful and more important than what He is against, is what He is for, and what He is.  In preaching the Kingdom of God in Himself, in His own flesh and blood, He preaches the Love of God.  Such love is the standard and the fulfillment of the entire Law, which He fulfills in love for you and for all people.  But such love as that is unknown to the devil and his minions.

Christ Jesus preaches the true divine Love, which is patient, and kind, and gentle.  Which does not think of itself but of others.  Which does no hurt nor harm to the neighbor, but helps and heals in whatever way it can.  He preaches not the infatuation, lust, and selfish, self-consuming hunger of sinful desire, which the world calls “love,” but the self-giving and self-sacrificing Love that does not get envious, jealous, or covetous, but concerns itself with caring for the neighbor in his need.

He does come, here and now, preaching this Love of God to you.  And the whole Law is summed up in this preaching.  Thus, in faith and love for God, you also are to love your neighbor as the Lord your God loves you in Christ.  For it is not only what He preaches, but also what He does.

So, then, what are you afraid of?  Why are you so threatened by this preaching of Christ Jesus?  What are the voices  whispering in your head that would make you want the Lord Jesus to go away and leave you alone?  Why are you so convinced that He has come to destroy you?

The pastor comes preaching the Kingdom of God, preaching repentance for the forgiveness of sins in the Name of Jesus Christ.  He preaches Holy Baptism, and so also the benefits and ongoing significance of your Baptism into Christ, that is, the daily dying and rising of repentance and faith in the Word of the Gospel.  To that end, he preaches Individual Confession & Absolution, and he teaches you this salutary practice from the Holy Scriptures and from the Small Catechism.

And you say, “Have you come to destroy us!?  What business do you have with us?  By what right do you say these things?  Would you weigh us down with this Confession?  Would you terrify us?  Would you have us expose our sins, and tell our secrets, and make ourselves weak?”

Why is it that you are so afraid of Jesus?  Why is it that you cower at His preaching and try to hide yourself away from Him and from His Word?  Why is it that you flee from the Kingdom of God?

The demons have it right when they say that Jesus is the Christ, the Holy One, the Son of God.  And they are quite right when they express their fear that He has come to destroy them.  For He has come to cast away the works of darkness, and He does preach against the devil, all his works, and all his ways.  He comes to defeat all the enemies of man, who would devour His dear children.

But the demons are wrong to place their terrible fears and vile accusations upon the lips of men.  And they are utterly wrong when they would have you utter such words, as though the Lord Jesus had come to destroy you.  Such unclean spirits of the devil would have you share their despair and drown in their deep darkness.  They would have you suffer their punishment and their judgment.

But Christ Jesus has not come to destroy men’s lives.  He has come to save them.  To save you.

It is hard for you to believe, because He does send His servants to preach His Law.  He sends men like Jeremiah to speak His Word with power.  He does not wink at your sins or call them cute.  He does not overlook your sins, and He will not permit you to continue in them, for they would in fact destroy you in body and soul.  He calls you away from your sins to live according to His Word.

You cannot get away from this preaching of the Law.  It is like a bronze wall, which towers over you with its strength.  You cannot get past it, go around it, or escape out from under its shadow.

Jesus preaches Love, as I have said, which is what the Law requires.  And you might well say and affirm that Love is good.  You certainly want to be loved.  But how often are you impatient and unkind?  And how often does your heart burn with jealousy and envy?  You do not rejoice with your neighbor when he prospers.  You covet what he has; you want it for yourself; and if you cannot have it, then you do not want your neighbor to have it, either.  You are easily provoked.  You take offense, and you give offense.  You use your words artfully to cut and to hurt, while guarding and protecting yourself.  You do not lift you hand to help, but to wound your neighbor.

Which is why, when Jesus preaches love — that you should love the Lord your God above all else, and, loving God, that you should love your neighbor — when He preaches that you should think not of yourself, but of others — when He calls you to believe and trust in Him, and to be content with what you have — you hear the accusation of the Law, and you know that you have failed.

You are afraid and become defensive when the Kingdom of God draws near in the preaching of
Christ Jesus, because your own little kingdom is threatened by His Word.  When He calls you to give up your sin, to give up your fornication of body and mind, to give up your drunkenness, to give up your filthy talk, and to give up the anger in your heart against your neighbor — when He calls you to give these things up, you are terrified that He would destroy you.  That He would hurt you.  That He would take away these sins that are so precious to you, to which you cling so firmly.

In this way, the Law of God and His preaching of repentance have their way with you and do put you to death — to yourself, to your sins, and to the world with its idols.  And yet, Christ performs this work, by His Word, for the sake of raising you up in His righteousness, sharing with you His own Life and Liberty, and sanctifying you with His own Holiness by His Gospel and His Spirit.

You see, He loves you.  It is in love that He beholds your trouble and misery.  It is in love that He beholds your sin.  And it is in love that He calls you to repentance, that you should live and not die.

Recall that man in the synagogue with the demonic unclean spirit.  Remember how he cried out, “Jesus of Nazareth, have you come to destroy us?”  Jesus commanded that demon to shut up and come out of the man, and as it came out the man was thrown to the ground, as you also may be thrown and brought to your knees when you are called to give up your sins.  It  was likely scary for the people around him, perhaps members of his family, fellow members of his congregation.  It was probably scary for him, as well, to be stripped of the spirit that had taken hold of him and driven him.  And yet, the demon came out at the Word of Jesus, and the man was left unharmed.

You, also, when you come and you confess your sins; when you expose them in the bright light of the Word of God; when you are honest with yourself and with the Lord, and you reveal your secrets and your shame to the servant of Christ Jesus — you are not destroyed but you are healed.  You are not simply crucified, dead, and buried, but you are also then raised up to newness of life.

It is in love that Christ Jesus comes.  It is in love that He preaches.  It is with love that He speaks.

And He is patient.  He is kind.  He is not jealous or boastful.  He is not arrogant or unbecoming.  He is gentle.  He does not think of Himself, but has emptied Himself and made Himself nothing.  In humble obedience He has gone to His death, so that you should have life in His Name.

It is in such love, therefore, that He comes preaching, not to destroy you, but to destroy the demons that possess you, and to shut up the accusations and the condemnation of the Law.  He comes and He preaches to give you peace, to give you rest, and to give you healing in your body and soul.

It is for this purpose that He has established His Church on earth, against which even the gates of death and hell cannot prevail.  You have heard that already in this Holy Gospel.  For Jesus got up and went out of the synagogue, and He entered the home of Simon Peter in Capernaum, where He preached His Word, where sinners heard Him and were healed, and they ate and drank with Him and shared His fellowship and life.  He entered in and healed Simon’s mother-in-law.  He rebuked her fever, as He rebuked the demons, and the fever left her; and she was raised up, no longer close to death, but alive and well and active in service to the Lord Jesus Christ and to her household.

So has He also entered in and made this house His Church, the home of forgiveness and healing in His Name.  For He Himself has borne away your sins.  He has kept the Law in every way, in love for His God and Father, and in love for you and all His neighbors.  And in such love for you, He has already suffered the consequences of your failure to love.  His Cross has atoned for your sins, and in His Resurrection He now raises you up — righteous and holy and reconciled to God.

As Christ lays hold of you in love, as He preaches repentance and forgiveness of sins, and as He calls you to and from the waters of your Baptism, to and from the Altar of His Body and Blood, He delivers you from the fear and bondage of death and the devil.  He sets you free to live and to love in peace, in confidence and hope, to serve His Church and your neighbor with a glad heart.

Though devils all the world should fill, all eager to devour you, do not be afraid.  Do not tremble in fear of them, but fear God and trust in Him, with whom there is forgiveness.  The bronze wall no longer towers over you as a fierce judgment of the Law.  It now surrounds you as a mighty fortress, within which you are safe.  Herein is your Peace with God and Sabbath Rest in Christ.  For here is the preaching of His Gospel, with which He loves you and gives you His own Life.

He does not simply preach and teach about Love, but He actually loves you by His preaching.  So take heart, and take comfort in the Word that you have heard this morning.  For He has said that He must keep preaching.  And He does keep preaching in every city, in every place, and also here.  It is for this purpose that He comes to you, that you should live with Him in the Kingdom of God, here at His Altar, and hereafter in the Resurrection of your body unto life everlasting.

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