“Unity in the Way of Worship (Ordo): Altar & Pulpit Fellowship and Liturgical Integrity”

The Augustana confesses and identifies the Church as “the assembly of saints in which the Gospel is taught purely and the Sacraments are administered rightly” (AC VII). That is to describe and define the Church in terms of the Holy Ministry (as confessed in AC V). I have long been struck by how closely that description matches the picture of the Church that Dr. Weinrich drew for us from St. Ignatius of Antioch back in the day – that of the bishop and the people gathered around the Lord’s Altar for the giving and receiving of Christ Jesus in His Word and Sacrament. Various theologians have referred to this sort of picture as a “Eucharistic Ecclesiology,” and I have found that way of thinking (in general) to be salutary. As we all eat of the one Bread which is the Body of Christ, and as we all drink from the one Cup which is the New Testament in His Blood, so are we all together one Body in Christ Jesus (1 Cor. 10:16-17).

To think and speak of the Church on the basis of “the ministry of teaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments” (AC V) is to identify the Church liturgically, that is, with reference to the Divine Service. Really, the Holy Ministry, the Divine Service, and the Liturgy all refer to more or less the same thing from slightly different angles; each at its heart comprises the Gospel as it is preached and administered. Or, to say it another way, as the Apology explains, “the term ‘liturgy’ squares well with the ministry.” It is an ancient word for “public service,” which coincides “with our position that a minister who consecrates shows forth the Body and Blood of the Lord to the people, just as a minister who preaches shows forth the Gospel to the people” (Apology XXIV.80-83). A liturgist cares for and/or administers public goods.

The “Liturgy,” in this respect, is narrowly defined and understood as the public reading and preaching of the Holy Scriptures, unto repentance and faith in Christ Jesus, and the administration of His Holy Supper in the Name and remembrance of Jesus, according to His Institution (1 Cor. 11:23-26). At this point we do not yet have in view any particular forms of the Liturgy, nor any of those “human traditions or rites and ceremonies, instituted by men” (AC VII), which have developed over the course of the Church’s life on earth. To begin with we are dealing with those things that are constitutive, definitive, essential, and necessary to the Church, her life, her unity and fellowship. In this respect, the Liturgy is not incidental or irrelevant but foundational and fundamental, because the preaching of the Gospel and the celebration of the Eucharist are the means whereby God “gives the Holy Spirit, who works faith, when and where He pleases, in those who hear the Gospel” (AC V). And as the Church, properly speaking, “is the assembly of saints and true believers” (AC VIII), there is no Christian Church apart from the Liturgy of the Gospel.

My point in laying out the liturgical character of the Church is to emphasize the liturgical aspects and parameters of Church Fellowship. It is the Liturgy of the Gospel that we have in common, not only as individual congregations, and not only within our respective synods and regional churches, but also in our relationships with each other in the communion of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. Indeed, the Liturgy is what connects us to one another as fellow members of the one Body of Christ, across the ages and around the world; not simply in the sense that we are all doing these same things, but more profoundly, that these sacred things of Christ Jesus – the faithful preaching of His Gospel and the right administration of His Sacraments in accordance with His Word – are the very things that bind us to Him and unite us with each other in Him. It is no accident or coincidence that St. Justin Martyr’s second-century description of the Divine Service still serves as an adequate and accurate summary of the Church’s liturgical life and activity on any given Sunday (Justin Martyr, First Apology, 66-67); for the Lord in His mercy and providential care has preserved the Liturgy of His Gospel for His Church on earth, and He has preserved His Church on earth by the Liturgy of His Gospel.

Of course, heterodox, heretical, and sectarian churches also read and preach the Bible in some fashion and make use of the outward rites and ceremonies of Baptism and the Supper to some extent; yet, we do not enter into Pulpit and Altar Fellowship with those churches. We do acknowledge that heterodox Christians belong to the fellowship of the Church catholic by faith in Christ Jesus, notwithstanding their erroneous teaching and confession. But we do not condone or participate in their heterodox doctrines and practices by exchanging pulpits with their preachers, communing them, or communing with them. In many cases, unorthodox teaching will manifest itself in unorthodox liturgical practices – and by the same token, we should add, unorthodox liturgical practices will often result in unorthodox doctrines. What is more, since the preaching of the Gospel is itself a constitutive part of the Liturgy, it will always be the case that teaching and practice – doctrine and doxology – rise or fall together over time. But the point remains that even impeccable rites and ceremonies are not sufficient in themselves to establish Church Fellowship where there is no harmonious agreement in the teaching and confession of the faith.

Written confessions are obviously of significant importance in this respect, as the Lord has revealed His Word in the Holy Scriptures, and as His Church has inscribed her confession of His Word in Creeds and the like from the start. Our own Lutheran Confessions function as a means of both teaching and testing the preaching and practice of our pastors, and we rightly pledge ourselves to those objective writings in the Rites of Ordination and/or Installation to the Office of the Holy Ministry. The seriousness with which we treat the orthodoxy of our pastors is especially appropriate in view of the topic at hand, because our Church Fellowship is exercised, not in written documents, but in the actual preaching and administration of the Gospel by our pastors in the liturgical life of the Church – in fellowship with one another.

In short, Church Fellowship is pastoral fellowship, that is, a fellowship of pastoral care in all those things that pastors are called, ordained, and sent to do in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. This takes us back to the Augustana’s confession of the Church in terms of the Holy Ministry, but now in consideration of the unity and fellowship of churches with each other. What does that entail, and what does it look like? As the Church is the assembly of saints and true believers gathered by, around, and for the preaching of the Gospel and the administration of the Sacraments in accordance with the Gospel (AC VII), churches live in true unity and enter into genuine fellowship when their pastors are preaching the same Gospel in harmony with each other and likewise administering the Sacraments in conformity with their preaching. That’s not to say or suggest that the pastors will all be preaching exactly the same sermon; neither will they all be conducting the Liturgy in a kind of lock-step uniformity that allows no discernible differences. But pastors in fellowship with each other will be recognizably consistent and similar in their preaching of repentance and forgiveness of sins in the Name of Jesus; and so will their liturgical practice be consistent and resonate with their preaching and teaching of His Word.

It bears noting that the right preaching and teaching of the Word of Christ Jesus is integral and essential to the right administration of His Holy Sacraments, both Holy Baptism and the Holy Communion (as well as Holy Absolution). Holy Baptism is given and received along with the teaching and observance of all that Jesus has commanded (St. Matt. 28:18-20); and not only is the Holy Communion given to disciples of Jesus (St. Matt. 26:26-28), that is, to those who are Baptized and being catechized in His Name, but it is administered in His “remembrance,” in proclamation of His death “until His comes” (1 Cor. 11:23-26). It is precisely for these reasons that the preaching of Christ Jesus is a constitutive part of the Liturgy. And that is also why an outwardly “correct” conduct of the external rites and ceremonies of the Liturgy is not sufficient in itself for the true unity and fellowship of the Church; orthodox preaching is also necessary.

In respect to both preaching and the entire conduct of the Liturgy we are dealing with pastoral practice and pastoral care, which are the heart and soul of Church Fellowship. By “pastoral care” I have in mind preaching, baptizing, catechizing, hearing confession, speaking Holy Absolution, administering the Holy Communion, visiting the sick and homebound, and exercising the cure of souls with the Word of Christ. Admitting individual Christians to the Sacrament of the Altar, whether the first time or any other time, is itself an exercise of pastoral care, which happens within an entire context of ongoing pastoral care. This point is fundamental to the orthodox practice of Closed Communion, which is nothing else and nothing less than the expression and actual practice of Church Fellowship. That is to say, pastors commune those Christians who are under their own ongoing pastoral care, as well as those Christians who are under the ongoing pastoral care of brother pastors with whom they share the same preaching and practice. Along the same lines, orthodox pastors will not commune Christians who are under a different pastoral care; nor will they commune individuals who have no pastor, although they will certainly invite and welcome such individuals to come under their pastoral care and to become part of the Church through catechesis.

In all of this, it is not so much that Church Fellowship is the prerequisite for Pulpit and Altar Fellowship, although that is also true; but it is more to the point that the Holy Communion is the actual embodiment of Church Fellowship in the exercise of pastoral care – in the preaching and practice of the Liturgy. So, the challenge that faces the Church on earth is discerning where such pastoral fellowship is located, and how it should best be carried out and practically expressed. And that challenge is all the greater where we have also to deal with differences in language and nomenclature, history, experience, and resources.

As previously noted, there is no expectation that pastors in fellowship with each other will conduct the Liturgy with absolute uniformity in every detail. Such an expectation would not be reasonable, nor even possible; pastors are all different, congregations are all different, church buildings are different in their architecture and furnishings, and any number of other differences enter into the equation. Thankfully, absolute uniformity in liturgical practice is not necessary to the exercise of pastoral fellowship. But all the differences do beg the question, as to how our pastoral fellowship shall be manifest and recognized.

There are those foundational givens which are necessary to Church Fellowship, such as we have already discussed. There must be the right preaching of the Gospel in all its truth and purity, in accordance with the Holy Scriptures – all centered and fulfilled in Christ Jesus, crucified and risen from the dead – unto repentance and faith in His forgiveness of sins. And there must be the right administration of the Holy Sacraments, in conformity with the Lord’s Institution and in harmony with the preaching of His Gospel. These are the most important and essential matters, so fundamental as to be cliché, and no Lutheran (indeed, no true Christian) would presume to argue otherwise.

But what of all the details that are not determined by the clear and explicit Word of God? It is in those areas of “adiaphora” that the Church has struggled to find the sweet spot between legalism and chaos. Within the Missouri Synod, for example, there has been increasing diversity in worship practices since the early 1980s, resulting in a decade or more of “worship wars” (throughout the 1990s), then settling into a status quo in which congregations are predominantly defined and identified by their particular “style” of worship, ranging from full-bore free-form “contemporary” practices that mimic Protestant Evangelicals, to carefully-ordered traditional “high church” practices replete with all the ceremonies. Every man appears to do whatever seems right in his own eyes; which is admittedly “biblical,” but not in a good way (Judges 17:6; 21:25)! Whether all of these styles actually maintain the fundamental integrity of the Gospel Liturgy in Word and Sacrament is debatable at best. In any case, even allowing for the sake of argument that all these things are permissible (1 Cor. 10:23), such a plethora of divergent practices is surely not edifying or beneficial to the unity of the Church or the tangible exercise of our fellowship. It is confusing and offensive to the people of God, misleading to those outside of His Church, and distracting from the One Thing truly needful. Albeit adiaphora are free in themselves, they are often so intimately connected to the preaching and administration of the Gospel that they cannot easily be distinguished in practical perception; so care must be taken that the actual Liturgy not be treated as if dispensable. If we do not wish to have “a king in Israel” (Judges 17:6; 21:25) – nor a Pope, for that matter – there must yet be some way for our pastors and bishops to manifest, measure, and recognize in practice our common confession of Christ Jesus, the unity of His Body, the Church, and our fellowship in His precious Gospel.

As Luther writes in his “Christian Exhortation to the Livonians” (1525): “For those who devise and ordain universal customs and orders get so wrapped up in them that they make them into dictatorial laws opposed to the freedom of faith. But those who ordain and establish nothing succeed only in creating as many factions as there are heads, to the detriment of that Christian harmony and unity of which St. Paul and St. Peter so frequently write. Still, we must express ourselves on these matters as well as we can, even though everything will not be done as we say and teach that it should be” (Luther’s Works AE 53, p. 46).

It was around that point that Dr. Luther finally consented to work on a German Mass (Deutsche Messe), after resisting the request to do so for some time. He feared that anything he might produce along these lines would be made into “a rigid law,” binding consciences in violation of Christian liberty. Yet, he saw “the widespread demand for German Masses and Services and the general dissatisfaction and offense that [had] been caused by the great variety of new Masses,” which so many others had rushed to make. So, then, while urging the freedom of the conscience before God in respect to “differences in liturgical usage,” Luther did set forth “The German Mass and Order of Service” in 1526. It was not his intention “that all of Germany should uniformly follow our Wittenberg order,” but he wrote that “it would be well if the Service in every principality would be held in the same manner and if the order observed in a given city would also be followed by the surrounding towns and villages” (Luther’s Works AE 53, pp. 61-62). In making this observation Luther acknowledges the blessing and benefit of having free things in common.

There is freedom and flexibility in human ceremonies. That there are many things which the Lord has neither commanded nor forbidden (adiaphora) is simply a fact, which we also teach and confess (FC X). The Lord has not specified every detailed nuance of New Testament worship; He has left most of those details to be worked out by His Church on earth and by the ministers of His Word in their pastoral care of His people in each parish. While the principles of adiaphora are often misunderstood, misconstrued, and/or misapplied, the actual freedom involved in that which God has neither required nor prohibited remains a blessing and a gift that He has granted to His Church for the sake of His Gospel, that it should have free course and be preached and administered to the joy and edification of His people in a wide variety of circumstances, across broad differences of time and place. But the freedom of adiaphora also means that the Church and her pastors are free to work toward common and consistent practices.

In asserting that “it is not necessary that human traditions or rites and ceremonies, instituted by men, should be alike everywhere,” the Augustana cites Ephesians 4 (verses 4-6) in affirming “the true unity of the Church” in the pure and right preaching and administration of the Gospel; for “there is one Body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all,” etc. (AC VII). Interestingly, although Dr. Luther does not cite the Ephesians passage in the Preface to his Deutsche Messe (1526), he offers a comparable premise as a compelling reason to seek unity and harmony in liturgical practice, not as though it were necessary, but because it is appropriate and edifying: “As far as possible,” he writes, “we should observe the same rites and ceremonies, just as all Christians have the same Baptism and the same Sacrament [of the Altar] and no one has received a special one of his own from God” (Luther’s Works AE 53, p. 61). In other words, the very oneness of the Gospel which is entirely sufficient for the true unity of the Church is also, in its own way, the ground on which the Church is well able to establish common and consistent practices.

In fact, the Lutheran Church has generally followed Luther’s advice in seeking to adopt, adapt, and make consistent use of worship practices in common, by and large preserving the liturgical traditions, rubrics, rites, and ceremonies of the Church catholic (AC XXIV.2-3). Consider the Lutheran Church Orders of the 16th and 17th centuries, which specify to varying degrees the way that pastors and congregations within a given territory should carry out the work of the Church. Those Lutheran Church Orders give directives in matters that are theologically free before God, but which the Church in her freedom chose to arrange and govern for the sake of consistency and unity in practice. Such consistency and unity are beneficial, not only for peace and harmony between neighboring parishes, but also for the clarity and precision of the Church’s catechesis and confession of the faith within each parish and beyond. “After all, the chief purpose of all ceremonies is to teach the people what they need to know about Christ” (AC XXIV.3).

The whole world knows that actions speak louder than words, and as we use care in the words that we confess in preaching, teaching, and otherwise, so do we rightly exercise care in our liturgical practice at the heart and center of the Church’s life. Along the same lines, Luther’s recommendation that churches should ideally seek to have Services, rites, and ceremonies in common is analogous to his admonition, in his Preface to the Small Catechism, that we should choose “one fixed, permanent form and manner” of teaching the Ten Commandments, the Creed, and the Our Father, and make every effort “to teach the young and simple people these parts in such a way that we do not change a syllable or set them forth and repeat them one year differently than in another” (Luther’s Small Catechism with Explanation, CPH, 2008, pp. 247-248). While Luther did not dictate any one particular “form and manner” for everyone, he did provide his Small Catechism for the use of the Church, and the Lutheran Church in freedom and love has chosen to continue using that beautiful contribution – to the great benefit of many generations.

Similar principles of pastoral care in respect to liturgical practice are exemplified in the case of Wilhelm Löhe’s Agenda, written for the mission of the Church in the United States, based upon the forms and practices he found “in one or the other of the many old Lutheran [Church] Orders” (Liturgy for Christian Congregations of the Lutheran Faith, Third Edition, tr. By F. C. Longaker, 1902, p. xi). To prepare and produce such an Agenda is, in itself, to make decisions and offer directions in matters that are free; and to do so on the basis of past precedent demonstrates the intention to be in continuity with those who have gone before us in the faith and confession of Christ Jesus. There is a deliberate embracing and fostering of catholicity with past, present, and future generations of the Church. Similarly, Friedrich Lochner, a student of Löhe and one of the first pastors of the Missouri Synod, in his thorough study of the history, theology, and practice of the Liturgy, likewise gives careful attention to the practices of the Lutheran Church Orders (see The Chief Divine Service of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, translated by Matthew Carver, edited by Jon Vieker, Kevin Hildebrand, and Nathaniel Jensen, CPH, 2020).

Not surprisingly, the Missouri Synod took these things seriously from the beginning. A conservative hymnal and liturgical agenda were among the first things that C.F.W. Walther and the congregations under his care took the time and made the effort to prepare and produce in the early years of the Synod’s existence (the hymnal within a year, the agenda within a decade of the Synod’s beginning). What is more, the Synod’s Constitution has always stipulated, in one way or another, the necessity of “doctrinally pure agenda, hymnbooks, and catechisms in church and school” (LCMS Constitution VI.4, Handbook 2019, p. 13). As the Missouri Synod began to use the English language, they also adopted the “Common Service” of 1888, which had been developed by a joint venture of several Lutheran Synods in the Eastern United States. By deliberate intent, the “Common Service” was based upon “the common consent of the pure Lutheran Liturgies of the Sixteenth Century,” or, in those parts of the Liturgy where there was not “an entire agreement” among the Church Orders, “the consent of the largest number of greatest weight” (Luther Reed, The Lutheran Liturgy: A Study of the Common Liturgy of the Lutheran Church in America, Revised Edition, Fortress Press, 1960, p. 183).

The point here is simply to say that the Lutheran Church, from the outset and throughout her history, has recognized the benefit of common and consistent liturgical practices and the corresponding need for direction and guidance in these areas. That has been true especially among those who take doctrine and confession of the faith most seriously, precisely because liturgical practice is indicative of what we actually believe, teach, and confess, as well as a means of ongoing catechesis in God’s Word and faith. By the same token, the unity of a common confession of the faith is both embodied and substantiated by a unity of practice. It is true that Church Fellowship does not depend on a uniformity in adiaphora, but where there is fellowship in doctrine the Church will also tend to gravitate toward a common and consistent usage of adiaphora in the conduct of the Gospel Liturgy. And the beauty of it is, the Church is perfectly free to pursue that path. Indeed, it is not a violation but an exercise of faith and freedom when the pastors and congregations of a particular territory or jurisdiction of the Church mutually agree – in love – to order and conduct their liturgical life according to common rubrics, rites, and ceremonies.

The truth is that the Church cannot do those essential things that God has given her to do without some other rubrics, rites, and ceremonies to accompany them, even if those accompanying practices differ over time and from one place to another. The question is not whether to have and use such things, but how best to choose them – that is, by what criteria – and how best to think of them and use them. In fact, the use of rubrics, rites, and ceremonies is fundamental to the Ministry of the Gospel in the life of the Church. So, it is useful to unpack these things a bit and explain what they are and how they work:

Rubrics are the rules or instructions that guide and govern the conduct of the Liturgy, whether instituted by the Lord or left to the freedom of the Church to determine in love. In the Lord’s Supper, for example, the Rubrics given by the Lord are, “Do this in remembrance of Me” (and, “as often as you eat this Bread and drink this Cup, proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes”). Examples of the rubrics determined by the Church would include information on the day and time of the Divine Service (e.g., Sunday 9:00 a.m.) and basic logistical instructions for the distribution of the Holy Communion (in writing or by the ushers). Such rubrics are necessary to any sort of coordinated group activity, and so also for the Church’s life.

Rites are the words that are spoken, chanted, or sung by the pastors, cantors, choirs, or congregation, whether instituted by the Lord or left to the freedom of the Church to determine in love. In the Lord’s Supper, for example, the Rites given by the Lord are, “Take, eat. This is My Body, given for you. Drink of it, all of you. This Cup is the New Testament in My Blood, shed for you, for the forgiveness of sins.” Examples of the rites developed by the Church in love include the Creed, the Preface, Proper Preface, and Sanctus, the distribution formula and distribution hymns, and the Post-Communion Collect, etc. All such rites are in keeping with the fact that we are verbal creatures, and that God Himself does and gives everything by and with His Word – which we are given to confess and pray to Him and to each other.

Ceremonies are all the actions, movements, postures, architecture, furnishings, vessels, vestments, paraments, artwork, and adornments involved in the conduct of the Liturgy, whether instituted by the Lord or left to the freedom of the Church to determine in love. In the Lord’s Supper, for example, the Ceremonies established by the Lord are taking the bread and the cup of wine, consecrating them with His Word, and distributing them to His disciples to eat and drink as His Body and Blood. Examples of the ceremonies adopted by the Church in love include the Sanctuary, the Altar, the crucifix and candles, the stole and chasuble, the Communion vessels, the Communion rail, and the work of Elders and Ushers in directing “traffic.” Some such ceremonies are inherent and inevitable to our life in the body, occupying space and time, as well as being unavoidably involved in the administration of the Holy Sacraments.

It is not possible to administer and receive the Means of Grace without ceremonies. However, not all ceremonies are created equal. Some ceremonies are better, and some are worse than others; and some ceremonies have no place in the Church, even if they would otherwise be “free.” All things are lawful in Christ Jesus, but not all things are meet, right, and salutary (1 Cor. 10:23). Any ceremony or practice that might be considered for use in the Liturgy must be measured and evaluated according to its service and support of the Word of God, and thereby determined to be more or less helpful to faith and love.

Our Lutheran hymnals and service books, and even the old Lutheran Church Orders, do not specify every detail of liturgical practice. Whereas the rites and rubrics of the Divine Service, the Daily Prayer Offices, and various other occasions, are more or less adequately provided for the use of pastors in their care for the Lord’s Church, certainly not all of the potential ceremonies are spelled out, prescribed, or described. As previously indicated, it is not necessary for all such human arrangements to be everywhere the same; nor would it be desirable for all of those details to be the same, even if that were theoretically possible. Practical matters can be dealt with pragmatically. But there are still a variety of adiaphora that may be practiced (or not) with theological significance for catechesis, confession of the faith, and pastoral care. And those choices and decisions do have some impact on the relationship of pastors with each other.

The boundaries and parameters of the Church’s freedom in worship are established and contoured, not only by explicit commands and prohibitions, but also implicitly by the constitutive rites and ceremonies of Holy Baptism, the Preaching of the Law and the Gospel unto repentance and the forgiveness of sins, and the administration of the Holy Communion in remembrance of Jesus. These divinely given Means of Grace are the foundation, the beating heart, and the central high point of the Church’s faith and life in Christ. Whatever else may be done in worship is determined in relation to these constitutive Means.

Beyond those basics, the measure of any given ceremony’s worth and benefit requires more than the avoidance of overtly false doctrine. The best ceremonies are not simply true, as opposed to false; they are positively helpful in teaching and confessing the Word of God, and they are beautiful in adorning His Liturgy of the Gospel. It is indeed appropriate and salutary to adorn the Liturgy with artistic beauty, as a confession of faith in the Word and work of Christ Jesus, and as a catechesis in the hidden Mysteries of His great Salvation. One may consider such examples as chanting, the sign of the Cross, chasubles, the elevation of the Sacrament, genuflecting at various points in the Liturgy, and the use of incense.

The broadest criteria for the consideration of any liturgical practice are faith toward God and love for the neighbor; which can also be summarized in terms of reverence and courtesy. That which is harmful to faith and love is not free but forbidden. And that which is irreverent, rude, or frivolous, is likewise not free but forbidden (FC SD X.1, 7, 9). The Second Commandment requires that God’s Name be kept holy, and that God must be sanctified by His priests and His people (Ex. 20:7; Num. 20:12; Lev. 10:3).

Courtesy and love for the neighbor do suggest a steady consistency and continuity of practice, which are so conducive to peace and rest in the Liturgy of the Gospel, because they allow for a ready participation of the entire congregation in the Church’s worship of Christ Jesus. By contrast, frequent fluctuations and diversity in practice are unsettling to the people of God and easily distract them from His Liturgy of the Gospel, because they require a level of literacy, attention, energy, and effort that tends to frustrate or prevent the participation of many members in the Church’s worship of Christ Jesus.

In considering various possible adiaphora, pastors should also take into account the larger fellowship of the Church catholic, including those who have gone before us in the faith and confession of Christ Jesus, as well as those who will follow after us (our children and our children’s children), and those with whom we are in fellowship in the present (and those with whom we are working toward Church Fellowship). This, too, is another exercise of love for the neighbor, a ready willingness to set aside our own personal proclivities and preferences for the sake of having “all things in common” (Acts 2:42-44).

Tradition is generally more conducive to the Gospel than novelty (1 Cor. 11:1–2, 16–26), because what is handed over is received as a gift or inheritance from the past, rather than being fabricated for ourselves and our own purposes in the present. Lutherans have therefore been evangelically conservative when it comes to tradition, in contrast to the legalism of Rome on the right and of the Reformed on the left.

Along similar lines, catholicity in practice is generally more conducive to love than personal innovation, because it belongs by definition to the entire Church, to the household of faith and the whole family of God, rather than being the unique invention or private property of an isolated individual or small group.

What is more, the collective wisdom of the Church is usually wiser than the personal insights of any one individual. True, the nature and needs of pastoral care require the free exercise of pastoral discernment and discretion, just as the Church in each time and place is free with respect to human customs. Yet, the starting point should be what has been given and received within the life of the Church, rather than the novelty of personal ingenuity. Consider the great value and benefit of the Church Year and Lectionary, the Ordinary and Propers of the Divine Service, and the use of customary vestments and furnishings.

These are some of the key criteria that should help to guide a pastor in caring for his congregation in the freedom of faith and the service of love. The same criteria are also of help to bishops and the churches under their care in working toward harmony and unity of liturgical practice, both within their respective jurisdictions and in the exercise of Church Fellowship with one another. To whatever extent we are able to share rubrics, rites, and ceremonies in common, those practices demonstrate, express, substantiate, and support our common confession of the faith, even as they also serve and support the preaching and administration of the Gospel Liturgy. What is more, those recognizably Lutheran liturgical practices also help the laity to distinguish and identify our Church Fellowship wherever in the world it may be found. Certainly, as we share the ecumenical Creeds and our Lutheran Confessions in common, it is also meet, right, and salutary that we should share those things that govern and guide our liturgical practices.

To Redeem and Purify You for Life with God

Here and now, on this Fortieth Day of Christmas, the Lord has brought you once again to His Holy Temple, that you should receive and worship the Christ Child in His Body of flesh and blood. Everything unfolds exactly as the Lord has spoken, according to His Word and under the guidance of His Holy Spirit. For these events belong to the fulfillment of His promises of old.

Though not readily apparent, St. Luke has actually recorded the keeping of two specific Laws from the Old Testament, one concerning St. Mary and her purification after giving birth to her firstborn Son, and the other concerning that same Son, Christ Jesus, who is here called holy to the Lord.

It may seem odd that St. Mary, the blessed Virgin chosen by God, should need to be purified for giving birth to the Lord Himself, conceived in her by the Holy Spirit. Of course the Holy Family keeps the Law received from God through Moses, according to the custom. But there’s more to it than that. For this Law, in particular, concerning the purification of a woman after childbirth, now finds its true goal and its fulfillment in this Mother who has given birth to this Son.

It goes back to that first promise of the Gospel in the Garden of Eden, following the Fall into sin, that the Seed of the Woman would crush the head of the serpent. You know that St. Mary is that Woman, and Christ Jesus, her Son, is that Seed who treads Satan, sin, and death beneath His feet.

At the same time, along with the promise of the Gospel, there was also the curse and consequence of sin, that Eve and her daughters would suffer pain in the bringing forth of children. Hence, both the curse and the promise are met together in the conceiving and bearing of daughters and sons.

In the light of God’s Word, notwithstanding the burdens and hardships of sin and death, it was the case that every son born of a woman — to Adam and Eve, to Abraham and Sarah, to the family of Isaac, Israel, and Judah, to the house and lineage of David, as the promise became more focused — every son born of a woman might be the Messiah; and every daughter might be the mother of the Messiah. Until, finally, there is this Woman who gives birth to this Son who is the Messiah, whose Body and Life shall be given into death for the redemption of all people, and whose holy and precious Blood will be shed upon the Cross for the Atonement of the sins of the whole world.

That is what the requisite offering for the purification of a new mother signified. It was for the atonement of her sins and the sanctification of her body and life, in view of the hope and promise of the Gospel. And all of those sacrifices pointed to the One who has now come, the Child Jesus.

So there is also the Law concerning Him, which is here fulfilled, as well. For every firstborn son who opened the womb was to be “called holy to the Lord.” This Law went back to the Exodus from Egypt; and, along with that, it also recalled the case of Abraham and his beloved son, Isaac.

You know that earlier story, when God came to Abraham and told him to take his son, his only son, Isaac, whom he loved, and to sacrifice him as a whole burnt offering to the Lord on the mountain. Abraham proceeded in faith to do as he was commanded, painful though it was to comprehend. But at the last possible moment — his hand poised in the air with the knife, ready to slay his son as a sacrifice — God stayed his hand and provided the Ram, caught in a thicket, in the place of Isaac.

So, likewise, in the Exodus from Egypt, when the Angel of the Lord passed through Egypt and struck down all the firstborn sons of man and beast, the sons of Israel were spared because God provided a lamb in their place: The Passover Lamb, sacrificed at twilight, prepared according to the Word of the Lord, the blood of the lamb marking the door, the flesh of the lamb being eaten. Where the Lord beheld that blood, He passed over, and He spared the sons in those houses. So it was that all of those firstborn sons belonged to the Lord; and so were they called holy to the Lord.

Now, to be sure, all of Israel belonged to the Lord. Indeed, the whole of creation belongs to the Lord. But those firstborn sons, in particular, were spared and redeemed by the Lord through His giving of that lamb in their place. So every firstborn son, precisely in this way, belonged to God.

The way God worked that out was by taking the entire tribe of Levi to be His special servants. The Levites would serve in His presence, assisting the sons of Aaron (also from the tribe of Levi) in caring for the Tabernacle (later the Temple). For this sacred service the entire tribe of Levi was dedicated, consecrated to the Lord. By contrast, all of the other firstborn sons, from all of the other tribes, were redeemed for the price of five silver shekels, rather than being given over to serve.

This is the Law that God established for the firstborn sons of Israel, which Mary and Joseph came to fulfill in the Temple on this day. Notably, though, St. Luke does not speak of redemption. The Lord Jesus is not from the tribe of Levi, and we may assume that Mary and Joseph brought the five silver shekels that were specified as the price of His redemption. But that is not what St. Luke describes. Instead, he indicates that the Child Jesus was presented to the Lord, almost as a Levite would have been — in the way that Samuel (a Levite) was dedicated to the service of the Lord.

Of course it is true that Jesus belongs to the Lord, for He is the almighty and eternal Son of God, begotten of the Father from all eternity. But here now, in the substance of human flesh and blood just like your own, He is presented and dedicated to the Lord on your behalf. He is given in your place, in the place of all the sons of Adam and daughters of Eve. His entire body and life are given up to God, to live and die for you and all people. He is not redeemed from sacrifice and service; He redeems you by His sacrifice and service. He is the Ram and the Passover Lamb given for you.

Now, then, what the Law actually required for the purification of a woman after childbirth was not two young birds, be they turtledoves or pigeons, but actually one bird and a lamb. But in the case of those who were poor, who could not afford a lamb, the Law made provision for a second bird in the place of the lamb. So it is that St. Mary and St. Joseph here bring the offering of the poor, that is to say, two young birds, for the purification of the Blessed Virgin Mother of our Lord.

And yet, for all of that, this same Mother brings in her arms the One who is the Lamb, the true Passover, the Lamb of God who takes upon Himself and takes away the sins of the whole world. She brings not just a couple birds but her own dear Son, and she presents Him to the Lord, that He should live and die as the Sacrifice of Atonement for Israel and all the nations; that He should redeem His people from their sins, and purify and cleanse them, by the shedding of His own Blood.

And He is the Atonement for all of your sins, as well. For by the sacrifice of His flesh and blood, He has liberated you from Egypt and redeemed you from the bondage of sin, death, and hell.

And that is not all. For He has become like you, not only to bear your sins, but to partake of blood and flesh like your own, that you might become like Him and partake of His divine nature in body and soul. So has He bound Himself to you, and He traverses the wilderness right along with you. His entire Body and Life are dedicated to God, and He lives that life in the flesh as the true Man, as the beloved and well-pleasing Son. He is a Babe in arms, a Toddler, a little Boy, a Twelve-Year-Old, a Teenager, and a full-grown Man. He lives the same human life that you are called to live in the flesh. He lives by faith, He lives in love. He lives unto God, that you might live in Him.

He traverses the wilderness with you, and He brings you into the Promised Land. He brings you into the presence of God. He brings you into the Holy of Holies made without hands, eternal in the heavens. He is not only the Propitiation for your sins, but He is your merciful and great High Priest in all things pertaining to God. By His sacrifice upon the Cross, and in His Resurrection and Ascension, He has not only entered the Temple of God, but His Body has become the true Temple, the divine, eternal Temple of God, that you might abide in the presence of God within His Body.

As He has given Himself into death for your sins, so has He been raised as your righteousness and holiness forever. And He ever lives to make intercession for you — in the human Flesh that He shares with you, and with the Blood that He has shed for you. As your own High Priest, not from the tribe of Levi, but according to the order of Melchizedek, forever and ever, He stands for you in the presence of God the Father, in the Holy Spirit, that you should be with Him where He is.

In the beautiful words that St. Paul has written, you have already died with Christ in your Holy Baptism, and so is your life hidden with Christ in God. You are seated with Him in the heavenly places. And here is the surety and guarantee, the sign and seal of that Life: As Christ is presented in the Temple in human flesh and blood like your own, presented to His God and Father on your behalf and in your place, so are you presented to His God and Father holy and blameless in Him, without flaw, without blemish, perfect in every way. You are holy and righteous in the presence of God, you are beloved and well-pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, His Son, our Lord.

As He has partaken of your flesh and blood — as He has come in the fullness of time, the Seed of the Woman, the new and greater Adam, the Husband and Head of His Body and Bride — so are you here given to partake of His Flesh and Blood. And as you feast upon these Fruits of His Cross, the Body and Blood of the Lamb, you have the Life of God in yourself, in your body and your soul.

And in this one Lord Jesus Christ, your merciful and great High Priest, you have Peace with God — at all times and in all places. Peace even now, in this poor life of labor, as you go about your days in the world. As you lay down at night and get up in the morning, as you go about your work, as you care for your family and serve your neighbor, you have Peace that surpasses all human understanding. For you know that you are reconciled to God and acceptable in His sight.

And at the last, when the Lord shall call you from this vale of tears to Himself in heaven, you shall depart in Peace from this mortal life on earth, knowing that your death is but a slumber, and that, as your Savior Christ Jesus is risen from the dead, so shall you also rise and live with Him.

Then you shall see Him face to face with your own eyes, from your own body of flesh and blood. Then you shall behold Him, no less than Simeon did, but even more clearly, the One who is the Glory of Israel, the One who is your Light, your Life, and your Salvation, who sanctifies you with His own holiness and glorifies you in both body and soul with His own righteousness forever.

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

Today this Scripture Is Fulfilled in Your Ears

It is an audacious claim that Jesus makes, not only for the people of Nazareth way back then, but also for you, right here and now. It is a claim concerning Himself, His Person, and His work as the Messiah, as well as a bold assertion concerning the preaching of His Word, that is, the Voice of the Lord which proceeds from His gracious lips and from the mouth of His servants into your ears.

By this Word of Christ — not simply a Word about Him, but the Word that He continues to speak to and for His Church — by this Word the most amazing things are done for you and given to you. But apart from this Word, there is neither life nor light, nor any hope or help for you.

By way of example, consider what great things and what tremendous benefits the washing of water with the Word of Christ does for you and gives to you and to your children in Holy Baptism. It works the forgiveness of sins, rescues from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this — all of this by the power and authority of His Word. Without His Word, it would be water only and not the Life-giving Baptism that it is. But by and with the Word of Christ, your Holy Baptism makes of you a living member of His Body, the Church, on earth as it is in heaven.

It is a pleasant and agreeable thing to hear and receive such lovely Gospel Words and promises, which are most certainly true. And yet, there is a problem: Your sinful heart does not believe and trust this Holy Gospel, for one thing, nor are you satisfied by these gracious Words that enter your ears and fall upon your body and life from the lips of your dear Lord, Jesus Christ.

His promises sound too good to be true as He speaks of deliverance, freedom, safety, and security in the Land of God. So you are skeptical and cynical to begin with. But patient you are not. For you covet and crave more tangible benefits than you have yet seen or held in your hands, and you would much prefer to have the promises of the Lord in your body and life right now, instead of waiting for the Resurrection of your body to the Life everlasting on the other side of the grave.

Meanwhile, your fallen flesh, your sinful heart and mind delude you to suppose that, in contrast to others, you actually deserve to have what you want by some right or rationality of “fairness,” despite the fact that for your sins you deserve nothing but punishment. The Lord does not owe you anything. But in defensiveness and desperation, you get angry, build up a big old head of steam, and become hostile toward the Lord and everyone around you when others appear to be receiving what you want for yourself. Such covetous desire is the root of all temptation and sin.

The same thing happens when it comes to the Church on earth. How often do you hear comments and complaints about what the Church ought to be like, what it should be and do, and how it should make you feel. Comparison and competition with the world are the ruling standard.

How many other such questions and criticisms go unspoken, perhaps within your own thoughts and feelings when you’re not hearing what you want to hear or getting what you want to get? It’s not for me to get inside your head or your heart, but ask yourself whether you are content with the Word of Christ and the gift and promise of His Gospel. Or do you covet what He does not give and resent the neighbor who appears to have what you do not? Are you jealous of Capernaum? Or of that other congregation with more people, more money, more of this, or maybe less of that? Such envy and jealousy will poison your heart and mind against the Lord Jesus and His gracious Gospel.

Truth be told, there are as many differing opinions as to how the Church on earth should be as there are people in the world shopping around for the savior and the sort of salvation that suits them. But there’s no real safety or security in that. No divine Wisdom or divine Life in it, either.

But the dear Lord Jesus bestows what only He can give, according to His good and gracious will, where and when and how it pleases Him, solely by the way and the means of His Word and the preaching of it. He does His mighty works and establishes the Kingdom of God here on earth, not by any might or cleverness of man — far less by any greed or grasping of man — but by the Cross that He first of all bears and then lays upon His disciples, and by the promise of His Resurrection, the surety of your own resurrection, which you cannot see but can only believe.

So, how shall you respond to this preaching of Jesus? Will you receive Him and embrace Him as your Savior on His terms, and rejoice in His divine Life and eternal salvation, although He comes to you and deals with you by and with the Cross? Or will you insist on your own way, on your own expectations, on your own pride and selfishness and greed, and drive the Lord Jesus away?

Oh, to be sure — and make no mistake about it — your unbelief, your sinful rejection, and your rebellion against Jesus will not thwart Him or prevent Him from accomplishing His great salvation. As surely as He has become Man, has sacrificed Himself once for all upon the Cross, has risen from the dead and ascended to the right hand of the Father, so surely will His Name be hallowed, His Kingdom come, and His Will be done. The only real question is, what will become of you?

How often shall you throw Him out — if not bodily, then by your attitude, and by your words and actions — before He simply passes through your midst like water through your hands and moves on to others, leaving you with nothing but your bitter resentment, to languish and die in your sins?

Take care, then, how you hear and receive the Lord Jesus Christ as He comes to you and speaks to you. Repent of your sinful unbelief, your covetous lust, and your angry rejection of His Word. Do not insist on your own wants and your own way, but rejoice in His gracious Voice and give thanks that He comes to you in Peace to atone for your sins and to reconcile you to God forever. Repent of all your sins, and find your help and hope and life in the preaching of His Gospel.

It is instructive to contrast the response of Nazareth to the preaching of Jesus with the response of the people in Nehemiah’s day when Ezra the priest read and preached the Law of God to them.

Take your cues from those who heard and repented, who were comforted with the mercies of the Lord and given to feast upon the gifts of His grace. Rather than hardening your heart and mind against the Lord and adding sin upon sin by rejecting and refusing to hear and heed His Word, humble yourself before Him, live by faith in His Word under His Cross, and worship Him with reverence and awe in your body, soul, and spirit. Fear, love, and trust in Him above all else.

It is the great irony and paradox of the Christian faith, that when the Law of God exposes you and condemns you as a sinner, just so does He open you up to His grace and mercy and declare you to be the object of His Gospel of forgiveness. For if you are a sinner, the Lord Jesus is your Savior. But if you refuse to be a sinner, then you refuse and reject the One who is the Savior of sinners.

It is indeed for this very purpose that He has come to you, and for which He has been anointed by the Spirit of God in His Baptism. He is here in the flesh to bear and carry the Cross, in order to save you from your sins, to redeem you from death and the devil, and to bring you to God as a member of His own crucified and risen Body. He comes to cleanse and heal you, to set you free from the bondage of guilt and fear, to fill up your poverty with His heavenly riches, and to feed your desperate hunger and deepest thirst with nothing less than Himself, His Body and His Blood.

None of this according to any merit or worthiness in you, nor by any pedigree or power in you. That is precisely the point! It is all by His grace, by His divine charity, to meet your real need.

If He does not relieve you of your loneliness and isolation; if He does not provide you with the spouse, the family, or the friends that you would so much like to have; if He does not cure all your aches and pains and hurts and anxieties, nor heal all your temporal, bodily ailments; if He does not make you rich and famous, or give you whatever else it is that you have demanded and expected in your sinful thoughts and desires — it is not because He has not come to be your Savior.

On the contrary, the Lord Jesus would have you recognize your real need for Him and so receive Him as your Savior from sin, death, the devil, and hell. And He would have you live by faith in His preaching, instead of living for earthly comforts and worldly achievements, which can be ever so delightful but are deceptive in their appearances because they do not last and cannot save you.

Indeed, if you are blessed by the Lord your God with many and great things here on earth, pray all the more fervently that He would “lead you not into temptation,” but that He would guide you by His Word and Spirit to use whatever He has put into your hands in godly faith and in holy love for Him and for your neighbor. Do not put your trust in such things which whither and fade like grass.

The harsh reality is that, whether you have much or little, your covetous and sinful heart will lead you astray to the left or to the right, either into sinful pride or else into faithless despair.

In your idolatrous fear, love, and trust in yourself and in other false gods, you will get frustrated, angry, and rebellious with Jesus, and you would just as soon cast Him out of your life altogether.

But for all of that, He has come to be the Savior of sinners. He comes to be your Savior, to speak to you the gracious Word of His Gospel, to absolve you of all your sins, to release you from the oppression of your old Adam, and to set you free from false belief, from pride, and from despair.

It’s all right here for you — in this preaching of His Word — sounding in your ears, even now — this Word of Christ that lifts you up and gives you His Life in place of your death and damnation.

Do not let it go right by you, in one ear and out the other. But give careful attention to His Word. Consider it, and cling to it, and take it to heart, irrespective of your fickle feelings and emotions.

It is the Word of the Word-made-Flesh that is here preached to you, which makes of your Holy Baptism a cleansing from transgression, from the vile leprosy of sin, and from the stink of death.

It is the Word of the Word-made-Flesh that is here spoken to you with such tenderness and peace, which feeds you from the never-empty Bread Box and the overflowing Chalice of His everlasting Marriage Feast; for He is your immortal Bridegroom, who lives and does not die forevermore.

As you now hear His voice in your ears, so eat of the Fat Portions which He gives into your mouth, and drink of the Sweet Wine which He pours out upon your lips and tongue for the forgiveness of all your sins. As He has spoken, so does He freely distribute these sacred Portions to you, and to the many who have nothing, because He has prepared this great Feast for His own Name’s sake.

Neither mourn nor weep, but rejoice in the Lord your God. For He rejoices over you in holy Love. As He forgives you all your sins and justifies you in His sight by the preaching of His Gospel, so by His Word does He delight in you with great joy, and by His Word you are strengthened in Him.

It is His Word of the Gospel which sanctifies this day and makes of it the day of salvation for you, and His Word of the New Testament which makes of this building His own House and Home, His dwelling place of peace, that you might live with Him in His Kingdom both now and for eternity.

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

United with Christ Jesus in His Baptism, His Cross, and His Office

It was on this Sunday twenty-five years ago that I had the privilege of preaching for my father’s installation as the new pastor at Our Savior Lutheran Church in Milford, Illinois. Not only does that make this a particularly poignant and nostalgic occasion for me, but I remain convinced — now as then — that the Baptism of Our Lord is an especially appropriate day for an installation, as a compelling opportunity to consider the meaning and significance of the pastoral office.

If I have understood correctly, it was almost nineteen years ago, Pastor Griebel, when you were ordained at Emmanuel-Soest and there received the special gifts of the Holy Spirit which are known collectively as the Office of the Holy Ministry: When you yourself — your body and soul, your eyes, ears, reason and all your senses, and all that you are — were given as a gift of the Spirit to the Church on earth; when the yoke of Christ Himself — the mantle of His holy Prophets and Apostles — was laid upon you, not as a burden, but as a joyous vocation under the Cross; when, in addition to your other vocations as a son (and a son of God in Christ), as a husband and father, you also became a shepherd of the Lord’s flock under the one Good Shepherd of us all.

From the first, there is a particularity to all of this. You were ordained at Emmanuel-Soest, but you were given to be the Pastor of St. John’s Lutheran Church in Wapakoneta, Ohio, and thereafter to serve at the Veteran’s Hospital and later at Lutheran Life Villages. So, too, you have now been called and are here today given to be the Pastor of Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church.

This particularity — this “locatedness” of your pastoral ministry — is a continuation and extension of the very Incarnation that we have so recently celebrated in the Holy Nativity of Christ our Lord. For it is the scandalous particularity of the Christian faith, that we can point to this Baby in this place at this time — and/or to this Man on this Cross at this time — born of the Blessed Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate — and precisely (and only) here in Him, we confess, is the one true God in the Flesh, who for us and our salvation came down from heaven to earth.

Now, to be sure, you are not God! You are not the Lord Jesus Christ! But we can point to you — here in this place and at this time — and rightly confess that you are here given to speak with the Voice of Christ to these people, and to administer on their behalf the works of Christ Himself.

That is the very point and purpose for the rite of installation this morning: that we might see with our eyes, and confess with our lips, that God has placed you here to speak and act for Him, and in your Ministry to be His active Gospel-presence among these dear people, for whom Christ died.

Today, you do not become what you were not, but what you have been, what God has given you to be in your Ordination nineteen years ago, is now given to and for Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church right here on St. Mary’s Avenue. In all of its particularities — and we might even say, in all of its peculiarities — God is present and at work in this place, at this time, in and through you.

In this respect, it is so fitting and appropriate that the Lord has chosen this day — the First Sunday after the Epiphany: the Baptism of Our Lord — to install you in this new Office of responsibility. For it is certainly the case that our Lord Jesus did not receive the Holy Spirit for the first time at His Baptism (as though He were previously without the Spirit), but He was visibly and publicly anointed by the Spirit — when He descended bodily upon Him in the form of a dove — to “install” Him, as it were, into His Office and Ministry as the Christ or Messiah, the Lord’s Anointed.

He is the Son of God and bears the Holy Spirit from all eternity, but in the waters of the Jordan River, as the Son of Man, He is bodily anointed as our Substitute and Savior. As St. Luke puts it, “When all the people were baptized, Jesus also was baptized.” Henceforth, all that He is and does is for the sake of our salvation. And so also for you: Henceforth, all that you are and all that you do — as a minister of Christ and as a pastor of His Church on earth — is for the people of Trinity.

Now, there are many who would say that your ministry is an extension of your own Holy Baptism. But that is only indirectly true, and it is a bit misleading to follow down that road of logic. By all means, there is no greater treasure in your life than Holy Baptism! But it is not by virtue of your Baptism that you speak the Words and work the works of Christ Jesus as a pastor of His Church. Rather, as the Liturgy of the Holy Communion has taught us so well, it is by virtue of your Office as a called and ordained servant of the Word that you forgive sins, and preach the Gospel, and baptize, and distribute the Body and Blood of Christ to and for His people (now also in this place), all in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Make no mistake, the Sacrament of Holy Baptism belongs to all of this, and the waters of your own Holy Baptism are certainly also involved. For in the washing of those waters with the Word you have been united with Christ Jesus in His Cross and Resurrection, anointed by His Holy Spirit, and adopted by His God and Father as a beloved and well-pleasing son. And, as a son of God in Christ, you bear His Holy Name in all of your various vocations. Indeed, your entire life in all its aspects, including your vocation as a minister of Christ, is an ongoing confession of the Christian Creed.

But your pastoral vocation was not given to you in your Baptism. There you were called to be and to live as a child of God. So were you called to be a child of your parents when you were born; you were called to be a husband when you were married; you were called to be a father when your children were born; and you were called to be a pastor when you were ordained to the Office of the Holy Ministry. And you serve faithfully in that Office, as in all of your vocations, because you are a baptized child of God who lives in Christ, and Christ in you, by grace through faith in Him.

But whereas your Holy Baptism united you with Christ in His Cross and Resurrection as a child of God, your Ordination united you with the same Lord Jesus Christ in His Office of preaching and teaching and otherwise administering His Holy Gospel of forgiveness unto others. By your Holy Baptism, you became a disciple. By your Ordination, you were called and sent to make disciples.

As a child of God, you stand in the waters of the Jordan with Jesus, and you hear the Voice of your dear Father in heaven declaring that you are His beloved son, with whom He is well pleased.

But as a minister of the Gospel, you stand on the banks of the Jordan with St. John, preaching a Baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, and baptizing other sons of God in Christ.

The nature of your pastoral ministry is, in many ways, very much like that of St. John the Baptist, but more so. You do not prepare for a Christ who is yet to come, but you preach and bestow the Christ who has already come, and you proclaim His death until He comes again. Even so, it is still the preaching of repentance, which the Lord Jesus Himself describes (on that first Easter Sunday) as being on par with His Cross and Resurrection in its divine necessity. Without such preaching, the forgiveness and life and salvation of His Cross would never be distributed and received.

Thus were the Holy Apostles sent to preach repentance in the Name of Jesus to all the nations. And so have you also been called, ordained, and sent to preach this same repentance in the Name and stead of the same Jesus, for the forgiveness of these dear people who are entrusted to your care.

This is the “Word and Sacrament Ministry” with which you are charged by Christ Jesus Himself. And this “Word and Sacrament Ministry” is no mere cliché. It is to be understood and carried out quite tangibly in your flesh-and-blood preaching, living, and embodiment of the Holy Gospel.

Which means that you will hear the confession of real sins by real sinners, and you will forgive those sins with the spoken Word of Holy Absolution. It means that you will visit frail and hurting people who are hospitalized or homebound, that the Word of Christ might dwell among them and with them in body and soul. It means that you will administer the Holy Communion, putting the true Body and Blood of Christ Jesus into the mouths of His people. And it means, of course, that you will Baptize young and old into His very real and eternally-significant Cross and Resurrection.

In the footsteps of the Holy Apostles, you are sent by the one Lord Jesus Christ in His Name and with His own authority — who is with you in all that you say and do — to baptize, to teach, to pray, to feed the flock with the Word and Flesh of the One who sends you; to speak with His Voice, and to work His own works with His own hands, as it were, all according to His Word:

Whoever hears you, hears Him who sent you; and whoever receives you, receives Him who sent you, even Jesus Christ, your Savior and your God.

With all this in mind, both you and the people of Trinity must realize that you are sent, not only to tell them “about” Jesus, “about” the Gospel, “about” the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation; but here among them you are given to embody the Gospel in your Office, to deal with them with the Law and the Gospel, as the one through whom Christ Jesus deals with them personally. He speaks and acts through you to forgive their sins in fact, and to bestow His own divine Life and eternal Salvation into their ears, their hands, their mouths, and thereby into their hearts and lives.

How shall you rise to this occasion and live up to this Office and responsibility? You shall not, nor can you. But Christ shall raise you up — and so shall He raise up His people here through you.

As a minister of Christ, as a pastor of His Church, you must also live from that same Word that you preach, from that same Body and Blood that you administer, and from those same holy waters with which you baptize. In this respect, you shall find your best example in St. John the Baptist when he was languishing in prison, waiting for his head to be removed, and suffering the doubts and fears of his own sinful heart. What, then, did he do?  He sought a Word from Jesus, the Voice of the Gospel; which is the one and only thing that will sustain you in the Office of the Holy Ministry.

The Lord will seek you out, because He loves you, and He will not let you go beyond the sound of His Voice. But you must also seek out His Voice for yourself, and give ear to it — from your Brothers and Fathers in Christ Jesus — through Individual Confession and Holy Absolution, and through the mutual conversation and consolation of the brethren (especially within your Circuit).

And dear people of Trinity, as you also must live from the Word and Voice of Jesus, which you will hear from Pastor Griebel in this place (under the Cross, in the midst of all the hurts and frailties of life), remember that, as you have heard, so you should also speak a Word of the Gospel — a Word from Jesus — to your family and friends, to your neighbors and acquaintances, and so also to your Pastor, who lives by the grace, mercy, and forgiveness of the Lord no less than you.

Martin Luther offers a beautiful example of how to live such a life in such a way as that. It is said that he would get out of bed each morning and begin his day with the reminder: “I Am Baptized!”

That simple confession of faith sustained his confidence and hope in Christ Jesus, even in the midst of all sorts of personal doubts, ongoing challenges, and numerous threats from all around him. Whenever he was tempted or afraid, he likewise recalled his Baptism by making the sign of the Cross (as he did in all his prayers and at meals), marking himself as one redeemed by Christ the Crucified. He took comfort in the fact that he was baptized into the Cross and Resurrection of Christ Jesus, that he had thereby received forgiveness of sins and the Holy Spirit, and that he was thus a beloved and well-pleasing child of God the Father in heaven.

You have that same comfort in the waters of your own Holy Baptism — consecrated and set apart by Christ Himself today in His Baptism. To the human eye and senses, according to the wisdom of this world, it is nothing but a splash of ordinary water (an empty symbol). But to the eyes of faith, according to the gracious Will and Wisdom of God, it is a gracious water of life, a rich and full washing of regeneration. Indeed, it works the forgiveness of sins, delivers from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this, as the Words and promises of God declare: “He that believes and is baptized shall be saved.” Grant this, Lord, unto us all!

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

He Is Called the Nazarene for You and Your Salvation

The example of St. Joseph is a beautiful confession of faith. And it is a good example, because the Lord our God is faithful in His mercy and compassion, in all His Words and promises; and because He has saved us from sin and death by His Son, the Child born of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Truth be told, and all appearances to the contrary notwithstanding, it is the Lord your God who has you and your situation and all things in His hands, in His care and keeping. Although you do have responsibilities to carry out, you are not in control of your life and your future. Not really. But neither are your enemies, no matter how big and strong and powerful they may ever seem to be.

No, the Lord your God, the Maker of the heavens and the earth, He is the Author and Giver of Life, and He is the One who governs all of creation for the sake of His Church. He rules the universe for the benefit of His people. And He accomplishes His purposes in love, for the salvation of sinners, by His grace and mercy and forgiveness. Not only “in spite of” those who oppose His will, but even through them, contrary to their own designs — He fulfills His Word and promises.

So, too, He guides and guards His faithful people — including St. Joseph and you — by and with His Word: As written by His Prophets and Apostles in His Holy Scriptures, and by the preaching of His Law and His Gospel through His messengers, whom He sends to speak to you in His Name.

All that He has spoken, He has fulfilled in the Person of Christ Jesus, the incarnate Son of God, conceived and born of St. Mary. As He is the Word of God made Flesh, He is the accomplishment of God’s good and gracious will for you and for all people. And all that He is and does — as true God and true Man — is in accordance with the Word of the Lord. So do the Season of Advent and the Christmas story demonstrate and rehearse, year after year, that you should hear and believe in all that God has spoken through the Prophets and in the Person of His Son.

Again this morning, St. Matthew clearly indicates that the events in this story of the Holy Gospel are in fulfillment of the Old Testament Holy Scriptures. And that turns out to be the case even in ways that we would never have been able to guess or figure out for ourselves. In this case, for example, you’ll never be able to find any specific Old Testament Prophecy that says the Savior would be called a Nazarene. In the Hebrew language, though, the root word for both “Nazareth” and “Nazarene” is the word for “root.” And it was clearly foretold in many and various ways that the Christ would be the “Root” of Jesse — from the house and lineage of Jesse’s son, King David.

Sure enough, our dear Lord Jesus Christ is indeed great David’s greater Son, the Root or Nazar of Jesse, anointed by the Spirit of His God and Father to be the King of the Jews, to rule and shepherd His people Israel, the sheep of His pasture. And not for Israel and Judah only, but for all those who are the children of Abraham by faith in the Gospel. And yet, it is truly meet, right, and salutary that you will find this Lord and King, not in Jerusalem, but in the little burg of Nazareth.

He Himself, the Son of God and of St. Mary, is the Epitome of faith and trust in God His Father. To be sure, from all eternity He is of one substance with His Father, of one mind and one will, in and with the Holy Spirit. He is the one true God, now and forever. But in His own human flesh and blood, as the true Man from His conception, even in His Mother’s womb, He is fully devoted to God with His whole heart and mind, His body, soul, and spirit. His human will conforms entirely to the divine will, even to the point of His great anguish, suffering, and death upon the Cross.

In this, He has been consecrated and devoted to the Lord, much as the Nazarites were dedicated to the Lord by their vows and in their obedience. In His case, it is not only for a set period of time, but with His entire body and life, and with His very flesh and blood, even unto death.

It is finally on the Cross that He is called the Nazarene. For by His voluntary sacrifice, He fulfills the Scriptures of the Prophets, and He accomplishes the will of God for the salvation of the world.

His death and burial are on the horizon and anticipated from the beginning, as for example in Herod’s persecution, and in the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt. But God the Father calls Him out of Egypt, just as He will draw Him out of the Red Sea waters of His Baptism. So does He finally call Him out of death and the grave. This, too, is “according to the Scriptures,” just as we confess in the Nicene Creed. And in this Resurrection of Christ Jesus from the dead, God the Father calls you also out of death into Life, to be His beloved and well-pleasing son by adoption and by grace.

He calls you by the preaching of His Word to repentance and faith in His forgiveness of sins, and to newness of life in Christ Jesus. He calls you, as He called St. Joseph, to live according to His Word within your vocation as a Christian, and within your own proper office and stations in life.

Although it is true that neither you, nor your life, nor your future are in your own hands — for they are in His hands — it is also the case that He accomplishes His purposes in you and through you, and He cares for others, including His Church on earth, by means of your faithful service.

Here, too, consider the example of St. Joseph, who quietly and quickly obeys the Word of the Lord in caring for his Bride, St. Mary, and for her Son, the Christ Child. Such a tremendous task it is, of such great importance! But God provides for the Child and His Mother, and He preserves their lives by the hand of His servant, St. Joseph. He does the same for your neighbor by your hand, as you work and serve according to His Word in the place where God has called you to be.

In a corresponding way, you know where and how the Lord is with you by giving attention to His Word and the ways and means that He has thereby designated. St. Matthew has made this clear and plain in his record of the Infancy Narratives, in the way that he refers to the Christ-Child always with “His Mother.” Over and over again, it is “the young Child and His Mother.” Not only in this Holy Gospel, but already in the Visit of the Magi that precedes it, as we shall hear on the Feast of the Epiphany tomorrow. Such is St. Matthew’s way of indicating and stressing, as Dr. Luther also stressed, that one should not look for God — nor will you ever be able to find the one true God — anywhere else than here in the flesh and blood of Jesus, the incarnate Son of God born of St. Mary.

Which is also to say that you should not look for God — nor will you ever be able to find Christ Jesus, the incarnate Son of God — except in His external Means of Grace, that is, in the preaching of His Holy Gospel, in His spoken Word of Holy Absolution, in the washing of the water with His Word in Holy Baptism, and in the Holy Communion of His Body and Blood, given and poured out for you to eat and drink with your body in repentant faith and with thanksgiving. For these bodily Means of Grace are where and how the Lord Jesus Christ is present and available for you and for the many. These are the lap of His Holy Mother, wherein and whereby His flesh is given to you.

So, you find and receive the Lord Jesus in and with His Church, and as a servant of God you are called to love and support His Church on earth and His beloved children, His sons and daughters, your brothers and sisters in Christ: Much as St. Joseph was given to care for the Holy Family.

And as for St. Joseph, so also for you, the Word of the Lord directs you in the darkness of night, in the midst of great danger, and on paths of real difficulty. The world hates you, as it hates the One whose Name you bear. And the devil himself seeks your life more viciously than any King Herod. In the face of all that, you have only the Word and promises of God to go by, and there are times when, like St. Joseph, you are afraid of the foes who reign so fiercely in the world. The task set before you is too daunting, and yet, it is too important to fail.

Even so, get up and go! Hear and heed the Word that God the Father speaks to you by His own dear Son. Remember that you and your journey, the outcome of your duties, and your destination are all in the hands of Him who loves you. God has guarded the Child with His Mother, and so does He guard and keep you as a member of His Bride. He has been at work through St. Joseph, and now He is at work in you to will and to do His good pleasure for you and for your neighbors.

The guarantee is in the Body of Christ Jesus, who has been crucified for your transgressions and, yes, who has been raised for your justification. Out of Egypt God has called His Son, in order to bring about this great Salvation for you and for all. And by and with His Word in the waters of your Holy Baptism, He has called even you His beloved and well-pleasing son in Christ Jesus, and He has promised you eternal Life and Salvation in both your body and your soul.

With those precious Words and Promises of God ringing in your ears and going with you from this place, be encouraged by and emulate the good example of St. Joseph in heeding the Word that God the Lord has spoken to you by His Son. Not only in obeying His Commandments, as you are surely called to live the new life in Christ throughout this New Year of His grace. But, above all, in receiving and believing His precious Word of the Gospel, whereby He forgives you all your sins.

So does your God and Father call you out of Egypt and save you by His mighty deliverance, by the humility and meekness of the Cross and Resurrection of His Son. And so does He reveal and give to you that same Son, Jesus Christ, that you should live and abide with Him forever. This promise is for you and for your children, and for your children’s children and their children yet unborn.

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

D. Rick's Album Top 40 from 2024

Although I continue to enjoy listening to music, in recent years I have simply not had the time or inclination to discover, explore, and immerse myself in the latest releases as I have done in the past. It was too much to keep up with, and I gradually became aware that I was rarely able to savor the music I already knew to be enjoyable and pleasing to my tastes and interests. It's not that I pay no attention whatsoever to the new music coming out, but I'm far more selective in what I choose to investigate, and in general I am more "passive" in my music listening habits at this point. Strikingly, I have over the past couple of months begun to listen more to audio books and podcasts than to music when I'm driving, and those who know me at all will realize what a significant shift that is!

All that being said, even with my more passive approach, there were new albums over this past year that not only managed to pique my interest but to capture my attention and endear themselves to me for future listening enjoyment. And so, for what it's worth, I share my top forty favorite albums from 2024 below. A number of these actually snuck up on me and caught me by pleasant surprise. They're listed roughly in order of my preference, but that tends to hold more true for the first part of the list than it does in the case of the latter entries. For those who use Spotify and are interested, you can find these albums collected here.

1. Luke Combs - Fathers & Sons

2. Stephen Wilson Jr. - Son of Dad

3. Aaron Lewis - The Hill

4. Myles Kennedy - The Art of Letting Go

5. The Script - Satellites

6. Uncle Kracker - Coffee & Beer

7. Skillet - Revolution

8. Cody Jinks - Change the Game

9. Black Country Communion - V

10. Will Hoge - Tenderhearted Boys

11. Drew Holcomb & the Neighbors - Strangers No More, Vol. 2

12. Kenny Wayne Shepherd - Dirt On My Diamonds, Vol. 2

13. Brantley Gilbert - Tattoos

14. Firewind - Stand United

15. Scott Stapp - Higher Power

16. Chase Rice - Go Down Singin’

17. HammerFall - Avenge the Fallen

18. Kacey Musgraves - Deeper Well

19. Wade Bowen - Flyin’

20. Sheryl Crow - Evolution

21. Saxon - Hell, Fire and Damnation

22. Mat Kearney - Mat Kearney

23. The Avett Brothers - The Avett Brothers

24. The Secret Sisters - Mind, Man, Medicine

25. American Aquarium - The Fear of Standing Still

26. Accept - Humanoid

27. Kings of Leon - Can We Please Have Fun

28. American Authors - Bon Voyage

29. Brooks & Dunn - Reboot II

30. Amos Lee - Transmissions

31. Lindsey Stirling - Duality

32. George Strait - Cowboys and Dreamers

33. Sister Hazel - Sand, Sea & Crash Derbis

34. Flatland Cavalry - Flatland Forever

35. OneRepublic - Artificial Paradise

36. Avery Anna - Breakup Over Breakfast

37. Kassi Ashton - Made from the Dirt

38. Cody Johnson - Leather Deluxe

39. Linkin Park - From Zero

40. Bon Jovi - Forever

As a bonus, again for those who use Spotify, here is a playlist of my top 100 favorite songs from 2024, many of them (not surprisingly) from the above albums.

Rejoice in the Lord at All Times and in All Circumstances

The Season of Advent awaits and anticipates the coming of Christ Jesus, whose Way St. John the Baptist prepares, calling sinners to repentance that they might escape the wrath to be revealed when the same Lord Jesus comes in Glory for the final Judgment. It is a penitential time of patient perseverance in the confidence of the Cross and in the hope and promise of the Resurrection.

Advent prepares you to receive the coming Christ, now as then, by the preaching of the Law and the Gospel unto repentance and faith in the forgiveness of sins. Such preaching returns you to the significance of your Holy Baptism. It teaches you to confess your sins and to seek the Word of Holy Absolution. And it leads you to the Body and Blood of the Lamb who saves you at His Altar.

Because He comes to save you, here and now, by the preaching of His Word and by His means of grace, your Advent repentance is not without rejoicing. Especially this Third Sunday in Advent calls you to rejoice in the Lord, because He is at hand with His mercy and His great Salvation.

It is for the sake of this rejoicing that our Advent candle for this Sunday is rose-colored instead of purple. It signifies that true Light that was coming into the world, like the rose-colored hews of an early morning sunrise. It would have you look at life through the rose-colored glasses of faith, that you should remember the Incarnation of your Lord, receive His Body born of Mary and His Blood poured out for you from the Cross, and rejoice in the expectation of His glorious coming.

All of which is fine and good. And of course, you might say, as Christians we rejoice in Christ. Then again, you may not feel like rejoicing this morning or at many others times, especially in view of your own sins and the sins of others against you, and given the consequences of sin that dog you all year long and really never do let up in this mortal life. The so-called holidays can be some of the most depressing and difficult days, because they aggravate your envy and jealousy of others, and they make all the more painful your loneliness and the absence of those you have lost. So many expectations, as to what you must do to get ready for Christmas, it’s a struggle to rejoice when you’re stressed out and wondering how on earth you are going to meet all your expenses.

Despite the faith and life to which the Lord has called you by His Gospel, and notwithstanding your confession of His Word, there are days when He seems so far away, and you may wonder if your faith has been too optimistic. Does Jesus really care? Does He even know your name? Or has He just given up on you and written you off altogether on account of your sins and failings?

Perhaps you would compare yourself to poor St. John the Baptist, imprisoned by King Herod, no doubt wondering what’s going to happen next, and probably tempted to question the glorious promises of God. There he sits, the Forerunner of the Lord Himself, but left to rot in prison. Left to rot, that is, until his head will finally be removed by order of the king. How about that?

As he waited in prison for death, John sent his disciples to ask Jesus: “Are you the Expected One, the Christ who is to come, or should we be watching and waiting for Another?”

Of course, St. John the Baptist knew that Jesus is the Christ, the Lord’s Anointed. For even though Jesus, the Son of God, always possesses the Holy Spirit, He also received a special anointing of the Spirit at His Baptism by St. John in the Jordan, the inauguration of His own Ministry on earth. The Holy Spirit came upon Him as a dove, and the Father declared Him to be His beloved Son.

St. John knew that Jesus is the Christ, because he had seen the Lord anointed with the Holy Spirit. It was part of his own preaching to others, even as he pointed to Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. But for all of that, St. John also needed to hear the preaching of the Gospel for himself. He needed Christ Jesus to set him free — not from Herod’s prison, nor even from his executioner — but from the dungeon of his own sin and its deadly consequences.

What are your expectations of the Lord Jesus Christ? What are you watching for and waiting to receive from Him? Is it rescue and redemption from your sins, from death and the damnation you deserve? Or would you rather He fulfill your hopes and dreams for this body and life right now?

Bear in mind that the Son of God is not a means to some other end, as though He were coming to give you a leg up on your personal ambitions. Neither is the salvation He brings a matter of facts in your head or feelings in your heart. It’s not enough to know this or that about Jesus, and all the warm fuzzies in the world are not going to set you free from death and hell or bring you to God.

Like St. John, what you need is the Word of Christ Jesus: The Word that He speaks into your ears, into your heart, mind, and body. The Word that forgives your sins, and gives you life, and fills you up with Christ and His Spirit, even in the midst of the most dire and desperate of circumstances.

That is what He does and gives by the preaching of His Word, beginning with St. John himself, the Forerunner of Christ who was sent to preach repentance and forgiveness of sins in His Name.

And now in this case, in this Holy Gospel, the same Lord Jesus Christ does the same thing and provides the same help and comfort for His servant, St. John. He preaches His Word to His preacher of repentance, that John be delivered from all doubts and fears and rejoice in the Lord.

As great as St. John was, and as much as he suffered for his faithfulness, even unto death, it is not John but Jesus Christ who gives to you divine, eternal Life in place of your death and damnation. He is the almighty and eternal Son of the Living God, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who became Flesh of your flesh and Blood of your blood, conceived and born of the Woman; who then also made Himself least in the Kingdom of Heaven, so that He suffered and died in the stead and for the sake of sinners — for John the Baptist, for you, and for all people. So it is not by your keeping of the Law, but by His, and not by your repentance, but by His Cross and Resurrection, that Christ Jesus has first of all obtained and now bestows the free forgiveness of all your sins.

He proceeds in every case by sending His messenger before His face to prepare His Way by the preaching of His Word with His own Voice, and to work His works of repentance and faith with His own authority: Isaiah the Prophet, and John the Baptist, who is more than a Prophet because he ushers in the Christ. Then, in the footsteps of Christ Jesus come His Holy Apostles, who speak and act for Him as the shepherds of His Church on earth, and following after them, the pastors who feed and care for His lambs and sheep with His Holy Word and with His Holy Sacraments.

It is by this ongoing Ministry of His Gospel in every age that He brings forth streams of water in the desert and prospers His Church with milk and honey, bread and wine, and every good thing.

Even so, as beautiful and wonderful as this providence and promise of the Gospel is — that the Holy Triune God should send to you, as to His Church in every time and place, His messengers to speak with His Voice and to preach good news in answer to your every need — the fact is that your circumstances may not improve in this life. They might just go from bad to even worse!

To frail flesh and blood there is an evident contradiction between the promises of God and your actual experience in the world; between the hope of the Resurrection and the present reality of the Cross that you bear and carry in this vale of tears. It is especially hard when the wicked prevail and appear so powerful on earth, whereas the righteous of the Lord suffer and perish on the way.

Consider, for example, that St. John remained in the captivity of his prison until he was beheaded. So, too, in this life, no matter how much you may receive and trust the Gospel — the forgiveness of your sins and the free gift of eternal life in Christ — you may yet suffer all manner of difficulties and atrocities, as do many of your fellow Christians throughout the world. Sometimes you bear the temporal consequences of your own sins, that you should be disciplined in love by your dear Father and called to repentance by His Spirit. But you are also given to bear and carry the Cross as a disciple of Christ Jesus, who was born of the Virgin Mary to suffer under Pontius Pilate.

It’s all too easy to be scandalized by this sort of Christ, who comes in such lowly meekness and humility, born in a stable, living homeless, riding on a donkey, and then condemned and put to death on the Cross. Not exactly impressive credentials. And His followers and supporters fare about as badly, beginning with St. John the Baptist, who was more than a Prophet and the greatest of those born of women, but who finishes his days on earth in Herod’s dungeon. One might well expect more and better from the Savior of the world. It’s no surprise that even John wondered and chose to ask:  Are You the One, Jesus, or not? And, if so, where are You now when I need You?

It is only by the grace and blessing of God, by His Word and Holy Spirit, that you are not offended by Christ and His Cross, by His messengers and means of grace, and by the way that He rules and governs the Kingdom of His Church in this world, that is, in lowliness, meekness, and humility. And it is only by the grace and blessing of Christ the Crucified — by the preaching of His Word, and by the administration of His Body and His Blood in remembrance of Him — that you believe and trust His promises, even while you sit and wait in your own dungeon for the final axe to fall.

Now take this to heart: Your God-given confidence in Christ, which is not offended by His Cross or scandalized by His Gospel, will not by any means be disappointed. The suffering and death of His Cross is not the last and final Word for Him or you, but it is the end of sin, death, and the devil. For by the Cross of Christ sin is forgiven, death is destroyed, and the devil’s kingdom is routed.

Satan still rages and taunts, he hinders and afflicts, not least of all through tyrants like Herod, but all to no avail. Actually, the Lord your God uses even the devil’s wickedness, against the devil’s will, to call you and others to repentance and to drive you back to the Cross. And as always, that old dragon, the devil or Satan, is defeated by the Cross. Your salvation is made certain in Christ Jesus, who preaches the victory of His Cross and the righteousness of His Resurrection to you.

It is this profound privilege that we your pastors are given, that is, to preach and teach the Word of Christ into your ears, knowing that His Word alone is steadfast, eternal, unchanging, and true.

We are sent to you — as St. John the Baptist was sent — to call you to repent and to forgive you all your sins in the Name of the Lord. We are sent to announce and proclaim the presence of Christ and His Kingdom, here and now among you, in the very Word that we preach to you by His authority, and in His flesh and blood, given and poured out for you to eat and to drink unto the resurrection of your body and the Life everlasting of your body and soul.

We do not speak and act for ourselves. But with the Voice of Jesus — by virtue of this Office, as called and ordained servants of His Word — we declare to you that He is the Christ who is coming. That blind unbelief is here replaced by the sight of holy faith. That deaf ears are opened to hear the Word of God. That the leprosy of your sin is cleansed by the waters of Holy Baptism. That death has been destroyed by the death of Christ, and those who were dead in their trespasses and sin are raised up with Him by His Holy Absolution. That for two-thousand-plus years the Gospel has never failed to be preached to the joy and edifying of Christ’s holy people, and so also to you and to your children, and to your children’s children.

So, then, while weeping and sadness remain for a night, rejoicing will yet come in the morning.

Rejoice, therefore! Rejoice in the Lord at all times and in all circumstances. Again I will say it, Rejoice! Your own dear Lord is at hand. He is a very present Help in times of trouble. Be anxious for nothing, for He is faithful and just. He will never leave you or forsake you. And the Peace of God, which surpasses all human understanding, will guard your heart and mind in Christ Jesus.

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