Quietness, Peace, and Sabbath Rest in the Word of Christ

Here is the special authority of Christ Jesus, your Lord.  He does not simply teach the Holy Scriptures, He fulfills them in Himself.  And so, for example, here in this Holy Gospel, we find Him keeping the Sabbath Day — in more ways than one — and using the Name of God rightly.  With fear, love, and trust in His Father, He comes to preach and teach the Word of God, by which the Name of God is made holy among us.  He thus works on the Sabbath, that you may rest in Him and in His Word to you.  But He likewise finds His own Sabbath Rest in His own God and Father.  He lives by faith as the true Man, and in love for His Father He lives in love for all His neighbors.

God’s Name is hallowed when His Word is taught in its truth and purity.  Jesus teaches that Word in truth and purity.  And God’s Name is hallowed when His children lead holy lives according to His Word.  Jesus lives such a life, and He does so in love for you.  He keeps the Law.  For He has been born of the Woman, born under the Law, in order to redeem those who were under the Law.

That is where you find yourself by your conception and birth — under the authority of God’s holy Law — and that is a scary thing.  For the Law of God exposes, and it even exacerbates, your sin, the unclean spirit in your heart, mind, and body, the perverted nature of your Old Man in all your thoughts, words, and actions.  You strive to keep the Law and to live by it, but you cannot do it.  You do not keep it.  The Law does not make you righteous, but it condemns you, because you do not keep the Law.  And that makes you angry; and it makes you afraid, like the people at Mt. Sinai.

You want God to stop speaking to you, and you attempt to stop your ears to His speaking, because it’s already more than you can bear.  You don’t like His Law.  You suppose that you should find in it your salvation, but you don’t find salvation in the Law; you find only condemnation of your sin and certain death.  So you flaunt the Law, you despise and disobey it, and you finally despair of it altogether.  The more cynical, frustrated, and hardened you become, the more you criticize and condemn your neighbor, because you are sure that God is out to get you.  You do not forgive those who trespass against you, because you are convinced that God does not forgive you.

After all, listen to His Law — to His divine Law, to what the Lord commands, forbids, requires, and threatens.  And consider that He is the Holy One.  He clearly says that you are to be holy and righteous, perfect and good, just as He is.  Trying hard and doing your best is never good enough.  Your good intentions and New Year’s resolutions don’t count and don’t cut it.  Anything less than perfect is sinful and unclean.  If you fall short at even one point, you have failed at everything.

So, what does this mean for you?  Why does the Lord your God come to you and speak to you with His authority?  Has He come in divine anger, with righteous wrath and just judgment, in order to condemn you?  Is He here, and does He speak, in order to destroy you?  That is the question.

It is the question, not of those who go about their lives ignorantly “out there” in the wild, wicked world; it is the question of those who are in the synagogue, who are there confronted by God and by His Word.  It is precisely your question, as a child of Adam, as you are here confronted by the Word of God.  For you have some knowledge of His Law — and His holy Law condemns you.

The Giver of the Law is here on this “Sabbath,” and His presence throws you into convulsions — if not in your body, then in your heart and mind, within your thoughts and feelings — because His Word brings to light the war that is waged in your members, that is, within your mortal flesh and blood.  You cannot hide from His Law, nor can you escape it.  It brings you out into the light.

The Epiphany of God in the Flesh is a bright and beautiful Light that shatters the darkness and scatters all the dark shadows of sin and death.  Christ be praised for His coming to us, the Lord who is both true God and true Man!  But bear in mind that His bright Light cannot leave your own fallen flesh and sinful nature unscathed.  It brings out into the open all that you would prefer to deny, forget, and hide away (even from yourself, wherever possible).  It lays bare your sin.

So, there is this sense in which the Lord your God, who comes to you with His Word and His authority, must first of all destroy you.  He must condemn you, crush you, crucify you, and put you to death.  For if you are not brought to contrition and repentance, then you shall be lost forever.

But it is not finally for that purpose that He has come.  Nor is that the special authority of Christ Jesus, the Son of Man, the incarnate God, your crucified and risen Lord.  That is not His purpose.

He drives out the unclean spirit from you, and He restores a new and right spirit within you, not by way of violence, threats, or punishments, but with the free and full forgiveness of all your sins.  That is why He has come; that is why He comes to you here and now in the Liturgy of His Gospel.  He is here to forgive you, in order to give you His Life.  Everything He does is for that purpose, the forgiveness of your sins and the free gift of Life and Salvation with God.  Everything He does.

It is true that His preaching of repentance puts you to death, and that is a painful ordeal, because it robs you of everything you have trusted and relied upon, everything you have prioritized, valued, and worshiped.  Indeed, it throws down and destroys all your false gods and idols, beginning with yourself, your ego, and all your “trophies.”  But He does so to bring you into Life with Himself.  Everything is aimed at that.  He forgives you in order to give you divine, eternal Life.

That is what He has done for you in your Holy Baptism, as the Holy Scriptures testify.  By the washing of the water with His Word, you were crucified, put to death, and buried with the Lord Jesus Christ.  And so are you also raised with Him to newness of life.  That’s not just a promise for the Resurrection of all flesh at the end of days, but a gracious work of Christ Jesus throughout your life as a Christian.  For there in your Baptism He poured out His Holy Spirit generously upon you — and into you — and so does He drive out the unclean spirit of your sin, your unbelief, your guilt and shame, your perversity and all your dark despair, day after day, by His gracious Word.

Therefore, do not be afraid.  And do not attempt to hide yourself away from Him — which would not work, in any case.  You cannot get away from Him, nor can you escape His coming and His final Judgment of the living and the dead.  Nor would it be at all to your advantage if you could!  For as painful and deadly as the accusation and condemnation of His Law are to your Old Man, far greater is the blessed gift of forgiveness, Life, and Salvation that He bestows by His Gospel.

And again, it is for the sake of that Gospel that He comes to you, enters in, and confronts you with Himself and with His Word, here in the “Synagogue” of His Holy Christian Church on earth.

Do not stop your ears to His Word, and don’t drown out His Voice with your own chatter, with your endless discussions and debates, or with your angry arguments and accusations.

Listen to Him.  Hear and heed His Word and the preaching of it.  Take to heart His Law, and so examine yourself and your place in life according to it.  Repent of your sins and confess them.  But do so in the faith and confidence of His Gospel, and allow that Word also to have its way with you.

Be quiet, and be at peace.  Be still and know that Christ Jesus is your Savior and your God, who comes to you in the Flesh and manifests the Glory of God in His grace and mercy toward you.

It is in love that He has willingly gone to the Cross and died for your transgressions.  You didn’t have to twist His arm or talk Him into it.  He went and He did it for you because He loves you.  And so has He also been raised from the dead for you and your salvation — for your justification — for your reconciliation with God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and with His holy people.

His preaching and His authority, which are so threatening and so scary to your fallen flesh, return you daily to the death and resurrection of your Holy Baptism.  Which is really to say that He unites you to Himself in His dying and in His rising from the dead, so that you are not destroyed forever, but you are forgiven, and you are saved.  Death could not hold Him.  So, death cannot hold you.  The power of His indestructible Life is your Righteousness, Holiness, Life, and Salvation.

And that is how and why it is that His Christian Church is the true Synagogue, and His Gospel is the true and lasting Sabbath Rest.  For it is by the authority of His Cross and Resurrection that you are forgiven in His Name.  Even your death cannot destroy you, and the devil cannot accuse you, because God does not count your sins against you.  He has cancelled them out.  He refuses to look at them anymore.  He has judged you righteous in Christ Jesus, in His Resurrection from the dead.

You are forgiven by the Ministry and Preaching of His Holy Gospel.  You are innocent in Him.  You are holy and righteous by faith in Him.  You are alive in His risen Body.  And you are free.

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

Two Ways, and a Great Difference Between Them

There are two ways, one of life and one of death, and there is a great difference between the two.  The way of life is that of faith in Christ Jesus, which proceeds in love for God and man; and the way of death is that of unbelief and self-idolatry, whereby you strive to serve yourself above all others, only to find that you are consumed by the desires and demands of your own fallen flesh.

So you stand at the crossroads, and these two roads diverge before you, the blessing and the curse, the way of life and the way of death.  You cannot travel both, but it seems as though the choice  ought to be easy enough, since faith and life and sin and death are as different as heaven and hell.

The trouble is that, in the blindness of your sinful heart and mind, you cannot perceive or interpret the difference clearly.  The way of life looks like death to you.  The life-giving Word of the Lord sounds onerous and burdensome, as though it were asking too much of you, whereas the gifts and promises of God in Christ appear foolish and pointless.  Life itself looks like the opposite to you.

By contrast, the way of death appears to you as though it were pious and righteous, as though it were a sure and certain path to life and happiness, to safety, security, and peace, and as though it were actually the way of God.  In your sinfulness, in your native unbelief, life looks like death, and death looks like life.  Faith seems foolish, a bad investment.  Sin seems wise and profitable.

The way of death, in short, is the way of legalistic self-righteousness, which is already the heart of the problem.  It comprises all the many and various ways by which you strive to get life for yourself, whether by attempting to bargain and barter with God, seeking to buy Him off with your works and sacrifices, or by ignoring Him altogether on the false assumption that you know better.

This way of death is common to all the sons and daughters of Adam & Eve, apart from conversion.  Until the Holy Spirit shines the Light of Christ into your heart through the Gospel, you dwell in thick darkness, though you cannot even tell that you’re in the dark.  You strive and strain with all your might to set things right, to get life for yourself, to gain control, to get whatever you want.  But what you get is death; and many others suffer, too, as you pursue that path of self-destruction

The way of life is the very opposite.  It is followed by no trust or confidence in yourself at all.  It is pursued solely by faith in the Cross and Resurrection of Christ Jesus, by His Word and Spirit.

You cannot find or follow that way of life by any wisdom, reason, or strength of your own.  For you cannot recognize or know the Lord Jesus apart from His Word and Holy Spirit, far less can you believe in Him or follow Him by any intelligence or effort of your fallen flesh.  But the Lord in His mercy does not leave you to your own devices or allow you to proceed unhindered on the way of death.  He rather confronts you with the preaching of His Cross and Resurrection.

By the preaching of His Word He knocks you off your high horse, He shatters your hard heart, He pierces your beclouded mind, and He breathes His life-giving Spirit into your body and soul, so that you become a living being.  He shines the Light of the Gospel into the midst of your darkness, so that you begin to see Him as He is.  It is as though something like scales falls from your eyes.

He does it by the preaching of His Cross and Resurrection, which is the preaching of repentance for the forgiveness of sins in His Name.  That same preaching is what is necessary for the salvation of all the nations.  So that is what St. Paul is called to do, like the other Apostles before him; and that is what pastors to this day are called to do in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

By that preaching of repentance you are crucified and put to death — to yourself, to your sins, and to the wicked world all around you.  You are crucified, put to death, and buried with Christ Jesus, in order to be raised to newness of life by His forgiveness of your sins and the gift of His Spirit.

Whoever tries to save his own life will lose it, but whoever loses his life in this world for the sake of the Lord Jesus and His Gospel will have Life everlasting with Him in body and soul.  That is the paradox between these two ways, the way of life and the way of death.

The preaching of repentance for the forgiveness of your sins marks your body and soul, heart, mind, and spirit, with the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ and the sign of His Cross, as also in your Holy Baptism.  So it is for you as it was for St. Paul.  As the Lord sent Pastor Ananias to lay his hands on Saul of Tarsus, to bestow the Spirit upon him, to open his eyes, and to baptize him in the Name of the Lord Jesus, so has the same Lord sent His pastors to baptize and catechize you, to anoint you with His Spirit, and to sign you with His Cross upon your forehead and your heart.

As the Cross has been signed upon your heart, mind, and body, as it is preached into your ears and confessed with your mouth, so does the Cross mark all that you think, all that you say, and all that you do.  It crucifies and puts to death whatever is self-righteous in your body and soul, whatever is sinful, whatever is unfaithful and unloving.  But it also resurrects and sanctifies your body and soul, and it strengthens the New Man in you — which is your life in Christ and His Life in you.

Because the Cross does all of this, because it marks you, and because it crucifies you, and because it raises you up with the Lord Jesus Christ, it also means that you are hated and persecuted for His Name’s sake, and that you bear and suffer His Cross in your body and life on this earth.

Consider what God said concerning St. Paul: “I will show him how much he must suffer for My Name’s sake.”  Not that God would punish him for being so wicked up until that point, but that his suffering for the Name of Jesus Christ would manifest the Gospel in his body and life.  Thus were the power and wisdom of God manifest in St. Paul; and so are they manifest in you, as well.

What you suffer is not pointless, it is profound and fruitful, both as a discipline by which you are strengthened in your repentance and your faith in Christ Jesus, and as a bodily confession and proclamation of the Cross and Resurrection of the same Lord Jesus Christ.

So was St. Paul called to bear the Cross and to suffer for the Name and sake of the Lord Jesus.  And though you do not have the same office and vocation as St. Paul the Apostle, you do have the same Lord, you are called by the same Jesus, and you are given the same life in His crucified and risen Body.  You bear His Name and His Cross in your body and life, wherever He stations you.

As you are thus called to live and die with Christ Jesus on the way of life — and so to rise and live with Him forever in both body and soul — He does not leave you to fend for yourself on your own.  Like St. Paul, having received the true sight of faith through the preaching of the Holy Gospel, and having received the gift and cleansing of the Holy Spirit in the waters of your Holy Baptism, so are you also now fed and strengthened in body and soul by the Body and Blood of Christ Jesus.  You are invigorated as a member of His Body, the Church, to live in faith and love by His grace.

And it is not only that you bear and suffer His Cross as a disciple, but Christ Jesus Himself is with you to share your sufferings and to bear you up in the midst of sin and death, each step of the way.  Indeed, so closely does He identify Himself with His Christians, that whatever you suffer in His Name, He suffers in you and with you and thereby sanctifies your sufferings with His own and saves you from sin and death in His Resurrection and Ascension to the Right Hand of the Father.

Whatever it is that is put to death in you by the Cross of Christ Jesus, much more do you receive in the Fruits of His Cross, in His crucified and risen Body given for you, and in His holy, precious Blood poured out for you.  Baptized in His Name, anointed by His Spirit, fed and strengthened by His Food and Drink, you live and walk with Him on the way of life.  Which is to say that, even though you die to yourself, to your sins, and to the world, yet shall you live unto God in Christ.

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

The New Creation in the Baptism of Our Lord

The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a return to the beginning of Creation.  In fact, it is a renewal, a restoration, and a fulfillment of God’s good Creation.  The Baptism of our Lord, in particular, bespeaks and begins a New Creation through the forgiveness of sins.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  And He did so for the sake of His own divine Love, that of God the Father for His Son from all eternity in the bond and unity of the Holy Spirit.  For the sake of that Love He spoke and created.  And this gracious work of creation was (and is) the giving of Himself, His Life, His Light, and His Love, to His own creatures.  He does it all by the speaking of His Word and the breathing of His Spirit.  And it is no coincidence that He begins with water and brings all things into being out of the water.  Creation was the first big Baptism, which pointed to the Baptism of our Lord Jesus — and so also to your Holy Baptism.

The Lord’s creation of the heavens and the earth culminated in His creation of Man in His own Image and Likeness.  In this there was already an icon of Christ Jesus and His Bride, the Church — and it pointed again to Holy Baptism.  For Christ came down from heaven to seek His Bride and to give Himself for her, that He might cleanse her by the washing of the water with His Word.

All of this the Lord God did by His divine grace, and it was very good.

Then there was the Fall into sin and all the deadly curse and consequences of sin.  Man’s rejection and disobedience of God’s Word drives the Holy Spirit from man’s heart, mind, body, and life, breaks and shatters the Image and Likeness of God in man, and causes death and destruction and dark despair on every hand, making a desert wilderness out of the Lord’s formerly lush Garden.

And yet, the Holy Triune God remains — the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — with Life and Light and Love for His creatures, even and especially for all the fallen and rebellious children of man.

So the Lord does not destroy His good Creation.  Even in the case of the Flood, with all its terrible death and destruction, the Lord was working to redeem and save His people — and pointing ahead to the saving waters of Holy Baptism.  The same waters of the Flood that drowned and destroyed the sinful world with all of its idolatry and unbelief, with all of its unfaithfulness and wickedness, also saved believing Noah and his family, cleansed the world, and gave new birth.  The Flood was the next big Baptism, pointing to the Baptism of our Lord — and so also to your Holy Baptism.

The Lord God has not exterminated man and started all over from scratch.  Instead, He has become true Man in the Person of God the Son.  He has entered and become a part of His own Creation.  And in His own Body of flesh and blood like yours, He makes all things new.  He brings light out of the darkness.  He brings life out of death.  He restores the Image and Likeness of God in Man.

Once again, not by coincidence or accident, the Creator of the heavens and the earth begins with water — with the speaking of His Word and the bestowing of His Spirit.

The Baptism of our Lord is straightforward, short and simple, especially in St. Mark’s account.  But for all that, it is no less significant, no less fundamental.  It is profound, and it is permanent.  God has here established and accomplished something for all eternity.  For Christ Jesus, the Son of God, has taken His place with you and all people in His Baptism; so that all who believe and are baptized into Him are forgiven all their sins in His Name, and they are saved in and with Him.

As I have often said, Jesus here submits Himself to St. John’s preaching and Baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  Not for His own benefit — He has no need.  It is for the sake of Love.  And not for any sins of His own — He has no sins.  But it is for you and for all people, for the forgiveness of all your sins, for your life and salvation, on account of His divine and holy Love.

Here is the “great exchange,” as Dr. Luther liked to say.  The holiness, righteousness, innocence, and blessedness of Christ Jesus, in exchange for your sins, your death, and your damnation.  His Life and Light and Love, all given to you at His expense.  His Sonship, His Holy Spirit, His home in heaven with God the Father — all of this for you by way of His Cross and in His Resurrection.

You see, the Baptism of our Lord already anticipates and initiates His Cross and His Resurrection from the dead.  Here He is crucified, put to death, and buried in the water.  Here He emerges and arises from the water in righteousness and purity.  All of this in your place and for your benefit.

Everything that was yours is now His in His Baptism.  Your sin becomes His.  Your death becomes His.  The righteous wrath and judgment of God against your sins is here and now leveled against Him.  And everything that is His is now yours in your Baptism.  You rise with Him, and you live with Him.  You are a beloved and well-pleasing son of God by grace, anointed by His Holy Spirit.

This is how Christ Jesus baptizes you with the Holy Spirit.  It is in and with the waters of His own Baptism — which have become your Holy Baptism in His Name and with His Word.

So it is that the heavens are now opened to you.  And the Father’s heart is opened to you.  And the Father’s arms and His home are opened to you, never to be closed again.  All because Christ Jesus has suffered and died in your place, and He is risen from the dead as your Savior and Redeemer.

Now you are a New Creation in the same Lord Jesus Christ by the washing of the water with His Word and Spirit.  He has named you with His own Name, the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  And with His Name He has recreated you in His own Image and Likeness, in your heart, mind, body, soul, and spirit.  You are set free from the bondage of sin and death.  You are free to live as God lives.  You are free to love as God loves.  You are free to reflect and radiate His Light, as He enlightens you by His Word and Holy Spirit.  For the One who caused the light to shine out of the darkness has caused the Light of Christ to shine forth within your heart.

What, then, shall you do?  What shall you do with yourself and your life?  How shall you live?  How shall you exercise your freedom in Christ Jesus, since for freedom He has set you free?

Will you live to sin?  To serve yourself?  To go your own way?  To abandon the God who loves you and saves you and gives you life, in order to be your own false god and so to die in your sin?

May it never be!  You have been crucified with Christ Jesus, in order to live with Him.  You have died to sin.  Let it remain dead to you.  All that so appeals to the world — all that so appeals to your old mortal flesh — all that seems to be a source of life and freedom and happiness — it is really the false allure of slavery and death, beckoning you back to destruction and dark despair.  It is the idolatry that does not give but only takes.  It is a pantheon of false gods that destroy you.

But your true life is in Christ Jesus.  Your life is found, paradoxically, in His Cross and Passion.  And it is safe and secure in His bodily Resurrection from the dead, although it is now hidden under much weakness.  So, your life is found in repentance — unto faith in His forgiveness of your sins.

None of this is your own work or effort, none of this is your own choice or decision.  It is beyond you.  It is not something you can achieve for yourself.  But it is given to you freely by the Lord.  It is Christ’s work, and it is His good and gracious gift, freely given to be freely received in the Liturgy of His Gospel by the preaching of His Word and the working of His Holy Spirit.

Come, then, confessing your sins and receiving His free and full forgiveness.  Return daily to the significance of your Baptism by contrition and repentance.  Examine yourself, your heart and life, in view of the Ten Commandments and the place where God has stationed you.  Confess your sins, and hear the Lord’s Word of Absolution.  Die to your sins, and rise to newness of life in Christ.

Rely upon the Word and Spirit of Christ Jesus.  Avail yourself of the means of grace, which are His good work and His free gift to you.  Live in the freedom and the sure and certain hope of His Resurrection from the dead.  For your life is already manifested in His crucified and risen Body.

As you have died and risen with Him in your Baptism — never to die again, but to live forever with God the Father and the Holy Spirit in Christ Jesus, the incarnate Son — do not be afraid to love and serve, to sacrifice yourself, and even to die for your neighbor.  Do not be afraid to forgive those who trespass against you, for your own sins are freely and fully forgiven in Christ Jesus.

So, give generously.  Serve faithfully.  Love freely.  Live gladly.  And at the last, depart from this body and life in the peace and joy of Christ Jesus, the beloved and well-pleasing Son of God.  For even though you die, yet shall you live.  For Christ has died, and Christ is risen, and you are His.

You are baptized, as He is baptized, and all that belongs to Him is yours most surely.  Your sins are all forgiven, the heavens are opened to you, and the Word and Spirit of God rest upon you.

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

Come and Worship Christ Jesus, Your King

When you have learned to know the value of Holy Absolution, Dr. Luther writes, you will gladly run a hundred miles to receive it.  For the forgiveness of sins in the Name and stead of Christ Jesus is more precious than gold or silver.  Indeed, it has been purchased and won for you by His holy and precious Blood, and it gives to you eternal Life with Him, with the Father and the Holy Spirit.  You cannot buy that kind of gift, nor could you discover it on your own, but here it is given to you freely with a spoken Word.  This Gospel of forgiveness from your Lord Jesus Christ is truly your greatest treasure.  When everything else is said and done, it is the only treasure that really matters.

Come, then, receive the forgiveness of sins and life and salvation in the One who has been born — and who has died — as “the King of the Jews.”  Though you would not even know where to look, nor would you ever be able to find Him by your own wisdom, reason, or strength, He calls you to Himself, and He leads you and guides you on the way, by His Word and Holy Spirit.

The stars, along with the sun and moon, are for signs and seasons in this world, but they do not point you to the Christ apart from His Word.  The Magi recognized the significance of the new star they had seen, but they most likely knew what it meant from the Prophecies of the Old Testament concerning the Star and Scepter of Israel and Judah — whether they knew those Prophecies directly from the Holy Scriptures or by tradition from Balaam, from Solomon, or from Daniel, who was given oversight of the magi in Babylon and Persia.  In any case, they discerned in the rising of the star the birth of a new Jewish King, who would have salvific importance, not only for His Jewish kinsmen, but for the Gentiles and the whole world.  For by the Seed of Abraham all the nations of the earth are blessed.  And that knowledge, too, is the promise of God in the Scriptures.

Bear in mind that it is not the star but the preaching of the Holy Scriptures that leads the Magi — and now also you — to Christ Jesus.  Thereby it is known that He is born in Bethlehem of Judea.  Only when that Word of the Lord has been confessed does the star reappear for the Magi, in order to seal what God the Lord has spoken, and to mark the presence of His Word-made-Flesh.  So, too, the means of grace confirm His Word and promise to you, and they mark His presence with you.

Christ Jesus truly is God-with-us in the Flesh, as the Prophets foretold.  And He has come in the Flesh, conceived and born of the Woman, the Blessed Virgin Mary, in order to save you from sin and death and from the power of the devil in both your body and your soul.

That is the sort of King He is — the true divine King who bears the government on His shoulders; who becomes like His subjects, in order to serve them and to share His royal dignity with them; who invades “the darkest depths of Mordor,” so to speak, in order to plunder Satan’s kingdom, to set free those who have been held captive in the slavery of sin and the fear of death, and to make them free citizens of His own eternal Kingdom.  For His Kingdom is not of this world, but of God and of the Gospel, of the Resurrection and of the New Creation.

Even so, His coming and His Kingdom do disturb and shake up every earthly kingdom and every power structure which presumes to set itself up as a god.  Eventually, all such lords and gods of men shall be removed from their thrones and thrown down, whether they be a Caesar or a King, a President or Governor, a petty tyrant or a bully in the home, the office, or the classroom.  All these rulers and would-be powers on earth conspire against the Lord and against His Christ, but none of them shall prevail, nor shall they survive; whereas His Kingdom has no end.

The newborn King of the Jews is no tyrant or bully of any kind.  He is a Man after His Father’s heart, the Son of God from all eternity, now also great King David’s greater Son.  He is anointed — in His Flesh — by the Spirit of His God and Father — to be the Christ (the Messiah) who shall save His people from their sins.  He rules with equity, with justice and righteousness; not by violence or force, but by His Word and Spirit.  He shepherds His people in peace and joy, because He delivers them from all their enemies and reconciles them to God.  He feeds and waters them in green pastures and cool, clear streams.  He freely provides, not only for the wants and needs of this body and life, but true Spiritual Food and Drink for both body and soul, for now and for ever.

He establishes this Peace within His Kingdom between God and Man; and by the Gospel of His Incarnation, His Cross and Resurrection, He bestows exceedingly great joy upon all who come to Him.  For not only has He become true Man — made Flesh by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin Mary — but so has He also borne in His Body the full calamity and bitter weight of man’s sin and mortality.  Thus, He is born “the King of the Jews,” in order to be nailed to the Cross, crucified and put to death under Pontius Pilate.  And by His sacrificial death He does away with sin and death, and He rescues you and all people from every evil of body and soul.

Better than any earthly diplomat or negotiator, He is the perfect Mediator between God and Man.  He makes amends for all the wrongs that every man, woman, and child has ever done, and He repairs the breach between the Creator and all the children of Adam & Eve.  In love for His Father and for all those whom He has not been ashamed to call His brothers and sisters, His voluntary suffering and Self-sacrificing death and bloodshed bring Peace where there has been no peace, such true and perfect Peace as this world cannot give.  Such is the almighty power of this King, Jesus the Christ, whose strength is perfected in the willing weakness of His Cross and Passion.

As He lays down His life for you in love, so does He take it up again in the strength of His Father and the power of His Spirit.  Having given Himself over to death for the salvation of the world, so does He receive divine Power and Glory and all Authority in heaven and on earth in His own Body of Flesh and Blood.  That is the Authority of the Gospel, the free and full forgiveness of sins, with which He pardons and emancipates you from every crime and punishment.  So does He reign in love as the true King, at the Right Hand of the Father, while all His enemies are placed beneath His feet.  And to you who come to Him, who call upon His Name, He gives the Life everlasting in body and soul, as surely as He is risen from the dead and lives and reigns to all eternity.

You come to Him now, and you call upon His Name, because He has come to you and He calls and gathers you to Himself by the Ministry of His Gospel.

That is how and why you are here with Him who is God-with-you.  For His Gospel is the blessed and beautiful Light that now shines upon you in the deep darkness of this fallen and perishing world.  It is by His Word and Ministry of the Gospel that you see and know the Way of Life; for it is by the Gospel that you believe in Jesus Christ, your Lord, and come to Him to worship Him.

Arise and shine, therefore.  Your Light has come.  The Glory of the Lord has risen upon you.  And the great Sun of Righteousness, this bright Morning Star, shines upon you here within His Church through the Gospel.  Indeed, here in the Church on earth the divine Mystery of all the ages is made known, not only to the Jews and Gentiles alike, but even to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, to the angels and archangels and to all the host of heaven.  The Holy Triune God is manifested and made known in the Flesh and Blood of the incarnate Son, Christ Jesus, in His Church where His Gospel is preached and His Supper is administered according to His Word.

Have you not heard that He is “with His Mother”?  Over and over again, St. Matthew has made a point of saying so.  The Lord our God has become flesh of her flesh, and blood of her blood, in order to be with us — in order to be our Savior from sin and death.  You’ll not find God anywhere else than in His Flesh and Blood.  But just so, these very sacred things are given and poured out for you here in this House of the Living Bread, in this Sacrament of the Altar of Christ Jesus.

Read this Sign of His coming and recognize His presence here with you by the means of His Word.  Know what this Bread and this Wine are, and what they are for, by hearing what Christ Jesus says concerning them: His Body is given for you to eat, His Blood is poured out for you to drink, for the forgiveness of all your sins.  This is the Gospel of your dear Lord, your King, and your God: Not the sign of a star up in the heavens, but your Savior Himself right here with you on earth.

Come and worship Him here, as the Magi worshiped Him in Bethlehem.  How so?  In the Spirit and the Truth, which is to say, by the Holy Spirit and in accordance with the Word of God — in the humility of repentance and the confidence of faith.  It is from the heart, first of all, by such faith in His Word, that you worship Him rightly.  Apart from such repentant faith, whatever worship you attempt is nothing but idolatry.  But not to worship Him at all would be equally blasphemous.  So, then, repent of your sins, believe the Gospel, and ascribe to the Lord the Glory due His Name.

Now, the faith and worship of your heart will not remain hidden in your heart.  As the Lord saves you in body and soul by His Word and with His Word-made-Flesh, so humble yourself and honor Him with your whole body and life.  With all that you are and have, acknowledge Him as your one true God and King, as your great High Priest, and as the Sacrifice by which you are redeemed.

Consider the example of the Magi, and learn from it to live and move by faith.  They journeyed to find the Christ Child and worshiped Him in person.  They opened up their treasures and gave to Him their best.  Then they returned to their own country — much as the shepherds returned to their sheep — but they did so by another way.  Their whole way of life was changed by their encounter with Immanuel, Christ Jesus, so that, henceforth, they proceeded in faith to the Glory of His Name.

It is the same for you, beloved of the Lord, notwithstanding the differences in your circumstances.  You need not go to Bethlehem of Judea or follow a star to the ends of the earth.  But you worship the same Lord Jesus Christ by taking the time to journey to the House where He is to be found.  And this journey, in particular, is for your sake and for your own benefit, not for His; that you might hear and receive His Word of Absolution and eat and drink of His Body and His Blood.

Your worship of Christ begins, not with what you give, but with His Gifts of the Gospel to you.  You kneel or prostrate your body before Him, not to stroke His ego, but in order to receive His mercy and help.  Even repentance and faith derive, not from yourself, nor from your heart, but from His Word and Spirit.  You come to worship Him because He is your Savior, Christ the Lord, and all of your worship of Him — in heart and mind, body and soul — arises from His saving of you.

In returning thanks and praise to Him, you do worship Him with your treasures and your talents.  But these are not for His sake or benefit, either, but for His Holy Family, which is now also your own household and family in Him.  Remember, again, that He is found “with His Mother,” and it will be St. Joseph who cares for both Mother and Child as they travel in and out of Egypt.  So you worship Christ with your treasures by using them to care for His people, for your neighbors in the world, and for the Church and Ministry of the Gospel.  And like the Magi, you return to your own country and go about your life on earth in a new and better way.  You are not in league with Herod but a subject of the newborn King of the Jews, a free citizen of His Kingdom.

It has often been said that the gifts of the Magi confess who Christ is: The Gold, that He is King; the Frankincense, that He is God (for incense is offered to God as the prayer of His people); and the Myrrh, that He is Priest and Sacrifice.  Truly, He is each and all of these.  But the gifts of the Magi are also tangible signs of the worship that you are called to bring: The myrrh of repentance, as your old Adam is put to death with Christ; the frankincense of faith, in which you pray and confess, praise and give thanks, and call upon the Name of the Lord; and the gold of your love for one another in Christ, as you exercise a stewardship of His gifts to you in service to your neighbor.

With repentant faith before God, and with fervent love for God and for each other, you worship the Lord in the splendor of His Glory, in the beauty of His Holiness — not of yourself, but of His Gospel.  It is in His Light of forgiveness that you become a light of love for others.  Deep darkness still surrounds you in this valley of sin and death, and there is still the darkness within you, within your heart and mind, your thoughts and feelings, and your words and actions.  Yet, the Light has come in the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ, and behold, His Light continues to shine upon you.

He daily and richly forgives your sins with His Word of the Gospel, His Holy Absolution.  And in His Body given, His Blood poured out, His Glory still rises upon you in His Peace and Love.

Here, indeed, is Christ Jesus Himself, your dearest Treasure.  Here He is, the bright Morning Star, the Sun of Righteousness who rises with healing in His wings for your body and your soul forever.

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

Finding the Son in the Father's House

One of the most remarkable things about being a parent is watching the children grow and develop, as they learn to walk and talk, as they get taller and stronger, as they add to their knowledge and understanding, and as they increase in wisdom and maturity.  Even as you watch it happening over the course of weeks and months and years, it is both delightful and breathtaking; and then, as you look back, you wonder how they “suddenly” went from where they were to where they are now.

We have something of that sense in the case of our Lord Jesus Christ on this Second Sunday of Christmas, as we have gone from His circumcision to His “Bar-Mitzvah” in just a few days.  And whereas we are accustomed to the familiar images of the Christ Child in the manger or nestled in the arms of His Mother, we have really only this one Gospel story from His subsequent childhood.  But of course, for Mary and Joseph, and for Jesus Himself, those thirty years or so between His Holy Nativity and His Holy Baptism were not incidental, inconsequential, or insignificant.

Indeed, the great Mystery of the Incarnation — that God became Man, the Word became Flesh — that the almighty and eternal Son of the Living God was conceived and born of the Blessed Virgin Mary, becoming flesh of her flesh and blood of her blood, in order to be our Savior — that is no less awesome and amazing in His adolescence than it is in His conception, birth, and circumcision.

The incarnate Son of God was not only a little Baby, but He also grew, He got bigger and taller, stronger and faster.  His hair and arms and legs got longer, and as a young man His muscles began to fill out, His shoulders widened, His voice changed and deepened.  All of that may seem normal enough, because you already know that He went from a Babe in arms to the Man on the Cross, and that didn’t happen over night but over several decades.  But along with the growth of His Body from infancy to adulthood, there was also the growth and development of His mind over time.  He learned things.  He asked questions, and He listened to the answers.  He got smarter and wiser, and He interacted with the world around Him with increasing insight and understanding.  And while that is remarkable in the case of any child, it is all the more remarkable in the case of this Child.

That God the Son became true Man means that He did not simply pop into existence, but He took human life from its very inception and made it His own; He lived and grew through all its stages from the womb to His tomb.  Cell by cell He got bigger within the body of His Mother, and so also from His birth into His teen years and beyond.  He laughed and played, He ran and jumped and climbed things.  He learned to eat new foods.  He went to school.  His mind expanded.  His abilities increased.  His skills were sharpened.  “He grew in wisdom and in stature.”

Jesus wasn’t goofing off or playing games with the teachers in the Temple when He engaged them in conversation.  He was gladly hearing and learning the Word of God, just as you are given to do.  For He has taken your human nature to be His own, and so has He lived your human life, as well, save only without sin.  He has lived as the true Man, that you might live the divine Life in Him.

To live and grow, to learn and develop belongs to the goodness of life as a creature of God, and the almighty and eternal Son has made that His own as the Image and Likeness of His God and Father in human Flesh and Blood.  But He also took upon Himself the curse and consequences of sin, the circumstances and conditions of fallen man, subject not only to growth and change but to injury, illness, infirmity, and death.  He made Himself, not only truly human, but vulnerable and mortal.

He has done so, bearing your sin and death in His Body, in order to sacrifice Himself in your place, for all of your sins; that He should become the Sacrifice of Propitiation, not for your sins only, but for the sins of the whole world.  For He is not only the Son of God and the true Man, but the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, who gives Himself as your Meat and Drink indeed.

So it is that your reconciliation with God, your redemption, and your righteousness are in Christ Jesus.  In Him you have divine Life and eternal Salvation.  Apart from Him, you have only death.

How, then, shall you hang on to the Lord Jesus and not lose sight of Him?  By what wisdom shall you grow and abide in Him, that you may have true and lasting Life in and with Him?  And if you are a parent, how shall you secure Him for your children?  That is the single most important thing you are given to do as a father or mother — to secure Christ Jesus for your sons and daughters, from their infancy through each stage of development.  How shall you not lose Jesus to yourself and to your children, so that you and they shall not be lost forever under the curse of sin and death?

You have a good example, to begin with, in St. Mary and St. Joseph, who faithfully went up to Jerusalem every year to celebrate the Feast of the Passover in accordance with the Law of the Lord.  They were pious and faithful.  They went to church, to say it simply, and they took the Boy Jesus with them.  They went to hear and learn the Word of God in the fellowship of His people Israel.

Parents, that is how you keep from losing Jesus for yourself and for your children.  You go to the House of the Lord.  You give attention to His Word and the preaching of it.  You see to it that you and your family call upon the Name of the Lord in the fellowship of His Holy Christian Church.

By the same token, note that even such faithful and pious parents as Mary and Joseph managed to leave the Lord Jesus behind and to lose Him, simply by going on their way without Him.  Heed the warning of that example, and guard your heart, mind, body, and life against such temptations and dangers.  Do not leave the Lord Jesus behind as you return from here to your everyday routines.

The problem is usually not found in your activities per se.  After all, you have your responsibilities, your God-given callings and stations in life to serve and carry out — and it is quite right that you should do so.  But take Christ Jesus with you by the prayer and confession of His Word.  And when your activities distract your heart and mind from Him and His Word, Repent: Turn back around.

That’s what Mary and Joseph finally had to do.  After a day of fruitless searching among all those things that were so familiar to them, they had to turn around and go back to Jerusalem.  And in that you are given a picture of what your own repentance and return to faith in Christ will look like.

To begin with, when you first realize that He is missing — when you finally notice the big hole in your life where the Lord Jesus ought to be — then what anxiety and what dread settle upon your heart.  In many cases, you probably can’t even identify what’s wrong; but even so, when Jesus is missing from your life, then everything is utterly out of sorts.  You might even be doing all the right things, and yet they’re still all wrong.  If you have not held on to Jesus, then you have lost what is most important, most necessary and essential to both your body and your soul and to all of life.

So you start looking, and you search for what is missing, but just like Mary and Joseph at first, you look in all the wrong places, in all the wrong ways.  You suppose that you will find Jesus among your family and friends, in that which is comfortable and familiar to you.  Even if it’s not “Jesus” that you think you’re looking for, you attempt to find and make a life for yourself in those things and in those places; whereas you’ll have no true or lasting life apart from the Lord Jesus Christ.

You’ll not find life with God in your family or among your friends apart from Christ Jesus.  You’ll not find life with God in your job, in your hobbies and pastimes, or on vacation, if the Lord Jesus is not with you.  When Jesus is missing, you’re as good as dead, and He’s as good as dead to you.

But His Resurrection from the dead — on the Third Day — His Resurrection for you and yours — is in His Father’s House, in His Church, in His Word, in the hearing of the Word of God in Christ.

That’s the sort of heart that Solomon prayed for, and that God gave to Him by His grace.  English translations generally refer to a “discerning” heart, but the text actually says that he prayed for a “hearing” heart, that is, a heart that listens and gives attention to the Word and wisdom of God, which is the root of all true discernment.  It is when your heart hears the Word of the Lord that your heart is faithful, and trusting, and loves God, and obeys His commands, and lives by His grace.

It is in the hearing of the Word of Christ that you find Jesus, because it is by and with His Word that He finds you.  And you hear the Word of Christ in His Church, in the preaching and Ministry of His Gospel.  That is where you find Him; because, again, that is where and how He finds you.

And you should already know that, because the Lord your God has taught you and trained you to find the Son in the Father’s House.  Indeed, that lesson is at the very heart of the Passover Feast.

You know the story of the Exodus from Egypt, how the Angel of Death went throughout the land, but each of the fathers was instructed to take a lamb and sacrifice it, to put the blood of the lamb upon the door, and to feed his family with the flesh of the lamb, because it was the Lord’s Passover, and He would spare the sons of Israel and bring His people out of Egypt.  The sons of Israel were safe when each of them was in the home of his father, in the home where the lamb was sacrificed in place of the firstborn son, and eaten by the family in fellowship with the Lord and with each other.  That’s where and how the sons of Israel were kept alive, and preserved, and safe from death.

So, the Boy Jesus is exactly right, of course.  He is found precisely where He ought to be, that is, in His Father’s House.  So should Mary and Joseph have known and expected from the Passover.

Indeed, all of God’s people are to be found within their Father’s House — where the Lamb who has been sacrificed is found — where the Flesh and Blood of that same Lamb are given and poured out for the Household and Family of God in holy fellowship with Him and all His dear children.

What God did in the first Passover for the households and families of Israel in Egypt, what fathers did according to the Word of the Lord for their own households and families on that occasion, God did for the whole household and family of Israel in King Solomon’s building of the Temple in Jerusalem, where year after year the Passover lambs were sacrificed for the keeping of the Feast.  It was for this very purpose that Mary and Joseph took the Boy Jesus up to Jerusalem every year.

But now, in this Boy, the Lord has provided for Himself the one Lamb who is given in the place of all the sons of Israel — and for all the children of man, for all the sons and daughters of Adam and Eve.  He is the true Passover Lamb of God, who is sacrificed for the redemption of His people.

Where He is found, therefore, is in His Father’s House.  That is where the Flesh and Blood of this true Lamb are given and poured out for you and for all the children of God to eat and to drink in the Holy Communion.  That is where you and your children are to be.

This one Lord Jesus Christ is the true Solomon, the true Son of David, the true King of Peace, who has established the true Temple of God in the true Jerusalem, that is to say, His Holy Church, the place where His Word is spoken and His Body and Blood are administered according to His Word.

It is here in that House of God, in His Church on earth, that His Flesh is given to feed you unto Life and Salvation.  It is here that His Blood covers you from sin and death, and protects you from the devil and hell.  It is here in His House that you find Him.  It is here in His House that He finds you.

So this is where you and your children belong.  This is your true home, and this is your true family.  This is your Father’s House, wherein your anxious heart and troubled mind find Peace and Sabbath Rest in the Lord Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, your Brother in the flesh, who has been sacrificed for your sins and raised for your justification.  It is here that you are raised up with Him from the fear of death to faith and life with His God and Father, who is now your God and Father.

It is here within His House that the grace of God is upon you, in such a way that you can live — and not just go about your activities, and go about your days and weeks and months and years, and go through the motions of your relentless routines, but you can actually live and learn and grow and thrive.  In your callings and stations, in your home and family, even at play, you can live and thrive and grow to and from this House — to and from this Altar, where the true Lamb is given to you as Meat and Drink indeed.  It is in Him that the grace of God is upon you.  And He shall not abandon you.  If you lose Him, He shall not lose or let go of you, but by His grace He seeks you out and calls you always back to His Father’s House, which is your own house and home forever in Him.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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