“Jesus Is My Salvation” (St. John 20:19-31)

If Christ has not been raised from the dead, our faith is in vain and we are still in our sins. But now Christ Jesus — who was crucified for our sins — has in fact been raised from the dead for our justification. So has God the Father reconciled us and all the world to Himself by His Son; and so has He entrusted to His Church on earth the ministry of reconciliation. By and from the Cross — in the crucified and risen Body of Christ Jesus — by and with His Word and Holy Spirit, He bestows His sweet Peace upon us through the free and full forgiveness of all our sins. He raises us up from death to life, out of darkness into light, from doubt and fear and unbelief to faith and trust in Christ. Thus do we now live and love in the confidence and contentment of that sure and certain hope of the Resurrection of the body to the Life everlasting of body and soul with Him, our living Head — signed, sealed, and secured in His own Resurrection from the dead on the Third Day.

It was already on that Third Day, that first Easter Sunday, that the risen Lord Jesus came to His disciples, comforted them with His Peace, and commissioned them to carry and convey His Gospel to the nations. Each of the holy Evangelists records examples of these Resurrection appearances and the accompanying Words of our Lord, upon which the one, holy, Christian, and Apostolic Church rests and depends. St. Paul likewise indicates the various appearances of the crucified and risen Lord to multiple witnesses in his first Epistle to the Church at Corinth, the fifteenth chapter, which opens with a creedal affirmation of the Cross and Resurrection of Christ Jesus.

What is remarkable, as one reads or listens to the accounts recorded in the four Holy Gospels, is the persistence of doubts and fears on the part of the disciples — not only the first time, but on each occasion, albeit in a variety of ways. It should not surprise us, however, but rather comfort and encourage us, considering that we are likewise afflicted with persistent doubts and fears of our own, even though we surely ought to know better. It remains the case, throughout this mortal life on earth, that we cannot by our own wisdom, reason, or strength believe in Jesus Christ our Lord or come to Him. Thanks be to God that He comes to us in peace and love, and that His Holy Spirit calls us by the Gospel and brings us again and again to repentance, faith, and newness of life, in order to strengthen and sustain us in Christ Jesus as living members of His Body, the Church.

We find all of this laid out for us in the Holy Gospel According to St. John, the second half of the twentieth chapter, heard every year on the Second Sunday of Easter. It begins with St. John’s description of the appearance of the risen Lord to the disciples in the Upper Room, which follows immediately after the Emmaus story in St. Luke 24. There are similarities and differences in the details provided by the two Evangelists with respect to that first appearance on Easter Sunday evening. But then St. John goes on to record a second appearance of our Lord on the eighth day later, that is, the next Sunday. It is well known from St. John’s account that St. Thomas was absent from the gathering when Jesus first appeared, but then became the focus of our Lord’s attention on the second occasion. In his doubts and demands we recognize the frailties and fears of our own fallen flesh and sinful hearts and minds. So, too, in the Lord’s gracious dealings with St. Thomas we see demonstrated His patience, mercy, and compassion toward each and all of us, as well. Not only that, but in St. Thomas we also find an example of those men whom the Lord Himself called, ordained, and sent to preach repentance and forgiveness in His Name. And it is precisely by that Apostolic Ministry of His Gospel that He comes to us, abides with us, and deals with us as our Savior and Redeemer, our Lord, and our God!

While the Crucifixion of our Lord is the Hour of His Glory, and as such the crescendo of St. John’s Holy Gospel, the Resurrection appearances of Christ to His disciples in the twentieth chapter are the culmination of all that has transpired from the beginning. The concluding chapter that follows is brilliant in its own way, comprehending as it does the restoration of St. Peter (against the backdrop of his denials). But our Lord’s bestowal of Peace, the Holy Spirit, and the Office of the Keys — and the opening of His wounds to St. Thomas and the rest of the disciples — gathers up all that He has accomplished by His Cross and thereby establishes the Church and Ministry of His Gospel for all the ensuing generations.

In this Easter account we find the Incarnation confirmed, the Holy Trinity revealed and at work, the means of grace bestowed, and the divine gifts of repentance and faith, forgiveness, life, and salvation made available. We hear the confession of Christ Jesus and receive the peace, hope, and joy that belong even to us, who are blessed to believe in Him by the testimony of the Apostles, even though we do not yet see Him. Thus do the redemption, reconciliation, and righteousness of the Cross and Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ become ours by grace through faith in Him.

Who, then, is this Lord Jesus Christ? That is the heart of the matter, for St. John as for all the Apostles and Evangelists. If Jesus is to be our Strength and our Song, our Savior and Salvation, it is necessary that He be true God and true Man. And so He is! From the beginning of the Gospel it has been asserted and affirmed that He is the divine Word by whom, through whom, and for whom all things are created and exist, the divine Word who is the Light of the world and the Life of all people, who for us men and our salvation came down from heaven and became Flesh of our flesh and Blood of our blood. Conceived and born of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the only-begotten God who resides from all eternity in the bosom of God the Father has come to reveal and make known His Father to us in love. For this purpose He was baptized, anointed by the Holy Spirit in His own human Body, openly declared the Son of God, and identified as the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world (St. John 1:1-34). Herein are all the Mysteries that come to fruition in His Cross and Passion, which are in turn bestowed upon His Church in the gathering of His disciples in His Resurrection from the dead. So, for example, His divine nature and power are demonstrated by His sudden appearance behind locked doors (St. John 20:19, 26), by His breathing of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles (St. John 20:22), and by His knowledge of the demands that Thomas has made regarding His sacred wounds (St. John 20:25, 27). Paradoxically, though His wounded hands and side are the evidence that He remains the true Man of flesh and blood who was crucified, died, and was buried, they elicit from St. Thomas the profound confession that He is “Lord” and “God!” (St. John 20:28). And in turn, the Apostolic witness obtains such faith in countless others, who are thereby granted to believe and confess “that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God” (St. John 20:31). Which is to say that this Man, Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of St. Mary, crucified and risen from the dead, is the Lord’s Anointed, the Bearer and Bestower of the Spirit, the only-begotten Son of God the Father, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God. He has come down from the Father in heaven to us, has borne all our sins and griefs and sorrows in His own Body to the Cross, and gathers us to Himself, grafting us into His riven and risen Body, in order to bring us to the bosom of His God and Father in peace and love and holiness.

It is fundamental to this Gospel that the risen Lord is the crucified Christ. His Cross is not to be repeated, His once-for-all Sacrifice is finished, perfected, and complete. But neither are His Cross and Passion left behind, forgotten in the past. It is by His being “lifted up” in death upon the Cross that He has glorified the Father and accomplished our salvation as the Propitiation for our sins — and not for our sins only, but for the sins of the whole world (St. John 3:14-15, 12:27-32; 1 John 2:1-2). Despite appearances, this “lifting up” is also the beginning of His return to the Father, as well as the means whereby He calls and gathers disciples to Himself from all the nations, to be lifted up in and with Him. His atoning Sacrifice and the shedding of His holy, precious Blood cleanse us from all unrighteousness and open the Kingdom of heaven to all who believe and are baptized in His Name. So do His innocent suffering and death make possible the gift of His Holy Spirit, that we should be sanctified in the presence of God and not consumed and destroyed by His divine glory and absolute holiness. What He thus accomplished by His Cross, He delivers to His disciples in His Resurrection from the dead; the Spirit He gave out from the Cross (St. John 19:30) He breathes upon His Apostles in the Upper Room (St. John 20:22), that they in turn should breathe the same Spirit into others through the forgiveness of sins in His Name and stead.

Similarly, the wounds that He received upon the Cross — in His hands and side — are now opened to His disciples in His Resurrection. There is more than proof of His identity at work here. The Evangelist has stressed the piercing of His side — and the outpouring of blood and water from His side — in the account of our Lord’s Passion (St. John 19:34-37). In this we see a picture of the New Adam who gives life to His Bride, the Church, by the waters of Holy Baptism and the Blood of His New Testament in the Holy Communion. So, here again, what He has accomplished by His Cross is now manifested in His Resurrection, summoning His disciples from the death of doubt and despair to faith and life and peace and joy. Notably, these same three holy things — the Spirit, the Water, and the Blood — are cited in St. John’s First Epistle as a unified threefold witness to Jesus Christ, the Son of God (1 John 5:5-9). And in the previous chapter of that same Epistle, the Apostle indicates the nature and content of that witness, namely, “that Jesus Christ has come in the Flesh” (1 John 4:2). Indeed, not only in His Incarnation, but from the waters of His Baptism — where He was anointed by the Spirit and confessed by His Father — to the blood of His Cross, and now in His Resurrection from the dead, the Son of God has come — and does come — in the Flesh. As He promised His disciples on Maundy Thursday, on the Eve of His Passion, He has not left them as orphans, but He comes to them and discloses Himself to them (St. John 14:18-21). His coming to them is prominent in the first and second Resurrection appearances (St. John 20:19, 26). Likewise, the Peace that He promised on that earlier evening (St. John 14:27) is spoken and delivered to them repeatedly in connection with His Resurrection coming (St. John 20:19, 21, 26). It is surely no coincidence that His Word of Peace accompanies the opening of His wounds and the breathing of His Spirit, for it is the Crucified One who is risen from the dead who comes to them with His Word and Spirit, Flesh and Blood, that they should have faith and life in Him.

The Gift of the Holy Spirit — the Spirit of Truth, the Comforter (Paraclete) — was also promised in our Lord’s “farewell discourse” on Maundy Thursday evening (St. John 15:26-27, 16:7-15). Prior to that, on the last, great day of the Feast of Booths, the Lord Jesus declared that those who believe in Him would receive the Holy Spirit, who would in turn well up in them as a River of Living Water (St. John 7:37-39). But that Gift of the Spirit would not be given until Jesus was glorified — a reference to His Crucifixion (St. John 7:39, 19:30). The Blood and Water from His pierced side, and the subsequent breathing of the Spirit upon His disciples, inaugurated the fulfillment of those promises and established the ongoing work of the Spirit in the life of the Church on earth (St. John 19:34-35, 20:22-23; 1 John 5:6-8). As the Son receives the Spirit from the Father — in His Baptism and in His Resurrection from the dead (St. John 1:32-34; Acts 2:32-33; Romans 8:11) — so does Jesus pour out the Spirit upon His Apostles and upon all who believe in Him through their Word (St. John 17:20). And as the Holy Spirit takes from the Father the things of Christ and bestows them upon the Church through His Word (St. John 16:14-15), it is the Spirit who gives Life and Salvation in and with Christ Jesus (St. John 3:5-8, 6:63). Accordingly, the Lord’s breathing of the Spirit upon the disciples recalls the breathing of life into Adam (Genesis 2:7), as well as the breathing of the Spirit into the resurrected bones and bodies of Israel (Ezekiel 37:7-14). This is the fulfillment and perfection of Creation in the crucified and risen Body of Christ Jesus, who pours out the Spirit of His Father upon His own, even as that same Spirit lays Christ upon their hearts and minds, bodies and souls, through the forgiveness of the Gospel.

This is our Life and our Salvation, that is, to receive the Spirit of the Father in the Son, and to be united with Christ Jesus and anointed by His Spirit as beloved and well-pleasing children of His God and Father. It is for this Life with God in Christ that we have been created in His Image and Likeness — redeemed from sin and death, rescued from the devil and hell, reconciled to God by the Cross of Christ, and righteous in His sight by faith in His Word.

All of this is worked in us by the Spirit through the preaching of repentance for the forgiveness of sins in Jesus’ Name (St. Luke 24:46-49). Here in St. John’s Holy Gospel, that takes the form of the forgiving or retaining of sins by those who are sent by Christ Jesus, as He is sent by the Father, anointed by the Holy Spirit for this Ministry of the Word. As all three Persons of the Holy Trinity are actively present and at work in Holy Baptism (St. John 1:32-34), so are all three Persons of the Holy Trinity actively present and at work in this binding and loosing of sins (St. John 16:5-15, 20:21-23). Everything aims at repentance and faith in the forgiveness of sins, that sinners should be saved from death for abundant Life with God in and with Christ Jesus, by virtue of His Cross and Resurrection (St. John 10:7-18, 20:31). The Spirit is not simply an instrumental means to these ends. To bear the Spirit of God is to share in the divine Life, even to partake of the divine nature (2 Peter 1:3-4).

That being said, Luther helpfully distinguishes between the bearing of the Spirit by faith for one’s own life and salvation, and the bearing of the Spirit in one’s office for the benefit of others (Luther's Works AE 69, 354-359). In the case at hand, the Apostles are anointed by the Spirit for the Office of the Holy Ministry, for the forgiving or retaining of sins in the Name and stead of the Lord who calls, ordains, and sends them with His authority. While the forgiveness of the Gospel is confessed, spoken, bestowed, and delivered in a variety of ways — by preaching, Holy Baptism, and the Holy Communion, and in the consoling testimony of Christians for one another (Smalcald Articles III.IV.1) — it is significantly conveyed by the ministers of Christ, not according to their own persons, nor even by virtue of their own Christian faith and piety, but by virtue of their objective office and station (Apology VII-VIII [IV].47).

The objective integrity of the Office of the Holy Ministry is particularly important, because it is the primary way and means whereby the Lord Jesus comes to His people and bestows the Spirit upon them for the forgiveness of their sins and for the gift of His Life and Salvation. That is the case, expressed in different ways, in the commissioning accounts recorded by each of the four holy Evangelists: St. Matthew highlights Holy Baptism and ongoing catechesis in all that Jesus has commanded (St. Matthew 18:18-20), St. Mark similarly focuses on preaching and Holy Baptism (St. Mark 16:15-16), and, as already noted, St. Luke emphasizes the preaching of repentance for the forgiveness of sins in Jesus’ Name (St. Luke 24:46-48). We see these very things exemplified, as well, in Acts 2:37-42, culminating in the Apostles’ teaching and fellowship, the Breaking of the Bread, and the prayers of the Church. In St. John 20, the focus is on the forgiving of sins, which is at the heart and center of the entire Church and Ministry of the Gospel. And in the next chapter, the Apostle and Evangelist summarizes this pastoral ministry — in the Words of Jesus to St. Peter — as the feeding, tending, and nurturing of His own dear lambs and sheep (St. John 21:15-17).

This preaching and administration of the means of grace for the forgiveness of sins is the ordinary continuation of the extraordinary office and work of the Apostles. As such, along with and by the forgiveness of sins, this pastoral ministry has the same goal and purpose as St. John’s writing of the Holy Gospel: “that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that, believing, you may have life in His Name” (St. John 20:30-31). This is precisely our confession concerning the Office of the Holy Ministry, that the Lord has instituted this preaching of His Word and the administration of His Sacraments in order to establish saving faith, where and when it pleases Him, in the hearts and lives of those who thereby hear and receive the Gospel (AC V). And this same Ministry is the source and substance of the Church’s true identity and unity (AC VII-VIII). So it is that Church Fellowship is essentially a fellowship of pastoral ministry and pastoral care, a mutual administration of the means of grace. To embrace the unity of the Spirit in the bond of Peace is to confess one Lord, to teach one faith, to practice one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins, and to live and love as children of one God and Father in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 4:1-7). Not as a merely “political” arrangement, but as a genuine fellowship in the actual practice of those who receive and bear the Holy Spirit in accordance with the Word of the Lord, who are called, ordained, and sent in the Name and stead of Jesus the Christ.

It is, indeed, a remarkable Word of the Lord Jesus, that He sends the Apostles as the Father has sent Him, especially considering the importance attached to the Father’s sending of His Son (St. John 3:16-17; 5:23-24; 6:29, 38, 57; 8:16, 18, 42; 10:36; 12:44-45; 14:24; 17:3, 8, 21, 23). To fear, love, and trust in the only true God, and to believe in Jesus Christ whom He has sent, is the pivotal point of the faith in the Gospel According to St. John (17:3). To know the Lord Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son, is to know the Father in Him (St. John 1:14-18, 14:5-11). And by extension, the Lord Jesus Christ is received, heard, and known in the words and works of those whom He sends in His Name (St. John 13:20; St. Matthew 10:40; St. Luke 10:16). Thus do we seek the Lord where He may be found — in the preaching and ministry of His sent ones within the life of the Church on earth. We know Him, especially, in His Word of Absolution, the forgiveness of sins in His Name. And where we have deviated or departed from His Word, He calls us back to Himself by the preaching of repentance, even by the discipline of the binding key — and excommunication where necessary — that we should be turned around, away from our sins, to the Life and Salvation that are found only in God. So He did for Thomas, in love, and so He does for each of us.

This Holy Gospel not only shows us the ministry of reconciliation and salvation, but also the ongoing faith and life of Christian disciples within the Body and Bride of Christ, His Holy Church. That is one of the most beautiful and compelling aspects of this account. And here we are not talking about simple practicalities or strategic programs, but about the real-time experience of Salvation in the fellowship of the Holy Triune God. That is what the Apostles have with the Father in the Son and by the Holy Spirit, and that is what we are now given and receive through the Word of the Apostles in the Church and Ministry of the Gospel (1 John 1:3-4; St. John 17:20; Acts 2:42). The paradigm for that life and fellowship is depicted and spelled out for us in St. John chapter 20.

St. John’s description of “that day, the first day of the week,” and again, “after eight days,” when the disciples were gathered together inside, behind closed doors, immediately calls to mind the gathering of the Church, week by week, on the Lord’s Day (St. John 20:19, 26; Revelation 1:10). The Resurrection of our Lord on the first day of the week, as well as these very appearances of our Lord to His disciples, established the Church’s practice of coming together for the Lord’s Supper on Sundays (initially in the evenings, as in this case, but eventually in the mornings). And just as the Breaking of the Bread at Emmaus (St. Luke 24:28-35) points to the Breaking of the Bread in the life of the Church (Acts 2:42-47), so does this Holy Gospel from St. John point to the coming of our Lord — His weekly Advent — to the place where His disciples are gathered together in His Name, by and for His Word, to hear His preaching of forgiveness, to receive the Gift of His Spirit in and with and through that preaching, and to enter into the fellowship of His Body through His opened wounds. That is where and how the Church lives — on earth as it is in heaven.

It is no accident or coincidence that the Peace of the Lord (Pax Domini) punctuates the Liturgy of the Lord’s Supper. It is what we pray for in the Gloria in Excelsis, and again in the Agnus Dei; and it is what we are granted by His Word following the consecration of the Sacrament, and then in the Sacrament itself, His Body given and His Blood poured out for us Christians to eat and to drink in faith and with thanksgiving for the forgiveness of sins. Thus do we Lutherans regularly “depart in Peace” with the Nunc Dimittis on our lips, because His Word has been fulfilled in us by the gifts of His Spirit, Flesh, and Blood. In this perfect Peace of Christ we are sent as Christians, anointed by His Spirit, as children of His God and Father, to live and love and serve to the glory of His Name within our callings and stations. In the world we are yet routinely confronted with trials and tribulations, but He has overcome the world on our behalf, and our sure and certain hope abides in His crucified and risen Body — to which we belong by grace through faith in Him, by the new birth of water and the Spirit, and by the New Testament in His Blood. That is the source and substance of our true and lasting Peace, such Peace as the world neither knows nor can it give or take away (St. John 14:27).

I’ve already mentioned how the post-Resurrection coming of the Lord to His disciples, His gift of the Spirit, and His granting of Peace are the fulfillment of His promises on Maundy Thursday evening. On that same occasion, He forewarned the disciples that for a little while they would no longer see Him, and they would “weep and lament” for that time. But then they would see Him again, and their sorrow would turn to joy (St. John 16:16-22). This promise, too, is here fulfilled in St. John chapter 20. For the disciples were troubled and afraid, hiding behind closed doors, but they rejoiced “when they saw the Lord” (St. John 20:20). St. Thomas, likewise, on the subsequent Sunday, was brought from his doubt and fear to believe and confess the risen Christ Jesus as his Lord and his God when he saw Him with his own eyes (St. John 20:26-29). And now, for our part, although we do not yet see Him, we are blessed to believe and trust in Him, to confess His holy Name, to worship and adore Him, all by the eyewitness testimony of those holy Apostles (St. John 17:20, 20:31). For what they saw, what they looked upon, what they touched and handled, and what they heard from the crucified and risen Lord Jesus, they proclaim to us in the Holy Scriptures (1 John 1:1-4). By this Word, by faith in this Word, we have fellowship with the Apostles, with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and with one another as members of the Body and Bride of Christ Jesus. And in this sharing of the Christian faith and life with us and the whole Church, the joy of the Apostles is made full (1 John 1:4). Thus do the many signs which Jesus performed in the presence of the disciples continue among us in the Apostolic Ministry of His means of grace. And thus do we have faith and life and peace and joy in His Name (St. John 20:30-31).

It is enough, and we are content — confident and courageous in all affliction and in the face of death itself — because Christ Jesus, our “living Head,” has risen from the dead. As He comes to us in mercy and abides with us by grace with His own Word and Spirit, Flesh and Blood, so do we live and abide in and with Him in body and soul, in heart, mind, and spirit — here in time, and hereafter in eternity. As we are set free from the chains that bind us by the liberating Key of Holy Absolution, so shall we awake and arise from death and the grave to live forever with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Arising glorious in body and soul, like unto the glory of our dear Lord Jesus Christ, we shall rejoice before Him forever and forevermore.

Indeed, Christ Jesus “rose for this purpose: so that we should be righteous and live through His Resurrection, and this is what He has commanded His Apostles and everyone to preach unto the end of the world, namely, that a Kingdom has been established on earth, which is a Kingdom over against sin, death, and the power of the devil, and it brings heavenly and eternal blessings. Christ help us thereunto, who has risen” from the dead and lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit forever and ever (Luther’s Works AE 69, 436). To Him be all the glory, honor, and praise!

“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.

A Steward of the Rich Man's Things

When it comes to your life in this world, you’ve learned a thing or two over the years, and you’ve got at least a few things figured out. Whether you’re a second-career man, a bi-vocational pastor, or rocking a side hustle — or simply a full-time pastor with a home and family to care for and look after — you know how to “get ‘er done.” Right? You know your own business, your hobbies and pastimes. You’re a bona fide expert at your own occupation and activities in this body and life.

By a fair amount of trial and error over the years, you’ve learned how to make your way in the world. You know how the system works, and how to work the system. You know how to connect the dots, to make ends meet, and to get what you really want, one way or another.

You’ve also figured out how to make friends. You know what they expect from you, and what you can reasonably expect from them. And likewise, notwithstanding all the ups and downs on your learning curve, you know what to expect from this life on earth, and what it takes to survive.

But do you know the business of God? Do you know how things work in His Kingdom? Do you know what to expect, and what is expected of you, on the way that leads to the Life everlasting?

The fact is that you are a steward or manager of a Rich Man’s things, not only as a pastor, but as a human being, and all the more so as a Christian — a Blood-bought baptized child of God. Your life is not your own, no matter what you may kid yourself into thinking. Everything you have is on loan from God. It is entrusted to you, not for the purpose of feeding the appetites of your fallen flesh, but for the glory of God in the good that He does to you and to others. You are to use His gifts in faith before Him and in love for your neighbors. That is your job and your responsibility.

And you should take heed and take to heart, there will be an accounting of your stewardship. There will be a day of reckoning, when the ledger of your body and life in this world is presented to the Lord your God. And there will be the facts to speak for themselves.

How have you spent your time? And, yes, how have you spent your money? Where have you invested your energies? To what or whom have you given your affections? What have you done with God’s things? And what have you done for those people whom God has placed around you?

In short, who has been your master? Who has been calling the shots? Is it you, or the Lord?

Do not suppose that “clocking your hours” as a pastor every week is adequate or somehow even generous on your part. If there is any portion of your life that you regard as “your own,” then you are robbing from your true and rightful Lord, who has created you and given you life and all that you are and have. On any given day, in any given week, at best you have only done your duty.

Have a care how you think about tithing, as well, and about almsgiving. Perhaps you have shied away from any such notions altogether, because they have sometimes been taught and practiced legalistically. And to be sure, do not at all suppose that tithing will atone for your sins, justify you before God, or purchase your place in His Kingdom. But having been forgiven freely by Christ Jesus, made righteous by His grace through faith in His Gospel, and named a child of His God and Father in your Holy Baptism, do not at all suppose that you are now to live as a god unto yourself.

As for tithing, ten percent of your income is not a bad guideline, a starting point. It is surely not too much. But if you are hard pressed, commit some significant percentage of your income as a regular offering to the Lord, as an exercise of faith and love. And if you are able, do not hesitate to go well beyond ten percent. Or, if you do not think so readily in terms of percentages — if your income and expenses are variable through the year — then consider setting apart as much for the Church and Ministry of Christ as you spend on your hobbies, your entertainment, your vacations, and your luxuries in life, whatever goes beyond your food and clothing and safe shelter.

And let your almsgiving likewise be as generous as you pamper yourself. After all, if you can find the means to pay for your pastimes, for ball games and video games, for going out to eat or going to a show, then you can also find the means to care for your brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus.

Only, whatever you do, realize that you are not buying God off, nor are you earning His favor, since you are using and investing His riches, not your own.

Be very clear on this point: God doesn’t need your stuff. It’s already His stuff in the first place. But God does require your heart. All of it. And because you are His steward or manager, He has entrusted you to live and serve according to His good pleasure, that is, according to His Word.

The Lord looks not only at what you accomplish, but at whatever drives you to accomplish it. When you proceed in selfishness, it may result in impressive things in the sight of men, but the Lord your God is not impressed. Nor is He pleased by your selfishness and self-serving behavior.

The Lord does not measure things by the law of the jungle. He does not teach you to look out for yourself first, and for your neighbor only when it appeals to you or suits your plans. He calls you to live by faith in Him alone, and for His sake to sacrifice your entire life in love for your neighbor. He charges you to love even your enemies, and to pray for those who persecute you. That is how you are to occupy your days and nights, your life, your time, your energy, and all of your stuff.

That which is highly esteemed among men is detestable in the sight of God. And the opposite is also true: That which is highly esteemed before the Lord is detestable in the eyes of men.

Consider the Lord Jesus Christ, the almighty and eternal Son of the living God. Though He was rich, yet, for your sake, He made Himself poor, so that you could inherit the riches of God in Him.

He came down from heaven to become true Man, and not only that, but to bear the sins of the world in His own Body, to hand Himself over to the Cross. He liquidated Himself. He spent it all. He gave Himself away. Not for those who loved Him, but for you, though you were His enemy.

And the world says in response, “Jesus, you’re a bloody fool! That’s no way to live!”

And yet, it is the way that God lives. It is how He has lived for you. He humbled Himself and became obedient even unto death, in order that you might live with Him in His Resurrection.

You also, then, have this heart, mind, and spirit of Christ in you. For this is how you are to live.

For God’s sake, be generous to your neighbor, even if you don’t like him. Use the stuff that God has given you to love and serve those in need around you. And don’t tell me there are no people like that. There are. You know there are. So, love them. Don’t just speak nice words to them. Do things for them. Go out of your way. Give up some of your time. It isn’t your time, anyway.

Forgive. Above all, forgive. Forgive those who have trespassed against you, as your dear Father in heaven forgives you. That is the coin of the realm in the Kingdom of God, within His one, holy, catholic, and Apostolic Church on earth: Forgiveness of sins. It is not hoarded and hidden away. It is spent freely. And the more forgiveness is given, the more it multiplies and grows.

You are to exercise your stewardship in faith and love. That is the course that you are given to follow. So, then, trust in God, who has given you all things to begin with. Do not be afraid that if you give some of it away, He’s going to deprive you. He’s not going to stop being generous. He has no problem with generosity. That is what characterizes Him. It flows from His very nature.

If you are generous with what the Lord your God has entrusted to you, do not worry, and do not be afraid. He knows how to feed you. He knows how to clothe you. He knows how to take care of you. And because you are His very own, He does all of this for you with charity and compassion.

Even when you fail to be grateful, even when you fret and fidget and forget to say thank you, and even when you go about your life as though you have gotten everything for yourself, your dear Father in heaven still has this overflowing abundance of generosity for you in Jesus Christ. And it is such generosity that you are likewise to have for your neighbor. Indeed, the Lord’s generosity with you is not for your benefit only, but for the benefit and blessing of your neighbors, as well.

So, what’s that going to look like? What is that kind of faithful stewardship of your life and that kind of godly generosity in your life going to look like?

Well, here’s the thing, which ought to resonate especially with all of you who are pastors of the Lord’s people: It looks like the stewardship of the Mysteries of God, to which you have been called. It looks like the Ministry of the Gospel, like the administration of the Means of Grace.

The right way to use the temporal stuff that God has entrusted to you for this body and life on earth looks like the way that you as a pastor are given to use the Means of Grace on behalf of God’s dear children: the way you make disciples by way of Holy Baptism and ongoing catechesis in the Word of Christ Jesus; the way you feed those disciples with His holy Body and precious Blood; the way you freely and fully absolve them in His Name and stead. According to the Lord’s commission and command, all of these sacred things are done and given freely, without charge, and without cost.

The stewardship of the Mysteries of God, that is the pattern by which you are called to exercise the stewardship of your body and life, and of all that the Lord your God has placed into your care.

It is not like the scribes and Pharisees, who are lovers of money and lovers of praise from men. It is rather like the Gospel, because it is the life that is lived by and from and in the Holy Gospel. It is like the Lord Jesus, coming down from heaven and giving Himself for you and to you, and to and for others, also. That is how the Lord administers His true riches.

And that is how you are to manage and administer the Rich Man’s things.

It may seem foolish in the eyes of the world. Well, so be it. You ought to look foolish in the eyes of the world. Your Lord Jesus did, and so He does. The world still thinks this is all a bunch of nonsense. But living by faith, your hope is in Christ. And your hope shall not be disappointed.

Truth be told, your stewardship is not what it ought to be, neither in the church nor in your home.

Surprisingly, shockingly, the Lord nevertheless continues to deal with you by the stewardship of His Gospel. The Lord Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, your Savior, He is the faithful Steward and Manager of His Father’s things. For His Name’s sake, He praises you and blesses you, because He has poured out the Holy Spirit generously upon you and adorned you with His perfect righteousness. He has given Himself for you. He has reconciled you to His God and Father. He has been a Friend to you in need. And having befriended you in love and called you to Himself, He forgives you all of your debts, all of your trespasses and sins, and all of your faults and failings.

In His own faithfulness and righteousness, He who gave Himself up for you in love, continues to give Himself to you with the free and full forgiveness of all your sins. And for His own sake, for the sake of His divine and holy Love, He welcomes you into His House, into His dwelling, both here in time, where He feeds you at His Table in His Church, and hereafter in eternity, where you shall feast upon the Wedding Banquet of the Lamb in His Kingdom forever and ever.

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

The Ministry of the Word of Christ

As He called and gathered the disciples to Himself, to follow Him on His journey from the waters of His Baptism to His Holy Cross and Passion in Jerusalem, so does He appear to them and reveal and give Himself to them in His Resurrection from the dead.  Not only for their own faith and life and salvation in Him, body and soul, but that He should also send them as ministers of His Word, that His fulfillment of the Old Testament should be written down and preached to all the nations, even to the ends of the earth and to the close of the age.  That you also, here and now, should hear and believe the Word of Christ Jesus, in order that, believing, you should have life in His Name.

As God the Father intended from before the foundation of the world, His Son, Christ Jesus, has perfectly fulfilled the Holy Scriptures by His becoming flesh, by the ministry of His preaching and miracles, by His Sacrifice upon the Cross, and by His bodily Resurrection from the dead on the third day.  This work of God in Christ is what the whole Bible is really all about.

So, too, by the preaching and teaching of the Holy Scriptures, by the Ministry of His Word and Sacrament — as also here and henceforth in the words and works of His servant, Pastor Gadbaw — Christ Himself is actively present within the life of His Church on earth, and He is powerful to save all those who hear and receive Him in the preaching of His Holy Gospel.

The Lord is merciful to all who call upon Him in truth, that is, by faith in His Word; for it is by His Word that you know His Name, that you know the Father and receive the Spirit in Christ Jesus, the incarnate Son, and that you fear, love, and trust in the Holy Trinity by divine grace and mercy.

And yet, for all of that, life within the world and in your own skin is a daily challenge.  It is a troubled world, challenging and difficult, chaotic and discouraging.  Everyone is dying, everything is perishing.  Suffering and sorrow, anger, hatred, and violence are pervasive on all sides.

The Cross looms large over a fallen and perishing world, and it cannot be understood rightly apart from the Word and Spirit of Christ Jesus.  But there are so many voices, so many words, and so many competing agendas, all of which threaten to drown out the preaching of His Gospel.

In the face of terrorist attacks on a daily basis and Christians being martyred all around the globe, the Lord’s Church appears to be powerless, subject to the capricious whims of this sinful world.  Certainly, there is open and growing hostility toward the Lord’s Word of Truth.

Even within the life of the Church, there are doubts and fears and difficult times.  You are tempted  to second guess or reject your pastors, to control them, or simply to ignore them; all because your sinful heart and mind refuse to recognize the Lord Jesus Christ in His Ministry of the Gospel.

Examine yourself.  Allow the Word of God to have its way with you.  And consider how it is with your heart and mind, with your spirit, soul, and body.  Are you at peace with God in your thoughts, words, and deeds?  Are you confident of His forgiveness and salvation?

Do you live as though the Cross and Resurrection of Christ made any difference in your life?  Do you lie down and go to sleep each night in the faith and comfort of the Cross?  And do you wake up each morning in the joy of the Resurrection?  Or do you drag yourself off to bed, exhausted by another day, with a mind full of worries and fear?  And do you get back out of bed to face another day with something more like grim determination than cheerful hope and expectation?

If you would know and love the Lord Jesus and abide with Him in Peace by faith in His mercy, then remain here in His City, in the midst of His Jerusalem, that is to say, within His Church on earth.  For here you are clothed by His Father with the Holy Spirit through His Word of the Gospel.

It is by the preaching of His Cross and Resurrection that He comforts you and lifts you up from your doubts and fears to hope and joy and gladness in Him.  That is the preaching of repentance for the forgiveness of all your sins in His Name, that you should believe and trust in Him, and live in Him by faith, with peace in your heart through the hope and promise of His Resurrection.

Such repentance, faith, and life with God are accomplished in your body and life by the preaching of the Cross and Resurrection, because it is by the Cross and Resurrection of Christ Jesus that He has accomplished everything for you.  His dying and rising are your repentance, faith, and life.

So, then, because the Lord your God loves you and does not want you to perish forever in the darkness of your sin, despair, and unbelief, He sends His servants to proclaim Christ Jesus to you.  And just so, Pastor Gadbaw is sent by the Lord to preach to you here at Trinity, to comfort and sustain you in the Word and faith of the Lord Jesus Christ.

You receive and embrace the Lord Jesus in this preaching, not by your own reason, wisdom, or strength, but only because the Lord in mercy opens your ears, your heart and mind, to understand the Scriptures.  And to understand the Scriptures is to understand Christ Jesus, crucified and risen from the dead.  For the whole Bible is the Book of Christ, and He is the One who opens that Book to you.  Not to make you smart, but to make you alive, and to make you His own.

The preaching of His Cross does crucify you.  It puts you to death and buries you with Him.  But at the same time, His Word of the Cross also removes all of your sins and raises you up with Him.

And Christ Jesus preaches this Word to you in flesh and blood like your own.  For He was not only crucified in the flesh, and not only did He shed His precious blood for you upon the Cross, but He is also risen from the dead forever in His own Body of flesh and blood.  He has known the curse of your sin and death, He has suffered your blood, sweat, and tears in His Body, that you might receive and know His Life and His Salvation in your own body of flesh and blood forevermore.

On your own, you are blind and lost and frightened.  Only Jesus can open your eyes to His Gospel of peace and forgiveness and eternal life.  First He must show you how real your sin is, and how desperate is your situation and your need for a Savior.  And then He must lead you to recognize Him as your Savior and to know the glory of His Cross as the fulfillment of the Holy Scriptures.

That is how He works to save you.  By His Word of the Gospel, proclaimed in His Name, your sins are freely and fully forgiven.  And by that Word of Holy Absolution, you are rescued from your fear of death, from your uncertainty and superstitions, and brought into the confidence of faith.  You are taught by His grace to trust and rely upon Him, and to receive all good things from Him.

He is here with you in His Church, and He addresses Himself to you.  He speaks from His great heart of love to your own heart and mind, to your body, soul, and spirit.  In the midst of your pain and confusion and difficulty, He’s here talking to you.  And by His Word to you, He removes your burdens; He grants to you the peace and hope that are found in His Resurrection from the dead.

From within His Church and Ministry on earth, His Cross and Resurrection are preached to all the nations — unto repentance and faith in His forgiveness of sins, unto life and salvation in His Name — until you are gathered to Him in glory in the Resurrection of all flesh on the Day of Judgment, when you shall be clothed with Power from on high, glorious in body and soul, like unto Christ.

His Word does and gives what it says, just as the Holy Scriptures of St. Moses, the Psalms, and the Prophets preached Christ in days of old and were perfectly fulfilled with His coming in the flesh.  The preaching of the apostolic witness of His Cross and Resurrection truly delivers the goods.

Just as Jesus was present in a bodily and personal way for His disciples, so is He present for you in the life of His Church, in the preaching and administration of His Holy Gospel.  That is what it’s all about.  Christianity is not a disembodied “spirituality,” or a superstitious “ghost story.”  It lives and abides in the flesh-and-blood real presence of the crucified and risen Jesus of Nazareth.

That is what it meant for the Twelve to be sent as witnesses of the Cross and Resurrection.  And that is what it means for Pastor Gadbaw to proclaim repentance and forgiveness of sins “in the Name of Jesus.”  For when the called and ordained servants of the Word of Christ thereby deal with you in His Name, in accordance with His divine command, it is your dear Lord Jesus Christ Himself who is thereby caring for you, granting you His Peace and His forgiveness of your sins.

And for you, Brother Gadbaw, as from and in your Baptism, in your vocation as a child of God, so also from your ordination to the Office of the Holy Ministry, and now in your Divine Call to Trinity, in your station as a servant of the Word of Christ Jesus, the Promise of the Father rests and remains upon you and accompanies you in all that He sends you to do and say in His Name.

It is not an easy work that you are given to do.  Humanly speaking it is often a thankless task, and you may not be able to see or perceive that you are doing any good or making any difference.

The preaching of repentance is not fun for the preacher or the hearer.  It crucifies and puts to death the sinful heart, mind, body, soul, and spirit.  But it accompanies and aims at the preaching and bestowal of the Gospel, the forgiveness of sins in the Name of stead of Christ Jesus.  And it is by that Word that all the people of God, pastors and laity alike, live and abide in Him by His grace.

The Word that you are called and sent to preach is the Word of Christ, crucified and risen from the dead.  It is for the nations, but it is proclaimed from within the Church, on earth as it is in heaven.  It is to and from the Church, the City of God, His true Jerusalem, that you preach — to and from the Font, to and from the Altar, the Breaking of the Bread, wherein the Lord Christ is with you.

And as the Lord has bestowed His Spirit upon Pastor Gadbaw, and as He continues to sustain him in the Office to which He has called and ordained him, so does He bestow the same Holy Spirit, the Promise of His Father, upon all of you through this Office and Ministry of His Holy Gospel.

He causes His Word to be preached to you here in this place, in this city, that you may know Him and receive Him in the Breaking of the Bread, and that you may know and love the Gifts Christ freely gives you by and with His Word.  So that, hearing and receiving, trusting and believing, you may abide in Him, and be purified in Him through His forgiveness, and raised up to newness of life in Him, both body and soul, in perfect health and strength, at peace with God forevermore.

Rejoice, therefore, give thanks, and sing.  Even from the waste places of Jerusalem, the City of the Cross — under duress; in the midst of destruction; assaulted by the devil, all his works and all his ways; tempted to despair — sing for joy and praise the Lord, confess and call upon His Name in the sure and certain hope and promise of the Resurrection, which is yours in Christ Jesus.  For the One who calls you is faithful, and He will surely continue to fulfill all that He has spoken and promised, to the praise of His glorious grace, for the life and salvation of His beloved children.

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