The New Creation in the Baptized Body of Christ

Here is the New Creation that God the Father makes by His Son and with His Holy Spirit.  It is in the Body of Christ Jesus, the incarnate Son; and the Life of the new heavens and new earth is in His holy and precious Blood.  For He has come in the flesh to receive and bear the Spirit on behalf of the children of men; in order to pour out the Spirit upon them, and to give them new birth as children of God.

This is what He has done for you, and given to you, by the washing of water with His Word in Holy Baptism.  In this way, by this means of His grace, He has manifested Himself to you, and made Himself known to you.

Otherwise, because of sin and death, you did not know Him; you would not and could not know Him.  Nor could you have found your way to Him or figured Him out.

But, see here, He has come to you.

From before the foundation of the world, He has known you in His love; and so has He come down from heaven to raise you up with Himself, to give you Life with His God and Father.

It is for such Life and Love that He conceived you in your mother’s womb and gave you birth; and for such Life and Love that He has recreated you and given you the new birth of Holy Baptism.

Before you ever called upon Him, and before you even knew to pray, or how to pray, He has answered your prayer and met your deepest need and longing with Himself.

He has done away with death by taking away the sins of the world.  As the Lamb of God, He has borne them in His Body to the Cross, and He has given Himself into death as the Sacrifice of Atonement.  He has poured out His Lifeblood, for you and for all, to redeem you from death, and to grant you His own divine Life by the Spirit.

It is for this purpose that He comes to St. John, to be baptized by him.  He enters the waters of the Jordan in His own Body of flesh and blood, conceived and born of St. Mary, in order to achieve and establish the salvation of the world.

On the one hand, He receives your sins, and the sins of the whole world, into His flesh; so that, by the shedding of His Blood, all those sins should be paid for, and death thereby undone, the devil defeated.  In this respect, He is baptized into your death; because He makes His Body mortal with your sins, in order to open the way for your mortal body to pass with Him through death and the grave into the Resurrection of the Body and the life everlasting.

Therefore, on the other hand, He receives the Spirit of His God and Father into His flesh; so that His own flesh and blood — bearing the Spirit to and from the Cross, and in His Resurrection from the dead — His own flesh and blood should become the first fruits of the New Creation.

In this, also, His divine Sonship from all eternity is realized in His humanity, so that He might become the firstborn of many brethren.

As pivotal as the Baptism of Jesus was for Him, for His Life and Ministry, and for His great work of Salvation, so pivotal is your Baptism for you.  In those waters of the font, your body of flesh and blood has been cleansed of all your sins and set free from death.  And at the same time, you have received the Spirit of Christ Jesus and the gracious adoption of His God and Father.

This now is your life, even in your flesh here on earth, and as it shall be in the resurrection of your body forever and ever.  For the flesh of Christ is your Anchor in the Paradise of the New Creation, your Stronghold in the new heavens and the new earth.  What He has already accomplished, once for all, by His Baptism into death, is fully yours by your Baptism into Him.

Therefore, your labors are not in vain, no matter what you may seem to be accomplishing (or not) in this fallen world.  Nor do you bear children for calamity — whether your infants live but a few days or to a ripe old age.  Because you and your children are the blessed offspring of the Lord.  It is no longer the legacy of sinful Adam, but the inheritance of Christ, the Second Adam, which belongs to you by His grace.

That is no fickle or arbitrary thing, but a sure and certain promise, a sure and certain hope, in His own crucified and risen Body.  As you are baptized into His death, so do you live in His rising.  And as the Spirit remains upon His Body, so does the Holy Spirit, the Author and Giver of Life, rest and remain upon you.  And so shall He raise you up at the last, even forevermore.

In the Body of Christ, God the Father has built a House that stands fast and shall not fall.  And you now live in that House.  So, too, the Body of Christ is the Father’s true Vine, in which His whole Vineyard lives and grows and prospers.  And from His Vine you drink the sweetest Wine of all, which is the holy and precious Blood of Christ, as of the Lamb unblemished and spotless.

So does the Lord your God rejoice over you with gladness in the midst of His Holy City, His true Jerusalem, in heaven and on earth.  For you are His beloved and well-pleasing child, and He shall permit no evil, nor any harm to befall you, in all His Holy Mountain.

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

I Baptize with Water that You May Know Christ

Concerning himself, John does not want to speak.  He is the voice who cries out about Christ the Lord.  So when he speaks, he would speak only of Him.

When pressed for an answer, John chiefly confesses who and what he is not.  In particular, he is adamantly not the Christ; nor is he worthy to assume that office and role.  For he is certainly not the Redeemer of Israel; nor would his whole body and life be adequate or able to redeem anyone from sin and death.  Rather, he too relies upon the Christ to whom he points with his preaching.

Nor is he Elijah.  Although, it is true that he comes in the spirit and the power of Elijah, as the Lord spoke by the Angel Gabriel, concerning St. John, at the annunciation of his conception and birth.

He will turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children, and the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God, by his preaching of repentance and forgiveness of sins in the One who comes after Him.  For that is St. John’s special office and role as the Forerunner, who goes before the face of the Lord to prepare His Way.

In this respect, though he is not that Prophet, like Moses, who would actually be the Word of the Lord in human flesh — for that Prophet is none other than Jesus the Christ — yet, St. John is something uniquely more than any other Prophet, because he ushers in that very Word-made-Flesh in person.

Although he is not the true Light, which, coming into the world, enlightens every man, St. John is a witness to the Light, so that, by his testimony, all might come to know and believe in the Light.

That is why he baptizes — in the wilderness on the far side of the Jordan — in order that you might know, through the waters of Baptism, the One whom you otherwise do not know.

This is the Way of the Lord that St. John prepares: namely, through the waters of the Jordan River, out of the wilderness, into the Land that God has promised.

The true Redeemer, Jesus the Christ, passes through those waters on His Way to the sacrifice of His Cross in Jerusalem.  And it is by His Cross that He accomplishes — for you and for all — the repentance that St. John preaches.  So it is, that, by His death, you are turned back to God in faith, and you are turned to one another in love.

For it is by His sacrificial death that your sins are atoned for — by the Blood of God Himself — and your iniquities are all forgiven (they are remembered no more); and God’s righteous wrath and anger are spent (upon His Son in your stead) and are thereby removed from you.

This Baptism with water now saves you by this forgiveness of the Cross of Christ.  And it is by this forgiveness of your sins that you know the Lord your God rightly, and you are reconciled to Him, and you are returned to Him: to God the Father, by the Spirit, through Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son.

It is in your Baptism that the Lord God makes His Name known to you; not as your adversary or an enemy, but as your own dear Father in Christ Jesus.  So that, now, you call upon the Name of the Lord your God, and you lay hold of Him by faith in His Word and promises.

And though you are not worthy of the least of all His grace and mercy toward you, yet, by virtue of your Baptism into Christ, you are fed from His hand here at His lavish Table.  And in this great Feast, the wilderness has become an oasis of peace, and this house a holy and beautiful Temple.

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

Always More Gifts in the Name of Jesus

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

In the holy Name of Jesus. Amen.

Your Loins Girded, Your Lamp Burning

Her name was Charlotte.  She was six years old; not much older than my Gerhardt or Stefan Horner, but she was all girl.  Like some other young ladies we know, she enjoyed Tae Kwon Do with her Dad, but she was into pink and pretty dresses.  Her brother, Guy, was three years older, but they attended the same elementary school, where her Mom was an active volunteer.

Charlotte’s Grandma & Grandpa, on her mother’s side, live in Minnesota, on the western outskirts of the Twin Cities, not far from where I worked and went to church between college and seminary, and not far from where I served my vicarage a few years after that.  Small world, isn’t it?

You may have seen pictures of Charlotte’s funeral procession, as her body was taken from Christ the King Lutheran Church to be laid to rest in the Newtown Village Cemetery.  It’s been in the news a bit.  She and her family were not members of Christ the King, but Charlotte attended the Sunday School there, and Pastor Morris has been caring for her family and conducted her funeral.

Charlotte’s parents, Joel and JoAnn, had no idea how little time they would have to care for their daughter, to give her what she needed most, and to teach her the most important things there are to learn in life.  I’m sure they were doing the best they could.  They were actively involved with their children in school and sports.  I don’t know why they weren’t members of the church; maybe they were in transition, or maybe they had let that slip in the busyness of so many other things.  But in the providence of God — maybe it was at Grandma Irene’s urging — they had taken Charlotte to the church, to learn of Christ her King, her Savior and her God.  In doing this, they gave her life.

Be sure of this, dear friends in Christ, if the Principal and PTA of Sandy Hook Elementary had known on what day, and at what hour, the gunman was coming, they would have had that school on lockdown before the tragedy could happen, in order to prevent it.  They would have saved lives.

But there is always more at stake than temporal life and mortal flesh and blood.  Six years is a tender age, but life on earth is not long, in any case: maybe sixty years, or barely more than 100 at most.  But this brief span in a fallen world is not yet the Life for which you (and all) are created.

As it was, the gunman, twenty-year-old Adam Lanza, took the lives of almost thirty children and adults, none of them very old.  But for each of those victims who were catechized in the Word of the Holy One of Israel, who were brought to faith by His Word and Spirit, death was but an end to their watching and waiting upon Him: It was a graduation to the neverending Day — to the new heavens and new earth where righteousness dwells, and where the Prince of Peace reigns in Glory — to the nearer presence of God in Christ, in order to behold Him face to face.  For the steadfast love of the Lord endures forever on those who fear Him, who are called to faith by His Gospel.

Blessed are those parents who teach their children the fear and faith of God, by caring for them with His Word.  There is no more significant task that any father or mother is given than that:

To bring their sons and daughters to the washing of water with the Word and Spirit of God in Holy Baptism, by which the Lord guards all their going out and coming in, henceforth and forevermore.  And to catechize their children in the Name of the Lord, with which they have been named.  To teach them the pattern and practice of repentance and forgiveness, both by exemplifying the use of Confession and Absolution with the pastor in the life of the Church, and by exercising mutual confession and forgiveness of sins in the life of the home and family.  And to bring their children to the pastor, also, for the Holy Communion, to be fed by the coming Lord at His Table.

Fathers and mothers, you do not know the day nor the hour when death may snatch your sons and daughters from your stewardship forever.  But in bringing them to Christ Jesus in His Church, and in giving Christ to them with His Word, you prepare them for the ongoing Feast in His Kingdom.

What, then, if you have no children?  Blessed are you, one and all, who watch and wait upon the Lord by giving careful attention to His Word and to His works, whereby you live, now and forever.  Blessed are you, when you remain awake and alert and alive, by His Holy Spirit, by His grace, even in the nighttime.  Not that you must never take your rest or get any sleep; for He does also give to His beloved sleep.  But how shall you, perhaps, stay up late to bring in the New Year on such a night as this, and yet not keep vigil to watch and wait upon the Lord your God?

You do not know how little time you may have; nor how long you may have to wait.  What if the loud and angry voices that you sometimes overhear at McDonalds, or even at the library, were to escalate into physical violence?  What if treacherous icy roads, or a fire in the night, were suddenly to wreck your car, destroy your home, or end your life on earth?  A tree might fall on you; for accidents do happen.  Deadly cancer might strike, irrespective of age.  Or, your mind might fail long before your body.  Number your days, therefore, and let each one count for what matters most.

Do you not hear the watchmen singing on the heights?  Christ has come!  And He is coming!  Be ready, then.  Have your loins girded, and keep your lamp burning.  Do not be caught unprepared.

If you were a father, a mother, a child, young or old, a brother or sister, in Egypt on that night of the Lord’s Passover, then you would know from the Prophet Moses that the Lord was coming at some hour after twilight: A terrible Thief in the night, He would come, to steal away the firstborn sons of Egypt, from the Pharaoh in his palace and from the captive in his cell.

But how many sons of Israel has Pharaoh already put to death?  And now shall the Lord Himself slay even more?  Not so!  For He has heard your cries.  He knows your sorrows.  And He has come to save you, to release you from the Egyptians.  He shall bring you through the waters into safety and freedom, and feed you generously with bread from heaven in the wilderness, and bring you at last into the Good Land He has sworn to give you, a land of creamy milk and sweetest honey.

What, then, shall you do, now, on this dark night in Egypt?  The Lord your God has told you.  He has given you His Word to guide you and guard you.  You shall take a male lamb, unblemished, from the sheep or from the goats, and you shall slay it in the evening, as the night falls.  If your household is too small for the lamb, then you shall join with your neighbor and his household.  And you shall anoint the doorposts and the lintel of the house with the blood of the lamb, and you shall roast its flesh and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.  Eat it with haste.  Your loins shall be girded as you eat, with staff in hand and sandals on your feet, ready to leave in a hurry.

You know the story.  The Lord is faithful, and He brings you out of Egypt with His mighty arm and outstretched hand.  No plague befalls you, for the blood of the lamb covers and protects you, and your whole household, in accordance with the Word that God, the Lord, has spoken to you.

Now, beloved, this is how you are to live, each day and every night of your life on this earth.  For the Thief is surely coming, at an hour you do not know.  Death is coming, yes:  Tonight, tomorrow, in the new year ahead, or at some point in the years to come, if the Lord shall grant such years to you and to this earth.  But the Lord Himself is coming like a Thief in the night.

You neither know the day nor the hour of His coming.  Yet, He has not left you clueless, without a Lamp to lighten your way.  He has given you His Scriptures and the preaching and teaching of His Word.  And there is, for you also, the Lamb who has been slain. His Blood anoints your lips and tongue, the doorposts and lintel of your body, and protects you from death.  And His Flesh is your Meat indeed, your true Passover Feast, which you eat with the unleavened bread.  You share this sacrificial Meal in the household and family of God, regardless of your own station in life, no matter the size of your own household.  And here you are kept safe, so that you may have Life.

Therefore, let your loins also be girded, and be ready to leave at any time.  Be dressed for work, and packed for travel at moment’s notice; like a woman ready for her labor and delivery to begin.

Not as though your watching and waiting upon the Lord were a waste of time.

But here now is the point and purpose of your time on earth, whether in Egypt or the wilderness:

Here and now you learn to live by the grace of God, by faith in His Word.  You learn to live each day in view of your Baptism, dying and rising with Christ.  You learn to live with Him, to follow Him through the water, and to be fed by Him in the wilderness, without complaining or grumbling.  And so you are taught to number your days, to know how short your life here is, and to apply your heart to wisdom; which is to fear the Lord your God, but also to love and trust in Him.  You are taught to repent of your sins, and to rest in His mercy and forgiveness.  You are taught to be alert to Him and to His coming; neither anxious nor afraid, but in quietness and peace.

In such repentance and faith, you also love and care for your neighbors, especially for those who are entrusted to your care: Your spouse and children, if you have them; your siblings and parents, your co-workers and customers, your neighbor next door, and your brothers and sisters in Christ.

If your own household is small, or if you are alone, you still share the Lamb with your neighbors.

You love and care for all of these others, as the Lord so enables you to do, in order that they too may be prepared for His coming; so that, when death and judgment come, they shall also be found ready and waiting in the faith of Christ Jesus.  Such love for your neighbor is a priceless service.

All the while, dear little child of God, you do already live: by the grace of your Father in heaven, through faith in His beloved Son — even while you are still watching and waiting upon Him in the power and peace of His Holy Spirit.

For the Lord is coming to you, here and now, and He is already with you: By and with His Name, with which He has named you as His own in Holy Baptism, and with which He still claims you and richly blesses you with His Glory in the Divine Service, in the Invocation and the Benediction.

He is your very present Help in every trouble; for with His Word and Holy Spirit He attends you.  And because you are His very own, and you are dear to Him, He watches over all your going out and coming in, even to the last: With His Holy Angels, whom He has given charge over you; and through the service of His watchmen, your pastors, who shepherd you with the staff of His Word.

By the preaching of His Gospel of forgiveness, He satisfies you in the morning with His steadfast love, and He gives you peace and rest in the night season; no matter what terrors may lurk outside.

And now, again, as day by day and week by week throughout the year, through summer and winter, seedtime and harvest, here and now He comes into His House; and though He is your Lord, He girds Himself to serve you.  He gently invites you to recline at His Table, and here He waits upon you in tender love and mercy: He washes you and feeds you.  And in doing this, He gives you Life.

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

Plan A, B, C, and D (all of the above)

Do your duties faithfully, as best you can

Repent of all your sins and failings
Confess your sins and be absolved

Receive the Gospel in preaching and the Sacrament

Call upon the Name of the Lord
Rejoice, give thanks, and sing

Spend time in the sunshine
Exercise your body and mind
Listen to good music

Sleep: Christ Jesus is Your Sabbath Rest

Remember your Baptism: God raised Jesus from the dead

Our Top Twelve Read-Aloud Favorites of 2012

For many years now, from when my Zach & Bean were small fries, one of my favorite pastimes has been reading aloud to my children.  Over the years, I've plowed through numerous books, with lots of highlights along the way.  My doctoral work slowed down the pace considerably, especially in the final years of dissertation writing. But Harry Potter came to the rescue even then, while also serving as something of a transition within our family: It was really the last series that I read aloud to DoRena and Zachary, and the first significant set of books that I read to Nicholai and Monica.  After that, it was a bit hit-and-miss for awhile, because it was frankly difficult to find anything worthy to follow the magic of Ms. Rowling.  Last year shook us out of our slump, and this Year of Our Lord 2012 has been a marvelous literary adventure for me and my five middle children listeners: Monica, Ariksander, Oly'anna, Justinian, and Frederick.

Especially as various other projects and pursuits have gone by the wayside for me, whether being finished up or given up, I've been able to read aloud to my children with regular consistency this year.  Unless I'm out of town for something or other, which happens on occasion, I generally read at least half an hour each day; and, sometimes, when we're closing in on the end of a good book or series, it might be as much as several hours. Many a family day has been spent largely in the pages of a story, in the company of beloved characters.  In my life on earth, there is hardly anything that I treasure more fondly than this time spent with my children.

So far this year, we've shared a total of forty-four books together, my middlings and me.  We'll probably devour another couple or three before the year is finally finished; although the observances of Christmas Tide will slow us down, naturally.  But the next thing on our list are the Chronicles of Prydain, by Lloyd Alexander  — one of my own childhood favorites, among the many that I enjoyed listening to my own Dad read aloud to me — and I'm quite certain that we won't be able to finish that whole series (five books in all) before the New Year.

Anyway, in typical Stuckwisch fashion, the six of us who read and listen together voted on our favorite reads of 2012, and tabulated the results this afternoon.  Because we like to share such things, and because others might discover worthy treasures to enjoy within their own family enclaves, I happily publish the following list of our Top Twelve Read-Aloud Favorites.  We've grouped sequels and series into single entries, rather than trying to segregate the individual titles; and in some cases, we are breathlessly awaiting subsequent volumes, yet to be published. Meanwhile, there are plenty of books in the world to occupy us.  It should be noted that most of the following books were not published in 2012, but were among those that I was privileged to read aloud in the course of the year.  I've exercised paternal privilege in unilaterally resolving the numerous ties that occurred, but each of the following received at least two votes (out of six possible).

Top Twelve Read-Aloud Favorites of 2012

1 - the Jimmy Coates series (six books and counting), by Joe Craig

2 - the Michael Vey series (two books so far), by Richard Paul Evans

3 - The Candy Shop War; and, Arcade Catastrophe, by Brandon Mull

4 - the Gregor series (five books), by Suzanne Collins

5 - the Percy Jackson series (five books), by Rick Riordan

6 - the Beyonders trilogy (two books so far), by Brandon Mull

7 - Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes, by Jonathan Auxier

8 - the Fablehaven series (five books), by Brandon Mull

9 - The King in the Window; and its sequel of sorts, The Steps Across the Water, by Adam Gopnik

10 - Savvy; and its sequel, Scumble, by Ingrid Law

11 - the Hunger Games trilogy, by Suzanne Collins

12 - the Ghosthunters series (four books), by Cornelia Funke

Astute readers will notice that our favorite authors of the year were Brandon Mull (nine books, three series) and Suzanne Collins (eight books, two series).  Bring 'em on, Brandon and Suzanne; we're hungry for more.

The Preaching and Baptism of Repentance

So, what does such baptizing with water indicate?

It is a baptism of repentance, which both requires and results in more than lip service or an outward show; although words and actions are certainly also a part of it.  Genuine repentance necessarily includes a confession of the truth and godly behavior, in accordance with the Word of the Lord.  But repentance begins and continues, far more deeply, with a decisive change of heart and mind.  It is a turning away from one way of life to another, a full conversion of self from the inside-out.

Repentance is both a death and a resurrection, and this is the very thing that such baptizing with water means and does.  It calls you and converts you to become altogether different than you have been: in your attitudes and commitments, and in your thoughts and feelings, and therefore also in your words and actions.

Truly to repent is to flee from the wrath to come, in the conviction that the one true God exists, that He is the Author and Creator of all things, including you, and that His Law is a serious matter, which means what it says and holds you accountable for what you have done, and for what you have not done.  Thus, repentance begins with the fear of the Lord.

God threatens to punish all who break His commandments.  Therefore, you should fear His wrath and not disobey Him.  The axe is laid at the root of the trees, and eternal fire awaits the ungodly, who do not live in faith and love.  For to flee from God’s wrath is not to flee from Him, as if you could ever escape from His judgment.  It is, rather, to live righteously according to His Word; and all the more so as the Day of His coming draws near.

He is the Lord, your King, who approaches.  And St. John the Baptist is sent to prepare the royal highway before Him, which shall be called a highway of holiness.  Thus, by his preaching and his baptism of repentance, he fills up the valleys and flattens the hills; he straightens up the crooked places and smooths out the rough spots.

Where, then, have you been lacking in your labors, whether out of laziness, arrogance, or despair?  And where have you exalted yourself, and puffed yourself up with pride?  Where have you turned to the right or to the left, distracted from your duties, or bounced around from one passion and pursuit to the next, as though you had no clear direction?  Where have you stumbled and fallen?

That is where St. John directs his preaching to you.  And that is where your Baptism would drown and destroy the old Adam in you, and put you to death, in order to make you alive and brand new.  That is where your fruitless tree ought to bear the fruits of repentance: Not only to claim sorrow and regret for past failures, but from the heart to change your behavior; to set your ears, and mind, and mouth upon the Word of God; to cease from doing evil, and to do what is good and right.

Would you receive the Christ who comes, and follow Him into His Kingdom, and live with Him in righteousness and purity forever?  Would you be a Christian, a child and heir of God?  Then live with both humility and confidence before Him, within your vocation and stations in life.  Fulfill your duties faithfully, and carry out your responsibilities with honesty and integrity.  Not for the sake of appearances, as a people-pleaser, but in the fear of the Lord, and in love for your neighbor.

That is what such baptizing with water indicates.  And that is how you flee from the wrath to come.

For now the Lord has begun to purify the sons of Levi, beginning with Zacharias and his son, the baptizer, St. John.  These righteous men, to whom the Word of the Lord has come, have been raised up in striking contrast to the reigning high priest, Caiaphas, and to his father-in-law, Annas, who was still pulling strings and calling shots behind the scenes.  Annas and his extended family were something of a religious mafia, as corrupt as Eli and his sons when Samuel was born.  It was not to Annas or Caiaphas, however, but to faithful Zacharias in the Temple, while he was offering the incense of Israel’s prayer, that the Archangel Gabriel was sent.  And it was St. John who was commissioned as the messenger of God, called and sent to prepare the people for the Lord.

By his preaching and baptism of repentance, St. John offers up the people as a priestly sacrifice to God, and as a righteous offering to the Lord.  He slays them with his words in the waters of the Jordan, and then pulls them back up out of the water and points them to the path of righteousness in Christ.  And by this repentance thus worked in them, by the washing of the water with the Word, the people offer up themselves and their lives to the Lord their God.  They each become a living sacrifice, entrusting themselves entirely to Him, and so living a new life, by faith in His Word.

Such repentance is exemplified, later in St. Luke’s Gospel, in the tax collector Zaccheus, when he restores what he has stolen and then gives half his money to the poor; and in the soldier who confesses that Jesus is the righteous Son of God, after witnessing His death upon the Cross.

You also are called to live a life that is pleasing to God, that is, according to His Word, in the place where He has stationed you: In the fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of repentance and of wisdom; and in the confidence of His faithfulness, His righteousness and steadfastness.

He is the Lord, He changes not.  From everlasting to everlasting, He is God.  His promises are true, and His covenant is certain.  Though you have wandered far and wide, and forsaken His Word, return to Him, for He returns to you.  He draws near for judgment, for justice and righteousness, in order to make all things right; in order to restore the people of His choosing as a priestly nation, in holiness and righteousness before Him, forever and ever.  That is what He comes to do for you.

But, honestly, who can endure His coming?  Who can stand in His judgment when He appears?  Who can survive His Advent?  For even on your best day, no matter how hard you try, there is yet more to be done, and there is still sin in your heart and life.  Outwardly, your words and actions do not fully measure up, but inwardly it is far worse.  You neither fear the Lord your God, nor do you love and trust in Him; not as you ought.  There are still valleys to be filled, hills to be flattened.

The holy and righteous Law of God leaves no one unscathed.  It does not accuse you falsely, nor does it demand from you more than is fair.  And yet, for all your effort, you cannot live up to it or make amends for all your wrongdoing.  Will you pay back four times over all that you have taken from your neighbor?  Will you give up all of your possessions, or even half of them, to the poor?  And would you thereby atone for all your sins and justify yourself before the Lord your God?

No, the axe still cuts you down; the fire still consumes you.  The Law is insatiable in its demands and prohibitions, in its condemnations and its punishments; until it is fulfilled in the righteousness of perfect faith and holy love.  But such righteousness and holiness are beyond your grasp.  They are not a work that you can do or achieve for yourself, but a work that only God can accomplish.  You do not perform it, but suffer it.  And only then, after it has killed you, do you begin to live it.

St. John is not a motivational speaker, nor a self-help guru, but a preacher of repentance.  It is true that he baptizes with water, but the Word that he preaches, being God’s Word, is a fire to be sure.

Yet, it is also the Gospel that St. John preaches to the people; although he does not fully realize or understand, at first, what his baptizing with water shall do.  He rightly preaches the Law, but to begin with he does not perceive that Christ Jesus will submit Himself to the righteous judgment of that very Law.  He preaches a baptism of repentance, and then he is confronted by the Christ who suffers that Baptism and repents for the sins of the world.  Which is how and why St. John’s baptism of repentance is for the forgiveness of sins.  And so it is that, afterwards, he will point to Christ Jesus and say: There’s the Lamb of God, the Sacrifice to end all sacrifice for sin, who makes Atonement for the world, who justifies and sanctifies all who believe and are baptized into Him.

He is mightier than John, not in threats and punishments, but in mercy and compassion for poor, miserable sinners.  He is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.  He forgives iniquities, trespasses, and sins.  That is the character of His heart, the essence of His Being, the perfection of His almighty power.  That is the sort of Lord He is: The true and only God, who is Life and Light and Love.  That is why you are not consumed, even though you deserve nothing but punishment.

Not as though the Lord overlooks sin or takes it lightly, but because He is mightier than you — in taking sin and death upon Himself, and suffering their worst, and establishing the righteousness of perfect faith and holy love in His own faithfulness, in His own flesh and blood, on your behalf.

St. John’s preaching and baptism prepare you for the coming of the Lord, because they make ready the way by which He comes to you.  That is to say, Christ Jesus comes by the way of repentance, which He thereby opens up for you and for all, by taking responsibility for the sins of the world, by making Himself accountable for every last one of them, and by suffering their consequences.

The Lord Jesus submits Himself to St. John’s Baptism, not to flee, but to bear the wrath to come.  He suffers the axe and the fire by His Cross and Passion.  He bears the tree of the Cross, and by it He bears the fruits of repentance — which are for you the fruits of righteousness and salvation.

This is the good work that your dear Lord Jesus Christ has already accomplished for you, which He has also begun to work in you by His preaching and His Baptism.  By the fruits of His Cross, and in His Resurrection from the dead, He brings you daily to repentance, and He purifies your heart and life by faith.  And just as surely as He is risen from the dead, and lives and reigns to all eternity, so shall He bring this good work of His to perfection in you, in body and soul, forever.

Not only does He daily and richly forgive you all your sins, by the fruits of His Cross — that is, by the preaching of His Gospel of forgiveness, by His spoken Word of Holy Absolution, by the remembrance of your Baptism, and by His Food and Drink of the Holy Communion — but so does He also bear good fruits in you, by the same means of grace, after the same kind as His own Tree.  For the Gospel bears the fruits of faith and love in the righteousness of Christ, your Savior.

He puts to death all that is sinful, unholy, and unrighteous in you, but then He also raises you up to newness of life in Himself.  This is the repentance of His own Cross and Resurrection, which He works in you by His Law and His Gospel.  In this way, and by these means, He removes the chaff from your life, from your thoughts, words, and actions, and He gathers you as finest wheat into His barn: into His Church, and into His Kingdom, now and forever.

He does it by His Word of the Cross, to and from your Baptism, day by day by day.  He crucifies you with that Word, as He puts you to death and buries you with Himself by those waters; so that you die to yourself, to your old attitudes, behavior, and commitments, and you rise up to live unto righteousness in Christ.  You follow Him through the waters into the way of faith and love.  And all the while, on the way, beloved, know this: You are blameless before God in Him.

Remember how Joshua, when he led the sons of Israel into the promised land through the waters of the Jordan, established a memorial of twelve stones, not only on the shore, but also in the midst of the water: In the very place where the sons of Levi had remained with the Ark of the Covenant until all the people had passed from the wilderness into the paradise flowing with milk and honey.

So has this priestly son, St. John the Baptist, stood with the Christ in the midst of the Jordan, to whom you have come, as to a living Stone — rejected by men, but choice and precious before God.  And you, also, are a living stone in Him, built into a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, in order to offer up sacrifices that are pleasing to God through Jesus Christ.

Such is the Word that is here preached to you:

From these stones, in the midst of these waters, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has raised you up as a beloved and well-pleasing child in Him.  He has dressed you with His own tunic, so that you are now fully clothed and covered in His righteousness and holiness.  And He who has the Food of everlasting life, now feeds you with the fruits of the Cross, the Body and Blood of the Lamb.  Therefore, in His flesh, you taste and see the Salvation of God.

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