Pentecost 15 (Prop 21, Year A) [Matthew 21:23-32] (25-Sept-11)

This sermon was preached at Redeemer Evangelical Lutheran Church, Toowoomba, 9.30am.

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Text: (Mt 21:23-32)

A man had two sons. And he went to the first and said, “Son, go and work in the vineyard today.” And he answered, “I will not”, but afterwards he changed his mind and went. And he went to the other son and said the same. And he answered, “I go, sir,” but did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “the first.”

Prayer: Lord God, our heavenly Father, enlighten our darkness with the light of your Holy Spirit, so that I may preach well and we all may hear well, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

In the book of Genesis, chapter 41, the prisoner Joseph is called to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams: 2 dreams in fact – one about seven ugly cows swallowing up seven fat cows, and the other one about seven withered ears of wheat swallowing up seven good ears. And Pharaoh says to Joseph, “And I told it to the magicians, but there was none who could explain it to me.”

Then Joseph said to Pharaoh, “The dreams of Pharaoh are one; God has revealed to Pharaoh what he is about to do.” – He then goes on the interpret the dreams and then he says, “And the doubling of Pharaoh’s dreams means that the thing is fixed by God, and God will shortly bring it about.”

Listen to these words again: “The doubling of Pharaoh’s dream means that the thing is fixed by God, and God will shortly bring it about.”

Often God does things in twos. He tells you what you should not do, and he tells you what you should do. He shows you what is good, and he shows you what is bad.

In Hebrews 4, the word of God is compared to a “double edged sword.” It is a sword which works in two ways – one: to cut you to the heart, two: to save you from your enemies. One: to show you your sin and threaten you, two: to defeat sin, death and the devil. The word of God is a merciless blade which leaves no heart, no human flesh unscathed: but it pierces the side of your loving Saviour on the cross showing you water and blood flowing out and washing all over you.

Today, we see this living and active word of God working in the sacrament of Holy Baptism, as Sophia Fandrich and her old nature is killed and destroyed, and raised to new life with Jesus Christ, resurrected from the dead.

The word of God is living  and it is active, sharper than any two-edged sword.

So it’s no wonder that God shows us his will, reveals his will to us in twos, with two blades, two sharp edges.

Jesus often shows us two examples and cuts a dividing line between them. So we have a wise man with his house built on sand, we have a foolish man with his house built on a rock. And the rain came down, and the floods came up. You know the rest of the story. But you are either one or the other. You are either in column A or in column B. There is no half-foolish half-wise man with his house built on a rubber hovercraft. Jesus cuts you in half – either your house is on rock or it is on sand.

Or there’s the Pharisee and the tax collector praying in the temple. The Pharisee says, “I thank you, God, that I am not like that tax-collector over there.” The tax collector says, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” You are either one or the other. There’s no half-Pharisee or half-tax-collector in between.

Or what about Lazarus and the rich man? You are either one or the other. You are either feasting sumptuously every day dresses in fancy clothes, or you are having your sores licked by dogs. Which one’s it going to be? You will either be in the bosom of Abraham on one side of the chasm or you will be in agony on the other side.

If there is a man beaten half-dead in your path, you are either walking on one side of the road with the priest and Levite or you are bandaging the man and pouring out wine and oil with the Samaritan. There’s no half-way.

On the last day, there will be sheep on the right, goats on the left. There’s no halfway breed like the mule, the liger or the labradoodle. You’ll either be a sheep or a goat.

You see how Jesus always gives us two examples. He reveals his will in twos. He presents to us the law of God with all his strictness, weight and severity. But he also presents to us the gospel with all its sweetness, its refreshment, it’s delightfulness.

On the day of Easter, Jesus breathed on his apostles and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. As the Father has sent you, even so, I am sending you. If you forgive anyone’s sins, they are forgiven; if you withhold forgiveness, unforgiven they remain.”

There’s only two tasks that the apostles and all pastors of the church can do if they want to act with the power and authority of the Holy Spirit. Forgive sin or withhold it. The door of heaven is either opened for people or it is shut. The keys to the kingdom of heaven either open the lock or they bolt it shut.

If this is how pastors should operate in their preaching and pastoral care and in their ministry, if this is how the ministry of called and ordained servants of the word operate, it’s no wonder then that Jesus does the same, because he says, “As the Father sent me, even so I am sending you.”

So in our gospel reading today, a man has two sons. Not one, not three, not four: two.

So the question I ask on this beautiful Sunday morning in Toowoomba is: which one are you? Are you the first son or the second son? If we don’t ask that question, we’ve missed the point. Jesus sets before us two sons – # 1 son, and # 2 son. You are either the first one, or you are the second one.

Jesus is calling out to us in this parable, as in the Deuteronomy: “See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil… I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore, choose life, that you and your offspring may live.”

Two sons: one is a man of life, one is a man of death. Which one are you going to be?

We read: “A man had two sons. And he went to the first and said, “Son, go and work in the vineyard today.” And he answered, “I will not,” but afterwards he changed his mind and went. And he went to the other son and said the same. And he answered, “I go, sir,” but did not go. Which one of the two did the will of his father?”

We have to admit that both of these sons are a bit dodgy, to say the least. There’s nothing perfect about either of these two sons. And Jesus knows full well that none of us are perfect. We are all a bit crooked, all have our fair share of dodginess. We are all conceived and born in sin. Every thought, word and action of us, is tainted by this corruption, by constant disobedience.

Just a couple of words about this: Sin, and especially the teaching of original sin is something that we learn about only through the word of God. We can’t learn the depth of sin by looking at ourselves, or at a new-born child. Most parents don’t see this at all – at of course they don’t see it. They love their new-born children. They think they’re perfect. That’s what love is: “love holds no record of wrong.” But that love shouldn’t get in the way of the teaching of Scripture. The word of God still tells us that all have sinned, and fallen short of the glory of God. God said it, I believe it, that settles it.

So Jesus says: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.” And St Peter says: “Baptism now saves you.” God’s word said it, I believe it, that settles it.

Baptism is not our work though, but it is the work of God. It is his powerful creative work, where he sends a person the Holy Spirit, life and salvation and forgiveness, freely, because Christ died for that person and rose again for that person, that child, and gives all of this without any contribution at all on the part of the person being baptised.

Any contribution on our part would always be tainted and corrupted, like one the two sons in our reading today. It would always have a bad smell, it would always be a bit dodgy. Only Jesus is perfect. Only his sacrifice on the cross is perfect. That’s why he has to give everything to us through baptism and through the hearing of the word of God.

Which brings us back to the these two tainted sons in our reading. One says, “No, I won’t go”, but then he changes his mind. The second one says, “Yes, I will go”, and doesn’t.

This simple situation which Jesus puts before us can be applied on all sorts of different levels. And we can see the problem with these two men, we can see the sin in each one. The second son is particularly dangerous. The second one says, “yes” and then doesn’t do what his father says. We don’t have any choice about being a sinner: but what sort of sinner?

But the reason why Jesus tells this parable is because in the first part of our gospel reading today, the chief priests don’t recognise the authority of Jesus. They don’t see the divinity of God the Father radiating from his face, they don’t hear the voice of the one who created the heavens and the earth echo out from his mouth. This is the great sin: not to recognise the authority of Jesus. Most sins in the church have to do with not recognising the authority and the presence of Jesus – not recognising him present in the church, standing among his disciples behind closed doors, not recognising him in the sacraments, working salvation through holy Baptism, not recognising and discerning his body and blood truly and physically present in the Lord’s Supper – and also, not recognising the work of Jesus through his called and ordained shepherd, the pastor, whom he sends to congregations. When we sin against these things, we sin against the authority of Jesus. We don’t recognise the authority of Jesus where he has put in. We don’t see him standing right here in the midst of the church of God on earth, amongst the seven golden lampstands, with the seven stars in his hands.

In our reading today, the chief priests and the elders say: “By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?” Jesus answered them, “I will also ask you a question: the baptism of John, was it from heaven or from man?” They talk among themselves: “If we say “from heaven” he will say, “Why then did you not believe him?” But if we say, “from man” we are afraid of the crowd, for they all hold him to be a prophet.” So they answered Jesus, “We do not know.” And he said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

Listen to their answer: “We do not know.” They lie – of course, they know the answer, but they don’t want to accuse themselves, they don’t want to repent. They don’t want to cut themselves with God’s own sword. The words “we don’t know” deserve no place in the church. If God says something in the Scripture, the words “We don’t know” are simply not a satisfactory answer. Luther said that pastors should never ask for forgiveness after preaching a sermon, because you shouldn’t apologise to God for speaking his word! There is no altar to an unknown God in our churches, and the words “We don’t know” deserve no place in our pulpits. Jesus wants you to know – he wants you to recognise his authority – he wants the scales from your eyes to be peeled away, like with St Paul. Jesus says, “Ask and you will receive. Seek and you will find.” Shut your open mouth and your open mind on something solid. God kept the mystery of his will hidden for the ages, and now he has revealed it to us in Jesus Christ. He wants us to know his will. He wants to pour out on us all the gifts of the Holy Spirit. He wants our sins to be forgiven through Christ’s holy and precious blood.

When Jesus says to you, “Who do you say that I am?” it’s no good to say, “We don’t know.” Instead we need to look him in the face, kneel before him in his holy presence, and say, “I believe you are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

Which brings us back to the first son. He says, “No”, but then he changes his mind afterwards and goes.

After our parable today, Jesus says, “Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. And even when you saw it, you did not afterward change your minds and believe him.”

There is only one way to enter heaven and that is to join forces with tax-collectors and – yes! – prostitutes, and acknowledge that you were wrong when you said to your heavenly Father, “No, I will not go.”

All of us sin, you know. We all say to God, “No” and if we do the will of God and believe the gospel, it is only because God has won us back to him, and allowed the Holy Spirit to call us back and change our mind. Nobody recognises the authority and the divinity and the real presence of Christ at first – everyone changes their mind later on. Jesus gradually reveals to us his presence and his glory in the church bit by bit as we can take it, he shows us his Holy Spirit in the font, his body and blood on the altar, his judgments in the absolution of the pastor. Each week we are being lead more deeply into these realities, each week we are enabled to see heaven on earth more fully, until we die when we see everything we believed in by faith on earth.

That’s the cross of preaching too – because pastors preach week after week, and rarely see their work bear any fruit. That’s because we all say, “no” and change our minds later. Even now, I look back at sermons I heard ten years ago, and realise that the seeds that were sown all the way back then are now bearing fruit. Pray for your pastor to have patience. Preaching requires great patience and it requires a trust that the word we preach is good seed.

So as we come to the Lord’s table today, let’s recognise the authority of Jesus anew and afresh, and say “yes” to our Lord not with words only like the second son, but turn away from the “no”s of our past like the first son.

God is in his holy temple. He is here to forgive you. He is here to show you the death and resurrection of his Son. He is here to give you the gift of the Holy Spirit. He has come to build your house upon a rock. He has come to take you to Abraham’s bosom. He has come to open the kingdom of heaven for you and usher you in through the doors. That’s what the church is.

It’s not the time to say “We don’t know”, but it is the time of salvation, of certainty, of faith, of confidence. Now is the time that Jesus with authority does these things.

Amen.

Lord God, heavenly Father, protect us from saying to you, “Yes” with our mouth like the first son, though we refuse to believe in your promises. But shows us all those places where we have said, “no” and denied you, change our minds, and shower us with every gift of your Holy Spirit, especially the forgiveness of all our sins, through our Saviour and Redeemer, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Trinity 12: Audio Sermon (11-Sept-11)

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Trinity 12 [Mark 7:31-37] (11-Sept-11)

This sermon was preached at St Paul's Lutheran Church, Darnum (9am), Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Traralgon (10am, lay reading), Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yarram (2pm) and St John's Lutheran Church, Sale (4pm).

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Text: (Mark 7:31-37)

And looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened.”

Mëë cɛ nhial liɛc, cuɛ yiëë ŋɔk a di̱t, kä cuɛ wut jiök i̱, "Ɛ-pa-thä", mi lot ni ɣöö, "Lɛprɔ."

Prayer: Lord God, our heavenly Father, enlighten our darkness with the light of your Holy Spirit, so that I may preach well and we all may hear well, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

When it comes to talking about miraculous healings and miracles, we here in Australia are always somewhat baffled by these passages.

In our reading today, Jesus heals a deaf and dumb man. Here is a man who has a particular disability from birth, and Jesus heals him.

But what about today? It seems as though there are miracles happening in all sorts of corners of the world, like Africa, China, but not here. Or it seems as though there are miracles in other churches, like in the Catholic church or Pentecostal churches, but not in the Lutheran Church.

On one hand, Jesus says: “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.”

We see this happen in the New Testament. Jesus heals people simply by touching them, but in the book of Acts, chapter 5, Peter heals people simply by his shadow falling on them. A woman is healed by touching Jesus clothes, but in Acts, chapter 19, people are healed through handkerchiefs and aprons that Paul had touched. So we see these words come true: Greater works than these will he do.

But on the other hand, Jesus says: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.”

We see here that just because something happens that looks like a miracle of some sort, doesn’t necessarily mean that this is a sign of the working of the Holy Spirit.

We have to be very careful that we don’t just believe any overnight preacher that stops by, or any TV evangelist who wants money to go around healing people in a foreign country, or any crazy madman who says that if you don’t speak in tongues you are not a true Christian, or the reason why God hasn’t healed you from your sickness is because your faith isn’t strong enough.

Beware of this sort of stuff. But at the same time, what do you make of it all? Well, first of all, all the miracles of Peter and Paul came about to strengthen their preaching of the gospel. They were preaching to people the forgiveness of sins through the death of Jesus. If a person comes along specifically as a “faith-healer”, we should be very careful with them if that’s the only thing they are doing. Christianity is a whole package. Christianity includes the 10 commandments as a mirror for our life, the creed as the faith of our hearts, the Lord’s Prayer as the words of our lips, Holy Baptism as the means of salvation, the Office of the Ministry as the mouthpiece of God’s judgments, and the Body and Blood of Christ in the Lord’s Supper as our miraculous, heavenly food for body and soul. If someone is performing miracles, and at the same time is undermining one of these pillars of Christianity, then reject them. You know there’s something wrong if someone undermines your baptism, because baptism is God’s work, not yours. If someone says, “I don’t need the creed because I follow Jesus”, you know something’s wrong, because you can’t follow Jesus if you don’t believe what the creed says. The creed is the church’s answer throughout history of Jesus’ question to us: “Who do you say that I am?”

Anyway, I’m sure you get the message. As St John says in his first letter: “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.”

All these crazy groups want to do everything fast and quickly, because they don’t have a future. But the church of God on earth has a future, so sometimes we have to wait.

But our problem is this: Many people say, “If only I had a stronger faith, I would be healed from my disease.”

This can be a real problem talking like this. God doesn’t save us because of how strong our faith is, but because Jesus is strong to save us. When we say that we are saved by faith, it doesn’t mean that on the last day we all roll up to heaven and say to God, “Look at how strong my faith is.” Being saved by faith means that you turn God’s attention away from you as much as possible onto Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.

Most people who say, “I am strong in faith” are usually weak in faith because they put their trust in themselves rather than outside of themselves in Jesus.

Most people who say, “I am weak in faith” are usually strong in faith because they recognise their weakness, and helplessness, and sin.

If you think you are weak in faith, thank God for that, because it is the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus once said to a man: “All things are possible for one who believes.” And the man said: “I believe; help my unbelief.”

So don’t beat yourself up about your faith being strong or not strong. All the strength you need in faith won’t come from you, it only comes from Jesus and from his power over death.

But one more thing about this. In the western world, our great problem is this: It’s not that people do not have a faith in Jesus Christ as their only Saviour from sin, death and the power of the devil. In fact, I would say, that the trust in Jesus outside of ourselves is much stronger in Europe, Australia and America, then anywhere else in the world. And I would say further, that the Lutheran Church of all churches has really got this right. Salvation does not comes from inside of us, it is from outside of us. We only believe in the forgiveness of sins, not because we feel it, but because the word of God says so.

The problem is, though, that we don’t believe that God created the world. We’ve got the second part of the creed right. We all believe in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, and all of that.

But we don’t believe in the words: I believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.

In every pagan religion, a god is not really in charge of the universe, but is beneath it in some way. So in Ancient Rome, there were various gods and then various things happened to them, and who did they blame? Fickle fortune! Unhappy fate! The gods were not in charge of things, they simply had to put up with whatever was their lot. In Hinduism, it’s the same. There are all sorts of gods, but none of them are actually in charge of the way the world works. In Sudan, I think people used to worship various animal gods, but in the end, these gods would die, of course. A crocodile can be speared or shot. It’s not a god.

In the same way, many people think that Jesus Christ is subject to the laws of nature. People say Jesus is a great person, but the universe is more powerful than him. So we look at this miracle in our gospel reading, and we say, “It’s not true. If Jesus were alive today, and there were a few brainy scientists around, we could work out a “logical” explanation for it.” We look at the Virgin Birth of Jesus and we say, “It can’t have happened like that. Because nothing happens outside of the laws of nature.” We look at the resurrection of Jesus and we say, “Well, he didn’t actually rise from the dead.”

Or take the Lord’s Supper. There are many churches who make it their public confession of faith that it is not possible that Jesus can give us his body to eat and his blood to drink in the Lord’s Supper. People say, “It can’t happen. It must be symbolic.” Well, it’s not symbolic. Jesus says, “This is my body, this is my blood.” Jesus said it, I believe it: that settles it.

Or take Holy Baptism. Many people don’t believe that baptism does anything, even though St Peter says, “Baptism now saves you”, and St Paul says, “through baptism we were buried with Christ into death”, and that baptism is a washing “of the Holy Spirit”. It’s not symbolic. You are not saved by your works, or your own strength.

So we look at our reading today about Jesus healing the deaf and dumb man. Jesus is not a magic-man freak-show with a few tricks up his sleeve. Also, he’s not Buddha, or Genesh, or Krishna, or Hercules, or Jupiter, among many. But he is true man and true God, God of God, Light of Light, true God of true God. He is able to perform this miracle, because he is true God, who was there at the creation of the world, who then took human flesh from the Virgin Mary and became a man. And if you want healing from Jesus for anything, then ask him. If he heals you, good. If he doesn’t, well, know that he will heal you in the next life, and in the meantime take up the words of Ecclesiastes 3 and say, “For every time there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted.”

There’s no harm in asking, though. In fact, Jesus wants you to ask. “Ask and you will receive.” Remember though, that your suffering might bring greater glory to God and might bring more inspiration and strength to other people in the faith. Peter and Paul healed people, but they also got locked up in prison, they also fled for their lives, they also died cruel deaths. And nevertheless we say, “God has made everything beautiful in its time.”

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But what about this deaf and dumb man?

He is a perfect example of what it means to receive the faith. There was nothing in him that earned him Jesus’ help. Everything came outside of him from Jesus. He didn’t even know about Jesus – he couldn’t hear. He couldn’t even ask Jesus for help – he couldn’t speak.

Other people bring him to Jesus. Jesus puts his finger in his ears, and touches his tongue with spit. He sighs, he looks up to heaven. And Jesus speaks those words: “Be opened.” In Aramaic: “Ephphatha.”

That’s how faith works for us. I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him, but the Holy Spirit has called by the gospel.  Everything comes about because Jesus opens us up through his own words, and his own words create faith in us, faith in the creating work of God the Father, faith in the saving work of Jesus Christ his Son, and faith in the transforming work of the Holy Spirit.

When Jesus died on the cross for us, the heavens were opened for the whole world and now we can walk in. He says, “Be opened.”

And even now in the church, we hear those words applied to each one of us, “Be opened”. The doors of the kingdom of heaven are opened for us each time we hear the absolution, the forgiveness of sins. The preaching of the word opens us up to salvation through the power of the Gospel. He takes us who are deaf and dumb, and he gives us ears to hear and mouths to speak.

Jesus gets his finger and sticks the Holy Spirit in our ears. He looks up to heaven and sighs, and the Holy Spirit and all the gifts of heaven come down upon us in the waters of baptism. He opens up our mouths and sticks his body and blood on our tongue. Everything comes about because Jesus opens us up, and from nothing else.

So be opened. Ephphatha!

And we read: “They were astonished beyond measure, saying, “He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”

Amen.

Lord Jesus Christ, open our ears to hear your words, and send us the Holy Spirit. Heal our diseases, both of body and soul, and give us strength and peace. Amen. 

Funeral of Oskar and Helga Pildre [John 14:1] (9-Sept-11)

This sermon was preached at a graveside service at Moe Cemetery, 11am.

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Text: (John 14:1)

Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?

Prayer: Lord God, our heavenly Father, enlighten our darkness with the light of your Holy Spirit, so that I may preach well and we all may hear well, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

In the book of Genesis, the first book of the bible, we read the following words:

The Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

Most of the time if we were ever in a situation where two people were buried at the same time, even a husband and a wife, usually it would happen because of some sort of accident, like they were both in a car accident together, or something like that.

But for Oskar and Helga, it is a different situation. Oskar died on Thursday, and Helga died on Saturday. It reminds me of the love poetry in the bible, the Song of Songs, where the woman says to the man she loves: “Draw me after you; let us run.” And also when the woman says: “Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm, for love is strong as death, and jealousy is fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the Lord.”

And we might say, Why did it have to happen like this? If Oskar died, couldn’t we have held on to Helga a little longer?

Well, the reason for we don’t know. We don’t the answer to the question why. But we do know the answer to the question, “who”. The book of Job says: The Lord gives and the Lord takes away: Blessed be the name of the Lord.

And in Genesis again: Enoch walked with God, and he was not found, for God took him.

We don’t say that Oskar and Helga simply gave themselves up to death, but that God took them. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. And this message, that God took him, that God took Oskar and Helga, is a very significant thing, and it is a very comforting thing. It is a word that gives a lot of strength, not just mental strength or spiritual strength, but physical strength. Because when we come to look in a grave, we don’t say, “It’s bad luck”, “it’s bad fortune”, “it’s bad chance”, “it’s bad destiny”, or something like that. We say, “It’s the hand of God at work.” Not that God likes to see people die, and likes to see people suffer, and wants take our friends away and wants to see us lonely. In the prophet Ezekiel, God says: “I have no pleasure in the death of anyone.” – but we believe in the one true God who became a human person in the flesh of Jesus, a God who entered into our world through a virgin birth, and who says: “In my Father’s house are many rooms, and I am going to prepare a place for you.”

You see, death is not a sad time for a Christian. It is not the end. It’s sad for us who grieve – but why should we be sad when all the desires of the person who has died have reached their fulfilment? Why should we shed tears when we know that all of their tears are not only being dried up, but are being wiped away by the living God himself?

Jesus says: “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?”

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But I want to think back again to the creation of the woman which I read just before.

In every relationship and friendship, but especially in a marriage, God gives us as a gift to the other person. We read: And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.

He didn’t just stick them out there in the garden to wander around and find each other eventually, but God actually brought them together.

And then we read those great words: “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”

And with Oskar and Helga too, we can say that God actually brought them together. It wasn’t simply chance or fate, that a couple of Estonians who escaped their homeland and ended up on the other side of the world just found each other.

I actually came across a newspaper article online about Oskar and Helga from the Latrobe express, where Oskar describes this. He said: “I asked at the Heidelberg hospital if there were other Estonians working at the hospital and the man showed me the register and I picked an Estonian name out of the book and took a chance in contacting her. That’s how I met my wife, Helga.”

Can’t you hear the words there: “God brought the woman to the man.”

Then he says: “I took her to Luna Park that day and her friend’s parents let me stay that night in their bungalow. After that, we tried to meet as often as our jobs would allow and in August 1948 we got married.”

Can’t you hear the words there: “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”

You can hear that natural desire for them to pledge their loyalty to each other “until death us do part”, as it says in the old wedding vows.

But that brings us to something else. Because in the Christian religion, when a person is married, they aren’t married for eternity, but only for life. If one person dies in the marriage, the other person is free to marry someone else if they want to. Jesus says: “In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.”

That’s not to say that the angels are some kind of asexual beings with no enjoyment. Marriage is for this life only, but there simply is no need for it in eternity, in the next life, because the joy of marriage, the joy of companionship and sexuality and friendship as we know it here, is superceded by something better.

Here we might live in our homes, in the houses which our own hands have built, but in eternity, Jesus says: “In my Father’s house are many rooms, and I am going to prepare a place for you.” I am going to prepare something better than what you can imagine. I am going to prepare something, not with the bricks and with mortar. That sort of physical labour isn’t necessary for Jesus – he grew up as a carpenter and he knows how all that stuff works. Instead he labours under the sin of the world, takes it to a lonely cross and dies on Good Friday. And when he gave up his last breath and poured out his holy and precious blood upon the earth, we read that he said: “It is finished.” In other words: The house is finished. The place is prepared for you. The room in my father’s house is ready and waiting, furnished, warm, and comfortable.

We think that we enter that house when we die. But that’s not true. We enter that house when are baptised, we only see it with our own eyes when we die. When we are baptised, we enter the gates of heaven, because our sin is washed away with the blood of Jesus Christ himself. Baptism is not a washing with water, but it is a washing with the water and the Holy Spirit.

We sometimes look back at history and say, “Well, baptism once upon a time was the done thing.” But a culture should be respected that wants to bestow all the gifts of Christianity, of life and salvation on all its people. Nothing like that should be treated as insignificant. Holy baptism is God’s work, not ours. Baptised people do not belong to death, they belong to God. We should never forget that the church – not as an empty shell of an historical institution, but as the sanctuary of the living eternal God – is just as much a part of Estonian culture as its language, its traditions, and its food.

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But one last thing: It’s not uncommon that when there’s an elderly couple who have been married for well over half a century that when one of them dies that the other one follows reasonably quickly, sometimes within a year, or a few months. Here it’s particularly sad for us, because they have both died only within a couple of days of each other.

In Genesis we read: “This at last is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh…. Therefore a man will leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife and the two will become one flesh.”

It doesn’t say, This is at last is mind of my mind, or that the two will become one mind, or one soul. Each person is only responsible for their own mind and their own soul. But in marriage, we become one flesh. So it’s a natural thing, that if we lose our husband or wife to death, that there is something which doesn’t just stir us in our mind or in our thinking, but that something stirs us profoundly in our bodies, in our flesh. People say: “I feel like I lost a part of me.” And there can be a desire even to want to die too.

But nobody wants to die. Death is the great unknown for all us. Anyone who doesn’t fear death is a fool. But when someone dies that we love, it’s only natural that the desire for eternity is aroused in us. Because the desire to be with someone who has died is not the desire for death, but it is the desire for eternity. We read in the book of Ecclesiastes in the bible: “God has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into a person’s heart.”

Sometimes people say at the time of death, “He or she has gone to be with grandma”. Or something like that. That’s not the way a Christian talks. That might be the way a Buddhist talks, or someone who belongs to a religion that worships ancestors. Christians say: “He’s gone to be with Jesus.” And there’s a great difference here, because if we say the people are reunited simply by dying, it can only be a bit of poetry, or something nice and sentimental. Death is impersonal. It just takes one person after the other.

But if we say the person has gone to be with Jesus, then we know they are in the hands of something that is not just personal, but living, a living God who loves, and who gives. And out of love, he reunites our loved ones in heaven who have died in the faith, he awakens and resurrects each one and gives them back to each other in him, he brings them back together, he gives us to each other. But more importantly, God gives us to Jesus.

And then Jesus says: “This at last is flesh of my flesh and bone of my bones.”

Jesus rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven. And this awakens in us a desire to want to follow, a desire to say: “Draw me after you, my husband. Draw me after you, my Saviour. Let us run.”

We started today’s sermon at the beginning of the bible. It’s no wonder that at the end of the bible, the angel says to the church: “Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.”

Heaven itself is a marriage supper, a wedding reception. Lord Jesus Christ, draw me after you. Let us run.

Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms and I am going to prepare a place for you.

Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted. Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Trinity 11: Audio Sermon (4-Sept-11)

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Trinity 11 [Luke 18:9-14] (4-Sept-11)

This sermon was preached at St Paul's Lutheran Church, Darnum (9am), Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Traralgon (11am) and Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Bairnsdale (3pm).

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Text: (Luke 18:9-14)

But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, “God, be merciful a sinner!” I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

Kä cu thuul tho̱l-bo̱kä cuɔ̱ŋ a na̱n, a cäŋɛ ni nhial /kenɛ jɛ liɛc. Kä duundɛ ɣöö cuɛ cuɛ lɔcdɛ pa̱t wëë i̱, 'Kuoth, a lɔcdu kɔ̱c kɛ ɣä, ɛ ɣän gua̱n dueeri!' Ɣän la̱rä jɛ yɛ, ci wut ɛmɔ loc dhɔrɛ a cɛ cuɔ̱ɔ̱ŋ jek nhiam Kuɔth kä ram in dɔ̱diɛn. Kɛ kui̱ ɛmɔ ram mi kap rɔɔdɛ nhial ba jɛ luɔ̱ɔ̱c piny, kä ram mi loc rɔɔdɛ piny ba jɛ kap nhial.

Prayer: Lord God, our heavenly Father, enlighten our darkness with the light of your Holy Spirit, so that I may preach well and we all may hear well, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

In our gospel reading today, we have two prayers.

One goes like this: God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, I get tithes of all I get.

The other prayer goes like this: God, be merciful to me, a sinner!

The first prayer belongs to a Pharisee standing up straight.

The second prayer belongs to a tax collector, with his eyes cast down, and his hands beating his breast.

One prayer is wrong, the other prayer is right.

One prayer is bad, the other prayer is good.

One prayer God hates, the other prayer God loves.

So which is the good prayer? Which is the bad prayer?

Actually, we all know the answer to this question. We’ve all heard the story today, we know that the tax collector’s prayer is the good one. But why?

We all know the Pharisee’s prayer is the bad one – but why?

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First of all, we all understand that there is something wrong with the Pharisee’s prayer. We all recognise a mile away someone who thinks he’s better than someone else. Australians are good at recognising hypocrites.

The Pharisee says: “God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tithes of all that I get.”

At the end of the reading, Jesus says: everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

But what exactly is wrong with the prayer?

First of all, we hear the words: “God, I thank you.”

There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s good to thank God for things, isn’t it?

In fact, St Paul starts the letter to the Romans with the words: “First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you.” The book of Romans starts in the same way as this Pharisee’s prayer. And later on, Paul preaches the anger and judgment of God upon unbelievers as those people who don’t give thanks. He says: Although they knew God, they did not honour him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened.

So we can see from Romans that we should give thanks to God. The psalms tell us: “Give thanks to the Lord for he is good.” Isn’t this what the Pharisee is doing? Yes, he is. He’s thanking God and it’s a good thing to give thanks to God.

The Pharisee says: “God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.”

Is it a bad thing that he’s not an extortioner? Of course not! It’s a good thing! Good for him! We’re happy that he’s not an extortioner, we’re happy for him that he’s not unjust, or an adulterer. Good for him if he fasts twice a week – there’s nothing wrong with that. Good for him if he wants to give 10% of all his earnings – there’s nothing wrong with that.

But there’s one little thing that he says, “I thank you that I am not like that tax collector.” These are dangerous words. They are dangerous, because that Pharisee has forgotten something. Jesus says: the true worshippers will worship in spirit and in truth. The forgiveness of sins is applied to a person’s heart, and that is something that the human eye cannot see. We can’t hear the secret prayers and thoughts of people. Only God sees that. 1 Samuel 16 says: “Man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.”

“I thank you that I am not like that man, like that man over there. I can see everything that is worth seeing, I can judge everything about that man that is worth judging, and I thank you, God, that I am not like him.”

The dangerous thing is this: the tax collector says: God, be merciful to me, a sinner! And Jesus says: this man went down to his house justified.

He went down to his house with the blood of Jesus dripping off the cross and onto the top of his head. He went down to his house with the list of all his sins ripped up by God himself, burnt on the cross and given to him in a little urn to go and scatter across the water. The tax collector went down to his house with all the accusations of his conscience stilled, all of his worries brought to an end. The tax collector went down to his house with the devil locked up and on a chain, and nevertheless, the Pharisee says to God, “I thank you that I am not like him. I thank you that I am not pleasing to you. I thank you that I don’t need the forgiveness of sins. I thank you that I don’t need the blood of Jesus, that I don’t need absolution, that I don’t need Holy Baptism, that I don’t need the Lord’s Supper, because I can quite easily cope by myself, because I fast twice a week, and I give a tenth of all I have.”

I thank you God that I am not justified by faith alone.

Well, what do you make of the Pharisee’s prayer now?

But before we all run off and pray to God, “I thank you God that I am not like that Pharisee”, let’s have a look at the tax collector’s prayer:

We read: But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

You know, a lot of people can see why the Pharisee’s prayer is wrong, but they still don’t like the alternative. Sure, we can easily say that we’re not Pharisees, but do we really have to run around bowing and scraping?

Comedians throughout the centuries have ridiculed this sort of prayer.  People don’t generally like it. Many people complain, including many pastors and “theologians”, about the confession of sins in the divine service. “Why do we have to start on a miserable thought? Why do we have to come to church and beat ourselves up and sit around and feel sorry for ourselves?”

Modern psychology would tell you that sitting around, beating your breast and saying, “God, be merciful to me a sinner” is not good for your self-esteem.

But you see, here’s the catch: There’s no halfway prayer. You are either one of these people or the other. You are either the Pharisee or a tax collector. If you don’t want to be the Pharisee, then the only alternative that you’ve got is to be the tax collector. If you don’t want to be the tax collector, the only alternative you’ve got is to be the Pharisee. God doesn’t deal with fractions. You can’t be have saved or half damned. You’re either saved or your not. You’re either in or you’re out.

So what is it that the tax collector says that is so special? What is it that makes his prayer so good in the eyes of God?

He says: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

God, I have nothing, you have everything.

God, all I see is my sin, you have forgiveness.

God, I am messing up my life, you can fix it up.

God, I am a fool, you are wise.

God, I am a sinner, you are holy.

There is nothing that you can give God that can reconcile you to him. The only thing that is worth anything is the suffering and death of Jesus, and you are called to trust in him alone.

Isaiah says: “All my righteousness is like a filthy rag.” It’s a dirty tissue. A dirty nappy. It’s worth nothing. Nobody wants it. It goes in the bin. It’s a bit of filth.

Yes, you might think you are not an extortioner. You might not think you are an adulterer. Whatever! Who cares! On the last day, it won’t be worth the paper it’s written on. All your righteousness is like a filthy rag.

All your righteousness is given to you by God, but you throw it back in his face if you carry on like he didn’t give it to you.

But what about all my good work? – It’s corrupt.

But what about all the good things I do for people? – You do them for the wrong motives.

But what about all my church going? What about all my prayers? Aren’t they worth something? – Not if you think they’re worth more than the blood of Jesus. And if you want to make your peace with God with your piddly, cheap-shop, two-dollar righteousness, then go ahead. But you won’t go down to your house justified. Your prayer will be: “I thank you that I am not like that tax-collector, over there.”

Jesus on the other hand says, “If you want to learn to pray, then you should say, “I ask you, Jesus, I beg you, Jesus, make me like that tax collector over there.” Put away from me all my self-righteousness. Put away from me all my pride.

Say: God, be merciful to me, a sinner!

Even a prayer like this doesn’t earn you anything. The tax collector doesn’t waltz into the temple like he owns the place, says, “God be merciful to me a sinner”, and struts himself out as if he’s done his bit of religion for the week.

This man is a man who knows his sin. And when you know your sin, you have to know who’s going to forgive it. And God so loved the world that he gave his only Son so that whoever believes in him will not die but have eternal life.

We don’t earn our salvation before God by beating our breast. We don’t earn our salvation by saying these words or those words. We don’t earn our salvation by beating ourselves up and making sure that we feel as miserable as possible all of the time.

But St Paul says: “What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?”

It is a serious thing to walk into the presence of God. You don’t deserve to be in the presence of God. You don’t deserve to walk into heaven on the Last Day. You don’t even deserve to have your backside on the pew that you’re sitting on. You need to recognise that when you enter the presence of God.

But Jesus died for you. When you come into the presence of God, when you pray, you can do so, only because Jesus died for you. Jesus blood poured out of his nailed hands and feet, and you can be so certain, so sure, so confident in the power of that blood that you walk into the holy presence of God with all your sin, you can even show it to God who knows it already, and you can say: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” What else are you going to say? You’ve given him nothing that he doesn’t have already. He doesn’t need anything from you! But God has given you everything. He has given you your life. He has kept you and preserved you from every danger and all the harm that you could possibly think of. He has sent you his Son Jesus. He has baptised you. He has given you the Holy Spirit. He has forgiven you. He feeds you with the body and blood of Christ. And he promises to raise you up on the last day together with all believers.

We’re not talking about self-esteem here. We’re talking about real things! We’re talking about the fire of God’s own presence, his power, his majesty, which becomes a cool stream, a flowing river, it becomes a pasture next to still waters, not because you are so good to have put the fire out with your lack of extortion, or your fasting, or your tithing, but because Jesus came into the world to save sinners, including you. And when you know that one fact, that you are a sinner, then you need Jesus. And he is sitting at the right hand of God, enthroned in the church of God on earth, waiting for you, blessing you, praying for you, counting your tears, lifting up your head, drying your eyes, and filling you with his Holy Spirit.

So as we come into the presence of God today to pray and receive the holy supper, let your prayer be: “God, make sure that I am like that tax collector over there in every way.” “God be merciful to me a sinner.” Jesus was not ashamed to be like that tax collector. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under the Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried. And when Jesus comes to you, and sees all of us tax collectors and sinners sitting here, he says: “I want to be like those tax collectors over there.” And I want to forgive them, I want to breathe on them the Holy Spirit, and I want to love them.

Lamb of God, you take away the sin of the world, have mercy on us.

Amen.

God, be merciful to me, a sinner! Amen.