In this way God loved the world

Posted on June 8, 2022 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for the week of Pentecost

Isaiah 32:14-20  +  Acts 10:42-48  +  John 3:16-21

The readings you heard this evening are the historic readings for the day after Pentecost. It’s sort of the continuation of the theme of celebrating the Holy Spirit’s coming. As Isaiah prophesied in the first lesson, Israel would be a wasteland because of their unrighteousness, Until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, and the fruitful field is counted as a forest. Then Israel would prosper. In what sense? In the sense that, on the Day of Pentecost and in the decades following, Israel became a fruitful field of believers in Christ who were devoted to the true God, a fruitful field of genuine faith and sincere love.

Not everyone in Israel, of course. Many—most!—remained enemies of God, remained a desolate wasteland with regard to faith and love. But a good number of them—3,000 of them on the Day of Pentecost—received the Word of God and, with it, the gift of the Spirit from on high.

And not only Israel in the sense of the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but also including believing Gentiles, as we heard in the Second Lesson from the book of Acts. When Peter went to the house of Cornelius the Gentiles, he preached a clear message of Law and Gospel: Jesus commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that it is He who was ordained by God to be Judge of the living and the dead. To Him all the prophets witness that, through His name, whoever believes in Him will receive remission of sins. Yes, Christ will judge all people, even those who have already died, since He will raise all the dead on the Last Day. Who will escape condemnation? Who will not have to answer for all their sins? Whoever believes in Him. Really? “Whoever”? Jew or Gentile? Israelite by birth or non-Israelite? Yes! What sign do we have that Peter’s “whoever” really meant “whoever”? We have this sign: The Holy Spirit was poured out in a visible way on the Gentiles who believed, as they began to speak in other languages, just as the believing Jews in Jerusalem had on the Day of Pentecost when they received the gift of the Holy Spirit.

And that brings us to the third lesson this evening, the familiar words from John chapter 3. For God so loved the world… Whom did God love? “The world.” All people. All men. The love of God extends to everyone in the world.

But not as many people today understand “love.” It isn’t the love of attraction. It isn’t the love of really liking a person, loving who they are or what they do. It isn’t the love of always being nice to people. It isn’t the love that overlooks people’s character flaws and evil deeds and sins, and it certainly isn’t the love that celebrates people’s wickedness and people’s sins. Rather, it’s the love that deeply desires to rescue people from their wickedness and from the painful and eternal consequences of it. It’s the love of a Creator who pities His miserable creation, even though our misery is entirely our own fault. Still He loved the world.

How did He love the world, then? What did He do for the world in His love?

He “so” loved.” Not “so much,” but “in this way.” In this way God loved the world: He gave His only-begotten Son. Gave Him into our humanity, to be our Brother. Gave His life as a living sacrifice for us, and then gave His Son into death for us, for the world.

So that, what? Everyone goes to heaven? No. Everyone is spared from earthly tragedy and pain and suffering? No. So that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. God desires the world’s salvation. His purpose in sending His Son was the world’s salvation. All mankind. All people. That all people should believe in His Son and escape perishing, escape being condemned to everlasting death, be saved from eternal exile and suffering in hell. That was God’s purpose. That’s how He loved the world.

And He did more than give His Son. He also gave His Spirit to work through the preaching of this Gospel to persuade men and to empower men to believe it, to believe in Him. He gave His Spirit in the Means of Grace so that believers can be strengthened and preserved in faith. And He gave His Spirit in the Church so that believers might live as children of the day and children of the light and no longer walk in the darkness of sin and depravity and disobedience. What’s more, He continues to give His Spirit so that, as the Church continues to confess the Gospel in the world, still more of the world’s population might hear and believe and be saved.

Not all men will believe, and so not all men will be saved. Not all will be justified. Not all will escape condemnation. Most won’t, in fact. Why? Why won’t they come into the Light of Christ and His forgiveness and salvation? Why won’t they tolerate the Light that’s being shined through His Gospel? Because men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.

What a strong warning this is, not to be found among those who prefer to wallow in sin than to be cleansed with the blood of Jesus and to live a clean life, a life of love, true love, like the love of God who so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son. May Jesus’ words about the Father’s love keep you firmly grounded in the faith. May they inspire you to walk in the light, to stay in the light, to live as children of God. And may they also motivate you to tell anyone who will listen about the God who loved the world in this way. And when you do, there will be the Spirit of God doing His all-important work of persuading sinners to believe, and turning the desolate wasteland of this world into the fruitful field of His Holy Christian Church. Amen.

 

 

 

 

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God has made a home with us

Posted on June 5, 2022 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for Pentecost

Acts 2:1-13  +  John 14:23-31

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Today we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit into the world on the Day of Pentecost, as we heard in the Epistle reading. Not that He wasn’t already in the world before that; He’s been here all along. But He was given to the world in a special way on the Day of Pentecost. We’ll talk about that a little bit. Remember, it’s the Holy Spirit who is responsible for inspiring the writings of the prophets and of the apostles, so really, it’s the Holy Spirit teaching us today about the Holy Spirit in that account. But the Spirit of God also has much to teach us in today’s Gospel. So we’ll spend a good amount of our time there, too, where we’ll see that the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost is the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise to come and make a home with believers. With the coming of the Holy Spirit, God Himself has made a home with us.

Let’s consider the Gospel. Jesus begins with these words: If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. There’s so much packed into that little sentence! First, what is Jesus’ word? It’s everything he ever said to the apostles, His entire teaching. His entire teaching about man and the lost condition in which we’re all born. It’s His entire teaching about God—who He is, what His commandments are, what He declares to be right and wrong, how He hates and punishes sin, and how He sent His Son into the world to redeem fallen man and to reconcile us to Him through faith alone in Jesus the Christ.

Not that Jesus came up with any of that Himself, as if it originated with Him. The word which you hear is not mine, but the Father’s, who sent me. There we see a tiny glimpse into the workings of the Holy Trinity. God the Father is the Fount and Source of the words, of the teaching. What He speaks is…Jesus, who is the eternal Word who was in the beginning with God and who was (and is) God. When Jesus came into the world and spoke to the world, He spoke the words that came from the Father as the Source.

Of course, even before Jesus was born, the words that originated with the Father also came into the world. They came by the Holy Spirit, who spoke through the prophets, bringing the word of God into the world bit by bit, book by book, prophecy by prophecy, meaning that the entire Old Testament is also the word of Jesus and the word of the Father and, in yet another sense, the word of the Holy Spirit.

What does it mean to “keep His word”? It means to treasure it, to hold onto it, to believe it, and to put it into practice. In summary, it means faith in God as He reveals Himself in His Word, and love toward God and our neighbor as God has revealed in His Word what love is and what it looks like.

If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. Why would anyone love Jesus? This is the love of agape, of sincere devotion. Those who love Jesus love Him because He has told us the truth about God and about the way God has provided for sinners like you and me to be reconciled to Him: through faith in Christ Jesus, who demonstrated His own love for us in that He gave His life for us, the Just for the unjust, to bring us to God. If anyone loves Jesus, he will keep Jesus’ word. If anyone loves Jesus, He will read the Word of God. Hear the Word of God. Learn and meditate on the Word of God. He will know and believe in the true God. He will be devoted to God, to avoid what is sinful and wrong and to think and to do what is right in God’s sight. And, if he stumbles and falls, he will repent. That’s also part of “keeping Jesus’ word.”

Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. Sadly, that describes most people in the world today. They don’t love Jesus, and so they don’t keep His words. Or they love some made-up idea of Jesus instead of the one actually revealed in Holy Scripture, and then think they can keep a few of His words and ignore the rest. But it doesn’t work that way. You can’t know what Jesus says and intentionally do the opposite, refusing to repent, and still pretend to love Jesus.

But He has this beautiful promise for everyone who does love Him and keeps His word. And my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make a home with him. Imagine, God Himself making a home on earth, not just in some city somewhere, but with an individual. How is that possible? How is it done?

Well, in the Old Testament, God, who fills all things, whom even the highest heavens can’t contain, made His home, His dwelling place on earth, a temple in the city of Jerusalem. There God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—lived among men, made Himself accessible to men, in a symbolic way. But the temple was only a picture. Then Jesus came, the true Temple of God, and God made His dwelling place on earth in a man who literally made His home with Mary and Joseph, and then with His apostles, moving from place to place with them. Where Jesus was, there was the Father, and there, too, was the Spirit.

What about after Jesus’ ascended into heaven? That’s where Pentecost comes in. You know the story. Ten days after His ascension, the Lord Jesus poured out the Holy Spirit on His believers in Jerusalem. But the Holy Spirit is a spirit, invisible like the wind. At Jesus’ Baptism, He made Himself visible in the form of a dove. On the Day of Pentecost, He made His presence known in three external signs: (1) The sound of the loud, rushing wind—a sign that the powerful Spirit of God was among them. (2) The tongues of fire on the heads of the disciples—a sign that the Spirit now dwells with believers; a sign that the Spirit is passed along with the tongue, through the preaching of the Word of God; and a sign that He would use their tongues, their preaching, to kindle a fire on the earth, to spread the kingdom of Christ in the hearts of men. And (3) the sudden ability of the believers to speak the wonders of God in different languages—a sign that the Gospel was to be preached to all the peoples of the earth.

And after Peter preached to the people and exposed their sin, after they were cut to the heart by his Spirit-filled preaching, what was it he promised them? Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call. You see, the gift of the Holy Spirit wasn’t just for the Day of Pentecost. He would be dwelling on earth in and among believers, that is, within this worldwide Holy Christian Church, until Jesus Himself returns to bring us to His home. Until then, God has made a home with us by His Spirit.

That home is the Christian Church in general, as St. Paul writes to the Corinthians in chapter 3: Do you not know that you—that is, you plural, you as a group of Christians—are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? The Spirit works through Word and Sacraments to gather a Church on earth and to strengthen and govern it. But that home of the Spirit is also each individual believer, as he writes later in chapter 6: Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? God dwells in each believer by His Spirit, testifying with our spirit that we are children of God, teaching us about Jesus, urging us to keep trusting in Him, to bear the cross with patience, and spurring us on toward love and good works. It’s as Jesus promised, But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all the things I have said to you.

This is why Jesus could say what He did to His apostles: Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. How can we have peace in this world as long as the devil is the “ruler of this world,” as Jesus calls him? How can we have peace when sin is rampant, and when suffering and death surround us? How can we have peace when the devil, the world, and our own sinful flesh seek to destroy us day and night? Because, in the midst of all that, God Has made a home with us. He is present in His Church with the peace of the forgiveness of sins, proclaimed in the Word and applied by the water of Baptism and by the body and blood of Jesus given to us in the Sacrament of the Altar. And He is present by His Spirit in the heart of every believer to remind you continually that God is real, His Word is true, Jesus reigns at the Father’s right hand, and you belong to Him.

So let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. The world laughs at the peace Jesus gives, but you and I—we live by it. We thrive on it. And as you face the challenges and struggles of each day, take comfort in Jesus’ promise. Even in the darkest times, even on the loneliest of days, when friends are few and when allies become enemies, you are not alone. It’s as the Psalm says, Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence? If I ascend into heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell on the far side of the sea, even there Your hand will lead me, and Your right hand will hold me fast. If that was true in the Old Testament, it is much more so now, after the Day of Pentecost, when God’s Spirit dwells in and among believers, when God Himself has made a home with us. Amen.

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Meditations for midweek of the Sunday after Ascension

Posted on June 1, 2022 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Ezekiel 36:25-27  +  Romans 8:29-39  +  John 17:20-26

Ezekiel 36:25-27  Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.

Israel was wasting away in exile when Ezekiel wrote those words. Punished for their stubborn rebellion against the God who had made a covenant with them and who had patiently borne with them for a thousand years. But they were stripped of their homes, stripped of their belongings, stripped of the comforts they had known, because they kept hardening their hearts to the preaching of God’s prophets, kept refusing to repent, kept refusing to live righteously, according to God’s commandments, because they weren’t righteous people. They had abandoned the faith. It takes righteous people to lead lives that are truly righteous. But you only become a righteous person when God, by His Spirit, turns an unbelieving heart into a believing one, and He doesn’t do that while people are stubbornly resisting Him.

But God speaks a beautiful promise to these Jews in exile. A day of sprinkling. A day of cleansing. A day of return. It would much more than the return from exile in Babylon. It would be a return to faith, a conversion of many Israelites who had been lost, a new beginning from the Holy Spirit, who would melt away their stubbornness, their stony hearts, and give them hearts of flesh.

That happened on the Day of Pentecost, when Jews from many nations were gathered and heard Peter’s preaching and his call to repent and to be baptized. And there was the sprinkling with clean water. There was the forgiveness of sins. And there began the New Israel, gifted with the Holy Spirit to lead new lives of obedience.

You’ve been included in that New Israel, too, sprinkled with clean water and brought into Christ. But that’s not just an external sprinkling. It has to be a sprinkling of the heart. Be on the lookout for the idolatry that derailed Old Testament Israel. Be on guard against a dead or dying faith. And learn to walk each day, not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

Romans 8:29-39  For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: “For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.” Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Where do you seek certainty of your salvation? How do you know that you will escape condemnation? How do you know that God’s promises to Israel apply to you? Your call to believe the Gospel is evidence of God’s eternal plan to save you, the fact that the Gospel was sent to you and that you embraced it as the truth—that’s proof of predestination, as long as you continue in faith and keep living in daily contrition and repentance. If the eternal Father gave His Son for you, what won’t He give of all that you need? What do you have to fear? From anyone or anything? If Christ is at the right hand of God interceding for you, even as the Spirit Himself intercedes with groans that words can’t express, what can you lack? No sin can condemn you. No guilt can weigh you down. No enemy can touch you as long as you remain in Christ.

John 17:20-26  “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me. “Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father! The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. And I have declared to them Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them.”

What was it Paul said in the Epistle? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Of He makes intercession for us there. Because He already made intercession for us here, before He suffered, before He died. I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word. That’s you. That’s me. And how is it we came to believe? “Through their word,” Jesus says. As always, faith comes by hearing the word that is preached about Christ.

And what does He pray for in this particular great High Priestly prayer? That all believers may be one, with a oneness that resembles the oneness between God the Father and God the Son, in perfect love and devotion, perfect appreciation, perfect unity of purpose and of goals. This is what Jesus wants for His Christians, for us to be one—not one with different doctrines and beliefs, but one in the true prophetic and apostolic doctrine, one in the truth, one in the true faith, and one in love.

But all of that is only possible because of the Spirit of truth. And so we continue to pray, Lord, Jesus, send us Your Holy Spirit! And we look forward to Sunday when we will celebrate the outpouring of the Spirit into the world.

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Prepared to testify. Prepared to die.

Posted on May 29, 2022 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Exaudi – Sunday after the Ascension

1 Peter 4:7-11  +  John 15:26-16:4

This past Thursday we celebrated again Jesus’ Ascension and His sitting down at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. Our Lord, our Savior, our King, our Brother now rules over all things for the benefit of His Holy Christian Church. And one of the first and most important acts of King Jesus sitting on His throne was the sending of the Holy Spirit, which we’ll celebrate next Sunday on the day of Pentecost. But once again we turn back this morning to Maundy Thursday evening and the final instructions Jesus gave to His apostles, much of which centered around the coming of the Holy Spirit, “whom I will send to you from the Father.”

He calls the Holy Spirit by two names in this Gospel: The “Comforter” and the “Spirit of truth.” We’ve talked about the name “Comforter” before. Literally, He’s the “Encourager.” The One who comforts. The one who helps. The one who encourages Christians and urges them on toward faith and toward love. He’s called the Spirit of truth, because everything He reveals and teaches and testifies is true and trustworthy and dependable.

He will testify about Me, Jesus says. He’s referring, first of all, to the testimony the Spirit would give on the Day of Pentecost in the hearts and minds of the faithful. He would testify in their hearts about Jesus, confirming them in their faith in Christ Jesus, teaching them about Christ Jesus, helping them to know Him rightly and to follow Him steadfastly.

He’s also referring to the testimony the Spirit would give in the many miraculous signs He would perform among the believers, including that sign they would exhibit on the Day of Pentecost of speaking in foreign languages. That would be the Spirit’s testimony to the world that the apostles’ preaching was truly from God and not from man. It would be the Spirit’s testimony about Jesus that He was the Christ, as the apostles said, and that all should repent and believe in Him. It would also be the Spirit’s testimony that the Gentiles were included in God’s plan of salvation, as the infant Church wrestled with the issue of how the Gentiles fit it. Those who had doubts about the Gentiles had it confirmed to them by the Holy Spirit that the Gentiles were to be given equal status with the Jews in the Christian Church when the Spirit enabled the Gentile Cornelius and his household to speak in tongues after hearing Peter’s preaching.

And you also will testify, Jesus tells His apostles, because you have been with me from the beginning. Notice, Jesus isn’t talking to all Christians here. He’s talking to those apostles who were with Him from the beginning. It’s eyewitness testimony He’s expecting them to give, eyewitness testimony about Him, about all that Jesus said and did from His Baptism to His suffering, death, resurrection, and ascension. “This is who Jesus is. This is what He did. This is what He taught. And this is what it means.” That was to be their testimony.

That doesn’t mean they were to forget about the Old Testament. Far from it! They were to expound the Old Testament as Jesus Himself expounded it, as the true Word and teaching of God, as the true history of the world, and as the true history of the people of Israel, all of which was pointing to Him as the Savior of the world and as the great King who would reign forever.

In fact, the apostles were to start with the Jews, with the people of Israel, as they bore witness to Jesus and proclaimed to the Old Testament people of God that their Messiah had come. That Jesus was the Heir of the Old Testament and that He had fulfilled it. That Christ had instituted a New Testament in His blood, and that it was time to repent and believe in Him. The apostles had to be prepared to testify to all these things.

But how would it go for the apostles among the Jews?

They will put you out of the synagogues.

Imagine, having grown up your whole life faithfully attending the synagogue, hearing the Word of God pointing to the coming Christ, then finding the Christ, being sent by the Christ to preach to your brothers and sisters in the synagogue, and then being cast out of the synagogue. Excommunicated. We see it happening to the apostle Paul time and time again, from city to city, from synagogue to synagogue. This is what the apostles had to look forward to.

But it would get worse. Yes, the time is coming, when whoever kills you will think he is doing God a service. The Jews were, for the most part, sincere in their persecution of the apostles and of Christians in general. They really thought they were doing the right thing, thought they were serving God by arresting and executing Christians.

How could they do those things to God’s own chosen preachers? Jesus states it bluntly. These things they will do to you, because they have not known the Father, nor me. Knowledge of religion is worthless; sincerity in one’s religion is worthless; faith itself is worthless, if it is not placed in the true God, if it is not exercised in service of the true God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the One who is revealed both in the Old and in the New Testament. Sadly, tragically, the Jews who rejected Jesus as the Christ demonstrated that they never really knew God the Father, either, and the apostles had to be prepared to die at their hands.

Now, if that was true of the Jews, it would also be true of the Gentiles. We read in the book of Acts how the Gentiles, too, would seek to kill the preachers who preached Jesus as the only true God and who exposed their pagan idols as false gods.

So, again, imagine that you’re one of the apostles. And you’re being told ahead of time that the great mission on which you are being sent will end in your rejection and your death. How on earth did they ever agree to it?

They agreed to it, because they actually believed their own testimony. They were convinced that this Jesus whom they would preach in the world was the true God. What’s more, after seeing Him risen the dead, they were convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that, no matter how poorly they were treated in the world, Jesus would raise their dead bodies, too. And, of course, they were also persuaded that to deny Jesus before men, to fail to testify when called upon to testify, would be a terrible betrayal of their Lord, for which they would have to answer.

But there was yet another reason why they were prepared to die for their testimony. Because Jesus had promised that it wouldn’t all be in vain. They would be rejected by most, but not by all. Through their preaching and even through their martyrdom, the Lord Christ would gather a little flock to Himself, a little flock of believers who would be saved from eternal condemnation and who would join them, the apostles, at the great Supper of the Lamb.

Here you are today, Christians who have been baptized and have confessed Jesus as the Christ. You are the joy that was set before Jesus, making Him willing to endure the cross and its shame. You are what motivated the apostles to testify and to face rejection and death for their testimony.

Now the question confronts you and me. What am I prepared to do? What are you prepared to do?

Are you prepared to devote yourself to reading and studying the apostles’ testimony? Or will you be satisfied with a cursory knowledge of Scripture? Are you prepared to keep gathering around the Word and Sacrament of Christ, no matter what may try to get in the way? Are you prepared to confess Christ in your daily life with your words and with your actions? And if so, are you prepared to suffer for it, to lose friends for it, to lose money for it, to lose your life for it?

You must be. No servant is above His master. No student is above His teacher. If you would be disciples of Christ, then you, too, must be ready to confess Him and to die for your confession. And if you’re willing to die for it, then you’ll certainly also be willing to lose lesser things than your life for it, won’t you, to present your body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God?

You will be able to make the good confession and to present your life as a living sacrifice—or as a dead one—because you know that Jesus is the Son of God, because you know that Jesus became our Brother in order to die for our sins, because you know that He took up His life again and now reigns at the right hand of the Father. You will be prepared to confess Him and prepared to die for Him, because you know that He has conquered death, that He has overcome the world, and that your confession of Christ, in what you say and in what you do, is the very light that shines in the world through which the Lord Christ will build His Church and make His kingdom come. Amen.

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The King now sits on His throne

Posted on May 26, 2022 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for the Festival of the Ascension of Our Lord

Acts 1:1-11  +  Mark 16:14-20

Ascension Day couldn’t have come at a better time. It brings with it a much-needed sigh of relief. In the midst of this world’s chaos and violence and senseless killing of children, both in and out of the womb, we celebrate today the fact that a good and righteous King has gone up out of this world in order to reign over this world and to prepare a place for us, a King who reigns, not by ridding the world of evil in this age, but by controlling all things, both good and evil, so that it all must serve His purpose of building His Church and preserving His people so that we make it safely to the coming age. In the midst of this world’s death-spiral, St. Luke’s words in the Book of Acts still ring out today in churches around the world, The former account I made, O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus began both to do and to teach, until the day on which he was taken up.

 Did you hear what St. Luke said? “All that Jesus began to do and to teach until He was taken up.” Luke’s Gospel is the “former account” of that beginning. You know what Luke’s Gospel proclaims. How the God who made this world sent His Son into it, descended from Adam and Abraham and David, born in Bethlehem of the Virgin Mary. Why? For what purpose? To make it a nicer place to live? To set up an earthly kingdom where justice and decency prevail? Not at all. This world was doomed from the first sin of Adam and is destined for fire and destruction. The history of mankind is not one of evolution or progression upward toward a better and brighter world. On the contrary, the whole history of mankind is a history of violence and immorality, of regression and decay. Oh, there is a memory of righteousness inherent in our race, a conscience that speaks from within. You can sometimes see people striving for what is good and right. But in the end, sin and death are the defining qualities of mankind, not justice and righteousness and peace.

No, the things that Jesus began to do and to teach during His days on earth were not the establishment of an earthly kingdom. He came into this world to reveal God to us in person. The real God. Not a God who fixes man’s sin or ignores man’s sin. But a God who suffers for it Himself, who pays for it with His own blood, who makes atonement for it by His own death and offers sinners a refuge against the judgment and condemnation that their sins have earned for them. That refuge is Christ Jesus, Son of God and Son of Man, crucified, dead, buried, descended into hell, and risen again on the third day, now ascended into heaven and seated at the right hand of God. Faith in Christ and the blood He shed for us is what reconciles sinners to God, brings us back together with Him, places us in His good graces and guarantees us a future life in the coming age that is far better than this present one. That’s what St. Luke’s Gospel account was all about. It was the beginning of the account of Jesus’ doing and teaching, but only the beginning.

The whole earthly life of Jesus, which St. Luke chronicles for us in his Gospel, from His birth all the way up to His ascension, was just the beginning, what He began both to do and to teach. The ascended Lord Jesus continues both to do and to teach. The Book of the Acts of the Apostles is the record of the continued doing and teaching of Jesus after His ascension into heaven. It was Christ who sent out the apostles and has been sending out their successors ever since. It was Christ who first sent His Spirit on Pentecost and who worked through the preaching of His apostles to spread His word and to build up His Holy Church. As He promised His Apostles, “On this rock I will build My Church.” And as you heard Mark record at the end of his Gospel, they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them.

The ascended Lord Jesus continues both to do and teach. Only now He does and teaches from His throne at the right hand of God from where He reigns as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Everything that happens in the world, everything that happens in the Church is under the supervision and control of Him who loved us and gave Himself for us. Paul wrote this to the Ephesians, I pray that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. And He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all. The kingdom of God isn’t stagnant, isn’t dead, isn’t failing. It’s conquering the devil and the world, even now, with Christ as the King sitting on His throne.

But you don’t see that, not really. The reign of Christ at God’s right hand is a matter of faith, not sight. You don’t see how Christ is governing the affairs of this world or know the reasons behind what He does. You can’t see the Holy Spirit’s plans or predict when Christ will come back in glory on a cloud.

His disciples wanted to see, they wanted to know. “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” There’s so much they still didn’t understand. They wondered if, now that He had risen from the dead, Jesus might sit on an earthly throne in Jerusalem and reign over an earthly kingdom. They wondered if He might overthrow the Roman empire and make the nation of Israel independent and sovereign again, which shows they hadn’t been listening. Jesus had told them over and over, I am going away. I am going to the Father. My kingdom is not of this world. The kingdom of heaven is within you.

So He said to them, It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has established in His own authority. God has reserved for Himself the knowledge of when He will finally come and crush the kingdoms of this earth under His feet and remove His Church from this dying world. That time was not yet at the time of the apostles—they had much to do, and much to suffer first. And it has not yet come for us, either, though it’s much closer now than it was. God knows the work He still has to do with this world. That’s the very reason Christ ascended, to do that work for as long as it takes, according to the times and seasons known to the Father, until His whole Church is completely built and the world has had the opportunity to hear the Gospel.

For now, the ascended Lord Jesus continues both to do and to teach. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Here we are, at the end of the earth from where Jesus spoke those words, gathered together 2,000 years later in the name of Him whom we have not seen, and yet have believed, gathered together—preacher and hearers, baptized in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, hearing and honoring His Word, ready to receive His Sacrament of the New Testament, committed to living lives of love according to God’s commandments, committed to confessing the name of Christ Jesus in Las Cruces, in all Dona Ana county and New Mexico, and to the ends of the earth, as the ascended Lord Jesus gives us strength and opportunity. Where did we Christians come from? Where did our faith and our eagerness to confess it come from? It came from Christ Jesus, sitting at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, as He has continued to send forth His Spirit in Word and Sacrament, as He has continued to give pastors and teachers to His Holy Church, as He has seen to it that the Gospel has been preached and continues to be preached among us.

No matter what the world does around us, no matter how it rages against Christ and His Church and continues to degenerate, no matter how much lawlessness abounds and the love of many grows cold, Christ Jesus has ascended into heaven. The King now sits on His throne at the right hand of God, which is not far away from us, but very close to us, hidden, but real, where all things are being placed under His feet, where He continues both to do and teach through His Holy Spirit, in His Holy Church, preaching sin and grace, repentance and the forgiveness of sins until He comes again in glory to judge the living and the dead.

Rejoice in the crucified, risen, and ascended Lord Jesus, all you Christians! Turn to Him, all you ends of the earth, and be saved! Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved. Whoever does not believe will be condemned. Amen.

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