Offer your sacrifices of Thanksgiving

Posted on November 26, 2025 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon


Service

To download this video, press here to go to the download page. You may need to scroll down to see the download button.

 Download Bulletin

Sermon for Thanksgiving Eve

Luke 10:38-42 + Hebrews 13:10-16

You’ve all probably celebrated Thanksgiving since you were little children. It’s a national holiday, not a church holiday, so Christians find themselves celebrating it right alongside their non-Christian fellow countrymen. We have a shared national history in our country (for those who still care to acknowledge it). We share similar customs and menus for our Thanksgiving Day feasts. But the most important part of Thanksgiving is celebrated only by Christians in this country. Unlike our non-Christian neighbors, we Christians include Thanksgiving among the sacrifices that we alone can offer to the true God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—sacrifices that are pleasing in God’s sight, because they are offered through and by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. As Peter wrote in his first epistle, As you come to the Lord Jesus, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Let’s take a moment this evening and consider what these sacrifices of Thanksgiving include, and what they don’t include, based on the Scripture Lessons you heard a moment ago.

We’ll start with what they don’t include. No Christian would dare to offer God a sacrifice for sins. As we heard in the Lesson from Hebrews this evening, Jesus suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood. We know very well that Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. It was His precious blood, shed on the cross, that made complete atonement for all sins. He is the One who sanctifies us and makes us holy through His own blood, not through any sacrifice we could offer. Nothing you or I could ever offer to God could make up for even one trespass, for a single offense against God. It’s impossible for us to atone for our own sins. It’s impossible for us to redeem ourselves. And it’s blasphemy against Christ if we should try. Jesus has already offered to God the only sacrifice for sin that was acceptable in His sight. So never try to do anything for God or to sacrifice anything to God in order to earn His favor or make up for your sins. That is not why we have come together on this Thanksgiving Eve.

But we have come together to offer another kind of sacrifice, a sacrifice of thanksgiving in the form of gladly hearing and learning what God has to say to us, and, of course, also believing it. That’s what we saw Mary doing in the Lesson from Luke 10, isn’t it? Mary, Martha, and Lazarus were brother and sisters, and Jesus visited their home in Bethany from time to time. Martha wanted to offer Jesus a nice meal and a tidy house, as a little sacrifice of her time, a way of giving thanks to Him for the salvation He had brought to their family. There was nothing wrong with that. But Mary offered a different sacrifice, and on this occasion, Jesus says it was a better one. Mary offered the simple sacrifice of sitting there by Jesus and eagerly listening to the things that Jesus wanted to teach. Yes, there are things we can do for Jesus to show our thanks to Him, as Martha was doing. But none of those things are needed for our salvation. The only thing needed for our salvation is to hear His Word by which the Holy Spirit creates and strengthens faith in our hearts. When we gladly hear His Word, we’re not really “giving” anything to God. Instead, we’re coming to Him with open ears and believing hearts in order to receive the good things He wants to give. That sacrifice of setting aside all the other things you could be doing in order to listen intently to the Word of God—that’s one of the things we’ve intentionally gathered here to do. First and foremost, to listen. You’re offering God that sacrifice right now.

But there’s more to the Christian’s sacrifices. The words you heard from Hebrews 13 mention two others. Therefore through Jesus let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name. Since God did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, since God has given You His Word and Sacraments and a church in which you can receive them, since God has given you your life, and all you need for it, and so many things in abundance, you come back to Him, regularly, with the sacrifice of praise on your lips.

Have you thought about Thanksgiving that way? As a sacrifice to God? You’ve been offering this sacrifice all throughout the service this evening, in every prayer you spoke in faith, in every hymn stanza, in every Psalm. You have been offering to God the fruit of your lips as a sacrifice to Him, a sacrifice of praise, an offering of Thanksgiving. Is that something you can do at home, alone and by yourself? Of course. And God accepts those sacrifices, too. But the combined sacrifices of Christians as they are gathered together, offering up their thanks to God the Father, through the Lord Jesus Christ, are a public testimony to God’s goodness. It’s an act of faith in which we all say together, before the world, I am not afraid to acknowledge the name of God, because He is good and His mercy endures forever.

There’s one more sacrifice Christians offer to God. As you heard in Hebrews 13, But do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. Anyone can “do good and share” in an external sense. Christians aren’t the only ones who try to share with the poor and needy and who do good things for their communities. But understand that when the unbeliever does these things, it isn’t a sacrifice to God—certainly not one that He accepts or looks upon with favor. Apart from Christ, God looks upon sinners with wrath and anger, no matter how much good they do or how many things they share. But for those who are in Christ Jesus, every good deed is a sacrifice that God accepts. Every act of sharing is an offering made to our Father in heaven, upon which He smiles and with which He is satisfied. Your kind words to one another, your friendly greetings, your willingness to help, your intercessory prayers, your expressions of thanks and appreciation and concern, your willingness to put up with things that may annoy you but that don’t really matter—all these things that you do for one another, or for your family at home, or for Christians in other parts of the world, or for your neighbor in general—are sacrifices offered upon the altar that is Christ, who alone makes these sacrifices of ours acceptable and pleasing in the Father’s sight.

So let this Thanksgiving be added to the rest of your holy sacrifices, as you continue to listen, to speak and to sing words of praise for our God, and to do good and share. Remember that you do these things, not to please yourself, but to please the God who has given you everything by grace and has sanctified you through faith in the blood of His Son. Let your thanksgiving always be intentional, and your praise ever sincere. Because God has been good to you and to us all. He is worthy of our thanks, and of all the sacrifices we bring. Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged | Comments Off on Offer your sacrifices of Thanksgiving

Will you prepare for the Lord’s coming?

Posted on November 23, 2025 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon


Service

To download this video, press here to go to the download page. You may need to scroll down to see the download button.

 Download Service Folder Download Bulletin

Sermon for the Last Sunday of the Church Year (Trinity 27)

1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 + Matthew 25:1-13

The end of all things is near. But the question is, how near? I don’t know. No one knows, except for God alone. It could come at any time. The more important question is, when the end does come and the Bridegroom, the Lord Jesus, enters the wedding hall of eternal life, will you be among those who go in with Him, or will you be shut out forever among those to whom He says those tragic words, “Truly I tell you, I do not know you”? Jesus Himself is not indifferent to how you answer that question. He has no desire to shut people out of eternal life. On the contrary, He earnestly pleads with all who have ears to hear to hear, to prepare, to think ahead about the things you will need and to bring them along with you throughout this life, so that, no matter how long the Bridegroom delays, you will be found among the ready.

The parable Jesus tells in order to drive home the importance of thinking ahead is very simple. Ten virgins, ten chaste young women are assigned a task: “Go out and wait for the bridegroom to arrive at the wedding hall. When his wedding procession comes near, go out and meet him, with your lamps brightly burning, and join the festive procession into the wedding hall. The bridegroom is coming sometime tonight, but he hasn’t said at what time. So be ready!”

They all go out to wait, excited to carry out their task. But five of the virgins are wise, while the other five are foolish. The wise ones take along a jar of oil, along with their lamps, in case the bridegroom delays. The foolish ones take no extra oil—only the oil that’s already in their lamps. They wait, and wait, but he still doesn’t come, so they all drift off to sleep. Suddenly, the cry rings out in the middle of the night, Look! The bridegroom is coming! Go out to meet him! The girls wake up and trim their lamps. The wise are ready, but the foolish are not, and it’s too late, at this point, to do anything about it. The wise join the procession and enter the wedding hall with the bridegroom, and then the doors are shut. When the foolish virgins finally arrive, they are denied entry. I do not know you, the bridegroom says.

The meaning is simple. Jesus, the Bridegroom who came the first time to suffer, to give Himself for the Church, that He might sanctify her and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that is, in Holy Baptism, is going to return at the end of time (once all the elect are baptized into his Church) to bring an end to this world and to bring His Church with Him into the new heavens and the new earth, the home of eternal righteousness, and joy, and peace. He’s told His people to be ready when He comes, with faith burning brightly, a living faith, a working faith, and He’s given us all the opportunities we need to have that brightly burning faith when He comes. He has warned us to be ready for a long wait. And He has also told us ahead of time that many Christians will not be ready when He comes, because they failed to take His warning to heart.

So the question before each one of you today is, will you take His warning to heart? If you’re determined to do that, then consider what you will need to be doing. Consider what wisdom looks like, how to be wise like the five wise virgins in the parable and not foolish like the other five.

When the trumpet sounds suddenly on the day of Jesus’ return, heralding His arrival, you will be surprised. Everyone will, because He will come unexpectedly, like a thief. But surprised doesn’t have to mean unprepared. Being prepared means being found with a penitent heart, a believing heart that is sorry for sins committed against God and clinging to Jesus alone for mercy and for salvation, a heart that is devoted to keeping God’s commandments. In other words, you will need to have a living faith. Not the faith you once had as a child, or that you once had years ago, but then wandered away from it. Not the faith that simply remembers who Jesus is but that no longer clings to Him for dear life. Not the faith of head-knowledge only, but of knowledge combined with confidence and trust in God’s goodness, mercy, and promise of forgiveness for Jesus’ sake.

How does a Christian prepare to have that kind of faith, not only now, in this moment, but in a week, in a month, or a year, or 70 years in the future? How do we live in a state of preparedness? Some people like to prepare for a future crisis with an emergency food supply, not unlike having extra oil on hand for an oil lamp. Emergency food storage is not a bad analogy, except that food storage is for a possible crisis, whereas what Christians are preparing for is a future certainty, even though we don’t know how far in the future it will be.

So how does one do “faith prep”? How do you bring along extra oil for the extended wait? You start by taking Jesus seriously when He talks about His second coming and when He urges you to prepare for it. That seems like a no-brainer, but, as the parable of the Ten Virgins reveals, many who initially go out to wait for the Bridegroom won’t take that extra oil along.

But, having determined to take it along with you, you do that by using the opportunities God gives you now, and for as long as He gives you such opportunities. Which opportunities?

Well, let’s start with the opportunities to read your Bible, the very Word of God that sits in every home and on every electronic device. Judge for yourself how often you have made use of those opportunities. If you have made good use of them, don’t stop. And if you find that you haven’t used them very faithfully, do better. There’s still time!

We can talk about the opportunities to not only read but to study God’s Word, even to commit some of it to memory. It’s why we have Bible class in addition to our weekly services. Judge for yourself how often you have made use of those opportunities. If you have made good use of them, don’t stop. And if you find that you haven’t used them very faithfully, do better. There’s still time!

We can talk about the opportunities to hear the preaching of God’s Word and to receive His Sacraments from the ministers who have been sent by God for the very purpose of keeping His people prepared for His coming. Are you not yet baptized? Don’t wait! Are you baptized? Remember it every day and think about what it means. Are you able to receive the Lord’s Supper on a regular basis? Receive it! Or, if you’re not able to receive it very often, being far away from your church, that’s okay, but as soon as you do have the opportunity, be eager to receive it, and, in the meantime, be sure to look for ways to use the ministry of God’s Word in whatever ways are available to you and your family. Are you planning a career, or a career move, or a physical move, or a family? Don’t let God’s Word and Sacraments become an afterthought.

Finally, let’s talk about the opportunities you have to pray—something we can all do throughout the day, every day. But do we? If not, let us all determine to do better—to do all these things better in the coming Church Year. That’s the wise thing to do. Prepare for Christ’s coming by making the most of every one of these opportunities. Prepare today. And when today turns over to tomorrow and tomorrow becomes today, prepare today again. And be assured that God is not leaving this all up to you. He knows what opportunities each person needs, and He knows well how to provide them. He has made you children of the light and children of the day and has given us all we need to be prepared for the day of His coming. And so, Paul urges us, Since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet, the hope of salvation. For God has not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, in order that, whether we are awake or asleep, we should live together with him. Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged , | Comments Off on Will you prepare for the Lord’s coming?

Enter God’s rest by believing His Word

Posted on November 19, 2025 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon


Service

To download this video, press here to go to the download page. You may need to scroll down to see the download button.

 Download Bulletin

Sermon for the week of Trinity 26

Hebrews 4:9-13

Come, you blessed ones of My Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Don’t you long to hear those words from the King when He descends from heaven on the last day, with all the angels and saints accompanying Him? You heard a few descriptions of that inheritance on Sunday, from Peter’s first epistle: Incorruptible, undefiled, unfading. In this evening’s Lesson from Hebrews chapter 4, you heard another description of it: So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. “A Sabbath rest.” John speaks of it in similar terms in the book of Revelation: Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, “Write: ‘Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.’ ” “Yes,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them.”

To understand why the writer to the Hebrews speaks of it as a Sabbath rest, we need to go back a few verses, back into chapter 3, actually, where he quoted a Psalm in which God said about Israel: Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years. Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart; they have not known my ways.’ As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’ ” God rested from all His work of creation on the seventh day of creation week. But when He commanded Israel to rest on the Sabbath Day, it wasn’t only in memory of God’s rest during that week. It was also in anticipation of another rest, a future rest for the people of God, a rest from all the toil and labor of this sin-tainted earth, a rest from being constantly attacked by the devil and constantly buffeted by temptation, a rest from suffering, a rest from loss, and from every heavy burden we carry. It’s the rest that awaits the people of God after this life on earth is through.

But many in Israel failed to enter that rest. Why? Because of their disobedience to the Word of God, which was the result of the unbelief. Oh, they believed God was real. They even knew who the true God was. But they didn’t trust in His goodness, or in His promise to give them eternal life. They wanted a better earthly life, and so they rebelled against Him throughout the Old Testament period. And then, when Jesus came to them, calling out, “Come to Me, you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest”…they remained in their unbelief. And so those people didn’t receive Jesus’ rest during this life. Their souls didn’t receive His rest when they died. And they won’t enter into His rest after the Last Day, either.

And so the writer to the Hebrews pleads with Christians, Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. Strive to enter that rest! How do we enter it? It isn’t automatic. Israel had the promise, but then fell. And as long as we’re still in this world, we, too, could fall by the same sort of disobedience. Notice, there’s no such thing as “once saved, always saved” in Scripture. The writer to the Hebrews warns Christians that we could fall, if we follow unbelieving Israel’s example. But the good news is, we don’t have to follow it! Here we have God the Holy Spirit, through these inspired words, urging us toward that rest, which God wants us to enter and offers to us for free. And so He urges us to enter it, by hearing and believing the Word of God.

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Living. Active. Sharp. Piercing. The Word of God cuts through all the defenses, all the excuses, all the false motives, all the lies. It exposes the sins in our past, so that no one can hide anything from God. No creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

But the word of God does more than expose our sins. It also reveals where there is repentance, and where there is faith in the Lord Jesus who died for our sins. It’s living and active, and able to work repentance and faith in our hearts. It’s living and active, and able to guide us away from sin and temptation and disobedience, able to show us the disobedience of Israel and other unbelievers in the past, so that we don’t repeat their foolish errors, able to set God’s eternal rest before our eyes and cause us to yearn for it, and, finally, to enter it. For we who have believed do enter that rest, it says.

Keep hearing. Keep believing. And keep working and toiling and suffering with patience for a little while longer. Because rest is coming for all those who remain faithful until the end. Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged | Comments Off on Enter God’s rest by believing His Word

The King is watching how His brothers are treated

Posted on November 16, 2025 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon


Service

To download this video, press here to go to the download page. You may need to scroll down to see the download button.

 Download Service Folder Download Bulletin

Sermon for Trinity 26 / Second-to-Last Sunday

2 Thessalonians 1:3-10 + Matthew 25:31-46

Picture Jesus, sitting on the Mt. of Olives, just two nights before His betrayal by one of the twelve men sitting there with Him. He has a lot to teach them in so very little time. He looks past His suffering, death, resurrection, and ascension, all the way through the New Testament period to the day on which He would return. Those men sitting there would not be alive on earth then. But He knows that these apostles of His will pass on these words in their teaching, and that one of them, Matthew, will write them down for the generations of Christians who will live during that in-between time. Last week’s Gospel talked about the tribulation leading up to the Lord’s return, and it left us with Jesus returning and gathering all people to Himself when He appears. Today’s Gospel talks about what comes next.

We call it the day of judgment. But there will be no trial in which the judge hears arguments from both sides, or interrogates the defendants. Judgment, in the context of the Last Day, will simply be the separation of the righteous from the unrighteous, whom God will have already identified before He comes, because the verdict is established during each person’s own lifetime.

When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then he will sit upon his glorious throne. And all nations will be gathered before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will set the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. In just a few days from then, the Son of Man would appear in great shame, with not a single holy angel coming to His aid, by His own choice. Because Christ came the first time, not to judge, not to condemn, not to escape suffering, but to suffer the condemnation we all deserve because of our sins, so that, during this New Testament period, we might hear the Gospel, repent and believe in Christ, and so be saved from the judgment at Christ’s second coming. Because, when He comes again, the time for repentance, the chance to escape, will be gone. There will be no bargaining with God at that time, no defending ourselves, no making excuses. For those who will have died already before the Last Judgment begins, the state of their soul at their death locked in their verdict. For those who are still alive when Christ comes, the state of their soul at that time will be final. All the dead will be raised, all bodies and souls will be reunited. And our position, among the sheep or among the goats, will be revealed to everyone. We will all be found on that day either among the penitent believers in Christ on the right, or among the impenitent unbelievers on the left.

Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you blessed ones of my Father! Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave me food; I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in; naked, and you clothed me; I was sick, and you visited me; I was in prison, and you came to me.

There’s so much here that isn’t stated, like, how these people came to be blessed in the first place. The King mentions just a handful of their good works, because that’s the thing Jesus wants to focus on here, as we’ll see in a moment. But He doesn’t mention their sins, of which they were all guilty in this life. He doesn’t mention His own sacrifice on the cross which was the payment for their sins. He doesn’t mention the work of His Holy Spirit in calling them to repentance and faith in Him, their dear Savior, or their washing in Holy Baptism for the forgiveness of sins. That’s how they became blessed. That’s how they became children of the heavenly Father and brothers of the Lord Jesus, not by a single work they did, but through faith alone in the Lord Jesus, who earned heaven for them. That’s also what then produced in them the ability and the eagerness to do those simple acts of kindness for Jesus.

“When did we do any of these things for You, King Jesus?” they’ll ask. “When did we see You in any of these times of need?” Truly, I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’ We have to pay attention to the words Jesus uses here. “These brothers of Mine” is not a reference to all people. Jesus is not talking about feeding the poor in general, or about inviting total strangers into your house, or foreigners into your country, or visiting random people in the hospitals or in the jails. Jesus is talking about simple acts of kindness done toward His brothers. And “brothers” is the word most commonly used in the New Testament for Christians, for those who have been adopted as children into God the Father’s family through faith in Christ Jesus, who is God’s true Son by nature and by right, making Him our human and divine Brother.

So what Jesus is emphasizing in this Gospel is that the King is always watching. The King is keeping track of how people treat each and every one of His little brothers (and sisters), His blood-bought Christians, in this time in between His first coming and His second. He wants us to know how much He cares about you, His brothers, in this life, and about how we are treated by men. It may seem, at times, as if the King weren’t watching, but He is.

And in praising the sheep on His right—the Christians who took care of their fellow Christians, simply because they were followers of Christ—Jesus is also emphasizing to His people how earnestly He wants us to be caring for our fellow Christians as we await His return. Because there are many who won’t. King Jesus Himself promises to receive your works of service to His little brothers as works of service done to Him directly. Let the fact that Jesus cares so much about this drive you to spend your life doing these simple acts of kindness for your fellow Christians, looking for ways to help and to serve when your fellow Christian has a need.

After addressing those on His right, the King will turn to those on His left and say, Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. And He will proceed to accuse them of not doing any of those kindnesses to Jesus’ brothers. Will they be guilty of much greater crimes than these? Absolutely. All the books containing all the records of human deeds will be opened, and those whose names are not found in the Book of Life—who don’t trust in the Lord Jesus for forgiveness—will have to answer for all their evil works. But see again how much Jesus insists that His believers be cared for in this life, as if He were the one in need of that care. Truly, I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me. The King is watching how unbelievers fail to serve Him by not serving His brothers and sisters, and you should take great comfort in this, knowing that no one who abuses you, and for that matter, no one who fails to be kind to you when you’re in need of a kindness, will get away with it. Because the King is watching.

Then what? And these (the ones on the left) will go away to everlasting punishment, but the righteous to everlasting life.

The unrighteous are cursed by God, because they never repented and believed in the Lord Jesus, so they have to answer and pay for all their own sins, including these sins of omission toward Jesus’ brothers, in everlasting punishment, even though Jesus bore their sins on the cross, too. Because they didn’t want Jesus for their Redeemer, they will depart from God’s gracious presence forever. Their judgment will be everlasting, lasting forever, in that everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. Notice that hell and hellfire weren’t originally created by God for human beings. It was His will from the beginning to save all men from death and hell, even though He knew not all would end up being saved through Christ. But God never prepared any such salvation for the devil and his angels. Hellfire was their destiny the moment they rebelled against God. But now, when people turn down God’s offer of salvation through Christ, they will join the devil and his demons in that fiery judgment they could have avoided, but didn’t.

On the other hand, the blessed ones of Jesus’ Father will go with the King into their eternal inheritance, to everlasting life—that is, life that lasts forever, where there will be no more sin or suffering or crying or pain. This inheritance was prepared for them from the foundation of the world, because it was always God’s plan for them to receive it. And there, in that inheritance that was purchased for them by the blood of Christ and that they themselves will receive for free, they will also receive rewards of grace for all those kindnesses done in this life for their fellow Christians, and for all the works of love that they produced in this life, as branches connected to the true Vine that is Christ.

These are the main things Jesus wants His followers to know about Judgment Day. The logistics of it and the other details aren’t for us to know ahead of time. But this is enough. Enough to keep us watchful. Enough to keep us longing for that day, and preparing for that day by living in daily contrition and repentance, and by caring for Jesus’ brothers, as the King watches over us all, making sure that, sooner, or, for sure, later, we all receive that promised inheritance that is, as Peter writes, imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged , | Comments Off on The King is watching how His brothers are treated

The end will come when God’s patience runs out

Posted on November 12, 2025 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for the week of Trinity 25

Isaiah 49:12-17 + 2 Peter 3:3-15

Christians know that this world has an expiration date. But we don’t know when that date is. At some points in your life, maybe in your younger days, when you think you have many good things to look forward to here, you may not really yearn for the end of the world. At other times, the harder things get, the uglier the world becomes, you may be desperate for Jesus to come, wondering why it’s taking the Lord so long to keep His promise. St. Peter addresses that in the second Lesson you heard this evening, as he assures us that the Lord will come, gives us the reason why He hasn’t come yet, tells us what we have to look forward to when He does come, and reminds us what effect such knowledge should have on our lives while we wait.

First, the Lord will come, in spite of the scoffers who think that He won’t. Knowing this first, Peter writes, that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation.” Peter foresaw, by the Holy Spirit, that Jesus’ coming would take a while. And he foresaw that scoffers—people who laugh at the idea of God—would come along and mock Christianity’s claim that Jesus will come again. He wasn’t wrong, was he? Jesus has taken a while. And those scoffers are now everywhere. Many of them are atheists who don’t believe that God is behind the creation of the universe at all, but that everything came into being by natural processes that can be explained by science and scientific theory. In fact, Peter seems to allude to that in the next verse.

For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water, by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water. They “willfully” forget how God created the heavens and the earth out of nothing, by the power of His almighty Word. It takes willfulness to forget that, because the creation all around us screams, “There is a divine Creator of all this!” The order, the beauty, the complexity of life and of the laws of science themselves—all of it points to an all-powerful, all-knowing, eternal God. But because people deny God’s existence, and maybe more importantly, God’s right to rule over His creation, they have to find a different way for the universe to have come into existence, which they now call “evolution.” And, of course, they deny not only the creation of the universe, but also the terrible judgment God brought upon sinful mankind through the waters of the worldwide flood.

Men can scoff. Men can make fun of God, and of us who believe in Him. Men can spread the lie of evolution all they want, and deny that Jesus will come again for judgment. But what they can’t do is actually get rid of God, or stop Jesus from coming, or escape the judgment He’ll bring with Him against the ungodly and unbelieving. But the heavens and the earth which are now preserved by the same word, are reserved for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. It’s only the word of God that continues to preserve this creation. He holds it up, keeps it going, keeps it running, and, yes, allows the suffering and the pain and the wickedness that the world is so full of. But God has made a reservation for the day of judgment, a day of fire, when everything evil and wicked and harmful will be burned up, and when every unbeliever will be sent, body and soul, into the eternal fire that was long ago prepared for the devil and his angels, as we’ll hear this Sunday in the Gospel.

But why does the Lord allow so much suffering to go on now? Why has Lord not returned yet to put an end to man’s wickedness? Peter spells it out for us: But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. Understand what that means. It doesn’t mean that God measures time differently than we do. It means that God views time differently than we do. He is outside of time. We view a thousand years (or 2,000 years) as a very long time, as if God were “taking too long.” God views it as if it were only a day. We view a day as a very short time. But to God, who has eternity to spend on each and every day, one day might as well be a thousand years. So we shouldn’t look at the time between Christ’s first and second coming as “long” or as “short.” In God’s estimation, it will be “just right.”

But here is why Jesus hasn’t returned yet: The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance…and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation. “Longsuffering” is a word we don’t really use anymore. “Patience” is the word we commonly use for it. But “longsuffering” does give us the original picture behind this word. God “suffers” or “puts up with things” for a long time. He puts up with mankind’s sins and wickedness, because the alternative is immediate judgment on mankind. When that judgment comes, it will be final. After that judgment, no one will be given any more time to repent, to see the error of his ways, to hear the Gospel, to believe in Christ, and to escape the eternal fire of hell. That judgment will come, and everyone’s time of grace will be cut off, when God’s patience, when God’s longsuffering runs out. And it will run out. And God knows how long it will be until it runs out. But God also knows that there are people out there, who have yet to be born, or maybe who have already been born, who will believe the Gospel when He sends it to them and join us in this Holy Christian Church. Thank God He was not willing to cut off this time of grace before you and I were born, or worse, before we had a chance to be born again of water and the Spirit. Instead, He waited a little longer. Consider, Peter writes, that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation.

What do we have to look forward to when He comes? But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up. That’s one thing we look forward to: the destruction by fire of this present universe. That destruction will come suddenly, unexpectedly, like a thief in the night. Everything you see, everything you own will be gone. Only mankind will remain. And as we already heard, the ungodly will remain only to perish in eternal fire.

But as for believers, Peter writes, nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. The prophet Isaiah wrote about these new heavens and this new earth. John also writes about them in Revelation. Jesus spoke of it as the “mansions” He has gone to prepare for His people, to which He will bring us when He comes again. This is the main thing we have to look forward to, a home of righteousness, a home with the enormous Christian family we barely see a fraction of in this life, and most importantly of all, a home with the Lord who has loved us and paid for our new home with His own precious blood.

What effect should such knowledge have on our lives while we wait? Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat?… Beloved, looking forward to these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot, and blameless. Christians are looking for Christ to return. Why would we want to be living in sin and filthiness as we wait for the One who is sinless and pure? Why, if we are children of heaven, would we want to live as children of hell? If we are waiting for eternal life with God, then let us rehearse for what that life with Him will be like, with genuine love, with heartfelt obedience to God’s commandment, with ears that are eager to hear His Word, and always with an eye toward the sky, yearning for our Savior’s promised return. Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Comments Off on The end will come when God’s patience runs out