1 Corinthians 10:6-13 + Luke 16:1-9
(Audio only for this week’s sermon.)
Romans 8:12-17 + Matthew 7:15-23
Beware of false prophets. That is Jesus’ instruction to His disciples. Let’s begin this morning by giving thanks to God for that instruction, because without it, we might get the idea that the Christian Church on earth would be this glorious, easily identifiable, united entity, filling the whole world with a unanimous confession of Christ, with all its pastors and preachers in communion with one another.
But that isn’t what we see, is it? We see dozens and dozens of different doctrines, different confessions, church bodies that divide and then sub-divide and then split again and again into smaller and smaller groups. The world laughs at how divided the Christian Church is, and Christians wring their hands over it. They either try to fix it by brushing aside doctrinal differences and coming together on the basis of something other than doctrine—“deeds, not creed,” they say, are what matters. Or, they despair and say, “How can I ever know who’s telling me the truth? Why bother trying to figure it out?”
But the divine Author of our faith is the One who told us ahead of time to expect exactly what we now witness on this earth: false prophets, and many who follow them. In fact, if the visible Church were not plagued by false prophets, then Jesus would be a liar, and then where would we be?
And here we’re not talking especially about non-Christian false prophets, although there are plenty of them, too. Here in this Gospel Jesus is warning us about those who call Him, “Lord, Lord,” who bear the name “Christian,” who look and sound harmless, mild, gentle, innocent, intelligent, and sincere, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
And so we have the command—not the suggestion, but the command—from Jesus to beware of false prophets. It won’t do for Christians to say, “Meh, doctrine doesn’t matter.” It won’t do for Christians to say, “Why bother trying to figure it out?” It won’t do for Christians to tell Jesus on the Last Day, “You, know, Lord, I was pretty busy and never got around to actually checking to see if that preacher was telling me the truth or not. I was just a layman, after all. It’s not my fault I believed that guy (or that gal, as the case may be, and if it’s a woman pretending to preach in the name of Christ, you should know right away that she’s a false prophet). Anyway, Jesus, it’s not my fault. Blame the false prophet, Lord, not me for believing him!”
Don’t worry. Jesus will blame the false prophet. But He will also blame the one who heard His warning to beware of false prophets and refused to take heed. He will blame the disciple who had His Word and who cared more for earthly benefits than for the Word of Christ and who trusted more in the word of man than in the Word of Christ.
You must have God’s Word for yourself. Each one. Not the word of this or that pastor or synodical statement, or of this church or of that church father or of this diocese. You must have God’s Word. Your parents can’t have it for you. Your husband or wife can’t have it for you. Your church, your synod, your diocese, your pastor can’t have it for you. You must have it and be able to stand on it before God. And when you have it, then you are never to let go of it or let it be compromised or twisted or perverted or diminished. Then you are not to sit at the feet of one who teaches it even a little bit falsely, no matter what great earthly benefits you might reap from staying with such a preacher or with such a church, no matter what hardships or afflictions you may have to endure for holding onto God’s Word.
So how do you know? How do you judge? The Apostle John writes in his First Epistle, Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. The test that St. John then sets before his readers is a doctrinal test, comparing the teachings of the preacher with the teachings that have been passed down from the holy prophets and apostles.
So when Jesus says in today’s Gospel that you will know them by their fruits, He’s talking about the teachings that they produce. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.
Now, there is something to be said about examining the “fruit” of a preacher’s life and works. Ultimately the faithful preacher sent from God will show his faith in various ways, producing the fruits of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control—while the false prophet may have good-looking works for a while, but his lack of concern for the sheep usually becomes evident, and fear instead of faith will tend to show itself. Fear that outweighs faith, fear that manifests itself in many ways, but especially fear to stand up for the Gospel if it means losing some earthly benefit; and unbelief when it comes to trusting the Gospel to do what God wants it to do, always trying new ways to bring people into the Church that have nothing to do with the Gospel.
But true prophets of God have a sinful flesh, too, and won’t always do the good they want to do. So judging a man by his life and good works should always be secondary. The main fruit of a preacher is the teaching he produces. The leaves and flowers on thornbushes can often appear just as beautiful as the leaves and flowers on grape vines and fig trees. You have to look past appearances, look past official titles, look past the preacher’s strengths and weaknesses, his personality traits, his niceness, his charm, look past how he makes you feel. Look to the teaching he produces, to see whether it is good or bad. Then and then alone will you know if the preacher is good or bad.
So what is the fruit Christians are to look for in a preacher? You look for teaching that either agrees or disagrees with what you know to be true from God’s Word. And since you are Lutherans who have already compared the teaching of God’s Word with the Small Catechism (and all the Lutheran Confessions) and determined that our Confessions teach the Word of God purely and without error, you look for teaching that either agrees or disagrees with your Catechism.
Let’s summarize those teachings briefly. The Ten Commandments teach what is good and right in God’s sight, how to love Him above all things and how to love your neighbor as yourself. But they also show how you haven’t done that, and so deserve only God’s wrath and punishment.
The Apostles’ Creed confesses who the true God is—one God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—who has made all things, who has had mercy on His fallen creatures by sending His Son into human flesh and giving Him into death for our sins and for our redemption, who sends His Holy Spirit into the world in the preaching of the Gospel to gather a holy Church by calling sinners to repentance and faith in Christ.
The Lord’s Prayer teaches you how to pray as Christians, what to ask for and what to expect from our gracious Father.
Holy Baptism teaches you how and where God first forgave you your sins, adopted you as His child and made you an heir of eternal life, by applying the merits of Christ to you and clothing you by faith with the righteousness of Christ. There the Holy Spirit gave you rebirth and began the lifelong process of sanctifying you and renewing you in the image of Christ.
Confession teaches you that baptized Christians are continually to confess your sins and trust that God Himself is the One declaring forgiveness to you through the mouth of His called and ordained pastor, who speaks to you in the stead and by the command of the Lord Jesus.
And the Sacrament of the Altar proclaims the simple truth that the risen Lord Christ now regularly feeds the members of His Church with His own body and blood, which are really present with the bread and the wine, to offer and seal to you the forgiveness of sins, purchased with the death of our Lord.
Now that’s a summary of a summary, and a necessary starting point. But God has put His whole Word at your fingertips to study and to learn, and the whole Book of Concord is a faithful guide, so that you can use it to see through all the lies and deceptions and falsehood that pass for “Christian teaching” these days.
Where you find the Gospel purely taught and the Sacraments rightly administered, there you know the preacher is a good tree who is bringing you good fruit. Where you find teachings that differ from this or practices that are contrary to this, there you should not look for good fruit at all, even if many things the preacher says are right.
And where you find good fruit, there you should remain. Where you find bad fruit—from there you should flee. Don’t settle for the “closest thing” or the “next best thing.” Remain with the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Even in this church and in this diocese, I urge you in the name of Christ to continue to test the doctrine that is proclaimed from this pulpit, because there is no guarantee than a good teacher will ever and always remain a good teacher. Many good trees have gone bad over the ages, and many Christians have fallen away from the truth by continuing to cling to a good teacher gone bad.
Does this sound difficult? Does this sound like hard work? Who ever told you it would be easy? Salvation is free, already earned for you by Jesus! But the Christian life is not easy. It involves denying yourself and taking up your cross daily as you follow Jesus. And it’s serious business. Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. The will of God is that you should abide in His Word and cling to it for dear life, for there He reveals Christ to you, and you are saved and justified by faith alone in Christ. There in His Word He speaks to you, and He’s always sincere. There He draws you to Christ and gives you eternal life and preserves you in Christ Jesus, who has made you this promise: If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. God is faithful, and He will do it. Amen.
Romans 6:19-23 + Mark 8:1-9
Jesus provides refreshment for the weary, bread for the hungry. That’s the simple summary of today’s Gospel—another timely text for the troubled times in which we live. Who couldn’t use a little refreshment after yet another week full of news that depicts a nation consuming itself, destroying itself from within? Here we sit, hungry for peace, thirsting for righteousness, weary of violence and hatred and lies and distortions of facts. Who will save us from this wretched, sinful world?
I’ll tell you who won’t save us. Politicians. They won’t save us. Angry, vengeful people. They certainly won’t save us. In fact, people won’t save us at all. Only God can. And He will. But He won’t do it by turning our nation or our world into a utopia here on earth. He won’t save us by making America great again. He won’t save us by forcing people to live in peace and harmony with one another. No, we are living in the days before the Great Flood, when the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually, and only a remnant of humanity will be rescued, as Noah and his family were kept safe on the ark. God will save us as He saved Noah, by bringing His judgment upon this earth and rescuing us out of it.
In a way, He has already done that for us Christians. He did it through Holy Baptism, where He washed us clean of our sins, forgiving us our sins in the blood of Christ, and has caused us to cross over from death to life through faith in Christ. He has already rescued us from condemnation and from wrath on the Day of Wrath. He has already made us new creatures, after the image of His Son. He has already redeemed us from the slavery of sin and uncleanness and lawlessness. As Jesus said to His disciples, “I chose you out of the world.”
But the Lord God has not yet taken us out of the world. In fact, Jesus once prayed for His Church, saying, Father, I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. So feed on God’s word today. Find refreshment in the goodness and mercy of Christ, and in this way God will keep you from the evil one.
We learn in today’s Gospel, not just that Jesus has the power to do miracles, to multiply bread and fish, to feed lots of people. We learn of His care and compassion, which extend to all men, but we learn here of His special care and compassion for those who have “continued with Him,” for those who have come to Him and believed in Him and left things behind in order to hear Him and learn from Him. Yes, God, in His mercy, provides food for the good and for the bad, for the righteous and for the unrighteous. More than that, God has given His Son into death for all men, so that all might believe and be saved, even though not all will believe and be saved. But we see today the special care Jesus shows for those who believe in Him, His ever-present compassion for His Church in the midst of this wilderness of chaos and despair.
The multitude of the 4,000 in today’s Gospel was different from other multitudes. For example, on a different occasion, Jesus gave bread to 5,000 men, plus women and children, in order to point them to Himself as the true Bread that came down from heaven. That multitude was curious about Jesus. That multitude was infatuated with the miracles Jesus had done and couldn’t get enough of the signs and wonders. They spent a day with Jesus, not far from their homes, not far from their cities. And they proved very quickly that they didn’t really want to hear the words of Jesus, that they didn’t really believe in Jesus or want the eternal life He had to offer.
This multitude, however, in today’s Gospel had followed Jesus a long way out into the wilderness for no other reason than to hear Him, to learn from Him, to receive eternal life from Him.
At the end of three days, they had no food left. Whatever they had brought with them for the journey had been consumed. Jesus looked out at them and said to His disciples, I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now continued with Me three days and have nothing to eat. And if I send them away hungry to their own houses, they will faint on the way; for some of them have come from afar.
That’s the care and compassion Jesus has for His people. He knows what they’ve given up to be with Him. He knows what they need. He knows what would happen to them if left on their own. And so He takes care of them.
It’s not as if His people deserved His help. We don’t. Our sins would condemn us just as much as the world’s sins condemn them, if not for the grace of the Lord Jesus, who sent His Spirit in the preaching of the Word and has brought us to repentance and faith in Him.
But now, in His grace, He treats us like friends, like family, like brothers, because He has become our Brother and has made us into children of the heavenly Father. He assures us time and time again that the Father will always have compassion on His dear children who are united to Christ by faith and covered with His righteousness in Holy Baptism.
In the case of this multitude in our Gospel, what they needed at that moment was literally bread, food, which God normally provided through regular channels, like working for wages that can then be used to purchase food, clothes, and house. But, when necessary, God has also promised His people that He will provide in miraculous ways, so that there’s never any reason for us to turn anywhere but to Him for all that we need in this life and for the life to come.
Those needs are summarized well in our Catechism in the Fourth Petition of the Lord’s Prayer: What is meant by daily bread? Everything that has to do with the nourishment and needs of the body, such as food, drink, clothes, shoes, house, yard, land, livestock, money, property, a godly spouse, godly children, godly servants, godly and faithful rulers, good government, good weather, peace, health, discipline, honor, good friends, faithful neighbors, and the like.
Jesus teaches us to trust in God and to trust also in Him for all these things.
That doesn’t mean He’ll make us rich in earthly possessions. That doesn’t mean we will not bear a heavy cross in this life. On the contrary Jesus tells His disciples plainly, In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.
Even in the midst of earthly tribulation and suffering under the cross, Jesus will not abandon us or leave us to fend for ourselves, just as He refused to abandon the 4,000 who followed Him out into the wilderness and to leave them to fend for themselves on their journey home. He offered them a meal’s worth of bread—not enough refreshment to get them through the rest of their lives, but enough to get them safely home on that day. Again, daily bread.
As we heard earlier, the bread that God’s people need most to get through this life, to be kept from the evil one as we walk through this world to our heavenly home, is the Word of truth, the Bread of Life, Jesus, who feeds on with Himself. What we need most is a constant supply of Word and Sacrament, because that is God’s means of sanctifying us and keeping us separate from the world and safe while we’re still in the world. Through His word, He shows us our sin and brings us to repentance. Through His Word, He shows us Christ crucified for sinners, brings us to faith, and keeps us in the faith. Through His word, He speaks forgiveness and comfort and hope and peace, and He seals it all to us, individually, one by one, as He gives us His own body for bread and His own blood for drink.
And now, as you make your journey home today, refreshed once again by the miraculous food that Jesus has provided in Word and Sacrament, you have all you need to face the world again for another week, to get back to your daily life of faith toward God and loving service toward your neighbor. You have all you need to live another week…as a slave. Not slaves to sin, but slaves to righteousness, as St. Paul said in the Epistle. Slaves who live to serve their loving Master, who gave His life on the cross so that we might live. Beloved slaves, who have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.
Romans 6:3-11 + Matthew 5:20-26
In today’s gospel, Jesus teaches His disciples about righteousness. The Scriptures speak of three kinds of righteousness, actually, or even four. One is God’s own essential divine righteousness, His quality of being righteous, good, loving, and just. We won’t focus on that righteousness for the moment, because that’s who God is, with or without us, just as He is omnipotent and omniscient and omnipresent. It’s an attribute of God, and we’re concerned today with the attribute of righteousness that God demands of us human beings.
In that regard, there are two kinds of righteousness that are necessary, and a third that is theoretically necessary. The first is the righteousness by which we are justified and enter the kingdom of heaven. There is a second righteousness in which justified Christians begin to live within the kingdom of heaven. The third kind, if we want to speak of a third kind, is more theoretical in nature. It can’t actually be performed by any of us who are born from a man and woman. But it is, nonetheless, required of us, so we’d better understand it.
It’s actually this third “theoretical” kind of righteousness that Jesus speaks of in today’s Gospel. You have to be righteous in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. That’s what Jesus says. And not just a little bit righteous. Not just pretty righteous or very righteous or extremely righteous. The scribes and Pharisees had that going for them already, but Jesus informs His disciples: I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.
Perfect righteousness. Utter sinlessness. Complete obedience to God’s Law, in thought, word, and deed. That’s the requirement for entering the kingdom of heaven. The Ten Commandments do not say, “Do your best! Try your hardest!”, or, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!” No, they say, “You shall! You shall not!” And they go deeper than most people imagine, including the scribes and Pharisees in Jesus’ day. The commandment says, “You shall not murder!” They thought they were righteous because they had never actually murdered anyone. But Jesus reveals in the Gospel that angry words, hurtful words, make a person just as guilty of hell fire as murdering someone. The apostle John, in his epistle, applies the commandment also to the heart, “Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer.”
Likewise the scribes and Pharisees thought they were righteous because they didn’t sleep around with other men’s wives. But Jesus reveals in the words just after our Gospel that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
The righteousness that God’s Law requires is high and lofty. You have to be good and loving, just and upright all the time. Honoring God all the time, and not according to your version of who God is, but honoring Him according to His Word, recorded in the Bible. Loving your neighbor all the time, and again, not according to your version of what love looks like, but according to Holy Scripture. That’s what God demands of His creatures. That’s the righteousness that earns a place in the kingdom of heaven.
But it’s theoretical. It can only be performed by people who start off righteous. That’s not you or I, or anyone born of man and woman. We’re doomed from the start, not because God made us incapable of being righteousness, but because our parents did, and their parents before them, back to Adam and Eve. Original Sin has infected us all and turned us into people who don’t even want to be truly righteous, by nature, people who trust in ourselves first, who look out for our own interests first, people who easily find fault in others, or even in God, but who imagine ourselves to be, well, righteous—or at least, righteous enough, more righteous than a lot of other people.
Now, the Law’s penalty for unrighteousness— for every misstep, for every transgression, for every rebellion, for every “oops,” is the shedding of blood. Without shedding of blood there is no remission. And not just a little blood. All of it, till you die. And not just physical death, but eternal death and the suffering of hell fire. So the price for forgiveness and reconciliation with God is a price so high that to pay it is to perish.
In the Old Testament, God offered some temporary remedies for Israel’s unrighteousness, the death of animals, one after another after another, to atone for, to make up for the sins of the people, to earn reconciliation with God. But, as you know, those animal sacrifices were only temporary remedies until the true price could be paid, the sacrifice of God’s own Son, true God and true Man. His perfect obedience under the Law, His suffering and death for the sins of mankind—that’s the righteousness that counts before God.
And so the Gospel goes out into the world, calling all men to repentance, because all have sinned. All have transgressed the Law of God and all are under its condemnation, by nature, because no one can perform the righteousness that the Law requires. But see, in the Gospel, in Holy Baptism, God holds out to us poor sinners another righteousness, or better, the righteousness of Another, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. The righteousness that counts before God. He offers it to us a free gift, already purchased for us by the blood of Christ. This is the righteousness of faith.
Faith saves, faith justifies, not because it’s such a good and noble work, but because faith lays hold of Christ, who offers us His righteousness—His perfect obedience in doing and suffering, living and dying—to hold up before God as our own. God counts this faith to us for righteousness—again, not a righteousness that we had done, but a “foreign righteousness,” the righteousness of Christ, credited to our account through faith in Him.
By this faith, by this righteousness of faith, we are justified before God. This is the righteousness that is necessary for us to enter into the kingdom of heaven, to be reconciled to God, to be adopted as His children and made heirs of eternal life, and it’s entirely ours by faith in Christ.
That’s our great comfort, because, when we believe in Christ Jesus for righteousness, we know that it is certain, because His righteousness is certain. His perfect life was already lived for us. His death as the payment for sins has already been accomplished. And so eternal life depends on Him, not on you.
There is still that other righteousness that is necessary—not necessary in order to enter the kingdom of heaven, but necessary, nonetheless, for those who have been justified by faith, for those who have been made heirs of heaven by the righteousness of faith. This other righteousness is the new life of obedience to which God has called us. It is the ongoing renewal of the Holy Spirit as He sanctifies us and forms us Christians more and more into righteous people, who think what is right, who want what is right, who do what is right. This righteousness within us who believe is necessary, because it’s what a living faith always produces, and it’s God’s will that we live in it.
What did Paul write to the Romans in chapter 6? As many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? 4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin… Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Reckon yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ. That’s what daily contrition and repentance looks like, saying no to sin, and living each day for God, which includes living each day to serve your neighbor, in love. That’s what the Ten Commandments teach us how to do, now that we’ve been justified by faith. They guide us in the new obedience of the children of God, in righteous attitudes toward God and our neighbor and in righteous behavior.
We recognize that this righteousness of new obedience is only begun in us in this life. We never reach the goal of perfection here on earth, because of the weakness of our sinful flesh. But we keep working together with the Holy Spirit. We keep striving to be righteous like God, and we keep watching out for sin and temptation, always taking it seriously, because God has warned us that, yes, we’re saved by faith, but faith can’t coexist with an evil intention or with impenitence. And if we allow ourselves to grow indifferent toward sin, indifferent toward righteousness, then we will make shipwreck of our faith, as the Scripture says, and drive out the Holy Spirit.
So let us pray that God would preserve us from that, through His Word and Sacrament. He has already promised to hear such a prayer and to work through His means of grace, to keep us steadfast in the faith by which we stand righteous before Him, and to strengthen us in the love and obedience in which God’s righteous children walk, being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. Amen.
1 Peter 3:8-15 + Luke 5:1-11
What on earth are you doing here? Don’t you know that the souls of men are dying out there? And here you sit, comfortable and safe in a church. You’ve been saved by God’s grace, by the blood of Christ, by the Gospel and Holy Baptism, by faith in the Son of God. But what good are you doing anyone else, sitting here in church? Shouldn’t you be out there pounding the pavement, knocking on doors, luring people into “trying out” our church, spreading the Christian message into the political realm, seeking to change the cultures of the world, spending every spare moment fishing for the souls of men? Isn’t that what the Christian life is all about?
No. That’s not the way it works in Christ’s Church. But it’s the way a lot of people think that it works, and the devil is more than happy to foster that kind of thinking. As a Christian, you’re made to feel insignificant all the time, like you’re not doing enough, not having enough impact on the world around you, especially as members of a small church like ours within a small diocese like ours. So you’re tempted in three different ways. You’re either tempted to blame someone—to blame “your church” for not doing enough. Or you’re tempted to despair of doing any good and to just turn your whole Christian life into going to church on Sunday mornings (if that!), or you’re tempted to “do something new,” to build the Church in your own way, as if the kingdom of God were built on the hard work and the brilliant ideas of Christians.
What we learn from Jesus in today’s Gospel is that He and He alone has the power to build His kingdom, and that He wishes to do it, not through the great and mighty works of His people, but through the simple vocational activities of His Christians, as He sees to it that His Word is proclaimed in ways we could have never imagined. One of those vocations is the Office of the Holy Ministry, to which Jesus did call Peter at the end of the Gospel. But every God-pleasing vocation can provide an opportunity for the net of the Gospel to be cast into the world, to bring God’s children in and save them from being condemned together with the world.
Let’s review the Gospel. Jesus had been preaching and performing miracles in Galilee for some time already by the time He stepped into Simon Peter’s boat. He had already spent time with Peter, James and John, and taught them about the kingdom of God, but He hadn’t yet called them to be His apostles or to follow Him full-time. They still had their vocation as humble fishermen.
So Jesus steps into Simon’s boat and simply asks Simon to put out from the shore a little bit, which he does. That’s it. That’s all he does. Jesus does the preaching and teaching to the multitudes along the shoreline. Jesus teaches the people about their sin, about the judgment that is coming on the world, about God’s love for sinners and faith in Him as the One would save them from the coming wrath they had earned for themselves by their sins. Simon’s contribution to all this? Simply being a fisherman who has a boat handy, and the willingness to let it be used by Jesus for His purposes.
Then Jesus asks Simon to take the boat out into the deep waters for a catch. Peter explains that he and his companions had worked hard all night, which is the best time for fishing, exploring this part and then that part of the lake, dropping the nets and then hauling them in over and over again, and had caught nothing. What he didn’t know was that God had a purpose behind his bad night of fishing, a lesson which Jesus would soon reveal. It was to teach him—and us! —that his hard work, the Christian’s hard work, would never bring a single soul into God’s kingdom.
Peter obediently agrees to take the boat out one more time, expecting to catch nothing, but at the same time, honoring the word of Christ. He goes where Jesus told him to go. He lets down the nets, as Jesus, told him to do. And the nets immediately fill up with more fish than the nets could hold—more fish than two fishing boats could hold, as they both began to sink. Suddenly, they were buried in fish.
And they did nothing special, nothing spectacular, nothing new. They lowered their nets at Jesus’ word, and the word and power of Jesus did all the catching, confirming Him as the Son of God, confirming the divine truth of the sermon He had just preached to the multitudes, and confirming the way in which people would forever be brought into God’s kingdom: with His word and His power, as He accompanies His Church throughout the world through His Spirit and uses the simple vocational activities of His people to get His Word preached and to get men into His kingdom.
Peter’s reaction to this great miracle was two-thirds really good, and one-third really bad. When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” It was really good that Peter recognized Jesus as the Lord through this miracle, and it was really good that Peter recognized that he, a sinner, didn’t deserve to be in the presence of the holy Lord God. The really bad part, though, was that Jesus’ entire preaching, His whole message to mankind was that Jesus the Lord had come, not to save the righteous and deserving, but precisely to save sinful and undeserving men. Sinful men are fools to ask Jesus to depart from them. He came to save them. He wants to save them, not because they deserve saving, but because He is good and gracious.
And He shows that goodness and grace to Peter in His response. Do not be afraid. From now on you will catch men. Jesus takes sinners into His kingdom—penitent sinners who mourn over their sins and flee to Christ for refuge. He comforts them, forgives them, and then begins a new life in them—a life of freedom, a life of hope, a life of service.
In Peter’s case, and in the case of James and John, who were with him, Jesus told them what that life of service would look like. Jesus called those men into the office of the Holy Ministry, to “catch men,” that is to be preachers of the Gospel who, by throwing out the net of the Gospel, would bring many people into Christ’s kingdom. They wouldn’t do it by their own hard work and effort, although they certainly would work hard. The catch would always and only come by the Word and power of Christ, and it would be miraculously huge.
That doesn’t mean that every time they preached, many people would believe. Many times when the apostles preached—many times when Jesus preached—very few believed. The great number of believers who end up in the kingdom of God is the sum total result of all the preaching of all the preachers who have been sent by Christ over past two millennia. A few here, a few there, a thousand here, twenty there. They all add up to that great multitude which no one can number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They have all been caught in only one way: through the preaching of the Gospel, which is God’s only method of bringing people to faith. As we confess in the Augsburg Confession, Article V: So that we may obtain this faith, the ministry of teaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments was instituted. Through the Word and Sacraments, as through instruments, the Holy Spirit is given. He works faith, when and where it pleases God, in those who hear the good news that God justifies those who believe that they are received into grace for Christ’s sake. This happens not through our own merits, but for Christ’s sake.
That’s why you support this preaching ministry here in our midst, by coming to church and Bible class, by listening, concentrating, by praying for me and other preachers, by your offerings and by your obedience to the Word. This is the vocation through which Christ has chosen to have His Gospel proclaimed in the world, and He has told us what a life of service in this office will look like.
But He has also told all Christians in general what a life of service will look like in many vocations. Husbands and wives, parents and children, workers and employers, young and old, citizens and rulers. God gives direction to all of them in His Word, and will use those vocations in the service of His kingdom.
You heard some marching orders from St. Peter today in the Epistle: All of you be of one mind, having compassion for one another; love as brothers, be tenderhearted, be courteous; not returning evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary blessing, knowing that you were called to this. Living as Christians, as sons of God, in your vocations—that’s what God has called you to, with love and kindness. And He is able to use your Christian life to open up opportunities for His Gospel to be preached. As Jesus said to His disciples, Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
What else does Peter say to all Christians? Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear. Ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you. There’s your direction from the Lord Jesus. Not to go around knocking on doors or serving on committees. Not to force your beliefs onto others. But to carry out your vocations in such a way that the people around you can see, what?, that you have hope in God—hope that is based on absolute truth, hope for the forgiveness of sins, hope for an eternal future in heaven, hope for God’s care and providence even in the midst of suffering and hardship and pain. And then be ready to give them the reason why: Jesus Christ, crucified and risen from the dead. Christ and His goodness and mercy to you and to all men. Christ and His Word. Christ and His Sacraments. Christ and His Gospel, which is purely taught in your church, by the grace of God, which is why your friends and family and neighbors and coworkers should come here, with you, so that they can hear the voice of Jesus clearly and be caught by Him, not for punishment, but for salvation.
That’s how it works in Christ’s Church. And we have the promise of Jesus that our labor is not in vain in the Lord. Amen.
