Zion, your King is coming to you!

Posted on December 2, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

right-click to save, or push Play

Sermon for Ad Te Levavi – Advent 1

Jeremiah 23:5-8  +  Romans 13:11-14  +  Matthew 21:1-9

The new Church Year begins today, on the first Sunday in Advent.  Advent means coming, arrival.  It’s the season of expectation.  And so we wait and expect the coming of Jesus, our King.  We long for His coming. We prepare for His arrival.  And the name for this Sunday in the Church Year really summarizes the whole Church Year, every single Sunday from now till next December.  Every Sunday it’s Jesus who comes to us in Word and Sacrament, with His rebuke, with His correction, with His mercy, with His love, with His forgiveness and with His strength.  He comes in Word and Sacrament and we gather to meet Him.  Ad Te Levavi, “to you, O Lord, I have lifted up my soul.”  That describes the waiting Church perfectly.

Do you know what it’s like to wait for someone to come who never comes?  It’s depressing, isn’t it?  You stand in the schoolyard, waiting and watching.  Did mom and dad forget about me?  You sit at the restaurant and watch the door for your friend or for your date to walk in. You stand at the window and wait and watch.  You pace back and forth.  Nothing.  They promised to come and meet you but they don’t.  People are like that sometimes.

But God never is.  What He promises, He fulfills.  What He says, He does.  And nothing in the universe can get in His way. He promised to come to Zion.  But He didn’t say exactly when He would come.  For four thousand years He told His people to wait and watch, from generation to generation to generation.  He gave them signs and prophecies to reassure them that, yes, He was still coming. Most gave up waiting, but not all.

In today’s Gospel, we see the King fulfilling His promise to the Daughter of Zion.  Of course, by that time He had already fulfilled His promise and come into our human race through His conception and birth of the virgin Mary.  That’s the coming of the King that we’re getting ready to celebrate in just over three weeks.  But we celebrate the birth of Christ, we celebrate Christmas because Christmas prepares the way for today, the last ride of King Jesus up to the gates of Jerusalem at the beginning of Holy Week for the battle between life and death, where death won a battle, but life won the war.

The Spirit-inspired, Spirit-filled words of the Gospel take you back to that day.  They place you in front of the window so that you can watch with the people of Jerusalem as your King fulfills His promise and comes to the daughter of Zion, so that you can see this King for yourself and know Him for yourself, not by sight, but by words.

The first words you have to understand in order for it all to make sense are the words St. Matthew quotes from the prophet Zechariah, “Say to the Daughter of Zion, behold, your King is coming to you.”  Who is this Zion?  And who is his daughter?  Zion is the name of the mountain on which the city of Jerusalem is built, and the daughter of Zion is the people of Jerusalem.  But Scripture means more than that.  Zion is the place where God chose to dwell among men in His holy temple there, and the daughter of Zion is the Church herself, the Bride who is watching and waiting for her Bridegroom to come, as we heard in last week’s Gospel.  Two thousand years ago, Jesus came to the daughter of Zion in Jerusalem.  But now that He has died and risen again, the Gospel has brought both Jews and Gentiles into the One Church through faith in Christ Jesus, and at the same time the Gospel has kicked out of Zion the Jews who reject Jesus as the Christ.  Zion is no longer located in just one city on earth.  Zion and the daughter of Zion are located wherever the Gospel of Christ is preached and the Sacraments are rightly administered.  There are believers in Christ.  There the daughter of Zion is found.

That’s here and now.  So, listen, daughter of Zion!  Because God commanded his prophet to write down words that He intended for you to hear.  “Say to the daughter of Zion!”  This is the ministry of the Word.  This is the ministry by which God reaches down into the world to crush the arrogant and to kill those who are secure in their sins.  This is the ministry by which God speaks grace to the humble, life to the dead and to give spiritual food to those whom He has brought to life through the baptismal water of rebirth and regeneration.

God has a message for you, Zion, right here in the book of Zechariah and again in the Gospel of Matthew, brought to you right now through this ministry of the Word.  “Behold, your King is coming to you.”  Behold!  It’s like standing at the window, staring out at the road, watching and waiting for your loved one to arrive, and someone calls out, behold!  Look!  And you look out, and you see.  Here He comes!

Who is He?  He is your King.  Your King. Yes, in a sense He is King of all.  “Let earth receive her King!” we will be singing in just a few weeks.  But!  Most of the earth remains outside of His kingdom, still sitting in darkness, still slaves to sin, enslaved by the devil in his vile and wicked kingdom.  Most people are governed by this King’s rod of iron and not by His shepherd’s staff.  And many, even some who now call Him “King,” will bow down before Him when He comes, not in grateful worship, but in dreadful defeat.

But now, before that day comes, He calls to you with these words of our Gospel to believe in Him as your King who wants you to be in His kingdom—no matter who you are, no matter what you’ve done or not done—and who has called you into it through the Gospel and even now keeps calling you to remain in it, to trust in Him as your King who is mightier than every other king or power or ruler or authority.  He calls you to acknowledge your sinfulness, to repent and to flee to Him for mercy, because He is a merciful King who rode up to the gates of Jerusalem so that He could take up His cross and die for your sins.  He did that, whether you believe in Him or not.  He did that so that you may believe in Him and call Him your King.

Your King, Zechariah says, is coming to you.  See, you don’t come to this King.  You aren’t the one who comes to Jesus, who brings Him down out of heaven or who reaches up into heaven to find Him.  You don’t make yourself worthy for Him to come or deserving of His gifts. Your King comes to you.  He prepared it all—world history, the virgin’s womb, the events of Palm Sunday and Holy Week, the events that led up to you hearing the Gospel today, the water that washed you clean of your sins, the very wheat and the grapes and the words and the preacher through which the Son of God comes to you today.

He comes to you humble.  Zechariah also adds “righteous and having salvation.”  Or as Jeremiah foretold, He comes to make Israel dwell in safety.  He comes gentle, riding on a donkey.  As Matthew points out, it’s a beast of burden.  It’s not a war horse.  It’s not meant to intimidate or to frighten you or to exalt the rider and make Him look good or exciting.  On the contrary, your King comes to you in the humblest way possible so as not to frighten you, but to move you to trust in Him as your Savior and as your righteous Substitute before God.

The King of all, the Creator of all, comes to you, not to receive gifts from you, but to give gifts to you—the gifts of righteousness and peace and forgiveness of sins.  He comes to make you right with God and to promise you a kingdom that will never end.

Isn’t that better than Santa Claus?  Honestly.  Santa has a list and checks it twice.  He’s gonna find out who’s naughty, who’s nice.  He’ll reward the naughty ones with a lump of coal. He’ll reward the good boys and girls with material things that will rust and decay, or soon be thrown away.  He comes in a jolly red suit with a jolly red face, riding on a jingling sleigh—a magical ride that inspires children’s fantasies and dreams.

And all the while, there’s Jesus.  He makes a list and checks it twice and finds that all are naughty, none are nice.  He knows your sins and that you don’t deserve anything from Him at Christmas. And yet He comes anyway, with rewards of grace and with gifts that last. He’s never depicted as jolly.  Sometimes stern, usually serious, once in awhile weeping, and always compassionate and loving, and joyful as He faces the cross for the sake of the daughter of Zion.  He rides, not on a cool supernatural fast-flying sleigh, but on a humble, average, slow-walking donkey, coming down to our house, not through a chimney, but through Word and Sacrament. With no toys, but with words of eternal life.  With no jolly red suit, but with garments stained in blood for our salvation.  Best of all, Jesus is not a figure of fantasy who exists if we believe in Him.  Jesus is real and lives and reigns whether or not we believe in Him. 

So let us put our faith in Him and prepare for our King to come.  Cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Daughter of Zion, your King comes to you.  The season of expectation has begun.  Lift up your soul to watch and wait.  Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Zion, your King is coming to you!

Praise the Lord for preserving our place of worship

Posted on November 28, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Our congregation decided on October 17, 2012, to disaffiliate from the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS) so that we can continue to believe and teach that sinners are saved and justified in no other way but by faith in Christ. The WELS demanded that we believe and teach that God has already saved and declared all people to be righteous in His sight, whether or not they believe and are baptized. When they condemned our confession of faith as false doctrine, we could no longer remain in fellowship with them. The Gospel is more important than any denominational affiliation, and by God’s grace alone, the Gospel is still being proclaimed in our midst.

Our congregation faced an immediate challenge.  Our church’s mortgage was with the WELS Church Extension Fund (CEF), and we still owed $275,000 on the property.  Within 48 hours of our decision to disaffiliate, in spite of the fact that we had never missed a monthly payment, the CEF sent us a letter in which they cited a clause in our loan agreement that placed us in default on our loan the moment we disaffiliated from the WELS.  In the same letter, they threatened to begin foreclosure proceedings if we did not pay off our balance in full by December 1st.

We were not entirely surprised by this letter from the CEF.  On the very evening on which we decided to disaffiliate from the WELS, within two hours of our decision, Pastor Jon Buchholz, president of the Arizona-California District of the WELS, who happened to be at a pastors’ conference at that very moment, began announcing to some of the pastors there that the CEF would call the note on our loan—another warning not to defy the synod.

But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? For we are not, like so many, peddlers of God’s word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ (2 Corinthians 2:14-17).

The Lord provided willing and generous hearts among our members and among our brothers and sisters in Christ in other parts of the country, and we were immediately able to reduce our debt by over $25,000.  At the same time, He provided a local bank that was willing to refinance our mortgage.  We closed on the loan November 26th, five days ahead of our December 1st deadline.

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 gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?　Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies (Romans 8:31-33).

This is part of a letter I sent to my members yesterday:

I would like to thank all of the families and individuals of our congregation who helped to make all of this possible—those who donated large or small amounts. Your gifts for the work of the Lord in this place are fragrant offerings to the Lord, acceptable and pleasing to Him through faith in the blood of Christ that cleanses and purifies all the works of God’s children. I give thanks to God for all of you.

Most of all, let us give thanks to God together. We took a stand on a very basic but very important doctrinal issue, trusting that the Lord would preserve us in spite of the odds that were against us. It is He who has helped and supported us for the sake of His Gospel. We could never have done it. And so we pray with the Psalmist in Psalm 115: 

1 Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory, for the sake of your steadfast love and your faithfulness! 2 Why should the nations say, “Where is their God?” 3 Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases. 4 Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands. 5 They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see. 6 They have ears, but do not hear; noses, but do not smell. 7 They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat. 8 Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them. 9 O Israel, trust in the Lord! He is their help and their shield. 10 O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord! He is their help and their shield. 11 You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord! He is their help and their shield. 12 The Lord has remembered us; he will bless us; he will bless the house of Israel; he will bless the house of Aaron; 13 he will bless those who fear the Lord, both the small and the great. 14 May the Lord give you increase, you and your children! 15 May you be blessed by the Lord, who made heaven and earth! 16 The heavens are the Lord’s heavens, but the earth he has given to the children of man. 17 The dead do not praise the Lord, nor do any who go down into silence. 18 But we will bless the Lord from this time forth and forevermore. Praise the Lord!

See you Sunday,
+Pastor Rydecki

Posted in News | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Praise the Lord for preserving our place of worship

Wake, awake! Watch for the Bridegroom!

Posted on November 25, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

right-click to save, or push Play

Sermon for the Last Sunday of the Church Year

Isaiah 65:17-25  +  1 Thessalonians 5:1-11  +  Matthew 25:1-13

What beautiful images are set before us today in the lectionary, like a banquet of words to appetize our souls before the day of the great Wedding Banquet arrives!  New heavens and a new earth, the city of New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, that we are children of the light and children of the day, destined not for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.  Ten virgins waiting with their lamps, watching for the Bridegroom to come, and waking at the midnight cry announcing his arrival.

But only half of the ten virgins—the wise ones—were ready to enter the marriage feast when the Bridegroom arrived in Jesus’ parable, while the other half—the foolish ones—were left outside, locked outside forever and ever.  Jesus told this parable to His disciples long ago and repeats it to you, His Christians who are gathered here today, so that you may be found in the half that enters with Him.  Wake, awake!  Watch for the Bridegroom!  For you know neither the day nor the hour of His coming.

The kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.  According to Jewish custom, the bridegroom would leave his father’s house, and, at the appointed day and time, together with his groomsmen, he would go to pick up his bride and her attendants, and they would go together in a joyful procession to their new home where the marriage would be celebrated with a rich banquet.

Throughout the Scriptures, God depicts Himself, and specifically Jesus Himself, as the Bridegroom, and the Church as His Bride. Of course, this Bride is totally unworthy of His love.  She is made up of sinners, and the worst of sinners.  But she has been chosen out of the world by the grace of God, washed with water and the Word of God in Holy Baptism, declared to be righteous and holy through faith alone in Jesus. Jesus sealed the marriage contract with His blood long ago, then rose from the dead, ascended into heaven and continues to feed His Bride with His body and blood until He returns to claim her and to begin the never-ending marriage feast with her in their new home, the new heavens and the new earth.

Until then, we wait, with our feet firmly planted on the earth but with our eyes and our hopes and our longings in heaven, where the Bridegroom is seated at the right hand of God. But Jesus warns us that we are still in danger as we wait, because we wait for Him like those ten virgins in the parable who needed one thing and one thing alone in order to meet the Bridegroom and join the procession with Him.  Each one needed to have her own burning lamp.

Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.  We’re talking about Christians here, people who start out watching and waiting for the Bridegroom, Jesus, to return.  We’re talking about Christians who, at least at first, are given a lamp, a lamp of faith.  Faith is like a burning lamp.  It’s the one thing you cannot enter heaven without.  Whoever hears my words and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life, Jesus says.  Not a single work of yours would light the way to heaven or prepare you to meet Christ when He comes.  But faith, faith in Christ crucified for you, faith in His blood shed for you, faith in His Word that promises eternal life to all who believe in Jesus—that faith ties you to His goodness, to His merits.  It’s Jesus’ own blood and righteousness that lights the path and makes you worthy to enter into His wedding feast.  Faith lights the way to Christ.  Faith overflows in works of love and compassion and overcomes fear and doubt and the devil himself. Faith rejoices at the thought of spending eternity with Jesus in His great marriage feast. The ten virgins represent all Christians.  All Christians start out longing for Jesus’ appearing, with the lamp of faith burning.

But the Bridegroom was delayed.  He took longer to come than the foolish virgins expected.  They were ready at first to run out to meet Him and join the procession.  But they weren’t prepared for a long wait.  They didn’t bring along any extra oil—just the oil that was already there in their lamps, being consumed moment by moment by the flame.

So it is that the Christian life of watching can get old. As the cares and pleasures of this life compete for our attention, as life gets harder and money gets tighter and society around us becomes more and more wicked and godless, as the body grows older and weaker and pain grows stronger, as the cross grows heavier and daily self-denial becomes more and more unbearable…Who’s watching for the Bridegroom anymore?  Who has time?  The Christian life becomes a fantasy world that we set aside as easily as we set aside a book, as we get back to the “real” world of paying the bills and watching TV.

But Jesus has warned us ahead of time that it would be this way.  Jesus has already told us that He will be delayed in His return and that life will make us weary and sleepy as we wait.  Your life of watching for the return of the Bridegroom won’t be a simple matter of hours.  It will be a matter of years, decades maybe, from the time you become a Christian until the day and the hour of His return.  And you will be tempted, enticed by this world to stop thinking about the Bridegroom, to stop your waiting and to take your readiness for granted.

But you dare not do that. Only five of the ten virgins will be ready when the Bridegroom comes—only the wise ones, only those who took along oil for their lamps, to keep them burning during the Bridegroom’s long delay.

What is it?  What is the oil and how do you take it along?  Just as the flame of a lamp is fed by oil, so the faith of Christians is fed by the Word of God.  You were born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and enduring Word of God. Like newborn babies, crave the pure spiritual milk of the Word.  My words, Jesus says, are Spirit and they are life. The same Word of God that gave you the new birth of faith continues to feed your faith until Christ comes again.  Christ has given the Ministry of the Word not only to bring you into His family one time through Holy Baptism, but to sustain you throughout your long watch for the Bridegroom, to teach you with every word that is written in the Holy Scriptures, to preserve you through the Word of Absolution spoken again and again to penitent sinners, to nourish you through the Sacrament of the Altar week after week after week and even in between.  These Means of Grace are God’s instruments for keeping your lamps burning bright.

So there’s no excuse for running out of oil.  You have a constant supply at the ready.  This Divine Service and every Divine Service brings Jesus to you through His Word so that you’re ready when He comes in glory with all His holy ones.  And you have as many opportunities to dig into God’s Word as you want on your own, and as many opportunities to be taught as you ask for, as many services and classes here at church as you’re willing to attend.

Those who take along this supply of oil with them can fall asleep in peace—literally, you can go to sleep at night without worrying that the Bridegroom may come while you’re sleeping.  Don’t worry, He’ll wake you up.  You won’t miss it.  And you can also fall asleep in peace in that thing we used to call death.  Don’t worry.  The Bridegroom will wake you up when He comes.  You won’t miss it.  The midnight cry will ring out and the Bridegroom Himself will call you out of your grave and you will join the wedding procession into the marriage feast.

But those foolish virgins who neglected their lamps, who gave no thought to the fuel they would need, for those who began as Christians but then foolishly neglected the Means of Grace—they will wake up, too, when the Bridegroom comes, but for them it will be too late.  There are no dealers of oil who can help them at that time, no ministers of the Gospel to preach or teach or absolve.  When the Bridegroom comes, either you’re already prepared with a faith that has been fed and nourished by God’s Word, or it’s too late.

We have come to the end of another Church Year.  Most of you here today are here most days when we gather around the Word of Christ and the Meal of Christ.  Some days you surely pay attention better than other days.  Some days you’re more serious than others about the words you speak and hear and sing.  I know that’s true for you, because it’s certainly true for me.  Jesus gives you an opportunity today to check your lamps, to check your oil, to fill your flasks and to keep them full.  Do you know the Scriptures better today than you did at the beginning of this Church Year last December?  Are you equipping your children with oil that will last their whole life through?  Are you awake or asleep?  Watching for the Bridegroom or just taking your readiness for granted?

Wake, awake! For night is flying. The watchmen on the heights are crying, “Awake, Jerusalem! Arise!” Not a single one of you can make yourself ready for that day.  But see!  The Spirit of Jesus is preparing you today for that day.  Repent and believe the Gospel that, for the sake of Jesus Christ, God forgives you your sins and will most certainly welcome you into His marriage feast.  Until then, watch for the bridegroom, no matter how long He delays!  Behold, He says, I am coming. Soon.  Amen!  Come, Lord Jesus! And keep us ever watchful until Your appearing, that with our lamps trimmed and burning, we may arise prepared to meet you. Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Wake, awake! Watch for the Bridegroom!

The final separation

Posted on November 20, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

right-click to save, or push Play

Sermon for Second to Last Sunday of the Church Year

Daniel 7:9-14  +  2 Peter 3:3-14  +  Matthew 25:31-46

Everyone knows that the day of judgment is coming.  God has hardwired it into the fabric of our souls as part of the conscience He has written into our hearts.  The day of judgment is coming.  Wouldn’t you like to know beforehand how things are going to be?

Jesus tells you today in the Gospel. He prepares us so that we know ahead of time just what to expect on that day when the Son of Man comes to judge the living and the dead.  He wants us to know how the judgment will go and what the outcome will be in order to spur us on to live as Christians in this world as the Day of the Lord approaches.

What will it be like?  First, Jesus says, When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne.  You have to catch the irony in what Jesus was teaching His disciples.  He said these words during Holy Week when the contrast couldn’t be greater between the Son of Man coming in glory, and the Son of Man facing the greater shame than any man has ever faced—the shame and humiliation of the crucifixion, and all of the wicked details that surrounded it.  The Son of Man came first in humility, and the world mocked Him and rejected Him, even as the world still mocks and rejects and places a cross on the shoulders of God’s people.  But after all the shame and disgrace and suffering, the Son of Man would come out victorious on Easter Sunday, and He will come in all His glory on the Day of Judgment.

When He comes, it will not be to investigate anything.  It will not be to determine who has been naughty and who has been nice.  He knows already who are the sheep and who are the goats, who are the righteous and who are the unrighteous.  He knows already whom He has justified—as Paul says, the one who believes in Jesus.  And He knows already who stands condemned—the one who does not believe in Jesus, who does not rely entirely on Jesus Christ, crucified for our sins and raised to life for our justification. The Lord knows those who are His and has marked His believers with a seal that, for the moment, only He can see.  It says, “Holy to the Lord.”

So when He comes, it won’t be for investigating. It will be for separating—separating the sheep from the goats.  Right now, up until that very day, sheep and goats remain unseparated in this world, living side by side, suffering similar catastrophes, engaging in similar activities like going to school, working, getting married, having kids, waking and sleeping and all the other human activities that there are.  But on that day everyone will see who are the saints and who are the wicked as they are separated one from another and placed into two groups.

In the same way, those who have died before that day all appear to be unseparated now.  Graveyards do not distinguish between believer and unbeliever, sheep and goat.  All the dead are lumped together and their bodies decay together, buried under the earth.  But on that day, they will all be resurrected.  Again, not for determining where they should go—their souls have already been separated and waiting for this great day, either in heaven (for those who fell asleep in faith) or in hell (for those who died in unbelief).  They will all be raised and visibly separated one from another, believers in one group with all the other believers who have ever lived, and unbelievers in one group with all the goats.

And how will it go on that day, when all of mankind has been visibly separated into two groups?  First, the King will speak to those on His right, to the sheep. Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.  There’s that word again, “Inherit!”  And in that word we learn so much.  The kingdom of heaven, the new heavens and the new earth—the new creation—is an inheritance, not a payment for service.  You don’t earn your place there.  You inherit your place there.  And who are they who inherit?  They are sons and daughters of the King, born again by water and Spirit, born into His kingdom through faith in Christ Jesus as the Holy Spirit calls us by the Gospel and teaches us to rely on Christ alone for grace and mercy and life.

And see, the kingdom has been prepared for the sheep from the foundation of the world.  God has known His elect from eternity.  He planned everything in the history of the world to have His Gospel preached to the elect, to put them in contact with the Means of Grace and to work powerfully through those means to bring them to faith and to preserve them in the faith unto life everlasting.  Nothing about this inheritance is earned by us.  It was earned by Christ for us.  And on that day, we will see with our eyes what we hope for now.

At the same time, Christ will say to those on His left, Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

The Judge will list some of the works of service done by His believing people in this life, and He will accuse the wicked of not doing these same works.  “You fed me and gave me something to drink when I was hungry and thirsty, you welcomed me when I came to you as a stranger, you clothed me when I needed clothes and visited me when I was sick and in prison.” When did we see you in need, Lord?  When did we help You?, the righteous will ask.  Or, when didn’t we help you?, the wicked will ask.  Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.  Who is He talking about?  “These brothers of mine.”  It goes back to the inheritance, doesn’t it?  Christians inherit the kingdom of heaven because we have been made brothers and sisters of Christ through Baptism and faith in Him.  Jesus is talking about helping Christians in need—serving them because they are Christians—brothers and sisters of Christ Jesus.

There are many good works that God has commanded.  Jesus lists only these from the 5th Commandment—helping our neighbor with his bodily needs.  Why do you think?  Maybe because these are works that lots of people do, believers and unbelievers alike.  There are plenty of unbelievers who do works of charity and who help one another in need.  And yet on the day of judgment, none of those works will help them, because their works don’t come from faith in Christ, and their service isn’t done for Christians out of love for Christ. Only believers will be praised on the Day of Judgment, and their works will be recognized.

Jesus said to His disciples on the night He was betrayed, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”  See how Jesus spurs us on to faith in Him and to love for each other as Christians.

And why not?  God has given us all things, and all these things will pass away and be destroyed by fire.  As Peter says, Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace.

The day is coming and Jesus has warned us ahead of time.  He’s painted this picture for us so that unbelievers have no excuse on that day.  Here they have been warned, at least those who hear these words of Jesus.  Now is the time for repentance, not later.

He’s painted this picture for Christians so that we should not live as unwise, but as wise, for the days are evil, and the great day of separation will surely come.  The only way to be counted among the righteous is through faith in Christ Jesus.  And that faith is a living, active thing.  That faith in Christ urges us each day to serve our fellow Christians in love.  So take Jesus’ words here in the Gospel as comfort that, for as difficult as things are in this life, for as useless as our faith appears to be now, it will go well for those who believe in Christ in the end.  And take Jesus’ words as an encouragement for you to live as Christians, to serve one another in love, or as the writer to the Hebrews says, to keep on meeting together, encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day approaching.  Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged , , | Comments Off on The final separation

Warnings and comfort in times of tribulation

Posted on November 15, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

right-click to save, or push Play

Sermon for Third to Last Sunday after Trinity

Exodus 32:1-20  +  1 Thessalonians 4:13-18  +  Matthew 24:15-28

Today our thoughts begin to turn toward the end of the Church Year, and at the same time, to the end of this world and to the coming of Christ.  Last week as we celebrated All Saints’ Day, we saw the saints wearing white robes.  These, said the angel, are the ones who are coming out of the great tribulation—those who die in faith and whose souls are even now before the throne of God in the presence of Christ, the Lamb, washed in the blood of the Lamb and clothed in sparkling white.

But that means that the great tribulation they were coming out of, is here and now.  It means that these are the last days, and that you and I are living in the midst of the great tribulation.  Jesus speaks of it in the Gospel, and Matthew weaves back and forth between Jesus’ predictions about the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the world.  The Evangelist Luke separates Jesus’ sayings, especially in Luke 17 and Luke 21, so that you can easily tell when He is predicting the destruction of Jerusalem, which happened about 40 years after Jesus’ resurrection in 70 AD, and when Jesus is predicting the events leading up to the end of the world and the return of the Son of Man.  Why does Matthew tie them so closely together?  It’s no accident and no mistake.  The Holy Spirit wanted those two events to be connected for us, so that we learn some things about the great tribulation of the end times from the great tribulation that surrounded the destruction of Jerusalem.

Jesus warned His dear disciples and Christians about the coming destruction of Jerusalem and taught them how to survive those troubling times.  But today we won’t spend much time talking about the destruction of Jerusalem.  Instead, we’ll focus on this great tribulation in which we still live, and we’ll listen as Jesus gives us Warnings and Comfort in Times of Tribulation.

 “Therefore when you see the ‘abomination of desolation,’ spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place…”  An abomination is something that is detestable—hated and despised by God.  This abomination enters the “holy place” and brings with it “desolation.”  “Desolation” is devastation, to turn a place into a wasteland, either by causing the inhabitants to flee or by wiping them out.

Throughout the Old Testament, the thing most hated and detested by God is idolatry—the worship of idols, false gods.  You heard this morning about that abomination called the golden calf and how God almost wiped out—desolated—the entire Israelite community because of it.  Over and over again, the idols of the Old Testament caused desolations in Israel.

But the greatest idolatry Israel ever committed was its rejection of Jesus as the Savior sent from God to redeem them from their sins.  The Jews at the time of Jesus didn’t bow down to images of silver or gold.  But when the majority of them rejected Jesus as the Messiah, they turned away from the worship of the true God and turned toward the abomination of works-righteousness—trust in themselves and their own goodness.  From that time on, all their priests and all their sacrifices became an abomination in the sight of God, because instead of promoting faith in Christ, their worship now pointed away from Christ. The desolation of Jerusalem by the Roman armies was God’s severe punishment for such idolatry.

Idolatry is all around us in the world today as people worship false gods.  Sometimes images of gold or silver or stone, but more often things like money and comfort and pleasure, the idol of self and self-reliance and self-service.

But see!  Jesus is not warning us in this Gospel against all the idols that may exist in the world.  He speaks of “seeing the abomination of desolation” standing “in the holy place.”  The holy place is no longer Jerusalem. There’s nothing holy about Jerusalem anymore. No, the holy place is the Holy Christian Church, the communion of holy ones—the communion of saints.  And the abomination is still idolatry.

Yes, it’s true, the Lutheran Church has, for the last 500 years, identified the papacy in Rome as the very Antichrist that sets itself up in the Church above the Word of God, that exalts man and puts man in the place of God in the hearts of the people, and that condemns the teaching that sinners are justified by faith alone in Christ.  The abomination is epitomized—summarized in the papacy. But the abomination extends beyond the papacy, and just because the Lutheran Church has separated from Rome does not mean that the Lutheran Church is immune to the abomination.  No Christian church is immune, hence Jesus’ warning in our Gospel.

Where the word of man is made equal to or even given priority over the Word of God in the Church, there is the abomination that causes desolation.  Where faith alone in Christ for salvation is replaced with the works of man in the doctrines of the Church, there is the abomination that causes desolation.  Where men and councils and synods pretend to speak for God apart from His Word, or where they demand our allegiance above our allegiance to the Gospel of Christ, or where they condemn the teaching and the teachers of justification by faith alone in Christ, there is the abomination that causes desolation.  See it for what it is!

See it for what it is, because on the outside, it doesn’t look like an abomination.  Nobody, not even the pope, comes out and says he denies Christ.  And he can twist the Scriptures and quote from the Word of God and make it sound like he must know what he’s talking about.  And he has so many supporters and so many intelligent men to back up his doctrine and so much history and so much glory on his side, and he teaches so many things that are true and right and good.  Who could see an abomination of desolation behind the papacy?

Luther could.  And so could all the faithful who took to heart the simple Word of God and compared it to the teachings of Rome.  The abomination that causes desolation will not be removed from the holy place, from the Christian Church, until Jesus Himself returns and destroys it with the breath of His mouth, as Paul writes to the Thessalonians.  The abomination is an integral part of the great tribulation in which we live. Keep your eyes open and see it for what it is!

And when you see it, Jesus says, flee!  Flee and don’t look back.  And pray that your flight may not be hindered by anything.  Don’t go down to take anything out of your house. Don’t go back to get your clothes.  Or as He says in Luke, don’t look back as Lot’s wife did while Sodom and Gomorrah were being destroyed.  Her hesitation to leave the idolatry behind cost her her life.

But it’s not as simple—and in some ways, not as difficult!—as fleeing to the mountains, as the Jews in Judea were warned by Jesus to do when they saw the abomination in Jerusalem.  The holy place, the Christian Church, extends now into all the world, to every nation, tribe, language and people.  And wherever the people of God gather, there the abomination will threaten to take hold.

So what’s the answer?  Leave the world?  No, God Himself will take each one of us out of this great tribulation when He sees fit and bring us safely into His heavenly kingdom.  What, then?  Leave the Church itself where Christ Himself has given pastors and teachers to preach His Word and administer His Sacraments?  Wouldn’t Satan have his victory then!

No, you don’t leave “the Church.”  But you may need to leave “a” church or even a church body if the abomination is allowed to set up shop in the denomination.  We have some experience with that, don’t we?  Jesus’ admonition to flee and don’t look back still applies.

But as you leave and as you flee, be on your guard there, too, because false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.  As you run away and flee from the abomination of desolation there will be church salesmen trying to drag you into their dens. Look, here is Christ!  Look, he’s in here!  Come on in! Come to my church!  Don’t believe them, Jesus says.  It would be like hopping out of the frying pan and into the fire.

And so it is that, ever since Luther led the flight away from the Roman papacy, countless denominations have formed, one sect after another, and you know what almost all of them have in common?  They invite you to come and find Jesus where He isn’t, and they turn you away from where Jesus is.

What am I talking about?  I’m talking about the separation of Christ and His Spirit from the preached Word and the Sacraments.  When Jesus returns, every eye will see Him.  It will be like lightning flashing from one end of the heavens to the other.  Until then, Jesus is not found out in the desert or there in the inner room.  He isn’t found in your feelings or in your heart or in your prayers or in a certain kind of music.  Until His return, Jesus has promised to give Himself to us for salvation, for the forgiveness of sins, only in the Word, only in Baptism, only in Holy Communion.  And ironically, or maybe just in fulfillment of prophecy, the vast majority of denominations in the world today that have separated from Rome deny the saving, forgiving power of Holy Baptism, and they deny the real presence of Jesus in the Sacrament of the Altar for the forgiveness of sins.

Well, doesn’t this all sound frightful?  Abominations, desolations, false christs and false prophets and danger on every side.  What is our comfort in the midst of this great tribulation?  Our comfort is sure and certain.  Our comfort is Christ Himself and the Word of Christ that will not pass away, even though heaven and earth pass away. Our comfort is that Christ has preserved His Word among us.  His Spirit has gathered us here today around the Gospel and has enlightened us with His gifts.  Here He has given us shelter from the storm.  Here He forgives our sins and strengthens our faith and nourishes our bodies and souls with the body and blood of Christ, so that even in the midst of this great tribulation, God has not abandoned His children but has given us all we need until Christ returns, even the warnings and admonitions in today’s Gospel.  The Lord Jesus hasn’t sent us off into the great tribulation to fend for ourselves.  He has given us His Spirit and has promised to go with us.

The final words of our Gospel are also comforting, although somewhat cryptic.  For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together.  Strange as it sounds, that’s Jesus referring to Himself and His people, even as He says to His disciples in other place, I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. Even now we gather around Jesus in the Sacrament.  But when the times of this great tribulation are finally over and past, we will fly to Him like eagles, as you heard in the Epistle today: For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.

All of Jesus’ prophecies have come true up until now.  Why would we think that this one wouldn’t—this prophecy about the abomination of desolation and the great tribulation that His people would experience in the time before His return?  But if the great tribulation is real, then so is Jesus’ promise to sustain us along the way and to return to rescue His people. Pay attention to His warnings.  And take comfort in His promises.  And let us each be a blessing to one another along the way, in these times of great tribulation.  Amen.

Posted in Sermons | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Warnings and comfort in times of tribulation