Sermon for Palmarum, the Sixth Sunday in Lent: April 10, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Rejoice, Daughter of Zion, your king comes to you! Cheer loudly and wave your palms to greet Him as He marches in solemn procession on a colt, the foal of a donkey. But be aware of what it means for you to be called the daughter of Zion. This name does not give you much to be proud of. In fact, the unbelieving and overachieving world, the world you know that is drunk with its out-of-control self-esteem fetish, they would take it as nothing else but a slap in the face or backhanded compliment, as if someone were to tell you, “You know you’d be so pretty if you just lost a little weight.” Or “That job may not pay well, but at least you’re able to handle it.” Thanks but no thanks, right? Comments like that can get really humiliating and make you upset. Daughter of Zion refers to the church whenever the Bible uses that name, but it is certainly not a flattering title.

In the Old Testament, the names daughter of Zion and daughter of Jerusalem were used more to announce bad stuff happening to the church rather than good. The prophet Jeremiah witnessed the destruction of God’s city at the hands of an oppressive, terrorist Middle Eastern regime known as the Babylonian Empire. He lamented after this devastating event, and as the dust was still floating over this Ground Zero wasteland, Jeremiah cried, “Oh, how the Lord in His anger has set the daughter of Zion under a cloud!” (Lam. 2:1) He knew the reason why Jerusalem was destroyed. The Lord did it because the daughter of Zion rejected Him. The daughter of Zion was always in trouble. She was the sheep that always loved to stray, looking for better pasture in the fields of another master besides her God. Even to this day, she struggles against her own unbelief and gets bogged down in the sin that so easily entangles, so that she is often not completely free to run the race with perseverance, the way God intended for her.

The daughter of Zion is sometimes full of doubts. She wants to believe and to do what’s right, to stand right up and publicly make her statement of faith right along with all of you, but the trials, the temptations, the everyday life that swirls around her head push her down again. The daughter of Zion has often been brought down low, even forced down to her knees, in order for her to confess and admit she can do nothing to save herself. For her whole life, this struggling child of God has fallen to the temptation to rely on herself, to declare her independence from Christ, her loving Husband, and dictate to Him how He would best serve her. And then, almost invariably, she runs into trouble and she falls flat on her face. She finally realizes that she can’t make any more vows and promises to do better, because she’s going to go right ahead and break her word yet again.

The more the daughter of Zion would read and study the Bible, trying to follow its principles for a better life, the more that same Bible would accuse her and condemn her for the hypocrite that she is. She might have been sucked in by the televangelists, with their high-flying promises to achieve the glorious Christian life—all you have to do is really give your life to Jesus and pray more often. Follow Jesus’ example, she hears from popular preachers, everything will be all right in your life if you could just be a more dedicated believer. But where are those preachers and their great promises when the daughter of Zion faces sickness, the death of loved ones, and persecution because of the Christian faith? She is often led to think that there’s something wrong with her, that God is punishing her and her family for not being as committed to Him as she should. The daughter of Zion must come to terms with her own sin and doubt of God because deep down, in her sinful human heart that she inherited from Adam, there is nothing that could give her cause for any joy. If there is any hope for her, if there is any peace, it cannot come from her heart, but only from the outside.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, you are that stumbling, confused and broken daughter of Zion. Some of you may have tried to convince yourself that because of all your years in church and Sunday School, and perhaps even Lutheran Day School, that you are well on your way past all these things that those infants in the faith struggle with. You think you’re ready for the solid food, that you’re set in position to grasp the baton for the great spiritual relay race, yet really inside you are starving for the milk of God’s Word and the forgiveness that wipes the mud off of you after you’ve tumbled face-down yet again. You have every reason to be proud of the faithful people whom God used in the past to make this church possible, but now you throw your arms up in disgust at the changes going on. You are attacked, not only by the full frontal assault of the devil, but also with his favorite, sneaky, back-door approach, using your own sinful flesh and evil desires against you. Those whom you know who stay away from church are attacked the same way, and yet you find yourself too busy to reach out and help them in some way. Remember, I your pastor am just as much the struggling daughter of Zion as you are.

As I said, the hope for the daughter of Zion is outside, not coming from within your heart. There is no source of divine potential in yourself for you to tap in to. But that hope, and help and peace from outside of you does exist and it is perfect, because it is sent from God. Daughter of Zion, your help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth! He is your King, you are His privileged subjects because you are born into His kingdom through Baptism. What you could never do for yourself, your King Jesus has already done for you. He was born without sin and lived a perfect life, just so God the Father could look at you and no longer see the sin that would condemn you. When He was crucified just a few days after Palm Sunday, you were joined in Baptism together with Him in His death. The sinful flesh you still have is crucified with your King every day as you confess your sins to Him, to each other, to your pastor and then receive absolution, that is, forgiveness from God Himself. You are together with Him in His death, but also you are together with Him in His resurrection, and the new man within you is Jesus Himself, making His home within your heart, feeding your body and soul with His precious body and blood.

Therefore, rejoice O Daughter of Zion! This name of scorn is now your greatest pride, for Christ said, “My power is made perfect in weakness.” Your hardships have turned into badges of honor, for you have been counted worthy to suffer for the sake of Jesus. Behold, daughter of Zion, your King comes to you, righteous and having salvation. He comes to you today not with judgment and condemnation because of your sins and broken promises to Him, but rather He is full of forgiveness, life and salvation because of His sacrifice and victory, and because His promises to you will never fail. He comes to you humble and lowly, though now not riding through on a donkey, but He’s humble all the same and hidden for your benefit in His lowly gifts of water, Word, bread and wine. Though you have often fallen, your righteous King will lift you up and heal you, taking away all your sin. He has the power to restore your broken relationships with the forgiveness and peace that is unknown to our fallen world. He alone can lift our church to remain faithful to His Word and stay strong as a beacon of true saving light, shining forth to our spiritually dark society.

And the suffering, broken, beaten down daughter of Zion will not remain that way for long. In fact, the saints of God who have died believing in Christ and are safe in the arms of the Lord, they are no longer discouraged, they no longer taste the curse of death. Since you are baptized in Christ, and they have died in Christ, you are one together with them, too! You are never closer to this invisible cloud of witnesses than you are at this communion rail. There is true hope for you, the daughter of Zion, for you are one Church together with the blessed citizens of the heavenly Zion, the redeemed children of God who still pray for you and surround you along with the angels and archangels, even though you cannot yet see them.

Rejoice in the presence of your King, O Daughter of Zion! Receive Him in your mouth and drink Him down your throat in a joyful procession. Wave your palms and sing Hosanna for joy, though this week, take to heart the dark, subdued and solemn observance of His death for your sake that we will commemorate as we do each year. Only then on Easter, burst forth with singing and shouts of joyful Alleluia, for your King who comes to you now humble and lowly, will be the same King who will come again in great power to take you to your rightful home in His kingdom. Your Jesus who once was crucified, died and was buried, now lives. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest. A blessed Holy Week to you all!

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Zechariah 9:9–12 your King is coming to you … Lowly and riding on a donkey
Philippians 2:5–11 He humbled Himself … at the name of Jesus every knee should bow … every tongue confess
John 12:20–43 We wish to see Jesus

Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent: April 3, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Judge me, Lord! Prove me. Try me out. Test and verify that I am faithful. Be my vindication in the time of trial. That all sounds good and right. It’s what you know that God will do from time to time throughout your life. You know it’s good for you to be tested. Until the time of testing actually happens. Then, that becomes the last thing you want! Thank you, O God, for giving me the gift of faith and trust in You alone. But when that faith comes to the test, and something happens that makes me think, Lord, what were you thinking? I wonder, are you still there for me? I thought you always wanted what was good for me. I thought you made promises to your beloved children and kept them. So often, I have to struggle at my work, or my relationships. Temptations sneak up on me. I was about to get into a good rhythm and then something else happens to upset the balance in my life once again. Lord, I love your gifts of faithfulness to me, but the times of testing that seem to sneak up on me? I can do without.

No one could have felt that pain of faith-trial more than Abraham. He finally had a son, Isaac, who fulfilled the Lord’s own promise that he would become a father of many nations. You can’t be father of anything without a son. Without offspring. And so with Abraham and Sarah both in their 90s, Isaac arrived and the Lord’s promise came true. He was their whole world, the laughter, the delight of their old age. They would do anything to protect their little boy from harm, even from the teasing laughter of half-brother Ishmael, whether it was vicious or just a joke, Abraham and Sarah made sure nothing was going to touch this boy.

Then came the command from God, kill your son, your only son, whom you love. Offer him as a sacrifice to Me. Abraham, I am testing you, proving you. You don’t know it now, but I am doing this to vindicate you before all the other ungodly nations. Not only will I prove your cause and give you your son back, as if he had risen from the dead, I will also prove My cause at the same time and display to all the world how I, your God, I am going to come into My world and save it for eternity.

I, your God, will one day undergo and pass my own test, and send My own Son, My only Son, whom I love, and order Him to be sacrificed for the sake of the whole world. Him I will not spare or remove from the cross at the last minute. The ram with horns tangled in a bush would take the place of Isaac that day, but Jesus, with hands and feet nailed to the cross on a hill nearby, would take your place and mine on Good Friday. That’s the day Jesus knew that Abraham saw and rejoiced. Abraham rejoiced when he dropped his knife and took his beloved son off of the wood and the altar. He also rejoiced when he saw the day when the crucified Son of God would be removed from the wood of the cross, laid in a tomb and raised to life on the third day. That was the day when not only Isaac was back in Abraham’s embrace, but you also would be part of that heavenly bear hug from Father Abraham.

Jesus testified to Abraham’s rejoicing when He was undergoing a trial Himself. He was questioned before the official religious leaders who were clearly by this time trying to find a way to stop Jesus, even if it meant putting Him to death. As our Lord answered the questions put to Him, He was not looking for a way out of their traps. Instead, His responses were the very cords that were beginning to bind Him like Isaac was at first tied up as if he were a lamb about to be slaughtered. Jesus testified to His status as the Son of God walking around in a human body and did not hold back the truth, even pointing out the liars who had the power to destroy Him. This was no insult, like these leaders had thought. Jesus could prove that they had constantly misrepresented the truth and corrupted their spiritual official capacity. He didn’t have the demon possessing Him; they did!

They should not have gotten away with their plot to get rid of Jesus. Our Savior should have been vindicated and cleared of all these frivolous charges against Him, from destroying the Jerusalem temple complex all the way up to the ridiculous implication that Jesus wanted to unseat the Caesar himself! But it was the Father’s will that Jesus would not be vindicated by man. He wanted the grossest injustice and greatest evil imaginable to happen—He wanted it to happen to Jesus, that is. God loved you, so that He took the wrongs you have done, all the evidence in your life that says you have not passed His test, and placed the entire blame on Jesus instead. The Son of God was directed to be judged as though He were the Sinner and allow Himself to be punished to the fullest extent. His blood, which poured out in the whipping, beating, nailing, suffocating of Jesus on the Cross, is your cleansing flood that was washed over you in your baptism, and is continually cleansing you to forgive your sins and purify your life, as long as God allows you to take your breaths of earthly air. Then, He’ll call you home to the rejoicing of not only Abraham, but all your fellow saints and the angels too.

Jesus was judged, you were vindicated. You were proven true and faithful in the time of trial, not because you had the stamina to withstand the attack, but rather because Jesus took your place and He was faithful to the heavenly Father for you. For Christ your Savior who died in utter blood and pain, has been raised to life, and when He was raised, not only was He acquitted, proven true, vindicated; you also were acquitted, you were accepted into God’s forever kingdom. Nothing that afflicts you, that sorely tries and tests you while you are still here in the flesh on earth, none of that will ever be able to separate you from the Love of God that has been forever extended to you through Jesus Christ. Follow the example of your fellow Good Shepherd members who recently proved to our observation that they were not fearful of death or painful trial, because they knew what you also know, that every day is one step closer for us to see Jesus face-to-face.

For a little while, you will still have occasional tests. God is going to verify that your complete trust and hope remains in Him alone. Your loving Savior assures you that these tests do not hang your faith or your eternal destiny in the balance. No uncertainty there. These instead are all tests of love, even though they still smart and prick your soul at times with spiritual pain. Death is still a scary enemy, but if it tries to bare its teeth at you, then you will find that Jesus has knocked out all of its teeth! The grave will not hold you away from the open arms of God, because you have been judged, and Jesus assured your verdict to be life forever more.

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Gen. 22:1–14 where is the lamb for a burnt offering?
Heb. 9:11–15 Not with the blood of goats and calves
John 8:42–59 before Abraham was, I AM.

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Lent: March 27, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

The money always dries up toward the end of the month. Your health or physical condition is not at the level you would like. Your emotions or those of your family irritate you to the point of insanity. You are going without, and so you face a problem where it looks more and more likely that there isn’t a solution. You find yourself in a condition that seems beyond help. And isn’t it that very condition which then prompts you to ask the question, “Why?” “Why do I have to endure suffering and lack such as this?” “Why must I simply ‘make do’ with it?” “Why can’t the Lord send down a miracle for me like multiplying the bread and fish?” “All I’m asking for is for just enough to live peaceably and comfortably – just enough so that I don’t have to be in constant pain, persistent anxiety, or watch every penny from week to week.” Is that asking too much?

And there it is, right there. Wondering if you’ve asked too much. There’s where you are in danger of losing or damaging your precious faith. Because it’s not a case of asking too much, but actually of not asking for enough. What do I mean? Why stop with asking just for material gain, or for the greater ease of your mental and physical anguish? Why not just go all the way and ask for an absolutely perfect life? After all, wasn’t it Jesus Himself who once said: “Ask for anything in My name … and you shall receive it?” You and I, you see, we seem to have this tendency to view everything backwards – or at the very least, with a severely limited and often self-centered point of view. While God constantly provides for you in His Holy Word a glimpse of transcendent, everlasting life, you tend to be too busy fretting about this miserable and temporary life. While God wants us all to look at suffering and lack of things with a heavenly perspective, we insist on starting with the bad and letting that influence the way we look at the good. That’s what makes our Christian joy feel so scarce in our lives.

Among the most important lessons to be learned from a familiar miracle story like this is that you must recognize that, on your own – at least apart from Christ – you have nothing of value to offer God. Look again at the first part of the Gospel. I want you to note something about this multitude which followed Jesus. They had nothing – and that’s not simply in terms of food. What I mean is that these people had nothing about them which would cause God to love them. Do you see that they were just like you?

Now Jesus had just received news that John the Baptist had been beheaded by King Herod’s orders. It was just described in the verses immediately before the feeding of the 5000 was recorded in the other Gospel books. That event was terrible news for Jesus to hear. A boastful, power-drunk king would rather save face than kill an innocent man. But before you get too offended, you must remember that according to God’s Law you too are also murderers. For Jesus Himself has said that even hating someone in your heart is the same as murder in God’s sight – as is failing to help and befriend our neighbor in every bodily need, as the Catechism explains. So, no less than King Herod, each of us sinners are murderers too. And as such, there’s nothing that you can find within you—whether it is years as a church member, or family pedigree, or amount of “sweat equity” you’ve built up—none of that would invoke God’s love – nor would it dissuade Him from punishing you.

And yet there’s still good news for you, for even though the crowd that pursued Jesus out in the countryside had no redeeming qualities – we’re told that Christ’s heart went out to them. He was moved with compassion for them and healed their sick ones. And so, without reason, without logic, and without any just cause, our Lord Jesus fed them. Then He went beyond that spectacular miracle to do even more– He sacrificed His own life on the cross for miserable, sinful creatures – even for you.

Isn’t it amazing, that here we are, a people who are so caught up with amassing the table-scraps of temporal things for ourselves, while God’s desire is to bless us with so much more, with the ultimate banquet. Here we are so busy trying to get our hands on the mere five loaves of bread and two fish. Yet at the very same time Christ has already secured for us that heavenly food which will satisfy our greatest need – that food which will bestow upon us everlasting life and true Christian joy. Most specifically, that meal is His very own body and blood given and shed for us sinners to eat and drink for the forgiveness of our sins and to strengthen our faith and declare to one another our unity in confessing the one, true Christian faith.

The clues are in today’s Gospel. Did you notice them? If you didn’t, look again at the miracle of feeding the five thousand. It’s really quite significant. First, the people reclined. Then, Jesus took the bread, gave thanks, broke it, and gave it to His disciples. Does it sound familiar? It ought to. Even though at this point in our Lord’s ministry, Holy Communion wasn’t initiated yet, it can’t be an accident that this was the very same action Jesus used when He celebrated the first Lord’s Supper on the night He was betrayed. And notice also what happened when the meal was concluded. There were twelve full baskets left over. It can’t be a coincidence that there are also twelve Disciples – twelve who would carry on the office of Christ and distribute His gifts to the Church. In just the same way, the Pastors of Christ’s Church have continued to do right up to the present day in the stead and by the command of their Lord, and not to fulfill the whims of whoever controls their livelihood.

In Christ, dear friends, you’ve already been given everything you need. You have as your possession the forgiveness of sins, the sanctified life, salvation, and the promise of an eternal home in heaven, and in the resurrection. Nothing you might think is lacking in your life can ever supersede or replace what God’s already given you in Christ Jesus through His Word, through His Spirit, and through His Church. You may recall from Romans the Lord’s promise through Saint Paul that said throughout your tribulation, distress and persecution, you remain more than conquerors through Him Who loved you! It’s all yours. Just ask for it.

But now if that’s so, why do you still have to go through tribulations? Why do you have to put up with heartache? Why do you have to go without? Why doesn’t God simply give you deliverance like you request; or freedom from the pain of this world? Well, that is precisely because you are God’s elect, the ones chosen for eternal life, and so therefore He allows these things to happen.

That’s what explains that whole part about how all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose. Well, the fact is that you have been baptized and called to faith so that you might partake of eternal salvation. And the “things which work together for good,” are described plain as day: “tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, and sword.” God allows those who are His elect to experience such things. Why? Because in the midst of it all you have no other choice but to place your faith in God alone for all things. In your own limited wisdom and understanding you could never fathom how any of this could possibly be for your benefit. And so you simply have to take God at His Word.

You have to accept things in your life the way they are because He says so? Does that make God indifferent or uncompassionate toward you? Not at all – but rather it reveals He has such great love and mercy that He was willing to give up His own Son for the guilt of our sin – and all so that He might then grant you the full assurance, that already in this life – through the Gospel-word-and-sacrament ministry of His Church, which you sing and speak in the liturgy, that nothing – “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate you from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Can you see yourself among those spiritually hungry crowds following Jesus? Are you faced with the struggles that come with being a faithful Christian in our world today? If so, then you can see your life in the life of Jesus Christ. By faith, His life belongs to you just as much as you belong to Him. In Him you live, and move, and have your being. And if your life is in Jesus, what are you lacking? Nothing. What do you have to be anxious or worry about? Absolutely nothing. And what do you have to look forward to? Absolutely everything – everything in Jesus – both now and forevermore – for His sake – and in His name.

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Is. 49:8–13 In an acceptable time I have heard You
Gal. 4:21–31 Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are children of promise.
John 6:1–15 Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat?

Sermon for the Third Sunday in Lent: March 20, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

As we were preparing for this season of Lent, you may recall that I enjoined you to rest your whole faith and confidence in the power of God’s Word. Three Sundays into the season of Lent, and we have seen very clearly why this must be for us. It’s because we are in a spiritual battle. Satan waged war against Jesus in the wilderness after His forty days of fasting. An evil spirit tormented the daughter of the Canaanite woman that we read about last week. Today, the Gospel begins with Jesus casting out a demon that had made a man mute, then it leads to a skirmish of words with His enemies who claimed Jesus was using demonic power to deceive the masses, and it ends with a correction for those who wish to praise the Virgin Mother Mary at the expense of trusting in God’s Word alone. This is a constant battle, and you have no choice but to be involved in it. Unlike the distance of space and situation that we have between us and the ravages of war going on right now in the Ukraine, this spiritual war hits us much more deeply than our news headlines and gas prices. All along the way, our only weapons, whether they be offense or defense, are found in the Word of God.

As he did earlier in Genesis, when the devil convinced Adam and Eve that they could be like God just by eating the fruit of the forbidden tree, he’s constantly using the tactic against you too, feeding you the delusion that you can get along much better without God calling all the shots. Satan tricked Pharaoh through his court magicians that these divine plagues were just tricks that anyone with magical skills or contacts with evil spirits could perform. Turn your staff into a serpent? We can do that! Turn the Nile River into blood—that’s an old one. Thanks to the devil’s work, our human race has turned into a house divided, for it was he who convinced human beings that they should attempt to declare their independence from God. And when sinful human creatures declare their independence from God, they quickly turn on each other as well, as we’ve seen all too clearly these days.

Do you think you’re safe from this evil scheme? Does your baptism somehow protect you from the assaults of the devil? If you think so, you should guess again. Satan works the hardest against those who are not his. He can divide those in a Christian house against each other just as easily as he could anyone else. But he doesn’t stop with messing up your relationship to God and with other people. The devil also attacks your very self and actually creates a civil war within you.

The Apostle Paul describes this inner conflict in his letter to the Romans: “For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I desire not to do, that’s what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I desire not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.”

What’s true for Paul is also true for you. As a Christian, you want to do what pleases God and helps other people, yet you actually do the very opposite. That’s the war between good and evil also going on within your flesh—a war instigated by the devil himself. And what’s more, he has an ally in your own sinful human nature, a traitor that would make even Benedict Arnold blush. It’s the sin that dwells in you, it’s in your very nature, causing you to divide yourself against God and feed your own lusts and desires. It’s that part of you that says you’d get along much better without God calling all the shots. Your heart is a house divided, and if the devil and your sinful self had their way, you would not stand.

It can start out very innocently, as we read today in Ephesians, the ways of the evil world have always tried to creep in to the family of the Church. Even foolish talk and crude joking can be pathways leading to the total denial of the faith, if they are not checked with the law of God and repentance. The covetous man can hide his idolatry from everyone else, but the Lord has still removed His inheritance from those who love the things of this world more than Him. We must not be deceived. We were once darkness, on the wrong side of this spiritual battle, but now we are light in the Lord, and our Savior Jesus fights for us.

To highlight this battle and what it means for our Christian walk through life, in today’s parable, our Lord likened the devil to a strong man in order to point this out: Jesus is the stronger man, the one who actually has bound Satan and plundered him for all he’s worth. Though we have given in to temptations and disregarded God’s will in favor of the darkness of the slave-holding Egypt that we have left, Jesus stood up to the crafts and assaults of the devil. He prevailed without falling into sin—for our sakes. God has always had the upper hand in these battles with the Evil One. Remember that Pharaoh was convinced that his magicians could match the plagues that Moses dished out? Then when the gnats and the flies started attacking in unprecedented swarms, those magicians could only admit the truth: This is the finger of God. Their snake-staffs were swallowed by the serpents made from Moses and Aaron’s staffs. Even they could see that every time God faced off with the devil, that God would always win. Though we, following our deceived sinful nature, would rather side with the devil and only think for ourselves, Jesus took it upon Himself to rescue us from the slavery that placed us in the house of Satan.

Our rescue was certainly a show of divine power, because Jesus destroyed the power of the devil once and for all. Yet at the same time, it looked the opposite—like the devil was the one who would emerge victorious. With Jesus and what He’s going through as we read in the Gospels, we don’t see cataclysmic plagues unleashed against the bad guys and our Savior’s boot pressing down on the devil’s neck. In fact, the ultimate death blow in this war that had begun at the dawn of time was when Jesus humbled Himself to the point of death, even death on a cross!

He chose to bind your sins to Himself and forced God the Father to be divided against His own Son—after all, who was it that said, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” The rejection and scorn, suffering and dying of His crucifixion, these were in fact the very cords that bound up Satan and rendered him powerless and divided. Now with the strong man tied up, Jesus the Stronger Man robbed his house, taking back you and me, the poor souls who were once lost in our sins and slavery. Once we were rightfully accused of sin and rebellion, of doubt and hypocrisy. Now we are in Christ, the risen and victorious Savior. You are free!

Now that you are released from the devil’s kingdom and made a part of the Kingdom of God, you are no longer a house divided from Him. Instead, Jesus took great pains to unite you as one with Him and with your fellow believers. He does some binding on you, too, a different kind of binding. Christ binds you close to Himself in faith that is His gift to you, and He binds you to your neighbor in love, so that you may fulfill each other’s needs. With His Holy Spirit in you and guiding you, now you walk as children of light and you have the ability that you never had before to pursue all that is good, true and right according to the Ten Commandments. Jesus calls you His brother, sister and mother, because you believe in Him, you trust in the power of His Word, and by His grace you perform His will, not as a requirement but as a naturally-occurring response. Blessed are those who hear the Word of God and keep it.

Renounce the devil, and all his works and all his ways. Resist his evil schemes and deceptions. Instead, turn in faith to your Savior Jesus, who called you out of darkness and into His marvelous light. Continue to rely on the power of God’s Word that always will fight for you in this war that you are in. Do not remain a “house divided” within your soul. Drown that rebel sinful nature in the waters of your baptism into Christ, a baptism that still lives on to make you grow in your Christian life. Remember your baptism by reminding yourself, “Jesus claimed me as His own and no one can take that inheritance away from me.” You are not a possession of Beelzebul. He has no power over you. Instead, you belong to Jesus and your sinful division is mended because of His word of forgiveness.

“A house divided against itself cannot stand.” It is true for us in our spiritual battle as Christians, now that we are free from the bondage of sin, death and the devil. Because of Christ, Satan’s kingdom has been divided and his eternal judgment has come, but we on the other hand stand united in our Lord and share in the everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness that God has in store for us. Thanks be to stronger man Jesus, for He bound strong man Satan, and released us from his prison. Now, with God’s Word in your Lenten arsenal, you are in God’s house unto eternity.

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Ex. 8:16–24 the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.”
Eph. 5:1–9 be imitators of God as dear children
Luke 11:14–28 blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!

Sermon for the Second Sunday in Lent: March 13, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

In today’s Gospel, a woman knelt before Jesus, saying,
“Lord, help me.” And He answered, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”

Whenever the Gospel of Jesus is read in our midst, each Christian has but one job. We must each find a place to stand, not only literally stand on our feet for the reading of the Gospel, but also, in a matter of speaking, spiritually stand in that Gospel too. We must each locate ourselves inside its precious and true story. If you fail to see yourself standing in the Gospel, you also will fail to see Jesus and what He came to do for you.
Today’s Gospel does not give us very many options. Present here are only Jesus and a woman kneeling at His feet. Jesus calls her a dog.

Here is the thing to remember about Jesus, no matter what He might appear to be saying: your Lord Jesus Christ does not have a mean bone in His body! He NEVER speaks with cruelty. He ONLY speaks love and compassion. Even our Lord’s harsh Words—even His rough actions, like when He makes a whip and drives people and the money changers from the temple (Matthew 21:12-13, John 2:15) even those things are said and done for us and for our salvation. Do not consider it an insult that Jesus calls this woman a dog. Consider it instead a proclamation of the faith.

“It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Our Lord did not call the woman a dog because of the way she looked, and certainly not because she was a woman. Jesus only called her a dog because she did not have any more Jewish blood in her veins than you do. It was customary for the Jews to call their gentile neighbors “dogs.” To the Jews “belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises” (Romans 9:4). To the dogs—that is to say, to people like this woman—belonged nothing. She deserved nothing. She did not qualify. She and her nation were on the outside.

Why, then, did this woman throw herself at Jesus’ feet? She was seeking the benefit of gifts that had been sworn on an oath to give to someone else. She wanted to receive the blessing that had been promised to Abraham and Isaac and their descendants forever—but not to her. This woman did not pretend that she had any inherent right to receive the things promised. She felt no sense of entitlement. She stood as a foreigner and stranger in someone else’s house. She made her appeal to “the Lord, the Son of David,” solely on the basis of His grace and mercy; solely on the basis of who Jesus is, rather than who she is. This woman had nothing, but she knew Jesus had plenty: “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” I know, and I believe with all my heart, that You have enough, even for me.

Is it really so insulting for you and me to identify ourselves with the dog in today’s Gospel? The good news here is quite clear: this woman’s lack of qualification, unfortunate as it was, did not prevent her from receiving the benefit of being with Jesus, and that is a VERY GOOD PLACE for you and for me to stand! Like this woman, we should not even try to offer Jesus our impressive resumes. Like this woman, we should each say: many other people are much more worthy to be with Jesus than I am. We should kneel in the place of the Gospel story where this woman kneels if we want to see Jesus as she sees Him. Above all, we should NOT be insulted by unbecoming analogies or unflattering figures of speech just because they sting the way they must.

He said, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
“Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” With these Words, this Canaanite woman spoke the very Christian faith by which you and I are saved. With these Words, this woman was saying,
“I am not worthy, Lord, but I firmly believe my merit or worthiness is NOT the point.”
“God’s promise of forgiveness and salvation in Christ extend beyond the bloodlines of Israel and reach even to those who are far from Jewish.”
“Just a tiny bit of Your infinite mercy will be fine, my dear Lord! A crumb is all I need!”
“It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”

We could venture, while we’re at it, to take our Lord’s analogy a little farther than we see here, as a matter of illustrating what is in Scripture. There is, when you come to think of it, at least one very good thing about being a dog: Dogs become interested in the things that nobody else wants. Dogs pay close attention even to tiny morsels of food and they find nourishment where others see only a waste of time. They could be well-fed and even satisfied on their own food, and still crave those tiniest of scraps that happen to fall on the floor. It’s as if they’re saying, I may have just finished eating, but a crumb falls on the floor, and all of a sudden, I’m starving again!

Yet what is the Holy Communion, which we are about to receive? There is present in the Communion only a crumb, a tiny morsel of food; one that very few people desire, for various reasons:
The Jews did not want the Body and Blood of their Lord Jesus for the forgiveness of sins. For them it was enough that His body was pierced and His blood was shed—just so long as Jesus went away and stayed away. As St. Paul wrote in Romans, to the Jews “belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ who is God over all, blessed forever” (Romans 9:4). But the Jews did not want Him!

To use the imagery of today’s Gospel, the children of the house wanted nothing of the lavish banquet of salvation that God had prepared in the body of His Son Jesus, the very bread that God had promised. What good thing resulted from their disinterest in the banquet of salvation? Thankfully, there resulted plenty of crumbs left for us dogs to live on.

Many Christians likewise share the same disinterest in Jesus’ Body and Blood. “The Holy Communion is merely bread!” they claim. “Jesus cannot possibly be present in a crumb,” they complain. These sadly mistaken Christians imagine that when Jesus said of the Bread, “This is My body, given for you for the forgiveness of you sins” (Matthew 26:26, 28), He must have been talking about something else. So they have no interest in our meal. They have interest only in making the meal something that it is not.

If you were to drop a dollar on the ground, even a guy with a backache will stoop over to pick it up. Serve the Holy Communion, and you’ll find most people cannot be bothered. Yet this woman was right. She demonstrated for us how we are to stand, to stand with our hearts squarely fixed in the Gospel. The children’s bread is here offered to you, and you are welcome to have it to the full. This woman gives us a good place to stand because she speaks the same faith that the Holy Spirit has planted also in your heart: “Amen, Lord! Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” And so you are filled, fed, forgiven, and fortified in body and in soul unto life everlasting.

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Gen 32:22–32 a Man wrestled with him until the break of day
Rom. 5:1–5 having been justified by faith, we have peace with God
Matt. 15:21–28 even the little dogs eat the crumbs which fall from their masters table

Sermon for the First Sunday in Lent: March 6, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Sin is not just a theological topic. It’s your mortal enemy. Sin is always on the attack against you, an attack mounted by the father of lies, the devil himself. You were promised that your Lord Jesus Christ dwells in you ever since your baptism, but His protection from this attack seems weak at times. It’s very distressing. No one is above sin and temptation, and our sinful nature is of course to blame for that, and we are descended from the first sinners, Adam and Eve – but that isn’t much comfort. Wouldn’t you rather be rid of sin for good? Isn’t that why you came here today? You know there’s sin in your life – and you don’t like it one bit.

Yet the fact of the matter is that you’re never going to be freed from sin’s assaults until that day when God takes you to Himself. Daily you have to struggle with it. You struggle with it because you live in this fallen world. You struggle with it because the “Old Adam” who clings to you will never let go. And you struggle with it because the old evil foe will expend all his energy trying to trap and devour any who might try to escape his grip. Should it come as a surprise then, that when Jesus determined to take upon Himself the full weight of your sin, He found Himself face to face with the very same temptations you daily have to deal with?

When the prince of darkness confronted Jesus in the wilderness, right after His baptism, you might notice that he tempted our Lord with the very same unholy trinity of evil that you and I daily struggle with. Those three temptations try to cast doubt on your heavenly Father’s ability to provide for your body, to value the praise and wealth of the world rather than God’s love, and to place one’s self over and above the Lord.

He was in the wilderness forty days without food, and so Satan tried to tempt Him first with bread – and what is more, to get Jesus to obtain that bread in a most unholy way. How strong was this first temptation? Imagine how great the struggle would be for you if you hadn’t eaten for forty days! Then add the full force of all the temptations arising from your old, sinful nature – the gluttony, the lust and the desire for all kinds of things that could easily bring you into harm’s way. It’s not only an unhealthy desire for food, but this temptation affects those who destroy themselves and their families by lust – who daily face the reality of addiction of any kind – and daily give in to it. These are the very same temptations of the body which our Lord Jesus Christ fully resisted when He stood fast against the devil’s enticement that He feed Himself through a misuse of His own creative power. And when He refused to satisfy His hungry body in this way, that made His body become the righteous payment for all the sin you’ve ever committed with your body.

When it comes to the second temptation, you yearn for the pleasures you could enjoy if only you weren’t a Christian – when you reach out to take something that God has not seen fit to give you – when you disregard the boundaries God has set about you – the authority He’s set over you – and the dignity of the neighbor with whom you live and work – in all these ways Satan is busy tempting you. Satan came to Jesus with the false promise that if He would only yield to him, all the wealth of all the kingdoms of all the world would be His. Think how that temptation must have felt to His human nature – how wonderful the palaces of the world must have seemed, even to this Man who is God, after forty days in a barren wilderness, struggling to survive. Think how you struggle to improve your earthly life – to get a better job, a bigger house, a nicer car, anything pleasing or more secure – and then consider how Satan promised Jesus He could have far more than that by taking the deceptive shortcut he offered Him. But Jesus willingly set aside His own desires, interests, and even His own gain, to the authority and will of His Father so that you might receive it all in His place.

You know well the struggles you daily face from the Devil, who comes to reinforce the temptation that’s already in you by reason of your own sinful nature and this fallen world, who makes sure the thing you’re most likely to fall for, that’s exactly what’s placed there before you. He takes perverse pleasure in causing the fall of those who seem highest and holiest – and that through the most sordid, cheap means at his disposal – because the seedier and cheaper the temptation that causes a person to fall, the harder it’ll be for others to make God’s voice heard in this world which already refuses to believe that there is a loving heavenly Father.

Every decent civic leader is besmirched by the person who would sell his vote or judgment for a few dollars – and soon all politicians and judges become derided as fools – in spite of the fact that God is the One who established them in their office for earthly peace and good order. Every honorable, hard-working businessman is hurt by the person who sells shoddy wares at inflated prices and preys on the gullibility of the public – even though God is the One who stations every person in their vocation to see that their neighbor is well-served. Every decent, loving, mother and father is hurt by those parents who abuse and neglect their own children – so that soon every mom and dad become the object of society’s scorn – though in truth mothers and fathers have been called by God to serve in an office that’s higher and holier than any other on earth. Even pastors are robbed of their voice and effect upon the hearts of people by that pastor or priest who falls into scandal – so that after awhile, to many people, all pastors become suspect. Consider who it is that’s able to plant such an evil image in your heart. Consider who it is who wants to destroy the blessed work of all good and helpful vocations – and of every upright and honest leader, parent, teacher, or pastor.

Satan’s the one who wants all authority, all offices, all vocations, and every avenue for Godly love, wisdom, and service to be degraded, scorned, ridiculed, and abandoned. Satan would like nothing better than if you would disregard everyone but yourself. He’d love you to overthrow your family, Church, society, and government in the false belief that you could then be in charge of it all by yourself. He’d like nothing better than to convince you that you can actually be like God. It’s the breath of the Evil One which causes you to believe that ultimately you alone know what’s best. It’s a Satanic will which thinks it has the right to put itself before the needs of others. And this is what Jesus faced when He was taken to the pinnacle of the Temple and tempted to throw Himself down so that the angels of God could swoop down to catch Him. This is the temptation you face in your darkest hour – when destruction, rebellion, suicide, and all forms of lashing out against your self try to seep into your consciousness.

Make no mistake about it, dear children of God – it’s in moments like this when you come face to face with the Evil One himself – and against such power, you, in your sin, on your own, are entirely helpless to defend yourself – no matter how strong you may think you are. The old Evil Foe does mean deadly woe. Deep guile and great might are his dread arms in fight. On earth is not his equal. And if you try to stand on your own in opposition to such might and power, soon you’ll find yourself defeated. Yet, sadly, that’s exactly what oftentimes happens. You try to stand on your own – and soon you find yourself caving in – helpless, hopeless, and powerless before the might of the devil’s temptation which attacks through our flesh, our world, and our own evil lusts and desires. But know this for certain, Jesus has already – once and for all – stood where you yourself have often fallen! He was tempted, just as you are daily – and yet, He fully and completely overcame your mortal enemy. And, even though you may think and act as if you’re all alone in this world and struggle, the Good News is the exact opposite!

The Valiant One, whom God himself elected, is there with you – fighting alongside of you – fighting for you. This Jesus Christ, the Lord of hosts – this One who carries within Himself the very power and might of heaven – this One who alone is God – alongside whom there is no other God – who was tempted by Satan in every possible way – this is the One who overcame it all for you – as Satan lost, and Jesus won. And now, because Jesus has won, you’ve been freely given His life and victory forever to claim as your own. Daily He gives you the prize of forgiveness from your own defeat under sin and temptation. Even in the midst of all this He has made you the victor. The kingdom of God is near as Jesus calls you again to repent and believe the Good News – to come to Him with your sin so that you might leave this place today with His righteousness – and as He gives you opportunity, to eat His body and drink His blood for the forgiveness of your sins!

Once, you were alone and without hope – helpless before the threefold enemies of your old sinful nature, this fallen world, and the devil. But now, with all the hosts of God’s kingdom, you too are able to sing with joy the words Martin Luther sang so long ago in celebration of the awareness God had given him concerning the blessed victory of the Savior for us all:
“Though devils all the world should fill,
all eager to devour us,
we tremble not, we fear no ill,
they shall not overpower us.
This world’s prince may still scowl
fierce as he will.
He can harm us none, he’s judged; the deed is done;
one little word can fell him.

The Word they (our enemies) still shall let remain,
nor any thanks have for it.
He’s by our side upon the plain (of our battle)
with His good gifts and Spirit.
And take they our life,
goods, fame, child, and wife,
though these all be gone,
our victory has been won.
The kingdom ours remaineth.”

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Gen 3:1–21 “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden?’
2 Cor. 6:1–10 now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation
Matt. 4:1–11 If You are the Son of God…

Ash Wednesday March 2, 2022

When I give, I wonder if anyone will notice? Will it all count off on my tax return? Will I have enough to live on after I give what God asks of me? Perhaps it will help if I accompany my gifts with a little trumpet fanfare flourish…

Now you know that’s not going to fly, right? Yet those and other similar selfish thoughts are still what runs through our heads whenever we think of our giving.

Could you be so popular as a giver that you could stand next to Oprah and the Queen, letting the crowds clamor before you as you spread the gifts of your generosity all around to those less fortunate?
You could be all the rage on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok and all of those places too, because you scratch where the people of our day and age itch. You could meet their needs and they’ll be putty in your hands.

How about if you became a Super Pray-er, an Über- Faster. Your prayers are right out there in public, and you bow down on one knee for all to see! You are so intense in giving up luxuries for Lent—we’re not talking about a cover-up for a diet. You could move beyond the typical lack of chocolate, soft drinks, saturated fats. People will really take notice if you do something extreme like camp out on a roof for forty days, attract attention from the news, win the sympathy and acclamation of thousands, maybe even millions!

And it just might work, too. Until Jesus comes along and says, Watch out! Like a shot across your bow. Something like that from Jesus could really put a damper on all those “acts of righteousness” that your human nature’s imagination is going wild on, those ways you’re trying to store up for yourself treasures on earth and the praises of earthly men.

That’s Jesus! He’s the real spoil-sport when it comes to things like that. Just as it’s getting to the point where you and he can be really good buddies, He goes ahead and shakes you up with another warning, Watch out!

You still need the warning. No one knows it better than He does. You are constantly enticed by evil forces, not only to sin, but also to do good works! Can you believe that? Evil is making you do good—if only you manage to do the good thing for the wrong reason.

And what is the wrong reason? To glorify yourself, to be seen by others. To replace the Lord your God and center all glory on the person you look at in the mirror every day.
Even good, loving and helpful deeds can lead to a destruction of faith, whenever it becomes all about putting on a show; to gain recognition by all that you can accomplish. A life of acclamation, benefits, perquisites, popularity, maybe even a little notoriety to make people notice.

Yet do you know what sort of life that really is? Do I dare to say… it’s bondage. Slavery! You will get caught always having to justify what you do as going the extra mile, of filling one more mouth than you counted on, of outdoing the last generous act because the finicky crowds are not as impressed as they once were. The insatiable Law will not let you off because you meant well. It will always demand more.

Watch out, Jesus warns. Rightly so—because He says, others may give you lots of recognition, shower you with affection, laud your generosity, your prayer life and intensity of fasting, but the only one who matters, your Father in heaven, He is not going to regard your piety the same way.

You should pay attention to what Jesus says to you, because He is the one who made His Father to be your Father. He brought you to Him by grace through His death and resurrection. He set you free from that slavery of needing to be recognized, of justifying yourself. He says,
When you give to the needy, don’t put on a show. Don’t let your right hand know what your left hand is doing! Let your giving be done in secret!

It’s not about you. It’s about your needy neighbors. They need your love and your help, and your Father, the only one who needs to know. Trust me, He’ll know, Jesus says so.

Do you suppose that He will criticize your prayer life? You bet He would! Listen to Jesus:
And when you pray, do not try to be seen by others. It’s not about you, remember? Pray instead for those who need help. Pray for the world, your family, nation, your church, those who are sick, poor, dying, the persecuted. Stop the “look at me” public spectacles and theater performances. And don’t try to pass it off as effective witnessing or super-evangelism work.

Jesus has the nerve to say, Go pray without anybody else knowing. Go to your room, shut the door and talk to your Father who is in secret.
And your fasting? What are you going to gain when you give up something for Lent and then sound your trumpets about it? Jesus cannot stand it if you screw up your face and look so disfigured that you tease out the sympathies of a fawning and adoring public. In your dreams!

Stop the phony act! Wash your face… Go ahead and fast, but make it only for yourself. Nobody needs to know. Only your Father, and He already knows that whatever you choose for fasting or giving up for Lent is designed to remove any distraction from prayer and study of God’s Word. That’s its only function.

Jesus warns you about these things because a true disciple of His lives life differently. You realize that He is your one and only treasure in heaven. When it comes to other people, you don’t work to earn their love, adoration and recognition, you must die to that phony, self-centered life. Don’t work to set yourself as a greater saint than they are. You need to repent of always making excuses for your attraction to yourself.

It’s called a “curved in on yourself” life. It will end up not impressing others. It will lead to utter despair. The curved in on yourself life will not fulfill you, it will fail you. Earthly fame is fickle. One day’s praise, is the next day’s scathing criticism. The spiritual paparazzi will make you, and they’ll break you.

You are disciples for whom Jesus died to redeem you. As for others, you are to love and serve them, just as He loved and served you. So when (He still says when!) you give, pray and fast, keep in mind that He is using you to help your neighbors, not to bring added benefits to you. Faith in Christ is your true treasure in heaven.

This is what is God-pleasing. The Father of Jesus Himself, who in love also became your heavenly Father since before the dawn of time, will see what you do in secret and reward you.

But not a salvation reward, of course not! That gift is already yours and no one can take it away, nor is it possible to add to that any more.

Your “it-is-finished” Jesus suffered and died for you. He buried you into His all-atoning death through your Baptism. It’s called a “reward” not because you’ve earned it but simply because the Father is such a giving Father! Whatever He gives as though it is a reward is His business. We’ll do well to leave that up to the Lord and His generosity.

Now, it’s about time to get ready for more of God’s generosity. This time it is in the form of Christ’s Body and Blood, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins. It’s the perfect answer to the problem posed at the beginning of our Ash Wednesday service. This precious Good Friday gift is salvation in the flesh to strengthen your faith in Him and to increase your love for others in giving, praying, fasting, or whatsoever else your hand finds to do for them.

Your ashen crosses tonight are symbols of sin and penitence intended for you alone. Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return. No one else needs to know that, especially since they too need to be told that for themselves.

Yet the ashes are in the form of a cross, not to create some new Sacrament or superstition, but to drive home the point to your very heart that this Lent is not only a focus on yourself and your sin, but an even sharper focus on the cross of Jesus Christ your Savior. Because of that cross you are forgiven, your curse of ash-ridden death seeping down deep into your body is fully released, and the Father of Jesus is also your Father. You belong to Him. Forever.

sdg

Pr. Stirdivant

Sermon for Quinquagesima Sunday: February 27, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Jesus was talking about some scary stuff as He was getting nearer and nearer to Jerusalem. He had just taught His disciples about the Last Day, the Day of Judgment. He called it the Day when the Son of Man is revealed. He compared it to the time long ago when Abraham’s nephew Lot was rushed out of the city of Sodom, and He, that is, the Lord, rained down fire and sulfur from heaven and destroyed everyone in that accursed city who were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building, in short, life was going on as normally as one would expect. Then it was all over. Done. One will be taken and the other left. The disciples couldn’t lift their mouths up off the ground!

Then He took aside the twelve, His closest, most attentive students, and warned them that His day of deadly suffering was just around the corner. For the third time, the Lord predicted His passion, death, and resurrection. And they still did not understand anything He said. Actually, it was hidden from them, meaning that God hid it from them, but only for the time being. It was the Divine plan for the disciples to grasp what happened to Jesus later, once the mission was complete and Jesus rose from the dead. At the moment, though, all they feel is shock and despair.

In between these two shockers, Luke chose to include two parables, and two sets of contrasting responses to Jesus. And our Holy-Spirit-inspired narrator informed us that Jesus wanted to teach these things to us, so that we would always pray, and never lose heart. No matter what you face, no matter how scary it looks in this world as we lead up to the Last Day, no matter how opposite your blessings from God look to you at the moment, that they look more like curses instead, Jesus wants to ensure that you always pray, and never lose heart.

Now in this last part of chapter 18, that we read today, here’s a blind man, belonging to the lowest of the Bible world’s social echelons, a beggar who is at the mercy of anyone passing through Jericho. And even that city is low—literally cursed by God and actually situated below sea level. Suddenly, there’s a commotion; a crowd is coming past him, and the blind man doesn’t know what’s going on. “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.” That’s what the sighted people say. A popular rabbi has visited a place that might as well be El Centro. People are trying to get a good spot so they can see a miracle, perhaps get a free meal like the other crowd did up the river in the rolling hills of Galilee.

But the sighted people themselves need help. They didn’t see the true Jesus, the full Messiah. Sure, they were correct about Jesus being from Nazareth; yes, He has more important places to go, like Jerusalem, up there in the high country. But we’re not going to let anyone, let alone this nagging beggar, get in our way of a good view of what Jesus will do in front of our eyes. They didn’t see Jesus. But someone else did.

It was the blind man! The beggar was the only one who really saw Jesus. He saw with his ears, that is, he believed what He had heard about Jesus from God’s Word. The Old Testament spoke clearly about the Son of David. King David himself called Him “My Lord,” to give the unambiguous clue that his prophesied descendant would be God in human flesh, sitting at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, maker and ruler over heaven and earth. This Son of David alone had the power to give sight, the power to take it away, and even the power to give it back again. Even more important, His power also is accompanied by mercy. That is what this beggar believed, and that’s what made him see the true Jesus, and plead to Him for mercy. In fact, the more he was rebuked and rebuffed, the more fervently he sought out the Lord. The blind man prayed Kyrie eleison, Lord have mercy, like we did at the beginning of our Service, and he did not give up, nor did he lose heart.

Jesus heard him. He stopped His uphill march to the cross. He wouldn’t forsake Jerusalem and all that had to happen to Him there, but He did stop here in God-forsaken Jericho for the blind man who truly saw Him; saw Him with the Word that he had heard. Luke wants you to know that it wasn’t because the blind man had a superior virtue or a faith that arose from some inner self-confidence. It was all because King Jesus, all of His own will, desired to show mercy to His lowly subject. When Jesus tells you always pray and never lose heart, He’s not wagging the finger of a demand and condemning you if you neglect to pray. Instead, He’s encouraging you that you can rely on a strength that doesn’t live inside of you, but it’s a strength that comes from Him as He gives that faith and confidence into your heart.

When you prayed Kyrie eleison, Lord have mercy, Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. His procession to the altar has stopped for a moment so He can turn His attention to you. Today the Son of David has heard your prayer; He calls you forward into His presence, His healing body and blood that has been handed over as a substitute payment for you. Though you might have some scary stuff happening in your life, He is listening for your voice to cry for rescue and forgiveness, and He will give it to you. Recover this very day your sight of King Jesus your Savior and accept His invitation to pray to Him for all you need, all that worries you, all that occupies your mind and tries to steer your gaze away to the insignificant idols of this life.

Since Lent starts in just a few days, it’s important to regain anew an appreciation for all the suffering Jesus went through, that He endured a hideous and shameful death on the cross, that He rose victorious on the third day. But even more important than that is for you to be reminded that all that He endured, He went through it for your sake. His will for you is hidden no more, the mystery is uncovered: He wants you to be with Him in His kingdom, showered with everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness. He lives and reigns to all eternity, His power is accompanied by mercy, and it is His unchangeable will that you will be with Him, restored in a glorified body along with your immortal and ransomed soul. Soon the day will come when all curses will come to an end. All your blessings will be unmistakable. Anything of this life that had threatened to tear you away from your Lord will be annihilated on the Last Day and forgotten. No longer are you a beggar in lowly Jericho, you are a privileged citizen of the New Jerusalem, the Church of God that has been cleansed, forgiven, and made pure in the precious Blood of Jesus Christ.

Lent will continue on for six weeks, that is, 40 days from Ash Wednesday plus the Sundays. This season of repentance will give you the opportunity to take seriously once again all that Jesus did for you and for your salvation. Your pious observance of Lent, like giving something up, taking advantage of private confession and absolution, or donating more to those who are less fortunate, is pleasing to God, and Jesus Himself mentions something of a reward, but it’s not because you do something that He likes for you to do, but rather the pleasure of the Lord shines on you because He has already given you the sight that is like that of the poor beggar of Jericho. Today you recover the sight that sees Jesus as He really is, as the Son of David, the Savior King who desires to come to you. Believe this as you eat His Body and drink His Blood, and you will be ready this coming Lent to turn away from your self-serving deeds and anxious thoughts, and turn instead to Him who loves you with First- Corinthians- 13- style love, and has worked great wonders in your life.

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
1 Sam. 16:1–13 Arise, anoint him; for this is the one!
1 Cor. 13:1–13 … but have not love, I am nothing
Luke 18:31–43 Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!

Sermon for Sexagesima Sunday: February 20, 2022 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

The Church calendar designed three Sundays to follow the Transfiguration of Our Lord with themes that get us prepared for Lent, which this year comes up with Ash Wednesday on March 2. They are Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima. Those names are quite a mouthful, but if you can follow these numbers in their Latin forms, you see there’s a countdown: Seven, Six, Five. Indeed there is a countdown to the two full weeks that we’ve been given to examine the Passion of our Lord. Before we get to Jesus’ passion, His love mixed with pain, and in order fully to appreciate what those memorable events in the Gospel records do for us sinners, we need preparation. To be sure, Lent itself is a preparation for Easter, forty days’ worth, but Lent at times needs its own preparation, so it doesn’t get lost on our minds and hearts. We can’t afford to waste the opportunity we’ve been given!

Today, on Sexagesima Sunday, before we jump into Lent, we need to be absolutely rock-solid convinced that the Word of God is a doer. It is much, much more than just instructions for us to follow. The Word of God is a mighty, active doer, a creator, and even a preserver. If the Word of God were only instructions, then there would be no need to believe in it and put your whole trust in the Word of God. You would just follow the instructions, the seed would be sown in your heart, and the plant would grow—all would be well. And yet, we know that life as a Christian can get more complicated than that, so we need the Word of God to do for us and within us the mighty work that God has given His Word to do.

First, the Word of God is a seed. Even though it looks tiny and insignificant, a seed is a miracle of life. You can have a clump of cells smaller than a poppy seed, but that is still a fully human baby girl that has started to grow in her mother’s womb. The Seed of the Word of God comes to someone who is born a sinner, dead, cold, lifeless in the spiritual sense, and in that barren environment brings to life a forgiven, redeemed, holy believer. This miracle is called faith, and it can only be created by the Word of God.

It was our heavenly Father’s great pleasure to call you out of the spiritual darkness called sin and death and bring you to new life. That was what the Word of God as a seed did in your heart. When you were baptized, and remember baptism is the same powerful Word of God joined together with water, when you were baptized not only were your sins and just punishments removed, but you were also made a child of God, a receiver of many precious gifts, forgiveness and eternal life being at the top of the list. This forgiveness was declared upon you in a particular form of the Word of God that is called absolution, and it was paid for by the suffering and death of Jesus Christ on the cross. Your promise of resurrection of the body and life everlasting was guaranteed when Jesus rose from the dead. This forgiveness and life is not given to you just once, but constantly, week after week, as you come to the Divine Service for the Word of God in scripture and sermon and as you eat and drink the Lord’s Body and Blood in Holy Communion. Our Lord constantly plants the seed of His Word in your heart and He intends for it to grow and produce fruits of good works that give Him glory and help the neighbors that God has given into your life.

Secondly, the Word of God not only plants faith in Christ within your heart, but that same Word waters, maintains and grows that faith for the rest of your life unto the life everlasting. Think about that story Jesus told about the sower casting seed over all kinds of soil. He explained the parable immediately afterward, saying these different soils are different people who have differing responses to the same Word. But I would challenge you today to think of those different soils as they occur within your soul. Sure, you may be hearing and meditating on God’s Word now and it produces great fruit in your heart. Your neighbor, your child, your loved one is benefiting from those good works that God has used you as His instrument to perform.

However, there are also times in your life when your soil is of a different quality. Sometimes we become callused to the Word of the Lord; too familiar this great gift and so our fear, love and trust in our heavenly Father doesn’t take deep root. Other times the cares of this passing world distract us from the Word. We get worried and concerned about our world’s political leaders; we get caught up in who said what on this social media platform or that 24 hour news station and who wants to do yet another crazy, yet very predictable act of robbing our freedoms. Satan is constantly active all around us, threatening to choke out the seedling of our faith like a nasty thorny weed that appears unwelcome in the garden. Our nightmarish pandemic has surely tested our mettle in not a few areas of life, but have you taken the opportunity it has provided for you to grow in the Word of God, or has that growth been hindered by the lack of what you thought you needed in the so-called normal pattern of life that we used to enjoy? Put it simply, have you grown in your trust in Jesus Christ your Savior?

What can you do when your soil is not as productive as it should be? What is the way that will improve your relationship with your heavenly Father and bring you closer to Him? The answer is the Word of God. And it’s not like those billboards that say, Are you scared? Jesus can help. Of course He can help, but how exactly does He help? What really helps is repentance. We’ll hear a lot about that during Lent. What do I mean by repentance? For that you can turn to the catechism: Consider your place in life according to the Ten Commandments. Have you been self-serving, rude, quarrelsome with others? Have you failed to fear, love and trust in God above all things? The sharp, two-edged sword of the Word cuts deeply into you, revealing the sins that you have done, even down to the very thoughts of your heart. Without the powerful doer that is the Word of the Lord, you would be powerless to change your heart and be the fruitful, productive soil that would cause God’s good seed to grow. For Lent to do its work that it needs to do, you need to have full faith and confidence in the Word.

And when you realize that God’s Word not only plants your faith in you but also nourishes it when times in your life are not going as well, then you understand the true power of that Word. Not only are you informed about Jesus and the sacrifice He made for you on the cross, but you also are taken up into His resurrection from the dead, forgiven of all your sins, consoled in your mourning heart, strengthened and preserved in the one true faith unto life everlasting. The Word of God does it all for you, beginning and sustaining your life-saving trust in Christ for eternal life. You were dead, but through His Word Jesus called you back to life, breathing His blood-bought forgiveness into you, and then you breathe out the same Jesus-filled forgiveness to your family members and neighbors who have sinned against you. This brings great pleasure to your Creator, for this is exactly how He made you to be and to act in accord with His Will.

The Word of God flows from God to us and back to Him again, as Isaiah sang. It’s just like rain coming down from heaven, watering the earth, flowing together into whatever body of water our Lord has designed to collect that rain as a sort of congregation, if you will, be it a small puddle like our church is or a vast and wide ocean. Then that water of God’s Word is spent in good works and returns to the Lord who gave it in order to complete the cycle that will not be halted until the end of time itself. If anyone can appreciate the precious resource that is rain for our land, it would be we who live in a land often ravaged by drought. Let us also appreciate just as much, yes, even more, the precious Word of God that He allows to rain down upon us, granting us the seed of faith, as well as the nourishment of that faith that leads to the good works of love that we owe to one another.

Next week, after one more helpful preparation called Quinquagesima Sunday, we will begin the season of Lent on Ash Wednesday, which is not only a six-week preparation for Easter, but also commence a deliberate exercise of our hearts and bodies in repentance. If our observance of Lent only consists in making promises to modify our diets, cut out meat or sweets or renew whatever New Year’s Resolutions that we broke in the first week of January, then the whole point would be lost. What would truly make Lent a useful practice of repentance for you is, in addition to those outward disciplines and personal training, to focus your attention on the Word of God. Recall its great power to reveal your sins, but also the even greater power to wash those sins away in the flood of forgiveness that streams to you from the pierced side of your Savior Jesus Christ. He has planted His Word in you. He will even use His Word to cultivate that faith He has created in you. He will also bring your life to its completion, His good work that you are in His sight, on the coming Day when the final harvest will be gathered in and the eternal life we’ve been promised is realized in full. May the Word of God be for you from this day forward not only a talker, but a doer. His Holy Spirit has made it so.

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Is. 55:10–13 My Word…shall not return to Me void
Psalm 84 Even the sparrow has found a home
Heb. 4:9–13 let us be diligent to enter that rest … Word of God…sharper than any two-edged sword
Luke 8:4–15 A sower went out to sow

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

As much as our human reason doesn’t want to believe it, the truth is that we’re all sinful from the very moment of conception. As Scripture says, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Ps 51:5). And anyone who’s spent any time with a toddler knows the truth of this. Their defiance, hitting, and coveting with screams of displeasure, for example, are prevalent long before they have any rational understanding of right and wrong, that is, a rational understanding of their own sinfulness. And, as God has also revealed to us in His Holy Word, “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 6:23).

Most, if not all of you, have heard this, but I bring it up because all of our Scripture readings for today are talking about those who’ve already been called by the Gospel to be the people of God along with the benefits that go with that, namely, the forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation. So, if this is the first time you’ve heard this, then know that “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved…” (Mk 16:16). If – by the grace of God – the Holy Spirit has worked faith in your heart that clings to these promises of God, then you too are among the people of God that are spoken about in today’s readings.

Now, St. Paul explains that the Israelites we heard about in our first reading were “all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea … “, prefiguring our own entrance into God’s kingdom through our baptism into Christ’s death and resurrection: that “we too might walk in newness of life” (Rom 6:4). And in that same Epistle, St. Paul refers to Christians as those who run the race: that they might receive the imperishable wreath of eternal life. And in the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard, the “master of the house” – that is, God – goes out and hires “laborers for his vineyard”: a parable of God calling people by the Gospel into the “kingdom of heaven”.

So, now that we know that the Scriptures appointed for today are talking about the people of God, what do we take away from these passages?
“the people quarreled with Moses … And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?”
or … “When those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also received a denarius.
And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us …”.
This is a perfect example of the truth that even as God’s people, we remain both just and sinner in this life.

The truth of the matter is, that even we who’ve been baptized into Christ and declared righteous by grace, through faith, on account of Christ’s saving work continue to struggle with being sinful, grumblers. We’re often no different than that defiant and covetous toddler who lashes out in unloving greed and selfishness, and who doesn’t want to sit still and listen to God’s Word. We all do this. We just can’t seem to be content with God’s provision. We complain about our homes, our jobs, our spouses, our children, and the food that’s provided to us. We grumble about our brothers and sisters in Christ and having to sit in church when we’d rather be off worshipping our other idols. We even sometimes despair of God’s grace and mercy. So, perhaps we should our lives “Massah and Meribah” because of our own quarreling and testing of the Lord.

We should remember and take to heart what we learned in the Catechism about how to examine ourselves when we slip into such grumbling: “Consider your place in life according to the Ten Commandments: Are you a father, mother, son, daughter, husband, wife, or worker? Have you been disobedient, unfaithful, or lazy? Have you been hot-tempered, rude, or quarrelsome? Have you hurt someone by your words or deeds? Have you stolen, been negligent, wasted anything, or done any harm?” Whichever of these apply to us, let us pray that we would be led by God’s Word and Spirit to contrition and repentance: that we might return to our baptism and daily receive the forgiveness of sins that we desperately need as those who are at the same time just and sinner.
The Christians in Corinth were no different than us, so St. Paul’s exhortation is equally applicable:
“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable.”
That’s why he also exhorts us (by example of himself) to discipline our own bodies by fleeing from sin so that we don’t end up disqualified, that is, so we don’t lose the imperishable wreath of the kingdom of heaven.

A little further on, St. Paul also gives a very understated example of the dangers of not repenting of our sinfulness:
“Our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food,
and all drank the same spiritual drink. … Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.”

They were baptized. They heard the Word of God proclaimed by His called servant. Yet to say that most of them were nonetheless overthrown is about as understated as you can get. Of the more than 600,000 men above twenty years of age who experienced the Exodus [cf. Numbers 1] only two ended up entering into the Promised Land: Joshua and Caleb. Paul’s point is that just as this vast multitude of baptized Israelites were disqualified from entering the Promised Land because of their idolatry and faithlessness, so to do we Christians run the risk of being disqualified from God’s heavenly kingdom.

But that’s what happens if we resist the work of the Holy Spirit in Word and Sacrament: turning away from God’s grace and mercy, and embracing lives of sin and unrepentance instead. God forbid that should be any of us!

Now, while we should certainly strive by God’s grace and Spirit to run our race with self-control (putting down the desires of our flesh), it’s also true that the weakness of our fallen nature will stumble (more often than we’d care to admit). But at such time, we can take comfort in the fact that, for all their sinfulness, God graciously provided the Israelites with the Rock which was struck, and from which the they drank: and that Rock was Christ. And, in our own wilderness of sin, Almighty God, by His grace, sent that same Rock, His only-begotten Son, to be struck with nail and spear: shedding His life-giving blood to blot out our transgressions, dying the death that we deserved to die, and rising again as the Firstborn of we who are baptized into His death and resurrection. There’s our comfort as we struggle to discipline our bodies and run the race that is the Christian life: God’s grace. And that is just what’s pictured for us in the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard.

This parable is all about God’s grace. The landowner (who is God) hired laborers (that’s us) at various times throughout the day. When the workday was over, he paid them all the same wage no matter how long they had worked. Jesus told this parable to teach us that the kingdom of heaven is not about what we deserve. It’s about the grace of God, and not about any merit or worthiness in us. Jesus has promised that by His suffering and death, He’s won for us the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting. We are called to be God’s people by His abundant grace and mercy.

Christ redeemed us by the shedding of His own blood, and He richly and daily provides for all our needs. He is truly our rock and our fortress and our deliverer, For He has saved humble and lowly sinners like us.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Pr. Jon Holst