Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Peter wrote his second epistle from prison. Not a comfortable nor cushy place. It was a dark, dirty, and lonely place, full of fear, and most times it seemed devoid of all hope. When you sing with the prophet Isaiah, “The people that in darkness sat,” don’t forget about Peter and all the other apostles and prophets who did time unjustly because they proclaimed the One true Savior, Christ Jesus the Son of God. Of course, these pillars of the early church knew that heaven was their true home and soon, perhaps within mere days like it was with Peter, they would be rid of all that pain and persecution and depart to be with Christ, which is better by far, as Paul once said. We all need to be reminded of that perspective every day, even though those painful trials we face will still attack us in this earthly life.

Peter must have had a good amount of time in prison to recall memories of the past. There must have been so much from the three years or so that he was a disciple of Jesus, when he and the other eleven were following Him around and learning so much that the Holy Spirit would later bring to their remembrance. But of all the memories that Peter could possibly recall, he wrote in his last recorded letter about the time when he witnessed the Transfiguration, that is, the time when he and two other disciples with him saw the face of Jesus shine radiant and his clothes turned white as light. Moses and Elijah appeared in heavenly glory with Him and they had a conversation over what Jesus will soon do for the salvation of the entire world.
What a life-changing day that must have been for Peter! Truly astounding, both to his eyes and ears! For Peter not only saw Jesus in full Son-of-God glory, but he also heard the voice of the Father speak from out of the radiant cloud, “This is my beloved Son. With Him I am well pleased.” There could be no way anyone who witnessed that could ever forget it! Do you suppose that glorious memory encouraged Peter when he sat in that prison, that total opposite of the exalted mountaintop which was filled with God’s light? You would think so, but no, Peter himself says there’s something that’s even greater and even more of an assurance than that experience could provide.

Peter was fully aware of what the enemies of the Christian faith were saying. He was aware of the charge out there that all this Jesus stuff was just a cleverly devised myth. Just think of that: not even a generation had passed after Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, and still there were people spreading the untruth that it had never happened! It’s not just a 20th century idea, and such slanderous bunk has been around long before books and films like the Da Vinci Code were ever hatched in anyone’s brain. Would Peter and the other disciples of Jesus have gone through such agony of persecution if any one of them knew that Jesus was a hoax? Surely somebody would have caved in! He would have been celebrated as the ultimate whistleblower! No, Peter was entirely convinced for himself, yet this loving pastor, a true shepherd of souls, found it necessary to write by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit for the benefit of those in the church, including you so many centuries later, so as to relieve the uneasiness that doubt can bring to your heart.

What would bring that full assurance to you? What would tell you once and for all that you should never give up on being Christian? What would prove conclusively to you or to someone you’ve been talking to that Christ is not a myth? Would it be an experience like Peter had? Just think of the extra confidence that could well up within you if you had a direct contact with your risen Lord and Savior! And while He’s at it, let God appear in awesome majesty to that unbeliever and knock ’em down flat.

Maybe you had a moment in your life when you felt close to God, so much so that you sensed yourself directly in contact with Him. Everything fell into place then, your assurance was high, and your commitment to the Lord was unflappable. Sometimes, God allows such wonderful moments to happen in a person’s life, and there’s nothing wrong at all with that. There are Christians, however, including some Lutherans, who are being taught to believe that they aren’t a Christian, or at least not a fully-developed and sanctified believer, unless they’ve had one of those emotional “mountaintop” experiences. They may be deceived into thinking that their often-manufactured euphoria must endure or even increase, and it must translate into a morally spotless life free of suffering, or else something must be wrong with their faith. Yet an unbiblical demand such as this is one of the surest ways to pull you away from Jesus and it does serious harm to the true faith that the Holy Spirit planted within your heart by your hearing His Word. It also strengthens the skeptics and unbelievers who are always out there collecting whatever so-called evidence that they could find to portray Christians as wild-eyed do-gooders, or plain hypocrites.

That’s why Peter writes what he remembers of the Transfiguration of Jesus on the “holy mountain,” not to boast of his personal experience, but in order to give you what really matters for your day-to-day Christian life. Indeed, he said “we were with Him, we heard the voice, we saw His glory,” all to put the naysayers to silence. But for you, for the believers, there’s something more, and Peter says specifically that you would do well to pay attention to it. Whether you’re literally in a dark, dirty place like prison or not, whether you’re aware of your spiritual darkness of sin or not, take heed of this light because it’s the only true comfort you need. Everything else in this world will at one time or another leave you helpless and lonely. What is it? The Gospel. Who speaks it? Jesus does, for after all, God the Father said, “Listen to Him!”

And your Lord says, I came to earth and I, the glorious Son of God was born in your fallen human flesh. I came, not to hand down to you more rules to follow but to wash your sins away from you. I, Jesus says, I who knew no sin became sin for your sake. I took your heavy burden of guilt and removed it from your shoulders and carried it along with the cross to die for you. I gave my life willingly as your ransom from prison. My light has shined in your darkness, so that you could sing that ancient psalm with confidence, “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?”

Listen to Jesus, who not only died, but also rose from the dead, for He who took your sins to the grave with Him, has left your sins there in His empty tomb. Your offense against God remains dead and buried, but you are raised up with your Savior to walk in the newness of life. This renewal is the Holy Spirit’s gift to you, not an achievement that you have to produce for yourself. Think of the Transfiguration story again: what was the mightiest, and most Gospel-filled moment of that event? Was it the blinding light? No, Jesus always had that absolute power with Him, only at the other times when people saw Him, He simply refrained from displaying His full majesty. So was it the sudden appearance of Moses and Elijah in splendor? No, they were always there as part of the whole company of heaven. Was it the voice from God the Father? No, somebody had to step in to stop Peter from talking nonsense.

Instead of all those flashy, knock ’em dead parts of the story, God’s true Gospel power was revealed when it was all over, when the light faded, the prophets hidden from sight, the Father’s voice stopped speaking, and there was no one but Jesus only. And just like Elijah discovered God not in the earthquake, wind or fire, but rather in the still, small whisper, so it was for Peter, James and John on the mount of Transfiguration. Jesus, plain-looking ordinary Jesus, came and touched them and said, “Rise, and have no fear.” That was the truly powerful moment in the story, the moment of forgiveness, of a gentle but sufficient removal of all their fear. You experienced that powerful moment in your life when plain, ordinary water poured over you along with the mighty words of Holy Baptism. God the Father has proclaimed He is well pleased with you.

So Jesus bids you today, do not fear, for He is close to you, even at those times when you don’t feel close to Him. In fact, He is even closer to you now than He was to Moses and his companions who dined with God on that mountain in Exodus. The holy Body and Blood of Jesus Christ is here for you to eat with your own mouth, so that you would be strengthened in the one true faith to life everlasting. Here in Holy Communion you’ve been given your direct contact with God! It’s not a passing experience that you have to recall from memory later, rather it’s the holy food that you need for daily life in this world. You may feel the bumps and bruises of carrying your cross along with Jesus, but His gentle, reassuring touch is always there. And soon the day shall dawn when Christ shall come again. He, the Light-bringer, the bright and shining Morning Star, shall appear to you so that you too will glow bright in His reflection, with the same brilliance as Jesus had in His Transfiguration. For you who once sat in the prison-darkness of sin have seen the great light of God’s forgiveness for your sin and eternal life in resurrected glory awaits for Moses, Elijah, Peter, all the saints, and you as well.

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

Readings:
Ex. 24:8–18 the glory of the LORD was like a consuming fire
Psalm 2:6–12 You are my Son, Today I have begotten You.
2 Peter 1:16–21 redeemed…with the precious blood of Christ
Matt. 17:1–9 and He was transfigured before them

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Do you remember a time when you had to undergo a test of maturity? You could probably remember how it happened when you were, perhaps suddenly, forced to abandon the childish, self-centered and feelings-oriented time (some might call them the “good old days”!) and start acting more like a responsible adult. Paul wrote, “When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.” (1 Cor. 13:11) There is usually a moment or a series of events in our life when our maturity has to be tested.

During those times of testing you wonder if you were going to fit into those “big boy” or “big girl” pants, after all. You felt abandoned, betrayed by how easy childhood had made everything look to you. Now that you face it, the situation seems much more difficult. You were going to be much better at parenting than your own parents were, you were absolutely certain of that, until the day your first child was born. Then it was like you had to learn everything all over again! How frustrating that was to start again from square one!

Tests of maturity come throughout our life, and not just in the critical times of adolescence and teen-age. What is even more important are the tests of our spiritual maturity. At these particular times you are confronted with the pressing question that you cannot avoid: will you rely on yourself, on your own powers and resources? Will you revert to the wisdom of this world, and forsake the mind of Christ? Or will you deny yourself, take up your cross of difficulty and shame, and follow Jesus into a way that will be despised by the world, that will lead to your rejection, even by your close friends? Will you (as all the Commandments demand of you) fear, love and trust in God above all things? Or will something else come up and become your miserable substitute god? Will you revert back into spiritual childhood and have to start again your growth in the Lord’s Word?

The Apostle Paul had realized, after being away for a few years, that the congregation of new believers in the Greek city of Corinth was facing a great test of her spiritual maturity. The whole epistle addresses one problem after another that had sprung up in their midst, and he had heard reports from others about them. Right at the beginning of the letter, Paul pointed out a trend that was going to threaten their very existence as a church, and might actually tear them apart. The congregation seemed to be breaking off into teams, or political cliques, and many people were believing that belonging to one of those groups was more important than hearing the Gospel of the forgiveness of sins. Paul was not flattered by the existence of a group that owed allegiance to him: “I follow Paul.” Nor was he incensed that others were enamored by the wonderfully talented speaking ability of his successor pastor: “I follow Apollos.” The Apostle was only concerned that these groups formed in the first place! He wanted it to stop. Be united in the same mind! Follow the Word of the Cross of Jesus Christ! Make your boast in no one else but the Lord.

You are people of the flesh, said Paul to the Corinthians, infants in Christ. You needed milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. Something else besides God’s Word and the forgiveness of sins has caught your eye, and you are tempted to stray away from the inheritance of faith and eternal life. You want a prosperous earthly kingdom of some sort, something to prove that you are significant in the opinion of the world. You have therefore lost sight of the true, yet hidden power of Christ crucified and risen from the dead. And when these arguments about allegiance to this or that human being, when all this jealousy and hatred for your fellow forgiven sinners and co-workers in the Lord’s vineyard springs up, the sinful human nature tempts you to behave in a human way, says Paul. When this sort of thing takes over in a church, then it alerts the Apostle that it’s time to get back to the basics and form them in the image of Christ once again.

Not that there’s anything wrong with a return to simple truths, though, as Martin Luther himself said, I take my catechism every day and repeat it word for word, praying it like a child. But this problem in Corinth was more like what James complained about in his epistle, “A man … looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like.” (James 1:24) If you are constantly acting like you are “new” at the Christian life, always slipping on the same sins, incessantly unsure about the love and mercy of Jesus, then you haven’t really believed and retained in your heart the Gospel message. For instance, you have heard all about forgiveness, but you go right ahead anyway and condemn your brothers and sisters in Christ with an angry, bitter heart. In some way, you have determined that they have not deserved your love, so you are not going to give them even the time of day.

That’s the point at which you need to repent, and return to the basics, the milk of simple Law—you have offended God because of your sins against Him and other people—and the Gospel—Jesus has paid the full price for your sins and you are completely forgiven. A more advanced and mature Christian life builds on that simple foundation, of course, but with more years’ experience in it you get a better understanding that God’s forgiveness has set you free from the constant slavery to sin, you are better equipped to head off those sinful urges and temptations, and you rely more on what the Word says, rather than simply what your feelings feel.

Another sign of Christian maturity is how you see the role of your pastor. At first, the Scriptural truth is very easy to grasp: he’s just a mouthpiece of the Lord. He who hears you, hears Me, Jesus said to those first pastors. Yet the Corinthian Christians were dividing up into warring factions, thinking that one preacher gave more blessings than another, when both were preaching the very same Word of God! That completely misses the point! No matter who the pastor is who preaches from this pulpit, you the hearers must train yourselves with proper spiritual maturity to listen for and test the Word that they preach, even though no two styles will ever be identical.

When a plain, ordinary, flawed man whom you don’t always like, nevertheless with the authority given to him by Christ Himself announces to you the forgiveness of your sin in the absolution, then believe the Word. The man is secondary, actually in comparison to the Word, he is nothing. Whether it was Stirdivant, Nava, Wolter or Pledger, it was still the same Word they preached, and God gave the growth, as the Apostle Paul declares. If it pleases Him, and we certainly pray that it does, God will give the growth again. Not because we pray hard enough, not because we deserve it, not because we have finally put all our childish ways behind us for good, but because our Lord promised: My Word that goes out from my mouth… will not return to me void. It will accomplish My purpose for which I sent (the Word out). (Isaiah 55:11)

Let not the slavish, childish ways of being merely human weigh you down. In repentance, give them up and rely completely on your Savior. Embrace the freedom that His Word of forgiveness gives you! As Lent approaches in ten days, witness once again the suffering Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, who went to the cross for you, so that in His forgiveness you would be reunited with your heavenly Father, and in Christ, united also with your fellow forgiven brothers and sisters. Only when sin, anger and resentment are drowned in the Baptismal Water, covered by the Blood of Jesus, can we then work together with God in His mission. We proclaim His truth and share His mercy. We grow in our Christian maturity whenever we face a time of testing and trust in the holy cross of Christ. Without Him, we could never do it, but now that you have heard the peace of the Lord from God’s own chosen mouthpiece, nothing in this world or in Satan’s kingdom will ever be able to stop you!

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

Readings:
Deut. 30:15–20 I have set before you today life and good, death and evil…choose life
Psalm 119:1–8 Blessed are those who keep His testimonies
1 Cor. 3:1–9 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase.
Matt. 5:21–37 First, be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Fasting is clearly an individual activity (Jesus Himself said, let no one see what you are doing, Matt. 6), but it is also understood to be done together as a church, in mutual love, as a positive kind of discipline or bodily training for the building up of the whole congregation. Lutherans fasted in years past, but it was not to make God look upon their good works in addition to those of Jesus, nor did they try to connect themselves to Christ on some emotional level. You see, fasting, when tied closely to a Christian’s faith alone in Christ and what He has done for us, is a certainly fine outward training, as Luther says in the Catechism, because it helps the humble believer rely wholly on God’s Word for life now and life eternal.

But the sinful nature was not going to let fasting remain a good and wholesome thing. Satan himself would stop at nothing to corrupt it because he commonly uses even the most salutary-looking church practices to teach his faith-destroying doctrines. How else can a simple exercise in humility become transformed into the height of arrogance? Eventually, as good things like fasting and private confession and absolution were corrupted and simply allowed to die out in church practice, people were led to believe that all religious matters only had to do with your mind, and certain bodily training exercises were regarded as superstitious and anti-intellectual.

Now, to be sure, everything we do must not be left to mindless individual feeling or ritual, but should always be tested according to God’s Word, especially the Ten Commandments, and not by how we feel about it or just because of who said it. The same thing goes for fasting. While Scripture mentions the practice several times and has a lot to say about it, in no way can those Bible passages be taken to command us to do it as a requirement for our salvation, nor as a condemnation for those who do not do it. Romans 14 in fact says about food rituals, “The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God.” Fasting is a fruit, a response of faith, just like good works, and you wouldn’t be Lutheran if you didn’t know that good works are not what get you to heaven, but rather they serve as a sign (one of several, in fact) that the Holy Spirit has given you the one, true, and saving faith, and faith does give heaven to you as a gift.

That is the point that the prophet Isaiah is getting at when he was inspired by the Holy Spirit to address fasting among the people of Israel in our Old Testament reading. They had let their faith grow cold, and then slip away altogether. They became so wrapped up in their everyday lives that God did not matter to them, and they themselves mattered most. They said, however, that they had no sin, and so they were in the very midst of deceiving themselves. God’s people did not honor Him as the only true God, nor did they have any regard for His holy and pure Word that was announced to them by the divinely inspired prophets.

But they fasted! Boy, were they on top of that one! That last time some of them had a massive stomach ache to prove it! Their sackcloth and ashes this year were especially austere; nobody was able to outdo the people of Israel in their exercise of humility. Their news channel even did a story on one woman who fasted so hard that she started seeing visions! Everybody can acknowledge that we’re special, so they would say. All the nations are well aware that we fast and we pray and we humble ourselves—they take notice. So what’s wrong with God, then? Why can’t He see how devout we are? What is it going to take for our Lord and Creator to notice when we need Him? Isaiah quotes these baffled Israelites when they said to God, “Why have we fasted, and you see it not? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you take no knowledge of it?”

Your objections may not be about fasting, but they still sound quite similar, don’t they? I come to church and do what I was trained to do from early on as a believer—I come even on most football game Sundays! I have been involved in many things that help make this church tick. I give a good, regular amount so nobody has the right to get on my back about that! Why doesn’t all that I do count for anything with God? Why is it that He seems so far away so often in my life? Even when I go through a difficult trial, I tell myself that God is with me and His will is best, but frankly, there are lots of times like that when I just don’t believe it, whether I say it or others attempt to comfort me with it. Why are the wicked and godless people of this world doing so much better than I am? I know I’m not perfect, but at least some of this stuff that I do as a Christian has to count.

And so gradually, faith that struggles like this begins to feel isolated, cold, and indifferent. Church and other religious actions reduce down to a mere going through the motions. Church leaders and pastors in this spiritual funk start getting concerned only about the finances and the material prospects of staying afloat and in business, so to speak. God becomes a mere idea, or an intellectual exercise where one can recite the doctrine verbatim and yet the heart receives nothing of the joy that comes from the forgiveness of sins. So this lukewarm faith hides behind empty actions, on the one hand staying focused on oneself, while on the other hand looking for whatever activities or programs that can at least give the appearance of vigorous spiritual activity, just like those Israelites, who feigned their spirituality behind the mask of an empty, faithless brand of fasting.

What was the Lord’s answer to Israel as they continued in this damnable spiritual condition? Let’s be serious, you folks are not really fasting—you have your mind on other matters, on your own pleasure. You fast, making yourselves look so pious and holy, but all you do is quarrel, and fight, and hit with a wicked fist. For us in our situation today, we need look no further than what the Catechism teaches concerning the Third Commandment, Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. That’s not about sitting in a pew, running a committee or activity, nor is it about some detailed evangelism program. Those come in their time, because they’re the results. Rather, this commandment is about holding sacred the preaching of God’s Word, gladly hearing and learning it—and in your sinful human nature, you have not done this. Yes, you are here, you’re hearing God’s Word now, I get that. But this Law is relentless—it condemns me, too, probably crashing down more so on pastors due to our vows to teach and preach the Word.

The Lord’s harsh, condemning word comes to a head in our Old Testament reading when He says these words, “Fasting like yours this day will not make your voice to be heard on high.” Almighty God, is that possible? I’m serious…how close are we here today to that dreadful precipice? That all we do each week and through the week in our daily callings, if they continue with a dead and cold faith, with no regard for one another, that they will become useless, meaningless spiritual activities, and we’ll be closed off from the mercy of our heavenly Father. How soon will this point of no return come upon us in this congregation? This is a serious matter that we face, and our answer to it is not in fasting, nor in any other new and fancy devout works or useful ministries that we can think of, our answer is in Christ and what He has done for us. You can’t do more and more church stuff to get out of it. If you try that way, you will get overwhelmed in guilt and sooner or later entertain the temptation to fall away, whether you decide to stay home, or you simply tune out and just do little more spiritual activity than warm your seat.

But at just the right time, Christ the Lord appeared among us sinners and spoke the comforting Gospel words that our ears had desperately needed: Here I am. He is the one and only answer to our struggling souls’ cry for help. Though you had failed to keep the Commandments, including that Third one, He came as your light breaking forth like the dawn. He attended to all the details of true and perfect worship of the Father, so that you would be accounted as righteous and holy in God’s sight. He was rejected and reviled to remove from your lips the unkind words that you allowed to soil them. Jesus bore all your sins on His shoulders all the way to the cross, so that by His suffering and death He would pay in full for your spiritual healing, that is, for your forgiveness once and for all. He rose from the dead on the third day, so that His all-encompassing glory would be your rear guard—to guide and protect your conscience so that guilt will never overwhelm you.

Isaiah continues the good news in the rest of this chapter: “And the Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.” That good news did not die out with the ancient Israelite inheritance in the holy land. That forgiveness of sins and life everlasting continue for you to this very day, because Christ is still with you: Here I am! He says. Here I am in the Word you hear today. Here I am in the never-failing waters of Baptism. Here I am, in the bread and wine of the altar, under which I feed you the living heritage of your fathers in the faith- my real and true Body and Blood.

So then, what about fasting? You could so choose to do-or not do- with full freedom, and Lent is coming, after all; it would be a good idea to prepare in body as well as in mind. What about being in church and getting involved in its activities? That could be done too, most of all to hear and learn the Word with a genuine, God-given faith that truly delights in the habitation of the Lord’s house. These resulting good works will fit in nicely with all the other fruits of faith that are also pleasing to the Lord (vv. 6-9). You’re not using these works for the poor and unfortunate to inaugurate your own

version of the glory of God on earth like the social gospel, but you are spreading the mercy of Christ that comes only from the pure Gospel of eternal, heavenly salvation. This way, whether you abstain from food or not, you are still observing the fast that your Lord has chosen for you—that is, to rely on the spiritual nourishment of His pure Word, go in the confidence of sins forgiven, love your neighbor with a sincere heart, and cherish the life together that you have with one another as the Body of Christ, the family of faith.

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

Readings:
Is. 58:3–9a Is this not the fast that I have chosen
Psalm 112:1–9 Unto the upright there arises light in the darkness
1 Cor. 2:1–16 …not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified
Matt. 5:13–20 you are the salt of the earth

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

As the Church travels forward, she always does so facing backward. Not face-first, but back-first, she marches onward toward the Omega, the final goal of her existence. We don’t do this just because we like it better in the years gone by, longing for the good old days, nor should we be afraid of the future, since with God as our Protector, we need not fear any adversary. No, the Church treasures the past because it is only in looking at the past that she beholds her future. The heavenly Jerusalem toward which she journeys, the slain yet living Lamb, the River and Tree of Life, a new and better Eden – these images of our heavenly future are all painted with the colors of what happened to the Church in the past. Without these images, our future looks uncertain, despairing, and void of the Gospel. If there were no history or past to give us our story of ourselves, where we come from, we would feel like utter orphans and waves tossed about like the sea, rather than anchored to the truths that have kept us firmly grounded.

The Old Testament, it turns out, is never quite as old as we think. Consider, for example, the Presentation of our Lord, from Luke chapter 2, which is also part of the Christmas Eve Gospel. Now, back when Moses and the people of Israel exited Egypt, they left that nation that through 10 devastating plagues had been totally transformed into a morgue. Think about it: Every unbloodied door had become the unlocked portal for the Destroyer, the Angel of Death to pass through unhindered at midnight. The first-born sons of Egypt were killed while the first-born sons of Almighty God lived. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a son for a son. From that time on, the first-born sons of Israel belonged to their God. They were holy to the Lord, purchased with blood.

And just as the Lord had sacrificed every first-born son in Egypt, so every first-born son in Israel had to be sacrificed to the Lord – though not literally but this time sacrificed through a substitute, and that was the original meaning of “redeeming” the first-born, and “purifying” the mother after childbirth. Just as all Israelites had been redeemed by the blood of the Passover lamb, so all future generations of first-born sons would be redeemed by another ceremony, a one-time sacrifice. When their sons, first-born or not, were 40 days old (for daughters the wait was twice as long), then the mothers of Israel would carry them to the temple, where sacrifices would be offered to purify the mother and redeem the son. Leviticus 12 is where this law is written down for Israel: “She shall bring to the priest at the entrance…a lamb a year old for a burnt offering, and a pigeon or turtledove for a sin offering, and he shall offer it before the LORD and make atonement for her. Then she shall be clean from the flow of her blood. … And if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two pigeons, (by the way, Luke tells us that Mary and Joseph fall under this category, because in their situation they couldn’t afford a lamb) one (dove or pigeon) for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering. And the priest shall make atonement for her, and she shall be clean.” Remember, this law is an example of ceremonial law and that the blood of childbirth, similar to the blood of a monthly period, was not considered morally sinful, but only ceremonially unclean and therefore not yet appropriate for worship. Nothing more than that.

And so it came to pass that an Israelite mother named Mary carried her 40-day-old first-born son to the temple. Here, the Mother of Purity Incarnate, and who because her Son was the Son of God, she really needed no sacrifice for purification, yet she offered the sacrifice for purification anyway. And here, the First-born Son, who needed no redemption, who would be our Substitute on the cross, He offered the Old Testament substitute price for redemption anyway. And in so doing, the lips of Moses the law-giver were forever clamped shut, that his legal tongue may accuse you no more. By faith in Christ, God counts His obedience to these ordinances as though you had kept them perfectly in every detail. For the law has been out lawed, out-done, by the One who was under no compulsion to bow to its demands, but still bowed to them anyway that He might shut up the law forever for you.

But there is more, for the First-born of Mary is presented in the Temple not as one who needs redemption, just as He was baptized not because He committed any sin, but He was presented to faithful Simeon and Anna on behalf of all of us as the one who comes to accomplish redemption. He enters the temple to fill it with His greater glory, as Haggai had prophesied (saying, The Lord, whom you seek, shall suddenly come to His temple), but it is a glory whose shimmer and shine are dulled to earthly eyes by the paint of blood, here the blood of birds, later, with His own blood on the Cross. He is the Glory of God’s people, Israel, as Simeon sings in his song, but He is no longer the Cloud of Glory, nor the Angel of Glory, but rather the Crucified of Glory. He will not dwell between the Cherubim and hear “Holy, holy, holy” chanted into His ears, but will dwell between the thieves on Calvary and hear “Crucify him, crucify him” shouted by the crowds. His holy of holies will be an unholy, cursed tree. Almighty God in the flesh will hang naked before the naked eye of man. Normally, when someone sees God, he would immediately die as punishment for transgressing what is Holy. But here, with Jesus nailed on the cross, no one will die but God Himself as the last Substitute. In His sacrifice, this Son of the Lord becomes a son of Egypt that all of you sons of Egypt might become sons of the Lord in Him.

The First-born Son of the Father is made to be your substitute. The tenth and final plague of Egypt falls on His shoulders. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a son for a son. The Destroyer, the Angel of Death, is destroyed at the cross. And you? You are spared, you are passed over, for His blood is painted not on your door frame, but now, along with His Holy Body in the Sacrament of the Altar, the blood of the Lamb is on your tongue, painted with the brush of the chalice. Paul calls Christ the First-born among many brethren and Hebrews calls His Body the Church of the First-born. For here is the mystery of God, that packed into the flesh and bones of Jesus are all of you. You are woven into the fabric of His humanity. You are also exalted in Christ into heaven, sitting with Him at the right hand of God the Father almighty.

In this First-born Son of the Father, you are thus also considered First-born sons, whether you are Jew or Greek, slave or free, even male or female. You, as the first-born Son, are presented to the Father on this Holy Lord’s day, Candlemas, the fortieth day of Christmas; you are sacrificed on His cross; and you are raised to undying life in Him, because He is the First-born from the dead. He who was made to be like you in all things now makes you, His brethren, to be like Himself in all things, so that it is no longer you who live but the First-born Son who lives in you. His Father is your Father, His Virgin-Mother is your Virgin-Mother, and in His human nature you are made partakers of His divine nature.

All of these events that happened to Jesus in the past are not to be forgotten, lest we jeopardize our future as the Church awaiting the coming of our Savior. All of these events that happened to Jesus, have now been counted as happening to you. What Jesus earned through His hard Work is your free Christmas gift of forgiveness that lasts way beyond the torn-up paper, the boxed up decorations, the broken toys and returned gifts. He who is presented in the temple, as we heard on this day, bids you walk backward toward your future, having a clear conscience, bearing none of the law’s accusations that you may be feeling in your heart, but rather seeing the Maternal Old Testament pregnant with the Gospel future, visibly showing what is about to come any day now. For in many and various ways God spoke to His people of old by the prophets . . . and now in these last days He has spoken to you by His Son. The Pure one has made you pure, your eyes of faith have seen your Savior, and with a forgiven, clean heart this day, you may with Simeon and Anna depart in peace.

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

1 Sam. 1:21–28 I have lent him to the LORD
Psalm 84 a day in Your courts is better than a thousand
Heb. 2:14–18 He is able to aid those who are tempted.
Luke 2:22–40 they brought Him to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Isaiah wrote so that he virtually sings when he says: The people that walked in darkness have seen a great Light. And those who dwell in the shadow of death, upon them the Light has shined. The disciple John sings in response: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God…. And the Word became flesh.” (Jn 1:1-2, 14). We know all that. We heard it all-over-again not long ago at Christmas-time. Jesus is the Word of God, meaning Jesus is God. He came to be where all that flesh is, and lived Himself in that flesh. The Lord God Almighty now stands among us, still in His own human flesh. The One who created the ticking of every second put Himself in time, in history, in a certain place.

And He entered … the way you did: He came as an infinitely small cell, the fullness of the infinite God and the fullness of finite man all in one divinely fertilized ovum. Behold, God has come out from darkness, from behind the Temple veil—and yet you still can’t see Him. Not yet. He remains hidden for a time, for nine months behind the veil of Mary’s flesh—the Child, not yet born, called Holy, the Son of God, Son of the Most High (Luke 1: 31-35). No one could see Him, but God was in His “temple,” dwelling with His people (Jn 1:14). Take your time moving through this great mystery of the Christian faith. God is at work, but in a hidden way. You can’t see Him within His mother there. God being found in appearance as a man—taking the form of a servant (Phil. 2:7-8) … and it begins in the womb. This is God who is so weak! An embryo so fragile that, to say it in the clinical language of bio-technicians: if you took His ‘stem cells,’ it would destroy Him … just as King Herod would try to destroy Him when He was just a little older. Mighty God … guarded by nothing stronger than the flesh and tissue of His mother’s womb. Hidden in the darkness, but He’s coming. You’ve seen pregnant women before; you know all about that. But here is God’s ‘new and unique’ Man for us, His Son, God-in-flesh for us.

A world like ours today, that renders even a two- or three-day old embryo to be an ‘insignificant life’ that must surrender to any human desire to snuff it out, or just to be another unwitting donor who gets to give up his or her life in the latest guess of a premeditated lab experiment, this is a world that if consistent must also say that our Lord Jesus Christ—who for nine months lived the same exact way—is also insignificant. If you think that way about Jesus, then it is too easy to say no to Him and His forgiveness, and then you are without salvation. It is utter darkness without the Truth.

We’ve become accustomed to the strange sound—but the Biblical truth—of saying things like: God was cuddled by His mother Mary; God played in the wood shavings of a Nazareth carpenter’s shop; God learned how to walk. The One who created the heavens and the earth … became flesh, blood and bone like that. Look at any newborn to get a sense of what your God was like, and what He did to save you. The One who has no beginning, sent by the Father, knit together in the darkness of the human womb, born of Mary Virgin Mother. A God who comes so weak, little baby-weak. But that’s precisely how your God works. He has begun this marvelous thing … and to the whole world it looked like nothing worthwhile will come of it.

Now move ahead, three decades later, witness His cousin John publicly worshipping Jesus as the “Lamb of God who takes sin away” (Jn 1:29). That was the same John, the yet unborn baby boy, “leaping for joy” worshipping in the presence of His Creator God (Lk 2:41-44). So John still worships Jesus. Behold! There is Jesus, there goes God, into Jordan-water where John had been preaching “Repent! Heaven is near!” And there the Father puts His emphatic stamp on Baptism forever, as heaven opens and the Holy Spirit descends like a dove (Matt. 3:16-17)—but don’t miss God Himself standing in that middle-eastern river … where the sinners are. Looking just like us. And then the Spirit led Jesus out to the desert to do 40 days of skirmish with Satan. Where Jesus, a true Man, the second Adam, says, “Away from Me, Satan!” and Satan must obey, just like he fled from you at your Baptism.

In just a few minutes we’ve traveled from God’s eternity … to this Epiphany season … to this day … with Jesus. And this is where things are serious. Indeed, John, now that he’s in prison for his preaching—it will go worse for him because of Jesus. But the Lord is into His everyday schedule of fulfilling the words of Isaiah, pulling His flesh out of the Old Testament prophecy. So as the Gospel narrative begins, we know what really is happening behind His weak appearance. Jesus is God … God beginning His ministry… God calling those whom He had in mind, even while they were still in the womb.

Jesus comes here to you today because of the darkness of our world. It is because of the darkness—or what God calls darkness (and you really only know for sure what a thing is when God tells you what it is). As the prophet Isaiah said so long ago: People are sitting, just sitting there in darkness. Suffering, Crying, Mourning in darkness. You have darkness even if you’ve got artificial, Las Vegas neon light to guide all your stumbling. Our culture is “living (if you want to call it that) in the land of the shadow of death” which is to say, they are sitting where death has been and always comes again. Death in you. Death around you. Have you been to a funeral recently? When is yours? Have you driven by a cemetery lately? Not as peaceful-looking if you were to see what’s only six feet below the surface. Or a Planned Parenthood clinic—do you know what’s there? The great Abortion “Law of the Land” is at work. Death as a so-called “temporary” solution is at work. It’s not her body or your body or my body, but after the cross, all bodies have been bought by Jesus. Redeemed. You, and every child conceived and foreknown by God before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4), bought with blood, not with silver or gold, or even credit or through a generous health plan.

But still, this is America, and still I am a sinner, and so still, darkness. Maybe it is the long silent darkness of a pressured young mother weeping because she realizes her child will never have a birthday, and she wishes now it was otherwise. Or the sadness of a young Christian man who looks back and cries, “I’m not even the kind of person who would ever think abortion is okay”– a young man who will always be a father to a child that will never sit next to him at a ball game. When darkness and death seemed at the time like a good alternative for a difficult temporary situation—a quick treatment for an “unfortunate” or “unplanned” pregnancy that only God saw in His plan and found fortunate. Honestly, think close to home, like someone in your family—indeed, Christians having abortions in the same number as unbelievers—there is no difference in finding abortion, that is, darkness, an appealing idol, a helpful “cure.” There is darkness all around us, and in us. But how does that person, how do I, get out of that darkness or any other darkness?

I don’t. I can’t claw myself out. Neither can you. There is only the Light that breaks in from the outside, outside us. The Light that dawns. Fulfilling exactly what the prophet Isaiah says. Jesus is the only Light for our darkness. And He brings nothing but mercy.

It’s practically automatic for Christians to say, “Jesus died for the sins of the whole world,” but when it comes to those certain sins—whatever you have in the dark—sins from the past, we torment ourselves as if “that is certainly the only sin that Christ won’t forgive and can’t forgive”: my abortion, my letting an abortion happen, my adultery, my divorce, my silence, my lies, or whatever my evil day was, or still is. But God will have none of that. He says this: “The people who walked in darkness … have seen a great Light. Those who dwelt in the shadow land of death—upon them a Light has shined.” Isaiah can’t say enough about it, this bright Light who shatters darkness. It is Jesus. Forgiveness. My sin and yours, undone.

What is it like? The yoke, the burden crushing you has been broken off. The Law you have not kept, always coming up behind you and requiring even more that you cannot do, has now been kept. The club of the three slave-drivers sin and death and the devil has been shattered over God’s knee. For God has a face, He has a knee, everything flesh and blood. It is Jesus for you, shattering the yoke of the Law by wearing it Himself, and breaking the rod that beats your back by letting it beat Him in your place. Satan did his worst, but Christ arose as the Victor. It was a strange-looking victory, because it looked like defeat. Just as strange are the gifts: also hidden in plain, ordinary things. A simple thing like water that washes you spiritually clean and unites you with Jesus. Ordinary bread and wine that feed you in an immortal, you could even say, a healing feast. And in place of the death and darkness in your life, you have light and the only true and everlasting life.

It’s not just for yourself. It has pleased God for Him who has formed you in your mother’s womb, to give you to one another, to help each other, and not to think of yourself, which always was the way of darkness. Mary’s body does not belong to her after all. Her womb and every mother’s womb is the Holy Spirit’s workshop—where God knits together for you a body that still belongs to Him for you to take care of for now, and He promises you your glorious, heavenly body in which you will live with God the Father forever. What a marvelous work He does in darkness: in the darkness of Mary’s womb, in the darkness of every mother’s womb, and even still for those who are yet “sitting in darkness”: Jesus, He remains the great Light.

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

Readings:
Is. 9:1–4 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light
Is. 49:1–7 The LORD has called Me from the womb
Psalm 40:1–11 Sacrifice and offering You did not desire
1 Cor. 1:1–9 God is faithful, by whom you were called
John 1:29–42a Behold the Lamb of God!

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Christian Baptism often is an event that, for most of us, is remembered only as some point in the distant past. And so, I’m afraid, it can also be too easily forgotten. The Word of God and the Holy Supper – on the other hand – they are continually being placed before us. Through these events we’re reminded constantly of the many blessings that God showers down upon us. But our Baptisms have to be brought to light over and over again. We have to set our minds on remembering them. That’s why – in Luther’s Small Catechism – it’s suggested that, as a Christian, you begin each day by making the sign of the cross over yourself as a remembrance of the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the name that was placed on you at Baptism. You would not want to lose sight of the importance of what happened on that day when God first called you to be His own.

And what are you supposed to remember about your Baptism? Is it the faithfulness of your parents, who – in obedience to God’s Word – brought you as an infant to receive this Water of Life? Or, if you weren’t Baptized as an infant, how about that moment when, as a believing adult, God placed the desire in you to be Baptized? More to the point, God wants you to remember that real water was applied, that His Holy Word was invoked, and that – in that very moment – the Holy Spirit worked an amazing transformation by transferring you from this kingdom of darkness and death into the kingdom of His beloved Son. For this is precisely how your heavenly Father gave you life where before there was nothing in your life but death – it’s how He granted you faith where before there was nothing but unbelief. And most especially, it’s how, when all is said and done, your conversion is a miracle wrought straight from the hand of God Himself.

It’s important to remember these things because we live in a world where many people – even Christians – still deny that God’s Holy Spirit does anything through Baptism to grant faith. They are downright adamant about this, much more than you or I ever get excited over the truth, I’m afraid, and so they are constantly winning people over to their way of thinking. What do they teach? Instead of Baptism being God’s gift to man, that in the system of decision-theology, it’s the other way around – nothing more than a public act of the Christian’s obedience and promise to God.

Wouldn’t that mean that all Jesus did for you wasn’t enough? How easy it is then to forget or deny what God has truly done in and through Baptism. Perhaps it’s because Baptism defies the cardinal rule that for something to make sense it first has to check out according to human reason and visible measurement. For the reality is that – to the eye, at least – Baptism doesn’t appear to be much of anything – even though Scripture teaches the contrary. Hear what Dr. Luther had to say regarding Baptism when he wrote: “What God institutes and commands cannot be in vain, but must be a most precious thing – even if in appearance it seems to be of less value than common straw or stubble.”

You would receive the most comfort and gain the most understanding of your own Baptism if you would look at it through the Baptism of Jesus. Even though you were brought to God with nothing – through simple water and His Word God imparted to you everything needful, namely, His forgiveness, His Spirit, and His good pleasure toward you. Matthew informs us that John tried to prevent Him, saying, “I need to be Baptized by You, and You’re coming to me?” John perhaps was utterly amazed that Jesus – this sinless Son of God – this One who knew no sin – should through repentance, seek Baptism and forgiveness from his hand! And yet, it’s precisely in the fact that Jesus came seeking John’s dispensing of forgiveness, that God now holds out an incredible comfort for you. Jesus said, “It is necessary for us to fulfill all righteousness.” That means that there’s no sin you’ve ever committed – or ever will commit – that He hasn’t already soaked up in His own body.

Jesus came to John as the one and only “Sinner” in the world because Baptism is for sinners. And so, just as John once poured the cleansing water of Holy Baptism upon the Son of God our Savior, so also in the very same way – when those blessed waters were first poured out over you at your Baptism – a cleansing took place as the merit of Jesus, all he lived and died and rose from the dead for – these precious gifts were miraculously and fully imparted to you. We have just begun the season of Epiphany, and we should recall that Epiphany marks the opening of the Christmas gift for the whole world. This week, the Baptism of Jesus fits very neatly with that theme because at your Baptism, that’s when the Lord’s precious Christmas gift of eternal life was opened specifically for you. It wasn’t when you made any kind of commitment to Him.

Another thing you need to note about Jesus’ Baptism is how He received the gift of the Holy Spirit – how, as He came up out of the water; the heavens were opened and “He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest upon Him.” Does it strike you as strange that the very Son of God would have to receive the Holy Spirit? Certainly Jesus hadn’t come into this world without the Holy Spirit. And yet here in Christ’s Baptism we see God granting Him this Spirit in a very special way. But that’s how it was with your Baptism, too. Heaven was also similarly parted, and God reached down to touch you as His child – as He bestowed on you His Holy Spirit in a hidden way and put in your heart a saving faith that looks to the cross alone for salvation and life. Yet sadly, because we can’t see these things happening, we’re tempted to believe there’s nothing to them at all – even though God’s Word teaches very clearly that they are very, very real, indeed. You see, in Baptism God adopted you as His child – He made you to be a new creation who abhors sin – and He brought you from this world of death into His world of eternal life.

The final thing I want you to notice about Jesus’ Baptism is how – when the Spirit had descended on Him – the Father pronounced His great pleasure, saying directly to Jesus, “You are My beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.” Of course, Jesus had never done anything to displease the Father. Even as He wrestled in the Garden with having to drink from the cup of suffering for us, Jesus remained constantly obedient to His Father’s will. His entire life was a life of perfection – and in that, the Father was well pleased with Him. And this is where you really get to test your understanding of this Gospel and the blessings you’ve received in and through Baptism.

The test comes by way of a question. And that question – a “yes” or “no” question – is this: “Is God pleased with you?” Now, I suspect that when you hear such a question, the first thing that happens is the Law immediately kicks in and you begin to think, “Well, I should do this – but I don’t. And I shouldn’t do that – but I do! So really, how could God be pleased with me? It’s impossible to know!” It’s then that you need to hear the Gospel – this one of Jesus’ Baptism – of the Father’s words spoken at that Baptism – and of the fact that everything Jesus did here in this life He did in your place. And because of that fact, you are compelled by the Gospel to acknowledge that God is also therefore pleased with you. The truth of the matter is this – if God is pleased with His Son, He’s also pleased with those who’ve been Baptized into the name of His Son.

What great and glorious news that is! As members of Christ’s body, the Church, you are all together considered to be God’s beloved Son, and He declares that He is well-pleased! There’s no treasure on earth worth more than knowing that your heavenly Father is pleased with you. His pleasure isn’t something injected into you and you have to make your Christian life grow before He says that He’s pleased—that’s the Law again—rather, you have it in full as God’s gift, but of course along with that sure forgiveness your holy life will simply continue and grow by His grace for the rest of your life. Therefore, so that you might always be reminded of that fact and live in the realization of it – perhaps you might consider starting in your own life the ancient practice of making the sign of the cross over yourself – as the Catechism teaches – so that you would be daily reminded of your Baptism when you pray, and remember the blessings God freely imparted to you – that you might be reminded whose child you are – and of His good pleasure guaranteed to you in Christ.

A story is told about how – when paying a visit on one of his dear friends – Luther found him in a very depressed state of mind. When asked the reason for his sorrow, Luther’s friend responded that he hadn’t been able to determine what it was that had made him so sad. So Luther said these simple words to him. He said: “Don’t you know you’ve been Baptized?” By those words, his friend would later say, he was comforted more than if he’d heard an entire sermon. Well, that is a fitting summary for you to take home with you today: “Don’t you know you’ve been Baptized?” What appears on the surface to be of less value than straw or stubble has been intended by God to be for you a great source of comfort – even though it’s a treasure you cannot even see. Give thanks to God that in Baptism He has cleansed you from all your sin – He’s given you His Holy Spirit – He’s made you a new creation in Christ – and that He has shined His face upon you in the assurance that He is, indeed, as pleased with you as He is with His own dear Son.

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

Readings:
Is. 42:1–9 A bruised reed He will not break
Psalm 29 Give unto the LORD the glory due to His name
Rom. 6:1–11 How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?
Matt. 3:13–17 Jesus…at the Jordan to be baptized

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

We have had a joyous, happy holiday. These past few days we have been celebrating the “good news of great joy,” that to us is born a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. With the angels who give glory to God in the highest, with the shepherds who return glorifying and praising God, with the wise men who rejoice exceedingly with great joy, we too join in the joy of Christmas. We cannot totally get rid of all the negative, unpleasant things that go on in our lives, but at least for a few days, can’t we just block them out?

Now, on the Sunday after Christmas, the Church Year calendar gives us the account of what’s called “The Slaughter of the Holy Innocents.” Now if there is any other event in the Bible that could be more of an antithesis to an upbeat, cheerful holiday mood, I don’t know what it is. Herod’s murder of defenseless children of Bethlehem is a singularly horrifying and tragic story. Yet it comes hard on the heels of Christmas, and is right there in Matthew chapter 2. What saves the story for us, though, is what can really be called “The One That Got Away.”

King Herod heard of a newly born king of the Jews from the wise men, the Magi who suddenly had paid him a visit. This is not the news that a desperate despot wants to hear. “Another king of the Jews? What about me? Where would that leave me? I’m the only king around here. I’m not going to have some little upstart challenging me for my throne.” But Herod is a sly fellow. He’s not going to come right out and tell the wise men all this. That would scare them off. No, Herod wants the wise men to lead him right to the little king. His advisors find out from the prophecies that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem, but he wants to know the exact location and the exact child. So he sends them to Bethlehem on the pretense that he wants them to report back to him so he too can go and worship.

Of course it’s a lie. Herod doesn’t want to worship the newborn king, he wants to wipe him out! But the wise men are warned in a dream not to go back to Herod. So Herod gets stood up by the wise men; they don’t come back. He still doesn’t know which of the baby boys in Bethlehem is the one to eliminate. So just to make sure he gets the right one, Herod orders the death of all of them–all the baby boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity, up to two years old.

Herod the Great was a brutal, murderous ruler, insanely jealous and protective of his power, suspicious to the point of paranoia. Ancient history records other occasions when he had potential rivals to his throne, whether real or imagined, ruthlessly killed. He even murdered members of his own family when he thought it served his own interests. So for Herod to order the deaths of maybe up to 20 baby boys in a small town–if he thought that doing so would be a sure way to get rid of a new “king of the Jews”–this was nothing out of character for him.

The soldiers are dispatched. The dirty deed is done.

This is a crime so unspeakable and heinous, the details are hard to contemplate, much less to describe. What kind of a monster could do such a thing? What is as senseless and tragic as the violent death of innocent children? What grief as profound as that of parents mourning the death of their little ones? Try to imagine the sorrow of those mothers in Bethlehem: “A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted, because they are no more.”

Is there any comfort for these mothers of Bethlehem? There is, and it’s all because of “the One that got away,” the one baby Boy who escaped the slaughter of the innocents. Joseph is warned in a dream to take Mary and baby Jesus and flee the country. The little, innocent Messiah is safely on his way to Egypt. God is not going to have the infant Savior cut down before he can get started.

You know, God had done this sort of thing once before, saving an infant savior. Many centuries earlier there was another evil ruler who wanted to kill a bunch of Israelite baby boys. But the Lord had a little baby deliverer that he wanted to keep alive. Moses was his name. So that time the one that got away was baby Moses. This time it’s Jesus. That time the baby was already living in Egypt. This time the baby goes to Egypt, in order to escape. Moses had a great mission in front of him: to lead the people of Israel out of bondage in Egypt. Jesus had an even greater mission in front of him: to lead people of all nations out of bondage to sin and death and the power of the devil. That’s why baby Jesus needed to flee from Herod and escape to Egypt.

It was necessary for baby Jesus to live, in order for him to grow up and fulfill his saving mission. Jesus had to live so he could later die, at the right time and in the right place. Some thirty years later, Jesus would stand before another Herod–Herod the Great’s son, Herod Antipas–and before a governor named Pontius Pilate, and at that time and in that place, Jesus would suffer and he would die. His death at the hands of evil men would redeem us from the power of death and deliver us from all evil. So the Christ of Christmas had to live, in order that the Christ of Calvary could die, for your sake and mine.

That’s the crucial connection between the joy of Christmas and the somber tragedy of the Holy Innocents. Any celebration of Christmas that can function only on a surface level of sweet, syrupy sentimentality, a Christmas that cannot come to grips with the harsh reality of death and suffering and evil in the world–that kind of a Christmas is not worthy of the name. But the true Christmas, the real Christian Christmas, does speak a word of lasting comfort to those who are suffering, to those who are struggling with the unanswered, and unanswerable, questions of life—and death. Maybe you are one of those today who can benefit from this comfort found hidden in the story.

Is there any comfort for people suffering from tragedy and loss? Is there any comfort for young mothers who lose their children? Is there comfort for you, when you lose a loved one or are losing one to advancing age or debilitation? For you, when you come face to face with your own mortality? Yes, there is comfort for them and for you! It is all because of the One, the Savior that got away! Christ Jesus, by winning forgiveness for all our sins has taken the sting out of death. It still is going to hurt, you will continue to miss that person or still endure physical suffering yourself. But the big hurt, the big death–death under the wrath of God–that has been accomplished. Jesus took that death for us and so took the sting out of death.

Christ’s absolutely “holy, precious blood” and his totally “innocent suffering and death” mean that now we who are connected to Christ are accepted by God as true “holy innocents,” holy before God and innocent of all the guilt that the Law says we had deserved. Those who belong to Christ will “live under him in his kingdom and serve him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness.” So the question then becomes: How do we get connected to Christ? The baby boys of Bethlehem–they were connected, for they were sons of the house of Israel. They had received in their bodies the sign of the covenant which God had given to Israel, namely, circumcision. And so they shared in the hope of Israel, the promised Messiah, who would deliver God’s people from sin and death.

How about us? How do we get connected to Christ? We are connected to him in Holy Baptism. In baptism, we participate in the death of Christ. Paul says in Romans 6 that “all of us who are baptized into Christ Jesus are baptized into his death.” So the big death for each of us has already occurred. The death we deserve for our sins, Christ has already suffered. And we participate in that death by way of baptism. Now the only death left for us is the one that leads to life–everlasting life with our Lord and Savior, where there will be no more pain, no more suffering or sorrow, no more tears and weeping.

There is the source of comfort–and even joy–for all who are surrounded and set upon by the sorrows of this life, this vale of tears. There is the comfort for the mothers of Bethlehem and the mourners worshiping on Avenue E. All who are connected to Christ have already died and now are joined to the life of Jesus. His is life that is truly holy and innocent, life with God, life forever. Now that life is yours. Here in this place.

And so Christmas, which is still going, by the way, is not a time for artificially trying to block out unpleasant thoughts and put on a fake, happy face. No, Christmas is to be celebrated especially in view of all the tragedy and suffering we experience in life. Because Christmas is when Christ came into the world, and that makes all the difference. For the Christ of Christmas is also the Christ of Calvary. That’s why Jesus had to be “the One that got away”—so that he could go to the cross for you. And connected to him, we have a comfort and a hope and a joy that all the Herods of this world cannot destroy.

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

Readings:
Is. 63:7–14 You lead your people to make Yourself a glorious name.
Psalm 111 The works of LORD are great
Gal. 4:4–7 when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son
Matt. 2:13–23 take the young Child and His mother, flee to Egypt

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Reading the signs can either save you or sink you. The sign says your freeway exit is coming up. Signs are telling you not to skip that appointment with your doctor. We rely a lot on signs, for good reason. But signs that don’t help us or confuse us even more keep us from going where we need to go, and we could find ourselves in a lot of trouble.

God’s work among us is shown in signs. His signs are given for the comfort and the personal assurance of all those who believe in Him. Yet for those who are evildoers, faithless and opposed to God, His signs are signs of wrath and condemnation. They know who they are because they are without excuse; their father the devil stands condemned by the decree of Almighty God, as seen already in Genesis chapter three, where the offended Creator says: I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed. He shall crush thy head, and thou shalt crush His heel. To us, this statement means victory, relief from oppression, that Christ the Seed of the woman shall conquer over sin, death and the devil. But to the prince of darkness it means destruction, and he will not stand for that.

Thus it is with King Ahaz, in our reading from the prophet Isaiah in the Old Testament. This man, though he was a King of Judah and a descendant of the faithful King David, Ahaz is still just a political opportunist who is hearing this prophecy from God. Does he hear a voice from heaven, or from somewhere within himself? No, Ahaz hears God’s word speaking from the mouth of Isaiah, God’s chosen preacher.

With utmost patience, God is offering yet again to give a sign to this wicked king for the sake of the believers in his kingdom, as well as his righteous father, David. All of creation, from the highest heights to the lowest depths is in the control of the Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It was his idea to reach out to Ahaz! Any sign would have been possible to give lasting comfort and peace to young Ahaz. This was his first year as king, and already he was caught up in a war with two northern nemeses: namely Syria, and the broken off tribes of Israel. He could have used a divine sign for comfort, but instead Ahaz chose to discard the sign and he mocked Almighty God in rash unbelief. What good can a sign do for you if you refuse to believe what it says? The king even had the nerve to tell God that He was off-base! There’s ironic snark in his response: “Far be it from me to test God, I will not ask!”

You see, Ahaz was not suddenly going to be a pious and reverent man. He only had one thing on his mind and that was to secure and solidify his political power. Nothing got in the way of his ambition—not even his family, many of whom were killed at his orders for the sake of personal convenience.

You could say that King Ahaz and King Herod, who ruled at the time of Jesus’ birth, have many things in common. Although Herod was basically a puppet king of the Roman Empire, he still went to great lengths to keep what power he had. He, too, would kill his own family, or even murder every innocent two-year-old in Bethlehem to keep sitting on his throne.

So, for Ahaz, Isaiah’s prophecy of the Virgin’s Son, Immanuel, was not a comfort but a judgment from God against him. He heard the verdict on behalf of the whole family line of kings descended from David. Desolation would soon come to the people of Judah and Ahaz would be judged. Because he lacked faith in God, Ahaz failed to read the Sign. The Sign. The promised Messiah was not going to be yet another political king, but “…of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end.”

So it was with Ahaz, it was the same for Herod. When Isaiah’s prophetic words about Immanuel were fulfilled, when the baby boy Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary and laid in the manger, King Herod trembled for his feeble, earthly throne. Both kings, Ahaz and Herod, received this blessed Gospel word with fear and trembling—they would be ever hearing, but never perceiving, just like the Pharisees hearing Jesus, but refusing to take His parables to heart. Even then, Ahaz has this one distinct difference from Herod—he was the ancestor of the very Messiah that he rejected! So the sign did not bring good news to him.

However, to repentant sinners, to you and to me, God’s work through signs, through this sign of Immanuel, Jesus, God with Us, the baby in the manger means great comfort. And comfort not just for us today looking back at Christmas as just a past event, but this is comfort for people of all times, for this time, for what you and I have to face in this evil world every day. All the faithful people since Adam and Eve who looked for the Messiah to crush the serpent’s head and save us from our sins—this sign says He is now right here!

God wants all to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth, the one Truth who came into our human flesh, wrapped up in swaddling clothes and was laid in a manger on the night He was born. This Immanuel, He is God’s Gospel-sign for us today and always. Jesus Christ is true God, the Son of the Father, who came down from heaven to be God-with-us, to be one of us.

When God gives signs, He also hides Himself in those signs. Why does God have to hide Himself? Because no sinful human being may see God the Holy One and live. We would be condemned and lost forever if we were to approach God’s presence unforgiven. That was the reason why Adam and Eve had to be banished from the garden. Their punishment for their sin would have been permanent if they had remained in God’s holy, unveiled presence. Our sins merit that same exact punishment—God is not accessible to us because we are unholy.

But an amazing thing happens when God hides Himself. When God hides Himself, He is actually making Himself accessible to us! God the Father reveals Himself to us as Our Father because He is the Father of the only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Christmas, then, embraces and celebrates the gift that God the Father gave for the life of the world: He gave Immanuel, God Himself is here with us, hidden and lowly.

Immanuel is more than just a fancy name. It’s a phrase—God with us. The name reveals the two natures of Christ, He is true God and He is true man: God with us. It’s the whole theme of Christmas and even of our whole life in communion with God as the holy Christian Church. Jesus is God in human flesh, which we say in the creed as Incarnate. The Father’s purpose for sending His Son to live and ultimately to die in our human flesh was “for us and for our salvation.” God incarnate, though, wasn’t just a one-time historical event; our reason for celebration this December 25th is not only that Jesus is one year older this year. That may be true, since He still has a real human nature, but more importantly, Christmas tells us how we come to know God, and especially how we come to know that God actually loves us, that He chose to reveal Himself to us. In the flesh of Jesus Christ, this is God who came to us, and that’s why He gave us this sign.

Coming in the flesh wasn’t all He did. Immanuel is hidden also in another sign, a suffering man on the cross, a spectacle of foolishness, a stumbling block that unbelievers refuse to accept. Our own sinful natures inside us, they tempt us to ignore Him, to prefer other ways to have contact with God. Still, God comes back to us with His signs. He won’t give up on us. He won’t give up on you. He is ever patient, never wanting the sinner to die but to repent, say I am a sinner, and receive His absolution.

The forgiveness of our sins was won when Jesus died on the cross, and eternal life was proclaimed when Christ rose from the dead. That very same forgiveness and life is given here in the Divine Service, and here God gives more signs. He hides himself in the signs we have as our treasures here under this roof. His Holy Word that you read in the Bible and hear in the sermon, Baptism and Holy Communion—these are God’s signs and He reveals Himself to us in them just as at the same time He hides Himself in them. We who once belonged to the devil and were worthy of nothing from God except condemnation, have by God’s own signs been transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. Whatever our hardship that we may face, He gives us the grace in the forgiveness and life that we receive here to endure that hardship because now, with these signs, He lives in us—Immanuel, God with us!

Jesus Christ, Son of the Father, Son of the Virgin, this Jesus is revealed in the flesh in order to forgive you, and that forgiveness is what the Church gladly proclaims until Jesus returns in glory at the end of the world. We sing His praises as we join in the song that the angels sang to the shepherds in their fields: Glory be to God on high, and on earth peace, good will toward men. We pray with all believers for Our Lord Jesus to do as we prayed in the Collect of the Day today: “Stir up Your power, O Lord, and come among us.” And He does it! And He will do it again, as we look forward with the whole Church to that Day when God will no longer hide Himself in signs but then we as His forgiven people, will meet Him face-to-face.

Thanks be to God that He has given us all of His signs to save us. This Christmas, the risen Immanuel invites you to behold God’s great Sign. Receive forgiveness through the signs He has instituted to deliver that forgiveness to you. Bring your hopes and fears of all the years. They will be met in the baby boy of Bethlehem, the Incarnate Son of God our Immanuel.

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

Readings:
Is. 7:10–17 a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.
Psalm 24 Who may ascend to the hill of the LORD?
Rom. 1:1–7 Through Him we have received grace and apostleship
Matt. 1:18–25 the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

What has bowed your head down, recently? It seems that especially during Advent, people have their heads bowed down more than at other times of the year. They could be just watching their step, because with less than a moment’s notice, you could find yourself flat on the ground, and Christmas is no fun when you’re spending it in the hospital. Maybe you have your head down right now as you are examining your list of countless things to do and to prepare before that holiday comes in a week’s time, ready or not. Perhaps that particular bell-ringer at the store entrance has a knack for locking in too-direct of a gaze and you just don’t want to make eye contact when you’ve got a busy schedule and no spare change… best to look down!

Do you perhaps have your head down in a different way, because you feel beaten, defeated with tension in your family, hurt because someone sinned against you and won’t admit it? Or maybe you want to clear the air and admit your fault with someone whom you hurt with your words and they refuse to forgive? Our heads ought to be down, at least in a spiritual sense, because we must daily repent of our sins against God and against all our various neighbors in our lives.

You know our world has its head down—you can tell the signs of that are all around us. The difference, however, is that our world’s head is down not in repentance but in self-worship. Those whom we see in this world who reject our only Lord and Savior, are instead worshiping the only deity that they hold most dear—themselves. Their heads are down only because they would rather stare in absolute wonder at their own belly-button! It’s all about my life, my needs, my body, my political party, my set of values, my wants. You are tempted to have your head down in that way, also, as am I.

You know what happens, though, when someone walks around too long with their head down all the time. It could lead to a funny bump on the head when she walks into a pole, or a quite frightful and deadly thing when he gets run over in the street. You are unaware of what is vitally important when you are not alert, and there is no way for you to tell what is right there in front of you. The more you stay bent down, the harder it is for you to get yourself straightened up again. I’m always getting told not to slouch over; I guess I’m not very easy to train in the fine art of good posture.

There was someone else who had his head down. Once again, we are talking about the designated preacher for the season of Advent, John the Baptist. This time, the Gospel records a moment once he had been thrown into prison, somewhere near the Dead Sea, we think, and he sent some loyal disciples of his to ask Jesus a question. It is quite a shocking question, considering that it came to Jesus from the courageous John the Baptist. After all, he was the one who pointed our Lord out and said, Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! Whether he was discouraged, and had his head down in that nasty dungeon, or his disciples were concerned, and John wanted to send them, heads down in their own disappointment, straight to the source to get the final word from Christ Himself, both would be answered in the same way. Jesus gave the perfect response to raise any head that might be bowed down with pain, repentance, sin, and sorrow.

Lift up your heads! So says the Psalm, and a few Advent hymns sing it, as well. Yes, there is a time to bow down in repentance and to sacrifice your personal desires and the world’s self-worship that entices you. However, there is also a time to lift up your heads, to straighten up and see your salvation coming ever nearer. We already heard that when you witness the many frightful signs of the end of the world, those are actually the indicators that your Savior is about to rescue you. What Jesus says to John’s disciples will raise up their—and John’s own—heads. Are you the promised Messiah, the Christ? Or should we be looking for another? Should we keep our heads down and ignore our vain hopes that God is going to fulfill His Word right here in front of us? It is getting tougher, from our human perspective, to believe that Jesus will help us in our day. The world is just getting worse and life as a committed Christian believer and family and within the blessing of a Christian marriage seems impossible. Our heads are down because we feel alone.

Lift up your heads! Look with eyes of faith that trust in the mighty works of our Lord Jesus Christ. Receive the everlasting joy upon your heads, as Isaiah predicted. He who healed the sick, cleansed the lepers, raised the dead, gave sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf—He it is who has come into your midst right here this very day. You have heard His Word of forgiveness before, and you have it as your very own gift once again today. You couldn’t lift up your own head, for all of the sin, pain and death that had kept it down. But He raises up your head, since He bowed down His own head in death on the cross for your forgiveness and eternal life. He gave up His Spirit in utter agony and shame so that you would breathe in the blessings of your lasting inheritance in His kingdom. He lifted up His head again to new physical life on the third day so that resurrection for your physical body would be certain. Your weak knees will be strengthened, as Isaiah sings, you of anxious heart– “Be strong” in the strength of the Lord and not in your own strength. You are now known as the ransomed ones, belonging to the Lord forever. He has come through for you to restore what sin and its curse had taken away. Your head is raised up with confident faith, since the Blood of Christ your Savior was shed on the cross to pay for your release, and to ease all of your hurt.

Rejoice, so we hear on this Third Sunday in Advent, and we light the pink candle on our Advent wreath. And you know that this is more than simply to put out an effort to “remember the reason for the Season,” as important as that is. A happy stream of mere thoughts on how I can bring peace on earth, would not do that much good for John the Baptist, locked up in prison. They don’t seem to last that long for you or me, either. You need the flesh and blood forgiveness that Jesus gives you today. That’s the only joy that lasts. You are here for the mighty works of God that happen in front of your face, and give you a reason truly to rejoice. No one else, including yourself, can replace the joy that Christ our Lord came to bring, and we look forward with repentant joy to that Great Day when our heads will be lifted up in everlasting glory, never to be bowed down in sorrow again.

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

Readings:
Is. 35:1–10 Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees…the ransomed of the LORD shall return
Psalm 146 do not put your trust in princes
James 5:7–11 be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord.
Matt. 11:2–15 Go and tell John the things which you hear and see

Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

No shepherd would choose to lead his flock of sheep into a barren wilderness. That is because at least a good and faithful shepherd is continually concerned about their health and safety. They are his sheep, they are precious to him, and he would not for all the world want anything to happen to them. If sheep were ever led into the desert, it would be almost certain that they would starve to death. Even if they were able to get by on the sparse wilderness plants for their food, then their lives could be claimed by the heat of the sun, or they might fall prey to wild animals and robbers lurking in the wasteland. If you were going to feed sheep, you wouldn’t want to do it in the wilderness.

The Bible attaches a deeper, spiritual meaning to the wilderness. It is the place where the devil lives, the place of sin and of temptation. We’re talking about a place that is obviously not the land of milk and honey. People who live out there include the man who was possessed by several demons, and he was clearly a menace to peace-loving society. After Jesus was baptized, He was sent starving into the wilderness so that He would do battle against Satan himself. It is the exact opposite of the Garden of Eden. Instead of the tree of life and streams coming up from the ground, it is a tree-less place of dryness and death. It stands as a reminder not of God’s rich goodness, but rather of what sin and unbelief has brought into the beautiful world that God created. The desert was where God’s people, led by Moses, wandered for 40 years because of their unbelief against God, and if they could have taken the direct route instead, they would have gotten to Canaan in less than two weeks! The wilderness is a harsh reminder of sin and rebellion against God. You would be hard-pressed to find God’s children living for very long apart from His Word in the wilderness.

Yet God, like the psalms say, is the Shepherd of Israel, even as the Lord is your shepherd, and to the amazement of all, God decided to place a shepherd to do His work of preparation in none other than the wilderness, of all places. Our readings from God’s Holy Word today tell us this shepherd is the famous prophet John the Baptist, and his title Baptist simply means “one who baptizes.” Everyone seems to think that the strange thing about John is his wardrobe and diet. Yes, he wore camel-hair clothes and ate locusts and wild honey, that’s the vivid picture we have of him. Yet the prophet Isaiah, who lived 6 centuries before, and the holy Gospel itself both tell us that John was, above all things, a “voice crying out in the wilderness.” Through this eccentric man, God was feeding His sheep in the desert with His Word. John’s preaching was actually the voice of God Himself, and God’s people of all times and places hear His voice and follow Him, even, strange enough to say, into the wilderness.

This faithful shepherd in the wilderness preaches “a baptism of repentance,” not a religious sounding speech, but real preaching dripping wet with forgiveness. This preaching of his really does something. It leads people to turn away from their sins and receive God’s forgiveness that is freely given in the waters of Holy Baptism. All who listen to this preaching are pointed to the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. John preaches to you, too. Repent, be ready to receive Jesus. This is why the season of Advent prepares you for Christmas. The world around you is nothing but wilderness, and your own sinful nature within you is likewise a spiritual wasteland, full of unbelief and despair inside. If you let that sin within you have its way, and we often do, then you also deserve John’s rebuke, “You brood of vipers. You must repent!” Because the word of God coming from the mouth of John is the food and drink of forgiveness and salvation that you need to live in the wilderness of this world, the desert of your struggle against sin. And so, repent, confess your sins and receive Jesus who comes to you today, and who will come again at the Last Day.

Remember, John does not only have bad things to say. Isaiah informs you that this preacher in the wilderness has a wonderful Gospel word for you: “Comfort, comfort, ye My people” God says through His appointed servant. Be comforted, you who mourn. Be comforted, you who are anxious and in need of our Lord’s loving hand. For you cannot deceive yourself into thinking that things will get better all on their own. You cannot imagine that you can pull yourself up, dust yourself off and start all over again. You are attacked daily by the devil’s sharp arrows accusing you of your sins and trying to convince you that God does not care. By yourself you could not withstand such a barrage. Be comforted, God does care for you, and not because you now finally do what God wants you to do, but because He has reached out in mercy to you, poor miserable sinner that you are.

God will comfort you, this you can know for certain. However, be aware that you will not in this earthly wilderness of life feel comfortable. Remember, it is the Lord’s comfort, not the comfort you expect from this world; Jesus the Prince of Peace, brings a true peace that the world despises and cannot give you. You can work and struggle to achieve a comfortable way of life for you and your family. You could plan ahead on everything so that you could get through this hectic holiday season or you could look for comfort in all sorts of things that you think will make your life more fulfilling, but in the end it’s all an illusion. You won’t reach lasting comfort in these things—only God out of His undeserved mercy and love—only He gives you true comfort in His Word.

But consider the comfort that He proclaims to you—it sounds strange falling on human ears. He talks about iniquity, that’s the guilt that accompanies or is left over from sin. It is the sense of God’s judgment hanging over you, it produces that nagging heaviness in your heart because the Almighty Lord is righteous and holy and you are sinful and unclean. Talking about your sin surely doesn’t give you any comfort. Who wants to be reminded of the wrongs they have done in the past? God’s call to repentance sounds harsh, too. Turn away from your sins, you haven’t lived with the constant attitude that God is first in your life. Too often, other things have taken His place, but your complete trust needs to be in Him alone. At first hearing, the comfort of God doesn’t sound comforting at all.

In all this talk of sin and iniquity and the need to repent, God is making a straight, level road in the rocky, forbidding wilderness where you are. The reason why you need to hear and admit that you are by nature sinful and unclean is so that you would be truly comforted with these words: Your sins are forgiven. Your iniquity is pardoned. You are the spiritual inhabitants of the New Jerusalem, the holy mountain where this poetic scene comes true: the animals that once ate each other up for dinner now lie down together, the lion and the lamb, leopard and goat, all of them eating plants just like they did in Eden. No one will harm or destroy; the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord. Believe me, there is no government around that will be able to make this world perfect like that. But then again, they don’t have to. You have the promise from Jesus, the shoot that sprouted from the stump of Jesse, father of King David, ancestor of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. That image means that although the glorious tree God had planted was cut down because of sin and the sheep rejecting their shepherd, the merciful Father’s promise will still spring up like a shoot or sucker from a stump. And that promise came true when Jesus came to this earth and was planted in the womb of the Virgin Mary to be born as the sacrifice for your forgiveness, and to be your King for all ages.

And so you have found food in the comforting words of God’s forgiveness given to you through Jesus Christ. The Lord is your shepherd; he is feeding you in the wilderness, just as He fed His people of old. The same baptism of repentance that John preached, the baptism that forgives your sins, this is what you can claim for your very own inheritance. This baptism is none other than the Lord’s comfort to you that sins are forgiven and you as God’s people are rescued from the devil’s wilderness, saved from the deadly snare of unbelief.

Your Lord Jesus gives you real food and drink every time you kneel at this altar and eat His Body and drink His true blood. This is not spiritual “comfort food” or merely a fine reminder that everything will be all right. This food brings true comfort, the comfort that comes from sins that are forgiven and a heart that is turned so that you love and trust in God above all things. This is the food that sustains you in the wilderness, and prepares you for the coming of your Savior. Though you may find yourself at times in a spiritually barren wasteland, attacked by the constant temptations of the devil and plagued with worry and despair, you will not starve, you will not be harmed. The Lord is your shepherd and you shall not want—you shall lack no good thing. You are His sheep, and you are precious to Him because He has washed you in the saving waters of Baptism and made you His own. God is constantly concerned over the health and safety of your soul and body. He will not let go of you. And He will guide you with His Word and promises in the paths of righteousness, through the wilderness of this life, that you may dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

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

Readings:
Is. 11:1–10 A Rod from the stem of Jesse … the wolf will dwell with the lamb
Psalm 72:1–7 He will bring justice to the poor of the people
Rom. 15:4–13 whatever things were written before were written for our learning
Matt. 3:1–12 the voice of one crying in the wilderness