This last Thursday was Ascension Day. It marks 40 days since Easter and the day when Jesus was taken bodily up into heaven even as His disciples looked on. Now this is more than a mere historical remembrance. If it were, it wouldn't worth more than just a brief mention. However, the Ascension of Jesus into heaven is significant. It is significant for you, me, and the Church throughout the ages. By His Ascension, Christ has been crowned to receive the full glory, power, and might due Him as the Son of God. Jesus has ascended to prepare a place for His Church; He has gone to send forth His Holy Spirit to bring faith by His Word and Sacraments until Christ comes again in the fullness of His glory at His final return.

Now we may wonder why did Jesus have to ascend into heaven to do all that? The disciples may have wondered why as well. They might have preferred to have Jesus forever on earth with them like Peter had remarked at the mountain of transfiguration when Jesus had shown His glory and Peter suggested making a shelter in order to stay there longer. No doubt they would have loved Jesus to be continually teaching them rather than leaving even to send the Holy Spirit which to them may not have made sense. This is the importance of the words of Jesus in John chapters 13-17 as we have heard them the last several Sundays. On the night that He was going to be betrayed, He explained some of the mysteries as to His ministry and why it was necessary and for their benefit that He had to do all that was required of Him as the Messiah and leave them. 

The Ascension of Jesus into heaven is important as part of that entire Ministry of Jesus Christ. As with all the other parts of His ministry, it was necessary to fulfill God's plan of salvation. It was all necessary to rescue and redeem His creation from the curse of sin. Since Adam and Eve's sin you and me and all children born naturally inherit the corruption of our parents and are guilty of sin and worthy of eternal punishment. To redeem humans in their fleshly corruption God had to send His own Son to be born of a human mother not through natural means but through the power of the Holy Spirit working through the Word in the Virgin Mary so that the Word of God would join human flesh without original sin. It was necessary for Jesus to be true man and true God. Only in the sacrifice of a man could God's wrath for sin be turned, but only by Jesus being true God could He keep the Law perfectly. In His preaching, teaching, and healing, He was announcing that the kingdom of heaven was at hand, that He was in His own person, fulfilling all OT prophecy, that in Jesus, God was reconciling man to Himself, and the power of sin, death and the devil was being overthrown. This overthrow of sin, death, and the devil could only happen through that sacrifice of the perfect Messiah as our substitute; therefore Jesus had to suffer and die on the cross in our place. He received the guilt of all sin upon His own flesh and the heavenly Father cursed Him upon the cross. Jesus had tried to prepare His disciples for this event as He spoke to them the night before He died. He told them that it was necessary that He be betrayed and die so that His Father would be glorified in His loving sacrifice of His own Son for us. Jesus told them that that time of weeping and mourning would only be for a short time; that He would come to them again. He was referring to His resurrection and its necessity to show that the payment for sin was indeed completed in Christ's crucifixion, to show that the power of death had been over turned and now resurrection from the dead is a promise for those who believe in Christ. 

Now we get to the necessity of the Ascension. The disciples, of course, rejoiced when Jesus appeared alive to them after the resurrection, but they also had fear. They feared what would happen next. They did not yet understand. We can see by their question to Jesus just before He ascended that even then they still didn't get it. The disciples were still trying to figure out everything and see everything through the eyes of reason. This is one of the reasons why Jesus had to ascend, so that they could "get it" by the sending of His Spirit upon them. The Spirit could give them true understanding and bring to the disciples' remembrance all that Jesus had said to them. Jesus said in John 16 "I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send Him to you." In this way, the disciples would be given power from on High so that they might bear witness to Jesus and to what He had done. They would be given not only the authority, but the knowledge through faith to rightly administer Holy Baptism, Absolution, and the Lord's Supper in the care of the young church. They would be given the Holy Spirit's inspiration to write down the Gospels and the books of the New Testament so that future generations would also hear the voice of the Good Shepherd and be saved from their sins by God's Grace.

Therefore, in Easter triumph Jesus entered the heavenly realm and was declared the king of Glory in heaven as well as on earth. This is what Jesus was talking about in John 17:5 "And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed." The glory, power, and honor that were due Him as the Son of God who was begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father, through whom all things were made was restored to Him. When we confess in the creeds that Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father it is not a place where His earthly body is confined. It refers to His position of authority as true God. Now glorified on high, His human body is no longer subjected to the regular rules of science, but His divine nature now shares Divine attributes to His human nature. Now that Jesus is ascended His resurrected human body is now even more free by the full exercise of Jesus' Divinity to be everywhere and anywhere He declares Himself to be. This is another benefit to us and the Church. He now is present where He has promised. Jesus comes among us through His Word as it is preached and studied. He is present in Holy Baptism and calls and gathers His sheep into the Church. Now that He is ascended He now also comes to us in a presence that is better and truer than the visible resurrected form that the disciples witnessed with their earthly eyes. Now as He is fully glorified, Jesus gives unto His people His glorified flesh and blood and the fullness of His godhead to ingest in, with, and under the bread and the wine no matter where we are around the world. In this way He comes to us poor forgiven sinners to strengthen our faith to continue to give us joy and hope as He prepares us for the place that He has prepared for us, that is, eternal life.

This is another triumph of the Ascension, for Jesus has gone to prepare a place for us. He is making ready heaven for the last day when He shall return in the same way that He ascended. When He returns, He shall come in His full glory and power to judge the living and the dead, to bring to life the flesh of all the dead and to those who believed on His name He will gather and restore body and soul and bring them to live for eternity in heaven. As we wait for that day, the Ascended Christ continues to send forth His Holy Spirit in the places where He promises to be, His Word, baptism, Absolution, and the Sacrament of the Altar. Jesus has ascended to prepare a place for His Church; He has gone to establish His Kingdom here and in heaven, He even now rules over all things, He sends forth His Holy Spirit, until His final return. He continues to intercede for us by His sacrifice so that we receive mercy from the Father, even as He hears our prayers. 

This mercy is yours by the forgiveness of your sins. You are redeemed in Jesus Christ. You are His child, you may pray to the father in Jesus name, and His sends His Spirit to you to give grace and faith in abundance through His sacramental presence. In this way, you too are now witnesses of His crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension by faith. Let us rejoice then that our Lord and Savior has Ascended on high so that He may also be with us here below. Let us who have received His presence and forgiveness be filled with joy like His disciples and bear witness to this joy. This same Jesus who has been crucified for your sins, risen from the dead so that you may not fear death, has now ascended so that we might ascend to Him at the last day. And on that last day He will come again to judge the living and the dead, but also to bring us with all believers into His eternal glory where we may dwell with Him forever in His joyous victory for Jesus Christ’s sake. Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas

Prayer does not make sense from the perspective of merit. Why should anyone approach a Holy God asking for favors expecting anything when nothing worthy can be given in return? Is it right that a sinner would even approach the Holy of Holies?

Consider the fact that we are all sinners. To be a sinner does not simply mean that we make a few little mistakes here and there. It means that we are fundamentally filthy in our soul. Sins come pouring out of us constantly because all sinners are turned away from God in prideful rebellion and selfish action. Even actions we think are good works are soiled by our unclean sinful nature. So even the purest, most selfless prayer coming from one who has sinned is a horrible abomination, an offensive, a screeching noise in the ears of the holy God….Or at least they would be without Christ.

How is it that we can speak our prayers to the Lord? We do not and cannot approach God in prayer because we think we are worthy. On the contrary, we confess that we are unworthy sinners. In fact, because we know that we are sinners, that we are weak and heavy laden, that we are in need and are otherwise worthy of wrath, we know that we need salvation and help. And God, in His mercy, has given us an intercessor, and we believe and hope in Him. For the sake of Jesus Christ, therefore, we come to Him as Our heavenly Father invites us in Christ’s love and stead.

It is Jesus who has atoned for our sins with His Blood. He died on the cross for your sins and mine. He has redeemed us from our sin, rescued us in our damnable condition. He has torn the curtain that separated us from God by giving up His life for us. God has adopted us as His children by the promise given in Holy Baptism, and Jesus Christ has invited us to call upon Him in prayer. “Ask and you will receive,” says Christ to us today. We approach the Almighty as our loving Father who cares for us and wants to help us because of the merits and for the sake of Jesus Christ. This is what it means to pray in the Name of Christ. We base our prayers on His merits. He has earned for us the right to come to God with our requests.

How strange this makes prayer! We should realize and appreciate, from time to time, that God should NOT listen to us based on our merit and worthiness. We are praying to Him based on Someone Else’s virtues. The ordinary, earthly way of doing things is that we do not ask for favors because a different person is worthy of the favor. How would it sound if I said, “Hey, can you give me a thousand dollars? I am a nasty jerk, but I know someone else who is an awesome person. So, give me the money because of how great that other person is.” In everyday life, that does not make sense. But that is how true Christian prayer works. That is the strange principle of how God decides to treat us.

What a good thing it is that God works this way! Because of sin in us, sin in the world, the curs of it hangs about us. Humanity is vulnerable, weak, and destined for mortality. A world that exists without Christ, aimlessly seeks control and power in its own might of reason, science, or brute force, yet the brute forces of disease, hurricanes, floods, fires, famines, earthquakes and the like show that we do not and cannot have ultimate control. There is so much suffering due to disease, fear, anger, and unbelief all a result of sin and rebellion against God.

Our dear Lord knows this: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God is patient and loving. God is not a distant, indifferent observer looking down from heaven. God fashioned Adam and Eve in a very personal and specific way. He had made them for life, not death. When Adam and Eve sinned despite the threat of death, God did not destroy them in the curse of sin, but gave them a promise of salvation.

In Mercy, the Word of God joined Himself to flesh to redeem that fallen flesh. Jesus, the Son of God, knows what our human lives are like. He lived it. He knew the ache and trouble of temptation. He knew the pain of suffering illness. He knew the grief of loved ones dying, even though He knew that they could and would be raised from death. He knew the severe pain of injuries inflicted upon Himself, and the pain of dying. But unlike us, He deserved none of it. He was perfect, obedient to the Law, and without sin, unworthy of suffering the effects of sin upon Himself. Yet, Christ allowed Himself to live as a weak Man, a vulnerable Man, a Man who suffered and wept and felt crushing emotions. He knew exhaustion, hunger, and physical weakness.

Why? Because He loves you. He loved His creation so much that He was willing to come and redeem it from damnation: from eternal suffering and separation from God forever. So in addition to His love for you as His redeemed creature, purchased and won by the ransom of Christ’s precious blood and His innocent suffering and death, so that you may be His own and serve Him in everlasting innocence and righteousness forever. Your loving Savior knows what it feels like to be you. He knows everything you experience, except for sin. He knows your weaknesses, He loves you despite your fear and weak faith. He has given you faith now to believe in His love and gives you strengthening of that faith by His Word and sacraments as He descends to give you forgiveness of sin, life, and every blessing by His Spirit.

Know that when you pray to the Lord, the Lord understands. He is not a distant, strange creature who has no sympathy for your troubles. Far from it. He understands and has felt it.

If you believe that God knows nothing of your life and does not care, then prayer is an exercise in futility. But if you know that the Son of God has become Man and lived your life, died for you, and has become your Brother, then you also know that God is your Father who cares deeply for you. Prayer requires this kind of faith. Prayer is a response of faith to God’s Word as He speaks to us and gives us faith. We see this even in our worship and liturgy.

So how does the loving Father answer your prayers? Since He is loving, He wants to give you what is best. But sometimes you and I ask Him for things that are not best for us. We simply cannot always know what is good or not good. What appears helpful may actually be harmful. If only we can remember this. Deep down, our old Adam thinks that he knows better than the Lord. We may impatiently complain when He does not give us what we want.

It is precisely because the heavenly Father loves us that He does not give us everything we desire. As we learn better to be His children in the image of His Son, we pray, “Not my will, but Yours be done.” Jesus Christ even prayed this in Gethsemane.

Our sinful mind is sometimes too foolish to do that. Instead, like a little child, we may ask for destructive things without realizing it, and then whine and pout because we did not get our way.

But we may also go to the other extreme. We may be too fearful to ask for something foolish, and so ask for nothing at all. Our timid prayers would refuse to ask for a single blessing.

But the loving Father wants to hear our prayers. Even though our prayers may be stammering and foolish, He wants to hear the desires of our hearts. No petition is too small for His Fatherly care.

By all means, avoid asking for what is obviously sinful. And yes, confess your sinful foolishness to God in your prayers. But then say, “Please give me this thing, if it be Your will.”

When God seems to delay, perhaps He has said, “No.” Or perhaps He is delaying for a good reason and the answer is “not yet”. Whatever happens, let your faith stand fast toward God. Continue to receive His Word and respond to Him with worship Him in your prayers and your lives. Feed those prayers with the Word and Supper, since a plant does not flourish and flower without water and the sun. God uses prayer to strengthen faith, for by praying you are repeating the words and promises of God. You are hearing again God’s promise to you. You are remembering that God is your heavenly Father and you may approach Him as dear children approach their dear Father in Heaven. You are acknowledging your needs and salvation can only come from Him for the sake of Jesus Christ. Know that that is what He wants: your salvation. He wishes only for your good. Pray for that strengthening of faith to say “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”. Pray for blessings of His Holy Spirit as He feeds you by Word and Sacrament: to that His answer will always be “yes”. He desires that you would be saved and kept in the faith. God’s Gospel of salvation shows you His enormous love in Christ His Son. 

Always remember that Jesus did say: “In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” Therefore, dear Christians as His beloved children, redeemed for the sake of Jesus Christ and given faith to believe, you also are overcoming the world. Pray for ongoing strength and peace. Rejoice in His promise to hear you: all for the sake of Jesus Christ your loving crucified and raised Lord and Savior, In Jesus Christ’s Name. It shall be so. Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas

This morning Jesus speaks about the Holy Spirit. Based on what we see throughout Scripture, we confess that the work of the Holy Spirit is to create and nourish saving faith. What does this mean? Our Small Catechism confesses this in a short and sweet kind of way: “I believe I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him, but the Holy Spirit calls, gathers, enlightens and sanctifies me in the one true faith.” Short, sweet, and to the point. When the Holy Spirit works faith, that work consists of calling, gathering, enlightening, and sanctifying.

But, if you’re paying attention to our Lord’s words in the Gospel lesson, He doesn’t speak of the Holy Spirit calling, gathering, enlightening or sanctifying. Jesus adds to the “job description”, saying that He’s going to send the Holy Spirit to “convict” people in the Truth. Convict: That’s seems like a harsh word to our ears. It’s short, but there’s nothing sweet about it…at least not in how we typically use the word. What is Jesus saying here? The word that Jesus uses here (in the original Greek) is elegko, which we translate as “convict,” although a better translation would be “convince.” Okay…so the Holy Spirit’s job (as sent by Jesus) is to “convince”? Convince of what? Well…Jesus answers that question. He says that the Holy Spirit will elegko (convince/convict) in the Truth. His job is to convince/convict in the truth of sin, righteousness, and judgment.

Now, before we go any further, it is important to understand that all of this important convincing/convicting finds its source in the cross of Christ. The crucified Christ is the origination and destination of this holy conviction. John makes this clear in his Gospel and John the baptizer confesses in the first chapter of this Gospel: “I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son[ of God.”. Three years later, Jesus is telling His apostles here (Maundy Thursday evening, at the Last Supper) that He will send His Spirit of Truth so they [the disciples] can understand. They can’t understand what’s about to go down, yet. But…Jesus will send His Holy Spirit of Truth later on, and then they will understand. Three chapters later (John 19), and Jesus is hanging on the bloody cross, mere moments away from breathing His last. John tells us that Jesus, knowing that all of the Father’s plan for salvation was now complete, each and every sin atoned for; the full wrath of the Father against sin for all time paid for in full, declares victoriously, “It is finished!” He then drinks the sour wine, and gives up the Spirit. So often this is simply translated/understood as Jesus “gave up the ghost.” He breathed out His last breath. End of story. But…the way the Greek reads is that Jesus gives up and sends out or even breathes out “the Spirit.”

This is important! The Holy Spirit—the Spirit of Truth—proceeds forth from Christ at the moment of His death on the cross; at that singular moment of our eternal, vicarious satisfaction. Divine Truth—the Spirit of God’s condemning, life-giving Truth—flows forth from and finds its source in Jesus Christ and what He accomplished at the crost. Three days later the resurrected Jesus—the One who has completely conquered sin, death, and the devil for all time—stands among these same apostles and breathes on them. “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of anyone, they are forgiven. If you withhold forgiveness, it is withheld.” Here is Christ giving His Holy Spirit to the apostles, the very men who would be the first pastors of His New Testament Church. Again, notice that this giving of the Holy Spirit—the Spirit of Christ’s Truth—is all about forgiveness of sin. It’s all about the forgiveness that flows forth from and flows back to the crucified/resurrected Christ. There is forgiveness of sin NOWHERE else! This is the Truth! 

Now, did these men fully understand all this? No. They wouldn’t (and didn’t) understand the necessity of the brutal death of Jesus. They didn’t understand the necessity of the cross. Easter Sunday? They still didn’t get it. They were hiding behind locked doors. When they encountered the resurrected Christ, they were in disbelief. They were joyous—yes—but as St. Luke tells us that they “disbelieved for joy.” They still did not fully understand what the death and resurrection of Jesus meant for them and for all mankind. Even forty days later, atop that ascension mount, they still didn’t get it. Jesus is getting ready to ascend, and at least some of them are still thinking in terms of “worldly kingdom” and “earthly rule and power.” “Lord, are you now going to restore the kingdom of Israel?” They didn’t get it. They didn’t understand what Jesus—His death, His resurrection, His victory, and His reign and rule—was all about. They needed help from the Helper to make it clear. Only the Holy Spirit could bring about that sort of faithful understanding… which He would do ten days later at Pentecost. Pentecost is when they finally understood by the working of the Holy Spirit. That is why it was important for Jesus to Ascend and the Spirit to be sent in His fullness.

How can we come to any understanding without the Holy Spirit? We can’t. Can we save ourselves by our good works or come to faith of our own efforts? No, we cannot. Why did God send His only-begotten Son? To take our place and die for our sins; to do what we cannot do; to save us from our justly-deserved wage for sin. This is where the work of the Holy Spirit comes in for our benefit. This is where His “convincing/convicting” is focused: On the cross of Christ. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and our sin is so great that God Himself had to die for it. We cannot save ourselves, no matter how hard we try. The Holy Spirit works saving faith to be convinced of this fact that we need Christ’s redeeming work for us. Faith believes this truth, in spite of what the devil, the world, and our sinful flesh tell us. Faith looks to this same cross and rejoices because faith believes Christ when He victoriously declares, “It is finished!” Faith is convinced of this all-redeeming righteousness. 

Look at the crucifix. It doesn’t look like a victory, does it? It certainly doesn’t have the appearance of “good.” But saving faith worked by the Holy Spirit is convinced of this singular all-redeeming Truth. Saving faith is a firm conviction of all of Christ’s Truth. It is finished. Because of the crucifix we are redeemed outside of our merits, but by Christ’s merits, once and for all time. The faithful one has a firm conviction of their judgment according to their sins. But now in repentant faith in Christ, they do not fear or doubt or worry whether they’re good enough to make the cut. Baptized into Christ’s all-redeeming death and resurrection; holding fast in faith to this all-atoning death and resurrection, the faithful one stands firm in the sure and certain conviction that God has already judged them “innocent,” not because of who they are or what they’ve done, but solely because of who Jesus is and what He has done for them in their place.

And we see the fruits of this Holy Spirit-wrought conviction in our midst, from baptism to funeral and everything in between. Consider when a baptism of a child takes place. The faithful parents, convinced of what our Lord says regarding “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” and “the wage of sin is death,” faithfully bring their little baby born into spiritual death and the trespasses of their father Adam, to the life-giving Good Physician so that He can breathe His Holy Spirit into that precious little one and give them the gift of eternal life. We see this in the funeral, as the baptized child of God who has fallen asleep in the faith is brought before the altar covered over in the white pall of Christ’s all-availing righteousness. That is a confession of faith; a public proclamation of the firm conviction that the deceased now rests peacefully and confidently in the blood-bought righteousness of Christ. Even as we grieve the death of our departed loved one, we grieve differently. We don’t grieve like those who have no hope. We grieve in the joyous hope and firm conviction of blessed reunion before the heavenly throne of God; reunion with them, and more importantly, reunion with Christ in all glory and peace.

And the “everything in between”? You are baptized. Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized have been baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection? This is present-tense assuredness and peace; a peace that surpasses all understanding; a peace that can only be known and understood in the conviction of Spirit-wrought faith. No matter what befalls you on this side of eternity; no matter what crosses you bear as you make your way through this shadowy valley we refer to as “life,” you are completely covered over in Christ’s perfect righteousness. 

May you, by God’s good grace through the working of the Holy Spirit, ever hold fast to this peace of Christ. God be with you by His Spirit to ever and always be humbly convicted in the reality of your sin, while rejoicing in the greater reality of God’s judgment. A judgement that now declares you holy and righteous in His sight for Jesus Christ’s sake. 

Pr. Aaron Kangas

“When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.”

Jesus speaks these words to the disciples shortly before His betrayal, crucifixion, burial and resurrection. He compares this time of trial and sorrow to the pain, anguish, and worrisome time of expectation that happens at the time of childbirth. From the perspective of a woman giving natural birth, there is sorrow, perhaps fear, and certainly pain even with various medications to numb it, but once the child is born, the excitement and uncertainty is passed, the mother worn but joyful, embraces her newborn. That, is of course, the ideal outcome. But the reason for the fear and worry before the birth is that much could go wrong during the actual childbirth: internal breeding and hemorrhaging, heart troubles, strokes, blood clots for the mother, umbilical cords wrapping around where it shouldn’t, breeches, and so on. Will both the mother and child be healthy? How long will the labor last?

No doubt some of the same emotions of doubt, fear, sorrow, pain, anguish and uncertainty went through the hearts and minds of the disciples after the arrest, crucifixion, and burial of Jesus. “Oh no! What is happening? What will happen? How much longer will this trial last? Surely, they will find Him innocent. Wait, now He is dying, will He be rescued? Now He is dead. What now? What will happen to us?” Yet after and through all those labors of Jesus, Jesus had given the answer to these questions. God had not abandoned them: He had not abandoned His servant, His Christ, His Son. No, Jesus now having broken through the bonds of death and the grave, has become the first born of the dead in the glorious resurrection of body and soul for eternity. Jesus is the first born of the resurrection victory triumph. He kept the Law, took our sin, our sorrows, and the punishment that we deserved at the cross in His suffering and sorrow of His crucifixion so that we might be born from above as His people now by faith, but ultimately to be brought forth into the resurrection of our flesh and soul at the last Day. But what about in the meantime? How do exist and survive in a world that seems so often hostile to God, His Word, and His Church?

You know, it is very interesting. Today is the first time that I can recall that this particular text has fallen upon our secular holiday and remembrance known as “Mother’s Day”. This is a day in which we give thanks for the gift that God has given called motherhood through which God brings forth life. Sadly, not all mothers are good at raising their children once they have come out of the womb. Some try hard and make mistakes, some don’t try to be good mothers at all which is among the worst mistakes, and some women do not understand that to conceive a child is a great gift and make the mistake and sin of aborting the life of their child.
Furthermore, we know that taking care of the child is not just about what you do after the child is out of the womb, but how to take care of the child while it is yet, unborn, within the womb is very important. What foods should a mother eat to feed its child through her body: supplements, exercise, taking care of the body, making sure that bad substances are not taken in, lest it affect the child being formed. Now they say, avoid recreational drugs, smoking, low nutrient foods and both mother and child will fare better.

This is where Jesus’ words to the disciples apply to us, as we exist in our current life and situation as members of that body of the church militant. We speak of ourselves as Sons and daughters of God and indeed we are. As St. John says in the epistle this morning: “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” 

The life that we live now in our relation to God is kind of like the relation of an unborn child in relation to his mother and father. We were conceived by the Holy Spirit by the Word of God into belief and faith, attached to the womb of the Church by Holy Baptism in Christ’s blood, and we receive ongoing sustenance from the umbilical cord of the liturgy and the Sacrament of the Altar, and through the Word of God spoken in and through our mother of the church, we also hear the voice of our Father. We have not yet seen Him face to face. We are still being formed for what is yet to come. We are yet, weak and unable to breathe the pure air of holiness with perfectly constructed body and soul that we shall receive after the labor and birth pangs of the judgement of this world.

As we live in this world and this life and we look to the world to come and ponder its mysteries, it really is like a child in the womb who lives and if possible could ponder what life outside the womb may be. But ponder as it may, it cannot fully conceive the idea of sunshine, breathing air through lungs, eating food though the mouth, or any of the other things that we on this side of our earthly mother’s womb know. So the joys of heaven remain somewhat a mystery.

As we remain in the womb of the Church, Christ’s bride, we receive a foretaste of that joy as our knowledge of God in Jesus Christ is ever growing and maturing. What we are right now as people of sinful flesh and bone is different than what we will be. Though differently from what exactly happens in the womb of our earthly mothers, God is forming us and fashioning us. We are now weak, and we cannot take care of ourselves as we ought. We sin, we see the labor pangs of the devil and the world pressing about us and we fail. We think upon death and the different life that we are being trained for and we fear and tremble and sorrow. We wriggle and fight. We momentarily despair that our heavenly Father will not bring us safely through the trials and travails of this world. We wonder if truly He sees us. Again as a child in the womb has no knowledge of the ultrasound images that its parents sees, we are ignorant of how much better God sees us and has mercy upon us and is taking care of us even now.
From Psalm 139 we declare:
For you formed my inward parts;
    you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
    my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
    intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
    the days that were formed for me,
    when as yet there was none of them.

Dear Brothers and sisters in Christ, God has created, formed and named us with His name. He sent Jesus Christ to die for you to forgive you of your sins and to give you eternal life. Look at the miracle that is your physical body, despite its taint of sin, it is a miracle and wonder and He has redeemed it for the sake of Christ crucified for something even better. It is already being made more perfect as you receive from Him grace, mercy, forgiveness of sins, here in His Word, here with His body and blood. God is ever faithful and bountiful in goodness to you and for you in Christ.

Rejoice, be of good cheer, though there may be times when the Church Militant cries out in pain, the labor of this life and these trials are very short compared to the eternity that is yet to come. Remember death is swallowed up in Christ’s Victorious Resurrection. You are by faith in Jesus Christ appointed to eternal life, soul and body. As Jesus said, “so also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.”
In the meantime, look to the cross and the empty tomb. As it is written “they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
    they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
    they shall walk and not grow faint. God’s understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the faint,
    and to him who has no might he increases strength.”
Grow in Him and be formed by Him in His strength, abiding in the womb of His church. Hear His voice and have peace and joy now until we are delivered to heavenly birth in eternal life. There we shall see Him face to face and live with Him in an everlasting innocence, righteousness, and blessedness in Jesus Christ. Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas

Vocal impressions and imitations can be funny. You know, when comedians and actors do vocal imitations of famous people. It can be entertaining because it can be fun to hear a particular voice come out of somebody else. But, even though these impressions can be pretty good, a trained ear or a computer can detect the differences between the imitator and the voice of the original person. That’s because every person has a unique vocal pattern, a different shaped mouth, throat, teeth, neck all which make for a voice that cannot be perfectly duplicated by another person. Your voice is almost like a fingerprint. Our unique vocal pattern not only includes our accents, and rhythms of speech, but the actual physical waves of sound that comes from our uniquely structured bodies. Our voice is part of what makes us, us. Our ears recognize this. That is how we are able to recognize the voice of each other, the voice of a celebrity, or the treasured voice of a loved one.

Today’s text talks about the voice of another, often imitated voice, a voice which is not funny to imitate or mock: and that is the voice of the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ. Jesus referred to Himself as a shepherd and His followers as sheep. Jesus had gone into greater detail of that sheep/shepherd relationship in John chapter 10. But in the section appointed for the Gospel today Jesus highlighted the vocal aspect of the sheep/ Shepherd dynamic. He said, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow me.”

At the time Jesus said these things in chapter 10, He had been speaking with some Pharisees along with the man who had been born blind but Jesus had healed on the sabbath in the previous chapter. The Pharisees had twice questioned the healed man as to who healed him. The second time, the conversation went like this: They said to him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?” He answered them, “I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?” And they reviled him, saying, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.” The man answered, “Why, this is an amazing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him.”
And they cast him out of the temple.

Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and having found him he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” He answered, “And who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?” Jesus said to him, “You have seen him, and it is he who is speaking to you.” He said, “Lord, I believe,” and he worshiped him. Jesus said, “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” Some of the Pharisees near him heard these things, and said to him, “Are we also blind?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would have no guilt; but now that you say, ‘We see,’ your guilt remains.”

Jesus is speaking the Good Shepherd texts of John 10 in this context. The sheep of God’s fold hear His voice. They recognize that Jesus and His preaching are not nothing. He calls to them, and by the Holy Spirit, they respond by sound and not by sight. The Shepherd Jesus knew and knows them, that is why He seeks them out to call them, to protect them, because they are His own and He will protect them, yes, even to the point of laying down His life for His sheep.

How did the Pharisees respond to Jesus’ voice? At the end of John 10, they picked up stones to stone Jesus. But it was not yet His time to die.

The one who has been crucified and raised continues to be the Great and good shepherd. He continues to watch out for the flock. Gathering even as He continues to call to them. His sheep find refuge and strength in His presence as He feeds and defends them.

Yet He must gather them. Why in Scripture does the Shepherd have to go hunting for the sheep calling to them except that the sheep are prone to wander away?
Among the many dangers lurking are the enemies who imitate the Good Shepherd in act or voice. Who creep into the sheep fold of the Church acting as under shepherds but are false shepherds. Whether they creep in by television, radio, or as pastors in congregations. They try to ape the message of the Good Shepherd. They add to it, subtract from it, all with an attempt to fool the sheep, to woo them away from the Good Shepherd, so that separated from the Good Shepherd and the safety of the sheep pen, they can be all the more easily eaten and devoured by the enemy. They are wolves in shepherds clothing. If only the enemies were as clumsy and silly as Wile E. Coyote in the old Warner Brothers cartoons when he plotted to steal sheep, but the sheepdog would always save the day.

Sadly, these spiritual enemies are truly wiley and clever, they know our weaknesses. They know how susceptible we are to laziness, or coveting: the grass always seems greener elsewhere, or even to fear. The competing voice of the devil or our flesh may cause us to question the love of our Shepherd sometimes. When trouble arises, when the valley of the shadow of death looms large, we may be tempted to panic and lose faith that we will be defended, that Christ’s promises are true and that we need not fear. And so we fail and fall, sinning in our unbelief.

We are powerless on our own to defend against such trickery. There is a reason that sheep get a bad reputation in terms of intelligence, they are easily distracted, they cannot defend themselves well, they get their wool messed up and fouled, and do go astray and get devoured and ignore the voice of the Shepherd they should listen to.
When it comes to us, how we behave, how we think and feel, how we trust or don’t trust the voice of the Shepherd, sometimes going after other voices or teachings out of curiosity or dissatisfaction with the truth. Are we any different than sheep that go astray and get what they deserve?

Yet the shepherd Jesus Christ came for this reason. As a shepherd pities his silly but beloved sheep so God pities us. Jesus said, “I am the Good Shepherd. The good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.” He spoke about the coming of wolves and thieves who would seek to steal, kill, consume, destroy, while scattering the flock. Jesus declared in verse 10, “I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it abundantly.”

The Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ intends to do all that He can to rescue all the sheep of His sheepfold. Because He loves us. He loves you. He came and dwelled in the muck and mire of the sheep, getting dirty even as He led the perfect life that we could not. He laid down His life and was crucified for your sin, defeating all your enemies and has risen triumphant from death to life.

The Good Shepherd continues to call out to us and to the world. He continues to come to us in our valleys and wherever we may be, to do the acts that His Father has given Him to do. Now His voice is the voice of His Word in Holy Scripture, and in the proclamation of His Word by faithful under shepherds and sheepdogs.

Yes, all we like sheep have gone astray, but today and every day, the Good Shepherd calls to you and me by His Word to come to His Divine Service, to be gathered around Himself. To confess our sins and hear again His voice of triumphant forgiveness, “I forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”

That is why you are here today. By faith, you recognize His voice. You desire to be where the voice of Your beloved Shepherd is heard. The Holy Spirit has led you here again today because He worked this faith into your heart. He did it by that voice of His Word as it has been taught and preached and given in His Sacraments. In Baptism, He called you by your name and marked you with His name. He abides with you His sheep and hears you when you call to Him. He comes with His staff to rescue and His rod to defend you in your life.

In order to better spot the imitator wolves, to hear and recognize the comforting voice of our loving Shepherd, let us continually come to where He is. The more familiar we are with His voice, His teaching, His forgiveness, the less likely we can be led astray. But if and when we do, know that the Good Shepherd calls and gathers us again to Himself, crucifying our sins upon Himself, washing us clean, and comforting us in all our trials. Feeding us His body and blood to nourish us and strengthen us soul and body as His cup of mercy runs over.

So now rest in His arms, listen to His voice and receive His love, forgiveness, and mercy. Jesus says to you: that for His sake, through faith in Him, you will never truly perish, but you shall receive eternal life. Your enemies cannot ultimately harm you, for they are defeated already through Jesus Christ, your Good and loving Shepherd, Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas

Christ is Risen, He is Risen indeed Alleluia!

This is such good news that to our Christian ears, but to the disciples it seemed perhaps too good to be true. They had heard from the women and Mary Magdalene that earlier that same day, they gone to the tomb of Jesus, but He wasn’t there, it was empty, they had seen at least one angel and then Jesus himself appeared to them. It was especially difficult for Thomas to believe even after the other 10 disciples bore witness to the fact that they too saw Jesus. He had come to them in that room that had been locked, He had spoken Peace to them, showed His wounds to them, and commissioned them with the Office of the Keys to forgive and retain sins.

Sadly, Thomas was not with them when this took place, so He doubted that good word of Christ’s appearance. Perhaps, He doubted, not because He didn’t want the news of Jesus being resurrected to be true, but because He was afraid of being disappointed. Thomas appears to have been a pessimist: the kind who expected the worst to happen. Even back in John 11 when Jesus announced that He was going to go to Bethany to raise Lazarus, going right into the territory and hands of His keenest enemies, Thomas somewhat bravely but matter of factly, shrugged his shoulders and said to the other disciples, “Let us also go, so that we might die with Him.”

There is a type of worldly wisdom in this way of looking at things. Expect the worst, and you won’t be disappointed when it happens and feel better prepared emotionally. And if it doesn’t happen, you will be pleasantly surprised. This pessimistic thinking is behind that kind of comfort that points out that something could have been much worse. Your leg is broken, and the Thomases stand beside your bed and observe, “you should be thankful you only broke your leg and not your neck driving the way you do.” The attitude “be grateful it could be worse” is small comfort.

The other extreme attitude isn’t a more healthy or sensible alternative. I am referring to someone who expects that everything will be sugar, roses, and sunshine every day of their life. They will be in for a rude awakening and some shocks in their life.

Most people have gone through some kind of hardship, unfairness, or cruelty. At some level, no matter how bitter our experiences have been, we cannot accept that that is the way it ought to be. So, we react to those experiences. We feel that we have been wronged, that we haven’t had a fair opportunity. We resent and rebel against our misfortunes. We feel that our lives ought to mean something and be filled with happiness. When it doesn’t go that way, we know that something has gone wrong. We cannot surrender this hope, and one of the ways in which we try to protect it is by expecting the worst. Then it is possible that things may turn out better than we expected. Hoping for what is good but expecting the worst are two sides of the same basic attitude. This tells us a lot about ourselves. When people say it most likely going to rain their whole vacation, they aren’t saying that they want it to rain the whole time. They really want the sun to shine, but they seek to protect themselves from disappointment by expecting the worst.

When Thomas set off with Jesus and the disciples he didn’t want to get killed, but he expected the worst so that if the worst happened, he could say, “I told you so” but if it didn’t happen, he could be pleasantly surprised.

When the other disciples told Thomas that they had seen the risen Jesus, it wasn’t that he didn’t want this to be true. Thomas wanted to protect himself against the disappointment that it might not be true. Thus he said, “Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.” That is what he said, but deep down, he was hoping he was wrong. How do we know this? Because when the disciples were gathered again in the same place as the previous week where Jesus had appeared to them, Thomas was sure to be there. If hope had truly died in him, if he were absolutely sure of disappointment, he would not have been there. He could not give up hoping, not yet. Even though the measure of proof for Thomas had been on the level of what his eyes could see and his hands could touch, he hoped he was wrong. Therefore Jesus came and met Thomas on that level. He appeared again among them and said to them all: “Peace be with you!” Jesus called Thomas by name and invited him to not only see with his eyes the wounds, but to touch them, to handle them and in so doing touch the mystery of the resurrected Christ.

Then the astonishing thing happened. There burst from Thomas an acknowledgment far deeper than what eyes could tell him. “My Lord and my God!” Thomas was finally there, he got it, he believed, even as Jesus said to him, “Do not disbelieve, but believe.” This miracle of faith and confession was of and by the Spirit of God as Jesus pulled Thomas through his pessimism, his doubt, his grief, his sin and his unbelief all to fasten him to the central point and certainty of hope: Jesus Christ crucified and raised. God, in Jesus, had connected Thomas to Himself, and this connection is what is called faith. Faith does not need to delude itself in false hope, faith is not captive to what meets the eye, faith does not need to protect itself against disappointment and despair by the pessimism of expecting the worst.

Faith is a new realism, a new way of living and thinking that is far more wonderful than the worldly wisdom of pessimism which cannot fully trust but expects the worst. Faith also replaces unrealistic thoughts of perpetual roses, sunshine, and sugar. The problem with both pessimism and this attitude of unbridled optimism is that they are expectations that center in “me”. Their ultimate concern is me. But faith has its center outside of yourself or myself. Faith has as its center something much more true and solid than our frail flesh and emotion which is so easily swayed and betrayed by our sin. No, faith clings to God through Jesus Christ to a hope that is sure. Jesus Christ died on the cross so that you don’t have to depend on yourself or any unsure thing for salvation. Things may not always go well in this life because of sin in this world. According to our sins, we deserve the worst of God’s wrath, but Jesus has taken the worst upon Himself, making Himself accounted as the worst of the worst sinners as He took the weight and punishment for all sin upon Himself at the cross. He died for your sins, He was buried, but He was raised again showing that His accomplished His goal and His payment for sin was accepted. So that you, are gathered here and now forgiven all your sins for the sake of Christ, so that you may have faith and life and salvation.

By the Word of the Gospel Christ is here with you and His people. He comes to you to touch and to see the fruit of His wounds made for you even as you recline here at His Table with Him receiving His very body and blood to confirm you in that faith. Repent of your unbelief and believe. Jesus is here truly to save you, in body, soul, and spirit, for the resurrection and the life everlasting with Him. He gives the glad tidings of Peace by the forgiveness of sins. He would have you believe these glad tidings of salvation. Therefore, He both grants faith to you and His strength to believe in His Gospel so that you need never fear disappointment. So that you would be comforted in your weakness, doubt, and fear; and, that you would not despair and die in your sin, but live in peace and rest in Christ, your Savior.

Sin, death, the devil, and hell do not get to have you; nor are they permitted to have the last word concerning you. The Lord Jesus, by His Cross and Resurrection, has shut that lion’s mouth which preys upon doubt and pessimism, who would otherwise devour you with lies and bitter condemnation. Instead He opens the mouth of me your pastor to speak forgiveness for you to hear and receive peace. He has opened your mouth even as you receive Christ upon your lips so that you might also speak of the grace and mercy that you have received here, to others outside the Church. He can and will use you to speak His Word to give hope to those who also have experienced bitter disappointments because of sin. So that they too may hope in Jesus, the sinless one who saves from sin and the insecurity of this world.

Be at peace, and live now in His peace. You are baptized into Christ. In Him, by faith, you are saved. For He has died your death, so that you are now raised up in His Resurrection.

Sickness, suffering, and death are all finally powerless against you, because Christ is with you, who has risen from the dead and lives and reigns forever for you and His Church. There is no poison in the Cup that He pours out for you. He shall neither hurt nor harm you. He is your Champion, who has crushed your enemies under His feet. How sweet is this Word in your ear and in your heart, upon your lips and tongue, and in your body! Christ is Risen He is risen indeed for you and for your salvation in Jesus’ name. Alleluia. Amen.

Pastor Aaron Kangas

Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed Alleluia!
The faithful women of Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome, also called Joanna, desired to pay proper respect for their beloved teacher. Grieved as they were by the sudden betrayal, trial, and crucifixion and burial, they thought to buy the spices and resins to anoint the body of Jesus. They were right to give the body of Jesus such respect and dignity, but in their grief and their intentions, they did not think until on their way about the tomb itself. Then they were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb? And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back—it was very large.”

Now before we talk about the fact that they found it rolled back, let’s think of the stone and the way in the Jews buried their dead and sealed the tombs as compared to our way of burial today.

When we think of grave stones, we think generally of grave markers which stand above ground. These are often very heavy by themselves. But many of the tombs of our loved ones have burial vaults lowered into the ground before the casket with a lid to cover the casket after committal. These are usually very heavy concrete or steel structures that must be lowered and installed with machinery.

The burial custom of the Jews was similar in a way, but remember they had no machinery to assist! The graves were often dug or carved in a depression, and they were sealed with a stone. Usually one stone, with some smaller stones around it. The main stone was rolled down an incline to cover the mouth of the tomb. For a small grave, about twenty men were required to roll such a stone downhill to cover the door of the tomb. The Bible tells us that the stone covering the door of the tomb of Jesus was a “large” stone. So it was much larger than an average stone. The women would have needed more than 20 men and many animals to work with levers to pull and roll away the stone. This was a major task, that they must have suddenly realized was beyond their ability.

As it turned out. They did not have to worry. Behold the stone was rolled away! They could go in and anoint the body… but there was no body! Instead an angel, in an alb much like mine but much whiter and more pure. He pointed like a tour guide to the place where a body should be, where the body of Christ had been lain, and he said: “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.”

Yes, the women went from worry to alarm to fright even in the middle of good news. But why did the angel say: tell the disciples AND Peter, that Jesus would go before them? Why was Peter singled out. Perhaps you know? Even if it has been a long long time since you have attended a midweek service, or a Maundy Thursday, or Good Friday service, perhaps in the recesses of your mind you recall that Simon Peter had denied Jesus. The irony is that Peter means..what? rock. The rock.

You and I we have great stones rolled before our hearts. Yes we do. We have fears. We have sins that we fear to let the fumes of its deathly stank release, we know that behind the stone boulders we have all sorts of rotting and decomposing wretchedness. That is why people would rather ignore their sin and the stench of fear, for that stench of fear, the stench of sin, is the putrid smell of death. Death even within the hearts of those bodies that breathe. That is the curse of sin: death. That is the result of denying God and Jesus Christ: eternal judgment.

Who will roll the stone away from the grave door of our hearts? We little hard hearted rocks have denied the stone which the builders rejected. We cannot roll the stone cold, rock hard, slabs of unbelief back from our hearts ourselves. The weight is too great, the stench too overwhelming, and we cannot bear to face the shame and humiliation. As St. Paul Said: “Who will rescue me from this body of death?”

That is why Jesus has come into the world. That is why the Father has sent Him. That is why Jesus faced the agony of death upon the cross with the weight of all the sacks and tons upon tons of every stone and pebble of sin. He took all the weight of sin, the pebbles and rocks amounting to weight greater than a miller’s stone hanging from around your neck choking you to eternal death, and placed it around His own. And He who was perfect and innocent died in your place so that you might be freed. Does this sacrifice move you to tears of sadness and joy? Do you appreciate it?

If you do not. If you do not feel something. Repent. Pray to the Lord to remove that blockage keeping you from breathing free from death and numbness of unbelief.

The answer to your cry from the Lord: who will roll away the stone?: He is Risen! Jesus Christ is risen from the dead! He died upon the cross for your sin, and now death is shown to be defeated. The rolling back of the stone in the garden was not to release the body of Jesus, but to show that the tomb, the grave could not hold Jesus. Jesus, the innocent, Lamb of God, took your sin upon the cross, buried it with His body, and destroyed it by His power along with death. Proving that your sin, your hard heartedness and mine. The tombstones, burial chambers, rocks, seals, surrounding bodies breathing or at rest are nothing to Jesus. God’s power. The power of Jesus, God’s Son, the power to condemn the world replaced with the power to forgive by His blood and body, scoff at all other barriers upon those who do not deny Him. By the Holy Spirit, He comes and removes the stones blocking you, taking away your unbelief, your stench of sin and death, and replacing it the breath of life, by the forgiveness of your sins. Jesus died for your sins, taking them into the tomb, now in His resurrection, He leaves them there. You are baptized into His death, burial, and resurrection. You are absolved. You are now an heir of life eternal in Christ Jesus.

So we sing and say today: Alleluia! Praise the Lord. The Lord has come. Jesus is raised. He has shown that His crucifixion paid for sin. Now Jesus is the first born of all those who have and will triumph over the great stone barrier of death. We no longer need to fear death. We no longer need to try to hide from it, ignore it or our sin. By confessing our sin and our need for life, Christ comes to us by His Spirit and as in our Baptism rolls back the stones of our heart, erodes it away and washes the chambers within so that we are clean and no longer filled with filth and decomposition.

So we return every week to sweep anew. To be cleaned anew. To be filled anew. To be built up anew. Not upon the pebbles of this world which shift and shudder and mean eternal doom. No to be built upon the greatest of all stones who has crushed the stone of Satan, sin, and death, Jesus Christ. He is the greatest stone upon which we are built. It sounds like mixed metaphors, but it is not. Jesus rolls away other stones, but He is THEE stone upon which nothing built upon it can move.

So pray to the Lord. Allow Him to move those pebbles and the weight of your sin by His Spirit working in His Word and Sacrament which is the power of the cross and empty tomb. Be freed to breathe the freedom from sin and an heir of eternal life as a son or daughter of God by faith. Be filled by the victorious crucified and raised body and blood of Jesus Christ, and be built upon Jesus Christ. Be not afraid! Rejoice! He is risen from the dead. He is victorious for you, and you will see Him again in His glory forevermore, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas

What sort of king are we getting? What will this mean for our lives? How will this king change us? Will we be better off? Or will there be no noticeable difference in our lives due to this king’s arrival? These may have been the questions asked by the people as Jesus came in procession on that Sunday before the Passover, before His death. At that time large numbers of people were coming into Jerusalem to celebrate that Passover feast. A city of 50,000 inhabitants suddenly swelled to larger than 250,000. It was such a large event in Jerusalem that Pontius Pilate had to leave his cozy quarters on the Mediterranean seashore and move his post into Jerusalem to maintain order.

Just before this procession of Jesus on the young donkey, He had stunned the people with a miracle. His friend Lazarus had died, having been in the tomb for four days. Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. Dead Four days! and this man walks out of the tomb at Jesus’ command. All were abuzz! The news was spreading. Could it be? Is He the promised king? And what sort king are we getting? Popular Jewish Messianic thought believed that an earthly king would come and set the people free from the oppressive leadership of Rome with the use of military force.

The crowds then gather. They all take hold of palm branches. They shout “Hosanna,” meaning, “Lord save, I beg!” The palm branches were praises, signifying victory. The people were ready to rally and win a military victory and have Israel be restored by God on earth. Knowing the misunderstanding of the crowd and to fulfill prophecy, Jesus sent the disciples to get Him a colt, the foal of a donkey to ride into Jerusalem. This sent a message. This king was no military and earthly ruler. Riding in on the young donkey sent the message of peace. This posture seems like a sort of protest by Jesus. Yet, it is not a protest so much as it is a rebuke of false earth based notions. It was a fulfilling of Scripture as to the nature of this Messianic King. This King would come bearing peace, and He would not shed others blood to obtain it; He would shed His own.

The Pharisees watch Jesus ride in and they say to one another: “You see that you are accomplishing nothing. Look, the whole world has gone after Him.” Their rejection grows more bitter, more venomous, and more desperate. Yet, the very next verse not in our reading for today tells us that some Greeks (Gentiles) who heard of Jesus come with a request: “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” What irony. Jesus raises the dead (Lazarus), then the marveling crowd wants an earthly king. This king comes bringing peace and His own people reject this peace, while some no good Gentiles seek His face.

What sort of king should we expect for us today? Does this king bring anything to the table in the midst of your life that is full of the “hustle and bustle” of tasks and requirements? Can this king impact a pagan world that is obsessed with their own self-indulgences and is overrun with pressing schedules that demand constant movement? Does this king ride in to Jerusalem in order to shape, direct, and give meaning to you, or is it just an isolated event in history with no real purpose? Many see nothing in this king. As with the Pharisees, it has been a problem throughout history. What did those Greeks who came searching for Jesus think they were going to do or see if they saw Jesus?

This is the same question we must ask today. How does Jesus change your life? Where do we see Jesus? We are surprised at Jesus’ response to the Greeks who sought Him. Jesus did not go to see them. What a disappointment it must have been. Jesus’ answer to the Greeks’ request relayed by Andrew and Philip is the parable of the grain of wheat that falls and dies. “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain.”

Jesus’ words are simple. If the Greeks wish to see the face of Jesus in any meaningful way that will benefit them, then they must see Jesus as the grain of wheat that dies to give life to others. The only meaningful way to receive this king is to behold the King of the Jews who is raised up on the cross for all to see. This is the King of peace. The king who defies expectations. As His own blood is spilt onto the dusty and parched ground called Golgotha, the world is washed and the price of sin is paid.

It is the isolated obedience and death of Jesus that will bring forth the New Testament of forgiveness given in the Lord’s Supper and the Gospels. Here is where the Greeks’ request will be answered. If those Greeks who came to the Passover feast in Jerusalem want to the see the face of God they will have to find it in the fruitfulness of His death on the cross. “Sir, we wish to see Jesus” will be answered in their viewing the crucified Jesus as He hangs there. The request will be answered in the Eucharist that He would institute on Maundy Thursday. The face of Jesus will be seen on the day of the resurrection. The request would be fulfilled in their baptisms where they would be joined organically to His death, burial, and resurrection.

Those Greeks sound like us. There are many things swirling around us, especially thoughts and opinions on truth, life after death, heaven and hell. Straining in the midst of cell phones, technology, mixed messages, and harrowing schedules, we try to focus our eyes on the face of Jesus. What sort of King are we getting? Is this King different from the rest? Do the palm branches, the shouts of “hosanna”, and the young donkey give us a clue into something that cuts through everything else in our lives?

Yes. Something very significant is at work. Carefully set in your midst is your redemption. Your weaknesses, your life of sin, your continual cycle of struggle and sadness and all of your battles in this world are dealt with by the face of Jesus that you behold in the Holy Scriptures. Likewise, you behold Him here when you come and drink from the cup. There in the cup of Eucharist is Jesus, His blood given and shed for you. Carefully placed among us is not just a one time snapshot of Jesus’ face that we hope memory will remember. We have something better.

Jesus comes to His church continually. He didn’t ascend into heaven leaving behind an orphaned church. He continues to descend to us in the Bible and at the Lord’s table with His real sin and death conquering presence so that we may find His favor for us and for our lives—that we may see His face and receive His forgiveness and be changed. No matter what the next week of your life will require of you, you have your King who comes to you lowly and glorious, with a word of peace and forgiveness because He has dealt death and Satan a final and punishing blow. The palm branches of victory on Palm Sunday prefigure the victory won through Jesus bitter suffering and death so that you might be forgiven. Your life is defined by this victory. Your king won the battle for you and believers throughout the world and time. So we look forward to what is written in the Book of Revelation chapter 7: “After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” This is the victory throng which Palm Sunday points to. The great triumphal procession at the last Day when Christ gathers all His Church in resurrection splendor to live in peace forever.

May we be kept and gathered in this body of believers by Christ’s continual visitation. Let us follow Christ into Jerusalem this Holy week, giving thanks that He does save us now, and promises to give us resurrection victory not only on Easter Sunday, but forevermore. Because of His work, we shall live eternally with our Savior King, Jesus Christ, who is always coming to us. Behold Him, Christ crucified for the forgiveness of your sins. Be comforted to know the loving forgiving face of Him who conquers sin, death and the power of the devil so that you may be His own. Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel! Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas

I don’t know if you have noticed it yet, but in the one year liturgical readings, the pattern for lessons throughout the Lenten season share similar subject and thematic content. All the scenarios involve and/or include a reference to: The Devil or demon possession, bread/crumbs/food, and/or the Word of God versus another kind of Word. Truth vs. Lies. Are the physical and spiritual elements in opposition to one another or is it a demonic lie to try to set them up as opposed to one another? The things of the flesh and the things of the Spirit are not separate entities; they are, in fact, united.

Remember a couple of weeks ago when I spoke of demon possession? Not all demon possession manifests itself in wild, strange, and uncontrolled actions. But demon possession is the natural state of humanity without being delivered from its bondage to sin and Satan by the Word of God and by His Spirit.

That is what is at the heart of the matter in the discussion in this morning’s Gospel. That is why so many reject and act hostile towards the Word of God, toward morality, towards truth of any kind. But the truth matters. Only the Truth can save. Only the truth of God in Jesus Christ can satisfy and give peace and clarity for us body and soul.

In the Gospel lesson for the 2nd last Sunday in Lent, Jesus says it very clearly. There is truth and there are lies. There is no in between. Lies are the tool of the Father of lies: the Devil. What is the product and end result of lies? Death and murder. Jesus said, the devil was a manslaying murderer from the beginning. Why? Because the Devil himself did not abide in the Truth. Now, he only lies and twists the Truth so that all may become like him.

The result of NOT abiding in Truth is death. It is destruction. It is the way of selfish sin which is slavery. There is only one way to be set free. There is only one way to have life. Jesus said earlier in this same chapter of John chapter 8: “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free… everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin… if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” Then in today’s Gospel text: “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.” It is the Word of Jesus Christ alone where there is Truth, life, and hope.

Yet what do we see and hear today? An obscuring and hiding of this Word of Truth, life, and hope in Jesus Christ. The devil causing confusion through the words and whispers of the media and modern psychology and sociology which celebrates carnal desires and identity confusion. He uses politics to unsettle hearts and minds for worry and trouble. One media outlet says this, another says that.

We find ourselves asking again: What is truth? What are we to believe? These can’t all be true reports: they contradict each other. So, which are the lies? You cannot declare yourself to be something that disagrees with your biology, can you?

What is very tricky is that even if a report, a teaching, an opinion is 99 percent correct but contains 1 percent falsehood, the whole is tainted and is no longer objective Truth. The Devil often takes truth and adds lies to it claiming that it is still the truth. This is his nature since his fall. He cannot abide the truth. He also sees how easily he can twist the Truth to appeal to and enslave humans, to take their eyes and ears away from the source of Truth. When the devil convinces humans to define their own concept of truth for themselves according their needs or their whims, he has succeeded. This kind of “truth” is a combination of opinion and perceived fact: a mix of fact and fiction: truth and lie and is therefore a lie.

Lies lead to destruction because it leads us back to ourselves, to the world, to sin, and back to the captivity and possession of Satan. Our human nature is sinful and easily enslaved again to those lies of fear, hypocrisy, and pride while standing outside the Truth: nay, fleeing from the Truth of God.

If you do not abide in the Word and Truth of God, whose child are you, are we?

So, are we children of the heavenly Father, who confidently abide in His Word come what may? Who search out the Truth and measure all reports, thoughts, opinions, by the Word of God? Do we take all world events, political happenings, medical reports, or anything else that may happen, do we take it in stride, by commending them unto the Lord? Do we gladly hear the Word of God as often as possible, do we yearn to be fed that bread of life by His hand as often as we should?

No, none of us have been such good and faithful sons and daughters of God. Let us repent of how we have succumbed to the lies of Satan who uses our flesh to tear us from God our Father back again to the Father of lies. To fall by seeking our truth, to a controlling fear that God is not actually in control, that we must help ourselves and live only for ourselves or if we do a good work it ought to be to our glory along with or separate from the glory of God our redeemer.

So, you have two sides. Jesus said, either: You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires…” or “Whoever is of God hears the words of God.” 

The heritage of those who abide in lies, who do not abide in Truth, who can take God’s Word or leave it, who don’t care what is truth except their own selfish truth, which is but another lie, stand to inherit mortal death, eternal judgement, fear in this life, and sorrow and regret in the next.

Repent. Recognize the confusion of pride and unbelief caused by sin. In your weakness and need, with a contrite heart plead for forgiveness, and your Father in heaven answers in Jesus Christ for you. In Jesus Christ you receive His Word of forgiveness, His Word of Truth, His Word of life everlasting.

The heritage for those who abide in the Truth is life. Jesus promises that “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.” “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

God is merciful, and has given His Son, Jesus Christ, to beat back the lies of Satan. In times of uncertainty of partial truths, of talking heads, and contradiction, behold the Truth which is always steadfast: Jesus Christ, crucified for your sins. Jesus Christ as True God and True Man, fulfilled the demands of the Law, becoming the obedient Son of Man that we could not be. He did not do this as an example of the piety and perfection that humans can accomplish. No. He did this so that He could be the sacrifice. To stand and abide in the place of punishment for all men and women. That is why He allowed Himself to be sacrificed, so that by His blood all the trespasses of the Old Covenant and Law could be covered over. Jesus poured for me and you His life blood and for our pardon died. Now in that blood and crucifixion of Jesus Christ, we see the grace of God and the truth of God’s Love. By the death of His body and His rising again to life, believers in Him will never truly see death.

God knows that our flesh is still weak and heavy laden. He knows the burden of the devil’s constant lies and the culture of death, that is constantly attacking you, me, and every believer trying to drown out God’s Word, attempting to distract, mislead, confuse, and frighten at every turn.

That is why Jesus has appointed a place for gathering and strength where He brings His in-the flesh reality: a place outside our hearts and minds with all its warring voices: a place to hear His Voice, to abide in His Word, and receive in the visible and sacramental substance His true body and blood in the bread and the wine.

Here our bodies and our souls are refreshed together in the temporal and eternal, the physical and spiritual in Jesus Christ.

Be gathered to Him and to each other, to confess our sins and receive the power of His crucified and raised body and blood. The churchly body of Jesus Christ is visible in the gathering of His saints as we are built up, abiding and drinking from the fountain of Truth in Christ Jesus.

We meet here in the flesh, to receive the benefits of our Saviour in His flesh, so that this frail flesh may no longer be afraid or confused, but freed to live in peace. Freed to give thanks for forgiveness of sin, newness of life, boldness to confess the faith that is given in Jesus Christ, who is the resurrection and the life. And joined through Christ with countless other believers the world over, from times past, and yet to come. Put your burdens upon the Lord and be delivered, vindicated, and freed in His truth and teaching from any attempts of the deceitful devil, the world or the flesh.

Rejoice, and glorify the Lord. You are baptized into Jesus, called to abide and believe in the Truth of God’s love in His Word as His sons and daughters, called and appointed for life eternal for our souls and these bodies as He keeps and defends us from the harm of the evil one. Rejoice and be glad in the light and the truth of Jesus Christ your Savior, Amen.

Pastor Aaron Kangas

3 weeks ago for the first Sunday in Lent, the Devil proposed that in His hunger, Jesus should make bread for Himself; the next week, the Caananite woman whose daughter was oppressed by demons said that even a crumb from the bread of the master’s table is all she asked for in order to be satisfied. Today in both the Old and the New Testament reading we hear about bread yet again. Jesus feeds the crowds with bread and fish in the wilderness, and in the Old Testament God feeds the exodus pilgrims in the wilderness with bread from heaven.

“What is this?” This is the question the Israelites asked when they first encountered the bread that God had so graciously given them from heaven; bread that literally covered the ground in amounts large enough to satisfy every single person with the dew of the morning. Yet they asked, “What is this?” “Ma ana?” From which we get the word: Manna.

Set within the immediate context of this lesson, it’s very easy to hear a “snotty voice” accompanying these words. “What is this?” You call this bread?! Are you serious?! Is this a joke!” The text tells us very plainly that the Israelites had been grumbling and complaining about how bad they had it as freed children of God, and how much “better” they had it as slaves when they were living under Pharaoh. 

Keep in mind, this is only about forty-five days after leaving the bondage in Egypt. They had just witnessed ten plagues; they were being led by pillars of cloud by day and fire by night; they probably still had dirt from the bottom of the Red Sea in the treads of their sandals after that miraculous crossing just a few weeks earlier. As fresh as it all was, none of that was registering. “That’s all great, but where’s the food?”

But what if the Israelites were actually asking their question out of genuine ignorance? What if they were genuinely hungry? I’m trying to put the best construction on all this. What if as they beheld the flaky stuff on the ground, they really, truly didn’t know what they were looking at? After all, it’s not like manna had ever appeared before. This was an entirely new and strange gift from God.

Now, these are the same people who will go on to grumble that they “have no bread, and they hate the bread they have.” They quickly come to hate the manna God so graciously gave them. How can you not look on these people with pitiful, angry disgust? But this is precisely why I want you to give honest thought to the fact that maybe, just maybe, at this moment they were asking ‘what is this?’ out of genuine ignorance and lack of understanding. 

Look in the mirror. Are you really any different in your entitled ingratitude and ignorance and forgetfulness of His gifts? Are we always contemplating the goodness of God? Sadly, I know that I’m not any different. I do not appreciate fully what it is that gives in all the plenteous ways He provides. I can confess this. Am I so snotty, bratty, entitled, and unbelieving so as to take such an arrogant stance against God and grumble and complain that I deserve so much better? Well, I wish I could say ‘no,’ but that’s not the truth. I have had my share of crosses that I was convinced I didn’t deserve, and just like the Israelites, I did grumble and complain to God about it…just like all of you have done too. It’s an ugly, sinful truth that nobody wants to admit to. 

How many times have you struggled and despaired and not recognized God’s gracious abundance in your midst? How many times have you missed or overlooked or just plain ignored the fingers of God at work in your midst, in your life, simply because you were looking for or expecting something very different; something more grand, more powerful, more showy? How many times does God show Himself in very real and tangible ways, and you just don’t get it? You don’t see it. You don’t recognize it. 

Sadly, if we’re honest, it happens. It happens to all of us, and there’s nothing snotty or bratty about it. Maybe we miss it because we’ve been blinded by grief or worry. It happens. Maybe it is because we are distracted by something else in our selfishness. In the end we don’t see what’s right in front of us. We don’t recognize Immanuel: God with us in all His bountiful goodness. 

What’s truly sad and regrettable is the fact that we do this with things that we’re already well-acquainted with. It’s one thing for the Israelites to ask ‘what is this?’ with the manna. As I said, it was an entirely new and strange gift from God. But what about us? God provides us with food and drink, house and home, family, friends, all that we need to satisfy us, but it’s not enough. We don’t see it as a gift. We want more. We all too often do not appreciate what we have been given. Then suddenly, things happen. Then, we struggle and despair; life gets tough; things get a bit sideways; things don’t shake out the way we want or expect, and we turn to God looking for some sort of miraculous sign or proof of His love or His presence as though it was never there. “God, where are you? Help! Why me? Why now? Don’t you care? Give me a sign and let me know that it’ll be alright.” You know, it’s easy to forget all the good that He has given us when things aren’t good or calm if we never had thought to appreciate it before. But even in the trouble, turmoil, pain, that may befall us in this sin plagued world, in those times when the devil is near to whisper doubts in our hearts, the Lord is still providing for our bodies and our souls.

God gives us proof of His love in the midst of our troubles by pointing us to the cross where the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ, died on that cross reminding us of the weight of our sin and that by that sin we have never deserved anything but death and destruction… but we look at this gift, and we say, that’s great, but how does that help me now?
May God have mercy on us!

And the Lord does have mercy upon you and me even in our ingratitude even as He did to those wilderness pilgrims both in the Old Testament and New Testament lessons. Many of those people who followed Jesus did not understand who Jesus was but God had pity on them and fed them nonetheless.

But dear friends, we are not so ignorant. We are not called to remain in ignorance and unbelief. We are called, gathered, and enlightened to repent and receive from God His grace and forgiveness, to grow in wonder at His mercy and grow in appreciation, and not just for those things that keep our bodies living and breathing in its mortal frame. No, Jesus came, and Jesus died so that these bodies, our souls, may live forever. He gives us bread, meat, and life giving gifts to you and me far greater than the feeding of the Israelites at the time of Moses or in the feeding of the 5000.

Here and now God is raining down the dew of His gifts. The true manna from heaven is here in Jesus Christ. In the Word proclaimed in the liturgy, the hymns, the preaching, in the baptismal font as you entered the sanctuary reminding you when you entered into Christ’s Church. He is speaking to you the message of life. He is here, right where He tells you to look and listen; right where He has promised to be until the very end of the age. 

‘What is this?’ In the words of Moses, “This is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat.” In the words of Jesus (words which He will speak just a few verses later in chapter 6), “I am the Bread of Life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is My flesh.” It doesn’t get any clearer than that. Here is Christ. Here is the Bread of Life in the bread and the wine, with His body and blood, the rich meat, bread and drink which help us in our body and blood. It is He who opens our eyes of faith so that we can be truly satisfied body and soul, mind and heart.

God opens your eyes and ears of faith to not only recognize, but to hunger and thirst for this righteousness; the righteousness of Christ that avails to everlasting life. Jesus Christ has been crucified and raised for the forgiveness of your sins, for your eternal life and salvation. This Christ-centered peace—this Bread of Life—will completely fill and satisfy your soul so that no matter what life may bring, richer/poorer, sickness/health, feast or famine, you will always be satisfied in the over-flowing abundance of God’s mercy, grace, peace, and love in Jesus Christ’s name. Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas