Trinity 8
Acts
20:27-38
8/2/20
When Lutheran pastors of our synod get together –
especially those from our area - they share a unique bond with one another.
First of all, they are committed Christians, which in this world today already
makes them part of a minority. Then they are also Lutherans which in this far
southern part of this state, as we know all to well, makes them part of a yet
smaller minority.
And then as pastors, they are part of an even smaller
group that is unique in its own ways. As
the one placed by God to care for a congregation, pastors have responsibilities
and experiences that only other pastors can really understand. It is the fellow pastor who understands what
is like to visit and provide spiritual care for a person dying of cancer. It is the fellow pastor who knows the
challenge of confronting sin, when some in the congregation don’t want that
done – especially if it involves their son, daughter or family member. It is the fellow pastor who understands the
sense of grief and failure that is present when a husband and wife in the
congregation divorce.
When pastors get together they share with one another the
challenges they are facing. They seek advice and counsel from other pastors
about how to approach a particular situation.
They encourage one another, and seek to build each other up in Christ.
But during my years in the ministry, I’ve never attended
a gathering of pastors like the one in our text this morning. Never have I heard a pastor who was retiring
or leaving the area say: “I know that after my departure fierce wolves
will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among
your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the
disciples after them.” I’ve never heard
a pastor tell other pastors that some of the pastors there listening
were going to become false teachers who would draw away believers. Now that would be a circuit meeting or
pastors’ conference to remember!
Yet
that is exactly what happens in our text this morning as the apostle Paul meets
with the pastors who had gathered at Miletus. Paul was in a hurry to get to
Jerusalem and didn’t want to get hung up with a long visit in Ephesus. So when his ship docked at Miletus, the port
that served
Ephesus, he didn’t go into the city.
Instead, Luke tells us, “Now from Miletus he sent to Ephesus and
called the elders of the church to come to him.”
Now these elders were not what we call “elders” in our
church today – laymen who assist the pastor.
Instead, these were the pastors of the area. Paul speaks a farewell to them, because as he
says just before our text, “And now, behold, I am going to Jerusalem,
constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except
that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment
and afflictions await me.”
Paul
is convinced that he is saying farewell to them, and so he wants to remind them
about the ministry that he conducted in their midst. He proclaims to them that despite the plots
by the Jews against him, “I did not shrink from declaring to you anything
that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to
house, testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God
and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ”.
Repentance
toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ – that’s Law and Gospel. Paul declares that he had not held back from calling
them to repentance. He had proclaimed
God’s law. But he had also proclaimed
the Gospel – he had proclaimed faith in Jesus Christ.
And
now in our text, Paul repeats the phrase about not holding back. He says, “Therefore I testify to you
this day that I am innocent of the blood of all of you, for I
did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.” Why is
Paul innocent of their blood – why is he not responsible if any of them are
lost? It is because he did not hold back
from declaring the whole counsel of God.
He told them God’s will and truth, not matter whether it was hard or
easy.
This
raises a question that we need to ask ourselves – do we really want to hear
the whole counsel of God? For if the
pastor does proclaim this we are going to hear that there is salvation in no
other way than faith in Jesus Christ – not Islam, or Mormonism, or Hinduism.
And that includes our family and friends who have rejected Christ as Lord and
God. We are going to hear that sex outside of marriage, and the arrangement to
make this easy – living together – are sins that bring God’s judgment. We are
going to hear that homosexuality is inherently disordered and sinful. We are
going to hear that marriage is the one flesh union for life, and that apart
from clear biblical grounds, to divorce and remarry is adultery. We are going to hear that our love of sports
is more often than not a false god, no matter what excuses we make.
We
are going to hear things that confront us with our own sin. We are going to
hear things that will make life harder, not easier, because they will set us in
conflict with our culture and world. The whole counsel of God share his
ordering of the world – the way things are supposed to work. It will share law with us.
But after
saying how he had acted as pastor, Paul then tells the pastors how they are to
act as pastor. He says, “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to
all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made
you overseers, to care for the church of God, which
he obtained with his own blood.”
Paul describes the Church of God – he describes you – as that which he
obtained through his own blood.
This
too is part of the whole counsel of God.
God the Father sent his Son into the world as he was incarnate by the
work of the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. God became flesh and blood – true God and
true man at the same time. The Son of God, Jesus Christ, did this to be the One
who was wounded for your transgressions and was crushed for your iniquities. He came to be the One upon whom the Lord laid
the iniquity of us all. Jesus Christ did
this for you, and by his bloody death he has redeemed you. He has made you his own.
How
precious are you to God? He gave his Son
into the suffering and death of the cross for you. He poured out his judgment on Jesus in your
place. And then on third day he raised him from the dead. Jesus Christ defeated death by going through
it. He left the tomb on Easter as the new Adam – the One who can never die
again. And because he has, he promises
that he will give the gift of resurrection life to you on the Last Day.
While
we wait, we live in the time when the risen Christ, exalted to the right hand
of God, has poured forth his Spirit. Paul makes a very striking statement this
morning. He speaks to the pastors
gathered at Miletus and tells them to pay “careful attention to yourselves and
to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made
you overseers.” Notice that it is the Holy Spirit who has made them
overseers in the place where they are pastor.
Christ
has instituted and given his Means of Grace.
He has given us his inspired word.
He has given us baptism, and absolution and the Sacrament of the Altar. He has given us his Office of the Holy
Ministry to administer these gifts in our midst - to preach the word; to
baptize; to absolve; to celebrate the Sacrament. And his Spirit then works through his church
to place a man in that office in the midst of each flock – each congregation. He gives us the pastor – the shepherd – who
speaks the whole counsel of God to us.
He gives us the law that we need to hear. He gives us the Gospel by which we have
forgiveness and life.
As
Paul concludes his address, he says to the pastors at Miletus, “And now I commend you to God and
to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give
you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified.” Of course what was true for these pastors is
also true for you. The gracious word of
God is able to build you up. It is able
to give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified – all those who
are holy in God’s eyes because of Christ. It does because through that word the
Spirit of God creates and sustains faith in Jesus Christ.
But for it to do so, it also must be used. It must be heard. It must be read. We need to
recognize the incredible gift that God has given to us. Through his word the Spirit builds us up in
faith so that we can receive and believe the whole counsel of God. He gives us forgiveness which is true now,
and will be true on the Last Day. He
gives us the inheritance of sharing in salvation with all who have been
sanctified - made holy – by the blood of Jesus.
In this farewell address, Paul certainly holds
himself up as an example as he speaks to these pastors. And he does so in
another important way near the end of our text. Paul calls attention to
his own hard work. He describes what a
life created by the Gospel and built up by God’s Word looks like. He says, “In all
things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we
must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he
himself said, ‘It is more blessed to
give than to receive.’”
We think about our work as
providing money to provide for our basic needs, and then also for the fun
things we want to do. Yet for Paul this
work calls to mind something entirely different. It is instead something that provides the
ability to help the weak – to help others. When the Gospel is the source of our life –
when Jesus Christ’s service for us shapes our life – then serving and helping
others becomes the way we do things. And
in order to explain this fact, Paul provides a most interesting quotation. He says, “remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he
himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”
Now the interesting thing is
that this statement by our Lord is not found in any of the Gospels. Of course, Luke, the author of Acts is also
the author of the Gospel of Luke.
Certainly he knew about this statement by our Lord. But rather than include it in the Gospel, he
shares it here.
Why is it more blessed to
give than to receive? It is because this
action flows from the blessing that Christ has given to us. He gave all in order to give us forgiveness
and life. And because we have received this from him, living in the blessing
which is Christ means giving to others. When we give we see that Christ is at
work through us, and in this there is blessing. There is the blessing of being
in Christ as a forgiven child of God. There is the blessing of faith active in
love, and a faith active in love is a living, healthy and vibrant faith which
knows that our Lord Jesus has obtained us by his own blood.”
No comments:
Post a Comment