Feast of St. Stephen, Martyr

Today is the Feast of St. Stephen, Martyr.  Stephen is mentioned in Acts chapters 6-7 as one of the seven deacons appointed by the Church to provide for the needs of the poor in the Christian community in Jerusalem.  Because of his powerful witness to the Gospel, Stephen was brought before the Jewish Sanhedrin, where he boldly confessed Christ.  Infuriated, the Sanhedrin took him outside of the city and stoned him to death.  Stephen was the Church’s first martyr (a word which in Greek means “witness”) as he died for the faith.  He is remembered for commending himself to Christ in death when he said, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” and for forgiving those murdering him with the words, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them” (Acts 7:59-60).

Scripture reading:

And Stephen, full of grace and power, was doing great wonders and signs among the people. Then some of those who belonged to the synagogue of the Freedmen (as it was called), and of the Cyrenians, and of the Alexandrians, and of those from Cilicia and Asia, rose up and disputed with Stephen. But they could not withstand the wisdom and the Spirit with which he was speaking. Then they secretly instigated men who said, “We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God.” And they stirred up the people and the elders and the scribes, and they came upon him and seized him and brought him before the council, and they set up false witnesses who said, “This man never ceases to speak words against this holy place and the law, for we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and will change the customs that Moses delivered to us.” And gazing at him, all who sat in the council saw that his face was like the face of an angel. And the high priest said, “Are these things so?” And Stephen said: “Brothers and fathers, hear me….

You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered, you who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.”

Now when they heard these things they were enraged, and they ground their teeth at him. But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. And he said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.” But they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed together at him. Then they cast him out of the city and stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

(Acts 6:8-7:2a, 51-60 ESV)

Collect of the Day:

Heavenly Father, in the midst of our sufferings for the sake of Christ grant us grace to follow the example of the first martyr, Stephen, that we may also look to the One who suffered and was crucified on our behalf and pray for those who do us wrong; through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Persecuted Church: Christmas Day bombs kill Christians in Baghdad

Two bombs, one exploded outside St. John  Catholic church as people left the service, targeted Christians and have killed at least 35 people.

Sermon for Christmas Day

                                                                                    Christmas Day

                                                                                    Jn. 1:1-14

                                                                                    12/25/13

            In the philosophical and religious language of the first century Greco-Roman world, the term “flesh” was a dirty word.  The word flesh was considered to be base and vile and abhorrent.  As I have described in catechesis and in Bible class, at the other end of the spectrum was the word “spirit.” This was good and beautiful and desirable.

            The Greco-Roman world set the spiritual in opposition to the material.  The spiritual was “higher” and good, while the material was “lower” and bad.  And you couldn’t get much lower or worse than the word flesh.

            The flesh was to be escaped because something had gone wrong for our spirits when they were trapped in flesh.  In fact for a number of versions of what we now know as gnosticism, the fall occurred when our spirits became part of this material world – when they became trapped in flesh. Salvation was to realize this fact.  And once you realized that the flesh was evil, you could choose to live in one of two different ways.  Either you could decide that since the flesh is evil, it needed to be beaten down and suppressed by ascetic practices like eating little food and punishing the body. On the other hand, you could decide that since the flesh was evil, it didn’t matter at all.  Therefore, you could do whatever you wanted with it.  Wild excesses of drinking, eating and sex were the thing to do.

            This is the world into which the Gospel entered in the first century A.D.  Of course the Gospel came from a very different perspective.  It was rooted in God’s revelation to Israel – what we now know as the Old Testament.  Here the material world was not bad.  Instead, God the Creator had made it on purpose and considered it to be very good.  The body – the flesh – was not evil and something to be escaped.  Instead God had created man’s body from the dust of the earth and breathed into him the breath of life in order to make Adam into a living being.  It was in the unity of body and soul – it was life in the flesh – that was God’s intention for man. 

            And in fact man was intended for a life of a one flesh union.  Woman was created as the helper corresponding to man – the one without whom life was not very good.  God created man and woman to be joined together in sexual union as one flesh.  And this one flesh union physically demonstrated how God viewed them – they were now one flesh in his eyes.

            This is what is described in broad strokes at the beginning of our Gospel lesson for Christmas Day.  We hear in John 1: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.”  In Genesis 1 we hear God say, “Let us make man in our image.”  Here – as elsewhere in the Old Testament – we receive the hint that there is more to the truth than the simple fact that there is only one God.  We sense that there is a complexity within this unity.

            Our Gospel lesson makes this clear when it speaks about “the Word.” We learn the Word was with God in the beginning – an obvious reference to God’s act of creation.  And we learn that the Word was not just with God as some kind of created sidekick.  Instead the Word was God. The Word was – and is – God, and so all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

            From the rest of John’s Gospel, and the New Testament as a whole, we learn that the Word is the second person of the Holy Trinity – the Son of God.  In the words of the Gloria Patri we confess the basic facts about the triune God – “Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.  As it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever, Amen.”  God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  God was this way in the beginning.  God is this way now.  God will always be this way, because this is who he is in his own eternal nature.

            The material world was very good.  The flesh of human existence was very good.  The one flesh union between man and woman was very good.  All of this was true until Adam and Eve decided they wanted to be God.  They were not satisfied with being created in God’s image. They did not want to be like God. They wanted to be God, for that is the temptation that the devil held out before Eve.  He promised that if they disobeyed God by eating of the forbidden tree they would be just like God, knowing good and evil.

            Adam and Eve disobeyed God and brought sin into the world.  They brought sin into the flesh.  And now flesh, which was created as something very good, has become ruled by sin and death.  Now the flesh is something that sets itself against the Spirit of God as it spreads to each person conceived and born in this world.  Jesus said, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” The fallen, sinful nature produces more of the same.  And the flesh does one thing – it sins.  The apostle Paul told the Galatians,          “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”  Indeed, the sinful, fallen flesh dies – that’s what happens every time.

            At Christmas we celebrate the fact that God was not content to let this situation stand.  Instead, he acted in a most surprising and unexpected way.  This is described briefly in our text – brief words that contain the greatest mystery there has ever been.  John tells us, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only begotten Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

            The Word became flesh. The Son of God became flesh.  God, a spiritual being, became flesh.  That’s what happened as Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary.  Without ceasing to be God, the Son of God became flesh – he took humanity into himself because he is now the One who is true God and true man at the same time.

            This basic fact which stands at the heart of the Christian faith – the incarnation – directly contradicted what almost everyone in Mediterranean world believed about how things worked.  The Word became flesh?  How absurd!  How offensive!  If you wanted to make up a religion that would be popular and would spread in the world, you could hardly have chosen a worse foundation.

            And so from the very beginning we find the Church defending the fact that the Word really did become flesh.  Jesus Christ did not only seem to be human – he really was, even as he was also really God.  In his first epistle, John wrote, “By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God.”  And the in his second epistle he wrote, “For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist.”

            God sent the Son into the world in the incarnation because it is sin that is bad – not the flesh.  He came to redeem flesh from sin, to free it as the second Adam who removes all that the first Adam caused.  St. Paul wrote, “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh.”  God condemned sin in the flesh on the cross.  He killed the flesh in Christ.  And the on the third he raised the flesh up.  He raised Jesus Christ with a flesh that is no longer able to die – a flesh transformed and freed from sin and death.

He raised Jesus with the flesh that will be ours in the resurrection of the flesh on the Last Day – for that is in fact exactly what the Latin text of the Apostles’ Creed says.

            Christ has won us forgiveness.  He will raise and transform our flesh on the Last Day.  And in the present he gives us his flesh – he gives us his true body and blood in the Sacrament of the Altar.  The risen Lord gives us his body and blood, given and shed for the forgiveness of our sins. The Lord gives into our bodies his risen body and blood, and so we know that our bodies will be raised too.  After all, Jesus said, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.”

            Through this divine food Jesus Christ gives us forgiveness and new life.  Through the body and blood of Christ the Spirit nourishes and strengthens us in the faith.  And because we have received the blessings of what Jesus won for us in the flesh, we now seek to live in the flesh in ways that share this love.  John wrote, “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.”

            On this Christmas Day, we hear in our Gospel lesson: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only begotten Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”  In the incarnation of the Son, we have received the saving love of God that frees us from sin and death.  We rest secure in the knowledge that because Jesus’ flesh was raised from the dead and transformed, our will be too.  And as our risen Lord gives us his flesh – his true body and blood in the Sacrament of Altar – we are nourished and sustained in the faith so that we can use our flesh to love our neighbor in word and deed. 

                       

Sermon for Christmas Eve

                                                                                                Christmas Eve

                                                                                                Isa 9:2-7

                                                                                                12/24/13

            The United States military is currently in the process of a massive logistical operation as it pulls out of military operations in Afghanistan. Because Afghanistan is landlocked, shipping things out means that they either have to be flown or sent overland through other nations.  Both options are expensive because in the latter case the nations involved are using the opportunity to make as much money as they can.

            The U.S. has decided that in many cases it is more economical to leave things behind rather than to ship them to U.S. bases.  That may not seem like a big deal if you are talking about microwaves and deep fryers. But it has also produced a rather bizarre situation.

            In 2007, the U.S. military was in the midst of operations in Iraq. U.S. troops were taking heavy casualties from IED’s – improvised explosive devices.  It was clear that even armored humvees were insufficient, because they had never been intended for this kind of mission.  What was needed was a vehicle that was resistant to mines and protected the occupants against ambush.
            The U.S. military had started what would be a $50 billion dollar program to produce such a vehicle, and the result was the MRAP – Mine-resistant ambush protection vehicle.  It was armored and had a V-shaped underside that helped to deflect the shock waves of a blast. The MRAP did save U.S. lives.  As the insurgency in Iraq abated, the conflict in Afghanistan heated up.  The Taliban began employing IED’s in large numbers and so MRAP’s were deployed there as well.  Eventually 24,000 of the vehicles were built.

            Today the U.S. is out of Iraq and is leaving Afghanistan. No on expects or wants the U.S. to be involved in another military operation where MRAP’s are needed.  The military now finds itself with thousands of vehicles that have no real mission. And so a rather bizarre scene has been playing out in Afghanistan since this summer.  The U.S. military has decided that it is not worth the expense to bring back 2,000 MRAP’s from Afghanistan.  Of course they can’t be left there for just anyone to use. And so the U.S. is scrapping the vehicles there on site.  At a $1 million dollars a piece, that’s $2 billion dollars of basically new equipment that is being turned into junk.

            The weapons of war are being destroyed by the U.S. in Afghanistan.  And yet the war has not ended. Instead it continues as we speak and the attacks of the Taliban will surely intensify once the U.S. is gone.  This situation stands in marked contrast to what we find in our Old Testament lesson for Christmas Eve.  There we hear about the final destruction of the implements of war because light has come and the Prince of Peace has arrived.

            Our text for tonight is in fact set in a time of war.  In the late eight century B.C. the near eastern super power Assyria was threatening Palestine and all of the nations around it.  The northern kingdom of Israel had joined with the nation of Syria in an alliance to fight off the Assyrians. However, it would not succeed because Yahweh was using Assyria as his instrument to punish Israel for her unfaithfulness – for her worship of he false gods of the surrounding peoples.  The Assyrians swept in, conquered Israel and in 722 B.C. destroyed their capital Samaria.  They took the population of Israel away into exile in other parts of the Assyrian empire.

            The first places in Israel to feel the brunt of this attack were the lands of Galilee in the north – the land of the tribes of Zebulun and Naphtali. However, writing in this same time period, the prophet Isaiah offers a word of hope.  He says. “But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.”

            Isaiah goes on to say, “The people who walked in darkness

have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.”  The present was a time of darkness and sorrow, but God was going to do something.  In fact since God was going to do it, the future event was so certain the prophet could talk in the past tense as if it had already happened.

            God was bringing light to this darkness, and the reaction would be one of joy.  We hear in our text, “You have multiplied the nation; you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you

as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil.”  Oppression would be broken and there would be peace.  In fact Isaiah describes the destruction of the implement of war.  He says, “For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire.”

            How was this going to happen?  What could produce such a change?  The answer is surprising: a child; a child described in the most unusual ways.  Isaiah writes: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

            Wonderful Counselor; Mighty God; Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace – these words strain the imagination as we try apply them to a child.  But Isaiah leaves no doubt about what he will do. The prophet says: “Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.”

            In our text, Isaiah speaks about the darkness of war, invasion and devastation.  Yet God’s Word teaches us that these are only manifestations of a deeper problem – the problem of sin. Wars go on all the time – and I’m not talking about the kind where you need guns or rockets or MRAP’s.  Wars go on in our families as angry and hateful words are spoken between husband and wife; between brother and sister.  Wars go on within ourselves as we feel anger, lust and coveting welling up within in us – feelings that we know are wrong and that we don’t want to be there. And sin casts its darkness over all of us because in the end it leads to only one thing – death.

            Because this is so, God acted. That’s what we are beginning to celebrate tonight.  In our text Isaiah says, “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.”  We hear about this in our Gospel lesson for Christmas Eve.  In fact the arrival of this light was announced by God’s glory, for we learn: “And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear.”

            On this Christmas Eve we celebrate the fact that this child who is Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace was born in our world.  As Isaiah had said two chapters earlier, the virgin conceived and bore a son – the One who is Immanuel, God with us.  Lying in the manger, Jesus Christ is truly human.  He is the frail flesh of a baby. And yet he is also truly God – he is the creator and sustainer of all things.

            Jesus was born in this world in order to carry out a mission.  Some thirty years later, after his baptism in the Jordan River, he began his ministry.  Matthew tells us: “Now when he heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew into Galilee. And leaving Nazareth he went and lived in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, so that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: ‘The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles— the people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light, and for those dwelling in the region and shadow of death, on them a light has dawned.’”

            Jesus Christ began his mission in Galilee of the Gentiles. But he finished it in Jerusalem of the Jews.  There he defeated the darkness by entering into it himself.  He bore your sins. He became sin for you. He received the wrath of God against your sin in our place.  He carried your sin.  He died and was cut off from God because of you.

            And then, on the third day, a great light dawned.  In the resurrection of Jesus Christ we see the victory and future that is ours.  This is the light that drives away all darkness.  Death has been defeated and resurrection life like Christ’s will be ours. This is the good news that Jesus sent forth his disciples to share when he returned to Galilee and on a mountain told them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

            I mentioned at the beginning of this sermon about how in Afghanistan they have been scrapping MRAP’s.  It’s a strange looking action because of course, the war they were built to fight is not over.  Instead, the U.S. has decided that the costs are just too high.  Afghanistan’s long history of war suggests that the lofty goals of U.S involvement were probably never attainable in the first place.

            Be that as it may, the situation in Afghanistan – and in our own lives – reminds us that while the light has come, the war has not ended.  Sin and death are still present.  But the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ mean that they have no real power over us.  In Christ we are justified – we have been declared not guilty – the same verdict we will hear on the last day when we stand before Christ.  We have peace with God and because of baptism we live as the children of God. Death may still exist, yet death itself cannot separate us from Christ.

            Tonight we celebrate Christ’s first coming as he was born as a baby in Bethlehem and laid in a manger.  Yet thought about Christ’s first coming must always prompt us to look for his second coming – a second coming that will be one of power and might and glory.

            We rejoice in the present because of what we have received and who we are now through the saving work of Jesus Christ.  And with Isaiah’s confidence that in our text describes the future as if it had already happened, we look forward to our Lord’s second coming on the Last Day.  For on that day the final and complete peace will arrive and the words our text will be true in every possible way: “Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.”