Trinity 15
Mt.
6:24-34
9/28/14
Many of you know that model
railroading is my hobby and that I am building a layout in my basement. As a model railroader, it has been
fascinating to watch the changes that have taken place in the hobby during the
last fifteen years or so. In particular here
have been two developments that have changed everything for the better … and
for the worse.
The first change has been the way
that the model train engines are controlled.
In the previous decades, engines had been controlled in one way. They operated on D.C. – direct current – and
you controlled the engine by turning the power on and off from the power
pack. If you wanted to run more than one
train, you had to divide your track into electrically isolated units, and then
use a rotary switch to assign that section to one of several power packs. This allowed you to run several trains at
once – but you had always to make sure that each section was assigned to the
correct power pack.
The advent of DCC – Digitial Command
Control – has changed everything. In
this system there is current constantly fed into the track. The controller sends out a digital packet of
information through the track telling a particular engine what to do. Each engine has a decoder in it, and only the
engine for which that information is intended can read it. This means that you can control two engines
independently that are right next to each other. It lets you run trains like a real railroad.
The second great change has been
sound equipped engines. Advances in miniaturization have made it possible to
put sound units in model engines. And we
aren’t talking about generic railroad sounds.
We are talking about the exact sounds made by a particular kind
of diesel or steam engine. Sound
equipped engines sound like the real thing and they are blast to run.
All of this is great. But it does create some problems. In order to run an engine on DCC it must have
decoder in it. This means that every
engine you own and ran on the standard DC system is now useless until you buy
decoders for them. You can get a basic
decoder for a little more than $20, which isn’t too bad. The problem was that
when I made the transition you were talking about fifteen engines or so. And since I have four children to feed,
clothe and put through college, it has been a very gradual process of equipping
engines so that they can actually run on my layout.
The other problem is that sound
equipped engines sound so good. The joke in model railroading is that if
you have one sound equipped engine, then you only have one engine. It’s the
only one you are going to want to run, and the moment it arrives on the layout
all the other engines no longer seem that great. And let’s just say that the
many of my engines don’t have sound because sound is expensive.
So the hobby is better than it has
ever been. And at the same time it has become more expensive than it has ever
been. It’s more expensive, and you really aren’t satisfied if you can’t run all
your engines yet or they don’t make that prototypical sound. Thoughts turn to the answer for this problem, which is money … and how you
just don’t have enough of it.
The experience in model railroad illustrates
exactly what our Lord Jesus is talking about this morning when he says: “No one
can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or
he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and
money.”
This morning our text takes up a
basic issue of the First Commandment.
And frankly, you aren’t going to like what I have to say. Honestly, I don’t like what I have to say,
because like all of you, I like nice stuff.
It’s fun. It’s enjoyable. And the truth is that we don’t want to admit
how much the old Adam in us clings to the stuff of this world that money can
buy.
In our text this morning, Jesus
says, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will
eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not
life more than food, and the body more than clothing?” Our Lord introduces this statement by saying
“therefore,” or more literally, “because of this.”
His statement draws a conclusion
that is based on what he has just said. Now I just quoted the verse that
precedes it. But actually, this is the
third of three statements that together provide the foundation for all the
Jesus says in our text this morning.
First Jesus says, “Do not lay up for
yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves
break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where
neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For
where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Christ reminds us that what we treasure and
value is the true focus of our life – it’s where our heart is. He urges us to treasure the things of God
which are lasting and permanent, and not the treasures of this world which are
transitory and perish.
Next our Lord says, “The eye is the
lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of
light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If
then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” The ancient world described light as coming
out of the eye. Jesus says that your
choices and life reveal what is inside you.
And then at the beginning of our
text, in the third statement Jesus says, “No one can serve two masters, for
either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the
one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” The reality is that there can only be one
Lord – one master. Someone or something
is going to be in charge – it is going to run the show. And as we live in this
world there are two candidates for this position God and money. Of course when Jesus says “money” he
referring to all that goes with it. This
includes all the reasons we want money – all the things we want to own: the
bigger house, the interior decorating, the clothes, the vacations, the car, the
electronic gadgets … and yes, the sound equipped model railroad steam engine.
All of these things become our lord
– they become our god. They become the thing that is really important to
us. They become the thing that really makes us happy. They become the
thing that really gives us a sense of worth, value and success.
Our Lord tells us today that this is
wrong. It is sin. It is idolatry. It is putting a false god before the true
God.
Instead, the triune God – Father,
Son and Holy Spirit - is to be our God.
Jesus tells us today that when God is our true God, we do indeed lose
something: we lose worry. Christ says in
our text, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you
will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is
not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of
the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly
Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?” Jesus says don’t worry
about food and drink and clothing. After
all, God provides for the needs of the birds, and you are worth far more to him
than they are.
Our Lord asks, “And why are you
anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they
neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not
arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which
today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more
clothe you, O you of little faith?”
You need to understand that Jesus
spoke these words to people who were far poorer than you are. He speaks of food and drink and clothing – of
daily bread. The reality is that God doesn’t
promise you must of the stuff you think is important and necessary for
life. Oh yes it is nice. But all too easily it becomes a gilded
cage. The new iPhone6 makes you happy –
until its current software problems make you want to pull your hair out. You love your big flat screen TV and new
furniture – until you look at your credit card bill and fret about how you are
ever going to get out of debt. You make it your god – but this is a god that
enslaves you.
The answer to all of this are the
words at the end of our text as Jesus says, “Therefore do not be anxious,
saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’
For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows
that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his
righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”
Jesus says don’t worry, and instead
seek God’s kingdom and righteousness.
When our Lord refers to God’s kingdom and righteousness, he is speaking
about himself. For it is in Jesus that
God’s reign and his saving righteousness entered into the world. By his death on the cross and resurrection
from the dead he has freed you from the slavery of Satan, sin and death. He has freed you to be the people of God. And
God’s people can trust that the One who redeemed them with the death of his own
Son will certainly provide them with food and drink and clothing.
We seek God’s kingdom and
righteousness by seeking Jesus. And we seek Jesus in his Means of Grace for it
is there that Christ’s saving reign continues to be present for us. It is through his Word; through Baptism;
though Abosolution; and through the Sacrament of the Altar that we receive
forgiveness for all the times we have made money and possessions our god. It is through these life giving means that we
are freed from the burden of guilt. It
is through these gifts of Christ that we are forgiven for all those time we
have been people of little faith.
And it is through these means, that
Jesus enables us to be people of great faith.
For through the Means of Grace the Holy Spirit nurtures us so that we
can begin to see money and possessions for what they really are. The Spirit leads us away from worry and
toward trust in God because the One who gives us forgiveness and salvation will
not fail to give us the things we need to support this body and life. After all, our heavenly Father knows that we
need them. He doesn’t promise more than
that. But he does promise that in Jesus
Christ we have more than we will ever need.
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