Sermon for the Second Sunday after the Epiphany: Ex 33:12-23

                                                                                    Epiphany 2

                                                                                    Ex 33:12-23

                                                                                    1/20/19

            Will God be with us or not? That is the question that hangs over our text this morning.  And now there was good reason to wonder.  It hadn’t always been that way.  Certainly Yahweh had been with Israel in the exodus.  At the Passover he had killed the first born males of Egypt while sparing the Israelites who had placed the blood of the lamb on their houses.  Yahweh led the people of Israel out by a pillar of cloud at day and a pillar of fire at night.

            When trapped between the Red Sea and the oncoming Egyptian army, the pillar of cloud moved behind the Israelites to separate them from the Egyptians as God brought the Israelites through the sea on dry ground.  Then he had bogged down the Egyptians who entered the sea after the Israelites, and when the water returned to its place he destroyed the Egyptians.

            When Yahweh called Moses to be his servant at the burning bush he had promised, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.” God had kept his word and brought Moses and Israel to Mt. Sinai.  There he told them, “Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”

            At Mt. Sinai Yahweh had entered into a covenant with Israel.  He had taken them to be his people.  Oxen were sacrificed and the blood of the covenant was thrown upon the people in order to signify that they were included in this covenant.  And then, something remarkable happened.  Where before Yahweh had told Moses that no one was to go up or touch the mountain upon which God had descended with fire and smoke lest they die, now Moses, Aaron and the elders went up on the mountain and saw the God of Israel.  We learn, “There was under his feet as it were a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness. And he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel; they beheld God, and ate and drank.”

            All was well.  Moses went up onto Mt. Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments and instructions for making the ark of the covenant and the tabernacle.  He was gone for forty days and forty nights.  During his absence, the days dragged on and the people did not know when they would end. And so finally they said to Aaron, “Up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.”  Aaron complied.  They gave him their gold and he made golden calf – an image used by the pagan religions of the area. When the people saw it they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” They offered sacrifices to the golden calf, and they celebrated with food and drink.

            Yahweh sent Moses down the mountain, and he confronted Israel about their sin.  God was ready to destroy Israel and start over with Moses. But Moses interceded for the people.  He called Yahweh back to his own promise.  He said, Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever.’” And so Yahweh relented.

            This great sin had happened in the chapter just before our text.  Yahweh had now told Israel to set out for the promised land of Canaan.  He told them that he would send an angel before them drive out the nations that we living there. But then he added, “Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.”  Yahweh said he would not go with them as before, because they were a sinful and stubborn. The people of Israel mourned when the heard this.

            In our text Moses addresses this question of whether Yahweh will be with them or not.  He states, “See, you say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.’”  Moses asked to know God’s way – what he was going to do – and he again called God back to his own word. After all, Yahweh had told Moses that he knew him by name, and that Moses had found favor in God’s sight.

            Like several other occasions, Yahweh listened to Moses’ appeal to his own word, and granted Moses’ request.  In our text God says, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” Yahweh promised that his presence would go with his people. Yet Moses left nothing to chance. He reemphasized how important this was as he said, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?”

            It was the presence of God with Moses and his people that during the era of the Old Testament made them distinct – unique and different from every other people.  God promised that the mercy seat – the cover of the ark of the covenant – was his throne, and that by means of the ark and the tabernacle he dwelt in the mist of his people.

            However this unique presence with Israel was not an end in itself.  Instead, Israel was the means through which God was at work for all peoples.  In King David and his sons God gave the promise of the Messiah who would bring salvation and peace.  In particular, the prophet Isaiah revealed that God’s salvation was for the Gentiles as well.

            We have just celebrated during Christmas how God’s presence came to be with his people in order to fulfill all of these promises.  John tells us that the Word – the Son of God – became flesh and dwelt among us.  During the season of Epiphany we see how Jesus Christ revealed his glory – such as in the miracle of turning water into wine.  Through his miracles he revealed that he was God in the midst of his people to save.

            However, we are never quite satisfied.  We see it in our text this morning. God had told Moses that his presence would go with him, and that he would give him rest. But Moses now asked, “Please show me your glory.” Moses had talked directly with God.  Just before our text we learn, “Thus the LORD used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.”  Apparently shaken by recent events, Moses now asked for even more.

            God granted his request – in part.  He said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name 'The LORD.'”  Yahweh told him the reason that he would do this.  He said, “And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”

            Yet God also told Moses that there was something he could not do. He informed Moses, “But, you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.”  This was something more than what had been described as “face to face.” It was a direct revelation of God’s glory that was simply too much for sinful man to endure.  God could not – and would not – do this. 

            But there was a way that he could reveal himself.  In our text Yahweh places Moses in the cleft of a rock and covers him while his glory passes by. Yet he removes this protection in a way that allows Moses an indirect perception.  Moses cannot see God directly.  He can’t see his face.  But he tells Moses, “Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”

            God reveals himself, but in a way that is indirect. That’s how it was with Jesus. Jesus Christ was God dwelling in the midst of his people.  The miracles where there to be seen.  But it was not something that compelled people to believe.  On the contrary, many were able to see Jesus and still reject him.

            And this is all the more true for the goal of Jesus’ ministry.  On Good Friday, God revealed his saving glory in the crucifixion of his Son. This was God acting powerfully to take away your sins.  And yet, it looked like nothing except weakness and defeat.

            As Jesus was buried it appeared that he was not Immanuel.  It appeared as if God was not with us.  But this impression could not have been more wrong.  On the third day God raised Jesus from the dead.  In fact, the Son of God had taken on humanity in order to be the second Adam.  He had become one of us – God with us – in order to begin a new human existence that cannot die.  This is the life that will be yours too when Christ returns, for his resurrection is the first fruit of your resurrection.

            While we look for that day, we are sometimes like Moses.  We want more.  We are not always satisfied with how God reveals himself right now.  Make no mistake: It is God with us sustaining faith and giving forgiveness.  But it is not as direct as we would like. 

            The best that Moses could do was God’s “back” – a revelation that was still indirect in some way. We too continue to receive God’s revelation. Yes indeed, God is with us.  But it is indirect.  It is through means that call forth faith.  He reveals himself through his inspired Word as the Holy Spirit uses that word to give faith and salvation.  He reveals himself in the water and word of Holy Baptism, as we share in Christ’s saving death and receive the promise of our own resurrection.

            He reveals himself in the Sacrament of the Altar.  Here our risen Lord uses bread and wine to feed us with his true body and blood, given and shed for you.  In our text, Moses’ concern is whether God will be with his people during their journey.  Here in the Sacrament, Jesus Christ is God with us for our journey – for our pilgrimage through life.  With good reason the early Church described the Sacrament as the cibus viatorum – “the food of the travelers.” Christ feeds and nourishes us so that we can continue to walk in faith as saints – as forgiven sinners. And through his body and blood he guarantees our future, for our Lord 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.”

            In our text this morning Moses says: “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?” Because of Jesus Christ, we know that God’s presence is with us. Through Word and Sacrament he gives us forgiveness.  And he points us to his direct revelation that will occur on the Last Day.     

             

              

             

Feast of the Confession of St. Peter

Today is the Feast of Confession of St. Peter.  This event reminds us that there are incorrect answers and a correct answer to Jesus’ question: “But who do you say that I am?”  In Matthew’s account of this event, we are told that it was the Father who enabled St. Peter to make this confession (Matthew 16:17).  Through the work of the Holy Spirit, we continue to answer our Lord’s question today in our use of the ecumenical Creeds of the Church.  The confession of the person of Jesus as Christ is then immediately tied to His work as our Lord goes on to predict His passion for the first time.  Jesus’ words teach us that the confession of Christ will often prompt us to take up the cross and follow Him.

Scripture reading: 

And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” And they told him, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.” And he asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Christ.” And he strictly charged them to tell no one about him.  And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”  And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it. (Mark 8:27-35).

Collect of the Day:

Heavenly Father, You revealed to the apostle Peter the blessed truth that Your Son Jesus is the Christ. Strengthen us by the proclamation of this truth that we too may joyfully confess that there is salvation in no one else; through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Mark's thoughts: Lutheran beliefs in the years to come?

A 2018 survey of evangelicals by Ligonier Ministries and LifeWay research found that 97% of respondents indicated agreement with this statement: “There is one true God in three persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.”  However, it found that 78% indicated they agreed with this statement as well: “Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God.”  In addition, 59% agreed with the statement: “The Holy Spirit is a force but not a personal being” (16% were unsure, and only 25% disagreed).

 

Survey results always invite questions about methodology, and the results can only be seen as one indicator of the situation. Yet once this caveat has been expressed, it is shocking to see evidence for commonly held opinions that directly contradict the orthodox Christian faith as confessed in the Nicene Creed.  Faith in Jesus Christ saves, but there are very serious problems if the Jesus of that faith is in fact an Arian one.

 

It fair to say that non-denominational evangelical churches place a relatively low emphasis on the doctrinal content of the faith, and a high emphasis on the personal meaning and value for the individual. The description provided by one very popular evangelical church in my area summarizes well what most are attempting to provide:  “Our worship services are truly energetic and are primarily made up of engaging worship music and dynamic teaching. God’s Word is presented in a way that applies directly to your life.”  This is a “lowest common denominator” Christianity that seeks to be “practical.”  Catechesis that teaches the individual about the confession of the church in order to join the congregation is not part of this model.  The true engine of evangelical churches, the small group ministry, does not emphasize doctrinal content because it too seeks be practical for life and is led most often by laity who have little theological training.

 

Evangelical churches of this kind are living off of the theological capital of earlier Christians.  The intent of their leaders is to be orthodox Christians.  Yet their very character as non-denominational churches works against the preservation of this orthodoxy.  By rejecting creeds and liturgy they have cast the worship of their people into a vacuum that is filled only with emotionally charged “worship experiences” and practical teaching. There is little to guide and form belief about the Trinity and the person of Christ, and at the same time this is not a focus in other areas of church life.

 

The contrast is marked when one considers just two pieces found in the liturgy.  The Introit contains the Gloria Patri: “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.”  Explicitly anti-Arian in phrasing, through weekly repetition it drives home the point: God has always been this way.  There can be no consideration of “there was when He was not.”

 

Likewise the Nicene Creed confesses in unmistakable terms the orthodox faith.  A Christian who says every Sunday that he or she believes in one Lord Jesus Christ who was “begotten, not made” is going to find it very hard to agree with the statement that, “Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God.”  

 

I make these observations not in relation to evangelicalism.  After all, they are being what they claim to be (even if it is perilous for the long term spiritual health of their congregations).  Instead, I direct them at Lutheran churches who are seeking to imitate them. The trend is very clear.  Lutheran churches seek to minimize catechesis because this seems like a barrier to people joining the congregation.  Catechesis in little more than a Saturday is not unheard of today.  Worship is the evangelical model: an energetic experience of “engaging worship music and dynamic teaching.”  Creeds may not be eliminated, but in the bulletins that members bring back I have noticed a trend toward the use of the Apostles’ Creed.  I suspect that this is because it is shorter and seems more accessible to outsiders. Yet the language of the Apostles’ Creed was unable to fend off Arianism, and the Nicene Creed was created because it was necessary for the Church in order to do so.

 

If you want to know what a church really believes, don’t look at their confessions and doctrinal books.  Instead, look at how they worship.  This is what will be forming the belief of the people who gather week in and week out.  The trends that affect the spiritual health of a church cannot be evaluated in years or decades.  Instead they must be considered over centuries. Yet our moment in time is not unimportant in this evaluation.  The biblical understanding of tradition is that each generation passes on to the next what they have received (1 Corinthians 15:3).  Each generation has a responsibility to see that the same faith is passed on to the next.  The creeds and liturgy have always been the key tool in doing this for the laity of the Church.  Decisions made to abandon these or adjust their use will ripple on in unexpected ways.  Trends in some Lutheran churches today offer the potential that one hundred years from now members may in an unreflective way agree with this statement: “Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God.”

 

 

   

 

Sermon for the Baptism of Our Lord - Mt 3:13-17

                                                                                    Baptism of Our Lord

                                                                                    Mt 3:13-17

                                                                                    1/13/18

            I had trouble believing that it was really happening.  I knew it was, because I could see it.  But it was just hard to understand. 

            On Monday night I was keeping track of the College National Championship football game between Alabama and Clemson.  I expected it to be a close game.  I thought Clemson certainly had a chance to win, but Alabama was favored and I thought they probably would.  After all, since coming to Alabama coach Nick Saban has won five national championships.  He has built a juggernaut that recruits the best talent every year, and then Saban’s singular focus creates a football team that is always in contention for a national title.  In particular, Saban – a coach with a background in defense – has fielded teams with stifling and overwhelming defenses.

            But as the game progressed, I saw something I never thought would happen: Alabama was blown out.  The final score was 44 to 16.  Clemson did to Alabama, what Saban and Alabama have been doing to everyone else for a decade.  They made Alabama looked bad and humiliated them on the biggest stage.  I had trouble believing that it was really happening.  I knew it was, because I could see it.  But it was just hard to understand.

            The same thoughts must have been going through John the Baptist’s mind that day at the Jordan River when Jesus approached him to receive John’s baptism.  Matthew tells us that John had appeared in the wilderness of Judea proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”  He announced a prophetic message of repentance, and he looked the part as he dressed like Elijah wearing a garment of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist.  He lived off the land as he ate locusts and wild honey.

            John got people’s attention.  He announced that the reign of God was imminent – it was about to arrive – and that all people needed to repent in preparation for it.  And the thing that was truly unique about John was the fact that he administered a washing – a baptism – to others.  As I mentioned during Advent, ritual washings were common in Judaism.  But they were all self administered.  John’s baptism was something that he applied to others and it was so unusual that it gave John his nickname – “the Baptizer.”

            Matthew tells us, “Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.” People confessed their sins, and showed that they were repentant and were looking for the arrival of God’s reign in faith by submitting to John’s baptism.

            John was an impressive figure, but he minimized himself by saying he was just the forerunner.  There was in fact someone even greater coming.  He said, “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”  John’s language left no doubt about what this coming One was going to do.  He was bringing God’s end time judgment.

            Matthew begins out text by saying, “Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him.”  Jesus made the trip from Galilee in the north of Israel to the area in the south where John was conducting his ministry.  He made the trip for a reason – to submit to John’s baptism. 

            When Jesus showed up, John was utterly confused.  In fact, he wanted to prevent Jesus from being baptized as he said, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”  John knew Jesus to be the coming One that he was proclaiming.  This was the One who was going to burn up sinners with the fire of God’s judgment.  So why was he coming to the water of a baptism of repentance – something people were receiving as they confessed their sins?

            Our Lord understood John’s confusion.  He said, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”  Jesus told John that they each had a role to play in order to fulfill God’s saving work to put all things right. This baptism he had come to receive was part of that saving work.  So John consented and baptized Jesus.

            Matthew tells us, “And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; and behold, a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.’”  After Jesus was baptized, God acted. The Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus, and God the Father spoke, identifying Jesus as his Son.

            You have to sympathize with John the Baptist.  Of course he was confused. After all, John recognized Jesus as the One who would bring God’s judgment against sinners. So why was Jesus acting like a sinner by coming to John for baptism?  And as readers of the Gospel we know that our Lord had been conceived by the Holy Spirit and given the name Jesus – “Yahweh saves” – because he had come to bring the forgiveness of sins. So what was Jesus doing in that water?

            The answer is to be found in Isaiah chapter 42. There through the prophet God says, “Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my Spirit upon him.” At the baptism of Jesus, God the Father spoke words based on this verse, and the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus in order to identify him as the Servant of the Lord.

            This happened in a setting where people were confessing their sin because it was the Servant’s job to bear the sins of all.  In Isaiah chapter 53, the prophet said about the Servant, “But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned--every one--to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

            We are like sheep that have gone astray. We know what God’s will is from his Word.  Yet we choose to do things our own way.  And sometimes it isn’t even a matter of choice.  In spite of ourselves we end of doing those things that are wrong – those things we really don’t want to do.  We don’t hallow God’s name by what we do.  We hurt the people we love and care about.

            Isaiah said that the Lord has laid on the Servant the iniquity of us all. That is why Jesus was in the water.  He was there to take our place.  Though sinless, he was there to take our sin as his own.

            You can draw direct line from the water of Jesus’ baptism to the cross of Good Friday.  From the moment he received John’s baptism, Jesus Christ had taken up the task of suffering and dying for your sin.  Just before Holy Week, Jesus said, “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” By that death he has redeemed you from sin.  He has freed you to be a forgiven child of God.

            God warned Adam that if he disobeyed by eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he would die.  Sin has brought death ever since. Your sin brought death to Jesus. But because he is the sinless Son of God, his death was the means by which God’s righteousness – his saving action to put all things right – was fulfilled.  Because of his death for you, you are now forgiven.  It does not matter what you have done. By confessing your sin and believing in Jesus Christ you sins are no more in God’s eyes.

            But Jesus Christ’s death was not the end.  Instead, he defeated death by passing through it. For on the third day the Spirit of God, who descended upon Jesus at his baptism, raised our Lord from the dead.  He is now the risen Lord.  And it is as the risen Lord that he instituted Holy Baptism.  On mountain in Galilee he told his disciples, “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.”

            Through his Word, Christ has taken water and made it the means by which we receive the benefit of the saving work he began in his own baptism.  On the cross Jesus received the judgment against your sin. St. Paul told the Romans, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?” Through the water of baptism you have shared in Jesus’ saving death.  It has become yours, and so you have received the forgiveness he won.  This is the promise of God’s Word.  Through faith in God’s work of baptism, you have exactly what he says: the forgiveness of sins.

            At his baptism, the Spirit of God descended upon Jesus and identified him as the Servant of the Lord.  Through your baptism, you have received the Spirit of God.  He worked regeneration through water and the word, and so now your baptism has become the source of your life that serves the Lord.  Paul went on to say about baptism, “We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”  Through baptism, you have received the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead.  He has made you a new creation in Christ, so that now through his work in you, you can walk in newness of life – so that you can live the life of the Spirit, the life of faith toward God and love for your neighbor.

            John the Baptist was not wrong about Jesus when he described what the coming One is going to do.  He didn’t understand that Jesus first had to suffer and die for all people – that he had to die on the cross, and that was why he had come to receive John’s baptism.  But the risen and ascended Lord is the One who will return in glory on the Last Day.  He will carry out the judgment as he clears his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn, but the burning the chaff with unquenchable fire.

            The comforting good news is that because Jesus was baptized to take on our sins and die on the cross, we are the wheat.  Because we have been baptized into Jesus’ death and resurrection, we know that we are saints in God’s eyes – we are holy because in Christ we are forgiven.  The day of our Lord’s return will be one of joy for us – a joy that we already have now because Jesus was baptized, and because we have been baptized.