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“The God of the Living and the Sons of the Resurrection” (Luke 20:27-40)In these days of November, as we near the end of the church year, our thoughts turn to the end times, the return of Christ, and, as we just confessed in the Creed, “the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.” Our Scripture readings during these weeks reflect this emphasis. So it is with our lessons today. In particular, I want to direct our attention this morning to the Holy Gospel for today, from Luke 20, where Jesus speaks of “The God of the Living and the...

“Who We Are and What We Will Be” (1 John 3:1-3)Today as we observe All Saints’ Day, we look back and remember with thanksgiving the saints who have gone before us, who now rest from their labors and are with the Lord. We look around us, and even though we cannot see them, we know that we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses to the faith, all of us united in the one great communion of saints, the whole church on earth and in heaven. And we look ahead, we look forward with hopefulness to the day...

“A Reformation in Catechesis” (John 8:31-36)“If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” This is the word of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he spoke in John 8:31-32. His word is truth, and this truth sets us free. Free from all our sins, and from our slavery to sin. Free from the burden of the law, which would crush us with its demands we can never meet. Free from our bondage to death and the grave, free to live forever. Yes, “if the Son...

“A Parable of Persistent Prayer” (Luke 18:1-8)The parable Jesus tells in the Holy Gospel for today, from Luke 18, is traditionally called the Parable of the Importunate Widow. “Importunate” is an old-timey kind of word. It means “persistent in making a request,” even to the point of becoming something of a bother. And that would describe the widow portrayed in this parable. She was importunate. She was persistent in her seeking justice from an unjust judge. And Jesus is saying, through this parable, that this is how we in the church should be--importunate, persistent. Thus our text today is “A...

“Mercy for the Marginalized” (Luke 17:11-19)The Holy Gospel for today from Luke 17, about the cleansing of the lepers, happens to be the assigned Gospel for the Day of Thanksgiving. And that makes sense. Jesus’ words about the one who came back to give thanks make it a natural for that occasion. But this text also shows up as a regular Sunday reading during the three-year lectionary, and thus it appears today. So this morning we’ll take a slightly different approach to this text than we would on Thanksgiving. Today we’ll emphasize the text’s theme of “Mercy for the Marginalized.”...

“Faith for Living in Community” (Luke 17:1-10)In our Gospel reading for today, from Luke 17, Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, and he is giving instructions to his disciples. At first glance it may seem like these are just several disconnected sayings strung together rather loosely. First there’s something about woe to anyone who causes a person to sin. Then there’s something about forgiving your brother. Then there’s a request about increasing our faith and Jesus’ response about faith like a mustard seed. And then there’s something about unworthy servants who only do their duty. Now all this could...

“St. Michael and All Angels: Messengers, Worshipers, Warriors” (Revelation 12:7-12)Today in the Christian church year is the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels. It always falls on September 29, and since this year that date falls on a Sunday, that’s why we’re celebrating this festival today. Angels, thus, will be topic of this sermon: who they are and what they do and why we thank God for them. And we’ll even get into who this mysterious figure St. Michael is a little bit. So with that by way of introduction, we begin our theme today, “St. Michael and All...

“Managing the Master’s Money” (Luke 16:1-15)Do you remember the name Bernie Madoff? He was in the news a few years back. Bernie Madoff was the investment-firm guy, the money manager, who, over the years, defrauded his wealthy clients out of billions of dollars--that’s “billions” with a “b.” Madoff made off with billions--for a while, at least. He finally was caught, and he’s in the jailhouse now, awaiting his release in the year 2159, when he will be 221 years old. But Bernie Madoff had to have been a rather shrewd character, he must have had something on the ball, to...

“Sound Doctrine: Law and Gospel” (1 Timothy 1:5-17)Today begins a series of weeks in which the Epistle comes from Paul’s two letters to Timothy. Paul we know, but who is this Timothy? Timothy was Paul’s younger assistant who often traveled with him and whom Paul would sometimes have oversee things in places while Paul was off elsewhere. This is the case when Paul writes this first letter to Timothy. Paul had gone off to Macedonia, and he had Timothy remain in the big city of Ephesus, in western Asia Minor. Ephesus was a very important city for the whole region....

Circuit Pastors' Conference Tuesday, September 10, 2013 “You Shepherds, Hear the Word of the Lord” (Ezekiel 34:1-24)The readings for this coming Sunday in the three-year lectionary are perfectly suited for preaching to a bunch of pastors. All the readings concern the role of a shepherd caring for his sheep. In the Holy Gospel, from Luke 15, Jesus compares himself to a shepherd who goes to find a lost sheep. This fulfills the prophecy of Ezekiel 34, the Old Testament Reading, in which the Lord says that he himself will search for his sheep and seek them out. Even the Epistle,...

“Philemon: The Gospel Transforms Relationships” (Philemon 1-21)Today I’m going to preach to you an entire book of the Bible. In fact, you already heard an entire book of the Bible as one of our readings today. Well, almost. You heard 21 out of the 25 verses that make up Paul’s Letter to Philemon. Philemon is one of those little one-chapter books that we have in the Bible. There are five of them: Obadiah in the Old Testament, and Philemon, 2 John, 3 John, and Jude in the New Testament. Now even though Philemon is a very short epistle, there’s a...

“The Great Reversal: The Humble Exalted” (Luke 14:1-14)Up is down, and down is up, in the kingdom of God. Or so it seems sometimes. Actually, the kingdom of God is all about turning things rightside-up. It’s just that rightside-up may look upside-down from our cockeyed perspective. From God’s perspective, though, the way things are in his kingdom is just right, the way things ought to be. Such is the case with our text for today, the teaching of Jesus that we find in Luke 14. Here Jesus makes one of his many paradoxical statements, which he seems to do all...

“Strive to Enter through the Narrow Door” (Luke 13:22-30)Do you ever wonder about who all will be saved? When people die, and when this world comes to an end, how many will make it into heaven? How many will end up in hell? And on what basis? “Pastor, what about people who did the best they could? What about people who never heard the gospel, like in Borneo or Papua New Guinea? Will they get in? If they don’t, how is that fair? What kind of a God would send anybody to hell? If that’s the God of the Bible,...

“The Miracle of Faith” (Genesis 15:1-6; Hebrews 11:1-16)Sometimes I think about the impossibility of faith. I mean, if you stop and think about all the things that are working against faith, it’s amazing that any of us have it. To believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ and all that that involves, to trust in the goodness and the promises of God, in spite of all that would cause us to not believe--it’s simply amazing. And so today we’re going to talk about “The Miracle of Faith.” Consider our Old Testament lesson for today, from Genesis 15. It relates a...

“Where Is Your Head At?” (Colossians 3:1-11)“Where Is Your Head At?” That, basically, is the question that comes out of today’s Epistle reading from Colossians 3. There St. Paul puts it like this: “Seek the things that are above,” and “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.” On things above, or on things on earth? Where is your head at? Today God’s Word would direct us to set our minds on things above. Our text today will tell us where not to set our minds, where we ought to set them, and...

The convention of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod is over. There were no big controversies. Virtually all of the resolutions passed, overwhelmingly, and those that didn’t were defeated overwhelmingly. No challenges to Lutheran orthodoxy even came up. The delegates were pretty much all on the same conservative page. After the jump, Lutheran journalist Mollie Hemingway writes about the difficulty religion reporters have in covering a church convention that is peaceful and non-contentious. But surely what didn’t happen is huge news for Lutherans. To be sure, issues remain, but could it be that the LCMS is getting unified again? Were any...

“The Lawyer and the Good Samaritan” (Luke 10:25-37)Our text today is one of the most familiar and well loved of Jesus’ many parables. It’s the story of the Good Samaritan. But really, we could call it the story of “The Lawyer and the Good Samaritan.” You see, there’s something that happens that prompts Jesus to tell the parable of the Good Samaritan. It’s a little exchange that Jesus has with a lawyer in the crowd: “And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to...

Since shortly after its formation in 1988 the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has been fixated on deviant sexual behavior, culminating in the endorsement of homosexual pastors in 2009, homosexual “marriage” in 2011, and the election last month of their first homosexual bishop. Dr. James Nestingen, a highly respected scholar and retired ELCA seminary professor, recently concluded that promoting acceptance of deviant sexual behavior has actually replaced the Gospel of Jesus Christ as the primary mission and message of the ELCA. Those within the ELCA demanding these radical changes asserted it is necessary for the ELCA’s very survival. Supposedly, they...

“The One Gospel Produces One Church” (Galatians 6:1-10, 14-18)Today we wrap up our six-part series on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians. And our theme today, as we look at chapter 6, is this: “The One Gospel Produces the One Church.” First of all, though, let’s review where we have been in this series. Week one. Title: “No Other Gospel.” Key passage, Galatians 1:6-7: “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel--not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble...

“Free to Be Fruitful” (Galatians 5:1, 13-25)Freedom is a wonderful thing. This week on Thursday, the Fourth of July, our nation will celebrate the 237th anniversary of declaring our freedom from Great Britain. But as we saw in our nation just this past week, freedom can also be abused, as when that freedom is used as a license for immorality. So the question becomes: What are we using our freedom for? That’s the question St. Paul takes up in our Epistle for today from Galatians 5. What are we using our freedom for? Only, Paul here is talking about something...