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Epiphany 3–“Repent, Believe, & Follow” (Mark 1:14-20)

B-20 Epiphany 3 (Mk 1.14-20)Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, amen. The text for the sermon is the Gospel, which was read earlier.

The clock and calendar dictate much of our behavior. It’s time to eat; time for the news; time for school; time to go to work; time to start working on taxes. The new year has already lost its magic glow as our new year resolutions have already been broken. Time is the eternal taskmaster and everything must take place at the appointed time or else everything falls apart.

Jesus too follows time and follows it to the letter. Everything He does happens at exactly the right time, not a moment before or a moment after. What occurs in our text is no different. Jesus says, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” Did you catch the first command Jesus gives in Mark’s Gospel? First, He says the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand. The time has come; not a moment too early and not a moment too late. Then comes Jesus’ command: repent. Repent is the first thing Jesus tells people to do. That word becomes the key word whenever He meets someone. It’s kind of a summary of what He taught, what He preached, what He wanted His miracles to bring about in people’s lives.

When Jesus uses the word repent, He is calling people to turn away from anything that leads away from Him and to turn instead toward Him. What difficult thing repentance is, to turn away from what is contrary to the Word of God. Just what exactly is contrary to the Word of God? In short, the world. What the world teaches and preaches often runs contrary to God’s Word. The world says it’s okay to do any number of things that the Word of God condemns. It’s is so difficult for us to abide by God’s Word when we are told by the world that what we’re doing is okay. But regardless of what the world says, God’s Word is the ultimate authority and Jesus says to repent. That’s not the only command Jesus issues. His second command is believe. Believe not just anything, but believe in Jesus. Trust Him. Turn toward Him. Hold on to Him.

Repent and believe is the heart of Jesus’ message when He speaks or does something. He says and does much more, but this is the gist, the summary, the heart of His ministry: repent and believe. Repent of sin. Believe, for He has come to remove it. And He will!

The time had been fulfilled with the coming of Jesus. Since Jesus arrived on the scene, the prophecies from the Old Testament were fulfilled in Him. All of history now hinges on what Jesus would do. And what exactly would Jesus do? He would come to live a perfect life for you because you live an imperfect life. He would come to die a sinner’s death even though He was sinless. He would rise again to eternal life in order to give you eternal life. This is what Jesus would come and do and this is what Jesus did for you. He did it, the action is already done. There is nothing to be done on your part because Christ has already done it. The only thing Jesus requires of you is to repent and believe.

Jesus calls for us to repent. He says to take responsibility for what you have done wrong. We call that confession, coming before Him with repentant hearts seeking His forgiveness. That is why we confess our sins each week, turning away from the sin in our lives and turning toward the forgiveness that Jesus gives. But we don’t just confess our sins on Sunday, as if we have only sinned that morning. We need to confess our sins daily for we sin daily. We need to turn away from our sinful lives and turn to Jesus and His forgiveness daily.

Jesus issues a third command in our text, one that He issues to Simon, Andrew, James and John: “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” There, Jesus calls them to become His disciples. That same command Jesus gave to them He gives to you as well. In your Baptism, He calls you and says, “Follow me.” We follow Jesus, not out of compulsion or a sense of righteousness on our part, but we follow Christ because of the mercy that He has shown us. We follow Christ; we become His disciples because of what Jesus has done for us. We follow Him to the cross where we see Him take our sin upon Himself, giving to us His righteousness. We follow Christ as He proclaims eternal victory over sin, death, and the devil on account of His life, death, and resurrection. We follow Christ to our heavenly Father, who sent His only begotten Son to restore His creation to what it was meant to be: holy and perfect.

This command of Jesus to follow Him is not a command that is to be taken lightly. To follow Jesus means first of all to subordinate everything to the Lord. Give yourself, your heart, mind, and soul to Jesus.

To follow the Lord also means that one will strive to simulate the Savior in all His ways, to be holy! St. Peter writes, “But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct.” Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ; that is, we should love and forgive unconditionally, just as St. Paul writes, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”

Finally, to follow Christ means to share the work of Christ. This point receives a mighty emphasis in Jesus’ statement, “I will make you become fishers of men.” The preaching of the Gospel was Jesus’ highest priority. His Gospel was more important than eating and drinking, than healing and miracles, than any personal comfort. The Gospel is this: Believe in Jesus, who suffered your hell in your place, and you will be saved. Jesus was determined to fulfill that Gospel and to proclaim that Gospel to sinners. His followers will share that commitment throughout their lives.

Today, our Lord calls to you. He calls you to “repent and believe in the gospel.” He calls you to repentance out of the love that God the Father has for you, His beloved creation. He calls you to repentance out of the love that He showed for you on the cross when He took upon Himself all of your sins. He calls you to believe with the faith granted to you in your Baptism through the work of the Holy Spirit. He calls you to believe in the promises that He has made to you and for you, promises such as, “I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also,” and “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” Our Lord calls you to follow Him. As baptized believers, we follow Him from death to everlasting life. In Jesus’ name, amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus, amen.

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Support and Love, Patience and Wisdom

The following is a quote from the Rev. Dr. Dean O. Wenthe from 1979. I find it very appropriate even today.

Our primary calling as theologians is to interpret reality for ourselves and for our people. In our day, we behold the tragic paradox of secular man seeking something more solid than the phony, penultimate, pleasure trips, of either the gross or more refined variety, that are constantly held before us as the only route worth traveling…and, in their seeking, find no one to speak to them of that which is solid and real. The saints whom you serve will at times overwhelm you with their support and love. The sinners whom you serve will at times send you scampering to the throne of grace for more patience and wisdom than your flesh can muster. And yet, on this latter point, I can forthrightly say that for all their frailties you will find your flock a joy to serve. I was simply not prepared for all that closeness which is forged between Pastor and people as they seek to live a real life in the midst of a phony world. Frankly, it’s great! And if these tasks do not plant the seeds of joy and happiness in our service, then we have ourselves drifted from that which is real.

Concordia Theological Quarterly 75, p. 367-368

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Baptism of Our Lord–“Gift of Baptism” (Mark 1:4-11)

B-18 Epiphany 1 (Mk 1.4-11)Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, amen. The text for the sermon is the Gospel, which was read earlier.

Christmas is over. With it, we saw the coming of our Lord. He came to us in the form of a babe, lying in a manger. The Christ Child was brought to the temple to be presented. There, Simeon spoke the words of the Nunc Dimittis to Mary and Joseph. Simeon had seen the salvation of the Lord, which has prepared in the sight of all people. We have heard what John has said: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

All of that brings us to today. Today we meet John again. Here we find him in the desert preaching about a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. While he was doing this, he had a message: “After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

So what does all of that mean? Why should I care? Well, you have John. He came as the fulfillment of the Old Testament passages concerning the second Elijah, the immediate forerunner of the Christ. John preaches a simple message: Jesus as the promised Messiah. He focuses on the necessity of repentance for receiving Christ aright, on the person of Christ as both God and Savior, and on Baptism for those who sincerely repented and believed in the Messiah. John also alludes to the Baptism with the Spirit and with fire that Christ will give to His people to carry out His saving mission in the world. John’s Baptism, too, worked forgiveness of sins, delivered from death and the devil, and gave eternal salvation to all who believed.

So we come to the focus of John’s Baptism: repentance. Are you truly repentant for your sins? Are you sad that your sins caused a Baby to be born, so that 30-some years later, He would die on the cross for you? It’s a hard question to ask. True repentance means not only sorrow over sin and dread of God’s punishment, but a turning of mind and heart away from sin that expresses itself in outward ways wherever possible. True repentance will not allow the penitent soul to continue to live in sin.

You see, John came and he went. He went to the desert region and baptized people. Why did he do that? No one told him to do it. He did it because he knew that the people were repentant of their sins and that by being baptized, the Old Adam would die and when you emerged from the waters, you were a new person.

The early Church had an interesting way of baptizing. They had a huge baptismal font. You would descend the stairs to the font. That symbolized your dying to sin. Once at the bottom, your clothes were removed and you were baptized. You then ascended the stairs as a new person. Who you were before died in the waters of Holy Baptism. That is the same thing that John did in the desert. John knew that there was One coming more powerful than he was. He knew that he was only a preview of the joy that would come.

John eventually moved to the River Jordan. There, he met Jesus and an interesting turn of events took place: Jesus comes to be baptized by John. Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God; He had no sins to confess! Why did Jesus need to be baptized for the remission of His sins that didn’t exist? Matthew records for us Jesus’ simple reply to John when John questions the Baptism: “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”Then John baptized Jesus.

Can you imagine Jesus coming up to you and saying, “Bob, it’s time for you to baptize me now?” How would you react? What would you say or do? We see in our text just how easy it was for John to question and do what he did. And when Jesus came out of the water, heaven was torn open and the Holy Spirit came to Him and dwelt with Him. Did Jesus have to be baptized? Was it mandatory for that to happen? No. In allowing Himself to be baptized, Jesus was showing His solidarity with sinners. Though Himself sinless, He was identifying Himself with sinners by giving Himself to the work of bearing their sins then and our sins now.

We need to make sure we fully understand what took place in the Baptism of Jesus by John. The view that by being baptized by John, Jesus only showed His willing obedience and that Jesus, though not needing baptism and yet submitted to it, makes the baptism nothing but a formality and misconstrues what John’s Baptism really was. It was not law, but gospel, not a demand to obey but a gift of grace to accept and to retain as such. Jesus was baptized by John because He regarded this as the right way in which to enter upon His great office. He, the Sinless One, the very Son of God, chose to put Himself by the side of all the sinful ones, for whom this sacrament of John’s was ordained. He signifies that He is now ready to take upon Himself the load of all these sinners, that is, to assume His redemptive office. As Luther points out, Jesus was here rightly beginning to be Christ, the Anointed One, and “was thus inaugurated into His entire Messianic office as our Prophet, High Priest, and King.”

Every time we celebrate a Baptism, the one being Baptized is made a child of God by the waters of Holy Baptism, and every sin that they will ever commit will be washed away by those waters, just as it was earlier with Averyanna. That person receives sonship in the kingdom of God. Their sins are forgiven. How is this done? It is done by a man named Jesus, sent from God to be our sacrificial Lamb, baptized in the waters of the Jordan River, forever joining Himself to sinful man in order to redeem us. It is accomplished for us by His death on the cross for us sinners. It is accomplished for us only by Jesus who has atoned for all our sins. In Jesus’ name, amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus, amen.

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Home

20120106-205255.jpgThis was the sight that I walked in to when I got back to the hospital after Wesley woke up from his nap. Gwen was waiting for the discharge papers to be completed and Bryce was as happy as could be. He could finally walk (he had monitor wires on his left foot) and get down from the bed. About 30 minutes later, we were led out of the hospital by his nurse on shift and we made our way home. Gwen took the boys and I went to Walmart to get 4 prescriptions filled. When we got home, he was happy as could be and running around and playing and even jumping on the mini trampoline.

I’m definitely glad to have all of my family home and my boy on the mend. Hopefully we won’t be making any more trips to the walk-in clinic, ER, and/or the ICU any time soon.

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Bryce and the croup

This last week, Bryce has had croup. It was bad on Monday and Gwen wanted to take him to the doctor’s office, but it was closed due to the holiday. She ended up taking him to the ER, but it was a 4-6 hour wait, plus they were waiting for a series of ambulances to come.

Tuesday she took him to the doctor and they gave him a steroid shot and said he should be feeling better within three days. Yesterday was day two and he actually sounded worse than before. Gwen took him to the walk-in clinic last night. She was there less than 30 minutes and they called an ambulance for him. His O2 stats were in the 80s which is not good. He was also sciatic (his lips were blue in color). The ambulance trip was only about 2 blocks away, so that’s going to be an expensive taxi ride!

At the ER last night, they gave him some IV fluids and he started to perk up. Gwen called me and I got up there and he was still puny looking but better than what he was at the walk-in clinic. This is what he looked like.

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Wesley and I spent the morning up at the ICU. Bryce really perked up and seemed to be more of his regular self. Starting at 1pm, they were transitioning him to oral medication and if all went well, he should be discharged tonight. This is what he looked like around 6:30 this morning.

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Circumcision and Name of Jesus–“All About the Name” (Luke 2:21)

F-6 Circumcision and Name (Lu 2.21)Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, amen. The text for our sermon this morning is the Gospel reading, which was read earlier.

In our Gospel lesson for today, a single verse speaks volumes about what’s in a name: “And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.”

Going back to the angel’s appearance to Mary, she was told about the Child she was to have, whose name would be Jesus. “And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.” Mary already knew what she was to call her Son; Jesus, which means “help of Jehovah” or “savior.” His name signified what His mission in life is: the helper of Jehovah or God, savior of mankind.

The name Jesus was not an uncommon name. It is used of other men in the Bible, most notably and prophetically of the leader of Israel who led the people of God into the promised land of Canaan, Yeshua, or who we know as Joshua. Here this common name is used for an uncommon person, who is Himself the Lord who saves!

While today is New Year’s Day, it is also the day of Christ’s circumcision, eight days following His birth, where He would receive His name. The circumcision and naming of Jesus is the scriptural subject for the festival of New Year’s Day, a day that has increasingly become more secular than sacred.

The full meaning of Christmas is not just found in the fact that the Word was made flesh, but also in the purpose for which He entered our flesh and blood. Already on the eighth day of His earthly existence, His blood flowed. As it flowed, it was both a sign and promise of the redemptive blood of Calvary, which was the goal and purpose of Bethlehem.

The Child whose birth was recorded in the opening verses of Galatians 4 had come to fulfill the law. “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” There we see what Jesus came to do: He fulfilled the Law to establish the Gospel.

This fulfillment was to be perfect. Therefore, meticulous attention to the Lord’s command is revealed with the words, “And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised…. God had said circumcision should be performed on the eighth day dating all the way back to Genesis, so the eighth day it was. He who had come to do His Father’s work did His Father’s will with delight.

Why should we make a big deal about the circumcision of Jesus? What is the significance of that? The rite of circumcision was given to Abram as the sign of the covenant between God and man. Circumcision was a God-ordained sign of the promise of the Savior, an outward sign signifying one’s membership in God’s covenant family. Submitting to circumcision would be an outward confession of faith that one believed God’s promise and wanted to be included among His people. Parents having a child circumcised were likewise confessing their faith in and obedience to God in the same way that Christian parents do when they bring their children to baptism today. In the same way, the Old Testament parents were to train their children to know the Lord whose gracious covenant they had received. They were also to watch that their children reflected their covenant relationship with God by circumcising their lives from sin. Without that inward disposition of the heart, the outward mutilation of the flesh was nothing.

Our Lord Jesus was not born in sin, and did not need that mortification of a corrupt nature, or that renewal unto holiness, which were signified by circumcision. This ordinance was, in His case, a pledge of His future perfect obedience to the whole law, in the midst of sufferings and temptations, even unto death for us. He came to shed His blood for us, to redeem us from sin and death.

The crowning point of everything was not the rite of circumcision itself, but the royal name bestowed upon Him who received it. That name was Jesus, which means Savior, but not merely Savior. It also means “the Lord saves.” And that is what Jesus Christ came to do. He was not born so that He would be a carpenter. While He was the Son of a carpenter, that was not His purpose in life. His purpose was to come into this world, as broken as it may be, and heal it. He came to grant forgiveness of sins and to bring all people into His Father’s house. His life was a selfless life, disregarding His own wants and desires to do His Father’s will: to die, to be resurrected, to grant new life to all those who profess the Name of Jesus Christ.

The name of this Child and the name God or Lord are not just sounds, but sounds filled with meaning. The name of the Lord is His reputation. He made that name known to Moses: “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”

His name tells us what He came to do. Jesus is the one who lived up to His name by living, dying, and rising from the dead. Jesus is the one who saves us from our sins. The little bit of blood that Jesus shed for us at His circumcision was only the beginning. The day would come when He would shed His blood and give up His life. In this way He would save us from our sins, for “the blood of Jesus [God’s] Son cleanses us from all sin.” In the name of Jesus, amen. Now the peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through faith until life everlasting. Amen.

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Pastoral Year in Review – 2011

2011 proved to be a year of change for me pastorally. In April, my senior pastor took a call to another church, leaving me as the only pastor. Our church was in a state of limbo from mid-April to mid-August while we evaluated our options as far as our ministry staff was concerned. Things solidified on August 18 when our Voters’ Assembly decided to call me to be the sole pastor of Trinity. So, here are the vital stats for 2011:

Sermons: 53
Weddings: 2
Funerals 7
Baptisms: 5
Junior Confirmation: 15
Adult Confirmation: 3

2011 was a definite change for me pastorally. In 6 years, I’ve never preached every Sunday since there have been 2 pastors here. For the last 8 months, that’s what I’ve been doing. Most of my other pastor friends have been doing this since Day 1 so I’ve been spoiled.

The month of December proved to be a very busy and emotionally taxing month. I had 3 funerals in a span of two weeks with Advent and Christmas rolled in there. Our Christmas Eve and Day services had 4 services (3 sermons) in 2 days. Needless to say, my post-Christmas staycation has proven to be much needed.

So, that’s it. That’s 2011 in the books. Here’s to a new year.

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Maintenance

My site is currently undergoing some maintenance. Keeping it on WordPress, just moving it to .com hosting instead of .org hosting. Please bear with me. All posts are there, just no graphics.

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Funeral for +Dorothy Jahn+

LSB Icon_040The text I have chosen for Dorothy’s funeral is Isaiah 61:10

I will greatly rejoice in the LORD; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.

Here ends our text.

Maxine, Carol, and David, family and friends, it is the season of Christmas, a time of rejoicing and celebrating the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Instead, we gather today in mourning, or at least, that’s what you might think.

As hard as it might be, this is precisely the right time that we should be rejoicing and celebrating, not only for the birth of our Savior, but also for Dorothy as well. We rejoice and celebrate because our sister in Christ is now with Christ. She has left the valley of the shadow of death and she now rests in the everlasting light and life of Jesus Christ.

If there was anyone who would want you to mourn less, it would be Dorothy. It’s not because she doesn’t want you to worry or care about her or to mourn her passing. The reason why she would not want you to mourn is because there is nothing to mourn. Dorothy knew that. She knew that her time on this earth would be limited. She knew that one day, she would die. For Dorothy, that day happened to be last Wednesday. But she also knew that when she died, this would not be the end of her life. She knew that because God had placed His name upon her, that because Jesus Christ came to live and to die for her, she would have eternal life. She knew what would happen when she drew her last breath on this earth. She knew that her loving Father would welcome her with open and waiting arms.

That is why we should not mourn but rejoice! We should rejoice because of the eternal life that Dorothy received! Yes, it will be hard to rejoice when right now it feels only natural to mourn, but like all things, this too shall pass. If there was one who knew sorrow and mourning, it was David. But even for all the sorrow and mourning David experienced, he was able to say, “You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; you have loosed my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness, that my glory may sing your praise and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks to you forever!”

We have every reason to rejoice at death and now is one of the two best times to rejoice because of what we celebrated on Sunday, the birth of Jesus Christ. We can and should rejoice because God sent Jesus for us, He sent Jesus for Dorothy. Because of the birth of Jesus, we know that Jesus is our Immanuel, God with us. We know that God is for us and that God is in us, redeeming us, giving to us his gracious gift of forgiveness of sins, something that Dorothy received all those many years ago in her Baptism, something that she heard every Sunday in church. And in the last few years when she was at the Beehive and Pioneer Manor, she heard them pronounced for her also.

On account of the work of Jesus Christ, we know that when we breathe our last breath, there will be more to our life than the years we live on this earth. We know that we too will see the face of Christ and the heavenly room He has prepared for us. Through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, we will have everlasting life. St. Paul reminds us, “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep.”

We are able to come together not as those who have no hope, but those who know the hope that we have received through Jesus Christ. We rejoice as Dorothy rejoices – not in our accomplishments but in what Jesus has accomplished for us. We have received the gift of salvation through His atoning sacrifice for us. When God speaks to us in this way, when He comes to give us a garment of salvation, a robe of righteousness, it is most certainly better for us to receive than to give. In fact, when God speaks pure words of grace and mercy to us, there is really nothing we can give. God’s grace is complete. It is absolute. It is perfect. It lacks nothing and consequently nothing can be added to it.

It is God working righteousness for us, not us working righteousness for God. Dorothy could never do anything for God than to simply receive from His bountiful goodness. There is nothing that any of us can do except to receive from God. God gives and we are merely capable of receiving, nothing more. For 90 years, Dorothy received from the Lord: she received His gift of God’s name. She received the gift of forgiveness. She received His gift of body and blood which was given and shed for the forgiveness of her sins. She received His gift of everlasting life for her. She was covered with the robe of righteousness, the righteousness that she desperately needed but could not earn. The robe of righteousness that she received was not something that could be bought, earned or achieved. The robe of righteousness was given to her by Jesus Christ, won for her by His death on the cross. That very robe of righteousness that she received is what Christ brings to you as well. God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”

For you Maxine, Carol, and David, you will mourn today and in the days ahead. But the joy that you have is the ability to rejoice – rejoice in the faith that Dorothy had, the faith given to her in her Baptism, the faith that gave to her everlasting life. Rejoice because this dear sister in Christ is now with Christ. Rejoice, for one day, we too shall stand with Dorothy and all the saints who have gone before as we gaze upon Christ, our heavenly King. Amen.

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Christmas Day–“The Word” (John 1:1-14)

B-13 Christmas Day (Jn 1.1-14)Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God, our Father, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, amen. The text for our sermon comes from the Gospel which was read earlier.

Few words in Scripture have gripped the human mind with the power of the opening lines of our text: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” The language is simple, yet the thoughts are so vast that the words seem to have a magical power. The Western Church used it for centuries as a blessing for the sick and for the newly baptized children. It was even placed in amulets and hung around the next to protect one from sickness. It’s seductive, though, to be so entranced by the mysterious repetition and simplicity of these words, that we forget their importance.

John’s Gospel is not the first place where we hear these famous words, “In the beginning….” The very first words of Scripture begin the same way: “In the beginning….” We find God in the beginning: uncreated, infinite, and eternal. He always has been and He always will be. He is without beginning and without end. Prior to creation, when there was nothing besides God, there was God’s Word. It is this Word that we gather around this morning, the Word who “became flesh and dwelt among us.” This Word is Jesus, the Babe in the manger.

Prior to our Lord’s incarnation, prior to His coming on Christmas Day, the Word was with God. St. John says that “all things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.” He was the agent by whom God spoke the entire creation into being. Light and life have their beginning and source in Him. It was this Word that created life, that created you.

Now let us fast forward to today. Things are far different than what they were at creation. Creation was deemed “very good” but would we call creation “very good” today? What is “very good” about it? There is nothing that is still “very good” according to God’s declaration. Look at this world that we live in. It is a world of darkness, a world that is spiritually ignorant and blind to God and His Word. It cannot recognize God for who He is, though His imprint is still evident of creation. With a single word, “darkness,” John describes creation’s fall, sin, death, and hell. The word “darkness” captures the confusion and misunderstanding and futility around us and even in us.

If the creation were to be redeemed, saved, rescued from this darkness of sin and death, then God would have to make Himself known, point Himself out, reveal Himself to us. But how would God do this? God would come to the place where we are, descend to earth, enter His creation so that we lost and condemned creatures might know Him and have communion with Him, the way we were meant to exist.

This is the true and wonderful meaning of Christmas. It is God coming to us and He has in the form of a Babe whose birth we celebrate today. God shows up in a place where we don’t expect to find Him: “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” God the Word, who was there in the beginning and participated in the creation of all things, took on a human nature like yours. God became man. What was eternal now became finite in the person of Jesus. The Word became flesh, Jesus Christ, true God and true man in one person.

The glory of God is seen in the face of Jesus Christ. He is the light of the world, the light that shines in our darkness, the light no darkness can overcome.

Think about it. When Joseph, Mary, and the shepherds looked into the manger, they were looking at God. When anyone saw they face of Jesus, they saw the face of God. The little child who lay in the manger is the same one who created Adam out of the dust of the ground. The one whom Mary wrapped in swaddling cloths and laid in a manger is the one who was before Abraham – more than that, He was before Adam. He is the uncreated one who is before time itself was created.

Think about it. The little one in the manger is the one who would one day hang from a tree that He created. The little one wrapped in swaddling cloths is the one who would one day be wrapped in burial cloths and laid in a tomb carved from the rock He created. Because He is the creator of all things, the life, suffering, and death of this little one will be more than enough to pay for your sins. The little one in the manger is the one who would one day burst forth from the tomb to proclaim His salvation for all people.

For God the Word who was in the beginning is now and forever incarnate in the person of Jesus Christ. That makes Christmas a blessed surprise: the uncreated, eternal, and infinite God comes right here among us as our light and our life.

Today we rejoice, for the Savior, which is Christ the Lord, is born. He is the Savior, which is Christ the Lord every day of the year and not just on Christmas Day. He was born for our sin and takes away our sin ever day of the year. Because you and I were born in sin, He is born to save us from sin. Because you and I are made of mortal flesh and blood, He becomes flesh and blood to raise us up to immortality. Because you and I face death, He is born to die and rise again to give us new life. He is our Savior, Christ the Lord, and He is born for you and has forgiven us all of our sins. Let this be our focus at Christmas: the Word made flesh in the form of an infant, so that one day, He may die for our sins and open the gates of heaven for us sinners. Let us rejoice in the Gift of all gifts which has been given to us, Jesus Christ, Immanuel, God with us, amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus, amen.