James 2:14-26
What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.
But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder! Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”—and he was called a friend of God. You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. And in the same way was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.
Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. These past three weeks, we have been doing a sermon series on raising children in the faith. Today is the third Sunday in our three week series. The first one was called planting the seed nurturing faith in the hearts of children. And we talked about the role of parents as the primary person for raising a child in the faith, how the Christian faith is passed on as parents talk about who Jesus is, establish patterns in the home and share that with their children. And that no amount of work that a congregation can do can really overcome the challenges of that. Parents are the primary people who begin this life in faith. Last week, we did a sermon called gathering in the name. And it discussed how the role of the worship service, the divine service is central to the life of every Christian, from the youngest to the oldest, because it's here that God comes to us, as a body, delivers his word and Sacraments and empowers us by the Holy Spirit, that every Christian, no matter how young or old, belongs in the divine service, to receive from God, His grace, and mercy. And today, we are talking about how parents and a congregation can come together to help them raise their children in the faith and make that faith a living an active faith through their lives as they grow into adulthood. And as we do that, I think it's good always to back up one step. And remember, what is the goal of a children's ministry? Or a youth ministry? What is the goal of the ministry that we do together to help these parents? And it is very simple. We ask every confirmation student in fact, we ask our new members to come into the congregation as well this question, do you intend to continue steadfast in this confession? That is the confession of the Lutheran Church in this confession and church and to suffer all even death rather than fall away from it? That's our goal. The goal of a children's ministry is the same as the goal of an adult ministry to grow adult lifelong Lutherans who are faithful to their savior, Jesus Christ, who returned to their their church, to receive the Word and the sacraments, be empowered by the Holy Spirit, and live lives of service wherever they go. Now, that may mean, they remain here for their entire lives, it may mean that we send them off, they head out to college or jobs or anything. And that we transfer them on to other Lutheran congregations where they continue in their life of faith. The goal is to make them faithful Christians their entire lives. And the only way that can happen is through the power of the word and the sacraments. The same way it happens with the adults, because the Holy Spirit comes to you, the same way to them, as they gather together, hear the word partake of God's grace, and are empowered by the Holy Spirit. But as we consider what that means for our children, as they as they grow from very young children all the way up until adulthood, we understand that very often this means they get approached in ways that are different than adults do. As we help these children understand their faith and grow in their ability to live it out. We have to ask, what does a congregation do in partnership with their parents? And I think it falls under two broad themes. The first of them is one that every I think most churches do. Training and understanding the doctrines and the content of the faith. What that means is, we teach them the word of God, plain and simple. They learn Bible stories. They hear from the from God's word, they understand the themes and the arc of the plot of the Bible. And as much of that as also, what it means for them. But the grace of God has been applied to them in their baptisms, and that they can continue to receive it every Sunday here in worship. But we also have an opportunity as a congregation, to encourage children of all ages from very young all the way up to just before adults for active service. And leaving out of that faith. Because active participation in the work of a congregation is also part of training and growing, and understanding what the faith means. Because faith is not just something that is in our heads, or in our hearts. Faith is something that produces works. And to understand what that means we have to teach children to do it. The same way we have to teach adults to be living and active in their service. And so congregation's job, is to help everyone grow in this ability, by giving them opportunities to build connections with each other, to do things of service acts of good works. And that's one of the reasons why I chose the Epistle reading for today from James, is to remind us that faith is not just something that is internal. but faith is something that produces works, that when the Holy Spirit works in us and builds us up and changes us to be like Christ, the evidence shows in your life. faith produces works. A long time ago, a professor of mine used this analogy to help us understand what James is trying to say. He was a kind of a car guy. And so he had like model teas that he owned. And back when he was a young pastor, the way he would greet people in his new town, very small town, they'd move in, he drove up his Model T to their house. Instant conversation starter, right? And what he said is, how do you know a car is running? The look? Can you go inside and see the flames? Do you look at the gas as it pumped into the cylinders? And go Oh, yes, I can see that. There's the fire. There's the pistons. You have to look at external things to understand. Unless you're willing to open up the entire engine as it burns fuel, kind of dangerous. You have to ask, Do I hear the sound? Do I see the smoke. That is how I know a car is running. And very often, what we do is we see faith that produces works is a way of expressing the faith that is inside us. As we can see that God is changing us and molding us to live in the world. And so faith without works, as James says, is dead. So our job is to help Christians understand what the faith is, and live that out in our lives. For us, I think we do a good job on training the knowledge of the faith. We have lots and lots of programs for our children, the children can be involved in our Sunday School meets for a whole hour right during my Bible study time, or all of our kids can come in and get an hour of lessons and hear God's word and do activities and talk together. It's a great way of understanding and growing in the faith. as they age out of elementary school, our confirmation classes, we have two years of training for one hour a week. The first year is a year of understanding the entire story of the Bible. The idea is that rather than teaching individual stories, we teach them how they all piece together as you go from Genesis all the way through Revelation as we prepare for the day that Jesus returns. And then the second year is understanding the Catechism that Martin Luther wrote, that gives us the basic doctrines and teachings and habits that set the Lutheran church apart from the Protestant churches around us to help us understand that God comes to us through these sacraments to justify us and give us the Holy Spirit.
We do these things. And these are part of of how we do this. And in that, in that Information class, we also learn from our songs as well. We lately have started singing this hymn called these are the holy 10 commands. You heard that one? No it? Did you know that Martin Luther wrote a hymn to help people memorize the 10 commandments. Isn't that kind of cool? That's great. It helps us do these things. But they're not done after confirmation. We also have a youth group that meets every Sunday, after our worship services, for our teenagers, all the way up through high school. These are all great ways that we have for training and the knowledge of the faith classes, helping them understand who Jesus is, what he does for us how he works. They are there to help us. Let these these students encounter God's word, receive the Holy Spirit, ask questions on their own, so that they can begin to understand and grow in their faith, almost independently of their family, especially as they as they begin entering into these middle school and high school years, becomes more important for them to do that on their own as they transition into adulthood. These cannot replace what you do at home, parents, but they do help. And they're a big piece of, of the life of the congregation. Where our congregation and I think many of our congregations need work, is incorporating children into the life and ministry that we do, how we take them as they as they grow, and we give them knowledge and classes and we help them. And I think we do a great job with that. It's as they age out of these elementary school years. How do we incorporate them with relationships with adults in the congregation, into the life and service of the church. That's an important piece of training. An important piece of, of developing an active and living faith is actually living it out. Jesus did that with His disciples. In Matthew chapter 10. We see Jesus sends out his 12 disciples, he had spent a whole lot of time teaching them preaching with them. Jesus went out and heal the sick, and he cast out demons and he did all this cool stuff. And then he said, now it's time for you to practice. You sent them out into the world. And while Matthew chapter 10, isn't a manual for training, it does offer us some help to understand that the faith is not just in our heads, but active in our lives. How can we, as a congregation, enable children and youth to serve alongside us to build relationships between people so that they can feel included not just as children of parents, but as equal members of the Body of Christ? We are currently going through a process of understanding and trying to figure out where we're going some strategic planning. And I think this is a big piece of what we need to think about. How do we incorporate these people into our lives? And personally, I am especially concerned about that transition from late elementary age in through confirmation. Historically, confirmation has been a time of teaching and training, where they hear the word of God and they think about it and then we stand them up in front of the congregation, we ask them a bunch of very serious questions like, well, you suffer all even death rather than fall away from the Lutheran Church in Christ. And the idea is, it's supposed to be a rite of passage, almost like you're stepping into adulthood in the faith. But we do this with 14 year olds. And in our society, you don't step into an adulthood when you're 14. And so it's almost like they go through this big ritual, two years of preparation, they stand up, they put on the robes, they do that thing. And then they go back to being the same as they were before. And I wonder what can we do to make that not the case? To take children who've gone through our confirmation, who are growing in their independence and treat them as slightly more independent, encourage them to interact in our congregation in ways that are unique to that person. So they can live out the Holy Spirit's work in their life. Where it becomes difficult, is what happens as they, as they begin to grow as they gain through high school, and eventually they turn 18. If we don't offer them a way to transition from childhood to adulthood, all of a sudden they become 18. And we say that's not for you, no more youth group have a great life. You go, Oh, now you're an adult, you've graduated Great. What do you do? We can use that time, as a way to grow in the faith to transition into more and more adult like responsibilities. So that when they turn 18, it is not like, what do I do now. But there's a clear path into our congregation as a full adult member. There are lots of ways we need to think about how we do this. I don't have all the answers. I'm just some guy up in front. You guys know your congregation, you know us much better than I do. Most of you have been here longer than me. And so you can think through how does this work here in this place? How can we as God's people love and help and build relationships with the young children, the older children and the high schoolers and incorporate them into our lives? But we do need to think about it. How can we build these organic relationships, to build up the faith that has been passed down to us? How can we tie them to the congregation through these person to person relationships where the word of God can be shared? And support can be given? How can we encourage faithful actions? One of the things that I've I've done historically as a pastor is that when people leave my congregation to go off to school somewhere, I will sit down with them, and walk through their options of where to go for church nearby. I think it's a great way for them to think through this. And I want to talk about one student who really typifies how a congregation can take a young adult and embrace them and build these kinds of relationships. It's this young boy named Nathan. He went off to school in Michigan, and I called up the nearest congregation and I said, Hey, I've got this Lutheran student, great kid. I want him to come to your church he wants to come to Can you get him there? First Sunday, he was there. Some old lady shows up at his door and says, given you a ride to church, that's how it starts, right? Faith in Action, God's love going out. He already had a friend in that congregation. He gets in the car, she gives him a ride every Sunday. He gets there. Not too long later, I see a photo of him carrying the processional cross into the sanctuary. The new guy, college student, he's got the robe on with the cross and he's walking in and everybody sees him. He's involved. He's doing stuff. You never missed a Sunday, at least as far as he told me. You know, what do you say to your pastor? But we can think about that sort of thing, as a way that congregations gather together people into their midst and build these ties that the Holy Spirit uses to bind them to the Word and Sacrament. And it's something we need to think about. How can we do that as our children grow? How can we do that as our youth transition into high school and adulthood? How can we build these relationships that then live out what we teach them every Sunday? In Jesus name, Amen.