The Bronze Serpent: Sermon for Sunday, March 10th, 2024

Numbers 21:4-9

From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.” Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. And the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.

From the great white north of snow and wilderness to California was the rattlesnakes. We don't have those up there. Just in case you are wondering where winter is there's no rattling no snakes, the worst we got our the garter snakes, they're like about that long, you've probably got them here, that long, maybe that big around. Almost cute. So when we came here, I was a little worried. In fact, I was kinda like, are they hiding under every log? Gonna jump out of every great in the street, a little worried. Two and a half years later, I haven't seen a one, which is kind of nice. But today, we are talking about serpents like that. Fiery, or what we would call venomous serpents that go and bite God's people as part of their punishment. And so let's take a look at this story. Before we dive into what's actually happening, we should know what's happened in the past, for God's people. We're in the book of Numbers and Numbers begins at the base of Mount Sinai. God has already pulled them out of slavery in Egypt, they have gathered around the base, they've received the covenant from God, Moses and all that stuff. Moses has then received a whole mess of laws that are part of this covenant, that deal with things like worship, and, and food and just about everything that you can think of. In Numbers, we get some of those laws in addition, and then they finally leave the base of Mount Sinai and start heading towards the promised land. And they start to complain. They have no food. So God gives them manna for their breakfast appears right outside their front door, every single day. And then, after a little bit of time they go, we're sick of this man, oh, we need meat. So God gives them quail. It just lands in the camp. They don't have to worry about it. No hunting, no shooting, just to meet. Okay. So then they get to the promised land. They look inside, and they say, oh, no, the people there are super scary. God could never defeat them. Almost forgetting what he did with Pharaoh and Egypt, the mightiest army of the time. And so God turns them away, and tells them that they will be wandering in the wilderness until that generation dies off 40 years. And then after that, we get to this story. They complain again. And here's what happens. They are in the wilderness. And they say, and the people spoke against God and against Moses, why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food. Now, first of all, that sentence does not make a lot of sense, right? There is no food and no water, but the food is terrible. Right? They're not saying there's no food, no water, they're saying, We're bored to God. The food that you've been giving us every single day is now boring. And we were better off as slaves in Egypt and not your people. That's a pattern that they had to talk about over and over again, in their complaining. Why did you bring us out here? And now all we have to eat is this food that you give us for free every single day. I think one thing that this can highlight is human nature is a bit like that. We get used to good things. When something really good happens in our life. We get to a point where it makes us happy for a little bit and then it just sort of fades into the background. It becomes a part of what we expect. So you can almost see God's people being like, oh, yeah, I mean, God gives us food every day. But what else is new? It helps us to see that this is part of human nature, both for you and for me, right? We get used to the amazing things that God gives us. Sometimes even bored with the amazing blessings that we have, whether it's blessings of body or blessings of soul, we get tired of our congregation grumble about losing an hour of sleep and having to get to church on time. We get tired of the shelters we live in the families we have, and we go, Ah, it's just so much work. That's because human beings aren't like that. We forget about the good things, and we focus on the bad. We find ourselves not being thankful for everything that we get out. And focus only on the places where life is not living up to our expectations. And this is why we have to continually remind ourselves of the blessings God has given us. When we read in the Lord's Prayer, about giving thanks for the daily bread that we have, give us this day, our daily bread. This is a reminder, as much as anything else, that God is the source of all the good things that we have, that he gives it to us out of His fatherly divine goodness and mercy without any merit or worthiness in me. The prayer is there to say, God gives this because he wants us to and we know that we know we should be grateful. And We gather here for the same reason. To remind ourselves that the gift of Jesus Christ is amazing. It is not a background thing that fades into our lives. But we need to talk about it all the time to remember how powerful Christ is to remember how joyous His sacrifice for us is. That we shouldn't take it for granted. But rejoice in it every single day, every single week, all our lives. Because if we don't, it might just fade into the background. Or we might just lose the joy that we need to have. Because it is the gift of life. What an amazing thing. Now God's people, ancient Israel, they have a problem they are complaining. And so what does God do? punishes them. It says, The Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people so that many of the people of Israel die. We would call fiery serpents, venomous serpents, snakes, like the Rattlesnakes I worried about what's going on here is God had given Israel a covenant. What he told them was, if you follow my covenant, things will be great. You will be safe, you will win all your battles, your enemies will stay away, your vineyards will grow, your fields will prosper. And you'll have everything you could ever want. And if you do not, if you turn away, the opposite will happen. Your vineyards will not grow, your fields will not prosper, enemies will attack you, and you will be punished. And so that's what's happening. God sends the serpents amongst the people and they bite them. And then it goes. And the people came to Moses and said, We have sinned. We have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord that He will take away the serpents from us.

So Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said to Moses, make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole and everyone who is bitten when he sees it shall live. So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone He would look at the bronze serpent, and live. There's an interesting detail in this, the people say, take away the snakes. But God doesn't. He doesn't remove the suffering for their sin, instead instructs Moses to snake on a pole. And then everyone who is bitten, poisoned by these snakes could turn and then be healed. This is a very different thing than take away the snakes. The snakes kept on biting. And the people of God kept getting sick, which meant they had to continually turn to this bronze serpent that Moses had set up and receive healing every time it happened. This is a way God reminded them that they constantly needed him that in their daily life, they would have to turn and look for healing. Because if he just took the snakes away, well, they'd go back to forgetting about him. But every time they got bit, one more time, they would turn to Him and look for healing. Now, this story has a number of lessons for us regarding our life in Christ. But it's important to point out the differences as well. The covenant that we have, is a covenant that is different from ancient Israel. For them, it was a community and national covenant, when the whole community sinned, the whole community was punished. When God's people turned away from God, God sent a direct punishment because of that. And that is what those fiery serpents were all about. We do not have a promise like that. The covenant is not, if you sin, God will punish you directly for that sin. You see, for us, Jesus Christ fulfilled the law of Moses, the law that the ancient people broke. And so that kind of promise is lifted from our shoulders and placed on his, which means that there is no covenant that says, if you sin, you will be punished. But very simply, in Christ, there is no punishment. In Christ, we are all saved. Which means that we cannot turn to the bad things of this world, and say, we know why they happened. And in Israel had Moses who could go out to the people and say, Hey, guys, God told me that you're getting these snakes because you did this. We don't have anyone like that. Despite what you might see, on the television, every time a hurricane comes, or a major earthquake happens, some guy will stand up and say, I know why this is happening. It's because my favorite political thing happened. Or my favorite spiritual hobbyhorse was broken. And they have no idea. There is no Moses or prophet who can come down and say that they act like they have some kind of spiritual insight that the rest of us do not have, and they are wrong. And sometimes we do that for ourselves. We say when something bad happens, I bet God is punishing me for whatever it is that I did. We don't know that either. We don't know why. Bad things happen or the suffering is brought into our life, other than the very simple fact that the world is filled with sin. We are broken, and all of us will one day die. That's it. That's the message. We have suffering. But what we have is a gift from Christ that gives us healing in the midst of it. And that I think is where we can understand the pattern from the book of Numbers is that when we cry out to God, forgive us for our sins. He does not take away death from the world. What he does, is he lifts up his son Jesus Christ on a cross to give us healing With a promise of resurrection. This is what Jesus tells us. In John chapter three. He says, As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life. Jesus Christ is the escape from death and sin and suffering in our world. He is the one who gives us healing, so that everyone who turns to him and believes on this crucified man will be saved. Doesn't take away the pain of the things we face, the challenges of this life or the hurt that we run into. But he does give us a promise that He will be with us even into death, and raise us on the last day. What this does, is it actually turns our suffering into something that can drive us to Jesus Christ. Because every time something really bad happens, you can say to yourself, I have healing. I have an escape. Someone went to a cross and died for me and experienced death so that I can follow him through the grave into everlasting life. It doesn't have to turn into a moment for despair, or a time to wonder what God is doing and why he is sending this to me. It can be a way to point us to our Savior. That's what the snakes were for. After the bronze serpent was lifted up the snakes brought people back to God, turn and be healed. And our Savior Jesus Christ does the same. When we face the inevitable results of a sinful world, when we get sick or hurt, or whatever happens to us, these things ought to turn us to our Savior. Because everyone who believes on Him has life. Everyone who turns to him is saved. In Jesus name, Amen.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: John 3:14-21 The Gospel Reading for Sunday, March 10th, 2024

John 3:14-21

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.”

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Gospel reading for Sunday, March 10, comes from John chapter three, verses 14 through 21. Jesus said, and as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life, For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world. But in order that the world might be saved through Him, whoever believes in Him is not condemned. But whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the Son of God. And this is the judgment, the light has come into the world. And people love the darkness rather than the light, because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things, hates the light, and does not come into the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true, comes into the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God. He rents the reading. This passage begins with a reference to our Old Testament reading for the week from Numbers chapter 21. With the bronze serpent, Jesus says, and as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life. We read this on Tuesday. And so what we see is that in that story, the people grumble against God and God said serpents, poison, venomous serpents to bite the people. When they pray for relief, Moses takes a bronze serpent, and instead of taking the venomous snakes away, the serpent becomes a way to escape death. So when they're bitten, they look on the serpent, believe and live. And so Jesus Christ becomes something similar. He says, that he will be lifted up, the Son of Man will be lifted up, the whatever looks on him and believes will have eternal life. So he's like that bronze serpent, except it's not just the venom of snakes that he is freeing us from, but death itself, that we have eternal life. Then we get the classic passage that everybody knows, For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. This is sometimes called the gospel in the nutshell, a God sent His only Son, so that all who believe in Him can have eternal life. Now it continues, For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him. So this shows the heart of God, God is not here to do not send Jesus as a judge, to condemn, but with the aim of salvation, that whoever believes in Him is not condemned. That is, he wants the whole world to be saved. But that doesn't mean there is no condemnation out there. It says, whoever believes in Him is not condemned. But whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And so, what we see here is that there is a division in the world, between those who believe and those who do not. When God sends a rescuer, out to rescue people from danger, the people who cling to the rescuer are going to be saved and the people who avoid the rescuer are not going to be saved, they will simply perish under the danger that they're facing. So if you've got somebody out there who's in a in a sea, thrashing around getting hypothermia about to go under, and you throw my life raft, and you say, Come on in, I'll save you and they say, No, no, no, I can swim. That's what's going on, when they don't cling to Jesus Christ, that they're already lost, already condemned with the world. So continues, and this is the judgment. The light has come into the world and the people loved the darkness rather than the light, because their works were evil. And so That's what life is like, right? So many people, they see the light of Christ. And they say, You know what, I kind of like evil. Now, nobody actually, like in their head says, Yeah, you know, evil evils for me, I want to be a bad guy. But we've got all of these things that we say, well, I shouldn't have to give up this favorite sin that I love. Or I shouldn't have to give up this thing that I like to be a Christian, I should be able to do whatever I want. And God should just love me because I'm awesome. And you know, that's not how it works. People love evil, and they love sin. And it's true. And many times, we'll just cling to that. He says, For everyone who does wicked things, hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. And that's one of those things that makes it hard to be a Christian, is that we have to admit that we are sinners, and not just sinners but evil. Right. We have rebelled against God, and we love our sin, we actually want to be we we love the things that we're we're clinging to from our old self, and that sinful flesh inside us just says, oh, isn't that nice to be able to do whatever we want. And when we become a Christian, we are our hearts are exposed. And we have to present that before God and say, Yeah, I'm a broken person who can't do anything right without you, God, I need you know, that says, but whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God. And so those who have faith, we come to the light, we're not afraid of having this our sin being exposed, and we live in the light. Now, what's really interesting about this passage is that we often just quote for God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. And then forget about the rest. And often the what that HYAH does is it leads us leaves a sense to have the idea that this believing in Him is almost notional, right? What I mean by notional is that believing in Jesus simply means knowing his name and having positive feelings about him. But when Jesus goes on to explain what that means is there's much more complicated, there's some faithfulness in there. Right? Our we have to be willing to let our sin be exposed and live in the light, confess our sins, hear the word, receive forgiveness, and do the works that he has sent us for. And so it's not just like this idea. Like I know Jesus's name, and it makes me smile that doesn't save. Faith is something more than that, that causes a gift of the Holy Spirit that causes us to cling to God's Word and His promises, to confess our sins, to receive forgiveness and desire to do the work that God has sent us to do. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: Ephesians 2:1-10 The Epistle Reading for Sunday, March 10th, 2024

Ephesians 2:1-10

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation.

The Epistle reading for Sunday, March 10, comes from Ephesians chapter two, verses one through 10. And you are dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind. And we're by nature, children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace, you have been saved, and raised us up with Him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages, he might show the immeasurable riches of His grace, in kindness toward us, in Christ Jesus. For by grace, you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a result of works so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Here ends the reading, oh, what a classic verse. This is a classic reading Ephesians chapter two, so much good stuff in here. I hope I can get it without doing a 20 minute podcast. Okay, let's dig in. And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, fall in the course of this world, following the prints of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. Okay, so this begins by addressing the Ephesians. Remember, Paul is talking to Christians. And he's saying, You were you used to be at one time, you were dead in your sins. And so he says, they were dead in the sins, they followed the course of this world, they followed the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. Now, there's a lot there. So first, the metaphor is, you were dead in your trespasses and sins, and then you followed the course of the world. So you're doing the same thing as the rest of the world. And then you err on the side of the prints of the power of the air, or Satan, the spirit that is now working the sons of disobedience. So there's, there's a lot to say about what it is like to be without Christ, even for Christians before they heard this. They were dead. They were following the course of the world, on the side of Satan. And he continues after that, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and mind. And we're by nature, children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. Yikes. Paul, don't you know that this is going to scare people away? So we lived in the passions of our flesh, we consider it up the desires of our body and mind and we were by nature, children of wrath. Yikes. Paul is not painting, a beautiful picture of our capacity apart from Christ, he saying we are dead on the side of Satan, by nature, children of wrath. Whoa. Now this is one of the passages that I use when I talk about the non Christians capacity to love and serve God. That there is no way for us to decide to follow God to reach out to Him and serve Him because we are dead. We are by nature, children of wrath, and there is nothing good in us. And then Paul says, what God does in response to that, he writes, but God being rich and mercy because of the great love with which He loved us Even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. God's amazing mercy is that he reaches out to people who are dead, dead bodies and makes them alive. Now you have to ask, what kind of capacity? Does a body a dead one have to do? To do good works? Can a dead thing get up? Can it cry out to God? Can a dead thing, love and serve? Nope, it's dead. God must first reach out to us by the power of the Holy Spirit to make us alive in Christ by His grace. This requires God's action on us. And the only way to be saved is for God to work on us first to choose us to call us to gather us. And this is why when we explained the work of the Holy Spirit, in the third article, the Apostles Creed, Lutherans repeat what Martin Luther wrote when he said, I believe that I cannot, by my own reason or strength, believe in Jesus Christ, my lord, or come to him. But the Holy Spirit has called me by the gospel, and lightened me with his gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. Only God can reach out and make dead things alive. Only God can take a sinner and make him a saint in Christ. And that's what it means when he gets to this, this next phrase, by grace, you have been saved. And if it's grace, it's not a work. It's not a choice. It's not a decision. It's not a thing that I do to please God, it is simply God does it. And if there is anything that I can do, that are a part of me, reaching out to God, then it is no longer grace. And it continues and raised us up with Him and seeded us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages, he might show the immeasurable riches of His grace, in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. So what's amazing about us being made alive together with Christ is that our life, who we are everything that we have is placed in Christ. And so we're raised with Him, we ascended into Heaven with Him. And we are now seated at the right hand of the Father waiting for Christ to return, to show off the power and glory that Christ already has, by giving us new life by taking our bodies, which at that time might be dead, and giving them a new life, making them alive again, so that we can walk on this earth, and have physical bodies one more time, what a great grace that our God has for us. And then St. Paul says, For by grace, you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. So God, he repeats again, Grace, you have been saved through faith. Now, what we have to be careful about is when we look at this, sometimes people want to turn faith into a work. And so the idea is, there's nothing that you can do to be saved, except to drum up some belief in your heart. And if you believe and trust hard enough, then God saves you. Which is then again, not grace. Even faith is a gift, a gift of the Holy Spirit, who calls us and grants us faith so that we can trust in God. And if it's not the Holy Spirit's work, you can't say this phrase, and this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God. So even the faith that trusts in God is a gift from the spirit. It's Grace is not a result of works. So no one can boast when they say, I have decided to follow Jesus. No, you didn't. The Holy Spirit came to you and gave you that gift even that even our faith in Christ is a gift, so that we can't say look at how much faith I have, we can only boast in the Lord. Then it continues, For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in. And St. Paul often, he comes up with the answer to the question that Lutherans often gift when we get when we emphasize grace so much. We emphasize everything thing as a free gift, there's nothing you can do. You don't have to, to work to be saved, and you don't have to work to stay saved. And then people say, well, people are just going to respond to that by taking advantage going out, they'll sin and do whatever and then come back and say, Oh, I'm sorry. And we'll have to forgive them. And that'll be fine.

But St. Paul says, No, that's not how it works. If you are made alive in Christ, then you are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works. And so if you're made alive in Christ, you have a new heart or a new creation, and then you want to do good works. And this is one of the things that has changed in my preaching, is that I realized that God's people don't need to be cajoled or threatened or like have their pastors fingers shaken at them, to tell them to do good works. They already want to love and serve their church. They already want to love and serve their neighbor. The Holy Spirit does that. We just need to know which direction to go and be excited and motivated to do it. God has made us new God makes us want to do these things. And we are His workmanship. Wow, so much to say about this passage, but we got to keep it short. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: Psalm 107:1-9 The Psalm for Sunday, March 10th, 2024

Psalm 107:1-9

Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
    for his steadfast love endures forever!
Let the redeemed of the Lord say so,
    whom he has redeemed from trouble
and gathered in from the lands,
    from the east and from the west,
    from the north and from the south.

Some wandered in desert wastes,
    finding no way to a city to dwell in;
hungry and thirsty,
    their soul fainted within them.
Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
    and he delivered them from their distress.
He led them by a straight way
    till they reached a city to dwell in.
Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love,
    for his wondrous works to the children of man!
For he satisfies the longing soul,
    and the hungry soul he fills with good things.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The psalm for Sunday, March 10, comes from Psalm 107, verses one through nine. Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for his steadfast love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so whom He has redeemed from trouble, and gathered in from the lands from the east and from the west, from the north, and from the south. Some wandered in desert wastes, finding no way to a city to dwell in hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble. And he delivered them from their distress, he led them by a straightway till they reached a city to dwell in. Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love for his wondrous works to the children of man, for he satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul, he fills with good things. Here ends the reading Psalm 107, verses one through nine as part of a much longer Psalm. The song goes on for some way after this, and it actually helps us understand what's going on here. But let's take a look at this first section. Oh, give thanks to Lord for He is good for his steadfast love endures forever. This is a passage that my family would pray. When we did our meal prayers, we would say what is sometimes called the Lutheran common table prayer. Come, Lord Jesus be our guest. And then we would finish it up with, Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for his steadfast love endures forever. And this is perhaps one of the great confessions of faith from the Old Testament, that his steadfast love endures forever, right. And so the psalm leads God's people in reflecting on this, it says, Let the redeemed of the Lord say so whom He has redeemed from trouble, and gathered in from the lands from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south. So the redeemed of the Lord, redeemed is economic language, bought out of the hand of someone else. In fact, you would use that language, if you bought someone from slavery and then freed them, they would be redeemed from slavery. And here, it's redeemed from trouble. They were in the hands of trouble, and God bought them and pulled them out. And that would apply to all of the people of God from all sorts of areas right the in Egypt, God redeemed them from Pharaoh when he spent the blood of the lamb in other places He has redeemed as well gathered people together from all over into Israel to find place. Now the next thing that we see is an example of one of those that has gathered in this is part of a series of different groups that Psalm 107 talks about. So the first is it says some wandered in desert wastes, finding no way to a city to dwell in hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them. Now there are a number of different groups that the Psalm talks about, not just this one in the reading. The next set of groups was some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, prisoners in affliction and in irons, for they had rebelled against the words of God and spurned the Council of the Most High. The next one is, some were fools through their sinful ways and because of their iniquity, suffered affliction, they lowered any kind of food, and they drew near the gates of death. The next group is some went down to the sea and ships doing business on the great waters. They saw the deeds of the Lord his wondrous work in the deep, for he commanded and raised a stormy wind, which lifted up the waves of the sea. And then finally moves on to describing the great power of God. And so what's interesting about this psalm is that it goes through a number of different scenarios where people are in need, and God rescues them. Now, this one, the first one, some wandered in desert wastes, finding no way to a city to dwell in hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them. This is one that people are trapped in through no fault of their own. They cried to the Lord in their trouble and he delivered them from their distress. He led them by a straightway till they reached a city to dwell in. Now, this one I think is chosen because of the reading from numbers, where you have a number of people who are, they are in the wilderness wandering, and God leads them after 40 years wandering in the wilderness back to Israel to give them a city and a place to dwell in. And so you've got wandering in desert wastes is that parallel to what you have in the reading from numbers, but they were only wandering because of the other things that have been going on. So it was they are more likely the one that goes, some were fools through their sinful ways, and because of their iniquities suffered affliction. They loathe any kind of food, and they drew near to the gates of death, that sounds a whole lot more like the numbers reading, where they're complaining about God taking them out of Egypt and giving them worthless food, the manner that he had promised them. So we returned to the reading, though, their soul fainted within them. And then it says, Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress. So they were lost, they were in the desert, they had no way to find a place and God delivers them. And we're thinking here, probably not like an individual person, but like a tribe, a group, God's people, perhaps, he led them by a straightway till they reached a city to dwell in. So once they call out for God's direction, He guides them and leads them into the land of Israel, where he can provide for them and have a city to live in. Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love for his wondrous works to the children of man, for he satisfies the longing soul and the hungry soul, he fills with good things. So the Psalm was talking about the person who wanders, finding direction, into a place where God can provide for them. Now, we shouldn't take this as as a metaphor for the Christian life. Like where it's not, it's not about like people who have no direction in life, and are just looking for God to show them the way to go. Though, you know, God's guidance and wisdom does do this. This is talking about people who are literally in the desert, and God provides them a land, this would be easily a reference to the wanderings of Israel, and God providing them a place to stay. Now, for Christians, we are we, before Christ, before were brought into the church, are wandering in a waste of a spiritual waste. And it's Christ who brings us together into the land of His Church where he can feed us and fill us with his body and blood to provide for us. Now, this is this group is the one that is of no fault of their own. The other some of the other groups are God rescuing them from their own foolishness. The one goes somewhere fools through their sinful ways, and because of their iniquities suffered affliction. And then it says, Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them out of their distress. What, oh, great gift, our God gives us that when we are fools, and we suffer because of our sin. God sent His Son Jesus Christ. Another one is some sat in darkness in the shadow of death, prisoners in affliction, for they had rebelled against the words of God and spurned the Council of the Most High, so we bowed their hearts down with hard labor. These are people who are rebels against God, imprisoned, justly forced into hard labor. And it says, Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress. Can you believe God delivers us the prisoners, great criminals, horrible people who do in violence on the world, God hears them. And if he hears them, he can hear you. And then the last one is someone down to the sea in ships, and they saw the works of the Lord how he called a stormy wind. And so here again, this is not people who are are sinners, and they're getting the consequences of their action. They're just fishermen out in the water, and God calls up a storm and they cry out to heaven. And he delivered them from their distress. This is what God does.

He is a God who saves he saves us when we are facing in things that are not of our own making, when we face the consequences of actions that are not ours, whether we're lost, we're on the sea or just human beings in search of a savior. But even more importantly, he saves us when we sin. When we are actually facing the consequences of our actions, and we need a Savior from ourselves. He sends us His Son, Jesus Christ. And we all we can do is rejoice in the goodness of God, how he redeems us from trouble. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: Numbers 21:4-9 The Old Testament Reading for Sunday, March 10th, 2024

Numbers 21:4-9

From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.” Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. And the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord, that he take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Old Testament reading for Sunday, March 10, comes from Numbers chapter 21, verses four through nine. From Mount Hor, they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. And the people be became impatient on the way. And the people spoke against God and against Moses. Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water and we load this worthless food. Then the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people so that many people of Israel died. And the people came to Moses and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord, and against you. Pray to the Lord, that He take away the serpents from us. So Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said to Moses, make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole. And everyone who is bitten when he sees it shall live. So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent, and live events, the reading this story from Numbers comes in the middle of Israel's wilderness wandering. Now you remember the story goes, God's people came out of Egypt, they went to Mount Sinai, and then from Mount Sinai, they came to the promised land, they get to the promised land, and they say, Nah, it's a little too scary. So what does God do? God says that He will put them to wander in the wilderness for 40 years. So that generation dies off. Now, while they're wandering through this wilderness, God is feeding them every single day with mana, it appears outside their tents, and they, they get food all the time. So the people get impatient. They go from Mount Hor, they go on the way to the Red Sea, around the land of Edom, and they're upset. So they say, Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we load this worthless food. Now, you may have noticed, there's a bit of a contradiction there. They say there's no food and no water and we load this worthless food wait. If there's no food, how can you loathe it? What they're saying, actually, is that there's no food that they can gather, that is different from the manna God is giving them. And so they're like a manna. Again, I can go out my tent in the morning every day and just find food on the ground, this socks so they grumble. And you know, people who eat the same thing every day, and they get bored, and that's what's going on. The Lord responds by sending fiery serpents, we would say, probably venomous serpents and they bite the people and many die. When God's people sinned, God responded with physical punishments for them. And this is the history of Israel is that when they they turn against him, he sends serpents or an army or earthquakes or whatever, to come and afflict the people. So they realize they did something wrong and they say, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord that he take away the serpents from us. So here we get repentance. They go, we know we did something wrong. We were grumbling about the the good things that God has given us. We wanted something else, but we weren't thankful. Ask God to take them away. So Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said to Moses, make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten when he sees it shall live. Now this is a key moment. The people asked, take the serpents away. God responds, put a serpent on a pole, and everyone who sees it will live. God doesn't take the serpents away. What God does is He offers a healing moment. So that if they are bitten by the serpent, they can look on the pole, and they will live. He doesn't take the punishment away, he doesn't take the pain or the suffering away. He just offers a way of escape. And so I think a lot of the Christian life is like this. We Christians can sometimes feel like the things of God are lowly, maybe not important enough. But what God provides us with just isn't exciting or interesting. Or we might consider in our congregations and mourn that some of them are shrinking. And that the, the word of God, even though it proclaimed to the faithful is still just, maybe God isn't gathering together the people like he did back in the 60s, or the 80s, or the 2000s, or whatever it was the heyday of your congregation, and was just like, Ah, this just doesn't seem to be working. And then we can feel ungrateful, or maybe God's provision just isn't enough for us. Whatever it is, when we ask God to take away the suffering and death that comes into our lives as a result of sin, he doesn't write. He doesn't take away the pain and the suffering that all human beings experience. What he does, is he gives us a way to live through it through Jesus Christ. And the provision that God provides is not a bronze snake that was lifted up on a pole but a Savior, who was lifted up on a cross that all who follow Him, even though we die, we will live. And so we get something very similar to what Moses put up on the pole is that God doesn't take away the serpents from Israel, just as God does not take away the suffering from us. What he does is he provides an escape through Jesus Christ, so we can have resurrection. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

The Ten Commandments: Sermon for Sunday, March 3rd, 2024

Exodus 20:1-17

And God spoke all these words, saying,

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

“You shall have no other gods before me.

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

“You shall not murder.

“You shall not commit adultery.

“You shall not steal.

“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

“You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.”

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Today we're taking a look at the 10 commandments. And you gotta wonder sometimes, when you're a pastor, what do you say? When you get to something like this? The 10 commandments? were reading the whole thing all 10 of them. Do you choose one? Or do you talk about them all, to talk about Israel and the ancient people and what God was doing here? mean, in our Small Catechism, Martin Luther spends a whole lot of time talking about the 10 commandments. And in the Large Catechism, it's page after page after page after page of explanation for each individual one. Good thing I have all day, right? Well, the 10 commandments actually give us a chance to ask a fundamental question. A fundamental question about Moses, his writing in the Old Testament, and what it has to do with us Christians, because we take a look at this, this whole set of the 10 commandments, and if you've memorized them from the Small Catechism, like many of us had to do when we were young, you'll notice there's a lot more text in there than what you memorized, right? So there's a lot going on. There stuff like carved images. And there's stuff about male servants and female servants not working on the Sabbath. You go, what are these doing here? I didn't have to memorize that. Why not? This gives us a chance to ask a fundamental question about the 10 commandments. What do they have to do with us, us Christians? What do the 10 commandments actually have to do with people on the other side of the cross? Instead of people who are there at the base of Mount Sinai? I have an answer for you. It's very simple. The 10 commandments do not apply to Christians. Now you're gonna say, wait a second pastor? Did you just join the ELCA? are you preaching against God's word? No. And I want you to hold on with me and see where I'm going with this. Before you walk out. Let me explain. The original context of the 10 commandments is a covenant between a nation brought out of Egypt, in slavery, freed and to go into the wilderness and God says to them, you follow my covenant, and you will live long in the land that I give you. Your nation and borders will do well, you will be defended from enemies, and you will be prosperous in this land. That's not the promise that God gives Christians isn't. That's not what we receive through Jesus Christ. The promise of these 10 commandments in its original context, was just for the Jews and their descendants. As long as the covenant the Old Covenant was active. And we know this on a fundamental level, because there is one commandment that we totally ignore, actively and willingly and you accept it without without knowing it. It's a very simple commandment. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy? Now you might think to yourself, Pastor, we're here on Sunday morning, we're in worship, we're keeping the Sabbath. Nope. Let's listen to what God says. Six days shall you labor and do all your work but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God on it, you shall not do any work. You or your son or your daughter, your male servant or your female servant, or your livestock or the sojourner who is within your gates. What that means is that God commanded his people from sundown on Friday night to sundown on Saturday night. Not to do any work. Zero. No yard work. No driving the kids to sports games. No volunteering for anything else. Friday to Saturday 24 hours, you could do no work. And when was the last time you tried that. Or you heard a sermon from your pastor saying you must rest on Friday nights. No starting fires, no driving your car, no taking walks, no going for a run. None of it. You have to read. We don't do that do we do. That's because deep down inside, we know the 10 commandments are not for us. They are for Israel, a covenant between God and a singular nation of people. That was fulfilled when Jesus Christ King. I'm not the only one who says this. Martin Luther himself said it. He writes, quote, the law of Moses, which henceforth is not binding on us, concerns the Jews, for the law is given only to the people of Israel. And Israel has accepted it for itself. And its descendants. We will not any longer have Moses for a rule and law giver. God Himself will not have it. Moses was a mediator and a law giver of the Jewish people only. To them he gave the Law. If I accept Moses, in one commandment, I must accept the entire Moses. From this would follow. If I were to accept Moses as a master and law giver, I would have to be circumcised to wash clothes, according to the Jewish custom to eat, drink and dress like them, and to observe all those customs which the law commanded them to observe. So if the 10 commandments in their original context are for us, then you got to do it all, every single one of the 613 commandments of the Old Testament, including the bacon you may have eaten this morning. Right. But Jesus Christ has fulfilled the Old Covenant. He obeyed it all perfectly. He did every ritual and every law and everything that God commanded, including loving God with his whole heart and loving his neighbor as himself and went to the cross, to take our sin and fulfill the covenant Israel could not sacrificed himself there to end the law. And its weight on our shoulders, to end the rule of Moses, and the guilt it assigns to us so that we could be free in Christ. Now, you may have heard it explained this way. But Pastor in the Old Testament laws, they're divided into three parts, right? There's the the Civil Code, the ceremonial code, and the moral code. Have you heard that before? Go through the Old Testament and point out which one is which? Moses doesn't mark civil, moral and religious. which pieces are which? And how do you know? There's no underlining or highlighting. We all come up with our own list and know the whole thing has been fulfilled. The whole thing has been taken care of. Jesus has done it all. Which means we are free from the law.

Just as St. Paul tells us, throughout the book of Romans and throughout the book of Galatians. And this is a joyous freedom that Christians have that we don't have to go and find every single commandment written in Have Old Testament law and check off the box when we walk out every morning. We don't have to be terrified that God might look down on us and say, Do you remember on page 372? I wrote this rule, and we are free in Christ. Okay, now you're gonna say But wait a second pastor Martin Luther wrote the 10 commandments for us to memorize. You spend weeks with our confirmation students telling them what every single commandment means, how it applies to your life? Why are you teaching a thing that doesn't apply? I'm so glad you asked What a great question. It's very simple. We use the 10 commandments as reinterpreted by Martin Luther King, because they reflect God's moral law. In the world. We call it natural law. You actually don't need a 10 commandments to say, don't kill, right? Or don't steal. These things are clear. Honor your father and mother is something we get from nature, as much as from Holy Scripture. And so since the early days, the Christian church has used these 10 commandments, because they reflect the natural law of the world, God's moral law, founded in creation. And they're a good guide for us. As Christians. They reflect the teachings of Jesus Christ in places like the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew, where he took these laws and expanded them into full love. loving your neighbor as yourself. And these 10 commandments then have two important functions in the life of Christians. First, we use them to cut the old sinful flesh in us. Because no matter how many times we come and gather and hear Christ's word and receive forgiveness, there's still that little sinner inside you that tries to act up and take over. And he wants to tell you that you're just fine all on your own and that God loves you just the way you are. And isn't it great that you get to do the things that you love. And then we look at the 10 commandments, as explained by Luther and we realize this little center is wrong. That little voice in my heart, and in my head, is trying to lead me away from God, and it slices that guy up to our enemy inside us. And when we realize that we're still a sinner, the 10 commandments point us to Christ and His sacrifice again. Where we can cry out to Him, I have nothing good in me, only you are good savior, Jesus Christ. Forgive me, give me life. Because without you, I am nothing. And Luthers commandments, as he explains them, they point out that none of us can keep a single one of these commandments for a moment of our day. All we can do is look for forgiveness. The other thing they do is they help to guide us because salvation is not just being forgiven, but it's also being given new hearts. When we're baptized into Christ, we are made one with him. We're a new creation. And every single one of you I know you, do, you want to do what is right, and follow God's will. And the question is always, well, then what do I do? And the 10 Commandments can help us there. Help us to see what it means to love your neighbor as yourself and to put them first in your life to serve the people around you. So when Christ gives us this new heart that He has given you by the power of the Holy Spirit, these give us practical methods to say, what can I do to serve my neighbor and through my neighbor, serve God? Because we still need to be told the Holy Spirit does wasn't beamed into our hearts all of God's will. We still need to look at it and say, What should I do? And the 10 commandments are there to be handy dandy easily memorizable guide to go out and serve the people around you. So they're not there to be a list of rules that we have to follow and be burdened by. They're not there as a as a way to make God happy or a covenant that we must cling to. And they're there to drive us to the forgiveness of Jesus Christ and guide us as we serve Him. In Jesus name, Amen.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: Mark 9:2-9 The Gospel Reading for Sunday, February 11th (Copy)

John 2:13-25

The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father's house a house of trade.” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”

So the Jews said to him, “What sign do you show us for doing these things?”Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple,and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking about the temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Gospel reading for Sunday, March 3, comes from John chapter two, verses 13 through 25. The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple, he found those who are selling oxen, and sheep, and pigeons, and the money changers sitting there, and making a whip of cords he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, take these things away, do not make my father's house a house of trade. His disciples remembered what was written, zeal for your house will consume me. So the Jews said to him, What sign do you show us for doing these things? Jesus answered them, Destroy this temple, and in three days, I will raise it up. The Jews then said, it has taken us 46 years to build this temple, and you will raise it up in three days. But he was speaking about the Temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this. And they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken. Now, when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name, when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part, did not interest himself to them. Because he knew all people, and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man, Here ends the reading. So Jesus goes up to Jerusalem for the Passover, as a faithful member of the people of God, Jesus followed all the rules and obligations that he was supposed to. So he goes to the city, and he goes into the temple. Now, we don't know exactly which part of the temple the oxen and sheep and pigeons and money changers would have been there. It doesn't say what particular courtyard or where it was. But what it does say is that there were oxen, sheep, pigeons, and money changers sitting there. Now, I'm willing to bet that they were not sitting there quietly. I would expect that the oxen and the sheep were making some noise move, man, the pigeons weren't exactly quiet. And you know, people who are selling stuff, they don't wait for clients to come to them. They just don't, they don't sit there quietly. And I just hope someone arrives. They reach out, they say, Hey, come over here, I've got the best oxygen. I want, you would imagine all of that happening in your church. Someone shouting, hey, my oxen are perfect for the sacrifice. Come on over by my pigeons over here. You can see why Jesus might be upset. He makes a whip of cards, and he drives them out of the temple. Now many people see Jesus doing this as an example of righteous anger. And we'll then point to it and say, well, we can also have righteous anger. But there's a big difference between Jesus's righteous anger and ours. Jesus is righteous, anger is righteous and ours is filled with sin. Right? Jesus can be angry and righteous, human beings, cannot. We, we always have sin. And so whenever we get angry, we cannot do it with the purity and the perfection that Jesus does. Our sin takes over and we do things that we're not, not supposed to when we hurt people in ways we shouldn't. And well, sometimes we love that anger too. So let's not not take that as the example. Perhaps we should take the example of offering up the space of worship as just for worship, and not for selling things. Of course, the Jews are not very happy about this. You know, maybe they got sponsorships for the best spots. Like the cattle guy. The oxen guy says, Can you put me right next to the door? I've got the booth right over there. That is a number one I'll pay you extra. Who knows? But what we do now is they got mad. What sign do you show us for doing these things? Jesus answered them, Destroy this temple. and in three days, I will raise it up. Now they think he's talking about the building. He's not. He is talking about his body. And it says, When therefore he was raised from the dead, the disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the scriptures and the words that Jesus had spoken. Jesus tells them destroy my body, which the Pharisees and leaders will do. And I will raise it up in three days. And that's what we see happen. Jesus dies on a cross and rises after three days. And he provides for us that sign that shows that salvation belongs to our God. This final passage is interesting, it says, Now, when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs he was doing. But Jesus, on his part, did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man. So Jesus did not entrust himself to their care, did not open up what was going on, he did not give himself over to them, because he knows that people are filled with sin. He didn't need to have anybody say what's in other people's hearts, because, well, he's got and he knows all things. And God and man, he also knows what's in the heart of man. And so, this shows that Jesus is not like normal people who had when they develop a great big following, they get caught up in it, and then sometimes they let the crowds lead them in the direction that they want to go. No. Jesus followed the mission of his father. He did not entrust himself to anyone. He just kept on the straight and narrow course that God had sent him on. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye bye.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: 1 Corinthians 1:18-31 The Epistle Reading for Sunday, March 3rd, 2024

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written,

“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
    and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.”

Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation.

The Epistle reading for Sunday, March 3, is from First Corinthians chapter one, verses 18 through 31. For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us we're being saved. It is the power of God, for it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the discernment of the discerning I Will Forte whereas the one who is wise, Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age, is not God made foolish the wisdom of the world. For since in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom. It pleases God through the folly of what we preach, to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs, and Greeks seek wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God, for the foolishness of God is wiser than men. And the weakness of God is stronger than men. For consider your calling brothers, not many of you were wise according to worldly standards. Not many were powerful. Not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not to bring to nothing things that are so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him, you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. So that, as it is written, let the one who boasts boast in the Lord, he runs the reading. This passage is one of the more famous passages from First Corinthians about the way the world looks at at everything, and the way that God and Christians do. It talks about the word of the cross being folly, it is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are saved it is the power of God. So he goes on to talk about how Greeks like the Corinthians, they were all about wisdom. You know, they had these wide sages, and they had philosophers and in the past, there are the 100 schools of philosophy. And they had all sorts of people who said all sorts of really interesting things. In the book of Acts, it talks about Paul going to Athens and he goes to the place, and he speaks. And it's says that there were people who sat around doing nothing but listening to something new. And so this idea of wisdom and debate and knowledge and understanding was really important for those people. And up against that the cross looks dumb, doesn't it? Like there's no powerful insight. There's no amazing anything. That's just a dead man, bleeding and broken and hanging on a cross. Like Plato doesn't write a dialogue about that. Socrates did not question anyone about that. Aristotle did not put together any treatises on a dead man hanging from across. But because of Christ, it is the power of God, the salvation for all it is everything, Christ's death, and resurrection, because hidden beneath the brokenness, of that poor man, hidden beneath his death, is the power of salvation for all. And all we need to do is be able to see it. And that's what this is, this passage is talking about, Has Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world. It says, And it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greek seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews, and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God, for the foolishness of God is stronger is wiser than men, and the weakness of God Art is stronger than men. As we consider these words, I think it's wise to think about what are the things that our culture seeks after the Greeks wanted wisdom, Jews demanded signs. What do you think we hold high up? Is it achievement could be that it could be the you know, having, having a family that looks good, that achieves high that that accomplishes things. I certainly know a number of people who approach their family life like looking for preschools with an eye towards how does how will this preschool, get my kid into Harvard? That's a achievement oriented. And when you bump achievement up against the cross, you go, Whoa, that is not an achievement, a dead man on a cross. But again, it's the power of God, the salvation of God. Many of us see money. I think money is a thing that has been a part of every culture in every era. There is certainly no riches, no wealth, in a dead man on a cross with the crown of thorns jammed on his head. But it is treasure in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and thieves do not break in or steal. There are a number of places we do have a kind of wisdom there sort of a tech guru, influencer kind of wisdom that we hold high up right now that's all about finding the right foods or blazing the right path. Or if you've ever watched a TED Talk and thought, Oh, this is just amazing. I need to see more of this. That's kind of the where we are with wisdom. And even that just when you bump the cross up against it, the cross looks like nothing. And yet it's the power of God. St. Paul ends this passage when he said talks about the people there. He says, For consider your calling brothers. Not many of you were wise. Not many were powerful. Not many were of noble birth. Now, he doesn't say none. He says not many. So some of them were wise. Some of them were powerful. Some did have noble birth. And yet none of that matters in the church, not power, not wealth, not nobility. It's just the cross of Christ, as it says, But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise. God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong, what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not pet is even things that don't exist. He chose those things, to bring to nothing the things that do exist, so that none of us no human being might boast in the presence of God. And that's the key is that the cross shows us exactly what we have to boast on. Nothing. Because on the cross is where our sin was paid for on the cross was where our punishment was doled out to Christ. And it reminds us of only one thing. We are nothing without the cross and the resurrection. And that is why we boast in Christ. Why this weak and broken thing is really what we celebrate. We don't celebrate the wealth and the power and the wisdom and the might in the the like tech guru guidance that so many people do. We just celebrate the cross of Jesus Christ because it's the salvation that God gives us. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: Psalm 19 The Psalm for Sunday, March 3rd, 2024

Psalm 19

The heavens declare the glory of God,
    and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
Day to day pours out speech,
    and night to night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech, nor are there words,
    whose voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out through all the earth,
    and their words to the end of the world.
In them he has set a tent for the sun,
    which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber,
    and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy.
Its rising is from the end of the heavens,
    and its circuit to the end of them,
    and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

The law of the Lord is perfect,
    reviving the soul;
the testimony of the Lord is sure,
    making wise the simple;
the precepts of the Lord are right,
    rejoicing the heart;
the commandment of the Lord is pure,
    enlightening the eyes;
the fear of the Lord is clean,
    enduring forever;
the rules of the Lord are true,
    and righteous altogether.
More to be desired are they than gold,
    even much fine gold;
sweeter also than honey
    and drippings of the honeycomb.
Moreover, by them is your servant warned;
    in keeping them there is great reward.

Who can discern his errors?
    Declare me innocent from hidden faults.
Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins;
    let them not have dominion over me!
Then I shall be blameless,
    and innocent of great transgression.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
    be acceptable in your sight,
    O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The psalm for Sunday March 3, comes from Psalm 19. The heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaims His handiwork. Day to day pours out speech and night tonight reveals knowledge. There is no speech nor are there words whose voice is not heard. Their voice goes out through all the earth and their words to the end of the world. In them he has set a tent for the sun, which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber. Unlike a strong man runs its course with joy. It's rising is from the end of the heavens and it's circuit to the end of them. And there is nothing hidden from its heat. The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul. The testimony of the Lord is sure making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart. The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever. The rules of the Lord are true, and righteous all together. More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold, sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them is your servant warned, in keeping them there is great reward. Who can discern His errors? Declare me innocent from hidden faults. Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins, let them not have dominion over me. Then I shall be blameless and innocent of great transgression. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight. Oh Lord, my rock and my Redeemer. Here ends the reading. This Psalm has four sections and they are in an interesting kind of movement. It begins with Heavens and the sky and all of creation, praising God and declaring his glory. The heavens declare the glory of God and the sky above proclaim His handiwork. Day to day pours out speech night tonight reveals knowledge. And we Christians we know that all of creation points us to God and His handiwork we see in the beauty of the natural world, in the goodness of creation, God's glory and his his wonderful handiwork. It continues to talk about his voice, their voice going out and their words to the end of the world. They proclaim God's goodness. In particular, he points out the Sun, who comes up like a bridegroom leaving his chamber strides across the sky and running its course with joy. And nothing is hidden from its heat. Now it moves from there to talk about the law of the Lord. And so we get the general revelation of all of creation, showing us the glory of God. And then next, the specific revelation of the law of the Lord. Now, remember that the law of the Lord doesn't just mean his rules. This isn't just 10 commandments, it's likely what's talking about is the torah, the whole of the first five books of Moses, the covenant between God and man, that not only includes God's rules, but also includes the story of salvation in Exodus, the promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. That is key to understanding the beauty of the law is that it's not just a set of rules, but it's also God's gospel promises for the Old Testament. It says the law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul. The testimony of the Lord is sure making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart. So God's law revives us his not not just his his rules, but also his promises they revive us and give us life. His testimonies Take, take the people who don't know much and make them wise, just as the revelation of Jesus Christ opens the eyes of our heart to see the world the way it is. It makes us wise. The precepts this the ideas of the Lord are right and so beautiful, they rejoice in our heart. continues the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. God's word opens our eyes to creation. The fear of the Lord is clean and dooring forever. The rules of the Lord are true and righteous all together. This is a wonderful summary of the beauty of God's Word. In particular, this is focusing on I think the Torah, first five books of the Bible, but it is reflected in all of God's word that we get beautiful testimony, preset precepts that make us open our eyes to creation and see the amazing wisdom of God in giving his gifts to us through Jesus Christ. And that's why it goes on to describe them as things to be desired. More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold, sweeter also than honey and the drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them is your servant warned, in keeping them there is great reward. It ends with a warning and a promise by by following God's word, a servant is warned against sin, and promised God's grace. So it begins with the the revelation of all of creation, and then a specific revelation through God's word. And then the author reflects having read God's word and understanding his law and and the promises and the rules. He says to himself, who can discern His errors, declare me innocent from hidden faults, keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins, let them not have dominion over me. Then I shall be blameless and innocent of great transgression. So he reflects inward, having read God's law, understand who's understood his grace, our response is only we are great sinners. How can we discern our own errors, we don't even know how bad we are. And yet you can declare me innocent from hidden faults. You can you can protect me even from my own sin and make me blameless. And finally, it says, After these revelations of creation, the revelation of God's law, the inward reflection, it is now we speak. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight. Oh Lord, my rock and my Redeemer. Having gone through all the ways we see God's glory and reflecting on the salvation that God delivers. Each of us were called to speak, the meditations of are the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart. And we asked God, even their God, make them acceptable. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: Exodus 20:1-17 The Old Testament Reading for Sunday, March 3rd, 2024

Exodus 20:1-17

And God spoke all these words, saying,

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

“You shall have no other gods before me.

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

“You shall not murder.

“You shall not commit adultery.

“You shall not steal.

“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

“You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.”

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Old Testament reading for Sunday, March 3, comes from Exodus chapter 20, verses one through 17. And God spoke all these words, saying, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, You shall have no other gods before Me, you shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth, you shall not bow down to them or serve them. For I the LORD your God, Emma jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me. But showing steadfast love to 1000s of those who love Me and keep My commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. For the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it, you shall not do any work, you or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days, the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor, You shall not covet your neighbor's house, you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant or his female servant, or his ox or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's. Here ends the reading. This passage from Exodus chapter 20, is the 10 commandments. God's people have just come out of slavery. Moses brought them through the Red Sea, they walked through the wilderness, they're at the base of Mount Sinai, and God is giving them the Covenant, the 10 commandments. So we begin with an important passage for understanding it in the context of ancient Israel. It starts with these words, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt out of the house of slavery. Notice where the 10 commandments come in the story. First, God goes to his people, rescues them from slavery, brings them out, and gives them a promise gathers together and saves them. And then he gives them the 10 commandments. This is much like the Christian life where Christ comes to save us and then calls us to follow him in holiness. Not if you are holy, I will save you. And the 10 commandments are no different. First, God follows his promise to Abraham, and then he gives them the rules. The 10 commandments, then are not ways to earn God's favor or tips for a better life or anything like that. In their original context, they were simply now that you are my people, I've gathered you together, I've made you mine. What are you to do with this new life that I've given you? And it closely mirrors the way that we we talk about Christ working in our lives? He comes to us in baptism forgives our sins gives us life. And then new people as in our baptismal identity, we say, how should I live and we follow Christ. And these 10 commandments offer a good way of understanding God's morality and God's will for our lives. Now, as you look at the 10 commandments, you can see that they're divided kind of into two sections. There's the first section which is all about our relationship with God. And the second section, which is all about our relationship with each other. The first section begins with you shall have no other gods before me, and then continues to explain it talking about a carved image or an idol. This is directly for the ancient Israelites. This is a a look at the idols of the land so they would be moving into worshiping In the false gods that were actually statues that they would worship and take care of, don't do that. He says, The next commandment, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. Don't misuse God's name. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. For Israel, this was about not working for six for the seventh day. For Christians, we approach it a little differently, because Christ is our Sabbath rest. And when Christ is our Sabbath rest there we find rest. So we set aside Sundays, not the Sabbath, Sabbath was Saturday. And we set aside Sundays to come and experience rest by being with Christ and hearing His Word. After that, we get to the section on our relationship with one another. Honor your father and your mother, you shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor, and you shall not covet. All of these are about how God says we should be in relationship with one another. And you can summarize it with the biblical command. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Know all of these 10 commandments point us to, well, an understanding of righteousness that is a little too much for us. It is far beyond our ability to keep even just You shall have no other gods before me, doesn't just mean don't worship idols or don't follow false God's its don't put anything before God. Like nothing, none of God's creation should be ahead of him on our priority list. And as we consider these 10 commandments, we have to say to ourselves, none of us has lived up to them. If you break one, you break them all. If you fall short on one, you fall short of heaven and end up in hell. Which is why our Savior Jesus Christ came and fulfilled these commandments did them all perfectly, so that by His forgiveness, we can have life so that it's not do these commandments and you will live but it is I the LORD your God brought you out of the Land of Death of slavery to sin and Satan. Follow me. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Father Abraham Had Many Sons: Sermon for February 25th, 2024

Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16

When Abram was ninety-nine years old the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless, that I may make my covenant between me and you, and may multiply you greatly.”Then Abram fell on his face. And God said to him, “Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you. And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you…

And God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her, and moreover, I will giveyou a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall become nations; kings of peoples shall come from her.”

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. I grew up in a very musical family. And so songs and musical pieces come easily to my head. And every once in a while I read a bible passage and a song just leaps into my brain. Usually, it's preschool songs because I lead a preschool chapel once a week. And I get to sing a lot of these like short, quippy catchy songs. Their favorite is the hippo song. I don't know if you know Well, probably not because it's, it's just for preschoolers. It goes. In the beginning God made the seas and the forest filled with trees. He built the mountains up so high. On the top, he placed the sky gods finger prints are everywhere, just to show how much he cares. In the middle. He had loads of fun, made a hippo that weighed a ton. And this is the best part because it's a hippo, they go here, Pippo potamus. Here, pepper a God made all of us, and it is the cutest thing you have ever seen. But that's not the song for today. That's just a fun excuse to sing the hippo song. The song for today is father Abraham. Have you heard this song before? catchy little kids song. It goes, father, Abraham had many sons, many sons had father Abraham, I am one of them. And so where are you? So let's praise the Lord for that one. And then of course, you sing it again. And every time you sing it, you have to you move a different part of your body. So you go right arm and I have to do this arms, because the left arm because I'm facing the kids, and they wouldn't figure it out. You go right arm, left arm, right foot and you do the whole thing. It's kind of a silly kid song. And by the end, they're laughing so much they don't get to sing. But it is deeper than many of us give it credit. Father Abraham had many sons, many sons had father Abraham, I am one of them. And so are you. So let's all praise the Lord. And I think this song fits really well with what our reading from Genesis is trying to get across to us. God is making a covenant with Abraham. The promise is something that fits with this song. And it helps us to understand what is going on. So what I'd like to do is use the song as an outline for our sermon to see what it teaches us about father Abraham. So let's start. Father Abraham had many sons, many sons had father Abraham, I am one of them. And so were you. So let's all praise the Lord. So the first words of this are father Abraham. In this reading, Abram becomes Abraham, right, God changes His name from one name to the other exalted father to a multitude of nations. But it's still kind of a weird name. Because father, Abraham, still did not have the son of the promise. When God came to him the first time and said I will make you into great nation. It was 24 years ago. Can you imagine waiting? Half of my lifetime for a promise to come through actually more than half just in case you're wondering. 24 years between when God said I will give you a son, and now and it still has not happened. Abraham was 99 and his wife Sarah was 90. Can you imagine having a baby at 90

God comes down and repeats the same promise that he has been repeating for the last 24 years. He calls him, Abraham, father of a multitude. Now we know that it happens. The very next chapter begins the fulfillment of this promise that Abraham is going to have a child, we see the three visitors come to Abraham and Sarah, and they make this promise. And then Sarah gets pregnant. And they have a baby. And they name him, Isaac, and God is calling him Abraham. And we call him, father. Because God does amazing things, impossible things. In this moment, this covenant that he makes with Abraham, a promise based only on God's grace and His will. And his promise to Abraham, means that the impossible will happen. When we see something like this, something impossible, like this happened throughout Scripture. God makes Sarah pregnant. He gives a baby to Hannah, who was called barren. And we see it happen over and over again in the New Testament to Elizabeth, who was also well beyond her childbearing years, and even greater miracle in the Virgin Mary has a baby named Jesus. And the New Testament tells us that God can raise up children for Abraham from even the stones. God can do the impossible, no matter what they thought, he even could raise a man from the dead. Because nothing is impossible for God. And we call Abraham father, because we have a sure and certain promise from the Father in heaven, that he can do the impossible for you. That on the last day, when his son Jesus Christ returns, He will call you from the grave. Father, Abraham. The next line is many sons. Father, Abraham had many sons. Now, in the actual history of the Bible, father, Abraham did have many actual biological children. The first one was Ishmael. And what we don't read in Genesis chapter 17, is coming right after this. God gives him the promise. And Abraham's like, well, can we just use Ishmael? I mean, he's, he's alive and pretty good. But God says, No, you're gonna get the son of my promise. Isaac. Later on. After Sarah dies, Abraham gets married again. And he has 123456 more sons. Their names are Zim, Ron, Jacque Shan meet on Midian ich, Bach and shuwa. There will be a test after the sermon.

But these aren't the sons the song is describing. The sons come through Isaac. Isaac is the son of the promise, not Ishmael. That was a something that Abraham tried to take into his own hands. But Isaac, the one who would be born of 90 year old Sarah, God says, and I will establish my covenant between you and your offspring after you throughout the generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you, and to your offspring after you do. This might as well be the summary of the entire story of the Old Testament, right? God says, I will be God to you and your offspring forever. And what we see is a God who is faithful to a people that grows out of this son, Isaac, overall history. He is faithful to them, even when they turn away when he brings them out of Egypt and they complain in the wilderness when they get to the promised land, and they say Are the other people in there kind of scary and let's not go in when they get into the promised land and they worship false gods over and over when the kings come up and they lead them astray. God is constantly faithful to them over and over and over. Again, because most faithful, when He sends His Son Jesus Christ, another son born in miraculous ways, a child of Abraham, throughout all the generations, who becomes this perfect son, who is righteous and blameless in God's sight, and fulfills God's perfect promise for all of history. The covenant with Abraham is now fulfilled, and that God would be a god to his people through His Son, Jesus Christ, and the whole world would be blessed, including you and me. And this covenant that we see, given to Abraham, always points to that savior, Jesus Christ. So that the sons of Abraham could be gathered together in Christ, and made God's people. Father Abraham had many sons, many sons had father Abraham, I am one of them. And so are you. This is kind of the craziest part of the song, isn't it? I am a child of Abraham, and so are you. And I have to tell you, I have as far as I can tell no Jarrett, genetic relationship with Abraham. My people come from a different part of the world. But that's not that's actually the whole point. Right? Being a child of Abraham does not mean being biologically related to the man. The covenant with Abraham was that he would be a father of a multitude, father of the people. And through Christ, we realized that all people in Jesus Christ, are brought into that promise, and made children of Abraham. This is not a new thing in the New Testament either has, it always been this way, all the way back throughout the history of God's people, foreigners were brought into the family of God by faith, and by trusting in the promises given to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and all the rest. The best examples come from the line of Jesus's family Rahab the prostitute in Jericho is one of the people that they were supposed to wipe out and kill. When the spies come to the city of Jericho, and she saves them, and she expresses her faith in the God of Abraham. And she becomes a part of God's people as part of the family line of Jesus. Something similar is true for Ruth, Ruth, the mother of Obed, the father of Jesse, the father of King David, Ruth is, is married into the family of Naomi. And when all of the husbands die off, she is brought into the family of God by traveling with her mother in law back to Bethlehem, and being faithful to her and to her God. God's people have always been made up of foreigners. The children of Abraham have always gathered together brothers and sisters from a different family line. And it goes all the way down through history, all the way down to you. You are a child of Abraham. You are a son of the promise and air along with Isaac, of eternal life, because you have been brought into Jesus Christ by your baptism. Because his baptism where you become adopted into this family, joined together with with all of the people of God as children of Abraham, to inherit all of the amazing promises that God gave him. So that just as Christ is raised from the dead, we too will rise on the last day Which means we are all one great big family, the family of God, in every church and every sanctuary all over the world, we are one, people are bound together by this covenant that God gave Abraham, all the way back in the book of Genesis. Father Abraham had many sons, many sons had father Abraham, I am one of them, and so are you. So let's all praise the Lord, right? How could we do anything but praise God for this amazing gift of the covenant promise given to Abraham being given to you, through Jesus Christ, you're saved. We are given life, we are gathered together in God's family. So let's all praise the Lord. How do we do that? Of course, we can sing our songs of praise. And we can shout to the Lord, maybe raise our hands and say, God, you're awesome. But those aren't the praises that God really desires. Those are actually for us to teach us about who he is, and praises God desires, the works of love, the family does for one another, right? If we are truly children of Abraham bound together in Christ, the love of God works through us towards each other. We welcome each other. We work for each others, we love one another. We forgive one another, care for each other. And welcome each other into this family. And that's what praising God means. As we praise the Lord for His gifts. It means loving the people who are near us, our fellow members of this body of Christ, fellow children of Abraham, the father, Abraham had many sons, many sons had father Abraham, I am one of them, and so are you. So let's all praise the Lord. In Jesus name, Amen.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Who Can Trust A God Like This? Sermon for February 18th, 2024

Genesis 22:1-14

After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac. And he cut the wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar. Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you.” And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together. And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together.

When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.” And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called the name of that place, “The Lord will provide”; as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.”

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The story from Our Old Testament reading today is, well, it's an odd one. Not just odd, though, but when we read a lot, actually, we read it today in Lent, we also will read it, or during our Easter Vigil. It's read on Christmas Eve as well. We get stories about this. Abraham offering the sacrifice of His son, Isaac. It's an important passage. But it's also super weird, right? You read it and you go what? God is saying, sacrifice your son. And then Abraham gets up the gumption to do it. And he's like, Nah, don't worry about it. It seems kind of weird, right? We know Abraham has gone through quite a bit leading up to this point. Abraham in Genesis 12, is contacted out of the blue by God and given an amazing promise. He says go to the land, I'll make a great a bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you, and all nations shall be blessed through you. And we see a promise that he and his wife would have a son. And it's through the sun that the nations would be blessed. And then, all of a sudden, Abraham is told to take his son, Isaac, His beloved Son, go to the mountain and kill him. And it's interesting. There's no bargaining. There's no questioning. We have that in other stories, where Abraham turns to God and says, No, right. When God wants to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham says, Wait a second. What if you find so many righteous people? And then you have a negotiation? Right? When Abraham has not had the promise of Isaac after more than a decade, he goes to God and says, Hey, God, what's with this promise. But all we got here is. So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him and his son, Isaac. That's it. God says sacrifice and the sacrifices. When we run into this story, I think we can ask a question. Who can trust a God like this? Right? Who can trust a God who would give you a promise, and then say, kill the promise? Right, because that's what it is the one and only son, his beloved son. The whole world will be blessed through him. And then God says, kill him. To understand how Abraham can do this, we have to understand Abraham's story a little bit better. Genesis 12, God comes to him and he gives them that amazing promise I already told you about. And then Abraham immediately forgets it. In the same chapter, there, it says that there's a famine in the land. An Abraham goes down to Egypt, and tries to fix the problem himself. He doesn't stay in the Promised Land and trust that God will provide. And then he gets to Egypt. And he looks around and he says, Well, they're gonna kill me. I know what I'll do. I'll marry off my wife to the Pharaoh. It's a great idea, right? He sees a problem. He does not trust that God will solve it tries to fix it himself. And well, it kind of goes badly, right? Except God uses that to enrich Abraham. It's so weird, right? He goes down to another her country married his wife to a ruler, God punishes that ruler for it. And then the ruler gives him stuff. That's not what I would do. If I were Pharaoh. God comes through. And he even uses Abraham's faithlessness his sin to enrich him. What about the next time? In Genesis chapter 16, Abraham and his wife, sarai decide to take God's promise into their own hands. And Abraham has a child with Hagar. They decide God is not coming through fast enough. So we're gonna have this baby with the servant, and everything's gonna work out great, right? Because when you introduce another woman into the marriage, everything is awesome. And of course, it's not. And there's problems in the family. But God protects them through it. In Genesis, chapter 17, Abraham goes to God and says, Wait a second, God, we've been doing this all this time, you gave me a promise, and it's not happening yet. And this servant of Mine is going to be my air, where is the sun you promised. And God makes a covenant cuts open the animals, and God Himself walks through them, to show that he has sworn by his own name that he will provide. The next chapter, three mysterious men come to Abraham. He feeds them under a tree. And they make a promise that went before the time they return, Sarah is going to have a child. And when they do, it happens. But in the meantime, Abraham does the same thing. He goes to a different place with a different King, and marries his wife off to her him. Again, can you believe it? And not only does this king not kill Abraham, he gives him stuff again. And then finally, they have a son. This little boy, Isaac, joy, and laughter. When Moses and Sarah are so old, that it should never be possible. years after when God made the promise. What we see during Abraham's life is Abraham's faithlessness not trusting when things are hard. And God's faithfulness is that even when Abraham has trusted in the promise, he says, Yes, I believe you. When the decision gets tough. He doesn't really. And he let sin get in the way. But God, not once turned from his promises. Even when Abraham sin, he was there, blessing him, enriching him, making him great. And giving him a son. Over and over, God proved faithful. And so when he comes to Abraham and says, kill the promise, Abraham has finally learned he's finally learned that no matter how bleak, how weird, how odd the situation God is putting him in. God will come through. Because God is always faithful. Who can trust a God like this? Well, Abraham could because God had proven himself over and over and over again. And so when they get up to the top of the mountain, and Isaac climbs up on the altar, Abraham knows that he's going to come down with his son, whether the angel is there or not. Hebrews tells us that Abraham had faith that God could raise even A dead

like Isaac, after a sacrifice. But God stops the sacrifice and provides a substitute for Isaac to be sacrificed there on the altar. Who can trust a God like this? Well, Abraham certainly could. Because he knew God keeps His promises. I think there's a similar experience. Many, many years later, as the people looked on, at another son, he was a son who was sent to earth and he did miracles. He preached, he had power, he could even stop the wind and the waves with his voice. And it looks like God had finally come through with the greatest promise of all, Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Savior of the world. And he was going to take out the Romans and bring Israel to the top, and it's gonna be amazing. And there was this weird thing about, you know, he would say things like, be betrayed and suffer and die and then rise again. But it didn't worry about that. Right. And then the strangest thing happened. This guy who could do miracles, was arrested. And he didn't stop it. This one and only Son of God allowed the Jews to take him allowed Pontius Pilate to have Him whipped. And he carried another wood of sacrifice up a different mountain, outside the city of Jerusalem. And you can imagine what it would be like for the disciples, who looked at their Savior on the cross crown of thorns on his head, so beaten and bloody that he died from exhaustion only a few hours later. Who can trust a God who would do that to his son? Right? It looks like the end the end of the promised one the Savior, the Messiah, he was dead on across.

But God proves faithful with his promises, right? That thing that they may not have understood that they didn't really listen to, that it was necessary for the son to be betrayed, crucified. And then after three days rise from the dead. That thing that was the heart of it wasn't even when the one and only Son the son of the promise the Savior, Jesus Christ was dead on the cross, God proved faithful. He kept his promise. And after three days, he rose from the dead, our Savior, Jesus Christ. God was faithful. He kept his promises. Who can trust a God like this? What Jesus did and he trusted in a way that we cannot. Neither Abraham nor us can trust with that perfection of a Savior who climbs up on a sacrificial altar of a cross and offers himself for you. We have a faithful God. I think we can relate to pieces of Abraham's story. None of us have spoken to God and been told you have will have a son who will bless the whole world through you. And if you did, we might have some questions. But at the same time, we face problems that will make us doubt won't be part of the human condition. Looking ahead and seeing Well God's promises are there they're written in a book they're proclaim from the pastor but my life well sometimes God takes things away from me. Sometimes I get sick What about his promises? We learned from Abraham, that even when we doubt, and fear and worry, God is faithful. He keeps his promises even when you don't trust them. Even when you're worried about them and your heart turns away, and secretly you inside you say, I don't know about this. God still keeps his promise to you. He sent His Son Jesus to die for you, to rise for you. So that when you face your own grave, when you are lying there on your deathbed, wondering what is next, you know, like Christ, God will keep his promise to you and raise you on the last day. Who can trust a God like this? Well, we can because he proves Himself faithful over and over and over again. He did it with Abraham. He did it throughout the Old Testament. He did it with his son Jesus Christ when he offered him as a sacrifice. And he will do it for you every day. In Jesus name, Amen.

Our Father, Sermon for February 14th, 2024 Ash Wednesday

Joel 2:12-19

“Yet even now,” declares the Lord,
    “return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
    and rend your hearts and not your garments.”
Return to the Lord your God,
    for he is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love;
    and he relents over disaster.
Who knows whether he will not turn and relent,
    and leave a blessing behind him,
a grain offering and a drink offering
    for the Lord your God?

Blow the trumpet in Zion;
    consecrate a fast;
call a solemn assembly;
    gather the people.
Consecrate the congregation;
    assemble the elders;
gather the children,
    even nursing infants.
Let the bridegroom leave his room,
    and the bride her chamber.

Between the vestibule and the altar
    let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep
and say, “Spare your people, O Lord,
    and make not your heritage a reproach,
    a byword among the nations.
Why should they say among the peoples,
    ‘Where is their God?’”

Then the Lord became jealous for his land
    and had pity on his people.
The Lord answered and said to his people,
“Behold, I am sending to you
    grain, wine, and oil,
    and you will be satisfied;
and I will no more make you
    a reproach among the nations.

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Tonight, we're beginning our Lenten journey. Every Wednesday night, we'll have a worship service all the way up through holy week, when we'll have a whole bunch of extra services, in remembrance of the story of Jesus Christ and His death on the cross. And each one of those nights, we are going to explore a different piece of the Lord's Prayer called a petition. And it just so happens to work out wonderfully that if we start on Ash Wednesday with our Father, who art in heaven, well, you get all the way to men at the Easter Vigil, which works out pretty well, right? That means I get all of my sermons planned out for me in one fell swoop. But it also means that we get to explore deeply the prayer Our Lord taught us to pray and say why this prayer is? What makes this special for the life of a Christian? And why these things? And what do they mean for us. And so we'll take a look at each piece. US Luthor to guide us in our exploration, and begin to understand it. And so tonight, we are looking at the very simple phrase, Our Father, who art in heaven. Now you might think about this and say, Well, isn't this just how you start a prayer? Right? You got to say who you're praying to our father, right? Sometimes we pray or pray to Our Lord Jesus Christ. On certain days, we pray to the Holy Spirit and ask Him to come into our hearts and guide us. What's so special about our Father, who art in heaven? Luther says this. With these words, God tenderly invites us to believe that he is our True Father, and that we are His true children. So that with all boldness and competence, we may ask him as dear children ask their dear father, I think the question behind that explanation is simple. How do we know that God is our Father? How do we know that He is father and not judge? condemn her cruel tyrant, indifferent God is somebody who just doesn't care. How do we know? He is our Father? Well, the easy way is to say Jesus says so right. Because He tells us to pray this way, our father. But I think Joel helps us understand it a little bit too. Our Father points us to a God who loves his children. Even when we sin, and we go astray. We are all today wearing marks on our foreheads that remind us of the curse of sin that we we all face. The curse of sin passed down from Adam and Eve. The curse that God proclaimed when he said, from dust, you have come to dust you shall return. And Joel says, Yeah Even now declares the Lord, returned to me with all your heart with fasting with weeping with mourning, and render your hearts and not your garments, returned to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. And he relents over disaster where he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, and he relents from disaster. This was a message to an Israel that was turning away from God. Basically, that's the reason God called the prophets in all of those little prophetic books. Turn Back to Me. He said, I am your father. I want to love you. I want to save you. Return to the Lord your God. He is gracious and merciful. Same message for us. When we see our own sin, because we know we do it, we see our errors or mistakes, we feel our guilt. And we know that we have a father who is merciful, that when we face our sin, we don't tear our clothes like they did in ancient Israel. Not even put ashen crosses on our foreheads. We rent our hearts, not our garments, and we turn to God and ask for mercy. And he is a father, who is gracious and merciful and slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. And he sent his son Jesus Christ to enter into death, the death, we remind ourselves with these ashen crosses, enter into death on the cross to take away your sin, so that he can be your father. He is gracious and merciful. It's the same. When we think that our Christianity becomes something that we can brag about. I think that's a thing that all of us fall into, especially when we gave up Valentine's Day dinner to come to church, right? Everybody else is at a restaurant, and here we are with ash on our foreheads. God must love us, right, we're cool. And that's sort of what Israel would think about. They're fast, and they're feast. And if they just did the right sacrifices, it didn't matter what else they did. God would think they're amazing. Jesus warns against that too, when he says to beware of practicing your righteousness in others, in order to impress them. It's always, it's always a thing that rears up in us. If we're faithful, and come to church, and volunteer. We might think, Wow, that's pretty lucky to have me, led, you know, at least deep in our hearts. And now's the time to repent of that. Return to the Lord our God, because He is gracious, and merciful. We are all sinners, all the same. Whether you're here every Sunday, or you just walked in the door. And we need a Savior, who is a father, who sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to give you grace and mercy and tell you, he is your father. He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. And he relents over disaster. We need to remind ourselves that God is our father too, when he sends disaster into our lives, as he often does been reflecting lately on what what it's like to be someone who is in their later years. We just had a funeral for Ellie day. She was 93 when she went by that time, all your friends are already gone. Right? If you've been to funeral after funeral, you've seen people around you pass away. And none of your generation are left to come when you finally can imagine how hard that is. How tough that must be. Or even when they end up seeing the next generation go before that. It's hard to think about a father who is loving when you face that, right. It's hard to think that there is a God who is gracious and merciful. But we know that he is there. And we know that he is there for us because he sent his own son Jesus, to go through it the same himself. Not to see all his friends go before him but to go first, through death into the grave and then rise from the dead. And so those people can be called behind him to rise into new life on the last day That's the kind of God our Father is

not one who will bat away every minor disaster, but takes care of the worst one. Death itself for you, and for me is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. And he even relents over the curse of death itself. Because he will raise you from the dead and give you new life. And that kind of God is the kind of God who will listen, when you pray, who commands you to turn to him and say, Father, I need because he wants to love you. He wants to give you His mercy. He wants to give you his peace. And it's always there for you to return to the Lord your God. He is gracious and merciful and slow to anger and abounding in steadfast law. In Jesus name, Amen.

Getting Ready for Sunday: Genesis 22:1-14 The Old Testament Reading for Sunday, February 18th, 2024

2 Kings 2:1-12

After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac. And he cut the wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar. Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you.” And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together. And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together.

When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.” And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called the name of that place, “The Lord will provide”; as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.”

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Old Testament reading for Sunday, February 18, comes from Genesis chapter 22, verses one through 18. After these things, God tested Abraham and said to him, Abraham, and he said, Here I am. He said, Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you. So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him and his son, Isaac. And he cut the wood of the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. On the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the plays from afar. Then Abraham said to his young men, stay here with the donkey, and I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the fire burnt offering, and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand, the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together. And Isaac said to his father, Abraham, my father, and he said, Here I am, my son. He said, Behold, the fire and the wood. But where is the lamb for a burnt offering? Abraham said, God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering my son. So they went both of them together. When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham. And he said, Here I am. He said, Do not lay your hand on the boy, or do anything to him. For now, I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram, and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called the name of that place, The LORD Will Provide, as it is said to this day, on the mound of the Lord, it shall be provided. And the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven, and said, by myself, I have sworn declares the Lord, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you. And I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of the heaven. And as it stands on the seashore, and your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice. Here ends the reading, or reading begins with a weighty phrase, after these things. That helps us see that we're looking back and a lot of has happened in Abraham's life. God came to Abraham in Genesis chapter 12, he called him and gave him promises. He would make his name great, he would give him a land, he would make his name his children, like the sand of the seashore, that all nations will be blessed through him, that whoever blesses him would be blast, whoever curses him would be cursed. Lots of cool stuff. Abraham tested God's promises over and over again, he put himself in terrible situations. When there was a famine in the land, he goes down to Egypt, and marries his wife off to another man who then gets in trouble with God and God uses it to enrich Abraham, instead of getting Abraham killed. Crazy, right? Things like that happen over and over again. He runs into conflicts with people, and then God shows up and saves him he there's Sodom and Gomorrah happened and God speaks with him and Luke go back and forth and God protects lot in this destruction. One more time, Abraham marries off his wife to another man and And the man gets in trouble. But Abraham gets enriched instead of being killed. It's all sorts of crazy stuff happens. But the best part is that after all of the years of waiting, God came through on his promise to give Abraham and Sarah, a son named Isaac. And his birth is what is told right away in the chapter prior to this, the promise of the son comes, Isaac, Isaac, is there, he's ready to go. And then we get these words, after these things. Now, we don't know how much time passed between the story of the birth of Isaac, and what is happening in this story. The chapter 21 ends with and Abraham sojourned amongst the Philistines many days, which is a great phrase, that means a long time, but we don't know how long could have been a week could have been a couple of months could have been several years. We don't know. There are some clues, though. We have a suggestion that the Isaac is old enough to carry a lot of wood, because Abraham gives Isaac the load of the wood to go up to the top of the mountain. And so it seems like it is likely that Isaac is a like a teenager, to be able to carry enough wood to be able to haul it up a mountain, that they can do a burnt offering. So God comes to Abraham after years, maybe of life with Isaac and says, sacrifice your one and only son. Now, the Abraham, of many years ago, would have freaked out at this request. The Abraham who decided that God wouldn't protect him when he went down into Egypt. So he gave his wife as to be the wife of someone else. He didn't trust God's promises, the Abraham who married off his wife again, in a different place, the Abraham who, who hedged and tried to have a baby with his servant girl, that Abraham would have freaked out about this. But after years and years of God proving himself of God coming through, it doesn't say anything. There's no question. It says. So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey and took two of his young men with him and his son, Isaac. So they take the burnt offering the wood, and they bring Isaac and they go to the mountain, and they leave the two young men behind, and they go up to the top of the mountain. And there, they took take the wood of the burnt offering, and he lays it on Isaac, his son who carries it. And Abraham gets the fire and the knife and they go up together. Isaac has a worthy question. Here's the fire and the wood. But where's the lamb? Abraham says, God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering my son. So they go together. Isaac is, you know, confused, as you would be to we're going up to the top of a mountain to give a burnt offering but we don't have an offering. That's what you think, Isaac? Abraham knows what's going on. So they get to the place. Abraham builds an altar. And then it says, And he lays the wood down and it says, And he bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar on top of the wood. We have to remember, Abraham is a very old man. He is likely about 100 years old at this time. And Isaac, if he is old enough to carry a whole pile of wood up a mountain means he is probably stronger than Abraham. Which means that either Abraham drugged his son or Isaac was bound willingly carried the wood up willingly got onto the altar willingly. So Abraham reaches out, takes the knife, and the angel goes, Stop. Don't kill him. I now know that you trust God. This interaction gives people some pause. God didn't really want his son, Isaac to be killed. Why did God put Abraham through all of this? Isn't this kind of, well, a little abusive? Almost.

What we see here Is is Abraham is finally displaying the trust that God's plan is always good. In fact, what he trusts is that when Isaac goes to the sacrifice that even should Isaac die, he will come back from the dead. And here Abraham is expressing the kind of faith that says, no matter what God wants, God, His promises will come true. And so it's not just a test of faith, but it is a place for Abraham to prove that he has learned from his life and experience of receiving God's promises and hearing it over and over and over again and actually seeing it come to fruition. And so what what they get then is a ram gets continents, they get in, in a thicket by the horns, and they offer that as a sacrifice. Now we see in this, an expression of Christ here, Abraham offers his son whom he loves his one and only Son, as a sacrifice. And God allows him to come out. But in Christ, we see a one and only Son on whom the wood of a sacrifice was laid, as he carried his cross up to the top of a different kind of Hill, outside of Jerusalem, where he wasn't spared, where the Father gave up his one and only son. Abraham could offer Isaac because he was he knew that God could raise someone from the dead. That's what it says in Hebrews chapter 11. It says, By faith when he was tested, offered up Isaac, who had received the promise, in the act of offering up his only son of whom it was said, through Isaac shall your offspring be named, he considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead. So Abraham, he knew that no matter what would happen, he would actually come down with his son Isaac, because Isaac was the son of the promise. And similarly, Jesus could go to the cross and willingly die, just like Isaac willingly climbed up to the top of that, that altar, and willingly die, knowing that God would raise him from the dead, to give him life, so that we could have life too. And so now the angel says, in response to Abraham, by myself, I have sworn declares the Lord, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you. And I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of the heaven. And as the sand that is on the seashore, and your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice. So here, God repeats the promise that He has given Abraham over and over again, and will multiply our offspring, stars of the heaven, sand of the seashore, your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. Same thing that God promised him in Genesis chapter 12. And so the Abraham is simply showing trust in the promises that God has already given him. Trust in the promises that God has carried out and kept this whole time. And we see, we can look at what God has done in Christ, and have trust in the promises that God gives us. Because we had a Savior who obeyed the voice of his father and gave up his life, gave himself up so that he could possess the gate of his enemy death itself. Those roll the stone away over the tomb, and give us life that lasts forever. And because Jesus is raised, we know that we are raised to that Jesus was the sacrifice for us so that we can be like Isaac and not have to die forever. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

The Office of Prophet and the Office of Preaching

2 Kings 2:1-12

Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. And Elijah said to Elisha, “Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel.” But Elisha said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they went down to Bethel. And the sons of the prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you?” And he said, “Yes, I know it; keep quiet.”

Elijah said to him, “Elisha, please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho.” But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they came to Jericho. The sons of the prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you?” And he answered, “Yes, I know it; keep quiet.”

Then Elijah said to him, “Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan.” But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So the two of them went on. Fifty men of the sons of the prophets also went and stood at some distance from them, as they both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his cloak and rolled it up and struck the water, and the water was parted to the one side and to the other, till the two of them could go over on dry ground.

When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Ask what I shall do for you, before I am taken from you.” And Elisha said, “Please let there be a double portion of your spirit on me.” And he said, “You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it shall be so for you, but if you do not see me, it shall not be so.” And as they still went on and talked, behold, chariots of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it and he cried, “My father, my father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!” And he saw him no more.

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Over the epiphany season, we looked at a number of Old Testament stories that have had something to do with the prophets. A while back, we looked at the calling of Samuel, oh, God came in a vision to Samuel and gave him a message for Eli. We asked ourselves, when we talk about the Word of God, do we tell the whole story like, like Samuel asked whether he should tell the story of judgment that God gave Him to Eli. After that, we looked at the prophet Jonah, who was sent to Nineveh with a message, yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. And this message brought repentance to the city. And we realized that God's message of judgment, always comfort comes with an offer of forgiveness, that it's a call to turn to him. After that, we looked at Moses, when he said that God would raise up a prophet like him, who would speak the Word of God to His people. And we saw that this message, this office of Prophet was given to the people for their good. And today, we're looking at a story about Elijah, passing on his office of Prophet, both to Eli Shaw, as well as to the sons of the prophets that we see. Which is an interesting aspect of this story that is often overlooked. And we'll interpret this understanding of this office of profit in light of Christ, to help us see what it has to say about the Office of the pastor, the preaching office, in the church. So this is a fascinating story in the Old Testament. Seems kind of weird, right? Most of the action is Elijah saying to Elijah, stay here, I'm gonna go over there. And Elijah says, Nope, I'm going with you. And then they show up, and they go to this place, and you get this phrase called the sons of the prophets. They come out and they say, you know, Elijah is going away. And Elijah says, Yeah, but keep it a secret. Super weird, right? What is going on here? And then it happens again, Elijah goes to a different place. And he says, Elijah, stay there. And Elijah doesn't know, I'm going with you. And the sons of the prophets come out again. And then Elijah says, well, let's go to a third place. You stay here, Alicia. And he goes, No, I'm coming with you. The cross the Jordan River. And you see this very weird thing. Elijah asked, Elijah, what do you want from me? And the lie, Shah says, give me a double portion of your spirit. odd things. And then Elijah is separated from Elijah by this chariot of fire. And Elijah is taken up in a whirlwind. And then we're done. Weird, right. What our reading doesn't give us is what happens next. It says, And he that is Elijah took up the cloak that had fallen, a cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him, and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. Then he took the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and struck the water saying, Where is the Lord the God of Elijah. And when he had struck the water, the water was parted from one side and to the other. And Elijah went over. Now, this helps us to understand what is going on in this story. Remember, Elijah, he smacked the water with his cloak and it split and they walk through. Then he goes up into heaven, and he lives Shaw gets the cloak, walks over smacks it, and the same thing happens right? This is an inheritance moment. The double portion of the spirit. What's going on here is the line Shah is asking Elijah For the inheritance of a firstborn son, ancient Israel, inheritance was split amongst the family and the firstborn got the double portion. So you have five kids, you split your inheritance up six ways, firstborn son gets two of them, the rest each get one. And so we're seeing inheritance. And this points us back to the sons of the prophets. That's a weird phrasing for this group of people, sons of the prophets are this order of prophets that have been building up under this new era of Elijah. Eli SHA, gets the double portion, they get the single portion. This office of Prophet has been handed down through this group of people called the sons of the prophets under this new era in Elijah. Now, we have to take a moment to recognize how crazy that is in Elijah's life. If you remember, in earlier in Elijah's life, the king has been going after him so hard, that he is the only prophet left. And he goes out into the wilderness in despair, curls up on the ground and says, God, just kill me. It's all over. And then by the end of his life, he goes from town to town, and in every place, prophets of God come out on mass to meet him. Isn't it amazing what God can do in only a short period of time? Isn't it amazing how God can raise up faithful people from desperation? What can God do? It's what we see with the sons of the prophets. It helps us to understand the office of pastor in the church, because interpreted through Christ, and after his death and resurrection, this preaching office is a whole lot like that office of Prophet that was handed down in the church, and established and trained by Elijah is the the office of Pastor like the office of Prophet is handed down. These sons of the prophets were the inheritors of Elijah. He is this new model of profit. That happens as as the Kings turn away. And so we see town after town, place after place, these new proclaimers of God's word are there and raised up. In the church, the proclaimers of God's word were handled very similar. The office is given and established. And we see that from very early on. In the book of Acts, it talks about people going from town to town, appointing elders, otherwise known as pastors in the church. Similarly, St. Paul writes to both Titus and Timothy, about appointing elders in the churches where they the God preserves this office of proclamation and preaching in his church that is handed down through his church as well. Which I think is an amazing blessing. That the church passes down this office of proclamation and preaching in clear and obvious way. Because what it means is you don't have to wonder whose job it is to proclaim God's word to write. See, we don't have any questions about that. God doesn't come down in a vision and anoint someone and say, I have chosen you like you did with Isaiah, or Samuel. You get to see it happen right in front of you. When pastors are installed and chosen, and the Holy Spirit works through the church to give them a call. It happened just over two years ago, here in this place, I kneeled right over there. And was installed.

And it's not just me, of course, this happens in any church. With the Holy Spirit calls a pastor for you, so that you can have God's word proclaimed. You don't have to wonder who God has chosen to give you this, this blessing. You don't have to go, Oh, I hope he is anointed by the Spirit. Because the church has done it. The Holy Spirit works through you to give a call to a preacher. What a blessing that is. That you know whose job it is, with the Holy Spirit has appointed you to give you God's grace, and call you to faithfulness in Christ. And pastors, just like the prophets, their job is to proclaim God's Word through the office of preaching. One of the big differences though is after Christ has died and rose, the source of that proclamation is a little different. Old Testament prophets, they received visions, right. And we've seen many stories like that stories of Samuel and Moses and Jonah, and the Bible is filled with them. Elijah himself gets all sorts of messages from God. But pastors are a little different. Hebrews starts out this way, in many in various ways, God spoke to his people of old by the prophets. But now in these last days, he has spoken to us by his Son. Our gospel reading emphasizes this. And one of the things that the Gospel reading is we get caught up in all the amazing things that happened, the shining face, the clothes, the Moses and Elijah, but the heart, the center of what is going on, is what the voice says, This is my beloved son. Listen to him. And so pastors, we don't receive visions for our messages. We hear from the word of Christ. Now, personally, I would love it. If I could be like, on Saturday night, sit in front of my computer and be like, okay, Jesus, give me a message. Wouldn't that be nice? All the hours of study, all of the the reading and the prayer and the outlines, and then the deleting, which often happens, and then the editing and then I would love it. If God simply said, Preach this. And then I did. But that's not where it comes from. The Word of Christ has been preserved for us through the preaching of the apostles. And then their preaching preserved for us in Holy Scripture. And so pastors, our job is to listen to him, and then proclaim, which means we have to spend a lot of time in God's word. So we can speak it to you. We listen to Christ and do our best to speak what he would want us to say, on mornings like this. So you can hear the Word of God preserved for you. And it's a temptation for every pastor in every place, to substitute to their own word for what Christ has called us to speak. Which means you have a job to do as well. Right? To hold me accountable, to ask me, Pastor, is that really what the Bible says? Is that really what God wants from us? It's your job, to make sure I know what I'm doing and to hold me accountable to the proclamation that Christ has given us. Because the word I am called to speak is not my own but Christ's, which is filled with the power of the Spirit and there for you to guide him. And I need you to keep me on track. To help me understand. Now, you're probably thinking to yourself, Wait, wait, I didn't go to seminary. How can I do that? actually really easy. When I say something you think is weird. Say to me Hey, Pastor, can you show me where why you said that? Can you explain to me from God's word, what you meant? I need you just as you need me. Because I am supposed to hear from Christ and speak to you. But I'm just as much a human being as you. It's your job to help. Lastly, the Office of Pastor much like the office of profit is here as a gift for you. Prophets were not designed to be people who were just there to be glorious. I mean, we look at Elijah, and we see the miracles. And we think, wow, wouldn't that be kind of cool, right? I think it'd be pretty amazing to be able to call fire down from heaven, which he did on a couple of occasions, right. I think it'd be pretty cool to be like Elijah, and heal the warrior of a foreign king from his leprosy, like, walk around and be all like, yeah, prophet of God over here. But that's not what they're for. The burden of preaching, and proclamation is designed to be a gift for you. Because it's a joyful, joyful gift, to be able to speak God's word to you, to help guide you and turn you back to Christ. Because we all need to hear it right. Every week, every day, our sinful nature wants to draw us away. And we need to hear God's word proclaimed to us, so that we can be pulled back again. That's what Elijah and Elijah did. Right? They were always called to go out into the world and say, return to the Lord your God, come back to him. For every person who would stray. And through most of Elijah's ministry, it was because the king was doing the opposite. And within the church, I am blessed that I do not have King Ahab's or queen Jezza bells, running around in my congregation. I have the faithful people of God, who come desiring to hear the word, who come wanting to be told of their sin, needing to be told about repentance, and craving, the forgiveness and healing that comes from Christ. And what a joy it is to be able to give it and speaking, just as you I hope, find it joy to hear it. It's a gift. Because it's through these words that God has preserved the message of Jesus Christ and calls you again and delivers the gift of salvation. What a joyful gift that is. God has preserved this office of prophet like he did with Elijah and the sons of the prophets. He continues to preserve it in this proclaiming office of Pastor which God gives you as a gift to give you the word so that we can remain faithful. In Jesus name, Amen.

Getting Ready for Sunday: Mark 9:2-9 The Gospel Reading for Sunday, February 11th

Mark 1:29-39

And immediately he left the synagogue and entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. Now Simon's mother-in-law lay ill with a fever, and immediately they told him about her. And he came and took her by the hand and lifted her up, and the fever left her, and she began to serve them.

That evening at sundown they brought to him all who were sick or oppressed by demons. And the whole city was gathered together at the door. And he healed many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons. And he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.

And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed. And Simon and those who were with him searched for him, and they found him and said to him, “Everyone is looking for you.” And he said to them, “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out.” And he went throughout all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Gospel reading for Sunday, February 11, comes from Mark chapter nine, verses two through nine. After six days, Jesus took with him, Peter, and James, and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them. and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them. And there appeared to them, Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus. And Peter said to Jesus, Rabbi, it is good that we are here, let us make three tents, one for you, and one for Moses and one for Elijah. For he did not know what to say, for they were terrified, and a cloud overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud. This is my beloved Son, listen to him. And suddenly, looking around, they no longer saw anyone with them, but Jesus only. And as they were coming down the mountain, he charged them to tell no one what they had seen, until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. Here ends the reading. Now, this is a short story of the end, a famous story of Jesus's transfiguration. So what I want to do is, I really want to slow down and take a look at it. Because sometimes when we read stories that we hear every single year, we don't always pick up on the new ones nuances. So let's do it. So, and after six days, Jesus took with him, Peter, and James, and John. So six days after what had been going on before this, Jesus takes his three inner core apostles, Peter, James, and John, and he takes them up to a high mountain by themselves. And it goes. And so going up this high mountain, this sort of retreat thing is something that Jesus frequently did. We just had in our gospel reading, this past Sunday, a time where Jesus God does His healing thing, and all the people come to his house. And then early in the morning, he rises and goes out to a desolate place to pray. So Jesus does this a lot, he goes off by himself, or he takes a few with him. And this time, he takes Peter, James and John, go up the high mountain. And then it says, And he was transfigured before them. So Jesus was changed, and he was right in front of the apostles. It continues, and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them. Now, we live in a world where there's white, all over the place, where the prevalence of really nice cloth of washing machines of dyes and generally a clean world compared to the world of Jesus's day, and so we get things, things can be pretty white. In fact, right now I'm surrounded by white paper, it's almost glowing. But that was not the world of Jesus's day. White did not stay white, for very long, when you were walking on dirt paths out in the wilderness where you had all of these these difficult challenges, like dusty animals everywhere. Traveling was tough. You didn't do it in a car with air conditioning. You walked. And so nobody wore white. It was not white. And if you did, it did not stay white for very long. So Jesus is closed change says they become radiant, intensely white, so white, that no one could make them that white in a natural way. It continues, and they appear to them Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus. Of course, the perfect question. The one everybody asks is, how in the world did the apostles know that it was Elijah with Moses? Like did they have picked have pictures in their wallets? Was there a traditional like, name tag? A, like a lanyard? You know, hanging around their neck? Hello, my name is Elijah. Or it was Moses carrying stone tablets just to be like, Yeah, you know what, these are nuts. That's how we have no idea how they were recognized him. It seems to me likely that the the way they? Well, I don't know, nobody really knows, we'll just leave it at that. And so they were talking with Jesus. Mark doesn't tell us what they're talking about. And so it's just a conversation. And Peter said to Jesus, Rabbi, it is good that we are here. Now this this address rabbi, is for a teacher, right? Teacher, it is good that we are here. So he's excited. Let us make three tents, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah. Okay, so Peter proposes an action, he's going to set up three tents, these are probably not the pup tents you think of from Boy Scouts, or Girl Scouts, these would have been the kind of tents that you lived in, like in ancient Israel, you know, when they were wandering through the wilderness with Moses, and they make tents. Or as they do in the Feast of Tabernacles. Every year, they would build this big tent that you could live in. And so Peter says, well, let's put up some houses here. They're movable houses, but houses nonetheless, one for each of you, Moses, Elijah, and for you. What did Peter want to do with those? We have no idea. And maybe he didn't either, because the Bible says, For he did not know what to say, for they were terrified. And our man Peter, he never lets not knowing what to say, stop him from saying something. He just put it out there. Hey, you know what, sometimes you just got to speak and let let your brain catch up afterward. Well, this is of course, weird. They were terrified. They had no idea what was going on. Then it says, in the cloud, overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud.

So the cloud overshadows them. And then there's a voice. Now, this cloud on the top of a mountain, it doesn't describe it. But it is reminiscent of the cloud that would have gone on the top of Mount Sinai. That was a vision of the presence of God. And so we see this cloud on the top of Mount Sinai as the way that God spoke to Moses. And maybe it's something like that. And don't we know that a voice comes, and it says, This is My beloved Son, listen to him. And then suddenly, looking around, they no longer saw anyone with them, but Jesus only. Now, this is the moment, that should be the center of the story. The cloud comes and you get a voice. This is my beloved son. Listen to him. When we think about stories, especially stories, because we have them visually, right, we see TV shows, we see movies, and even when we read books, what we really care about is the plot, what are the characters doing, and you can understand the characters best by their actions. And that's what we might expect from ancient literature. And if we come at it with that lens, then we're looking at all the stuff that's going on, the really important things are the Moses and Elijah appearing in the clothes, intensely white, and all this amazing stuff that's happening. And then the words don't mean so much. But in ancient literature, the words meant more and the actions meant less. And so all of the stuff that happened up until now, the close becoming intensely white, Elijah and Moses appearing Peter, not knowing what to say, but speaking anyway, leads to the moment where the voice from the cloud says, listen to him. That's the core of the story. Moses and Elijah, come down to tell Peter, and all of us, just listen, don't speak. Don't make stuff up. Don't try to tell Jesus who he should be and what he should do. Just listen. And that's what God calls us to do. Right? To hear the Word of God. Listen, and believe and obey. The reading ends with the follow up, it says, And as they were coming down the mountain, he charged them to tell no one what they had seen, until the Son of Man had risen from Dead. So there we go down the mountain. He says, don't tell anyone until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. And you got to wonder, do you do you think they understood what that meant? I don't, because they didn't it. That's what the Bible says, right after the reading it says, so they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead might mean. And so it seems to me likely that they really needed to listen to Jesus and be ready to just wait. Because they didn't understand what he might be saying that he would rise from the dead. We to need to just listen. Oh, Jesus tells us all about who he is. But so often, we want to say no, no, no, no, we really would like you to be like what we want. And all that does is it covers up the truth. And we need to understand the reality of who Christ is because only a real and true Christ is going to save us. And so when we can turn to Him and hear his word, we know the truth. And he teaches us and guides us and gives us life. That's all I have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: 2 Corinthians 3:12-18; 4:1-6 The Epistle Reading for Sunday, February 11th, 2024

2 Corinthians 3:12-18, 4:1-6

Since we have such a hope, we are very bold, not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit…

Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart.But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Epistle reading for Sunday, February 11, come from Second Corinthians chapter three, verses 12 through 18. And chapter four verses one through six. Since we have such a hope, we are very bold, not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face, so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. But their minds were hardened. For to this day when they read the Old Covenant, that same veil remains on lifted, because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day, whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord has the spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all with unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. From this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning, or to tamper with God's word. But by the Open statement of the truth, we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the god of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, for what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as Your servants for Jesus's sake. For God, who said, Let light shine out of darkness has shone in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Here ends the reading. So this reading begins with a reference to Moses, who had to put a veil over his face when he went up to see God. And so it says, since we have such a hope, we are very bold, not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. So the story is a story of when Moses would come down from the from talking to God, His face glowed. It was so bright, that it terrified the people. And so he had to put a veil over his face, so that they wouldn't be scared by his glowing face. And their hearts and their minds were hardened so that they did not see Moses and understand what was going on. And they still don't in Paul's day, he says, For to this day, when they read the Old Covenant, that same veil remains unlisted. Because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day, whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their hearts. So when synagogues would read the law of Moses, Paul says that the Jewish people, there was a veil over their hearts, preventing them from seeing the glory of Christ, just like the veil prevented people from seeing Moses's face when it was glowing. And what that is, is when when you don't have Jesus Christ, to unlock the key, to be the key to unlock the Old Testament, you never truly understand and see the glory of what God is doing. Without Christ. The law is just a series of rules and an old covenant that people have to obey or else. But in Christ, what we see is that this Old Covenant has become a promise that through Christ, God would save the world, and that all of the things that were requirements and rules and laws have been fulfilled by a Savior, who came to reveal the true heart of God by dying on a cross and rising from the dead. And with that key, you can finally unlock the treasure chest of the Old Testament to see God's love for the whole world. And that is why Paul says, But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. He continues is now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all with unveiled faces beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. So similar to Moses, who would go up and see God with his unveiled face, and then would come down in Vail, Paul is saying that we who are seeing the glory of God through the Word through the proclamation of the gospel, and and by understanding Christ in the Old Testament, are being transformed, like Moses was to have the glory of God reflected in us that into the same image from one degree of glory to another. That's what he's talking about. So then he goes to the word, therefore, therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. So we have this glorious transformation in us so we don't lose heart. And then, but we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning, or to tamper with God's word. But by the Open statement of the truth, we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. Isn't that the best way to do ministry, right? He says, We do not lose heart. But we also don't try to trick people. He says, We do not tamper or with God's Word or practice cunning. Now there's, there's lots of, of people who kind of lost confidence in the power of the proclamation of the gospel, and the power of God's Word. And we act like we have to dress it up, we have to, we have to coat it with something else, we have to tamp it down, we have to hide it, we have to feed it to people with a spoonful of sugar, or maybe just the spoonful of sugar, without any medicine to go with it. And we act like the the world just is unable to accept the true Word of God, the full power of the gospel. And I think that's why the Christian church is where it is, or dithering about all sorts of things. And we just don't seem to be willing to preach the full gospel of Jesus Christ. And St. Paul is, he says, We do not tamper with God's word. We commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. And you know, what happens if there are people who hear the word of God in the proclamation of the gospel, and they don't believe that's not the church's fault. St. Paul says, and even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the god of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. And so if the gospel is veiled, it's only veiled to the people who don't understand it and don't believe it, that there is a barrier that keeps them from understanding, it's not a problem with the Word of God, it's a problem with the hearer. Now, sometimes people take that too far. And they use that as an excuse to be cruel and mean with God's word. And then they act like well, it's not my fault, I'm being a jerk, you're the one who's supposed to be better. Now, we can't do that either. We can't be jerks with the gospel. There's other passages that talk about that. But what it does say is that when the gospel is proclaimed, sometimes people just aren't going to believe. And that's not a problem with the Proclaimer. Or a problem with the gospel. It's a problem in the heart of the person who hears it. Because the God of the world has blinded their mind, so that they cannot see pogos for what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord with ourselves as Your servants for Jesus sake. For God, who said, Let light shine out of darkness has shone in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. So we don't proclaim ourselves but Jesus Christ, and the God who said, let the light shine out of darkness. He brings the gospel, the light of Christ into our hearts. And isn't that enough? I know I know. Many people who may be listening to this many people who grew up in the Church lived in a time when the church had so much respect and power, and there was money and kids and we were building buildings and everything was great. And it might not seem like that now But

isn't that the sort of the side beside the point of the church? Maybe it's just enough that a God who said let light shine out of darkness has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of a son of the face of Jesus Christ. That's all I have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: Psalm 50:1-6 The Psalm for Sunday, February 11th 2024

Psalm 50:1-6

The Mighty One, God the Lord,
    speaks and summons the earth
    from the rising of the sun to its setting.
Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty,
    God shines forth.

Our God comes; he does not keep silence;
    before him is a devouring fire,
    around him a mighty tempest.
He calls to the heavens above
    and to the earth, that he may judge his people:
“Gather to me my faithful ones,
    who made a covenant with me by sacrifice!”
The heavens declare his righteousness,
    for God himself is judge!

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The psalm for Sunday, February 11, comes from Psalm 50, verses one through six, the Mighty One, God, the Lord speaks and summons the earth, from the rising of the sun to its setting. out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God shines forth, our God comes, he does not keep silence. Before him is a devouring fire around him a mighty tempest. He calls to the heavens above and to the earth that he made judge his people gathered to me, my faithful ones who made a covenant with me by sacrifice. The heavens declare his righteousness, for God himself, is Judge hearings, the reading. Let's dive in the mighty one God, the Lord speaks and summons the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting. So the psalm begins with a title for God, the Mighty One, God, the Lord, he speaks and summons the Earth. This is talking about the power of God's voice to bring the creation into reality. But I think it's also as it's talking about the rising of the Suns to its setting and the gathering of people, he speaks, and he causes things to happen. In this part, in particular, it's summoning the earth that is summoning all the peoples of the earth, from everywhere from when the sun rises to the sunsets to gather together, probably heading towards Jerusalem, because that's what it says next out of Zion, the perfection of beauty. God shines forth. So Zion is a way of talking about the mountain on which Jerusalem sits. And so Zion is Jerusalem. It's the place where God chose to put his name. And we know that through the temple that David built, that God would be there he would dwell amongst to peep his people and be their God. And that is why it calls this mountain, the perfection of beauty. It's not because Mount Zion is anything special. It's lower than other mountains, and it's not particularly beautiful. But it's the perfection of beauty because God has there. As it says, later, God shines forth. Next, it says, Our God comes, he does not keep silence, before him is a devouring fire around him a mighty tempest. So this is our God it comes. So it's expressing faith that God is coming. This could be for people who are looking in exile or worried about dangers or problems they're facing and saying, God comes, we know it, and he does not keep silence. God does not sneak when he shows up to judge, he is not a ninja to hide and dash and come out and strike when no one is watching. God does not keep silence. He is not trying to fool the enemy. He comes with a devouring fire, and around him a mighty tempest. This might be the image that you would think of with Moses and Mount Sinai, where there's fire and lightning and clouds and devouring Tempest. This is the image of the true God. It continues, he calls to the heavens above and to the earth that he may judge his people. So this is a reference to the the Old Testament and the making of the covenant. When when God made the covenant with His people, Israel, he made heaven and earth, the witnesses of the covenant. And so they were the ones who would witness the terms of the covenant, and they would they would be the ones who would testify whether God's people have kept it or not. And in fact, I forget exactly where it is. But there is a scene where one of the prophets holds a trial. And he calls on the heavens in the earth to bear witness about the ways that Israel has broken the covenant. And so this is a reference to that. So the heavens and the earth are gathered together so that God may bring about this judgment. And what does he do? He says, gathered to me my faithful ones who made a covenant with me by sacrifice. And so God gathers together the ones who remain faithful, who make this covenant and stay within it with the sacrifice. And God wants to bring mercy on them. And God gathers together people today through a sacrifice with a new covenant. Jesus, Jesus says, This is my blood of the new covenant, which has shed for you for the forgiveness of sins, and we partake of that sacrificial meal, when we eat Christ's body and drink his blood, like the great sacrificial meals and fellowship offerings of the Old Testament, like the Passover Lamb that was sacrificed in memory of the Passover covenant that God had made when he brought his people out of Israel. We too, are gathered together as God's faithful ones around the covenant meal of Christ's Body and Blood. The psalm finishes with the heavens declare his righteousness for God himself is judge. And so again, we see the heavens being witnesses in this trial, and they declare God's judgment on the on the covenant people as righteous because they are the witnesses, and God Himself is the judge. And we know that God does judge with righteousness. Even when when people are condemned or hurt or bad things happen. God is a righteous judge. But his righteousness also comes with mercy, mercy through His Son, Jesus Christ. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Getting Ready for Sunday: 2 Kings 2:1-12 The Old Testament Reading for Sunday, February 11th, 2024

2 Kings 2:1-12

Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. And Elijah said to Elisha, “Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel.” But Elisha said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they went down to Bethel. And the sons of the prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you?” And he said, “Yes, I know it; keep quiet.”

Elijah said to him, “Elisha, please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho.” But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they came to Jericho. The sons of the prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you?” And he answered, “Yes, I know it; keep quiet.”

Then Elijah said to him, “Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan.” But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So the two of them went on. Fifty men of the sons of the prophets also went and stood at some distance from them, as they both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his cloak and rolled it up and struck the water, and the water was parted to the one side and to the other, till the two of them could go over on dry ground.

When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Ask what I shall do for you, before I am taken from you.” And Elisha said, “Please let there be a double portion of your spirit on me.” And he said, “You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it shall be so for you, but if you do not see me, it shall not be so.” And as they still went on and talked, behold, chariots of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it and he cried, “My father, my father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!” And he saw him no more.

Then he took hold of his own clothes and tore them in two pieces.

Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation.

The Old Testament reading for Sunday, February 11, comes from Second Kings chapter two verses one through 12. Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elijah were on their way from Gilgal. And Elijah said to Elijah, please stay here, for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel. But Elijah said, As the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you. So they went down to Bethel. And the sons of the prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha and said to him, do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you? And he said, Yes, I know it. Keep quiet. Elijah said to him, Elijah, please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho. But he said, As the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you. So they came to Jericho, the sons of the prophets who are at Jericho drew near to Elisha and said to him, do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you? And He answered, Yes, I know it, keep quiet. Then Elijah said to him, please stay here for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan. But he said, As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you. So the two of them went on 50 min of the sons of the prophets also went and stood at some distance from them. As they both were standing by the Jordan, then Elijah took his cloak and rolled it up and struck the water, and the water was parted to the one side and to the other, till the two of them could go over on dry ground. When they had crossed, Elijah said to Eli Shah, asked what I shall do for you before I am taken from you. And Elijah said, Please, let there be a double portion of your spirit on me. And he said, You have asked a hard thing yet, if you see me as I am taken from you, it shall be so for you. But if you do not see me, it shall not be so. And as they still went on and talked, behold, chariots of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elijah saw it, and he cried, my father, my father, the chariots of Israel, and its horsemen. And he saw him no more than he took a hold of his own clothes and tore them into pieces. Here ends the reading. This is such an interesting story, really dramatic and powerful. The idea of Elijah the prophet going up into heaven. And it begins with Elijah taking his apprentice, Eli Shah, all around the area. He Elijah takes Eli Shah, and they go to Bethel. And he, he tells a lie show stay behind. And Elijah says, No, I'm going with you. And they get there. And it's really interesting. So it says, And so they went down to Bethel, and the sons of the prophets who are in Bethel came out to Elisha and said to him, now I'm pausing there, because I want you to think a little bit about Elijah's life. That phrase, the sons of the prophets should strike you a little bit. Remember what Elijah's early Prophet prophetic ministry was like, Elijah goes up against the king, and his wife Jezebel is out killing all the prophets of God. And it gets so bad that Elijah ends up curling up in the wilderness and asking God to kill him because he's the only prophet left. And everybody is out to hunt him and kill him and find him and make him dead. He's like, just kill me. It's over. And now, within the same lifetime, Elijah is going from town to town, and every where he goes, the sons of the prophets, which are prophets themselves, like the local prophets of God, are coming out of the town to meet them. He goes from being the last of his kind, persecuted almost dead, ready to call it quits. And now there are prophets everywhere. Amazing, right? It's amazing what God did in one man's lifetime to go from what looks like terrible defeat to all the sudden seminaries are springing up everywhere and producing pastors all over the place. Just an interesting note. So when they get there, the sons of the prophets come out and they go to Elisha, and they say to him, Hey, do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you? And Alicia knows? He says, Yes, I know. Keep quiet. What is that about? I actually have no idea. I'm trying to figure out why is a lie, Shah, trying to keep all this quiet. So I should take some again. So they go down to Jericho. He says stay here. But Alicia says nope. As the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you. So they go on the tour. This time they come down to Jericho. And the same thing happens, another group of the sons of the prophets comes out. And they say the same thing. Do you not know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you? And Alicia replies, again? Yes, I know it. Keep quiet. So Elijah does it again, stay here, I'm going to the Jordan. They go down to the Jordan 50 Men of the sons of the prophets, so just a portion of the sons of the prophets also come. And they stood at a distance and they see this. And then Elijah rolls up his cloak strikes it in the water, and they go across. And here's where you get some very interesting things. Elijah then turns to Elijah and says, asked me what you want from me? What should I do? And Elijah says, give me a double portion of your spirit. Oh, here, I'll quote it. It says, Please let there be a double portion of your spirit on me. What is Elijah asking? What we see here is a, an inheritance language. When a man dies, and leaves his sons in inheritance, the inheritance is spread out amongst the sons equally except for the firstborn son, who gets a double portion. And so this is inheritance language. Elijah has been going out to all the quote unquote, sons of the prophets, and showing off Elijah and they're seeing everyone. And now that Elijah is going up into heaven, Eli Shah is asking to be the firstborn son of the Prophet, not to receive like twice Elijah spirit, but a double portion as in to be the chief, the firstborn, the double portion of the inheritance. And so as the Office of Prophet is passed down from Elijah, who's kind of the stereotypical prophet Elijah becomes the main Prophet with all the sons of the prophets are also inheriting a portion of that office in spirit as it's been passed down to them. And so Alicia becomes kind of the key one, as we move into the next set of stories in Kings, while Alicia passes that inheritance on, and there are other prophets, but Alicia is the main one. So he says, You've asked a hard thing, yet if you see me as I am being taken from you, it shall be so for you. But if you do not see me, it shall not be so. So what they do is that he says, if you see me when I'm taken up, you'll get the the double portion. If you don't, you won't get the double portion. So Elijah sees it, he cries out this, this chariot of fire goes in between them preventing Elijah from getting near Elijah, and then Elijah is taken up into heaven in a whirlwind. What comes after this is is a big deal, because it shows what the result is. Eli Shah, he tears his clothes. And then he goes to the Jordan, the place where Elijah took off his mantle and rolled it up and slapped the Jordan River. So he like shot does the same thing takes off his mantle slaps the Jordan River and it parts and he walks across on dry ground. And this shows that Elijah has power has been passed on. He's received Elijah spirit. And Eli Shah is now the main guy. What I take from this is that this office of Prophet is passed down in the history of Israel. similarly to the way we have the office of pastor and that there's this proclamation element of the Prophet If that is passed on to the people, and then now that Christ has come we have something very similar in every congregation and in every place a, a prophetic ministry of preaching that goes out into the world. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Is God Like Us? Sermon from Sunday, February 4th 2024

Isaiah 40:21-31

Do you not know? Do you not hear?
    Has it not been told you from the beginning?
    Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
It is he who sits above the circle of the earth,
    and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers;
who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
    and spreads them like a tent to dwell in;
who brings princes to nothing,
    and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness.

Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown,
    scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth,
when he blows on them, and they wither,
    and the tempest carries them off like stubble.

To whom then will you compare me,
    that I should be like him? says the Holy One.
Lift up your eyes on high and see:
    who created these?
He who brings out their host by number,
    calling them all by name;
by the greatness of his might
    and because he is strong in power,
    not one is missing.

Why do you say, O Jacob,
    and speak, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,
    and my right is disregarded by my God”?
Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
    the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary;
    his understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the faint,
    and to him who has no might he increases strength.
Even youths shall faint and be weary,
    and young men shall fall exhausted;
but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
    they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
    they shall walk and not faint.

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

The season of epiphany is all about revealing the identity and person and work of Jesus Christ. We see today in the Gospel reading a savior going out and freeing people as God's anointed. By casting out demons, preaching the gospel and healing the sick. We learn who Jesus is. And it culminates in next Sunday's story of the Transfiguration, where Jesus appears at the top of a mountain with Moses and Elijah. And the voice says, This is my Son, listen to him.

People have a lot of weird ideas about God.

This should be no surprise, you live in a culture where you get to hear all sorts of crazy ideas about God. You may read about them in books, you may hear people on radio, or online or in podcasts or whatever media you consume.

There's some strange ideas about God out there.

And that's actually no different than any time in history. People have always had weird ideas about who God is, and what he does. Ideas, not based on any sort of Revelation, but whatever it is, the culture suggests.

It's true today. And it was true in ancient Israel.

And one of the main problems that the book of Isaiah tries to deal with are the common problems with the understanding of who God is, amidst all of the craziness that the rest of the world thinks.

And so Isaiah, chapter 40, today helps to correct some ideas of who God is, and how he fits in creation, that the people of that time we're dealing with.

And oddly enough,

many of the ideas that our culture has about God, are pretty similar to the ideas that the ancient Israelites might have had. Because human beings haven't really changed. I know, not a big surprise, right?

Most of us, when we think about God on our own, we imagine God being a little bit like ourselves, just bigger and better. When you think about God,

most people have this image. It's the Santa Claus in the white robe, right? There's the big bearded man in the sky long and gray, and he looks down on the world.

That really isn't all that different from the old pagan ideas of Baal, and Asherah, that the ancient Israelites used to believe in.

And it's not all that different than say, the Greek gods with Zeus and Athena, and all of those things.

In fact, human beings have always imagined God, basically, as a bigger and better version of us, stronger, more powerful, but kind of like us in that way.

And Isaiah, his message to ancient Israel, and to us today is God is not like that.

So what I'd like to do is make a comparison, using Isaiah chapter 40. To compare the true God on one hand with the guy that may be, you know, best Zeus, right? If you can reach back into your elementary school Greek mythology lessons and remember, who is Zeus is, what I'd like to do is make a comparison between that old idea of Zeus and the true God, and see how that sort of fits in with the way people think about God and mix the two.

So let's take a look.

I think one of the best ways to understand who Zeus really is is not through all the mythology, but to take a look at the Iliad. The Iliad is has much more conversation back and forth between Zeus and the other gods and Zeus and the heroes. And so one of the things that we see in the in the Iliad, is that Zeus has limited attention.

In fact, I think one of my favorite stories from that is z

looses decided that in the Iliad that the Greeks and the Trojans, he has a favorite, he knows who he wants to win. And he's declared it from the beginning. And the other gods are not so happy about that. So what does Hera do? Hara goes in and dresses in her nicest clothing, she puts on her best perfume. And she seduces her husband, Zeus,

to distract him, so that the other gods can do stuff. And he is so distracted that he, well, eventually he falls asleep after enjoying her company. And then Poseidon can go out and fight at the head of the battle, and turn the tide against what Zeus wants.

Now, none of us imagine our God to be like that, right? He doesn't get distracted by pretty ladies and good smelling perfume.

But I do think sometimes we imagine him as having limited attention.

That is,

if he's paying attention in one place, he can't in another.

Or that may be if a whole bunch of people are praying about really important things, his queue fills up. And so it's the minor things that just don't get listened to. As if God has limited attention.

Or even

that you might get lost,

that you might not be seen by him.

And if God is just that bearded man floating in the sky, who's just a bigger version of us, it means that maybe he's looking in one place

and not another.

This is not how God works.

God does not have limited attention like us, he does not have a a narrow gaze, because God is not a bearded man floating in the sky.

He is the foundation of all being the creator of the heavens and the earth.

As it says, It is he who sits on the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He brings princes to nothing and makes rulers of the earth as emptiness.

God does not have limited attention for his creation.

He sees all things and knows all things.

And you're never outside of his sight.

Which can be a little scary when we sin.

But it's pretty great when we pray. Right?

Because there are some times when people think God isn't listening. In fact, I've had people come to me and say, Pastor, I just don't want to bother God with you know, this minor thing, right? I mean, he's really, he's a busy guy. He's got more important things to think about.

But that's not the case.

I once had a person, I scheduled a time to go visit with them. And it's always funny, when I go visit, they people often will have a burning question in their heart. And they'll say something to me, like, Oh, Pastor, I know you're busy. I don't want to bother you with and then they bring out this important question in their spiritual life. And I think you should have asked me that six months ago.

And this was one of those questions. I went to visit a couple and they brought me in and we did the chatting and we visited.

And they said that thing it was pastor, you know, I have this question, and I just didn't want to bother. I know you're busy. I feel like God doesn't listen to my prayers.

Right? That's a big question, isn't it?

Maybe God was too busy. Maybe he just didn't look on them. Whatever. That wasn't a minor problem. That was a big problem. And

the answer is course. God, here's all our prayer. He does not have limited attention. He does not have to go over to Ukraine because there's a war there and ignore the United's

dates. He does not go to the hospitals and like, okay, all of these people are sick, so I can't worry about the family over there.

He hears and knows, and responds to all things.

He listens to you.

And we know that because our Savior Jesus Christ promises that through him, all of your prayers are presented to the Father, our Great High Priest brings everything to Him.

And God promises to hear.

He promises to respond and answer every prayer.

Whether you feel like they're being heard or not,

whether your heart is overjoyed or sad,

in all circumstances, your prayers go to the Father.

Now, he may or may not always say yes.

But know that he is there, and he hears and he cares.

Another way that our understanding of God sometimes is limited, is that we think of God as if he is limited in action.

Zoo Zeus in the Iliad, he is limited to the in the things that he can do, because he is can only be in one place at a time.

He can be up in up with Hara, or hanging out with the gods. But then he can't be down around Troy.

He's off galavanting are having fun, his eyes aren't on a place where he is he wants to do stuff.

He can only be in one place at a time.

And while we don't think of God, like the Greek god, Zeus, if we do think of him as that man, bearded man floating up in heaven, sometimes we think that God's action in the world is limited.

Because if he's up there looking down, it means he's not down here, in control of all things, and doing things.

It means that his fingers only reach down and touch in one spot or another, and that he's limited in his ability to intervene in creation.

And we know that that is not true.

God is not limited in the amount of multitasking he can do.

I certainly am limited in the multitasking that I can do. I have one of those brains that once I switch from one task to another, the previous task is as if it never existed.

And my poor wife knows that because I walk around the house going, where did I leave my even though I set them down 30 seconds ago? Of course, she's always got the answer, because she's so much smarter than me.

And

God isn't like that, right?

He can be doing all things in all places, isn't a man floating up in the clouds, who just sort of reaches down every once in a while, which is how we know that Jesus Christ can be present in every congregation, in every sanctuary, all across the planet earth, all at the same time.

Because we're not the only place that has Christ's Body and Blood with us today, right?

There are hundreds of 1000s, maybe millions of congregations that are gathering together where God has come to be present in a unique and amazing way.

That isn't limited in action. It's not like he can have 100,000 pieces of his body and blood. And then he says, Wait a second, I'm full. You'll have to wait till next week. Right?

He couldn't be here in this place. With us doing things by his mind and his power, and there is no limit to it.

And that's the same wherever you are.

That you don't leave God's protection when you go home. You don't leave his area of activity when you're out at work. And

he is always there.

With you, he is always there to guide and protect and be with you.

And you can't leave that.

God isn't like Zeus, or the bearded man in the sky. He's unlimited in his ability to act in the world.

And even more than that He is unlimited in his power to act in the world.

The Zeus is quite limited. In the Iliad, even though he is more powerful than all the other gods, he spends a lot of time threatening them to try to get them to do what he wants. And there's in one book, there is a long thing about how if they all teamed up against him, he could still fight them all. And even if they they had the strength of them all, they couldn't lift the things that he can lift,

which is really kind of petty for God, right? But no one accused Zeus, of not being petty.

We don't imagine God to be like that guy that threatens the other gods into obedience.

But sometimes,

when we imagine the bearded man in the sky and the white robe,

we act as if creation is sort of running on its own. The natural world just sort of happens. And every once in a while God intervenes. And that sometimes

things happen that are out of his control.

And we do that often to try to get around the bad things that happen in creation.

As if God could not be there with his power and his action. When a car accident happens,

or cancer,

or tragedy, and

sometimes we say that God withdraws his hand over us, or no, that wasn't God, that was Satan.

And that's what the Israelites are kind of thinking at this time.

That maybe God isn't everywhere doing all things. When he says, Why do you say, oh, Jacob and speak, oh, Israel, my way is hidden from the Lord and my right is disregarded by my God. Have you not known Have you not heard, the Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth, he does not faint or grow weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might, he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young man shall fall exhausted, but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength.

God is in control of everything.

Even Satan, right?

God is there in all things. Now you might think, Wait, wait, wait, God is there in the bad stuff too.

But which is worse, God being in control of everything,

or not being in control of everything.

Right? We want a God who can be there with us in the tragedy, who we can say, I know that this is part of your plan to bring me to the resurrection, and that there is nothing that can take me out of that plan, not even Satan, himself.

And the best way to know that even Satan is under God's control is to realize that without Satan,

Jesus's death and resurrection wouldn't have happened.

Right?

All Satan would have had to do to win

was just not do anything.

Not tempt Judas to betray Jesus, not go into his heart and cause the him to take the blood money, not act with the Pharisees and tempt them to react against Jesus. If he had just backed off and said, I think I'm gonna go over to Asia instead.

None of it would have happened.

But the devil is God's devil.

And even he was part of the plan to bring Christ to the cross, to put him in the ground and raise him from the dead.

Even that was under God's control.

Which means that we can trust that when these bad things happen

They are still part of God's plan to bring us to eternal life. And they're still part of a loving father, providing for his children.

That nothing can take us out of that. No act of Satan is no spiritual force. No tragedy can pull us out of God's salvation, and out of his power.

So we can be sure that God will bring us to this resurrection, and we will not be lost.

People have weird ideas about God, whether it's the old gods, Baal and Asherah, or Zeus, or the floating man up in the sky,

but they're not at all the true God.

It's good for us to notice and understand that our God is not like us. He's not a bigger and better version of us. He is so powerful and so mighty, and so unlimited. That it really kind of hurts our brains to recognize it.

But it's good.

It's only that God can save us the way we need him to.

In Jesus name, Amen.