Divine Service

LWML Sunday 2017

                                                              LWML Sunday 2017

                                                              LWML Sunday 2017

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2017 LWML Sunday

Sermon Text: 2 Timothy 4:1-4

Reverend Dr. Lawrence R. Rast Jr.- President of Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana

“Be Ready to Confess Jesus”

2017 is really a rather amazing year.

First off, of course, it is the 500th anniversary of Luther’s posting of the 95 Theses. The whole word is paying attention to Luther this year. In fact, it seems like 2017 is all Luther all the time—24/7/365! This is a big deal!

But there is even more to 2017. This year marks the 75th anniversary of the Lutheran Women’s Missionary League, our LWML, which has done so much to encourage and support the sharing of Christ’s gospel within our Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod and among partners and friends throughout the world. This is a big deal!

In the half millennium since the Reformation began and the 75 years since the LWML formally organized itself, confessing the faith has not gotten any easier. In fact, it may be even more difficult for us to speak and to live as Christians today. And who knows what the future might hold for us, our children, and our grandchildren? Yet God is faithful and has promised that His church will survive all the challenges that the devil, the world, and our own sinful flesh can throw at us. 

Building on God’s promises, we know that this is our time to be distinctly Lutheran. As confessing Lutherans in a rapidly changing world and in an increasingly hostile culture, we need to Be Ready to Confess the Gospel of Christ to a world that desperately needs to hear it.

I. Confessing Christ is Central to Our Identity as Christians

To be proclaimers of the message of salvation is central to our identity as Christ’s people.

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching (2 Timothy 4:1-2).

When Saint Paul wrote these words to Timothy, he did so as one writing to a fellow pastor, a man specifically called to carrying out the office of the public ministry. And he did so also knowing full well the challenges that faced preachers of the Gospel in the setting of the early church. But he did so also knowing that Timothy had come to the faith through the Holy Spirit working through faithful teaching of a committed mother and grandmother. I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well (2 Timothy 1:5).

The good news of the Gospel is given to each of us to share with those whom God places in our sphere of influence regardless of our station in life. Proclaiming the salvation won by Jesus is not just “the pastor’s job.” Every single one of us is all called to be ready to confess Christ as God opens the doors for us to do so.  You are called to be ready to confess!

The need for sharing Christ is as pronounced today as it has ever been. While it is true that somewhere around 90 percent of Americans claim that they believe in “God,” their understanding of the one, true God is often less than biblical. Add to that the fact that upwards of 60 percent of Evangelical Christians (a category that would include LCMS members) think there may be other ways to salvation outside of faith in Jesus, and the need to be ready to confess the message of salvation by grace alone through faith alone because of Christ alone is as pressing today as ever.

Add to that Paul’s realistic assessment of where people were at his time.

For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

It sounds like a commentary on 2017!

II. Luther Was Ready to Confess

But not just 2017 – also 1517. The setting in which God called Martin Luther to confess Christ was easily as confused as our own day. Worship of saints had intruded on worship of Christ; works were preached as necessary to salvation in addition to faith in Christ; purgatory, images, relics, and other aberrations had obscured the Gospel of salvation in Christ alone.

This context, of course, led to the unique character of the Lutheran Reformation. For Luther, as he read the New Testament and particularly read Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, was confronted by the question of righteousness: What does it mean to be right in God’s eyes? And the Scriptures were clear to him: keep God’s law perfectly. However, he knew that he did not keep God’s law perfectly; he knew that he did not keep God’s law sufficiently.

Oh, he tried to make things right. He went to his priest repeatedly and confessed his sins. He dredged up every thought, word, deed from a lifetime of sin, confessed it, was conditionally absolved, and then went and did good works as a satisfaction. But as he worked, he remembered other sins. His mind recalled other things that he had done, and he realized that his confession of sin was insufficient. And that meant his works were not enough. Finally, his priest confronted him: “Luther, it is not that God hates you; it is that you hate God.”

The dam finally broke when Luther understood, through the Scriptures, that the righteousness of God is not about us being good enough. The righteousness of God is about Christ who is perfect. Christ, the God-man, who has completed salvation for Luther, for you, and for me, perfectly, once and for all. There is a great exchange that occurs. The filthy rags of our sinfulness and rebellion towards God, Jesus took upon Himself, carried it to the cross, and crucified it once and for all. The perfect righteousness that is His, He now clothes us in and through the waters of Holy Baptism. Where before there was sinner, God now sees his perfectly redeemed child through Christ; where before the person was far from God, there is now a child of God. God’s work is for us and is applied to us freely and completely because of Christ.

III. God Calls Us to Be Ready to Confess

This Gospel This—the biblical Gospel—is what we must be ready to confess!

Luther didn’t see all of this clearly in 1517. It took a few years for him to work out all of the scriptural implications. But once he did he was ready to confess—and he did so to the end of his life in 1546.

Which poses a question for us. How do we, like Luther, prepare ourselves to be ready to confess?

Today in particular, as we’ve already noted, we want to recall the work of the Lutheran Women’s Missionary League, which is celebrating its diamond anniversary this year.

The LWML has had a marvelous impact on the mission efforts of the congregations, districts, seminaries, and other entities of our Synod. And it has done so always by carrying out faithfully its mission “to assist each woman of The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod in affirming her relationship with the Triune God so that she is enabled to use her gifts in ministry to the people of the world.”

There is never a perfect time to start an organization like the LWML, but could we have chosen a time more challenging than 1942? The world had been at war for three years and the United States had joined the effort in 1941. Rations were short, many young—and older!—men were preparing to fight overseas. Women were entering the workforce to fill the vacancies left by the new soldiers. The circumstances were challenging, to say the least!

Yet, on July 7-8, 1942, over 100 women—among them twenty-eight formal delegates—met in Chicago and established the LWML. Its purpose was to encourage a greater consciousness among women for “missionary education, missionary inspiration, and missionary service.” It also decided to gather funds for mission projects above and beyond the Synod’s budget. From this humble beginning— and through the use of the now familiar “Mite Boxes”—the League has blessed the mission efforts of congregations, districts, and synod in amazingly powerful ways!

But there is more, as LWML historian Marlys Taege Moburg has captured it so well:

…the blessing of the LWML, now also known as Lutheran Women in Mission, goes far beyond the millions raised for missions. Its benefits can be seen in faith deepened through Bible studies, in confidence built through leadership training, in the befriending of career missionaries, in blankets and clothing gathered for the impoverished, in food shared with the hungry and, above all, in the friendships nurtured and the lives changed by sharing the love of Jesus Christ.1

“Time marches on,” as we all know so well, and it seems that as we age it marches at the double quick. The Lutheran confession has always struggled against the intrusion of false teaching. But the Lord has been faithful and has raised up faithful pastors like Timothy who have preached the pure Gospel of Jesus Christ crucified for our sins and raised for our justification. And the Lord has gathered faithful men, women, and children who have carried out the work of the Lord with zeal and devotion, meeting the challenges and opportunities to reach out to those who need to hear the Gospel. Simply put, our faithful God keeps His promises and we pray this Sunday and always that He will always enable us to be ready to confess.

1Marlys Taege Moberg, “History of the LWML,” https://unite-production.s3. amazonaws.com/tenants/lwml/attachments/21814/lutheran-women-mission-historyrev.pdf, accessed April 3, 2017.

Fifteenth Sunday after Holy Trinity

           Fifteenth Sunday after Holy Trinity

           Fifteenth Sunday after Holy Trinity

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Fifteenth Sunday after Holy Trinity

Sunday, September 24, 2017

Baptism of Ethan Fry

Matthew 6:24-34   You Cannot Serve God & Mammon

Grace and mercy to you David and Johnnie, Noah and Adam.  Relatives and friends.  Congregation of Our Savior Lutheran Church.  Grace and mercy to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

It is written: “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.

Let us pray: Gracious Creator Father, who gave Ethan Michael his first birth by means of his mom and dad and gave has now given him his second birth by means of water and the Holy Spirit, grant all of us to serve You, the true God, alone; in the name of Jesus.  Amen.

You cannot serve God and money.  This is a saying that gives faithful Christians pause.  We need money for many things.  We need money to pay the bills.  We need to save money for school and retirement.  So what does it mean, “You cannot serve God and money.”

The old term is mammon.  Mammon is money but it is unneeded money.  So this mammon or unneeded money is not the money needed to pay bills, tuition, or even your retirement nestegg.  Unneeded money is that large rainy day fund that never gets used.  

A clear but uncomfortable example is our congregational building fund.  It was started with good intentions but with no new building it has become a diversion.  This is our congregational repentance for the day.  A repentance that leads to the faith to give that money to someone who needs it.  For example, our mammon could fund a missionary family for two years to plant a faithful church body.  Or our mammon could fully fund up to three seminarians to serve 40 years each without school debt.

David and Johnnie, you did not come here this morning to hear about mammon.  You came to have your third child baptized.  

Your wealth is your children.  This is a work of God.

Jesus is teaching us to trust in Him, saying “You cannot serve two masters, for either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to one and despise the other.  You cannot serve God and money.”

David you work hard to pay the bills.  Johnnie you work hard as a stay at home mom.  All the more to remain devoted to Jesus first, then each other and the children.  Why, because Jesus carries your burdens of repentant and believing sinners.

Ethan is baptized.  

David, you are a dad and an outdoorsman.  Jesus has given the birds of the air to remind you of Him.  Trust Jesus and look to the birds of the air during those times when you become anxious about your wife and children, what they will eat or what they will drink or what they will wear.  The birds neither sow nor reap nor gather excess wealth into barns and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  David, you and Johnnie and Noah and Adam and Ethan are more valuable than the birds of the air.  Turn from anxiety and believe that Jesus is taking care of you and your family.

Johnnie, you are a mom.  Jesus has given the lilies of the field to remind you of Him.  Trust Jesus and consider how the flowers grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet even king Solomon did not dress better than the flowers of the field.  The Lord dresses the flowers.  Johnnie, you and David and Noah and Adam and Ethan are more beautiful than the flowers.

Trust Jesus.  Jesus is God’s wealth.  Our Father did not keep Jesus from you but sent Him to you; to bear your burdens; to bear your unbelief.  The Father store up His wealth in barns.  The Father spent all He had on you.

Our Father put His Son to death so that your son Ethan may live; not just for a season but even through death and for eternity in the resurrection of Ethan’s body which you hold.

Our Father stripped Jesus of His beauty so that Ethan is dressed more beautifully than King Solomon; more beautifully than the flowers.

May we all repent of our anxiety by giving away our unneeded wealth to someone who could use it and live by faith in Jesus our Savior.

Sufficient for the day is its own trouble; in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

 

Thirteenth Sunday after Holy Trinity

                                                  Thirteenth Sunday after Holy Trinity

                                                  Thirteenth Sunday after Holy Trinity

THIRTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER HOLY TRINITY

THE CONFESSION AND ABSOLUTION
The Confession of Sins p. 184
The Absolution

THE SERVICE OF THE WORD
The Psalm 146
The Kyrie p. 186
The Gloria in Excelsis p. 187
The Salutation and Collect of the Day p. 189
The Old Testament  p. 190
The Epistle
The Triple Alleluia
The Gospel
Glory Be To Thee, O Lord!
Praise Be To Thee, O Christ!  p. 191
The Nicene Creed
The Hymn of the Day p. 192
The Sermon
The Offertory
The Offering p. 193
The Prayer of the Church

THE SERVICE OF THE SACRAMENT
The Preface p. 194
The Sanctus p. 195
The Lord’s Prayer p.196
The Word’s of Our Lord p. 197
The Pax Domini
The Agnus Dei p. 198
The Distribution of Christ’s Body and Blood
The Nunc Dimittis
The Thanksgiving p. 200
The Salutation and Benedicamus p.201
The Benediction p.202
 

The man tells Jesus that the Law says to love God with everything you've got and to love your neighbor as yourself. "So do that and you'll live," says Jesus. But he, wanting to justify himself asks who his neighbor is. We know what it means to justify ourselves. We know that word. It means to explain why you should get away with what you did. "Officer, I don't want to get in trouble with my parents so I'm trying to get home before their curfew." "Honey, I know it was expensive but the one I have is too out of date and old so I needed a new one. Gun. Laptop. Car. Whatever." "Mom, I know my grade is bad but you don't understand how unfair the teacher is." And worst of all, "God, I know I'm not perfect but I'm pretty sure I deserve better than that guy over there!" We try to justify ourselves. Explain away what we don't like. Make excuses for what we do. You should never break a promise to me but if I break my promise, I have a good reason.

The thing about Jesus is that He won't let the man justify himself before God. And He won't let you either. That's why He's our Savior. He rescues you from your own sinful way of thinking. And how do sinners think? Well, we say, "Love God with your whole heart and love your neighbor as yourself." Sure. I can do that. Those are good rules. The Law of God is good. Until it gets specific. Until loving God means actually being in church as often as we can and confessing not just a generic God but Jesus who is true God and man. And loving our neighbor is a great idea until loving our neighbor means actually loving and forgiving the people we can't stand. Who hurt us and do us wrong. The people we don't want to have anything to do with. Love your neighbor! "But pastor, if you only knew what they said or did!" Justify yourself much? 

The way Jesus rescues us is the way the Samaritan rescues the guy who is lying half-dead on the side of the road. When we justify ourselves, sin comes along and robs our self-made righteousness and leaves us lying in the ditch. What does the Law do? How do the commandments help? They don't. They just pass by on the other side. We need Jesus to come and pick us up from the muck and mire of our sins, to wash our wounds and take care of us. And He does exactly that, all at His own expense. The expense not of His cash but of His holy, precious blood and His innocent suffering and death. That's the price Jesus pays. He spares no expense to rescue us and heal us. Then He brings us to the inn of His church and pours in the oil and wine of Word and Baptism and Supper, the gifts which heal us and restore us to life. Again, all at His expense. 

You see, the Law condemns us because we DON'T love God or our neighbor. Jesus fulfills the Law by being both God and man, God and neighbor. On the cross, Jesus fulfills the Law by trusting in His Father above all things and by loving His neighbor--the world--by dying for our sins. Jesus saves us from our sins by being the One who takes on our sins. That saves us from having to justify ourselves to God on the basis of the Law. Now when we hear the Law say, "Love God! Love your neighbor," we don't have to make excuses. Rather we answer truthfully, "I don't! And I'd be condemned were it not for my Savior Jesus who has kept the Law perfectly and loved God and neighbor for me!" And then now the Law, those commandments become not a way to justify ourselves but to serve our neighbor. To love others. To forgive them. To pull them out of the ditch. And when you fail at that, no excuses, no justifying yourself. Just more Jesus, more forgiveness and get back out there and do whatever your neighbor needs to help and support them.

It's easy to justify ourselves. to make excuses. To explain to God why we should be let off the hook. The Law doesn't give any wiggle room. Love God. Love neighbor. If not, you're doomed. But Jesus did it. He kept it. Perfectly. For you. He's pulled you out of the ditch that sin threw you in. He's bound up the wounds that death and the devil have inflicted on you. He's lived your life and died your death so that you would be free to live your life not to impress God but to be a blessing to those around you. So go and do likewise, not because it gets you to heaven, but because your neighbor needs you to. In the Name of Jesus. Amen.

Twelfth Sunday after Holy Trinity

                                    Jesus Heals the Deaf Man with a Speech Impediment

                                    Jesus Heals the Deaf Man with a Speech Impediment

Today's sermon is about how faith gives birth to love.  Each of us can only believe for ourselves but motivated by love we can help people by bringing them to Jesus who gives faith. 

Lutheran Service Book - hymnal

Divine Service Setting Three - page 184

THE CONFESSION AND ABSOLUTION

The Confession of Sins p. 184

The Absolution

THE SERVICE OF THE WORD

The Psalm 146

The Kyrie p. 186

The Gloria in Excelsis p. 187

The Salutation and Collect of the Day p. 189

The Old Testament  p. 190

The Epistle

The Triple Alleluia

The Gospel

Glory Be To Thee, O Lord!

Praise Be To Thee, O Christ!  p. 191

The Nicene Creed

The Hymn of the Day p. 192

Audio Block
Double-click here to upload or link to a .mp3. Learn more
Audio Block
Double-click here to upload or link to a .mp3. Learn more

The Offertory

The Offering p. 193

The Prayer of the Church

THE SERVICE OF THE SACRAMENT

The Preface p. 194

The Sanctus p. 195

The Lord’s Prayer p.196

The Word’s of Our Lord p. 197

The Pax Domini

The Agnus Dei p. 198

The Distribution of Christ’s Body and Blood

The Nunc Dimittis

The Thanksgiving p. 200

The Salutation and Benedicamus p.201

The Benediction p.202

September 3 & 4, 2017

Twelfth Sunday after Holy Trinity

Pastor Pautz

Text: Isaiah 29; Romans 10; Mark 7:31 Jesus Heals a Deaf Man; Hymn 545 Word of God, Come Down on Earth

Grace and mercy to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

It is written for us this morning in Mark chapter 7 that “those who begged Jesus to lay hands on the deaf man who had a speech impediment said, ‘Jesus has done all things well.  Jesus even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.’”  Thus far the text.

Let us pray: Gracious Father, open our ears by granting us Your Holy Spirit that we may believe in Jesus and speak plainly to our neighbors about Him; through the same Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.  Amen.

Jesus brings us together.  Jesus gives us Himself week after week.  Together we share in this abiding joy that Jesus is doing all things well, even among us.

This mornings Bible story is plain and clear and precious.  It speaks of Jesus.  And, since we have only one story to tell, let us look at this short text as a summary of the whole.

Then he returned from the region of Tyre and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis.

32And they brought to him a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment, and they begged him to lay his hand on him.  

A crowd brings a poor man to Jesus.  The man is both deaf and has a speech impediment.  The crowd brings the poor man to Jesus as if his deafness and speech impediment were their own.  

In this one story, Jesus shows us both faith and love.  Faith toward God.  Love toward neighbor.

We hear that Jesus is kind and compassionate and helps those who come to Him.  We hear the Word of God that shows us the mercy of God.  This Word sinks into our hearts so that we depend on this mercy.  

First comes the Word of God which creates this faith and trust in Jesus.  It is the Good News of our Savior Jesus which is properly called the Gospel.  Good News that is proclaimed for all to hear and believe.

The folks that brought the deaf man to Jesus heard that Jesus is kind and friendly and willing to help anyone in need.  This is the beginning of their faith.  They begin to trust Jesus to be who He says He is.

Second comes the faith in Christ which grows out of the Word.  The Word first sets before us the mercy and goodness of God.  Only then does Christ’s faith appear and grow and give us the desire to say Amen to more and more that is written.  Faith in Jesus says yes to the Holy Writings in thought, word and deed.

Third, this Gospel describes what follows the Word of God and faith in Christ.  What follows is works of love like this, the people go and care for the deaf man.  They do this without the deaf man doing anything for others first.  The faithful crowd is now doing what faithful Jesus had done to them by giving His healing Word without any merit or worthiness in us.  This is Christian love.

Let me focus on this love born from faith for a moment.  For those of you who have ever asked, ‘How can my faith in Jesus help other people?’ the answer is love.  Christian love is not a sentimental emotion but an action.  What is it that the people around you need?  Christian love fills that need

For example,

Hurricane Harvey, give or pray….


 

33And taking him aside from the crowd privately, he put his fingers into his ears, and after spitting touched his tongue.  34And looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened.”  35And his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly.  36And Jesus charged them to tell no one. But the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it.  37And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, “He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”


John the Baptist recently beheaded.  Also about 1 year before Christ’s crucifixion.

First faith, then love.

Father loved us.  Jesus faithfully goes when the Father sends Him.  Jesus loves us while we were yet sinners.  

The crowd had opportunity to hear Jesus and believed Him.  

The deaf man with a speech impediment did not hear Jesus.

The crowd loved the deaf man by bringing him to Jesus.

Jesus uses, basically, sign language.  Tongue, ears, looks to heaven.  Even Hollywood has people look up to the skies when a character is talking to God.  Jesus shows that man that He is giving God’s healing of tongue and ears.

Stroke victims may hear but have no way to speak.

I knew a lady who had a stroke and could hear and speak but could not longer read.

I knew another lady who had a stroke and could not speak or swallow but could understand.

There are those born deaf and because of deafness never learned how to speak.

I heard an account of a baby born deaf but there was a special type of hearing aid that could help.  The child did not want anything put into its ears.  But when the child heard its mother’s voice for the first time.  Joy!

Jesus is doing a miracle.  Physical healing but also speaking faith into people that grows into love for others.

The crowd is acting upon faith in what they heard from Jesus and not their reason.  In churches, even ours, a common place to see reason lifted above faith are in church meetings.  Synod and district conventions.  Voter Assemblies and Church Councils.  One person urges faith and prayer.  The crowd urges reason and finances.  The reasonable crowd wins the debate.

We do this too.

Jesus keeps doing miracle among us.  Jesus baptizes our babies and then our children hear their heavenly Father.  Babies learn to talk to mom and dad because mom and dad first talk to each other and to their babies.  Babies learn to talk to their heavenly Father because mom and dad talk to the same heavenly Father and therefore teach their babies by their behavior and their words.

You have been given faith therefore you act in love toward your children according to God’s Word.  You can’t give anyone faith.  You can only believe for yourself.  But faith acts in love and you bring others to Jesus.

I know one person who said that it is good to dedicate babies to God because God’s Word is a blessing.  I couldn’t help but add that they baptized their babies just without the water like God commanded.  My addition wasn’t met with a smile but it was a gentle nudge toward the Word which my friend cherishes.

Faith and love work together.  But let us continue to remain in the Word of God from which first comes faith and then comes love.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.