The basis for today’s sermon is the gospel reading, from Matthew chapter 21[:1-9] , where it is written: “4 This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, saying, 5 “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’””
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The right and proper office of a king is to save his people. To do that which they cannot, to uphold the lives and good of the people by establishing justice, rewarding the righteous, and punishing the wicked. Jesus rides into Jerusalem in the Triumphal Entry, “9 And the crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!”” They were singing Psalm 118, according to the custom on Passover week[, much the same way that we have hymns we sing on certain holy days like Christmas or Easter or the like]. They were chanting a psalm for the coming Messiah, the “Son of David” Who was to be the king and the savior alike. They may not have realized how fitting it was. Whether or not they fully understood Who it was among them, in chanting “Hosanna!” they spoke as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit, asking the King Christ Jesus for just the right and proper office of a King: to save his people.
The word “Hosanna” means “O Save us!” This plea to the Lord God is echoed through time and history, as we need the saving and the Lord God had redeemed us His people time and again. Consider what Jeremiah the prophet says: “7 “Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when they shall no longer say, ‘As the Lord lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt,’ 8 but ‘As the Lord lives who brought up and led the offspring of the house of Israel out of the north country and out of all the countries where he had driven them.’ Then they shall dwell in their own land.”” God had saved His people once from Egyptian slavery. Jeremiah foretells how God would, and did, save His people from captivity in the north countries of Babylon. How much more then, at the crucial moment in all of history, does the Lord God save His people from slavish captivity to death and hell? The promise was that the promised “righteous Branch” [/Kingly Messiah] would reign on the throne of David forever, and save His people according to that Kingly office.
So it is that Jesus, King of the Jews, comes to Jerusalem. His majesty hidden, laid aside for a time for a time, cloaked in our humble human flesh. Isaiah 53:2 says of Jesus: “For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.” Or in Philippians 2[:7-8] it is written: “7 … [He] emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant,[a] being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” In the course of His saving work, Jesus humbled Himself, and did not fully use His divine attributes or display all of His divine majesty. Even fulfilling prophecies according to His Kingship, He does so in humble form. All “4 This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet [Zechariah [9:9]] , saying, 5 “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’””
Therein we have great hope. Christ our King works to save His people through humble means. All too often we are tempted to fear and love the majesty of things in the world... the power money seems to have, or the glitz and glamour of fame and reputation. We get so worked up, anxious about what the kings and rulers of the world are doing. The idol we fear is often “what are they up to?” We fear they can harm us, as they in their power are anything but humble. Yet Christ is King, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. They would have no power apart from His permission and patience. The Lord is sympathetic to our fear and does come to save us, but we ought to learn to trust that no matter how evil the world seems, we know that Christ Jesus is still King. He rules even now, and He does hear and answer our plea to save us.
As King, Christ Jesus saves His people through humble means. To Jerusalem He came, to save his people from the ultimate wages of sin, by His cross and passion and death and resurrection. In this humble way He saves, by dying and rising. In this humble way He comes to us even now in bread and wine, word and water. Humble means. Faded bread and thin wine are the Body and Blood of God, given you to eat and drink. God’s kingdom comes among us even now.
We have to be told about this. It is not something we would think of on our own. It says: “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you….” God is at work; We pray that He would reveal to us how He is at work among us. When Peter confesses that Jesus is the Messiah, Jesus tells him: “And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.” (Matt 16:17). We need to hear this to have our eyes/ears opened to it. If all you see is the tense dramas of a voters meeting or the gossipy worst-possible constructions we poor miserable sinners project onto one another, you’d miss the holy Christian church entirely. God is present in His Word. Where two or three are gathered in His name, there He is among us. Angels kneel and adore Christ with us as heaven touches earth here in the holy communion. The demons flee in terror at the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray : “Thy Kingdom come” in the Lord’s Prayer… and How does God’s kingdom come? God’s kingdom comes when our heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His grace we believe His holy Word and lead godly lives here in time and there in eternity.
All that said, it means that the Kingdom of God is among us even now. Christ came humbly, mounted on a colt, the foal of a donkey once in time and history. He did His work by the cross and the empty tomb. He rose and ascended, and is still actively reigning over all things even now. However the news cycle rages and storms, it will not change the fact that Christ has already triumphed. Eternity is His, and because He is risen, it is yours too, because you are Baptized into His death and resurrection. So we do not lose heart. We have a strong encouragement and comfort in the reign of Christ the king among us. What can they do to you, that Christ has not already overcome?
So also we look to our conduct in the present-day rule of Christ. The Epistle reading from Romans 13 points out: “11 Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. 12 The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.”
So also ought to straighten up our act, and straighten up our heads, looking forward to our King Who hears our Hosannas. He came once in the days of His crucifixion. He rules even now, especially His church through His means of Grace. And our King Christ Jesus could come back at any moment. We don’t know when it is. Don’t be wasting time with quarrels or bad blood. Christ comes among us even now. Salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. God is at work in history, even in your life now. He will not let “them,” whoever that is, prevail. He sees and knows your distress, and will see you safely through, according to His wisdom. He will bring you even more through death into life, because you are baptized into His death and resurrection. Call out to him and pray for His salvation, asking for His ever present mercy to you. God grant you ears to hear what the prophet speaks: O Daughter of Zion, your King comes to save you. In the name of + Jesus. Amen.

The basis for today’s sermon is the gospel reading, from Matthew chapter 25, where the Lord Jesus says: “13 Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Last week, we heard Jesus tell a parable about the kingdom of heaven at the world’s end. Instead of a courtroom, where the sheep and the goats are sentenced, this time we hear of a feast, a marriage feast. Wedding festivals then as now were elaborate events, and lasted for up to a week, so it was wise to be well stocked and prepared, as the couple at Cana in Galilee learned. After the initial services and ceremony, the couple would celebrate joyfully among all the community gathered together with them. To be in the feast meant participating in the ongoing life and joy of the couple, while being outside the feast was to suffer, alone with only wailing and gnashing of teeth. In the parable, Jesus is the bridegroom and the holy Christian Church as a whole is the bride. We don’t really hear much about her, as it’s not important for the parable. What’s important is that Jesus is coming back, and that’s when the high feast of heaven starts – the marriage feast of the Lamb, in His kingdom which has no end.
Yet in the parable, the the bride and groom are not there yet. They’re on the way, but it is unknown when they will arrive [, like a couple at a wedding and they’re taking pictures and it takes forever for the reception to really get started]. That’s where Jesus begins the simile, the illustration for what it’s like as we wait, to the effect that we should stay watchful, faithful in hope of our Lord’s return. He says: “1 “Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom.” These young ladies were part of the wedding procession… maybe something like bridesmaids, and at the time they would be taking part of the procession by carrying the lamps, lit with fire, into the banquet hall.
The gathered group may all look the same, but there are significant differences. Jesus says: “2 Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. 3 For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, 4 but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.” Remember, this is a parable, a story to illustrate. So while some parts are just there to make the story work, others directly show how he kingdom will be in the end of the age. Here we have an illustration of the visible church of Christ. All ten of these young ladies together look more or less the same – they showed up, dressed in purity for the occasion, they have the lamps, they have all the outward appearances of Christians. They all seem like they’re waiting for the bridegroom, that is, waiting for Christ to return. But what use is a lamp without oil? What use is for people who call themselves Christian to do good works of love for others, if they do not have the one thing needful?
Consider how common the temptation is to show off, to signal to everyone all our self-presented qualities or heartfelt intentions, but fail at the one thing needful. There are many ways we can try to show off, but there is only one savior Jesus Christ, and therefore, there is only one holy Christian Church. It is written in 1st Samuel 16:7b “For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”
The oil in the lamps is the discriminating factor between the wise and the foolish. Only the ones who had this oil are rightly called ‘wise,’ for they sought the one thing needful.1 Why should this be? Oil fuels the fire to light their lamps, so to participate in the procession [, also that their faces be recognized at the door, to be let in the doors]. The oil recalls the work of the Holy Spirit through the holy scriptures, to create and sustain faith. Consider the tongues of fire at Pentecost – fire not to burn, but to illuminate. Consider how the Holy Spirit gives us eyes to see and ears to hear through God’s clear Word by faith. Psalm 119[:105] points out : “105 Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.”
It might be said then that the oil for the lamps is faith in Christ Jesus. It is a gift given by the Holy Spirit, at the hearing of God’s promises, poured out in the waters of Holy Baptism. This faith in Christ has to do with trusting His promise to return… we hear from Hebrews 11[:1] “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Without the oil of faith, it does not matter how pure someone looks on the outside. The Christian who waits for the return of the Lord has both an outward confession, as well as a heart that receives God’s promise through faith, as it says in Romans 10:10: “10 For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.”
So those five who had this oil of faith, given by the Holy Spirit, they really were expecting the bridegroom to appear, though they didn’t know when. (Acts 15:8; Rom 8:27) The other five thought it didn’t matter, they thought He wasn’t coming at all, and so they didn’t bother to get any of this precious oil, as if outward appearances were enough.
So it is worth noticing that all of them fall asleep. Verse 5 says: “5 As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept.” That they fall asleep recalls how Jesus was at prayer and the disciples Peter and James and John fall asleep, so Jesus asks them: “...could you not watch with me one hour?” (Mt 26:40b). So it is that every Christian, no matter how faithful, dies. Unless Christ returns in our generation, this cannot be avoided. We are not perfect in and of ourselves. Even we Christians fail and fall short, beset by the devil, the world, and our own sinful nature. The faithful and the faithless of the wedding party both sleep the sleep of death, and are only awakened when a cry appears.
Verse 6: “6 But at midnight there was a cry, ‘Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’ 7 Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps.” “8 And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ 9 But the wise answered, saying, ‘Since there will not be enough for us and for you, go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.’ 10 And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. 11 Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ 12 But he answered, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’”
At midnight a cry sounds. The proclamation goes forth: Make straight the way! The bridegroom draws near!2 Even though they sleep like the dead, they are wakened from their sleep. It says that the cry of announcement happens at midnight – the idea being that it is the time least expected, unknown. Remember what Jesus says in Matthew 25[:36] about the specific date chosen by the Father as the Last Day: “But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.”
So even though they had been sleeping, the faithful virgins awake and trim the wicks of their lamps, making ready to receive guest of honor. Although they died, yet they who believe in Jesus shall live. On the other hand, the foolish are surprised, realizing too late that the outward appearance is not enough. In the parable, they had no oil, so they couldn’t be in the procession. On the last day, do not be like them, caught without faithful expectation of the arrival of the One Who is to come, to judge the living and the dead.
No person can believe for another. No one gets forgiven or saved because their grandma believes in Jesus. Each person himself or herself is to believe in Jesus. We do not pray to the saints, because they and their faith cannot help us. Neither, in the story, can these foolish borrow oil from the wise. And so it is they are caught unprepared. While they fumble away to find someone to sell them oil at the last minute, the bridegroom arrives, and the faithful are welcomed in glorious procession into the banquet hall. The faithless are the foolish ones, they are shut out. They were not looking for the bridegroom’s advent, nor did they know him. Recall what Jesus says in Matthew 10[:32-33] “31 Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. 32 So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, 33 but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.”
So it is that Jesus commands us to watch. “13 Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” The idea is not that we would quarrel and fret over the unknowable, as though we could predict the end of the world. He tells us outright “you know neither the day nor the hour” when the Son of Man will come again. There are far too many groups of sensationalists who fret over that already, looking for signs in every full moon or red cow. The point is that we do not want to be caught without faith. The charge to “watch” is none other than the charge to believe in Jesus. To hear the word of peace He has spoken, to receive the forgiveness He bestows on account of His death and resurrection, to look to Him for help.
We do not need to be watching ourselves, perpetually second guessing whether we’re the wise or the foolish. Look at Jesus. You are wise to listen to the cry, the proclamation, the sound pattern of words that the announce the coming of Christ Jesus. Is what we say in the Creed true? Will Christ come again? Let it be done for you as you believe. Yes, Amen, yes it is so. Your sins are forgiven. As we heard in the epistle: “9 For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, 10 who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. 11 Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.” So it is that the faithful live according to the pattern God gives: faith and love, having the certain hope of salvation at His coming.
We are watchful in that we make use of the means of grace, for by this we have certain forgiveness for our sins, and nourishment for our faith.3 Recall the formula that dismisses us from the Lord’s Supper: “The body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ strengthen and preserve you in the one true faith. Depart in Peace.” In the Lord’s Supper we have a foretaste of that heavenly high feast to come. We look joyfully to the return of Christ Jesus, who will return to bring you, the faithful, into the marriage feast of the Lamb, in His kingdom, which has no end. In the name of + Jesus. Amen.






1 Recall what happened in Luke chapter 10[:42]: No matter how excellently Martha worked at serving, it was Mary (who sat at Jesus’ feet to hear the gospel) who had the “one thing needful.”
2 We sang about this in the hymn. This reminds us of the Last Day, as its written in 1st Thessalonians 4: “16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.”
3 The oil might remind us of the ‘sealing’ or ‘anointing’ that traditionally went along with Baptism. Oil isn’t the same as baptism, but it is a mark of being put into an office – Baptism gives us new birth from above by water and the Word, and the oil used in ancient times was a human-custom mark of that new birth – that the baptized are heirs and citizens of the kingdom of God.

The basis for today’s sermon is the gospel reading, from Matthew chapter 25[:31-46], where it is written: “31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne.” In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The bible passages about the Last Day ought to bring the Christian comfort and hope. God the Father has given our Savior Jesus Christ all authority in heaven and on earth. That means that Jesus Christ is King. Since He is ascended the heaven, He rules over all things for the good of His dear bride/flock, the one holy Christian and apostolic Church. Each one of the readings today, in fact, has something to do with Jesus acting in His ruling office by exercising judgment, as The judge on the Last Day.
In the human legal systems of our day, the king and the judge and the jury are different people. This seems like a very good idea, because each one of us human beings is fallible, and we need checks and balances against one another. On the other hand, it is well said in Psalm 116:11 “I said in my alarm, “All mankind are liars.”” And again in Jeremiah 9:3 it is written: “They bend their tongue like a bow; falsehood and not truth has grown strong in the land; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they do not know me, declares the Lord.” Our poor miserable sin can often gum up a trial; judgments of human courts might not always get to the heart of God’s eternal justice, because we are fallible. Yet there is no such fallibility in Christ Jesus: He is both King and Judge and Jury (consider Prov 25:2). As True God, Jesus knows all things and sees all things clearly. He determines the guilty and the innocent, He declares the sentence, and He gives command for it to be carried out.
As we heard in the gospel reading, Jesus the great Judge will come again on the last day and “sit on His glorious throne.” The throne is the sign to us of His divine authority: to Him belongs the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever amen. Jesus is the only-begotten Son of the Ancient of Days, as we heard described in the old Testament reading for today (Daniel 7:9-14). Nothing is outside of His jurisdiction. We today are tempted to put far too much stock in whatever human beings declare as right and wrong, good or bad. On the Last Day, however, it will be abundantly clear that Jesus Christ alone is the authority. All nations will bow down before Him – every person from every country or race or language or tribe on earth will kneel before Him, whether in terror or in joy.
So it is that Jesus divides the sheep and the goats. It says : “32 Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 And he
will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left.” Now, the human race is not livestock – it’s an illustration. Right now, before the Last Day, those who are made alive by faith are all mixed together in the world, surrounded and beset on every side by the wicked and unbelievers. On the Last Day God will sort all that out. The lies and the liars will be fully revealed for what they are. Jesus says in Luke chapter 8[:17]: “For nothing is hidden that will not be made manifest, nor is anything secret that will not be known and come to light.” The wretched, wicked condition of every human heart will be exposed for what it truly is, judged, and finally sentenced.
Now, if that’s all we knew, we ought to be terrified, because each of us is guilty at one point or another of breaking God’s Holy and Eternal Law, and on our own we deserve the wrath He describes here. Consider how the “goats” in the judgment were very concerned with their actions, as if that was what justified them in the judgment. Yet the apostle John writes in 1st John [1:8,10] “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” It may well be that some – some – of the anxieties we face in daily life is our conscience recognizing God’s judgment against sin.
But everywhere in the gospel, Jesus repeatedly tells us to “fear not,” when He is near to us with His gracious favor. Our Judge Christ Jesus is also our redeemer. He took on human nature and was born among us, under the Law, to redeem us who are also under the Law. In dying and rising, He paid every cost associated with our guilt. In Holy Baptism, in the Word of holy Absolution, He puts His righteousness onto us, His holy little flock. So it is that you who receive His righteousness through faith are counted as righteous as Jesus Christ is, as innocent and just as the Judge Himself. You do not need to be afraid of the judgment, because your sins are forgiven. Again, St. John writes in his letter : “9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” The judgment is that you are innocent, on account of Christ. St. Paul writes using courtroom language in Romans chapter 3: “28 For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.” That’s what it means when we confess in the creed: that He will come again to judge the living and the dead, that is, those who are made alive through faith will be judged according to Christ’s righteous, and those who remain dead in their trespasses will be judged according to their own.
So it is that the sheep – the ones who are justified already by God’s grace in Christ alone, we can look forward to that day with hope. We can love our neighbors, even the least and most unworthy of them, for their good, without having to worry about the reward.The sheep, in the judgment, weren’t aware that they’d done anything that would justify them in the judgment – they weren’t focused on themselves, but rather on their Good Shepherd, and His promises. St. Peter says in the epistle reading: “13 But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. 14 Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace. ” (2 Pet 3:13-14)
In that peace, we can look forward to the Last Day and the final judgment. It will be a day of vindication. All of God’s Word will be proven true, and no one will scoff at Him then. The evil people who afflict you, dear Christians, will be put away from you. Our suffering will cease, and the life everlasting will be pure joy. You who believe and are made righteous by the forgiving blood of Christ Jesus… you will be fully and finally set apart, made pure. The good that God has worked through you will be made known, His promises will be confirmed, faith will turn to us, and we will all give glory to our Lord Jesus Christ, Who does all things well, Who sits on the throne, Who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit, + one God, now and forever. Amen

“These are the ones coming out of the great tribu- | lation. *
they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood | of the Lamb.” (Revelation 7:14b)
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
It’s been said that the basic condition of human life on this earth is one of suffering. Any philosophy for how to live have to deal with this at some point or another. The world is broken, and life in the state of nature is poor, nasty, brutish, and short. Those struggling with anxiety or depression, or even those who suffer the general dis-ease1 and dread from the last few years can recognize this.
Now people have tried to fix the world by our own reason or cleverness. Religions (like Bhuddism), or the Stoic philosophies try to get rid of desire as a way to be free of suffering…. Lowering expectations mean less disappointment. Some religions like Islam, or Modern atheistic social programs, try to get rid of suffering through conquest, mistakenly thinking that a superior configuration to our human kingdoms of the world will be the final solution to all our problems. The greedy overcommercialized way of our modern life leads us to numb our sorrows in the fleeting pleasures that money can buy. No one has ever found peace at the bottom of a bottle, nor has anyone ever found happiness by scrolling to the end of the internet. While we are glad when our life together is rightly ordered and we have enough bread for each day, none of these approaches toward ending human suffering have really worked. For all our technology and governance, for all that we manage our expectations and our grief, there is no doubt that the human race is still poor and miserable. The Christian answer to all this is different, unique, set apart from all the world, because our hope holds on to the one true, living, almighty and merciful God.
Today we gather, remembering today all the saints who have gone on before us. Saints are holy people, made holy through faith in Christ Jesus alone, by His grace their sins are forgiven, by God’s grace they remained faithful unto death, and so have received the crown of everlasting life because Christ Jesus is risen. We do not worship the saints or even pray to them, but as our Lutheran forefathers did, we thank God for their examples of faith and love, and try to learn a thing or two from them so that we can be better Christians in our own day.2
This includes remembering and thanking God all the saints who are named in the bible, like Peter or John or Paul, or Moses or Isaiah, or John the Baptist or Mary the Mother of our Lord, all of them. So also we can learn from the saints who have lived since, like St. Augustine or St. Martin Luther or the like. Even our own dearly departed, who were faithful unto death, we remember them with rosy, if tearful, eyes. That’s fine, good, perhaps. The condition of those in heaven is most certainly blessed, joyful, free of all evils and abounding in overwhelming good.
There is this temptation to airbrush the memory of our dearly beloved saints, as if they lived perfect lives here on earth because we loved them so much, or as if their body and life here on earth did not have any kind of troubles. Yet in their case and in the history of all the world, the saints experienced the same kind of poor miserable lives that we do now. If we’re honest... they struggled too. What does that verse from revelation say about the ones in heaven? “These are the ones coming out of the great tribu- | lation. * they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood | of the Lamb.” (Rev 7:14b, emph. added). They faced anxiety and grief and hard work and sleepless nights just like we do, they were made “destitute and afflicted and were mistreated,” it says in Hebrews chapter 11, and yet the Lord God by His grace in Christ Jesus brought them through it all. Their sins are forgiven. God was for them, and so what could stand in between them and the promised resurrection to blessed life eternal? The “saints triumphant shine in bright array” because in them is a victory, a hard fought battle won against the devil and the world and our own sinful nature, won by Christ Jesus crucified and risen.
So we saints here below in the church militant do not have to sugar coat any of our suffering, or cover it up. Sure, we might not choose to tell everyone all the time how our day has really been, but we don’t have to lie to ourselves. We may be grieved by whatever it is, but as 1st Thessalonians 4 says, we grieve as those who have the certain hope of resurrection of the body for those who have faith in Jesus’s resurrected body. We know the way out, the way through, because we are known by Jesus Who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
So it is that Jesus calls us blessed. The gospel reading today gives us the Beatitudes, the ‘blessseds.’ These are not primarily a list of what we ought to Do and Not Do. Yes, it is good to show mercy, to make peace, to be pure in heart, to strive for righteousness. Yet in amid the dog-eat-dog world, the pure and peaceful people tend to suffer. [Righteous guys seem to finish last.] Yet Jesus says you who believe and are made righteous by His own blood are #Blessed anyway. Beatitude, blessedness, isn’t a measure of worldly happiness or success, but rather of the certain heavenly life to come. Blessed are you who mourn, who are meek or lowly or not much in the eyes of the world. Blessed are you even if you suffer, even through all the trials and tribulations. You have been washed in the blood of the Lamb, who takes away the sin of the world. You are united to the victory of Jesus Christ. In His incarnation, in the death of His body on the cross, He endured faithful and righteous, paying the price for our redemption. By His rising again on the third day, He overcame death and the grave. In His mercy, He gives us that resurrection, victory, and life unfading. In Holy Baptism, God has made you his holy child, a saint through faith in the risen Christ Jesus. We fear no evil because we are being brought through death into Life by Christ Who is our head.
The apostle John writes in the epistle reading: “2 Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” We do get a brief vision of the blessed glory of the resurrection in the reading from Revelation: “16 They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. 17 For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.””
The basic conditions of life in the resurrection is joy. Peace. Restoration and rejoicing. Blessed are you Who are made children of God: Your mourning will have an end. Your meek trust in the Lord will be vindicated. You will see Him make peace everlasting. The poverty of spirit will be replaced by treasure in heaven. Your hungering and thirsting for righteousness will be satisfied, since you will be shepherded by the Lord Himself. He gives His righteousness in the holy communion, the Body and Blood of Christ Jesus for us Christians to eat, as a guarantee and foretaste of heaven’s high feast to come.
So weep no more, for Christ is risen. The Lamb has triumphed. Your sins are taken away. Our troubles will have an end, but you who by faith are united to Christ Jesus will live before God in blessedness. ““Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”” In the name of + Jesus. Amen.


1  You might also say ‘angst’ or ‘inquietude’
2  AC XXI.1; Ap XXI (IX).4-6

The basis for today’s sermon is the gospel reading, from John chapter 8, where it is written:“… Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.””
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Mankind was created to be free. Freedom is the state we were meant to live in. Yet the lies of the devil, the world, and our sinful nature have twisted and distorted freedom, and everywhere we are beset by slavery of various kinds. The work of Christ Jesus, in dying and rising to declare us righteous through faith, His work ultimately is what sets us free.
Now, slavery is an evil thing, a result of the sinful human nature treating people as less than human. It wasn’t unique to the American south. In the ancient world it was practiced in almost every culture, in some places much more harshly than others. At times it was more like an intense form of labor contracts, other times it was harsh, reducing people made in the image of God to brutish laborers. No human being was created to live that way. Despite what they said in the gospel reading, the sons of Abraham had indeed been slaves before. Perhaps the oppressive rule of the Babylonians, Greeks, or Romans in their own day counted. But certainly they had been slaves in Egypt, under the cruel rod of the Pharaohs. The Lord led them out in the Exodus with mighty signs and wonders, led them into land promised for their own inheritance. When God wrote the civil laws of that kingdom of Israel, laws about labor deliberately respected the humanity of those who were to work, such as treating laborers as members of one’s own household, setting regular times for their release, and a generous portion of their master’s goods. In Deuteronomy 15[:15], the Lord tells His people “You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you.”
But Jesus talks about a different kind of slavery. Political and economic liberty is a beautiful thing, but that which enslaves our human nature runs more deeply than our outward conditions. He says: “34b Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.”
Now, Freedom does not mean that you get to do do whatever you want, or as if you had no limits. We need some boundaries to live in. It’s good that gravity keeps us stuck to the earth. We’re glad that our skin keeps all our internal organs … internal. It’s a good thing that there are rules to keep us from acting stupidly at times. Otherwise our rebellion or anger or lust or greed would get the better of us and we make choices that harm ourselves and others. Freedom means that nothing prevents you from doing what is good, nothing stops you from living according to your God-given callings, not even yourself.
Think about how anxiety or fear or depression afflict many people you know, preventing them from doing or living according their vocations. Would they say they’re free?
Or consider how more often than not our slaveries start out as self-inflicted. Addiction is slavery, because it captivates, chains a person’s desires to whatever it is they’re addicted to. Ask an alcoholic if they are free. Ask the fentanyl addicts in our county if they are really at liberty to do what is good. What about those who stretch the truth so often that they’ve come to believe their own lies. Ask yourself why someone would ignore their family or their job to check social media just one more time, or why so many men and women use pornography - at the expense of their health, their marriage, and their immortal soul?
St. Paul writes about this in Romans chapter 7: “18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.... 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.”
If you are not capable of doing good according to the calling God has given you, you are in a very real sense a slave. Even if you were supreme grand emperor of the world and had more money and power and talent than anyone else, you would still be a slave to the desires and ignorance of your own flesh, captivated by the anxieties and self-centered pride of your own heart. In this, we cannot blame other people, or pretend that we’re victims of our own desires, but must confess our own slavery to sin, slavery to doing what seems good in our own eyes instead of what God has shown us is good. Repent. The invitation to eat a forbidden fruit and be free as a god was a lie, a temptation to sin and slavery. “The slave does not remain in the house forever,” but is cast out. Jesus says it: “Everyone who sins is a slave to sin.”
Thanks be to God that His Son Christ Jesus has come to us. He says: “31b If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” Notice that He does not say that we are to free ourselves from our poor miserable condition. Many great thinkers in human history have suggested that our human freedom has to be worked out by our own repeated, intentional actions.1 While this is fine for the kingdoms of the earth, we cannot by our own reason or strength free ourselves from our sinful condition. God’s holy Law reveals to us His righteousness, and by contrast the unrighteous condition of sinful mankind. The Epistle reading today says: “19 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. 20 For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.”
It is Christ Jesus Who restores us to Christian freedom. He laid aside His glory for a time, and took on the form of a servant, a slave (Php 2:7). He took on a human nature and was born among us, born “under the Law” it says in Galatians 4[:4b-5] “5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” By His holy precious blood shed on the cross, He propitiated, made atonement for our sinful human race. By His rising, He opens the way for resurrection to life eternal for all who have died in the faith. This is part of His office as the messiah, as He says in Luke chapter 4[:18-19 & Isaiah 61:1ff]: “18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, / because he has anointed me / to proclaim good news to the poor. / He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives / and recovering of sight to the blind, / to set at liberty those who are oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.”
Jesus’ perfect righteousness is put onto us through faith in God’s promised mercy, His favor. By putting His righteousness on us, He redeems us from slavery, buys us back, and transfers us to live under Him in His kingdom. He counts you as pure. Your sins are forgiven. So we are not slaves working for a new master, in Christ Jesus we are given to live in His Kingdom as Sons, heirs with status, being renewed in freedom to live as we were created to live.2 “35 The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”3
The road from slavery to freedom is not easy. You are forgiven and made God’s child, perfectly justified through the work of Christ Jesus alone, and yet our sinful flesh does hang around our neck until the day of resurrection.4 You want to quit that shameful, sinful habit, you want to be a better steward of God’s gifts, you want to be better at loving others according to your vocation, but this proves difficult. Our sinful habits do not go away automatically because we are Christian. Living in a way that matches our standing as justified children of God is difficult for us, we get confused from time to time about what our freedom is for.
Yet you are not alone. Your inheritance is not earned by more and more slavery. It’s been given to you already. His righteousness is stamped onto you already. It is repeated to us in the Absolution. You can be certain of God’s mercy to us in our time in His sacrament of Holy Baptism. There, God the Holy Spirit begins to renew us in true Christian freedom: changing our activity to match our status. Galatians 4:6-7 says “6 And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.” With this precious gift comes the Holy Spirit to strengthen us in the virtues that go with freedom. Our willpower to do what is good, that self-discipline that goes with Christian freedom is only possible by inspiration from the Holy Spirit.
So it is that we continue to depend on Christ through faith in in what He has promised. “If you abide in my Word,” He says, “you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” We rejoice that God is working to re-form our hearts and minds to live in Christian freedom, since we have His favor... In the name of + Jesus. Amen.


1 Aristotle argues as much in the Nichomachean Ethics, perhaps not using the the term ‘freedom’ so much as ‘happiness.’
2...in righteousness, innocence, and blessedness.
3 Now, today we are celebrating Reformation Day, a yearly feast when we are blessed to hear a few of the bible passages so central to the events and ideas of the Reformation. And it is good and useful to remember the Church’s biblical confession that is rightly our heritage, the truth that “[For we hold that] one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.” (Romans 3:28) Yet Martin Luther is often highlighted only as a rebel, and the spirit of the reformation nothing more than holy revolution against the establishment. Even though he specifically told people not to do this, Luther has been made into a mascot for any number of contemporary sociological or political causes. But we are not freed from sin or death by mascots, but by the One and only Son of God made flesh, Christ Jesus the Lord. The reformation is still about Jesus and what He has done.
4Technically, the day of our death, but I’m wanting to point towards The Resurrection here, consistent with creedal language.