Deuteronomy 6,4-9. 1. Sunday after Trinity

In the Name of Jesus

Deuteronomy 6,4-9
1. Sonntag nach Trinitatis  046
Jeremiah, Prophet, 629-580 B.C.
26. June 2011

            1. O Lord, the Strength of all who put their trust in You, because of the weakness of our mortal nature we can do no good thing: we do not love You with all our heart, soul, nor might; we do not meditate upon Your Word in our heart; we fail to teach our children the Holy Scriptures; we do not consider Your doctrine and teaching to be of utmost importance in our lives. We find ourselves in the same lot of all humanity: lost and adrift from You as our lives are caught in the current that leads to hell and unquenchable fire. Send the Holy Spirit to us through the Word and Sacraments, so that we may freely receive Your grace on account of Christ Jesus and be assured of our forgiveness and salvation, and from this blessed assurance of faith in Christ help us to follow Your Word and live Your law.  Amen.

            2. Our sermon text for this morning, dear brothers and sisters, is from Deuteronomy where the Prophet Moses said to all Israel: ⁴“Hear, O Israel: Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one.^{[1] 5}You shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. ⁶And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. ⁷You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. ⁸You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. ⁹You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”  This is our text.
            3. The Divine words spoken by Yahweh through Moses in verses 4 and 5 constitute the core of Old Testament theology. The doctrine revealed in these verses are furthermore upheld in the New Testament by Jesus and His Apostles. These verses, first and foremost, teach us about God. Last week, we confessed on Holy Trinity Sunday the Athanasian Creed which affirms that there is indeed One God. The Creed furthermore instructed us that this One God is comprised of Three Distinct Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
            4. Yahweh teaches us about Himself in Deuteronomy 6:

                                      I. Our God has a Name.

                                     II. Our God has a nature.
                                    III. Our God has a relationship with us.

I.

            5. Our God has a Name, and His Name is not „God“. God reveals His Name in Genesis 2 when He creates Adam and Eve, and He calls Himself „Yahweh“ which means „I Am Who I Am“. In many older English translations, like the King James Version, you might see God’s Name transliterated as „Jehovah“. In most modern English translations, God’s Name is written as „Lord“ with four capital letters. God reveals His Name when He creates man from the dirt and the woman from the man’s bodily side. God names the man „Adam“ which means „man“ and is a derivative of the word „adamah“ which means „ground“ and Adam names the woman „Eve“ which means „life“ because she was the mother of every human being.
            6. When God sent Moses to free Israel from Egyptian slavery and lead them to Mt. Sinai where they would worship their God and then bring them to the promised land of Canaan, Moses asked God, „When I go to the people of Israel, they will ask me Your Name. What do I tell them“. God replied, „ I Am Who I Am. Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I Am’ has sent me to you“. God also reveals to Moses that He, Yahweh, is the God of Moses’ father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. The God that redeemed Israel was not any of the Egyptian gods, like Ra or Osiris, nor was He the Babylonian god Baal, but He was and is and always will be Yahweh, the God of Abraham, the God of Israel, and the God of the Christian Church.

II.

            7. Our God has a nature, and His Divine Nature is one. We confess this monotheism in the Creeds and sing it in the liturgy of the Divine Service. The Creeds also confess that this One God is comprised of Three Distinct Persons, namely, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This Triune God is revealed in the Holy Scriptures; He is worshipped and adored.
            8. Deuteronomy reveals that there is only One, True God. This God created the universe, Adam, and Eve. this God promised to redeem His fallen humanity. This God rescued Noah from the Flood of His Divine judgment. This God revealed Himself to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. There is only One, True God, and He is the God of Abraham, the Patriarchs, the Apostles, and the Church.

III.

            9. Our God has a relationship with us. Yahweh our God loves you, me, and the world with all His heart and with all spirit and with all His might. Every day these words and this great love is on God’s heart.

            10. God desires us to be holy as He is holy. He created Adam and Eve holy in His image and likeness. Our first parents fell into disobedience and sin; they exchanged Yahweh’s holiness for the devil’s wickedness. Through Moses and the law, Yahweh shows us our corrupt and rebellious nature. We do not love Yahweh with our heart, soul, and might. As a result, we do not love our neighbor with our heart, soul, and might. The Son of God teaches us in the Holy Gospels that loving God and our neighbor is the fulfillment of the law. But we do not love God. We do not fear and trust Him. We treat our neighbor no differently.
            11. Jesus shows us how evil man’s heart is. The rich man saw poor, sick Lazarus outside his house each day. He never spared a few copper coins from his immense savings account to buy ointment to soothe Lazarus’ sores. He never ordered his servants to fix up a dinner plate and take it to hungry Lazarus. Moses and the Prophets rang in his ears each Sabbath in the synagogue and exhorted the rich man to consider the plight of his neighbor at his very doorstep. The rich man ignored God, the Prophets, and his neighbor.
            12. Inside each one of us beats the heart of the rich man in Luke 16. God’s law accuses each one of us: You are no better than the rich man who ignored Lazarus! Learn what Moses and the Prophets teach: Draw nigh unto Yahweh with a humble heart and a repentant spirit. Do not remain lost in your sins and unbelief. If you do, then you will suffer the same eternal fate of the rich man. The unquenchable fires of Hades await those who reject Yahweh and His Prophets.
            13. Our response to the law’s condemnation is not: My repentance and renewed effort to obey God’s law will merit God’s love and earn me salvation. We cannot gain entrance to the bosom of Abraham in Paradise by doing what the law commands. It is impossible to save ourselves by the works of the law. We cannot do it. Yahweh knows we cannot do it, and He did not give us the law and the Prophets to attempt our own merits of salvation.
            14. Moses and the Prophets speak the law, but they also exhort us to cast our eyes upon Yahweh’s promise to send us His Son who will save us from the law’s condemnation and the curse of sin. »Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the Prophets, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed the heir of all things, through whom also He created the world« (Hebrews 1,1-2). The Apostle John applies the refreshing salve of the gospel to our suffering consciences: »Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in Him, and he in God. By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as He is so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.« (1. John 4,15.17-18). The only way to be spared the rich man’s eternal destiny and to enjoy Lazarus’ eternal joy is to trust fully and only upon Christ Jesus. God the Father first loved us while we were still sinners. He sent His only Son into the world to redeem those stuck in the rich man’s way of treating his neighbor. Christ has paid the redemptive price by suffering on the cross. The law has been fulfilled in Christ. Faith receives His free gift of salvation, and faith bears the fruit of love: First for God, and then for our neighbor. Go in peace with the law before your eyes as a guide to loving God with all our hearts and lovingly helping our neighbor with all our might. The Holy Spirit will enable us to do so.  Amen.
            15. Let us pray. O Lord, Your testimonies are righteous forever; give us the saving faith in  Your gospel that is centered upon Christ and Him crucified, so that we, like Lazarus, may dwell in the bosom of Abraham, live in Your heavenly Paradise, and receive our resurrected body on the last day.  Amen.

One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you!

                All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4^th Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27^th Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart. 

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¹ dx'a, hw"hy> Wnyhel{a/ hw"hy> laer"f.yI [m;v.

John 3,1-17. Holy Trinity Sunday

X Whoever desires to be saved must, above all, hold the catholic faith X

 John 3,1-15[16-17]

Tag der heiligen Dreifaltigkeit (Trinitatis) weiß  045
Gervasius and Protasius, Martyrs in the 1^st century
19. June 2011

            1. O Almighty, Everlasting, Merciful God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who, with Your Son and the Holy Spirit, has made and does still preserve heaven and earth, all the holy angels, and the whole race of mankind, together with all other creatures, and who, of Your great goodness has revealed Yourself unto mankind in Your Holy Word as the One Eternal God in Three Persons of the Same Essence, Power, and Glory: You, O God the Father, Son, and Holy  Spirit, Holy and Ever, O Blessed Trinity, we worship and adore, and in true faith praise and acknowledge You, honor and magnify Your Holy Name now and forever.  Amen.  
            2. Our sermon text for this morning, dear brothers and sisters, is from the Gospel according to John the Apostle and Evangelist who writes: ¹Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. ²This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” ³Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the reign of God.” ⁴Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” ⁵Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the reign of God. ⁶That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ ⁸The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” ⁹Nicodemus said to Him, “How can these things be?” ¹⁰Jesus answered him, “Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things? ¹¹Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony. ¹²If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? ¹³No one has ascended into heaven except He who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. ¹⁴And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵so that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life.” ¹⁶“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. ¹⁷For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him.”  This is our text.
            3. The Athanasian Creed begins: ¹Whoever desires to be saved must, above all, hold the catholic faith. ²Whoever does not keep it whole and undefiled will without doubt perish eternally. ³And the catholic faith is this, ⁴that we worship One God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, neither confusing the Persons nor dividing the Substance.
            4. American Christianity has fallen away from what the Church confesses in her Creeds. The Apostles’, Nicene, and Athanasian Creeds all confess and teach that the Holy Spirit is God and the Third Person of the Holy Trinity. George Barna conducted a poll in 2009. This Barna Poll indicated that over 50% of American Evangelical-Protestant Christians understand the Holy Spirit as a force or power rather than as a living entity and Person (68% of those under 25 say He is a symbol of God’s power or presence but not a living entity and Person; 59% of Busters, 55% Boomers, and 56% of Elders) (Issues, Etc. 30. May 2011). Only 33% of American Evangelical-Protestant Christians disagree that the Holy Spirit is not a living force. Barna’s Poll shows that over one-half of all American Evangelical-Protestant Christians do not believe a key doctrine regarding the Triune God. Over 50% do not believe that the Holy Spirit is God. The state of American Christianity, therefore, is in need of a serious reformation for one half of American Evangelical-Protestants hold a very serious heretical error.
            5. The Athanasian Creed takes Christian doctrine serious. The Creed promises eternal life to those who confess and believe the catholic faith, but the Creed furthermore condemns to hell those who do not confess and believe the catholic faith. Too many Christians get hung up on the Athanasian adjective „catholic“ modifying the noun „faith“. The Creed uses „catholic“ for it is the old Church usage that means „universal“; the adjective „Christian“ is the modern Church usage. The Creed confesses that the faith confessed by entire Church is the only and true saving faith. Lest we doubt what this Church’s saving faith is, the Creed immediately defines the catholic, Christian faith: we worship One God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, neither confusing the Persons nor dividing the Substance.
            6. The Athanasian Creed exhorts us to worship the Triune God. It is not enough to just believe, teach, and confess the Triune God, but we must worship the Triune God. We worship the One, True God who is One God comprised of Three Persons and Three Persons comprising One God. We worship the One, True God who is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Each Person – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – is fully and completely God. Here we see why over 50% of American Evangelical-Protestants Christians do not believe the Holy Spirit is a living Person and God, because many times in their Divine Services they do not worship God as the Triune God. If the Holy Spirit is not regularly worshipped as God, then over time people will stop believing that He truly is God.
            7. Churches whose Divine Services trace back to the Apostles have a visible and powerful worship of the Triune God. The Trinity abounds in the Historic Liturgy of the Divine Service. Thus in the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Roman Catholic Church, the Lutheran Church, the Anglican Church, and the Episcopal Church, the liturgy is centered upon the Holy Trinity. This does not guarantee that every Roman Catholic or Lutheran will correctly understand or confess that the Holy Spirit is God, but they really have no excuse not to confess this because their churches really worship the Triune God each week in their Divine Services.
            8. Our Divine Service abounds with Trinitarian references. A cursory look reveals the following. The Invocation: In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The Absolution: I forgive you all your sins in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The Gloria Patri: Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. The Kyrie: Lord, have mercy upon us. Christ have mercy upon us. Lord, have mercy upon us (where the first Lord is the Father and the last Lord is the Holy Spirit). The Gloria in Excelsis: Thou only, O Christ, with the Holy Ghost, art most high in the glory of God the Father. The Collect of the Day concludes: through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. The Triple Alleluia (one alleluia for each Person of the Trinity). The Creed: I believe in one God, the Father Almighty ... and in one Lord Jesus Christ ... and in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of life. The Sanctus: Holy, holy, holy Lord God of Sabaoth (one holy for each person of the Trinity). The Nunc Dimittis: Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost. The Post-communion Collect: We give thanks to You, Almighty God, … through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God. The Benediction: The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace. The Triple Amen. (Weedon’s Blog, Tuesday 14. June 2011).   
            9. The true, Christian Church worships the Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We worship this Triune God because this Triune God has worked out our redemption from all sin and brought us eternal life and salvation. God the Father sent His Son Jesus Christ into this fallen world. The Son of God merited the world’s salvation by suffering, dying, and rising again. The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, speaking through the Prophetic and Apostolic Scriptures and through those Scriptures reminds us of all that Christ has done and said.
            10. Men and women are born sinful. We must receive a new birth. We who are born in the flesh must be born anew in the spirit. „The Lord Jesus calls this new birth from the Holy Spirit, a new birth from the water …. The new birth from the water is the water of Baptism, the grace-filled water of life, the washing of rebirth in the Holy Spirit. This, water is available – and because we now know that the Holy Spirit works through the water, so we know where the hem of Christ’s garments are that makes us recover from all of our disease“[1] (Löhe 353 §7).
            11. In the Baptismal font the Triune God saves us by washing away our sins. This is the work of God of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. At that Baptismal font each of us first confessed the Triune nature of God, and thus we confess that very essence of the Trinity today in our Divine Service, in remembering our Baptism, and in the Athanasian Creed all of which affirm and teach that we are saved by the work and power of the Triune God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. „There are Three who bear witness in heaven, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and these Three are One“ (Löhe 356 §12) and they bear witness to the one way and means of salvation: through the vicarious sacrifice of the Son who was sent by the Father and who is testified as the world’s savior (der Welt Heiland) by the Spirit.  Amen.
            12. Let us pray. Blessed are You, O Lord God of our fathers, and greatly to be praised and glorified forever. For in Your infinite majesty and wisdom You did show grace and favor upon Your fallen human creation, redeemed us, and sanctified us; may we ever worship You thus, for in worshipping we believe and in believing we hold fast to the gospel that proclaims that we are restored in everlasting fellowship with You, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit: Three Persons yet One God.  Amen.

that we worship One God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity,

neither confusing the Persons nor dividing the Substance.

X

                All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4^th Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27^th Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the New Testament Greek Manuscripts, Luke © 1995 by Reuben Joseph Swanson. 

                Löhe, Wilhelm. A sermon preached on Allerheiligsten Dreieinigkeit Sunday in Neuendettelsau, Germany on John 3,1-15. Copyright © 1859 The Rev. Wilhelm Loehe. The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind, Tr. © 2011.
                Löhe, Wilhelm. Liturgy for Christian Congregations of the Lutheran Faith. Copyright © 1902 Frank Carroll Longaker.
                http://weedon.blogspot.com/2011/06/speaking-of-glorifying-holy-trinity.html

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[1] Gott Lob, daß wir mit unserm sehnlichen Verlangen nicht abgewiesen werden! Der Herr nennt die neue Geburt aus dem heiligen Geiste auch eine neue Geburt aus dem Waßer, und damit enthebt Er uns aller Verlegenheit. Denn was wir unter dem neugebärenden Waßer zu verstehen haben, darüber können wir keinen Zweifel haben: es ist das Waßer der Taufe, das gnadenreiche Waßer des Lebens, das Bad der neuen Geburt im heiligen Geiste. Dieß Waßer ist erreichbar – und weil wir nun wißen, daß der heilige Geist durches Waßer wirkt, so wißen wir wo der Saum der Kleider Christi ist, der uns genesen macht von aller unsrer Krankheit.

John 14,23-27. The Feast of Pentecost

X In the Name of Jesus X

John 14,23-27
Pfingstsonntag  043
The Council of Nicaea, 325
12. June 2011

            1. O Holy Spirit, the Mighty Wind of the Church, You spread the gospel ten days after Jesus’ ascension with mighty force and zealous fire. We live in a pluralistic world much like the world experienced by the first Christians, a world of many diverse cultures, languages, and beliefs. In our politically correct 21^st century we are tempted to accept many different and contradictory ideals of truth instead of looking to the one, certain Truth found in the Holy Scriptures. As a result, we are tempted to take evangelism and the proclamation of the gospel lightly, for we have been influenced by the satanic deception that all people will be saved, regardless of what they believe, because God, after all, is a loving God who will not condemn anyone. The Bible, however, points out clearly that salvation is found only in Jesus Christ and His suffering on the cross and His resurrection from death and the grave. Your Holy Word shows us today in the Acts of the Apostles that Your Word must be preached in the purity of the law and the gospel whereupon the Spirit creates faith in those who hear such proclamation when and where He pleases. Help us, O Holy Spirit, to be faithful to the proclamation of the gospel for the salvation of all who hear and believe it.  Amen.  
            2. Our sermon text for this morning, dear brothers and sisters, is from the Gospel according to John the Apostle and Evangelist who writes: ²³Jesus answered Judas (not Iscariot), „If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him. ²⁴Whoever does not love Me does not keep My words. And the word that you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me. ²⁵These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. ²⁶But the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My Name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. ²⁷Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.“  This is our text.
            3. The Apostle John tells us in his Gospel that on Maundy Thursday Jesus promised that God the Father would soon send the Holy Spirit upon His apostles and disciples. Today is a double festival in the Church: this Sunday is first and foremost the holy feast of Pentecost, and 12. June is the date on which the Church commemorates the writing of the Nicene Creed. Today, therefore, is a theological dove-tailing of two important events in Church history.
            4. Today let us contemplate the following theses:

                      I.   Wer ist der Heilige Geist? Who is the Holy Spirit?

                      II.  Was bedeutet der Heilige Geist zu tun? What does the Holy Spirit do?
                      III. Was ist das für die Kirche? What is this for the Church?

I.

            5. The Nicene Creed wonderfully describes for us who the Holy Spirit is. In the Creed we confess three (3) attributes of the Holy Spirit. The Creed attributes and confesses that the Holy Spirit is God, the Third Person of the Trinity. We know this from the adjective „Holy“ that is attached to His Name. Furthermore, the Holy Spirit is „the Lord“, a title that affirms His Divinity. Finally He is „worshipped and glorified“, and the Scriptures tell us that only the one true God is to be worshipped and glorified.

II.

            6. The Creed also attributes that the Holy Spirit is the „Giver of life“. This also is a Divine attribute, but it is more descriptive. Here the Creed testifies that the Spirit who hovered over the face of the deep in Genesis 1 on the first day of creation is the very same Holy Spirit. We see that the Holy Spirit was directly and actively at work during the creation of all that exists. When Yahweh created man, He breathed into man’s nostrils. This breath may very well have been the Holy Spirit. Man is a sculpture of flesh and bone made from the dirt, lifeless and empty until the very Holy Spirit is breathed into him. At that moment, the man takes his first breath and becomes a living, breathing person who is filled with the Holy Spirit dwelling within him. Our soul and spirit are integral parts of our human makeup, and they are what animates and gives life to our body as a result of the Holy Spirit giving life to the first man, Adam.
            7. This life-giving breath is not merely physical, but also spiritual in nature (bios and zoe). God’s breath of the Holy Spirit not only caused Adam and all mankind to live, and move, and have his being (Acts 17,28), but the breath of God created eternal life in the man’s lifeless body. God created man and woman to be in perpetual and everlasting fellowship with Him and His angelic host.
            8. Eternal life comes by the very word of God. In the Nicene Creed we confess that the Holy Spirit speaks by and through the Prophets. Through His Prophets, the Holy Spirit spoke to His people, calling them to repentance through the law and promising full absolution for their sins through the gospel. In various ways each of the prophets prepared the way for God’s chosen Christ, reassured the people that God would fulfill His promise of salvation history (Heilsgeschichte), and when the fullness of time had arrived the Holy Spirit raised up His greatest and final prophet, John the Baptizer, who proclaimed: »Behold, the Christ is in your midst!« (John 1,29). Just as the Holy Spirit moved upon the face of the deep at creation, so He moved upon the virgin womb of Mary and conceived Jesus therein.
            9. At His ascension, Jesus promised His apostles and disciples that He would send them this very Holy Spirit. Ten days later at Pentecost the Holy Spirit was sent and He arrived in fiery power and glory. On this feast of Pentecost the apostles spoke in foreign languages to those who had travelled up to Jerusalem to worship Yahweh. The Apostle Peter preached the gospel of Christ’s sacrifice for the world’s sin and His resurrection from the dead for our justification. The other apostles and disciples testified to these magnificent deeds of Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit worked through the preached gospel that day and converted 3000 Jews to the Christian faith!

III.

            10. The Holy Spirit did not withdraw Himself from His Church after that first Pentecost following Christ’s ascension. Throughout the Acts of the Apostles, Luke the Evangelist records how the Holy Spirit dynamically worked through His apostles to create and strengthen faith in the risen Jesus. In the Creed we confess the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. This glorious Church exists by the will of the Holy Spirit and He sustains her to this very day.
            11. The Holy Spirit makes His Church one, holy, Christian and apostolic. Christ Jesus only has one Bride – His Church. Although throughout the world the Church is fractured and comprised of many and various denominations, nevertheless the Church is one and ecumenical. There is only one gospel that saves and brings salvation to the world, and only the Church has that pure gospel by the providence of the Holy Spirit. Through the Word and the Sacraments the Church gives the world the precious gospel of Christ crucified. By these very same means of grace the Holy Spirit makes His Church holy and preserves her in this holiness.
            12. The Holy Spirit grounds His Church on the Holy Scriptures. Therefore, the Church is Christian and apostolic. The Church’s cornerstone is Christ and her foundation is the apostles and the prophets (Ephesians 2,20). The Church preaches only Christ and thus follows in the footsteps of the apostles who bore witness to His resurrection.
            13. The Holy Spirit brings people into His Church through holy Baptism. This is no different from the days following the first Pentecost after Christ’s ascension. After hearing the Apostle Peter’s sermon, the Jews inquired „what now?“, and the apostles responded „Repent and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit“ (Acts 2,38). Beginning with Baptism, the Holy Spirit brings all Christians the resurrection of the dead and eternal life in the world to come.
           14. The Holy Spirit is the Third Person of the Holy Trinity. He is the Lord and Giver of life. He creates and sustains His Church. The Holy Spirit is Jesus’ precious gift to His Church, to you, and to me. Each Sunday is a mini-Pentecost, for on this day the gospel is proclaimed and people believe and are saved. Yes, today the Holy Spirit is in our midst and working upon us.  Amen.
            15. Let us pray. O Holy Spirit, Heart-filler and Fire-ignitor of Your Christians, hover over this fallen world and breathe the gospel life into the wicked and unbelievers, so that they, like us, may become one of Your faithful and filled with Your Divine love for the glory of You, the Heavenly Father and the Ascended Son.  Amen.

One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you!

X

                All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4^th Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27^th Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the New Testament Greek Manuscripts, John © 1995 by Reuben Joseph Swanson. 

Daniel 7,13-14. Christ's Ascension, transferred

X In the Name of Jesus X

Daniel 7,13-14
Christi Himmelfahrt  041 weiß, transferred
Boniface, Archbishop of Mainz & German Apostle, Martyr 755.
5. June 2011

            1. O Lord, Almighty God and Father, who this day has made us glad through the glorious ascension of Your dear Son, most heartily do we thank You for this joy and consolation. He has entered into His glory, and has promised that we will follow Him. And we beseech You, enable us steadfastly to believe the same, and ever more worship and praise You in the Name of Your dear Son, our Lord. Hide Your face from our sins, and behold us in the face of Your Anointed, whom You have received, for our joy and consolation, to Your right hand. Be gracious unto us, O Lord, and hear our cry. Send down Your Spirit, so that we also may arise and seek those things which are above where Christ sits. Grant us grace to depart from evil and to follow righteousness, to love You, and in cheerful obedience serve You forever. O Lord, our God, enable us, with Him and through Him, to ascend and rule in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness (Löhe 141).  Amen.  

            2. Our sermon text for this morning, dear brothers and sisters, is from the Prophet Daniel who writes: ¹³I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there arrived one like a son of man, and He came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. ¹⁴And to Him was given dominion and glory and a reign, so that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him; His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which will not pass away, and His reign one that will not be destroyed.  This is our text.
            3. In the past two hundred years, the Prophet Daniel has been hijacked by false teachers who use his prophecies to prop up their heretical teaching of dispensational premillennialism. They put an unbiblical gap between Daniel’s sixty-ninth and seventieth week in order to make the holy prophet conform to their errant understanding of eschatology. They focus more on the Antichrist rather than the Christ. They see prophecy as the prediction of future historical events rather than the Biblical approach that prophecy points us to Christ and His ministry. The Biblical prophets were more concerned about forth-telling the arrival of the Christ and less concerned about foretelling of future human events.
            4. A straightforward reading of Daniel clearly shows that the prophet is speaking about Jesus’ ascension into heaven. We know this on account of several theological points: 1. The „son of man“ in Daniel 7 is a reference to Jesus Christ. In the Holy Gospels, Jesus refers to Himself seventy-eight (78) times as the Son of Man. He never uses this phrase to refer to someone else; Jesus only applied this phrase to Himself. 2. The „Ancient of Days“ is a reference to God the Father. 3. The phrase „was presented before Him“ is a reference to Jesus’ post-ascension appearance before the heavenly throne. 4. The dominion, glory, and reign that was given to Jesus is His coronation as the King of all creation and more specifically His Kingship over His holy Church.
            5. From the Prophet Daniel we therefore learn:
    
                                    I.   All history is centered upon Jesus Christ.
                                    II.  God the Father has given Christ a heavenly reign.
                                    III. This heavenly reign is one of everlasting dominion and glory.

I.

            6. All history is centered upon Jesus Christ. Almost every history textbook will tell you the exact opposite of this. We learn that dramatic world events and history-making decisions are the result of powerful leaders embarking on momentous endeavors. President Kennedy declared in 1962: „We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.“ President Reagan implored in 1987 at the Brandenburg Gate (West Berlin): „General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! “ In high school, my world history teacher told us that there are only three dates he wanted us to remember from Western Civilization: 1. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus in A.D. 30;  2. the fall of Rome in 476; and 3. the fall of Constantinople in 1453.

            7. To be sure, there are plenty of momentous events in history. In 755, the martyrdom of Boniface, the Archbishop of Mainz, brought to an end his dedicated evangelization to the pagan Germans. To this day, Boniface is affectionately called „the apostle to Germany“. VE Day and VJ Day in 1945 liberated millions of people around the world who had been under the heavy boot of Japanese imperialism and German fascism. Christians can therefore honestly say that Jesus Christ is the most important person in this world’s history, and His ministry has impacted the world over more than any other person or regime. All history is centered on Jesus Christ.

II.

            8. God the Father has given Christ the heavenly reign. Kingdoms come and go. Empires rise and fall. This terrestrial Earth has seen mighty and glorious empires in its history: the majestic  Egyptian pharaohs (3000-30 B.C.), the powerful Babylonian Empire (625-539 B.C.), and the mighty Roman Empire (27 B.C. – A.D. 1453). The grandest earthly reign was the British Empire (1583-1997). During the reign of Queen Victoria (ruled 1837-1901), the sun never set on her territories and her grandchildren took the throne in all the prominent European monarchies. Nevertheless (dennoch), Queen Victoria’s British Empire was a flickering candle flame against the blazing star of Jesus Christ’s reign, for the reign of Christ endures forever.

            9. The Prophet Daniel was an eschatological prophet who dealt with the end-time reign of God. He forth-told the eternal glory of Jesus’ reign. Jesus stood as a king before Pilate, John’s Gospel records that: »Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, „Are you the King of the Jews?“ Jesus answered, „My reign is not of this world. If My reign were of this world, My servants would have been fighting, so that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But My reign is not from the world.“« (John 18,33.36). Jesus’ reign is not some temporal empire like Rome, nor is it a theocratic kingdom like Old Testament Israel. Jesus’ reign is spiritual. Jesus’ reign is manifested in His Church.

III.

            10. This heavenly reign is one of everlasting dominion and glory. Daniel tells us that all people, nations, and languages shall serve Jesus in His heavenly reign. Jesus’ glorious reign is manifested in His holy Christian Church which consists of two distinct realms: the Church militant and the Church triumphant. The militant Church consists of all the congregations and parishes that one finds throughout the world. Some are regal and hierarchical, like the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church with their bishops and patriarchs. Others are independent and congregational like the Presbyterian and Baptist Churches. Some Christians worship in churches with grand cathedrals in cultured cities made of stone, marble, ornate stained glass, and classical pipe organs. Others are simple tin-plated square buildings in the African bush where a cantor keeps the worshippers on meter with only his singing voice. The Church on earth is militant because she daily struggles against the Devil, that rebel-usurper, who has planted his tyrannical banner upon God’s creation. Jesus advances His reign through the Word and the Sacraments by which Church liberates those behind enemy lines. The triumphant Church, however, consists of all those dear Christians who have fallen asleep in the Lord Jesus and now enjoy the bliss of Paradise. These Christians behold Jesus in His ascended glory and dominion, and they are free of the cares and the struggles that the Church militant must bear. A spiritual veil separates the Church triumphant from the Church militant, but when Jesus returns on the last day that veil will be removed and both realms of the Church will be united together.

           11. Daniel foresaw that Jesus’ reign would be powerful and mighty; it would not pass away nor be destroyed. Jesus’ reign is eternal. Jesus did not arrive at His first advent to establish a temporal kingdom that would rival the governments of this world. He did not arrive to reestablish the monarchy of Davidic Israel. He did not arrive to establish a Christian reign where morality and spirituality reign supreme. Jesus arrived as the true King of creation to overthrow the devil and his terrible tyranny. Jesus accomplished this by His crucifixion and resurrection whereby He opened up the reign of heaven to all believers. Jesus has commanded His Church, the New Israel, to proclaim the gospel of forgiveness and salvation in His Name through the preaching of the Word and the administering of the Sacraments. By these means of grace the devil is defeated and his wicked schemes are thwarted.
            12. This morning we, Grace Evangelical-Lutheran Church, assemble in the Divine Service (Gottesdienst) whereby the Holy Spirit serves us with the gospel through the liturgy, the proclaimed Word, and the administered Lord’s Supper. We in grateful thanksgiving serve God with our hymns and prayers, and when we leave this sacred and holy space we honor God and our neighbor with our simple tasks of our various vocations. Our church is but a small estate in Christ’s militant Church that spans the globe from India, Asia, Europe, and America. Each Sunday we join other churches in Christ’s reign, confessing the regal phrases of the Nicene Creed: „I believe in Jesus Christ, who ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father. And He will come again with glory to judge both the living and the dead, whose kingdom will have no end.“ Christ is ascended. His reign is an everlasting dominion. One the last day, Christ will return and „this present sinful age will be overtaken and supplanted by the new age to come. This new age will come with effects for the entire cosmos; the whole creation will be affected“ (Gibbs 29). We partake of it now, and one day also in the bliss of the Church triumphant, only and solely by the righteous merit of Jesus Christ that He gives us by grace.   Amen.
            13. Let us pray. O Lord Jesus Christ, Your right hand exalts and does valiantly, pour out upon us the Holy Spirit so that in the days ahead when we struggle as Your Church militant we may be comforted with Your promise that we will inherit Your heavenly reign on account of Your righteous merit.  Amen.

One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you!

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                All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4^th Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27^th Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart. 

                Löhe, Wilhelm. Liturgy for Christian Congregations of the Lutheran Faith. Copyright © 1902 Frank Carroll Longaker.