✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠
The Word of the Lord Endures Forever
Verbum Domini Manet in Aeternum
Romans 13,8-14 0116
1. Sonntag im Advent: Populus Zion
Noah
Saturninus, Bishop of Toulouse, France. Martyr 250
29. November 2015
1. O Lord God, Heavenly Father, we thank, laud and praise You eternally, that You have appointed Your Son a King for us poor men and women, who had to be under death’s and Satan’s tyranny on account of our sins, a Righteous King who frees us from our sins by His death and wants to be a Savior, who helps us against and saves us from death. We also beseech You: enlighten, rule and guide us with Your Holy Spirit, so that we hold fast alone to this Righteous King and Savior, and do not, like the world, take offense at His humble form and despised word and thus be saved eternally by a firm trust in Him (Veit Dietrich for the 1. Sunday in Advent). Amen.
2. Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. The commandments: »You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,« and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: »You shall love your neighbor as yourself.« Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law. Besides this you know the time, that the hour has arrived for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. 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. Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
3. Jesus once taught in a parable that the last will be first and the first will be last. The Church Year follows this axiom as our liturgical year begins anew today. We prepare for Jesus’ advent at Christmas by focusing upon His entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.
4. The 1. Sunday in Advent emphasizes the themes of justification and salvation, for Yahweh made us a promise through His prophet: »Behold, your King is arriving; He is justifying and saving you; He is humble and mounted on an ass, on a colt, the foal of an ass« (Zechariah 9,9). This Divine King fulfills His promise, and He rode up to Jerusalem to make you righteous: this is why Jesus was born. Zechariah and Matthew tell us that Jesus saved His fallen world meekly and mildly. He rode into Jerusalem on a beast of burden; He did not lash out against His accusers and He died the death of a condemned criminal. In all this, Jesus was in complete control during Holy Week, but He exercised His authority by willingly humbling Himself and submitting Himself to others in order to redeem His fallen creation. On this Sunday in Advent we begin our preparation for Jesus’ birth.
5. Saint Paul writes in our Epistle Lection for today: »You know the time, that the hour has arrived for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. 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.«
6. The Holy Scriptures proclaim that »Jesus Christ is the Light of the world, (John 8,12) the Light no darkness can overcome (John 1,5). His Light scatters the darkness, (1. Corinthians 4,5) and illumines His Church (2. Corinthians 4,6)«. Jesus is the Morning Star, the Splendor of Light Eternal and the Sun of Righteousness: He draws near and enlightens those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.
7. Advent begins with one lighted candle, a mere flame in the dark night of sin, but that single point of light shines forth the promise of forgiveness in Christ Jesus. Our sin is forgiven. We are redeemed back to God the Father. Everlasting life is ours. Jesus has done it all for us.
8. We confess with the crowds: „Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He who arrives in the Name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!“ We are acknowledging that Jesus saves and delivers us from sin, death and the devil, for Jesus desires to justify and save us. He has justified and saved us by suffering on cross, dying as the sacrificial Lamb and rising from the grave on the third day. We are acknowledging that Jesus is the Light of the world, whose Radiant Brilliance we begin preparing for once again today in this season of Advent.
9. With the first purple candle lighted on Christ’s royal advent crown, we proclaim with the Prophet Isaiah: »Rejoice greatly, O people of Zion, for you shall weep no more. The Lord will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as He hears it, He answers you« (Isaiah 30,19). Indeed the Lord does hear and answer! He triumphantly entered into Jerusalem and He humiliated Himself on the cross to purchase our salvation. The promise of His birth was foretold in the Prophets and that promise was fulfilled at Christmas in Bethlehem. Thus Advent begins our preparation for the Heilsgeschichte (salvation history) of the world through Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. Amen.
10. Let us pray. O Lord, out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, the Son of God shines forth. Help us to welcome Your arrival so that we rejoice in the salvation that You bring from heaven above. Amen.
To God alone be the Glory
Soli Deo Gloria
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All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4. Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27. Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart.
ELKB. Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. www.bayern-evangelisch.de/www/index.php. Copyright © 2013 Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern.
VELKD. Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands. www.velkd.de. Copyright © 2013 Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands.
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