1. Peter 5,5c-11. 15. Sunday after Trinity

✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠

The Word of the Lord Endures Forever 

se cwide þæs béaggiefan ábireþ ferhþ

1. Peter 5,5c-11 4616

15. Sonntag nach Trinitatis  060  

Moses, Prophet, 1500 bc 

4. September 2016 

1. О Lord God, Heavenly Father, we thank You for all Your benefits: that You have given us life and graciously sustained us unto this day: We beseech You, take not Your blessing from us; preserve us from covetousness, so that we may serve You only, love and abide in You and not defile ourselves by idolatrous love of mammon, but hope and trust only in Your grace.  Amen.  (Veit Dietrich for the 15. Sn. n. Trinitatis) 

2. »God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.« [Proverbs 3,34] Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time He may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on Him, because He cares for you. Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you. To Him be the dominion forever and ever.  Amen. 

3. The Apostle Peter tells us that the devil prowls around seeking people to inflict suffering upon. The devil has done this since his fall from heavenly glory. Job is perhaps the best Biblical example of someone who suffered at the hands of the devil. In a test of Job’s righteous integrity and faith the L told Satan: »Behold, all that he has is in your hand« (Job 1,12). Job subsequently lost his children, his wealth and his health at the hand of Satan.  

4. WE are tempted to view suffering as a sign of God’s displeasure, His lack of love for us or His inability to stop suffering. Thus the Apostle Peter speaks of humiliation by the mighty hand of God (Wenz ¶ 10). „This shows why God allows suffering in the lives of His children. Suffering drives out our pride and arrogance. In suffering, we know that we are not in fact the masters of our lives, as we believe, when everything does not go the way we want it to go. Suffering makes us see our need of help“ (Wenz ¶ 10).

5. „Therefore, the theme of our preaching is: The suffering of Christians does not disprove God’s omnipotence nor His grace. Let us turn to Peter to the first point: 1. Our suffering does not disprove God’s omnipotence, because that suffering comes from God’s hand“ (Wenz ¶ 9). St. Peter says precisely in his epistle: »Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time He may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on Him, because He cares for you.« 

6. Suffering does not separate us from God. Our sinful flesh tends to believe this, but nothing could be further from the truth.  The Apostle Paul said: »No one and no thing shall separate us from the love of Christ. Not tribulation or distress, not persecution or famine, note nakedness, danger or even the sword; not death or life, not angels or rulers, nothing in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord« (Romans 8,35.38-39). 

7. The proof that nothing can separate us from God is Jesus Himself who suffered on our behalf. Our Baptism unites us to this Suffering Savior (Romans 6,3). First, this means that there is no pain-free Christianity (Wenz 16); Christians will suffer in this life. Jesus told us plainly: »If anyone would follow after Me, then let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow Me« (Matthew 16,24). To deny ourselves and to take up our cross is to suffer even unto martyrdom. Christ walked the path to His cross, and we follow Him to that cross where he suffered and died. People will ridicule us, tempt us to deny Jesus and walk away from the faith. People may persecute us so that we suffer physical or financial loss. Some Christians lose family and friends when they confess Jesus. Christianity is a theology grounded in suffering.

8. The ministry and message of Jesus does not end with suffering on the cross, death and burial in a grave. Walking the path of Jesus who bears the cross is a walk of death into the grave and hades and then a return from hades and leaving the grave in resurrected glory. Thus St. Peter tells us: »And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you.« 

9. Jesus exhorts us by saying: »Draw near to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me that I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your lives. For My yoke is easy to bear, and My burden is light« (Matthew 11:28-30). We need not fear the devil, suffering, persecution or even death itself for Jesus has walked though them victoriously. His victory is our victory. 

10. Thus the Apostle Paul tElle us: »Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our suffering, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any suffering, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too« (2. Corinthians 1,3-5). May the Holy Spirit give us opportunities to comfort others in their suffering and give us the strength to do so.  Amen. 

11. Let us pray. O Lord Jesus Christ, we taste and see that the You are good; help us to always take refuge in You so that we are always blessed.  Amen. 

To God alone be the Glory 

Gode ealdore sy se cyneþrymm

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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. 

Babylon 5. Parliament of Dreams. Copyright © 1993 PTN Consortium and Warner Bros. Television.

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. 

   Wenz, Armin. A sermon preached on 16. September 2012 (15. Trinity) in Oberursel, Germany on 1. Peter 5c-11. Copyright © 2012 The Rev. Dr. Armin Wenz. The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind, Tr. © 2012.