Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

This sermon on 1 John 4:16-21 contrasts worldly love with God’s true love, urging us to abide in His Word and serve others not out of fear, but because He first loved us. Drawing from the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, it shows how abiding in God transforms our hearts, destroys idols, and frees us to love sacrificially. Real love begins with God and is revealed through Christ.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, last week I was away attending a wedding of one of my nephews out in Sun Valley, Idaho.

It was an extremely beautiful event set in the wonders of God’s creation in the hills overlooking the ski resort.

And during the ceremony, the officiant and the couple made vows to each other, and in these vows and in the ceremony, they spoke much about love.

They did, however, not speaking of God’s love for us, but of the emotion of love that a man and a woman might feel toward one another.

St. John writes, God is love.

And he who abides in love abides in God, in God in him.

As beautiful as the setting and as beautiful as the wedding, as beautiful as the bride and the groom may have been, for me that service was incomplete.

If you wish to understand love, you first have to understand God.

True love.

Love, as you and I were created to feel, requires that you abide in God and have God abiding in you.

We must start by seeing how God wants to be loved, as he reveals to us in his law.

You shall have no other gods before me.

You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

Now, in my many years on this planet, my travels and visits, aside from seeing a few little Buddhist statues, or maybe when we visited a Hindu temple, seeing the statues to their pagan gods.

And more recently, I think the Norse gods, the Odin and Thor and stuff like that are becoming popular.

But we don’t tend to have false gods, statues or idols to them physically in our hands.

We do, however, have many such idols in our hearts.

And one of the foremost idols we have is this notion of human love.

I will argue that Valentine’s Day is the high holiday where this pagan god is worshiped.

The angels in heaven, the angels that worship with us here this morning must look in derision at those little babies on the cards, you know, the ones with the wings and their little heart-shaped arrows.

These mighty warriors of God would not dare be caught flying around in a little diaper.

They would not be passing out candy more likely to give your beloved the diabetes than to engender feelings of true love.

I remember as a child in school having to pass out cards to all of the other kids in the classroom.

You couldn’t leave a single kid out on Valentine’s Day.

That sentiment of love in those cards was as false as those protesters today with their rainbow flags.

When we elevate the human emotion of love to this point where it is the focus of weddings, holidays, or an entire month, we’ve made it into an idol.

True love abides in God.

True love remembers the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

We keep it holy as we abide in God’s word.

This is the rebuke that Father Abraham gives to the rich man in Jesus’ parable today.

When the rich man begged him to send Lazarus to warn his brothers to avoid going to hell, Abraham says to him, they have Moses and the prophets.

Let them hear them.

As the rich man pleads with him, no, Father Abraham, but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.

Abraham replies, they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rise from the dead.

To abide in God and his love means that first, we must listen to Moses and the prophets, to the word of God, every word.

The rich man had heard Moses and the prophets.

He know this because he calls Abraham father.

Yet he did not abide in that word.

He did not have faith.

He did not trust in God above all else.

How do I know this?

He’s in hell.

He’s in hell because he did not love as God commands him to love.

He did not love as God has loved him.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

The rich man had received many good and gracious gifts from God.

He was formed by God in his mother’s womb and given life.

He had a family which included at least five brothers, and he appears to love.

He’s been blessed with a nice home.

He’s been given wealth that enables him to dine sumptuously, every single day.

He’s received many, many good things in his lifetime.

All this, God does for him only out of fatherly divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in the rich man.

For all this, it is his duty to thank, praise, serve, and obey God, to abide in his word.

Yet, he does not.

He does not abide in God’s word.

He does not love his neighbor as himself.

The poor man, Lazarus, at his doorstep, is exhibit one in the prosecution’s case against him.

We don’t know anything about this man named Lazarus, other than that he was hungry, sick, homeless, and that he loved God, that he abided in God’s word, for he goes to heaven and he dies.

We don’t know how he became to be in his circumstances, the circumstances in which Jesus cites in this parable.

Was he an alcoholic?

Was he a drug user?

Maybe he’s an ex-con who couldn’t get a job.

Perhaps he’s mentally ill.

He could be a veteran suffering from PTSD.

Maybe he lost everything he had on Wall Street or at a casino.

It doesn’t really matter, does it?

This man had heard Moses and the prophets.

This man abided in God’s word, and if he had come to his circumstances because of any sin, he had repented of those sins and been forgiven.

He was saved.

A person’s circumstances in this life, the trials and the tribulations they face, do not define them as a person.

God does.

God creates them and God redeems them.

God loved Lazarus every bit as much as he did the rich man, even though he didn’t give Lazarus nearly what he had given the rich man.

But Christ died for both of them.

Christ died that their sins would both be forgiven and that they could abide in him forever, in his mansion with many rooms.

What Lazarus lacked in his unhappy life on earth is now abundant for him in heaven, and so much more than he could have ever imagined or asked for.

Lazarus was a servant of God, a servant who had been placed on this rich man’s doorstep as his neighbor that the rich man might have that opportunity to demonstrate God’s love to him.

Just as Jesus would later instruct his disciples, when you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back and you be repaid.

But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just.

Jesus, love incarnate himself, reveals that the love of God is not transactional.

The son of God came to pour out his lifeblood, his precious, priceless blood and calvary, to win your soul back from sin, death, and the power of the enemy.

He did not redeem you with gold or silver or precious gems by which he could be repaid, but with a gift of his love, which no man and no woman can ever deserve nor repay.

This God’s sweetest love, who on us his grace has bestowed, invites us to the wedding feast of the lamb in his kingdom, at his table, where all of your sins are forever forgiven, where they are washed away.

Here, abiding in his word, in his love, the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind are healed and raised to new life, given blessing upon blessing in his name, given a gift they can never, ever hope to repay, a gift that he now asked them, only that they share with their neighbors.

God had poured out grace upon grace to the rich man.

Not so that he could simply feast sumptuously every day, not so that he could hoard them, not so that he could build a bigger barn, not so that he could gorge himself on rich dainties from the tribe of Asher.

And we see this at the wedding of Cana, by the way, when Jesus creates so much wine, so much more wine than the people there could ever drink, he doesn’t do it so they can get loaded.

Jesus gives these manifestations of God’s love, he gives them to the rich, he gives them to the people at Cana, that they might in turn share his love, share every manifestation of that love with their neighbors, especially with Lazarus.

Lazarus is that neighbor that God put at this man’s doorstep specifically so that he could demonstrate God’s love to him.

The rich man didn’t have to go to North America, he didn’t have to go to Europe, he didn’t have to travel to Asia to find some poor child who’s hungry, whose belly’s distended by hunger so that he could do some nice thing, maybe he could have, but God put a neighbor right on his doorstep for him to serve.

When Jesus tells you to invite those who cannot repay you to your table and that in doing so you will be blessed because they cannot repay you and you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just, Jesus is not advocating works righteousness.

John teaches us as much in his epistle.

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear because fear involves torment.

But he who fears has not been made perfect in love, we love him because he first loved us.

We serve our neighbors because we love them.

We don’t serve them because we fear going to hell.

If you believe in Christ, every single one of your sins has already been paid for.

You have nothing that you can do to pay for a single one of them yourself.

You can’t do it.

No matter how many poor people you feed, no matter how many Lazaruses you give all your money to, that won’t get you into heaven.

Your faith in Jesus Christ alone has done that.

But we can give Lazarus everything we have, everything that we’ve received, not to avoid going to hell, but because we know that we are going to heaven, where we will never thirst, hunger, or sorrow again.

We can give without fear of being impoverished or being hungry or thirsty, because faith trusts that our Father in heaven will continue to give us our daily bread.

If not in this life, then in the next.

Faith trusts that even should we lose our lives, goods, fame, child or wife, that these all be gone, yet our victory has been won, and the kingdom of heaven will be our inheritance forever.

This faith then frees us.

It frees us to live and to love as God has called us to do.

He who loves God must love his brother also.

Jesus commands us to love one another, to love our brother because he loves our brother.

He poured out his holy precious blood to redeem our brother.

He died for the sake of our brother, for the Lazaruses of this world.

If he loves them, how can we not?

This love though, does not always look like the love that the world expects.

The world expects that Lazarus, and the world in this case is evidenced by the rich man.

The world expects that Lazarus would have mercy on this rich man and dip his finger in the waters to quench his thirst.

The world expects that Lazarus had warned the rich man’s brothers.

Unless they repent, they’re going to join him in hell.

The world expects signs and wonders.

They expect these things because they have rejected the word of Moses and the prophets.

The world expects tolerance for sin.

The world expects tolerance for wickedness.

Pro tip, God does not.

Consider God’s command to the Israelites upon their preparation to enter the promised land.

You shall utterly destroy all the places where the nations, which you shall dispossess, serve their gods.

On the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree, you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, burn their wooden images with fire.

You shall cut down the carved images of their gods and destroy their names from that place.

You shall not worship the Lord your God with such things.

Well, you shall seek the place where the Lord your God chooses, out of all your tribes, to put his name for his dwelling place, and there shall you go.

Love begins by abiding in God’s word.

Abiding in God.

Abiding in the place he’s called you to be.

Today we carry out this commandment, but I’m not telling you to go to your neighbor’s house and chop his little Buddha into little pieces and light it on fire.

I’m not telling you to do that.

Please, don’t take what I’m saying that way.

To be obedient to God, he wants us here in worship.

He wants us to worship him.

He wants us to remember the Sabbath, not misusing his name, not forsaking to gather together as he’s commanded in person.

Because here, he forgives your sins.

Here, you are forgiven in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Because God forgives you.

He wants you to hear it from the mouth of his servant.

Here, you have the waters of life poured over your forehead, washing you clean of every sin.

Here, you receive his body and blood in person, in the flesh.

He comes to you as no other God can possibly hope to do because they are dead gods and you serve the living God.

He’s commanded you to do all this.

We serve him taking the cup of salvation and call it on the name of the Lord.

But abiding in his word means that we have to remove the logs from our own eyes.

We do have to go into our own hearts and chop down those idols and utterly destroy the false gods in our own hearts to make room to abide with God and he with us, that we may learn to love as he has loved us.

It means rejoicing.

It means rejoicing because God has spoken to us by Moses.

God has spoken to us through the prophets, and in these last days, God has spoken to us through his son.

We rejoice because God has chosen to abide in us, in our hearts, in this place, in this time, so that we may learn to love as he has loved us.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

This sermon on John 3:1–17 explores Jesus’ midnight encounter with Nicodemus and the mystery of being born again—born from above by water and the Spirit. It contrasts life in the flesh with life in the Spirit, emphasizing baptism’s power to renew us through Christ’s cross. Discover how God’s love in sending His Son enables us to live not by the flesh, but as heirs of eternal life in the Spirit.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Amen.

You may be seated.

Nicodemus, a man of the Pharisees and a member of the Sanhedrin, went to talk to Jesus at night.

He addressed Jesus reverently as Rabbi.

And as a teacher come from God, he knew that no one could do the signs that Jesus was doing unless God was with him.

He acknowledged Jesus’ teaching and his miracles.

Jesus answered him, Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

These very first words of Jesus to Nicodemus caused confusion.

And in part, it can be explained by an ambiguity in the Greek.

In our text, the word anothin is translated as again, to be born anothin, to be born again, which seems to be the way that Nicodemus understood Jesus.

However, the word can also be understood as from above.

With that, we get a bit of a different meaning from what Nicodemus understood.

We would have instead this, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

This helps to establish the two types of birth that Jesus taught to Nicodemus through the rest of the Gospel reading from this morning.

There is an earthly birth in the flesh, and there is a different heavenly birth from above, that is from the spirit.

Jesus begins with the birth that all mankind is born into, saying that that which is born of the flesh is flesh.

This isn’t a circular argument using a word in order to define itself.

It’s not like the false definition of woman that has been propagandized in recent years that says a woman is anyone who identifies as a woman.

Rather, that which is born of flesh is flesh actually teaches us that what is born of the flesh is concerned only with the things that impact the flesh.

Those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh.

This path leads only to death.

The flesh we know is hostile towards God.

It does not love God.

It doesn’t want to love God.

In fact, it’s incapable of loving God.

We cannot submit to or keep God’s law, especially when it comes to the first three commandments.

It has contempt towards God and doubts His word.

In the flesh, we even sin when we do works that outwardly look good to our neighbor.

Nothing that man does from the perspective of the flesh can please God.

In fact, the desires of the flesh have us flee from God as we learn from Adam and Eve as they hide in the garden.

In the Old Testament reading today, Isaiah is in great fear because of his unclean lips.

He knows that man cannot come face to face with the triune God and live because of man’s impurity of the flesh.

Just like Adam, Eve and Isaiah, according to our flesh, we are guilty of all sin.

We cannot justify ourselves or come to live a holy and pure life.

The right punishment for this is eternal punishment and death.

We were unable to free ourselves of the guilt and sin of the flesh.

Often, we still live our lives as if we are born only of the flesh.

We set our minds on things of the flesh concerned most with ourselves and how we can get what we want.

One of these temptations of the flesh is a tendency towards laziness.

Many of you, I’m sure, are paid to do a job.

We are paid to serve those we work for, to help them to prosper in their vocation.

But regularly showing up late or leaving early or taking a long lunch is often out of laziness.

Your flesh tells you, it doesn’t matter.

You’re going to get paid anyway.

It’s not hurting anyone.

Also taking time during your workday to send personal texts or emails isn’t what you’re paid for either.

It’s also a form of laziness in doing the thing you want to do, rather than what your boss has instructed you to do.

Laziness, though, often extends to our homes as well.

Your wife nicely asked you to take out the trash two days ago, a task that takes about five minutes, and you still haven’t found the time.

We also neglect time we have with our family.

If you didn’t know, it’s the norm now in America to spend hours a day scrolling on social media, or watching TV, or playing video games.

Almost half of American teens say they’re on the internet almost constantly, and the average American spends almost four hours in front of their phone screen.

But no one seems to have the 12 minutes a day it would take to read or listen through the Bible in a year.

It’s not so much busy-ness as it is lazy-ness that keeps us from finding the time for God’s word.

The temptations of the flesh fight against the things of the spirit.

Diligence is needed in teaching the family the word of God, but the flesh tempts us to neglect our duty to our family and to do what’s easy instead.

We tell ourselves, well, I guess I didn’t have time for that again today.

I really want to start my devotions with my family, but I’m just so busy.

Sometimes maybe we really are that busy, and other times we throw our time away through temptations of flesh.

The habit of scheduling your time can certainly help prevent some laziness, but when temptations of the flesh come unexpectedly, don’t expect yourself to overcome them on your own.

Trying to do things on your own often makes things worse.

Instead, pray the Lord’s Prayer.

Pray, Dear Father, let me not fall into temptation.

He will answer, He has promised to help guard and defend those who call upon His name.

While we were still in a sinful and fleshly state, still hating God, still His enemies, the Father sent His only begotten Son.

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and so we are not left without hope.

Jesus told Nicodemus, that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

Just as you are only conceived and born once in the flesh, you are also born of the Spirit one time in your baptism.

There is only one Lord, one faith, one baptism.

In your baptism, you were born of water and the Spirit, washed to a new birth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.

We have been justified by God’s grace.

Jesus further explained how the birth and the Spirit would become possible for those of us born of the flesh.

He said, and as Moses lifted up the servant in the wilderness, so must the son of man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

Many in the time of the Exodus perished in the wilderness, having been bitten by fiery serpents as punishment for their disobedience to be healed.

They had to look upon a bronze serpent that Moses lifted up.

All in the camp, who looked upon that bronze serpent were saved.

In this way, the father loved the world so much that he sent his only son to be lifted up on the cross, that whoever looks only to the son of man for the forgiveness of sins and believes in him will have eternal life.

Christ’s death on the cross opened for us the way in which we could be born again.

In our baptism, we die with Christ on the cross and we are born of the Spirit and the water.

Therefore, we are not of the flesh, but of the Spirit because the Spirit of God dwells within each one of us.

Our bodies that were dead in the flesh according to our sin are given new life because of the righteousness of Christ.

We have been given new life through the Spirit who dwells within us.

Those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit and are given life and peace.

The faith given to us by the Holy Spirit enables us to live spiritual lives.

As we have been reborn by faith and justified by Christ’s death, we can begin to fear God and love him.

We can begin to obey the first table of the law.

Being born of the Spirit, we can pray to our Father in heaven and expect him to answer and help us.

Just as an earthly father will answer and help and protect his own children.

Born of the Spirit, we come here to worship and praise God for his many great gifts to us.

Not only this, but in the Spirit, we’re able to begin to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Our hearts are turned toward spiritual and holy impulses and away from the desires of the flesh.

All this begins after we have been justified by grace through faith in the Son of Man who was given up for us by the Heavenly Fathers.

In our baptism, we have been reborn and gifted the Holy Spirit who enables us to live as those born of the Spirit.

Born of the Spirit, we are no longer flesh.

We are no longer children of the flesh, the children of the Kingdom of God, as children of the Heavenly Kingdom.

We are heirs of the hope of eternal life.

Amen.

This sermon on 1 Peter 4:7-11 unpacks what it means that “the end of all things is at hand.” Christ’s redemptive work is finished, and now believers are called to speak God’s Word boldly, love fervently, and steward their gifts faithfully. Like Noah and Lot, we must proclaim truth amid rejection, trusting the Spirit to work through our words. Jesus saves—our role is to speak and serve in love.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Brothers and sisters in Christ, more than 1,500 years ago, Peter wrote those words that we read earlier.

The end of all things is at hand.

The end of what though?

Certainly, as we heard before the service, the school year has just ended for those still matriculating, and congratulations again for our youth who just graduated.

But this is certainly not what Peter had in mind.

Many assume that he’s saying that judgment day is nigh, that 1,000 years is but a day in the eyes of the Lord.

So repent and believe.

And this, though wrong, is closer to Peter’s meaning.

Certainly, judgment day is coming, and we do need to repent and believe, but this is not what Peter is getting it here.

Peter has been warning his readers to be ready for that day, to be ready for the end, but the end of which he’s writing here, the end of all things, is the work of redemption that Jesus Christ accomplished for us on the cross, and which is completed, and thus he has ascended into heaven.

This is what Peter has been teaching the church in his letter, for Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the Spirit, by whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison, who formerly were disobedient when once the divine long-suffering waited in the days of Noah, but the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is eight souls were saved through the water.

Christ’s death on the cross covered all sin, every sin, and that committed at first by Adam and Eve, to those which you and I will commit in the future, even the ones we may commit as we draw our final breaths.

Covered, paid for, done, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

God’s love and sin in Christ, to bear our shame and transgressions to the cross.

This love has covered all of your sins.

God’s love, the blood of the lamb, has washed your robes as white as snow, clothing you in Jesus’ holiness and righteousness.

But in order to receive this gift, you must believe.

Moses, excuse me, Noah, his wife and his three sons, and their wives, eight souls in all, were saved through the waters of the flood in the ark.

Because they had heard God’s word, and they believed that he would do as he said.

They repented from sin.

They strove to be obedient to God, including by building the ark, and including by loving their unbelieving neighbors.

Noah took 120 years to build the ark, 120 years.

During that time, he was proclaiming God’s word to his neighbors.

Do you think they didn’t wonder why he was building a boat in the middle of nowhere?

It gave him an opportunity to preach.

And yet, the people that heard it rejected his word.

And they perished, not just in the waters of the flood, but in the fires prepared for Satan and his angels.

In our creed, we just confess that Jesus descended into hell.

He did this not to suffer for sins in hell.

He had already done that in the cross.

But he did it as Peter taught to preach to those who were disobedient, to show them the folly of their unbelief, the consequence for rejecting the love of God in Christ Jesus.

For souls such as those who had rejected Christ’s work of redemption, this is the end of all things.

Christ has come, Christ has taught, and revealed all that is needed for the salvation of man.

He died, and he has risen, and now he has ascended to God’s right hand of power.

His enemies, sin, death, and the powers of hell are mere footstools of his.

His work of redemption is completed.

The end of all things is at hand.

Now the work of the saints has begun.

Now the church is called to be serious and watchful in our prayers.

Exaude Domine, hear, O Lord, when I cry aloud.

Hallelujah.

I was once told by a well-meaning member of the church that if I wanted to become a good preacher, it kind of implies I wasn’t, I should include no less than six jokes in every sermon.

Six jokes.

That’s 40 percent of the average sermon.

The majority of you do not regularly attend Bible studies during the week, so the precious few minutes of the sermon is the only time that I have to proclaim the ways of the Lord, to speak his oracles, to spend 40 percent of that time telling jokes is not taking God’s words seriously.

It’s elevating my words, my humor, my opinions above his.

It’s treating you as if you were mindless imbeciles, unable to grasp the richness and beauty of what our Lord has done for you, or as if you had the attention span of a gnat.

Even worse, it would be neglecting to show you the fervent love of God, the love that covers a multitude of sins.

Sin is serious business.

Sin should not be glossed over by humor.

Sin cannot be paid for by human love.

Not all love is love.

I’m sorry.

To claim this, I’m actually not sorry.

To claim this is to deny the objective truth that God’s love in Christ Jesus alone atones for your sins.

God’s love alone atones for your sins.

Not my love, not your love, no matter how much you love.

You cannot atone for a single sin.

His love has covered my sins.

His love has covered your sins.

And this is why Peter tells us not to speak as court jesters, but as the oracles of God.

If anyone ministers, let him do it as with the ability which God supplies, that in all things, God may be glorified through Christ Jesus.

Each of us, each of us have been given gifts, and Jesus calls us to use our God-given abilities to speak his word to all men.

To speak to mankind, specifically we are to speak to those whom God has placed into our lives, both family and neighbor alike.

This is what it means to be good stewards of his manifold grace.

Like Noah, however, we have to be prepared to be rebuffed, to be ridiculed, to be rejected.

We should feel no guilt when this happens.

We should learn to shake the dust off of our proverbial sandals and get on with the work that God has given us to do.

Noah was not able to save a single person to whom he preached outside of his family.

Later in scripture, we read of Lot and his family in the city of Sodom, and God had sent him to preach to the men of that city.

And they too rejected God’s word, and they take it a step further.

They told Lot, this one came in to stay here, and he keeps acting as a judge.

Now we will deal worse with you than what they were planning to do to the two angels.

Neither Noah nor Lot apologized for speaking God’s word.

Neither one of them softened their tone.

They didn’t stop to crack a joke.

They didn’t make light of the sins they’d been called to condemn.

For to do so would not be speaking the oracles of God.

It would not be God’s love.

It would be preaching peace, peace, when there was no peace.

You and I, we are commanded to teach all that the Lord has said, all of it, even the parts that the world and our neighbors will hate.

To do any less is not love.

To do any less means that we are not using the gifts that the Lord has given us properly.

We speak, we speak all of it, for the end of things is at hand.

Christ has accomplished the salvation of all mankind, and now he’s sending his spirit to move us to do those good works which he has prepared in advance for us to do, to speak God’s love to our neighbors.

Imagine the courage that it took for men like Noah and Lot to speak, to condemn the cultures in which they were living, knowing that no one else outside their family would take them seriously, knowing that they might get killed for saying the very things God had called them to say.

Yet they spoke anyway.

Just as today, you and I must speak.

It’s not your job to save your neighbor.

I hope that doesn’t surprise you.

It’s not your job to save your neighbor because you cannot.

You can only speak the oracles of God and have faith that the Holy Spirit will use those words to create faith in your neighbor’s heart.

You are not even to worry about what to say, for the Holy Spirit will give you the words at the right time.

This isn’t done mystically.

It’s not like a dove is going to descend from heaven and sit on your shoulder and whisper in your ear what you’re supposed to say.

You’re equipped with the words to speak every time you read scriptures, every time you participate in the divine service and hear his words, every time you engage in a Bible study or pray or sing hymns.

With these words, you learn the language of God, you learn to let go of your own fears and you learn to speak the oracles of God.

You learn that Jesus alone is the savior of mankind.

Noah and Lot, Moses, King David, St.

Paul, Peter, none of these men were saviors.

And neither are you or I.

You’re mere humble servants, equipped with unique talents, skills, and gifts to serve our Lord.

Jesus saves.

Jesus paid the price for sin on the cross.

That debt has been paid in full.

In God’s word, you learn that Jesus alone is wise, wise enough to guide us through the end of all things.

Jesus’ law, his wisdom, his spirit is what we need to find peace.

As we turn to him, as we repent for our sins, we hear that our sins are forgiven.

We hear and we live, and we have peace.

This is true for our neighbors as well.

As we surrender our lives to Jesus, as we allow him to direct our lives, we find freedom and peace.

We surrender control over what we think we’re doing, and we trust that the good shepherd, the keeper of Israel, that Jesus alone will defend us from the assaults of the evil one with the shield of faith, that he will guide our footsteps in the way that we should go.

Rather than rely on our own strength or intellect, we turn to the giver of these gifts.

We turn to the shepherd of our souls.

We cry out loud to him for his wisdom and his guidance.

And above all things, have fervent love for one another, for love will cover a multitude of sins.

We have spinned to one another without grumbling.

As each one has received a gift, minister it to one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

Your shepherd has given you his grace.

He’s given you the forgiveness of sins.

His love was poured out for you.

And it continues to be poured out in the chalice, in the waters of the font, and in the living waters flowing from the pages of Holy Scripture.

These means of grace have covered all your sins.

Every one of them.

Now, he sends you forth to bear the same hospitality to the world you find at your doorstep.

The Lord is calling you to use your gifts.

Jesus came to pour out his love, to cover your sins, to usher in the end of all things, whether people want to believe in him or not.

He was approaching Jerusalem during Holy Week, and he stopped to gaze upon the people for whom he had come to die, for whom he loved so much that he would pour out his own life.

He stopped and he saw the city, and he wept.

He wept saying, if you had known even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace, but now they are hidden from your eyes.

Jesus wept for the loss of Jerusalem.

He knew the fate that awaited them, as surely as he had seen those lost in the flood or in the fires of Sodom.

Jesus wept.

He wept, and then he moved on.

Jesus had a mission to complete, and he pressed forward to Good Friday and to the cross.

And we too need to heed this lesson of Jesus’s.

We’re to weep for the loss of this world.

It’s a tragedy that those who reject the time of their visitation, the ones who turn the deaf ear to the Messiah and take pride in their sins, that they will be lost forever.

We weep, and then we move on.

Jesus didn’t stop to beg people to believe in him.

Jesus didn’t camp outside their houses and plead with them.

Jesus simply declared the truth of his word.

Jesus offered to them faith by the power of the Holy Spirit, and if it was rejected, he moved on.

And the church, too, has the same mission, a mission to share God’s word.

There’s a lot of people out there who haven’t heard and who need to hear, but there’s other people out there who will hear and not join us.

There’s others out there who will hear and seek to betray us or even to crucify us as they did their Lord.

So when we encounter these people, we don’t waste a whole lot of time.

We shake the dust off our sandals and move forward with his mission for the sake of the others who will hear and who will believe.

We cannot allow the doubters.

We cannot allow the enemies of the Lord.

We cannot allow our wicked culture to turn us from the mission that our Lord has given us.

We can allow fear of speaking to turn us from that mission.

The end of all things is at hand.

He is risen.

He is risen indeed.

Let this be our battle cry as we go forward from Easter in triumph and joy.

Let it be our battle cry as we go forth to call the world unto our Lord’s victorious banner.

Let us go forth in love.

Let us go forward trusting that the Word of God will do everything that our Lord promises it will do, that it will restore lost sheep to the fold.

That it will do these things because the Lord is our good shepherd, and in him alone do we find peace and salvation.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

In John 16:23-33, Jesus prepares His disciples for tribulation, offering peace through faith in Him. This sermon explores how Christ’s death, resurrection, and real presence in Word and Sacrament overcome worldly chaos. True peace isn’t wishful thinking, it’s the certainty of salvation, grounded in God’s promises and sustained in His Church even amid suffering.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, Jesus’ words and warnings about his need to depart and be crucified, and to ascend into heaven have caused the disciples enormous anxiety, enormous stress.

After they acknowledged him to be the son of God, after they confessed that they knew him to have come from the Father, Jesus gave to them a final warning about the events to come, and he offers words of comfort.

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace.

In the world, you will have tribulation.

But take heart, I have overcome the world.

The Incarnate Word of God came at his first advent to bring peace to the world, to bring peace on earth and goodwill towards those with whom God is pleased.

In me, you may have peace.

Faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, your Redeemer, will bring you peace.

Peace means tranquility.

It means freedom from worry, harmony, order, and rest.

This is what Christians find in Christ.

It is the assurance that you will go to heaven the instant your life on this world ends.

That you have no doubt of this fact.

There is no equivocating.

There is no saying, I hope I go to heaven, or maybe I’ll go to heaven, or I’ll go to heaven if I’ve been good enough.

Statements such as those are not peaceful, for they stem from the worry that you have that you’ve not done enough to merit salvation or that Christ promises may not apply to you.

These statements deny the efficacy of Jesus’ death and resurrection.

St.

Peter wrote to the early church that they should have no such doubts.

God’s abundant mercy was begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

In Christ Jesus, you have peace because he called you to faith by the power of the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the Gospel.

Then, Christ works to keep you there.

Christ works to keep you in faith by preaching and teaching his word through the power of Holy Baptism, by coming to you with his body and blood at his table, joining you as one flesh with not only himself but with all your brothers and sisters in the faith.

This is the power of God for salvation.

This is the peace promised by our Lord.

I have said these things to you that in me, you may have peace.

In the world, you will have tribulation.

In Christ Jesus, you have peace in him, in his word, in his church, and especially in his sacrament of the altar.

You find peace.

Hermann Sase, a German Lutheran pastor who held fast to the true faith amid the tribulations of World War II, wrote, Everywhere a congregation is gathered about her altar in the deep faith in the one who is her Lord and her head, because he is her Redeemer, where she sings the Kyrie and the Gloria and lifts her heart to heaven.

And with all angels and archangels and the entire company of heaven sings holy, holy, holy to the triune God.

There will her church be a true house of God, a place of the real presence of Christ in the midst of a boisterous and unholy world.

This text will apply to her.

The Lord is in her temple.

The Lord is in his temple.

Let all the world be silent before him.

So I’d say a man living in the midst of Nazi Germany in the middle of World War II, with bombs falling all around, with tanks on trains going across the country, with the sound of boots on cobblestones outside the doors of his university office, still had the Lord’s promise in mind.

In the world, you will have tribulation.

The Christ on the cross has overcome the world.

And he now comes to you, not just in spirit, but physically in the sacrament, to bring you peace, to bring you confidence because of his victory.

When Sase writes of a boisterous non-holy world, he’s quoting the prophet Habakkuk, who prophesied, you walked through the sea with your horses, through the heap of great waters.

When I heard my body trembled, my lips quivered at the voice.

Rotten, rottenness entered my bones and I trembled in myself that I might rest in the day of trouble.

When he comes up to the people, he will invade them with his troops.

This is the life of God’s people, whether you lived during World War II or not.

You walk through the sea.

You’ve been brought into the church, through the waters of Holy Baptism.

Just as Israel entered the promised land, through the waters of the Red Sea and the Jordan River.

At every step of the way, Satan and his evil hordes, the world and your sinful flesh, these are the great heaps of waters held back by the power of Almighty God.

These are symbolized by the waters of the Red Sea, held on either side as the Israelites walked through on dry ground.

The waters that threatened to destroy them.

This is what the disciples would endure on Monday, Thursday and in the days immediately following the crucifixion.

Anxiety, doubt, disorder, the rottenness of sin creeping in through their very bones, causing them to doubt.

Their creator had been killed.

That was not how they imagined salvation was to work.

This is the folly of the cross and human wisdom.

Would they be next?

Who would save them from their enemies?

What were they to be doing?

Could they still be forgiven after they had abandoned their Lord?

They lacked peace, because they lacked Christ.

Christ came to them on the evening of the first day of the week.

And he did so, speaking the very first words, peace be with you, peace.

He was back with them.

And even the doubtful among them would later explain, my Lord and my God, centuries before this night, Isaiah also came to speak words of peace to Israel, the people who were also anxious and disordered and doubtful.

Come, my people, enter your chambers and shut the doors behind you.

Hide yourself, as it were, for a little moment, until the indignation has passed.

For behold, the Lord comes out of this place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity.

In that day, the Lord, with his severe sword, great and strong, will punish Leviathan, the fleeing serpent, Leviathan, that twisted serpent, and he will slay the reptile that is in the sea.

This is a promise for the church.

Come, enter into your chambers, enter into the house of the Lord.

Enter into his word of peace.

Repent of sin.

Be forgiven.

Enter into the waters of Holy Baptism, where every sin is washed away, where you are sealed as his child forever.

Enter into the church and sing, Lord, have mercy and glory be to God on high and on earth peace.

Cry out with the angels and the archangels and the whole host of heaven, holy, holy, holy, as your Lord creates in you a new heart, a heart which you then lift up onto him.

As he comes to you speaking peace, your sins are forgiven.

And never will I leave or forsake you.

Come into his holy temple and let all the tribulations of the world fall silent before his heavenly throne, for he has redeemed you from sin.

The Lord called us here.

The Lord has called us into his church, into his family, into a new life, walking in the spirit.

He’s called you here to sustain you in the faith for a little moment.

This life, this world, this tribulation, though may seem like an eternity at times, is but a little while.

The Lord will return and he will come back not as a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in the manger.

He will come back not as our savior, not as a humble rabbi.

He will come back with a trumpet call.

The cloud shouts, riding on his horse with his two-edged sword in the clouds, bringing his judgment to the earth.

On that day, Leviathan, that evil serpent, Satan, and all his hosts and allies will be slain and cast forever into the abyss of hell, never again to trouble the saints.

No more will God need to restrain the great heaps of waters threatening to sweep his way, for they will be destroyed.

There will be no more pain, sorrow, or tribulation.

There will be no more need for memorial days, for death will be put away forever.

Until that day, the Lord has equipped us with his means of grace, with the ability to pray.

On that day, he will ask of me nothing.

Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you.

The disciples had relied on Jesus’ presence among them for help and understanding.

And Jesus promised them that in that day, you will ask nothing of me.

After the resurrection, after the gates of heaven have been opened again to them, in that day, the faithful no longer need an intercessor.

They don’t need a high priest and certainly not another saint in heaven to go to the Father in prayer.

They can go directly themselves.

Our Father, who art in heaven.

These words, God tenderly invites us to believe that he is our true Father, that we are his true children, so that with all boldness and confidence, we can approach him as dear children ask their dear Father.

Our Father, who from heaven above, teach us no thoughtless words to say, but from our inmost hearts to pray.

This is your privilege as his child.

You can call upon him day or night.

There’s no numbers to take, no hotline to call.

You simply pray.

And you know without a doubt that he has promised to hear and to answer your prayer.

As Jesus tells us, ask and you will receive that your joy may be full.

That your joy may be full.

That you may be at peace.

That Christ may be with you as he has promised.

Because he has risen.

He has risen to be.

He’s risen victorious over Leviathan, victorious over the world.

He’s risen victorious over your sinful thoughts, words and deeds.

He’s risen victorious and redeemed you from trouble.

He’s risen, and his holy precious blood has paid for all your sins.

His innocent suffering and death has done this as well.

That you may be his, that you may be his own and live with him in his kingdom, and serve him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness.

Just as he’s risen, he lives and reigns for all eternity here as his children, gathered in the real presence of Christ, in the midst of a boisterous and an unholy world that surrounds us, he rejoice for the Lord is in his temple.

Let all the world be silent before him.

Be at peace.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

This sermon on James 1:16-21 reflects on grief, trials, and God’s unwavering truth. Through Job’s suffering, Christ’s farewell words, and the power of hymns, it urges believers to be quick to listen, slow to speak, and to find comfort in God’s Word amid sorrow. Explore how faith, patience, and the Spirit’s guidance lead us through life’s darkest valleys to hope in our Redeemer.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, in his farewell address with the disciples on Monday, Thursday, our Lord saw that sorrow had filled their hearts.

His words caused them grief and pain.

They could not comprehend why he must die or why he must return to the Father when he was to ascend into heaven.

He told them that he had much more to save them, but they could not bear it at the moment.

There are times like this in every man’s life.

Few years ago, a friend called to tell me that his daughter had died from cancer.

Neither he nor his daughter confessed Jesus as Lord.

What words of hope could be offered to him in such a case?

I simply stated, that’s terrible.

This is not the most profound observation in the world.

Certainly not spiritual.

It’s not that I would preach.

I would refuse.

Thank God.

Yet it’s true.

And in the silence, it followed my friend thinking.

You see, he called not to hear that his daughter was in a better place.

Not to get advice on having a funeral, not to ask if it was at all possible that she somehow went to heaven.

He wasn’t looking for me to fix anything.

He called to have a friend listen to his grief.

At such times, silence can be golden.

The Book of Job is the Bible’s manual on how not to comfort the bereaved.

Job was in deep sorrow because he lost everything, his wealth, his house, his servants, all ten of his sons and daughters.

He was covered head to toe in sores and wounds.

His loving wife came to him, not with an ointment or salve or bandages, but to advise him to curse God and to die.

Three of his friends who’d heard of his misfortune came to comfort him.

And for seven days, they do great.

They sit there quietly, saying nothing.

They saw his grief was very great.

And then once Joe began to talk, they proceed to scold him, telling him he’s clearly done something terrible for which he’s being punished by God.

He’s brought this catastrophe upon himself.

In the end, the Lord rebuked them for not speaking correctly of God and his ways of dealing with man.

God tells them to make a sacrifice and have Joe pray for them, lest God deal with them according to their folly.

James also had a lot to say about the tongue and how Christians are to speak.

So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God.

His advice, speaking of how to respond to temptations, trials, and tragedy, including to stop trying to debate with God.

Stop trying to tell God that it’s not fair, that it’s too much, or that God is somehow the cruel person.

And instead to hear his word, even when it may be a word that you dislike.

James began his letter stating, My brethren, count it all joy.

Count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.

That patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.

That any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives to all, liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

Trials beset you, ask for wisdom from God, and he speaks to you through his word.

There’s a reason the praise, the patience of Job has come into our lexicon.

In all of his suffering, Job had never lost faith or trust in God.

He had demanded answers.

He had been angry.

Yet never once did he question his faith.

Never once did he lose hope.

In fact, one of the greatest confessions of our faith came during his laments.

Job writes, For I know that my Redeemer lives, and he shall stand at last on the earth.

After my skin is destroyed, this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.

It took Job seven days, seven days to put together his thoughts, seven days of prayer, seven days of meditating on the Word of God, even as his wife and his friends had questioned his faith and righteousness.

In his grief, he ignored the wisdom and the emotions of man, and held fast to that which he knew to be true, the Word of God.

He delivered a clear testimony to the coming of his Redeemer, Jesus Christ, and he confessed the bodily resurrection to eternal life.

For when all earthly hope is lost, when family and friends fail, when despair is deep, God’s Word incarnate is the solid rock on which he stand.

Are those words familiar?

Do you now have a hymn, a melody running in your mind?

I don’t know if he does.

He played this game at home, named the hymn as he’d give a snippet of the lyrics, and she guesses she’s very good at it.

We should all be very good at it.

Perhaps you’re thinking, I know my Redeemer lives based on Job’s words, where my hope is built on nothing less.

Hymn number 575 in your hymn notes.

The second verse of which reads, when darkness fails his lovely face, I rest on his unchanging grace.

In every high and stormy gale, my anchor holds within the veil.

On Christ, the solid rock, I stand.

All other ground is sinking sand.

In all other words, veil us.

The hymn is a great tool to help us pray.

Cantate Domino, sing to the Lord.

Sing a new or old song.

It doesn’t matter.

But sing to the Lord, for he’s done great and marvelous things.

The disciples, though, they could not bear to hear more of Jesus’ words.

We depart the upper room to head to the Garden of Gethsemane only after singing hymns.

As I watch my grandfather die, I clearly recall that after he had received the sacrament, after the prayers had been said, after scriptures were read, the family sang hymns.

We finished only after my grandfather had joined the heavenly chorus.

For there is power, there’s comfort in the words of our hymnody.

Consider another more modern hymn, by modern I mean 1955.

One of our favorites actually here at the congregation, Water, Blood, and Spirit Crying, number 597.

Though round us death is seething, God, his two-edged sword uncheathing.

By his spirit, life is breathing, through the living, active word.

The living, active word, this is what the Holy Spirit brings to each of us.

This echoes Christ’s promise to the disciples.

When the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you into all truth.

God’s word is truth.

And this is what the Spirit brings to us.

This is the two-edged sword of the Lord that pierces bones and marrow and reveals the truth of our hearts, our need for a Savior and his mercy for us.

Of course, Luther captured this quite clearly in the ninth verse of the hymn of the day this morning.

Dear Christians, one and all, rejoice.

To my Father, I depart from earth to heaven ascending, and heavenly wisdom to impart the Holy Spirit’s sending.

In trouble, he will comfort you and teach you always to be true, into truth and God to you.

And also, as James reminded the church, do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.

Every good and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.

Of his own will, he brought us forth by word of truth that we might be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

We each have been called to faith by the living, active word of God, the Holy Gospel.

This was not your choice.

This was not done through your own will.

It was done by God’s will, the unchanging God.

The same God who created all that exists is the God who died on the cross to redeem your life.

It is the same God who now comes to you to call you to new life in his word, the word that comforts, teaches, and guides you into every truth.

There are many strong and powerful moving hymns that speak this truth and which can help you find comfort and peace, even when words fail and grief abounds.

The behavior, the night of Maundy Thursday, teaches us that even we Christians do not always enjoy the words God has to speak to us.

We do not like to hear that the desires of our hearts are evil and wicked, contrary to the will of God.

We don’t always enjoy the tests, the trials, and the tragedies that God sends our way that are used to refine our faith.

Job, a righteous man by God’s own testimony, did not understand why God would allow the tragedies that came upon him to happen.

He knew though that in spite of such things, there is nothing more true or noble or powerful than the word of God.

In the end, his faith is rewarded.

The Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning, for he had 14,000 sheep, 6,000 camels, 1,000 yoke of oxen, and 1,000 female donkeys.

He also had seven sons and three daughters.

Why do we care about the numbers of donkeys?

Have you ever wondered, why does he tell us about the yoke of oxen?

The numbers reveal the mystery of God.

The Lord restored to Job double what was lost.

Double the number of sheep, camels, oxen, and donkeys, yet only 10 more children.

For the 10 whom he buried were not dead.

Yes, they died in this life, but they live again in heaven.

For God is the God of the living, not the dead.

When Job at the last stood bodily before his Redeemer, and he beheld him with his own eyes, when he will behold him with his own eyes, he’ll do so in the presence of not just 10 children, but 20 children.

When he’s first ascended up into heaven in spirit, he’s there with his 10 children who have already preceded him.

For his Redeemer lives.

Every good gift is from the love.

Every good gift comes from the Father in heaven.

Even the gifts that we don’t yet appreciate.

This included Jesus Christ, our Redeemer who laid down his life on the altar, on the cross to destroy death and its sting forever.

A gift that the disciples did not quite appreciate on Good Friday.

Yet there on Good Friday, as their Lord died, he paid for the pain of all our losses.

He paid for the pain of the suffering that we experience when a loved one goes, when we suffer from illness, when we bear financial struggles, our doubts, our uncertainties, and even moments of unbelief.

Unbelief such as the disciples suffered on Monday, Thursday.

These are all crucible and bear on the cross on Good Friday.

And so we sing, Quintate Domino, that hearts be purged of evil, that we may see aright the Lord and raise eternal of resurrection light.

And listening to his accents, may hear so calm and plain his own, all kale.

And hearing, may raise the victor’s strain.

Sing to the Lord a new song, Hallelujah, for he has revealed his righteousness in the sight of the nations, the righteousness of his song, that even amid all trials, we may rejoice, for he is risen.

He is risen indeed.

Hallelujah.

In the name of Jesus.

Amen.

1 Peter 2:11–20 calls believers to live as faithful servants of God in a fallen world. Though governments are flawed, Christians are to honor authority for the Lord’s sake, just as Christ submitted and suffered unjustly to save us. Like Joseph in Egypt, we are called to glorify God through humble service and good works, that others may see and believe. Live not for self, but as living stones in God’s spiritual house.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Grace, mercy, and peace be on to you from God our Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, four weeks from the resurrection of our Lord, the joy that is set before the disciples is finally beginning to sink in.

This is the same joy that our Lord had promised them on Monday, Thursday, the night when he was to be betrayed.

And yet, fear had prevented them from receiving all that they were entitled to.

Jesus had asked them, are you inquiring among yourselves about what I said?

A little while and you will not see me.

And again, a little while and you will see me.

Most assuredly, I say to you that you will weep and lament, that the world will rejoice and you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will return to joy.

Jesus is speaking of his three days in the tomb and then also the period following the resurrection as he looked forward to his ascension, to returning to his father in heaven.

The disciples are uncertain.

They are afraid to ask Jesus what he meant.

But why?

Why would they be afraid?

Well, he’s right there with them.

He’s taught them for three years and yet they discuss it among themselves.

And they don’t want to ask him because they are afraid of what he’s going to say.

He’s already told them that the son of man must go to Jerusalem to be betrayed, to be handed over to the chief brace, and to be crucified.

And each time they respond, never.

No, it can’t be this way, Lord.

We don’t want it this way.

They don’t want their Lord to depart either to the grave, or to his father in heaven, or to go anywhere but to be with them.

And this reflects man’s inability to grasp the ways of God.

It’s a weakness that so often leads us into sin.

It’s a failure to trust God in all his ways, in the things he does for us.

We are not so unlike the disciples.

In fact, we are not so unlike the Israelites of old.

When they come to the prophet Samuel, and they demand from him a king.

The prophet knew that this was a terrible idea.

And so he went to God and asked God for his advice.

And the Lord said to Samuel, heed the voice of the people in this, in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, they have rejected me.

That I should not reign over them, according to all the works that they have done since the day I brought them out of Egypt, even to this day with which they have forsaken me and served other gods.

God warned them exactly what a king would do.

He said that the king would send their sons off to die in his wars.

That a king would force them to pay taxes, that a king would make them work for him in his fields.

He would take their daughters as his servants.

He would demand the rest of their fields, vineyards, and olive groves, that he could then dole them out as favors to his friends.

He would make them his servants.

God warned them, you will cry out in that day because of your king, whom you have chosen, and the Lord will not hear you.

How did the people respond?

The people refused to obey.

The people said, no, but we will have a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us, and that our king may go before us and fight our battles.

They wanted someone else to fight their battles.

They refused to obey God.

They did not want to be accountable to God’s judgment.

They did not want to obey his law.

They wanted human judges to look over them, because they thought they could control the humans.

That’s working out so well for us today.

They wanted a human king to fight their battles.

They did not want to live as free people.

They chose a life of servitude.

Do not deceive yourselves.

You and I are no more free today than these people were.

The kings of this earth, the prime ministers of this world, whether you call yourself a czar or even a president, all of them do what God warned that they would do, and they do even more than that, as we’re learning.

Yet, we continue to ask them to fight our battles, even in those areas of life over which they have absolutely no authority.

Peter told the church, the subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution, whether it be an emperor as supreme or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good.

Here in this passage, we hear echoes of Romans 13, knowing that the government has the right to bear the sword in order to protect their people, to protect the state from those that harm its citizens.

The state has the duty to reward the righteous.

These are the battles that it’s authorized to be fighting.

When a king or a president or a ruler of this earth does these things, when they govern justly, all goes well for the nation.

Yet, there’s absolutely no government on this earth, and there’s no government or style of government that man has ever come up with, that has not been corrupted.

Every government desires to obtain more power for itself.

It’s the nature of power.

The citizens often want their kings even to exercise more power over them, but usually, it comes at the expense of their neighbors.

We want other people to fight our battles.

We want the rich to pay their fair share.

Usually we mean we want the rich to pay all of it.

We want our neighbor to pay off the balance of the student loan that we signed off on.

Or maybe it was your parents, but someone in your house signed for it.

We want the neighbor to pay for it.

The billionaires who own our sports ball teams, they want the taxpayers to fund the new field so that the millionaires they paid to play their sports ball game have some place to run.

This doesn’t make sense.

And heaven forbid you allow your grass on your lawn to grow too tall or not to grow at all, and you’ll get a visit from your lovely homeowners association.

We could go on and on and on and on.

There’s so much injustice in the world today.

And a lot of it stems from wanting other people to fight our battles.

Except the one battle that we need another to fight.

The battle that mattered the most.

The disciples did not want Christ to die.

They did not want Christ to be handed over to the chief priest.

They did not want him crucified by the Romans.

And they certainly did not want to see his lifeless body laid into a tomb.

They had all spoken such bold words.

They had promised to go to jail.

They promised to die with their Lord before they left such a thing happen.

Yet we all know how that turned out.

The shepherd was struck.

They fled.

Yet he is risen.

He is risen victorious over sin, death, and hell, for the King of Kings fought the most important battle of our lives, even as we esteemed him not.

He fought not with the power of his almighty right arm.

He fought not at the head of his angel armies.

Instead, he fought by walking the road to the cross.

He fought by pouring out his precious blood with his innocent suffering and death.

You were ransomed from sin, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.

And now you are living stones, being built as a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Christ Jesus.

Your King won this battle against sin, and he has now called you into his glorious kingdom through the preaching of his word.

He has shaped you as a living stone in this spiritual house of God.

He has created you not for sin, he has created you for service to God and to your neighbor.

He has created you to fight.

Yes, he has created you to fight on behalf of your neighbor that he may hear the Gospel.

And thus, Peter writes, be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme or to governors as sent by him.

The same God who warned us what a king would do now commands fealty to these very same men.

Peter was inspired to write this not because of his great love for the emperor, not because he thought Roman policies were the be all and the end all, he did not.

The emperor, the notorious Nero, found delight in torturing Christians to death.

Peter subjected himself with joy to this tyrant, because in doing so, he did it for the sake of the Lord.

For this is the will of God, that by doing good, you put the silence, the ignorance of foolish people.

Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover up for evil, but living as servants of God.

Honor everyone.

Love the brotherhood.

Fear God.

Honor the emperor.

Christ set you free, truly free, not so that you would go on sinning, not so that you would go on cursing those in authority, not so that you could post dank memes on the internet, making fun of everybody.

No, he set you free, that you would live the redeemed life, that you would honor everyone.

But those who are easy to honor and to love, hopefully like your mothers, and also those who are not so easy to honor and to love, you do so that they may see your good deeds and glorify God.

The greatest Old Testament example of this, in my opinion, is that of Joseph, a man sold into slavery in Egypt, falsely accused of crimes, unjustly imprisoned, yet eventually raised up to be the second most powerful man in the nation.

When he made himself known to his brothers who’d wanted him dead, he revealed, so now it was not you who sent me here, but God.

And he has made me a father to Pharaoh, and Lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.

When Joseph’s wicked brothers had intended to sell him into slavery for evil, God used this evil act for good.

Joseph was God’s missionary to Egypt.

He eventually became Pharaoh’s spiritual father, bringing him to saving faith, along with the entire household that he had.

He used the wickedness for God’s glory.

Joseph’s success began with being a good, faithful, loyal worker, even though he was a slave, even though he worked for tyrants, even though he worked for pagans, even when he was mistreated and abused.

He worked hard, not for their sake, but for God’s sake, to glorify God.

And when given the opportunity, because of his hard work, he preached the Gospel.

The Greater Joseph, Jesus Christ, came as a good, faithful, loyal son of God, obedient to the will of his father, mindful of his father, enduring sorrows while suffering unjustly.

Obedient, so that today, as his Holy Spirit continues to carry the Word of the Gospel forth on the lips of good, faithful, and loyal sons and daughters of the King, many people might be called to faith.

Many living stones might be laid upon the chief cornerstone of the church.

For this is the estate of the Holy Christian Church.

Anywhere that saints are gathered in his name, anywhere that these saints gather to hear the Gospel preach in its purity and to celebrate the sacraments as Jesus instituted them, there is this temple of living stones, the church that exists to call sinners to repentance, to forgive their sins, to preach the Gospel, to anoint people with the Holy Spirit in the waters of Holy Baptism, and to feed them the body and blood of their Savior at his table for their salvation, to proclaim the glory of the Lord by the salvation of the lost.

Church in this world exists within the estate of the government.

Even so, it’s like Joseph so that her example, so that her proclamation of the Gospel might be a blessing to all who hear.

That it might call forth those dead and sins unto life in Christ Jesus, turning sorrow into joy, for he is risen.

He is risen in me.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Rooted in Ezekiel 34:11-16, this sermon proclaims Christ as the Good Shepherd who seeks the lost, binds the injured, and strengthens the weak. Drawing from King David’s humility and failures, it calls both church and government back to God’s Word. Through repentance, baptism, and the cross of Christ, the scattered are gathered into His fold and sustained by His mercy, peace, and eternal promise.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God, our Father, and our Lord, and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, King David, the greatest and most beloved ruler of ancient Israel, the one whose armies conquered all of her enemies, the one whose mighty men were of legend.

This king begins his confession in Psalm 23 with the words, The Lord is my shepherd.

This is true and godly humility demonstrated by a head of state.

David understood that the kingdom he now possessed, the victories that were under his belt, the loyal men under arms who pledged their allegiance, and all that he possessed, that these all were good gifts that came from his father in heaven.

They were given by him to be a faithful steward of that which the Lord entrusted.

He may have been the greatest living king of his time, but he certainly knew that this was not of his own doing, that this was a blessing that God had given him, that he was a man under authority himself, and he owed his fealty to the king of heaven, to Jesus Christ, to his good shepherd.

As one under authority, David understood that every action he took as king was to be aligned with God’s word and his purpose for the holy estate of the government.

He was God’s servant to keep the peace, to reward the righteous, to punish the wicked.

He bore the sword of God’s wrath to destroy foreign enemies that threatened the welfare of his people and to punish those within Israel who defied God’s law.

As long as he ruled according to God’s will, as long as he walked the Lord’s paths of righteousness, the people of Israel would know peace, would have rest beside those still waters in those green pastures.

They would not need to fear their enemies that surrounded them.

David, like all men, however, was a sinner.

Sometimes he failed to walk down the righteous paths of the Lord, and Israel would suffer God’s chastisement.

His failure to discipline his children led to his son, Absalom’s rebellion and civil war, costing thousands of Israelites their lives, including that of his son.

When he broke God’s command not to conduct a census, and he did it anyway, 70,000 of his people were struck dead.

Such disasters were the shepherd’s rod of chastisement, a rod that brought his erring sheep of the house of Israel back into his sheepfold.

For God desires not the loss of anyone to eternal death.

Not a single sheep should be missing, even when those who bear his authority on earth, those he charges to guard his sheep, even when they go astray and scatter the flock.

God warned Israel through the prophet Ezekiel.

Behold I, I myself will search for my sheep and will seek them out, as a shepherd seeks out his flock when he is among his sheep that have been scattered.

So will I seek out my sheep.

I will rescue them from all places where they have been scattered on a day of clouds and thick darkness.

This prophecy spoke of the good shepherd, Jesus Christ.

Jesus invoked this very metaphor when he visited the house of an infamous tax collector named Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus, when the Lord came to his house and dined with him, at no prompting from the Lord, Zacchaeus repented of his sins.

He confessed them and Jesus spoke to him.

Today, salvation has come to this house because he also is a son of Abraham.

Even this tax collector could say that even the IRS agents, even they are sons of Abraham.

For the son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.

This is the proper work of the Word of God, calling sinners to repentance and then pronouncing their sins forgiven.

When a man comes into the presence of God via the Word of God, it reveals the darkness of his heart.

The Word pierces the defenses that he’s built to deceive himself, to convince himself that he is righteous, that he’s a good man, that he’s really a nice guy.

The Word reveals is to praise soul for the purpose of bringing repentance.

Then and only then, once the man is humbled and brought to repentance, can the words of the Gospel come to bring peace and salvation through the faith in Jesus Christ, through the forgiveness of sins.

The Word leads the man of God to repent, and then to the green pastures of forgiveness, of faith and life within the church.

Good Friday was a day of clouds and thick darkness, a judgment day for sin.

It was the day our good shepherd laid down his life for the sheep.

There on Gogatha as his life poured forth into the dark soil, as the sun darkened, as the clouds gathered, the power of sin, death, and hell was broken forever.

It was just as Isaiah foretold.

Behold, I will lift my hand in an oath to the nations and set up my standard for the peoples.

They shall bring your sons in their arms, and your daughters shall be carried on their shoulders.

Kings shall be your foster fathers and their queens, your nursing mothers.

They shall bow down to you with their faces to the earth, and lick up the dust of your feet.

Then you will know that I am the Lord, for they shall not be ashamed to wait for me.

They shall not be ashamed to wait for me.

The Cross of Jesus Christ, the Crucifix is the standard in which the Lord set atop his Holy Hill of Zion, the standard that God has raised for his peoples, the standard by which he leads the nations to faith, by which he leads the nations to bring their sons and daughters into the sheepfold through the waters of Holy Baptism.

Here, with eyes of faith, we behold the nailed scarred feet and hands of our King, and we confess, my Lord and my God.

For he is risen.

We are risen, he and our father, Jesus.

And by our Baptisms into his death and resurrection, so too shall we arise in triumph.

God made it clear through Isaiah that he appointed kings to be our foster fathers.

They are to be his servants.

They are to rule faithfully that the preaching of the Gospel may go forth into all the world unimpeded.

They shall bow down to their Savior.

They shall worship at his nail scarred feet.

For they too are servants under authority.

When you think of our earthly rulers today, the first adjective that comes to mind is probably not servant of Christ.

Even those rulers who are Christian and behave as such, seldom receive such a moniker.

For in a hyper partisan political environment, to make such a claim is to invoke charges of being a Christian nationalist, or of attempting to establish a theocracy.

You’re some kind of dangerous zealot.

Even to critique our rulers by such standards, using God’s word as our standard, you would be cast as a dangerous modern day John the Baptist, and you would probably be beheaded figuratively if not literally.

As a pastor, I’ve been directly told through the ecclesiastical supervisors to be on the lookout for Christian nationalists.

Dangerous Christian nationalists.

When told this, I asked for a description.

Please point me to the scripture that I can use to identify these people.

Tell me who these people are.

Maybe I can put a wanted poster out in the narthex.

So we can all be on the lookout for these dangerous people.

As of today, no description or verses have been offered.

I don’t expect they ever will be.

The description isn’t given, for it would require those using the term to be specific.

And specificity invites debate and critique.

A vague boogeyman to invoke fear is more useful than an academic categorization.

When you get beyond the scare quotes, you soon realize what we’re being warned against is exactly what God requires of his faithful people, that the government and its people serve him.

That doesn’t mean that everyone in the government must be a Christian, but it does mean that our laws, that our governance, that everything the government does must be moral, just, that it must protect the innocent and punish the guilty.

It means that the church must not be hindered in its efforts to proclaim the Gospel, for that’s the mission of the church, not the government.

All of these are commanded by scripture.

All of these are consistent with the doctrine of the Holy Christian Church from the very beginning in the beginning of the church after the fall into sin.

The church has always recognized that God established the holy estate of the government once sin came into the world.

The government is specifically formed to restrain sin and sinners.

To do so effectively though, must be informed by the word of God.

The Holy Christian Church, another divine institution of the Lord is given to us so that it can inform the government concerning God’s word.

The pastors and the laity must, as Isaiah states, not be ashamed who wait on the Lord.

For when the church is ashamed of the word of God, when the pastors in the church are ashamed of the word of God, when they fail to faithfully proclaim it, then the sheep are scattered, the kings are misguided, and the nation will fall.

Jesus or I have come to tell you who to vote for.

We’re not telling you which political party is the holy one.

There are none.

Spoiler alert, there are no holy Christian parties in our world or in our nation.

Jesus came to call sinners to repentance.

Jesus came to forgive your sins.

He came to be lifted up on Calvary’s Cross as the signal, as the standard for all nations to behold and to come unto him.

Come and to find peace, to come and to find the abundant life, to find salvation in his name.

He came to call people, the church, and the government back to the word of God.

The serpent, our ancient foe, despite having been crushed underfoot by our Lord’s heel on Calvary, never ceases seeking to lead people astray today, to lead the nations.

He does this through his attacks on the church and her pastors, through attacks on the government and her rulers, through attacks on faithful families gathered in his name, which is why we’re to lift all of these up to the Lord in prayer, that he defend and guide them, that they all learn to rely on their shield of faith for protection against the fiery darts of the enemy.

The Lord continues to come.

He continues to breathe on his faithful people, speaking, peace be with you.

He continues to send them forth.

He continues to call under shepherds to serve his church, to faithfully preach and teach all that he has said, to go unto the world, to gather his sheep, to pronounce the Gospel of the forgiveness of sins.

I will seek the lost and I will bring back the strayed and I will bind up the injured.

I will strengthen the weak and the fat and the strong I will destroy.

God does all of this through the Holy Christian Church, the church that proclaims the full council of his word to those who may like or like it not.

The church that binds the injured in the waters of Holy Baptism, pouring forth God’s word and water to heal those broken by sins, pouring forth the Holy Spirit to anoint them with the oil of salvation.

The sheep are fed.

Sheep are nourished on the mountain of the Lord, Mount Zion, his church, as they participate in the body and blood of the Lord given for them, given for the forgiveness of their sins.

This is God’s mercy for mankind.

This is the gifts.

These are the gifts that he gave that all may hear, that all may believe, that all may find salvation in his name.

And here we remain until the end of days.

And the end will come.

Christ will return in his glory.

He will bring his angel armies and sin will be forever banished.

This is the Easter promise.

And this promise holds fast.

No matter how dark or how gloomy the world appears, no matter how good or how wicked our government may be, for no light was darker or gloomier than that which followed on Good Friday.

And the light of the world appeared to have been extinguished.

And yet, in the words of our Easter exultant, proclaimed on Holy Saturday, rejoice now, all you heavenly choirs of angels, rejoice now, all creation.

Sound forth the trumpet of salvation.

Proclaim the triumph of our king.

Rejoice to all the earth in the radiance of the light now poured upon you and made brilliant by the brightness of the everlasting king.

Know that the ancient darkness has been forever banished.

Rejoice, Church of Christ, clothed in the brightness of his light.

Let all this house of God ring out with rejoicing to the praises of all God’s faithful people.

Let this house ring out with rejoicing.

Let it ring with the unashamed joy at the truth of the triumph of our king, with the truth of his word.

Christ, our good shepherd, our good shepherd has forever banished the darkness of sin.

And you and all the saints of God are clothed in the radiant light of his glory, for he came to seek and to save the lost.

And he has done it.

He is risen.

He is risen in me.

In Jesus’ name.

Amen.

Now may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Amen.

On Easter morning, the angel at the empty tomb called the women to remember Christ’s words and promises. In this sermon on 1 John 5:4-10, we are reminded that the abundant life Jesus gives is not defined by worldly wealth or ease, but by forgiveness, peace, and eternal fellowship with God. Despite fear and failure, Jesus breathed new life into His disciples, granting them the Holy Spirit and commissioning them to share His peace with the world. Today, through Word and Sacrament, Christ continues to breathe His Spirit into us, joining us to the fellowship of all believers—across time and eternity. In a world of uncertainty and trials, we find true abundance in the unshakable joy and life that Christ has won for us by His death and resurrection.

Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org

Transcript

Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, at the empty tomb on Easter morning, the angel admonished the women.

Remember how he told you.

Remember, for Jesus is the word incarnate.

His word brings forgiveness.

His word brings life, and it brings salvation to all who believe in Christ, to all who confess him Lord.

He has come not only to bring life, but that you have it abundant.

He says, I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.

Abundant life.

What do you imagine this to be?

Great wealth such that you never have to worry about paying for a new roof, paying for your property tax bill, paying for your higher insurance rates after the storms last fall.

Not having to choose between preparing the car or putting groceries on the table.

Enough money to be able to travel, to see those places which you’ve only read about.

We’re having a lot of friends, family, perhaps good health.

Whatever you imagine an abundant life to mean, you’re certainly not picturing the way the disciples were living in Jerusalem in the days after Holy Week.

Sunday following Easter, after Jesus had appeared to Mary Magdalene in the garden, after he’d made himself known on the Emmaus Road to the disciples in the breaking of the bread, after the angel had told the women to head to Galilee to meet their Lord, to tell the disciples to do the same.

Instead we find the 12 minus Judas huddled together behind locked doors in Jerusalem, afraid, confused, uncertain regarding what they ought to do, not obedient unto their Lord’s instructions, and our Lord has mercy on them.

Jesus comes to them, and he says, Peace be to you.

Offers them his hands, his side, as proof that he’s not a ghost, that he really lives, and then he changes their life forever.

He changes them from sorrow and doubt, into joy and abundance, saying, Peace to you.

As the Father has sent me, I also send you.

And he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit.

If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them.

If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.

Just a few days before when the Father struck the shepherd, and he gets ceremony on Monday, Thursday, the sheep scattered.

Faith abandoned them, hopeless, afraid, embarrassed, perhaps at their personal and collected failures.

They now meet to ponder the events of this past week.

Now, here on the octave of Easter, the shepherd whose heel was bruised comes again to his lost sheep.

He has restored them to his fold.

He has breathed upon them his Holy Spirit.

He has forgiven their sins.

He has forgiven their personal failings, whether in the garden or elsewhere.

He brings them peace.

He comes to them that they may have peace and that they may take this peace and share it with the world abundantly.

The gift they bear, the abundant life they bring, is the word of God.

The Lord told Thomas, have you believed because you have seen me?

Blessed are those who have not seen me and yet have believed.

The Lord wanted Thomas and the others to remember how he had told them that the Son of Man must go to Jerusalem and be lifted up and die and rise again on the third day.

He wanted them to remember all that he had commanded them, so they could go into all the world, unto all the nations who make disciples.

He wants them to bear his word into the world, to speak the law, to break man’s pride, to call them to repentance, and then to offer the words of the Gospel.

I forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son and the Holy Spirit, amen.

He wants them to bring peace.

Blessed are those who do not have the chance to place their fingers into the wounds on the Lord’s hand or their hand into a side, and yet they believe that their sins are forgiven because he is risen.

He is risen, he is making.

Hallelujah.

John described the abundant life in his first epistle, that which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled concerning the word of life.

The life was manifested, and we have seen and bear witness and declare to you that eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us, that which we have seen and heard, we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us, and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his son, Jesus Christ.

And these things we write to you, that your joy may be full.

That your joy may be full.

This is the testimony of God.

This epistle are the words that were inspired by the Holy Spirit.

John, as he’s writing this, is near the end of his life.

He’s told to write down all that he has heard, all that he has seen, all that he has done, all that he has witnessed firsthand from the Lord, so that you and I can read these words, so that we can hear them, that we can believe and have life, that our joy may be full.

That we purely have fellowship with him.

And by him, I mean both John and God the Father in heaven.

John isn’t only speaking to the people in the region of Ephesus, where he now lives.

He speaks prophetically to you and to me today.

He speaks to everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ, everyone who has been born of God.

And those born of God are members of his body, the church.

And they are in fellowship with not only their fellow believers here on earth, but with the saints through all the ages.

From Adam until the end of the days.

When you were baptized into this church, into the church, anointed with God’s own name, cleansed of all your sins, filled with the Holy Spirit, you became part of the body of Christ.

The fellowship of believers.

As you kneel before the altar of Christ to receive his body and blood, you do so in communion with every saint throughout the world, with all the hosts of heaven.

Our communion rail, this nice, new, beautiful communion rail is a half-circle because it symbolizes the church here on earth.

The other half of the circle is completed in heaven, filled with those saints who have overcome the world by the blood of the Lamb, those saints who held fast to their confession that Jesus is the son of God.

You, however, would know none of this, would confess none of this if the Lord had not first breathed upon you with his Holy Spirit.

Apart from the Holy Spirit who caused the seed of faith to grow in your heart, you would have received none of the blessings of your baptism, or the body and blood of our Lord which you received at his table.

Now, these gifts are what they are regardless of whether or not you possess faith or believe them to be so.

They are because God’s word says they are.

Your baptism would still be valid and the body and blood of the Lord still present in the bread and the wine.

But apart from faith in Christ, you would not receive their blessings.

Apart from faith, you would not believe your sins forgiven in those blessed waters.

Apart from faith, you would not believe Christ is present for you for the forgiveness of your sins at his table.

Apart from faith, you would not live an abundant life.

You would not be at peace with God.

Apart from faith, you would cower behind the locked doors of your good works, hoping that you could be nice enough, hoping that you could do enough good or be pleasant enough, that you could earn enough karma, or that you would have a valiant death, and perhaps a valkyrie would swoop down and haul you off to Valhalla for whatever other pagan shrine you sought after.

But you would never truly be sure that you had done enough, were good enough, were valiant enough.

You would never truly find peace.

This is why John’s testimony matters.

This is why God’s word matters.

This is why we’re to remember all that he has said, that you believe that Jesus is the Christ, and that by believing have life in his name.

That you know without a doubt that this is he who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ, not by water only, but by the water and the blood.

The spirit is the one who testifies because the spirit is the truth.

For these three testify, the spirit and the water and the blood.

These three agree.

We receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater, for this is the testimony of God that he is born concerning his son.

The Lord has come to you in the water of your baptism, in blood and spirit, marking you as his own child, sealing you with his testimony, forgiving all your sins.

It is the blood shed by your Lord at Calvary that is sprinkled upon you in the font, making you sons and daughters of the king, enabling you to overcome the world, enabling you to live abundantly, at peace with God and one another.

The abundant life, however, is not without strife.

John was the last living apostle when he wrote his Gospel.

All of his brothers in Christ had at this time been martyred.

You, too, can expect to feel the pressures of life, especially as our society continues sliding into godlessness.

You will face cravings of your sinful flesh, lust of the eyes, temptation of pride and boastfulness.

You will face heresy, all stochron and enlightened reasoning, which all seek to turn you away from God’s word unto yourself.

These same assaults drove the disciples from the garden, and they were unable to reason out why the Lord, his son of God, was seized by the priests, why he would be allowed to be sacrificed in such a way.

But the great fear for the disciples after the resurrection is fear, fear of physical punishment.

This fear drove them behind locked doors.

They feared that they would be next.

They feared that they would be killed.

They feared that they might be put out of the synagogues, that they might not be able to go shopping, that they might not be able to go to school.

Today we call this cancel culture, and it’s no less effective.

Whatever the form of the enemy’s assault upon your soul takes, whatever his assault upon the church manifests as, we can take comfort knowing that our Lord has overcome such assaults.

These things lost their power on Good Friday.

Whoever believes in the Son of God has his testimony within.

And those who cling jealously to the word of life shall live as Peter confessed.

You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.

And our Lord replies to Peter, on this rock, his confession that he is the Christ, I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.

And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven.

Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

Those words sound familiar.

Those words take us back to the upper room in Jerusalem, behind the locked doors, together with the disciples, gazing upon the wounded hands, feet, and side of our Lord.

Together with them, as we contemplate the meaning of his resurrection, we receive his peace and his forgiveness.

We receive his Holy Spirit.

We receive his commission to be about the work of sharing the Gospel with all nations.

We go forward remembering all that he has said, all that he has given us to be used to bind up the wounds of the broken hearted, to pronounce their sins forgiven as they repent, that they too might overcome the world, that they too would join us in confessing that Jesus is the Son of God.

We go forth that those who hear and believe shall find salvation and the abundant life in his name, uniting all the faithful in fellowship, both here in time and in eternity, with John and all the saints and all the heavenly hosts, that in the joy of the saints, their joy may also be complete.

In Jesus’ name, amen.

Now may the peace which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.