Tis the Season
Epiphany • Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 25 viewsWe are in the season of Epiphany. When people recognize Christ, they are drawn to worship and obedience. It is by His Word that Christ is recognized, not by our actions (Jonah 3:1-5; John 1:46). This has been true, from the Magi (Matt 2:1-12), to John the Baptizer and his disciples (John1:43-51), to those whom Jesus Himself called to follow Him (John1:47-49; Mark 1:14-20).
Notes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
Lord God, bless Your Word wherever it is proclaimed. Make it a Word of power and peace to convert those not yet Your own and to confirm those who have come to saving faith. May Your Word pass from the ear to the heart, from the heart to the lip, and from the lip to the life that, as You have promised, Your Word may achieve the purpose for which You send it, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen
Illustrations for Biblical Preaching Preaching, Content of
“If I profess with the loudest voice and clearest exposition every portion of the word of God except precisely that little point which the world and the Devil are at that point attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christ. Where the battle rages, there the loyalty of the soldier is tested. To be steady in all the battlefields besides is mere flight and disgrace, if the soldier flinches at that one point” (Martin Luther).
Tell somebody - “It’s time!”
Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it the message that I tell you.” So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, three days’ journey in breadth. Jonah began to go into the city, going a day’s journey. And he called out, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them.
God works by means of His Word, and His Word is properly distinguished as Law and Gospel. The Holy Spirit works with the Word of God, the Logos, to bring us out of the bondage of sin and into a saving, living relationship through faith in Christ. Dr. Luther taught about this in the Smalcald Articles Part III:
SA III:II:[4] The foremost office or power of the law is that it reveals inherited sin and its fruits. It shows human beings into what utter depths their nature has fallen and how completely corrupt it is. The law must say to them that they neither have nor respect any god or that they worship foreign gods. This is something that they would not have believed before without the law. Thus they are terrified, humbled, despondent, and despairing. They anxiously desire help but do not know where to find it; they start to become enemies of God, to murmur, etc.
SA III:III:[4] To this office of the law, however, the New Testament immediately adds the consoling promise of grace through the gospel. This we should believe. As Christ says in Mark 1[:15*]: “Repent, and believe in the good news.” This is the same as, “Become and act otherwise, and believe my promise.”
We are in the season of Epiphany, which continues until the Feast of the Transfiguration of Our Lord. When the λόγος, Jesus Christ, is revealed through the Gospel, people are drawn to Him, and then they are led by the Holy Spirit into worship and obedience. This is what we mean when we say that God works alone to bring about our salvation, or Divine Monergism. We know by faith that there is no other way for a person to be saved than for Christ to be revealed. Just as a man must be brought to repentance by the the 2nd Use of the Law, without which he will not recognize that he is a sinner, so Christ must be made manifest through the preaching of the Gospel, without which a sinner cannot be delivered from the curse of the Law.
Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
John fulfilled his vocation by announcing that the Kingdom of God was at hand and baptizing with a baptism of repentance. When the devil moved to dim the light of God’s holy Law as proclaimed by John, Jesus came forth, fresh from His victory over Satan in the wilderness, to proclaim that the καιρὸς - the season - is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God has drawn near. Those who loved darkness and thought that things would get back to the normality of sin’s continued enslavement of God’s image-bearers, found that the Kingdom of Darkness had not won at all, for John performed no signs, but Jesus would perform signs and wonders to manifest that the Kingdom was in their midst.
Passing alongside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” And immediately they left their nets and followed him. And going on a little farther, he saw James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, who were in their boat mending the nets. And immediately he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him.
It seems unfair to hold these words as a mirror to our life and ministry in this community, doesn’t it? After all, that was Jesus, and He has “all power in heaven and on earth,” while we are weak through the flesh. That’s why this is not about a system, but about submission. When we accept that we have no power to accomplish God’s Mission through our plans and schemes and material resources, but must take hold of the Word of the Lord as written by David:
3 I call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies.
I am a sinner-I am a saint. The first part, you and I know from experience, whether we want to admit it or not. We sin, our parents sin, and our children sin.
God knows it even better than we do, and it is to the praise of His glorious grace that He calls us by His glorious virtue so that we can be blameless before Him in love. The Lord Jesus Christ works through His Bride, the Church, because He loves and honors His Bride. The Lord will not be unfaithful to His Bride; He will not cheat with man-made philosophies, or use those who do not honor His Bride to do His work. Others can pontificate; they can demonstrate; they can use all the weapons of the flesh, but the Kingdom of God is not with them.
1 For God alone my soul waits in silence; from him comes my salvation. 2 He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be greatly shaken. 3 How long will all of you attack a man to batter him, like a leaning wall, a tottering fence? 4 They only plan to thrust him down from his high position. They take pleasure in falsehood. They bless with their mouths, but inwardly they curse. Selah
You cannot deny God and demand justice. You cannot dismiss the Holy One and call for purity. There is no righteousness that can be stolen from the Righteous One. When people put their trust in men, and put their hope in princes, they set themselves up for failure,
11 Has a nation changed its gods, even though they are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that which does not profit. 12 Be appalled, O heavens, at this; be shocked, be utterly desolate, declares the Lord, 13 for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.
We wonder what has happened to the blessings to which we had become accustomed. Even in the midst of the Devil’s raging, we were preserved, we were saved from the hand of our enemies. The things that God did for us were so amazing that people all around the world marveled. Even today, they still speak with awe of people like the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King who, whatever weaknesses he might have learned in teaching or in the struggles of the flesh, he understood that God continues to watch over His Word to perform it.
Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear. For your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies; your tongue mutters wickedness. No one enters suit justly; no one goes to law honestly; they rely on empty pleas, they speak lies, they conceive mischief and give birth to iniquity.
The stench of sin is everywhere. We see it in every abandoned building. We hear it in every speech that politicians and preachers hurl our way. We feel it as we ask, “who shall deliver me from this body of death?”
We try to cover it with work, we try to cover it with consumption, we try to cover it with entertainment.
We fail. Over and over. We fail, as our parents failed, as our children will fail.
By day the Lord commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life. I say to God, my rock: “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” As with a deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?”
That’s why we hesitate when the door opens. That’s why we pause when opportunity beckons, when someone has seemingly given us the perfect moment to share Christ’s Gospel with them. We flinch as if dodging a punch, or flail weakly with some nice generic god-talk, nothing too offensive. Nothing that will convict and cause their Old Adam to rise up and defend itself.
Why are we so afraid of what God’s “Strong Word” will do to people?
Those of low estate are but a breath; those of high estate are a delusion; in the balances they go up; they are together lighter than a breath. Put no trust in extortion; set no vain hopes on robbery; if riches increase, set not your heart on them. Once God has spoken; twice have I heard this: that power belongs to God, and that to you, O Lord, belongs steadfast love. For you will render to a man according to his work.
From the homeless man on the street to the President in the White House, the words of David are true. We are ALL in trouble before the holiness of God, whether we acknowledge it or not. There is no one who can deliver us from His hand.
He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no one to intercede; then his own arm brought him salvation, and his righteousness upheld him. He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head; he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and wrapped himself in zeal as a cloak.
Jesus did that at the Cross. Jesus responded to all the injustice and iniquity, all the wickedness and wrongdoing. All of it. Then He paid for it - all of it.
This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”
There is no one else whom I can offer to you. No one else can help your children, your grandchildren, your neighbor or yourself. Just one man - the Man Christ Jesus!
But remember, Jesus is a “one-woman man.” His name was the only name that Peter could proclaim on the Day of Pentecost, His was the only message that Paul could bring to Corinth, to Galatia, or to Rome. His Gospel is the pure Gospel, the only good news that defines what truly good news is. Apart from Him, there is no salvation. Praise God, He’s all we need.
He’s all we need when people ask why we serve.
He’s all we need when we are asked why we pray.
He’s all we need when people ask, “Where is your God?”
His Word has power. Satan might fight against it, but he can’t defeat it.
The world might resist it, but it can’t stop it.
We might doubt it, but we can’t erase it.
The best thing that you can do is -
Believe it. Receive it. Share it.
Christ calls us to share the gifts He gives, the materials with which He blesses us in life, but especially, the Word of Life. Share personally, and share through partnership in the ministry of the Gospel. As Christ overcame in Gethsemane, He gives us strength to overcome in Witness - Mercy - Life Together. As He trusted in the love of the Father, we trust in the love of the Son, and in the power of the Holy Spirit, we “stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has set us free, and not be entangled in a yoke of bondage.”
Some look to City Hall, to Indianapolis, or to Washington DC. Others look to famous entertainers or wealthy businessmen. Others look downward in despair, or inward in search of affirmation, but we are, in the words of Hebrews 12:2, "looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”
We see His love at the Cross, His power at the grave, and His glory at His return. We know His presence and receive His grace in the preached Word, and in the Holy Sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist. We learn our faith from the Confessions. We show the reality of His promise in sanctified lives offered in service to our neighbor.
Through it all, we rejoice in hope - the hope of the Resurrection, of which He is the First-fruits, and in which we shall share at His Coming.
Jesus calls to us today, in His Gospel, and through us today, in our witness. Come today, by his grace before He comes tomorrow, in His Glory.
And let the peace of God, that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds, through Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.