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Reformation Day (Observed)
Sunday, October 30, 2022

“A Reformation in Liturgy and Hymnody” (John 8:31-36)

Jesus said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” Friends, this is really what the Reformation was all about: that people would abide in the living, life-giving word of Christ; that they would know the truth of the gospel, which had been obscured by the errors that had crept into the church; and that this truth would set people free from the slavery they had been laboring under. Luther himself had labored under that slavery, and when he discovered the freeing truth of the gospel, he bent every effort toward wanting others to know the freedom that is theirs in Christ. The whole Reformation was geared toward that end. And it meant reforming every area of church life that had been infected by those enslaving errors. It meant bringing the truth to light in every aspect where it had been clouded over.

Today we are the recipients and beneficiaries of that great Reformation program. And one of the prime ways in which we enjoy that rich heritage is in what we are doing right here in this church service. For today, on this Reformation Sunday, we will see what benefits are ours, precisely because the Lutheran Reformation included, very prominently, “A Reformation in Liturgy and Hymnody.”

First, a reformation in liturgy. By that I mean reforming the church’s regular order of the Divine Service of Word and Sacrament, otherwise known as the Mass. And the Mass was in need of reform. For over the centuries, false ideas had become attached to the Mass, that by our doing of it, the priest and the people were offering up a sacrifice to God that contributes to our salvation. In other words, the arrows had been reversed. Instead of the big thing being how God gives us his gifts in the Divine Service, purely out of his grace–which is the big thing–instead, over time the emphasis had switched to our works in the performing of the Mass, in order to gain God’s favor. And this false view was reflected in the practice of the Mass.

In 1523, Luther wrote about the abuses had crept into the service. He said, “God’s Word has been silenced,” that is, that typically there was no preaching of God’s Word in the service. Further, he said, “such divine service was performed as a work whereby God’s grace and salvation might be won.” “The mass became a sacrifice,” said Luther. And that needed to be changed. “Let us, therefore, repudiate everything that smacks of sacrifice . . . and retain only that which is pure and holy, and so order our mass.”

And that is what Luther proceeded to do. He removed from the liturgy the parts that gave the idea that by our work we are offering up to God some atoning sacrifice. Another problem that needed to be addressed was that the Mass was in Latin, a language that most people did not understand. So by 1526, Luther had developed a German mass, so that people could know what was going on and participate in the service.

Luther saw the need to reform the Mass. But he did not reject it. Lest you think Luther was some sort of radical who wanted to junk the liturgy altogether–no, that was not the case. He kept as much of the historic liturgy as could be kept without injury to the gospel. He writes: “It is not now nor has been our intention to abolish the liturgical service of God completely, but rather to purify the one that is now in use from the wretched accretions which corrupt it and to point out an evangelical use.” For example, he says, “Let the chants in the Sunday masses and Vespers be retained; they are quite good and are taken from Scripture.”

The historic liturgy had developed over many centuries, from the time of the early church. The Kyrie, the Gloria in Excelsis, the Creed, the Sanctus, the Agnus Dei–these historic canticles have been integral to the structure of the service from long before Luther. They have served the church well. And so Luther saw the need only to cleanse the Mass from those “wretched accretions” that had crept in, which gave the impression that we are offering up to God our work, rather than God doing the work of giving us his gifts in Word and Sacrament. He kept everything that could be kept.

And so it is, dear friends, that here today we are using the same basic order of service that had developed over many centuries in Christendom and that Luther cleansed and reformed. Our liturgy has stood the test of time and passed with flying colors. We are blessed to have and to use the historic Divine Service as we have it in our hymnal.

And speaking of hymnals, the first Lutheran hymnal was published in 1524. It consisted in eight hymns, in the German language, for the people to sing. But that was just the start. Soon, Luther and his colleagues began producing many hymns that praise God and extol the gospel. Luther himself, who knew the Word of God better than anyone and who was a skilled musician–Luther would write some 41 hymns in his lifetime. Not only is he our chief theologian, he is also our best hymn writer. We have many of his hymns in our hymnal. In fact, all of the hymns we’re singing today in our service were written by Luther.

And what a joy it is to sing them! How the beautiful light of Christ shines through! Take, for example, the first hymn we sang today, 556, “Dear Christians, One and All, Rejoice.” In my opinion, this may be the greatest hymn ever written. The music is an uplifting match for the text. The text is theologically sound; it gets Law and Gospel right. And the imagery is creative and imaginative. Consider stanza 5, wherein the Father speaks to the Son:

God said to His beloved Son:
“It’s time to have compassion.
Then go, bright jewel of My crown,
And bring to all salvation.
From sin and sorrow set them free;
Slay bitter death for them that they
May live with You forever.”

Brothers and sisters, this is the gospel, isn’t it? It’s putting into singable, poetic, memorable form the wonderful good news of what God has done for us in Christ. God did send forth his beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, to bring us salvation. By his atoning death and victorious resurrection, Jesus does set us free from sin and sorrow and death, so that we now will live with him forever. It’s like Jesus himself says, “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

Friends, our liturgy and our hymns proclaim the gospel loud and clear! Prior to Luther’s reforms, the gospel was being obscured and hidden. But now, every Sunday here in church, you are getting the life-giving, liberating gospel of Christ, full blast, in word and song–in your ears, on your tongue, implanted in your heart and mind. Liturgy and hymnody have a way of doing that.

It’s like what it says in Colossians 3:16, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” When the word of Christ dwells in you richly, as it does through our liturgy and hymns, then you will be abiding in Christ’s word, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

Grace Lutheran Church (LCMS)

Guest Pastor: Rev. Robert Zagore, LCMS Executive Director of National Mission.

Old Testament Reading: Genesis 32:22-30

Epistle: 2 Timothy 3:14-4:5

Holy Gospel: Luke 18:1-8

Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 9, 2022

“But the Word of God Is Not Bound!” (2 Timothy 2:1-13)

Do you ever feel constrained or held back, like you’re the prisoner of things that are too powerful for you to overcome? Maybe it’s age. You feel the advancing years taking their toll on you. Maybe it’s sickness. You get over one thing, and then it’s something else. More pills, more trips to the doctor. You feel like a prisoner in your own body. Or maybe it’s a guilty conscience weighing you down. You sense your own failings. Your past sins keep on dogging you. Then there’s the approach of death. We don’t know when that will come, regardless of our age. It’s like how Scrooge saw Marley’s ghost, shackled with chains, rattling and haunting him in the night. The inevitability of death can haunt us like that. All these things–the sadnesses and sorrows of life; the lack of connectedness with people we know we ought to be closer to; the sense of alienation from God, tucked in the back of our head–all these things are like chains wrapped around us, holding us back, weighing us down, binding us up.

“But the Word of God Is Not Bound!” And it is through this word that God frees you from your chains and makes you alive in his love. Today I want you to hear this freeing word that God has for you. And you can hear it in all of our Scripture readings today.

Let’s start with the Epistle. The apostle Paul was bound up and chained–literally. He was a prisoner in a Roman jail when he wrote this letter to Timothy. Now Paul had been arrested and imprisoned a number of times in his career as an apostle. For example, he had been in jail at Philippi, Paul and Silas had been, with their feet fastened in the stocks. Then at midnight there was a great earthquake; their chains were loosed and the doors were opened. Later on, Paul was imprisoned again. He was taken to Caesarea, and then off to Rome, where he was placed under house arrest for two years before being released. But that was then, and this is now. Now Paul is in prison again in Rome, but this time it will be for keeps. This time–and it’s probably around the year 66 or 67–this will be the last time Paul will be in prison. But this time there will be no great earthquake to break the bars and loosen the chains. And this time it is not a low-security house arrest that will end in release. No, this time, this imprisonment, will end in Paul being executed, beheaded, for the crime of preaching the gospel of Christ.

Paul is waiting for the carrying out of that sentence as he writes this letter to his young assistant Timothy. He reports that he is suffering for the gospel: bound, he says, “bound with chains as a criminal.” But lest young Timothy get discouraged and dismayed–lest Timothy gets deterred from his task of carrying the gospel forward–Paul adds a very important reminder: I, Paul, may be bound, bound with chains, that is true. “But the word of God is not bound!”

Did you catch that? “But the word of God is not bound!” This is the freeing message that gave confidence to Paul in the face of his impending death. This is the freeing message that gave courage to Timothy, in spite of the prospect of facing persecution himself. This is the freeing message that will lift your spirits today no matter what you are facing. “But the word of God is not bound!”

You see, the mighty Roman Empire could chain up Paul and even put him to death. But they could not chain up the word of God. After Paul would come a Timothy. And what Timothy heard from Paul, he entrusted to faithful men who in turn would teach others. There would be no lack of proclaimers of God’s word. And so it goes, down to our day. The word of God is not bound. It is not bound by persecution. It was not bound to only the age of the apostles. The word of God is not bound. It is alive and active and free, mightier than any prison chains. And the word of God frees up those who receive it in faith. That would be Paul, that would be Timothy, and that’s you and me.

The word of God is not bound. It never has been. That was the case, even hundreds of years before Paul, in the days of the Old Testament. Back then, the nation of Israel was entrusted with the task of being the caretaker, the steward of God’s word. But even so, God’s word of blessing was not limited to only those from the nation of Israel.

Take the story of Ruth, for example. Ruth was a woman from the country of Moab. She was not an Israelite. And so Ruth was outside the covenant of blessing the Lord had established with Abraham. Or was she? Remember, the Lord had told Abraham: “I will bless you and make your name great, and you will be a blessing. In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” All the families of the earth! So here was Ruth, from one of those other nations. But by coming into contact with the people of God, she too came into the blessing! The word of God was not bound by nationality. God’s word crossed that boundary and brought blessing to the Moabite woman Ruth.

The word of God is not bound. It’s not bound by persecution. It’s not bound by nationality. The word of God reaches out. It frees and blesses. That’s what happened in the case of the lepers that we heard about in today’s Gospel. Lepers are unclean. They have a terrible skin disease and have to isolate themselves from other people. “Unclean!” they cry, to keep others away. Except this time, in our Gospel reading, they cry something else: “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” You see, they’ve heard enough about Jesus that they sense in him someone who can help. They hope that Jesus will bring them a word of mercy from God, a powerful, effective word that can heal and help. And they’re right. Jesus is the one to ask for such a word. Which is what he speaks, and does. He tells the lepers to go and show themselves to the priests, who will attest to their healing. And even before they get there, as they go, they are cleansed. God’s mighty word of mercy and cleansing and healing was not bound by their disease.

What’s more, one of the men Jesus healed was a Samaritan. Like Ruth the Moabitess, this Samaritan leper was an outsider–not only because of his skin disease, but also because of his ethnicity and religious practice. But the word of God is not bound by any of that. Jesus is able to overcome all barriers. He receives and welcomes, he helps and even commends the Samaritan leper. Jesus is in the business of showing mercy to the marginalized, to all sorts of people, even folks like you and me.

So where do you find yourself in these stories? Are there chains of hopelessness that would try to lock you in, and lock you out from God’s mercy? Is it the fear of what people might think of you or do to you, because you’re a Christian? Then hear the message that freed up Paul and Timothy in the face of persecution: God’s word is not bound! Therefore you are not bound by fear! Are there chains that bind you? Is it the sense of being an outsider, like you’re someone God doesn’t want to bless or help? Then hear the word that blessed Ruth: The God of Israel is your God too! God turns outsiders into insiders. Hear the word that helped those lepers, even the Samaritan: Jesus wants to have mercy on you! Because your faith is in Jesus Christ, your faith will make you well. Not because it is “your faith,” as though you were doing some great thing. No, it’s because your faith is in Christ. He has mercy on you and makes you whole for eternity.

Jesus is the one who brings the word of God to you. Jesus is the Word of God for you! And the word of God is not bound! Jesus, the Word of God incarnate, was not bound by the shackles of death. He conquered death for you. The tomb could not hold him. Jesus is the Redeemer who breaks all your chains and sets you free! Remember Jesus Christ, the Son of God come to earth to be your Savior. Remember Jesus Christ, crucified for all your sins. Those were the real chains that tied you down. But Jesus took your sins and let himself be bound by nails to a cross, where he suffered and died for you, in your place. Those chains of sin are broken! And then: “Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead.” Christ burst the bonds of death that kept all of humanity in its chains. Those chains are broken also ! You are free! Free in Christ!

Our message today: The word of God is not bound! And this is the gospel word that is being preached to you right now! This word is for you, so that you also, as Paul says, “may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.” You then, my friends, like Paul said to Timothy, “be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus.”

Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 2, 2022

“Timothy and the Women Who Raised Him in the Faith” (2 Timothy 1:1-14)

In today’s Epistle, Paul writes to Timothy to encourage him in his faith. Paul also reminds Timothy of the ladies who passed on the faith to him. Their names were Lois and Eunice. One was Timothy’s mother; the other, Timothy’s grandmother. Let’s see, now which one was which? Here’s the way I have of keeping them straight: “Lois” sounds like “oldest,” so she was the grandma. “Eunice” sounds like “youngest,” so she was Timothy’s mom. So now let’s hear more about “Timothy and the Women Who Raised Him in the Faith.” Let’s hear what that faith is, and what it means for us today.

First, a little background. When Timothy was young, he and his mom and grandma all lived in a town called Lystra, in Asia Minor, which is modern-day Turkey. And these two ladies–Eunice was the mom, and Lois the grandma–these two women did great work in support of the spread of the gospel. How? By helping to produce a missionary. Timothy may not have ended up as “St. Timothy” unless these two ladies had not first done a lot of work to prepare him to be the great missionary-pastor he ended up being.

In our text, Paul writes: “I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well.” Do you notice here the great work that Lois and Eunice did? They passed on their faith to young Timothy. That is perhaps the most important and God-pleasing work that you mothers and grandmothers–and fathers and grandfathers, and aunts and uncles–this is the great work that you also can do: You can pass on the faith that dwells in you to the next generation coming after you. Whether or not that child grows up to be a missionary or a pastor, whether or not he or she ends up having the word “Saint” in front of their name, the important thing is that your young person has been brought up in–and lives out and carries forward–the only saving, life-giving faith there is, which is a living faith in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

A little more background is in order. Why are only the grandmother Lois and the mother Eunice mentioned? Where’s the dad? Where is Timothy’s father? That’s the first question, since, according to God’s word, it is the father who has the primary responsibility for being the head of the household and its spiritual leader. The father is the person who should see to it that the whole family goes to church together and that the children are raised in and taught the Christian faith. That’s the way God has designed for families to work best. But unfortunately, in Timothy’s case, as in so many families, the father was not doing his job of being the spiritual head of the household.

In fact, Timothy’s father was not even a Christian. That’s the way it appears when we first meet Timothy, in Acts 16. Paul had come to Lystra, and it says: “A disciple was there, named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer”–that would be Eunice–“but his father was a Greek,” that is, a Gentile, and presumably not a believer. So here you have Timothy, whose mom was a Christian and his dad was not. Nevertheless, Timothy was a believer, a Christian, a disciple. The apostle Paul took him under his wing, and Timothy became part of Paul’s missionary band. And the godly influence of Eunice and Lois played a big part in raising Timothy the right way.

How did they do it? They taught young Timothy the Bible and the Christian faith, and they did this from early on. In 2 Timothy 3, we read where Paul says to Timothy: “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.”

And so here is an encouragement for you, moms and grandmas, dads and grandpas, aunts and uncles–any of you who can help influence a child for Christ. Even if someone in the family who should be taking the lead in passing on the Christian faith isn’t, perhaps God can use you in some small or not-so-small way to help get the job done.

I know in my own case, my dad died when I was one year old. But thank God, Grandma and Grandpa Henrickson lived right next door, and they did a lot–I mean, a lot–in both modeling the Christian faith for me and in seeing that my sister and I went to church and got a good Christian education. God put my grandparents in my life to help fill a void, a gap that my father was not filling. I would not be a pastor today–maybe not even a Christian–if it were not for them.

Well, that’s what Lois and Eunice did for young Timothy. They filled in the gap. They passed the faith on to him. They made sure he learned the Bible. And then Paul took it from there. Paul became Timothy’s spiritual father, his mentor in the faith. And you can hear that relationship expressed in the beginning of our text, where Paul addresses Timothy as “my beloved child.”

So what is it about the Christian faith that makes it so important to pass on–the most important thing in the world, actually? Paul explains that in our text, in a passage that is utterly brilliant and profound. Paul lays out an exposition of God’s plan for the ages. This plan stretches from eternity to eternity, and yet it lands smack dab in the present, with what’s happening here today. Notice, God’s plan begins before the beginning: He “saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began.”

Dear friends, God planned for your salvation before the foundation of this world. God knew that we would need a Savior, and so he made provision for that to happen. God the Father appointed and determined that his own eternal Son would one day come into this world to bring us God’s grace and favor. God’s own Son would win for us forgiveness for our sins, a work we could not do for ourselves. In the mystery of God’s foreknowledge and in the depth of his love, our heavenly Father knew that this is exactly what we poor sinners would need.

And so Christ came. Paul says that God’s own purpose and grace “now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” Christ has abolished death. He did this by himself dying the biggest death of all, the death that put an end to death. The very Son of God, come in the flesh–this same Jesus Christ suffered and died in the place of us poor sinners, taking our sins on his own sinless shoulders, shedding his holy blood to purchase our redemption. This is what Jesus did for you! And then he rose on the third day, showing that life and immortality are the result when sin is paid for and removed. This gift, eternal life, is for you, in Christ, through faith in him.

And this faith comes through the gospel, the gospel as it is preached and sacramented to you, today, here in this place. Paul says that Christ “brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher.” Through the ministry of the gospel, through the church’s work of Word and Sacrament, through missionaries like Paul and Timothy, through pastors today speaking the gospel of Christ into your ears and putting the body and blood of Christ into your mouth, you are being given faith in Christ and forgiveness for your sins. This is the gospel in the here and now, the present-day application of our text.

And this gospel will sustain you and sustain the church until the day of Christ’s return. That’s where Paul takes us next. He says: “I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me. Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you.”

The Holy Spirit keeps and sanctifies you and me and the whole Christian church in the one true faith, until that great and glorious Day when Christ returns. The good deposit that has been entrusted to you, the deposit of the Christian faith, which you have received–the Holy Spirit will continue to keep you in that faith and keep you from falling. And so we look forward in hope to the return of our Lord on the Last Day. Then he will right the wrong, he will restore the whole of creation, and he will raise the living and the dead who have believed in him. Our Lord will bring us into unending, everlasting life and joy.

What a gospel! What a faith! This is the faith that Eunice and Lois passed on to Timothy. This is the faith that has been passed on to us. This is the faith we ourselves believe in and rejoice in and gladly pass along to our children and grandchildren. And this is the faith and the gospel ministry that our church will carry on.

Today I want to remind us all–moms, grandmas, dads, granddads, all of us–of the importance of raising our children in the Christian faith. We raise our children right by both our personal example and our verbal teaching. This means raising our “Timothys” in the faith, in the church, in the Holy Scriptures. This is our Lois-and-Eunice work. And it is some of the most important work that God has called us and gifted us to do.

Have you failed in this in the past? God forgives you for the sake of Christ. Do you need help to do this in the present? God will supply it. And together–parents, grandparents, children, all of us–together we have a great hope to sustain us as we head toward our eternal future.

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost
September 25, 2022

“The Poor Man and Rich Lazarus” (Luke 16:19-31)

Our text today is the story commonly known as “The Rich Man and Poor Lazarus.” But I’m going to suggest to you today that we could just as well call this story “The Poor Man and Rich Lazarus.” As we shall see. So let’s go.

Jesus starts out the story with the rich man: “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day.” Now this is quite a picture Jesus is painting with just a few words. The man is described as a rich man, but his wealth is made more vivid by what follows. It says he is clothed “in purple and fine linen.” Now those were very expensive fabrics in those days. It would be like if we would say that a man today wears $6,000 custom-made Armani suits! So this guy was very wealthy, very rich, and he liked to dress in the fanciest style.

And what about his dining habits? It says he “feasted.” OK, fine. Special occasion, once in a while, maybe he likes to splurge a little bit. But no, it’s more than that. It says he “feasted sumptuously.” That means he didn’t hold back at all. He laid it on with the fanciest food, the most expensive wine, whenever he did feast. But wait, there’s more. It says he feasted sumptuously “every day.” He wasn’t content with just his daily bread. No, he wanted his daily filet mignon and pheasant under glass and several bottles of Dom Pérignon, every single day! This man is living in the lap of luxury. He’s living the dream.

But then we meet a man who’s living a nightmare. At the rich man’s gate is “a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table.” This poor man is not far from the rich man in terms of distance–he’s right at his gate–but in terms of living conditions, the two men could not be further apart. The rich man is covered with expensive clothes. The poor man is covered with sores. The rich man’s table is filled with sumptuous feasts every day. The poor man would be happy just to get some scraps from his table. The poor man has to be laid at the rich man’s gate, in hopes of getting some help from inside. And the rich man wouldn’t even miss the little bit of help he could have easily given the poor man, and it would have been more than plenty for the poor man. But the rich man will not help.

This rich man has everything you could possibly want–except of course the qualities of love and mercy that flow from a living faith. The poor man, by contrast, has absolutely nothing–except he does have one thing that the rich man does not have. This poor man has a name. And his name has in it all the riches and all the help that will make the difference in the long run. For this poor man’s name is “Lazarus.”

You know, it’s very unusual for anyone in Jesus’ stories to have a name. But here, in this story, this man does. And his name is Lazarus. In Hebrew, his name would be “Eliezer,” which means, “My God is help.” So, “Lazarus”: “The one whom God helps.” The rich man isn’t helping Lazarus. No one else is helping him. But God will.

Lazarus, the one whom God helps. And God does help him, magnificently so, at the hour of his death. The poor man dies, and he is “carried by the angels to Abraham’s side.” Wow, what a beautiful way to describe what happens at a believer’s death! To be “carried by the angels to Abraham’s side”!

And this is the hope you and I have in Christ, the hope that will be realized at the hour of our death. It’s like we sang in the hymn: “Lord, let at last Thine angels come, to Abr’ham’s bosom bear me home, that I may die unfearing.” Friends, this is the hope and the help that God will give to you, so that you need not fear death. When you die, your soul will be with the Lord in heaven, even as your body is laid in the grave, awaiting the resurrection of all flesh, which will happen on the day when Christ returns.

So the poor man–I guess I should call him the formerly poor man–is carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. Beautiful! But now contrast that to what happens to the rich man when he dies: “The rich man also died and was buried.” Boom. Blah. Not so beautiful and poetic, is it? And what’s more, where does this formerly rich man end up? In hell. In Hades. In torment. Not because he was rich. No, in fact, Abraham himself was rich, and he ends up in Paradise. No, the rich man went to hell because he lacked faith. He was an unbeliever. He did not repent and put his trust in God. No, this unbelieving rich man was all about himself, indulging his pleasures and making himself his own god. That’s what sin is, that’s what sin does, and, if left unrepented and unforgiven, it will send you to hell. Whether rich or poor or anywhere in between, unbelief–that is, lack of trust in the mercy and forgiveness that God freely offers in Christ–this unbelief will send you straight to hell.

So the rich guy is in Hades, and he looks up to heaven and sees Abraham there, with Lazarus at his side. “Father Abraham, have mercy on me.” In the Bible, Abraham often is portrayed as the father of faith. So in this story, Abraham kind of functions like we might talk about St. Peter at the pearly gates–he’s sort of a gatekeeper. The rich guy addresses him with a special request: “Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.” If you don’t think that hell is real, and that it’s a place of anguish and torment, well, guess again. Because Jesus certainly believes in and teaches, here and in many other places, the existence of a real hell.

“Abraham, help!” But Abraham replies: “No can do! You had your chance during your lifetime to escape the flames of hell. You could have received God’s free gift of repentance and faith, but you refused. That was evident in your lack of mercy toward Lazarus. Besides that, I can’t grant your request, because there’s no crossing over from here to there or there to here. There’s a great chasm, a great gulf, between heaven and hell, and it is impassable.” So much for the unbiblical notion of purgatory. No, once a person dies, that’s it. “It is appointed unto man once to die, and then the judgment.”

“OK, disappointing,” the man in Hades thinks, “so I’ll have to try something else.” He says: “Then I beg you, father, to send Lazarus to my father’s house–for I have five brothers–so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.” Well, that isn’t going to work, either. If those boys need a warning, they’ve already got one, just like you had. It’s called the Bible. Abraham says: “They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.” “Moses and the Prophets” is shorthand for what we call the Old Testament, which was the extent of the Bible at that time. Now we’ve got the New Testament, too. The Bible throughout has plenty to warn a person of the dangers of sin, unbelief, and eternal judgment. But do people listen? That is the question.

The rich man hadn’t listened to the Bible’s message. And he’s worried that his brothers won’t, either. So he thinks he has a better idea: “No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.” Abraham shoots that one down, too: “If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.” If people refuse to listen to God’s word, if they will not hear the Bible’s clear message: that you are a sinner, and you will be going to hell if you think you’re good enough on your own. . . . If you will not listen to Holy Scripture’s clear teaching that you need a Savior, and you’re not it. . . . If you or your friends or your family have no concern about eternity and where you will spend it, if you just merrily go about your way, ignoring God, dismissing his word of penetrating law and life-giving gospel–well, then you’re on your own, because you are refusing the help God wants to give you. And good luck with that.

Friends, today be a Lazarus, the one whom God helps. Brothers and sisters in Christ, you have been given a name, the name of the triune God, placed on you in your baptism. God knows you by name; you are his own. Your sins are covered by the holy blood of Christ. For there is one man who did come down from heaven. He is the God-man, our Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus came so that you would not be cast into the flames of hell, so that you would be delivered from eternal torment and anguish, so that you would be carried by angels into heaven. Jesus did this for you–he did this for your friends and family, he did this for all the rich men and poor men and everyone in between. Jesus did this out of God’s pure grace and mercy. Our Lord suffered pain and agony when he was beaten and flogged, and his body was covered with bloody stripes. He did this for you, in your place. Christ Jesus was crowned with thorns and nailed to a cross. There he cried out in thirst. There he suffered the agony of God’s judgment upon sinners–the judgment you and I deserve, which he took in our place.

And then, this man did rise from the dead. And yet, many still did not believe. Some people will not be convinced even if “someone should rise from the dead.” But, dear friends, you do believe. You are convinced. You have heard Moses and the Prophets and the rest of the Bible, and the Holy Spirit has given you the gift of faith. Praise God!

Now you are forgiven. Now, as Christ’s baptized believers, you share in his everlasting life. When you die, you too will be carried by the angels into the bliss of Paradise. And then when this same Jesus returns, you will share in his bodily resurrection, with a glorified body, in a perfectly restored creation. Brothers and sisters in Christ, whatever your income, you are truly rich! You also are named Lazarus! For you are the ones whom God helps!