Category: Sermon Page

THE BAPTISM OF OUR LORD,
JANUARY 12, 2025

IN God’s Eyes Text: Isaiah 43:1–7 Other Lessons: Psalm 29; Romans 6:1–11; Luke 3:15–22 Sermon Theme: Despite all that makes us feel worthless, we are valuable in God’s eyes because of Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Sermon Goal: That you are assured you are precious in God’s eyes on account of Christ. Based on a sermon in Concordia Pulpit Resources by Rev. Dr. Adam T. Filpek.

Sermon: Have you ever felt worthless? Insignificant. Incapable. Unlovable. Shrink-down-in-your-chair, bury-your-head-in-your-hands, unworthy-of-the-time-of-day kind of worthless. It is easy to feel and to see yourself as worthless, isn’t it?

You lose your job. You search and search to find another one. But it seems that no one wants to hire you. You have nothing to offer. Worthless. You go on date after date, but you never really find “the one.” Or you ask and ask people to go on a date, but no one seems to say yes. Worthless. You lose your spouse. You go through a messy separation or divorce. You feel that you have nothing to offer the opposite sex. You have no one to share your life with. Worthless. You’re diagnosed with a debilitating illness: cancer, dementia, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis. Or simply just old age, which renders you incapable of doing the things that you normally used to do: mowing your lawn, shoveling snow, working in your shop or garage, driving, reading, feeding yourself, going to the bathroom alone, talking, walking, or seeing clearly. You feel incapable. Yes, you feel worthless.

You hear those dreadful words ring in your mind and out of your loved one’s mouth, “I am extremely disappointed in you.” And you mentally kick yourself: “Why? Why did I do that? I know better. That was a stupid thing to do. If I could just take it back. If I could just change that one sin, that one moment of weakness. That one word. That one night I lost my virginity, that one day I lost my temper, the onetime where I lied, taking the Lord’s name in vain just to save my own skin and not get caught. That one moment of pride and arrogance where I should have just bit my tongue and said nothing.” But you can’t. You can’t take it back. 

And you don’t want the whole world to know what a failure you are. That you are not the student, citizen, employer, employee, friend, husband, wife, parent, grandparent, brother, sister, child, man, or woman that you know you should be. You’re not even the one you know you could be. You don’t want everybody to know that you fail God, that you fail others, and that you fail even yourself. You feel worthless. Insignificant. Incapable. Unlovable. Shrink-down-in-your-chair, bury-your-head-in-your-hands, unworthy-of-the-time-of-day, “I-a-poor-miserable-sinner” (see LSB, p 184) kind of worthless. 

This is the Southern Kingdom of Judah’s reality at the start of our Old Testament Reading this morning. And despite all of God’s warning cries to them through the mouths of his prophets, Israel and Judah have reveled in their idolatry. Hence, in chapters 41 and 42, Isaiah refers to them as a “worm” (41:14) and a blind, deaf, disobedient servant (42:18–25). “I-a-poor-miserable-sinner” kind of worthless.

Yet it is to these worthless sinners, to Judah, to you, and to me that God speaks. Today, God speaks a blazing word of hope and comfort through the mouth of his prophet Isaiah. Notice how our Old Testament Reading begins. It begins with a radical shift in identity. You may very well feel and see yourself as worthless. You have been a bunch of worthless sinners. “But now thus says the Lord,” you are valuable! “You are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you” (vv 1, 4). 

And what’s more, Judah’s value is also determined by the price that God willingly pays for them. In verse 4, God says, “I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life.” And so he did. When God led Israel out of Egypt, he paid for them with the lives of some Egyptians. And when God led Judah out of Babylon, he paid for them with the lives of some Babylonians.

But the greatest payment that God would make for his people, for Israel and Judah, for you and for me, was when he “sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons” (Gal 4:4–5). And there, at his baptism in the Jordan River, Jesus took your sin upon himself. He who knew no sin became sin for us so that on a hill outside of Jerusalem, the Father might give his only-begotten Son as ransom for you. Jesus willingly and graciously loved you unto death, even death upon the cross. He paid for your sins in full. Not with gold or silver but with his holy, precious blood, innocent suffering, and bitter death. You are free. It is finished. Jesus has done it all, and all that he did was for you. You are forgiven all your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. There is no condemnation, no fiery judgment of God, for you who are in Christ Jesus. Do you see what kind of love the Father has lavished upon us, that we should be called sons of God (cf 1 Jn 3:1)?

And so, you are! “In Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ” (Gal 3:26–27). You were buried and raised with Christ in Baptism. You don’t belong to sin, death, or even the devil any longer. They have no power over you. You belong to God. In Baptism, he who created you, who formed you and numbered the hairs on your head, marked you with his cross, covered you with the robe of his righteousness, and said to you, “You are mine.”

Don’t you see, dear saints of the living God? The Good News of the Gospel is that it doesn’t matter if you feel worthless. It doesn’t matter if the world calls you worthless. It doesn’t matter what accusation the devil throws at you, or your life circumstances, the turbulent waters and the fiery trials that you endure in this vale of tears. It doesn’t matter if in your eyes you seem worthless. Because none of these things define who you truly are. Despite All That Makes Us Feel Worthless,
We Are Valuable in God’s Eyes
Because of Jesus’ Death and Resurrection. Your identity comes from God himself. He has given it to you. He has told you who you are. To him, “You are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you,” now and forever. In Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

Pastor Tim Weiser

Due to the winter weather, Church was canceled; however, Pastor’s service can be found on his Facebook account linked below.

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1ABkkHArd6

ADVENT 4, DECEMBER 22, 2024, Holiness in the Body of Jesus Text: Hebrews 10:5–10 Other Lessons: Micah 5:2–5a; Psalm 80:1–7; Luke 1:39–45 (46–56)

Sermon Theme:

God wants to make you holy; for that he needs a body.

Sermon Goal: That seeing the contrast that the letter to the Hebrews makes between the new covenant and the old, you are strengthened in faith that God makes you holy by the bodily sacrifice of Jesus, which you share in the Sacrament of his body and blood. Based on a sermon in Concordia Pulpit Resources by Rev. Dr. Geoffrey R. Boyle

Sermon: God alone is holy. He’s totally other, uncommon, undefiled, and free from the stain of sin and death. His holiness reveals his one-of-a-kind-ness. No other god and nothing within creation is holy like our God. Yet this holy God—the one who made man in his image, who created everything out of nothing, and who still preserves it all to this day by his grace—this holy God desires above all that you, too, would share in his holiness. He wants to sanctify you.        Of course, there’s much that stands in the way of his holiness—first and foremost, our sin. We’re not only unholy; we’re also unclean. Defiled without and within—in thought, word, and deed—what right do we have to share in his holiness? What right do we have to draw near to God, to approach his holy presence, to be sanctified, sharing in his holiness?     None at all. No one comes before God on his own terms, with his own plans, by his own means or merit, no matter how great it may seem at the time. But none of this stops God from coming to you, making you holy, and giving you access to him, and he has his particular way to do it. God Wants to Make You Holy; For That He Needs a Body. Actually, that’s how it’s always been. God has always wanted to make his people holy, and he’s always done so with a body. That’s what the whole sacrificial system at the tabernacle and temple was all about: atoning for Israel’s sins and drawing his people near to him, making them holy.  

It’s a shared holiness. Israel never was nor ever could be holy in themselves. They could never be totally other, set apart, one-of-a-kind—at least, not like their God was. But they were given to share in his holiness, given to draw near to him, be separate with him, and reflect his one-of-a-kind-ness to the world. “For I am the Lord who brought you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God. You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Lev 11:45). But the only way to approach this holy God is on his terms, according to his Word, by the means that he so graciously establishes for them. That’s what the book of Leviticus is all about—God’s gracious means of access to his holiness. All the rules and rubrics of timing, location, and animal—everything laid out so that Israel could draw near to God and that he might sanctify them. There’s no works righteousness in the Old Testament. It’s not a different God or a different way of being God. Salvation is always and only through faith in Jesus Christ. Holiness is always a participation in his presence, sanctified by his Holy Spirit. But the way we’re given to approach him and share in his presence differs. Holiness in the old covenant came through the bodily sacrifice of animals. Then it was by bulls and goats;now it’s by bread and wine, water and Word.Then it was by daily, monthly, and yearly offerings;now it’s by one Baptism and the ongoing feeding at the altar and hearing the 
preached Word.

The letter to the Hebrews doesn’t deny that the saints of old were sanctified by their sacrifices. But it does strongly warn against going back to what is old when the new has come! When Christ came into the world, he came taking a body. And with this body he came to do the will of God—to atone for the sins of the world and sanctify all who would believe in him.

        But why a body? Why not just up and forgive the world? Why not simply thunder a word of absolution from heaven, avoiding the messiness of flesh and blood? Well, as it was of old, so it always will be. To forgive and make holy requires a body because it requires blood. And without blood there is no forgiveness. The letter to the Hebrews says: “Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins” (9:22).   

Now Christ has come. And the body prepared for him was a body prepared for death, for the shedding of blood, for the forgiveness of sins and sanctifying of his people. Holiness in the new covenant comes through the bodily sacrifice of Christ.

It was never the body and blood of animals that took away sins or gave access to God’s holiness. But it was by these that the atoning work of Jesus was given to them. Through sacrifices as through sacraments, Israel gained access to God and shared in his holiness. They were types, figures, and means of God’s grace, delivering the One whose blood alone forgives sin. No wonder the body and blood of these animals were so central to the worship of God’s people! But when Jesus came, everything changed. His body offered on the cross, and the blood that flowed from his hands and feet, this was the once-and-for-all sacrifice. This wasthe real deal, the real sacrament, the opening of heaven, the forgiveness of sins won for the whole world. Here, in the body of Jesus, we have full and final access to God; here we share in his holiness.     

God certainly never intended for anyone to trust in the sacrifice itself but rather to look to him who promised to sanctify by his Word, through these slain bodies and shed blood.       

God wants to sanctify his people. He wants to make you holy. For that he needs a body—a body prepared for him that he might offer it once and for all. Through him and his offering we have access to God; we’re invited to share in his holiness. The old is gone; the new has come. Sacrifices and offerings no longer grant access to God, but here he comes to you today. He gives you his body and his blood with this bread and this wine. Again, he speaks his promise of forgiveness, life, and salvation. Here he draws close to you that you might be found with him. He has come to do the Father’s will. He has come to make you holy, for he is holy. So take and eat the very body of Christ given for you. Amen.