“Say to those with an anxious heart…”. That is how the text starts. And I think that is just about everyone. We start off with a background level of anxiety. Like background radiation. It is just there. But we all have our own specific anxiety. And here is a word from God to exactly those with an anxious heart. And that word is “Be Strong! Fear Not!” The immediate response from the anxious heart might just well be “why? tell me why I should fear not?” And the text gives us one of God’s rare answers. God will come and save you. God will come and save you with vengeance and recompence. And that is what this sermon preaches. What is a salvation of vengeance and recompence.
Biblical Text: : Mark 7:14-23, Eph 6:10-20, Onward Christian Soldiers
One of the things that largely disappeared from Christian vocabulary in the preceding couple of generations was martial language. There are some reasons. This sermon makes some guesses. But losing that language has cost the church dearly I believe. First, it is biblical. Using military words for the Christian life is all over the New and Old Testaments. The Epistle Lesson for the day (Ephesians 6:10-20) is just the most direct. And second, the Christian Life is the life of sanctification. And the life of sanctification is a life of stuggle against Satan, the World and our own sinful flesh. Now while pride might want us to use that martial language against Satan, the honest answer is that we are called most often to use it against ourselves. This sermon works on those themes, and it does it using the hymn Onward Christian Soldiers as the opening.
What is a Sabbath? There is a simple answer about a date on the calendar. But that is not how Luther’s Small Catechism defines it. Neither do I think that is how the Jesus talks about the Sabbath. That’s where this meditation starts, but it is really about the Old Testament reading for the day and Elijah’s journey. It is about the contrast between the Power and the Glory and The things that were made for man. It is about the regular Sabbaths and those that we desperately need. It is about how we receive the Bread of Life for the Journey that is too much for us.
The text is sometimes call the Bread of Life Discourse. Actually, it is only the first third. The lectionary has us in John 6 for the three weeks. This sermon address that in noting the difference between the Synoptic Gospels (Matt, Mark, Luke) and John. John might tell the same story, but his story wants to work on deeper levels. In this case the question is really: “What do you hunger for?” Obviously we hunger for food. We eat some and feel full. But 4-6 hours later we are hungry again. The material and temporal points at our spiritual reality. We are hungry. For what? The sermon tries to preach that.
The text is the Markan account of calming the storm and walking on the water. There are multiple accounts like this, but Mark’s is unique. It isn’t about Peter getting out of the boat. It is really about Jesus getting into the boat. In this sermon there are two words from the key phrase that I think need sharpened up. The first is how the disciples are described. “making way painfully” misses both the origin of the word which is in testing the purity of precious metal and misses how the word is normally used as torture. The disciples rowing int the 4th watch against the wind is a test or torture. And Jesus means to pass the by. Means is just too squishy. He desired, a much deeper word. The combination is a tough saying. But it is in the toughest saying that we often find the sweetest gospel. This sermon meditates on that.
The feeding of the 5000 is one of the few episodes that is in all 4 gospels. And I think each one of them has their own theological understanding of the event. Mark’s to me emphasizes the providence of Jesus in the Spiritual Life. We all tend to think we can do it ourselves. And then we end up hungry in a desolate place. This sermon walks through both how we find ourselves in those places, and how Jesus restores to us life by giving himself.
It is a difficult text and a difficult day. I am always amazed at the synchronicity of the lectionary. Honestly you start writing the next sermon in your head by Sunday afternoon. You translate it. Make sure you understand the words. You read what a few solid commentators have said through the ages. But by Wednesday, Thursday at the latest, the general theme is locked down. In this case the text was the story of John the Baptist’s execution by Herod. And the general theme I had decided upon what a contrast of the Kingdoms. The Kingdoms of this World represented by Herod and the The Kingdom of Heaven represented by Jesus and John. The general thrust coming from the best prayer ever written by Thomas Cranmer (which is saying a lot) – may we pass through things temporal without losing things eternal. As the people of God we are citizen of the Kingdom of Heaven. Yet today the Kingdoms of this World and the Kingdom of Heaven exist side by side. Each exerting some authority over the other. How do we live in that overlap? And then Saturday evening someone tries to shoot a major Presidential Candidate. Someone was overtaken by things temporal and lost things eternal. And all of us, and entire nation, seems to be walking that same line. The propaganda assault we live in daily puts eternal weight (“The Republic Will Be Lost”) on temporal things. And it is not that those temporal things are not important. They are. It is that the Christian must not lose sight of the eternal. The Kingdoms of this world might listen and respect and protect us. We should pray for that. Herod did that for John, for a while. But they ultimately have a different master and work by different rules. They turn into beasts and chop off heads. The promise of the Kingdom of Heaven is not temporal rule or health and wealth. The promise of the Kingdom of Heaven is eternal life under the one true King, Jesus Christ. And if that means a temporal pit, so be it. The Kingdoms of this world will become the Kingdom of our Lord in his good time. And we shall be there to receive them.
This sermon starts out with that theological phrase, the Scandal of Particularity. I think it is much more common that we admit. Primarily because we don’t really know what to call it when it happens. It is more than just envy. And it has some logic behind it. But if we can identify it, I think it is also what hangs around at the most intimate invitations from God to know Him better.
The text is one of Mark’s famous “sandwiches.” He puts one story on the inside of a story interrupted. I think the reason is that we are meant to compare and contrast the inner and the outer stories. They illuminate each other. And these two stories are stories of desperation and faith. They are stories of the soul. In the inner one a story of how the soul meets God. In the outer one all the lies that Satan might throw in our way. This sermon is a little more experimental than what I normally do. And by experimental I probably mean spiritual experiential.
This is the “free will” or bondage of the will sermon. The texts of the day, at least to me, set it up perfectly. The effect of the law in our day I believe is felt most acutely when we are talking about knowledge or technique. We all have a sense that something is wrong, but natural man today believes everything could be solved simply with more knowledge or better technique. Enter the God of the whirlwind from Job. “Who is this who darkens my council with words without knowledge?” That doesn’t prevent us from holding onto that. Our situation is so ruined and dire – we have no free will in spiritual things – that even omniscience wouldn’t do us any good. We need a savior. We need someone to change the rules. And the that is what Jesus does. He fulfills the law. He has perfect knowledge and technique. And to our broken want-ers what he offers is grace. Have faith. God loves you and will see you through.
