Sermon for 2-4-24

Sermons, The Word

Luke 8: 4-15

Historic pericope for Sexagesima.

 

Opening prayer:   O most gracious heavenly Father, keep Your Family, the Church continually in the true faith that, relying on the hope of Your heavenly grace, we may ever be defended by Your mighty power.   Amen.

I.N.I.

 

  • You are here because you believe that the devil tempted Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and caused the Fall.
  • You are here this morning not to hear how prosperous God wants you to be in this life, but because you know that the devil continues to tempt you to sin using the world and your flesh to accomplish each sin with the purpose to rob you of your inheritance.

 

Sadly, many say they believe that the devil exists, but their actions in this life betray that outward confession.      Those who stay away from the Divine Service week-after-week act as if the devil did not exist or that he has very little influence in their lives.       And the greatest trick the devil plays on people is to make them think he does not exist.

 

The Holy Spirit has bound us to His Word and Sacraments.   In these means, the LORD condescends to sinners telling them something much different than the devil who works through the world and our sinful flesh.

 

  • Through these Means, Christ gently calls us to repentance each week in the face of the devil’s temptations. We don’t deserve that!
  • Through these Means, Jesus assures us that our sins are forgiven.
  • Through these means, our Savior is guiding us to heaven and keeping us on that path.

 

Thus, because of the devil, hearing the word of God week-after-week should be the highest priority in life.     And the reception of the Lord’s Supper is an intimate part of this priority.         Luther had much to say about receiving the Sacrament in the Large Catechism:

 

  • Let it be understood that people who abstain and absent themselves from the sacrament over a long period of time are not to be considered Christian.
  • When a person, with nothing to hinder him, lets a long period of time elapse without even desiring the sacrament, I call that despising it.
  • If a person stays away from the sacrament day by day he will become more and more callous and cold, and eventually spurn it altogether.

 

More importantly than Luther, our Savior had something to say about growing cold toward the Word and Sacrament also in His words to the Church in Laodicea, “I know what you are doing, that you are neither cold nor hot: I wish you were cold or hot.   But now that you are lukewarm and not hot or cold, I am going to spit you out of My mouth (Rev. 3: 15-16).”   What caused them to be lukewarm?     Very simply, the temptations, trials, cares, riches and pleasures of this life which Jesus describes here in the Luke text this morning.       They began to neglect Word and Sacrament.

 

“Pastor, you’re being overzealous here!”      I am not the one who said, “I am going to spit you out of My mouth.”      Jesus is not being overzealous here.    He is concerned about your soul and He is telling the truth.

 

Consider those words of Jesus to the Churches in Asia Minor.   The LORD eventually took the lampstands (The churches) away from the people of Asia Minor because they did not faithfully and consistently make use of His Word and Sacrament.   Today, Asia Minor, the cradle of Christianity, the land where St. Paul started so many churches, the area that gave us the Nicene Creed, is a Muslim country.   The great Cathedrals dedicated to the hearing of God’s Word, are now mosques which call their people to a worship of a false god that delivers hell.

 

You see, the devil makes people believe that the hearing of God’s word can be left to convenience; that is, when we get around to it, when all the other things in life are taken care of; when we don’t stay up too late the night before; or as long as it does not interfere with my family time, my sleep time, or my recreation time.    That is what Jesus means by His words, “And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life.”

 

This morning, given the solemn words of our blessed Savior, and as we consider the second of the Solas, which speak of the need to hear the Word of God, let us come before Him today repenting of our sins and considering once again:

 

THE NEED TO KEEP ON HEARING THE WORD OF GOD.

 

In the parable, our Savior introduces us to four kinds of soil.     In three of the scenarios, Jesus places in front of us the key barriers to faith: the devil, temptations, trials, and the cares, riches, and pleasures of this life.    Every Christian needs to take heed to the warning and exhortation to be kept in the faith as pilgrim hearers and Catechumens for the rest of their life lest they lose what they have.

 

Jesus tells the disciples, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God.”    The Gospel is a “secret” in the sense that natural man knows nothing of the Mercy of God in Christ by natural knowledge.     Natural knowledge only tells the unbeliever that God exists.     As a result, natural man invents his own way of salvation: “If I do my best, God will forgive the rest.”   Natural religion is Christless, crossless, resurrectionless.

 

It is this beautiful “secret” of Christ Crucified and risen that your Savior wants you to know and believe and has brought you to believe.    So this text is actually Gospel.    And the Gospel is this “secret” that inheres in the Means of Grace, Word and Sacrament.    Satan does not want you or anyone else to know this “secret.”      As a result, the various obstacles, mentioned by Jesus, are placed in the way of hearing the Word and using the Sacrament.

 

Out of the four types of soil, only one receives the blessing of our Savior: “As for that in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience.”     In order to avoid confusion, we need to define the “good soil.”     An easy answer to the difference in the four types of soil would be point to the “differences” within people, as if some hearers were “good,” that is, more fertile ground, while others have harder hearts, rockier spirits or poorer soil.    That explanation is appealing to natural man, but it is not in line with the grace of God.

 

We dare not think for a moment that we are the “good soil” because we are not “like the others,” as the Pharisee prayed in the Temple.    The “good” quality of the soil is based only on God’s grace in Christ.   The receptivity of the Gospel is a precious gift of God.   And it comes only through the Means of Grace.   As Paul says, “Faith comes by hearing,” or as Jesus says, “The one who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

 

The words of our Savior this morning are perhaps some of the most solemn regarding the need to hear and believe.   Death waits for us every hour of our life.   Our Savior’s greatest desire is that we believe that He is the greatest gift God has given us in this life so that death does not swallow us up in hell.

 

Even yet today, in spite of our sins, in spite of our neglect to warn others as we ought, in spite of our indolence in prayer and lack of personal study, He has set His table before you this morning.    It is not a table filled with the things that appeal to the flesh: pleasure, ease, riches or fame.    This is the food of Satan.    It is food that may satisfy for a time, but brings eternal death.

 

Jesus has rather prepared for YOU an eternal meal filled to overflowing with forgiveness, for you the sinner; with a life in the golden streets of heaven, and a rescue from the horrors of hell.   When Jesus says, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear,” He is speaking to you and inviting you to hear and apply to yourself what He has to say this day at His table: “Given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.”

 

                Sadly, you and I are guilty also of allowing the things of this world to avert our attention away from the Word of God.   Our conscience should bother us.   But with these words, Jesus means to point your troubled conscience away from your sins and the things of this world to the treasures of eternal life.   The “motto” in our bulletin is Crux Sola est Nostra theologia.     These are based on the words of S.t Paul in I Corinthians 1: “We preach Christ Crucified.   A Stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Greeks.”

 

The crucifix is not attractive to the flesh and the world, but through that image, we are reminded of the price our Savior paid to bring us to eternal life.

 

  • You are the object of that price.
  • You are the object of that forgiveness.
  • Jesus lived to keep God’s Law for you.
  • Jesus died the ugly death on the cross for you.
  • He spoke decisively and eternally to your sin when He said, “It is Finished,”
  • You are a baptized child of God; baptized into Christ.
  • Our Lord tells us through His inspired apostle, “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.”
  • You are the object of this preaching and why the LORD has ordained the ministry among us which allows me to keep on preaching. Go in peace.