JULY 2025
JULY 2025
6 July 2025 - Trinity 3 - 1 Timothy 1:12-17
“This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.”
All of us sometimes speak in superlative terms. This means that we sometimes describe something or someone as the very best of all, or as the very worst of all.
Politicians and patriots often say that America is the best country in the world. I can tell you what was the best day of my life, and what was the worst day of my life. Others will tell you about the best book they have ever read, or about the worst movie they have ever seen.
In today’s lesson from his First Epistle to Timothy, the apostle Paul speaks in a superlative way in describing himself as the chief of sinners. Other translations render this sentiment, from the original Greek, as his being the “foremost” of sinners, or as being the “worst” of sinners.
He doesn’t just say that he is among the worst, or that he is really bad, but he says that he is the very worst. That’s remarkable. He summarizes his sins in this way: “I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man.”
Those are certainly not good things. But if we were to compare Saul of Tarsus - later known as Paul the apostle - to other notorious sinners mentioned in the Bible, we would probably not think of him as the very worst of all.
Wasn’t Herod the Great a more brutal sinner than Saul? Wasn’t the high priest Caiaphas a more hypocritical and corrupt sinner than Saul? Wasn’t Judas Iscariot a more treacherous sinner than Saul?
Well, in that deeply introspective moment, Paul didn’t think so. And Paul wasn’t even thinking in those categories.
In that moment, he was not comparing himself to other people. In that moment, he was comparing himself to God’s holiness, which he had not taken seriously. And he was comparing himself to what God had taught him - or had tried to teach him - which he had ignored and failed to learn.
In his conscience, as he stood before the tribunal of God’s law and its just judgments, this was a very lonely moment for Paul: as he took account of himself and assessed himself. He was not looking around at others, to try to mute or minimize what his conscience was telling him about himself.
“This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.”
As he stands before God, Paul says this for himself and about himself. But Paul also expresses himself here in a way that shows that he would expect others also to be willing to say this, and to mean it.
Our translation has Paul say: “This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance.” But the full impact and implication of what he says is probably best captured by a translation that puts it in this way: “This is a trustworthy saying, and everyone should accept it.”
Paul is not merely saying that I should concur that he - Paul - is the worst of sinners, and therefore that I may conclude that I am not so bad. Rather, he is saying that each of us, as we also stand before God’s judgment, should feel the same way about ourselves as he felt about himself.
As you confess your sins, you are not to be comparing yourself to other people, and measuring yourself against the relative goodness or evil that you can see in the lives of other people. In a true and genuine repentance, you are to be comparing your words and actions to God’s Word, and to what you knew was right even when you did what was wrong.
And this is to be without qualifications, without excuses, without self-justifications, and without the casting of blame onto others. You are the chief of sinners.
And I am the chief of sinners. Each of us, according to the accusing testimony of the conscience that resides in each of us, is the chief of sinners.
In that lonely moment when we in a solitary way stand before God, fully exposed to his probing and penetrating judgment in every aspect of our lives, that’s all we can think or say. And that’s what we need to think and say.
Whenever we join in the version of the confession of sins that was used at the beginning of today’s service, we should take note of the fact that even though we are saying the prayer at the same time and in the same place, we are not actually saying it together, as a “we” prayer. Each of us is saying it for himself, or for herself, in the singular voice, as an “I” prayer.
And therefore it might be helpful for you sometimes to close your eyes, and not to look at anyone else or even to be aware of anyone else, as you in that prayer acknowledge that you individually are indeed the chief of sinners, and the very worst of sinners.
“O almighty God, merciful Father, I, a poor, miserable sinner, confess to You all my sins and iniquities with which I have ever offended You and justly deserved Your temporal and eternal punishment. But I am heartily sorry for them, and sincerely repent of them, and I pray You of Your boundless mercy, and for the sake of the holy, innocent, bitter sufferings and death of Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ, to be gracious and merciful to me, a poor, sinful being.”
This deep and honest confession of your sins, without comparisons or qualifications, does not lead to the despair and hopelessness that would indeed come from such a confession, all by itself. We are not afraid to empty ourselves of all pride and pretense before God, because we know that God will forgive us for the sake of his Son Jesus Christ, and will not cast us away from his presence.
That confidence in God’s mercy toward us - which he has demonstrated to be a reality over and over again - takes away our fear of being totally vulnerable before him, and open to him.
And that is because Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. That means that he takes away my sin, and will not allow my sin to remain stuck to me, to weigh me down, and to pull me into hell. He will lift that sin off of me, and wash away its stain, in his gracious absolution.
This is also why St. Paul, in the statement on which we have been focusing, does not merely admit that he is the chief of sinners, but also celebrates the wondrous truth that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.”
There are many superlative things that can be said about Jesus the Savior of sinners, and that God invites us to believe about Jesus in his gospel. He is the best and most righteous man who ever lived.
And this is because - as St. Paul explains it to the Colossians - all the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily in him. Jesus - in, with, and under his true humanity - was and is the eternal Godhead, come to earth as a man.
The death of Jesus was, from one perspective, the most unjust death in human history, since he personally was without any sin. Yet the death of Jesus was, from another perspective, also the most loving and gracious death in human history: since he had willingly taken all human sin upon himself, and on the cross willingly atoned for that sin.
And Jesus was raised from the grave for our justification, winning the greatest victory ever in his victory over death: so that now he can and will justify me personally, and cover me personally with his righteousness, as I trust in his words of pardon and peace.
Jesus’ gospel of forgiveness, life, and salvation truly is the very best message that anyone can possibly hear. When we believe this message, it restores our fellowship with God; it unites us to Christ in a most blessèd mystical union; and it brings to us the indwelling of God’s Spirit.
By God’s grace, the gift of eternal life is accordingly ours already in this world, as we live in him and for him. And by God’s grace, the gift of eternal life will be ours without end in the world to come.
I may be the chief of sinners. Indeed, that is exactly what I am. But Jesus came into the world to save the chief of sinners. He came into the world to save all of the chiefs of sinners.
And every time I hear his absolution, spoken by the lips of his called servant, he saves me from my sins once again. He restores and renews me in my fellowship with God once again. He lifts me up to the heights of heavenly peace and holy joy once again, when he says: “I forgive you all your sins.”
Chief of sinners though I be, Jesus shed his blood for me,
died that I might live on high, lives that I might never die.
As the branch is to the vine, I am his and he is mine!Chief of sinners though I be, Christ is all in all to me;
all my wants to him are known, all my sorrows are his own.
Safe with him in earthly strife, I await the heav’nly life. Amen.
13 July 2025 - Trinity 4 - Genesis 50:15-21
In the movie “The Godfather, Part 2,” the mafia boss Michael Corleone and his brother Fredo had a serious falling out, due to Fredo having taken sides with a competitor crime family, against his brother. After a tense meeting between the two, when Michael might have been expected to order his brother to be killed for this betrayal, he instead let him leave the house, alive - after telling him that he never wanted to see him again.
But then, in a hushed tone, Michael said to one of his enforcers: “I don’t want anything to happen to him - while my mother’s alive.”
Michael wanted to save his mother the grief of losing a son. Of course he wouldn’t have told her that he had ordered a hit on his own brother in any case.
But, Michael’s seeming decision to spare his brother was not what it looked like. Michael had not forgiven Fredo. Michael was still going to punish Fredo. And after their mother did pass away, Fredo ended up dying in - shall we say - a boating accident.
Regarding Fredo, while Michael had disowned him, he seemed to have decided to forgive him, at least in a certain sense, because he had not killed him. But in reality he was planning to kill him all along, as soon as their surviving parent was dead.
It was not a real forgiveness. It was not forgiveness at all.
Can you think of times when you said that you had forgiven your spouse or your sibling, for something offensive that they said or did? But then, when they say or do a similarly offensive thing later on, not only do you complain about the new offense, but you also dredge up the earlier example that you supposedly already forgave, and throw that up to them as well?
As Christians, and as human beings, we do have a concept of forgiveness as a good thing. At a rational level, we understand the benefits of forgiveness.
Holding grudges and plotting revenge against those who have offended us, betrayed us, or humiliated us, actually hurts us. Objectively speaking, we know that it is better to be free from such toxic thoughts and emotions. But the selfish pride that resides squarely within our fallen sinful nature so often overrides our reason in such matters.
My common sense tells me that I should just forget about the offense and move on. But my pride tells me that I should not forget, but that I should wait for an opportunity to get even, and settle the score.
We see in today’s lesson from the Book of Genesis, that Joseph’s brothers feared, and maybe expected, that Joseph would do a Fredo on them, now that their father was dead.
Joseph’s brothers had previously sinned against him grievously. As you remember, because of their jealousy, they had initially intended to kill him, but then finally settled on selling him into slavery.
This in turn had set in motion a sequence of injustices in Egypt - where Joseph served as a slave - including imprisonment for something he had not actually done. But Joseph endured all these injustices in faith, until finally he was released from prison and by divine providence became the viceroy of the Kingdom of Egypt.
To be sure, the brothers were sincerely penitent over what they had done to Joseph. Many years later, as their consciences continued to accuse them, we are told elsewhere in Genesis that
“They said to one another, ‘We are truly guilty concerning our brother, for we saw the anguish of his soul when he pleaded with us, and we would not hear... And Reuben answered them, saying, ‘Did I not speak to you, saying, “Do not sin against the boy”; and you would not listen? Therefore behold, his blood is now required of us.’”
But Joseph had forgiven his brothers. And Joseph’s forgiveness was sincere and genuine.
Joseph was a man of faith who walked with God, and he was able to see - in hindsight - that there were reasons why God allowed him to endure all the hardships he had endured, even though he certainly would have wondered what God was doing at the time. Again, we read in an earlier section of Genesis:
“Joseph made himself known to his brothers. And he wept aloud... And Joseph said to his brothers, ‘Please come near to me.’ So they came near. Then he said: ‘I am Joseph your brother, whom you sold into Egypt. But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life. For these two years the famine has been in the land, and there are still five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvesting. And God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.”
But that was then. This is now. Jacob is now dead. And the brothers wonder if Joseph’s earlier kindness to them was just a ruse, to avoid hurting their father, and if now they would get what was coming to them.
They knew that they did not deserve the mercy that Joseph had shown to them. Their consciences were still accusing them. And so - as was typical for these men - they told Joseph a lie, in order to protect themselves from his rekindled wrath.
Jacob, who knew the character of Joseph and who trusted him, did not expect him to turn on his other sons after his death. So he had not asked that a special request for mercy be given to Joseph.
It wasn’t necessary. Joseph’s forgiveness had been real, and it had not been revoked. But for their self-preservation, the brothers claimed that Jacob had done this.
“When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, ‘Perhaps Joseph will hate us, and may actually repay us for all the evil which we did to him.’ So they sent messengers to Joseph, saying, ‘Before your father died he commanded, saying, “Thus you shall say to Joseph: ‘I beg you, please forgive the trespass of your brothers and their sin; for they did evil to you.’” Now, please, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of your father.’”
It should not come as a surprise that this hurt Joseph. By every human standard, Joseph certainly would have had the right to get his revenge. And as the second-most powerful man in Egypt, he certainly also had the ability to get his revenge - by either killing or enslaving his brothers - if that’s what he had wanted to do.
But Joseph had not taken a human course in this matter, and he would not be doing so now, either. He had taken the divine path: imitating the mercy and forgiveness of the God in whom he trusted, and from whom he received the forgiveness of his sins - even if his trespasses had not been as egregious as his brother’s trespasses.
And so Joseph assured his brothers - unworthy though they were of his goodwill and of his love:
“Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God? But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive. Now therefore, do not be afraid; I will provide for you and your little ones.”
Joseph had put his pain and anger behind him. Nothing he had ever said or done would have given his brothers a just reason to doubt this.
But they did doubt this, not because of anything in Joseph, but because of their own sinfulness. They probably knew that in a similar circumstance, they would not be so forgiving. So they were projecting that onto Joseph.
But what was also going on, is that the ancient messianic promise of God for his people Israel, and for all peoples, was being projected by God onto Joseph and through Joseph. As Joseph’s personal decency and merciful heart were being shaped by the influence of the Holy Spirit within him, so too was Joseph serving in this instance as an image and foreshadowing of Christ.
When Joseph asked rhetorically, “Am I in the place of God?,” he meant God insofar as God is the righteous judge of all the wicked and of their wickedness. But in another sense - insofar as God is a God of mercy and forgiveness - Joseph was indeed in the place of God in this moment.
The ancient story of Joseph is one of the key ways in which the Lord taught his people what the future Messiah would be like, and what he would do. Indeed, the Lord, through this story, was teaching the people of Israel what he is really like, and what he would be like when he - in the person of the messianic Seed of the woman - would someday walk the earth as a man among men.
Jesus, a just and innocent man, would someday be betrayed by his brethren - that is, by the Jewish people. Jesus would someday be put into the hands of foreigners and be carried away - that is, by the Romans. And Jesus would be as a dead man, gone and out of sight.
But then - to the surprise of everyone - Jesus would be found alive again, with words of forgiveness and hope on his lips, even for those who had harmed him; with sacramental gifts in his hands; and with great power and kingly authority that would be used for the benefit of those who are the objects of his unmerited love.
In all of these ways, Joseph prefigured Jesus and was a type of Jesus. Through the Book of Genesis, where Joseph’s story was preserved for all generations, his words and deeds impressed upon the family and nation of Israel, what kind of Messiah they should be expecting.
And today, the story of Joseph reminds us of what kind of Messiah we do in fact have. We have a Savior - a divine-human Savior - who forgives as Joseph forgave.
With respect to sins of your past of which you have sincerely repented, your conscience, and the deceptive trickery of Satan, may still be causing you to feel that you don’t deserve forgiveness, and therefore that you probably don’t really have it. God will punish you for those things after all, and you are just deluding yourself if you think that all is now forgotten.
But the risen Christ, with nail marks still in his immortal hands, holds those hands out to you over and over again, and absolves you over and over again: assuring you in your penitence that as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed your transgressions from you.
By his death he atoned for your sins. As God sees you in Christ, clothed in the righteousness of Christ by faith, he therefore doesn’t see those sins. He sees only the perfection and obedience of his Son, which have now been credited to you.
What God says in Holy Scripture, he still says - about you and to you: “I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.”
And what God’s mercy toward Joseph did to him - making him like the God of mercy - God’s mercy in Christ toward you, also does to you: as his Spirit now indwells you. God’s mercy makes you evermore like the God of mercy, in being willing and able to forgive those who have hurt you. And I mean really to forgive, and to forget: for their sake and for yours.
Oh, you’re not all the way there yet. But you are becoming more and more like Joseph: as your faith allows you to see that God did not abandoned you in your humiliations and trials, even if you sometimes felt that he did. Rather, you know - as the Epistle to the Romans tells you - that
“All things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”
You are able to know this even when you can’t see it. The inspired account of Joseph and his brothers helps you to know this, even when you can’t see it. And that inspired account helps you to pity those who are weighed down by guilt, or who are poisoned by vindictiveness, rather than to become like them.
Remember not, O God, the sins of long ago;
In tender mercy visit us, distressed and humbled low.
O Lord, our Savior, help, and glorify Thy name;
Deliver us from all our sins, and take away our shame. Amen.
Trinity 5 - 1 Corinthians 1:18-25
“For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom.”
There is a natural human inclination toward being religious or spiritual. But this natural kind of religiosity or spirituality - among those whose faith and piety have not been shaped by the divinely-revealed Christian gospel - takes more than one form.
In today’s text from his First Epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul writes that there are actually two basic ways in which people who do not know Christ, approach God and the idea of God, or spiritual questions in general. Paul describes these two natural, human religious orientations as the way of the “Jews,” who request signs; and the way of the “Greeks,” who seek after wisdom.
Now, there certainly are Jews who have a more philosophical approach in their spirituality; and there certainly are Greeks who are eager to see and experience miracles. But the apostle chooses to catagorize these two approaches in these ways, because of the common associations that he had seen in his interactions with people.
Still, you don’t have to identify yourself as Jewish, for Paul’s words to find their mark in your way of thinking about God and the things of God, if you are the kind of person who expects God to prove himself to you through signs and miracles.
You don’t have to identify yourself as Greek, for Paul’s description of the Greeks also to be an accurate description of you, if you are the kind of person who sees God - or the concept of God - as little more than a source of spiritual wisdom and inner enlightenment.
During the earthly ministry of Jesus, the leaders of the Jewish people often demanded a “sign” from him, to validate the authority of his claims and actions. But Jesus did not submit to their demands.
St. John tells us in his Gospel that on the occasion of our Lord’s cleansing of the temple, the Jewish leaders said to him, “What sign do you show us for doing these things?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”
He was, of course, not speaking about the literal building that stood before them, but about “the temple of his body,” and about the future resurrection of that body.
On another occasion, as reported by St. Matthew, some Pharisees and Sadducees tested Jesus by asking him to show them a sign from heaven. He answered by telling them:
“An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.”
The “sign of Jonah” to which Christ referred, also points to his resurrection: that is, to Jesus’ emergence from the tomb on the third day; just as Jonah, after three days, had emerged from the great fish that had swallowed him.
So, whenever the Jews requested a “sign” from Jesus, then and there, he pointed them instead to his future resurrection.
And, for Jesus, his pathway to the resurrection went through the cross. There was no detour that would have allowed him to bypass this humiliating death, on his way to victory and glory.
Our sins were atoned for at the cross of Christ, before a holy and righteous God. Indeed, the sins of the whole world were “taken away” from the world at his cross: where the Lamb of God was slain; and where the Son of Man laid down his life as a ransom for many.
For fallen man, there can be no reconciliation or relationship with God, without forgiveness from God, and justification before God. And God’s forgiveness and justification cannot be known, apart from the cross. The cross is a fundamental defining reality of the Christian faith.
By all human standards, there is nothing attractive or intriguing about the cross. A Roman cross is not a sign of power - spiritual or otherwise.
A cross is emblematic of shame, humiliation, and degradation. If the religion that we are pursuing is a religion of glorious and powerful signs, then the cross of Christ - and, the crosses that we might bear in this life - are to be avoided, or escaped from, at all costs.
Those who want signs don’t want just any signs. They want signs of strength, not signs of weakness. They want signs of life, not signs of death.
They want a religion that works for them in this world, and that makes things better for them in this world, not a religion that makes things worse.
A religion that demands signs, is also a religion that is imbued with the expectation that God will provide practical and observable earthly benefits to those who believe in him. According to the assumptions of this kind of religion, God will prove himself through miracles, or special interventions, that give special advantages to believers.
The cross, though, is a stumbling block to all of this. If you think you’re on a pathway to success and prosperity with God, the reality of the cross will trip you up. The only genuine pathway to God is a pathway that goes through the cross, not around it.
And for us who follow Jesus by faith, there is likewise no way to bypass the crosses that are laid upon us in this world, because of our faith in Jesus. As he also said to his disciples:
“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.”
In contrast, the religious assumptions and expectations of “Greeks” - or of those who think like Greeks in regard to spiritual or religious matters - are quite a bit different from this. But they are just as far from the truth as it is in Christ.
According to the natural religiosity of the Greeks, as Paul characterizes it, there is no demand for signs. In fact, the philosophical and rationalistic “Greek” mind tends to be somewhat skeptical regarding the possibility of miracles.
They are not looking for signs. They are seeking after wisdom. Remember what happened when Paul presented the message of Christ’s resurrection to the Athenians, at the Areopagus. We read in the Book of Acts that
“When they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. But others said, ‘We will hear you again about this.’”
People today who pursue a pathway of “new age” spirituality do not care all that much about the Christian story of the resurrection of Jesus. What would be the point of a literal bodily resurrection?
The soul moves on after death to ever higher spiritual levels. It doesn’t need that body any more. If Jesus plays any role in their religious quest for supernatural wisdom, it would not be as a redeemer, but as a teacher.
But even there, Jesus’ teaching about the purpose and necessity of his death, and his sacramental teaching that his body and blood are given and shed for the forgiveness of sins, are conveniently ignored. Instead, they would shine a spotlight on New Testament texts like the Sermon on the Mount, which can be appropriated - in isolation from their broader context - as sources of spiritual wisdom: alongside the teachings of various gurus and enlightened masters.
Those who, in Greek-like fashion, seek after wisdom, don’t want a religion that works for them - in terms of earthly miracles and other material benefits - as much as they want a religion that works in them: enlightening their minds, satisfying their spiritual curiosities, elevating their consciousness, and giving them what they consider to be a comprehensive understanding of the meaning of everything.
Humanity’s fundamental problem, as they see it, is not alienation, but ignorance. The substitutionary death and resurrection of Jesus, and the forgiveness of sins offered by Jesus in his means of grace, are not solutions to this problem. Wisdom is the solution.
But any purported wisdom that ignores God - in his real acts and words, and in his self-disclosure in the person and work of his Son - is not wisdom. It is blind foolishness, masquerading as wisdom.
True wisdom is not based on the mere idea of God, on which the human imagination can then build whatever it chooses. True wisdom is based on the objective revelation of God in human history.
And true Christian wisdom takes shape in our lives, and in our relationships with others, in such a way as to reflect the governing themes of the gospel: love, reconciliation, and forgiveness.
The Christian faith as God reveals it in Christ, through his apostles, does not disdain the genuine divine sign of the resurrection. In fact, it is built on that sign.
The personal transformations in character and temperament that can often be seen in people who have turned away from a life of brazen sin, and who have embraced the Savior who embraces them in his regenerating grace, are often very noticeable. These transformations are a kind of “sign” of the reality of God in the lives of his saints.
But Christian faith does not demand signs like this. By faith we rest in the love and grace of God in Christ, and as forgiven sinners we rejoice in the justification of God in Christ, sometimes even in the midst of great weakness and struggle; and sometimes even in the midst of great suffering in this world.
The hardships that we do often endure do not challenge the legitimacy of our faith, but they confirm it. In St. John’s Gospel, Jesus spoke words of comfort for his disciples specifically for such circumstances:
“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.”
There is a unique kind of power in such weakness, though. It is the resilient power to withstand the onslaughts of the devil against our faith, even to the point of bodily death, “because of the grace of God that was given to us in Christ Jesus.”
It is the liberating power to love and pray for our enemies, even as they are persecuting us, “because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”
These are not the kinds of miraculous signs that the world notices, or respects. But these modest signs in the life of a humble Christian, such as they are, do point to the greater sign of the raising up of the “temple” of the body of Jesus. They point to the greater sign of Jonah: the resurrection of Jesus on the third day.
It is the resurrection of Jesus that brings the saving meaning of the crucifixion of Jesus into focus for us, and that makes all of this possible. It is Jesus’ victory for us over sin and death, that removes from us the fear of death; and that supernaturally gives us the courage to confess him as Lord, to the glory of God the Father, in any circumstance.
St. Paul accordingly writes to the Corinthians, and to us:
“We preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”
The Christian Scriptures in their totality do indeed convey a great wisdom to us. The Bible shows us a clear and accurate way of looking at and evaluating the world; of making some degree of sense out of the world; and - with God’s help - of navigating through the challenges and pitfalls of the world.
But what we know to be God’s true wisdom in this respect, is looked upon as foolishness by others - others who do not know God, or his wisdom.
It is foolish, they think - foolish and pointless - to seek to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength; and to love your neighbor as yourself. It is foolish, they think - foolish and misguided - to forgive your brother seventy times seven times.
It is foolish to be willing to lay down your life, rather than to deny Christ before men. It is foolish to live for others and not for yourself - and for the satisfying of your own greedy and lustful desires - and to want to serve God by serving others.
It is foolish to pay special attention to the weak and the sick, the poor and the needy; and to expend time and resources for the benefit of those who can do nothing to repay you for your kindness.
But we are not troubled by the world’s disapproval. God’s approval is of much more value to us.
Jews request signs and Greeks seek after wisdom. In Christ, we request and seek after neither. But in Christ we receive both - at a higher and truer level - when we receive Christ.
In Christ we receive life - which is itself a “sign” of the resurrection of the one who gives us this life, by his Holy Spirit. In Christ we receive life - which raises us from the deadness of worldly wisdom; and which fills us with the wisdom of the creator of all life, and with the love of the redeemer of all men.
In Christ we are saved from the guilt and power of sin. We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
And ultimately we will be saved from the consequences of sin - in our resurrection to eternal life on the last day. We will dwell forever in the place in his Father’s house, that our Lord has gone now to prepare for us.
There is no earthly sign that shows us what this is like. Jesus Christ shows us what this is like.
There is no earthly wisdom that enables us to look forward to this with confidence and hope. Jesus Christ enables us to look forward to this with confidence and hope.
And finally, St. Paul also writes:
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.’ Where is the wise? ... Where is the disputer of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.”
It pleased God, through the foolishness of what Paul and all the apostles preached, to save you. Amen.
2025 July 27 - Trinity 6 - Exodus 20:1-17
The text of the Ten Commandments that we heard read a few minutes ago, from the Book of Exodus, included the original and full wording of the Third Commandment as follows:
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.”
So, according to this commandment, the seventh day of the week - that is, Saturday - was to be kept by the nation of Israel as a day of rest. This was no doubt a very welcome regulation for people who until recently had been slaves in Egypt, where they very likely had no day of rest in any given week, but were compelled to labor every day.
Also, this commandment was not rooted in something unique to the experience of the Hebrews, as was the case with their annual Passover observance and their other special holidays. The Sabbath regulation seems to have been rooted in something of universal human significance: namely, in the pattern of God’s creation of the heavens and the earth - culminating in his creation of humanity - in six days, after which he rested on the seventh day.
So, every time the Hebrew people now rested, they would recall God’s work of creation, and his rest. And any other people or national group could conceivably derive the same benefit from observing the seventh day as a day of rest. They also are God’s creatures, and should be reminded of the reverence and accountability they owe to their God and creator.
Does this suggest that our practice - and the practice of the vast majority of Christendom - is wrong, and unbiblical? Should we be resting and worshiping on Saturday, rather than on Sunday?
We often speak of the Ten Commandments as embodying the moral law of God, which is binding on all people, as compared to the ceremonial law of the Old Testament, which was binding only on the people of Israel. Is the Third Commandment, as originally written by the finger of God on Mount Sinai, therefore binding on us, even if God’s directives given at other times and places - regarding circumcision, animal sacrifices, and kosher eating - are not?
Well, in comparison to the other commandments of the Decalogue - which require things like respect for God’s name and for the authority of parents, and which prohibit things like murder, adultery, and stealing - the commandment about Sabbath observance is a bit different.
Unlike the other commandments, it did include a ceremonial component: which made it similar to the requirement for, say, circumcision, in being of limited and temporary application, rather than being of universal and enduring application in its literal sense. This is not just my opinion, but it is the teaching of St. Paul.
He writes in his Epistle to the Colossians about the ways in which the saving work of Christ, and the Christian gospel in Word and sacrament, show us, and bring to us, a higher spiritual reality, which the ceremonial requirements of the Old Testament only symbolized. Paul writes:
“In [Christ] you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. ... So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.”
St. Paul also writes to the Galatians that
“When the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.”
This means two things. First, it means that Jesus, in the way he lived his life, perfectly fulfilled the requirements of the unchanging moral Law of God. He was a truly righteous man, whose righteousness now covers over our unrighteousness in the forgiveness that is bestowed upon us in the gospel.
And second, it means that Jesus, and his spiritual kingdom in the holy Christian church, are the reality of what the various rituals and ceremonies of the ancient Hebrews symbolized. Jesus, and his spiritual kingdom, are the fulfillment of what the Old Testament rituals and ceremonies were pointing to.
Throughout the centuries of Old Testament history, the Sabbath regulation was not only reminding people of God’s creation of the heavens and the earth in the past, but it was anticipating, and preparing the people for, the new creation that God would bring about for the human race in Christ: in his righteous, justifying life; and in his atoning, forgiving death.
What this means for us, is stated in St. Paul’s Second Epistle to the Corinthians:
“If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. ... God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them... For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”
And in a more specific way, the nation of Israel resting on the seventh day in the Old Testament era, always pointed forward to the resting of the Savior of Israel - and of the world - in his tomb, on the seventh day: after his work of redemption on the cross had been completed.
Jesus had not simply passed out, or gone into a coma. According to his humanity he was dead. In the tomb, and in the complete and full “rest” of his death, he had fully ceased from his work of achieving the forgiveness of humanity’s sins.
But then, when Jesus rose again on the first day of the week, he started working again. Now, however, he was not doing the work of achieving forgiveness, but he was doing the work of distributing forgiveness.
As the glorified Savior of the world, and as the immortal Lord of his church, Jesus continues this work without rest, and will continue it - through the means of grace - until this world comes to an end. Martin Luther explains this very well when he writes:
“We treat of the forgiveness of sins in two ways. First, how it is achieved and won. Second, how it is distributed and given to us. Christ has achieved it on the cross, it is true. But he has not distributed or given it on the cross. He has not won it in the supper or sacrament. There he has distributed and given it through the Word, as also in the gospel, where it is preached. He has won it once for all on the cross. But the distribution takes place continuously, before and after, from the beginning to the end of the world.”
Since the time of the apostles, the church has gathered on the first day of the week - the day of Jesus’ resurrection - in order to receive the forgiveness that the risen Lord distributes. The living Christ is working again, after his Sabbath rest in the tomb, and we want him to be working among us: as we gather to hear his holy gospel and to partake of his holy sacrament.
The strictly ceremonial dimension of the Third Commandment does not apply to us any more. That aspect of the commandment found fulfillment in the death, and rest, of Christ.
But there is a resting of the soul, through faith in Christ, that is an enduring reality for us. Jesus issues this invitation in St. Matthew’s Gospel:
“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
When we come to Jesus in faith - as Jesus comes to us in Word and sacrament, to create and draw that faith - then we do find rest for our souls.
The literal, physical requirements of the Third Commandment may not apply to us any more. But that doesn’t mean that the Third Commandment has nothing to say to us in the New Testament era. According to the Epistle to the Hebrews,
“There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered [God’s] rest has himself also ceased from his works, as God did from His.”
We know that we are saved from the guilt and power of sin by the grace and mercy of God, and not by our own works. Good works do serve our neighbor, and should be done for the benefit of our neighbor.
But as far as our standing before God, and our reconciliation with God, are concerned, we are not working, but are resting. We are continually resting in Christ, and in the gospel of his free and complete forgiveness, received by a penitent heart through faith alone.
The way in which we experience this spiritual rest, then, is by applying the Third Commandment in the way that the Small Catechism tells us to apply it.
What is the Third Commandment? You shall keep the day of rest holy. What does this mean? We should fear and love God, so that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but regard it as sacred and gladly hear and learn it.
The Augsburg Confession adds this thought:
“Scripture itself has abolished the Sabbath Day. It teaches that since the Gospel has been revealed, all the ceremonies of Moses can be omitted. Yet, because it was necessary to appoint a certain day for the people to know when they ought to come together, ...the Church designated the Lord’s Day for this purpose.”
And the Large Catechism adds this thought:
“In the Old Testament, God set apart the seventh day and appointed it for rest. ... This commandment was given only to the Jewish people for this outward obedience... This commandment...in its literal sense, does not apply to us Christians. It is entirely an outward matter, like other ordinances of the Old Testament. ... The ordinances...have been made matters of freedom through Christ.”
But as the Large Catechism goes on to explain, we do nevertheless observe the Lord’s Day, and other festivals, as special days of rest and worship. It says that
“We...keep holy days...for bodily causes and necessities, which nature teaches and requires. We keep them for the common people, ...who have been attending to their work and trade the whole week. ...and most especially, on this day of rest...we have the freedom and time to attend divine service. We come together to hear and use God’s Word, and then to praise God, to sing and to pray.”
“However, this keeping of the Sabbath...is not restricted to a certain time, as with the Jewish people. ... Instead, this should be done daily. However, since the masses of people cannot attend every day, there must be at least one day in the week set apart. From ancient times Sunday has been appointed for this purpose. So we also should continue to do the same, in order that everything may be done in an orderly way.”
The ancient Hebrews found rest for their bodies on the Saturday Sabbath, every week. You find rest for your souls in the Sunday Divine Service, every week.
Unless you can justify your absence in your conscience - before God and under his scrutiny - you should be here each Sunday: not because I say so, but because God says so. In the Epistle to the Hebrews we are all given this exhortation:
“Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some.”
We are drawn together as a caring community of faith, by the Holy Spirit, not for the sake of the day as such, but for the sake of the Word of God; and for the sake of our mutual, continuing need for the Word of God, in sermon, supper, song, and supplication.
When you are not able to be in the Lord’s house, here or elsewhere - perhaps because of bodily weakness or the requirements of your earthly vocation - modern technology allows you to receive some spiritual benefit in your home, through watching the video recordings of our services that are made available to you online each Sunday afternoon.
God’s Word should be in your home, not only as you occasionally watch a YouTube video of the service, but also in daily reading and reflection: of and on the Scriptures themselves; and of and on spiritual materials that unfold and apply the Scriptures to your life of faith. And God’s Word should be in your home, in daily prayers and devotional exercises that are inspired and guided by the Scriptures.
The world, the flesh, and the devil are the unholy trinity of enemies of the Christian.
The corrupted culture of hedonism that surrounds you does not want you to obey the Third Commandment in its New Testament application. You have more important things to do on Sunday morning, for your comfort and pleasure.
The old sinful nature that still clings to you does not want you to obey this commandment. Don’t waste your time listening to that preacher. Follow your own heart.
And the old evil foe, who wants to steal your soul back from God, certainly does not want you to obey it. Did God really say not to forsake the assembling of yourselves together? Or is that just someone’s opinion?
But Jesus says this to you:
“If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
His earliest disciples in Jerusalem, after the Day of Pentecost, set this example for you:
“They continued to hold firmly to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of the bread, and to the prayers.”
And the new godly nature that the Holy Spirit has planted within you, and that the Word and sacrament of Christ sustain within you, sings out with joy, in the words of Psalm 26:
“I will go around Your altar, Lord, that I may proclaim with the voice of thanksgiving, and declare all Your wonders. Lord, I love the dwelling of Your house, and the place where Your glory remains.”
Safely through another week God hath brought us on our way;
Let us now a blessing seek, waiting in His courts today:
Day, of all the week, the best; emblem of eternal rest!May Thy Gospel’s joyful sound conquer sinners, comfort saints;
May the fruits of grace abound, bring relief for all complaints.
Thus may all our Sabbaths prove, till we join the Church above. Amen.