Merry Christmas (Yes, still)

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been listening to Sirius-XM Holiday Pops, and each morning I’m greeted with the sweet sounds of the choirs of King’s College, Chanticleer, Boston Camerata, and other fine ensembles and choirs presenting sacred works  and hymns of the Christmas season from Händel, Bach, Tschesnokoff, and other great composers of the Church (as well as some classical secular music).

So you can imagine how striking it was to get into my car the morning that I write my newsletter, to the brassy refrain of a John Philip Sousa march, Stars and Stripes forever.  What happened to Christmas?  Christmas carols fill the radio waves for a month or more before Christmas, but on December 26—only the second day of Christmas—there’s complete radio silence.  No more silent nights, no more glorias in excelsis, no more joy to the world. 

What happened to Christmas?  The Church’s celebration of Christmas is from the evening of December 24 to January 6, but the world spends one-twelfth of the year trying to get you in the Christmas spirit only to dump that spirit the day after Christmas like so much crumpled wrapping paper and last week’s fruit cake.  It’s as if Jesus is born, and then He’s immediately irrelevant. 

What happened to Christmas?  The Christmas season gets longer each year.  Black Friday Christmas deals can now be had as early as Thursday morning (I’ll take that turkey to go, thank you).  Christmas trees illuminate the Halloween stock in many department stores.  But try to find a caroler on the day you return your Christmas sweater that’s too small, and you’ll find none.

 

What happened to Christmas?  Clark Griswold might have the answer for us.  The month before December 25 isn't the Christmas season, but the Christmas shopping season.  Why can you hear Christmas music in stores for a month or more before Christmas?  Because when you hear Christmas music, you’re reminded that you have to buy gifts for people and spend your money at their stores. 

The Gospel isn’t just another great deal of the season, but free grace of God lavished upon us richly in Christ.  One of the ways we keep that in perspective is through the Church’ year.  While the world is getting into the spirit of the season, we enter into the presence of God in Advent to remind ourselves that the birth of the Christ Child is a cause for repentance.  And when the world throws Christmas away like yesterday’s garbage, the Church keeps singing the newborn King’s praises for another two weeks. 

So, merry Christmas!  Still. 

JWE

Christmas Eve Sermon

Christmas Eve
Luke 2:14
24 December, 2012
Emmanuel Lutheran Church—Dwight, IL

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

One of the most enduring parts of the Christmas story is a short, eleven word hymn of praise that the angels’ sang to the shepherds the night Christ was born.  It’s the basis for more than a couple Christmas hymns of the season.  More importantly, it serves as one of the five great pillars of the Divine Service—one of the texts that Christians have sung since time immemorial.  For just as Christ came down from heaven to take on human flesh at His nativity, He comes down from heaven again in the Divine Service, in flesh, to the manger of your heart by way of the Holy Sacrament.

The hymn of the angels is the Gloria in Excelsis.

Glory in the highest for Godand upon earth peace,among men favor Luke 2:14

In this sweet verse, the entire mystery of the nativity of our Lord is summarized in three-part harmony.  Glory.  Peace.  Favor.  The birth of Christ is the counterpoint between heaven and earth, an interplay of the strains of divine and human in one infant Man.  The multitude of the heavenly host praise God with their song, but also

THE ANGELS’ HYMN PROCLAIMS CHRIST’S BIRTH FOR YOU

I.

A precise translation of the angels’ opening line is, Glory in the highest for God.  What do the heavenly host mean by glory?  It’s a word that’s often used as a pious exclamation by Christians—Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! goes one refrain—but it’s seldom used in its correct sense.

The word for glory is related for the word, “to know or understand.”  God’s glory is the way in which He makes Himself known.  In the Old Testament, it was the Glory of the Lord—the cavod YHWH—that showed when the Lord was leading the Israelites in the desert or when His presence was in the temple.  It’s what covered the mountain when Moses spoke with God.  God’s glory is when He makes Himself known—the visible manifestation of the presence of God.

Why would God need to make Himself known?  In the beginning man and God walked together in the garden.  God knew man and was known by him.  But man desired a different knowledge, a better knowledge he thought—the knowledge of good and evil.  Because Adam knew God, he knew only good, but with one rebellious bite he got his wish and knew evil.  And it was himself.

God had put a warning on the fruit of the tree of knowledge: In the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.  But as the fruit’s juice ran down Adam’s beard, death did not come.  Adam’s heart kept beating; his brain maintained activity.  But something had changed.  What God had called good, Adam had made bad.  There was now a conflict, a discord between God’s holy intention and Adam’s new reality.

God removed Adam from His presence, or rather removed His presence from Adam.  But it wasn’t because He was disgusted with him, that He wanted him out of His sight, but because He loved his creature.  As God would tell Moses generations later, You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live (Ex 33:20).  Adam’s death wasn’t a result of the fruit’s toxicity, but because he gave up his original righteousness.  And what is not righteous before God cannot live.  So God obscures Himself for the sake of man.  He hides Himself, removes Himself from sight—so that man would not die.

You are of the same stuff as Adam, born with the knowledge of good and evil.  You cannot see God as He is, because in your unrighteous state, you cannot stand before God and live.  God hides Himself from you, obscures Himself from your sight.  Yet, He reveals Himself—in places you don’t expect to find God.

The angels proclaimed glory on the first Christmas, and that glory was for God’s advantage.  He doesn’t make Himself known in great and terrifying displays of power, but in the weakness of a newborn baby boy.  God’s advantage on Christmas is that you would come to know Him not as a strict judge sitting high above the heavens, meting out punishments and curses, but in the flesh, as a humble servant.  His glory is that He is made known by the love that is in Christ, love that would exchange the wood of the manger for the wood of the cross.

II.

The angels’ lofty hymn of the highest heaven sweeps down to earth in its second movement to praise the result of Christ’s birth.  And upon earth peace.  The opposite of peace is war, discord, strife, division.  Without the Christ, that is precisely the situation of man.  By nature you are an enemy of God.  This is not something that is self-evident—we all fancy ourselves friends of God—but God reveals otherwise.

The passions of the flesh wage war against the soul and the things of God (1 Pt 2:11).  But God did something most unexpected and Himself took on human flesh, though without the mark of sin.  Divinity and humanity are united in the flesh of the Babe of Bethlehem.  God and man are reconciled.  Jesus Christ came to earth to put Himself on the front line of the battle, to bear the brutal assaults of the devil and of evil men.  And that was their undoing.

Christ’s resurrection is the signature on earth’s peace treaty.  It’s a peace that surpasses all understanding.  It’s a peace that proceeds from His precious wounds, carried along by the breath of the Holy Spirit.  It’s a peace of Holy Absolution.  Christ is the reconciliation of God and man, and all who are baptized into Him are rescued from the losing side of the heavenly battle.

III.

The final theme of the angels’ magnum opus zeros in on the crown of God’s creation:  among men favor.  Not the earth.  Men.  Humanity.  The Son of God did not take on the form of a goat, or a bull, or a dove, or rocks, or waves, or clouds in order to be the sacrifice or reconciliation for mankind.  He became a man.  The same flesh that houses your self.  The same blood that runs through your veins.

The Son of God is the Son of Man, and He lives, walks, breathes, and talks among men.  He shares your joy.  He shares your sorrow.  He shares your sickness.  He shares your temptations.  He is in every way like you, except He is without sin.  He lives a perfect life according to the Law.  He is the apple of His Father’s eye.

Despite having every claim to superiority, He sets it aside to become a servant.  Your servant.  To the point of death.  He is the One who stands to accept your condemnation, the One who takes your lashes on His back, the One who opens His palms to receive your nails.

Because He lived the perfect life, and suffered the punishment of all mankind, He alone has the Father’s favor, His good pleasure.  This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased (Mt 3:17).  Where Jesus is, there is the Father’s favor.  In the manger as a baby, in the temple as a boy, in the Jordan as a man, on the mountain teaching, on the cross bleeding, from the tomb breathing, at God’s right hand interceding.

Christmas isn’t a celebration of past events, remembering when Christ used to be among men.  He is still among men—though not as the babe of Bethlehem, nor as the teacher of Nazareth.  He is the risen, ascended Lord, who still comes to the Church today, cloaked in bread and wine, speaking through His Word.

Where Jesus is, there is the Father’s favor.  Jesus is here therefore the Father’s favor is here, among men and women in Dwight, IL.  He has come to bring peace, not as the world gives peace, but by Holy Absolution.  Your sins are forgiven.  Glory in the highest for God.
     
In + Jesus’ name.  Amen.


Rev. Jacob Ehrhard
VD+MA

Trinity 2 Sermon

I was just able to get more than 15 minutes of upload on Youtube, so here's the sermon from June 17.  It's on the parable of the Great Banquet.  Enjoy.

Thoughts on Higher Things conference

Last week I attended Higher Things' Coram Deo conference.  This was my third conference and the first at which I presented a sectional.  A week has gone by since the opening Divine Service in Bloomington (and another conference is underway in Atlanta).  I've had some time to reflect on the conference and I offer up these thoughts.

I have three goals in bringing youth to these conferences: 1) Exposure to traditional Lutheran liturgy in all its richness and fullness; 2) More thorough catechesis that builds on the foundation of my confirmation classes; 3) The chance to meet and mingle with other Lutheran youth.  I think all three goals were met and exceeded last week.

This year's schedule was the best yet.  It kept the day full and active, but I didn't feel rushed to make it to everything.  There was ample free time, and college campus facilities provide a variety of things to do.

Speaking of free time, I realized this trip that it's not so much how awesome the free time activities are.  The youth have a good time when they have friends to do it with.  Whether they're friends from our church or friends met at the conference, sitting on a bench laughing and talking is loads more entertainment than if they scheduled skydiving or some other thrilling event.

Worship was, as always, outstanding.  I knew when the first hymn we sang was O God, O Lord of Heaven and Earth that we were in for a treat the whole week. 

The youth were a little surprised at the higher ceremony (bowing, crossing, processions).  But they didn't really need to be taught how to do them.  They followed along with the rest of the youth.  There was no need to say, "Let us stand;" when it was time to stand, everyone stood. 

Finally, I also recognized that the behavior of these youth was noticeably better than at other youth events I've been to.  That's not to say that kids won't still do stupid things.  Kids are kids.  But overall, there was a greater sense of politeness, generosity, kindness.  My parents were there for the first time with their youth and they noticed it.  My colleague at Emmanuel came down to visit and someone at the store remarked to him how pleasant the youth seemed to her. 

I don't think that this is unrelated to the fact that there is worship 4 times a day.  The conference began and ended with the Lord's body and blood.  There was preaching at two services a day.  We sang Psalms.  Lots of them.  If we truly believe that sanctification is worked in us through the means of grace (AC IV, V, VI), then this should come as no surprise. 

A small-town problem?

When I grew up in the North County of St. Louis, I had a lot of civic pride (North County Proud!-where else can you see the things that you see in the circle?).  I loved Florissant--still do--but my community was not really defined by my geography.  I regularly spent time in Bellefontaine Neighbors, Ferguson, Hazelwood, Clayton, St. Louis City, etc., etc. 

My community was defined primarily by my church.  Part of the reason was because I attended parochial school at my church, but even in high school and beyond my activities were usually connected with the church or with people from the church.  My family was not the only one; in fact I know of at least a half-dozen families who were (and are) just like mine in spending a lot of time at church.

Now I live in a small town.  There are many great things about a small town--John Mellancamp can tell you all about them.  But when it comes to the church, there seems to be a bit of a difference.  I could be way wrong, but it occurred to me this morning as I was walking the streets of Dwight, that many people would consider their community primarily defined by the town, and by the church only secondarily.  First a resident of Dwight, second a member of Emmanuel.  Because I had a community defined by my church growing up, church was where I went to be with my friends, with my extended family, whether in worship or other things. 

I don't know if this is something that's more particular to a small town as opposed to a large city or suburb (the high school behind my house where I grew up had more students than my current town has residents).  Perhaps it's a problem we've created for ourselves at Emmanuel by failing to foster a community around the Word of God and the Sacrament.  I don't know. 

Sermon for Easter 7

Seventh Sunday of Easter

Ezekiel 36:22-28

5 June, 2011

Emmanuel Lutheran Church—Dwight, IL

In the name of the Father, and of the T Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

            Between our Lord’s ascension and the coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, we’re told that the disciples “with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers” (Acts 2:14).  As they followed Jesus’ command to wait for the promise of the Father and the baptism of the Holy Spirit, they spent their time in prayer and meditation upon God’s Word.

            When the Jews prayed, often their prayer was shaped by the Psalms—the prayer book and hymn book of the Bible.  In ten days time, it is reasonably certain that they prayed David’s great Psalm of repentance, Psalm 51, in which is found the words, “Create in me a clean heart, O God and renew a right spirit within me.  Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me.  Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit” (Ps 51:10-12).

            This Psalm shows that

The Gift of the Holy Spirit Is the Gift of a New Heart

I.

            Consistently, one of the top killers each year is heart disease.  Many of you have probably been warned about it already.  Bad diet, lack of exercise, unhealthy habits all cause your blood vessels to harden, your heart to work harder, your arteries to clog with cholesterol.  Your heart beats within your breast until it cannot take the strain any longer and it fails.  Scripture says that “the life of every creature is its blood” (Lv 17:14a), and when your heart stops pumping blood, your life will soon be lost.

            I recently read about another form of heart disease—this one more deadly than arthrosclerosis.  It’s more deadly because it’s harder to detect.  An angiogram will overlook it, and the symptoms are mostly unnoticeable until it’s too late.  It also affects those who lead an active and fit life just as often as it does those who are sedentary.  This particular form of heart disease is a congenital defect—if you have it, you’ve had it since birth. 

            Our Lord warns us against this heart disease in His prophecy through the mouth of Ezekiel.  “I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (v 26b). 

            What does the Lord God mean by a heart of stone?  Clearly it’s not that the tissue inside your chest is petrifying.  To have a heart of stone means two things: first, it is a heart that resists God’s Word; second it’s a heart that chases after idols. 

            When Pharaoh witnessed God’s miraculous signs in Egypt, again and again we’re told that he hardened his heart.  God spoke His Word to him through His prophet Moses, but he would not listen—he would not let the people go.  Even when it seemed as though he would relent, he again hardened his heart and resisted God’s good grace.

            The gracious words of our Lord deliver His good gifts to you—but a gift can always be rejected.  Hard hearts don’t like to receive from God, but would rather earn on their own merits. 

            The result of the hardening of hearts is the pursuit of idols.  God works graciously through His Word and His holy Sacraments, but for most people that is exceptionally offensive.  That God would descend from heaven to atone for their sin must necessarily mean that they can contribute nothing to their standing before God.  And so they reject God because they reject His Word.  But it is not possible to live without a god.  Something will inevitably fill the void. 

            The Large Catechism says that a god is anything on which you rely for all good.  The most common god is money.  Why do you think that we have nearly 600 members in this congregation, but less than a hundred worshipping here today?  Because God asks you to give Him money.  But God’s ten percent can be spent on so many other things on Sunday morning. 

            We often make the mistake of limiting idolatry to the Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, and atheists.  But notice to whom Ezekiel prophecies.  He’s not speaking to the nations about their idolatry, but to Israel—God’s chosen people.  They are the ones who have profaned God’s name; they are the ones who have worshipped the idols. 

            This prophecy still speaks to Israel today—not the nation, but the new Israel in the Church.  You also were born with spiritual heart disease that turns your heart rock-hard.  You bear God’s name by virtue of your baptism, but your sin profanes God’s name—you drag it in the mud with you whenever you disobey.  Your heart of stone seeks after idols to replace the true God even as you sit here and worship Him.

            Repent.  Know that your heart is hard and pray to God to give you a new one.

II.

            Ezekiel’s prophecy, though harsh, isn’t ultimately a prophecy of judgment, but a prophecy of grace.  Even though he speaks God’s Law in all its fury and wrath, he does not do so to condemn, but to save. 

            “I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (vv 24-26).

            This is the best news that can be given to someone with spiritual heart disease.  God does not offer to treat only the symptoms of this disease—to make you feel good about yourself, to hide your suffering under false emotionalism—but He promises a complete heart transplant.  He will remove your heart of stone and replace it with a heart of flesh. 

            How does this spiritual surgery work?  It begins with the sprinkling of water.  God washes you clean from all of your idolatry by combining His Word with water.  Even though you drag His name through the muck of your sin, His name remains vindicated through the obedience of His Son.  For you bear not only the name of the Father, but also of the Son, who came down into the muck with you, yet kept God’s name holy. 

            God keeps His name holy in you with the continual word of forgiveness that He speaks to you in the Holy Absolution.  He returns you to your baptism to wash you clean once again.  Once you have been cleaned of your idolatry, God goes to work on the root of the problem. 

            What makes heart disease so dangerous?  The heart is responsible for pumping blood throughout your body to deliver all sorts of nutrients to you members.  But the most important duty of the heart is to deliver oxygen.  The air that you breathe goes into your blood and is sent throughout your body by your heart.  When the heart stops, the oxygen stops.

            In Hebrew the word for air is also the word for spirit.  I don’t think that it’s a coincidence that God goes about replacing your heart in the way that He does.  “And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my just decrees” (v 27).

            God promises the Holy Spirit to cure your heart from the inside.  The spiritual surgery is done every time the Word is spoken, which is sharper than any two edged sword.  It cuts to the heart and removes the malignant disease that finds its way to your core. 

            Many of you know that a major surgery isn’t something that you get taken care of in a short visit to the doctor.  Surgery lasts hours and recovery takes a long time with follow-up visits.  The Lord’s surgery is a life-long procedure, and it will only really be finished on the day of resurrection when your old flesh, which will be laid to rest in the grave, will be raised to new life. 

            Jesus ascends to His Father, but not without first promising to send the Holy Spirit.  He is a precious gift; He is the gift of a new heart.

In T Jesus’ name.  Amen.

JWE

VDTMA

 

Ehrhard-Legoute Wedding

Legoute-Ehrhard Wedding
Ephesians 5:22-33
28 May, 2011
Blessed Savior Lutheran Church—Florissant, MO

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

3.

Three times in Holy Scripture it is said, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh” (Gen 2:24; Mt 19:5 & Mk 10:7-8; Eph 5:31). Whenever Scripture speaks once, Luther says, “there the Holy Ghost, faith, and other gifts of the Spirit must necessarily be.” Where Scripture speaks three times, we ought to give double attention to what it is that our Lord intends to sanctify by His Word.

The Father first speaks these words at creation, when no suitable helper can be found for Adam. So from his side, God creates woman—bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. She is man’s complement, filling in the spaces where he cannot help himself. God sanctifies marriage with these words; a holy estate instituted in the holiness of Eden. And it is by this holy estate and the union of man and woman that God continues His creative work, the unique aspects of two individuals becoming one flesh in their children. “Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward” (Ps 127:3).

The Son of God repeats the Father’s words in order to defend marriage against sinful abuses. The Pharisees came to Jesus looking for some justification for getting divorced from their wives—after all, even Moses allowed it. But Jesus says to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so” (Mt 19:8).

Rachel and Lionel, unlike the first marriage where God joined together a righteous man and woman, today God is joining together two people with hard hearts. That’s the reality of sin. Not all days will be like your wedding day. Your heats will harden in sin against each other. You’ll bicker, you’ll fight, you’ll think that it was foolish to get married in the first place.

But the problem will not lie with your marriage—God has joined you together, let not man separate you—but the problem will lie in your own heart. Therefore, the solution will always and only be to have a change of heart. Jesus calls that repentance.

The third time the institution of marriage is invoked is by the apostle Paul in his letter to the Ephesians. But the words you heard read in the epistle were not St. Paul’s own opinions or advice about marriage—they were the preaching of the Holy Spirit. Here the Third Person of the Holy Trinity not only instructs Christians how to treat marriage, but also reveals to us why marriage is so important that God would repeat it three times in Holy Scripture.

2.

St. Paul writes, “’Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ This mystery in profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church” (v 32). Today, your union in one flesh as man and wife is pleasing to God because it is a picture of Christ’s union with us in the flesh.

We confess a God who is incarnate—enfleshed—by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary. The same Son of God who defended marriage against the abuses of the Pharisees is Himself the product of the fleshly union of God and man. The unique aspects of God and the unique aspects of man come together in the person of Jesus.

Earlier in his epistle to the Ephesians, St. Paul writes that it was the eternal intention of God that He would wed Himself to His creation through the incarnation of Jesus—and He did so with the precise purpose to redeem us. “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish”

Rachel and Lionel, Christ has wed Himself to you—hard hearts and all—in order to sanctify you with water and the Word of God, and to redeem you and all the sins within your marriage. Rachel, you are redeemed to gladly submit to Lionel in your marriage, just as you and he together gladly submit to the Lord. Lionel, you are redeemed in your marriage to give yourself up for Rachel in love and to treat her as you would your own body.

1.

Three times in Holy Scripture it is said, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” I can only think of one other phrase in Scripture that is repeated as often: “Take, eat; this is My body…Drink of it, all of you; this cup is the new testament in My blood” (Mt 26:26-28; Mk 14:22-24; Lk 22:19-20; 1 Cor 11:23-25).

In the same way that you will give each other rings in a few moments “as a pledge and token of wedded love and faithfulness,” so also has Christ given you a pledge and token of His love and faithfulness in the Holy Sacrament of His body and blood. When you go to the Sacrament, be reminded that your God is a God of flesh, who redeemed your flesh, and He is pleased with your union in one flesh.

St. Paul writes that marriage is a mystery.

THE GREAT MYSTERY OF YOUR MARRIAGE IS THAT IT REVEALS THE NATURE OF GOD’S LOVE AND FAITHFULNESS

In + Jesus’ name. Amen.

JWE

VD+MA