Listen to the sermon with the player below, or, download the audio.
+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
If you and I are members of a typical family or ever have been students or employed in any way, we no doubt know what it is to have things commanded of us or what our duty is. I remember one of my previous job descriptions, where the last obligation listed was to “perform other duties as assigned”—itself in a sense infinite obligation! In today’s Gospel Reading, our Lord Jesus Christ in part draws on even our somewhat‑removed familiarity with masters and servants, as He warns us against causing others to sin, commands us to forgive others, speaks of the power of faith, and at least indirectly shows how He goes well beyond what we as masters and servants might do, ultimately inviting and enabling us to “Come at once and recline at table”. This morning we consider today’s Gospel Reading under the theme “Invited to Come and Recline”.
Today’s Gospel Reading again picks up where our more‑or‑less continuous reading of St. Luke’s Divinely‑inspired account last week left off. You may recall that for several weeks we have been hearing Jesus tell parables both to the leaders of the Jews and to His own disciples—parables about such things as rejoicing over finding things that were lost and about the right and wrong uses of money. As Jesus continues in this week’s Gospel Reading, not merely a collection of four sayings but four connected sayings, we can think of how our use of money certainly both presents us with a temptation to sin and presents others with a cause for them to sin, as can our not forgiving others cause others to sin. Our forgiving others as God commands certainly requires us to have faith, but even when we have such faith and forgive others, we are not worthy of any special thanks, for we have only done what was our duty.
So, in only the immediate context of today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus commands us to pay attention to ourselves so that we do not cause anyone else to sin, and Jesus commands us to rebuke those who sin against us and, if they repent, to forgive them as often as they do. Just those two commands in today’s Gospel Reading might seem to be infinite obligations! But, we can think of still more of God’s commands outside of today’s Gospel Reading, including those commands God gives us indirectly, through our parents, teachers, and employers, and we realize the countless ways that we fail to do all that we are commanded. In today’s Gospel Reading Jesus arguably says that, even if, as fruits of the faith He gives us, we were to do all that we are commanded, even then we still would be servants unworthy of any rewards for the things we had done.
Of course, we do not come close to doing all that we are commanded, even as fruits of the repentance and faith that God gives us. We remain sinners by nature, sinners who, apart from repentance and faith, deserve both death now in time and torment for eternity in hell, far worse than having a millstone hung around our necks and being cast into the sea! Yet, God calls and enables us to turn in sorrow from our sin, to trust Him to forgive our sin, and to want to do better than to keep on sinning. When we so repent and believe, then God forgives all our sin. God forgives our causing others to sin, and God forgives our failing to rebuke and forgive those who sin against us. God forgives all our sin, whatever our sin might be. God forgives all our sin for the sake of His Son Jesus Christ. Jesus goes well beyond what we as masters and servants might do, ultimately inviting and enabling us sinners to “Come at once and recline at table”. Our master the God‑man Jesus Christ already served us by dying on the cross for our sins, and He continues to serve us today, preparing His Holy Supper for us, dressing Himself (as He did on the night when He was betrayed) in order to serve us, and then serving us with Himself and the benefits of the infinite forgiveness He won for us on the cross (Luke 12:37; John 13:4; Revelation 3:20).
Certainly God does not owe us anything. Today’s Epistle Reading, for example, makes clear that God saves us from our sins not by our own works but by His grace given to us for the sake of Jesus Christ, Who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel (2 Timothy 1:1-14). Likewise today’s Old Testament Reading makes clear that the righteous will live by faith (Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4)—a short verse from what we might think of as an otherwise obscure Old Testament prophet that is often quoted in the New Testament precisely because it so clearly shows us our salvation is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Whether God is working through the reading or preaching of the Gospel, the water and Word of Holy Baptism, the Word in the rite of individual Holy Absolution, or the Word with the bread and wine of the Sacrament of the Altar that gives us Jesus’s Body and Blood—no matter how God works our salvation, our salvation is His gracious gift to us, as is the ministry of Habakkuk, Paul, Timothy, and those who succeed them, including pastors in our time.
Today is LWML Sunday, and we appropriately recognize what the Lutheran Women’s Missionary League has done and still does to support the ministry of the Word and help others around the world for nearly 75 years, and we appropriately recognize what Pilgrim’s LWML Society has done and still does to support the ministry of the Word and help others here and elsewhere over this congregation’s more than 64 years. Of course, the ladies arguably have only done their duty, but we nevertheless thank them for their work; we encourage and support them in their work, and we join them in inviting others to “come and see”, both what LWML is about and, more importantly, what God has done, His awesome deeds towards the children of men (Psalm 66:5). Yet, as great as the work of the LWML is, we are also mindful of women’s and men’s greater responsibilities, in their vocations as parents and grandparents, to pass on the faith to their children and grandchildren, as Eunice and Lois passed on the faith to young Timothy.
God set apart Timothy for the ministry of the Word through Timothy’s ordination by at least St. Paul’s hands, and God so sets apart pastors still in our time, in order to invite us sinners to “Come at once and recline at table”. Here we receive the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation, not because we deserve them but because God gives them to us out of His mercy and grace. We are worthy and well‑prepared for this Holy Supper as we have faith in His Words, “Given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins” (Small Catechism VI:10). So blessed by receiving God’s forgiveness through Christ’s Body and Blood, we are blessings to others, such as by not causing them to sin and by rebuking and forgiving them as often as they sin against us. Those may seem like infinite obligations, but God calls and enables such actions on our part, and, when we fail, as we will, He forgives us as we daily repent and trust in Him.
As the apostles in the Gospel Reading prayed for increased faith, so have we already prayed in today’s Hymn of the Day (Lutheran Service Book 587). As we also prayed in that hymn for greater service of our Lord, until we come and recline at His feast for eternity, so we pray again now.
In faith, Lord, let me serve You;
Though persecution, grief, and pain / Should seek to overwhelm me, /
Let me a steadfast trust retain;
And then at my departure, / Lord, take me home to You, / Your riches to inherit, /
As all You said holds true.
In life and death, Lord, keep me / Until Your heav’n I gain, /
Where I by Your great mercy / The end of faith attain.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +