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.
The story is told of a mid-twentieth-century New York Yankees’ series game in which a batter with two out and a full count did not swing on the seventh pitch. When the home‑plate umpire yelled “Strike 3!”, legendary manager “Casey” Stengel reportedly charged home plate and screamed in the umpire’s face. Loud enough both to drown out Stengel and for a nearby sports reporter to hear and write down, the umpire supposedly shouted, in the Brooklyn accent of the day, “I calls ’em as I sees ’em.” Even if that story is true, that umpire was not necessarily the first to make that statement, however, as there are published records from decades earlier of others using the umpire’s statement “I calls ’em as I sees ’em.” (StackExchange)
Regardless of its origin, the statement “I call them as I see them” was on my mind this past week as I studied the appointed Gospel Reading for today, the Fourth Sunday in Advent. In the Gospel Reading the Divinely‑inspired St. Luke explicitly mentions both “calling” and “naming” each four times, and he implicitly calls and names some ten other things and describes what things are perhaps another three times. The Gospel Reading’s historical nature may make less‑surprising the frequency of its “calling” and “naming” things as they are (K. L. Schmidt, TDNT 3:487), but, nevertheless, we benefit from directing our reflection on the Gospel Reading this morning to the theme “Calling things as they are”.
The umpire who calls balls and strikes as he sees them exhibits one approach to perception (StackExchange), which approach recognizes that the pitch could actually be something other than what he calls it, for example, the pitch could be a ball instead of a strike. In today’s Gospel Reading, something was other than what it was called. The angel Gabriel refers to Mary’s relative Elizabeth’s being six months pregnant but, in the original Greek, if not in many English translations (but see AAT and NEB), Gabriel also mentions her notably still being called “barren”, a mistaken characterization perhaps because Elizabeth kept herself hidden, apparently until Mary came to visit her soon after (Luke 1:24, 39‑40). Of course, even when something is called as it is, not only baseball fans but also other people do not necessarily understand and believe it. In today’s Gospel Reading, the angel Gabriel greets Mary by telling her to “rejoice” (NKJV), calling her “favored one”, and telling her that the Lord is with her, but Mary was greatly troubled at the saying and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. We might say Mary was thoroughly confused and was reasoning or debating within herself. The original Greek expression implies what has been called “an unusually doubtful attitude of mind” (Dana-Mantey, §164[3], p.174).
Mary’s being a “favored one”, or, as Gabriel put it later, her finding “favor” with God certainly can be confusing, as can our being “favored” or finding “favor”. We might understand and share Mary’s doubt! To be sure, there was nothing in Mary—and there is nothing in us—that warrants “favor”, or, we might say “grace”. Our sinful nature and all of our actual sins—including our doubting what God calls, names, or otherwise says about us—warrants nothing but death and damnation. But, in His love for us, God graciously turns to us who have nothing but sin and death and acts to save us. In some sense, anyone’s finding grace is the mystery that today’s Epistle Reading (Romans 16:25-27) said was kept secret for long ages but now has been disclosed, the mystery that through the prophetic writings—arguably Holy Scripture of both the Old and New Testaments—has been made known to all nations, the mystery, namely, the Gospel of the forgiveness of sins by grace through faith in Jesus Christ (see Zimmerli, TDNT 9:377, 378, 381; confer Preisker, TDNT 2:769).
A second umpire might say that he calls pitches not as he sees them but as they are (StackExchange). We might grant that an umpire and other fallen beings might correctly call things as they are some of the time, but we should also grant that God and His angels and His other faithful messengers, insofar as they are faithful, correctly call things as they are all of the time (confer K. L. Schmidt, TDNT 3:489). As Gabriel, and Isaiah before him (Isaiah 7:14), said would happen, the Virgin Mary conceived in her womb, bore a Son, and called His name. The Son was Mary’s human Son, and the Son also was God’s Divine Son. He was correctly called as Gabriel said He would be and as He is: “the Son of the Most High” and “the Son of God”. The Holy Child was sinless, but He took on the sins of the whole world, including your sins and my sins. Both Mary and Joseph were told to—and at His circumcision did—call His name “Jesus”, which means “the Lord is salvation”, for in Him God Himself was present and acting in order to save His people from their sins (Matthew 1:21; Luke 2:21; confer Roehrs-Franzmann, ad loc Luke 1:31, p.60). On the cross, Jesus died for us, in our place, the death that we deserved on account of our sins. When, enabled by God, we repent and believe in Him, then God forgives us our sins. For Jesus’s sake, God forgives our sin of doubting what God calls, names, or otherwise says about us. God forgives all our sin, whatever our sin might be. God forgives our sin, through His Means of Grace.
As St. Luke tells it in today’s Gospel Reading, arguably all three Divine Persons of the Blessed Trinity were involved in Jesus’s conception (confer of the Holy Spirit in Matthew 1:18, 20), though only the Son took on human flesh. And, all three Divine Persons were involved in Jesus’s Baptism by John (for example, Luke 3:21-22), as all three Divine Persons are involved our Baptisms by pastors today. At the Font, our parents may have called our names that God has written in His Book of Life (for example, Revelation 13:8), but, more importantly, the Triune God calls us by His Name as we are baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and our sins are thereby forgiven. Likewise, when we privately confess the sins that we know and feel in our hearts, our pastor individually absolves us, forgives us in the same Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. And, so first instructed, examined, and absolved, we are admitted to the Sacrament of the Altar. As the human and Divine natures are personally united in Jesus, so also there, in the Sacrament of the Altar, His Body and Blood are sacramentally united with bread and wine, in order for us to receive them and by receiving them to receive also forgiveness, life, and salvation. Nothing is impossible with God, not a virgin birth (confer Genesis 18:14), nor a real, physical presence!
A third umpire might say that pitches are nothing until he calls them something, such as a “ball” or a “strike” (StackExchange). That approach to perception might fit well with many people’s view of reality today, but that approach to perception can be taken to deny an objective reality and also sort of makes the umpire something of a god. The only true God truly does call and name things and have them be what He says. With the same all‑powerful Word that spoke nearly all of creation into being (for example, Genesis 1:3), God calls us forgiven, and we are forgiven. He calls us His children, and we are His children (1 John 3:1). Through His faithful messengers He says, I baptize you, I absolve you, This is My Body, This is My Blood, and we are baptized, absolved, and strengthened and preserved. He calls us holy, and we are holy. He says rejoice, and we rejoice, for the Lord is with us. There is no need to be troubled or to discern. The Father has shown us favor, grace, by forgiving our sins through faith in His Son, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit brings forth His fruit of joy and all of the other fruits of the Spirit and all good works according to our vocations (confer Conzelmann, TDNT 9:362-363, 367). Like the earlier prophecy spoken through Jacob to Judah (Genesis 49:10; confer Just, ad loc Luke 1:33, p.68), the prophecy spoken through Nathan to David in today’s Old Testament Reading (2 Samuel 7:1‑11, 16) is fulfilled, as Jesus rules over all for the benefit of His Church (Ephesians 1:22) and there is no end to His Kingdom. The Lord calls things as they are. Like Mary, we say, We are the servants of the Lord; let it be to us according to His Word.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +