Quasimodo Geniti, 2017

April 23, 2017
Rev. Thomas Christophre

Sermon Audio

Episode Notes

Sermon for Quasimodo Geniti (The Second Sunday of Easter), 2017

O sons and daughters of the King, Whom heavenly hosts in glory sing, Today the grave has lost its sting! Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia (LSB #470, vs 1)

How do you take the sting out of bee? Well, you have to kill it, rip out its stinger. I once grabbed a bee that was buzzing around Michaela when she was a wee tot. The bee stung me on the hand and then it fell dead. It hurt, but it was no longer a threat to my daughter – and I pulled the stinger out and walked away.

The sting of death is not the fact that we must die – we’re all going to follow our Lord Jesus Christ into the grave, unless He comes again in His glory, that shouldn’t surprise nor should it scare us – Jesus is there and where He is there is peace. The sting of death is that once it grabs you it has you forever. The sting of death is the sin that holds you in its icy grip. How do you take that sting out of death? Well, you have to kill it, and someone without sin must do the killing because that one cannot be hurt by death, sin cannot hold such a one in death’s eternal grip so such a one can just pull the stinger out and walk away alive while death itself lies dead at his feet. “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."

Friends in Christ, Jesus is the sinless one who has gone into death for you and for you has pulled the stinger out by forgiving your sin in the flood of His precious blood; death lies dead at His feet, all its victory is gone, it cannot hold you forever. Today, friends in Christ, the grave has lost its sting! Death cannot have the last word for those who are baptized into Christ because God has given you victory over death through Jesus Christ and that victory is found in this one certain and never-changing fact: “Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!” He was dead, and, behold Christian soul, He is alive again forevermore. He was dead for you, bearing your sin and guilt under the awful weight of God’s wrath, and, behold, Christian soul, He is alive for you, having ripped the stinger out of death He has given you the victory over death by His resurrection! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! That is the victory cry of the Church.

Two or three weeks ago I preached a sermon where I spoke of how boring many people find our Lutheran way of worship and why we worship differently than many other Christians. I got a lot of comments and questions from that sermon — more than usual, and a couple of folks took issue with the fact that I seemed to be saying our Lutheran way of worship is better than that of other denominations. In my defense, I remind you that I never said it was better, I said it was different — and different for a very important reason. The Lutheran understanding of worship can be summed up by one verse from 1 Corinthians: “We preach Christ crucified.” That’s all we preach and that’s all our worship centers around. I reminded you all that the only thing you should expect from your pastor as he preaches from this pulpit is Jesus — Jesus’ blood and righteousness covering your sin; Jesus’ resurrection ripping out the sting of death and giving you hope; Jesus poured over you in Holy Baptism and the Holy Absolution, which every week brings you right back to the font where God declares you not guilty in the Holy Name of the Triune God; Jesus stuck in your ears and put in your mind by the preaching of the Word; Jesus put in your mouth and filling every cell of your body in the Holy Sacrament of the Altar. It’s all about Jesus because without Jesus you simply cannot be saved.

So the Lutheran way of worship is different because we understand worship differently than other Christians. Lutherans believe, teach, and confess that the whole focus of worship is not about us; it’s not our feelings, our singing and praying, not about a really good band or a really good preacher with a highly motivating message, it’s not about our feeling spiritual or “on fire for the Lord.” The focus of worship is on Jesus alone, on God’s coming to us in Word and Sacrament to serve us, to give us Jesus, to forgive our sins in His name.

Forgiveness of sins is really what this is all about. Luther had a much better word for worship than “worship”: “Gottesdienst.” It means “God’s service,” and is the word from which we get the term “Divine Service” and describes exactly why we gather here around Word and Sacrament. What to the untrained and uncaring eye and ear may seem boring and lifeless and unfriendly and cold and who knows what other adjectives have been used to describe our Lutheran worship and theology, we hold the Holy Liturgy and the Holy Word and Sacraments precious and dear because they always bring us Jesus and in bringing us Jesus they bring us forgiveness of sins and rip out the sting of death and give us hope as we walk through this valley of dried up old bones. Only God has the power to give life back to dried up bones, and He does that by the preaching of Jesus Christ. You don’t need to feel especially spiritual, you need to do or say the right things, you need to put up your hands and cry and sing softly some praise song as you tell God how much He means to you, you don’t need any of that stuff. You need Jesus and God gives you Jesus in His Word rightly preached, in His Holy Sacraments rightly given. It not about you, it’s about Jesus for you.

Gottesdienst, the Divine Service: This is where God comes among you as the one who serves through the blood and righteousness of Jesus. It is where God gives you the victory over sin and death and the devil through Jesus Christ, the Son of God, given into death for your sins, raised again to life for your justification, and in whom and through whom you have now been cleansed of your sin and given new and eternal life by water and blood and Spirit. That’s what John says, isn’t it? For there are three that testify, water, blood, and Spirit; and these three agree. What is it that they agree about? Well, Jesus, that He is the Son of God, that the water and the blood that came from His pierced side alone are sufficient for our salvation. Water, blood, and Spirit, these do the testifying, it is their testimony that we receive as we gather here around the water of Holy Baptism, the Blood that is ours to drink from the altar, and the Spirit, which is the Word of God preached into our ears.

We gather here not to serve God, but because we know that here is where God serves us, here, and here alone, in Word and Sacrament, does God give us forgiveness of our sins, here, and here alone, in Word and Sacrament, which are Jesus for us, does God give us the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. You cannot find that anywhere else out there, you cannot find that in your emotions or your spirituality or you fire and zeal for the Lord, you cannot find that in your efforts to live by godly principles and model your life after Jesus. Forgiveness of sins and life and salvation are yours only through the water, the blood, and the Spirit, that is, the Word and Sacraments which are Jesus for you.

God raises the dead here, this is His service to you, this is the Gottesdienst. And in order to do that He sends out His called and ordained servants. A large congregation was gathered together one day, the name of their church was “The Valley of Dry Bones” Lutheran Church. And God looked out at all those who were dead and dried up in their sin and He had compassion and He called one to go out and preach to the dry bones, “Prophesy to these bones, and say to them . . .” He said to His servant Ezekiel, the one He had called to preach His Word to sinners. And Ezekiel preached the Word and the bones were covered with flesh and the breath of life entered them and they stood and on their feet alive again because God sent out His servant to preach Jesus into the ears of the dead, to pour Jesus over their heads, to put Jesus into their mouths and give them new life.

    And Jesus Himself called and ordained His disciples to go out and forgive sins and proclaim the peace of God. “As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you. . . If you forgive the sins of anyone they are forgiven, if you withhold forgiveness from anyone, it is withheld.”

Forgiveness of sins and life and salvation is what God wants you to have and is what He gives you in the Divine Service. You do not go to church to have fun, to hear good music, to listen to a good motivational speaker, to learn this week’s principles for a Christian life, to hop up and down and cry and laugh and feel like God is in your heart. It’s great if Jesus is in your heart, but that’s not where He saves you. You need Jesus hanging dead on the cross. You need Jesus cold and stiff in the grave. You need Jesus alive again victorious over death. You need Jesus for you, you need Him poured over you, preached into your ears, put into your mouth because you live in the middle of a valley of dried up bones. The burdens and afflictions and sorrows of life, the curse upon your various vocations, the sin that still dwells in your members, wear you down. With Israel we can all certainly sigh: “Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are clean cut off.” Have you ever felt like that? No amount of serving God is going to help with that. You need God to serve you. And so He does. He sends His latter day Ezekiels and Peters and Jameses and Johns to His people, His pastors, called and ordained to the task of breathing new life into His people by proclaiming Jesus to them, by calling them away from sin in the preaching of the Law and giving them rest from their labor; you do not need to try to work your way back into His good graces, He has already done all the work for you, he has caught the bee, He has taken the sting of death upon Himself and raised again to life He is your Victory and only in Christ crucified and raised again to you have hope: “Behold, I will open your graves, O my people. . . And you shall know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O My people. And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I shall place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am the LORD: I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the LORD.”

So our Lutheran Church believes, teaches, and confesses: So that we may obtain this faith, the ministry of teaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments was instituted. Though the Word and Sacraments, as through instruments, the Holy Spirit is given. He works faith, when and where it pleases God, in those who hear the good news that God justifies those who believe that they are received into grace for Christ’s sake. This happens not through our own merits, but for Christ’s sake.

Expect Jesus to come to you through the words and work of your pastor as Jesus serves you through the Word and Sacraments your pastor administers in His name. Expect from your pastor only Jesus for you in Word and Sacrament. Anything else is from the devil himself who wants that sting of death to still bind you in the pit of eternal despair. But Jesus has taken the sting for you, He is your Victory and your Salvation. May God grant us always faithful pastors to proclaim Christ crucified to this valley of dried up bones.

From Your own mouth comes forth a word; Your shepherd speaks, but You are heard; Through him Your hand now stretches out, Forgiving sin, removing doubt. In Jesus’ name. Amen.














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