"The Seventh Commandment: Protecting Private Property" Jeremiah 23

Series: The Ten Commandments

August 07, 2022
Rev. Nathan J. Rusert

False prophets lead us away from Jesus to trust in our own works and mammon. The 8th Sunday After Trinity 7-August-2022 Sermon Text: Jeremiah 23:16-20 Sermon Theme: The Seventh Commandment: Protecting Private Property Preached at Emmanuel Lutheran Church, Tell City, Indiana by Rev. Nathan J. Rusert

Episode Notes

The 8th Sunday After Trinity                                       7-August-2022
Sermon Text: Jeremiah 23:16-20
Sermon Theme: The Seventh Commandment: Protecting Private Property

I.N.R.I. False prophets. Lying prophets.“Mat 7:15-16 “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. (16) You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?” Our Lord Christ Jesus draws the sermon on the mount to an end with this warning. Six centuries earlier the Lord gave the same warning to God’s people through the prophet Jeremiah. Lying prophets who told the people their own dreams, the deceit of their hearts, instead of the living active Word of God. False prophets who lulled sinners to sleep assuring them that God wouldn’t judge them or their nation as long as the Temple stood in Jerusalem. False prophets who had turned God’s House into a den of thieves instead of a house of prayer for all repentant sinners from every nation.
    Satan still plagues Christ’s Church with false teachers who peddle cheap grace. Christianity without sorrow and repentance over our sin that turns us to cling only to our Crucified and Risen Savior. Dr. Martin Luther would call the false preachers peddlers of a “theology of glory.” In 1518 he wrote in the Heidelberg Disputation, “A theology of glory calls evil good and good evil. A theology of the cross calls the thing what it actually is. This is clear: He who does not know Christ does not know God hidden in suffering. Therefore he prefers ,works to suffering, glory to the cross, strength to weakness, wisdom to folly, and, in general, good to evil. These are the people whom the apostle calls “enemies of the cross of Christ” (Phil. 3:18), for they hate the cross and suffering and love works and the glory of works. Thus they call the good of the cross evil and the evil of a deed good. God can be found only in suffering and the cross, as has already been said Therefore the friends of the cross say that the cross is good and works are evil, for through the cross works are dethroned and the “oldAdam”, who is especially edified by works, is crucified. It is impossible for a person not to be puffed up by his “goodworks” unless he has first been deflated and destroyed by suffering and evil until he knows that he is worthless and that his works are not his but God’s. “
  False preachers boast before the Lord of all they have done for Him. Only to have their self-deception shattered by the Lord on the Last Day saying, “I never knew you. Depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness.” Living according to the flesh - trusting in their works and possessions brought only death and eternal separation from Christ in hell. They clung to the idol of their goodness and mammon which cannot save.
  Beware of false prophets. Especially of the false prophet of the old adam within your heart. Repent of idolizing money and goods as that which establishes your identity, gives your life security and meaning. Repent and return to trust in your Heavenly Father’s goodness alone. The Seventh Commandment: Protecting Private Property
    Who was the first false prophet speaking as Jeremiah warned, The “visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the LORD.”? Preaching “continually to those who despise the word of the LORD, ‘It shall be well with you’; and to everyone who stubbornly follows his own heart, they say, ‘No disaster shall come upon you.’”? Think about it. (LSB pg. 321 7th Cmdt.) What does it mean to steal? To take that which belongs to another. Who then is the first thief? (LSB pg. 321 7th Cmdt. W.D.T.M?) We are the fear and love God. Fear God’s wrath for all who break His Word. Love God for He first loved us - creating us and providing daily and richly all that we need to support this body and life. Who is the first false prophet and thief? He was not sent, but he ran to preach the visions of his mind saying “you will not surely die”? Satan masquerading as a serpent stole mankind away from the Creator by lying words. Adam and his wife became two thieves stealing from the Lord that which He had forbidden. Instead of trusting His love, goodness, and care for them in whose image they had been created. They stole the forbidden fruit and eating surrendered all their offspring and this creation to futility - to Satan’s lies, sin, and death. There they stood two thieves near the tree of life, running with Satan towards death and away from the Lord of Life.
      Fear and love God! . Have you ever listened to your money? On July 30th, 1956 the 84th Congress of the United States passed Public Law 84-851 and President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed it into law declaring “In God We Trust” as the national motto of the United States of America. This motto was first stamped on the two-cent coin in 1864 during the Civil War and soon was stamped on all U.S. currency. Do you live these words? Or is your trust in the paper in your wallet the ciphers on your bank statement, more than the God who created you, our nation and entrusted liberty to her citizens? Learn again the source of all things. (LSB pg. 322 1st Art. W.D.T.M? Para.1,2) Who gives and upholds your life? God, your loving Father. It is He alone who has entrusted to your stewardship of seventy to eighty years all that you need support your body and life. He is love and richly and daily He provides you with all you need for life in this world.
      Problem is the false prophet within our heart doesn’t believe it. Beware! He dresses up in sheep’s clothing while swimming in the cesspool of doubt and unbelief. Jesus warns, Mat 15:19 For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.” Listen only to the Good Shepherd’s Word. (LSB pg. 323 L.P. Intro, W.D.T.M?) Fear and love God. He has adopted you as His beloved sons in Christ Jesus. He gives you the Spirit of adoption breathing out Jesus’ Word, “Abba! Father!” Trust Him alone, not your money, not your scheming, not your stealing from others as your security now and throughout your pilgrimage through this valley of the shadow of death.
    What is the biggest trade union on earth? Dr. Luther wrote in the Large Catechism: “To sum up, this is the commonest craft and the largest guild on earth, and if we regard the world throughout all conditions of life, it is nothing else than a vast, wide stall, full of great thieves.”(LSB pg. 321 7th Cmdt. W.D.T.M?) All things that exist belong to our gracious Creator, our loving Heavenly Father. He planted a garden in Eden and entrusted that piece of ground to Adam and his wife’s stewardship to tend and keep it. Still today He makes some rich and some poor out of His fatherly divine goodness and mercy. Trusting in Him and fixing our eyes upon Jesus we are not to long for what He has given to our neighbor.
    The Scriptures are a rap sheet of many thieves. From Satan, our first parents, to Jacob stealing the birthright from Esau for a bowl of stew. Underpaying our neighbor for his goods is theft - though we boast of the bargain. To Jacob stealing the blessing of the firstborn by deceiving his Dad. Identity theft, fraud is stealing. To Uncle Laban stealing from Jacob by underpaying him for shepherding his flocks. Employers steal from their employees by underpaying them. Just as employees steal from their employers by being lazy on the job - not giving a full day’s labor for a full day’s pay. To Rachel stealing the household gods from her father Laban. To take another’s property, download, or upload someone else’s work without paying them is theft - even if you do it in the comfort of your easy chair on your phone. Doesn’t God fill all things? He knows our thievery. To Achan stealing from fallen Jericho - unable to enjoy what he stole burying it under his tent, until it buries him under a pile of stones. God is not mocked - a man reaps what he sows. The prophets preach against the rich robbing the poor. Then even among Jesus’ chosen twelve - Judas Iscariot is a thief - he feigns concern for the poor while he helps himself to the money bag. Swindling, mismanaging funds for personal gain is stealing. Judas finally will sell out his Savior for thirty pieces of silver - this treasure only leads to despair and suicide.
    In this commandment our God and Father erects a barrier between what is yours and what is mine. We are not to take or get what He has entrusted to another in any dishonest way, this also means that we are not to use the government to steal from another to give to me. Communism, socialism - is forced theft. Dr. Luther warns that we prosecute the small thieves, but laud the greatest “arm chair” thieves calling them slick businessmen. They steal from whole nations under the guise of international banking. The world captive to Satan’s lie is a den of thieves. Including me and you.
    What hope do dying thieves have? (LSB pg. 321 7th Cmdt. W.D.T.M?) Who is the richest Man ever to walk this earth? Solomon? Ford? Rockefeller? Vanderbilt? Fugger? Hughes? Gates? Musk? How about Jesus? 2Co 8:9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich.” The King of Creation, Who did not consider it robbery to be equal with God the Father, laid it all aside to rescue us from our thievery. He took on our form, became our Brother to steal us back from Satan, sin, death, and hell. For our sin. He was nailed to the tree of the cross surrounded by two dying thieves. They were getting what they deserved, but He had done nothing deserving of death. He shoulders our sin, our guilt, our shame, our punishment in His own innocent flesh. At first both dying thieves join in the crowd mocking this “Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews” as they suffer the agony of justice. One only wants to have Jesus take him down from the cross to return to his life of thievery. The other by hearing Christ praying the Father to forgive those crucifying Him, by the power of the Holy Spirit turns from earthly treasure - that moth and rust destroy and that he had stolen - to the only true and lasting treasure. He confesses his sin and accepts that he only deserves suffering, death, and eternal hell fire. Luk 23:42-43 Then he said to Jesus, "Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom." (43) And Jesus said to him, "Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise."
    Dear Christian - Jesus stole you from Satan, sin, death and hell in the waters of holy baptism. Cling no longer to your stuff as your security. Instead help your neighbor improve and protect his possessions and income. Eph 4:28 Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need.” Do not forget the Name of God splashed upon you in Holy Baptism and sealed with the sign of the holy cross. The Lord God has secured your eternity through the flesh and blood of Jesus. Now His Holy Spirit frees you to die to self and rise to serve your neighbor through your vocation and with the excess goods He entrusts to your passing stewardship. Amen.

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