gospel

11
Sep
2022

Ask God to Remember Who He Is

We pray to the One who is faithful, even when we are faithless

A sermon for September 11, 2022  (Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost)

Scripture for consideration:  Exodus 32:7-14


There is a tension inside of parents. Parents want their children to be good, to behave well, to do well. You have a godly desire for them to live productive, well-directed lives. You are upset when your children do things wrong, when they run away from you, when they do the opposite of what you know is good for them. At the same time, the core of a parent’s character is unconditional love. A parent will be there always for them, will never abandon them. A parent will search and strive and keep reaching out if ever children wander off or lose their way, intent on holding them close again in love, embracing them with forgiveness.

God describes himself to us as a parent to us; he is our Father. There is something of that same tension within God’s heart and in his Word to us. God has a righteous desire for rightness, obedience, and well-ordered lives for us. The Ten Commandments serve as a summary of the Law of God, his plans and principles for us. But law alone is not the essence of who God is. Above all, God’s love for us and promises to us always will be paramount. God’s essential character will not let him turn away from unconditional love, commitment, and caring for persons he has called to be his own. Even when we are not “good children,” when we are like prodigal sons who run off and squander our inheritance from our Father in “dissolute living” (Luke 15:13), our Father is waiting and watching for us every day, filled with compassion. Hi is ready to run and put his arms around us and welcome us home the moment we come back to him (cf. Luke 15:20). 

Mount Sinai (via Wikimedia Commons)

Today (in consideration of this Sunday’s Old Testament reading), we ponder what happened when Moses prayed on behalf of God’s people, and we hear that God “changed his mind” in response. This happened when the people of Israel were gathered in the southern Sinai Peninsula, at the base of Mount Sinai. Just three months prior, the people had exited Egypt amid astonishing signs and wonders and miracles that God enacted to deliver them from slavery. But when Moses was up on the mountain receiving teaching from God for forty days, the people lost faith. They reverted to the sort of worship they had seen in idolatrous Egypt.  They crafted a symbol, something like the Egyptian bull god Apis, a sacred cow, an image of fertility and strength. The LORD God, who had delivered Israel from Egypt, was angry at their apostasy. He announced to Moses that he was ready to destroy them and start over, making a new nation out of Moses and his descendants.  Moses, whom “the Lord used to speak to … face to face, as one speaks to a friend” (Exodus 33:11), spoke back to God and said, “No, you don’t want to do that.”  Moses asked why God would turn his power against the Israelites when he had promised to carry them forward as his people. “Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants,” Moses said. “You swore to them by your own self, saying to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants.’” (Exodus 32:13). Moses reminded God of his own character, his own promises, his own ultimate goal of gospel and mercy. At that, we are told, “The Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people” (Exodus 32:14).  

This is amazing, isn’t it? Do you sense the conundrum in a statement like, “The Lord changed his mind”?  Haven’t we been taught that the heavenly Father “does not change like shifting shadows” (James 1:17 NIV)? And regarding the path of our lives, we confess that “all the days that were formed” for us were already written in God’s book “when none of them as yet existed” (Psalm 139:16). So, if God knows all things in advance, how can he have had one plan in mind and then changed plans?  How is it possible that God was intending to end his relationship with the people of Israel, and then, in response to Moses’ prayer, turned around and “did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened” (Exodus 32:14 NIV)?

Well, that is the wonderful mystery of prayer, isn’t it? It also reveals something of the wonderful mystery of God’s being and how he deals with us.  God already knows what is best for us before we ever utter a single prayer, and assures us that he has foreseen the whole plan of our lives (cf. Psalm 139). Yet he also urges us to pray and promises that he responds to our prayers. Pondering a deep mystery of God such as this makes us say, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it” (Psalm 139:6). It is true that God knows all things, and therefore knows in advance all that will transpire in our lives. On the other hand, it is also true that God hears and responds to our prayers, even changing the course of history in reply to the prayers of his people. We do not try to reconcile this logical paradox; rather, we acknowledge that God’s knowledge is far past our understanding.

It’s good that there are two differing perspectives in how God deals with us, because It’s not just Israel’s idolatry with the golden calf that deserved God’s punishment. Scripture says, “There will be anguish and distress for everyone who does evil” (Romans 2:9), and, ultimately, everyone is guilty of evildoing. “There is no one who is righteous, not even one” (Romans 3:10).  Yet the same God who handed down the law that holds the whole world morally accountable also is full of mercy for us sinners. This is indeed a happy contradiction! God’s gospel (good news) stands opposed to his law of judgment. If it were not so, we would all be condemned forever. But God makes this promise to us:

Let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts;
let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. …
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts  (Isaiah 55:7-9).

The higher wisdom of God goes above and beyond rules that say, “The person who sins shall die” (Ezekiel 18:2). God provides an answer to his own demands from the depths of his own mercy.

At a later time in the history of Israel, when the people were about to be carried away to Babylon for 70 years of exile, God instructed the people to pray for a return home. God’s knowledge of their future included the prayers they would offer to him.  “For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, I will let you find me, says the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile”  (Jeremiah 29:10-14).

Notice that God’s plans for us that look into the future include also plans that we will pray and he will respond to our prayers. That doesn’t mean that our prayers are all pre-scripted, as if God has programmed us like computers. Think bigger than that. No matter how many options or scenarios there may be, there is nothing of our lives that is outside of God’s awareness, including our prayers and all the different possibilities of our actions day by day. 

The Christian church father Augustine commented on our freedom to act (and to pray) fitting within God’s overall knowledge of all things: “Our wills themselves,” Augustine wrote, “are included in that order of causes which is certain to God, and is embraced by his foreknowledge. For human wills are also causes of human actions, and he who foreknew all the causes of things would certainly among those causes not have been ignorant of our wills” (quoted from City of God, Book V, chapter 9). That’s complicated, I know, but did you catch what Augustine was saying? God’s knowledge and will is so vast and all-encompassing that every possible change of direction by us, or every petition of prayer we might offer, is included. Our God is not small!

September 11 (via Wikimedia Commons)

As Christians, we are not fatalists. We do not believe that God has pre-chosen every detail of our existence in such a way that all we are doing is going through mindless motions. We are not God’s puppets; we are his people. In a prominent confession, Lutheran theologians rejected all notions of fatalism. “We reject and condemn as contrary to the standard of God’s Word the delirium of philosophers who . . . taught that everything that happens must so happen, and cannot happen otherwise, and that everything that man does, even in outward things, he does by compulsion, and that he is coerced to evil works and deeds [such as] robbery, murder, theft, and the like” (Formula of Concord, Epitome, Article II). If you take a fatalistic view, then you would have to blame God for the behavior of the Israelites in worshiping the golden calf, as if he made them do that. Or you would have to blame God for the actions of the terrorists that caused so much destruction on September 11th twenty-one years ago, as if God willed for them to do that. In a history classroom at a religious college, on more than one occasion, I had to correct students who wanted to say the Holocaust–the massacre of Jews and others hated by Hitler and the Nazi regime–must have been God’s will because God is in charge of everything. That sort of thinking is an atrocity in itself and an affront to God’s character. “God is love” (1 John 4:8). “God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one” (James 1:13).  When human beings do evil things, we do that of our own accord. Persons are tempted by their “own desire, being lured and enticed by it; then, when that desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin” (James 1:14-15).

Do not assign death and destruction and harm and calamity to the will and desire of God. Moses knew God cannot do evil. So, when God denounced how stiff-necked and unfaithful his people were, and said, “Let me alone, so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them” (Exodus 32:10), Moses said, “No, Lord, that’s not who you are.”  The goal of God is never our destruction but our salvation. He is patient with us, “not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). Think of someone like Paul, who had been such a self-righteous Pharisee, “a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence” (1 Timothy 1:13).  But God showed him mercy, redeeming him from his ignorance, outpouring on him an overflow of faith and love in Christ (1 Timothy 1:14). Think of how Jesus described God’s intent and purpose–like a shepherd who will keep seeking and not give up on even one lost sheep, like a woman cleaning every corner of the house in search of just one lost coin (cf. Luke 15:1-10).  Emmy Kegler, in her book, One Coin Found: How God’s Love Stretches to the Margins (2019), describes God’s loving purpose toward us well. She writes: “We too are lost and dusty coins. We have gone unnoticed, rusted from others’ indifference, misspent and misused, and our friends and leaders did not see our neglect. But God, in big and little ways, has picked up a woman’s broom and swept every corner of creation. God, in big and little ways, has tucked up her skirts and flattened herself on the floor, dug through dust bunnies and checked every dress pocket. God has found us, dustier and rustier and without any luster, and held us up to the light to say: No matter how you rolled away or what corner you were dropped in, you are mine.” 

We may wander. We may roll away. People near and dear to us may go astray, may lose faith and begin worshiping other things rather than staying true to God.  But God remains faithful to us and to them. Even “if we are faithless, he remains faithful—for he cannot deny himself” (2 Timothy 2:13). God invites us to pray to him (Psalm 50:15, Ephesians 6:18). He invites our prayers in response to whatever is going on in our lives and in the world around us. And he promises he will respond to our prayers. We pray with confidence that prayer indeed can change things, for God has promised: “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you” (Matthew 17:20).

We have a God whose character is anchored in a desire to rescue, to help, to save, to forgive. Our God invites us to be in conversation with him, to ask him to change his mind when we or others have sinned much “and indeed deserve only punishment.” Though “we are worthy of nothing for which we ask, no have we earned it … we ask that God would give us all things by grace”–and he does. Let us keep calling on God in prayer, asking him to remember his gospel promises. Like Moses prayed boldly even when his people were at their worst, we will keep on praying to our God “boldly and with complete confidence, just as loving children ask their loving father.”

(Quotations in final paragraph from the Small Catechism, cf. Lutheran Book of Worship, p. 1163, 1164).  

Scripture quotations, except where otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Posted by David Sellnow
05
Jun
2022

Teaching a Love for Souls

Pentecost Sunday, 2022

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Luke’s Pentecost narrative [Acts chapter 2] challenges the church today to find even more effective ways of communicating the gospel to peoples in every land on earth. … Just as the early Christians moved beyond the land of Israel and the Jewish people, so we must help all the peoples in our world hear and express the gospel in their own languages and according to their own cultural patterns. – Daniel J. Harrington, “The Challenge of Pentecost,” America (May 5, 2008)

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Many peoples, one God

The sign over the classroom door encouraged students’ eagerness: “Enter with an open mind.” Inside, though, an open-minded approach was not consistently encouraged. In this elementary classroom at a Christian school, religious lessons for the month were focused on the practices of other groups, organizations, and faiths (different from the affiliation of the parochial school).  The children would come home and tell their parents, “Do you know what this (or that) group believes? They’re so weird!” The lessons were teaching young denomination members to judge others. One of the assignments, mislabeled as an “evangelism exercise,” asked the children to compose a letter that they would send to Tom Cruise, trying to convince him of the dangers and evils of Scientology.

Certainly, God tells us to be wary of temptations and to steer clear of false teachings. Yet our call as evangelists (proclaimers of good news) is to be warm and winsome in our witness to others, to be models and messengers of the character of Christ. It is an unhappy consequence if education efforts lead us to become insular and narrow and focused on our own ways and practices. Our discipleship goal in the body of Christ is not to close minds and hearts or isolate ourselves from others in our communities. Rather, we seek to expand and enrich our own understanding and reach out to others with the truths we have come to know in Christ. 

The apostle Paul advised us, “From now on … regard no one from a human point of view” (2 Corinthians 5:16). We don’t calculate who might be more inclined to agree with us or who seems too different from us. We take a view that is open to the wide variety of persons in our world–all of whom are people for whom Jesus died and rose again. We don’t close ourselves off from the world around us or avoid those who seem “weird” to us. [Truthfully, we likely seem “weird” to them too.]  Our aim is to live in the world and impact the world by the testimony of lives in Jesus. We want to be seasoned by the Spirit to serve as the salt of the earth, to walk as children of the light to give off light to the world (cf. John 13:35-36). May we see ourselves (and teach our children to see themselves)  as ambassadors for Christ, imploring other’s on Christ’s behalf to be reconciled to God (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:20).  That will be our way of “praising God and having the goodwill of all the people” (Acts 2:47). 


A Pentecost prayer:

God of all the nations, we pray for your one, holy, catholic and apostolic church. Praise to you for the great diversity present in the peoples, languages, rituals and practices of all people who follow you in the name of Jesus Christ. Turn us from fear of difference toward celebration. We pray for all people globally. Through the Spirit, grant us the power to be your disciples in the world. In our worship and in our work in the world, guide us to be good neighbors to our neighbors near and far. Free us from prejudice, that we may see your face in people around the world, through Jesus Christ, our Savior, and share his peace with all. (Adapted from Celebrate Global Ministries, Pentecost Sunday, 2017)

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Scripture quotations, except where otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Posted by David Sellnow
16
May
2022

Love for all, good news for all

A message for the 5th Sunday of Easter

“Love for All, Good News for All”

Readings to consider:  Acts 11:1-18, John 13:31-35


All along, God had made his mission clear. While God had chosen the nation of Israel to carry his promise until the promised Messiah came, his promise always was for everyone.  All people were to be told his good news and welcomed into God’s family through faith, hope, and love.  God described, through the prophet Isaiah, that it was too small a thing for the Messiah to be just for tribes of Jacob, the people of Israel. Rather, the Savior would be given as “a light to the nations,” for God’s salvation to “reach to the end of the earth” (Isaiah 49:6).  God’s people in Christ never have been defined on the basis of the blood running through their veins, but rather on faith in the promises of Christ that lives in their hearts. 

The earliest group of New Testament believers—the church that had gathered around Jesus’ message in Judea and Galilee—was a Jewish church.  As they shared the message of Jesus–how he had fulfilled all the long-awaited promises—their natural tendency was to share the message with other Jews, people like themselves. But the Lord showed Peter, one of the key leaders of the early church, that they needed to expand their vision.  

Peter’s vision by Domenico Fetti (1619)

God gave Peter a profound experience in a vision, then brought Peter to the household of Cornelius, a Roman centurion, to see faith in action there. Peter said to Cornelius and those with him, “I truly understand that God shows no partiality,  but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. … All the prophets testify about [Christ] that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name” (Acts 10:34,35.43). Peter witnessed a strong outpouring of God’s Spirit on the members of that Gentile household. They were people so different from Peter and his colleagues culturally, but they were united by faith as one in the name of Jesus.

If those early Jewish Christians, so deeply rooted in their unique customs and traditions, could begin reaching outside of their cultural community to people very much unlike themselves … what does that say to churches like ours today? We are people who have had the gospel for a long time, who have been blessed richly in our faith community.  But have we been a bit slow, a bit reluctant, a bit hesitant, about speaking of salvation outside of our comfort zone, outside of the rather narrow circles in which our paths usually run?  

Think about the vision God gave Peter–a vision of all kinds of animals for food that would be unthinkable for a Jewish person observing a kosher diet. The vision was about much more than cultural diet laws, though. Peter came to understand God’s essential point–“What God has made clean, you must not call profane” (Acts 11:9)–meant that we should not call any person profane or unclean (cf. Acts 10:28).  Do we tend to think of some persons as unclean, unsuitable, unwelcome alongside us in God’s family?  Do we look at people whose ways are different from ours, or whose background is different from ours, or whose lifestyle is different from ours, and completely overlook them as souls with whom to share God’s love and hope and truth?

God wants us to reach out more boldly, more widely with his good news—not just to people like ourselves, but also to people dramatically different from us.  Otherwise we are putting limits on the love of Jesus. When Jesus said, “Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another” (John 13:34), he wasn’t telling us to love only those already inside our fellowship within the church. Jesus’ call to “have love for one another” (John 13:35) encompasses every other person around us, every fellow human being. Jesus emphasized, as one of the greatest commandments: “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39). And do you recall how a religious lawyer tried to wriggle away from that responsibility by saying, “And who is my neighbor” (Luke 10:29)?  Jesus responded with the parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-35), referring to a people group that Jewish lawyer detested and would have gone out of his way to avoid.  Jesus made quite clear that someone who shows mercy to his fellow human beings–every fellow human being–is the one fulfilling the law of love as a true “neighbor” (cf. Luke 10:37, Romans 13:8-10).

Allow me to share a couple of examples that illustrate how we can be too inclined to limit ourselves and our outreach with the gospel.

A number of years ago, I did a ministry internship in one of America’s largest cities.  The congregations of the metro area were planning expansion, looking at locations for planting additional churches.  I was assigned to do demographic research, to find out which portions of the urban sprawl were projected for population expansion.  This would give cues about where future church work might be warranted.  I didn’t really know the city yet; to me, the research was simply a matter of maps and statistics.  The area I suggested deserved immediate attention, because of swelling numbers of residents, turned out to be a section of slums.  Others on the planning committee looked at me incredulously.  “Put a church where?”  Their pattern had been to put churches in the suburbs, in affluent neighborhoods, so that the ministry efforts could be paid for by offerings from the people who came. The mission planners asked, “How could we afford to start a ministry where the people had no money to support it?” That seemed to go against the spirit of what sharing God’s grace and goodness is meant to look like.* Yes, as we bring others to the gospel, we will urge them to become supporters of gospel ministry themselves. But when the apostle Paul was doing outreach and starting new churches, he made a point not to accept money from people. As he put it, he and his missionary colleagues did not want to put any “an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ” (1 Corinthians 9:12).  A policy of doing outreach only where it seemed the efforts could be financially self-supporting was a form of structural discrimination, neglecting poorer populations who needed gospel love as much as anyone. Such a policy risks Jesus saying to us, “Just as you did not help the least of these who are members of my family, you did not help me” (cf. Matthew 25:40,45). Rather than viewing prospective audiences for the gospel from a worldly point of view, we are called to be “ambassadors for Christ” (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:16-20), reaching out to all persons, without making distinctions. 

Or another story.**  A church had just had summertime Vacation Bible School (VBS).  One young mother had brought her two boys to VBS.  She also babysat another boy who lived in the same apartment complex.  She had asked that boy’s mother if she could bring him to the VBS too, and so she did.

That little boy, who was 5 years old, enjoyed VBS so much that he went home and told his mother, “I want to go to school there all the time!”  [The church had a Lutheran elementary school, starting with kindergarten.]  So the boy’s mother asked about enrolling him for the fall.

The boy’s mother—we’ll call her Sally—was a working mom.  Her profession was the oldest one around, as they say.  She had made her living as a prostitute; had made enough, in fact, to buy the business from … well, we’ll call him the ‘previous owner.’   So now Sally was the proprietor or “madam” for a number of “working girls.”

The church had a policy that any parents who wished to enroll children in its school needed to enroll themselves in a Bible study course.  Sally agreed with that; she said she’d be glad to take the Bible course if they could work it around her schedule.  So, at the next meeting of the congregation’s board of education, the pastor and the ministry intern brought forward the recommendation for Sally’s son to be enrolled in the school … and told them what the woman did for a living.

The school board members panicked.  They erupted with questions:

  • “Pastor, do you really want us to enroll this child in our school?”
  • “Are you sure the mother actually will take the Bible classes?” 
  • “What effect will this child’s presence in our school have on the other children?”
  • “Won’t this cause worries for other parents?”
  • “How can we expect support at home with Bible homework or principles of Christian living when the mother’s life is so at odds with our church’s moral principles?”

The members of that church’s school board were faithful, believing Christians.  But their gut reaction was not from an attitude of new life in Christ.  The pastor reminded them of how Jesus’ own ministry reached out to prostitutes and other public sinners. Still, though, they struggled to get past their aversions.  Each of us typically has the same aversions.   Our thought process is something like, “Well, yes, I know prostitutes and drug addicts and alcoholics and ex-convicts all need to hear the gospel … but do they have to do it in our church?”

Eventually, the Christian love in the hearts of the members of that church committee rose to the occasion.  They talked about the spiritual welfare of the child and how it was unthinkable to turn him away from the gospel he so loved when he heard it at VBS.  They talked about a mother who, in spite of her personal history, was willing to listen to Bible teaching—and about trusting the dynamic power of the gospel’s teaching.  So Sally’s son was enrolled in school, and Sally was enrolled in a Bible information class.  Long story short, not only was Sally’s son nurtured in the good news of Jesus, but also Sally herself was brought to faith and made changes in her life. 

May our attitude as Christians be inspired by the goodness the Lord has shown to us. May we be big-hearted and open-armed and opportunistic when it comes to declaring the praises of him who has called us “out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).  May we not be content declaring God’s name only to persons with whom we feel a sort of safeness, people who look like us or act like us or come from the same sort of background as us.  May we be bold to extend our hands and express our beliefs also to those very different from ourselves—whether that means different racial or ethnic backgrounds, or different religious backgrounds, or different moral backgrounds.  Because, in the end, as human beings, we all came from the same background of needing God in our lives. We ought not think of ourselves as somehow better than others, somehow more deserving than others, somehow more inherently righteous than others. We all do well to say, in a paraphrase of St. Paul, “There, but for the grace of God, go I” (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:9-10). Or, to quote Paul directly from one of his epistles, “There is no distinction [between us], since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God [and] are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:22-24).

That is the message we seek to share, across every human barrier that exists. God’s love is for all. Christ’s good news is for all. We will share that love and good news with all. May God give us eagerness and energy to extend his grace and support the spread of his Word to everyone everywhere. 

Prayer:  “Lord speak to us, that we may speak in living echoes of your tone. As you have sought, so let us seek your straying children, lost and lone” (Evangelical Lutheran Worship 676:1).  Amen.

*This story was previously published in Faith Lives in Our Actions by David Sellnow, available on Amazon.com.

**A version of this story, expanded from the actual events, was included in the book, The Lord Cares for Me, by David Sellnow, available on Amazon.com.

Scripture quotations, except where otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

Posted by David Sellnow
30
Apr
2022

Springtime book promotion

Free ebooks May 1 thru May 12

I had a dozen days available to use for Amazon Kindle ebook giveaways.  So, I’ve scheduled ebooks to be available for free download starting May 1, according to the schedule shown below.  If you don’t have a Kindle tablet for ebooks, the Kindle Cloud Reader is available, or you can install the Kindle app on your computer.   You also can get the Kindle app for iOS and Android to use on your phone.

If you take advantage of one or more of the free book offers, I’d appreciate reviews posted on Amazon’s site. All reviews are welcome, whether you like the book you read or not. Even bad reviews are better than no reviews!

Here’s the schedule of free download dates for books:

If you happen to miss the free download dates for any books, they are also available for sale in both Kindle and paperback formats.

Happy springtime, and happy reading!

Posted by David Sellnow
22
Feb
2022

Why church?

I initially sketched out the thoughts of this post as a conversation starter for a church committee. I’ve reworked the thoughts for sharing here.  Feel free to join the conversation here via comments, or to share with others if you find the thoughts useful.

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Why church?

Our mutual need for spiritual encouragement

Attendance at church services was dropping year by year before COVID happened. Getting people back into church settings after pandemic lockdowns added further challenges. When anyone can access anything they want online, including spiritual videos and writings, who needs church?

We do need church … although not necessarily in the sense of buildings we meet in. Martin Luther reminded us that a building “should not be called a church except for the single reason that the group of people assembles there.” Those who gather give the house of worship the name “church” by virtue of their assembly (Large Catechism: Apostles Creed). We gather in order to connect with each other and with the Lord, to keep “encouraging one another” (Hebrews 10:25). The first Christians (in the first century) didn’t have church buildings to meet in. They gathered in each other’s homes. They met wherever they could meet, knowing that holding onto hope and living in love wasn’t easy (cf. Hebrews 10:23-24). Like those first century believers, we still need community with each other and communion with God. As another writer on this blog has attested: “The benefit of having a close community with your church is immeasurable–a family of believers who all look out for one another in love, support each other in faith, and build each other up” (The Electric Gospel, 6/13/2014).

Image credit: Liturgy.co.nz

As Christians, we want to share the life and fellowship that we have with others. We invite others to join us in church–to be included in our prayers, in our songs, in listening to words from God together with us. At the same time, we seek to extend Christ’s message outside the church walls too, in every form of outreach available to us. Technology has been a blessing, allowing us to connect with persons near and far through blogs, emails, videoconferencing and live streaming. Where the ancient church used letters (“epistles”), disseminated from congregation to congregation, we rely on the information technologies of our time to stay in touch.  If you’re reading this as someone outside the church, and you’re not yet comfortable stepping inside a church, by all means explore, browse, stream, investigate from where you are. Look for ministries that convey Christ’s love and welcome for all people. Listen for the warmth of Christ that says, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). I pray you will find a gospel-focused ministry in your area that could become a church home for you.

I’ve known plenty of people who have been uneasy about churches and ministries, as they had been deeply hurt by religious institutions and individuals. There are now institutes and studies examining religious trauma, which usually stems from struggles within an authoritarian religion or religious group, and then persons begin to “question the true extent of what they’ve been taught to believe” (Apricity Behavioral Health, 2020). There are podcasts, such as Cafeteria Christian, for listeners who want a connection to Jesus but have been disillusioned by the actions of many professed Christians. It’s understandable for non-churchgoers to be skeptical of the church. It’s imperative for those of us who are churchgoers to show our neighbors that they truly are welcome in our community.  The church is to be a place for mutual spiritual uplifting, a place where Jesus guides how we treat one another: “Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven” (Luke 6:37).   When someone is in need of encouragement and seeks spiritual guidance (whether by attendance at church or accessing ministries online), we want them to know they have a friend in Jesus–and in us.

Let people come together–inside the church and through the extended outreach of the church–in ways that provide mutual spiritual encouragement in the spirit of the Savior.

********

Just as I am, though tossed about
with many a conflict, many a doubt,
fightings and fears within, without,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, thy love unknown
has broken ev’ry barrier down;
now to be thine, yea, thine alone,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

– “Just As I Am,” Charlotte Elliott (1835)

Scripture quotations, except where otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Posted by David Sellnow
06
Feb
2022

Keep fishing

for the 5th Sunday after Epiphany
David Sellnow

Christ calls us to reach out to others, even when it seems an impossible task

If you are a church member, you recently became part of a minority in America. For the first time, the percentage of Americans who belong to a church or synagogue or mosque fell below 50%.  When Gallup did its first poll about church membership in 1937, 73% of Americans said they belonged to a church. That number remained consistently around 70% up to 1999. Since then, the numbers have dropped precipitously, down to 60% by 2010, down to 47% as of 2020. (1)  Meanwhile, the percentage of Americans who do not identify with any religion has grown from 8% in 2000 to 13% in 2010 to 21% by 2020.  In the United States overall, persons who attend church regularly represent 24% of the population, compared to 29% who never attend religious services at all. (2)

In broader terms, you’re not a minority yet, but your majority status is shrinking. Apart from church membership or attendance, how do people see themselves? Fifteen years ago, for every person in this country saying they were non-religious, there were five persons who professed to be Christians. Today, for each non-religious person, there are maybe two Christians as their neighbors in the community. (3)

Jacopo Bassano, The Miraculous Draught of Fishes, National Gallery of Art, via Wikimedia Commons

I hope such news doesn’t make you uncomfortable. I hope, rather, that it makes you feel like going fishing. I don’t mean giving up on your religious life and spending all your time at the lake. Quite the opposite—I mean that we devote ourselves to living the faith in the way Jesus called us to be “fishers” of men and women. We learn something about our calling from way Jesus called his first disciples–fishermen by trade–to come follow him (cf. Luke 5:1-11). After a long night out on the lake, catching nothing, Jesus told Simon Peter and his colleagues to go out again and let down their nets–in deep water and in broad daylight.  This was not how Galilean fishermen approached their work.  They used trammel nets near the surface. In deep water, the fish would typically not be within their reach. (4)  Also, until the introduction of transparent nylon nets in the 20th century, “trammel net fishing was done only at night. In the daytime, the fish could see the nets and avoid them.” (5)

So, when the fishing partners caught so many fish that their nets began to break (Luke 5:6), with loads of fish so heavy they barely could keep their boats afloat, this clearly was a miracle of Jesus’ doing. It also was an object lesson in what “fishing” is like for us in a spiritual sense. Fishing isn’t easy. It takes great patience and persistence. Sometimes you can fish and fish and fish and catch nothing. Sometimes the fish just aren’t biting, no matter what lure or bait or method you’re using. Bringing others into the family of Jesus is like that. You can do outreach effort after outreach effort, and nobody seems to respond. You try every traditional method you know to do ministry and evangelism, but people from the community aren’t interested. On that day at Lake Gennesaret, it took a miracle by Jesus to bring fish into the nets of Peter and the other fishermen. On any day that we seek to bring a person’s soul into the arms of our Savior, it takes a miracle of God’s Spirit to make that change happen.  After all, “no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:3).

Perhaps many decades of cultural dominance by Christianity in America have made us think ministry should be easy. Historically and globally, that has not been the usual situation for witnesses of the gospel. In the present day, the world watch list details the fifty countries around the world where being a Christian is the most difficult and dangerous. Relatively speaking, here in the United States, while things are changing for us, we still have a much easier path for faith and ministry.  Back in the first years of the Christian mission, times were enormously challenging. Persecution and opposition were common. For the most part, the apostles died as martyrs for the faith. (6) The early Christians had no church buildings or public presence. They met together in each other’s homes. They met wherever they could meet, sometimes in secret. They encouraged each other, but they were going against the flow of the society around them.

It was during those same years, though, that the Christian faith grew exponentially.  One prominent sociologist has estimated that during the 300 years following Jesus’ death and resurrection, the number of Christians increased by about 40% per decade–continuing at that rate decade after decade until the Christian church came to be dominant in the Mediterranean world. (7)  What enabled the early Christians to have such a steady, growing influence on the people around them, so that people wanted to know more about them and more and more people began to join with them?  

One thing those early Christians had was a powerful story that they shared, “a better story than their neighbors. … Christians told their neighbors a story about a big God who was deeply good and who loved human beings … who out of love for humanity, stepped down into humanity to lift human beings up to himself.” (8) That story transforms the way we live our lives. Let me share an example. Some years ago, there was a woman in my congregation in Texas, just a regular person, someone like you. At her workplace, there was another woman, a single mom, who was struggling to get through the day most days. The women frequently took breaks and lunchtime together and talked about life. One day, the younger woman said to her older friend, “How do you do it? You seem to have such a sense of calm about you. Somehow you always are pleasant, even when I keep dumping my problems on you because I’m so tired and stressed and frustrated. What’s your secret? Where do you get your strength?”  

Image via depositphotos.com

“Oh, dear,” her friend replied, “I don’t feel like I’m all that well put together. I have plenty of days when I’m frazzled and at my wits end. But the thing that gets me through is faith. I just keep hanging onto Jesus, because I know that when I am weak, he is strong. I go to church to get strengthened, because I need the comfort and forgiveness and encouragement I get there.”

The two hadn’t talked about faith before, but they began to talk about faith and the gospel quite a bit from that day on. That’s how relationships of faith begin. You have the same strength of faith at work in your hearts and lives, the power that God “put to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead” (Ephesians 1:19,20). Our lives have been resurrected with Christ–already now in the hope that we have, and knowing that through the resurrection that is to come, “we will be with the Lord forever” (1 Thessalonians 4:17,18). So we encourage one another with these words, and we can encourage our friends and neighbors too.

When the early church was constantly growing and influencing people, “people were drawn into Christianity because of an experience of the resurrected Jesus.” (9) The knowledge and confidence and joy of the resurrection radiated in people’s lives. Remember why it was that Christians chose Sunday as their day for gathering to commune together.  If anyone ever asks you, “Why do you go to church on Sundays?” you have a powerful answer.  Every Sunday is a reminder that Jesus came back from the dead, alive again.  That miraculous truth is the center of our hope as Christians. We “know Christ and the power of his resurrection” (Philippians 3:10). “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, he was buried, and he was raised on the third day” (1 Corinthians 15:3,4). That truth is of primary importance, for if  Christ did not rise from death, our faith would be futile and meaningless (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:17). “But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead. … God gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:20, 57).  So, as believers of that truth, we can be “steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord,” because we know that in the Lord our labor is not in vain (1 Corinthians 15:58). 

You may feel like laboring for the Lord is too much for you, like the call to be an evangelist is too hard a thing to do.  You’re in good company if you feel that way. Every faithful servant called to go and speak for God has had similar misgivings. Moses said, “O my Lord, I have never been eloquent  … I am slow of speech and slow of tongue” (Exodus 4:10).  When Isaiah was called, he said, “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips” (Isaiah 6:6). When Jesus filled Peter’s nets, preparing to send him as someone who would fish for people, Peter said, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” (Luke 5:8).  When Paul was called by Jesus, he was stunned and for three days didn’t eat or drink anything (Acts 9:9).  So if you don’t feel up to the task, that’s understandable. But remember what God showed Isaiah. His mercy had touched Isaiah’s lips. All Isaiah’s guilt was gone, all sins and shortcomings forgiven (Isaiah 6:7).  Paul felt that he was unfit to be called an apostle, because he previously had persecuted the church of God. “But by the grace of God I am what I am,” Paul said. He realized that God’s grace toward him was given to him for a reason (1 Corinthians 15:9,10).  God’s grace has been given to you for a reason too. Each of you has a story to tell. You have a message to share.

Maybe, though, you feel like your opportunities to reach out are limited. Around the region where I live, there are many rural churches facing declining numbers in both congregation and in community. When we think of our congregations in rural America, the weaknesses and challenges tend to be the only things we see.  But one ministry advisor has focused on a key strength of small congregations in small communities.  ““People in rural churches share common experiences,” he said. “That’s certainly a strength of these churches. [They understand that] people are more important than programs. …  Relationships are key. Everything in a small church, a rural church, revolves around relationships.” (10)  I might add that relationships are key for all Christian congregations, in urban and suburban settings too.

Perhaps in the past we’ve had the mindset about our churches that if we have a building, they will come. If we have church services, they will come. If we have programs and activities, they will come.  But that’s not generally true.  The mission of the church is not to figure out what strategies to use to get people to come. Rather, our mission is to see what opportunities exist for us to go into all the world and speak the good news to every person (Mark 16:15).  That doesn’t mean buttonholing everyone you meet and saying, “Are you saved? If you were to die tonight, where would you be?” Conversations don’t start that way. Relationships built on trust don’t start that way. The strength of your witness for Jesus is in how you relate to others, human person to human person–like the story I shared about the woman and her work friend in Texas. It’s about how you extend hope and healing and heartfelt caring to people in daily life. The first followers of Jesus “initiated the largest movement in the history of the world, and they did it without an invite card.” (11) They didn’t even have church buildings to invite people to. You can share the faith simply by a willingness to live in faith and talk about your faith.

So, keep fishing. Keep putting your nets out in the water in the community around you. Drop a line to someone you know who needs good news. Christ calls us to reach out to others, even when it seems an impossible task. Jesus also promises to work miracles of his Spirit as we do what he calls us to do, just as he demonstrated that he could bring all sorts of fish into the boats that day on the Sea of Galilee. Keep fishing, my friends … knowing that when Jesus told us to go and make disciples of all nations, in the very next breath he said, “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). He is with you, and you will be his witnesses (Acts 1:8). 

(1) Jeffrey Jones, “U.S. Church Membership Falls Below Majority for First Time,” Gallup, March 29, 2021.

(2) Church Attendance of Americans 2020,” Statista, January 15, 2021.

(3) Gregory A. Smith, “About Three-in-Ten U.S. Adults Are Now Religiously Unaffiliated,” Pew Research Center, December 14, 2021.

(4) Cf. “Fishers of Fish,” by Gary M. Burge, Christian History Institute.

(5) David Bivin, “Miracle on the Sea of Galilee,” En Gedi Resource Center, June 14, 2019.

(6)  Cf. Ken Curtis, PhD., “Whatever Happened to the Twelve Apostles,” Christianity.com, April 28, 2010.

(7) Cf. The Rise of Christianity: A Sociologist Reconsiders History, by Rodney Stark, PhD, Princeton University Press, 1996. Review available in the American Journal of Sociology, January 1997.

(8) Cabe Matthews, “Evangelism in the Early Church and Today,” Firebrand, October 21, 2021.

(9) Cabe Matthews, “Evangelism in the Early Church and Today,” Firebrand, October 21, 2021.

(10) Dennis Bickers, quoted in “Rural Churches Struggle as Resources Flow to Urban Churches,” by Brian Kaylor, Center for Congregational Health, HealthyChurch.org.

(11) Preston Ulmer, “Stop Inviting People to Church,” Relevant, August 5, 2021.

Scripture quotations, except where otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Posted by David Sellnow
22
Dec
2021

Christmas reveals God’s glory to us

Blessings to you at Christmastime, as we ponder the implications of the birth of Christ. In Christ, God’s glory and grace are revealed to us. 

The following message was delivered as a radio sermon on Lutheran Chapel Service, KNUJ radio, December 25, 2012, reprinted here for your Christmas week this year.


“The Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).

God’s Glory Shines with Grace

by David Sellnow

In the film Raiders of the Lost Ark, men of evil intent seek Israel’s ancient ark of the covenant, in order to harness its supernatural power as a weapon. Archaeologist/adventurer Indiana Jones strives to stop them. The climax of the movie has the bad guys overseeing a ritual to open the ark. When they do, it unleashes a glowing fireball that burns holes through people, causing faces to melt and heads to explode. Indiana Jones, there as a captive, tells his companion damsel in distress not to look at it, no matter what–it will kill you. And sure enough, everyone who looked at the insides of the ark was killed. Only Indiana and his lady friend survived.

Now, of course, that movie was a fabrication of fiction. Yet some small grains of truth underlie what Steven Spielberg brought to the screen in that make-believe story. God did strike dead some people who presumptuously looked into the ark of the covenant. It happened long ago at a place called Beth Shemesh, and prompted others to say, “Who is able to stand before the LORD, this holy God?” (1 Samuel 6:20)  God has shown himself by revealing his glory in fiery forms. He did, in fact, show his blazing glory from the ark of the covenant, when Solomon built his temple for the LORD in Israel. Once the ark was placed inside, “the house of the Lord was filled with a cloud, so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God” (2 Chronicles 5:13-14).   

But here is where there is a difference that Steven Spielberg (or any human being) in his wildest dreams would not have imagined. In that cloud and fire of his glory, God showed his love to people, not anger. The central feature of the ark of the covenant was not wrath; it was called “the mercy seat.” God caused no one’s face to melt or head to explode. Instead, at the dedication of the temple, God sent fire down from heaven to consume the burnt offering and the sacrifices, to show the people that their sins were forgiven and they were welcome in God’s presence, as their gifts were welcomed by him. “When all the people of Israel saw the fire come down and the glory of the Lord on the temple, they bowed down on the pavement with their faces to the ground, and worshiped and gave thanks to the Lord, saying, ‘For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever’” (2 Chronicles 7:3).

Unlike Raiders of the Lost Ark fiction, what you see in the Bible is true. When God lets his glory shine, it is primarily for the purpose of showing his saving love. God’s glory shines with his grace! 

That is what we see at God’s coming at Christmas.  The glory of God came to us, but came in the humble form of Jesus in the manger.  As John the apostle said, the Son of God came to us from the Father “full of grace and truth.”  As the writer to the Hebrews said, “The Son (Jesus) is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being” (Hebrews 1:3). Jesus is “God with us,” namely “Immanuel” in Hebrew (Isaiah 7:14, cf. also Matthew 1:23). God became incarnate in Jesus to be our Savior in grace.

Let’s do a survey of Scripture, seeing how in all the time preparing for Jesus’ coming, God manifested his glory to people invariably as a shining of his grace. 

God promised Abraham: “Do not be afraid … I am your shield; your reward shall be very great” (Genesis 15:1). As a way of evidencing his commitment to these promises, God involved himself in a covenant ceremony, at the center of which God’ own glory was seen as “a smoking fire pot and a blazing torch” (Genesis 15:17). God guaranteed to Abraham that his promises of blessing were all true.

God’s next manifestation of his glory appeared when the security and future of Abraham’s descendants were in jeopardy. They were facing enslavement and infanticide in Egypt. God came to Moses, appearing to him “in a flame of fire out of a bush” (Exodus 3:2), and said, “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt. … I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them … to a land flowing with milk and honey” (Exodus 3:7,8). 

In setting his people free from Egypt, God showed this same glory to all the Israelites. “The Lord went in front of them in a pillar of cloud by day, to lead them along the way, and in a pillar of fire by night, to give them light” (Exodus 13:21).  When Egypt’s armies pursued them, the angel of God and the pillar of cloud “moved from in front and stood behind them,” separating and protecting them from the enemy (Exodus 14:19,20).

As Israel went further on their way, in the desert and wondering how they’d eat to survive, “they looked toward the wilderness, and the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud (Exodus 16:10). That evening “quail came up and covered the camp,” and in the morning manna was given for bread (Exodus 16:13-15).

The “glory of the LORD” next appeared at Mount Sinai, where the Law was given. But there wasn’t just law. Even when the law was given, God’s glory was evidence of his grace. God made clear he was choosing and consecrating Israel as his own people, his “treasured possession” (Exodus 19:5) among all the earth. He reminded them how he had carried them on eagles’ wings and brought them to himself (Exodus 19:4). He showed them grace and glory before and after they sinned against him with the golden calf (cf. Exodus 24 and 32-34). Finally, when they set up their tabernacle tent to worship him, God filled the tabernacle with his glory as a sign of his grace (Exodus 40:34).

In every instance, God shined his glory to point the people to his wonderful love, to how he was working out his salvation for them. The same is true of other appearances of the glory of the LORD. With “a chariot of fire and horses of fire” God took Elijah up to heaven in a whirlwind–graciously giving him eternal life without first tasting death (2 Kings 2:11). Isaiah and Ezekiel saw the glory of the LORD when God called them by grace to serve as his prophets (Isaiah 6, Ezekiel 1). God even gave visual evidence of this grace to Isaiah by taking a token of divine glory, a live coal from the altar of heaven, touched to Isaiah’s lips by an angel with the message: “Now that this has touched your lips; your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out” (Isaiah 6:7). That is glory, and that is grace. Forgiveness is the gift of our glorious Savior. 

Above and beyond all the dazzling appearances of God’s presence throughout the Old Testament, the greatest shining of divine glory is in the coming of Jesus. John says, “We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14 KJV). That Jesus is the brightest shining of all God’s glory was made clear on the night he was born into our world. The glory of God lit up the skies. “In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them” (Luke 2:8,9). They were terrified, but the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people” (Luke 2:10). Good news–of God’s grace!

Wise men in the east saw that glory of God shining too. “We observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage,” they said (Matthew 2:2). They saw the one whom Scripture calls “beautiful and glorious” (Isaiah 4:2), having been led to him by a glowing of his glory in the heavens.

Later on, Peter, James, and John would see the glory of God in Jesus when “he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white” (Mark 9:2,3). “His face shone like the sun” (Matthew 17:2). Jesus let them see his glory to bolster their faith before they witnessed his humiliation and death. 

God showed his glory also to a man named Stephen, a martyr about to be viciously killed for his faith. Stephen “gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God” (Acts 7:55). Men might kill him, but God wanted Stephen in his dying hour to know that he could not be robbed of God’s glory, for God’s grace had shown it to him.

So also at the end of the Bible, to the last apostle, God showed his glory yet again. Christ revealed himself to John, and John wrote, “His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined as in a furnace … and his face was like the sun shining with full force. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he placed His right hand on me, saying, ‘Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last and the living one” (Revelation 1:14-18).  At a troubled time at the end of the apostolic age, when Christians were being persecuted and isolated, God gave this revelation of glory as a sign of his grace. The vision revealed that the Lord was still with his church, Christ is still ruling all things, and God’s grace is still as amazing as ever.

God’s grace. God’s glory. It’s not like the face-melting, body-burning laser light show of a Hollywood movie. Instead, it is like the warm glow of heaven for us, like a candle left burning in the window of our eternal home until we can come to be there. The glory of God burns brightly in our daily lives, for God, “who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ … shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). That is God’s glory shown to us, to each of our hearts. That is how he shows himself, through the glory of the One and Only who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. God’s glory shines with grace–grace that saves us, in Christ. Amen.

PRAYER:  God our Lord, Jesus Christ, when you came in the flesh to live among us, the glory of the Lord shone in the skies and angels heralded your birth.  But we know you came not to terrify us with blazing glory, but to redeem us with your glorious grace.  Keep our hearts close to you in faith always, shining your light in our lives.  Amen.


Scripture quotations, except where otherwise indicated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Posted by David Sellnow
01
Dec
2021

The Resurrection is our Hope

Last month, I shared a sermon by my father as the blog post of the month. My thoughts are very much focused on family also as this month draws to a close.  A member of our family has passed away, and we will be gathering for her funeral.  It seems appropriate to share another sermon from my father at this time.  As church year thoughts shifted from End Times (thinking of the end of life and end of this world) to the start of Advent (thinking of Christ’s return to take us home), this was a sermon preached by my father, November 20, 1960.


Christian Comfort in the Face of Death

by Donald C. Sellnow

But we don’t want you to be ignorant, brothers, concerning those who have fallen asleep, so that you don’t grieve like the rest, who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus.  For this we tell you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will in no way precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with God’s trumpet. The dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. So we will be with the Lord forever.  Therefore comfort one another with these words.

(1 Thessalonians 4:13-18)


In directing us to the comfort that is ours in the face of death, Christ’s apostle refers three times who have died as being asleep. The death of a Christian truly can be called a sleep, because the person is awaiting a glorious awakening. The awakening will take place in the resurrection of the body on the last day, an awakening to eternal life made certain for God’s people by the resurrection of Jesus from the grave. As Paul reminded us, “For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus” (v.14). 

The resurrection of Jesus is a fundamental belief of our Christian faith. It is so vital and all-important that the New Testament writers refer to it no less than 104 times. It is the very basis of our Christian comfort in the face of death. If Christ had not risen from the dead, our faith would be in vain and useless, and we would look forward to death with only fear and despair.

But our faith is not in vain, and we need not fear death. Our Savior did indeed rise again the third day, as we confess in the Apostles’ Creed, as attested to by scores of witnesses (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:3-8). God’s sure word assures us Christ’s resurrection is a fact, beyond any reasonable doubt.  Christ’s appearances after his resurrection are detailed in that Word, recounting how Jesus showed himself to his disciples again and again. He gave them many convincing proofs that he—whom they had seen dead and buried—was alive again. He walked and talked with them. He ate and drank with them. He let them touch his risen body and see the marks of the crucifixion in his flesh. His friends and followers were at first slow to believe it, or we might say, they were appropriately skeptical. But the Lord Jesus thoroughly and completely convinced them of the miracle of his resurrection—so much so that they were ready to die for their confession of Christ as the risen Savior.

The good news that Christ rose triumphant from the grave is a sure, biblical fact. It also is much more than that, for it is a fact filled with wonderful meaning for us. The fact that Christ rose from the dead assures us that his death on the cross was indeed a redemptive, meaningful act for us all. His sacrifice of himself on the cross has taken away the sins of the whole world and opened up the gates of heaven to all, so that whoever believes in him will not perish, but have everlasting life (John 3:16).

Christ’s resurrection assures us that all our sins are forgiven, and also assures us that we, too, will rise to eternal life. As the apostle Paul stated: “Even so God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus” (v.14). All who by the grace and power of the Holy Spirit hold fast in faith to the end, trusting in the crucified and risen Savior, shall be raised up with him in joy and glory. For we have our risen Savior’s sure promise:  “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die” (John 11:25,26).

Therefore, since we have this sure comfort based on the resurrection of our Lord, we need not grieve in a way that is without hope when our loved ones depart this life. They have fallen asleep in Jesus, but will be awakened to life forever with Jesus. Surely, it is appropriate to mourn over the departure of loved ones from this life. Jesus himself wept at the grave of his friend Lazarus, whom he had loved deeply (cf. John 11:28-37). But in our grief, we also have rays of hope shining through, as we remember our loved one died in Christ. Those who have rested in Christ’s arms during this life rest in his loving arms also in death, and await the glorious resurrection of their bodies to life eternal, which is to come.

Another comfort we have concerning the resurrection is that there will be no disadvantage to those who have already fallen asleep in Jesus when that day comes. There will be equal joy for all believers in Christ.  The Christians at Thessalonica, to whom Paul wrote his epistle, were eagerly awaiting the Lord’s return in glory. But as they awaited the Savior’s second coming, they began to wonder what would happen to those who already had died in Christ. Somehow they had gotten the idea that those still living at the time of Christ’s return would have a great advantage over those who had already died. They feared the dear departed would not be able to see and welcome the Savior when he appeared. In connection with this misconception, the apostle told them: “For this we tell you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will in no way precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with God’s trumpet. The dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. So we will be with the Lord forever” (v.15-17).

Here Paul gives us a fuller picture of the great resurrection on Judgment Day. On that day, our Savior will return in glory to judge the living and the dead. He will descend from heaven with a shout, with a mighty order and command that will penetrate every grave and echo through the whole creation. The voice of the archangel (greatest among the angels) will also be heard. He will sound forth the trumpet of God over all the earth. Then “the dead in Christ will rise first” (v.16). We know that on Judgment Day, all that are in the grave, believers and unbelievers alike, shall be raised up. But here St. Paul wants to comfort the Christians concerning a very specific point. He is content to center attention only on the rising of the believers. And what he wants to tell us is this: The very first thing that the Savior will do upon his return for judgment is to raise up his believers. Then, as they are resurrecting, those Christians who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Thus there will be no advantage or disadvantage either for the dead or the living Christians. Simultaneously, both will be caught up to meet and welcome their Lord, who has come to bring final deliverance from evil to his people. In the resurrection, Chtrist will also give his people a glorified body. We will be given bodies free from the consequences of sin, sickness and disease, immortal bodies that will be perfectly suited for life that lasts forever. As the same St. Paul assured us in another of his letters to the church: “Listen, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die,but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When this perishable body puts on imperishability, and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory’” (1 Corinthians 15:51-55). 

That brings us to the final part of our meditation about our comfort in the face of death. The comfort is endless, perpetual, enduring, for “we will be with the Lord forever” (v.17).  Our comfort as Christians is an eternal comfort. We will be in the presence of our gracious Savior in a life of bliss without end. The resurrection of the body will take us forward to a place where God himself will be with his people and “he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4). What a wonderful comfort this is for us when we are approaching our own death and as we think of our loved ones who have preceded us in death. For we shall meet them again in heaven, where we shall be together with them and with our Lord. In that heavenly home, there shall be fullness of happiness and joy forevermore.

“Therefore comfort one another with these words” (v.18). We indeed can comfort one another with these words of gospel truth. The message of the resurrection to eternal life is a bright ray of hope in the face of death. The fact that Christ died and rose again—and that he will raise up all who believe in him to eternal life with him—is the rock solid ground of our confidence. This central truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ—the power of his resurrection, shared with us—is what gives rest and peace and comfort to our souls as we face the loss of a loved one or our own last hour on this earth. May we all hold fast in faith to Christ the Savior, clinging to this comfort always. 

Lord, keep us steadfast in faith and grant us at last a blessed death and a joyous awakening in our eternal home. Amen.


Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Posted by David Sellnow
31
Oct
2021

Faith of our fathers

Reformation Day remembrance

October 31, 2021

Doing some closet cleaning, I rediscovered a box of my father’s sermon manuscripts. Donald C. Sellnow (1928-1999) served in ordained ministry from 1954 to 1998. When I think of my parents’ faith, I can’t help humming in my head the hymn, “Faith of our Fathers.”  Frederick W. Faber, who wrote “Faith of our Fathers” in 1849, was a Roman Catholic priest in England. His lyrics were penned to honor Catholic martyrs who endured persecution in the 16th century, when the Church of England was being established under Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. 

Faith of our fathers! Living still,
In spite of dungeon, fire, and sword:
Oh, how our hearts beat high with joy
Whene’er we hear that glorious word.
Faith of our fathers! Holy faith!
We will be true to thee till death.

My father and mother, who were rigorous Lutherans all their lives, might object to having a Roman Catholic song in mind while remembering them. But Protestants have adopted the hymn, too, and adapted it. Faber himself had a fondness for hymns by English Protestant writers such as Charles Wesley, John Newton, and William Cowper, and he applauded the Protestant project that produced the King James Version of the Bible. When we recall the faith of those who went before us, we understand that all men and women of faith have had strengths and weaknesses. We honor their godly beliefs and consider their foibles with a forgiving spirit—the same way we hope others will regard us in our own practice of faith. Constantly seeking truth is vital. Striving to impose one’s own view of religious rectitude onto others by force is never a gospel-oriented goal. 

An esteemed faith father worthy of remembrance is Martin Luther. Like other heroes of faith, Luther had his flaws. We don’t idolize him. We do give attention to the best of his hopes and thoughts and actions. October 31st commemorates the day in 1517 that Luther posted 95 theses expressing convictions about faith. These statements for debate sought to start a dialogue about what truth in Christianity means. They sparked a movement that became known as the Reformation. 

I’ll share here a condensed version of a sermon my father preached in October 1973, in observance of Reformation Festival.

*****************

We Cannot Help but Speak the Things which We have Seen and Heard

by Donald C. Sellnow


What do you associate with October 31st? For many people, October 31st is Halloween, the night for tomfoolery, tricks or treats, and other such activities. Certainly, some of these things associated with October 31st are not objectionable. They may even be good, clean fun. But they are not the main thing about October 31st, which is also Reformation Day, the day on which Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the church door at Wittenberg, touching off the great Reformation of the Christian church. By God’s grace, we continue to enjoy the fruits of the Reformation today. As heirs of the Reformation, we pray the Holy Spirit may lead us to a deeper understanding of and appreciation for the blessings and responsibilities we have as people of faith. On the anniversary of the Reformation, we are reminded that we cannot help but speak about the things which we have seen and heard.

Such an attitude of faith was expressed by the apostles Peter and John.  They had been jailed for proclaiming Jesus as the crucified and risen Savior in the temple courts at Jerusalem. On the next day, they were told by community leaders to shut up about this Jesus of Nazareth, or else. The leaders thought themselves the guardians of their culture; they knew that any concession to the apostles’ testimony would mean an overthrow of their entire religious system. They knew it would mean reformation, and the last thing they wanted was a reformation.

Peter and John answered the threats aimed at them with this courageous testimony: “Whether it is right in God’s sight to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge; for we cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19,20).  By the power of the Spirit, they had been led to trust in Jesus as their only Savior from sin and death. In his gospel they had found peace for their souls and strength for their lives. They had seen Jesus’ miracles and heard his teaching. They had looked and listened as Jesus lived and suffered and died, then rose from death and ascended to heaven. Through what they had seen and heard, the Spirit of God worked faith in their hearts to place all their trust in Jesus, to cling to him as their priceless treasure. And in such God-given faith, they were compelled from within to share Christ and his good news with others. They knew that is what their Savior wanted, and what he willed became their will and desire. They simply could not keep still. They could not deny the Savior who had redeemed them. They had to confess his truth and share his blessings with others—no matter what the cost. They let it be known by word and deed that they had been with Jesus.

As it was with the apostles, so it was also with Martin Luther.  In pre-Reformation Europe, the vast majority of the people understood little of what the Christian faith is all about. They were steeped in superstition. Shrines displayed what claimed to be wood from the cross of Christ, bits of hay and straw from Bethlehem’s manger, wine from the wedding at Cana. These are but a few examples of supposed relics that were to be adored by the faithful. Confused doctrines, like that of purgatory, were embedded in fearful hearts. The gospel of Christ frequently was obscured by man-made rules and regulations.

Martin Luther was born into such religious conditions, and he grew up as a faithful servant of the church as it was. In his earnest searching to find certainty about salvation, he looked to the high church authorities for guidance and direction. He gave up studying to become a lawyer in order to enter a monastery, hoping there to find relief for his troubled conscience. He tried to do diligently all the works prescribed by the church. He later reflected, “I kept the rule so strictly that I may say that if ever a monk got to heaven by his sheer monkery, it was I. If I had kept on any longer, I should have killed myself with vigils, prayers, reading, and other work.” But the more Luther worked, the more miserable he became and the more his sins tormented him. When one day his Augustinian mentor, John Staupitz, counseled him to love God more, Luther burst out, “I do not love God! I hate him!”

Luther found the love of the Lord he was missing through studying Scripture. Assigned to teach Bible interpretation at the University of Wittenberg, Luther was led into an intensive study of God’s Word. In God’s Word, Luther saw the pure and simple truth of the gospel, so long hidden and obfuscated, that a person is justified by faith alone in Christ without the deeds of the law. The answer to sin was to be found not in what you did to correct yourself but in what Christ has done perfectly and completely for you. The way of salvation is not in human righteousness, which falls far short of divine law’s requirements, but in the all-sufficient goodness of Christ. When Luther, by God’s grace, came to see and believe this central truth of justification by grace through faith, the Reformation was born.

Once Luther understood the truth, he could not help but speak about the things he had seen and heard in God’s Word. He could have saved himself a lot of trouble had he just pondered these things in his own heart. But he could not keep quiet. The love of Christ which had captured his heart compelled him to share the good news. As he continued to search the Scriptures and see God’s truth with increasing clarity, he kept on speaking out. When religious authorities, as well as kings and princes, told him to shut up and to retract everything he had written, Luther appealed to the Word of God as the highest authority. At a meeting of the leaders of the Holy Roman Empire in the city of Worms, Germany (1521), Luther boldly asserted: “Unless I am convinced by Scripture and plain reason—I do not accept the authority of the popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other—my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. God help me. Amen.”

Like the apostles, Luther was impelled by the power of the gospel to confess the gospel. He needed to share the blessings he had found with others. And share these blessings he did, through preaching and teaching, through tracts and writings, through hymns and catechisms, and through his translation of the Bible into the language of his people. Like the apostles, he also proclaimed what he had seen and heard in God’s Word by the life which he led—a life of humble faith, of thankful love, of joyful service. The life of Luther, like that of the apostles, bore unmistakable testimony to the fact that he, too, had been with Jesus.

As it was with the apostles, and as it was with Luther, dear friends, may it be so also with us. As in the apostles’ day, as in Luther’s day, truth is clouded and obscured for the many in our day. Many do not honor God or give thanks to God (Romans 1:21). “They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of their ignorance and hardness of heart” (Ephesians 4:17). By the grace of God—and by his grace alone—the gospel of Christ has been revealed to us. We have seen the truth that sets us free—free in our consciences in the present time and free to live for all eternity. When the veil of spiritual ignorance is removed, we are guided by the Spirit. “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Corinthians 3:17), a freedom that invigorates us to serve God in thankful love and seek to bring the same freedom to the souls of others.

God has given us the freeing truths of his gospel not just to be heard in our own hearts, but also to share. We don’t keep the gospel’s joy to ourselves but give good news also to others, so that their joy and ours may be full. Filled with the joy of Christ, we will talk about the Savior. We will demonstrate by our words and actions that we have been with Jesus. We will support Christian education in our congregations and study the Word diligently in our own homes. We will give toward the work of missions that strive to spread hope and truth in other communities and around the world. In the same spirit as the apostles and the spirit of the Reformation, we will not be timid or silent. Indeed, “we cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:20).  God help us all to hold fast to his truth and share it richly with others, no matter what the cost. Amen.


Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Posted by David Sellnow
02
Sep
2021

Our Life and Protection are in Christ

We are armed against evil and go forth with God’s truth

Ephesians 6:10-20

 

Armor of Gustav I of Sweden, circa 1540. Image from Wikipedia.org

We have in our minds an idealized picture of the knight in shining armor. “The Book of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table (T.Malory, 1485), did much to create that heroic image in our collective consciousness. The Camelot-style combat uniform was elaborate. Interlocking, overlapping rings of iron were fashioned into headpieces and bodices as the first protective layer. Over this chain mail, they wore full suits of iron and steel, fired and polished to a slick finish, complete with domed helmet and faceguard, leg and arm protectors, metal gloves and boots. They carried a heavy shield to block any blows that the armor did not deflect. They also carried offensive weapons, a lance and sword, for jousting and jabbing and slashing at attackers. Overall, a suit of armor could weigh sixty pounds or more–not including javelin, sword, and shield. It required a strong man just to wear and carry it all, let alone do battle in such armor.  In such armor, according to folklore, good and chivalrous knights clashed on the battlefield with those they deemed evil opponents.

Of course, we know the legends exaggerate the goodness of the good guys and the badness of the bad guys. Real battles and warfare were (and are) always more complicated. The Crusades, for instance, were not altogether driven by Christian motives, and there were many atrocities committed. Even to the extent that they were religious wars, as one commentator put it, “The medieval crusades were a largely dreadful misdirection of religious enthusiasm [on both sides] towards painful and bloody ends” (TIME, “Ideas/History,” 10/10/2019). 

Warfare on this earth is rarely (if ever) a struggle of one entirely righteous group against an entirely evil adversary. In the spiritual realm, however, there is pure goodness, which is in God. And there is ultimate evil, which rages against God and all those he has claimed as his own. As God’s people, whose life and protection are secured in Christ, we are embroiled in a struggle for our souls. But in this struggle, we are given the protection we need in Christ and his peacemaking power that is our “weapon” for engaging with those around us in this world.

The apostle Paul used the picture of battle armor to portray what we need to take our stand on the side of the Lord and to go forth in the name of the Lord.  It’s a picture Paul borrowed from the prophet Isaiah, who revealed Christ our Savior as the one to wear such armor first.  Isaiah described the coming Messiah as one who would “put on righteousness like a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head,” and would “come to Zion as Redeemer” (Isaiah 59:17,20).  Paul used the same imagery to show why we are like knights or warriors, why we need armor and weapons.  He said, ““Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power. Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil” (Ephesians 6:10-11).

We need armor from God because we daily face the devil (the “slanderer”),  the accuser against us. He schemes and sabotages, trying to topple us from our position with God. If our life is drawn as a battlefield, the devil is like the fearsome, brutal enemy who seeks to oust us from our saddle, knock us to the ground, and slash at us until we are dead. Our battle with the devil is a fight to the finish.

And what’s worse, there is not just one devil to deal with. They are legion (cf. Mark 5:8-9), a horde of evil forces arrayed against us. “The dark spirits at work in this world are bigger and stronger than we usually think” (Christianity Today, October 30, 2018).  

As Paul reminds us, “Our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6:12).

What Scripture describes is an entire army, organized for onslaught against us. They are not mere flesh and blood. They are an army of angels who fell from grace but remain potent in power, using that power now to prey upon our souls. There have been plenty of human agents that have committed great evils in this world, but underneath the flow of human events there is a still more sinister influence. Mick Jagger wasn’t wrong when he introduced the devil as the one who “rode a tank, held a general’s rank, when the blitzkrieg raged and the bodies stank,” and has been in the background of other horrors in history. As the Rolling Stones sang, he’s “been around for a long, long time, stole many a man’s soul and faith” (“Sympathy for the Devil,” 1968). Behind so many evils is “the old satanic foe who has sworn to work us woe.” As Martin Luther reminds us, “On earth, he has no equal” (“A Mighty Fortress,” 16th century).

That’s why we need to “take up the whole armor of God,” so that we may be able to stand firm on “that evil day” when temptations attack us (Ephesians 6:13). We are weaker than our spiritual enemies, but the Lord our God is stronger by far.  One little word can triumph over the devil and knock him backward. The word that the demons hate most is “Jesus”–the name that means “the Lord saves.”  They hate the word “Christ,” the title of God’s Anointed One, knowing they are the rejected ones, cast out of God’s presence. Jesus, the Word made flesh, came to this earth “to destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). Because of Christ, there is no longer any condemnation for us; we are protected by Jesus’ name (Romans 8:1). Our accuser, the one who “accuses us day and night before God” has been “thrown down.”  We have “conquered him by the blood of the Lamb” (Revelation 12:10,11).


Let’s take a moment to consider each of the items of the armor we are given by God.   

First, “fasten the belt of truth around your waist” (Ephesians 6:14). Truth holds our whole self together. Knowing what God says–knowing the reality of Christ’s grace, knowing that eternal truth–is what keeps us from being vulnerable to the devil’s lies.

Next, “put on the breastplate of righteousness” (Ephesians 6:14). The breastplate of a suit of armor protects the vital organs. It covers the heart. The righteousness of Christ does exactly that for us. Christ’s righteousness covers our hearts, cleanses our hearts (cf. Acts 15:9), makes our hearts new and alive (cf. Ezekiel 36:26), keeps our hearts safe and at peace with God (cf. Philippians 4:7).  

Also, “take the shield of faith” and “the helmet of salvation.” Holding onto the precious gift of faith, we can “quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one” (Ephesians 6:16,17). Temptations seek to puncture our hopes and confidence. But the Spirit who inspires faith in us strengthens our resolve. And when various influences try to twist our minds away from God, the “helmet” that guards our thinking is God’s promise that “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come … will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38,39). 


What will it look like when opposition to God’s goodness is threatening us? One commentator put it this way:  “If the devil cannot overthrow our faith with one bold lie, he will try to wear it away, to condition us to compromise. … If he cannot seduce us into gross sin, he will try to lead us into Pharisaism” (I.Habeck, Ephesians, 1985, p. 128). Recall Satan’s method back at the beginning. He pressured Eve, while Adam was standing by, asking them, “Did God really say? Did he really give you such a command?” (cf. Genesis 3:1).  And then it was, “God is holding out on you. He is trying to keep you from knowing what he knows” (cf. Genesis 3:4-5). Now that Christ has come to redeem us from our fall into sin, as often as not the temptation is, “Did God really give you his promise? Did he really say that you–puny and worthless you–are worthy of his love? Did he really say that you–sinning in all the ways that you do–are forgiven of every sin?”  The devil’s big lie seeks to trap us in our guilt and shame and pull us down in despair. 

Or the devil, the father of lies, master of twisting words and meanings, connives to make us just as dishonest as he is. We smile and wave and say hello to our neighbors, while inwardly harboring anger or jealousy. We aren’t really interested in our neighbors or their well-being, because we’re too wrapped up in our own concerns.

Or we are tempted to share in the devil’s arrogance, to think our way is the right way and anyone who thinks otherwise is wrong. We become “holier than thou” in our attitude towards others. We look down on others. We look at people from a worldly and competitive point of view, rather than viewing every fellow human being from the perspective of Christ (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:14-21). The influence of warped and devilish thinking on our lives isn’t only when we commit acts of violence or speak words of hatred. It also shows itself in indifference, in judgmentalism, in lack of concern and lack of action on others’ behalf.

You see how difficult our struggle is “against the spiritual forces of evil” that are in the air all around us (Ephesians 6:12). The devils’ ways are often insidious and subtle. We think we are being ok, upright and upstanding, making something of ourselves in this world. What we actually are doing all too often is becoming caught up in ourselves, concerned mainly about making ourselves well off, asserting our own agendas rather than thinking of others’ needs. All the while, Christ is calling us to follow his path and “do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than [ourselves]” … and look not to our own “interests but to the interest of others” (Philippians 2:3,4). 


When our hearts are turned in the direction of our neighbors and our world, we find that Christ gives us also the weapons we need to go forward in our spiritual lives and advance his kingdom. We have “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17). With the Word of God we can cut down to size all opposing arguments and philosophies that run counter to the way of hope in Christ. Keep that in mind as the purpose of the Spirit’s sword. God’s word is not something to attack people with; our mission is not to beat down any person’s soul.  The Word of God is something we use to cut through falseness and establish the truth, always for the good of others’ souls.

Image from Winston-Salem Journal 4-1-17

As we go forth in Christ’s name, as shoes for our feet, we wear “whatever will make us ready to proclaim the gospel of peace” (Ephesians 6:15). We are ready to share the good news of Jesus, ready to step forward and rescue others from spiritual danger, ready to tell the truths that bring people out of darkness into the light. Wearing the full protection of the armor of God, we are ready to run, to do good, to be agents of mercy and bringers of peace.


Do you remember the battle between David and Goliath? When David was going to face that gigantic, menacing opponent, the army of Israel tried to put him in all their weighty battle armor. It was too heavy; David could not move in it. He rejected that human armor and went to face Goliath armed with just stones and a slingshot and the spiritual armor of God. David’s best defense was the shield of faith that he held as a believer in the Lord. The armor the Lord provides us is not a heavy burden; it does not bog us down. Remember what Jesus said of carrying him with us in our lives: “My yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:30). When we wear the armor of Christ, our lives are livelier, our attitudes are lifted higher, our spirits run further and freer than we ever could when operating in worldly mode.

We become ambassadors of Christ in this world. When Paul wrote these words of encouragement for us (Ephesians 6:10-20), he was in chains, imprisoned, because his message was perceived as a threat by the powers that existed in the empire at his time.  Yet his spirit soared in providing encouragement to the church then and to all Christians ever since. We are not in chains in our society today. We have tremendous freedom to speak our minds and speak the truth. So let’s put on our armor, the righteousness of Christ, and gear up to go out in our communities with faith and love to share.

“We do not wage war according to human standards” (2 Corinthians 10:2).  The weapons we use are not the weapons of the world. Our weapons create peace and hope and life, not violence and despair and death.  We speak with the gospel of Jesus. We wear the righteousness of God. Faith from the Spirit is our shield.


And as we go forth in Christ’s name, we also pray in his name. Another powerful weapon God gives us is prayer.  The apostles urged us (cf. Ephesians 6:18-20) to pray in the Spirit at all times in every sort of petition to God concerning our spiritual task in this world. So in that spirit, let’s close these thoughts with a prayer:  

  • Lord our God, we are strong because of your strength and power. We have life because of your life and grace. Arm us with your righteousness so that we are ready for each day’s battles. Protect us with your truth, with Spirit-given faith, and with your holy words. Make us ever alert to every opportunity to bring peace to others with your good news.  Make each of us–and everyone who is active in ministry and witnessing–bold in our witness, so that the mystery of the gospel may be made known to more and more people with clarity and confidence.  In Jesus, Amen.
Posted by David Sellnow