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The basis for our meditation this morning is from our Old Testament reading, the account of Joseph and his fearful brothers.  The setting of this reading from the very end of Genesis is so rich with conflicting emotions it might as well be a scene in a well acclaimed movie.

In the midst of the long expected death of the family Patriarch Jacob, there is considerable unease as to where the chips will now fall. You can almost picture a group of men gathered around a table secretly meeting over candlelight.  Joseph’s brothers are exceedingly fearful for their safety.  They suspect that their powerful brother Joseph will take this opportunity of their father’s passing to exact some long in coming revenge. Not just any revenge, but a 20 years in the making, you left me in a pit in the wilderness and faked my death so father wouldn’t come looking for me kind of revenge. 

To add to the intrigue of the story the brothers have come up with a desperate intervention of defense. They will tell Joseph that their father had a message for him, “please forgive you brother’s offense to you” The moment of truth is now at hand. One of the brothers serves as a messenger. Just as they rehearsed it, those words are recited… your father gave this command…

Will this plea even make a difference they are not sure, but before they know it Joseph is down on his knees in tears. The rest of the brothers come.  They begin to see in that moment how completely unfounded their fears were. They are all now on their knees overcome with emotion.  In fact they now are hearing from Joseph as if from the Lord.  “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.”

Joseph manifested to them the unconditional love of God to them as he forgave them. They received undeserved grace as they saw Joseph down on his knees in tears. He pointed them to the unconditional mercy and love of the Son of God who had appeared to their father Jacob and wrestled with him and blessed him. His forgiveness of his brothers pointed them to the ladder their father had seen where the angels of God where ascending and descending from heaven.

This passage in Genesis was further expanded upon in the book of Romans where in the 8^th chapter St. Paul writes “We know in all things God works together for the good to those who love him and have been called according to His purpose.”   From the previous content of Genesis we know that the good God worked out of the trials Joseph experienced was the long sequence of events where Joseph became second to Pharaoh in authority in all of Egypt and had the divinely given foresight

 to store up surpluses of food for the long drought and famine ahead. And in a much greater sense the good accomplished from the evil Jospeh experienced was none other than the settling of the children of Israel in Egypt as the stage by which Israel would be delivered by the Lord with a mighty hand- pointing forward to the same Exodus our Lord Jesus Christ would lead the people of God out of the grips of sin death and the devil.

Have you ever felt like Joseph’s brothers, gathered together plotting for their survival by deceit and desperation? Have you ever felt like the sins of the past are going to catch up with you? As if the amount of sins you have committed against God and against others is so great that it is more than you deserve forgiveness for? 

Have you ever found yourself doubting whether God’s forgiveness could apply to you? Have you ever doubted if someone could really forgive you for what you said or did to them?  The reason why they doubted was because they were looking at themselves, and not that salvation is outside of themselves. 

We heard in our Introit the proper response a believer has when confronted with the danger of enemies all around us. The response is to flee to the Lord for refuge.  This is the way we should handle the times when we feel that we have messed up too much and are in a hole we cannot get out of- flee to the Lord for refuge and seek his forgiveness.

In fact when we know we are forgiven by the lord- our enemies have no hold over us, for we know that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, neither death nor life, neither persecutions or things to come.

Sometimes as I recall particular things I have said or done in the past that were hurtful, I feel a sting of embarrassment or regret.  Sometimes it is over something as trivial that I could easily never think of it for years at a time. But then all of a sudden there is that painful memory of regret of sins against others.

What I have said in the spirit of sinfulness, God can turn into good, whether through my learning and maturity or through some other means.

Today’s reading from the gospel of Matthew demonstrates how vital it is that we forgive others considering that God has first forgiven everything of us. We have been forgiven the great debt of our sin.  

We are in this way just like Joseph’s brothers, we have shown mercy and forgiveness when we know we deserve none of it.  In fact, we are not only like Joseph’s brothers, we are more specifically Jesus’ brothers. 

As humans we badly mistreated Jesus in a way that even exceeds the mistreatment of Joseph.  We rejected Jesus and inflicted onto Jesus the completely undeserved punishment of death on the cross.  Despite our great offense Jesus has forgiven us completely.  

We can either accept this forgiveness, or we can look inward and live in fear and doubt about our own unworthiness as did Joseph’s brothers. We need to look at the salvation Jesus gives us- instead of looking at our own shortcomings.

In this fallen world we live in we can expect the experience of being hurt deeply by others. God’s word tells us that our life is not defined by the hurts we experience in life.  Instead, our lives are defined by the healing Jesus brings to our lives.  Forgiving others is not simply an exercise in proving that you are a mature Christian or the more mature person in a relationship.  

Forgiveness means that you believe the ways of God’s kingdom are bigger and greater than the ways of this world.  Forgiveness means that you treasure the new life you have in Christ far more than your own sense of pride. Forgiveness because of Jesus and through Jesus, frees us from everything that oppresses us and has a hold over us in our life today.  

Valuing the riches Jesus gives to you more than your sense of pride or fairness means that you forgive before or regardless of whether a person is repentant over the sin against you. This is because the Lord’s Forgiveness is a freely given gift that is not earned. It is no different than the servant who owed the impossible sum of 10,000 talents is shown mercy and forgiven his debt.

 This is the truly liberating work of the gospel in our lives.  We are freed from our debts and thereby freed up to love our neighbor unconditionally and offer unconditional forgiveness- regardless of what our neighbor’s behavior is like.   

This freedom means we are not expecting particular actions from others in order to forgive. And it means we are not seeking to perform our own actions of penance to make up for what we have done wrong. That would make an insult  of the gracious gift the Lord gives to us.

Iti s easy to focus on what we do not have and what vulnerabilities exist in our life, and what can go wrong next. Instead, we rejoice at the power of God’s Word to heal us and make us whole again. Although this fallen world brings us all many uncertainties, we have the perfect certainty of the gifts of God’s Word. We have perfect certainty of our salvation in our Baptism and in the reassurance of the Lord’s Supper.

 May the Lord bless us with a living faith that abounds with unconditional love to others. And may this living faith set us free from all of our fears. Amen. 

Brothers and sisters in Christ, have you ever thought about what impresses Jesus?

The large stones of the temple built up by King Herod did not impress Jesus. While the disciples looked at the construction in wonder, He warned the disciples that not one stone would be left on another.  The size of the Roman empire or the authority of Pilate to condemn or release him did not impress Jesus. We even hear at times how Jesus is underwhelmed by the disciples in their response of faith.  “O you of little faith.”  

The faith of the Canaanite woman however caught Jesus’ attention as she asked for her daughter to be healed:  The Canaanite woman came to Jesus in a time of great need, seeking help for her daughter oppressed by a demon.  She appealed to Jesus with recognition that he is a descendant of David, that he is of the people of Israel.  She acknowledged in her appeal to Jesus her position as an outsider. She communicated by her speech that she was out on a limb in her appeal to Jesus, depending completely on the mercy of Jesus. 

“O woman great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.”  Jesus seems to have reacted in a similar way as he did to the faith of the Centurion in Matthew chapter 8: When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those who followed him, “Truly, I tell you, with no one in Israelhave I found such faith. Faith, which is a gift of the Holy Spirit, is what Jesus treasures in this world.

Jesus celebrated the faith of the Canaanite woman knowing that she represented one of the first of many who would come to faith as gentiles- grated into the vine of Israel.  God’s word rejoices in the plan of salvation that the gentiles also would come to know God, through a continuation and an extension of the salvation God gave to Israel.  

these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer;  their burnt offerings and their sacrifices  will be accepted on my altar;  for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.”⁸ The Lord God, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, declares,  “I will gather yet others to him besides those already gathered.”

Just as Israel has its outcasts who need gathering back in, so also the LORD promised to gather the nations back to Him. It was never the plan to only provide salvation to Israel and leave everyone else out. Abraham was called to faith so that all nations would be blessed through him. 

The promise is there in the scripture that the Lord’s house is a house of prayer for all peoples. Yet just before Jesus praises the faith of the woman, it appears by our modern sensitivities that Jesus was insensitive to the Canaanite woman,

 that he was closing the door on her faith in an unloving and unrespectful way.  Can you imagine how it would sound in today’s world for someone to tell a woman from another culture that giving to her is like taking food from children and giving it to dogs. This would be called prejudice of the worst kind. 

But Jesus is not talking abrasively to her because she is a woman or because she is of another culture- he is simply addressing the fact that she is not an Israelite, she is a gentile- and gentiles did not at that time have a share in the covenant. They were without God’s law in their lives.  Jesus is protecting the holiness of God by observing the distinction between Jew and Gentile, clean and unclean.

Jesus sounds insensitive to our ears because the world we live in struggles with accepting that Jesus alone is the way of salvation.  Jesus’ short response served to illustrate that there is a way to have a relationship with God, and it is through the covenant, through the temple. If salvation were dispensed to anyone who came up to Jesus, regardless of what they believed, then where would the teaching of God’s Word be?

We are included in the all nations the LORD promised to save- and we also have reason to come before the LORD as beggars, as those who are not worthy of the gifts we receive, as those who ask for mercy- for crumbs from the table. By faith we can recognize that crumbs from the Lord’s table is a richer feast than anything we could make on our own.

The disciples preferred that Jesus would just help her and send her away so that she would not be a bother anymore. They were looking at what inconvenience she brought to their day and missed the big picture that Jesus had come to bring people back into the fullness of God’s love and care.

This woman was a very unlikely candidate for God’s mercy. The people of Canaan were ordered driven out of the promised land for their false idol worship. As a Canaanite woman she would not have grown up following the law, participating in the sacrificial system as a means of receiving God’s mercy and love. The disciples would not have expected her to know much about who Jesus is and what he could do for her.

When Jesus turned her down, it would be human nature for her to plead her case and say how she was deserving of the same bread as everyone else in Israel, or to say all of the good things she had done in her life to deserve what she is asking for- and to talk about how great her daughter’s need was and how innocent her daughter was in this possession that afflicted her.

 But she did not try and advance herself before Jesus- instead she stayed focused on His authority to provide for her needs in abundance.

We are all like the Canaanite woman, very unlikely candidates for God’s Mercy. We have done nothing to deserve God’s mercy. We are full of sin, any case we make for our deserving mercy falls flat.

We heard in our Epistle reading from Romans: ³² For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all.   By disobedience St. Paul is describing Israel’s rejection of the gospel as going against God’s law, and those who are gentiles were in disobedience already before the gift of the gospel.

The result is that nobody can say that they deserve mercy more than another. We cannot say that we deserve mercy more than the people of Israel who rejected the gospel, or more than those people in our neighborhood who would never consider coming through the doors of a church. We are not entitled to God’s mercy as our birthright. It is a gift given to us, which we gladly receive.

The gift sometimes seems to take longer than we would like.  “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the LORD delivers them out of all of them.” What must it have felt like for the Canaanite woman to work up the courage to ask Jesus for mercy only to be told he has not come for her people?

Did her heart sink for a moment, did she think all was lost?  It seems her faith kept her from doubting, so that she could look past rejection and instead keep making the case for the deliverance she knew Jesus was able to give.

We can learn from the perseverance she has in looking to Jesus for her needs. When life presents problems so deep that relief does not seem present to us, when we feel darkness holding us in its grasp, we need to see that Jesus’ mercy does not run out. Mercy to Israel and mercy to the gentiles, mercy that abounds for all.  Even the mere crumbs from the table are all we need for a living faith and hope in Jesus.

And Jesus provides us with much more than crumbs. He provides his very body and blood for us.  There is more than enough of God’s mercy to go around to us as we approach the Lord with humility and repentance.

As we receive the Lord’s Supper on a weekly basis, we are asking in faith for the Lord’s mercy, repentant of our sins, examining ourselves and seeing that we have once again done nothing to deserve God’s mercy. We taste and see that the Lord is good to us, that even as unworthy as we are the crumbs fall down to us and supply us with all that we need. There in the Lord’s Supper, Christ’s body for the life of the world.

We are here, part of a church at worship because the Father revealed Jesus to us.  Considering the unbelief in this world it was through very unlikely circumstances that you received the gift of faith- much of the world is designed to keep you away from faith. It was only because of the grace of God in your lives that you have been given the gift of hearing God’s Word with your ears in faith for your very life, your very salvation.

Jesus was amazed at the faith of the Canaanite woman, and Jesus sees our faith.  When we confess that what He provides is more than enough for our needs- then Jesus is greatly pleased. Amen.

“Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said: “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me.”

Can you picture yourself going through what Job went through? With tragedy after tragedy and painful boils all over your skin. What would you do? What would you say to God?

With all of the suffering Job went through, he said many things… he may not have felt proud of. He cursed the day he was born and wondered why he was not a still birth. But he also directs his attention to the ways of God’s Kingdom.   He lamented all of the wrongdoing and evil the unrighteous commit.  And he pleaded his cause as someone who has stayed faithful in his life purpose.

Job closes out his speech describing the punishment he would deserve if he had knowingly transgressed God’s law, using the phrase: “If I have.”

If I have walked in falsehood, and my foot has hastened to deceit, If my heart has been enticed toward a woman and I have lain in wait at my neighbors door, if I have withheld anything from the poor, if I have raised my hand against the fatherless, if I have rejoiced at the ruin of him who hated me, or exulted when evil overtook him. 

Could you picture yourself saying these things to the LORD? Have you ever thought to yourself, but I am a good person and wickedness is not ruling my heart? How could these troubles be upon me now? If I have done something to deserve this than so be it.

What have I done to deserve this trial? We know that the wages of sin are death.  Yet still we wonder why now, why this trial.

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways declares the LORD.” Isaiah chapter 55.   The answer is that God knows why we face such pain and suffering, God knows those things we cannot understand.

We want to make the case for ourselves and put a lot of thought into what we have done right- ways we have followed God’s law. But in the end what is most important is not how much effort we have put into living our life well, not what case we can present before the judge, but only the righteousness of Christ. 

Can you imagine if the LORD asked you to dress for action and provide all of the answers to the mysteries of creation? The law hits very hard and deep in these words, “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge?” Do we ever question why things are the way that they are and why do the wicked prosper and we dry up? Have you ever questioned God’s love and care for you in the midst of a long suffering problem or struggle? Of course you have. In our state of sin, we all have.  

God’s response to our prideful belief that we know it all is the same response to us: “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements- surely you know!”

The reading continues with further details of God’s creation, beyond what we can possibly know.  Yet through our faith we do not need to feel worse and worse as we hear more and more evidence that we know less than nothing as compared to God.

Through faith we can see that through hearing about the unsearchable majesty of God’s creation we can Be Still and know that The LORD is God. As we hear these words about the foundations of the world and the morning stars singing together and start to let go of the burden and pressure we put on ourselves to make sense of things in our life and in our world.

We can let go of thinking we need to have everything in order just how we would like it to be or else our lives would fall apart.  We can let go of the grip on life our sinful human nature holds and we can open ourselves to see by faith that Jesus holds the world in his hand.

Consider what it means that the LORD measured the length of the foundation of the earth and laid the cornerstone.  The earth was built exactly how it needed to be in order to stay together for as long as needed, through the flood, through seasons and years and centuries, through a time period of thousands of years and counting until the time when the new heaven and earth will be created when Jesus returns. 

Science has identified numerous factors that all needed to be fine tuned in the right way in order for life to be possible. Water is different than other liquids in that it is more dense in liquid form than in solid. As a result ice floats to the top of rivers and lakes and artic ocean areas. We may not think of this much, but if ice sank instead, more and more surface water would be exposed to the cold leading to more and more frozen lakes and streams making life uninhabitable.

If Saturn and Jupiter were not so incredibly large compared  to earth it appears comets would make life on earth continually in peril.  The strong gravitational pull of these large planets pulls in the most dangerous comets that would threaten life, like a mighty defense shield circling our planet.

If the moon were not the right size the earth would not be tilted by gravity to have 4 seasons.  If the earth were smaller there would be a weaker magnetic field that would result in solar winds stripping away our atmosphere.  If our electromagnetic force were smaller or gravity less, larger atoms would not hold together and no chemical bonds could occur.  Only God knows the exact measurements that make our world hold together.

We have not been there day after day as the LORD has commanded the morning and caused the dawn to know its place- each new day a miracle of creation.  

 No, we were not there, but God’s Word is telling us about it, and the fact that Jesus holds all of creation together is a tremendous cause for relief and security.  Pondering the wonder of creation and God’s perfect design can heal our troubled hearts and give us reassurance that no human words or knowledge can. We were not there, but we did not need to be, God took care of it all.

The LORD took care of it all for us.  “Immediately Jesus spoke to them saying: “Take heart it is I. Do not be afraid.”

When the disciples saw Jesus walking on water, it was far beyond what they could ever imagine or expect.  The one who shut in the sea with doors and said ‘thus far shall you come and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed.’ He who was there from the beginning told the disciples, “It is I, do not be afraid.”

We are no more righteous than Job, we also like Job need the forgiveness of Jesus that comes to us not through knowledge of how the universe is made, but through the gift of faith.

Like Job who looked to the promise of the Savior and said “I know that my Redeemer lives.”, we are invited by our Lord to look to his cross and see that no matter how difficult the circumstances of our life, God is certainly for us. God sent His Son to die for us. 

No matter the hardship we need not fear as God’s Word tells us that Jesus is here with us: “Take heart It is I, do not be afraid.”  By our human wisdom we often try and find security through the knowledge we can obtain. We look at weather forecasts, we read about economic outcomes and polls forecasting about the next election.

Yet our knowledge is always imperfect, and our knowledge is not what we need to put our hope in. Our needs are not met by the right circumstances of chance in the future, but instead by a Savior who reaches out his hand for us, who commands the winds and the waves, who has known us from the womb, and will see us through.

The storms of life in this fallen world come at us time after time, and sometimes it seems so fiercely!  The scripture does not hide the fact that we go through so many afflictions. “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the LORD delivers him out of them all.” 

Although the storms may intensify day by day, we are indeed delivered from them in a way that the world does not understand. We are delivered through the promise given in our baptism, that although our human nature should fold under the weight of the storm, our new life in Christ grows ever stronger, even in times of affliction.

So that you can look at your week ahead and know one thing for certain: Behold I am with you, even to the end of the age. The risen Lord Jesus is with you through the storm, and he says: “Be still and know that I am God.”

²⁵ At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; ²⁶ yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. ²⁷ All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. ²⁸ Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

This morning our gospel reading is short.  Just 6 verses, and only two main ideas- that the truth of God’s kingdom is hidden from the wise in this world and only revealed by those who the Father chooses- and that Jesus gives not more work and challenge to his people, but a lighter yoke and rest.  The simplicity of the reading is appropriate to help reinforce the simplicity of the message. Following Jesus is not an exhausting enterprise, but a nurturing and a life giving process.

To the wise and understanding of this world following Jesus is not desired or understood.  Those who are so high on themselves and their wisdom cannot see Jesus and the way he offers. They can only see the way they set for themselves, and they have little desire to repent of their chosen way.

For those of us who are able and willing to repent of our sins, we can see Jesus, we can know the path he sets out for those who desire life and salvation from him.  And with this right understanding in our hearts of what it means to follow Jesus we can see that it is an easy burden to carry.

Of course, we try and make things harder, we try and make things in our life more difficult than they really are. We want to prove ourselves and make a name for ourselves with hard work. We want to earn our salvation.  And we know this is not quite what the scripture teaches us, but it is just so hard to resist earning your place in life, that we move forward. And soon we are exhausted by our efforts.

One way this plays out is in trying to avoid sinning and covering up our sin. We hide our sins from one another, so that when we come to church on Sunday morning, we do not confess our sins to one another. We lie and cover up our sin- we believe that if people knew about our sins they would no longer want to talk to us.  Soon our Christian life can become just as much about keeping up with appearances and concealing our sinful nature as it is about abiding in the Word and abiding in Jesus.

This hard work of keeping up appearances has a cost. It perpetuates the lie that being Christian is all about being a good person- it obscures the gospel that Jesus died for us and calls us as his own regardless of how good or bad we are.

When Jesus talks about how his yoke is easy you can’t help but think about the opposite heavy yoke that Jesus describes of the Pharisees. The Yoke of the Pharisees is to add extra laws and regulations to God’s law, to essentially prove that you really mean it in following God’s law.  Because this takes so much work and effort to keep up extra regulations, it keeps a person from living according to God’s design and brings a person instead to become preoccupied with man made regulations. These man made regulations are a heavy yoke because they do not point to Jesus, they do not point to the gift of salvation to us in Jesus. Rather they point to man’s works and a self righteousness that professes that we can stop sinning and that tries to show off to the world that we are more devoted to God than others.

Our Epistle reading for today Romans chapter 7 shares about the futility of trying to be without sin: For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. ¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 

This is an amazing section of scripture because St. Paul is sharing the complete truth about our fallen human nature and how we will fail to live without sin. If the scripture was selectively edited like some cynical unbelievers would wishfully believe, this is the type of passage that would be worth editing out. Why tell people that they will fail?

What if a high school English teacher told students on the first day of class- you are just high school students, you know so little about literature and Shakespeare and the other classics, that whatever you think you know about literature is probably wrong or at best partially wrong. How hard would the students work? Would some just give up and let artificial intelligence write their papers for them?

The scripture shares this failure of our human nature to keep God’s law not to discourage us from trying to follow God’s law- but to point us to Jesus as the only way we can keep God’s law.

God’s law is good and there is certainly good in following the teaching in scripture in how we are to live our lives. We are not to just throw out what the scripture teaches in how to live a righteous life.  Even though we cannot live up to the full extent of God’s laws. Instead we are to keep the law through the power of Christ and the power of Christ alone.

²⁸ Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

When we see that Jesus is the one who can bring us to keep God’s law, then we experience the rest for our souls that Jesus promises.

The rest for our souls is in recognizing what we cannot do for ourselves. When you stop trying to hold everything together with your own effort, life can get much easier. This is the freedom Jesus brings, that you can be who you are as God’s child, you can confess your sins and your failures and you can look to Jesus for your strength and your belonging.

Instead of looking to prove yourself, you just look to Jesus as the one who is pulling the ox yoke and taking you along for the ride.

And what does this look like for your life? What does this look like for Christ Lutheran Church if we see that Jesus carries the weight of the yoke? How can we truly learn from Jesus and stop trying to carry ourselves?

It starts with our understanding the full gift of forgiveness we have in Jesus.  Since he has carried all of our sorrows and sins on the cross we know that we have a very light load in life indeed.  If we find we are carrying too heavy of a load we have to ask if we are carrying a load more for issues of pride than for the joy of God’s kingdom

Knowing the gift we have in Jesus is the light load that we are called to carry. If we have a heavier load to carry in our participation in the church, we can only carry it with Jesus as our help.   On our own we will fall exhausted.

Our hymn of the day put it well: “I heard the voice of Jesus say “Come unto me and rest; lay down thou weary one, lay down my head upon my breast.” I came to Jesus as I was, so weary worn and sad; I found in him a resting place, And he has made me glad.

I heard the voice of Jesus say, “Behold I freely give the living water thirsty one, Stoop down and drink and live.” I came to Jesus and I drank of that life giving stream; my thirst was quenched my soul revived, and now I live in Him.

I heard the voice of Jesus say: “I am this dark world’s light. Look unto Me, thy morn shall rise And all thy day be bright.”  I looked to Jesus and I found In Him my star my sun; And in the light of life I’ll walk Till traveling days are done.

This time of the year in Indiana is strawberry season. The strawberries all become ripe at the same time and you have to be able to pick the strawberries and use them while they are ripe, eat them quickly or can them or they will not keep. Without enough labor and effort, the window of time passes quickly and the proceeds of the land are not captured.

This urgency of timing is what Jesus is referencing when he says: “The harvest is great but the laborers are few.” In the ancient world a harvest of wheat or other crops came once a year and there were not combine harvester machines back then to gather all that the earth produced.

Since a crop like wheat provides a significant part of diet and economic livelihood, the timing of collecting the harvest is of great urgency. Receiving the returns of much work requires everything to come together with enough laborers to harvest. You can picture the excitement of a great harvest, with the right amount of energy expenditure a high percentage of the crop can be preserved, and with a poor effort much could be lost.

So it is with the harvest in God’s kingdom. The riches of God’s word are vast and limitless, we treasure the word in our life as the church as we learn more and more about the meaning of God’s Word.  We know the Word of God has the power for the great gains and the timing is very sensitive as Jesus is coming soon and the time to labor and harvest will at that time be past. The conditions are ripe, all that is needed is enough laborers in the harvest field.

Sometimes we convince ourselves that the unbelieving world that walks in darkness are having all of the fun, that they are living it up while we as Christians make sacrifice and settle for simple lives following God’s law.  There are always those times when the wicked seem to prosper because they are of the world and love the world.

But we should not forget that those who walk in darkness are without the light of Christ, although they may fit in with the world, they are fitting in with the emptiness of the world, their need is great, and the power God’s Word has to bring life and hope to those in darkness is great. The emptiness of our society provides conditions that are ripe for the work of God’s Word.

Certainly today we can see that our nation, is drowning in an epidemic of selfishness and rejection of God’s order in daily life. People do what is right in their own eyes. People are lost in their sin walking in darkness, and do not understand or know the light of Christ.  We heard in our gospel lesson how Jesus saw that the people are clearly lost, like sheep without a shepherd. Jesus has compassion on those who walk in darkness, Jesus knows how empty their lives are without his fullness.

The Collect of the Day asks for faith to believe God’s promises that we may receive eternal salvation.  This is language about how the harvest works. We take on the role of harvesters because we believe God’s promises.  Our faith in Jesus is what allows us to collect any harvest. Without this trust in Jesus, we can do no harvesting for God’s kingdom.  The work all revolves around our trust in our Savior, our faith in God’s Word. 

The workers are few because there are many without faith or with a stunted faith.  Many are called, few are chosen.  Those who are indifferent in their faith or doubting are not qualified for the job. The influences of the world lead many away from a mature faith. Some love the world more than they love God’s Word.

Because the workers are few we continue to pray for more laborers. And even as we pray for more workers there is much harvest for us.  There is a big percentage of the pie our role of service in the kingdom left for us to dig into.  We do not have to fight off others for the cultivation of the harvest. There is plenty of fruitful work for us to pursue. Our leader and guide in doing this work is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ.

Listen again to Jesus’ reaction to the needs of the people: “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”  In the New Testament this Greek word for compassion is only used of God. Only Jesus who is without sin can fully understand how lost and helpless we are without Him.  Only with Christ as our Shepherd can we extend this compassion to others.

A shepherd leads and guides. Think of the great commission from Matthew chapter 28, the 11 disciples at that time, were called to make disciples of all nations by baptizing and teaching.  The answer to the helpless condition of our world is the new life in Christ, and the teaching of God’s Word that comes with this new life.  We tackle the unbelief and darkness of the world with one baptism at a time, one lesson of instruction at a time.

As we work in the harvest field and pray for laborers, we should always see that it is the LORD who brings the harvest.  No matter how discouraged we may feel of the overall demographic decline of the church in America, we should never lose sight of how the Lord brings results with His Word.  

A few weeks ago a heating and air conditioning serviceman came to my house to fix a part that was covered over warranty. Since I was returning from a funeral that day around the time he arrived, he asked me about what work I was doing that appeared to have worked up a sweat.

I told him how I was the officiant for the funeral and how I had the opportunity to share about the comfort in sorrow and the hope of the resurrection our Lord brings to those who mourn. Soon he told me that he had lost two close family members in the last year and how important support and compassion from the Lord’s church was to him in his time of grief.  He commented on how God’s Word really works because he was never raised in the church, had little exposure to God’s Word and did not believe and now he is listening to a Bible app every morning. Through hearing the Word he has faith and he described how he is now experiencing that everything in the scripture holds true.  The harvest in his life is just beginning.  The Lord brings the harvest.

Our reading from Exodus chapter 19 helps us see how the harvest is all produced by the LORD. “You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself.”  Faith for the people of Israel was clear as sight, the LORD’s deliverance of them.

Israel was carried to salvation from Egypt as on wings of an eagle. Because they were carried in this way, they were put in a position to be God’s treasured possession among all the peoples. “and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” 

The harvest is so great at the time of the book of Exodus that a whole nation stands before the world as a kingdom of priests. So plentiful the harvest is today that the church which is present in every country in the world shares the good news of the kingdom.  

With verse 10 in our gospel reading we see a distinction between all of the disciples that followed Jesus and the particular 12 he sent out.  We can easily overlook the importance of Jesus establishing twelve disciples.  It is not just a symbolic honor to the twelve tribes of Israel that Jesus called 12 disciples. It is much more. Jesus is using the 12 disciples as a new creation for the world, a renewed faithfulness to the Lord which the twelve tribes of Israel failed to faithfully fulfill.

The twelve disciples were established by Jesus to show what it looks like when the twelve tribes of Israel are united and not at war with one another, when Israel is a people for God’s own possession.  And when Jesus talks about praying for laborers in the mission field, he is praying for laborers who are converts of the 12 disciples for a common purpose in ministry, and the establishment of the pastoral office.

We as the church are the priesthood of all believers who are built on the foundation of Christ and the 12 Apostles.  We are chosen for this calling. It is the Lord’s doing, He is the master gardener designer the beautiful and awe inspiring results.  Amen.   

Brothers and Sisters in Christ, there is something satisfying about completion. The end of a school career is celebrated with graduation. A wedding celebrates the completion of the joining together of a man and a woman to be a family united in Christ. Retirement celebrates the completion of a working career. Life always brings new chapters and new events that eventually reach a fulfillment or completion.

Today we are at the close of the Easter season. The risen Lord Jesus has led us through these almost 50 days now, with many high points in rejoicing in the joy of the Kingdom.  Today we think about the completion and the fulfillment that our Lord’s Passion on the cross, resurrection and Ascension into heaven brings to our lives.

 We prayed in the Collect prayer this morning: “O King of glory, Lord of Hosts, uplifted in triumph far above all heavens, leave us not without consolation, but send us the Spirit of truth whom You promised from the Father.”

First comes the Ascension of Jesus and the glory and triumph far above the heavens, and then comes that which brings the glory down to us, the gift of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

 The gospel of Luke ends with these words: “Then he led them out as far as Bethany and lifting up his hands he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God.”

In older churches that have painting of Jesus behind the altar, a common theme of these paintings is the Ascension. These altar backdrops show Jesus holding his two hands up in blessing. Jesus gesturing in blessing to them is what the disciples last saw as He was lifted up and a cloud took him from out of their sight.

We easily remember the last words of Jesus on the cross: “It is finished”  Less familiar to our memories are the last words the resurrected Jesus said to his disciples before he ascended to heaven “You are witnesses of these things , and behold I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”

Jesus gave the disciples this single purpose to witness to his death and resurrection and to teach that the scripture is fulfilled through him. And as the scripture was fulfilled there was nothing more that needed to be said.  They saw him holding his hands up in blessing and they worshiped him.

As we come to the altar of God in worship we still see Jesus holding his hands in blessing. Just as Jesus blessed the disciples, so also he is blessing us as we hear his words and receive his gifts. When Jesus returns we will see him again with hands out in blessing, we will see him blessing us and blessing all of creation as he makes the New Heaven and Earth and brings things to this blessed completion.

With his Ascension Jesus is lifted up and reigns in the highest of glories. And as he reigns at the throne of heaven, at the right hand of the Father he raises us up with him.

The closing verse of See, the Lord Ascends in Triumph LSB 494 summarizes what Jesus has done for us in his Ascension. “He has raised our human nature On the clouds to God’s right hand; There we sit in heavenly places, There with Him in glory stand. Jesus reigns, adored by angels; Man with God is on the throne. By our mighty Lord’s ascension We by faith behold our own.”

Jesus is fully man and fully God, which means our human nature is there at the throne of Heaven. And in sending the Holy Spirit to us, we may have this same completion as Jesus, we too will one day be glorified with the perfect righteousness of Jesus. At the new heaven and earth we too will be raised up with Jesus. 

There is a reason it feels special to be in this space.  And as we live our lives as Christians, already today we partake of God’s glories, already now we receive his very body and blood, already now we receive the gifts of heaven on earth.  Here in this church the Lord brings the joys of heaven to us.

We stand with Jesus in glory. This is the completion of what Jesus came to us for. He assumed our human nature, he joined in our suffering, and he obeyed the Father in perfect righteousness where we failed. He resisted Satan’s temptations and reversed the curse of sin. He restored our human nature back to the image of God, he completed the course of our salvation so that we are now in a degree of glory far far greater than Adam and Eve were before the fall into sin.

Such lofty themes of the completion of God’s design puts things in perspective. How many things do we waste our time with that have little importance? Colossians chapter 3 says it well: “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.”

We can attach great importance to different things that may or may not go our way.  But these things that seem so important in the moment mean little in light of the big picture that Jesus has ascended into heaven and we now wait his return.  We heard in our gospel reading today that Jesus prayed for the well being of the church as he knew he was returning to the Father. “I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world.”

Jesus in this speech is showing that he is very concerned about how the church will fare living in the world that he is leaving. Jesus knows that until his return the church will need watching over and protection. That is why he prays: “Holy Father, keep them in your name.” He says, Keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.” 

To keep them in the Father’s name is to keep the disciples faithful to the revelation of who the Father is.  Jesus told Phillip, if you have seen me you have seen the Father.  Seeing Jesus rightly and worshipping Jesus rightly is the way to see and worship the Father rightly.

We see Jesus rightly through seeing the scripture rightly, this is the fulfillment that was brought to us by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, that if we have God’s Word and listen and obey, then we are close to Jesus. This is the completion and fulfillment the Father planned for us. That we would recognize Jesus as the king of all, and that we would live our lives in a way that rejoice at confessing that Jesus is king.

No matter the uncertain future we face in life, let us confess in how we live our lives that Jesus is Lord of everything, and that he will return, he will bring you to the completion the work that He began in you and continues refine until the great day of the Lord. Amen.  

Brothers and sisters in Christ, when medical problems come up for you or for loved ones, aren’t we all grateful that there are people who have devoted so much focus in their lives to medical care. I don’t often think about what things are required in the event of different medical emergencies, but EMT’s doctors and surgeons think about these things and deal with them everyday. You might even say they live in that world of emergency care for the body. And because they live in that world, it can make the difference on any given day whether someone lives or dies.

In our gospel lesson today Jesus said: “Because I live, you also will live.”  Because Jesus is the living God, we also live.  Because Jesus is risen, we also shall one day rise. His death on the cross has saved us. Because Jesus lives to do the Father’s will, we now have life.

And Jesus invites us to also live in his love of the Father. Jesus wants us to be like the grad student who does not think about anything but classes for the sake of survival in the program. Jesus wants us to live in God’s Word.

It is true that you can have too much of things in life. Coffee or wine, an apple or dark chocolate all have been found to give health benefits. But only in moderation.  If you consume too much of a food with health benefits it can become basically toxic for you and harm you considerably.

This principle of moderation is not true in regards to receiving the gifts of faith. We can never have too much of God’s love, grace and forgiveness. Jesus did not leave us as orphans, not only did he promise his presence would be with the disciples always, he also promised the presence of the Holy Spirit.

To live our lives the fullest means that we live our lives always in the love of the Lord, that we do not hold back.  Part of how we do this is that we confess our sins and recognize that we in no way deserve all of the good gifts the Lord gives us. “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” We live in the love of the Lord, eternally grateful that He has brought us from the death we deserve to his marvelous and abundant life.

When we practice Confession and Absolution in our worship we are brought from humility to joy by the power of God’s Word, because Jesus lives, we experience the new lease on life of our sins forgiven.  

And when we recognize that we are forgiven, we respond in thanksgiving. In the last year we have continued to learn to sing the psalms.  The Psalms are a great illustration of what it means to respond in thanksgiving for what God has done for us. Listen to the words of Psalm 100:

Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth!  Serve the Lord with gladness!
Come into his presence with singing! ³ Know that the Lord, he is God!
It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

⁴ Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! Give thanks to him;           bless his name! ⁵ For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations.

How good it is to together with God’s people to praise God in our speech and singing and give thanks for his faithfulness to all generations.   Worship is part of what Jesus means when he says, if you love me, you will keep my Commandments. Keeping Jesus’ commandments is best explained in terms of sharing the gospel, the commandment to make disciples of all nations, baptizing and teaching everything he has taught the church.

To love Jesus is to gather for worship and to hand on to the next generation the teachings of our Lord. Caring for the church is to practice love for Jesus. In the summer time there are so many activities that we look forward to and perhaps treasure.  Church attendance goes down as people also travel for vacations or family visits.

Yet the summer time does not need to be a vacation from God’s Word. Instead it is an opportunity to renew daily routines of devotion to God’s Word.  Often the summer can involve more free time and more energy as longer days lighten moods that were darkened by winter. To love Jesus is to ask if not now when? We can recognize the time before us as a time to be daily transformed by the Word.

Jesus talked about keeping his commandments earlier in John 13: ³⁴ A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.

To live in the Lord also means to love others and Jesus loved us.  Loving others is to truly live your own life. If you only care for yourself, you are not living your life to the full, you are living in a closed off existence that makes you also by association closed off from God.

As Martin Luther began to take on more and more responsibilities for the sake of protecting the true proclamation of the gospel, he learned a life lesson about putting his priorities in order in the face of growing demands on his time. He is quoted as saying: “If I fail to spend two hours in prayer each morning, the devil gets the victory through the day. I have so much business I cannot get on without three hours of prayer.”

To the world this does not sound like a winning formula for success in managing a busy schedule. But for Christians, it makes sense to make sure you are aligned with God’s kingdom before starting your labors. How foolish it would be to spend only a few minutes in prayer and not have the right priority to your day, and then spend hours working tirelessly toward things that are against God’s will.

In the same way, when we need to be able to follow our Lord’s teaching “just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”  God’s Word challenges you today to ask, am I living only for myself today, or is my purpose grounded in love for others?  Jesus desires that everyday you remember that you have been baptized into his kingdom, that your old sinful nature can be drowned as you remember your baptism and repent of your sins.

Mothers are known for typically having priorities straight in terms of the care of children. Maternal care passions are a gift of God and part of God’s design in creation.  The selflessness mothers so often demonstrate aligns closely with Jesus’ command to love one another.  

We began reflecting on people who live for competency in their professions and how this can save lives. When we live to serve Jesus, when we live to love others- we can become God’s instruments to save lives not just for a certain number of extra years, but for eternity.  If you were to ask a person who lived as an unbeliever for many years and now has come to know the Lord, think about how thankful this person must be to those who lived to abide in Jesus, who shared the gospel because it is the most important thing in life. Amen.

God’s Word says there are two paths in life: the way of life and the way of death. The way of life is only traveled by faith in Jesus Christ, our Savior. To believe in any other way besides Jesus is to travel the wrong way in life. Jesus is very clear as he says: I am the way  the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. He is very clear: Jesus is the one and only way to the Father.

In contrast the world we live in today says there are many paths you can take in life.  Our society is full of mixed messages that say that you can have it all, you can pursue all kinds of directions in life whether they agree with God’s Word or not. Society says find what is true for you, look out for yourself and you will be fine. There is no longer a respect of the importance of following God’s designs and directions for how to live life.

You might even say that in a world where everything goes, that the world has lost its way. Brothers and sisters in Christ, how do you live your life well in a world that has lost its way? How can you stay on track and not be led astray by how so many around you are living their lives? In our gospel lesson today Jesus teaches us that we know more than we realize about going the right way.

In the setting of John chapter 14, after Jesus speaks to the disciples about the place that he will soon go to prepare for them, he promises that when he goes he will come again to take them to himself. He tells them “you know the way to where I am going.”

The disciples do not understand, they take the phrase “you know the way” literally as if it is road to follow a river to cross and a mountain to climb. The disciples are confused about what Jesus means- yet Jesus still is speaking accurately when he says they know the way to where he is going.  They know the way even though they don’t know that they know the way.

They know the way because they know Jesus.  Jesus has taught them about following him and abiding in him. He has taught them that they are the sheep and he is the Shepherd.  He has taught them that a servant is not greater than his master, if they persecute me they will persecute you.  The disciples have been shown the way that Jesus lays down.

Jesus’ way to the Father is the way of God’s will, which is the way of grace. It is not a way marked by the efforts of the human will and the way of works.  We know what our sinful nature likes to pursue: we are eager to hear about what works we can do in order to be earning a place with the Father. We like to think that we can earn our way to the Father by being pretty good in our hearts.

If you start to think that God has been blessing you for most of your life because you have been serving in the church in different ways for as long as you can remember, then you are relating the blessing you have from God through your actions and your commitments. 

But you probably don’t want to be judged based on your participation in the church, because along with those years of service you would also be judged for those times you envied another person serving at church for their apparent greater success, and all of the times you were distracted in worship, or prideful in exercising offices of leadership in the church- times when you are doing things just as much for your own glory as for God’s glory. 

If you were judged by your actions, you may feel good about yourself for a while as you remember high points of service, but once all of the votes start to come pouring in from the past, the pretty good person eventually loses by a landslide as the completely sinful person, evil in thought word and deed.

To understand this way of salvation we need to understand God the Father’s will. The will of the Father is that all be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth. Jesus came to do the Father’s will, not his own.  The Father’s will is the way of salvation by grace through faith in Christ- the only way of redemption.

Luther spoke about God’s will.  “If we want to feel assured of reaching heaven, we must have a sure way and road to travel, for their can be no more than one right way and road. And such a way is indicated only in God’s Word. Christ the Lord Himself is the only Way and the right road on which our heart can and must rely and depend. Therefore Christ concludes: “He who would be safe and not meet eternal loss and ruin, let him give ear to Me alone.”, and let me impress these words deeply “I am the way.”

Jesus’ way to the Father is the way of humility, the way of suffering on the cross, not the way of pride that thinks it doesn’t need Jesus’ cross.

Our way is the way of pride. It is any way that we follow when we put ourselves forward and lose sight of Jesus. The same thinking that says we’re good enough to earn our way to heaven is the way of pride, keeping some of the credit for my salvation for myself, denying God the credit.

This is the way of the world, where God’s Word is hated and despised because it stands as a stumbling block against all who would put their trust in themselves or put their trust in the innovations of man.

Luther commented how even Christians seeking to follow Jesus can twist things in a way where trust is in man.

“Yet the world will try and rely on any method or any work suggested to it. But there is one thing it cannot do, namely remain on this one safe way with firm and steadfast faith. And though it hears and is told that Christ is the way, it adulterates this message and seeks bypaths and other ways. It does not let Him have the exclusive honor, and it usurps part of this for itself, as though it could contribute something and find the way to heaven by itself.”

The way of humility in putting our trust in Jesus is the way where death to our sinful self gives life.  Jesus led the way  for us, so that we could see that dying to ourselves is to have life in Christ.  

The disciples were troubled at Jesus going the way of death. They wanted a powerful Jesus, not a dying one.  They wanted power and glory of the Father rather than suffering and death for themselves.

We often want our faith to bring us admiration and success rather than rejection and hurt. We strive to figure out how to carve out a place in the world where we can make a name for ourselves and find a way to advance ourselves.  But Jesus tells us that he who seeks to save his life will lose it.

When we say the Apostles Creed or the Nicene Creed we do not recite about how Jesus turned water in to wine, fed the five thousand, stilled the storm, or even that he rose Lazarus from the dead. The miracles Jesus performed are good and important, but it is the way he traveled toward his death on the cross that saved us, that is the most important thing that we recite in the Creeds.

Jesus went the way of the cross to bring life out of death. Jesus’ showing his glory and power was not the means to save us, but instead his suffering, death and resurrection.

By his holy suffering and death we have life and all its benefits. Here and now the Father is providing for all of our needs. We are given the comfort of Christ’s presence when we suffer. Jesus has prepared the mansion that one day awaits us when he comes back.

Christ is the only way to heaven. His life, death, and resurrection have won salvation for sinners. Believing this truth brings life for eternity. Believing this truth we have the way to live- even in a world that has lost its way.   

Have you ever found yourself at the other end of finishing a milestone in life and then asking yourself- now what? I remember the weekend my family came up to visit me to celebrate my graduation from undergraduate college.  It was a unique feeling that the time had come where there were no more classes to take, no more papers to write- nothing I needed to accomplish. After the graduation ceremony was over and my family left town, I said to myself now what?

As a child I always had heard about the goal of going to college, and now it was finished. I recognized my life had changed and I needed to answer the question of ‘now what’.  My way of answering this question was to recognize that there was a lot more learning and reading I felt important to take on. Within a short time I started reading books just for pleasure, to make up for how long I was only doing school related reading.

In our readings today, a lot has changed for the disciples since the events of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection three days later.  What was consistent and predictable in their lives was now much different.  In our reading from Acts we hear from Peter as he explains what has changed since Jesus was crucified.  In our gospel lesson we have an inside account of two followers of Jesus as they are leaving Jerusalem on the road to a town named Emmaus.  In both cases the Lord answers the question of these followers of Jesus, of “Now what.”

Brothers and sisters in Christ since early in March we have been working our way through the season of the church year centered around our Lord’s Passion and the hope we have in his Resurrection. We have attended extra services and we have reflected on all of God’s promises for us. Now we are into the third Sunday of Easter- the excitement of Celebrating Easter is diminished. We have already sung some of the most beloved Easter hymns, only a few Easter Lilies remain adorning our worship space.

Like the disciples we can ask, “Now What?”  Listen to verse 37 of our reading from Acts: “Now when they had heard this they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers what shall we do?”  In repentant faith and even in fear over their own contribution to the cross they asked of the Lord’s Apostle what they can now do.  Peter answers them with a statement of gospel, The Lord it turns out is gracious and merciful and has planned for how people can respond to what Jesus has done for us.  

“Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. ³⁹ For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” 

Indeed the promise is for you!  Jesus atonement on the cross is for all people, and in baptism the promise is available for all.  This is a clear teaching from the Apostle Peter that the Lord designed that the fruits of His resurrection should produce repentance by the work of the Holy Spirit, and that this gift of new life in Jesus should come through the waters of Holy Baptism, the sacrament that brings entrance into God’s Kingdom.

This is the “now what” response of the resurrection of Jesus, this is why we gather for worship throughout life, because the resurrection of Jesus never ceases to be important for us.

In our gospel lesson we have a front row seat of some different now what moments.  Jesus begins to walk with the two disciples who are on their way out of Jerusalem.  Without realizing they are talking to Jesus they share the events of Jesus’ crucifixion from their perspective. After sharing their experiences they lament”  “We had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.”  

As they are walking there on the road telling their sorrows to Jesus, they are broken, deflated, and perhaps trying to transition through stages of grief.  This language the disciple uses suggests a process of letting go- we had hoped. In the disciples eyes death has won, hope has died.

In this state of grief and hopelessness the disciple then shares another unique painful feeling- And on top of that, if that were not enough:  Moreover some women of our company amazed us They were at the tomb early in the morning, ²³and when they did not find his body, they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive.  The feeling the disciples are sharing is the emotional pain of a false hope- something that sounds great but is probably just too good to be true.  

This is astonishing for us as the church to listen to. These two disciples walking with Jesus, yet not recognizing Jesus are sharing with Jesus that the worst part of all is not just that their hopes were crushed as the man who they thought was the Savior was forsaken to die at the hands of their own chief priests and rulers,

but that the body of Jesus turned up missing, and that the women reported a vision from angels that Jesus was in fact alive. They are saying that the worst of it all was the false hope spread by tales of his resurrection, and yet here they are, no Jesus in sight. They say to Jesus.

In mercy Jesus rebukes their skepticism and unbelief and thereby cuts down the scales from their eyes so that they can see him. O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! ²⁶Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” 

 The reason these two disciples were so quick to skepticism is that they were attempting to understand the events of Holy Week only through their own eyes and through their feelings. They were lost as it were in their own depression and unbelief. They were not allowing Jesus’ own words to guide their sight. They forgot what Jesus had spoken to the disciples about how he would die and on the third day rise again. And they overlooked all of what the scripture said about the promise of a Savior who would innocently suffer for the wrongs we had committed. Isaiah had prophesied:

Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;  yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. ⁵ But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.

They had missed it, but Jesus opened their eyes to hear God’s Word rightly: ²⁷And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.  The church in her history has long marveled at what Jesus taught to these two disciples. Yet we do have the outline for what Jesus taught them, as the New Testament makes many references to how the Torah and the prophets pointed to Jesus. 

We only need to take the time to receive the Word and allow it to open our eyes to understanding how Jesus is the fulfillment of all of the scriptures. The more we hear God’s Word, the more our passion for knowing Jesus in the scriptures grows. It is just as the two disciples said, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked with us on the road, while he opened the scriptures to us.”

The more we walk with Jesus, the more we confess our sins and know his forgiveness in the Lord’s Supper, the stronger our passion to receive His Gifts in Word and Sacrament.

When the two Emmaus disciples say, did not our hearts burn within us, they are describing a discovery of divine truth that is awakening their very hearts, a truth that is reconnecting them with the clarity and joy of purpose that is part of the image of God that Adam and Eve held before the Fall into sin.  Jesus came to give us the truth, to give us life to the full.

 Satan, the world and our sinful nature can entice us away from this passion.  So that our sin leads us away from the excitement of God’s Word and into second choices that represent settling for less and which cannot produce the same lasting joy and peace.

Here in this third Sunday of Easter, God’s Word invites us to see that the Resurrection of Jesus answers every “now what” period in our lives.  As our Psalm of the day teaches: Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; our God is merciful. ⁶ The Lord preserves the simple;
when I was brought low, he saved me. Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you. ⁸ For you have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling; ⁹ I will walk before the Lord  in the land of the living.

Christ’s resurrection indeed means that at any time of crisis in life you can say, “I will walk before the LORD in the land of the living.”  And it means that you have a specific purpose to your life in worship: What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits to me? ¹³ I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord,
¹⁴ I will pay my vows to the Lord  in the presence of all his people.