1/20/13 - Epiphany 3 - Nehemiah 8:1-10

YOU NEED IT

Eight Straight Days

            Eight straight days.  For eight straight days God’s Old Testament people gathered around the Word of God.  And for hours on end they listened to those words and they worshiped with those words and they even cried over those words.  Why?  Because they hadn’t heard those words in a long, long time.  And they needed those words.  They needed them more than they had ever known. 

            These people were in Jerusalem for these eight days: a city that was surrounded by brand new walls, a city whose governor at the time was a man named Nehemiah, a city whose high priest was a man named Ezra.  140 years before, the Babylonian armies had come in, knocked down the walls of the city, burned down the temple of the Lord, and deported the people of Israel to another country.  But the grandchildren and great grandchildren of these people were back, the temple had been rebuilt, and the walls had just now been reconstructed a century and a half later.  And they Israelites were overjoyed!  Their capital city was finally intact once again and now they could start to become the nation they once had been!  And to celebrate this event, God’s people observed one of the three main festivals of Old Testament worship life: the Feast of Tabernacles. 

            The Feast of Tabernacles was an eight day celebration during which the people lived in tents and lean-tos made out of leaves and branches.  That’s what “tabernacle” means: it means “tent.”  And they did this so that they would remember how their ancestors had lived in tents and lean-tos when they had come out of the land of Egypt centuries and centuries before.  For the first seven days they were supposed to live like this, but then on the final day of this festival they were to gather together in a grand celebration, praising the Lord for what he had given them.  And so during the time Nehemiah on the first day of this festival for the first time in 1000 years, this is what happened: “All the people assembled as one man in the square before the Water Gate. They told Ezra the scribe to bring out the Book of the Law of Moses, which the LORD had commanded for Israel.  So on the first day of the seventh month Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, which was made up of men and women and all who were able to understand.  He read it aloud from daybreak till noon as he faced the square before the Water Gate in the presence of the men, women and others who could understand. And all the people listened attentively to the Book of the Law.”

            Did you notice how long they listened to God’s Word being read?  From daybreak until noon!  For six hours the people stood there outside listening to Ezra read from the Bible!  But that wasn’t the last time they listened to God’s Word during this festival.  The story continues later on saying, “Day after day, from the first day to the last, Ezra read from the Book of the Law of God” (v.18).  They listened to God’s Word for eight straight days!  But even more impressive than the time they spent listening to the Word of God is the fact that they wanted to!  They weren’t forced to listen to God’s Word.  They weren’t required to listen to God’s Word.  They were the ones who asked that it be read!  “They told Ezra the scribe to bring out the Book of the Law of Moses.”  It wasn’t Ezra’s idea; it was their idea!  And so for six hours on the first day and then day after day throughout the festival, the people listened attentively to the Word of God.  They couldn’t get enough of it!  They wanted more!  They needed more. 

We Can’t Find the Time

            In my office upstairs I have at least nine Bibles of various translations in various languages.  In the conference room upstairs there are about 25 more.  In our house there are probably another ten Bibles - kid and adult - lying around.  And you undoubtedly have a few in your home too, don’t you?  And on top of all that, we can get the Bible on the internet instantly.  Dozens of different English translations in a split second.  And if you have a Kindle or a Nook or an ipad or any other hand held device, you can get free Bibles in a couple seconds that you carry around in your pocket.  We have access to God’s Word at any time of day in any place.  So have often do you take advantage of that?  How often do you actually read and listen to God’s Word that is right there at your fingertips?  The Israelites during the time of Nehemiah didn’t have instant access to the Word of God.  But they craved it!  They wanted it!  They needed it!  And when they got it they couldn’t get enough of it!  Do you crave God’s Word?  Do you want it so badly that you would stand outside for hours just to hear it?  Do you need it so much that you would take an eight day vacation just to be around it?  Or don’t you need it that much at all?

            There are some nights when I’m exhausted from the day’s work.  And when it comes time for me to read my Bible on my own for my own personal benefit, sometimes I convince myself that I don’t really “need” to read it right now, what I really “need” is sleep.  And so I crawl into bed and leave God’s Word unopened.  And then there are other times when I really need to spend more time digging deeper into God’s Word to make sure that I understand it correctly, but then I tell myself that what I really “need” is to get these other things done and God’s Word can wait.  And there are still other times when I get so busy with the details of this life - those projects that I “need” to get done and those deadlines that I “need” to meet and those people that I “need” to see and those activities that I “need” to do - that reading and listening to God’s Word doesn’t even cross my mind as something that I “need” at all.

            Do you feel the “need” to read your Bible every day or is it something that you can easily let slip by?  Do you feel that you really “need” to go to Bible study today after our worship service or do you have more important things that you “need” to get done?  Do you think that you really “need” to show up to a worship service every single week or do you have other “needs” that far outweigh the spoken Word of God in this building? 

            For thousands of years God himself spoke through Christian men to produce the Bible that we have today.  And for thousands of years more God himself has worked to preserve that Word in pristine condition so that generation after generation can hear and read and learn and know of his love.  Our God has hand-crafted a five course meal for us that he has laid out in the words of the Bible available any time we want it.  Do we crave that food?  Do we want that food and need that food?  Or do we pick at it?  Do we eat that feast on our plates like we are starving to death or do we treat it like a little child might treat the food his mother worked so hard to prepare?  “I’m not hungry.” 

            Our Lord has worked hard to prepare his Word for us.  In fact, he died in the process.  And so it does not make him too happy when we act like we don’t need that food at all and we let it just sit there with an “I’m not all that hungry” kind of attitude.  In fact, after a while, the Lord tends to take that food away if all people do is pick at it.  He took it away from his own Old Testament people a number of times.  And if he takes away his Word, how can faith be fed?  And if faith cannot be fed, how can faith survive?  And if faith in your Savior cannot survive, how can you expect to end up in heaven?

What We Really Need

            Then Nehemiah the governor, Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who were instructing the people said to them all, “This day is sacred to the LORD your God. Do not mourn or weep.” For all the people had been weeping as they listened to the words of the Law.  Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is sacred to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.”

            Why do you think the people were weeping as they heard the words of the Law of Moses being read?  The people were crying because they realized how bad they had been, how many commands they had broken, and how often they had sinned against their Lord.  But Nehemiah said, “No!  Don’t cry!  This is not a day of sadness but a day of happiness!  God’s Word is once again being read and you, God’s people, are once again hearing it!  Do not be sad; the joy of the Lord is your strength!”  The joy of the Lord was their strength.  He was happy with them, not angry.  He was thrilled that they were listening to his Word, not frustrated.  And he forgave them.  He forgave them for the years of neglect and the decades of selfishness and the generations and generations of rebellion.  He forgave them for everything.  And that’s also what they heard being read.  Since Ezra was reading from the book of the law of Moses - the first five books of the Bible - the people not only would have heard commands, they would have also heard about the special Prophet who was to come from their own people many years later.  They would have heard about all of the sacrifices that were daily announcements of the sacrifice of their Savior yet to come.  They would have heard about the promise given to Abraham that through his Descendant all nations on earth would be blessed.  They would have heard about how God preserved the line of the Savior throughout the centuries, how God directed everything in this world to set up the coming of the Messiah, and how he had promised the Savior to the very first human beings on this earth, Adam and Eve.  The Israelites would have heard a lot about their Savior in those first five books of the Bible.  And that’s exactly what they needed to hear.

            That’s exactly what we need to hear.  We need to hear those hundreds of prophecies in the Old Testament about Jesus coming into this world.  We need to hear about the stories of Jesus himself: his birth, his miracles, his teachings, his healing, his thoughts, his attitudes, his emotions, his passion.  We need to hear about Jesus’ life: what he did, what he went through, what he suffered, what he accomplished.  We need to hear about his love for us and his compassion for us and his sacrifice for us.  We need to hear about his resurrection from the dead and his ascension into heaven.  We need to hear about his rule and his authority and his guarantee.  We need to hear all of that.  And we need to hear it all the time.  Which is why when you come to a worship service, we repeat the same truths week in and week out.  There aren’t a lot of new things you learn in a worship service because it is the same forgiveness and the same salvation and same eternal life that you’ve heard before.  But we need to hear it again.  We need to be comforted by it again.

       
So Many Opportunities

            But don’t just wait to hear it here on a Sunday morning.  You have that opportunity every day when you open up your own Bible at home.  You have that opportunity multiple times a week in a number of Bible classes here at church.  You’ll have the opportunity on Wednesday evenings starting next month during the season of Lent.  You have an unique opportunity this morning once again as we gather together for the Lord’s Supper.  Because here at the altar we receive our Savior’s love, his body, his blood, and his victory once again.  Here at the altar we receive the real forgiveness of sins, the same forgiveness he won on Calvary, given to us in tangible form.   That’s why the Lord’s Supper is the third “Mark of the Church.”  The gospel in Word, the gospel in baptism, the gospel in the Lord’s Supper. 

            So eat it up!  All of it.  Here in the Lord’s Supper, here from the pulpit, here in a Bible study, there in your own Bibles at home.  Because that is what you need!  You don’t need much of anything in this life.  A little food, a little water, a little shelter… but most importantly, you need God’s Word.  That is the only way your faith in your Savior grows and builds and strengthens.  That is the only connection with Christ you have.  That is the only means through which you are saved.  You need it.  You need it.  I need it.  And we actually have it.  A five course feast prepared by God himself.  Don’t let it go to waste.

            Amen.

1/13/13 - Epiphany 2 - Ephesians 3:14-21

FAITH GOES BEYOND KNOWLEDGE

A World That Breeds Skepticism

            1 out of every 5 retirees over the age of 65 in this country has been a victim of a financial scam...  Since 1968, when the International Olympic Committee started drug testing regularly, 139 athletes have been caught using performance enhancing drugs during the Olympic Games and have been stripped of their medals...  In 2010 a human resources association found that over 53% of people lie on their résumés...  No wonder we grow up to be suspicious!  People lie, people cheat, people deceive, and sometimes people are just plain wrong.  And so we’ve learned over the years to be skeptical and wary about what we read or hear.  And now we’re just used to it.  When you use a credit card at the store the clerk might ask to see your ID just to make sure that your name matches the one on the credit card - and we think nothing of it.  When you read something in the newspaper you might do some research of your own to make sure they got the facts right.  When you get advice from a doctor it is not out of the ordinary to get a second or even a third opinion.  Because even when someone has good intentions, they are not always correct.  And so it pays to be skeptical in this world.  It’s worth the extra time and effort to check things out a little more in depth than simply taking someone’s word for it.

            We want proof, don’t we?  We want clear information laid out in front of us that supports what we have heard or seen or experienced.  And if, by our investigation, we find that something doesn’t quite add up or something is out of line or something is missing, we immediately refuse to believe what someone else has claimed because our intelligence and our knowledge and our research have led us to a different conclusion.

We Submit God’s Word to Logical Tests

            And that’s a healthy practice.  It’s God-pleasing to use the abilities and the resources and the common sense our Lord has given us to evaluate things in this world.  We run into problems, though, when we apply that same kind of thinking to the Bible.  We get into trouble when we take God’s Word through a variety of logical tests, when we compare what God’s Word says with our intelligence and our knowledge and our experience.  Because when something doesn’t quite add up or when something is out of line or when something is missing, we have difficulty buying into what God clearly says.

            Let’s use a few examples: Jesus says in the Bible that he is with us to the very end of the age.  And we have read that and we have heard that and we want to believe that.  But there are times when it seems like Jesus is nowhere around.  And our observation is: “I’m alone!  There is no one here to help me.  There is no one here to support me.  There is no one here to back me up.  I am completely on my own.  There is no doubt about it!”  Our knowledge is contending with the clear words of God.  They contradict each other and one of them will have to win.  Which one will it be?

            God also says in his Word that we are to pray to him and that he listens to our prayers.  But then we pray and we pray and we pray for something and nothing happens.  So our experience says: “Prayer doesn’t work!  There’s really no need to keep on praying if the Lord isn’t going to answer me!”  Our experience is contending with the clear words of God.  They contradict each other and one of them will have to win.  Which one will it be?

            God says in his Word that he loves us and that he works everything out for our good because he loves us.  But then we think back to all of those horrible experiences that we have gone through and we can’t think of one good thing that resulted from them.  And then we have to go through another terrible experience in the future, and every single part of it seems to be bad as well.  And our intelligence says: “God’s promises don’t add up!  If God really did love me, if God really did make sure that all things would work out for my good, then why are these things happening to me?  What doesn’t he prevent them from happening?  Why doesn’t he stop them from happening?  I can’t see how a loving God would permit these awful things to happen to someone he supposedly cares about!”  And our intelligence contends with the clear words of God.  They contradict each other and one of them will have to win.  Which one will it be?

            Unfortunately, it is our intelligence or our experience or our knowledge that sometimes wins out, don’t they?  Because God’s Word doesn’t makes sense or it doesn’t seem right or it doesn’t add up and we become frustrated with the Lord and start to doubt whether or not these things are really true at all.  And in the end we actually end up trusting our minimal intelligence over the unfathomable intelligence of the almighty God!  We actually end trusting our few decades of experience over the few thousand years of experience of the eternal God!  We actually end up trusting our pitifully small bank of knowledge over the inexhaustible knowledge of the all-knowing God!  Now that doesn’t make sense!  Why would we ever put stock into what we think over and above what God knows?  Because we are that sinful.  We are that corrupt.  We are that arrogant as to think God’s will and God’s plans have to match up exactly with what we expect to happen, and if they don’t, well then God must be wrong.  Because we certainly can’t be wrong!  We certainly are never mistaken!  It must be God who is at fault!  It must be the Lord who doesn’t really know what he’s doing!

       
Faith Goes Beyond Knowledge

            As the apostle Paul wrote his letter to a congregation in the city of Ephesus, he knew that their intelligence and their experience and their knowledge would be in sharp disagreement with God’s Word, just like ours is still today.  And so when he prays for them in this letter, he doesn’t pray that their intelligence would increase or that they would be able to learn from their experiences or that their knowledge of earthly things would be built up over time.  Instead Paul prays for their faith through the power of the Holy Spirit.  “I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.”  Paul prays this prayer because faith trumps intelligence; faith overrules experience, and faith goes beyond knowledge. 

            Intelligence says: “It doesn’t make sense!”  But faith, worked by the power of Holy Spirit through the Word of God, says “It doesn’t have to.”  Experience says: “That has not proved to be true in the past!”  Faith, worked by the power of Holy Spirit through the Word of God, says “It is true nevertheless.”  Knowledge says, “There is not enough proof!  There is not enough evidence!  There is not enough support to substantiate these claims!”  Faith, worked by the power of Holy Spirit through the Word of God, says “I don’t need proof.  I don’t need evidence.  I don’t need anything else to substantiate God’s claims other than God’s Word.”  Faith is knowing that something is true even though you cannot see it, even though you cannot explain it, even though you cannot fully understand it, and even though you cannot logically figure it out.  Faith takes God at his Word even when everything else is screaming at you not to. 

            But faith isn’t a feeling.  And it’s not an opinion either.  Faith is a belief based on fact.  The facts are found in God’s Word.  And the faith to believe those facts is worked in our hearts through that same Word.  And so when your intelligence says to you, “It doesn’t make sense that God would forgive you; why would he bother with someone like you?”  Your faith can say, “He forgives me anyway because he says he does through Jesus’ death on the cross.”  And when your experience says, “It doesn’t seem like the Lord has loved you in the past after all that he’s put you through…”  Your faith can say, “I know that he loves me because that is what he has promised me in the Bible.”  And when your knowledge says, “Maybe this whole Christianity thing is just a hoax.  Maybe you aren’t going to go to heaven because heaven isn’t really there.  Maybe you’ve been tricked to believe in this Jesus like so many people are tricked to buy into a lot of things nowadays.”  Your faith can say, “I know Jesus is real.  I know he is both true God and true man.  I know that he lived on this earth as a perfect human being, died in my place, and rose from the grave to solidify his victory.  And I know that I will end up in heaven because God himself has guaranteed in his Word that whoever believes in Jesus will be saved.”  Intelligence is relative.  Experience can be interpreted different ways.  Knowledge is sometimes wrong.  But faith is strong, not because you are strong, but because the one in whom faith believes is strong.  Faith is confident, not because you are confident in yourself all the time, but because the words in which faith believes are trustworthy.  Faith is sure, not because you are always so stable, but because the love of God on which faith leans never fails.

         
Faith Believes How Wide, Long, High, and Deep Christ’s Love Is

            “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge.”  This is Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians and it’s his prayer for us: that we would grasp this love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.  And Faith is really the only thing that could grasp the love of Christ, isn’t it?  Your intelligence laughs at Christ’s love!  Your experience scoffs at Christ’s love!  Your knowledge instantly dismisses Christ’s love!  But your faith “grasps” Christ’s love like nothing else can.  Only the faith that the Lord has given me could believe that no matter how wide I have opened myself up to the temptations of this world, Christ’s love is wider.  Only faith could believe that no matter how long my rap sheet of sins grows every day, Christ’s love is longer.  Only faith could believe that no matter how high I have built my tower of arrogance and disregard for God’s Word, Christ’s love is higher.  Only faith could possibly believe that no matter how deep I’ve dug that hole for myself over the years, Christ’s love is deeper.  Christ’s love is deeper, higher, longer, and wider than any sin of any sinful person on this earth.  And I believe that.  Not because it makes sense to my intelligence, not because it lines up with past experience, not because it satisfies my knowledge.  I believe that but because the Holy Spirit has worked faith in my heart through the Word of God.  “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ” for you too.

            In this world of skeptics and scoffers, in the world of liars and cheaters, in this world of uncertainties and inconsistencies, faith in the Word of God is a powerful thing, isn’t it?  But that faith that you now have in your Savior is not because you chose to believe.  Your intelligence and experience and knowledge wouldn’t choose Jesus.  It wasn’t even because you wanted to believe.  Your intelligence and experience and knowledge want nothing to do with Christ.  You have faith right now because God wanted you to believe and through his Word he convinced your heart that, despite everything else, what he has done and what he has said and what he has promised is true.  That is a powerful Word of God to convince you of that!  And thanks to the Holy Spirit that is a powerful faith that now rests in your hearts.  It is your most precious gift.  It is your most prized possession.  Because through it your Lord will take you home.

            Amen.

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”  - Eph. 3:20-21

1/6/13 - Baptism of the Lord - Titus 3:3-7

WASHED CLEAN

Clean-Up at Birth

            If you have ever given birth to a child or if you have ever witnessed this amazing act of God’s grace, you know that a child does not come out very clean.  That newborn infant is not fit to be held and coddled the second it is delivered because gunk needs to be sucked out of the nose, crud has to be cleaned off the body, and a blanket needs to be wrapped around that little human being for warmth and protection and comfort.  Only after the child has been washed and wiped off and wrapped up is that tiny boy or girl given back to the mother or father to be held.

            And that’s true for any and every child, isn’t it?  No matter who the child is or who that child will grow up to be, no matter who the parents are or how cute they think their child is, no matter where the baby is delivered or what cultural traditions surround its birth, every child comes out dirty.  Helplessly dirty.  It cannot wash itself; it cannot wipe itself clean; it cannot wrap itself up.  Someone else has to do those things for this little child before it is cradled in the arms its loving parents.

We Needed Cleaning

            The Bible describes us in a very similar way: We are born dirty.  In fact, the moment we came into existence inside the wombs of our mothers, we were spiritually filthy.  “Surely I was a sinner from at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me,” King David says in Psalm 51.  We are covered in the awful and disgusting effects of sin the instant our hearts start to beat.  And it is a filth that we cannot get rid of ourselves.  We cannot wash ourselves off; we cannot wipe ourselves clean; we cannot wrap ourselves up.  We are helplessly dirty just like a newborn infant seconds out of the womb. 

            But it’s not just a surface problem like it is at a physical birth.  The grime of our instant imperfections and the sludge of our natural rebellious attitude and the slime of our inbred selfishness isn’t just something on the outside that can easily be cleaned off.  It’s on the inside.  It’s intertwined with the very nature of who we are.  It infects us and injects us with the bad and the wrong and the evil that spill out of us every day.  And we can see the effects of that all the time, can’t we?  The moment a baby is born, what does it do?  It screams and cries.  And if not right away, then soon after.  Why?  Because it is cold or hungry or tired or bored.  But does the baby care if the mother is exhausted?  Does the baby care if the father is preoccupied?  Does the baby care if it is inconvenient for everyone else?  No!  The baby wants something and that baby wants it now.  “But a baby doesn’t know any better!” someone might argue.  That’s exactly right: a baby doesn’t know any better.  All a baby knows is “Me, me, me.  I want it right now.  I don’t care about anything or anyone else.  Make me happy.”  A baby truly doesn’t know any better than complete selfishness because it is dirty from the inside out.

            Or watch a pair of two year olds fight over one toy while 50 other toys lie in the same room.  Watch a four year old steal a cookie.  Watch a six year old instinctually tell a lie to stay out of trouble.  Watch an eight year old get jealous of her mother’s love.  Watch a ten year old try to cheat in school.  Watch a twelve year old hate someone else.  Watch a fourteen year old bad mouth someone behind their back.  Do we have to go on?  Because no one has to teach children to do these bad things, do they?  They just naturally do those things.  Have you ever noticed how it’s so easy to be bad but so difficult to be good?  There’s a reason for that.  Everyone is dirty from the inside out.  And that includes us still today.

            Don’t we still fight and deceive and lie and get jealous and cheat and hate and gossip?  It might not be so obvious now that we’re a little older, but that’s because we’ve gotten so good at hiding it over the years!  We are able to cover it up and screen it from sight and brush it under the rug a lot better now than back then!  But nothing has really changed.  “At one time we too were foolish,” Paul once wrote to a man named Titus.  “[We were] disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another.”  Nothing has changed.  Human beings have always naturally been this way from the time Adam and Eve had their first child.  Because their sin was inherited by their children and their children after that and their children after that.  Which is why we were born dirty.  We were conceived filthy.  There are no exceptions.

A Washing of Rebirth & Renewal

            “But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior.” 

            There is no doubt that we were born dirty.  But because Go was also our loving Father, he reached down, washed us off, wiped us clean, and wrapped us up.  He saved us, but not because we were so good, because of his mercy.  “He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.” 

            The word “washing” in this verse is only used twice in the entire New Testament: here and in Ephesians chapter 5.  In the book of Ephesians Paul writes, “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the Word” (5:25-26).  Christ cleansed us by the washing with water through the Word; and here in Titus, God saves us through the washing of rebirth and renewal.  Both passages are referring to the power and the importance of baptism.  It is a washing, not of the outside but of the inside.  It is cleansing, not from dirt but from sin.  It is a renewal, not in a feeling of refreshment but an actual rebirth.  Those who are baptized are “born again” in a very real way by the power of the Holy Spirit!  The first birth was a birth into this world covered in sin.  The second birth is a birth into God’s family: washed off in Jesus’ blood, wiped clean with Jesus’ burial clothes, and wrapped up in the same robe of righteousness that Jesus now wears.  Because baptism cannot work if it is not connected to Christ.

            Notice that Paul explains that to Titus right here in these verses: “He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior.”  Baptism is simply a way in which our Lord connects us with Christ and his cross, his death and his sacrifice, his resurrection and his ascension.  Baptism is not something we are doing; baptism is one way through which God gives us what Jesus has already done.  That’s how he can save us through baptism.  Not by baptism or because of baptism, but through baptism.  Baptism is not a cause of our salvation; Jesus is.  Baptism is nothing more than one of the delivery methods God uses to give that very same salvation to us. 

            My parents bought a camera for us for Christmas.  Unfortunately, when we opened the camera box on Christmas morning, the camera was not in the camera box.  The cords were there and the software was there… everything but the camera.  And so the next day my parents went down to the store they had bought it from and the owners immediately gave them the camera without any hassle.  But my parents live in Ohio.  And so although the mix up had been fixed and although the camera was technically our gift, we didn’t have it.  My parents had to get it to us somehow.  And so they had three options: mail it, delivery it personally, or send it with someone else.  Fortunately, my youngest brother and his family were just over there for Christmas and we were going to see my brother’s family this past week.  And so my parents sent the camera back with them and we picked it up a few days ago.  Technically, the camera had been ours from the moment they bought it, but we could not benefit from it until it was delivered.

            The forgiveness that the Lord has won for us on the cross was technically ours the moment he died.  But we could not benefit from it until it was delivered.  God has decided to deliver that forgiveness to us through three different delivery methods: God’s written Word, God’s Word connected with the water of baptism, and God’s Word connected with the Lord’s Supper.  He gives us that same forgiveness earned by Jesus in those three different ways.  Not a different cause of salvation; the same salvation distributed in three unique methods.  That’s why these are the marks of the Church.  Where Jesus’ forgiveness is distributed correctly, that is where the Capital “C” Church is: a gathering of believers.

            And so think of how important baptism is for an infant.  An infant cannot understand the spoken Word of God yet; an infant cannot examine him/herself as Scripture requires in order to take the Lord’s Supper yet; but God promises forgiveness, the gift of faith, and salvation in baptism.  And so when that infant is brought up here to the font and water is poured on that child with the words “I baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” the forgiveness that Jesus won up there [on the cross] is delivered to that child right down there [in baptism].  And that infant once born in dirt and slime and sludge is now washed and wiped and wrapped.  And the Father cradles them in his arms as his own dear child and loves them with a love deeper than they have ever experienced before.  And that promise is true for anyone.  Whether that person is a child or a full grown adult, the promises of baptism are still the same.  The washing is the same.  The cleansing is the same.  The renewal and the rebirth are the same.  Baptism is an incredible gift of God for any and everyone.  No exceptions.

Keep Going Back to the Waters

            Immediately after every single one of us was physically born into this world, we were washed and wiped and wrapped.  But I know that was not the last time you washed dirt off of your body or wiped yourself clean, was it?  Because no matter how hard we might try, we get dirty again and we get covered in germs again: whether by our own fault or just because of the world in which we live.  Washing and wiping and cleaning is a constant cycle in everyone’s life.  But you don’t use a different kind of water than what was used to clean you after you were born, do you?  You wash yourself with the same basic plain water that you were washed with the very first time.  And you don’t attempt become cleaner than you were back then, you just want to stay clean.

            The same holds true for baptism.  At your baptism you were washed and wiped and cleaned in that water attached to God’s specific words and promises.  And although those promises from your Lord will never fail, as you go about your life you will inevitably get dirty again.  And so it is important to stay clean by going back to the washing of your baptism.  You don’t need to be rebaptized time and time again just like you don’t need to have a post-birth cleansing time and time again; but you do need to use the same kind of washing.  Because how were you washed in baptism?  You were washed in your baptism by the power of the Holy Spirit through God’s Word about Jesus.  You must go back to the cleansing power of God’s Word.  You must be constantly dipped in the flood waters of forgiveness and the crystal clear waves of your salvation found in the Bible.  This is a way that the Holy Spirit has a chance to preserve that washing that he gave you at the font, that precious gift given to you out of the mercy of the Lord.

             Baptism is a precious gift.  It is an act of God’s grace for the sake of sinners.  It is a spiritual cleansing.  It is a delivery method of the purifying blood of the cross.  It is a “washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior.”  Praise your God for this precious gift.  And continue to give him every chance to preserve that gift through the same pure waters of his Word.

            Amen.

“You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Spirit of our God.”  1 Cor. 6:11