Archives: Sermons

8-21-22 Trinity 10

August 21, 2022
When we think of Palm Sunday, we usually think of a joyful occasion with the crowds waving branches and praising Jesus. But as today’s reading notes, while Jesus was sitting on the donkey surrounded by the joyful crowds, he wept. He wept when the procession drew near to Jerusalem and he saw the city. And he wept because he foresaw its utter destruction. When we think of Palm Sunday, we usually think of the children…

8-14-22 Trinity 9

August 14, 2022
Make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous money, so that when it fails they may receive you into eternal homes. Jesus is provoking us with this parable. He points to the zeal and the shrewdness of the heathen, what they will do, how they will use money, to reach their goals, and asks why do you My disciples lag behind? Yes, it’s true that the sons of this world are more shrewd in this…

8-7-22 Trinity 8

August 7, 2022
The wolf disguises himself as a sheep, Jesus says, but there is one thing a wolf can’t disguise, and that’s his voice. Wolves howl. They don’t know how to bleat. The false prophet, the sham teacher, can look the part, can where the right clothes, smile the right smile, earn the right degrees and have the right credentials, but you’ll know him by what he says. A good tree produces good fruit. And a bad…

7-31-22 Trinity 7

July 31, 2022
Jesus is in Gentile lands when He feeds the four thousand. It’s a deserted place south of the Sea of Galilee, barren because it’s summertime, and in that part of the world nothing grows in the summer. There’s no rain and it’s too hot for anything to grow – it’s like Wyoming in July. When Jesus fed the five thousand you might remember that there was a lot of green grass in that place. Nothing…

7-24-22 Feast of St. James the Elder

July 24, 2022
Today we celebrate the feast of St. James the Elder, Apostle of our Lord. Now it’s been a little while since we’ve commemorated one of the saints, so it’s worth noting first of all why we do so. The Lutheran Reformers explained this well in The Apology of the Augsburg Confession in the Book of Concord: “Our confession approves honoring the saints in three ways. The first is thanksgiving. We should thank God because He…

7-3-22 Trinity 3

July 3, 2022
God is happy when sinners repent and so we should be happy too. Jesus’ picture of repentance is being lost to God and then being found by God. The shepherd leaves the ninety-nine in the wilderness and seeks out the one lost sheep. And this is the most natural thing in the world to us, this instinct to seek something precious to us that has been lost to us. God has implanted it in our…

6-26-22 Trinity 2

June 26, 2022
The world is a dangerous place, but it’s easy to misunderstand where the true danger lies. It’s easy, for instance, to see danger in sickness. When you’re sick, you can feel malfunction in your body and you realize how frail man’s life is. It’s easy to see danger in the rage of unbelievers as they push for communism, as they push for an abortion clinic, as they push against a court that has angered them,…

6-19-22 Trinity 1

June 19, 2022
Abraham was a very rich man. But he didn’t trust in his riches, he didn’t love them. When he and his nephew Lot had too much, so many animals that the land couldn’t hold them all, Abraham told Lot to take the better land and Abraham moved to the not so good land. Who cares? Money isn’t worth fighting over. It’s not worth destroying a relationship with family. God will provide. It would be better…

6-12-22 Holy Trinity

June 12, 2022
We don’t know who wrote the Athanasian Creed. Athanasius didn’t. Someone wrote it in the fifth century and named it after Athanasius. Athanasius lived a good hundred years earlier. He was the great defender of the truth that Jesus is really and truly God, of the same nature as His Father, eternal, begotten, not made. Athanasius was on and off again pastor or bishop in Alexandria, Egypt, which was at the time the second largest…

6-5-22 Pentecost

June 5, 2022
The Holy Spirit’s joy is to bring Jesus’ words to the whole world. That’s very clearly what the Lord Jesus Himself says and very clearly what the Holy Spirit does on Pentecost. The scene, the reality we confront before Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection is the outrageously privileged place of the disciples. To the disciples alone the body and blood of Jesus were first given. Jesus is always with them, always speaking to them, telling them…
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