New Year's Eve sermon 12/31/10

New Year’s Eve Sermon
12/31/10
Text Psalm 63:1 & Psalm 71:5
Title: New Year’s Eve Resolution All Christians should make.

Do you ever get a tune or song in your mind and you can't get rid of it? It happened to me when my family went to Disney World in Florida. We stood in line for, if I remember right an hour and half to ride the “It’s a small world” ride. Unknown to me that song was sung nonstop throughout the ride. Those words stuck in my mind for years. It was like listening to a broken record. Just telling you about my experience brings back the tune.

Sometimes a verse from the Bible does that. Some phrase from my daily reading just lodges in my mind and for days, even weeks I find myself reflecting on it. The more you read and study the Bible, the more common this experience. Unlike “It is a small world”, a tune you want to get out of your head you don't want to get rid of God’s Word. In fact, unlike “It is a small world” you find it of great comfort and guidance. God, you see, has a way, as we study the Word, of putting those verses, those truths we most need right there into our hearts and minds, ready to be used when we need them.

Here is one of the verses. It is from Psalm 63:1, "O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water."

What does that mean for me and you this coming New Year? It means that we are seek God’s will in our life and encourage others to do the same. What greater tragedy is there than to try to go through life without knowing God? We can make a lot of friends, have many companions in our days, but none so important or meaningful than God.

Our greatest need is God! Without a meaningful relationship with God, you can never be truly happy. As St. Augustine said, "Lord, you made us for yourself, and we can never know rest until we rest in thee." Count on this. You can have everything your heart has ever desired, but without God, you will always feel empty and unfulfilled.

To live a life not centered on God is like taking a CD or record that has a hole bored just off center. You try and play it and what happens? At the very least it sounds terrible. At the worst it will not even play. But play a CD or record with the hole perfectly centered and what do you have; beautiful music. That is the way it is with placing God in the center of your life; life is enjoyed to its fullest even those times when your life appears to be in the dumpster.

I confess that I have often made decisions without asking God's guidance. Sometimes I've started some new venture without even thinking about God! You know what I have discovered through the years? Most of these didn't work out so well. Some were real disasters.

You say, “God gave me a brain. I don’t have to ask God every time I make a decision.” I would agree with you except for the part of bringing God’s will into the decision. It is not that you stop and pray over every little detail of your life, but that you life is a life of prayer. After all we are Christians! We proclaim, "Jesus is Lord!" If he is Lord, then we should be constantly turning to him for direction and guidance in everything. We live to serve others thus honoring him.

This seeking of God’s will is not just for the major decisions, but every decision, no matter how large or small. Not one of them is unimportant to God, for God cares and wants to be involved in every part of our lives.

Do you remember when your children were little. As soon as they were old enough to get out of bed on their own I bet they came into your bedroom to snuggle with you before the day started. They needed to know that you were there for them; that you loved and cared for them.

As children of God what better thing to do first thing in the morning than to check in with God every morning by studying his Word and talking to him in prayer. Snuggling up to God is a great way to begin the day. As much as I like my morning coffee, the "best part of waking up" is not Folgers’s in my cup," but God in my heart, on my mind.

This gets the day off right, it focuses us on the right things, the most important priorities. Best of all it gives us a sense of God's presence throughout the day. When we know God is with us, we are then better able to face whatever the day may bring.

My prayer for you this New Year is that each day you would find yourself with a greater desire to seek God in the morning. Starting tomorrow seek the will of God in all you do, for there is nothing better for you or myself this New Year than a ever deepening sense of the presence of God in our lives. Lord, early will we seek You! Let us never tire of doing that!

Amen.

1 Sunday after Christmas 12/26/10

1st Sunday after Christmas
12/26/10
Text: Matthew 2:13-23
Title: The Plan

It just seems like yesterday that we came together to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Wait, it was yesterday, and yet today we are looking at an event that takes place when Jesus is about 2 years old. What happened? The Wise Men have come and gone which we will not even look at until January 6th at our Epiphany service. For some reason that I could not find those who picked out the readings some thousand years ago have put this reading as the official reading for the year that the Gospel of Matthew is read in the Christian church.

Yesterday we looked at the baby Jesus peacefully laying in his mother’s arms safe, warm, and loved. Today Jesus is on his way to Egypt as the family flees the murderous Herod. Today we read of the murder of innocent babies on account of Jesus. I don’t know about you, but today’s readings have brought me back to the reality of life. Jesus was hated even as a baby, just as he is hated by people today.

It helps to understand the events we read in our Gospel; in fact it helps us to understand the Gospel of Matthew, if we understand that Saint Matthew was writing to the Jewish people. He is writing to convince them that Jesus is the promised Messiah by quoting Old Testament texts that any knowledgeable Jew would recognize as being about Jesus.

Our Gospel reading for today was written to show the parallels between Moses and Jesus. Moses was the foreshadowing of the promised Messiah. Hebrew male babies in Egypt were murdered by Pharaoh in order to weaken the Israelites. In an effort to keep control of his kingdom when he found out that Jesus was to be the Hebrew King Herod murdered the Hebrew male babies.

Moses escaped the murderous wrath of Pharaoh in Egypt by being hidden in rushes alongside the Nile. Jesus escaped the murderous wrath of Herod when Joseph took him and his mother to Egypt so they could hide among the Egyptian population until it was safe to return.

The exodus from Egypt freeing the Hebrews from slavery which they, even in their misery, at times preferred rather than live in freedom in the desert prefigured Jesus saving all people, as he freed them from their slavery to sin. Even though at times those he freed grumble about their freedom and wish that they could go back and live in slavery to sin.
Oh, they don’t think that they are wanting to go back into slavery, but they are when they don’t believe that Jesus is truly the Lord of their life. They are wanting to go back into slavery when they don’t believe that through Baptism God works faith in infants and adults. They are wanting to go back into slavery when they reject the wonderful gift of Jesus’ body and blood when it is given in God’s Holy Sacrament. The rejection of these gifts to them are the same as the Israelites rejection of God’s words through Moses’ as he led them through the desert on the way to the Promised Land.

It is easy to question, to doubt God’s plan of salvation when innocent babies are murdered as it is told in God’s Word, or even as it happened just a couple of weeks ago when innocent children were murdered by their parents. We never have to look very far to see evil. It does not take much for us to ask, “Where was God in all this?”

On Christmas Eve I talked to those in attendance about why in the midst of all the evil in the world I can say that we are at peace. If you were there I told you that we can say we are at peace because of Jesus and his war with Satan. Jesus won that war on the cross when he said, “It is finished.” Why then the ongoing war? It is like Satan and his evil angels and people under his control never got the message. He is still fighting, for he knows our natural selves, selves who want to go back to the way it was before Christ entered our lives.

Our God Emmanuel, “God with us” did not just leave us when he ascended into heaven. He is still active in human creation; he is still in control. Through the Holy Spirit he continues to lead little children and adults into the safety of his Holy Church through the waters of Baptism. He continues to feed and nourish his people through his Word and with his precious body and blood in his Holy Supper. He continues to reassure you, his people when I stand before you, as your called Pastor and tell you, “In the stead and by the command of my Lord Jesus Christ I forgive you all your sins.”

God’s plan of salvation was in play when he created the world and at the perfect time he entered our world as our Epistle tells us, “When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.

That salvation has been accomplished. It is finished, and one day Jesus will come back and call all believers to be with him in the new heaven and earth. God has promised and as he has shown by his past and present deeds he will do it. Amen.