SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 2009
ALL SAINTS’ DAY
PSALM 150
DEUTERONOMY 34:1-12
MATTHEW 21:1-22
So, today was cool. I was the guest preacher at Our Redeemer Lutheran Church in Ocala, Florida. They had their first worship service ever on October 28, 1984. I was a lowly Vicar and preached at that service and was their first regular preacher until I finished my Vicarage being assigned to St. John’s Lutheran, but was loaned out to “the mission.”
Way back in the day, we met in a volunteer fire department. Our people had to go and pull the fire trucks out and set up about 300 chairs for the Roman Catholic mission and about 50 for us. We had this small, little organ that you could have in your home. One Sunday, a mouse ran out of it. Another Sunday they found a rattle snake in it. The Altar was a folding table with a sheet over it. For Christmas, they took a small tree and had to set it up each week because we couldn’t leave it at the fire house.
They are now in their second building. They have gone from 81 charter members to 600. They have two services each week, a hand bell choir and a choir with more members than we had in average attendance back then. It was wonderful being with them and seeing the few old faces that are still there. I even made a plug for having me back again (I was there for their 10th anniversary too) for their 50th Anniversary when I will be a mere 74 years old.
The whole thing reminded me of what’s good about a mission congregation. Everyone is so close. They have a common goal of sharing the Gospel and starting a new church. Everyone pitches in: everyone gets a job. You don’t just join a mission church to watch, you get immersed in the enthusiasm and excitement and participate. You take ownership. It’s your mission. It is a very unique experience and very exciting.
About their name, I was Vicar Steve Jennings back then. As I was leaving, they Called a new pastor right out of the Seminary, Pastor Steve Schaefer. I told them today, that they should have named the church St. Stephen Lutheran Church. But no, they chose Our Redeemer. They went from “the Mission” to “Our Redeemer.” With a name like Our Redeemer, you know what you are all about. It’s not about you, it’s about Jesus who bought us back from sin, death and the devil. Everyone who comes through those doors knows what you are all about. It helps keep the focus on the reason for existence. The church is there to share the Word and administer the Sacraments. Jesus, is the center of all we do.
It was a fun day. It kind of excites you to get back home and get back to work with a renewed focus. It was truly a blessed day.
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2009
PSALM 110
JEREMIAH 5:1-19
MATTHEW 22:23-46
I missed the end of Deuteronomy being gone. I just didn’t have time to keep up. But now I’m home and back to routine (except for having to shave now since the industrial accident that took my beard from me).
The Lord is the same, yesterday, today and forever. That’s part of the message we see in our Psalm. “The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind.” He will protect and execute justice. The Lord is fair if nothing else. If there is a problem in the world, it’s not God’s fault, it’s our fault. It’s a result of sin. Our Lord is in control and all will work out as He commands. We can take comfort in that message. It may rain and be cloudy and the world may fall apart around us, but our God is in control and He loves us. No matter what happens here, we will be with Him in heaven.
So, with our new book of Jeremiah, we jump ahead from about 1400 to about 600BC (a good eight hundred years), and our Lord is refusing to forgive the nation of Israel. They (as predicted) ran off following other gods, and they refuse to repent and if you don’t repent you don’t get forgiveness, that’s the whole message Jeremiah puts before us today. Using picture language in several different ways, Jeremiah paints a picture of the Israelites breaking God’s covenant with them and they see no reason why they should repent. But, the Lord is faithful and He will keep a remnant who will be faithful and who will rebuild the nation.
So, you have a bad day and it seems that all the kids are against you and they just won’t listen and every moment is a battle with them, well our Lord had days like that. But it wasn’t His children who caused Him problems (He didn’t have any kids) it was the Sadducees and the Pharisees who caused Jesus problems. They tested Him time and time again. Why would someone bring up this ridiculous story about a woman marrying seven brothers of the same family? Because they were stuck and didn’t know what else to do, they were desperate. Then the Pharisees jump in. But no one could trick Him. He is God after all.
The world may not understand God, but we do. We know it’s all about love. It’s all about His desire for us to be in heaven. So we try to reach out and explain as best we can, we want them to be in heaven with us. We answer their silly questions and pray the Holy Spirit works in their hearts.
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2009
PSALM 38:9-22
JEREMIAH 7:1-19
MATTHEW 23:1-12
Reading through these Psalms there seem to be two moods, either the Psalm is upbeat and positive, thanking God for all His blessings upon us, or, the Psalm is down and dreary, lamenting the hardships and the attacks and trusting in God for protection.
Obviously, our Psalm for today falls into the second type. David is down, “My heart throbs; my strength fails me, and the light of my eyes – it also has gone from me.” David’s friends and companions are distant from him and won’t help. His attackers are relentless. But still, David’s trust is in the Lord. He goes to the Lord for help. He cries to the Lord rather than complaining to His neighbor.
If only we did the same. Rather than complaining to anyone who will listen to us, people who can’t do anything any way, go to the Lord and seek His help. He has the means and He loves us and He WANTS to help us.
But the opposite is true as well, when things go well, we should go to God and thank Him and acknowledge that all things going right are due to Him. Thanksgiving is just a one day a year holiday; it’s an everyday activity.
How many times did we hear Moses warn the people of Israel about following after other gods? How many times did Moses tell the people that if they obeyed Him they could be in the Promised Land forever, but if not, they were going to have trouble? How many times did God warn the Israelites? Now, they are doing exactly what He told them not to do. They are breaking His commandments. They are following other gods. They are murdering, stealing, and committing adultery. And their excuse, the Lord isn’t going to destroy His temple, the Lord isn’t going to let harm come to His Holy City Jerusalem. Oh yeah? Just watch.
God is so upset with the people that He instructs Jeremiah not to pray for them and not to intercede for them. That was a prophet’s job, to intercede for the people. But now, things are so bad, the prophet’s job is merely to condemn, preaching law, there will be no Gospel until they repent, which isn’t going to happen soon.
And it’s amazing, after going into captivity, after coming back to the Promised Land again, the Pharisees and the Scribes are right back where the people of Jeremiah’s day were. Oh, they may not be worshipping false gods, but they are certainly not focused on God and His ways. They are focused on their actions and not God’s actions. They are focused on what they do and don’t do, rather than what God promises to do for them. They are focused on glory and honor and not service.
Lord, help us to keep our focus on you through the day. Help us to keep our focus on those around us whom we serve. Help us to place our trust and strength in you for all we do.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2009
PSALM 118:25-29
JEREMIAH 8:18-9:12
MATTHEW 23:13-39
Well, I’ve put it off as long as I can, this morning I have to go out and cut my grass for the last time. IT BETTER BE THE LAST TIME FOR THE YEAR!!! I don’t care if we get 80 degrees in December; I refuse to cut grass later than this. But, the yard will look much better.
Of course, our hearts go out to the families of the soldiers who were killed yesterday at Ft. Hood. We pray they find comfort in the name of the Lord and the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is at times like that, when we throw ourselves at the feet of the Lord. We don’t understand what happened, and when we don’t understand, that’s when we just trust in God. We don’t have all the answers yet, but why do we need answers. We don’t need answers; we just need to trust in God. We just need to put our faith in Him. The Psalm says, “You are my God, and I will give thanks to you.” We don’t thank God because things are going well. We don’t thank God when we are prosperous. We thank God because He is God.
In our Jeremiah text we find the prophet grieving over the sin of Israel. Their sin saddens him. Obviously, he loves these people and he knows if the fate that waits for them. He knows destruction is in the cards if they don’t repent. Just think about it, what pastor doesn’t get sad and frustrated when he sees things going wrong in his congregation? Any pastor worth his salt puts his heart and soul into his church and feels bad when things aren’t going well. And they don’t know what’s going to happen, Jeremiah knew. He had the Lord’s ear. God had even told him to stop interceding for them and that had to hurt too. At least I can pray for my church when I see things going wrong and that is a great comfort. We are very blessed at Trinity. We have our struggles, but things are going well for the most part.
Just as Jeremiah laments over the actions of Israel, Jesus laments over the woes of the Scribes and Pharisees. He sees their hypocrisy. He knows their evil ways. These same people who tried time after time to trick Jesus and get Him to stay something wrong have their sin and evil revealed. But Jesus isn’t just saying bad things to insult them, He is saying what He says to bring them to repentance. He is trying to get them to see their sin so they repent, just as He does to us each day. We see that at the close of the lesson, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!” Our Lord has compassion for Israel and even for the Scribes and Pharisees. He wants everyone to be saved.
He cares for us too. He wants us to be saved and He wants what is best for us. Knowing that, we take on the day, using it for His glory.
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2009
PSALM 121
JEREMIAH 11:1-23
MATTHEW 24:1-28
Happy Saturday!! It sounds like it’s going to be a beautiful day with temperatures near 70. Maybe I should have waited to cut my grass until today. But, since that is done, I have today open to do other things.
And how about this? I have requests from two Wisconsin Synod pastors to buy a Treasury of Daily Prayer! Isn’t that great? This is a wonderful book.
Normally, when I do this blog, I do it first thing in the morning. It’s the first thing I do when I get in the office and if it’s my day off, it’s the first thing I do after getting comfortable in my chair with a cup of tea. It is after a good night’s sleep that I do this blog and read our lessons.
Here in our Psalm, we see that our Lord spends His whole time protecting us, He neither slumbers nor sleeps. In fact, “The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil.” Notice that it doesn’t say, “The Lord will keep you from some evil” or “most evil” or “the worst of it evil.” No, the text says, “all evil.” Our Lord watches us 24/7. He takes care of us in all situations. If He were not with us, we would cease to exist.
So, we have this Psalm that speaks of the Lord’s protection, and both our Old Testament and Gospel lessons speak of destruction. Jeremiah speaks of the destruction of Israel. God, for the second time tells Jeremiah not to pray for the people because He’s not going to listen. Since they have gone astray and left Him after warning after warning, they are going to be punished. And then, in our Gospel lesson, Jesus Himself talks about the destruction of the temple and then end of the world, and the “abomination of desolation.” And yet, through it all, the Lord WILL watch over us. Life will be tough. Sometimes it is tough right now. But our Lord will be with us and help us get through. We ARE going to be in heaven with our Lord and that’s the bottom line. Jesus died on the cross so that we will be in heaven. That’s what it’s all about.
Have a blessed day. Enjoy the weather. I have to take the last of our yard waste to the village dumping ground today before winter sets in. I know. I have all the fun.
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 2009
ALL SAINTS’ DAY
PSALM 150
DEUTERONOMY 34:1-12
MATTHEW 21:1-22
So, today was cool. I was the guest preacher at Our Redeemer Lutheran Church in Ocala, Florida. They had their first worship service ever on October 28, 1984. I was a lowly Vicar and preached at that service and was their first regular preacher until I finished my Vicarage being assigned to St. John’s Lutheran, but was loaned out to “the mission.”
Way back in the day, we met in a volunteer fire department. Our people had to go and pull the fire trucks out and set up about 300 chairs for the Roman Catholic mission and about 50 for us. We had this small, little organ that you could have in your home. One Sunday, a mouse ran out of it. Another Sunday they found a rattle snake in it. The Altar was a folding table with a sheet over it. For Christmas, they took a small tree and had to set it up each week because we couldn’t leave it at the fire house.
They are now in their second building. They have gone from 81 charter members to 600. They have two services each week, a hand bell choir and a choir with more members than we had in average attendance back then. It was wonderful being with them and seeing the few old faces that are still there. I even made a plug for having me back again (I was there for their 10th anniversary too) for their 50th Anniversary when I will be a mere 74 years old.
The whole thing reminded me of what’s good about a mission congregation. Everyone is so close. They have a common goal of sharing the Gospel and starting a new church. Everyone pitches in: everyone gets a job. You don’t just join a mission church to watch, you get immersed in the enthusiasm and excitement and participate. You take ownership. It’s your mission. It is a very unique experience and very exciting.
About their name, I was Vicar Steve Jennings back then. As I was leaving, they Called a new pastor right out of the Seminary, Pastor Steve Schaefer. I told them today, that they should have named the church St. Stephen Lutheran Church. But no, they chose Our Redeemer. They went from “the Mission” to “Our Redeemer.” With a name like Our Redeemer, you know what you are all about. It’s not about you, it’s about Jesus who bought us back from sin, death and the devil. Everyone who comes through those doors knows what you are all about. It helps keep the focus on the reason for existence. The church is there to share the Word and administer the Sacraments. Jesus, is the center of all we do.
It was a fun day. It kind of excites you to get back home and get back to work with a renewed focus. It was truly a blessed day.
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 2009
PSALM 118:22-24
JEREMIAH 1:1-19
MATTHEW 21:23-46
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2009
PSALM 15
JEREMIAH 3:6-4:2
MATTHEW 22:1-22
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2009
PSALM 110
JEREMIAH 5:1-19
MATTHEW 22:23-46
I missed the end of Deuteronomy being gone. I just didn’t have time to keep up. But now I’m home and back to routine (except for having to shave now since the industrial accident that took my beard from me).
The Lord is the same, yesterday, today and forever. That’s part of the message we see in our Psalm. “The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind.” He will protect and execute justice. The Lord is fair if nothing else. If there is a problem in the world, it’s not God’s fault, it’s our fault. It’s a result of sin. Our Lord is in control and all will work out as He commands. We can take comfort in that message. It may rain and be cloudy and the world may fall apart around us, but our God is in control and He loves us. No matter what happens here, we will be with Him in heaven.
So, with our new book of Jeremiah, we jump ahead from about 1400 to about 600BC (a good eight hundred years), and our Lord is refusing to forgive the nation of Israel. They (as predicted) ran off following other gods, and they refuse to repent and if you don’t repent you don’t get forgiveness, that’s the whole message Jeremiah puts before us today. Using picture language in several different ways, Jeremiah paints a picture of the Israelites breaking God’s covenant with them and they see no reason why they should repent. But, the Lord is faithful and He will keep a remnant who will be faithful and who will rebuild the nation.
So, you have a bad day and it seems that all the kids are against you and they just won’t listen and every moment is a battle with them, well our Lord had days like that. But it wasn’t His children who caused Him problems (He didn’t have any kids) it was the Sadducees and the Pharisees who caused Jesus problems. They tested Him time and time again. Why would someone bring up this ridiculous story about a woman marrying seven brothers of the same family? Because they were stuck and didn’t know what else to do, they were desperate. Then the Pharisees jump in. But no one could trick Him. He is God after all.
The world may not understand God, but we do. We know it’s all about love. It’s all about His desire for us to be in heaven. So we try to reach out and explain as best we can, we want them to be in heaven with us. We answer their silly questions and pray the Holy Spirit works in their hearts.
Have a blessed day.
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2009
PSALM 38:9-22
JEREMIAH 7:1-19
MATTHEW 23:1-12
Reading through these Psalms there seem to be two moods, either the Psalm is upbeat and positive, thanking God for all His blessings upon us, or, the Psalm is down and dreary, lamenting the hardships and the attacks and trusting in God for protection.
Obviously, our Psalm for today falls into the second type. David is down, “My heart throbs; my strength fails me, and the light of my eyes – it also has gone from me.” David’s friends and companions are distant from him and won’t help. His attackers are relentless. But still, David’s trust is in the Lord. He goes to the Lord for help. He cries to the Lord rather than complaining to His neighbor.
If only we did the same. Rather than complaining to anyone who will listen to us, people who can’t do anything any way, go to the Lord and seek His help. He has the means and He loves us and He WANTS to help us.
But the opposite is true as well, when things go well, we should go to God and thank Him and acknowledge that all things going right are due to Him. Thanksgiving is just a one day a year holiday; it’s an everyday activity.
How many times did we hear Moses warn the people of Israel about following after other gods? How many times did Moses tell the people that if they obeyed Him they could be in the Promised Land forever, but if not, they were going to have trouble? How many times did God warn the Israelites? Now, they are doing exactly what He told them not to do. They are breaking His commandments. They are following other gods. They are murdering, stealing, and committing adultery. And their excuse, the Lord isn’t going to destroy His temple, the Lord isn’t going to let harm come to His Holy City Jerusalem. Oh yeah? Just watch.
God is so upset with the people that He instructs Jeremiah not to pray for them and not to intercede for them. That was a prophet’s job, to intercede for the people. But now, things are so bad, the prophet’s job is merely to condemn, preaching law, there will be no Gospel until they repent, which isn’t going to happen soon.
And it’s amazing, after going into captivity, after coming back to the Promised Land again, the Pharisees and the Scribes are right back where the people of Jeremiah’s day were. Oh, they may not be worshipping false gods, but they are certainly not focused on God and His ways. They are focused on their actions and not God’s actions. They are focused on what they do and don’t do, rather than what God promises to do for them. They are focused on glory and honor and not service.
Lord, help us to keep our focus on you through the day. Help us to keep our focus on those around us whom we serve. Help us to place our trust and strength in you for all we do.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2009
PSALM 118:25-29
JEREMIAH 8:18-9:12
MATTHEW 23:13-39
Well, I’ve put it off as long as I can, this morning I have to go out and cut my grass for the last time. IT BETTER BE THE LAST TIME FOR THE YEAR!!! I don’t care if we get 80 degrees in December; I refuse to cut grass later than this. But, the yard will look much better.
Of course, our hearts go out to the families of the soldiers who were killed yesterday at Ft. Hood. We pray they find comfort in the name of the Lord and the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is at times like that, when we throw ourselves at the feet of the Lord. We don’t understand what happened, and when we don’t understand, that’s when we just trust in God. We don’t have all the answers yet, but why do we need answers. We don’t need answers; we just need to trust in God. We just need to put our faith in Him. The Psalm says, “You are my God, and I will give thanks to you.” We don’t thank God because things are going well. We don’t thank God when we are prosperous. We thank God because He is God.
In our Jeremiah text we find the prophet grieving over the sin of Israel. Their sin saddens him. Obviously, he loves these people and he knows if the fate that waits for them. He knows destruction is in the cards if they don’t repent. Just think about it, what pastor doesn’t get sad and frustrated when he sees things going wrong in his congregation? Any pastor worth his salt puts his heart and soul into his church and feels bad when things aren’t going well. And they don’t know what’s going to happen, Jeremiah knew. He had the Lord’s ear. God had even told him to stop interceding for them and that had to hurt too. At least I can pray for my church when I see things going wrong and that is a great comfort. We are very blessed at Trinity. We have our struggles, but things are going well for the most part.
Just as Jeremiah laments over the actions of Israel, Jesus laments over the woes of the Scribes and Pharisees. He sees their hypocrisy. He knows their evil ways. These same people who tried time after time to trick Jesus and get Him to stay something wrong have their sin and evil revealed. But Jesus isn’t just saying bad things to insult them, He is saying what He says to bring them to repentance. He is trying to get them to see their sin so they repent, just as He does to us each day. We see that at the close of the lesson, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!” Our Lord has compassion for Israel and even for the Scribes and Pharisees. He wants everyone to be saved.
He cares for us too. He wants us to be saved and He wants what is best for us. Knowing that, we take on the day, using it for His glory.
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2009
PSALM 121
JEREMIAH 11:1-23
MATTHEW 24:1-28
Happy Saturday!! It sounds like it’s going to be a beautiful day with temperatures near 70. Maybe I should have waited to cut my grass until today. But, since that is done, I have today open to do other things.
And how about this? I have requests from two Wisconsin Synod pastors to buy a Treasury of Daily Prayer! Isn’t that great? This is a wonderful book.
Normally, when I do this blog, I do it first thing in the morning. It’s the first thing I do when I get in the office and if it’s my day off, it’s the first thing I do after getting comfortable in my chair with a cup of tea. It is after a good night’s sleep that I do this blog and read our lessons.
Here in our Psalm, we see that our Lord spends His whole time protecting us, He neither slumbers nor sleeps. In fact, “The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil.” Notice that it doesn’t say, “The Lord will keep you from some evil” or “most evil” or “the worst of it evil.” No, the text says, “all evil.” Our Lord watches us 24/7. He takes care of us in all situations. If He were not with us, we would cease to exist.
So, we have this Psalm that speaks of the Lord’s protection, and both our Old Testament and Gospel lessons speak of destruction. Jeremiah speaks of the destruction of Israel. God, for the second time tells Jeremiah not to pray for the people because He’s not going to listen. Since they have gone astray and left Him after warning after warning, they are going to be punished. And then, in our Gospel lesson, Jesus Himself talks about the destruction of the temple and then end of the world, and the “abomination of desolation.” And yet, through it all, the Lord WILL watch over us. Life will be tough. Sometimes it is tough right now. But our Lord will be with us and help us get through. We ARE going to be in heaven with our Lord and that’s the bottom line. Jesus died on the cross so that we will be in heaven. That’s what it’s all about.
Have a blessed day. Enjoy the weather. I have to take the last of our yard waste to the village dumping ground today before winter sets in. I know. I have all the fun.