Reformed Evangelical Synod of America

Posts Tagged ‘lectionary’

Jesus Heals A Deaf Mute

A sermon from Mark 7:31-37.

It’s easy to come to one of the miracle stories of our Lord’s life and be jaded. If we’ve gone to church for a while, we’ve probably heard these stories a million times. So what? We’ve heard these miracle stories before you know. We’ve probably even prayed for miracles ourselves but nothing quite like what Jesus did has ever happened to us has it.

Familiarity breeds contempt, and unless we pay attention, familiarity with the stories of Jesus’ miracles can let us miss God’s message for us this morning. May God help us NOT to be so bored with His Word!

Jesus is travelling far from Jerusalem – you know the place where the “experts” were sent from to trap Him and where He would be ultimately crucified. He’s travelling in a land who knew they were under God’s judgment.  They’d sided with the enemies of God’s people after they had been blessed by the Lord through Solomon. What betrayal! What traitors! Hear what the prophet says in Jeremiah 47:4 – “The time has come for the Philistines to be destroyed, along with their allies from Tyre and Sidon. Yes, the LORD is destroying the remnant of the Philistines, those colonists from the island of Crete.” NLT

So where is Jesus? He is not where the those who felt they were sure of God’s blessing lived, that is, in Jerusalem. Jesus was performing His miracles amongst those who knew themselves to be cursed. He’s walking among the Ten Towns (Decapolis) where the Gentiles are so thick the Jews of that region were considered “second class” because they lived some place defiled.

Have you ever felt you were some place which was so bad that, for whatever reason, Jesus could not reach you there? Some place so hopeless that Jesus would never visit where you find yourself stuck? Our Jesus walks today in the hopeless places – and however much they seem “God forsaken” –those who will receive Him may be surprised just how frequently He visits there just as He visited Tyre and Sidon.

While there were many in Jerusalem who did not notice His visitation – and were thankful whenever the news of Jesus died down – there were people who were eager for Him to arrive and when they knew Jesus came to supposedly “God Forsaken” places, they cried out for Him to visit their friend, perhaps a family member, who was a deaf-mute.  They begged for a miracle!

“Draw near Jesus!” they asked. Communicate your blessing and healing power. Touch our friend in his brokenness and weakness. Remove his humiliation! Heal him!

Who is the person who healed this man that day?

He is the one who touched a man whom many others would look at and ask “Who sinned? This man or his parents?” (cf.  John 9:2) He’s the one who dares to touch you and I in our squalor and weakness.

Jesus is the one who looks to heaven and beseeches the Heavenly Father to pour out blessing and healing in a land considered by the nice religious people as pagan to say the least. He is the one who at the Father’s right hand prays for us in our plight as well. That is why scripture tells us to consider this one who looks to heaven and intercedes for the broken and urges us to realize that He prays for us too: “Therefore [Hebrews says] He is able, once and forever, to save those who come to God through Him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf.” Heb 7:25 NLT

Jesus is the one who sighed as he draws near this pitiful man. Jesus groaned with the groaning all creation cries out with until the curse is removed (Rom 8:23; 2 Cor 5:2,4). He sighs for this man just as he wept for his friend Lazarus (John 11:35).

This one who weeps over sinners will weep over your plight, your struggles, your heart break when you cry out to Him.

Jesus commanded “Be Opened” and this man’s ears were open. A miracle happened at Jesus’ word.

And today when people cry out to this Jesus who said “Be opened” and the Deaf-Mute could hear and speak – this Jesus comes to shattered places and shattered lives and does amazing things for people who know they have no other option and they turn to Him!

Note the response of the people – when others will crucify Him, these people

They can’t stay quiet!

They acclaim Him as the one who fulfills Isaiah’s messianic promise:

Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.” Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy. Isa 35:4-5 ESV

And guess what – It’s no fluke! In Acts 3:1-10 we read about a man who saw the Apostles and thought “money”.  Instead this lame man was healed.

That healing shows the messianic promise fulfilled in Jesus, persists wherever, whenever, and however Jesus wishes it to in order to spread His kingdom.

It’s no fluke, the One who drew near to hopeless people in a hopeless “God-forsaken” place did not die, nor did His power. He rose again and lives at the Father’s right hand interceding, praying and caring for all those who come to God through Him.

It’s no fluke, the One who drew near a hopeless man draws near to all the hopeless who cry out to Him!

He sighs over our tears and our plight.

He is waiting for us to stop seeking silver and gold as that lame man learned and He is waiting for us to seek His Name!

How do we pray in light of this truth?

How do we praise in light of this truth?

How do we witness in light of this truth?

There are some people who never get healed in this life. There are martyrs – like most of the Apostles – who died for their Christian Faith. And there are those who struggle in many different ways.

But just because these things are true, we must never forget who Jesus is and the mercy and love He delights to show those who will put their trust in Him.

Our problem, for the most part, is not that we trust Jesus too much. Overwhelmingly our problem is that we trust Jesus too little. We have preconceived notions about our lives and we have a view of Jesus that demands He conform to our will.

The mercy of Jesus though is no fluke. The greatest need in our lives each day – and the greatest need of those we encounter – is to learn to entrust ourselves expectantly, in childlike trust, to the One who touches the despairing in their squalor and restores them by to power of God  so that we become part of eternity’ s chorus of souls who will give Him praise!

Will you praise Him? Will you bow? His mercy is no fluke. Why do we daily treat is as such?

Here’s an audio version of this sermon preached at St. Andrew’s Church.

John Wesley preaching at his father's grave

For a deacon in formation for the presbyterate…

Preaching is a divine enterprise and impossible apart from the Holy Spirit. Pray as Luke 11:13 encourages for the Father’s most amazing gift – the help, anointing and empowering of the Holy Spirit so that you and those who hear will increasingly grow in the grace of Christ through the Word. I have always sensed a great burden to be faithful to what I believed the text to be saying to me and those listening. I do not try to amaze myself or the listeners with too many big words, obscure quotes, or pretend to be some original language expert who says “The Greek means…” to the point that people do not trust their English language bibles to communicate the Word of God. I am a “big picture” guy who sees everything – and particular texts no less – through the sweep of Holy Scripture and therefore I aim not to declare them as individual “loose ends” but as parts of God’s great revelation and the unfolding of His plan. I preach the integrity and interrelatedness of Holy Scripture and defy those who consider themselves wise in the wisdom of this age to refute it. A resource like Alvin Schmidt’s “How Christianity Changed The World” will aid you in this task of explaining the wonders of what Jesus our Lord has done through His Body the Church concretely and objectively in history, not simply in the fond imaginations of the pious.

I remind myself and the people from time to time why the color of my stole matches the color of the paraments. As the minister of the Word I am not my own but am part of the furniture in God’s house. I as a preacher exist as a living stone in God’s Temple to declare the Word of God as Christ’s servant and not in my own service. That is why I am a man in clerical uniform – I am like any mechanic, fireman, or other person whose vocation is primarily a service instead of a “profession” per se. My service is not primarily to people but to God as the bearer of His Word for the people He providentially sends.

This is why I also preach from a lectionary. I know its inadequacies. I know that from time to time it is required that we change the text to address an urgent situation in the congregation or society. I know that other opportunities should be provided for indepth study of the text. But the most urgent need before us – the need that never departs from day to day, from age to age, in tumult and in alleged peace – is for we and those who hear us to be continually immersed into Jesus Christ. The Epistles exist to explain what this means to be sure and they must not be neglected. But study the epistles however we will, we cannot know the meaning they intend without continually reflecting on our Lord as He is revealed in the Gospels as the fulfillment of all God the Father’s promises to revealed from Adam onward. Those who would occupy the Lord’s Day mornings with extended expositions of the Torah or who preach for years through an Epistle in the name of expository preaching often claim Calvin as their guide in this. But even he, though he eschewed the lectionary, confined himself to preaching the Gospels and Acts on the Lord’s Day. How do lesser men dare to rob the Lord’s people of the Life of Christ and assume they know it as it should be known? God forgive us the horrible mischief that has been done by our reducing the Gospel to abstractions ripped from the narrative of our Lord’s life and presented as cold dogma!

Systematic theology has it’s place in preaching. Last week’s homily (in printed form at least) alluded to both Luther’s catechism and the Heidelberg Catechism. That is because they summarized a point I considered necessary to be addressed in the exposition of the text in question. Never forget that our confessions and our systematic theology must emerge from our reflection and submission to the written Word of God. Our “systems” and confessions aim to crystallize the thrilling revelation of the Saving Christ who unites us to Himself and ushers in a New Creation through His Cross, Resurrection and Ascension. We systematize in order to communicate but our systematics must never become an ax by which we chop the scriptures in pieces to conform either to our pride or our prejudice. When we do so, we have become hirelings who have attempted to master God and bend His ways to our convenience. God deliver us from that and forgive our ignorance and discipline our pride.

As you know, our lectionary covers the life of our Lord annually via the respective “Synoptic” Gospels with flourishes courtesy of St. John. Our other readings attempt to form a thematic unit to inform and expand upon the Gospel portion by way of cross reference, parallel, and biblical – theological continuity. These can be useful keys or preaching tools at times when you wonder “what should I say”? Other biblical-theological connections can be found readily in modern resources unavailable just a few years ago. For instance, Carson & Beale’s Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament will allow you to discern the proper connections between the testaments. You will learn that the Septuagint (LXX) is a fine bridge between the Hebrew and the NT Greek and that our New Testament is a Greek fundamentally shaped and informed by the Hebrew Scriptures mediated through the LXX.

Note these things now. I trust they will come alive for you as you engage in the act of studying and preaching. It’s hard when you don’t have a large congregation. But as my wife told me – preach as if you were preaching to a full cathedral. She’s absolutely right! Your audience of one deserves your full attention, because for them in that hour, you are God’s appointed messenger! The same goes for those who hear you online and those who may read your homilies on line.

St. Andrew’s Church is the Episcopal Base of Bishop Chuck Huckaby.

Here is a document provided people who attend St. Andrew’s Church to describe the church’s – and this synod’s – vision for discipleship. Local pastors are free to express this in their own words as we see here, but all share these common concerns:

Making Disciples At St. Andrew’s Church

“Catechesis” (whether it’s called that or not) is anything we do to transmit the Christian faith from one person to another! Teaching the Christian faith to others and making disciples is what Jesus told us to do in the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20) and what Pastors and mature Christians are required to do when planting a church according to St. Paul (2 Tim. 2:2; Titus 2:3-5). It’s our duty to teach the Lord’s Word wherever we are and go (Deut 6:4-7).

It is the Pastor’s duty to see that the saints of God are equipped to fulfill these commands (Eph. 4: 11-16). Here are the four corporate ways I plan to do that in St. Andrew’s Church: through Worship, Structured Bible Reading, the Catechism and the Psalms.

A. Our Worship is structured to teach us how to live the Christian Life… To enter God’s Presence humbly and with praise, to repent of our sins, to hear God’s promise of forgiveness, to reverently hear the Word of God, to confess the sufficiency of Jesus Christ in all our lives, to move from hearing God’s Word, to prayer, then offering ourselves to Christ and being fed and transformed by Him – and then being sent out into the World on mission.

B. Structured Bible Reading in worship means that as God’s People we will seek to read large amounts of God’s Word weekly and specifically cover the Life of our Lord Jesus Christ. My preaching will aim to help us be conformed to Christ’s Image (Rom. 8: 29) and to encourage us by God’s grace to present our bodies to Him as living sacrifices in response to His Lordship (Rom. 12:1,2). This method focuses on the story line of the Bible.

C. Catechism is a way to train Christians by way of question and answer. This method is slightly different than the catechism involved in reading the Bible’s narrative of Christ’s Life. It focuses on a summary of the Bible as a whole and “doctrine” instead of Bible stories. Ultimately we have to systematize the stories of the Bible into our doctrine. The catechism we will use focuses on the essentials of the Christian Life: Sin, Salvation, and Christian Living and the 10 Commandments, Apostle’s Creed, and Lord’s Prayer.

D. The Psalms composed the original hymn book of the Church but have been pushed out of our praise and worship. We will, by God’s grace both read the Psalms and learn how to sing God’s inspired hymns as part of our worship so that we can encourage “one another with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.” Eph. 5:19.

Are you satisfied with who you are?

Are you happy with the way your life is?

If you aren’t would you say your life just needs a “mild tweak” to nudge it forward into “perfection”?

If it needs “something more” – how radical a change are you willing to admit you need?

As the Lord’s Day lections for Proper 19 in Year B continue the Church’s readings through John 6 (John 6:41-51), we find our Lord’s encounter with the Jewish leaders who despise His assertion “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” In our Lord’s response we find some of His most open assertions of His own diety and exclusive claims as the unique Savior of not only God’s ancient covenant people, but also, all nations of the world.

In dismissing their arguments against Him as the fountain of salvation because they recognize him outwardly as truly man but not as He who is truly Immanuel, God with us, He equates the logic they find so convincing to mere whining – the opposite of the blessing they should pronounce upon the manifestation of God’s true heavenly bread.

Jesus’ hearers are not condemned for their failure to penetrate the mysteries of the Holy Trinity – instead they are criticized for their spiritual presumption. In a practical sense, they denied their need for a Messiah who offered more than a superficial restructuring of the failed Old Covenant economy. The failure of that economy becomes the focus of passages such as Galatians 3:10-12 and the extended argument of the Book of Hebrews.

To the holy nation which is so clearly suffering the effects of God’s curse for their sin (Deut. 28:16ff) and even in Jesus’ Day only experiencing the preliminary blessings of the restoration promised by the prophets and yet to be fully revealed in the New Covenant (Ezek. 36:24ff), Jesus the Messiah offers more than they are willing to hope for! To those whose wedding day joy is about be stifled by the absence of wine, Jesus turns the water into wine (John 2). He offers the life that characterizes the love, joy, peace and transfiguring power of heaven itself to those who believe Yahweh only offers them some pale extension of the life known through Adam (John 3).

Their sin is in underestimating the grace of God and the power of God. They presume that they as an accursed people already have the fullness of light (John 1) and that they are not blind but are able to discern what the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ requires of them and has planned for them (John 9). Therefore Jesus says in John 6:49 “Your fathers ate manna in the wilderness and they died.”

Our Old Testament  lection from 1 Kings 19:3-9 is one of the many lessons from Scripture demonstrating our Lord’s point. When Israel was on  the verge of a complete apostasy under King Ahab, God’s prophet Elijah is raised up. Though empowered by the living God to defeat the prophets of Baal (1 Kings 18), in the hour of his need and human fear and weakness even the prophet who was taken up directly into heaven must be fed by bread from heaven. That manna which fed a generation in the wilderness did not suffice and God’s gracious sustenance from the Angel of the Lord’s own hand must be given for a new day.

Presumption on God’s grace from the past had become an obstacle to entering into the blessing Jesus comes into the world to establish. Presumption on past grace, then, means that they had established a new idolatry that trusted their present status quo as sufficient, as is, to inherit God’s blessing without the Angel of the Lord coming to not only give bread from heaven but to be the bread of heaven.

The One who becomes for us the bread of heaven unto eternal life gives Himself to those who trust not in the nourishment present in themselves or available to them by any natural means. He is the bread of eternal life to all those who feast upon His flesh through faith (6:47). Unlike the former bread given in the wilderness, this bread does not spoil by nightfall – nor do those who partake of this bread ever die (6:50). Like the bush through which God Almighty revealed His covenant name (Exodus 3:1ff) was not consumed, He who is heaven’s bread is likewise never consumed because He is the living bread ever pulsating with life in and of Himself and renewing  with heaven’s life all those who commune with Him.

Presumption on past blessing prevents present grace. It is true for us as well as these self-satisfied grumblers. We are in constant danger of embracing an idolatrous view of our own strength, our own spiritual capacities, and the status of our relationship with God and deny the radical transformation yet required in us. We too are an accursed people without hope except that which comes from feeding upon Jesus Christ.

This day there are those who trust in a distant baptism or a prior religious experience they equate with the operations of God’s Spirit.  Yet they walk in the way of sin and darkness. They declare themselves Christians and yet reveal by their lives they have not been known by God or been taught by Him. They – as much as Jesus’ hearers then – are in danger or worshipping an illusion of spiritual security. Instead all people are called to examine themselves and feed by faith upon Jesus Christ the Risen Lord and the bread of Heaven come down.

Will you give yourself to the One who can transform you radically? Will you lay down your life for Him?

A sermon with study notes is available here: Presumption On Past Blessing Prevents Present Grace