Tag: Jesus the Christ

What Now?: Simul Justus et Peccator

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

The last two Sundays we’ve covered Paul’s argument in Romans 6 that leed to his prohibitions against returning to sin and the life of the old person who is persuaded by the ways of the kingdom of humanity and exhortations to the believers in Rome to pursue the reign of God, to actively present themselves for service in God’s mission of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation. Believers, according to the logic of chapter 6, are not defined by their works of the law in attempts to self-justify; rather, they are justified by God’s grace which is given to them when they assert and affirm (by faith) that what God says about them is true. In this exchange based on faith, the believer finds themselves forgiven and justified, the law fulfilled on their behalf by Christ and divine righteousness given of which the Spirit is a deposit and confirmation. The believer is, again by faith, united to God in such a way that they are grafted and grown together with Christ; thus, any attempt to return would result in a maiming and marring of the believer who would have to amputate themselves from the vine. For Paul, to go and seek one’s justification by own’s own accord and deeds is the basis of sin (which is founded in unbelief, not believing God is trustworthy and truthful) and is anathema for believers who have identified with Christ in his death and thus identify (and will identify) with Christ is in his life and resurrection. Believers are not justified by the law but by faith and therein receive the law fulfilled and are liberated—in accord with the law of love—to now go love the neighbor to the glory of God without needing to use the neighbor as a means to an end.

Sin, for believers and according to Romans 6, is a present reality but not one that controls them, for they are now no longer enslaved to sin and its impulses, its domination and control. Believers are now voluntarily enslaved to God’s reign through faith in Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit; they are not their own (and, in fact, never have been!). What is important to retain from the past two Sundays is that, according to Paul, due to the encounter with God in the event of faith, believers—those who follow Jesus out of the Jordan and to the Cross—are no longer willing participants in the death, indifference, and captivity of the kingdom of humanity (no longer can they uphold and promote any institution and structure, ideology or authority that intentionally promotes these things). Rather they are Christ’s representatives who participate in bringing divine love, life, and liberation to God’s beloved, the neighbor and this brings God glory. But this does not mean they are sinless as if they will never sin again. They are still human creatures in need of intervention and disruption, and this is what the passage from Romans 7 tells us…

Romans 7:15-25a

Paul writes, For I do not know understand/cannot judge that which I accomplish[ii]. For I practice not that which I desire but I do this thing which I hate (v15). In humility, Paul uses himself as an example of the tension of being simul justus et peccator (simultaneously justified and sinner).[iii] No matter how much education and training any of us have—including clergy—we are not exempt from the tension we live in as new persons striving against the old person. For Paul, sin isn’t just some detached external act or something that lacks power, it is a force that can dominate and it must be resisted because it is actively prowling about looking to devour and dominate. Paul emphasizes the tension between the failure of the outer person to align with the inner (regenerate) person. This tension Paul emphasizes highlights a greater reality that the law is necessary and good, as Paul says, But if I do this which I do not desire, I concede to the law that [it is] good (v16). While Paul has articulated earlier that the law brings the trespass and this surely cannot be good, it is. (Theologically) In the discrepancy between the inner desire and the outer doing of the opposite, our need is exposed: we are brought to the end of ourselves and in need of a mediator through whom we can align the outer person with the inner person so that the desired thing is the thing that is done thus not hated but loved. Also, (Civically), failure to do that which is desired and opting for that which is hated leads us to conclude that law is needed so that we do that which desired even if we do it (internally) kicking and screaming and obeying the law (even in letter only) can maintain peace and order and keeps evil at bay while protecting the upright. And in this concession (both theologically and civically) we see that the problem isn’t the law; the problem is us.[iv]

Paul explains further about the inner/outer tension highlighting the role sin is playing (even in the new life of the regenerate),

But now I, I no longer accomplish this thing but that which dwells within me: sin. For I have perceived that good does not dwell within me, that is there in my flesh. For it is easy[v]/close at hand for me to desire, but not to accomplish the good. For I do not do the good I desire, but the evil that which I do not desire this I do. Now if I do not do that which I desire, I, I no longer accomplish this thing but that which dwells in me: sin (vv17-20).

Here Paul is highlighting that the tension between the new person/the inner nature and the old person/the outer nature is provoked by the misalignment between the two. Using the term “flesh,” Paul speaks of the part of the person that is in the world (the outer nature) and most prone to wanting to conform to the will of the kingdom of humanity rather than the will of God (the old person), which causes a the tension between the inner and outer, the new and old, the justus and peccator. Paul is not making a distinction between the good soul and the bad body;[vi] rather it is one person who is torn in two[vii] as the battle wages on through the will and flesh, through the mind and heart and the muscle memory of the body,[viii] through the self.[ix] This is why Paul centers that there is another at work here: sin;[x] sin (the domination and power of) is at work creating the discrepancy between what is desired (the good) and what is actually done (the evil).[xi] It is not enough to be educated in the good, the head and the heart can know all about the good but the *actual* doing of the good is something altogether different.[xii] As the colloquialism goes, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” (This also explains why things like sexism, racism, homophobia, ageism, ableism, etc., all, sadly, still exist.) This is why Paul can then say, Therefore, I find a law for me when desiring to do the good that for me the evil is easy/close at hand (v21). Sin and its domination and power reside in the person while good is external, it is outside the body, thus evil is easier or closer at hand to do. Just like the nervous system preferring a familiar hell to an unknown heaven, that which is easier to do is more comforting for a body eager to use the least amount of energy to do anything. To know the good and to do it are not only two different things, but it also demands a lot of energy and fortitude for the knowing to become the doing.[xiii] In fact, it takes external intervention and disruption of the self and the domination of sin. [xiv]

Conclusion

Thus why Paul then writes,

For I rejoice in the law of God according to the inner person, but I see in my limbs another law waging war against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity by the law of sin which dwells in my limbs. Miserable person I am! Who will deliver me out of this body of death? Grace/thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord (vv22-25a).

The necessary intervention and needed disruption to help bring the outer person into alignment with the inner person is no one else but the mediator Jesus Christ of Nazareth, this man who is God. When/ever we come into an encounter with God in the event of faith in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, we begin our journey through this tension and we receive a Spirit (the Divine Spirit) that brings the good—Jesus himself—closer to us than it ever was before (though not to such an extent that we not no longer sin[xv]…we still prefer to do that which is easy and comfortable).[xvi] In that Jesus—the good himself—is closer to us through the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives, we receive directly the mercy, forgiveness, love and grace of God (which is the fullness of good in the inner person) apart from/despite our external deeds. This spiritual reality, then, helps us to labor to bring the outer person in line with the justified and righteous inner person so that the good can be sought and done in the temporal realm for the wellbeing of the neighbor and to the glory of God.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] LW 25:64. “This ‘doing’ means not to fulfill our duty, but to try to do so and to desire to do so. Therefore he also distinguishes ‘to do’ (facere) and ‘to accomplish’ (perficere) (v.18).”

[iii] LW 25:339. V 17 “Therefore sin remains in the spiritual man for the exercise of grace, for the humbling of pride, for the repression of presumptuousness. For he who does not earnestly strive to drive out sin certainly still possesses it, even if he had not committed any further sin for which he might be condemned. For we are not called to ease, but to a struggle against our passions, which would not be without guilt…if the mercy of God did not refrain from imputing to us.”

[iv] Sarah Heaner Lancaster, Romans, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2015), 126-127. “Because the law is holy and just and good, it is ‘spiritual,’ that is, it is of the Spirit, or of God. If sin is able to use the law to bring death, it is not because there is a problem with the law. Rather the problem is in ourselves.”

[v] LW 25:339. “Therefore he who comes to confession should not think that he is laying down his burden so that he may lead a quiet life, but he should know that by putting down his burden he fights as a soldier of God and thus takes on another burden for God in opposition to the devil and to his own personal faults.”

[vi] Lancaster, Romans, 127-128. Sin dwells in me/nothing good in me (vv17-18) “Paul’s point, though, is something different. Although he is talking about the self, he is not talking about the nature of human beings—what we essentially are. Rather, he is talking about where sin resides, and therefore where it exercises its control.”

[vii] LW 25:339. “Moreover, we must note that the apostle does not wish to be understood as saying that the flesh and spirit are two separate entities, as it were, but one whole, just as wound and the flesh are one. For although the wound is something by itself , and the flesh is another thing, yet because the wound and the flesh are one , and because the wound is nothing else than wounded or wakened flesh, we can attribute to the flesh the properties of the wound.”

[viii] Lancaster, Romans, 127. “‘Flesh’ conveys what it is like not to be oriented to God but to be oriented to the world without reference to God. This problem surely embodies the world without reference to God. This problem surely embodies itself in some way, but the problem is not the body. Being ‘of the flesh,’ Paul says, is having been ‘sold into slavery under sin.’ Paul is not concerned to explain how or why one gets sold into this slavery; he only describes the condition itself.”

[ix] Lancaster, Romans, 128. “Although a universal power, sin does not rule from a distance or exert its power in some diffused, impersonal way. Sin lives within the self, so its control of the self is near and personal. Because good does not live within the self, it is not in control of the self.”

[x] Lancaster, Romans, 127. “The explanation for this contradiction is that it is not ‘I’ or the self that is the controlling agent but sin (7:17).”

[xi] Lancaster, Romans, 127. “Living under the dominion of sin involves a deep and confusing contradiction, namely not doing what one wants but what one hates (7:15).”

[xii] Lancaster, Romans, 127. Ancient idea that reason keeps passions in order and if it knows the good it does the good, “Knowing what was truly good, then, should lead to doing what was good. Paul, though, points out that knowing what is good does not always lead to doing what is good.”

[xiii] Lancaster, Romans, 128. “…sin rather than good resides in the self, so evil rather than the good ‘lies close at hand’ (7:21). Because it is so close, it is much easier to grasp and implement what sin wants instead of what the law directs. So even if one delights in the law…and studies it regularly with the intention of learning from it, and keeping it, the self is in conflict—wanting to enact the goodness of the law but under the control of sin. So even if one knows the good intellectually (with the mind) one may not carry out the good (with the members of the body). What one actually puts into practice is in conflict with what one knows to be right.”

[xiv] Lancaster, Romans, 128. “Trapped in this way, the self is miserable. Furthermore, sin is so strong that it is not possible for the will to resolve itself out of the problem. The self needs to be rescued from it. Jesus Christ is, of course, the deliverer, and Paul thanks God for him (7:24-25).”

[xv] LW 25:64. “He uses the term ‘sin’ because according to blessed Augustine although in Baptism there is forgiveness as far as the guilt is concerned, yet it remains in fact and again turns us toward sin.”

[xvi] LW 25:63. “God in Christ restores man as created and cleanses corrupted man of his guilt immediately and of his weakness gradually.”

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What Now?: Liberated Unto Life and Love

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

Last week we looked at Romans 6:1-11 and saw how Paul, using baptism and faith, demonstrates that we cannot voluntarily re-yoke ourselves to sin and the death, indifference, and captivity of the kingdom of humanity. We are grown together with Christ in both his death and, thus, his resurrection through our identification by faith with Christ (and his death thus his resurrection). Being grown together provokes the imagery of grafting: we are grafted onto the branch of Jesse who is Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, this man who is God. For us who are justified with God by faith in Christ apart from deeds by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are forbidden from using our new spiritual liberation in a way that participates in furthering indifference, death, and captivity (intentionally); as those who are justified, we are not grafted onto and drafted into God’s mission of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation for the neighbor to the glory of God.

Here, in the second half of Romans 6, we get our second μὴ γένοιτο! Also, we receive Paul’s profound insights about what it means to be the recipients of divine liberation as those who believe. We are not, according to Paul, free to return to our old ways and old patterns and the patterns of the kingdom of humanity. We are enslaved to God’s righteousness made known in Christ and proclaimed and promoted by the power of the Holy Spirit. In other words, in the second half of chapter 6, we see that our liberation in and with God is a liberation that sets us on a different path from our society and culture: we are liberated from ourselves for others and not from others for ourselves. We are not our own, we are God’s beloved children, siblings of Christ, indwelt by the Holy Spirit and are, thusly, drafted into God’s divine mission and heavenly revolution, on earth as it is in heaven.

Romans 6:12-23

Based on what was written in vv 1-11, Paul begins the second half of Romans 6 with two prohibitions and a command/exhortation,

Therefore do not let sin be ruler in your mortal body for the purpose of subordinating it to its various[ii] impulses, and do not present your limbs as offensive weapons of unrighteousness, but present yourself to God as living out of death and your limbs as offensive weapons of righteousness for God (vv12-13).

For Paul, and based on what he explained above in vv1-11, the logical conclusion of being liberated from sin is not a backward movement but a forward trajectory where the entire person (limbs and all) is used to bring glory to God in the world. Rather than using one’s liberation and limbs for destruction and death, the Christian, for Paul, is liberated to act both defensively and offensively in and for construction and life. By refusing sin to rule in the mortal body, the corresponding sinful impulses are quieted and are refused opportunity to find footing[iii] (defense); by presenting oneself as the living and being rescued from death, the believer can use their limbs as weapons for the glory of God[iv] (offense).[v]

Thus, why Paul then says, For your sin will not rule [unless you let it[vi]] over [you], for you are not under law but under grace (v14). Here, Paul quickly correlates his earliest arguments in Romans to his argument here about the relationship of the believer to the old sinful person. As the believer is no longer defined by obedience to the law but rather is defined by God’s gift of grace received by faith, so, too, is the believer defined not by sin and its rule and impulses but by the power of God living in them by faith[vii] anchoring them to the ground of the living.[viii] The law, in and through Christ’s death and resurrection, has been put back in its proper place: not as a divine tool to condemn humans, but as a divine gift for humans to use to love their neighbor and bring glory to God (original intent); as the law is put back in its place and stripped of its power to condemn, sin itself loses ground because sin thrives where humans are convinced they are justified by the law and their own deeds and not by God’s word of promise and faith clinging to the promise.[ix]

This is why Paul then says,

What then? Should we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? Hell/ck no! Have you not perceived that if any of you present yourself [as] obedient slaves, you are slaves whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness [through faith]? Now, thanks be to God that you were slaves of sin but you obeyed out of [your] hearts toward that which you were handed over to according to the rule of the gospel; now being liberated from sin, you were brought under subjection for righteousness (vv15-18)

In other words, what Paul is saying here, is that the Christian, though liberated is not an autonomous person—meaning, the believer is not a law unto themselves, liberated to do whatever they want to do at whatever expense to their neighbor and to God’s glory. Taking a cue from Martin Luther and his treatise, The Freedom of a Christian, the Christian is liberated from themselves for others/their neighbor to the glory of God. This notion rubs against the orientation of the person in the kingdom of humanity who believes that they are liberated from others/their neighbor for themselves. For Paul, there is no such thing as a liberation unto the self that is liberation in the true sense. Either you are a slave of sin and are free to serve sin and death, or you are a slave of God (righteousness) and are free to serve God and life. The language Paul uses in these verses highlights that there is no neutral ground here[x] and there is no blank slate; for Paul, you are either serving sin or you are serving righteousness, you are voluntarily selling yourself into slavery to sin or voluntarily selling yourself into slavery to righteousness, [xi] you are either being molded by sin or molded by the gospel[xii] and being made more Christlike,[xiii] an argument that is both highly logical and contemporary to his context (which is why Paul then says, I am speaking in a way common to humans… (v19a) and follows with a re-exhortation[xiv] toward active participation in righteousness and away from active participation in unrighteousness (v19b-c).

Wrapping up chapter 6, Paul writes,

For when you were slaves of sin, you were free/unrestrained for (had no claim to) righteousness. So then what fruit did you have at that time about which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things [is] death. But now after being liberated from sin being brought under subjection to God the fruit you have [is] sanctification, and the end [is] eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the favor/grace of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (vv20-23)

Paul presses home the point, when we are slaves to sin, we have no claim[xv] to divine righteousness and find ourselves molded to sin and its various impulses and held captive by its ruling over us (a rule ending in eternal death).[xvi] However, when we are liberated from sin by faith to be formed by the Gospel of God into Christlikeness where we receive divine eternal life.[xvii],[xviii] This means that believers, who are now slaves of God and of divine righteousness, serve the reign of God and reject the things of the kingdom of humanity that promote sin, its impulses, and its wage: indifference, captivity, and death (now and in the future).[xix] Believers, as those who have been handed over to the incarnate Word of God and are being formed by the law of love and the gospel, are forever altered,[xx] unable, according to Paul, to turn back to a life of upholding the status quo, supporting systems and ideologies that thrive in fear and anger, and promoting institutions and structures that promote death.[xxi]

Conclusion

We are free and liberated by faith and God’s grace revealed in Christ Jesus, this man who is God. However, we are not liberated unto autonomy or ease[xxii]; liberation from sin and death unto righteousness and life puts a “claim” on us,[xxiii] puts a demand on us: the law of love. Being encountered by Divine Love, reborn from Divine Love, and nourished and sustained by Divine Love means that this Divine Love puts a demand on us because Divine Love can acknowledge the demand and the claim and meet the Beloved there in the midst. To follow Christ is to endure the trial of the journey out of the Jordan to the Cross; Christians who are disciples of Christ will have lives decorated with the accolades of death and resurrection, of self-sacrifice and self-receiving, of solidarity and identity with the neighbor (esp. the oppressed). Daily the Christian will, by the grace and mercy of God, take a long hard look in the mirror, confess their complicity and captivity to the ways of the kingdom of humanity, and then, by the power of the Holy Spirit, try to be different in this world, as one scholar put it, “Being under grace, then, places us under continuing revolutionary struggle,”[xxiv] privately and publicly, just as it was for Christ—the one who was truly liberated from himself for the wellbeing of the entire world.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] Sarah Heaner Lancaster, Romans, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2015), 110. “Epithumia could include desire for many pleasurable things, including food and comfort. The control of desire was n important topic of reflection in the ancient world that resulted over time in identifying many types of passions that could get out f control Anger and fear, for instance, could be as powerful as lust.”

[iii] Lancaster, Romans, 111. “Spiritual well-being has to include freedom from the temptations into which the passions lead us. With no passions, sin cannot find a place to enter.”

[iv] LW 25:320 “Thus the apostle wants to say that the members of the body must not be surrendered to ‘sin,’ that is, to evil lust and to the tinder of sin, for in obeying sin they become weapons of unbelief, and out of believers they make unbelievers in that they perform the orks of unbelievers according to the lusts of sin. But we must obey God, in order that ‘our members may be instruments of righteousness to God’ …that is of the life of faith and life.”

[v] Lancaster, Romans, 110. “If Paul’s concern about epithumia is limited to sex, we will miss the many ways that sin threatens to take control of our bodies. He reminds us that by being set free from sin, we no longer have to let those desires rule our lives. In fact, we are expected to present ourselves to God, thereby accepting God’s dominion of grace and receiving God’s grace to resist their controlling power. “

[vi] Lancaster, Romans, 114. “Never our own masters, we must choose whom to serve—sin or righteousness.”

[vii] LW 25:316 “Therefore sin has dominion over all those who are under the Law…For he who is without Christ is still in his sins, even if he does good works.”

[viii] Lancaster, Romans, 111. “Grace exerts shattering power as it makes the old person die so that the new person can live.”

[ix] LW 25:316 “For those people understand the expression ‘to be under the Law’ as being the same as having a law according to which one must live. But the apostle understands the words ‘to be under the Law’ as equivalent to not fulfilling the Law, as being guilty of disobeying the Law, as being a debtor and a transgressor, in that the Law has the power of accusing and damning a person and lording it over him, but it does not have the power to enable him to satisfy the Law or overcome it. And thus as long as the law rules, sin also has dominion and holds man captive.”

[x] Lancaster, Romans, 117. “We see that our choice is between death and life, with no middle ground.”

[xi] Lancaster, Romans, 114. “It was common for a person to sell oneself into slavery for economic reasons or event for eventual social advancement if serving someone of high social importance. This voluntary practice of putting oneself into servitude lies behind Paul’s explanation about presenting oneself as an obedience slave (6:16).”

[xii] LW 25:317 “For the wisdom of the flesh is opposed to the Word of God, but the Word of God is immutable and insuperable. Therefore it is necessary that the wisdom of the flesh be changed and that it give up its form and take on the form of the Word. This takes place when through faith it takes itself captive and strips off its own crown, conforms itself to the Word, and believes the Word to be true and itself to be false.”

[xiii] Lancaster, Romans, 115. “In other words, along with the enslavement image is also an image of being molded into the likeness of Christ. Obeideicne, then, is allowing oneself to be poured into the teaching, and so take the shape of Christ. Modern minds may find it easer to embrace this image than one of slavery.”

[xiv] LW 25:321 “For through the terms ‘sanctification’ and ‘cleanness’ he is trying to convey the same concept namely, that the body should be pure, but no with just any kind of purity, but with that which comes form within, from the spirit of sanctifying faith.”

[xv] Lancaster, Romans, 116. “The only freedom we have in the dominion of sin is freedom from righteousness: that is, freedom from being in right standing with God.”

[xvi] LW 25:53fn12 “That ‘sin reigns’ and ‘to obey’ sin is to consent to and do what sin desires.”

[xvii] LW 25:54fn16 “That is, you have been delivered from the form of error into the form of the Gospel…For the Word is not changed, but we are, and we yield to Him…For ‘the Word became flesh,’ so that we might be made the Word.”

[xviii] Lancaster, Romans, 116. “if we obey sin we get what we deserve: our wages are death. If we obey God, we receive God’s free gift, grace, which bring us into the relationship with God that means eternal life.”

[xix] Lancaster, Romans, 116. “If honor and shame are connected to social status, and if faith in Jesus Christ overturns the usual standards for honor and shame, then their participation in the entire social system is something to be ashamed of. A system of exploitation that assigns personal value hierarchically and treats those on the lower end of that scale as worthless is s a system of death.”

[xx] Lancaster, Romans, 116-117. “Living in the dominion of grace obedient to righteousness calls for a completely different way of life.”

[xxi] Lancaster, Romans, 116. “The followers of Jesus may not fully be extricated form that system, but where once they participated without questioning the system, now they are ashamed of it. Where once these followers of Jesus may have worked dot position themselves as high on the scale as they could, perhaps treating those below them poorly in order to get an advantage of over them, now they understand how pointless and harmful that behavior is.”

[xxii] Lancaster, Romans, 117. “Being under grace does not give Christians an easy life. Instead, grace puts us under pressure between its promise and its demand.”

[xxiii] Lancaster, Romans, 117. “The very power that affirms us also makes claims on us.”

[xxiv] Lancaster, Romans, 117.

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What Now?: New Creatures by God’s Grace

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

Continuing with our journey through Romans, we find ourselves in the first half of chapter 6. Here, Paul is addressing claims coming from the Roman church, specifically claims that if believers sin more than God’s grace abounds more. Paul is clear here, while we are justified by faith apart from works, we must not intentionally pursue sinful behaviors that drag and disrupt God’s revolution of the divine mission of love, life, and liberation in the world for the well-being of the neighbor to the glory of God. (Plus, we will have enough unintentional sin in our lives, we don’t need to pursue it!) We are, according to Paul, new creatures born of the waters of Baptism and are now defined by love, life, and liberation, and therefore voluntarily re-yoking ourselves to that which is indifference, that which is death, that which is captivity is not only anathema but also cut off.  

Romans 6:1b-11

Paul begins with a refutation of what is considered (by some scholars[ii]) to be a quotation from some at Rome, What then will we say? May we continue to sin, with the result that grace might superabound? Hell/ck no! We who have died to sin, how will we still live in it? (vv1-2). The question Paul asks in return is the driving theme of the chapter. It is also, especially for us, a crucial question for those who are justified by faith apart from works. Rather than the event of justification being a license to intentionally sin, it is an exhortation to live a new life. It is a gift given to be enjoyed—this is what the incarnate word is. Remember, back in chapter four, Paul gave a crystal-clear explanation of the gospel summarized by the events of Christ’s death and resurrection, [Jesus] was handed over for the sake of our trespasses and was raised for the sake of our acquittal/being pronounced justified/righteous (4:25). If we claim to believe in Christ, then we’ve come to the end of ourselves and have entered union with God by the power of the Holy Spirit. To intentionally return to the behaviors of the kingdom of humanity is to deny this belief and faith, it is to deny Christ and what Christ achieved for us because it is contrary to the very grace of God.[iii] In a sense, the claim Paul refutes makes God’s grace a human endeavor; for Paul, this is a μὴ γένοιτο! In the economy of God’s activity in the world and, especially, toward humanity, emphasis cannot fall on humans sinning to bring God’s grace. Rather, it must fall on God’s gracious activity in giving us God’s grace. Those who have been saved from the life of the dead are ushered into the life of the living and there’s no going back and certainly no human-centered way to make God’s grace abound more than it already is in Christ by the power of the Spirit. This is why Paul can then write,

Or are you ignorant that whosoever of us was baptized into Christ Jesus we were baptized into his death? Therefore we were buried with him through the baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from death by the glory of Abba God, even as also we might walk in the newness of life (vv3-4).

Paul then explains more,

For if we have become grown together with [Jesus] in the likeness of his death, but also we will be [grown together with him in the likeness of his] resurrection. Knowing this that our old person was crucified together with [Christ] so that the body of sin might be abolished, so that we are no longer a slave to sin, for the one who dies has been declared to be righteous from sin (vv5-7).

Paul anchors the believer’s new life not in the old life and person of the kingdom of humanity, but in the new person who is of the reign of God and who identifies (by faith) with Christ’s death and resurrection. This new person is born from the trifold dipping of Christian baptism, marking the fullness of the invested Godhead and our identification with Christ in the tomb.[iv] For Paul, this is all the believer needs to cling to. The believer does not need to take matters into their own hands and cause God’s grace to manifest; God’s grace is (already) made manifest in their lives (in its fullness) because they believe. Now, it is also shared out and into the world as they proceed to live into their resurrected new life and leave the old person and body of sin to the kingdom of humanity (like: “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead” Mt. 8:22, Lk. 9:60). These ones are grown together with (bonded to) Christ,[v] just as they were previously bonded to and grown together with sin and the old person. Therefore, they cannot return to the old way, old life, and old person. Again, Paul is refuting any notion that believers must return to sin to make God’s grace abound; the believer causes God’s grace to abound in the world as they live into their new life by the power of the Spirit and by faith in Christ and in union with God.[vi] (But they cannot cause God’s grace to become more present in their own lives than it already is by returning to sin.) Thus, believers become midwives of God’s grace by God’s grace and are encouraged and exhorted to go further and deeper into the world bringing God’s love and grace to all, especially the oppressed. Anyone who identifies with Christ by faith and baptism has identified with Christ in his death and will identify with him in his resurrection; herein is our justification: for the one who dies is declared righteous from sin. Sin is no longer in control and no longer boss (so, too, the law[vii]); God is now in charge of this new life, and Paul exhorts the Romans to live as such going forward and not backward. Saying,

Now, if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. Knowing that Christ, being raised from death, dies no longer, death no longer rules him. For he, he died, once for all he, he died to sin; but he, he lives, he, he lives to God. And in this way, you, you reckon yourselves to be dead to sin and living to/for God in Christ Jesus (vv8-11).

Conclusion

For Paul,[viii] Christ is the sacrament[ix]; it is Christ with whom we identify in both the waters of baptism and in the broken bread of the eucharist. It is not that water and bread are significant in themselves, but through them we come into contact with the dead and risen Christ; in partaking in these sacraments we identify in Christ’s three-day death and in his body broken; and as we identify so here, we can and will identify with Christ in his new life and bodily resurrection (today and tomorrow, present and future).[x] Further, to identify with Christ in his death—sacramentally and spiritually—means that we, too, like Christ our elder brother, are caused to be dead to sin, as in, sin no longer has dominion over us,[xi] eternal death,[xii] too, is rendered impotent for those who believe. (Because of Christ, death is dead, captivity is held captive, and indifference has met is own cold fate.[xiii],[xiv]) Sin’s stain and its consequence, death, are forever removed from the life of the believer;[xv] they are new creatures[xvi] (forever and daily[xvii]) no longer defined by sin but by God’s grace, no longer under the dominion of sin but under the reign of Christ.[xviii] No longer defined by death, but by life; no longer defined by captivity, but liberation; no longer defined by indifference but by love.[xix] We do not need to return…Nay! We cannot return to the sinful existence of the old person, of the kingdom of humanity; [xx] for God’s grace enters in anew every morning with God’s mercy.

Thus, we walk in all this newness, on the move because the Christian life is on the move because it is defined by Christ the gospel, defined by God and God’s Holy Spirit all of whom are always on the move looking for and seeking the beloved.[xxi]As those who identify with Christ by faith, we also identify with whom he identified: the lost, the unheard, the unvoiced, the ignored, the pushed off and pushed aside, the ones the society of the kingdom of humanity has deemed unworthy of love.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] Martin Luther Lectures on Romans: Glosses and Scholia (1515/1516) LW 25 Ed. Hilton C. Oswald (Saint Louis: Concordia, 1972), 50. “…as falsifiers understand the passage, when they say, ‘Let us do evil,’ that is, let us commit sin, ‘That good may come’ (Rom. 3:8), that is, that grace may abound.”

[iii] LW 25: 50. “By no means, because this idea is absolutely contrary to the work of grace,..”

[iv] LW 25: 50-51. “…the threefold dipping of Baptism signifies the three-day death period and the burial of Christ, into Christ Jesus, that is, by faith in Christ Jesus…”

[v] Sarah Heaner Lancaster, Romans, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2015), 108. “The kind of participation that baptism makes possible is an incorporation into Christ that is a secure joining for a thorough sharing, a kind of bonding.”

[vi] Lancaster, Romans, 107. “For Paul, baptism is s a clear sign of leaving the dominion of sin and entering the dominion of grace.”

[vii] LW 25: 308. “But he over whom sin reigns, no matter how he resists sin, is still under the Law and not under grace.”

[viii] LW 25: 310. “thus in this passage the apostle is speaking of the death and resurrection of Christ insofar as they refer to the sacrament, but not to the example.”

[ix] LW 25: 309. “For having put on our mortal flesh and dying only in it and rising only in it, now only in it He joins these things together for us, for in this flesh He became a sacrament for the inner man and an example for the outward man.”

[x] Lancaster, Romans, 108. “By being buried with Jesus, we are made participants not only in his death but also in his resurrection. To be united with him in death means also being united with him in resurrection (6:5).”

[xi] Lancaster, Romans, 107. “[Paul] describes sin’s power as ruling power; sin has dominion over us, enslaving us to its purposes and exercising influence over us as a kind of lordship. When we are under the lordship of sin, we are bound to submit to its influence.”

[xii] LW 25: 310. “Eternal death is also twofold. The one kind is good, very good.it is the death of sin and the death of death, by which the soul is released and separated from sin and the body is separated from corruption and through grace and glory is joined to the living God. This is death in the most proper sense of the word, for in all other forms of death something remains that is mixed with life, but not in this kind of death, where there is the purest life alone, because it is eternal life.”

[xiii] LW 25: 311. “Just as the death of death means to act against death, which is the same things as life, so the sin of sin is righteousness.”

[xiv] LW 25: 311. “Because for death to be killed means that death will not return, and ‘to take captivity captive’ means that captivity will never return, a concept which cannot be expressed through an affirmative assertion.”

[xv] LW 25: 310. “This is the way sin dies; and likewise the sinner, when he is justified, because sin will not return again for all eternity, as the apostles says here [v9]…”

[xvi] LW 25: 313. “The term ‘old man’ describes what kind of person is born of Adam, not according to his nature but according to the defect of his nature. For his nature is good, but the defect is evil.”

[xvii] LW 25: 314. “The meaning is that we must undergo this spiritual death only once. For whoever dies thus lives for all eternity. Therefore we must not return to our sin in order to die to sin again.”

[xviii] Lancaster, Romans, 107-108. “Those who have died to sin because they have been baptized into Jesus’ death. By participating in the death of Jesus, the follower of Jesus is dying to the lordship of sin and accepting the lordship of Christ.”

[xix] Lancaster, Romans, 108-109. “Dying to sin means that a person dies to an old way of life, and participating in the death and resurrection of Jesus means that a person enters a new way of life. The one who was crucified conquered death, and because we share in his victory, we are no longer enslaved to sin….The proper commitment to the new dominion in which we are privileged to live is to give up sin and live for God.”

[xx] Lancaster, Romans, 107. “To follow Jesus Christ means leaving the dominion of sin and living in the dominion of grace. If that is the case, then the follower of Jesus can no longer do the bidding of sin. By changing dominions, a person has changed lords and loyalties.”

[xxi] Lancaster, Romans, 109. “…new life in Christ is not static…Rather to walk in newness of life means to be on the move, to be ever attentive to what it means to live to God and to exercise our allegiance daily.”

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(re)Called and (re)Commissioned

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

We are all called to participate in God’s mission of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation. Everyone who can say, by the Spirit speaking through them, “Jesus is Lord” (1 Cor 12:3-13), is commissioned by the same Spirit to represent Jesus in the world by working for the wellbeing of the neighbor to the glory of God. Our call (individually and corporately) is a full Trinitarian affair; every person of the Godhead is not only invested but deeply involved in the life of us Christians (individually and corporately), breathing life and energy into and through our words and deeds of love and loving service born from faith. We never have to go it alone, because we are never out there fending for ourselves. The God who flung the stars and the planets into their courses has wed God’s self to us (Eph. 5), fulfilling the long promise that God will never leave or forsake God’s people.

But sometimes, we forget that our calling and our commissioning are of God. We take matters into our own hands, we confuse our thoughts and ideas for God’s thoughts and ideas, and we strive to accomplish tasks promoting the kingdom of humanity rather than the reign of God. And as we wander away, forgetting the source and substance of our call and commission, we end up hurting people, especially hurting those desperate to know the love and care of God the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Sustainer.

The good news is that God calls us back from our wandering, putting in our paths teachers and leaders who remind us not only about our call and commission, but remind us—especially—that God is our ground and source. Today, God is bringing to St. Luke’s a great and capable leader and teacher, Liz, to remind you, the beautiful body of Christ, that not only does God love you always and forever, but God is your sure foundation. Today we celebrate the Great Commission that defines the lives of all Christians, and we celebrate God’s specific commissioning of Liz to help love and lead you for the wellbeing of others to the glory of God.

Matthew 28:16-20

Matthew tells his audience, Now the eleven disciples traveled into Galilee toward the mountain where Jesus appointed for them and they saw him and worshipped him, but some were of two minds (vv. 16-17). The disciples, the eleven left after Judas’s departure, follow the proclamation of the women; they are on their way to Galilee as the women told them to do, they believed the testimony of the women.[ii] (The women traveled to the tomb on Easter morning and were commanded by both the angel from heaven and Jesus himself to go and tell the disciples to travel to Galilee where they would see Jesus (Mt. 28:1-10).) The newly minted eleven are moved to obey these women, trusting that what they witnessed was true;[iii] so, they traveled to Galilee.

When Jesus is there and meets them, the disciples worship him…but not all of them. The word translated as “doubted” has more nuance to it than just intellectual “doubting”; some were of “two minds” about Jesus being in front of them, they didn’t know how to respond to this familiar Jesus who was currently unknown to them in his risen form.[iv] Caught like deer in headlights, some of the eleven froze…just like you and I would do no matter what great faith we think we have. Their hearts thudded, was it really him? Their minds short-circuited, what do we do now? Some sunk in reverence, some had to let reality sink in.

With care and concern, bringing comfort and assurance,[v] Jesus moves towards his beloveds. Matthew tells his audience,

And Jesus approached and spoke to them saying, ‘All authority in heaven and upon the earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of Abba God, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to guard over all that I commanded you. And, behold!, I, I am with you every day until the consummation of the ages (vv.18-20).

Jesus stands before these humble eleven of mixed minds and assures them: I AM. In the fullest way possible, Jesus tells them that not only has he been vindicated by God[vi] being risen from the dead, defeating death, but that this Son of Man and Son of God is now in possession of all the authority in heaven and upon the earth. His authority is fully established.[vii] TL/DR: nothing, absolutely nothing can defeat him. And in this unalterable celestial and earthly, cosmic,[viii] reality born in the risen Christ is another unalterable reality of both celestial and earthly proportions: the disciples (even though only eleven now) are restored to their place alongside Jesus as his representatives. Jesus’s “task-force” can continue to proclaim the gospel[ix] and they are commanded to do so unto the ends of the earth, proclaiming the good news not only to Israel but to all the nations including (but not limited to[x]) the Gentiles.[xi] In these shocked and humbled (very) human disciples, Jesus’s mission—God’s mission of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation to bring all the world into God’s love[xii]—goes on.[xiii],[xiv],[xv]

How are the disciples to continue God’s mission made known in Jesus the Christ? By making disciples. Not by forcing people to believe (!!) but by proclaiming the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ crucified and raised and Christ’s new law of love.[xvi],[xvii] There’s no other message that participates in the furthering of God’s mission than the gospel, the proclamation of Christ. The Disciples must begin here and always begin again here at this basic message, which is the foundation of their lives, of their calling, and especially of their commissioning. Now, how they make disciples falls to two actions: baptizing and teaching. Less about “growing the church” and more about furthering the calling and commissioning of more disciples[xviii] who will, one by one and together, cause the church by the power of the Spirit.[xix] John’s baptism becomes the gateway for all people to enter into union with God as a result of faith; [xx] Jesus’s law of love will be distributed far and wide, letting it usher in the reign of God across lands and through nations, overturning the abuses and violences of the kingdom of humanity. On Good Friday, the disciples thought this Christ event was over and dead in the ground; but now, here, in this moment with Christ, what looked like an end, is a beginning…the commencement of their calling and commissioning to further God’s reign and righting wrongs.[xxi]

In this calling and commissioning are embedded two new realities for the disciples. First, is the trinitarian formula Jesus announces to them; the second is that Jesus will be with them always. According to Jesus, new disciples are to be baptized into the full name of the God-head, the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Sustainer. Jesus, the Son of God and of humanity, the one who was crucified and who is now standing before them, is to be counted as God and thus Jesus’s name participates in the full name of God, the Trinity.[xxii] In other words, Jesus is God, just as the Holy Spirit is God and Abba God is God. (The I am is no mistake here.) Following this is the promise the gospel closes with:[xxiii] I, I am with you every day until the consummation of the ages. It is no mistake that Matthew closes his gospel with this promise, considering he opened it (1:21) with the announcement that Jesus was Emmanuel “God with us”;[xxiv] all of Matthew’s gospel points to the continual presence of God among God’s people.[xxv] Without the power of Christ to call them, commission them, and compel them, the disciples cannot carry out their making of disciples; this is more than just a comforting thought, it is the very source of their lives and living as sent and powered disciples.[xxvi] Because of Jesus’s resurrection and the sending of the Spirit, Jesus can be with his disciples now and forever unlike when he walked the earth with them before Good Friday.[xxvii] God is with us, yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Conclusion

The calling and commissioning of the disciples is also our calling and commissioning (or, rather, recalling and recommissioning). This morning, we are called back to the root and ground of our lives as Christ’s disciples who are to live in such a way to proclaim God’s love in Christ to others and to the glory of God. We are to represent Christ in our words and deeds, knowing that we are not out here bumbling about alone; we are enveloped in the full love and presence of the Trinity, reminded of this fact every Sunday through our common worship together and in the preaching and teaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We do not need to make up a message; we already have one and it’s revolutionary. We do not need a new law; we already have one and it is built on and from love. We do not need to keep trying to find ourselves; we are found in Christ and given new life in him. We do not need to search for keys to unlock the captives; we have been given the key to bring liberation to all the oppressed and marginalized. This morning, hear your call and commissioning anew.

And, to Liz, you, too, are summoned this morning to help lead and instruct in the name of our Triune God. These here are now your charge (along with AliceMarie); to care for them, to bring comfort where there is affliction, and affliction where there is comfort, and, when necessary, to get into a little bit of good trouble as you participate as God’s called and commissioned leader of this humble church in Delta.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] Anna Case-Winters Matthew Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible Eds Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2015), 337. “The disciples…are following the instructions given for them to the women from the angel and from Jesus himself. Apparently they believed these women.”

[iii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 337-338. “Though they have not seen the risen Lord, they see the effect of the risen Lord on these women.”

[iv] R. T. France The Gospel of Matthew The New International Commentary on the New Testament. Gen. Ed Joel B. Green (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), 1112. “More likely it indicates that they did not know how to respond to Jesus in this new situation, where he was familiar and yet now different… [like transfiguration]”

[v] France, Matthew, 1112. Jesus “approached” Jesus came to his frightened disciples (assurance); Jesus “speaks” restoration of broken relations; and Jesus “says” words pushing their failures in the past, “swallowed up in the much greater reality of the mission to which they are now called.”

[vi] France, Matthew, 1108. “Jesus himself, risen form the dead, is now revealed in all his glory as the vindicated and enthroned Son of Man, a status which he has hitherto spoken of only as a future expectation, but which has now become a reality.”

[vii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 338. “Now there is no doubt of Jesus’ authority. God has raised him from the dead; it is a validation of his life and ministry. Now he announces ‘All authority in heaven and on earth have been given to me.”

[viii] France, Matthew, 1113. “…now what had been a vision for the future, albeit the imminent future, has become present reality. The risen Jesus, vindicated over those who tied to destroy him, is now established as the universal sovereign, and his realm embraces not only the whole earth, which was to be the dominion of the ‘one like a son of man’ in Daniel’s vision, but heaven as well.”

[ix] France, Matthew, 1107-1108. “In these few words many of the most central themes of the gospel reach their resolution and culmination. The preparation of the Twelve as Jesus’ task force, which had apparently ended in irreversible disaster in 26:56, is now resumed as they (or rather elven of them) are restored to their position of trust and responsibility and given the final instructions for fulfilling the emission for which they were originally called in 10:1-15.”

[x] France, Matthew, 1114. “The commission is of course to go far beyond Israel, but that does not require that Israel be excluded.”

[xi] Case-Winters, Matthew, 338. “His command to the disciples is that they should ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all nations” (Greek panda ta ethē). In much of Matthew ethnē means the Gentiles. The mission that was only for the ‘lost sheep of Israel’ is now decisively opened to the Gentiles.”

[xii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 339. “God’s work with Israel is not abolished or abrogated, it is rather extended outward to others who will be included even as was the Jewish eschatological hope. All will be judged—not on the basis of their religious affiliation or ethnic origin but on the basis of their love of God and neighbor as demonstrated by what they actually do.”

[xiii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 338-339. “The mission to Israel is never abrogated, just as Jesus comes not to abolish the law but to fulfill it.”

[xiv] Amy-Jill Levine qtd in Case-Winters, Matthew, 339. “‘It is because the promises to Israel have been fulfilled in Jesus’ mission that the message….can now be proclaimed to the Gentiles.’”

[xv] France, Matthew, 1108.

[xvi] Case-Winters, Matthew, 339. “The outreach to the Gentiles must include the teaching of the law; teaching all nations to obey everything that Jesus, the authoritative interpret of the law, has commanded them (28:20).”

[xvii] France, Matthew, 1118. “…they are to teach not their own ideas, but what Jesus has ‘commanded,’ entellomai, a term which hitherto has been especially associated with the ’commandments’…given by God through Moses. The basis of living as the people of God will henceforth be the new ‘commandments’ give in by Jesus.”

[xviii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 339. “It should be noted that this passage is not about ‘church grown.’ It is about ‘discipling’ (teaching) and baptizing (calling people into ministry).”

[xix] France, Matthew, 1108. “And at the heart of this new community of faith is the risen Jesus himself, as he had said he would be (18:20): they are to be his disciples, obeying his commands, and sustained by his unending presence among them. This new international community will be his ekklēsia (16:18) because it is he who now holds all authority heaven and on earth (an authority greater than that which he was initially offered by Satan and refused, 4:8-10)…”

[xx] France, Matthew, 1108. “The almost imperceptible mustard seed is now about to grow into a mighty tree; the kingdom of heaven is to be established over all the earth. The baptism which John had originally instituted as a symbol of a new beginning for repentant Israel (3:1-12) is now to be extended to people from all nations.”

[xxi] France, Matthew, 1110. “For the disciples, and for Matthew’s readers, this conclusion is in fact a beginning, a commencement.”

[xxii] France, Matthew, 1118. “The human leader of the disciple group has become the rightful object of their worship. And the fact that the three divine persons are spoken of as having a single ‘name’ is a significant pointer toward the trinitarian doctrine of the three person in one God.”

[xxiii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 339.  “The gospel closes with a promise.”

[xxiv] Case-Winters, Matthew, 340. “‘I am with you’ is the beginning, middle and ending of Matthew’s Gospel Jesus is identified from the beginning as “Emmanuel’ (1:21), which means “God with us.’ Midway in the Gospel Jesus comes to the disciples across the storm tossed sea and addresses them with his assuring presence: ‘“Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid”’ (14:27). Now the promise is given, ‘I will be with you always, to the end of the age.’ It is the final word of the Gospel, and perhaps the only word we really need.”

[xxv] Case-Winters, Matthew, 339. “‘I am with you’ has been a central theme for the Gospel.”

[xxvi] France, Matthew, 1119. “But the presence of Jesus himself among his people…ensures that it is not simply a relationship of formal obedience. In context this assurance is focused not on the personal comfort of the individual disciple but on the successful completion of the mission entrusted to the community as a whole.”

[xxvii] France, Matthew, 1119. “Jesus’ physical presence with his disciples was limited to the period of his earthly life span, but the spiritual presence of the risen Jesus has no such limitation: it is an eternal, divine being that Jesus will be among his obedient people, ‘God with us.’”

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Breathing into God’s Reign

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

While all the events marking key and signature moments in the life and death of Christ must be equally emphasized in the life of the church, it is his ascension and thus the sending of the divine Holy Spirit that establishes and motivates the church, the body of Christ, the ecclesia, the union of people committed to the message of Jesus Christ crucified and raised. Without the Spirit there would be no church. As the Iona Abbey creed proclaims, the Holy Spirit,
God within us,” is the life-giving breath of the church. The Spirit is the one who plows and prepares hearts and minds to hear and receive the proclamation of the gospel; it is the Spirit who opens ears and eyes to see God and Christ in others; it is the Spirit who motivates recalcitrant limbs and high-inertia bodies to participate in God’s mission of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation; and, it is the Spirit who causes the church to be and assures that the church will always be in the world, even if it means taking on different shapes and forms as it moves through the ages, adapting.

And it’s this last portion that is crucial for us today. The Spirit will always be the source and foundation of the church, despite us. While this is a comforting notion, removing the burden from our backs to “save the church,” it must also be our wake-up call urging us to press into the Spirit more and more, living in a way expressing our divinely ordered dependence on the Spirit not only for the life of our church or the life of our denominational expression of church, but as the unified body of Christ who represents Christ in the world individually and corporately through our words and deeds for the well-being of the our neighbors to the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 12:3b-13

In our Epistle text this morning, Paul begins with a declaration regarding what can be said by the divine Holy Spirit,[ii] Wherefore I am imparting to you this knowledge that …  no one is able to confess, “Jesus [is] Lord” if not through the agency of the Holy Spirit (v3a, 3c). Paul is making a strong distinction between what is and is not said by the Spirit of God.[iii] Too often, we incorrectly credit the divine Spirit with things that the Spirit would not say, things that have emotional energy behind them and things that carry depth of insight; but, not all of it is of the Spirit. For Paul, the principal declaration of the Spirit in the life of believers is the confession that “Jesus is Lord.” To say this is to be inspired by the Spirit. In fact, for Paul, it is the Spirit speaking through the one who says it. For no one concludes that a crucified man is the Messiah unless their ears and eyes have been opened by the Spirit to hear and see what God has done in Christ in the Easter event. Thus, the Spirit declares through the believer that Jesus IS Lord. (This is more than saying “Jesus lived” or “Jesus was Crucified” or “Jesus was raised”.)

Paul then discusses the acts of the believers motivated by the divine Holy Spirit. First, Paul emphasizes divine unity amid human diversity.[iv]

Now there are apportionings of the gifts of grace, but the same Spirit; and there are apportionings of servanthoods, and the same Lord; and there are apportionings of what activates effects, but the same God, the one who brings about/causes all things in all people (vv4-6).

The point Paul is making is that the various gifts of grace that believers have and express are from the same source and, thusly, do not allow for hierarchy to be created—the same God is behind each gift to each believer. [v] While the gifts are different from each other,[vi] they come from the same source and share in the same portion, God’s grace is freely distributed to all by God’s will.[vii] This automatically, for Paul, shifts the focus from the way things are done in the kingdom of humanity to the way things are done within the reign of God;[viii] there are no “special” apportionings, no one is singled out for being better or lesser in this divine economy of the distribution of spiritual gifts of God’s grace.[ix] All people and all gifts of grace are for the body of Christ and not to bring this or that one person fame and glory in the kingdom of humanity. This is why Paul then says, Now to each one the public manifestation of the Spirit is given toward the common advantage of others (v7).

Then Paul lists what type of gifts of God’s grace are distributed and apportioned to believers.

For to one is given the articulate utterance of “wisdom”, and to another rational statement of “knowledge” according to the same spirit. To a different person, a special endowment of faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miraculous power, to one prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another sorts of tongues, to another the explanation of tongues (vv.8-10).

This is not an inventory by which to create some test to discern who has what “spiritual gift.” What Paul is demonstrating is where and when the divine Spirit moves and is at work for the wellbeing of the body. Paul does not say that any of these gifts of grace participate as one time distributions but that the Spirit, in their orientation toward democracy and egalitarianism, distributes the gifts across the body of Christ so that the believers may, together, build each other up, encourage each other, and work toward and participate in the mission of the reign of God as Jesus did. In other words, the believers are to live in the world and among their neighbor eagerly using the gifts of grace they have received in that moment to the neighbor’s wellbeing and to the glory of God.[x] No one person gets all the gifts; no one gift carries more power or importance. Each person and all gifts function to benefit others. (Full stop.)

To have “wisdom” and “knowledge” is not to have sudden and special insight into others or events; rather, it’s about seeing and perceiving events and people through the lens of God’s grace,[xi] and to do so in a way that benefits others and the gospel.[xii] To be wise and knowledgeable in the economy of God is to see God at work everywhere through the Cross of Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit. Same goes for the gifts of “faith,” the (separate gift[xiii]) “healing,”[xiv] and “strength.” To have a special endowment of faith isn’t to believe blindly whatever the authority tells you to believe, but to believe in such a way that the common good is lifted and encouraged.[xv] Same, too, with healing and power which can (both) occur in various ways and by differing means (i.e. it’s not always spiritual, miraculous healing and power but could be done by temporal means[xvi]). Both “Prophecy” and the “discerning of Spirits” is about speaking rightly and seeing through false doctrine, being able to say what is and what is not of the reign of God. Both prophecy and discerning of spirits participate in furthering God’s reign as God’s truth is proclaimed and the lies of the kingdom of humanity are exposed.[xvii] The gift of “kinds of tongues” and the “interpretation of tongues” reflects deep spiritual groans that come from the subterranean self of believers; these groanings are unintelligible by the one groaning and another is needed to help to understand.[xviii] This unintelligible groaning and interpretation benefit everyone involved because, if we are honest, we all have deep subterranean desires and pleas that we cannot utter with regular words and need help in understanding and accessing those deep desires and please.[xix] (The gift and interpretation of tongues is not about new prophecy in the world or about speaking other languages, per se; it’s about participating in the birthing of the reign of God as both midwife and child-bearer.) The point of all this discussion, for Paul, is that the divine Spirit gives gifts of grace for the common good of all, to assist in the proclamation of the gospel, and to push back the evil forces of the kingdom of humanity eager to destroy human beings. [xx]

Conclusion

Paul concludes with,

Now all these things God works by the one and the same Spirit who distributes to each one distinctly just as the Spirit wills. For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body; this is the case with Christ. For also by one Spirit we, we all are baptized into one body, whether Jewish or Greek, whether slave or free, namely we were all given to drink one Spirit (vv.11-13).

Just as Christ is one, so too is the body of Christ one even though there are many members and many apportionings of gifts of grace. All of this diversity and difference is to serve the body of Christ so that this body of Christ can go into the world and allow God’s love and grace to spill over into the world, making the world a better place for those who are the beloved of God, our neighbors, those who are currently suffering in body and mind. We, as the body of Christ, are a body politically speaking, [xxi] thus we are Christ’s representative in the world as he is absent and only by the power of the Holy Spirit. We are one by our baptism into Christ,[xxii] by our shared faith in Christ, and by the power of the Spirit bringing us together to be the body of Christ and to bring us into union with God so that wherever we go and wherever we are, there, too, is God… just as is the case with Christ. As Christ breathed his last on the cross, we, by faith in Christ and in union with God by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, take up that breath and participate in the breathing into God’s reign through our words and deeds for the wellbeing of our neighbor to the glory of God. In other words, we participate in the Spirit’s life-giving breath of the church no matter where we find ourselves in history. Thus, there will always be church wherever there are those who can, by the power of the Spirit, confess Jesus is Lord.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] Anthony C. Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, NIGTC, eds. I. Howard Marshall and Donald A. Hagner (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 917. “On this basis Paul is asking what content of human speech may be said to count as what is spoken by the Spirit or through the agency of the Spirit of God.”

[iii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 917. “…what experiences and actions, as well as words, will count as manifestations of the Holy Spriit, rather than self-induced experiences, acts, or words, or even those induced by other agencies?”

[iv] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 928. “…in these verses, at least, Paul places his emphasis on the unit of source which lies behind a diversity of phenomena.”

[v] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 928. “The cohesive bestowal of the gifts ensures their fundamental unity.”

[vi] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 929-930. “Paul’s change of the Corinthian term πνευματικά, spiritual things, to χαρίσματα, spiritual gifts, ‘gifts of grace,’ calls attention to God’s generous act of freely apportioning different gifts to different recipients. Once again, grace through the cross governs ecclesiology and ministry.”

[vii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 930. “By the application of persuasive definition or code switching Paul redefines what counts as spiritual by talking about what God freely gives, on his own initiative, and in his own sovereign choice (12:11) as empowerments …through the agency of the Holy Spirit for practical service of God and of other persons…”

[viii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 939. “The background which controls the exegesis, therefore, derives from the contrast between the pretentiousness and competitive status-seeking of humans wisdom…and the gift of divine wisdom…”

[ix] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 930. “The lexicographical convention of distinguishing ‘general’ from ‘special’ gifts already imports distorting pre-judgments into a subtle rhetorical strategy on the part of Paul which intended to shift the focus form human status claims about πνεῦμα to more humbling realities about God’s different apportionings of gifts…”

[x] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 936. “The Spirit produces visible effects for the profit of all, not for self-glorification. If the latter is prominent, suspicion is invited. δἰδοται reflects both continuous process of giving, and the sovereignty of God in choosing and in freely giving.”

[xi] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 939. “Wisdom, in this context, becomes an evaluation of realities in the light of God’s grace and the cross of Christ. I s part of a response to grace.”

[xii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 944. “Paul does not seek the wisdom of the Sophists, but neither does he disparage practical reflection and judicious evaluation. Gifts of articular communicative utterance may draw on wisdom and knowledge from God especially when this serves both ‘the common good’ of all and the proclamation of the cross. (This is a far cry from some modern notions about coded messages for the welfare of individuals.)”

[xiii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 947. “It is not necessarily the healer who receives the gift of special faith.”

[xiv] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 947. “But if the majority associate healing with the faith cited in the first part of the verse, and if this faith is a sovereign gift given to specific, chosen persons and not to all believers, Paul may not expect that all believers who need various kinds of healing will necessarily manifest the gift of faith with which healing may be associated. This is given to ἐτέρῳ, a different person, or another.”

[xv] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 946. “…rather than focus on the category of miracle, it is more helpful to consider the conceptual entailments of faith in the God who is Almighty and sovereign in relation to his own world. This links faith here with λόγος γνώσεως…”

[xvi] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 950. “An exegetical scrutiny leaves open the possibility of gifts of various kinds of healings in whatever mode, through whatever instrument or human agent, and at whatever time God may choose, as one of many specific gifts…”

[xvii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 967. “The basic criterion for assessing the difference between the Spirit and forces of evil appears to operate more broadly in the public domain, having to do with whether the phenomena in question promote and witness to the sovereign Lordship of Jesus Christ (v.3).”

[xviii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 988. “Tongues may then be viewed as ‘the language of the unconscious’ because it is unintelligible (unless it is ‘interpreted’) not only to others but also to the speaker.”

[xix] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 988. “…Paul sees tongues as a genuine gift of the Spirt which can help the individual…”

[xx] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 956. “It is therefore essential to regain the collective and corporate framework of these gifts ‘to some…to another.’ Specific human agents (not all) may receive a particular gift from the Spirit to advance the gospel against oppressive forces, for the benefit of all.”

[xxi] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 996. “It is the use of the political body—rhetoric that is the object of comparison; Christ remains the main subject whom the rhetoric serves, as an analogy which later will be given an unexpected twist by ‘code switching’ what appears to be an unqualified hierarchy.”

[xxii] Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 997. “The previous verse had concluded with ὀ Χριστός as the focus of unity. Paul amplifies this unity by speaking of the common agency and experience of one Spirit and one body as focused in the very baptism that proclaimed and marked their turning to Christ and their new identity as people of the Spirit.”

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Clothed in Divine Righteousness: Easter Sunday!

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

On Friday, we bore the crushing weight of being utterly exposed; we felt the shame of being stripped down, our few fig leaves ripped from our bodies.[ii] On Friday, we viscerally felt the depth of our fragility,[iii] our unsafety,[iv] our hurt,[v] our lostness,[vi] and our guilt.[vii] On Friday we gazed long in the mirror and what was reflected back terrified us, angered us, grieved us, made us anxious, and was detestable to us; what we saw on Friday was that we are hopeless, helpless, lifeless, groundless, and ruthless creatures who lie to themselves, preferring to kill an innocent man than attend to the infection of the mythology of control we’ve grown quite drunk on. On Friday, we were abandoned to ourselves, left to our errant judgments, and found ourselves held captive in the tomb of arrogance and desperation, tombs we’ve constructed for ourselves, tombs we are unable to escape from because we are so curved in on ourselves. On Friday we were sealed in darkness and left for dead, alienated and isolated from God, from others, and from ourselves.

But then…God.

Today, where there was darkness there is now light, where there was death there is now life. This morning, the exposure we felt on Friday becomes the warm light of the risen Son, bringing us into himself, into the lap of Abba God, and wrapping us up like newborn babes in the heated blanket of the Holy Spirit. God sent death and his siblings packing because nothing stands between God and God’s beloved, not even death.

This is the goal and trajectory of God’s love: bringing that which is dead back to life, that which is encased in darkness into the light, that which is curved in on itself and loveless into belovedness. Today the oppressive burial linens of fragility, unsafety, hurt, lostness, and guilt are pulled off and we find ourselves dressed in the divine clothes of divine grace, mercy, kindness, joy, and righteousness. As God calls Jesus from the tomb, so does God call us from our self-imposed tombs. As Jesus is raised to life out of death, so, too, are we raised out of death into new life, new hope, new help, on to a new ground, with new confidence not in ourselves but in God, in love, in life, and in liberation. This morning, in our encounter with the risen Christ, our terror is quelled, our anger is released, our grief met with divine comfort, our anxiety gives way to peace that surpasses all understanding, and our detestable state is exchanged for cherished. And all of this as a gift from God to us through Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit; all of it dependent on God’s never-stopping, always and forever, unconditional love for us.

Happy Easter! Christ is Risen!!

Matthew 28:1-10

Matthew opens on the tomb. Unlike the Gospels of Mark and Luke,[viii] there is little movement here. Matthew begins at the tomb with the women Mary already there, Now late on the Sabbath as it was dawning into the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look on the tomb[ix] (v.1). As the women are already there, they know the tomb is sealed because they can see it. They are not planning to do any funeral and burial rituals; for them, what’s done is done. For Matthew, these women are not professing prodigious faith; they are there to confirm that Jesus is dead,[x] secured and sealed in the tomb, the supposed divine mission of God ended. However, God’s ways are higher than human ways: the last shall be first…[xi]

Matthew then tells us,

And, behold!, a great earthquake happened; for an angel of the Lord came down out of heaven and approaching rolled back the stone and was sitting upon it. Now the angel’s appearance was as lightening and their outer robe [was] bright as snow (vv. 2-3).

The Marys who were prepared for darkness and death find themselves immersed in the presence of the divine light, witnessing divine activity overhauling human space and time, folding death in on itself.[xii] As the male guards began shaking and (ironically[xiii]) became as corpses (v.4), the women hold ground through the earthquake caused by the angel’s arrival to roll back the stone.[xiv] Unphased by the men who are now on the ground and, thus, out of the picture,[xv] the angel of God addresses the women,

“You, you do not be afraid! For I have perceived that you are seeking Jesus, the one who has been crucified. He is not here, for he has been raised just as he said. Come and see the place where he was laid. And quickly go and tell his disciples, ‘he has been raised from the dead, and, behold!, he goes before you into Galilee, there you will find him.’ Behold! I told you (vv.5-7).

Those who were last at the cross become the first at the tomb;[xvi] those who were last in the economy of the kingdom of humanity become the first in the economy of the reign of God. The discipleship of the risen Jesus does not start with men minding their own business, but with grieving women coming to confirm death; the Marys, for Matthew, become the first witnesses to the resurrection of their beloved Jesus.[xvii] As they look in the tomb, as they see emptiness, as they remember that the stone was there when they arrived,[xviii] the Marys become the first to experience life amidst death. these humble ones get to be the divinely chosen preachers of the good news: Jesus lives![xix] Where they expected to find a dead body already in decay, they find the presence of God and the altering of history forever in the victory of life over death. [xx] And it is about this victory they are commanded to declare to the disciples with the authority of heaven behind them.[xxi]

And so, as quickly as they could, they left … from the tomb with fear and great joy and they ran… (v.8a). Matthew could have stopped here like Mark did in his Gospel; but Matthew doesn’t.[xxii] The women are eager to convey the divine message to Jesus’s disciples (v.8b), but God has another gift to give. Matthew tells us, And, behold!, Jesus encountered the women saying, ‘Rejoice!’ (v.9a). Just in case they might be doubting what just happened, Jesus shows up and greets them. What they saw back at the tomb wasn’t a figment of their imagination; Jesus is raised,[xxiii] Jesus lives.[xxiv] The event is so real, in fact, that they drew near [to Jesus] and held fast his feet and bowed down to him (v.9b). This was no ghost,[xxv] this was no figment of their imagination; Jesus stood before them, talked to them, and they grabbed hold of his feet.

As they are genuflecting, Jesus exhorts them, echoing the words of the angelic messenger of God, “Do not be afraid! Go your way and proclaim to my brothers so that they may go into Galilee, and there they will see me” (v.10). Jesus refers to the disciples as “brothers”; those who failed Jesus, those who betrayed him, those who denied him, those who ran and hid, those who are still hiding, are declared “brothers” and not merely “disciples” [xxvi] Divine victory of life over death eclipses the existential death the disciples are experiencing as they are still held captive in the oppression of darkness, of silence, and of guilt. In the raising of Jesus, God’s mercy, grace, love, kindness, and forgiveness come pouring out of that tomb rather than the stench of decay, decomposition, and death. As Jesus walks the earth in his resurrected state, life, love, and liberation are on the move.

Conclusion

To us who are exposed and found naked, not in control, fragile and hopeless, unsafe and helpless, hurt and lifeless, lost and groundless, and guilty and ruthless we are given, this morning, Christ himself—all of him—so that we never again find ourselves trapped in our self-imposed tombs. For us who find comfort in the consistency of our terror, we received an assurance like the Marys holding Jesus’s feet! For us who find ourselves addicted to our anger, we are beckoned in divine pleasure and given celestial joy through the resurrected Christ, the incarnate word of God’s love for the world. For us who know the weight of grieving, we are heralded into divine comfort in the surety of God’s presence always with us in Christ, the very one who overcame death with life. For us who are suffocating under anxiety, we receive peace that surpasses understanding. For us who find ourselves stuck in detest, we find ourselves cherished.

Today we’re given something completely new,[xxvii] completely different, completely strange to the kingdom of humanity. We are given life, love, and liberation. And while we benefit from this, we are given these things specifically so we can participate in God’s divine mission of the revolution of love, life and liberation in the world for the God’s beloved. We are refused the option of living as if we’ve not heard, seen, felt, tasted, smelled the good news. We are charged to take up the way of Christ and live as if the Cross isn’t the end of the story but the beginning. Today, we’re not the same as we were yesterday morning; today we’ve encountered an empty tomb and heard the announcement from the heavenly realm: he is not here; he has been risen! How could we ever live in the old way?

Today, our willful and chaotic self-determination collides with the steady path of Christ. Today we live under the weight that Jesus’s resurrection is not an event isolated to the past or retained for some future time, but is right now.[xxviii] We must hear our summons to go! and proclaim! in word and deed, not only telling but living in such a way that Jesus’s resurrection—thus life’s victory over death—is real for those most threatened by a world on fire, by leaders consumed with their own well-being, by institutions and systems hardwired to consume them. This morning, we, too, are resurrected and called out of our tombs to go and live radically and wildly in the name of God and for the well-being of your neighbor and to do so in a way that brings God glory and might get you in a little bit of good trouble. You’ve been summoned into life not death, into love and not indifference, into liberation and not captivity.

Today, we live because Jesus is alive, [xxix] we love because Jesus is love, we are liberated because death is no match for life.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/02/18/exposed-and-naked-we-are-not-in-control/

[iii] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/02/22/exposed-and-naked-we-are-fragile/

[iv] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/03/08/exposed-and-naked-we-are-unsafe/

[v] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/03/22/exposed-and-naked-we-are-hurt/

[vi] https://laurenrelarkin.com/?p=7127

[vii] https://laurenrelarkin.com/?p=7130

[viii] R. T. France The Gospel of Matthew The New International Commentary on the New Testament. Gen. Ed Joel B. Green (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), 1097. Four distinctive features of Matthew’s account: “…the earthquake, the angel rolling away the stone, the effect on the guards, and the women’s meeting with Jesus himself on their way from the tomb.”

[ix] Τάφος

[x] Case-Winters, Matthew, 336. “It was not uncommon for friends to come and wait by a tomb incase an apparently dead person should revive. This might continue as far as the third day. The effect of these visits was to confirm death.”

[xi] Case-Winters, Matthew, 336. “Waiting and watching in sadness, they have become the first witnesses to the resurrection. Once again the last are first. They are also first to worship the risen Lord.”

[xii] France, Matthew, 1099.

[xiii] France, Matthew, 1100. “Note the irony that those assigned to guard the corpse themselves become ‘corpses,’ while the on they guarded is already alive. The attempt at human security has been neutralized, and the guards play no further part in the scene until they have to report back in vv. 11-15.”

[xiv] France, Matthew, 1099. “…here the removal of the stone form Jesus’ tomb is attributed not to the earthquake but to the direct action of an angel. Indeed, Matthew’s connective ‘for’ suggest that the quake is itself the result, or at least the context, of the angel’s coming, so that emphasis falls on the angel rather than the earthquake.”

[xv] France, Matthew, 1100.

[xvi] Anna Case-Winters Matthew Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible Eds Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2015), 336. “‘Last at the cross, first at the tomb,’ the women have come to watch.”

[xvii] Ernesto Cardenal, The Gospel in Solentiname, translated by Donald D. Walsh (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2010), 618. “I: ‘In those times nobody paid much attention to women. And that’s why those women maybe didn’t run any risk, as Laureano says. Their role was only to go and weep and then embalm the body of Jesus. A humble role. But this Gospel assigns them a more important role: they were witnesses to the resurrection.’”

[xviii] France, Matthew, 1097-1098. “The action of the angel in removing the stone from the entrance to the tomb draws attention even more clearly than in the other gospels to the fact that Jesus has already left the tomb, while the stone was still in place.”

[xix] France, Matthew, 1101. “The women are not only themselves the witnesses of the empty tomb, but also the chosen messengers to convey the amazing news to Jesus’ male disciples.”

[xx] Cardenal, Solentiname, 619. “I: ‘The important thing about this story is that they find an empty tomb. They were arriving to embalm a corpse and there wasn’t any corpse.’”

[xxi] France, Matthew, 1101. Angel’s last words to women “reminiscent of the frequent TO formula, ‘The Lord has spoken’….The formula marks an authoritative pronouncement (perhaps even that the agnel speaks for God), and functions now as a call to action. The message has been delivered, and now it is up to the women to act on it.”

[xxii] France, Matthew, 1097. “Matthew’s account of the empty tomb is thus, like his account of the death of Jesus, more dramatic than Mark’s and supplies the surprisingly missing element in Mark 16:1-8, an actual encounter with the risen Jesus.”

[xxiii] France, Matthew, 1098. It’s “…a demonstration that Jesus has risen….What matters to the narrators is not when or how he left, but the simple fact that now, early on Sunday morning ‘he is not here’…”

[xxiv] Cardenal, Solentiname, 619. “Maria: ‘And afterwards he appears before them and shows them that he’s alive.’”

[xxv] Case-Winters, Matthew, 336. “The women ‘took hold of his feet.’ This latter establishes not only their posture of worship but that this resurrection appearance had ‘feet’—this is not a ghost.”

[xxvi] France, Matthew, 1103. The disciples become Jesus’s brothers, “The concept itself is not new….This time, however, it follows the abject failure of the Twelve to stand with Jesus when the pressure was on, a failure which was hardly less shameful because Jesus had predicted it in 26;31. But now it is time for the second half of that prediction to be fulfilled…and that Galilean meeting will eventually restore the family relationship which they must surely have thought had come to an end in Gethsemane.”

[xxvii] Cardenal, Solentiname, 621. “William: ‘Resurrection is a new life, not the prolonging of this life.’”

[xxviii] Cardenal, Solentiname, 621. “Laureano: ‘What’s important is for us to live resurrection here, right now, and for us not to believe, as many have believed, that this world doesn’t count, that what counts is to go to heaven afterwards and all that nonsense.’”

[xxix] Cardenal, Solentiname, 621. “I: ‘It’s certain they they’ve put Jesus resurrected in heaven, in another life, in the blue beyond, so that the earth will go right on being the same, and they’ll still be injustice, and there’ll still be poor people…But he rose to be here on earth: ‘He was dead and he goes to Galilee before you.’…”

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Exposed and Naked: Clothed in Righteousness

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

It failed. The grand divine experiment made tangible in Jesus of Nazareth failed. They took him. They tried him. And, they killed him. The promised coming of the kingdom stalled out and stopped. Everything they had witnessed and seen, everything they had experienced and touched, everything they had declared and heard was all now for naught. A big waste of time. A cosmic joke of grand proportions. Their tears give way to fear which then develops into anger. The oppression of their suffering I this moment was sealed by doubt, consuming them like innocent bystanders standing too close to a shore line when a tsunami hits. Where there had been light, there was now darkness. Where there had been liberation, there was now captivity. Where there had been love, there was now numbness. Where there had been life, there was now only death.

The Sabbath demanded a great deal of silence in body and mind. The people who followed Jesus—believed him to be the Messiah—were eager to enter the kingdom of God with Jesus as their great leader; these were now the ones who had to sit with their fear, anger, grief, and, for some who ditched Jesus in his final moments hanging and dying on the cross, they had to sit with their guilt. Not only did this divine experiment fail but they failed, too. And the time marking the sundown of Friday to the sundawn on Sunday morning was excruciating, burdened with great existential dread; this silence wasn’t like normal silences. It fell upon them like judgment from God; were they exiled…again? A silence so oppressive and a darkness so heavy, they might as well have been sealed in the tomb with Jesus to wait for decay and stench to arrive signaling death’s victory.

It all failed. They failed. Jesus failed. God failed.

On this night, all those years ago, the disciples died with Christ. What they didn’t know was that the story wasn’t as over …

1 Peter 4:1-8

Peter opens the fourth chapter of his epistle emphasizing Christ’s suffering and the correlation the believer has to that suffering. Peter writes,

Therefore, since Christ suffered in the flesh, you, you also equip [yourselves] with the same thinking—because the one who suffers in the flesh has hindered sin—for the purpose of living no longer to human desires but by the will of God for the time remaining in the flesh (vv.1-2).

For Peter the suffering of Christ—a major theme in the letter[ii]—is emblematic and representative for the believer[iii] who lives in the world. It is this one who is consistently subjected to the blustering mythologies and bombastic actions of the kingdom of humanity. Thus, it is this one who must put on the mind of Christ as they suffer, taking courage that they suffer because they are hindering sin,[iv] putting an end to old associations with indifference, captivity, and death.[v] Christ’s divine glory was made tangible in and through his suffering on the cross; it is through this obscured expression of divine glory that divine glory encounters the believers in and through their own suffering in the world[vi] as they dare to live differently[vii] (hindering sin) from their coworkers, neighbors, friends, and, even, family.

Thusly, Peter continues,

For sufficient time has passed having participated in the determination of the Gentiles, having followed in licentiousness, lusts, drunkenness, rioting, carousal, and lawless idolatry, by which they have been surprised by your not joining in the same wasteful excess, so they slander[viii] (vv.3-4).

Peter exhorts the believers that their suffering in the world is the fruit of their hindering sin. For Peter, sin is temporal and not merely spiritual—act rather than power—thus, to hinder sin is not to become sinless but to withdraw from participating in the actions of the kingdom of humanity that are antagonistic to the reign of God inaugurated through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. The Christian is to imitate Christ[ix] in the world; the Christian is to be a representative of Christ thereby pitting themselves against the kingdom of humanity and its actions thus leading to hindering sin in their own lives,[x] concurrently condemning those who slander them.[xi] For Peter, the believer once lived like everyone else in their society, but that way is now forever blocked.[xii] It will be up to the believer to serve either that which is easiest (going along with the kingdom of humanity thus sidestepping suffering thus negating Christ) or which is hardest: forsaking the kingdom of humanity, preferring to follow Christ, enduring temporal suffering, and seeking the way and will of the reign of God.[xiii] With either choice, they will be noticed and judged[xiv] accordingly either by their neighbor or by God and thus they will suffer now or later.[xv]

This is why Peter speaks of judgment.

They, they will have to give up word to the one who readily holds to judge the living and the dead. For this reason, the good-news is proclaimed even to the dead so that they might be judged according to human flesh but they might live by the Spirit as God does (vv.5-6).

Peter offers a word of encouragement and hope in these verses. The judgment that the believers will have to endure due to the slander of their neighbors still held captive by the allure of the kingdom of humanity pales in comparison to the judgment they will have when they find themselves face to face with God;[xvi],[xvii] for everyone–even the dead—is on a collision course with Abba God.[xviii] The believers can endure temporal suffering because the divine glory is theirs by their faith in Christ—partially now and in full when Christ comes again to judge the living and the dead.[xix] Divine glory is also theirs by way of their zealousness to imitate and represent Christ in the world to the glory of God; for as God is glorified does God give glory.

Therefore, Peter exhorts the believers to live well and to pray and to love one another,

Now the end of all things has come near. Therefore, be of sound mind and be soberminded toward prayers. Above all things, have earnest love toward each other, because love covers a great number of sins (vv.7-8).

The believers are to live in a way emphasizing their faith in Christ and their loving orientation toward each other while resisting relapsing into old habits and forsaking doing good in the world. Prayer becomes crucial here; prayer informs and is informed by love. As one bends one’s knee (literally or metaphorically) to God in prayer (a posture of humility and dependence) one is, therein, formed by God and God’s will[xx]—thus Peter’s argument comes full circle. To pray to God in the name of Christ is to identify with Christ and, therefore, to be molded in such a way as to identify with those with whom Christ identifies. This identification is none other than divine love for the beloved. Prayer gives us access to this divine love[xxi] so we can earnestly[xxii] share it with one another[xxiii] and, more importantly, share it with the world. In this way, believers participate in God’s mission[xxiv] of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation for the world.

Conclusion

For the disciples, the deadly silence of Saturday was palpable. For (about) 36 hours, waiting for the Sabbath to pass, they died; each one of them died with Christ—in hopelessness, helplessness, lifelessness, groundlessness, because of human ruthlessness. They despaired of themselves; they released all that they thought was and came to the absolute ends of themselves. And here, in their ignorance to divine movements, amid their darkest doubt, their deepest despair, surrounded by a void of sound and word, God was gearing up to usher them into a brand-new conception of what it means to live in Christ, to live in love, to live liberated from all that was. As the host of heaven held its breath and as the disciples cried, God was on the move raising the greatest gift for the cosmos: the fulfilment of God’s glorious promise, Jesus the Christ raised holding death itself captive to death, transforming suffering into glory—now and in the future, for all those who believe and follow him.

Tonight, we move from death to life. This service dives in deep to the silence of Saturday, the despair of a missing messiah, the stripping away of hope. At the beginning, we are stuck in our sin, set on a path toward that frightful day of judgment with no Christ to mediate, stealing from us any sense of peace—for how can anyone really have peace if they are always scrambling away from and fighting against judgment and death and their fruits? But in the blink of an eye, God moved, the heavenly host exhaled, and we find ourselves shrouded in the mystery of Christ being raised from the dead to be for us the source, sustenance, and sustainment of divine life, love, and liberation for all people, the entire cosmos, forever and always. We find ourselves moved from slavishly following the ways of the kingdom of humanity and (once again) in love with the reign of God and God’s will.

Tonight, we need to be moved from such enslavement into liberation so we can live and be different in a world that is collapsing into itself, being consumed by the hurt pride and immature tantrums of people who are out of control[xxv] and the epitome of hopeless,[xxvi] helpless,[xxvii] lifeless,[xxviii] groundless,[xxix] and ruthless.[xxx] Tonight, we must find ourselves naked and exposed in our complicity and captivity to the very same and then compelled to let go. We must let go of those ways because God has come in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit to clothe us with divine grace, mercy, kindness, joy, and the righteousness of God. And these are the fruits we bring into a world devastated and destroyed by death and destruction. And even as scary as our world is right now, tonight, through the suffering of Christ, our terror is quelled, our anger is released, our grief is met with divine comfort, our anxiety gives way to peace that surpasses all understanding, and our detestable state is exchanged for cherished. Tonight, As Jesus is raised to life out of death, so, too, are we raised out of death into new life, new hope, new help, on to a new ground, with new confidence not in ourselves or debased global leadership but in God, in love, in life, and in liberation. Today we are new creatures with a new life and a new way to walk in the world for the wellbeing of our neighbors and to the glory of God.

Hallelujah! Christ is Risen!

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] Peter H. Davids, The First Epistle of Peter, TNICTNT, ed. F.F. Bruce (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990), 147.

[iii] Davids, Peter, 147. “He encourages the Christians of Northwest Asia Minor to follow the example of Christ.”

[iv] I. Howard Marshall, “1 Peter,” The IVP New Testament Commentary Series, eds. Grant R. Osborne, D. Stuart Briscoe, and Haddon Robinson, (Downers Grove: IVP Press, 1991), 133. “His point is essentially that a person who suffers shows that he has given up those things against which his suffering is a protest. In other words, by suffering Christ showed his opposition to sinful living. Therefore, persecuted Christians must follow his example and say a firm no to their temptations.”

[v] Davids, Peter, 148. “What the Christian readers here put on is an ‘insight’ or a ‘point of view.’…That point of view is explained immediately: ‘the one suffering in the flesh has finished with sin….’”

[vi] Davids, Peter, 149. “While it is obvious that this is a difficult phrase, it seems most likely that (2) and (4) in the list above make the best sense of this clause, and that they are related in that (2) expresses the main point based on the underlying assumption of (4).” And the substance of (2) and (4): “…(2) when a person suffers, he breaks the power of sin (which is rooted in his flesh) over his life or atones for the sin in his life;…(4) when Christ suffered, he finished with sin (i.e., the phrase does not refer to the Christian at all)…”

[vii] Marshall, “1 Peter,” 134. “…all Christians were controlled by sinful desires in the past, but must no longer be so controlled for the future.”

[viii] Davids, Peter, 152. “Their reaction to this nonconformity is to slander the Christians.”

[ix] Davids, Peter, 150.

[x] Davids, Peter, 149. “First, sin in 1 Peter always indicates concrete acts of sin, not the power of sin over people…the ceasing of concrete acts that is intended. Second, the desire is to draw out a principle from Christ: he suffered for sin once in the past…with the result that he will ever have to deal with sin again. Third…the battle has an ending point. Finally, the point is that once the Christian grasps this insight he will realize from the example of Christ in 3:18-22 that he must live for God now (which means a suffering in the flesh and thus a battling of sin), for that will lead to a parallel victory (a state of having ceased form sin).”

[xi] Marshall, “1 Peter,” 136. “If Christians take a firm and consistent stand against this way of life, then by implication they condemn their former associates.”

[xii] Davids, Peter, 150. “On the other hand, since the flesh is weak and fallen, it is the mode of existence in which the evil impulse in human beings operates. Believers thus have a choice: (1) they can live their remining time ‘for human desires,’ or (2) they can live it ‘for the will of God.’”

[xiii] Davids, Peter, 150. “Thus there is a clear choice between taking the path of least resistance to their natural desires and their committing themselves to follow God’s will even if it entails suffering.”

[xiv] Davids, Peter, 152. “All of this rejection was certainly painful, especially when it came in the form of rumors they could not correct and ostracism from former friends and colleagues.”

[xv] Davids, Peter, 151. “These Christians, on the other hand, had been part of the culture, so their nonparticipation was a change in behavior and thus quite noticeable.”

[xvi] Davids, Peter, 152. “While the Christians may feel abandoned by God and unable to defend themselves, it is their accusers, not they, who have a problem, for the detractors will have to answer to God.”

[xvii] Marshall, “1 Peter,” 138. “Because there will be a final judgment, what the world thinks of Christians does not matter. What matters is the twofold fact that the pagans will have to answer to God for their refusal to obey him and that those who heard the believed the gospels will be vindicated by God and enjoy eternal life.”

[xviii] Davids, Peter, 153. “Yet we must not lose sight of the fact that the concern of the phrase is not who will judge, but that even the dead cannot escape the final judgment…”

[xix] Davids, Peter, 155. “The point of the passage, then, is that the judgment is also the time of the vindication of Christians. They, like Christ, may have been judged as guilty by human beings according to their standards, either in that they died like other human beings, or through their being put to death …”

[xx] Davids, Peter, 156-157. “Thus our author is calling for a mental alertness that sees life correctly in the light of the coming end. This will lead to prayer—not the prayer based on daydreams and unreality, nor the prayer based on surprised desperation, but the prayer that calls upon and submits to God in the light of reality seen from God’s perspective and thus obtains power and guidance in the situation, however evil the time may be…for proper prayer is not an ‘opiate’ or escape, but rather a function of clear vision and a seeking of even clearer vision from God.”

[xxi] Davids, Peter, 157.

[xxii] Davids, Peter, 157. “Thus when applied in situations such as this it means not to slack off on love, to keep it going at full force, to be earnest about it…these Christians are to maintain their devotion to one another.”

[xxiii] Davids, Peter, 157. “The love that is so important is that for fellow-Christians. As in the whole NT…unity with and practical care for other Christians is not seen as an optional extra, but as a central part of the faith.”

[xxiv] Marshall, “1 Peter,” 134.

[xxv] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/02/18/exposed-and-naked-we-are-not-in-control/

[xxvi] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/02/22/exposed-and-naked-we-are-fragile/

[xxvii] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/03/08/exposed-and-naked-we-are-unsafe/

[xxviii] https://laurenrelarkin.com/2026/03/22/exposed-and-naked-we-are-hurt/

[xxix] https://laurenrelarkin.com/?p=7127

[xxx] https://laurenrelarkin.com/?p=7130

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Epiphany: God for Us

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Introduction

At times, in the cool, dark of January and after all the festivities have wound down and the decorations and ornaments have been packed up, one can feel alone, unseen, unheard. Going from Thanksgiving to New Years is a tour of parties and engagements, concerts and events, gatherings and celebrations. One can feel swept up and out of banalities of regular life, being entertained from one moment to another.

As a parent of three children, each of whom is in a different stage of education, Thanksgiving marks the beginning of sweet returns and homecomings as semesters end and all the kids come home to stay, the onslaught of various concerts and parties threatening to overlap, and the rush of shopping, dining, traveling, and being ushered from one family visit to the next. This energy carries all the way through the first week of January. And then… Silence. And everything slows all…. the…. way…. down as if being caught in mud.

It’s not just parents who suffer the experience of the radical shifts between up and down, loud and quiet, active and inactive. Everyone feels it. The first few weeks of January, in the stillness, darkness, and coldness of the month, pose the greatest challenges for mental health; these can be the hardest weeks for our friends and family working with and through depression and grief, sorrow and loss, anxiety and despair, loneliness and alienation. The big drop after the cessation of the holiday feasts and fests paves the way for a dark cloud to loom over vulnerable humanity.

Thus, our orientation outside of ourselves is even more important as we tumble out of celebrations and land on that regular and blah day to day. Last week, Luke guided us to refocus our attention on the initial vibrations of the beginning movement of God’s mission of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation in the tween Jesus. Today, Matthew continues that refocusing outside of ourselves and on to another. Matthew tells us a story of the divine Son, Jesus the Christ, who identifies with us in all aspects of our life from the greatest of great to the lowest of lows.

Matthew 3:13-17

Jesus has no need for a baptism of repentance[ii] like the one Matthew tells us John is offering to those gathering to and in the river Jordan.[iii] And yet, Jesus shows up. Matthew tells us, At that time Jesus arrives from Galilee to the Jordan toward John to be baptized by him (v13). The sinless one, the Son of Humanity and the Son of God, shows up for the purpose of being baptized by John like everyone else. However, everyone else in that river needed to confess, needed to be washed clean, needed to repent.[iv] But Jesus is not like everyone else; John knows this. John nearly refuses Jesus this event, as Matthew tells us, But John was hindering him, saying, “I, I have need to be baptized by you, and you, you come to me?!” (v.14). Our English version makes it sound like John was speaking it as if from a script but not acting on it. I think he was acting on it with all the passion of a Palestinian Jewish man. With the emphasis embedded in the original language, John is (literally) astounded[v] by Jesus coming to him; it wouldn’t be farfetched to imagine Jesus’s cousin holding Jesus back by the shoulders with wet hands, confessing such words. John’s astonishment and confession to Jesus showing up in the Jordan will be echoed in Peter’s similar astonishment and confession when Jesus goes to wash his feet. God on the move is always on the move in a way that defies human reason and common sense.

Jesus (lovingly) replies to John’s passion not with chastisement or offense, but acknowledges that John’s not wrong, but here in this moment God is up to something different, something that doesn’t make sense, something that is new, something that will fracture the stagnant and toxic status-quo (the status quo he witnessed all those years ago in his week-long stay in the temple). Matthew tells us, Now, Jesus answered him and said, “You permit me just now; for, in this way, it is fitting for us to fulfill all justice.” At that time, [John] permits him (v15). Jesus links his being baptized to the fulfillment of (divine) justice. But what divine justice is being fulfilled here in the sinless God-man being baptized like a regular sinful human being? It is the justice of God that is fulfilled in identifying[vi] with the plight and predicament of God’s people.[vii] And it is through this identification with God’s people—in their highs and especially their lows—that God’s justice is manifest among and in those who are oppressed (spiritually and politically).[viii] Divine justice, divine righteousness is not about what one has (as if it is something we can possess on our own right); it’s about having a fleshy heart and a humble mind that drives one to live life before God in a human way with the people of God[ix] for the goal of “keeping human life human.”[x]

Matthew continues the story, telling us about what happened after Jesus is baptized, Jesus immediately ascended from the water. And, behold!, the heavens opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove coming upon him. And, behold!, a voice out of heaven saying, “This one is my son, the Beloved, in whom I am well-pleased!” (vv16-17). Something new is afoot and God is making Godself known in and through Jesus ascending out of the water and the dove descending to alight on him. Here we have clear images of new creation, of love, of life, of liberation. Jesus ascends from the midst of the water like his ancestors before him crossing the Red Sea to find themselves liberated from the oppression of Egypt; the dove descends and lands on firm ground that is the Christ, the son of God and the son of Humanity, much like Noah’s dove after the flood.[xi]

But what is significant here is the way God makes it known (directly and without mediation[xii]) that God identifies with Jesus and Jesus identifies with God. This is my son, the Beloved…Jesus identifies with the people and identifies with God. In that God identifies with Jesus, who identifies with the people, means that God identifies with the people in and through Christ. In this way, Jesus represents God to humanity and humanity to God.[xiii] In Jesus the Christ, the son of God and the Son of Humanity, humanity and God are united forever. In this way, humanity, the yous and mes of this world, participate by faith in being the Beloved with whom God is well pleased.

Conclusion

We hear this story every year, but do we pause long enough to consider the significance of Jesus taking a baptism of repentance he didn’t need? There’s no logical conclusion except for his desire (thus, God’s desire) to identify with the plight of humanity in its ups and especially in its downs. The Sinless one identifies with the sinful ones, and it’s this profound and earthy and fleshy identification that marks the very beginning of Jesus’s active ministry. If you’ve ever wondered if God is for you, Epiphany gives us a resounding HECK YES, GOD IS FOR YOU!

And not just for you when you are up, when you are “too blessed to be stressed,” when you are clean, neat, put together, organized, straightened up, physically killing it at work and at the gym, spiritually killing it in your quiet time and charity. Epiphany highlights and emphasizes that God is with us at our worst: in our desperate need to confess, to be washed, to repent. God is with us when our acts are not together, when we can barely get out of bed, when we just can’t anymore, when we are depressed and despairing, when we are consumed with grief and emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual pain, when we bare tremendous burdens of loss and sorrow, when we want to quit and when we do. God is with us when we fail. God is with us when our shoulders and backs feel as if they are about to break with the burdens. And what’s more? God is with us when society is against us, threatens us when we are different, and condemns us because we have need, because we lack, because we can’t rise to the demands of a system dead set on devouring us.

Epiphany is the unmediated voice of God telling you, telling us, that we are unquestioningly, undoubtedly, unconditionally accepted by God because God chose to identify with us on no other condition than God’s love and pleasure made known in Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] R. T. France The Gospel of Matthew The New International Commentary on the New Testament. Gen. Ed Joel B. Green (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), 117. “The first appearance of the adult Jesus in Matthew’s story takes place in the context of John’s baptism, with Jesus as John’s Galilean ‘follower’ … who receives baptism along with the repentant Judean crowds.”

[iii] Anna Case-Winters Matthew Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible Eds Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2015), 50. “John has been preaching a baptism that signifies repentance. Why would Jesus need to be baptized? What does he need to repent? Our theological tradition has insisted that Jesus is without sin.”

[iv] Case-Winters, Matthew, 51. “Regular ritual washing with water was widely practiced within Judaism and its symbolism of cleansing form sin was understood. This singular experience of ‘baptism’ that John was practicing is more reminiscent of the practice of ‘proselyte baptism.’ When Gentiles converted they were baptized. In extending this practice to everyone, John is in effect declaring that everyone stands in need of conversion, signaling their repentance and turning to God. Even the religious leaders stood in need of baptism.”

[v] Merriam-Webster “Astounded”, “feeling or showing great surprise or wonder”

[vi] France, Matthew, 120. “The most obvious away in which Jesus’ baptism prepares for his mission is by indicating his solidarity with John’s call to repentance in view of the arrival of God’s kingship. By identifying with John’s proclamation Jesus lays the foundation for his own mission to take on where John has left off.”

[vii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 50. “One way we might understand Jesus’ presenting himself for baptism is a sign of his solidarity with sinners. In this context, ‘to fulfill all righteousness’ is to be with God’s people, stand in their place, share in their penitence, live their life, die their death.”

[viii] Case-Winters, Matthew, 50. Righteousness/justice according to Hebrew thought, “It is about the establishment of God’s will that justice should everywhere prevail. God’s righteousness is connected with ‘vindication,’ ‘deliverance,’ and ‘salvation’…God’s righteousness is seen in God’s special regard for those who are powerless or oppressed and stand in need of justice.”

[ix] Case-Winters, Matthew, 50. “Thus righteousness is not to be conceived as a static quality that one possesses (what one is) but rather a matter of what one does in living life before God.”

[x] Paul Lehmann, Ethics in a Christian Context.

[xi] Case-Winters, Matthew, 50-51. “That he is baptized in the Jordan (v. 3) recalls the crossing of the Jordan into the promised land. That when he comes up from the water, the Spirit descends like a ‘dove’ reminds us of the links between water and Spirit in Genesis, as ‘a wind from God swept over the waters’ (Gen.:2). After the flood Noah sends out a dove. Themes of creation and new creation are reverberating here.”

[xii] France, Matthew, 122. Divine voice, “…the most unmediated access to God’s own view of Jesus.”

[xiii] France, Matthew, 120. “Further, as Jesus is baptized along with others at the Jordan, he is identified with all those who by accepting John’s baptism have declared their desire for a new beginning with God.” (representation)

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Jesus, Our Anchor Between

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[1]

Introduction

A new year is upon us. 2025 is now in the books; 2026 remains unknown as it stretches out before us. We are caught between letting go and taking in, wrapping up and rolling out, caught between what was and what will be. The beginning of a new year always invites resolutions and promises, some of which will be broken and others fulfilled. Somethings we can leave behind in 2025, others we will carry with us into 2026. For some of us there’s excitement as we think about all the unknown terrain to be discovered over the next 361 days; others of us may be feeling the heaviness the new year brings, fearing and worrying as we contemplate the potential for (more) loss and (more) pain to come our way.

The reality is that most of us probably have some form of all these feelings as we celebrate the new year. We are both excited and nervous, confident and skeptical, in control and not in control. So, it can be hard to feel anchored at this time between two years—one being completed and one barely started. And because we are caught between all these emotions and feelings, we can’t find our anchor in ourselves because that’s where all the instability is currently residing. So, where do we look?

Outside of ourselves. And this is the power of the Christmas season. Something new (even if the story is quite old) is born among us and to us and in us. Jesus, the Christ, is given to us anew, again. And while on Christmas Eve we were part of the rabble invited to the manger among shepherds and animals to look upon the newborn child who is the savior of the world, today we are invited to witness Jesus as tween participating in religious (and family!) life in a new way. The anchor we need at the beginning of this new year is found in Jesus the young and curious teacher and learner.

Luke 2:41-52

Luke tells us that Mary and Joseph were traveling to Jerusalem every year for the festival of the Passover. And when [Jesus] was twelve, they went [to Jerusalem] according to the custom of the festival and when the days of the festival came to an end, they returned and the boy Jesus remained in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know (vv.41-43). Every year for eleven years they traveled, as a family, to Jerusalem for the celebration of the festival of the Passover; every year for eleven years Jesus returned with them. And then, at year twelve, Jesus remains while the family leaves. Luke doesn’t give us a reason (upfront) about why Jesus decided to stay back or if it was an accident as if he was caught up in the events and the dialogues indwelling and swirling about the synagogue and in Jerusalem and couldn’t pull himself away. What is clear is that something new is happening; Luke wants his audience to see a shift in the narrative, to take note of Jesus’s self-differentiation from his family, his parents and siblings, even any extended family that may have been in the traveling company.

Luke continues the story, But considering him to be in the company, they went a day’s journey and then they were seeking carefully for him among the relatives and acquaintances. When they did not find [him], they turned back toward Jerusalem and were seeking carefully for him. After three days, they found him in the temple sitting down in the middle of the teachers and listening to and enquiring of them (vv44-46). Following Luke’s story, Jesus is missing for at least five days if not six. While it took his parents a harrowing three days to find him in the temple, he (most likely) spent more than just that moment (preceding his being found) in the temple. He spent about a week; a week is plenty of time to form observant opinions and rational conclusions.[i] Now, there is a correlation here between Jesus being found by his parents on the third day in the temple and Jesus being found on the third day after his death in resurrected glory; [ii] I’m not sure that’s Luke’s main point. Luke’s point is to make known the very beginning of Jesus’s ministry at a young age. While we know his active ministry starts at the Epiphany, what Luke is showing his audience is that the very beginning—the inception/conception—is here; for it’s here where Jesus is listening and asking, answering and debating with the very same religious leaders he will come into conflict with later when he’s an adult. It’s here, for Luke, where Jesus begins to make himself known and where Jesus begins to become aware of the toxicity of the religious situation for the people of God.[iii] Here, for Luke, God is moving Jesus’s spirit and planting the seeds of God’s divine gospel proclamation that will come.

So, after a week his parents find him and he’s teaching and questioning the elders of the synagogue. Then Luke tells us, Now, all the ones who were listening to him were amazed about his understanding and answers. And after seeing him, they were struck with astonishment and his mother said to him, “Child, why did you do this to us in this way? behold, your father and I were seeking you with suffering pain.” And he said to them, “Why were you seeking me? Did you not consider that it was necessary for me to be in this place of my father?” (v47). Not only has Jesus separated himself from his family, but he is also separating himself from the authorities of the synagogue. Their amazement at his insight and answers indicates that his comments and questions were not textbook but came from a different source, a divine inspiration, a divine, prophetic stirring. And this is what Luke wants his audience to see, to focus on, wherein to find anchor. Jesus the Christ, Jesus the child of Mary; Jesus the Son of God, Jesus the Son of humanity. It is through this one that God will challenge and overhaul the kingdom of humanity through the reign of God; it is through this one that the oppressed (spiritually and politically oppressed) will find liberation not only spiritual liberation with God but political liberation with the neighbor from the systemic oppression of the kingdom of humanity. It is through this divine child of Mary that the challenge and collision of the reign of God with the kingdom of humanity is already starting.[iv],[v] It is in and through this one that the very center of the temple[vi] will be relocated away from cold stones and in fleshy human hearts, away from cold law obedience and to warm faith wherein the law is satisfied and done.[vii]

Conclusion

As we enter this new year—with all its unknown and uncertainty, with all its mileage laying out before us and unchartered territory—we enter with a story of God for humanity guiding our way. We are given someone to walk with: Jesus the Christ, God’s son. So, we enter this new year knowing something significant and timeless: for God so love the world that God gave God’s only son to bring love, life, and liberation to the unloved, the dead, and the captive. Luke gives us a place to look, a focal point, something to allow our anxious minds and nervous hearts to focus on and find anchor. Luke gives us someone outside of ourselves to look to: Jesus of Nazareth, this man who is God. Christmas will always remind us that God comes to dwell with human beings on earth. This is God’s desire: to dwell with humanity whom God loves with all God’s heart. So, with resolutions or not, with promises or not, with intentions or not for this new year, we enter this new year with an ancient story made new to us at this moment. And in this ancient story we find the fulfillment of all we were waiting for through Advent: hope for the hopeless, peace for the peaceless, joy for the joyless, and love for the loveless.

[1] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[i] Ernesto Cardenal, The Gospel in Solentiname, translated by Donald D. Walsh (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2010), 46. “Olivia: ‘he went to the temple to teach the teachers of the law, because these teachers knew the law by heart but they didn’t put it into practice.’”

[ii] Cardenal, Solentiname, 46. “Olivia: ‘He also did it to help prepare them. He was going to be away from them later. And once Mary and his other relatives came looking for him, and he told them that his family was the community. And then Mary lost him in death, but on the third day, like here in the temple, he was found.’”

[iii] Cardenal, Solentiname, 46-47. “…Jesus was taken to the temple by his parents, in accordance with the religious traditions that they faithfully observed, ‘as was the custom,’ as the Gospel says. There he saw the Jewish religion, legalistic pharisaical, external. He also saw the money-changers that he was going to drive out later. And then, when his parents were leaving, he went back to the temple to see if he could do something to change the situation.”

[iv] Cardenal, Solentiname, 46. “Felipe…: ‘In this Gospel Jesus appears as a rebellious kid. He’s still a child and he’s already in the temple challenging their religion, criticizing and arguing with those guys, giving them arguments they can’t answer.’”

[v] Cardenal, Solentiname, 47. “Felipe: ‘Conclusion, then: Jesus was a revolutionary from childhood.’”

[vi] Gonzalez, Luke, 44. “The temple is the sign of God’s presence in the midst of the people.”

[vii] Justo L. Gonzalez, Luke, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2010), 43. Potential echo of 1 Samuel 2:26 in Luke 2:52. And, “Furthermore, Samuel’s connection both with the temple and with Jesus hint at the typology that sees Jesus as the new and final temple of God. For this reason, a common theme in early Christian theology was that the destruction of the temple showed that it was no longer necessary, for the temple prefigured the one who had already come.”

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Nothing to Lose; Everything to Gain

“‘Dear Lord God, I wish to preach in your honor. I wish to speak about you, glorify you, praise your name. Although I can’t do this well of myself, I pray that you may make it good.’”[i]

Now it happened, writes Luke, in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus to take a census of all the inhabited world … and all the people were going to enroll, each one to their own city (v1,3). Luke’s story about the event of Christ’s Nativity contrasts with what we expect it to be. Experiences and feelings of hope and peace, of love and joy, fill our expectations of Christmas and its season. But, on that night, for Mary and Joseph, for the shepherds at work, there was no hope and peace, there was no joy and love. There was fear. There was anxiety. There was chaos. There was pain (physical and emotional, maybe even spiritual). There was worry and concern threading through every thought and action. There were people struggling to find bravery when they needed it the most.

Luke narrows the scope of the story, focusing in on Joseph and Mary humbly going on their way: Now, Joseph went up from Galilee out of the city of Nazareth into Judea into the city of David being called Bethlehem because he was of the house and lineage of David. He went to be registered with Mary, the one who had been betrothed to him and the one who was pregnant (vv4-5). On that night, Mary and Joseph made a tough journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem. The path wasn’t easy, the ride wasn’t smooth, the forecast was unknown, and there was no confirmation that when they got to Bethlehem there would be lodging. On that night, all was not calm; it was scary and unknown because, on that night, tensions rose and the potential for harm from chaos loomed with every step they took. Adding to this heavy burden, Mary was ready to give birth to her first-born son; her body ached, her spirit fatigued, her mind consumed with what might happen if her time came. On that night, she fought to be brave—walking all that way, not wanting to be a burden to Joseph, unknowing of what was to happen or what would come. Where was God in this for Mary?

And what of Joseph on that night? We don’t hear much about his plight as he made his way, leading the pregnant Mary, to Bethlehem, away from the comfort of his own town of Nazareth, the places and spaces he knew so well. The discomfort of the unfamiliar road and journey barely eclipsed the rolling and roaming narrative in his head: is she telling me the truth? I know the angel spoke to me, but it feels strange, surreal, farfetched… Thoughts of the census accompanied his human doubt and questioning, what will happen to use once this census is done and all the chips are collected into wealthy pockets?[ii] As they traveled into Bethlehem and faced closed door after closed door, Joseph’s brave face faltered as he watched Mary’s face give way to the first pangs of labor. Now it happened, Luke writes, while being there, her days completed… (v6)One prayer passed over his lips, please let me find somewhere safe for her, for him…this child… that’s not even mine… Everything felt up to him; as frustration, fear, and maybe even some resentment began to surface, the burden continued to weigh down on his shoulders.[iii] Where was God in this for Joseph?

In a stable in Bethlehem, they felt safe enough. …[Mary] brought for her first-born son, and she wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was not lodging for them (v7). Neither Joseph nor Mary thought this situation ideal, but it was what it was. And, for now, the child was safe in the wooden manger and hay, among the animals forming fortress around the exhausted couple and the long-awaited Messiah of Israel and the world. Those who felt exhausted from the long, lonely journey, felt beleaguered by the socio-political demands of Caesar Augustus and Syrian Governor Quirinius,[iv] and isolated from family, those who wondered where God was in their plight, now had God in their midst, dwelling among them. God as brave, poor[v] infant daring to face the world in vulnerable humanity: to feel every pain, every sadness, every frustration with systems and ideologies set up and upheld just to keep the already down, down. This one, this brave divine infant, will be the one to heal the fractures existing among humanity and between humanity and God and creation, the fractures that fuel injustice, war, hatred, domination, inequality and inequity, disunity and discord.[vi]

And Shepherds were in that region spending the night and keeping guard through the night over their flock (v8). The shepherds held ground in that dark night, in that silent night. There was, of course, worry about potential animal attacks on their sheep;[vii] there was more worry about what would happen to them and their flock once the census completed. How much more will I lose? I already have so little and this feels like a kick in the gut while down… The shepherds feared not the literal wolf, but the metaphorical one, the one against whom they could not fight and if they did, they knew they would not win.[viii] The shepherds, the oppressed of the oppressed, where afraid; it is quite certain their blanket of anxiety that night did not keep them warm but it sure kept them awake and on guard.[ix] That night, those shepherds didn’t feel that brave as the powerful were gearing up to take what they wanted and they couldn’t do anything about it. Where was God for them?

And then to those who were eager to stay unseen and unnoticed, were exposed by divine, celestial light.[x] Luke describes,

And then an angel of God came upon them and the glory of God illuminated them, and they were frightened with a great fear. And the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid! For, BEHOLD!, I announce to you great joy whichsoever will be for all the people. A savior was born for you today—who is the Lord Christ—in the city of David. And this is a sign for you, you will find a newborn child having been wrapped in swaddling closes and being laid in a manger. And suddenly it happened a great number, an army of heaven appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to the most High God and upon earth peace among humanity whom God favors!” And it happened the angels left from them into heaven… (vv9-15a).

Heavenly light encompassed the shepherds, and for this moment they are center stage in this divine drama. It’s not Jesus the Christ, it’s not God in a ball of fire or voluptuous cloud, it’s not kings or princes, not emperors or governors, it’s not even Mary, the “God-bearer”, who is the center of attention here. It’s the shepherds, the lowly, unclean, unknown, unseen, not-all-that-brave-in-this-instance shepherds.[xi] They are not only addressed by divine representative, they are sent to go find God in a stable, in the hay and wood, among animals, among two very tired, fatigued new parents.

And they go! They are addressed by divine messengers and they are terrified by them,[xii] but they still go because there is always comfort and joy in God’s Goodnews.[xiii] Luke tells us, and they went and hastened and they found Mary and Joseph and the newborn child being laid in the manger (v16). These shepherds feeling, a bit unbrave against the raging of the kingdom of humanity, feel empowered by divine Spirit to go and dare to be in the presence of God without an mediator they know of. These lowly are now the brave, these unclean are now the righteous ones seeking and finding God in God’s humble abode and vulnerable body, it is these humble who are the first to be sent on a great divine mission in the world seeking, finding, and embracing the one who will bring both spiritual and temporal[xiv] release and instigate the divine mission of the revolution of life, love, and liberation to Israel and to the world to defeat the death, indifference, and captivity of the kingdom of humanity.[xv]

Conclusion

Every year I tell you that we are the shepherds, we are part of the rabble that is surrounding the baby Christ in the wooden manger and straw bedding. And this isn’t wrong, we are.[xvi] We are the ones peering in and being vicariously included, completely invited in this story as witnesses and onlookers.[xvii] We are the ones filled with anxiety, plagued with sorrow and grief, dreading what is to come from our own socio-political realities…more anger? More strife? More fear? More division and derision? We’re the ones struggling to be brave in the face of it all. And we’re the ones met tonight by the divine baby in the manger just like the shepherds.

But it’s more than just that; there’s more good news. The theme of tonight’s sermon is bravery. It is the case, in the divine economy, that those who have the least to lose can be the bravest.

Why did Mary say yes to God all those months ago? Because she, the lowly and poor, had little to lose and everything to gain.

Why did Joseph say yes to Mary by way of angelic vision? Because he, the lowly and poor, had little to lose and everything to gain.

Why did the shepherds say yes and hasten to find the new family carrying divine hope, peace, joy, and love into and for the world? Because they, the lowly and poor, had little to lose and everything to gain.

These are the bravest. And each of them was sent by divine summons to go and be in the world in a new way: a way trusting God, a way following Christ, a way empowered by the divine Spirit of God.

The baby is delivered. The mother is exhausted. Step-dad, too. The angels and the host of heaven have announced, glorified, and sang. The shepherds have heard and have found. But the work of Christmas is just beginning… because the baby of Christmas, Jesus the Christ, is born in our hearts tonight and now we become the brave ones called and sent.

“The Work of Christmas” —by Howard Thurman
When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among others,
To make music in the heart.

Tonight, we are, along with the Shepherds, along with Joseph, and along with Mary, being sent to do something brave: to dare to have hope, dare to work for peace, dare to rejoice, and dare to love. And we can dare to do such things because this daring comes with nothing to lose, and everything to gain. It is by our faith in Christ, the humble, vulnerable infant born this night, that we can dare because he has gone before us and promises to be with us every step of the way. Immanuel, Immanuel, has ransomed captive Israel.

[i] LW 54:157-158; Table Talk 1590.

[ii] Gonzalez, Luke, 33. “A census had sinister implications. It was not just counting people in order to see how many they were, and what population trends were. In ancient times, and long thereafter, a census was in fact an inventory of all the wealth of a region—its people its animals, and its crops—so that the government would be able to tax people to the maximum. A census usually announced greater poverty and exploitation. It was as welcome among the subjects of the Roman Empire as undocumented immigrants in industrialized nations welcome a census today.”

[iii] Gonzalez, Luke, 33. “As usual, oppression is not a merely political matter, the concern only of those directly involved in politics. It also reaches the everyday lives of people, as is seen in the very fact that Jospeh and Mary have to travel to Bethlehem even though she is about to give birth.”

[iv] Gonzalez, Luke, 33. “The setting is rather that of people living under an oppressive regime. The mention of August and Quirinius—as earlier the mention of Herod—is political charged. For a period before the advent of the Roman Empire, the Jews had been struggling against Syrian domination. Now their land was ruled from Syria by a governor appointed by Rome. Whatever the actual chronology may have been, the political structure is clear: the Jews have a puppet government under Syrian and Roman power.”

[v] Cardenal, Solentiname, 24. “‘[Christ] was the greatest revolutionary, because being God he identified with the poor and he came down from heaven to become a member of the lower class and he gave his life for us all. The way I see it, we all ought to struggle like that for other people and be like him. Get together and be brave.’”

[vi] Ernesto Cardenal, The Gospel in Solentiname, translated by Donald D. Walsh (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2010), 23. “[Jesus] was born into a humanity divided and dominated by crime in order to unite us and to change the order of things. And that’s where we are.”

[vii] Justo L. Gonzalez, Luke, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds. Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher (Louisville: WJK, 2010), 33. “This is not a mellow. Bucolic story about some shepherds tending their sheep with little or no care beyond the possibility of a wandering wolf. That is not the setting in which Luke presents the story.”

[viii] Gonzalez, Luke, 33-34. The shepherds, “they live out in the fields, suffer all kinds of deprivations and even dangers, in order to protect their flocks. But the census threatens a new danger, a wolf more dangerous than any four-legged beast, a wolf that will probably decimate their flocks, and whom they cannot fight, for it is too powerful. It is not difficult to imagine what would be the talk of such shepherds as they sought to remain awake through the night.”

[ix] Gonzalez, Luke, 34. “…the setting itself was one of fear and oppression.”

[x] Gonzalez, Luke, 34. “One of the ways in which the ‘little people’ mange to survive under oppressive regimes is not to call attention to themselves. They seek to go on with their lives unnoticed by the powerful, who could easily crush them. Now these shepherds are literally in the lime-light and an obviously powerful personage confronts them.”

[xi] Cardenal, Solentiname, 26. “Felipe: ‘The angel came to them because they were working men, and I find this is very important for us. Because they were poor little people who were working. They were watching over their sheep which is like taking care of cattle today. They were workers, laborers, poor people. The angle of God could have gone to the king’s palace and said to him: ‘The Savior has been born.’ But the angel didn’t go where the king was but where the poor people were, which means that this message is not for the big shots but for the poor little guys, which means the oppressed, which means us.’”

[xii] Gonzalez, Luke, 34. “It is in that scene, perhaps silent, but not as peaceful as we tend to depict it, that an angel suddenly appears before the shepherds, and they are terrified. Their fear is not surprising.”

[xiii] Gonzalez, Luke, 35. “An encounter with God’s power and might leads to awe and terror, but then God’s gracious word produces joy and comfort.”

[xiv] Gonzalez, Luke, 36. “The title, ‘Savior’ (sōtēr) was employed in the Septuagint (the Greek version of the Hebrew Bible that Luke used) to refer both to God and to those whom God sense to liberate Israel. In the Hebrew scriptures, the function of such liberators in either purely religious nor purely political.”

[xv] Gonzalez, Luke, 36. “The ‘saviors’ in the Hebrew Scriptures liberate Israel from its political oppressors so that the people may be free to serve and obey God…Thus when the angel announces Jesus as ‘Savior,’ his declaration has both political and religious overtones. The child who had been born will free the people from bondage—bondage both to their sins and to their oppressors.”

[xvi] Cardenal, Solentiname, 26. Thomas Peña “‘The way I see it is that those guys who were watching over their sheep heard good news. There they were just like us here, and they heard good news.’”

[xvii] Cardenal, Solentiname, 28. “I: ‘That’s right. At this very moment you are receiving the same news form the angel that the shepherds received.’”

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