Homily for Rorate Coeli (The Fourth Sunday in Advent)

(Audio)

John 1:19-28; Philippians 4:4-7; Deuteronomy 18:15-19

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.

“Are you the Christ?” “Are you Elijah?” “Are you the Prophet?” They asked. John answered them, “No.” Their suppositions were good ones, scriptural ones even, however, those titles had come to be loaded with false expectations founded, not in God’s Word, but in man’s fallen reason and wisdom. For, “Christ,” “Elijah,” “the Prophet,” these could mean any number of things to any number of persons or groups. And, to the priests and the Pharisees, they meant a threat to their control of the people. Therefore, they were watching and they were waiting for the Messiah to arrive, not in hopeful expectation, but with wary concern. And, when He came, they would watch him closely and they would test him. They would judge whether he fit the bill or not – the bill that they had contrived according to their fallen reason and wisdom, not according to the holy scriptures of God.

Thus, John answered them, “No.” “No, I am not the Christ.” “No, I am not Elijah.” “And, neither am I the Prophet.” And, when they asked him, “Then, who are you?” He proclaimed to them the Word of God saying, “I am the voice prophesied of by Isaiah.” John proclaimed to them, “No, I am not any of those falsely contrived titles that you name, but I am the fulfillment of God’s Word even as I speak to you right now.” I am not who you say that I am, but I am who God says that I am. My purpose is to prepare sinners to receive the true Messiah when He soon comes. I will prepare them by baptizing the repentant that they may be forgiven their sins when He comes. For, when He comes, He will baptize, not with water alone, but with the Holy Spirit of God. I am not worthy to untie the strap of His sandals.”

“By what authority, then, do you baptize,” they questioned John, “if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?” This is the same question they would later ask of Jesus Himself, for preserving their own authority, power, and control was foremost on their minds and hearts. John answered them plainly, telling them to simply observe what he was doing: “I baptize with water.” “I am not the Christ, Elijah, or the Prophet, but I am a man pouring water over the heads of repentant sinners. The One you look for is coming after me, indeed, He is amongst you right now! But you don’t recognize Him because you are looking for the wrong things. Though He, too, is a man like me, I assure you that I am not worthy to untie the straps of His sandals. I baptize with water those who repent, and they are forgiven. But, they are forgiven, not because of me, but because of the One who comes after me. I am here before you today that you may receive Him when He comes. However, you do not receive me, therefore, you will not receive Him.” Christ’s redemption was the basis of the means of grace that John delivered in his baptism. Without this redemption, no means of grace could exist. Thus, John’s work consisted in applying a means of grace that rested upon a far mightier act.

John was the forerunner prophesied of in the Scriptures. He is not the forerunner contrived of man’s fallen reason and wisdom. And, neither will the Messiah, the Christ, be the Christ contrived of by man’s fallen reason and wisdom. Therefore, in true forerunner zeal, John prepared the way for the coming of the Christ. This preparation consisted not only of repentance for sins, though that was surely the greater part, but it consisted of changing fallen man’s expectations about the forerunner and about the Christ. John was calling all of Israel to turn back, to return to God, to return to His Word. That is why he lived in the wilderness; that is why he was preaching and baptizing at the Jordan. He was calling Israel to repentance in the wilderness, where God had called His people to repentance so many centuries earlier. He was calling them out into the wilderness that they might repent and be baptized, crossing over the Jordan once again into the Promised Land of God’s grace and forgiveness.

In this way, John the forerunner is akin to Moses: He lived in the wilderness near the Jordan, he called God’s people to repentance, and he made his stand before a king. Additionally, while Moses was supposed to lead God’s people through the Jordan into the Promised Land, because of his sin, that charge was given to his successor Joshua (Yeshua), whose name in Greek is Jesus (Iēsous); thus, Moses served as the forerunner for Joshua, even as John was the forerunner for Jesus, who would lead God’s people out of captivity and bondage to sin by means of baptism into His death and resurrection into the Promised Land of heaven. Therefore, while Moses’ prophecy in Deuteronomy eighteen surely refers to Jesus – “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers” – it surely refers to the forerunner of Jesus, John the Baptist, as well.

The Christ comes, in precisely the way the Scriptures have said He would come. But, we have become blinded by our reason and confounded in our wisdom. The Baptist calls us to repentance still that we might not reject the LORD’s Messiah, but receive Him with faith in our hearts. Still the Baptist prepares the way for the Lord by preaching repentance that the hills of our pride might be leveled and the valleys of our despair might be filled in. He is Emmanuel, God with us, God as one of us, born of woman, flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone. Do not look for another. He comes in humility, and lowliness, bringing the mercy, grace, forgiveness, and love of God, His kingdom.

Yet, this is precisely why men reject Him. Though He terrifies us and makes us run in fear for our lives, we think we want the God of Sinai with His fire, thunderings, earthquakes, and lightnings. But, in His mercy, He gives a Savior, meek and mild, a God we may approach and touch and not die, a God who is our advocate, defender, and friend, who intercedes for us with pleas, obedience, and self-sacrifice unto death in our place. No, we were not prepared to receive our God, His Messiah, His Christ. Thanks be to God that He sent us John. Thanks be to God that He still sends to us His undershepherds to call us to repentance and to speak to us His forgiveness and peace. “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” The Lord has come as the Babe of Bethlehem. He has fulfilled God’s holy Law for you and He has suffered the death you deserved as due penalty for your sin, removing its sting forever. He is God’s peace with mankind of which the angels sang. He is the peace of God that surpasses all understanding. May your hearts and minds be guarded in Jesus Christ.

In the +Name of Jesus. Amen.

Advent Evening Prayer - Wednesday of Gaudete (The Third Sunday in Advent)

(Audio)

Luke 1:1-4, 26-38; Hebrews 1:1-14; Isaiah 7:10-16

Significant portions of this homily are taken directly or indirectly from “The Word of the Lord Grows” by Martin Franzman, CPH.

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.

St. Luke leaves no question as to the purpose of His Gospel. He states unequivocally that it is to be an “orderly account” of the events of Jesus’ life and ministry “that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught.” The Evangelist identifies an unknown patron by the name of Theophilus as the audience for his Gospel, a name which means “friend of God” or “lover of God” and, thereby, may be intended to represent anyone who loves God and His Word and desires to know more.

Luke’s Gospel is a didactic, or teaching, Gospel most certainly aimed at Gentile believers. The Evangelist often goes out of his way to explain Jewish traditions, customs, and culture to an audience who seemingly had little familiarity with them. Additionally, Luke intentionally, it seems, includes both a symbolic man and a symbolic woman, and also a symbolic Jew and a symbolic Gentile, at key moments in Jesus’ life and ministry so as to demonstrate that Jesus is the savior of both men and women, Jews and Gentiles, indeed, of the whole world. Unique to Luke is that the Evangelist also wrote a second volume to account for the deeds and ministry of Jesus’ Apostles following His ascension; we call that book The Acts of the Apostles, or, the Book of Acts.

Luke’s Gospel is the most thoroughly Greek of the Synoptics. With it’s preface, formal structure, conformity to Greek literary custom, reference to the works of other writers, it’s claim to painstaking and systematic research as the basis of an ordered and articulated account, and its companion volume The Acts of the Apostles, Luke’s Gospel stands sturdy as a work of Greek literature. The extensive proportions of the two-book work, its long perspective and broad scope, are in keeping with its announced literary intentions: to provide an “orderly account” of the events of both Jesus’ life and ministry and the ministry of the Apostles and the birth of the Church thereafter.

The Christ of the third Gospel is the Seeker of the lost, the Savior of the lowly. His birth is announced to the shepherds, whom good Jews suspected and despised, and He is branded by the righteous in Israel as one who “receives sinners and eats with them”. Of a piece with this picture of Jesus as the compassionate and condescending Savior is the special attention paid to women in this Gospel, for woman was not highly regarded in Judaism or in the ancient world generally. The infancy story is Mary’s story, not Joseph’s as in Matthew; and Luke dwells more than the other evangelists on Jesus’ relationship to women: Mary and Martha, the widow of Nain, the sinful woman, the women on the via dolorosa – these are peculiar to Luke’s account. And two parables dealing with women are peculiar to Luke also: the parable of the Lost Coin and that that of the Persistent Widow.

The third Gospel also emphasizes the universality of Jesus’ grace and Saviorhood. Jesus is the savior of all people, regardless of race, religion, or gender. Luke demonstrates this in his genealogy of Jesus, through Mary’s line, which includes both Jews and Gentiles and notorious sinners and goes back, not only to Abraham, but all the way to Adam. No other Gospel so shows Jesus’ special interest in Samaritans and even Roman soldiers and Centurions.

Perhaps, most of all, in the Magnificat St. Luke emphasizes the radical reversal that Jesus and His kingly reign bring. In the Magnificat, Mary sings of this great reversal saying: “He has shown strength with His arm; He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts; He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate; He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich He has sent away empty.” St. Luke, amongst all the Evangelists, offers us an image of our Lord in stark contrasts: Though He is God and the very Word of creation, He is born under humble and lowly circumstances as a helpless child. Though He is the true King of heaven and earth, He is seen as the very opposite of kingly power and glory in the eyes of the world. Though He is the Messiah and Savior of all mankind, He will accomplish mankind’s salvation by means of His own suffering and death.

Thus, the iconic symbol for St. Luke’s Gospel is a winged bull. For, the bull is a sacrificial animal and a beast of burden, and St. Luke portrays Jesus as the bearer of mankind’s sin and the atoning sacrifice for man’s sin. It is St. Luke who includes the Words of Jesus: “The Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost.”

In the + Name of Jesus. Amen.

"There is no power the state doesn’t have if it has a power over your children that supersedes your own."

If you are a homeschooler (or, an American that actually cares about things like the First Amendment) and you don't know Matt Walsh, then you need to get to know Matt Walsh.

The Matt Walsh Blog

Here's a post from today that is a must read:

Politician: “Let’s treat all homeschool parents like felony child abusers”
Posted on December 18, 2013 by The Matt Walsh Blog

Let me try to explain why you should care about homeschooling rights, even if you aren’t a homeschool parent:

Because we don’t have any rights at all if we don’t have the unquestioned and absolute right to teach and raise our own children. In a country where you do not have a right to your own offspring, to what else could you possibly have a right? Your home? Your car? Your body? Not in a nation ruled by bureaucratic deities so powerful that they may deign the very fruit of your loin to be their property. If we forfeit our jurisdiction over our sons and daughters, where else can we draw the line. “Sure, government, regulate how I educate my kids, but you better have a warrant if you want to take a peak in my glove compartment!” We all have to pick a hill to die on, I suppose, but mine will be the hill of Family Sovereignty.

Let me put it another way:

There is no power the state doesn’t have if it has a power over your children that supersedes your own.

Let me put it still another way:

If you do not have the right to teach and raise your own children on your own terms, then you don’t have the right to free speech, religion, association, or privacy, and you are not protected from unreasonable government intrusion into your personal life.

How could it be that so many who describe themselves as “pro-choice” would then turn around and argue against homeschooling rights? As terrifying as it may be, we need to confront the fact that our society is filled with people who honestly believe that you ought to have the right to kill your child, but you shouldn’t have the right to educate him.

When I call such people “lunatics,” I do so with great optimism. I’d prefer to be surrounded by delusional maniacs than to be surrounded by rational individuals who have actually reached the conclusion that a person’s only fundamental parental right is to butcher their children.

So, if liberty — true, God given liberty — is your thing, you might take a particular interest in the story of an Ohio Democrat who wants to require all homeschool parents to undergo a Social Services investigation. To make his case, Senator Capri Cafaro is repulsively exploiting the child abuse death of a 14 year old kid. Teddy Foltz-Tedesco died last year after his mother pulled him out of school to hide his abuse from authorities. The boy was finally beaten to death by the mother’s boyfriend.

In keeping with the government’s long tradition of being incompetent in every possible facet of existence, this young child’s abuse was already reported to Social Services. Social Services failed to act, and now, in response to THEIR OWN failures, politicians want to give them MORE power. This is a brand of mania that you can only find in government: an agency bungles its authority, and the solution is to give them more of it.

In any case, this is a tragic, awful situation. The mother and the mother’s boyfriend ought to be charged to the fullest extent of the law, and that means they should spend the rest of their pitiful lives in a cage.

But only a manipulative tyrant would take this one isolated incident and use it as a tool to intrude into the lives of every homeschool parent. And not just every homeschoolparent, but every parent, period. This proposed piece of legislation, or any law in any state that regulates or oversees how parents teach their children, has the effect of giving the government a claim to your child. Certainly, you should be able to lose your claim over your child if you are truly abusive, or if you commit any felony crime that would put you in prison and require your kids to be cared for by someone else, but homeschool lawsassume abusive and criminal intent in every parent. If that is not tyranny, then there is no such thing.

Moreover, if the rare case of an abusive homeschool parent can serve as an indictment of homeschooling, why can’t the more common case of a sexually abusive teacher serve as an indictment of public schools? By this politician’s own logic, all government schools should have been shutdown long ago. In fact, there was a 2004 study titled, “Educator Sexual Misconduct: A Synthesis of Existing Literature,” commissioned by the Department of Education. It received no attention from anyone, but the findings were terrifying: nearly 10 percent of all public schooled students had been raped, abused, or sexually harassed by teachers.

TEN PERCENT.

That makes the sex scandal in public schools many, many, many times more prevalent than the abuse epidemic in the Catholic Church. It’s not even close, actually. The Hofstra researcher who conducted the study had this to say: “The physical sexual abuse of students in schools is likely more than 100 times the abuse by priests.”

And homeschool kids are the ones at risk?

Add school shootings, gang violence, fights, bullying, and administrative abuse in the form of zero tolerance policies that brand and label young kids as criminals, and public school is clearly a much more dangerous proposition.

But what serious attempt have our politicians made to curb the sexual abuse of kids in public schools? It’s hard to address a problem if you’ve decided that the problem doesn’t exist.

Some teacher’s unions even think teachers ought to be given cash rewards after being found guilty of serial rape. A severance package for a man who sexually abused a young boy for three years? That’s not just “inappropriate,” that’s co-conspiratorial, as far as I’m concerned.

The government has no place pointing the finger of suspicion at parents. We are the ones who have every possible reason to be suspicious of them. The vast majority of us are doing our best to raise our kids in a hostile environment; an environment made all the more hostile by the very government entities that pretend to be concerned about the health and safety of our children.

We have a problem, America. We seem to be under the impression that our kids are safer in government buildings than they are in our homes. We have succumbed to a brainwashing campaign so effective that it makes me wish that the State was half as good at constitutional governance as it is at convincing its citizens to hate freedom.

Homeschooling laws vary by state. Some have virtually no regulations, some make moderate efforts to “keep tabs” on those dangerous homeschooling terrorists, while others are ruthless in protecting and expanding their government education system. In these states, homeschooling parents have to (among other things) register their curriculum with the education department, and even endure home visitations from government agents.

Surely, we can all see how terrible that is, can’t we? A government agent invading your house to investigate what information you’re passing on to your child? Can any substantive notion of freedom coexist along side such a thing? Extremist that I am, I don’t think homeschool parents should be required to make any effort to “check in” with any government agency, no matter how convenient they make the process. But even if you aren’t ready to meet me there, even if you can’t quite get on board with full parental liberty, aren’t we at least on the same page that homeschool parents shouldn’t be treated like sex offenders on parole?

No? We can’t even agree on that point?

I didn’t think so.

Well, carry on, Freedom Fighter.

Politician: “Let’s treat all homeschool parents like felony child abusers”

Exegesis the Lutheran Way

Excerpted from The Form and Meaning of the Fall Narrative by Norman C. Habel (1965)

Our moorings are biblical and our bearings are Lutheran. This means that we affirm certain presuppositions and follow certain basic principles of interpretation. In brief, these presuppositions and principles are as follows:

1. The approach of the Lutheran exegete is governed by his faith in Jesus Christ, in whose name he has been baptized, and by whom he has been made righteous in God’s sight. This faith is anchored in the Gospel, the scandalous news that Jesus Christ died and rose again to execute God’s plan of redemption for sinful mankind.

2. In the interpretation of Scripture, the Lutheran exegete must relate all of Scripture to its center, viz., solus Christus, that is, the message of justification by grace propter Christum [on account of Christ] through faith.

3. In applying this principle the Lutheran exegete must follow the rule that “Scripture interprets Scripture” (Scriptura Scripturam interpretatur). Understood in its primary sense this rule means that the clear passages of Scripture, namely those which display the teaching of justification by grace through faith in all its force and glory, must be used to interpret and evaluate those portions of Scripture where this truth is obscure. In short, the right distinction between Law and Gospel must be rigorously maintained in all biblical exegesis (Apology of the Augsburg Confession IV 5).

4. The Lutheran exegete also follows the norm that “the Old Testament must be interpreted in the light of the New Testament,” that is, in the light of Christ’s advent as the fulfillment of God’s eternal plan of salvation. The ultimate context of the Old Testament is the New Testament . This principle is abused, however, when we insist that that New Testament interpretation or application of a given Old Testament passage is always the only meaning which God intends us to discover in that Old Testament passage.

5. The Lutheran exegete must assume an attitude of subservience to the Scriptures as the inspired word of the living God which is designed to lead men to salvation. In so doing the exegete will always seek to determine the message which God intends to communicate in any given passage.

6. By seeking to ascertain the intended sense of a given passage the Lutheran exegete is applying the principlesensus literalis unus est. The Latin formula stands in antithesis to the medieval method of discerning the fourfold meaning of each passage of Scripture. Sensus literalis has reference to the God-intended rather than surface meaning (sensus literae) of the biblical text.

7. When attempting to determine the intended sense of a given text of Scripture the Lutheran exegete must employ all the tools at his disposal to discover the character or nature of the text with which he is dealing . In this task the evidence of the text itself must be taken into account and the analogy of comparable texts given due consideration. If this is done the exegete will not hastily jump to the conclusion that a given text is a chronicle, a law code, a parable, or any other kind of literature, without sufficient evidence.

8. Finally the Lutheran exegete must pay special attention to the usus loquendi of the biblical writer, that is, he must try to ascertain what the terms, concepts, imagery, forms, etc., of a given text meant in the culture and specific historical situation of the audience to which the passage was originally addressed. God means to be understood and so he employs that living language or medium of expression which can be readily grasped by the original audience to which the speaker or writer addressed his message. In short, the exegete must attempt to become a part of the audience which the inspired biblical author addressed himself and to hear that writer speaking on his own terms, as far as this is humanly possible.

HT: Piotr Malysz

Advice from Princeton Professor Robert George on the Marriage Debate

"I’m not a Hegelian or a Marxist. I do not believe in historical inevitability. History is impersonal and contingent. The future will be determined, for better or worse, by the free choices and actions of human beings. No good cause is permanently lost. So my advice to supporters of marriage is to stay the course. Do not be discouraged. Do what the pro-life movement did when, in the 1970s, critics said, “The game is over; you lost; in a few years abortion will be socially accepted and fully integrated into American life; it won’t even be an issue in our politics.” Keep bearing witness and making good arguments. Speak the truth in season and out of season. Do not allow yourselves be intimidated or bullied into acquiescence or silence. Keep challenging the arguments of your opponents, always with civility, always in a gracious and loving spirit, but firmly. If you are told that you are on “the wrong side of history,” remember that there is no such thing. History is not a deity that sits in judgment. It has no power to determine what is true or false, good or bad, right or wrong. History doesn’t have “wrong” and “right” sides. Truth does. So my message to everyone is that our overriding concern should be to be on the right side of truth. And that requires a willingness to think as rigorously as possible and to carefully, dispassionately, and fearlessly consider the strength of the arguments advanced in support of the competing positions. We ask nothing more — but also nothing less."

Robert George is a collaborating author of "What Is Marriage?"

HT: Rev. Professor Peter Scaer

Homily for Gaudete (The Third Sunday in Advent)

(Audio)

Matthew 11:2-11; 1 Corinthians 4:1-5; Isaiah 40:1-11

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Did John doubt, or was he merely asking Jesus if He was the Messiah for the benefit of his disciples? That is the question we seem to face each year on Gaudete Sunday. And, I am not too proud to confess that I have preached to you on this day both ways. Indeed, I have preached to you that John was no different than you and I, and that, as he was languishing in prison awaiting his execution at the hands of Herod, of course he had doubts – we all would, we all do. Thus, we are to be encouraged that a man of faith such as John the Baptist is so very like us that he could question and doubt, but also find strength and courage, just as we do, in the Word of God and its promises fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Likewise, I have at other times preached to you that John was the greatest of the prophets, even Jesus’ flesh and blood cousin, who assuredly knew Jesus even better than His disciples. For, it was John who pointed to Jesus and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” Likewise, it was John who confessed that he was but a forerunner for the Messiah, utterly unworthy to untie the strap of Jesus’ sandals. Therefore, of course John knew and believed that Jesus was the Messiah. Thus, John questioned Jesus’ being the coming one so that his own disciples would also know and believe that Jesus was the Messiah after John had fulfilled his role as forerunner and had been killed. However, this Gaudete, I am not going to preach to you about the faith or the doubt of John at all, for I have come to believe that this is of dubious relevance and is most definitely a distraction from the true theme of Gaudete, which is that we should “Rejoice in the Lord always! Again I say, Rejoice!”

Now, to rejoice in the Lord always means to rejoice, not only when things are going well for you, but to rejoice even when things don’t seem to be going very well for you at all. I believe that this is the message that is to be communicated in today’s pericope about John the Baptist in prison. When John’s disciples came to Jesus with his inquiry, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another,” Jesus instructed them to go and tell John what they have heard and seen: “the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them.” Indeed, John and his disciples had witnessed all these things. And yet, they did not happen for everyone, did they? That is to say, not all the blind received their sight, not all the lame were made able to walk, not all the lepers were cleansed, not all the deaf were given to hear, and not all who died were raised up. And, this is not to mention the fact that Jesus intentionally, it would seem, left out the part of Isaiah’s prophecy that proclaimed “liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound,” precisely what John most desperately wanted to hear.

However, while it is true that these signs were not happening for everyone, they most certainly were happening, and that is indeed good news! Further, there was one thing that was indeed happening for everyone: The poor had the good news of the Gospel preached to them. In fact, it is the Gospel that is the healing power of the forgiveness of sins, which is the true ailment we all suffer, which is also manifested, at times, in the physical healing of blindness, lameness, deafness, leprosy, and even death. Rare as they might appear to be, these wonderful signs could not happen at all were Jesus not the promised Messiah come at long last. For, the truth is, we are all John in prison – that is, in the prison of our own sin and the darkness of sin and death. And, like John, we want so desperately to be released and to be set free. While we know in truth that one day we will be released and set free, what we too often fail to see is that we already are!

Perhaps the Lord has our sinful shortsightedness in mind. He knows that we are truly blind to His will and His ways apart from the light He provides us by His Holy Spirit through His Word. Perhaps this is why he begins His words to John with “the blind receive their sight” and ends with “the poor have the Gospel preached to them.” Jesus’ message to John is this: “The reign of God’s kingdom has begun. Even now it is breaking into His fallen creation and restoring it, making all things new.” Then Jesus adds, “Blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”

In what ways might Jesus be an offense to John, or His disciples, or to us? It offends us that the new creation Jesus brings does not manifest itself quickly enough, or in the ways in which we desire or expect. Therefore, we need to change our expectations. Or, better, we need to have our expectations changed. Our expectations can only be changed if first our spiritual blindness is taken away and the light of God’s Word enlightens us. Then, we will receive the eyes of faith to see clearly the reign of the kingdom of God. Thus, let us be admonished to “not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart.” “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” And, “do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.”

Gaudete! “Rejoice in the Lord always! Again, I say, rejoice!” Why? Because “the Lord GOD comes with might, and His arm rules for Him; behold, His reward is with Him, and His recompense before Him.” Where? Here, right now! Hear with opened ears: Your warfare is ended. Your iniquity is pardoned. You have received from the LORD’s hand double for all your sins. See with opened eyes: The Lord GOD comes in Word and Water, Body and Blood. The Lord GOD comes for you, to comfort you, to strengthen you, to preserve and keep you until He comes on the Last Day to crown you with glory in His kingdom that never ends. You are God’s child now, and what you will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is.

This is a great and holy mystery, yet it has been, is, and will continue to unfold before you, to you, and through you until He comes. Indeed, each day you are nearer to your salvation than when you first believed. We are stewards, managers of the mysteries of God, says St. Paul. Indeed, it is with great humility, reverence, and boundless joy that I serve you with the mysteries of God. And, in turn, you have the privilege and honor of serving your brother and sister and neighbor with God’s liberating mysteries of forgiveness, mercy, love, and charity. When you encounter them in the prison of sin and darkness, hopelessness and despair, go and tell them what you hear and see.

You have been freed from that prison. The Son has set you free, and you are free indeed! What your ears do not hear, the ears of faith do. What your eyes do not see, the eyes of faith do. The shackles are off! The prison door is open! Only you can allow yourself to be imprisoned once again. You are free! Tell this good news to your brother, your sister, and your neighbor!

In the + Name of Jesus. Amen.

Advent Evening Prayer - Wednesday of Populus Zion (The Second Sunday in Advent)

(Audio)

Theme: "The Origins of Jesus According to the Four Evangelists" - This week, St. Mark.

Mark 1:1-11; Romans 5:12-21; Malachi 3:1-7a

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.

The Gospel according to St. Mark is the briefest of the four Gospels, and that is due, in no small part, to the Evangelist’s supremely efficient style of writing. Accordingly, the narrative he tells moves quickly, and selectively through the life and ministry of Jesus, hitting upon our Lord’s major teachings and works.

In fact, because of the brief and to the point nature of Mark’s Gospel, many biblical scholars have surmised that Mark was the first Gospel written and that the other Synoptics, Matthew and Luke, each borrowed from Mark and from an unknown, hypothetical source containing the sayings of Jesus known as “Q.” While this theory of Markan priority merits serious consideration, it is founded upon, I believe, a couple of dubious presumptions.

First, it is presumed that narratives evolve from the simple to the complex. This is essentially Darwinistic evolutionary theory imposed upon the text. Since, in comparison to Matthew and Luke, Mark’s Gospel is decidedly shorter, and the other Synoptics contain most of the material in Mark, along with additional material not included in Mark, it is surmised that Mark came first, and that Matthew and Luke are second generation improvements upon Mark’s Gospel. However, despite the fact that Darwinistic evolutionary theory has many sizeable holes in it and, despite what the popular media and culture would have you believe, it is anything but conclusive, there is very little reason to presume that older means simple when it comes to ancient texts. Each of you here tonight could easily name at least five ancient texts that are as complex and intellectually profound as the best writing today – likely, even better: Confucius, Aristotle, Plato, Homer, Augustine, just to name a few.

Second, Mark’s Gospel stands alone, having it’s own unique perspective and purpose. Even if it does not provide all the information that Matthew and Luke do, Mark’s Gospel accomplishes the purpose for which it was written – to demonstrate that Jesus is the “Proclaimer and the Bringer of the almighty grace of the kingdom of God, as the anointed King in whom man can trust, the Son of God in whom man can believe.”

This is to say that, in Mark’s Gospel, Jesus is clearly in control of His destiny, submitting willfully to the evil thoughts and intents of His enemies in order to bring about God’s purpose, the salvation of mankind. When He speaks, Jesus speaks with recognizable authority, unlike the scribes and the Pharisees. Moreover, His words are borne out in His actions; He brings God’s Kingdom as He heals the sick, cures the lame and the blind, casts out demons, and raises the dead. When He confronts the devil in the wilderness, He defeats Him by the authority of God’s Word and by His faithfulness and obedience. He submits to John’s baptism for sinners, though He has no sin of His own, and His Father declares Him to be His beloved Son, with whom He is well pleased. This truth is confessed by the Roman centurion at Jesus’ death, “Truly this man was the Son of God.”

Mark begins His Gospel with the ambitious statement, “The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Surprisingly, he then continues, not with the birth narrative of Jesus as do Matthew and Luke, but thirty years later, with the appearance of John the Baptist at the Jordan. This has lead some commentators to conclude that this first verse is not a verse at all, but, rather, the title of the Gospel. Regardless, be it verse or title, Mark’s purpose is not to tell the entirety of the narrative of Jesus’ life and ministry, but to convince you, His hearer and reader, who Jesus is and what He has come to do. Thus, immediately Jesus is understood as the fulfillment of prophecy, acknowledged by the Baptist to be so, and confirmed by the Father and the Holy Spirit as the Son of God with whom the Father is well pleased.

Jesus is the one of whom the prophets prophesied. Jesus is the New Adam come to do battle with the serpent, the devil, and defeat Him by the Word of God in faithfulness, and obedience. Jesus is the sacrificial Lamb of God who will lay down His own holy and innocent life, willingly, to redeem mankind from sin and death. Jesus is the one who will baptize into the Name of the Triune God and who will bestow the promised Holy Spirit.

The Gospel According to St. Mark is a Gospel of action. As compared with Matthew, Mark emphasizes the deeds of Jesus. The deeds of Jesus are by no means isolated from His words; the word is Jesus’ instrument in His deeds too; He speaks, and it is done. However, if Mark is an Evangelist of few words, the words he includes are meaningful and full of authority and action. In fact, the Gospel According to St. Mark contains more direct quotations of Jesus than the other three Gospels.

The iconographic symbol for St. Mark’s Gospel is a winged lion. Mark’s Gospel begins with John the Baptist preaching like a roaring lion. As it was believed that lions sleep with their eyes open, the lion became a symbol for Jesus’ resurrection. The lion also represents Jesus as the “lion of the tribe of Judah” and the “King of the Jews.” And, as St. Mark’s Gospel plainly teaches, Jesus’ disciples will face suffering and tribulation on account of their faith and obedience. Therefore, the lion symbolizes for them the courage required of Jesus’ disciples to follow Him on the path that leads through death to eternal life. As the Gospel in its earliest form ended with verse eight in which the women at Jesus’ empty tomb “said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid,” the exhortation to courageous faith is both warranted and necessary. In this regard, the Church continues to take the Good News of Jesus’ victory over sin and death to the ends of the world. Let us not be afraid to go and do likewise, trusting in our Savior, God’s Son, with whom the Father is well pleased and who has done all things well.

In the + Name of Jesus. Amen.