Jesus Says, “Go!”

Sermon preached at Our Savior for the 7th Sunday after Pentecost on July 11, 2010. Sermon text: Luke 10:1-12,16

"On your marks! Get set! Go!" I'd imagine all of you know exactly what those words mean. A race is about to start! When you hear "On your marks!", the racers find the starting line. At "Get set!" the racers get down into their racing stance. Finally, all the energy and training those racers had is used as they start running the course, not stopping until they hit the finish-line.

That's kind of how it works on Sunday mornings, right? In the announcements after the service, I might announce some sort of project that the church has going on or some need we have at the moment. I won't say "On your marks! Get Set! Go!," but I might say words almost as energizing: "sign-up sheet." Then, when an usher is excusing the different rows it's like a race has begun; people practically sprint to that sign-up sheet. Sometimes you can hear them, "I want to clean the church next month!" "VBS?! Make sure to sign me and the whole family up for the entire week!" "No! The snack schedule is all filled up again!" Yes, it can be quite the sight. And when it's all over and the dust has settled, I quietly go and pick up all the full sign-up sheets and try to make sense of it all.

Maybe you're starting to sense that I'm telling a pretend story here. I'm not saying that sign-up sheets are the greatest thing ever; they're not. Usually, I'm more surprised when anyone has signed up for something than when no one does. Do we treat opportunities to serve our Savior -- not Our Savior the congregation, but our Savior Jesus Christ -- do we see those as opportunities? Do we see them as a great way to show our thanks? Or do we see them as a burden? Do we just hope someone else does it so we don't have to? Do we just ignore it and not give it a second thought?

Jesus gives a very simple command in our text for this morning: "Go!" (Lk. 10:3) He's not commanding the start of a race; he's sending people out to serve. And if the call to serve our Savior isn't appealing, or if we can always think of something better, it's time for us to reevaluate our priorities and change what we're doing. Fortunately, we have our Lord to help us with that. He leads us with his love. He motivates us with his forgiveness. And he sends us out with his message. So, the time for getting on your marks and getting set is over. Because Jesus says, "Go!"

Our text starts with Jesus laying out the mission for his followers. After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. (Lk. 10:1) Jesus was essentially sending out these 72 people to canvass the neighborhoods that he would be visiting next. In case you're wondering how Jesus found seventy-two people, you have to look back into the previous chapter of Luke.

There, Jesus was trying to get people to follow him; it was sort of his version of a sign-up sheet. But things didn't go well. Wouldn't you know it -- people had all sorts of excuses! They had this and that other thing to do. So finally Jesus gives them the bottom line. No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God. (Lk. 9:62)

As a Christian, serving your Savior is not an option. Jesus doesn't mince words here. When we refuse to serve him, no matter how long our list of excuses, that's a sin. That's a sin that cannot stand before God. And that's a sin that can only find forgiveness in Jesus himself, his blood, his death, and his resurrection. There, in the joy of his forgiveness, in the shadow of his cross, there we have the reason to serve, the motivation. We love because he first loved us. (1 Jn. 4:19)
So you think, OK, I want to serve, but what do I do? Where do I go? The story of our text shows us some good things to remember. Listen to Jesus' words to those who would be serving him. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. (Lk. 10:2) When Jesus says, "Go!" you pray.

You pray because look at all the work there is to do! Think of this world we live in; think of how many people don't know their Savior. Think about how those who don't believe in him have rejected the salvation he won for all. It's overwhelming when you think about it. I don't care how motivated you are, you aren't going to be able to travel all over the world and reach everyone with the gospel.

And it's not much better when you look in our immediate area. Sure, there are a lot of churches here in Springville, or in the greater Buffalo area, but does that mean everyone's a Christian? How many people still don't believe in Jesus? How many people had believed but have fallen away, or are straying from their Savior and in grave spiritual danger? I don't think you have to look very far around you to find people like that. It's overwhelming. How could we ever reach them all? And then we look around at our congregation... It's a small group. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.

So, what do we do? We pray. Our heavenly Father knows the need around us. He knows it better than we do. He's the one in charge of this all. We pray to him. In fact, this is the way that everyone can listen to Jesus' call to "Go!" I don't care how old you are, what your physical abilities are, you can pray. And what a powerful thing that is! We get to approach God's own throne with our requests, and he's promised to hear us! So go! Pray!

Most of us will have lots of opportunities beyond our prayers, too. Jesus showed us this as he sent out the workers. Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road. (Lk. 10:3-4)

Jesus isn't shy in telling us that serving him can be dangerous. "Like lambs among wolves." Wolves eat lambs; it's dangerous to be a lamb. And we've seen time and again in God's Word the dangers and troubles we face as Christians. Our lives will not be easier because we are Christians; they may in fact be much more difficult.

So doesn't it strike you a bit odd that Jesus sends his sheep among the wolves, he sends his soldiers into the battle, with nothing! He tells them to bring nothing with them. Shouldn't they pack up everything they can think of? Shouldn't they be packing weapons, maps, strategies, psychological profiles of those wolves? Why would Jesus send them into danger completely defenseless and powerless?

He doesn't. And this is the second thing you need to remember. When Jesus says, "Go!", you go in his strength alone. When you know there's an opportunity to serve your Savior, what stops you? Think of some of the excuses that might come to your mind. "No one will listen to me." "They'll laugh at me." "I don't want people thinking I'm some sort of nut." "I won't know what to say." "I'll say something wrong and make everything worse."

To those excuses, Jesus says, "Go!" Go out and serve him, but don't worry, it won't be your strength, it will be his. His strength at work in you by the Holy Spirit through God's Word. One of the reasons we study the Bible is because there Jesus strengthens us, he prepares us and equips us to serve him. That's why we continue to go to the strength found at the Lord's Supper time and time again. Jesus wants to give us his strength to go!

When you go up to someone and tell them about Jesus, I'll tell you right now, you have absolutely no chance of convincing them to believe. No chance! But with Jesus' power, with the Holy Spirit working through the Word, people are brought to faith. Miracles do happen! The responsibility to do those miracles doesn't rest on you. It's Jesus' strength.

And when you come with Jesus' strength, remember what the message you speak really is. Jesus said in our text, When you enter a house, first say, 'Peace to this house.' If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you. (Lk. 10:5-6) Of course, in this specific case, Jesus was having his workers go out and stay in people's homes. That's probably not going to be our goal most of the time as we serve our Savior. But there's still a principle here for us. When Jesus says, "Go!" you go with a message of peace.

That's what the gospel is. It's peace. Peace between us and God. The book of Romans tells us, Since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. (Rom. 5:1) It's tempting when you talk with someone to get into an argument or to talk about what our church is against and all sorts of things like that. The most important message you have is peace. Jesus won us peace. He won us eternal life and forgiveness and salvation. That is your message.

And don't think you don't have the right to share it. You do. Jesus said it in our text. He who listens to you listens to me; he who rejects you rejects me; but he who rejects me rejects him who sent me. (Lk. 10:16) We might  not think it's any of our business to tell someone about their Savior. We might think they'll say, "Who gave you the right to tell me what to believe?" But remember, when Jesus says, "Go!" You go with his authority.

Spreading Jesus' message is spreading good news! It's news of peace, news of salvation! It's not your ideas; it wasn't your plan to share this. Jesus commanded it. He has sent you. And if someone doesn't like it, their problem is with Jesus, not with you. Remember that. Take comfort that you have the Savior and God of all behind you when you tell others about him.

So when you put it all together, it's clear. We need to go. We need to go and share our Savior's love. Now, that's going to look differently for different people. It doesn't mean you have to sign up on every sign-up sheet at church. Yes, there will be opportunities for you to serve here. But there will be many more opportunities in your everyday lives outside of this building.

You work with people. You have people in your family. You see people when you're out and about. That's your mission field. That's where God has placed you. And if God has placed you in a place where you can't go anywhere or talk to anyone, you can still pray. Yes, this is a mission for all of us.

So let's go! Let's go into this world with the good news of our Savior's love. Let's stop with the excuses and fears and the paralysis of sin. Instead, let's hear Jesus' command and go! Go  in prayer to your heavenly Father. Go with Jesus' power alone. Go with a message of peace. Go with the authority of Jesus himself. There's a big world out there. There's a lot of people who need to hear about their Savior. On your marks! Get set! Your mission field starts when you leave this church today. Go!

I Pledge Allegiance...

Sermon preached at Our Savior on July 4, 2010 for the 6th Sunday after Pentecost. Sermon text: Jonah 3:3-4:4 

"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America." Doesn't that just make you want to stand up and put your hand on your heart? We live in a country that, by anyone's definition, has been richly blessed by our God. We have an abundance of pretty much everything, despite what the news might tell you about a recession. We have freedom. We are free to be here today to worship our God and Savior in peace! No wonder we celebrate our Independence Day.

But wait. Before you start waving flags and celebrating your independence today, it's important for us to see what this all really means for us as Christians following our Savior. Saying the pledge of allegiance, flying the flag, and celebrating on the 4th of July are not wrong; it's right for us to give thanks for the blessings God has given us in this nation. But how do we live when when heaven is our true home, not this country? How do we live in this nation when our true citizenship is in the kingdom of heaven and when our true, full allegiance is to God alone?

The prophet Jonah struggled with this. I realize that Jonah did not live here in the USA. But if anyone had a reason to be patriotic, it'd be someone like Jonah. He was a prophet in Israel, a nation that God himself had chosen and set apart for himself, a nation through which God would send the Savior of all the world. Jonah had a reason to be proud to be an Israelite, because God had chosen the Israelites for something special. But it was Jonah's patriotism -- it was his love for his nation -- that ended up getting him in trouble.

When I say the name Jonah, what's the first thing that comes to your mind? The whale, right? Jonah is best known, by far, for being swallowed by a "large fish" -- probably a whale -- and surviving there for three days before getting out. (Jnh. 1:17, Jnh. 2:10) The Bible even uses Jonah in the whale as a picture for Jesus in the tomb. Jonah was in the whale for three days, but came out. After dying on the cross, Jesus was buried and in the tomb for three days before he rose from the dead. (Matt. 12:40)

But how many of you know why Jonah was swallowed by the whale? Well, let's just say he loved his country too much. The first two verses of Jonah set the scene for us: The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai: "Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me." (Jnh. 1:1-2) 

As a prophet of God, Jonah's job was to say what God told him to say and go where God told him to go. In this case, Jonah was supposed to go to the city of Nineveh, which was the capital of the nation of Assyria. Assyria was Israel's greatest enemy. There had been wars between the nations. And Assyria's capital city of Nineveh was well-known to be one of the most wicked, violent places on earth. In fact, the entire book of Nahum is about how bad Nineveh was. (see Nahum 3) So you'd think that when God told Jonah to go preach against them for their wickedness, Jonah would've gone happily.

But he didn't. He ran away and went in the opposite direction. (Jnh. 1:3) That's why God sent the whale to swallow him. He wouldn't let Jonah get away from his mission. So why didn't Jonah want to go? He didn't want to go anywhere near the nation that was Israel's biggest enemy. He didn't think God should send a prophet to such an awful place as Nineveh in such an awful nation of Assyria. He thought his country was more important than his God.

This could never happen to us, though. Right? Well, I don't think many of us are tempted to think or say, "The United States of America is better or more important than God himself." But we might tend to wear blinders when we look around us in our nation. We might almost think our country can do no wrong. We might even think of the USA as God's chosen nation for today, like Israel was in the Old Testament.

The USA, for all its blessings, is not God's chosen nation. As part of this country, living in this nation, in this state, in our particular place in it, we will see sin all around us. We do not simply go along with the sins of this nation because everybody else does. The vast majority of people in this nation believe that a couple living together outside of marriage is ok, that homosexuality is just an alternate lifestyle, that every faith or even the lack of faith is just another way to the same god...these are all lies that people are trying to sell us right here in our nation.

Yes, the freedom we rightly celebrate in our country shouldn't be celebrated when it's a freedom to sin. You can probably think of someone doing something to you that you don't like, you ask them to stop, and what is the answer? "It's a free country." That free country mindset we have in this nation often makes us think that nobody better tell us what to do, ever.

For many, that extends to church and to God himself. "The church has "rules" that I need to follow? Please." "God says "thou shalt not..." to so many different things, but what really matters is what's important to me." "Listen to God, read the Bible, go to church? No thanks. It's a free country."

Do any of those ideas of our nation have a hold on you? God blessed the prophet Jonah by having a whale swallow him when he went off track. We have God's Word reminding us that these attitudes are sinful, that they are the fruits of unbelief, and that they can and will eventually destroy our faith.

And when we recognize those sins in our lives, the best thing we can do is act like the people of Nineveh in our text. You see, Jonah had been afraid the mission God sent him on would be a success! And it was! Our text tells the story. Jonah started into the city. He proclaimed: "Forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned." The Ninevites believed God. They declared a fast, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth. (Jnh. 3:4-5)

God had decided that Nineveh's sins were too great. He was going to take action and destroy in 40 short days. But the people turned around! They recognized their sins. They repented. Our text even mentions that Assyria's king got involved to urge his people to repent so that God wouldn't destroy them all. (Jnh. 3:6-9) 

And you know what? God listened. When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he had compassion and did not bring upon them the destruction he had threatened. (Jnh. 3:10) The people of Nineveh deserved to die. Their sins made death and hell their destiny. But God didn't destroy. He didn't kill. He healed. He forgave them in love.

He does the same for us. God's Word tells us, Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning. (Lam. 3:22-23) God has compassion for us purely because of Christ our Savior. Jesus' perfect life satisfies God's demands, not anything we have done. Jesus' bloody suffering and death satisfies the punishment due for our sins so that we wouldn't have to pay it. Jesus' resurrection guarantees our resurrection, our salvation, our life forever through faith in him.

Jesus gives us true freedom, true independence. While we might pledge our allegiance to the flag, isn't it even more important to pledge our allegiance to our Lord and Savior? Don't our hearts burn within to serve him after he has shown us such love? Let's live out our thanks for him. Let's put aside the sinful ways of this nation (which are the sinful ways of our heart), and instead let's serve our Savior. Let's drink deeply of the water of life in his Word. Let's taste and see that he is good in holy Communion. Let's rejoice to hear those words time after time: "God, our heavenly Father, has been merciful to us and has given his only Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.  Therefore...I forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."

And just as we rejoice in that forgiveness that God gives us, let's also rejoice to see that forgiveness spread to others. That was Jonah's problem. He didn't want to see his enemies, the people of Nineveh and Assyria, get the benefits of God's love. Listen to the sad story of Jonah's heart. Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry. He prayed to the Lord, "O Lord, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. Now, O Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live." (Jnh. 4:1-3) Jonah would rather die than see God forgive his enemies.

Don't let that attitude come into your heart. Look around you and see all the people that Jesus died for, the people he has forgiven! To get the benefit of what Christ has done, they need to hear the message! They need to believe it! Maybe you can be the one to tell them!

Maybe you've thought that you can't share the good news of Jesus because you might say something wrong. This news is too important; it has to be shared. Jesus has forgiven the mistakes you'll make; just reach out with him to others. Maybe you don't want to talk to people who haven't been around church for awhile because it's "none of your business" or you "don't want to step on any toes." Aren't their souls more important than that? Doesn't Jesus' love for them compel you to talk to them, to ask them what's wrong, to invite them back to their Savior and his forgiving love?

Make today the day you say, "I pledge allegiance..." Maybe you pledge allegiance to our nation's flag, but I want you to pledge allegiance to your Savior! Don't go along with the sinful ways of this nation, look to your Savior and rejoice in his forgiveness. Then put the sinful ways aside. Live for your Lord. Make sure everyone you know knows about his love too. In Jesus we have salvation; we have freedom. Because of our Savior, we look forward to a better country than this one -- a heavenly one. (Heb. 11:16)

Is Living Your Faith Really Worth It?

Sermon preached at Our Savior on June 27, 2010 for the 5th Sunday after Pentecost. Sermon text: Genesis 39:6b-12,16-23  

"No good deed goes unpunished." That's a phrase that's often used to explain the strange way that this sinful world often works. Good deeds, of course, are supposed to be rewarded. When you do something good, when you do what's right, things are supposed to go your way.

But sin came into this world and sure made a mess of things. Sin, going against God's commands, has turned everything we would expect to happen upside-down. No, good deeds are not a guarantee of a good outcome or reward. Sometimes, that good deed done with the best of intentions, ends up costing you -- and hurting you -- big time.

Think of a time when you did something nice for someone. A little favor here, a little help there. And instead of getting thanked for it, the person got mad at you. And now, when you started out trying to be nice, trying to do something good for someone -- this is the thanks you get! It turned into a big fight. And it's enough to make you think that maybe doing nice things for others isn't really worth it.

No good deed goes unpunished. That phrase sometimes rings true even as we look at our life of faith, even as we look at our relationship with our God. As Christians who rejoice in having a Savior, we try to withstand temptation. We try not to sin. And sometimes when we stand up to temptations in that way it works out really well. Maybe you were tempted to drive too fast on the 219, but you resisted, knowing that it's right to obey the law. And as you rounded the next curve, there was a police officer who would've pulled you over for speeding. But you weren't speeding, and because you resisted temptation, things went better for you.

That's not how it always works, though. Quite often, it works in the opposite way. You live out your faith, you let your light shine, and your life just gets miserable because of it. That's what happened to Joseph in our text from Genesis. Joseph's case is going to remind us of the  problems we encounter. We'll be reminded of the crosses we are called on to bear as Christians. It makes us ask ourselves the question I'm asking you all today: Is living your faith really worth it?