7th Sunday after Pentecost

July 23-24, 2006
Vicar Michael Monterastelli
Mark 6:30-44 (Jer. 23:1-6, Eph. 2:11-22)

Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while (Mark 6:31).

Grace, Mercy, and Peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Today’s text reveals our Lord and Savior who comes to give us rest through His teaching and feeding.

Jesus sent His Apostles to engage His three persistent enemies: the devil, the fallen world, and our own sinful flesh. His Apostles proclaimed that people must repent. They cast out many demons, anointed the many sick with oil, and healed them. When they returned and told Jesus all they had done and taught, He planned to bring them somewhere quiet, so it seemed, to someplace desolate to rest and eat. Instead, what happened next seems less restful and more like exhausting work. [But was it?]

Like the apostles who had just come from working in the fields, we need time to rest. That’s why God made the Sabbath. That’s why God gives us Jesus. That’s why Jesus sends us the Holy Spirit. That’s why the Holy Spirit reveals the Truth. And that’s why we preach Christ crucified and risen.

Today’s Gospel tells us how Jesus finds and gives us rest in the midst of the chaos of this world.

What Jesus did after leading His apostles across the quiet water in a boat, did not necessarily involve His disciples doing any work. Instead, and here’s how Jesus provided their rest, Jesus went ashore. He had compassion on the great crowd who were like sheep without a shepherd. He began to teach the great crowd and His disciples many things. By His command, His disciples were on vacation. For a relatively short time, they sat back, listened, and watched Jesus work.

Eventually the apostles and the great crowd grew hungry as the hour grew late. The time had come to nourish their bodies as His abundant teachings nourished their souls. With what seemed to be a deficiency of food, Jesus fed them until they were all abundantly satisfied.

For some of us, the concept of going away with close friends or family to rest a while is not a strange or new idea. But some vacations (with all their preparation and tight schedules) leave us exhausted rather than well rested. Even though we keep trying to find it in the things of this world, (like television, drugs, and food) true rest is found in only one person. But even that gets wearisome to us. That’s because sinners like you and me see what God does for us and consider it just one more demand on our precious time. But He is our only true source of rest. And His gift to you is a rest that endures forever.

As the prophet warns, there are shepherds who scatter God’s flock with false promises of rest. They promise rest through compromise, by agreeing to disagree about God’s Truth. There is no real rest apart from God’s Truth. There is no real rest in forsaking your daily duties. There is no real rest in giving in to temptation even once. The false promises that seem to give some temporary relief and rest often bring permanent struggle, ultimate exhaustion, and eternal pain. Just because things may seem easy now, that’s no guarantee of God’s gift of rest.

Jesus planned to bring His disciples to rest a while in a desolate place. But how often do things ever go exactly according to our plans? Unconcerned with Jesus’ plans, men from all the towns ran on foot to be near Jesus. 5000 men crashed the apostles’ vacation with Jesus.

But Jesus had compassion on these 5000 men. They were like sheep without a shepherd. So He became their loving shepherd. After they had run to meet Him, (like a good shepherd) He gave them rest. He led them beside the quiet waters by teaching them many things. Not just for 60-minutes-or-so, but until the hour grew late in the day. Then, He made them sit down on the green [pastures] in groups by hundreds and by fifties. He fed their bellies which ached with hunger.

This is the pattern He used then. It is the same pattern He uses now. In the Divine Service, the Service of the Word precedes the Service of the Sacrament. This is no accident. This is the divine order practiced by God Himself.

After Jesus leads you, teaches you and gives you an abundance of spiritual gifts through the liturgy, scripture readings, hymns, sermon, and prayers, believers who confess that they are made worthy by the blood of Jesus are given an abundant feast with plenty to spare. This is how God gives and guarantees real rest with Him.

The same thing which allowed Jesus to sleep through a storm (while everyone else panicked) is the same thing which kept Him from worrying about feeding the 5000 men. He knows His heavenly Father will provide what we need in this world and the next. He rested when He observed the Sabbath and attended synagogues to hear the Word of the Lord read.

Here for you today, through His Word, God has prepared the table in the presence of your enemies. So relax, take a deep breath, and rest knowing the truth of God gives you everything you need both now and forever.

By not resting until the end of His Passion, our Lord gave all He had. He set His face toward Jerusalem to do the work no one else could — to drink the cup only He could drink. After a restless Thursday night in the city of peace, He went to the cross and made it our source of eternal rest. It is the place from which He gives Himself to everyone for all time. It is the place to which the flock gathers to receive the care God gives through the shepherds He has set over them. It is the place where there is no more fear or dismay. It is the place where He makes His people become fruitful and multiply.

After laying down His life and resting in the tomb, our Lord did what no one else could, He took it up again. Then He did what He sends His Church to continue doing in, with, and under Him. He got up. He spoke. He taught. And He fed His disciples.

With His body on the cross, He has broken down the dividing wall of hostility that separates you from His Heavenly Father. With His own flesh, He abolishes the law of commandments and ordinances. In the Truth He delivers with His blood, God grants you true, eternal rest.

If you are young and restless, uncertain about the future, afraid the world has something you’re missing, unable to quiet your mind… Jesus is here to give you rest.

If you are wearied by the demands of keeping a household, keeping a job, educating and feeding a family, or of persevering in the middle of so many obligations… Jesus is here to give you rest.

If you are tired of the constant violence in the world, or of the effects of aging, illness, and so many side effects of prescription medications… Jesus is here to give you rest.

On your last day on earth, when you face death, as each of us probably will, when our bodies are worn to the point of shutting down, when our hearts stop pumping, then Jesus’ invitation is more appealing than ever. “Come away by yourselves…and rest a while.” He will walk us through death’s dark valley. He will usher us into the splendor of God’s eternal presence. He will give you the rest He made on the Sabbath and peace at the last.

In the Name of Jesus. AMEN

6th Sunday of Pentecost

July 16, 2006
Text: MARK 6:17-29

THE KINGDOM PARTY ROARS ON!

To you, the saints at Luther Memorial Chapel and University Student Center, who are faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ; the daughter of Herodias said, “I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter.”

John the Baptist
- his coming was foretold by the prophet Malachi (Mal 3)
- he was a prophet of priestly descent
- he was the forerunner of Christ
- his conception and birth were announced by the Angel of the Lord (Luke 1) with wondrous anticipation
- he leaped for joy in the womb of his mother in the presence of Christ in the womb of the Virgin Mary (Luke 1:39-45)
- you know his rigorous life and his dessert diet
- he grew and became strong in spirit, and was in the wilderness until the day of his public appearance to Israel (Luke 1:80)
- in the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar, he came out of seclusion and preached (Luke 3:1)
- he preached a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins (Luke 3:3)
- he preached, “repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Mt. 3:2)
- he pointed to Christ in the flesh, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29)
- he baptized and baptized, baptizing even Christ to fulfill all righteousness for us (Mt 3:15)
- he said of Christ that He was the Bridegroom who must increase while John must decrease (John 3:30)
- Jesus said of him, “among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist (Mt 11:11)

John the Baptist! He had boldness appropriate to his office. His calls for repentance included change in life and conduct such as aiding the poor, being honest in duty, serving others. Because He was sent to speak God’s Word, he meddled morally in the life of people. He spoke the truth to people regardless of position and power. Therefore he kept saying to Herod, It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.”

Herod! He was called a “king” but more often a Tetrarch for he ruled only ¼ of the kingdom of his father. At times he listened to John whom he had imprisoned. He was perplexed and puzzled by what the Baptist said. He appreciated John’s rhetoric who was, after all, the voice, crying in the wilderness. But Herod did not heed John’s call to repent. He listened with curiosity and for a time kept him John safe from his adulterous wife, Herodias.

Herodias! She had lived in Rome, the wife of Herod’s half-brother, Philip. Herod, also had a wife. On a trip to Rome, however, they became charmed with one another. When Herod returned to Judea, he had Herodias in tow. In his lust, he quickly set aside his true wife. He had the possessions and power and palaces to pursue pleasure with whom he wanted, and he wanted Herodias. The historian Josephus tells us that it was his splendid palace at the fortress Macheraeus at which John was imprisoned.

Macheraeus! This military fortress overlooked the Dead Sea. It bordered the wilderness. Herod’s birthday party would therefore have been a retreat for people of substance and leisure. It was a festive wilderness get-away, a banquet for his nobles and military commanders and leading men of Galilee.

And the party roared on! There were bountiful plates of fine food. There was ample provision of intoxicating drink. There was laughter and entertainment. It was, after all, the “kings” birthday. But there were also undercurrents of palace intrigue. God preserve us from ever living in a palace for aren’t there always undercurrents of palace intrigue?

Languishing underneath the party hall, in the dungeon of this fortress was John the Baptist. Simmering underneath the festive mood of this party was the resentment of Herodias. She wanted to put the prophet to death. She wanted to shut him up!

Like Jezebel sought to silence Elijah and worship the idols of Baal, Herodias sought to silence the second Elijah and worship the idol of personal pleasure. Both were strong and calculating women with influence over weak kings. Both were determined to smother the Word of God that contradicted their life’s decisions and their pet idols.

And the party roared on! Seductive dances at a shindig such as this were generally done by women of low reputation. For a princess to flash her flesh and shake her body around was not normal. It would have occurred here only with Herodias’s approval and urging. And approve she did! She was quite willing to submit her daughter to physical degradation in order to gain her own desires.

Even in prison, John kept saying, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” What a stinking cloud hanging over the royal family. What an embarrassment this prophet was, even in chains; a hindrance to their pursuit of happiness. Herodias had the same view of John that the treacherous priest Amaziah had of the prophet Amos. “The land is not able to bear all his words”. In other words, he is a pain in the neck, “shut him up”. She had waited to sink the dagger into God’s prophet. The juncture of motive, means and opportunity was now at hand.

And the party roared on! All it took was a lewd dance to tease his eyes and tickle his lust. Incestuous Herod gushed with generosity. When Herodias’s daughter came in and danced, she pleased Herod and his guests. And the king said to the girl,…“Whatever you ask me, I will give it to you, up to half of my kingdom.” Now everyone knew that Herod didn’t mean “half his kingdom”. This was a proverbial expression for royal generosity. To actually ask the king for “half his kingdom” would have been treasonous. But this expression in public carried heavy expectation that a substantial gift would follow. The subject was free to make a sizable request.

And the party roared on! After a short recess to confer with mom, these grisly words came from her pretty young lips. “I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter.”

We aren’t told what the cultured, fashionable guests said or did. Perhaps there were a few gasps – perhaps only mocking curiosity. We are told how Herod reacted. The king was exceedingly sorry, but because of his oaths and his guests he did not want to break his word to her. Moments before, he had enjoyed boisterous, party-time fun. Then, in an instant, Herod was sobered by death-dripping words from his darling little dancer. “I want you at once…to give me his head…”

Herod was undone by his own sensuality. Controlled by the lust of his flesh he had seduced his brother’s wife. Now he is seduced by Herodias through her daughter’s dance. Herod could yet have done the right thing. He could have refused to satisfy the vengeance of this new Jezebel. He could have humbled himself and qualified his extravagant promise. He could have said, “Oh, dear girl, you misunderstood my intent. I meant a rich gift of property or jewels, not the unjust and illegal execution of John.” Herod could have done the right thing, but he didn’t.

What sort of man would be more afraid of the opinion of party goers than of what God thought of him? What sort of man would be so concerned with pleasing himself and his partners in sin that He would act to violently silence the Word of God? The truth is, Herod is our sort of man. We also like to make ourselves look good and please those around us sometimes even at the expense of withholding witness to God’s Word.

We also may shun being humiliated for appearing too Christian.
John was so concerned for human souls he lost his life defending God’s gift of marriage. In our culture of living together and homosexual promotion, are we so concerned for souls that we steadfastly defend God’s gift of marriage? Do we speak and act to honor marriage and keep the marriage bed pure? In educational and political, community and family venues do we speak the truth in love? Even if it brings suffering and even if others want to shut us up, do we continue to speak the truth in love? That’s all that John did. The same could be said of our witness to the third commandment and weekly worship or our cheerful proportionate gifts to the Church or other areas of life. God’s gift of marriage is central here because that is what cost John his head.
Even when the request was made to silence God’s voice, Herod could have done the right thing, the painful thing. But, He didn’t. Because of his oaths and his dinner guests he did not want to break his word to her.

Talk about a twisted sense of honor. Talk about a warped sense of principle in high places. And immediately the king sent an executioner with orders to bring John’s head. He went and beheaded him in the prison and brought his head on a platter and gave it to the girl, and the girl gave it to her mother.

Dear Christians, it is impossible to overstate the horror of this scene. The command was given. The soldiers were sent. The sword was swung. The platters of fruits and meats and delicacies at Herod’s birthday gathering were soon joined by another platter. On that plate was a head dripping with the preacher’s blood. John the Baptist! The forerunner of Christ was dead, decapitated in the dark dungeon of Herod’s palace. After two brief years of preaching, his voice was silent, his head was on display. As she had intended, Herodias had shut him up! And the party roared on!

Beloved, who wants to confess and worship and serve a master who allowed his own forerunner to be shamefully sliced apart? If this is the end that met steady, disciplined John, then what sort of end awaits waffling, rebellious me and you? The same kind of end – death in this dying world!

Dear Christians, please take this text for all its worth, because it is worth a lot. Few events in Scripture demonstrate so clearly that Christ’s kingdom is not of this world. If you want Jesus to hand over heaven on earth, then you will be bitterly disappointed. If you believe you are in a dungeon and that God has messed up your life, then look again. If you think that suffering or aging or the approach of death means that God is set against you, then consider His servant John. Is your dungeon darker than John’s? Is your life more Spartan than his? Is your nemesis more deceitful than Herodias? Is your earthly end to be worse than John’s?
You see, Christ didn’t suffer so that you wouldn’t suffer. He wasn’t crucified so that you would be spared the cross. He did not die so that you wouldn’t die. That’s a false picture of Jesus. The true Jesus died so that plunged into His death you might emerge alive again in the resurrection.

That’s why Ruby Susan was baptized into his death this morning! That’s why you were baptized into His death. You have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer you who live but Christ who lives in you. And the life you now live you live by faith in the Son of God who loved you and gave Himself for you (Gal 2:20). Death could not keep its hold on Him and death cannot keep its hold on you His Bride. His kingdom is not of this world and He has given you His kingdom in full, not half way.

Dear Christians, none of us will get out of here alive, in our mortal bodies. Our mortal bodies must put on immortality. The perishable must put on the imperishable (I Cor. 15). In his brutal death, John the Baptist was mercifully removed from this shallow world of lies and vanity. He was sent off to the arms of the angels and received his reward. He who pointed out Christ with His finger now lives in His eternal presence where no pointing is necessary, where Christ shines like the sun.

John was not the light. He came to bear witness to the light (John 1). The true light who came into the world was never imprisoned in the darkness of Herod’s dungeon. But there was a day when He was bound and brought before Herod. It was the same day that Jesus stood trial before Pilate. Hoping for a way out, Pilate sent him to Herod. By this time Herod no longer feared that Jesus was the beheaded John returned to torment him. By this time, Herod simply desired to be amused by seeing Jesus perform some miracle. When Jesus refused to perform, when Jesus made no answer, Herod and his soldiers treated him with contempt. They mocked him, arrayed him in splendid clothing and sent him back to Pilate (Luke 23:6-12).

Jesus would perform no miracle to amuse this depraved king. But He did perform a miracle to forgive him and us! Jesus suffered not only the momentary wrath of Jezebel, but the eternal wrath of the Father in our place. He suffered the torments of the damned in hell as our substitute. John meant exactly what he said when he pointed to Christ and said “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” He took it away from us by suffering its penalty for us. Christ’s blood cleanses us from all sin, the sin of dancing with the devil, of dishonoring marriage, of personal vanity, of seeking to silence God’s Word. Christ died for us who like Herod sometimes fear loss of approval or place in the world more than God. Christ died for us who like Herodias sometimes find fault with God’s Word that hits too close to home and want to silence its proclamation. The one whom John anointed in the Jordan has anointed us with the washing of rebirth. He loves you. In Him you have obtained an eternal inheritance. In Him you have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of your trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon you (Eph 1:7).

Today, because He comes into our midst, the real party roars on! It includes the angels and archangels and all the company of heaven. It includes John the Baptist. The lasting party, the celebration that has no end, the one feast that provides eternal pleasure is in the presence of the exalted Christ. That’s why He is present to feed and forgive you each week. That’s why comes again to lavish His grace upon you today. Eat, drink and be merry with the fruit harvested from the tree of life. In the Name of Jesus, AMEN.

5th Sunday after Pentecost

July 9, 2006
Rev. Dan McMiller
Text: Mark 6:1-6

Mark records four great miracles just prior to this chapter. Jesus had calmed the storm on the sea of Galilee, healed a demon-possessed man in the region of Gerasenes, raised the daughter of Jairus from the dead, and healed the woman who suffered from bleeding for 12 years. Word of Jesus’ power had spread throughout Palestine. His reputation, by the time He had returned to His hometown of Nazareth, had more than preceded Him. When it was the Sabbath Jesus went to the Synagogue with His disciples. As was the custom, the guest teacher was allowed to preach, but the opportunity was unique, for this was His home town.

Jesus lived in Nazareth up to the age of 30. There, He was more than the carpenter's son. He Himself was a carpenter. Tradition teaches that He made such simple instruments as plows and yokes or other tools for working the soil and producing a harvest. Now, during His ministry, He continued to make simple instruments for working the soil of the Kingdom, and for producing a Harvest - unto Life Everlasting.

But having lived there from His youth, Jesus was well known. His mother and siblings still lived there. Jesus most likely had been preaching and teaching and healing for over a year. He was at the peak of His earthly ministry. His life had certainly changed. His humility in Nazareth had been set aside in many ways. Wherever He went people watched and listened and believed that this was no ordinary man. Yet, Jesus, upon returning to Nazareth, continued to look like that same carpenter that had lived quietly and humbly among them for years.

But when He spoke in the Synagogue on that day, little did they know what was happening. As they listened to Him speak, they were listening to God speak - firsthand. As they gazed into His eyes, they were gazing into the face of God. They were a least as close to the Lord as any high priest had been in the Holy of Holies. How do they react? At first - astonished. They witness His wisdom, intelligence, learning, and even speak of His mighty works. YET, it is not enough. They continue by commenting, "But this is the carpenter, whose family is still with us."

Familiarity breeds contempt. I served 3 countries 14 years in Latin America. I heard men from the villages preach and teach faithfully, according to the Word of God, yet, because I was the missionary, the foreigner, from a distant land . . . it carried a whole different level of meaning. In reality, the faithful preaching of the native son and the faithful preaching of the missionary are one and the same - the preaching of Christ - the very Word of God. It is obviously not about the person standing here. Nunes: "If you knew me like I know me, you wouldn't have bothered coming here. If I knew you like you know you, I wouldn't waste my time teaching you." Ah, but we have the Gospel. It is not about the person. It is about the Word of God and its truth, power and mercy.

So it is that Jesus says in our text: "ONLY in his hometown, among his relatives and in his own house is a prophet without honor." A true Prophet proclaims the Word of God. In Jesus’ case, there is no excuse for such sinful behavior. The text says that they were amazed or astonished at His teaching, wisdom, learning, and even His miracles. In Jesus’ case, no one, absolutely no one could accuse Him of a single sin. Impeccable. Yet . . . they stumbled. They were offended at the humility of His past. They fixed their eyes on His years in Nazareth and thought that since there had not been anything great exhibited then, the greatness they now perceived had to be a sham. Their amazement and astonishment were transformed into contempt, envy and even hatred.

Jesus too expressed amazement or astonishment. He was amazed at their unbelief. Only a couple times in Scripture is Jesus amazed: here and at the faith of the Roman centurion who trusted in the power and authority of Christ's Word to heal his servant - even from a distance. No such faith here. Only contempt.

But, why did they lack faith? Of what did their unbelief consist? They couldn't argue with Jesus' learning, wisdom or even His miracles! They couldn't accuse Him of a single sin. What did they reject? What was at the root of their offense? The very content of His message. This they could not tolerate. It struck too close to home. This message revealed that Jesus knew them . . . very well. He knew their thoughts, their heart and their soul. He told them that they were spiritually weak, crippled, lame and bound in the slavery chains of sin, and that He had come to deliver them.

"How dare He say we are sinners! Who does He think He is? He leaves here and comes back saying we are in need of repentance?"

Here's the rub. It is hard to preach a message of repentance. It is harder still to hear it and accept it. This is Jesus' alien work - the proclamation of repentance - the preaching of the Law in all its severity. Be perfect even as My Heavenly Father is perfect. The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The wages of sin is death. All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. This was Jesus' alien work then, and it is His alien work now through the church. It is not His primary work. His primary work is to live a perfect life in our stead, die a perfect death as a perfect sacrifice in full payment for our sins, and proclaim to us the good, sweet, comforting news of complete forgiveness and eternal salvation. But, before we might believe this message of forgiveness and salvation, our hearts must be broken, the scales of our eyes removed, our necks lowered and our backs bent downward in repentance.

This they would have none of for He was, in their mind, only Jesus. Their familiarity with Him quickly shut Him out and with Him they shut out the riches of the Gospel - its saving power, light, mercy, peace, forgiveness and deliverance from eternal death.

So we are today. "I know the church. I know that pastor. I know the Bible. I know Jesus. I know His family . . . I grew up with them. There is nothing so great there." But it is not only people out there with whom familiarity breeds contempt. We too see familiar things in the church and stumble.

The ever-changing, trend-conscious world wants something new - new fashion, a new statement, a new philosophy. The devil tempts similarly. Even in the garden at the beginning of time - Satan was into change - changing the Word of God - twisting it into something new. Our flesh also itches for a new look, taste or feel. The result? We want to put this message of repentance aside. And then we too shut out the power and riches of the Gospel - its saving light, mercy, peace, forgiveness, and deliverance from eternal death.

But it is not just here in this Sanctuary before God's holy things of corporate divine worship where such despising or contempt for the Word of God occurs. It also occurs among us - out there.

Does the Word of God, and Jesus Himself in that Word, lose its power outside these hallowed walls? Does the Word of Jesus - Jesus Himself -lose its power when spoken by someone other than the pastor? . . . Does the Word of Jesus lose its power when it is not set to a beautiful melody or harmony . . . or when it is not read antiphonally?

Dear friends, the Word of Christ - His message of repentance and forgiveness - is powerful, rich and effective when shared by you with a suffering family member, when shared with the neighbor on the street, a friend in the office, a classmate in school, a teammate in sports. Has familiarity bred contempt among us, because we believe that somehow, Jesus is only at work here, and couldn't possibly be effective among us in our daily vocation or familiar roles around the community or home?

Jesus is merciful, and He was merciful even in His hometown which had rejected Him. The sick came to Him and He healed them. These who saw their physical frailty were inclined also to see their spiritual weakness. To these the words of repentance rang true. And, to them, Christ showed mercy. Those who had rejected Jesus were sick also. They only refused to see it.

We live in a sick time, and in many ways we too are sick. Our city and our community have ever growing ills. Our congregations too show such signs. Our pastors suffer and are weak. Our people do not stand together as they once did. What is needed? Confession. When the word of repentance is proclaimed, we confess Lord, I am a sinner. I am the weak, blind, lame, and imprisoned who is in need of the healing and freeing that You alone can give. To such comes the word of complete forgiveness.

Of such as these (those who repent), the carpenter from Nazareth continues to makes tools to work the soil so that a rich harvest may be produced and also gathered. You are such tools, made by the hand of the Carpenter. His powerful Word has shaped you to share your faith and the reason for the hope that lies within you. God grant you His grace to bow in reverence before His Holy Word and Sacrament here in this sanctuary as you are continually shaped / fashioned / tooled together; and God grant you grace to use His Holy Word - believing in its power - even and also out there where rocky soil lies, but where also a great Harvest is waiting. Amen.

4th Sunday after Pentecost

July 2, 2006
Vicar Michael Monterastelli
Text: Mark 5:21-43 (Lamentations 3:22-33,
2 Corinthians 8:1-9, 13-15)

Beloved believers in Christ,

The Son of God is a real man who lovingly prepares us to receive all that He gives. As Jesus healed two daughters, He taught a woman and a father about the power of His Word and His gift of faith. The daughter of Jairus was at the point of death. At the urgent request of Jairus, Jesus went with him.

But on the way, a faithful woman touched Jesus’ garments and was healed. He could have kept moving toward the house of Jairus. The lady was healed. As far as she could tell, the job was done. But Jairus’ daughter had not been made ready for Jesus, yet. There was still time to do a little teaching.

The life of the woman (in the form of blood) had been draining from her body for 12-years. No amount of money had been able to purchase the kind of medical service that could save her life as it flowed from her body. For 12-years she had suffered much under many physicians.

According to the Law of Moses, she was unclean. We might expect her to be too afraid and too ashamed to ask anyone for help. But she wasn’t, not completely, anyway. Somehow she had heard the reports about Jesus and His acts of mercy.

For some reason, the crowd did not prevent her from pressing her way through them to approach Jesus from behind. If Moses could safely view only the backside of God, then this unclean woman could only approach God in the flesh from behind. She knew, “if I touch even His garments, I will be made well.”

Her suffering served to help her become a theologian better than any priest. Jesus was born in the flesh to come and cleanse our unclean flesh. Her suffering helped her hear what the Spirit of God was saying through the words of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms. “My help comes from the Lord!” so sang the Psalmist today (Psalm 121:2a).

Could Jesus be the help who comes from the Lord? In Jesus, she was made to recognize the presence of God walking among unclean, sinful people. The help and mercy of God had come to her. But how did Jesus, the presence of God in the flesh, touch unclean people and heal them without being defiled Himself? Well, He didn’t. Oh, He touched people alright, but (listen to this) their defilement became His as His cleanness became theirs. That’s why He was born. That’s why He was baptized by John. That’s why the help from the Lord comes in the body and blood of Jesus.

No law was ever made to keep anyone away from Jesus. But every law prepares us to come into His presence. As she pushed her way through the crowd, she knew that Jesus could make her clean and that the law of cleanness would be fulfilled by Him. She came up behind Jesus, touched His garment, and she was immediately saved. And knowing in His body that power had gone out from Him, Jesus asked the crowd, “Who touched my garments?”

Here Jesus wisely shows us the humility of faith. He asked the woman to confess what she had done; not as a confession of sin, but as a confession of faith. And as she trembled with fear, now cleansed and kneeling, not behind, but before the face of God in the flesh, she did what each one of us will have to do one day. She faced God and told the whole truth.
Jesus did not respond with, “Way to touch my cloak, heal yourself, and confess the truth, lady! Good job!” Instead He told her, “Daughter, your faith has saved you.”
(now listen carefully to this)

The flow of blood from the woman was stopped. Her life was spared for several reasons. First and foremost is the power which flows from Jesus. But His power flowed to her and saved her specifically because she was caused to believe Jesus had that power and would use it to heal her. And the reason causing her to believe all this, was that she had heard the reports about Jesus. Someone actually told her about Jesus. What a loving thing to do.

Because of His power and her God-given faith in Jesus, she was saved. As Jesus stopped her flow of blood, the time drew near when His blood would begin flowing and never stop. His body, the vessel containing His precious blood, was torn open.

His precious blood burst forth from the fountain of His love. Every last drop of His life spilled out. By the words of Jesus, His blood now flows into the cup of His new testament. His blood has been shed for you for the forgiveness of sin. At Holy Communion, you are made to hear and see Jesus doing His work. As His blood flows over the lip of the chalice, between your parted lips, and down your throat, hearts broken by the bitter truth of the Law are healed. You are saved.

You are forgiven.

In today’s Gospel reading, both this woman and Jairus desired to see and hear Jesus do His work of physical healing. But Jesus directed their attention to the greater gift of faith.
Among the crowd of people, Jesus pointed to the woman’s faith as the gift that saved her. But among Peter, James, John, Jairus and his wife, Jesus merely spoke His command to the little girl and she rose up as though she had only been sleeping. What caused the 12-year old girl’s spirit to return to her earthly life was not her faith. For a dead body has no ability to believe, no capacity for good of any kind. What caused her to live again were the power-filled words of Jesus. For His spoken words are spirit and life (John 6:63).

But where was faith in this passage? We have to look at Jairus for that. The faith Jairus had in Jesus brought Jesus to his little girl, so Jesus could touch her, save her, and make her live. She was unable to raise herself to get help. She needed an advocate who would bring Jesus to her. And that’s just what God provided in her loving father.

Faith is that gift from God through which His power of salvation comes to us. Faith in Jesus is an integral part of our salvation. Without it, we are lost in eternal death. With it, death has lost its sting.

While Jesus spent time with the woman, the life of the second daughter, the daughter of Jairus, was at the point of death. As ruler of the synagogue, Jairus had called on and done everything He knew how to do. No amount of earthly sacrifice had been able to heal his little girl, until he found Jesus. But Jesus was delayed in coming.

Those who had come from the house of Jairus told him, “Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the Teacher any further?” As far as they were concerned, death was the end. And Jesus couldn’t do anything for his little girl anymore. But before their words turned him away, Jesus gave Jairus these words of comfort, “Do not fear, only believe.”

His daughter was now ready for Jesus. For if Jesus came not for the healthy but for the sick and unclean, then above all, He came for the dead. For as our Lord God made Adam from the dead dust of the earth, so He remakes the fallen sons of Adam and the fallen daughters of Eve — He remakes them, He remakes you only if you are dead as dust.

And so you are. For though your heart may be as healthy as an Olympic athlete, it is that heart, your heart and mine, that daily spews forth the sickness of evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, drunkenness, lies, and slanders. For though you keep up a good appearance to people in this congregation, your co-workers, your friends, and maybe even your family, inside you, inside me, is jealousy, greed, malice, and every form of evil. And even if you are able to avoid gross, outward sins, even if you keep your darkest fantasies hidden away in your mind, they cannot be hidden from the eyes of the Almighty Judge.

You are not nearly as good as you think you are, or as you like people to think. Indeed, you are worse than you are capable of knowing. For like all men, you lack perfect fear, love, and trust in God above all things. For that reason, you only love those who love you back, but those who oppose you, curse you, or hate you — them you ignore (at best) or hate (at worst). And in so doing, you prove yourself, no better than the Pharisees or scribes. When things don’t go your way, when someone steps on your toes, when you think you deserve something that is given to someone else, then your self-love produces thoughts that, if reflected on a screen, would make even the foulest men hide their faces in shame. These things are true and you know them to be true. And if you did not, you would deceive yourself and the truth would not be in you.

Repent. For if you know them to be true, and confess them to be true, blessed are you, for you have joined the ranks of Jairus’ daughter—one whom our Lord will raise. For to know that your heart is a cesspool of self-loving platitudes and to say Amen to this painful truth, is to stretch out on that bed beside that 12-year-old little girl and die with her. Blessed are you who die with the daughter of Jairus. Blessed are you who don’t live with the lie but die with the truth—the truth that in yourself you are as dead as dust.

Blessed are you who die with the truth, for it is the Truth Himself who has come to set you free from death, free from your sin, to heal your body and soul, and to raise you up to newness of life. For as Jesus took the daughter of Jairus by the hand and said to her, “Talitha kumi, Little girl, I say to you, arise,” so He says to you, “Ego te absolvo, O sinner, I absolve you, I forgive you, I say to you arise. I love you. You are mine. Come off the bed of death, the bed of sin, and live again.

The worst of your sins, your darkest of desires, your pettiness and self-love and greed, lust, and drunkenness — they are no more. They are gone. They are destroyed. I have taken them into My flesh and when My flesh was crucified, they were crucified with Me. They are no more, they have become nothing, that I might make you to be everything in Me.

Blessed are you, O sinner, for Jesus is the Friend of sinners; blessed are you who are dead in transgressions, for Jesus is your Resurrection; blessed are you who are sick, for Jesus is your Healing.

He did not come down from heaven to reform you, to teach you how to win the favor of His Father, or to show you some secret way of salvation. He came down from heaven to die a hellish death out of love for you. He came down from heaven to take on your nature—to have flesh and bones, skin and hair, to cry tears and sweat blood—and as a man to do for you what you could not do, in fact, what you did not want to do, for yourself. He came to keep the laws you have shattered, and to have His obedience applied to you. He came to have a clean heart, a pure conscience, a perfect faith and love, and to place all of these good gifts on you and in you. He came to become all sins of all sinners on that bloody tree. He became your lust that you might become His love. He became your greed that you might become His charity. He became your ugliness that you might become His beauty. He became all your evil that He might make you to be all His good. And in this blessed exchange, He makes you to be the sons and the daughters of God. He is merciful, not counting your sins against you, but grabbing those sins and injecting them into His flesh, that in His flesh He might destroy them once and for all.

Like Jairus’ daughter, you have died and risen by the hand of Christ. And now and forever you stand alive, clean, and forgiven in His presence. That is His promise, a promise to which He is forever faithful. AMEN

The Peace of God, who passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. AMEN

[several paragraphs about Jairus’ daughter have been included from a sermon on Mark 5:21-24, 35-43 and can be found in a collection of sermons published by Emmanuel Press in Christ Crucified: Lutheran Sermons by Chad L. Bird © 2005, used with permission]