The Twenty-Third Sunday after Trinity, 2017
Pastor Gregory L. Jackson
The Hymn #246 Holy, Holy, Holy
The Confession of Sins
The Absolution
The Introit p. 16
The Gloria Patri
The Kyrie p. 17
The Gloria in Excelsis
The Salutation and Collect p. 19
The Epistle and Gradual
The Gospel
Glory be to Thee, O Lord!
Praise be to Thee, O Christ!
The Nicene Creed p. 22
The Sermon Hymn #334 Let Me Be Thine Forever
Citizenship in Heaven
The Communion Hymn #316 O Living Bread
The Preface p. 24
The Sanctus p. 26
The Lord's Prayer p. 27
The Words of Institution
The Agnus Dei p. 28
The Nunc Dimittis p. 29
The Benediction p. 31
The Hymn # 309 O Jesus Blessed Lord
KJV Philippians 3:17 Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an ensample. 18 (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: 19 Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.) 20 For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: 21 Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.
KJV Matthew 22:15 Then went the Pharisees, and took counsel how they might entangle him in his talk. 16 And they sent out unto him their disciples with the Herodians, saying, Master, we know that thou art true, and teachest the way of God in truth, neither carest thou for any man: for thou regardest not the person of men. 17 Tell us therefore, What thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar, or not? 18 But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and said, Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites? 19 Shew me the tribute money. And they brought unto him a penny. 20 And he saith unto them, Whose is this image and superscription? 21 They say unto him, Caesar's. Then saith he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's. 22 When they had heard these words, they marvelled, and left him, and went their way.
Twenty-Third Sunday After Trinity
Lord God, heavenly Father: we thank Thee that Thou hast hitherto granted us peace and graciously spared us from war and foreign dominion: We pray Thee, graciously let us continue to live in Thy fear according to Thy will, giving no cause for wars or other punishment; govern and direct our magistrates, that they may not hinder the obedience due to Thee, but maintain righteousness, that we may enjoy happiness and blessing under their government, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, one true God, world without end. Amen.
Citizenship in Heaven
KJV Philippians 3:17 Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an ensample.
This letter from St. Paul is called his Epistle of Joy, and he included solemn warnings in it. If we isolate some verses, we can make anything out of this passage. It is common to use such verses to complain about Paul as a person. He was doubtless a difficult person in many ways, but God used this difficult person as a scribe to reveal and define the Gospel.
So Paul earlier wrote about what an excellent Pharisee he was, perfect by every measure. But those descriptions are intended only to say - The Judaizers have no claim over me. I was the model Pharisee - and I count it as nothing compared with the knowledge of Christ and the righteousness of faith.
Luther advised ministers to end sermons with warnings against false doctrine, as Jesus did at the end of the Sermon on the Mount (beware of wolves in sheep's clothing, Matthew 7:15ff.) Luther did that in some way in every sermon - not always at the end - and Paul did the same. Many find this style irritating, if not maddening, so they respond with personal attacks against Paul, Luther, or anyone else who does this.
18f (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:
- Whose end is destruction,
- whose God is their belly,
- and whose glory is in their shame,
- who mind earthly things.)
We can call these people - The Improvers. Unfortunately, many think only of the Judaizers, so they imagine - "We do not have that problem. We do not need to eat kosher."
The Improvers do not want to challenge the Gospel - not at all. Do not suspect them of such - they will deny it. They only want to improve it. When they are done, the Gospel has been replaced by a new man-made Law. The outward attributes remain, but the real message is the righteousness of their man-made Law.
In his sermon on this passage, Luther said he belonged to that group when he said Mass daily and did everything a good monk should do. If someone had tried to intervene with the righteousness of faith, he would have organized stone-throwing at this Stephen or gathered wood to burn the heretic at the stake.
If thirty years ago, when I was a devout, holy monk, holding mass every day and having no thought but that I was in the road leading directly to heaven - if then anyone had accused me, had preached to me the things of this text, and pronounced our righteousness which accorded not strictly with the Law of God, but conformed to human doctrine and was manifestly idolatrous pronounced it without efficacy and said I was an enemy to the cross of Christ, serving my own sensual appetites, I would immediately have at Mass helped to find stones for putting to death such a Stephen, or to gather wood for the burning of this worst of heretics.
But many others would say, we do not worry about the Romanizing clergy of Lutherdom either. They join Rome and are forgotten.
There are many brands of Improvers, but they all have a similar agenda - they will fix the Gospel so it works better in this age and earn the acclaim of the multitudes.
The Biblical Improvers
The Biblical Improvers want to awe us with their vast knowledge of ancient history and languages. That is, they start with human knowledge and apply that to the Scriptures, so that nothing will embarrass Christians when they talk about the Word. As one of these nitwits said to me, "You don't believe in the immortality of the soul, do you?"
The academics are far more dangerous, because the esoteric nature of their work can leave everyone gasping about their knowledge - Hebrew, Chaldean, Arabic, and empires seldom studied in school.
One good example is Ebla, a large and ancient kingdom that disappeared from history until thousands of tablets were accidentally found. After all, no one was looking for them. I read about them in the news about 1975. The historians said some Biblical cities were invented because "we have no evidence that they ever existed."
That suggests we know everything about the ancients when we are not even sure about Lee Harvey Oswald or why Napoleon lost the Battle of Waterloo. But all the Old Testament professors taught that "History shows those cities never existed." But Ebla tablets names them. Oops.
Likewise, Ninevah did not exist - ever - until it was found.
Thus the modern age has turned the Old Testament into a very interesting book of poetry and literature, but one that is unreliable about history and geography. In fact, the muchly praised Fuller Seminary's original "inerrancy statement" only applied that term to doctrine, not to history or geographical accuracy. We have Harvard for that!
The Improvers want a Bible that is intellectually acceptable to them. In the words of Martin Chemnitz, they do not like the fisherman's voice of the Holy Spirit. It must be cultured, refined, and appealing to the intellectualoids, the ones who prove their case with a furtive pathah or a iota subscript (items of Hebrew and Greek grammar).
Once they place their view of history over the Scriptures, they are using their reason and experience to judge and (in fact) to condemn the Word of God. Or, like Karl Barth, to only allow that the Bible only contains the Word of God.
Now we begin to smell the pot-roast. They are the new Judaizers. They are the best of the brains and want to rule over all the others. They are head over heels in holiness because they know these ancient secrets which the vast multitudes still foolishly believe.
Cleverly, these Improvers introduce their superior knowledge until anything can be supported by their own authority. "I thought the Bible spoke against that." Improver - "Well, it does, but that comes from crude, ancient prejudice."
One of my favorite Improver slogans is this one - "God wants His Church to grow." (McGavran, from one of the most left-wing denominations, the Disciples). This is a vast improvement over, "I planted, Apollos watered, but God gives the growth." 1 Corinthians 3. The first claim makes it impossible to thwart any Church Growth scheme, but the second one trusts in God's efficacious Word. Which one appeals to the Old Adam in each person? - McGavran's. But which one is true and brings great blessings? - Paul's.
Improvers say -
- We have to spend money to grow. Money as the Means of Grace.
- The Church must be run like a business. Like Sears-KMart?
- Statistics show that people will join a church after moving to a new home. So why did Glende's suburban plant not grow, but folded instead?
- Fuller has a vast deposit of statistical studies. We must use them. Why did Fuller have to cut back their own growth plans?
20 For our conversation (citizenship) is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: 21 Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.
Paul was in prison and expecting death when he wrote this letter. That is what illuminated his prison letters. As the Gospel of John ending shows - dying for the faith is a great honor. Our citizenship is not so much in one particular country but in the Kingdom of God, where we are translated from this temporary dwelling to an eternal dwelling with the Savior.
Living on this earth shows us that we still belong to the Old Adam, which makes us mortal. Nothing can take that away completely. But Christ is grafted onto us by faith in Him, and therefore the fruits of the Gospel come from believing in Him.
That is entirely different from earning and claiming righteousness. The problem with any system of righteousness through the Law is that we must measure and proclaim our own righteousness.
Paul is mistaken as a braggart because he used hyperbole (exaggeration) to make a point. If you are a Judaizer, I was a better one. But since he says that is nothing, the comparison is one of nothing compared to nothing.
The laity are lucky. They do not have to read a lot of theology and Biblical textbooks. Each one claims to be really something - that is part of the game. Get tenure by publishing. These books insert a lot of bad ideas, a lot of improvements of the Gospel.
As Jacobs said, the non-trained laity often have a better grip of the Scriptures because that is how they are trained, without all the various theories and erroneous ideas. The Word alone teaches us through the Holy Spirit's power. All the scholars in the world cannot compare to the Scriptures, because the Bible judges all books, even the greatest of all theology books - and especially the most popular ones.
