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Pastor Tom Steers on February 25, 2024

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THE SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT

February 25, 2024

Pastor Tom Steers

Christ the Saviour Lutheran Church, Toronto

OPENNING HYMNN: 693 “O Holy Spirit, Grant Us Grace”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Z3JmHIG3U8

The Invocation Page 184

Lutheran Service Book

Confession and Absolution Page 184-185

THE LITANY

P: O Lord. C: have mercy.

P: O Christ. C: have mercy.

P: O Lord. C: have mercy.

P: O Christ. C: hear us.

P: God the Father in heaven. C: have mercy.

P: God the Son, Redeemer of the world. C: have mercy.

P: God the Holy Spirit. C: have mercy.

P: Be gracious to us. C: Spare us good Lord.

P: Be gracious to us. C: Help us, good Lord.

P: By the mystery of Your holy incarnation; by Your holy nativity;

by Your baptism, fasting and temptation; by Your agony and bloody sweat;

by Your cross and passion; by Your precious death and burial;

by Your glorious resurrection and ascension; and by the coming of the Holy Spirit,

C: Help us, good Lord. Amen.

The Kyrie (Lord Have Mercy)

Lord Have mercy upon us.

Christ have mercy upon us.

Lord Have mercy upon us.

Collect Prayer:

O God, You see that of ourselves we have no strength. By Your mighty power defend us from all dangers that may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts that may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Our Bible Readings –

Old Testament Reading Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 Psalm 22, verses 23-31 Epistle Reading Romans 5:1-11 Gospel Reading Mark 8: 27-38

THE APOSTLES’ CREED P. 192

HYMN OF THE DAY: 688 “Come, Follow Me, the Saviour Spake”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Js77dtCGq_s

THE SERMON –

This Sunday we’re told by Jesus that in our Christian life there are crosses to bear.

We’ll have difficult roads to walk, and we travel them by faith, not sight.

The victory is real, but sometimes hidden in this life.

Faith is what you have when you can’t see the victory, but accept God’s Word that it has been won for you through Jesus.

This Sunday, Moses, the Apostle Paul, and Christ Himself have direct, even hard lessons.

Peter says he doesn’t want our Lord to suffer on the cross, he rebukes’ Jesus, and is called satan for his error.

Peter says Jesus is the Christ, yet he has a wrong view at the time of what that means.

The disciple thinks the death of Jesus isn’t necessary or appropriate because he’s looking for a political, a national Messiah.

Peter is holding to a prosperity Gospel, not the Christ who will die making payment for the sins of the world.

He’s focused on the things of this earth, not eternal salvation.

Abraham will long for the fulfillment of a promise God made to him.

Sometimes we yearn for this as well in our moments of doubt and pain.

In Biblical Greek ‘belief’ is not the same thing as ‘faith.’

To ‘believe’ involves an evaluation of what has been said, either accepting or rejecting it.

Belief is conditional.

We might ‘believe’ something on the basis of its likelihood, or on the speaker’s history with us.

Faith, on the other hand, is a much more relational word.

God is not asking us to evaluate what He says and render a judgment on whether it’s believable; God is asking us to trust Him.

The Lord’s Prayer, as Martin Luther described it, is a ‘faith prayer,’ not a ‘belief’ prayer.

Our Bible passages today invite us into that relationship of faith and strengthen it.

Christ suffered and redeemed all who receive the free gift of salvation through faith.

But our experience of Christ’s victory may well come through suffering.

Especially in secular, un-Godly times.

We can consider God’s words to Abraham in our Old Testament reading: “Walk before me and be blameless.”

Like Abraham and Sarah, we are unable, on our own, to hear and appreciate the promise and command of God.

When we put ourselves before God’s Word and purpose, we are sinning.

And as the Apostle Paul will teach us in Romans, we do.

When we witness to Christ in our lives, do we need to simply trust that God is with us, and let Him tackle the seemingly impossible?

The answer is yes.

In this this time of Lent, we reflect on what Christ did for us.

We read Psalm 22 written about 1,000 years before the crucifixion, and which describes it in detail.

The Psalm begins, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”

Jesus will speak these words from the cross.

The psalmist notes that his tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth.

He’s surrounded by strong men who pierce his hands and feet.

They gamble for his clothes.

One thousand years before Good Friday, God, the pre-incarnate Jesus, knew exactly what the salvation of the world would cost.

In fact, he knew it from the beginning of Creation.

The way we access this salvation is described by the Apostle Paul in our Epistle reading in Romans 5: 1-11.

Paul writes, “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Justified by faith Paul writes, and Martin Luther repeated.

Not through our own ‘good works’ as the catholic church and other false denominations teach.

Paul goes on to write that, “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

The Apostle is saying that Christ died for all, and that Jesus wants all to be saved and come to faith.

So much for false Calvinist church teaching that God only loves some, and always had intentions to damn the rest.

This section of the Book of Romans concludes with Chapter 8, where Paul says our current sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory to be revealed . . . and that we can be sure the love of God can’t be separated from us.

It’s not that our pain isn’t real; it is so real it connects us to Jesus’ own suffering. (Colossians 1:22)

The faith that allowed twenty-one Christians, who were executed by the Islamic State on a beach in Libya, to maintain their faith at the cost of their physical lives, is a sign of the peace only God gives.

Our salvation comes through the faith and sacrifice of Jesus.

It comes through the relationship He has with the Father into which we are included through the Sacrament of Baptism, which together with the Word works saving faith in us.

A Baptism which is effective at any age, infant or elderly.

And this is because Baptism is God’s work in us, not our own.

Paul tells us that our sinful human nature wants to take credit for salvation.

But it’s a lie for humans to commend ourselves for what properly belongs to God.

This is the problem with many TV evangelists when they talk about ‘accepting’ or ‘welcoming’ Jesus into our hearts, of making ‘a decision’ for Christ.

It’s Biblically wrong, it’s spiritual poison.

Paul explained in Ephesians 2:4-5, “because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions -- it is by grace you have been saved.”

Dead people do not save themselves.

Some may ask, ‘if God is really on our side, how is it that suffering isn’t diminished for Christians, but sometimes actually increases as we take up a cross and follow Christ?

Paul addresses this head on.

Suffering has become, for the Christian, an occasion for joy.

Because suffering produces endurance. (Romans 5:3-5)

Yet hardships are more than just a training for something.

Paul says suffering is the occasion for something valuable in itself.

We are not merely victims of the world’s brokenness, and death.

When we suffer, we’re revealed to be people of God-given strength that trust in Him.

We experience the same challenges that confront every human being.

The same death and sorrow that stalks them, confronts us.

But we deal with these things differently, we face hem in hope.

Not the false “hope” the world offers.

The power of Christian hope is nothing less than the very Spirit of God.

In our Gospel reading, Jesus lays it on the line.

The cross was the ultimate sign of humiliation and subjugation for the people of Judea.

No Roman citizen, no matter how insignificant, could be crucified, only a non-Roman, what they considered a second-class person.

Yet Christ says take up your cross, don’t merely admit that it might come.

For in the strange economy of God’s kingdom, giving away, losing oneself, is in fact the Kingdom life.

While Christian martyrs who were led into the Roman arena took comfort that their death was a door to Heaven, there’s more than one way to lose ‘self.’

Ironically, the grasping on to this life, the hanging on as if we owned it, could control it, and are only here to enjoy it, is actually the recipe to lose it.

For at the end of time there will only be two who can lay claim to anything, including the claim to own you and me.

We will either belong to God above, or the infernal one below.

The nature of God’s Kingdom, as we experience it in this world, is cross shaped.

But a person who is more concerned about fitting into and pleasing an “adulterous and sinful generation” than standing for the faith will have no part in that Kingdom.

The world’s definition of success and failure has been altered by God.

Salvation was achieved through the suffering of Jesus.

And so how can we turn our back on suffering, or say we should never experience it?

Today we get the sobering, yet encouraging reminder that our suffering is not our end.

That despite suffering we never face an enemy who is bigger than our Redeemer.

Even when our faith is weak, Christ’s faith and promise remains strong.

He has left us His Church, His Word, and His Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper to strengthen and protect us.

You have one who has defeated your greatest enemies: sin, death, and the devil.

And that champion is Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world.

Amen.

PRAYERS OF THE CHURCH

SERVICE OF THE SACRAMENT Page 194