"The Truth Shall Set You Free" John 8:31-36

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

“If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

In the name of Jesus

I don’t imagine it being too much of an enjoyment being an African in the new land of America from the early 1600’s to the mid to late 1800’s.  Living a life of slavery was not a luxurious, cushy, lavish lifestyle.  You worked sun up to sun down.  You had to be content with the little possessions that you had.  You were completely at the mercy of your master.  I would venture to guess that being oppressed, being degraded, being silenced, being bound in chains figuratively sometimes even literally, wasn’t exactly a morale booster.

Imagine for a moment now, you are in this situation.  Imagine you are being suppressed by a controlling master you dictates your every move.  You have heard rumors that there are people out in the unknown world who are fighting for you, but you don’t and even can’t think about it because that is all out of your hands.  You know very well, and are even told by your master, you are a horrible worthless person.  You own nothing.  You can do nothing on your own for you are owned.  

With the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation signed in 1863, freedom was on its way.  In 1865 the official word was given, all slaves were free in the new land.  What a liberating feeling it must have been to hear that no longer could you be held as a slave.  You were free in every sense of the word.  Now, granted it would be a while yet before civil rights movement, you lived your life as you pleased.  You owned land, you had a family, you had possessions.   

It is hard for us to imagine such a scenario isn’t it.  You and I have never been put through the horror of slavery.  We have never been held against our will and forced to work in such conditions as there were in 1600-1800.  It seemed difficult as well for the Jews in our text.  In fact, it seemed offensive to them to even be associated with slavery.  We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?  Jesus was beginning to offend them because he was speaking on the subject of slavery, and more specifically, their slavery and the need to be set free.  He said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” 

Slavery is an offensive thing.  No one likes to think about what it must have been like in those days.  Surely no one likes to think of themselves in that same position.  Yet you are.   You are a slave, please be offended.  You are a slave and you deserve everything which that title entails.  You sit here in God’s house having come in shackles.  You are the ones to whom Jesus is speaking in our text.  You are the ones who our Lord calls to abide in my word know the truth, and the truth will set you free. 

Martin Luther felt the restraints of sin upon him.  He knew well the convicting words of our Lord,  Everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.  The slave does not remain in the house forever.  He was taught that the way to loosen the chains was to please God with works, to sacrifice his life, by dedicating to the Lord’s work.  Yet the chains where binding.  His work was never enough.  The truth for Luther was that he was a poor miserable sinner worthy of nothing.       

We know from the history of our country what the reward, what the payment, what the compensation was for a slave.  They got nothing.  We know from our Lord’s teaching, from his holy and inspired word what our reward, payment, compensation for being a slave to sin, to the devil is, and it is more than nothing, it is death. 

What should the master give us for being unfaithful to him?  What should the master give us for not following his laws, his commands?  We can’t pretend everything is fine and dandy.  Our Lords very words convict us.  Everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.  The slave does not remain in the house forever. 

Who, therefore, in this house, does not practice sin?  Everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.  We are the slaves.

It took a special act in 1863 to begin releasing slaves, the Emancipation Proclamation.  A letter, an act, from President Abraham Lincoln declaring all those held as slaves, free.  By virtue of the power, and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be free; and that the Executive government of the United States, including the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons.

It took a special act, a special proclamation, words from the leader, to release us.  It wasn’t written on official letter head, it wasn’t written and declared immediately by the governing authorities.  It was in fact the just the opposite.  Our freedom was declared by one held on death row. 

Through of the proclamation of our Lord, it is finished, the greatest reversal took place.  A reversal, an exchange, which was foretold of in our Gospel reading.  Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.  The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever.  So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.  Because of the graciousness of our God we are no longer slaves set to be thrown out of the house.  We are not bound in the chains of sin, we are free.  We are the son.  Remember the slave receives nothing, yet the son receives everything.  The son receives the house, the son receives the place of honor, the son receives the inheritance.

This is the glorious truth Luther discovered in the monastery nearly 500 years ago.  The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.  For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.  

What a blessing we have been given.  Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”  They answered him, “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?  Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.  The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever.  So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

We have the truth.  We have the law written on our hearts and the sign of the cross placed upon us.  Yes those who practice sin are a slave to it, but on the cross at our baptism the Son set us free.  We hold the truth in the Bible for that is where it is contained.  We hold the truth of his death when we receive his body and blood. 

This truth also, because of our baptisms into his death and resurrection also lives in us.  For in our baptisms, the Wicked One was cast out to make room for the Holy Spirit.  The Spirit testifies for the Spirit is the truth.  Everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.  Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?  This is he who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only but by the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth.  For there are three that testify: the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three agree.

Thanks be to God the inheritance of the son is most certainly ours.  That which was won for us and is given to us, eternal life in heaven, at the throne of our Father, cannot be taken away.  Yes, though devils all the world should fill all eager to devour us, we tremble not we fear no ill, they shall not over power us. 

Thanks be to God that through the three solas, sola fide, sola scriptura, sola gratia, that is faith alone, scripture alone, grace alone, we are founded and anchored on the solid foundation of Jesus Christ.  We cannot be shaken. 

Amen.

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"What is God's?" Matthew 22:15-22

Grace, Mercy, and Peace be unto you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ Amen

 Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words.

In the Name of Jesus

Only 179 more days…are you excited?!  No, not until Christmas, I can’t count that I will most likely hyperventilate.  Until Easter?  No, but you are closer.  Not until the Vikings win the Super Bowl that could very well be decades yet…..  There are only 179 more days…….until Tax Day!  Yay!  

Don’t let my excitement fool you.  For me, tax day and every day leading up to it from the previous April 15^th, is a cause for major headaches.  Taxes are just so difficult to understand.  There are so many rules, regulations, numbers, formulas, exemptions, am I employed and I self-employed, the government says that I am both.  I just don’t get it!! 

If I didn’t know any better, I would think that the people of the IRS are all about tricks.  That they do all they can to catch us in their traps, maybe even without us knowing.  But it is hard to place the blame on them. They are just doing job, they are simply doing what they are asked to do. 

It was all about tricks, the Pharisee’s this time, we will leave the IRS alone for a while.  That was the name of their game.  If there was something, in this case someone, they didn’t like and they felt they needed to get rid of him, they would work tirelessly to capture them/it/whatever the case may be.  Anytime our Lord has interaction with the Pharisees, you can bet they are looking for one thing.  They want, more than anything else, to trap Jesus in his words.  They want him to say something against their church, here they want something against the government, which they could then use to arrest him. 

Here, specifically, what do you suppose they wanted to hear?  Listen again to our Gospel reading.  Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words.  And they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, “Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone's opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances.  Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” 

I bet they wanted to hear Jesus say something along the lines of “do not pay taxes!!”  Ahhh, no taxes.  Wouldn’t that be great?  They wanted Jesus to turn against the earthly authority and say “the only authority that needed to be obeyed was his authority, the authority from heaven”. 

But they have one problem, at least one anyway.  They don’t truly know who is in front of them and therefore miss entirely that Jesus knows, without them declaring, why they were coming to him.  He was well aware of their malice, [and] said, “Why put me to the test, you hypocrites?  Show me the coin for the tax.”  And they brought him a denarius.  And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?”    

If only they had realized the answer would be so simple.  “Whose likeness and inscription is this?”  They said, “Caesar's.” Then he said to them, “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.”  It is so profound and so simple.  Give Caesar, in our situation give the government, what is theirs, and give God what is His.  A black and white answer. 

Go ahead, then, and mentally divide your possessions.  Think about what you have and what requires you to give to Caesar and what requires you give back to God.  Maybe it is not as easy as we think.  We know the tax rules.  We know, fairly well, when and where Uncle Sam puts his hand in our pocket and takes.                

But maybe what we must give attention to, then, is what is God’s?  What belongs to him?  The list we could make, that the sinful man in is truly wants to make, is pretty slim.  After all, the things we have, the money we make, the items we buy, are ours.  We work hard for that.  We should be the ones who decide how, when, and where that money is used.  We work hard to make sure that our spouse, our children, even our grandchildren are provided for.  We work hard to make sure we can get the things we want.  What does any of that have to do with God?  I will give him a portion of what is left after I am satisfied.      

The Gospel is everything is God’s!  Everything we have in this life comes from God.  He gives us all that we need.  Listen to the explanation to the first article of the Apostles Creed. 

I believe that God has made me and all creatures; that He has given me my body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and all my senses, and still takes care of them. He also gives me clothing and shoes, food and drink, house and home, wife and children, land, animals, and all I have. He richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life. He defends me against all danger and guards and protects me from all evil. All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me. For all this it is my duty to thank and praise, serve and obey Him. This is most certainly true.

Yes, our Father gives us what we need to live for eternity.  He gives us the forgiveness of sins, he gives us the washing through the waters of Holy Baptism.   He gives us the body and blood of his son continually poured out for us.  He gives us that Gospel for eternity. 

But he gives us the gospel for Tuesday, the Gospel for our everyday live.  That is what is laid out for us in the explanation to the first article.  He cares for our spiritual and physical wellbeing.  He gives us what we need to live, he give us our daily bread.  All our earthly blessings come from him.  It is also those things described in the fourth petition of the Lord’s Prayer as daily bread which includes everything that has to do with the support and needs of the body, such as food, drink, clothing, shoes, house, home, land, animals, money, goods, a devout husband or wife, devout children, devout workers, devout and faithful rulers, good government, good weather, peace, health, self-control, good reputation, good friends, faithful neighbors, and the like.     

It doesn’t seem like Luther left anything out there did he?  Which means only one thing, all things come from God.  He gives us our spouse and family, and let me tell you how huge a blessing my wife and kids are to me.  He gives us the skills we use to make a living for ourselves.  Which means he gives us the money that we use to buy the things we need and even the things we want.  He gives us good friends, good neighbors, our health.  And, as Luther states, part of what he provides for us physically is our government and our rulers.  Think about that.  As hard as it may be to accept at times, he give us government for our good.          

And so as called Children of God, we must then give back what has been given to us.  Not spitefully, like our sinful man would love us to do.  But we give back gratefully in joy for what God has done.  In joy, we get to pay taxes.  Did you hear that, not have to, but get to!  Our Lord is Lord of all.  He has established earthly rulers that we must obey.  But returning money to the government, we are returning to God what is his.    

But more importantly, because we are Children of God, called to return to our Father the praise he rightfully deserves.  Did you catch the end of the 1^st article?  All this He does only out of fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, without any merit or worthiness in me. For all this it is my duty to thank and praise, serve and obey Him. This is most certainly true.

When someone gives you a gift, especially an undeserved gift, what is your reaction?  Each day is an underserved gift in many ways.  First is simple life.  The fact that we have breath each day.  Second, is that each day we live in the gospel of the forgiveness of sin.  Luther urges us to remember our baptism, the washing away of our sin, each day by making the sign of the cross upon us.  That is the beginning of our undeserved gifts. 

I hate ending a sermon saying Jesus loves you, now you must do this.  So let’s look at it this way.  Jesus loves you.  He cares for you so much he died.  By the help of the Holy Spirit, the only means by which we can please our God, may our lives be lived in thankfulness to what he has so graciously done for us.  In our thoughts, words, and actions may we, by God’s grace, give thanks for all his benefits to us.     

Amen

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"The Tenants" Matthew 22:33-46

Grace, Mercy, and Peace be unto you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ Amen

There was a master of a house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and went into another country

In the Name of Jesus

The master have planted a vineyard, dug a winepress, and built a tower.  Everything was perfect.  The only thing missing was someone in the vineyard to tend to the plants and keep the operation running.  As any good landowner would do, went and found tenants to lease the land to.  Everything was fine, going according to plan, until it came time for the master to receive the fruits of his land.  When he sent his servants to gather the grapes, they met their doom.  Jesus says that the first one was beaten and send away empty handed.  The next was beaten and treated shamefully and the third was also beaten.  Both sent away empty handed.  The master was in a pickle.  How was he supposed to get his crops if they beat each servant he sent and sent them away empty handed?

The master faced complete and utter rejection.  The tenants have undoubtedly broken the agreement that the master had made with them.  Their job was to tend to the crops and when the time came, give the fruit which the ground yielded back to the master.  This sounds like a very familiar story doesn’t it?  If it doesn’t it probably should.  This is the story of the human race and of the story of existence of the earth.  Our master, God, made the earth and the heavens and everything in them.  When everything was perfect, he placed the human race on his creation to tend to its needs.  And when the time comes, we are to give back to fruits the earth has produced, to God, the creator, the master. 

We are the tenants in the parable.  And like the tenants, wen servants of our Master come to us to ask where the fruits of the earth are, where our worship and praise for the creator and sustainer of the land is, we reject them and pretend they never existed.  We go about our day as if we are the only ones who matter.  And it is not just us, today, who reject the messengers of God.  Throughout the entire Bible, both Old and New Testaments, we read of countless messengers of God who are sent to the unbelievers and even sent to the believers, who are outright rejected and are beaten, stoned, and killed.

After many attempts by the master to retrieve his prize grapes, he finally decides to send his son.  He is sure that the tenants will respect his son and give him the crop that is rightfully his.  But at first sight of the son, the tenants saw their chance to get what they thought could be theirs.  They think that if they kill the master’s son, then they will get his inheritance.  So they reject the son, throw him out of the vineyard and kill him. 

Again, we are the tenants.  When the Word is preached to us, we decide that it is not for us and turn away from what it says and do our own thing.  We thank that we can get what we want without listening to the voice of the Master’s Son.  In essence we say Sorry God, thanks for all the help you have sent to us, but we can do this whole salvation and faith thing on our own.  Yes we know that you are all powerful, but we are pretty sure we can take it from here.  And by rejecting each of the messengers, we are rejecting his Son.  Oh and by the way God, no need to send any more help either, we know all we need to know, we’re good, thanks anyway. 

So there is the parable set before you.  The master builds the vineyard, places tenants in it, and when it comes time to gather the crops, death comes to whomever the master sends.  Jesus, speaking to the chief priests and the Pharisees at the time, asks what will happen to the tenants when the master comes and confronts them with what has happened to his servants and more importantly to his son?  And the Pharisees have this one all figured out, even they can’t get this one wrong right?  They say that the master will come, kill the tenants like they killed his son and servants, and find new tenants who will give him the fruit in due season.  Order will be restored and everything will be better.  Seems reasonable doesn’t it?  Seems like the punishment that the evil tenants, and us for that matter, deserve.  We deserve to be rejected and killed in the same way we have done to all those who have been sent by God to us.  After all, isn’t that the Golden rule? 

But Jesus says to the Pharisees, you who claim to devote your life to the study of God, you who claim to be the spiritual leaders, have you never read the scripture?  Through the rejection of the Master’s son, by the death of God’s Son, the entire human race is saved.  The Master comes to the tenants and says, you rejected and killed my servants which I sent to you.  You failed to give back to me what was rightfully mine.  You rejected and killed my son and you deserve to die.  But you know what?  My Son is risen.  He is living, and only because he is living, are you freed from the punishment deserve.  The sins which you have committed against me, against my son, and against your fellow man will no longer be remembered or counted against you. 

Jesus brings to the attention of those listening to him, those who have just questioned his authority before this parable remember by what authority do you do these things, and who gave you this authority, a passage from Psalm 118.  Jesus says the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.  Jesus is doing something simply amazing here.  By quoting this passage he is pointing the chief priests and elders to scripture which points to him, to what would soon happen.  Later on in this same Psalm the words are written which the crowds had just finished chanting, as this encounter happens shortly after the triumphant entry into Jerusalem Holy Week.  Save us now, we pray, O Lord, which in the Hebrew is Hosanna, we pray, O Lord.  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.  Everything, everything bears witness to our Lord and what had gone on, what was going on, and what was about to happen. 

Christ is the stone which the builders rejected.  And he has become the cornerstone of our salvation.  On Christ’s death and resurrection our faith and salvation stand unwavering.  If he had not died, then we would be doomed to death.  If he had not resurrected from the dead, then we would have no hope.  But Christ is risen and through his resurrection we are assured of the inheritance which belongs to Him.  Through our selfish sinning, which caused the master to send his son to his death, we are assured that we will be presented blameless before God, and that we will be brought into the kingdom of Heaven. 

The church is an heir of another great inheritance through Christ.  Those in the church are called to be ambassadors of Christ.  As Paul writes in 2 Corinthians, If anyone is on Christ, he is a new creation.  The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.  All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.  Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us.  We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.  Men are called into the Office of Holy Ministry, called to be missionaries; you and I are called to proclaim Christ in our everyday life.  WE are not placed in positions of authority as the owner is; we are placed in the humble role of servants.  We are to be the voice of the master through our thoughts, our words, and our actions among the tenants.  We are the messengers who are sent into the vineyard and we are the messengers who will inevitable be rejected.  We are the messengers who will be persecuted for living a life based on the Gospel and the message of Salvation.  Some maybe even to the point of death.  But for us, death is not something which needs to be feared. 

As we continue to draw near to the Advent and Christmas where we celebrate our Savior’s birth, and as we go from there to the season of Lent where we prepare ourselves for Christ’s death and resurrection we are really preparing ourselves foe the ultimate unraveling of Satan’s power and grip upon us.  While Jesus succumbed to death and lay in its grip for three days, he overcame that and rose to life again.  By doing so he rendered death powerless. 

The Lord God says of Israel in Hosea shall I ransom them from the power of Sheol?  Shall I redeem them from Death?  O Death, where are your plagues?  O Sheol, where is your sting?  Paul speaks of these words in 1 Corinthians the sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is in the law.  But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 

Christ took our sin, our inability to fulfill the law perfectly, to the cross.  Everything we could do but did not, everything we should not do but did, He paid the price.  He became what we could not be.  The sting of death is no more for death is only a temporary rest for physical bodies.  The grave can only hold our bodies for a time because they have been marked by Christ the crucified at your baptism. 

The master builds a vineyard, digs a winepress, leases it to tenants so that his Son could be sent to it and be killed.  Thanks be to God for the salvation and in heritance which is ours.  

Amen

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