Sermon for Second Sunday in Advent

December 7, 2014, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Isaiah 40:1-11

Sermon Theme:  “Speak Tenderly to Jerusalem”

(Sources:  Concordia Pulpit Resources, Volume 25, Part 1, Series B; Emphasis Online Commentary; Emphasis Online Illustrations; original ideas; Anderson’s Cycle B Preaching Workbook; Concordia Self-Study Bible Footnotes)

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

What’s the most comforting thing you’ve been told when you feel like life is beating down on you, when it seems like people are waiting anxiously for you to trip up?

It probably wasn’t “People are grass.”  That’s the last thing you want to hear when you already feel withered.  “The grass withers, the flowers fade,” says our sermon text.

Yet, these were comforting words for the people of Judah for two reasons.  It’s a needed reminder that there will be an end to Judah’s suffering and exile in Babylon; their enemies will not last forever, for they too are mortal.  Secondly, God is faithful, and it serves as a means against which the faithfulness of God can be compared.  The faithfulness of God is not like the faithlessness of men, and even the faithful, those who remained obedient up to and through the captivity, those who supported Isaiah’s controversial ministry, are like withering grass and fading flowers next to the faithfulness of God’s promises.

Like flowers and grass, we fade and die.  Even so, the Creator raises the flowers and the grass to newness of life.  Won’t He do the same for those who turn to Him in hope? Continue reading →

Sermon for First Sunday in Advent

November 30, 2014, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Mark 11:1-10

Sermon Theme:  “The ‘Door’ Enters Through the ‘Gate’”

(Sources:  Online PulpitBytes; Online Wikipedia; original ideas; Believer’s Bible Commentary; Believer’s Bible Commentary; Harper’s Bible Dictionary; Nelson’s Three-in-One)

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

The theologians who prepare the three-year lectionary for us don’t seem to know what to do with the Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.  Back in the days of the one-year lectionary, a gospel reading of the Triumphal Entry was read twice a year, — on the First Sunday in Advent and again on Palm Sunday.  Today, Psalm Sunday has been replaced by Passion Sunday, with the Passion Readings, and the alternate text for Advent One, concerning the Last Day when Christ comes back to judge us, is used by just about every church except the LCMS.

I’m glad our LCMS lectionary included this text about Jesus’ triumphal entry through the Jerusalem double gate for this special day when we dedicate the new entry doors into our church.  Continue reading →

Sermon for Christ the King, the Last Sunday of the Church Year

November 23, 2014, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Matthew 25:31-46

Sermon Theme:  “Did You Feed Jesus When He was Hungry?”

(Sources:  Emphasis Online Illustrations; Anderson’s Cycle A Preaching Workbook; original ideas)

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

I love ancient legends and folktales, especially Christian legends, like this one I want to begin with:

One winter day, a Roman soldier called “Martin of Tours” observed a beggar shivering and asking for alms.  Martin had no money to give, but the beggar was so cold.  Martin would give him what he had.  He took off his soldier’s coat, worn and frayed though it was.  He cut it in two and gave half to the beggar.

That night he had a dream.  He was in heaven in his dream.  He saw Jesus standing in the midst of the angels.  Jesus was wearing half of a Roman soldier’s coat.  One of the angels asked Him, “Master, why do you wear this old frayed coat?”

Jesus answered, “Martin of Tours gave it to me today.” Continue reading →

Sermon for the Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost

November 16, 2014, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Matthew 25:14-30

Sermon Theme:  “Using Your ‘Talents’ for the Lord”

(Sources:  Emphasis Online Illustrations; Anderson’s Cycle A Preaching Workbook; original ideas; Westminster Dictionary of the Bible; Online Bible Dictionary)

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

Our talents are given to us to be shared, not buried or hidden away.  One of my favorite stories is about a preacher back in the days before they had wireless microphones.  His hand mike was on a long, heavy cord, and he would have been OK if he had stayed in the pulpit, but, being a hyper-energetic type who pranced and bounced all around the front of the chancel area, jerking the microphone cord as he went, he kept getting tangled up in the cord.

As he got more and more emotionally worked up, he started making more bounces and jerks and nearly tripping, until a little girl in the third pew leaned toward her mother and whispered, “If the preacher gets loose, will he hurt us?” Continue reading →

Sermon for the Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost

November 9, 2014, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Matthew 25:1-13

Sermon Theme:  “Be Wise and Ready!”

 (Sources:  Emphasis Online Illustrations; original ideas; Anderson’s Cycle A Preaching Workbook; Concordia Pulpit Resources, vol. 24, Part 4, Sept. 21-Nov. 23, 2014, Series A)

 Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

 “What time is it?”  Molly shouted from the far side of the playground.

“Late!” Theresa yelled back over her shoulder as she ran headlong toward

the door.

“Eight?”  Molly thought.  “If it is only eight, why is Theresa in such a tearing hurry?”  she asked herself.

“We’re late, Molly!  Come on!”  Theresa urged, as she continued racing across the school yard.

Suddenly Molly realized Theresa had not said, “Eight!” but “Late!”  She grabbed her bookbag and ran after her friend just as fast as she could go.

“Wait, Theresa!  Wait for me!”  Molly cried.

“I can’t wait,” Theresa flung back, “you know the school policy.  Late more than five minutes and they lock the door.  You have to sit in the principal’s office while they call your parents!”

Out of breath, Theresa dashed into the building and down the hallway to her classroom, just as the hall monitor was preparing to turn the key.  A moment later, Molly raced inside, her dress torn, her knee and lip bleeding.  She had tripped on a high spot in the sidewalk, and had fallen flat on her face.

The hall door was, by then, firmly locked.  She beat on it to no avail.  Slowly, she turned toward the principal’s office, noticing for the first time the tear in her dress and the blood trickling down her leg.

“Oh, my!”  she thought.  “Am I ever in trouble!”

In the parable in our sermon text for today, Jesus is teaching about the Last Day, the Day of Judgment, when the Bridegroom, Jesus Christ, will return and call the faithful, repentant believers to the eternal marriage feast.  He tells the parable, because He doesn’t want us to have to say one day, “Oh, my!  Am I ever in trouble!” Continue reading →

Sermon for All Saints’ Day Observed

November 2, 2014, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Matthew 5:1-12

Sermon Theme:  Blessed Are We, the Living Saints

(Sources:  Emphasis Online Illustrations; Emphasis Online Commentary; Anderson’s Cycle A Preaching Workbook; original ideas; Hebrew Greek Key Study Bible; Concordia Pulpit Resources, Vol. 24, Part 4, Series A; Harper’s Bible Dictionary)

 Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

           In one of my favorite Charlie Brown cartoons, Charlie, Lucy and Snoopy are walking along the road when Lucy says, “Sooner or later, Charlie Brown, there’s one thing you’re going to have to learn.  You reap what you sow.  You get out of life exactly what you put into it.  No more and no less.”

Hearing these words, Snoopy stops following Charlie and Lucy, and he says to himself as he walks away from them, “I’d kind of like to see a little more margin for error.” Continue reading →

Sermon for Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost

October 19, 2014, St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Matthew 22:15-22

Sermon Theme:  “Render to Caesar and Render to God?”

(Sources:  Anderson’s Preaching Journal, Cycle A; Embassy of Heaven Midnight Rider Newsletter, 1995; “Heaven Is a Tax-Free Paradise in Oregon,” online article; Emphasis Online Commentary; Emphasis Online Illustrations; original ideas; Luther’s Small Catechism with Explanation, 1986 edition).

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

“Paul Revere has established the kingdom of Heaven in Oregon!”  That’s what newspaper headlines said in 1994.  Of course it wasn’t the 18^th Century Paul Revere of the American Revolution we know from history.

It was a pastor in Oregon who established “the Kingdom of Heaven” on 34 acres of land about twenty miles from Salem.  Twice Revere was jailed for issuing his own license plates with the word HEAVEN embossed thereon and for failing to pay property taxes.  He insisted that the kingdom of Heaven is not of this world, and that it is impossible to serve both God and the State.  He urged that his followers should not be yoked by the government, so should throw away their state-owned driver’s licenses and Social Security cards, cancel their car insurance, bank accounts, etc.  He argued that Jesus didn’t pay any taxes so why should we.

Revere posted a regular online Embassy of Heaven newsletter on the internet, entitled Midnight Rider.  He advertised his 34 acres as “God’s Government on Earth, and apparently had many followers, who were promised they could live tax free forever, first in Oregon, then in Heaven.  Officials in Marion County were unconvinced by any of Revere’s arguments, and informed him that if he didn’t pay the $10,000 he owed in taxes, they would put the 34 acres of the Kingdom of Heaven on the market. Continue reading →

Sermon for Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Oct. 12, 2014

St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Philippians 4:4-13

Sermon Theme:  “Rejoice!  Through Him We Can Do All Things”

 (Sources:  Anderson’s Cycle A Preaching Workbook; original ideas and examples; Emphasis Online Illustrations).

 Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

           When Tony Campolo was invited to preach at a Lutheran church in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the pastor began the service calling the people to worship by saying, “Let us make a joyful noise unto the Lord!  Let us come into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise!”  You can imagine his surprise when someone in the balcony jumped up and yelled, “All right!  All right!”  and started clapping.  And before long there were several young people on their feet shouting praise and applauding wildly.

Dr. Campolo later said, “I don’t know what he was expecting when he told the people in the church to make a joyful noise unto the Lord, but I do know that the last thing he expected that Sunday night was that anybody actually would!” Continue reading →

Sermon for LWML Sunday, October 5, 2014

St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Ephesians 5:1-9                                                                                        Sermon Theme:  “Fragrant Sacrifices and Offerings”

(Sources:  Online Meditation, entitled, “A Fragrant Offering”; 2014 LWML Sunday Sermon; “As Children We Imitate Our Father,” by David Ernst; original ideas and examples; Nelson’s Three-in-One; Harper’s Bible Dictionary; “LWML Mission Grants” online)

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

The dictionary definition of “fragrant” is simply “Having a pleasant odor.”  Of course we know that what is a pleasant aroma to some people is not at all pleasant to others.

Two wives, when talking about how their husbands deserted them for football and beer, decided they should try to find a perfume that smelled like beer.

When one of my aunts left her parents’ farm to work in Houston, she fell in love with an English/Irish city boy who had never been on a farm in his life and had never been around German Wendish Americans before.  My aunt brought him home to meet her parents, and her mother, my grandmother, fixed all of our family’s favorite dishes to impress him, including what we loved most, koch Kase , her delicious  homemade cheese which smelled like limburger while it was cooking.  Continue reading →

Sermon for the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Sept. 28, 2014

St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wallis, Texas

Sermon Text:  Philippians 2:1-4; 14-18

Sermon Theme:  “From Unity to Gladness and Joy”

 (Sources:  Concordia Pulpit Resources, Vol. 24, Part 4, Series A; original ideas; Anderson’s Preaching Workbook, Cycle A; Emphasis Online Illustrations; Introduction to Philippians, Concordia Self-Study Bible; Nelson’s Three-in-One)

 Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

           Ernest T. W. Hoffmann, the writer of the original stories in Offenbach’s Tales of Hoffmann, once visited the home of a person who had just come into considerable wealth.  The man loved to brag about how much money he had, and when he showed Hoffmann his palatial home he boasted about how many servants he needed to keep it going.

          The wealthy Berlin millionaire explained that he needed three servants for his personal attendance.  Hoffmann, convinced that sarcasm was the only way to respond to such a person, replied that he had four servants just to take care of his bath:  one to lay out the towels, one to test the temperature of the water, and the third to make sure the faucets were in good order. Continue reading →