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A sermon is a manner of oral communication and therefore words and sentence structure/order would be added, altered, or deleted at the moment of delivery. + In Nomine Jesu + The Rev. Evan Gaertner The Baptism of our Lord Genesis 1:1-5 For a long time the English liturgy of the church has included language that is now outdated. The Thees and Thous are not so much a part of the liturgy anymore, they do appear in some hymns and in the singable portions of the liturgy that we use from the old red Lutheran Hymnal. But in many ways that language is fading in usage. Personally I think it is a good thing that our liturgy is in the words of our present generations and not a relic of the past. But at the same time I respect and understand that there are words that we may want to define and help people to understand but don't necessarily want to fade from our vocabulary. What words are important to maintain in our Christian vocabulary, but also need to be defined so that people understand and know how to use them and be comforted by them? See we must be careful because there is a tendency to use words that as a life-long Christian you might know but which have become short-hand or code words that are undecipherable to a non-Christian. Consider with me how well you could do in explaining to someone else words like salvation, redeemer, justification, righteousness, sin, sanctification. These are all words that have become short-hand that need to be defined and explained in our witness of our Christian faith. Consider that more and more words of the church that we have taken for granted are not known by others or known with a different definition. For instance, "Grace" the undeserved love of God may be better known by non-Christians its other definitions suitable for a ballet dancer or a thanksgiving dinner. So we may at times use more common or course words to describe the holy works of God in order to explain the wonderful mystery of God's love revealed in Jesus Christ. But this use of common words is not meant to take away from the entirely uncommon work of God. No matter the words used there are actions that are completely and only applicable to God at work. Consider the work of creation. To make something is a somewhat common event. I make pizza and make some furniture from wood. I make things, but I would not want to confuse my rather common actions with the very uncommon, utterly unique, no comparison, work of God in creation. I believe in God the Father almighty maker of heaven and earth. This is a matter of obligation of faith for anyone that confesses the Christian faith. The Apostles', the Nicene, and the Athanasian Creed, all three ecumenical creeds, creeds which establish the base point of the Christian faith, express faith in God as the creator. The writers of the Old Testament took the unique work of God in creation very seriously. When we read in Genesis 1 that "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth," (Gen. 1:1) we might not think too much of the significance of the word "created." But I invite you to do a search of the Old Testament and you will find that the verb used there in the beginning of the Bible is only ever used with God as the subject. The writers of the Old Testament, inspired by the Holy Spirit, expressed unequivocally their faith in God as the maker of all things. God creates. The prophet Isaiah says about the power and authority of God to act for his people by saying, "Thus says God, the LORD, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread out the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people on it and spirit to those who walk in it." (Is. 42:5). And of course the New and Old Testaments speak with one voice, undivided in faith that God is the maker of all things. John in the book of Revelation says about the song of the elders in heaven, "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created." God has not created you as an accident or misapplication of his power. Nor are you the result of some random mutation of genetics that has occurred over millions of years. In fact just the opposite can be learned by the second verse in the Bible, "The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters." It was precisely in the middle of chaos that God continued to speak for the purpose of creating the heavens and the earth. It was out of the formlessness that God continued to speak his words of creation. In Star Trek 2 they send the Genesis project upon a planet and just let it go. It was too be the random beginnings of life through a computer program. But unlike the movies, and unlike evolutionary explanations, you are not an accident. You are not just a bump of dust in the cosmic universe. If there was big bang at the beginning, God was there before the bang and made that bang what it is. If there was simply the voice of God that said, "Let there be light," and there was light. Then that voice was the voice of God, and very well may be that bang itself. The New Testament book of Hebrews confesses, "By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible." (Hebrews 11:3) It is an act of faith to believe that God's Word is the creative power of all things. This may or may not be provable by the scientific method, and so, as science is defined presently, this topic may not be appropriate for the science classroom. But that creation is God's work does not become false or foolish simply because it cannot be proven by the scientific method. So if God is the creator of the universe, which I believe, then why did he take so long? I am not talking about the millions of years seen in the fossil record left in the dirt. I am talking about the six days found in the book of Genesis. God who can create with a word from out of nothing takes six days to create. That which could begin with a word unfurls over six days is not as much a demonstration that even for God something so challenging as the universe take a little time. The six days of creation and the rest on the seventh day are expressions of God's purposefulness in creating you and me and all that is and was and will be. God does create a mass of jumbled pieces of creation. In his creative work, God formed a divine piece of art that was to be without fault. Everything was prepared in advance for the creation of humanity. It was not until the sixth day that God created humanity. Nothing else on the sixth day was formed but male and female, there was no distraction found in God as he formed you. He didn't have a bit job list that you were mixed into. Yet God did not create male and female to be robots, he formed Adam and Eve with an intellect and will to know and please God. Unfortunately, Adam and Eve used that will and intellect in hostility to the command of God. They desired to please themselves and their own desires rather than obey the commands of God. As our first parents, Adam and Eve, disobeyed God they lost the ability to know and please God. Sin, one of those short-hand words, is the thought or action that is contrary to the will of God. Sin as the work of our hands is unfortunately entirely very common. Whether we want to or not we find ourselves daily battling against our sinful desires. The voice of God hovered over the formless chaos of creation and brought order and purpose. We give thanks that the voice of God hovered over the chaos of our lives and said to Jesus as he emerged from the waters of Baptism, "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well please." (Mark Just as the completely uncommon work of creation was brought about by God, so to the utterly uncommon work of salvation is brought into our world by this same God. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." (John 1:1) In the beginning Jesus was the voice of creation doing the will and command of his father. Now into our world, into our world filled all too commonly with sin and hostility, Jesus has come to work with his hands of mercy and grace. Salvation is the work of God. Redemption is the work of God. Justification is the work of God. Sanctification is the work of God. Paul wrote to the Corinthians of the utterly unique work of God coming alive in our times through Jesus Christ. Paul wrote, "And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God" (1 Cor. 2:1-5). We may at times in witness to our faith in Christ have to explain with very common words the work of God, but we never need give the impression that the work of Christ is common. He alone was worthy to die for the sake of us sinners and save us from the penalty are sins just deserve. Christ alone is my salvation. In him alone I trust and live. And if I put on Christ, though a common sinner I am, God the Father will judge me just, not because of my works but because of the unique work of Jesus Christ in his life, death, and resurrection Soli Deo Gloria -->> Home |