The sermon for the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost, 2024.
Delivered by Guest Vicar Grant Tapken.
Immanuel LCMS Fairview Podcast
Sermon - Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost - September 1, 2024
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. Our Lord tells us again and again in the Scriptures, as we are to be in the world but not of the world. And today is no different. Our Old Testament reading Moses says before the people of Israel, all that God had commanded them. As Moses says that if they keep the law, foreign nations will see them in call of great. And they will serve the one true God who is like none other. Therefore Moses tells the people that they must keep themselves and their souls careful not to forget, and their hearts would not become defiled. If they no longer serve the one true God, they make themselves to be God's with their own statutes and judgments. The people of Israel did not become defiled because they lived among the unbelievers in the Promised Land, but Israelites began to worship other gods as they encountered them. The people of the Lord did not become defiled because they lived in a sinful world. They broke God's law because they chose to. Instead of being part of the world, they became of the world. Instead of God's chosen people, they became like everyone else. Instead of receiving God's gifts and returning thanksgiving, in traditional words of other gods, and they defiled themselves by what was uttered from their mouths. This is the point that Jesus makes in our gospel reading from St. Mark. As he says, "There is nothing outside the man which defiles him. If it goes into him, but the things which proceed out of the man are what defile him." Jesus here speaks of our own sinfulness. We are sinners not only because we are born sinful, but because we actually sin. Yes, we are born sinful and unclean, but we also sin in thoughts, words, and deed. We do not only see the sins of the world, but we questions become part of the problem as well. Just as those ancient Israelites were not only sinners because they witnessed the worship of other gods, they were sinners because they themselves fought after those same other gods as well. Jesus here tells us that when we become like the world, we are no different than they. When we who have been called to be in the world begin to speak as the world speaks think as the world thinks and values what the world values. We defile ourselves. When we speak crude jokes filled with window, when we participate in speaking rumors and gossip about others, when we make promises and swear oaths that we never intend to keep and much more by saying these things we defile ourselves, showing who we are as sinners. There is still good news for us though we are not saved by what we speak, but by what we hear the sculches tell us that faith comes by hearing and hearing the words of Christ. It is Christ and Christ alone who words faith into our sinful hearts, our Lord Jesus who casts out demons of a small word who heal the name by telling them to take up their mat and go, who commands the storm with a simple phrase. The word of God is powerful and does what it says. The same God who creates faith inside you by the spoken word and preached by his Holy Spirit. You claim to his word and promises not only in the preached word but in Holy baptism and in the true body and blood given for you to eat and drink. It is this by his word who are made right with the God above. Much like the people of old who heard the word and promises of God as Israel was saved by faith, as Jesus Christ is the very word of God in flesh and blood who laid down his life upon for cross, though he did not know any sins of his own, he dies for your sins. And as he did not say any evil thing or use his words wrongly, he goes to the cross for you and for all your sins. And not just for the sins of your words, but the sins of thought and action. Jesus Christ dies on the cross for your sins that are no more. Your heavenly Father no longer sees them. Your Lord Jesus removes your sins as far as the east is from the west. And you know the word of God to be faithful and true for it is in Jesus Christ the word of God becomes a man to die for you and to forgive all your sin by faith given you by the Holy Spirit. You again and again come to this place to hear the word of God. To hear the words of holy absolution that you are forgiven. To hear the word proclaimed and preached from this pulpit. You will see the word of God in true bread and wine that is his true body and blood for the forgiveness of your sins and the comfort of your soul. By faith you are saved. By faith you hear the word. By faith you are made new. In our Lord Jesus Christ we are restored our sins are no more. And now our mouths and our words that words are filed by sin are now made holy and blameless before our heavenly Father. Now we are filled with his praise and worship with our words and our mouths we bless him. For in Jesus Christ he has first blessed us and by his cross we are saved forever. In the name of Jesus the peace of God would surpass us all understanding. Keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.