Easter 6 Sermon

      Greetings in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.  I had a good weekend.  Thursday I took the morning off to go golfing with a friend from Sioux Falls.  I am sad to say that was my first time out this spring.  I played about 11 out of 18 holes pretty well, the other 7 made me question why I was so excited to be back out golfing again.  However, for the first round of the season, actually not too bad.  Then Friday I did a bunch of landscaping.  I took the rocks out of pastor's landscaping cause they want to put mulch in there.  So I took the rocks out, and then after putting in edging and weed material, dumped the rocks in at my place.  Then Saturday I had a high school graduation reception.  I also had to do some work around the office to make up for taking off Thursday morning and to prepare for Sunday.  Sunday morning I had the opportunity to led services and preach at the dual parish just outside of Brookings.  Zion in White had about 22 people and First English in Aurora had about 18 people.  However, both services went very well and it was a great opportunity to get experience preaching from other pulpits.  Then Sunday afternoon I finished my landscaping project.  Well, other than I guess we still need more new rock to finish filling in all of the area.  

     Yesterday it was rainy all day so I did a bunch of indoor chores and just had a nice relaxing day.  This week is Vacation Bible School for us so Pastor and I prepared for all of that this morning and I think we are ready to go.  I would also like to get my "South Dakota" mounting board done this week so I can mount the antlers I got up here last fall.  The fact that I only have one month left up here is becoming more and more real.  I am going to be sad to go and am dreading the whole packing and moving thing again.  

     Here is my sermon from this last Sunday: 

Easter 6 – May 25th, 2014
Vicar Richter preaching in White and Aurora

Sermon Text: Acts 17:16-31
Our text for this morning comes from the First reading of the day, from Acts chapter 17, looking specifically at verse 18: “Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also conversed with him. And some said, “What does this babbler wish to say?” Others said “He seems to be a preacher of foreign divinities” because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection.”

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
       In our text for today Paul is in Athens, a city known for its schools of philosophy. I took two philosophy classes in college and loved how much both of them challenged my thinking abilities. I also loved learning the history of philosophy because these philosophers were simply trying to figure out the world around them. When something didn’t make sense to them or puzzled them, they spent all of their time trying to make sense out of it using their skills in logic. However, this also lead to a lot of heretical ideas because the answers they came up with were manmade, human ideas, human reasoning.
      Paul encounters two different schools of philosophy that are specifically mentioned here in Acts. I think it is very important that Luke included what specific philosophers Paul is talking to here. You see both of these schools of philosophy held that pleasure was the highest good. The entire goal of life is to be in a state of pure pleasure. However, the two schools differed from each other and were actually quite against each other in how one could obtain this pleasure.
       The Epicureans believed that pleasure could be obtained by lowering your expectations and standards. They taught that you have the ability to always be happy, always be in this pleasure. If you were unhappy it was because you expected something different than what you were experiencing and therefore it is your fault for expecting something better and that is why you are unhappy. So for an example, if you are unhappy with your job, it is not because your job is not a good job, it is because you let yourself think that there is a better job out there so you are unhappy with this one, if you lowered your expectations and standards to truly convince yourself that the job you have is the best job in the world, you will be happy with your job and be in this state of pleasure. They even took this as far as to say you should not feel pain. If you feel pain which causes you unhappiness, it is only because you believe you should feel better than you do, so again your expectations of how you should feel are higher than how you actually feel and this is what is causing you to be unhappy. According to the Epicureans, you can achieve pure pleasure by always lowering your expectations to be happy with what you are experiencing.
      The Stoics believed that pleasure could be achieved but not by lowering your expectations. They believed your actions and how you lived your life are what gave you the ability to be in a state of pure pleasure. They believed that if you always made the right choice with every decision you made in life, you could obtain true pleasure. They taught that when bad things happen in your life, it was a sign of bad judgment made on your part. Somewhere earlier you had made the wrong choice and that is the reason you were experiencing pain or suffering now. And it is not just the major decisions in your life, but every action you made, every word you said was a decision and if it was the right one, you would be in pleasure, if it was the wrong one you would not be. It was how you lived your life and the choices you made that your happiness depended on.
      So even though the Epicureans believed that you lowered your expectations to be happy in every situation and the Stoics believed you had to make the right choices to always be in a happy situation, they both still held pleasure as the highest good and the ultimate goal of life. They both also believed that every human being possessed the ability to obtain their own state of pleasure. You see the things that puzzled them that caused them to wrestle through these ideas were pain and suffering. This is what did not make sense to them, so they came up with manmade answers, human reasoning of how pain or suffering makes sense. The very idea that pleasure is the highest good in this life is human reasoning. This is where there manmade answers led them to heretical problems. They are entirely focused on our lives on this earth and what they can personally do about it, never once taking into account God, His action in this life, or His gift of life after this world.
      So this is why when Paul is preaching about Jesus and the resurrection, they are entirely confused. Now as good philosophers who like to hear every possible option and think through things as completely as possible before dismissing them, they want to hear more of Paul’s teachings. So Paul has the chance to preach the Gospel message to them. However, for most of them they dismiss Paul’s teachings because they see the pleasure of this life as the highest good. They are only focused on the things of this life, not heavenly things as we might say, or the things of the afterlife. The entire purpose for their life is pleasure and they can do it on their own by either lowering their expectations or making better choices with their lives, so what do they need this Jesus for and so what if He rose from the dead.
       You see we as good Christians know that we cannot obtain “pleasure” on our own. We know that the reason we experience pain and suffering is not because our expectations are too high or because we made a wrong choice, (although there are times that probably both of those might have some truth) but the reason we suffer and have pain is because we are sinners living in a sinful world. We can never obtain true state of pleasure because we on our own can never escape the effects of sin. We cannot do this on our own and that is the reason we need this Jesus who rose from the dead. We know the Gospel message, we know that Christ is risen, and we know that we have eternal life in His name. We have heard Paul’s sermon and did not dismissed it, but rather by the work of the Holy Spirit believed it and have been enlightened by it.
       And yet, there are times where we let ourselves slowly become like these philosophers. There are times where we let ourselves focus solely on the things here in this world. We begin to concern ourselves with only the desires and the pleasures of the flesh. We set our hearts and minds of things here below. We stress about money instead of trusting God to always provide for us, we get angry and hold grudges against someone who hurts our pride instead of forgiving, we think have to have a bigger house or a nicer car to be truly happy because the small outdated house just will not do or that old rust box is just too embarrassing to drive. We spend our money on golf clubs, guns, fishing gear, shoes, purses, clothes, bigger T.V.’s, and other things that give us happiness and pleasure in this life. We let ourselves find happiness in people giving us compliments, in our relationships with others, or our ability to be better than other people in certain ways.
        Now I am not trying to say that being happy is wrong, or that having pleasure in your life is wrong, but to think that that happiness or pleasure comes from anything other than God Himself is a sin. To think that you deserve to be happier, putting yourself ahead of everyone else, putting your own happiness ahead of everything else in this life is a sin. Or trying to find that happiness in ways that are not pleasing to the Lord such as at the bottom of a bottle, or putting others down to build yourself up, or skipping church to go be where you are truly happiest, this is sin. You see it is not a sin to be happy, but to think that you can or that you do obtain your own happiness or to obtain that happiness in a sinful way is a sin. The only reason we have any happiness in our lives at all is because our merciful God gives us the gifts to have pleasure in our life. Pleasure is not a sin, making our own person pleasure most important or letting that pleasure set our minds on things below instead of heavenly things is what leads us into sin.
       We even let ourselves get so focused on things here below and this life that I think we are all guilty of taking the resurrection of our Lord for granted. Yes, we do believe Christ rose from the dead, and we acknowledge that we too will rise from the dead on that final day. Our bodies will be resurrected and reunited with our souls to spend eternity in Christ’s presence; however, do we hold that as the highest good in our lives. Do we realize how amazing that gift from our Lord truly is, do we realize how great and important that Gospel message is for us sinners? Maybe at a funeral we might stop to remember that we do have hope in the resurrection of all flesh on that last triumphant day, but on the day to day basis I am willing to bet we all even as Christians take that Gospel message for granted and do not set our minds on that good news.
        We too need to hear Paul’s sermon reminding us that there are not several gods, but one true God, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, the one true Triune God of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit who created the world we lived in, knit us together in the womb before we were born, claimed us as His own placing His name on us in our baptism, washing away our original sin, making us holy and righteous in His sight. This one true God sent His Son to be our Savior by dying on the cross to pay for all of our sins and then if that were not enough raised Him from the dead, the first fruits of the resurrected, to give us all our hope and joy in the life we have in His name. Our Savior who was willing to die to pay for all of our sins that we committee, including the ones of being self focused, desiring our own pleasure in this life, rose from the dead, glorified in the flesh. This is what Paul preached in Athens and it is still the message we preach to this day. But unlike the philosophers who thought their human reasoning was what would lead them to the highest good of pleasure on this earth, we know the truth, the truth that our highest good is to be with our God in His presence. He has given us that gift already by being with us here is this life, but continues through His grace and mercy to give us that gift in the life we have after death. Our God who forgives us of all our sins for the sake of His Son our Savior, allows us to dwell in His presence first in heaven, but then on that Final Day, just as He raised His Son from death back to life, glorified in the flesh, He will raise us too reuniting our souls and our bodies to spend the rest of eternity in His presence in the new heaven and new earth. We know that this Jesus and His resurrection that Paul preaches does matter, because we who have been called into the faith know our highest good is setting our minds on things above not on things on this earth. So we do proudly proclaim that Christ is risen, He is risen indeed, alleluia! Knowing that we too will be raised into eternal life where we will spend the rest of eternity in the presence of our Lord and this is truly the highest good.

In the name of our Risen and living Lord, who is our hope and joy that we too will be raised, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Sheep Sermon

      Greetings in the name of Christ the Lord!  I had a great weekend spending as much time with the college students as possible before they left.  It is going to be a lot quieter around here now and I will have more free time.  I am going to miss all the students of LSF being around, but actually won't mind the town being a little less crowded without the other 12,000 students around.
     I also had a good mother's day.  Mom came up to see me and it was nice to spend some time with her.  We went out for lunch after church and then she came to the nursing home devotions with us.  After devotions I had pie and coffee with some of our church members and a nice visit.
      This week I am trying to actually work ahead on church stuff on top of getting a bunch more projects around home and the garage done.  Last Friday, I finally finished the shelving and tool bench in my garage.  Now I need to finish the hymnal holders for the church pews, my chair I started before Easter, and my deer antlers.  I also need to mow today while it is not raining.  Maybe life won't slow down as much as shift focus.  However, I love all these things and am happy to be able to physically do them.  My car is also in the shop today getting a couple recalls fixed.  That is about all that is new with me.
       Here is my sermon from Sunday, enjoy!

Text: John 10:1-10
Our focus text for today comes from the Gospel reading of John chapter 10, looking specifically at verses 3 through 5: “To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. 5 A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.”

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
       In middle school I had sheep for 4H. I had sheep for two years and this experience taught me a lot. My first year, I had two male lambs and I named them Scovic and Daunt. I always chose strange names for my 4H animals. I would ride my bike across town twice a day everyday to the farm on the edge of town where I kept them to do chores. I would spend several hours every morning working with them, walking them on the halters, breaking them to lead. But my favorite time I spent with these guys was after I would walk them for an hour or so, I would take them out to the green grass and just sit with them while they grazed as far as their lead ropes could reach. I had five sheep total over two years and I can tell you sheep have as different personalities as people. Scovic was scared of his own shadow and always stuck right next to Daunt for comfort. I always thought I was going to find him dead from a heart attack because he was just so frightened all the time. However, Daunt was an adventurer. I swear Daunt would have walked up to a barking dog just to get a closer look. He was as fearless of a sheep as I had ever seen. Daunt would come and stand right up in my face as I was sitting on the ground next to him and he would watch me leave as I rode my bike down the dirt driveway. Over the summer, spending time with these guys I got to know them, but they also got to know me. I would talk to them all the time and over time they came to know my voice. When I would ride my bike up and say, “Hey guys,” they would come running out of the barn up to the fence.
       In our text for today Jesus compares himself to the Good Shepherd. Now most of us are probably more familiar with verses 11-18 of this passage where Jesus tells us He is the good shepherd who lays down His life for His sheep. We know this is most certainly true, Christ did lay down His own life for us, His sheep by dying in the cross for us. He truly is our Good Shepherd who did lay down His life for us. However, today I want to focus in on a different part of this passage. Today, I want to look at the part where He says that the sheep know His voice. This comparison He is making of shepherd and sheep should have been easy for the people of that day who were accustomed to shepherds and sheep. In verse six John tells us they were confused, but they should have known that sheep do indeed learn the voice of their shepherd. However, the reason sheep know the voice of their shepherd is not because of some divine or supernatural reason. It is not because the shepherd has a specific tone of his voice that rings differently in the sheep’s ears than any other voice. The reason sheep know the voice of their shepherd is simply because they have been with the shepherd since they were little lambs and have spent their entire lives under the care of this one man. Just like Scovic and Daunt who knew my voice. And I was only with them a couple hours in the morning and maybe an hour every evening. But other than my dad who would come once in a great while or the vet who came twice to give them their shots, I was the only person they really ever saw or had contact with. They heard my voice for these few hours every day. Now imagine the sheep of Biblical days who are under the care of the shepherd all day every day. He takes them into the courtyard at night so they are protected by the stone walls surrounding the house and courtyard. But then every day the shepherd takes the sheep out to the green grass of the pastures and using only a staff, He guides them, leads them, and tends to them. They learn to trust him, to follow him, knowing he is leading them to good green grass that they like. Then as they graze, I imagine most shepherds talked to the sheep much like I did. They know the shepherds voice because he has been the one to raise them from little lambs and has always taken care of them, tended to them, and been the only voice they hear on a regular basis. They know his voice because they have grown to know his voice over time.
       The same principal applies to us too. We know a friend’s voice or a relative’s voice, but only because we have heard the voice repeatedly over time. The same is true for sheep who know the shepherd’s voice from hearing it repeatedly over time. So how do we apply this principle to Jesus comparing Himself to the shepherd? Now, before I answer that question I need to make a clarification first. In these first few specific verses, Jesus is the shepherd and the people of Israel are the sheep. However, we know Gentiles are also included in the sheep because of verse 16 in this same chapter that says, “And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.” So the sheep are the Jews in this specific instance, but us Gentiles are also included as this verse says in the one flock. So He is the shepherd and all His people, Jews and Gentiles, are the sheep. He tends to us, He cares for us, he leads us to green grass to feed. We know His voice. But this brings us back to our question of how do we know Jesus’ voice? Have you ever heard His voice? You may be tempted to say no, but I am going to say yes. Each and every one of you has heard His voice. Every time you have heard His Word read aloud, every time you have read His Word on your own, you are hearing His voice. Now I am not trying to say because Pastor Wurm read the lessons this morning or that because I read the text for this sermon that we have the voice of Jesus, but the Word itself is the voice of Jesus. The Scriptures, the inspired Word of God is the voice of our Good Shepherd. So how do we know His voice? Well just as the sheep know the shepherd’s voice from hearing it over and over again we know the voice of Jesus, by hearing it over and over again.
       God has given us His Word to be read, to be heard, to be learned. I thank the Lord that I was brought up in the faith from a very young age, hearing Scripture both at church and at home. Hearing it over and over again until it finally slowly begins to stick. I certainly do not have the Bible memorized, but the longer I continue to study it, the more I continue to read it and reflect on it, the more I can remember verses and passages. This is how we know the voice of Jesus, by over time knowing what His voice or His Word says. And this is important because the better we know His voice, the better we are able to follow Him and not be led astray. Jesus tells us that there are bandits and robbers who climb into the pen by some other way other than the gate. There are many robbers and bandits who have climbed over the wall in our world today, not using the gate to get in, and now that they are in they try to lead us with their voice. They try to get us to follow them instead of following the Good Shepherd. These bandits and robbers have disguised themselves to look like shepherds, they try to use as similar a voice as they can to the shepherd’s, but they are not the shepherd and they will only lead the sheep to death and destruction. These bandits and robbers are all the people in our world who use Scripture but teach it falsely; all the denominations of so called “Christians” who still hold up the Bible but then teach that there is another way into Heaven besides Jesus. Christ Himself tells us He is the door, He is the ONLY way into salvation and His voice leads us to that truth. His Word tells us uncountable times that He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. There is no way to the Father except through Him. He is the door and anyone who enters by Him will be saved. By Him being our Good Shepherd who did lay down His own life for us on the cross, He has won for you the forgiveness of sins He free gives you. By His grace and through His death on the cross He gives you your salvation and eternal life. He is the door through which one enters to be saved. And He has given us the amazing gift of His voice in the Scriptures so that we may learn His voice and follow Him all the days of our lives.
       This is why it is so important that firstly we hear, read, learn, and inwardly digest His Word so that we know His voice, so that we know when His Word is being taught in truth and purity. So when we hear strangers voice, the voice of those bandits and robbers trying to lead us astray from the truth of Jesus Christ, we can know they are strangers’ voices and flee from them. He gives us His Spirit to call us into the faith, to enlighten us with the Gospel, and the motivation to continue to read His Word, to hear His voice so that we will not be lead astray by false teachings, by people using His Word against Him, by those who climb over the wall and try to proclaim another door other than Jesus.
      So whether you have been a Christian your whole life and have learned His voice from a young age or are just new to the flock, just starting out remember how we know His voice. We know His voice by hearing it over and over again. I wrote in several of the confirmand’s cards that there is no such thing as too much time spent in the Word. Can you ever read the Bible enough? Can you even know the Scriptures well enough? The more we hear His voice, the better we know His voice, and the less likely we are to go astray from Him who leads us to the green pastures of eternal life.
       He gives us His voice in His Word, because He is the Good Shepherd who does lead us to green pastures, who feeds us, tends to us, cares for us, and talks to us so that we know His voice and always follow Him. He gives us forgiveness of sins so that even when we do go astray, we may be brought back into the one flock. He leads us through the door, the one and only door of Him our Savior Jesus Christ, to the green pastures of eternal life. He does all of this because He is our Good Shepherd who loves us and is always with us.
       In the name of our Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, Amen.

May 4th Sermon

       Greetings in the name of Christ our Lord!  I had a great visit with JoAnna and Steven this weekend.  I am so glad they were able to come up and visit.  We did a little antique shopping, pawn shop shopping, and afternoon drinking at the craft brewery in town on Saturday.  It was a great day.
     Sunday was a little bit of a sad day as we had our farewell dinner for the LSF.  I can't believe after this weekend, only two students will still be around Brookings.  I am definitely going to miss them.  We also put out 750 white wooden crosses on the church lawn on Sunday.  The trailer says 597, because that was the number of abortions in South Dakota in 2011, but we assumed that number has gone up and there were extra crosses in the trailer so we put out 750.  It is a sad but neat sight to see.
     Here is my sermon from yesterday.  Things around here should begin to slow down slightly, not a lot, but slightly.  So I will try to post a few more smaller posts on here.

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
     Our text for this morning is from the Gospel reading of Luke 24, looking specifically at verses 19 to 27: “And they said to him, “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, 20 and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. 21 But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened. 22 Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning, 23 and when they did not find his body, they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive.24 Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see.” 25 And he said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” 27 And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.”
       This text for this morning is good news. In fact it is great news. We see in this text that Christ our Lord is alive, He is not only alive, but He appears to two disciples. Now these are not any two of the main 11 disciples, but most likely 2 of the 72 disciples that He sent out earlier in His ministry. Either way we know that these are men who have followed Christ, disciples who have believed in Him as the Messiah. Luke tells us that Christ appears to these disciples. The tomb is empty as reported and this is Good News. This is Good News because we are not wondering where Christ is, why the tomb is empty, we know exactly why it is empty; we know exactly where Christ is because Luke tells us. He is alive, He is out walking around appearing to these disciples. This has been the theme since Easter morning, that He is alive, but I mean can we ever really say it enough, “Christ is Risen… He is Risen Indeed, Alleluia!”Amen. He is alive indeed. Last week we heard about how He appeared to the disciples in the locked room and tells them, “Peace be with you.” He appears to Thomas and gives Him physical evidence of the fact that He is alive. Here again, even though these two disciples do not get it right away, we see Him again appearing to His disciples giving them physical evidence that He is indeed alive. We continue to celebrate the Easter season, the Easter rejoicing by once again being reminded that He is alive, the tomb is empty and this is Good, this is Great News!
However, these disciples do not have the same insight we do. They have been kept from recognizing that this is Jesus Christ, the living Lord. They do not know who it truly is, instead they believe He is some clueless stranger. I mean He is oblivious to everything that has happened. They ask Him, “Are you the ONLY one in all of Jerusalem that doesn’t know what has happened here the past few days?” And then when He asks, “What happened?” they give Him a play by play list of everything that has happened. Except in their answer as they are catching Him up to speed, they not only give Him the events and facts, we also get a glimpse into what these disciples are feeling, what they are thinking about all of these events. They are doubtful and frustrated.
       They are doubtful because they were followers, disciples of Jesus and followed Him throughout His ministry. They heard His teachings, saw His miracles, and witnessed His ministry. They thought this one, this Jesus of Nazareth was the real deal. They thought He was the true Messiah, and the redeemer of Israel. But He died, and seeing Him die ended all of those hopes. The messiah, the one who was supposed to come and redeem them was not supposed to die. He was not suppose to abandon them after He taught them, trained them, and sent them out. He was supposed to be with them, supporting them, leading them, reassuring them that their efforts and labor were worth it. But He died and their hope in Him is completely gone. We see that they say in their dialogue, “We had hoped”, past tense, showing that their hope in this Jesus is gone. I think amidst all of these men’s doubts, the news of the empty tomb was bad news, not good news. It was bad news because they had put all their trust in this Jesus and been let down once. They trusted in Him as the redeemer and got those hopes and trusts crushed when He died and abandoned them. So now even though the women have reported the tomb being empty and even seeing angels who have told them He is alive, even though the other disciples affirmed that the tomb was empty, these two disciples will not believe it. They put all their hope and trust in Jesus once, and those hopes were crushed when He died. They have been let down and disappointed once, they are not about to risk feeling that same way again. They have decided to not get their hopes up again by this rumor. Just as Thomas said, “I will never believe unless I see the nail holes in His hands and put my hand in His side,” these disciples are saying that unless they actually see Him alive they are not going to get their hopes up and risk being let down again. They doubt the rumors of the tomb being empty and they doubt that He was ever the Messiah at all.
They are not only doubtful, but frustrated. Again, these men put all of their hope and trust in this one man. They dedicated their lives to Him, gave up their livelihood to follow Him, they were so sure He was the Messiah. Then He died and now they have made up their minds that He was not the Messiah, that they were wrong the whole time. Now some stranger who didn’t even know what was going on in Jerusalem until you filled Him in, is trying to teach you that all of these things that made you doubt your believes were NECESSARY?! They were SO SURE He was the Messiah, then they were SURE He was not, and this stranger is trying to get them to believe that He still is the Messiah by showing that His death was necessary. They aren’t sure what to be sure of anymore, they aren’t sure they can be sure anything is actually right anymore, and this is the frustrating part. They are frustrated with trying to figure out what is actually worth believing.
       For me, I think this is more of the reality you and I face in the weakness of our faith. As good Christians who know the whole story, who have the great gift of the New Testament as assurance that Christ is alive, I do not believe very many of us doubt the truth that Christ is risen. Every time Pastor or I say, “Christ is Risen,” you all immediately respond with, “Christ is Risen Indeed, Alleluia”. I have no doubt you believe Christ is alive, I know you all believe the empty tomb is good news. We have this very reading from Luke telling us that Christ is not only alive, He is the very one standing in front of these disciples walking with them, talking with them, teaching them.
       I think the struggle of the disciples that we can more directly relate to is the frustration. Even having all of the Scriptures, both Old and New Testament, I think it is pretty easy for us to be frustrated with the way God works at times. We can’t fully grasp why God would send His Son…. to die! We can’t fully understand why God acts the way He does, and does the things He does. We can’t even fully grasp the concept of the Trinity. I mean other than to quote the Athanasian Creed there is no easy way to explain the Trinity to someone. If we can’t fully grasp the concept of the Trinity, who are God is, how are we supposed to be able to fully understand how He works and why He works the way He does? Us humans, sinful humans let me remind you, we want to know everything, be able to understand everything, or else we aren’t sure we can trust it. This is frustrating to us! If God would just give us all the answers, if He would just make everything black and white clear and take out all the grey area of life, we would be so much less frustrated. But because we cannot wrap our minds around all of these things, we get frustrated. We get angry and upset with God. We go as far as to question God or even blame Him. We try to make up what God should be or how He should work in our own minds. “If God were truly a loving God, He would not let that baby die; If God were truly a loving God He would save all people and there would be no such thing as Hell; if God were truly all-powerful, He would never let natural disasters happen; if He was really a merciful God, He would not let us continue to suffer in this sinful world, He would end our struggles and suffering and take us all to Heaven or the New Heaven and New Earth right now.” We make up in our minds what God should be, and when the actions of God do not line us with what we have made up in our minds, we get frustrated with Him.
        But notice two things form our text. First of all, Jesus, even though the disciples don’t yet recognize it is Him, He teaches them that God has given them everything they need to know. He did not just send His Son to die without fair warning; He did not just act His plan of salvation without any teachings or promises. Christ teaches these two men that all of the Scriptures of the Old Testament pointed to Christ, that God made His plan of salvation very clear in the words of Moses and the prophets. It was told as necessary for the Son of Man to come and die to pay for the sin of mankind long before it now actually happened. He has given them what they need to know.
         Also, notice once they recognize that this stranger who taught them all of these things is Jesus, all of that frustration and doubt go way. They no longer have doubts about the empty tomb being Good news, they no longer have frustration of God working good through the death of Jesus. They are filled with joy and excitement as they race the seven miles back to tell the others the news that one, the tomb is empty and two this is good news, because Jesus is alive! They are no longer doubtful about what to believe and they are no longer frustrated with how God works, they are simply in awe of their living Lord being there in front of them.
         So what about us? Well first of all we know Christ is alive, we do not doubt this. We know He is living, we know His death and resurrection is not a thing to cause us doubt, but actually the root of all our salvation. We know that it is only because of what Christ did on the cross and through the empty tomb that we have any hope and goodness in our lives at all. We know this is not only good news, but it truly is the best of news. We know this how we have forgiveness of all our sin, and how we have our salvation and eternal life in Christ’s name. It truly is GREAT NEWS.
It also reminds us that God does indeed have a plan. He is not simply working however He feels that day and is moved back and forth, shifting in the wind. He has had one plan from the very beginning and He has always been faithful to that plan. He works in a certain way, but He has revealed to us what we need to know about how He works in His Word. No, He does not give us every answer we would ever like to know, but He has given us every answer we ever need to know in His Word. And what His Word directly leads us to is always His Son, Jesus Christ out savior. Christ is the answer, because Christ is the one whom all Scriptures points to. When we have Christ, our living Lord right there in front of us, all doubt and all frustration goes away.
         So if you find yourself doubting or frustrated, go to what He has given us. Go back to His Word and SEE your living Lord, Jesus Christ right there in front of you. When you find yourself doubting or frustrated come to the communion rail and SEE your living Lord right there in front of you. Just as the disciples, when He broke the bread and their eyes were opened, saw Jesus right there in front of them and all their frustration and doubts were gone, see your living Lord right there in front of you and let all doubts and frustrations be removed. Because Christ is Risen… He is Risen indeed, Alleluia! And this is the GREATEST NEWS we have ever heard!
       In the name of our Risen Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen. HHHHH