Sermon - Second Sunday of Advent
Sermon
Location St. Luke Lutheran – Date Dec. 7th, 2008
2nd Sunday of Advent – Year B
Primary Text: Psalm 85: 1-2, 8-13, Mark 1:1-8
Theme: Baptism, Preparation, Righteousness
The advent season is one of preparation, we prepare our homes, our workplaces, our towns, and our hearts and minds for the coming of Christ. Our psalm says “Steadfast love and faithfulness have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. Faithfulness shall spring up from the earth, and righteousness shall look down from heaven. The Lord will indeed grant prosperity, and our land will yield its increase. Righteousness shall go before the Lord and shall prepare for God a pathway.” Righteous, meaning to be right, or just, being who you are called to be. As children of God we are righteous when we are in relationship with God. God calls us to be righteous, to be right with God.
Who knows the story of the three little pigs? The first pig builds a house of straw, the second builds a house of sticks, and the third builds a house of bricks. The big bad wolf, then proceeds to blow down the first two houses and in some versions, eats the pigs, in others they escape to their brothers brick house, where they are safe and secure. Often this is the idea of preparation that we think of during advent. We think that we should be like the third pig, that we have prepared ourselves enough and that we are safe and see ourselves as righteous. But often we see ourselves as the first two pigs, and we think that we have not done enough to be righteous. We hear the thought that to be righteous we must make our selves perfect.
John in his announcement of the coming of Christ, states that he is unworthy to untie Christ’s sandals. John is exclaiming the greatness of Christ, not his own unworthiness, but that interpretation is easily brought to the surface. As we prepare ourselves, it is easy to say, well I too am not worthy to untie Christ’s sandals. How do I know I can prepare myself for his coming? We see all of the little things that we have done wrong, the people that we could have helped, the tasks that we could have done. We wonder whether we can meet the expectation that we have created for ourselves. We wonder if the house that we have made is strong enough. We imagine ourselves as the first two pigs, and see our houses destroyed by the wolves of the world.
That is not the true understanding of righteousness though. Luther Scholar Jaroslav Pelikan says this about Luther’s insight about righteousness while studying Romans.
“Luther suddenly broke through to the insight that the “righteousness of God” that Paul spoke of … was not the righteousness by which God was righteous in himself but the righteousness by which, for the sake of Jesus Christ, God made sinners righteous through the forgiveness of sins in Justification. When he discovered that, Luther said it was as though the very gates of Paradise had been opened to him.”
Righteousness is not something we do ourselves, but God makes us righteous through Jesus Christ. God brings us into right relationship with God. We stray and are distracted by earthly things, but God turns us back.
In his explanation of Holy Baptism in the small catechism, Luther states that: “[Baptism] signifies that the old Adam in us should, by daily contrition and repentance, be drowned and die with all sins and evil lusts, and, again, a new man daily come forth and arise; who shall live before God in righteousness and purity forever.”
It is in our baptism that we have been already made righteous before God. Nothing we do can change that.
The Use and Means of Grace, a book put out by the ELCA, says it this way. “In Baptism God seals us by the Holy Spirit and marks us with the cross of Christ forever. Through the water of baptism, we are washed clean of our old selves, we die and are raised to new life in Christ. We have already been prepared and accepted through God’s work in our baptism.”
Our preparation in advent then is not the task of transformation, but is the realization that we have already been transformed.
There is the joke, Why are Crocodiles brown and flat? If they were round and yellow, they would be lemons.
For a crocodile to be righteous, it has to be brown and flat, other wise it is not a crocodile. During advent should always remember who we are, Children of God. If we work very hard to become very nice people, that is all well and good, but we are not made righteous by our niceness, but as Children of God we have been made righteous by the transforming work of Christ in our baptism.
Using an example that C.S. Lewis uses in his book, Mere Christianity, we are like a house that God comes into to fix, but God does more than that, God transforms us. “You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but [God] is building a Palace. [God] intends to come and live in it [God]self.” When we wonder if the house that we built is strong enough to survive the wolves of this world, we see that it is not what we have built, but what God has built that matters. Our shack of straw is surrounded by an impenetrable fortress of God’s love and grace.
In Advent we remember God’s action in Christ entering into our heart and transforming us. We remember that God prepared us and continues to prepare us for Christ’s coming. We are reminded of how God has built us up in our baptism.
Let us Pray,
God of mercy and peace, come into our hearts and transform us. Bring us your peace, and show us your grace. Change us into your image and remind us of your love that we received in Baptism. Hold us in your arms and protect us. In the name of your Son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
Amen
Location St. Luke Lutheran – Date Dec. 7th, 2008
2nd Sunday of Advent – Year B
Primary Text: Psalm 85: 1-2, 8-13, Mark 1:1-8
Theme: Baptism, Preparation, Righteousness
The advent season is one of preparation, we prepare our homes, our workplaces, our towns, and our hearts and minds for the coming of Christ. Our psalm says “Steadfast love and faithfulness have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. Faithfulness shall spring up from the earth, and righteousness shall look down from heaven. The Lord will indeed grant prosperity, and our land will yield its increase. Righteousness shall go before the Lord and shall prepare for God a pathway.” Righteous, meaning to be right, or just, being who you are called to be. As children of God we are righteous when we are in relationship with God. God calls us to be righteous, to be right with God.
Who knows the story of the three little pigs? The first pig builds a house of straw, the second builds a house of sticks, and the third builds a house of bricks. The big bad wolf, then proceeds to blow down the first two houses and in some versions, eats the pigs, in others they escape to their brothers brick house, where they are safe and secure. Often this is the idea of preparation that we think of during advent. We think that we should be like the third pig, that we have prepared ourselves enough and that we are safe and see ourselves as righteous. But often we see ourselves as the first two pigs, and we think that we have not done enough to be righteous. We hear the thought that to be righteous we must make our selves perfect.
John in his announcement of the coming of Christ, states that he is unworthy to untie Christ’s sandals. John is exclaiming the greatness of Christ, not his own unworthiness, but that interpretation is easily brought to the surface. As we prepare ourselves, it is easy to say, well I too am not worthy to untie Christ’s sandals. How do I know I can prepare myself for his coming? We see all of the little things that we have done wrong, the people that we could have helped, the tasks that we could have done. We wonder whether we can meet the expectation that we have created for ourselves. We wonder if the house that we have made is strong enough. We imagine ourselves as the first two pigs, and see our houses destroyed by the wolves of the world.
That is not the true understanding of righteousness though. Luther Scholar Jaroslav Pelikan says this about Luther’s insight about righteousness while studying Romans.
“Luther suddenly broke through to the insight that the “righteousness of God” that Paul spoke of … was not the righteousness by which God was righteous in himself but the righteousness by which, for the sake of Jesus Christ, God made sinners righteous through the forgiveness of sins in Justification. When he discovered that, Luther said it was as though the very gates of Paradise had been opened to him.”
Righteousness is not something we do ourselves, but God makes us righteous through Jesus Christ. God brings us into right relationship with God. We stray and are distracted by earthly things, but God turns us back.
In his explanation of Holy Baptism in the small catechism, Luther states that: “[Baptism] signifies that the old Adam in us should, by daily contrition and repentance, be drowned and die with all sins and evil lusts, and, again, a new man daily come forth and arise; who shall live before God in righteousness and purity forever.”
It is in our baptism that we have been already made righteous before God. Nothing we do can change that.
The Use and Means of Grace, a book put out by the ELCA, says it this way. “In Baptism God seals us by the Holy Spirit and marks us with the cross of Christ forever. Through the water of baptism, we are washed clean of our old selves, we die and are raised to new life in Christ. We have already been prepared and accepted through God’s work in our baptism.”
Our preparation in advent then is not the task of transformation, but is the realization that we have already been transformed.
There is the joke, Why are Crocodiles brown and flat? If they were round and yellow, they would be lemons.
For a crocodile to be righteous, it has to be brown and flat, other wise it is not a crocodile. During advent should always remember who we are, Children of God. If we work very hard to become very nice people, that is all well and good, but we are not made righteous by our niceness, but as Children of God we have been made righteous by the transforming work of Christ in our baptism.
Using an example that C.S. Lewis uses in his book, Mere Christianity, we are like a house that God comes into to fix, but God does more than that, God transforms us. “You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but [God] is building a Palace. [God] intends to come and live in it [God]self.” When we wonder if the house that we built is strong enough to survive the wolves of this world, we see that it is not what we have built, but what God has built that matters. Our shack of straw is surrounded by an impenetrable fortress of God’s love and grace.
In Advent we remember God’s action in Christ entering into our heart and transforming us. We remember that God prepared us and continues to prepare us for Christ’s coming. We are reminded of how God has built us up in our baptism.
Let us Pray,
God of mercy and peace, come into our hearts and transform us. Bring us your peace, and show us your grace. Change us into your image and remind us of your love that we received in Baptism. Hold us in your arms and protect us. In the name of your Son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
Amen
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