"If Anyone Keeps My Word" (John 8:48-59)

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Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! Amen! Dear brothers and sisters in Christ:

Jesus said: “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word, he will never see death” (John 8:51).

 

Today’s Gospel reading picks up in mid-conversation between the Jewish religious authorities and Jesus. These Jewish religious authorities have been bombarding Jesus with question after question as to catch Jesus in a lie. But the problem for them is, Jesus only speaks the truth.

 

Earlier in John 8, Jesus was telling these Jewish authorities things that did not fit into their self-made notions of religion. So, Jesus told them that they were of the world, but He was not of this world (John 8:23). Jesus also told them, “If you abide in My word, you are truly My disciples, and you will know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free” (John 8:21).

 

Now, in today’s Gospel text, Jesus tells them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word, he will never see death” (John 8:51). To His hearers, they were likely thinking, “Who does Jesus think he is?! Our Father Abraham died! The prophets died! Everyone dies!”

 

So, who does this Man think He is? Well, since the question has been asked, Jesus is the Son of God, the eternal Son of the Father, the One who was with the Father before all things were made. He is the One who became incarnate, who came into our world, who took on our flesh. He is the One who came so that He could sympathize with our weaknesses, our fears, our illnesses. He is the timeless One, the One who existed before Abraham, and yet He also became Abraham’s descendant. He is the One, the only One who can say, “If anyone keeps My word, He will never see death.”

 

Jesus goes on saying, “Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad” (John 8:56). So, what exactly did Abraham believe about Jesus?

 

Well, Scripture gives no record of Abraham saying anything about Jesus, but Abraham certainly believed in this very word of promise. Abraham believed it. He kept it. He held on to it. 

Remember how Abraham saddled his donkey and took his son, his only son, Isaac, whom he loved, to the mountain as the Lord had directed him? Remember how he took the wood and laid it on the back of his son, his only son, Isaac? Remember how he built an altar and then tied up his son, his only son Issac on the top of that altar?

 

Abraham held onto the Word of the Lord. Abraham believed and kept the Word of the Lord, and on that day, his son, his only son Isaac did not see death.

 

God did all of this to test Abraham. God did all of this to test Abraham’s faith. And this test of Abraham served as a preview of another son of Abraham, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ Himself.

 

Jesus is the promised Son who carries the wood of His cross upon His back. He goes up Mount Calvary to make the great sacrifice to rescue us from the infection of our sin. He is the beloved Son who willingly bound Himself and laid upon the altar of the cross to deliver us from death. Jesus is the Lamb provided for the burnt offering. Jesus is the Lamb who is offered for us, who willingly caught Himself in the thicket of our sin and wears the crown of thorns upon His head. 

 

So, on Mount Calvary, it is Jesus who provided our deliverance from everything that infects us: sin and death.

 

So, how can Jesus say, “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word, he will never see death”? He can say that because He came to see death for us and to give us His life. He came to drink the cup of suffering in order that we may be released from death’s grasp. He came to be our Great High Priest to sacrifice not a sheep or a goat, but His holy precious blood, so that He would purify our consciences.  

 

So, if we keep His Word, by clinging to His Word, we are rescued from the power of sin, which is eternal death.

 

We have His Word. You hear His Word each Lord’s Day. You read His Word through Bible study and devotion. You sing His Word through hymnody and liturgy. Since we have His Word, let us keep His Word. Since we have His Word, let us hold onto His Word with our dear life. Remember, it is Jesus who also proclaims: “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in Me, though He die, yet shall he live, and everyone who believes in Me shall never die” (John 11:25-26) and “I am the way, and the truth, and life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6).

So, if you cling to Jesus as your Lord, you will live forever. For St. Paul proclaims, “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39). So, nothing ever can take away eternal life away from you as long as you cling to Jesus and His Word!

 

But as poor, miserable sinners, how do we keep His Word? For we are so much better at not keeping His Word as we ignore Him, and listen to false voices and our own hearts. We are so much better at dishonoring Jesus. We so often fear, love and trust in created things rather than in God, the Creator. We so often do not fear God’s wrath by avoiding every sin. We often hold grudges and harbor resentment against our neighbor. We have all lied, cheated, and stole what did not belong to us. We have all sinned in thought, word, and deed by our own fault, our own grievous fault. So, we are all not too good at keeping Christ’s Word.

 

So, if we can’t keep His Word, Christ will keep it for us. Jesus is the One who promises: “Whoever feeds on My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him” (John 6:54-55). So, that is the answer. That is how we keep His Word so that we will never see death. We keep His Word through the reception of His Means of Grace, His Word and His Sacrament. So, if you are united to Jesus in His Holy Supper of His true Body and His true Blood under bread and wine, you already have the victory over death, because His risen and glorified Body and Blood gives you His life, now and forever.

 

Jesus gave you faith in His Word through the holy waters mixed with His Word in Holy Baptism. There, you were born of water and the Spirit. There, you were united to Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. There, you were “united with Him in a death like His” so that you would be “united with Him in a resurrection like His” (Romans 6:5). 

 

Again, Jesus says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word, he will never see death.”Jesus is also the One who sends His called and ordained servants to “forgive the sins of any,” and those sins “are forgiven them” (John 20:23). 

 

 

So, when you hear those sweet words, “As a called and ordained servant of Christ, and by His authority, I therefore forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” your sins are removed from you. When you hear those words, you are at peace for Christ has blotted those sins away through His death.

 

On this Holy Trinity Sunday, Jesus also puts the icing on the cake for us. He says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). You see, through Jesus, God the Father and God the Holy Spirit is recognized in its fullness. The very Son of God enables us to see the Holy Trinity by Him becoming flesh. So, when we see Jesus and hear Jesus and touch Jesus, we also see, hear and touch the fullness of God. In Jesus, we have the Holy Trinity. And so, we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity (Athanasian Creed).

 

As we confessed the Athanasian Creed earlier, some of you may be thinking about the ending of that creed with its anathemas, its curses. We spoke, “And those who have done good will enter into eternal life” – you may like that. But what did you think about: “And those who have done evil into eternal fire”? What are we to make of that?

 

Well, what does Jesus say? He says to cling to Him. He says to trust in Him. He calls on us to grow in faith. And how do we grow in faith? By keeping His Word. And we can only keep His Word through receiving His gift of forgiveness through His Means of Grace, His Word and Sacrament.

 

“Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word, he will never see death.” You have His Word. So, keep it and hold onto it. For He who promises is faithful: “Whoever feeds on My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life … Whoever feeds on My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me and I in him” (John 6:54, 56).

 

So, keep His Word as Christ unites Himself with the Father and the Holy Spirit with you in His Supper! Amen.

 

The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,

 keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.  

+ SOLI DEO GLORIA +

Sermon for the Holy Trinity: "Trinity in Unity" (Acts 2:14a, 22-36)

 

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from the Holy Trinity – the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit – in undivided Unity!

 

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ:

[Intro]

Happy Trinity Sunday and a blessed Memorial Day weekend as we remember our fallen military who risked everything – including their own lives – to preserve our temporal freedom.

On this Trinity Sunday, we confess the very complicated. We confess the triune nature of God. We confess that there is one true God and it is the Holy Trinity.

Over the years, many have taught the Trinity through earthly things, like apples and clovers. The apple is like the Trinity in that it has three parts and yet it is one apple with the peel, the flesh, and the seeds. Clovers are like the Trinity in that it has three leaves and is yet one clover. But even with all the analogies that we have thought of, we cannot fully comprehend the Trinity.

Although the Trinity is hard to understand, this is an essential article of the faith. This is why we confess the Trinity each and every Sunday throughout the Divine Service in the Invocation, in the Introit, in the prayers, in the Creeds, and in the hymns. God has revealed Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. All other gods are only a figment of human imagination. All other gods are fake and offer nothing. The Islamic false god known as Allah has no power. The Hindu false gods have no power. All earthly “gods” are completely worthless.

The one true God is beyond our human understanding. Unlike all fake gods, the one true God reaches out to us specifically in the Second Person of the Trinity, that is, the Son of God, as He became fully human, so that He could suffer and die for our sins and rise from the grave so that we could be with God in all eternity.

You see, although we may find it hard to understand the Holy Trinity, He is essential to our salvation. It is indeed comforting and reassuring knowing who the true God really is.

As we may give the Persons of the Trinity particular attributes – such as Creator for God the Father, Redeemer for God the Son, and Sanctifier for God the Holy Spirit – we must also remember that we cannot separate the Holy Trinity, since the three Persons of the Trinity work together as the one true God. In today’s Second Reading from Acts 2, we hear this perspective in Peter’s Pentecost sermon.

Surprisingly, Peter’s Pentecost sermon is not really about the Holy Spirit – although the pouring out of the Holy Spirit is certainly prominent on that Pentecost Day. Through his preaching, Peter shows us how the Holy Trinity works together to bring about our salvation.

[The Resurrection]

Although the term Holy Trinity is never mentioned in the Scriptures, the Persons of the Trinity are mentioned. Most prominently, Jesus’ Great Commission stands out the most as He says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:18-20).

Peter also proclaims the Holy Trinity in his Pentecost sermon as he says, “This Jesus God raised up, and of that we are all witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing” (Acts 2:32-33).

Here, Peter is stating the resurrection of Jesus as a fact that can be confirmed by witnesses. Peter’s point is not to establish the fact of the resurrection, but to explain its significance. So, what is the significance of the resurrection?

Since Christ is indeed raised from the dead, we are certain of our salvation. In his Pentecost sermon, Peter said, “This Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised Him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for Him to be held by it” (Acts 2:23-24). You see, God the Father sent His Son to bear our sins and be our Savior and the Holy Spirit proclaims our salvation through proclaiming Jesus.

[The Athanasian Creed]

On this Holy Trinity Sunday, we dig deeper into the Triune nature of God. For centuries, humanity has attempted to understand who God is. As creatures created by God, we only know what God has revealed to us through His Scriptures and in nature. Through nature, we can only understand God the Creator.

But through His inspired Scriptures, He reveals so much more! He reveals how we are saved from the power of sin, death, and Satan.

This salvation – by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone – is confessed in the Athanasian Creed. Although this Creed does not fully explain the Trinity, it does give us boundary lines. We worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity. Now, this Creed can be hard to fully understand in one reading as it does present complicated words and appears to go in circles with similar phrases throughout. The Athanasian Creed also does often brings up questions, especially with its anathemas. That is, the condemnations at the beginning and end of this Creed. Let’s begin with that as we see how this longest Creed proclaims our salvation.

“Whoever desires to be saved must, above all, hold the catholic faith. Whoever does not keep it whole and undefiled will without doubt perish eternally” and “This is the catholic faith; whoever does not believe it faithfully and firmly cannot be saved.” So, what does this mean?

To be short and sweet, it means just that. We must believe in the Holy Trinity in order to be saved. Now, we may not fully understand the Triune nature of God, but we are to trust in Him. This is what this means. This is faith. We are to trust. And in trusting in the Trinity, we are saved. For He is the one true God.

This is what we confess each and every Sunday, but the difference is that the confession of the Athanasian Creed says what we imply in the other Creeds. The point of the Athanasian Creed is that we confess the Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity. Therefore, there are not three Gods, but one God who is coeternal with each other and coequal.

The doctrine of the Trinity is what Jesus constantly taught. On just a couple of those occasions, Jesus said, “Whoever has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9a) and “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30). This is Jesus proclaiming the oneness He has with God the Father, just as was said in Deuteronomy 6:4: “Hear, O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one.”

So, there is not three Gods, but one God. Through the Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity, we are saved. Salvation is only found in the Holy Trinity – the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

[Trinity in Unity]

Again, Peter’s Pentecost sermon is not ultimately about the Holy Spirit, but rather about how the Holy Trinity works together for our salvation.

From Creation as recorded in Genesis through all the millennia, the Holy Trinity was working for our salvation as He inspired the Prophets to proclaim the coming Savior.

In fact, this is what Peter proclaimed from David:

“I saw the Lord always before me,
for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken;
therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;
my flesh will dwell in hope.
For you will not abandon my soul to Hades,
Or let your Holy One see corruption.
You have made known to me the paths of life;
You will make me full of gladness with your presence” (Acts 2:25-28; Psalm 16:8-11)

Here, David is not telling of himself, since his flesh saw corruption and died as Peter rightly speaks. Instead, David is writing as a prophet as he foresaw the Christ coming. So, in fact, it is Jesus who is speaking these words from Psalm 16. It is Jesus who is at the right hand of the Father. It is Jesus who will not be abandoned to death. It is Jesus who will not be corrupted by sin. It is Jesus, with the Father and the Holy Spirit who is always before us.

Because Jesus has suffered, died, and rose for our salvation, this makes Him both Lord and Christ. This means that we can recognize that the risen and ascended Jesus is with us. So, our faith is not shaken by all the hardships that we encounter in this life, for David says concerning Jesus: “I saw the Lord always before me, for He is at my right hand that I may not be shaken” (Acts 2:25).

When Nicodemus came to Jesus by night (John 3:1-17), he thought he was only visiting a great prophet. But Jesus is more than just a prophet. He said to Nicodemus that the Holy Spirit will bring him to know that He is not just a great prophet, but He is the One who descended from the Father. Jesus taught Nicodemus and He continues to teach us that it is the Holy Spirit that brings us to faith in Him, since it is only through Jesus that we are able to enter the Kingdom of God.

So, whatever hardships we encounter – such as spiritual doubt, persecution, peer pressure – Jesus is with us as He offers us comfort as He says, “Take heart, do not be afraid for I have overcome the world” (Matthew 14:27, John 16:33).

This means that we can experience joy and hope because of the certainty that God will never abandon us. You see, Jesus’ death on the cross has reconciled us to God by forgiving the sin that separated us from Him. Now, since we have been joined to Jesus in Baptism and since God the Father did not abandon Him, we know He will never leave us in this life and the life to come.

On this Holy Trinity Sunday, Jesus enables us to see the Holy Trinity by Him coming in our flesh as He took away our sin through His death and resurrection. Through Christ alone, we know that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity. He brought us to faith through the waters of Holy Baptism. He alone keeps us in the faith through the hearing and study of His Word and through the partaking of Christ’s very Body and Blood under the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper, which forgives our sins and strengthens our faith. So, when we see Jesus, we see the Holy Trinity.

We may not fully comprehend the Holy Trinity, but we with the seraphim proclaim the salvation won on the cross through the Triune God proclaiming:

4    Holy, holy, holy! Lord God Almighty!
    All Thy works shall praise Thy name in earth and sky and sea.
Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty!
    God in three persons, blessèd Trinity!    (Holy, Holy, Holy! Stanza 4)

Text: Public domain

Amen.

The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.

T SOLI DEO GLORIA T

Let’s Get Back to the Basics

This month, I debated on what my article would be. I had two themes I wanted to write about. Originally, what you are about to read was going to be my “Pastor’s Corner” submission for the August 12^th McLeod County Chronicle. So, my second theme will be in the August 12^th newspaper. So, onto the August newsletter:

Why do bad things happen to good people? How would you answer this question? Take a moment to think before reading on.

Why is there so much crime? Why are there so many shootings? Why is there hate? Why is there racism? Why this? Why that?

While these answers may seem unanswerable, there is an answer. The answer is: sin. Now, what is sin? As the culture around us has eliminated sin from our collective conscience, some may wonder “what exactly is sin?”

Today, many sins have become accepted — or even praised — by society. But, according to the one true God, humanity cannot just eliminate sins. If humanity had this power, we would step into God’s office. So, again, what is a sin? Well, the one true God tells us in His Ten Commandments. Ever since the fall of Adam in the Garden, humanity has been destined to death, hell, and damnation. Every human being is under the curse that Adam set forth, since every human being is descended from Adam, so “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

But, didn’t God reveal the Ten Commandments to Moses? Didn’t Moses live well after Adam? Yes, but before the Law was revealed, the Law was written on our hearts — beginning with Adam. So, Adam, like you and me, was bound by God’s Law.

God reveals to us that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23a). So, are we just doomed? No! Why is this? “The free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23b).

But, what can Jesus do? Isn’t He like us — a descendant of Adam? Well, Adam was created by God. While, Jesus is God Himself. Jesus is the Creator. You see, Jesus is like us in every way, except Jesus never sinned. How is that possible? The answer lies in the good news, or the Gospel, that was revealed to us in the New Testament and is also revealed to us in the Creeds.

You see, the Creeds (Nicene, Apostles’, Athanasian) reveal this good news short and sweet. Although, Jesus is man, He is also fully God. He is fully God in that His mother Mary did not become pregnant via a descendant of Adam, but she became pregnant by God Himself. The Nicene Creed puts it this way: “And [I believe] in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of His Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made; who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary and was made man.”

This free gift of eternal life is found only by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone. By faith, we receive this grace through Christ’s perfect life, His sacrificial death for our sins upon the cross, and His bodily resurrection from the dead for our justification. This same Jesus is reigning in heaven at the right hand of God the Father.

Until, Christ comes again to judge the living and the dead, we pray as He has taught us to pray in the Lord’s Prayer. We pray to God the Father and ask Him confidently about all our needs of body and soul. We are able to ask these petitions through the person and work of Jesus Christ, who is the only mediator between God and man.

So, why do bad things happen to good people? Well, according to God, there are no good people on their own merit. We are all just lost and condemned sinners. But, through believing, trusting and following Jesus, we become good. In Christ alone, we are made good. In Christ alone, we receive forgiveness of sins, salvation, and life everlasting!

In Christ,

Pastor Adelsen

Sermon for Holy Trinity Sunday: "The Greatest Spectacles" (Acts 2:14a, 22-36)

On this Memorial Day weekend, we remember the men and women of the armed forces who gave their lives to protect our freedom.

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! Amen!

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ:

[Intro]

Today is the 102nd running of what is known as “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing” — the Indianapolis 500 mile race.

I know that everyone is not a fan of auto racing, but being from Indiana, auto racing just becomes a part of who we are. There is something about that roar of the 33 cars as they pass by at more than 200 miles-per-hour and that roar of the fans cheering on their favorite driver.

It is called the “Greatest Spectacle” because no one knows what to expect. The pole-sitter may not make it passed the first lap. The leading driver may take the white flag — for one lap to go — and not finish. This race is so unpredictable.

And, this is why people are so mesmerized by this race. This race is so hard to comprehend.

In a similar way, God could be called a spectacle, because He is hard to comprehend.

[The Greatest Spectacle]

Now, many of us wear eyeglasses – like myself. We wear eyeglasses to better comprehend the world around us. For everyone who has poor vision, is lost without glasses.

There may be the “Greatest Spectacle” in racing happening today in Indianapolis, but for those with poor vision, we need spectacles — glasses — to be able to see close or far things.

By wearing spectacles — glasses or contacts — we are able to see better. We can better understand the world around us. So, instead of bumping into things or not being able to see far away things, we are able to see what is right in front of us – because of these spectacles.

Today, the Christian Church is celebrating Holy Trinity Sunday. Today, we celebrate the one true God in its union in Trinity. 

Now, the Trinity can be a spectacle in itself. For outside of faith, the Trinity is hard to comprehend.

For this reason, our Triune God has given us the true “Greatest Spectacles” — the Creeds — which helps us better understand God. The Creeds are like magnifying glasses into the Triune God.

You see, the Apostles’, Nicene and Athanasian Creeds give us a short explanation of what is fully taught about the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in God’s Written Word.

In fact, the reason the Creeds were written in the first place was so Christians could better understand God. The Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds were written short for a reason — so Christians could memorize the basics of the faith, since the printing press was still centuries away and most people could not read. 

Then some centuries later, the Athanasian Creed came on the scene, which further defined the Triune God.

[Peter Professes the Trinity]

In today’s second reading, Luke records Peter’s Pentecost sermon, in which Peter says, “[Jesus] being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing” (Acts 2:33).

Here, Peter is saying what we profess today — Jesus has equality with God the Father. And more than that — God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are One God.

Now, the Trinity can be hard to comprehend, but that’s why God gave us the Greatest Spectacles — the Creeds — so that we could better understand Him.

For in the Trinity lie our only comfort, life and salvation. (FC-Epitome, 512.18)

As fallen creatures, we could never fully comprehend God, but the Creeds give us a glimpse into what God has done for us and for all of His creation.

You see, the Creeds summarize who God is and what He has done for the world: 

• Creating and preserving all things of out of Fatherly love.  
• Redeeming the world in the life, death, and resurrection of the Son — Jesus Christ. 
• And, calling and gathering believers into the Church by the Holy Spirit. 

Out of love, the Father sends the Son:

Jesus said: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son…” (John 3:16a)

And out of love, the Father and Son together send the Holy Spirit:

Jesus said: “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth…” (John 16:13a)

The Holy Spirit brings us to Christ: 

For we cannot by our own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ. For it is only by the power of the Holy Spirit that we have come to know Jesus as our Lord and Savior. (Paraphrasing Luther’s Third Article on the Creed)

And, the Holy Spirit shows us the Father’s love:

“That whoever believes in [Jesus] should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16b).

For it is the Holy Spirit who led Christ’s apostles — and the prophets before them — to document what God had done.

[The Creeds are a Gift from the Triune God]

Now, at the time of the Protestant Reformation, there were many reformers who wanted to throw out everything tied to the Roman Catholic Church. Some reformers got rid of singing, others instruments, and some wanted to scrap the liturgical history of the church altogether.

Then there was Martin Luther. He was a reformer, yet he was particular on what should remain and what should be scrapped.

Luther emphasized that it was not his intention to lead Christianity away from the ancient creeds, but rather to call it back to them.

He wrote: “This confession of faith we did not make or invent, neither did the fathers of the church before us.”

What Luther is saying is this: God gave us the Creeds as a gift. God gave us these spectacles — the Apostles’, Nicene and Athanasian Creeds — to better understand Him.

Yet, like eyeglasses, even with them on, we can never see perfectly, but it opens our eyes to the world. Or in this case, the Creeds open our eyes to what we can comprehend about the Triune God: The Father, who created the world; the Son, who redeemed the world; and the Holy Spirit, who sanctifies and renews the Church.

[Pew Study]

Now, even with the Creeds readily available today, there are those who do not want to use those spectacles to understand God better.

According to the Pew Research Center, 80 percent of Americans say they believe in God, however only 56 percent surveyed said they believe in God “as described in the Bible.” And digging deeper, most who believed in God “as described in the Bible” said that they don’t regularly read or study the Bible and often they know very little about God.

This may lead them into placing their own reason over what God’s Word says. This may lead them into believing wrongly about who God is.

So, in not knowing the one true God in Trinity, they create a false god in their mind. Maybe a god who cheers you on no matter what you do – good or bad. 

This may sound familiar.

You see, beginning with our first parents — Adam and Eve — all humanity has rebelled against God and has fallen into the darkness, which is sin, death and the power of the devil. As fallen creatures, we wanted it our way – rather than God’s way.

[The Void without God]

Recently, we have seen a rash of school shootings. 

You may wonder where is God in all this turmoil? You may ask yourself, why won’t God stop this.

At the same time, it appears to me that the news media and politicians are trying to push or pull the American people into one camp or another – pro-gun or anti-gun.

Others bring up mental health, which I believe is closer to the real issue.

For me, I believe this gun violence is related to morality – knowing good from evil, right from wrong. 

So, where is God in all of this? He is there. He is listening to our prayers. He is with us and with those facing these terrible times. God is there in every good and bad situation.

Now, I believe the increase in shootings has a correlation to belief in the Triune God.

You see, as the Triune God has been pushed aside in today’s culture, there has opened a void. And, sadly, I believe that much of that void has been filled with Satan and his minions who are pushing immoral living in television, movies, books, magazines and video games.

Now, there is a lot to the saying, “You are what you eat.” In this case, “We are what we watch and read.” Slowly, through the media, we become desensitized to the evil around us.

So, instead of praying to the Triune God for help and guidance, we find ways on fixing the problem ourselves.

But, for us who know God, we know that we are fallen creatures. We know we need to be rescued.

[Our Baptismal Promise]

So, on this Holy Trinity Sunday, we remember what God has done for us – once and for all time – out of His love.

God the Father sent His only Son into the world to become man and to redeem and save each and every one of us by His death and resurrection. 

Then God the Father and the Son sent the Holy Spirit so that we would have faith and come to Jesus, who is the world’s only source of hope, life, and salvation.

And, faith comes by hearing. Our faith in Jesus Christ officially began in us at our baptism, when we heard the pastor speak over us, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” — the name of God — as water was poured on our head.

In our baptism, we have God’s own pledge and promise that He has forgiven our sins and delivered us from sin, death and the devil. So, if you are ever in any time of doubt or temptation, we can always remember that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

And whenever we see someone in need of God’s love, we can tell them about God’s love for you and me.

We also rightly remember our baptism when we live in repentance and faith in the Triune God, who made us His beloved children.

And, we also remember our baptism at each Divine Service with the Trinitarian Invocation. So each time you hear: “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”, you should remember that we have received victory over sin, victory over death and victory over the devil. And, we have received forgiveness of sins, salvation and life everlasting through Christ’s sacrifice for us.

For all that has been done for us, we give thanks to the one true God – the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. We give Him thanks for giving us a glimpse into Him, through the spectacles of the Creeds, which show us God and His love for us.

This is our Creed. This is our faith. This is our trust. This is most certainly true. Amen.

The peace of God which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.

T SOLI DEO GLORIA T