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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, the text for this morning comes from the brief epistle of St. John, the second reading. You may be seated. So when you think of the treasures of the church, what are they? Maybe I should ask it in a different way. When you think of the treasures of St. Paul Lutheran Church, what are those treasures? They are not this building. They are not the location, although this is a great location and it’s a beautiful building. But you know what the treasures of St. Paul really is? Her people. You. You are the Lord’s treasure. You are his children.
And throughout the 125 years of St. Paul’s existence, do you know what kind of people God has gathered here to be his treasure? Wanky people. Quirky people, argumentative people, belligerent people, and most of all, sinners. You know, St. Paul has a reputation, and her reputation is this: this is a place where sinners are gathered. That’s her reputation. And if you look at her history, she has been filled with sinners. Whether she was in a small house with just a few families that gathered in the 1890s, being served by a pastor from the Serban area, whether she moved to a clabbered white board church or a brick church at 16th and Red River, which is now a parking lot for the Dell Medical Center, just to the south of the Irwin Center between it and Breckenridge Hospital.
Whether she started out in a fellowship hall just a few yards away or this church, what has made her church, what has made her God’s treasured people, what has made the sinners that gathered around His children are not the building, are definitely not the pastors, are not the teachers or the school, but the bridegroom, the Lord Jesus, who gathers sinners around Him and calls them his children and proclaims them to be born of him. And no other person. And no other way.
Now St. Paul has been a big church. At one time she had over a thousand baptized members, and the services were even more crowded than this morning. Sunday in, Sunday out. And there was a little bit of trouble in the 70s. There were maybe a few dozen left that gathered in this place. But you know what? Whether she had over a thousand members or a few dozen or she gathered in that house or this beautiful location, it’s not her size that makes her God’s beloved bridegroom. She is not his bride because of her size. She is not his bride because of where she gathers. She is not his bride because of the prominence of the people who step through the threshold of the narthex. She is the bride of these sinners because they’re sinners, and not because of anything else.
And the beauty is not the people, it’s the clothes that they’re clothed with in Christ Jesus. We read the names of those who have preceded us in the faith, who have died in the last 12 months. And their beauty was not in themselves, but in their robe that they wore, washed in the blood of the Lamb. Just like you. Just like you.
St. John wrote, “See what kind of love the Father has given to us?” You comment when you see love between a man and a woman that amazes you. You comment when you see love between a parent and a child that encourages you. You comment when you see someone else do something loving for someone else and it impresses you. Now take a moment to be impressed and consider your divine parentage. Who are you? You are born of God. You are God’s child. That is not a small thing. You are God’s child. And he consistently gathers sinners as his children and no one else.
It is He who called you into faith, whether it was in this church or another church. It is He who has gathered you, whether it was in this building or in another building. And it was He who has enlightened you with His gifts, whether it was from the font here or the chalice there. It is He who did it. And in fact, in John’s Gospel, the first chapter says, John writes about this. He said, “To be his children, you cannot be born of blood,” which means Germanic ethnicity does not get you into the kingdom of heaven. Being Wendish does not get you into the kingdom of heaven. Being a Texan does not get you into the kingdom of heaven. God calls you.
And in fact, in John’s revelation, they come from all languages, all tribes, all peoples. John goes on again. “You are not born by the will of the flesh.” It wasn’t your decision to be God’s child. It is God who claimed you to be His child. Your heart knows, as my heart knows, many people who were claimed as God’s children who have walked away from their mother, the church, and have forgotten their father who bore them at that font. But it is God who made you born. And you were not born by the will of man. Though your parents, God be praised, were used by God to bring you into the church, you are not and remain a Christian because of your parents. It is because of God’s gift of grace. He gave birth to you.
In fact, I’m very thankful that in spite of me, God gave Himself to my children. He said very clearly, to be His children, you have to be born of Him and Him alone. And John says, and so we are children of God. Consider that. And then it talks about in the revelation that he is sheltering his people in heaven who have weathered the tribulation of this life. He shelters them with his presence.
Now, I don’t know of any presence of God other than one because the presence of God isn’t the fluttering of your heart. The presence of God isn’t the movement of the cockles of your heart. The presence of God is the flesh and blood of God in Christ Jesus. And it is God who stands at the center of the entire heavenly picture that has been given to us. And it is He who gathers and calls and enlightens and shelters His people with His physical, corporal presence. Just like He is physically here in His corporal body and corporal blood for us to receive. And He shelters us with His presence here in that preached Word.
John goes on. He has mentioned to us that we live in this world, and the world does not know us because the world did not know Him, did it? And living in this world that doesn’t know us as it did not know Him means we’re always going to be where we don’t always like to be, and that’s on the outside looking in. That’s part of being God’s child. You are on the outside of the world looking in. This is not your existence, nor is it your destiny. It is your existence only for the time you are here, but it is difficult. You never like to be on the outside looking in at any choosing of sides, at any playground game, but this is your and my reality in this life.
In fact, Jesus in his gospel said this: “If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. But because I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” Hates you. Just as it hated him to the point of death for you, child of God, and for them who did it. Jesus went on and said, “I have said these things to you that in me, you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation,” Jesus said. “But take heart. I have overcome the world,” He said. And He did. He did on that Good Friday and He did on that glorious Easter Sunday. He overcame the world for the kind of people that He gathers around Himself who are called His children: sinners. Sinners. Sinners.
Now, one of the things that John tells us as we live out this faith in this life, on the outside looking in, being hated by the world and not beloved of the world, part of living out this faith is that there is something that is in store for us because we are God’s children. Listen to how John describes it. “We know that when He appears, we shall be like Him.” Well, first of all, if God can appear, he’s got to have flesh and blood, and that’s Jesus.
And if Jesus appears in flesh and blood, then he has a body that we can see. And if we can see Him, that means that we have eyes that can see him, which means that he will have a corporal, physical, flesh and blood body full of warmth, and we will have a corporal, physical, flesh and body full of warmth with eyes to see and ears to hear and mouth to speak. We shall see Him as He is, glorified and perfect, just as Jesus was revealed on the Mount of Transfiguration, and more importantly, just as Jesus was revealed post-resurrection. He made sure He showed Himself in not a spirit form, but in His flesh and blood form, which is what He is, which means that’s exactly what those people whose names I read will have just like you.
Oh, to feel the embrace of the one whom you love and whom your heart misses in this life. Oh, to hear their voice speak to you your name. That is your reality. And that’s real reality. Because the world is completely out of touch with reality. It is off the rail of reality. Only you who have been enlightened by His Holy Spirit, only you who have been called by His name know reality.
And the reality that you know and is true is that reality that John said to you in his epistle reading this morning that I’m preaching to you about now: “You shall see Him as He is, for we shall be like Him,” the text says. That’s the hope that all who have died over the last 125 years of this congregation and all who die in the faith—whether they worship in a hut in northern Iraq as they’re being pounded by ISIS, or whether they’re in a glorious tabernacle such as this—all who believe this will receive it as God has promised.
In fact, Jesus said through John, “Everyone who thus hopes in Him,” capital H, “purifies himself as He,” capital H, “does. Himself,” capital H, “is pure.” This is the hope or the faith that you’ve been given. These words that John reminds you of, that though you live in a world full of tribulation, you are God’s child. And though you live in the world not beloved of the world, you are beloved of God. And though you live in a world where it seems as if you’re always on the outside looking in, you carry in you the message and the power of salvation that was given to you to begin with.
Which is why it is all by grace that in spite of my parents, I’m a believer. And in spite of me and my wife, my kids are believers. And it’s not an explanation for why some have walked away from the church whom you love and know in your heart. That’s a difficult answer. But we know why we are, and it’s not because of de-parentage, ethnicity, parochial school background, or the lack thereof. It’s by grace.
People in heaven are not going to get into heaven because they have a litany of things that qualifies them. There is only one thing that qualifies them: the very thing that John wrote about in his epistle or in his revelation—they’re washed in the blood of the Lamb. Amen. Their white robes are white because they’re washed in blood. Counterintuitive, but true.
And you know why. Paul said this concept in a different way when he said this: “Your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears,” and it obviously is implying visible, “then you also will appear, visibly, with Him in glory.” Same thing that John said in this morning’s text. Luther commented about it in this way. Martin Luther wrote, “A Christian and believer is God’s child, but it is still hidden. It does not yet appear. The devil and the world do not see it, and it often seems to be the very opposite even in your and my eyes. Yet in time, it will become manifest and apparent, and those who are now God’s children, and you are, you will go forth in praise and worship and thanks to all lands with the message of that adoption.”
Pray with me. Thank you, Lord, for having given us a shelter. A shelter by your presence. Your presence in your holy gifts in these means of grace. Use us. Use us, O Lord, to accomplish your holy will here at St. Paul and in our homes and in our workplaces. We are and will remain your children.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and your minds on Christ Jesus to life everlasting. Amen.
