Ad Te Levavi-The First Sunday of Adventide: SERMON

“AD TE LEVAVI”

Saint Matthew 21. 1-9

Ad Te Levavi: 30 November Anno + Domini 2014

Fr Jay Watson SSP

In The + Name of Jesus

   All the ones who don’t understand, and don’t care to, because they are not our brethren…are already playing Jingle Bells and Jingle Bell rock. They embarrassed themselves and the Lord by their bacchanalian and Midas like excesses this past Friday. Consumerism is mammon-surfing on the devil’s ocean of fire. But they are you in so far as your sinful nature still gurgles deep in your gut, your heart, like heartburn from hell. You still remember the sickly delicious taste of Eve’s fatal fruit.

   That’s why you are so sad and run-down. Your sinful nature, his, hers, theirs, ours, and its permeating and marinating stench and stain over everything, is why you and your loved ones are sick and dying; why marriages dissolve, why kids use drugs; why jobs dissolve, why people shoot those who don’t deserve being shot; why people steal and vandalize; why wars are fought and friendships shatter; and why you are a donkey to the devil tied up in his stables of offal! 

   Faith comes by hearing and hearing by The Word. Yes that is more than true it’s predestined. The Lord seeks, searches, and secures you by His Word and His Holy Ghost. You are washed + in His Blood of Calvary poured out into you at the Holy Font. You are new creations in His glorious resurrection. But, where is that glorified body that you could use right about now? Where is that peace that pass-eth all understanding in your long dark nights of the soul—brokenness and pain?

   So, since even as royal priests you feel like lepers what does God do? If as Saints you still wander around lost and lonely what does The Shepherd do? You read your Book of Concord and your loved ones continue to die and your homes are still decaying…and This Word of Life contained in Holy Scripture doesn’t make you shine like Moses and Elias on Mount Transfiguration…what does the Rabbi from Nazareth do to help—help you?

   Where is He when you cry out with His very words “Unto Thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul?”

   Christ’s Kingdom isn’t a book. The Lord’s family isn’t platonic, Gnostic, or memorial. The Savior’s triumphal entrance into Jerusalem is not just the text for Palm Sunday and the 1^st Sunday of Advent.

      Jesus is the Prince of Peace for in His word of forgiveness for you is Peace—your peace, whether you feel it or not. Jesus draws near the Jerusalem of His new and eternal Jerusalem, His Church and His family right now—this very instant! This is Bethphage, this nave and this chancel is the Mount of Olives and He pours His love into you in absolution and Baptism active, whether you “experience” it or not.  The Lord this day looks at you and knows that Satan has called you asses and maybe even convinced you that you are dumb animals (or at least that those around you are) but Jesus looses you. You have the fetters snapped off because He had thorns pushed deep and nails hammered through. This is not past story to inspire this is today’s feast to feed.  If there is no actual and real presence, REAL not spiritual, than everything is meaningless and there is no respite from your pain or hope of rest and glory. The gospel is not “about” Jesus it IS JESUS for you here and now! Your salvation is not “about” words of absolution but IS forgiveness at this very moment: “I forgive you, in the Name of Jesus”—Christ forgives you!  Where there is loosing there is life whether you have “warm & fuzzies” or not and whether your disease ceases or not and whether your loved one has to remain in the ground for a few more days or not!

   His garments, not those of a distant past crowd, are upon you…you just can’t see them with your naked eyes. The angels see; they behold you richly adorned in His brilliant red blood—so shining and sparkling that they again shield their eyes at the whiteness and purity. 

   The actual bodily presence of your Lord and your God, the Christ, is so real that you are not just joined with archangels and the whole host of heaven in an English musical setting found in a 1941 hymnal but are actually in the cosmic court of the Holy Trinity at you sing the Sanctus, Agnus Dei and Nunc Dimittis!

   Advent is here…now…it is always here because the Jesus that will return visibly, very shortly, is here right now.  He loves you and He gives you the strength to soldier on under His Cross.  In Jesus this cross is not heavy but as light and joyous as palm branches.

   Blessed is He that is here in the Name of The Lord. Hosanna in the highest—right here for you!

In The Name of The Father and of The + Son and of The Holy Ghost

CHRIST FOUGHT, FIGHTS, AND WILL FIGHT

   Pope Leo XIII wrote "we were born for combat."  And then in my own lifetime Pius XII (the last true bad-ass pope; i.e. I want popes tellin' Lutherans that we're going to hell and not namby-pambying it all up in logomachy and tricks--makes it easier to focus on the Anti-Christ designation)...where was I?  Oh, Pius XII wrote: "fight or die, that has always been the story."  And recently, Roman Catholic lay-apologist (and actually a decent guy vis a vis ALL the "life" issues) Michael Voris wrote: "God gives the hardest battles to the strongest soldiers."

   I find much in these three statements to agree with, but only to a point.  I am afraid that the context of their utterance (writing) factors heavily into Trentian theology of synergistic sanctification at best, and "means of salvation" at worst.  To be sure, from a "kingdom of the left" perspective, in our vocations, we will indeed be immersed in combat for our families, communities, parishes, and confessions. And yes, it behooves us all to develop a "thick skin," strong spiritual muscles, an active and resiliant level of stamina, and the ability to "take a punch."    Life is certainly not easy.

But - -

   I think from a Pauline (i.e. Holy Spirit) perspective I would rather believe, teach, and confess:

"The Second Person was Incarnated the God/Man FOR US...and He died the substitutionary death FOR US.  Jesus obeyed the Law, paid for our Sins, and fought the only real combat that mattered when He met Satan, Sin, Death, & Hell on the Tree.  Our fight now, IN HIM, is to be what He has already made us, and to fight the "old Adam" in daily drowning our sins in contrition and repentance, ever looking TO HIM."

And - -

   "Christ fought and died FOR US, that IS the ONLY Story that matters. We are buried with Him into death and raised with Him in His Easter Triumph."

Finally - -

   "While there certainly have been brave and hearty Christian soldiers (Apostles, Evangelists, missionaries, pastors, laymen, mothers, martyrs, and more) we need never worry or despair over our weakness, frailty, fear, or inadequacies, for as the Apostle wrote 'And He said unto me, My Grace is sufficient for thee; for My Strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.' "

It's all about not just emphasis, but as Dr. Nagel says: "Who is doing the what!"

   We preach Christ Crucfied.  Our Sanctification is Christ active in us.   Our battle has been won though the daily "clean-up" skirmishes still have to be endured--IN CHRIST!

EVE OF A NATIONAL/GENERAL THANKSGIVING [2014]: Homily

“THEY WERE CLEANSED”

Saint Luke 17. 11-19

The Eve of a National Thanksgiving

26 November Anno + Domini 2014

Fr Jay Watson SSP

In The Name + of Jesus

   “O give thanks unto the Lord; for He is good; for His mercy endureth forever.” [1 Chron. 16.34] So speaks the writer of Chronicles; so too wrote King David. The Holy Ghost wants you to give thanks to the Lord. The Spirit fills you full so that you will. The Apostle says the same thing to you and he does it by way of exhortation, and so do I “I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men.” [1 Tim 2. 1]  Here your pastors, past and present, urge that you pray for and give thanks for men—your brethren; your neighbor.  Yes you are to love them as yourselves and always put the best construction on their actions and words but you are also to thank God for them—which is in effect thanking God. But you don’t. You don’t, and you can’t fulfill the Second Table of the Law because you don’t and can’t comport with the First Table.

   “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me” says the Lord. But you do. You don’t love God before all things because your first love is yourself. “Old Adam” doesn’t like giving thanks because he/you is too busy looking at himself and preening…or whining after more mammon…be it forbidden fruit, comfortable life style, better health, happier kids, or whiter teeth.  The Lord’s Second command nails it doesn’t it: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord, thy God, in vain.”  Oh, you don’t break this one because you don’t drop “f” bombs or yell out the Savior’s name when you hit your thumb with a hammer?  Luther will help you: “…His Name…but call upon it in every trouble, pray, praise, and give thanks.”  You don’t pray perfectly, you don’t praise continually, and you sure as hades (and Hades is the payoff for disobedience) don’t give thanks.

   The Sainted Kenneth Korby (R.I.P.) said there are only two ways to talk about God or to talk to God. The first is to speak His Word, receive His Word and thus praise Him by His Word.  The other way is the default position for fallen man—i.e. whine, bitch, moan, complain, and spend so much time thinking and talking about oneself that “thankfulness” is a burden at best and a hated thing at worst.

   You know that the Creed’s explanation of the 1^st Article gives a laundry-list, really a Grace eternal endowment list, of your Loving Lord’s gifts to you: “…He has given me…clothing and shoes, meat and drink, house and home, wife and children, fields, cattle, and all my goods; that He richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life.”  And sometime you do thank Him for these truly wonderful things. But your old nature really only thanks Him, now & then, sort-of, side-ways…when it’s what you want; what you like; what you think you need; what you ‘appreciate.’ Sinners as sinners are spoiled not rotten but spoiled rotting in dirt and ash!  Repent!

   Repent of having these precious jewels of earthly sustenance, and not thanking your Father.

   Did the Lepers give thanks for their fine clothes and homes? They had neither. Did the 10 unclean walking-dead give thanks for their families—the ones that disowned them; did they give thanks for their health and vitality that they most assuredly did not have?  No, probably not.  Should they have? Yes.

   But the Law kills. Ten is the number of leprosy and death.  Repent you ten lepers…you nine lepers always on the way to the priests of self.

    But give thanks, and you DO, to the God Who comes to fix all that is broken and to heal all that is diseased—to bring back to life all that was cold, dry, and dead.  For the Lord gives you what you need; what is required to repent.  He gives you His Word—Himself!  The Samaritan Leper, the stranger Leper, is you, and, it is Christ Himself.  For by Grace through Faith you are in Jesus and His works and worth are now yours!  Christ became a stranger to His own people and His own family to win back all the sick and homeless; all the lost and weeping.  Christ became not just a Leper, but He took all disease, shame, sorrow, brokenness and sin upon Himself.  Your Leper Messiah cleansed those poor souls and you poor souls by becoming poor and pinned to wood.  His Blood washes you white and sterilizes you with Salvation. 

   He Who is the WAY passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee, and Shawnee on His way to Calvary.  He Who is the TRUTH brought Divinity united with Perfect Humanity to ten men separated and pathetic, and to this small band—weak and seeking rest. He Who is the LIFE brought them back not just health but eternal glory. His Presence, then and now, brings the Holy Spirit Who constrained them to cry in Faith “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” He does the same this evening and you too cry out the Kyrie: “Lord have mercy upon us!”  Jesus’ thanksgiving to His Father for all of you and for the joy set before Him—to Love the Father perfectly and to Love you to suffering and death—is given you by Grace. You are given the Faith to participate in THE THANKSGIVING: The Holy Eucharist. 

   You give the perfect thanks when you receive the Perfect Jesus—the Glory of God.

In The Name of The Father and of + The Son and of The Holy Ghost

Just Because Lutherans Love Music

TOP TEN ROCK/POP BAND NAMES FOR LUTHERANS

(inspired by real band names)

 

10.  Blood Sweat & Tears  - - - - -   Believe Teach & Confess

9.    Spock’s Beard - - - - - - - - - -    Luther’s Gas

8.    Toad the Wet Sprocket - - - -     Baptism: The Wet Baby

7.    Average White Band - - - - -      Hyper-Euro White Band Collar

6.    Duran Duran - - - - - - - - - - -     Gaba Gaba  (for Latif J )

5.    Kool & the Gang - - - - - - - -     Tom & the Polycarpians

4.    CCR - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -    CTCR

3.    Siouxsie & the Banshees - - -     Grandma Schmidt & the Alligators

2.    Marilyn Manson - - - - - - - - -    Carl Vehse

 

DRUM ROLL PLEASE

 

 

And the Number ONE Rock/Pop Name for Lutherans

 

1.   Wolves in the Throne Room - - - -   Council of Presidents

LAST SUNDAY [2014]: Homily

“Behold, The Bridegroom Cometh”

Saint Matthew 25. 1-13

Last Sunday: 23 November Anno + Domini 2014

Fr Watson SSP

In The Name + of Jesus

   Ten is the number of virgins that Jesus speaks of in His picture of the End Times. Ten being the number of the Commandments is fitting to illustrate the futility of being saved by the Law.  For while the Groom, God the Lord Christ, tarried, they all slumbered and slept. That is, no one keeps the Law and thus no one has life through the stone tablets which only kill.  All will slumber, that is, die.  And even those who are physically alive when the Trumpet sounds are dead in their trespasses.

   The Kingdom of Heaven is Jesus.  In this context it is first His Kingdom of power which applies to all men of all times. In the beginning was the Word…all things were made by Him.  Jesus is Creator of the entire human race…all men.  As Adam was made of virgin mud, pure and undefiled, all men following the fall are born whores to sin, death and the power of the devil.  Our Lord’s point is that all ten, the race of men, are all without a Saving Spouse and are alone by themselves, unfulfilled and incomplete. Rather than obsess over all the detailed meanings of 1^st century oil lamps, fuel reservoirs, wicks, and oil merchants and the hours of their operation, suffice it to say the Lord’s point is “Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh.”

   Repent that your human nature is not virginal as God desires. You are not the loving help-mate, the good and faithful companion that He originally created to be His very own.  Repent of the harlotries which you have committed against your King and Lord—your adulteries against the 1^st Table.  Beat your breast in contrition over your foul deeds done in the darkness of your heart against the 2^nd Table as well.

   The entire world is condemned by prostituting its original Grace and betrothal for the snake pimp of perdition. But though the number 10 doesn’t save or make clean, the number One does…He Who is One, and Three, the Blessed Trinity—The King and His Kingdom Who is present for you in The Son, The God/Man Christ Jesus!

   The Lord is Lord but He is also Groom. He is the true mate and completion of His One Bride the Church.  As Saint Mary is the new Eve in a typological fashion, so too Our Lady of Nazareth is the “type” of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.  She said by God’s Grace “behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to Thy Word” and she was overshadowed by the Holy Ghost and filled with the Second Person—a lamp brimming with oil Who was The Light of the world. You are all the collective Bride—the Handmaid of The Lord.  Collectively, or as community, but not some weird Borg-like Communistic slave situation, you are part of the Wedding of Eucharistic Joy and Peace.  The Groom is coming back not to Judge you and condemn you.  He already Judged you innocent and forgiven when He was condemned to suffer and die in your place. By His stripes your wounds are healed. By His Blood your desert thirst is slacked. By His Body your starving stomach is fed.   By His flesh you are covered with His purity.  Jesus is the One and True Virgin King and His spotless and immaculate Works cover you and christen you not just as His brethren but as His Virgin Bride.

   You have oil in your vessels because Jesus has come to you and filled you.  Jesus Who is Life has been poured into you by The Holy Ghost in your Baptisms and in your Absolutions. Jesus the oil of joy has anointed you far better than Aaron was anointed and far better than Samuel anointed King David. Jesus the pure balm of Gilead, the spikenard of your Salvation anoints you in The Word and in The Word Made Flesh—Body and Blood. 

   You will have your lamps “trimmed” from time to time in this vail of tears, the old-Adam must daily be put to death, but there will always be enough fuel for lighting your way to the Nuptial Hall because Jesus is your fuel, He is your faith, He is your food.

   You are ready. Come in with Him to the marriage.

In The Name of The Father and of The + Son and of The Holy Ghost

SECOND LAST SUNDAY [2014]: Homily

“LOVED BY THE SHEPHERD KING”

Saint Matthew 25. 31-46

2^nd Last Sunday: 16 November Anno + Domini 2014

Fr Jay Watson SSP

In The Name + of Jesus

   “Save me, O God” King David cried out—and thus too it was written into the Psalter.  In today’s appointed Gradual you heard it restated as your own cry of need—a Kyrie of sorts “Save me, O God.”

   Good words to keep on ones lips as the Parousia approaches. “The day is surely drawing near when God’s Son, the Anointed, shall with great majesty appear as Judge appointed.” [TLH 611.1]

   Christ does not tell you when He will return exactly but it will be soon and you are to be vigilant and ready. The throne He will sit upon for the final judgment may be a throne such as Solomon had or not.  The “throne” which, like the “kingdom,” is but an extension of the King.  Your King is not a tyrant or despot. Your King is not cruel or vindictive—save for His righteous anger at sin, Satan, death, and Hell.

Your Judge is a Shepherd Who is good and loving. He is like the perfect Father, Brother, and Groom because He is perfect. This judging Herdsman is not dressed in a black robe but is wearing flesh and blood just like you—save for its horribly awesome and beautiful wounds and scars (“crimson trophies won”)  He wears no powdered wig but His sacred Head now wounded retains the marks of His crown of thorns.  And one wonders why the angels hide their faces?  Can one do anything but genuflect?

   The division between the sheep and the goats is the final pronouncement of the celestial courts verdict. Perfect good does perfect justice and judgment. Jesus sits in calm repose and majesty because His being extended, lifted up on high with pierced hands thrust out, has been already accomplished: “it is finished!”  He will sit as comfortably on His throne as He does on this altar, as He did in the homely and friendly house of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.

   The fear and apprehension is to be meditated upon not then, not at the Eschaton, but now in the struggle of the Church Militant, under the cross. You are slain in the spirit—the “old Adam” NOW in the daily drowning of sin. You sing these weighty hymns now not at the final trump.

   You do not do The King’s Law. You are a scofflaw, a brigand, and bandit. You are a wolfshead, a murdering, thieving, back-stabbing, fornicating, lustful, and covetous traitor to your King—Who is your Father!  Repent.

   Every year this text is preached and the same questions arise. You ask the same things that the sheep ask the Lord. What is the answer?  What is the answer to every question but Christ Himself.

   Yes you are to feed the hungry and you don’t do it. You give to your loved ones and sometimes you give to the real needy—but only if they pass some ‘worthiness’ litmus test your warped self-righteousness constructs. You don’t take in the stranger because more than anything else you don’t like the stranger. You don’t clothe the naked who need clothes and far more importantly you don’t clothe the brokenhearted and lonely with the warmth of forgiveness and family inclusion. You don’t keep the Second Table of the Law and for that you should be damned. You should hear the words “depart from me.” You should be cursed into everlasting fire. But you are not. The fire is quenched, like the fiery darts of the old evil flow. The burning of Hades is extinguished in the Water of Life Jesus. The flames and heat are doused by the Water and Blood flowing from His Body—His riven side. The inferno is flooded away in the Holy Water + of Baptismal regeneration. The heart-burn, the soul-burn, and the fear-burn are calmed in the Blood of His Holy Chalice—the tears He shed over you and then the joyful tears of life He pours into you: Peace.

   So yes, you are to love your neighbor as yourself and you are to strive to live both a holy life and a fruitful life of giving and sharing. You are also to love the King perfectly—the First Table of the 10 Commands.

   But you are as clueless and oblivious as were the Sheep when they asked The Lord “when saw we Thee…?” 

   The facile and incorrect answer is mis-found in worried and self-absorbed scurrying of business and methodistic check-lists. The way of righteousness is apprehended, received, only in The Righteous One.

    Jesus kept all the Law and by being chosen and adopted by Him, by being placed into His wounds, His side, His Body, and His Church, you have all that He did and is!  Jesus loved the World and died for the world.  Jesus gave meat to the hungry and drink to the thirsty. Jesus placed raiment on the naked and visited the diseased and imprisoned.

   Believe in Him and His merits are yours. You are royal priests and blessed by The Father because He has made His Father your Father. This kingdom, this King is yours because you are predestinated for it, for Him, “from the foundation of the world.”

   With your trespasses atoned for, with your failures washed away by He Who was the “least of these” you are placed on His right hand.  With Jesus, “for you” becoming Himself hungry, thirsty, a stranger, naked, sick with your sins unto suffering and death, and imprisoned in the tomb of death, you are touched + and fed by His own right hand.

   Your names + are written in the Book of Life, His Body, in His Blood.  “Come ye, blessed…inherit the King.”

In The Name of The Father and of The + Son and of The Holy Ghost

THIRD LAST SUNDAY [2014]: Homily

“CHRIST’S BODY GATHERS HIS EAGLES”

Saint Matthew 24. 15-28

3^rd Last Sunday: 9 November Anno + Domini 2014

Fr. Jay Watson SSP

In The Name + of Jesus

    The abomination of which The Lord speaks about is an abomination—that which should not be! It is desolation which is the opposite of fullness. Its greatest affront is in its destruction of holiness—that which God has selected and sealed with His Name.

    Jesus is interpreting and unpacking a difficult prophecy from Daniel. It is the very same Word which Christ caused Daniel to write some 500 years earlier by the Holy Ghost (“spake by the Prophets” as you testified in The Creed). Jesus is telling you this morning that the work of this abominable perversion is more than just the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in the year 70 AD.  He is instructing you that this tribulation includes more than the Eschaton—the final Advent and end of all corruption.

    The will of the angel now known as Satan caused his rebellion from God—from good. The abominable serpent tempted Eve and the woman chose to rebel. She and her husband, who refused to be a godly head and instead proved to be the worst pastor of all time (save for the rest of us), she became abominable in sin and attempted regicide.

   To be sure, all that The Lord spoke of that day came to fruition in 70 by having the last bit, last ounce, last drop, of fruitfulness squeezed dry out of God’s once holy city by sword, rubble, blood, and utter destruction met out by Rome’s pagan army.  But you sin in ignorance and lack of holding the Word if you assume that only the Imperial Roman Eagle and representations of Caesar standing on the debris of Solomon’s portico is the abomination.  You sin in arrogance and lukewarm complacency if you only crow triumphalistic against the crescent of Islam, the idols of Hinduism, the menorah of those who miss Christ’s identity; and the rainbow flag of radical homosexuality and all that is atheistic.

    The devil is an abominable fallen angel; the world is a decaying and corrupt mistress—a whore of Babylon; the Office of the Papacy, insofar as it presumes a power Christ has never given it and still officially condemns the Rule of Faith (Justification by Grace alone) is abominable…yes, yes, and yes!  But your “old Adam” traitorous collaborator is also abominable.  Repent!

    “What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are Gods.” [1 Cor. 6. 19-20]

   Every time you sin you let the contained and captured old nature spew out more foul and abominable filth into that which Jesus died for. Fight with the Word of God and your Holy + Washing the lustful thoughts and desires which seek to turn your Holy Nave into a brothel of shame. Run the race of prayerful obedience that the Apostle sets before you, In the Word, and avoid words of hate and actions of thievery and control. Submit by the Christ in you to your real identity as a child of The Father and a lamb of The Paschal Lamb!

   And when you don’t, repent and cling to the only One Who rescues you and restores you “seventy times seven”. [Mt. 18.22]

   Those who were in Judaea were not to flee to the Temple or synagogue or their false understanding of the Old Testament, but to the mountains, to all areas where the Apostles were carrying The Word of Christ Crucified and Risen for forgiveness of sins!

You are to flee to the mountain of Holiness which is found only in Jesus’ blood and righteousness. This safety and peace is no longer found on Mount Calvary but on the mount of His New Testament pulpits and altars. Flee not back into your mammon filled houses of self-will and self-justification but to the house of Jesus’ Father—the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church of the Living God!

   You are always driven and constrained by the Holy Ghost to flee to Christ for Christ never fled from you, your sins, or your penalties. Jesus obediently and passively marched to the Tree to be your replacement in His purity and sacrifice.

   Eschew and avoid putting the things of man ahead of Christ’s gifts for you. Suckling the children that may be with you is the vocation of mothers. Protecting your family is the vocations of fathers, but it is Jesus Who nourishes and feeds all His flock at His + font and at His communion rail.  The Church gives suck in these last and dangerous days; the Church gives the robes of Jesus’ righteousness in these days of wintery tribulation—always and only through Jesus—His absolving peace and His Body and Blood by His Word!

   While others sadly still look for a god of their own making and desire in false Messiahs and false prophets: Popes, Osteen’s, dispensationalist lunacies, insane delusions of Mohamed’s hoaxes, and humanism’s baal-like worshipping of science…the only joy and peace and everlasting solace comes from the wounds, the Blood, the Body of the pierced God/Man!

   “Behold, I have told you before” He says!

He’s here right now for you poor and lonely. He tabernacles today for you the frightened, hurting, angry and diseased. Jesus: not in the desert of man-made works and not in the secret chambers of your black hearts, but in the Cup of Blessing, in the Bread of Life. For where His Body is, there His body the Church will gather like the Eagles of Saint John’s Evangel.

   In Christ you are no longer an abomination. In Christ you are neither desolate or in desolation. In Christ the tribulation can be endured. In Christ the light of His lightning (“Light of Light”) shineth in you as the Son of Man comes this day!

In The Name of The Father and of + The Son and of The Holy Ghost

These Are Getting Harder To Write (and less funny--were that possible)

TOP TEN IDEAS

 TO MAKE YOUR CATECHESIS BETTER

10.   Every time one of your students gets the right answer put on your

        Luther hat and yell “Wunderbar!”

9.     Let every kid who starts genuflecting during The Creed at Sunday’s

        Mass skip turning in those pesky “sermon studies” (sic).

8.     Reassure them that if they miss the correct answer during their final  

        public questioning (i.e. ‘dog & pony show’) you’ll ask the same

        question to one of the adults attending that you  know doesn’t have    

        a prayer in getting it right.

7.     Sure you’ve told them you know Greek and Hebrew (thus

        necessitating another visit to your Father Confessor), but they

        won’t be ready for that whole hour in pig-Latin.

6.     Threaten them that the first one to call The Reformer “Dr. Martin

        Luther King” gets two additional years of Wednesday nights!

5.     Kill two birds with one stone: When illustrating to them the

        typological meaning of Joshua’s destruction of Jericho, go

        ‘Samson’ on the LWML display in the narthex and send it flying!

4.     Promise that any kid who continually “cuts up” in class will

        have his home “Confirmation-Sunday Party” visited by you and

        several clowns with balloon animals.

3.     When teaching the 6^th Commandment (which you explain is

         really the ‘Sexth’ Commandment) use those special “Children

         Protection Services” dolls.

2.      Explain why Anglo-Saxon profanities are not really what

         the 3^rd Commandment is all about, by utilizing the Rap lyrics of

         DMX and Eminem.

 

DRUM ROLL PLEASE

And the Number One

IDEA TO MAKE YOUR CATECHESIS BETTER

 

1.   Pack all the CPH stuff away and just use The Small Catechism.

ALL SAINTS' DAY [2014]: Homily

“Made Holy By The Holy One”

Saint Matthew 5. 1-12

All Saints Day [observed]: 2 November Anno + Domini 2014

Fr. Jay Watson SSP

In The + Name of Jesus

   “These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” [Rev.7.14]

   “And seeing the multitudes (‘for God so loved the world’), He went up into a mountain.”  Jesus ascends a hilltop to teach and preach that which He will shortly give to His own on another hilltop. He gives unto His own disciples (the followers He has chosen and selected) the blessings—the beatitudes—of royal sonship. “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon [you], that [you] should be called the sons of God.” [1 Jn. 3.1]  All that the Son of God is and has He credits and bestows to His own by His Gracious mercy and abundant giving. The faith He creates in His children, in you, makes them, makes you, truly Saints.  You receive Sainthood!

   To be a saint, “Sanctus” in the Latin and “Hagios” in the Greek means to be separate, apart, chosen, designated, proclaimed and made special—plucked out from all that which is not—and declared Holy!  Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus—Holy, Holy, Holy, is not just the song of the Seraphim but also the theme music and family lullaby of all Christ’s brethren! It will be your dinner anthem at The Eucharist.

   The world, thanks to Adams sin and your sins, is in thralldom to Satan—brood-like.  The world does not know God and cannot know or accept God by works or nature.  A “sovereign” universe creator may in fact be perceived by the “things of God,” natural revelation, but the Father and The + Son and the Holy Ghost are only received by revelation of The Word!

   You want to be rich. You lust after mammon. You put many things ahead of The Lord every day. You go great stretches of time not even giving The Christ a second thought. When you are confronted by The Law and the requirements to be rich only towards God you think you can be poor in spirit by works of self-abnegation and busy-body charitable activity. No.  By the works of men’s hands no one will be saved.

   You are to love your neighbor perfectly. You are to mourn for your enemies and adversaries. You are to turn the cheek when smitten. You are to feed the hungry (even if they’re illegal or diseased). You are to forgive those who have hurt you. You are to put down your weapons of revenge and fear. You are to grind your spears and swords into pruning hooks. But you don’t.  And, when you are confronted by the mirror of the Commandments you self-justify and make excuses…and then you again attempt to live the Beatitudes by your discipline and your self-holiness completely missing their whole point and The Holy One Himself.

   All Saints Day is important and needed because you need to know about Saints and Holiness. You need to hold tight the Holy Christ Who holds you tight. Only God is Holy and worthy of worship and praise.  His Saints are famous and larger-than-life sometimes: Irenaeus, Jerome, Augustine, Francis of Assisi, Bernard of Clairvaux, Gerhardt, and Korby. His Saints are your great-grandparents, parents, brothers, nieces, land-lords, employees, garbage collectors, grocery clerks, cabbies and hospital orderlies. His Saints are those He has loved before time and space began; those He has pre-destinated to come to faith IN CHRIST, by Faith, through the Word heard and the Word made effective by the power of The Holy Ghost.  His Saints are those He has initiated and + birthed at Holy Mother Church’s womb—the 8-sided font—and then fed the milk of sustenance in the Holy Scriptures until later fed the meat of Doctrine, Holy Dogma and Sacrament!  His Saints are the ones who He has given the eyes of faith see “another angel ascending from the east; the east of Bethlehem, Jerusalem, and Augsburg’s altar facing the rising of the sun every morning; having the seal of the living God—your Sign of the Cross!

   Because Jesus was poor in spirit—lowly and meek and obedient to The Father; because Jesus mourned for all His wayward creatures, as He wept over Jerusalem,  as a hen seeketh to gathereth her chicks; because Jesus hungered to feed His flock on the Bread from Heaven and The Water from the Rock; because Jesus was merciful forgiving all his enemies even those who pierced Him and jeered Him; because Jesus was pure in Sacred Heart and saw God at the Jordan in His Father’s voice and the Spirit’s descent; and because Jesus made peace between all of you and Your Father: you are blessed, you are Holy, i.e. a Saint!  Christ’s Peace is the Atonement for your rebellion. The Prince of Peace becomes the paschal lamb.

   Blessed are you Saints because The Holy One was persecuted.  Blessed are you Holy ones because The Saintly One, Righteousness enfleshed, was slain in His immaculate Flesh and Holy Blood.  He had all manner of evil spoken against Him falsely. He was reviled and persecuted and crucified. The Lamb was slain.

   And you stand “before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in [your] hands; and cry with a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.’”  Along with martyrs and confessors and Saints of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, you “have washed your robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”  “Since we are compassed (surrounded) by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us look to Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.” [Heb.12.1-2]

   “Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; for great is your reward in heaven; for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.”  Rejoice this day for it is a foretaste of the Feast to come!

   “For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne, Augsburg’s very altar, shall feed [you], and shall lead [you] unto living fountains of waters in His True Body and most Precious Blood. Here and hereafter “God [wipes] all tears from [your] eyes.”

In The Name of The Father and of The + Son and of The Holy Ghost