The sermon for December 19 was based on John 1:19-28.

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Today is the last Sunday of Advent, the season of expectant waiting for the arrival of Christ, the Lord. The all-powerful King of kings will thunder down from heaven on the last day when He returns. In the meantime, you have instructions as to how you should occupy yourself between His two advents. St. Paul gives you four directives from the King: first, rejoice. I will say it again, "Rejoice!" [Phi 4:4] Rejoice in the peace which God has given you, the peace of sins forgiven. Second, "Let your gentleness be known to all men." [5] The King, whose enemy you once were, treats you with all gentleness; you should respond to your neighbors in the same way. Third, "Be anxious for nothing." [6] The King of all creation, who has provided all things needful for you, will see to it that you never lack what you truly need. Finally, "In everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God." [6] Through His Son, you have access to the throne of God's grace, to ask Him in faith your every request. Joy, gentleness, contentment, and prayer, these four directives should characterize you and occupy you until your Lord returns.

"The Lord is at hand!" [5] Do these directives characterize your life? Have you been rejoicing in the Lord always? Have you been gentle to all men? Are you anxious for nothing? Is your life shaped by prayer with thanksgiving? You must answer no. You are sad now and then, even depressed at times, instead of rejoicing. You have treated others in anger or rudeness, instead of gentleness. You have your times of fretting and worrying, instead of being anxious for nothing. Few pray as much as they should, and even if you do, then you so often neglect the thanksgiving. You fall terribly short of what the Lord has called you to be.

Yet this sermon began as sermons often do, "Peace to you!" Peace is a concept at the very heart of Christmas. The herald angels sang of peace to those shepherds outside of Bethlehem, "Glory be to God on high, and on earth peace, good will toward men." Isaiah speaks of peace in his prophecy, "Speak comfort to Jerusalem, and cry out to her, that her warfare is ended." [40:2] St. Paul speaks of peace in today's Epistle, "The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding . . ." [Phi 4:7] With this blessing this sermon will end, as sermons often do. This peace is central to the Gospel, for Jesus Christ came to bring peace to the earth.

"Woe to those prophets who say, 'Peace! Peace!' when there is no peace." Luther wrote this in his 95 Theses. How can I say that there is peace on earth, when American soldiers are dying in Iraq? How can I preach comfort to Jerusalem, saying that her warfare is ended, while Palestinians and Jews are constantly plotting against one another? There is no such peace on earth.

I must be talking about peace in the Church, right? Is this the case? Has the Church ever been at rest since the Garden of Eden? Never! She is plagued by the devil and his minions. She is vexed by heretics. Congregations are torn by factions and strife. Pastors and people are persecuted for confessing the Truth. The Church is surrounded by a hostile world. She is the militant Church, the Church at war with many foes. How can I preach peace to Jerusalem? There is no such peace in the Church.

What about in your life? Many of the Christmas cards you have received are adorned with the word, "Peace". Does peace characterize your life? Are you at peace? Would you call the frantic rush to prepare for the Christmas celebration a time of peace? Hardly. More often than not your life is characterized by your struggles. You struggle to make a decent living. You struggle against your decaying flesh. You struggle against the chaos around you. You struggle against the sin within you. The devil is always breathing down your neck. Peace! Peace? There is no such peace. More often your life is a wilderness of scarcity, decay, chaos, and sin.

And yet this voice cries out in the wilderness: your warfare is ended; you are at peace. Does Luther's curse of "Woe!" fall on this prophet's head? May it never be so! God's great gift to you at Christmas was not peace in the senses mentioned moments ago. Jesus did not come to bring political peace to the nations of the earth. He did not come to spare His Church from the battles She must wage. Nor did He come to make your life free from every struggle. Any prophet who preaches peace in these ways will fall under Luther's curse, and God's as well. "Woe to those prophets who say, 'Peace! Peace!' when there is no peace."

God did not become a man in order to bring those kinds of peace to you. Your Creator became a creature in order to bring peace between two who were at war with one another. The war was of the most dreadful sort. One combatant was invincible and could instantly crush His opponent. The other warrior was, nonetheless, defiant and fool heartedly rushed against his foe with bitter hatred. Who were these poorly matched gladiators? The powerful One was God almighty. The fool hearted one was you. With no hope whatsoever of defeating your enemy, you would have completely spent yourself fighting your invincible Foe. You showed your hatred and enmity toward God whenever you sinned against Him. Your old Adam, your decrepit, sinful flesh, still hates God with bitter enmity. "The carnal mind is enmity against God." as St. Paul says in Romans 8:7. Your sinful nature would like nothing better than to throttle God to death, and be forever free of His tyrannical rule. What, don't you think so? Every time you sin you prove this to be true.

And so you deserved the enmity of God. He had promised death to Adam and Eve if they rebelled, "In the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." [Gen 2:17] The sins you commit earn the wages of death, "For the wages of sin is death." [Rom 6:23] Paul is speaking also to you when he said to the Colossians, "You . . . once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works." [1:21] And St. James warns, "Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God." [4:4] As God's enemy, you deserved His righteous wrath, as St. Paul also says, "We all once . . . were by nature children of wrath, just as the others." [Eph 2:3] And that is where you would stand, if God had not sent His Son.

Of course, God did send His Son. That is what you will celebrate this week as Christmas arrives. You were His enemy, and yet He sent His Son to earth, to become a man and die the death you had deserved. St. Paul put it this way: "God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. . . When we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son." [Rom 5:8,10]

Christ's death purchased your peace with God. By His death on the cross, Jesus abolished the enmity between you and God. The penalty of separation from God which you had deserved, Jesus suffered on your behalf. The loyal and perfect Son of the almighty King of creation stood in your place, and took your rebellion and its consequences upon Himself. He became your rebellion and sin, and the wrath and enmity of God fell on Him. That is why you now have peace with God, in spite of your sin.

Try and imagine what that means, for it is at the heart of the Gospel. Imagine a kingdom ruled by a good and powerful King, a fair King who always ruled with justice and the supreme good of His subjects in mind. In spite of this, His subjects rebelled against Him and sided with His enemy. When the good King sent his heralds to decree His forgiveness, the rebels killed them, tortured them, and slaughtered them. Then what does this gracious King do? He decrees that His subjects must be put to death, unless one would be willing to die in their place. His Son is willing. So He sends His Son, His only Son, the Prince and Heir of the entire kingdom, to die in the place of the rebellious subjects. And how do the subjects respond? They crucify His only Son. And the righteous King accepts His Son's death in the place of all those rebels. He forgives the rebels, and makes them His sons and princes and heirs.

This is the grace and forgiveness of God. This is what He has done for you! He has given you peace with the God against whom you had rebelled. And the price of this peace was His own death. The invincible Warrior, who could have instantly crushed His enemies, put an end to the warfare not by destroying you, but by laying down His own life for you. Now the warfare is ended; peace has been won. This is the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding. Peace has been granted to sinful men by holy God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

"The Lord is at hand!" Do you then quake with fear? No, indeed! Because He has granted you His peace, you have nothing to fear when He returns. Rather, you can look forward to it, for He has given you more than the peace of sins forgiven. He has also given you His rejoicing, His gentleness, His lack of anxiety, and His life of prayer. He gave you these things when He baptized you with water and clothed you with Himself. You rejoice in the Lord always because He always rejoices in you. You are gentle because He is gentle in you. The same is true of anxiety and prayer. He fills you with His Spirit, who comforts you in anxiety and who prays continually in you. Thus He has fulfilled the Law's directives in you.

Through Christ Jesus, through His blood and righteousness, you have peace with God. This peace, this forgiveness, will guard and keep you until He returns to take you into His glory. To ensure this, He continues to impart His forgiveness and peace through the means of grace. He stands among you, week after week, in the preaching of His Gospel and in His Body and Blood in this holy Supper. Here is where you find that peace which passes understanding. Peace is not found in military might nor in the political process, as the events of this past year have proven. Peace is not found in synodical or congregational alliances. Peace is not found in the frantic rush of yuletide. Peace is found right here, hidden in a wafer of bread and a sip of wine, where the Lord Himself stands among you to give you His peace. The peace of sins forgiven is found in this holy Supper, which is why the liturgy before, during, and after the Supper is full of references to peace, from the Pax Domini, "The peace of the Lord . . ." to the Benediction, ". . . and give you peace." Peace is found, even in the wilderness, wherever the Gospel is preached by the voices of God's picked men. For this and every sermon declares to you the peace of sins forgiven. That is why every sermon ends with the pronouncement of this peace . . .

The Peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Last Updated: 7/15/2008