Sermons

Joab, the commander of David’s army, lost his brother Asahel in the fighting against Abner. Without David’s permission, he called Abner back as he was returning home and killed him. David mourned and had the people walk behind the bier, yet he did not call Joab to account for his sin and left the judgment to God.

Joab had rendered David great service, but he grew proud, crediting what he had achieved to his own strength. Abner, too, made much of his part in setting Ish-bosheth on the throne, went so far as to threaten the king, and in the end was killed by Joab. Both men knew the will of God, yet went against it for the sake of their own selfish desires.

God used even Joab’s flawed abilities for David’s sake, but because Joab never repented, judgment came upon him in later years. David, by contrast, had the power to avenge himself, yet he obeyed and entrusted vengeance to God, and as a result he was established as king over a united kingdom. Wisdom lies in not treating God’s grace as one’s own, and in trusting God whatever may come.

When Peter heard Jesus foretell the cross and his resurrection, he held on to him and protested instead, and Jesus rebuked him, calling him Satan. Joab, too, had once served David at the risk of his own life, yet when his brother Asahel was killed by Abner, he was consumed by the desire for revenge and crossed over into betraying David.

Peter’s error lay in setting his mind not on the things of God but on the things of men. Joab, likewise, fell into the pride of believing that his own victories in battle had set David on the throne, and little by little he slid from an obedient servant into a man who put his own judgment first. Betrayal does not happen in a single moment; it is a slow corruption of exactly this kind.

The service and loyalty of God’s people are not for the sake of God and the church but for their own salvation, and so there is no reason for pride in them. Those who, like Joab, cannot let go of the urge to display their own righteousness will in the end forsake grace and bring about their own downfall. Only by repenting each day and obeying the Word can Christians enjoy the peace and blessing that no one can take away.

David asks Yahweh whether he may go up to Judah. Even after Saul’s death, he does not decide on his own, and he goes up only after receiving the answer to go to Hebron. The men of Judah welcome him and anoint him king.

There was a time when David, afraid of Saul, disobeyed the word telling him to go to Judah, and as a result he suffered the humiliation of having his family and his people taken from him. Without obedience, one takes a longer road around and in the end comes back to the same place. Even after becoming king, he praises the people of Jabesh Gilead, who took up Saul’s body, for repaying kindness, and he does not rejoice even when he sees his enemy’s suffering. In this his maturity is revealed.

Obeying and being faithful even in small things is the condition for reward. Obedience itself, more than the outcome, is gain, and the one who, like David, endures and leaves judgment to God is the one who is used in the end. God knows everything, even the sincerity that is hidden, and he makes such a person a child like ice-cold water on the day of harvest.

After David had won a great victory in the war against the Amalekites and was staying at Ziklag, an Amalekite young man came to him, held out Saul’s crown and bracelet, and lied that he had killed Saul. In fact, Saul had taken his own life to escape the shame of dying at the hands of foreigners, but the young man tried to use that death to win a reward from David. Far from rejoicing at the news, David judged him by his own mouth, which had testified that he had killed Yahweh’s anointed.

The young man judged David by his own standards, and so he wrongly thought he could deceive him. A person’s decisions cannot go beyond what that person has learned so far and who has shaped them, and because the young man did not truly know God or David’s faith, he did not realize that his lie would mean his death. Even though Saul’s death worked in David’s favor, David set his feelings aside and judged coolly according to God’s law, and that carefulness was the reason he was established as king of the united kingdom.

Out of a desire to prosper, the world tries to use God and his people, but a person’s words are that person, so a lie once spoken cannot be taken back. David did not avenge himself on his enemy but waited patiently until God would judge, and at the end of that patience he received the throne as his reward. Enjoying God’s grace without giving thanks and craving still more is the same sin as this young man’s, and the church must live relying on God alone, with the wisdom to repay the grace it has received.

Abraham is told to take the son he loves up a mountain and offer him there as a sacrifice. The son does not die; in his place lies an offering that has been provided instead. In later years a temple rises on that mountain, and on that same ground Jesus bears the cross.

Isaac was named before he was born, came into the world by a miracle, and alone inherited all that his father had. He carried up the mountain the wood that was his to bear, and he never left his father’s side. Jesus, too, was born in this way, was given all authority in heaven and on earth, and took up his own cross and climbed that mountain. As Isaac dug wells that kept people and livestock alive, so Jesus freely gave the water of life to all who thirst.

The life of God’s people leaves footprints that others are watching. If they stagger along, those who come behind take it that they may go the same way. To a church that has walked together for nineteen years came the word to go straight ahead, loving God and relying on him, with or without a pastor.

Just as children tell their mother what happened at school, Christians bring the joys and sorrows of each day to God in prayer. Paul, imprisoned and hindered in his preaching of the gospel, asks the believers to pray that he might proclaim it by other means.

A Christian’s life must be the same inside the church as outside it. Those outside cannot see Jesus for themselves, and so they judge Christ by what his people say and do. That is why the faithful are to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Wisdom alone turns into cunning; innocence alone is foolishly taken in.

Paul did not put himself forward but named his fellow workers, such as Tychicus and Onesimus, one by one, giving each his place. The work of the church is not achieved by the ability of a single person. It is when each one fulfills with care, from a humble place, the ministry they have received that God grants wisdom and fullness.

God desires that his people share his heart, loving one another and giving themselves to one another. The place for this is humility, with self no longer at the center. Just as Adam and Eve, ashamed because of their sin, covered themselves with fig leaves, people can never find satisfaction however hard they try to fill themselves.

God made garments of skin for them, appointed the garments of the priests, and clothed his people in the righteousness of Christ, revealing both his forgiveness and his holiness. Because Christians are covered by the blood of Jesus Christ, they must put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience, forgiving one another and bearing with one another.

Only a thankful heart allows the peace of Christ to rule within. When God’s people arm themselves with gentleness and humility, serving and forgiving one another in the home and in the church, they can live lives that are not put to shame before God.

When an unsightly quince is cut open, it releases a sweet scent. In the same way, when God hung the lowly Jesus on the cross, a pleasing fragrance spread through the whole world. Those who now carry that fragrance God cuts finely with the knife of suffering and lays down in sugar, as fruit is preserved, so that they will not spoil.

Christians live in the world, yet they must set their hope on the things above. God does answer when his people ask for material needs and for peace, but these are not ends in themselves. They are granted as means for extending the Kingdom of God. Those whose hearts are fixed on earthly things are enemies of Christ, and their citizenship is not in heaven.

Salvation is not reserved for a privileged few. It has been given without distinction to all who believe in Christ. Yet if they do not put to death what is earthly in them, sexual immorality and greed, and instead put on the old self again, it will not be easy for them to be rescued. If they are to enjoy peace and rest beside Christ when he returns, they must break with sin now, at this very moment, and live with their hearts set on the things above.

Those who sell counterfeit handbags never disappear, and neither do those who buy them. Vanity, a sense of inferiority and the fear of falling behind drive people to follow one another like a flock of sheep, and they cannot break free of that pattern on their own.

A poor choice among the things of this world costs no more than money. But exchange the truth for a counterfeit, and there is no chance to turn back. Satan does not rewrite the Bible wholesale; he gives a slight twist to just a part of the Word and passes it on, so those who do not know Christ cannot tell the difference and are taken in.

Jesus Christ fulfilled the whole of the law on the cross, and the new covenant sealed in his blood can be annulled by no one. There is therefore no need to take hold again of the basic principles of the world, such as feast days, the Sabbath or asceticism. Those who stand firm in Christ are not shaken, however plausible the words of false teachers may sound.

The sermon opens with a gift sent to Ukraine. There is no need to know exactly how those who receive help feel; it is enough to wish them some ease. Giving, it says, is not only a matter of money but takes in buying someone a cup of coffee, even the steps taken on the way to church. From there it turns to the story of a man who, while himself in prison, prayed for believers he had never seen.

Intercessory prayer, the sermon says, lets others share a hardship that would otherwise be borne alone, and it has the power to bring Satan’s schemes to nothing. Only as God’s people are united in love do they move toward knowing Christ, and a cult leader who sets himself up as God is a fraud — on this the sermon is blunt. Wisdom and knowledge do not come by human effort; the Holy Spirit must open them.

The church, it warns, has been losing hold of the truth in trying to keep step with the world, and only those who know the Word will stand firm against false gospels and heresy. It urges the congregation to put away the basic principles of this world, rely on God alone, and see their calling through to the end.

Judas Iscariot, who was entrusted with the money, followed Jesus because he had seen his power. But as the hardship went on, he began to sit in judgment on the Lord’s words, and in the end, thinking that no reward would come back to him, he sold Jesus.

Animal sacrifices had to be offered again each time someone sinned, but Jesus Christ gave his own body once for all as the atoning sacrifice. The very one who had said that eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would bring death went to the cross and died to take that word away himself. “It is finished” is the declaration that sinners have been set free from death.

The church is the body of Jesus, and his people are its members. Whoever weighs the grace of God by the values of the world can only come to the same end as Judas Iscariot. Remembering the grace received, giving thanks, and quietly bearing the work entrusted to each one in their own place: this is the life of those reconciled to God.

Colossae was a city where idol worship and philosophy were tangled together, and false teachers had come in among the church there, putting works ahead of faith and enlightenment ahead of the cross of Jesus Christ. To this church, whose people he had never met, the apostle Paul writes from prison. He opens by saying that he became an apostle not by his own will but by God’s choosing.

The dominion of trespasses is the power of sin, of death and of Satan. Satan seeks to blind people’s minds and hide the light of Christ, yet he cannot hold that light back. Every person is born a slave of Satan, but the moment someone hears the gospel and receives it, they are transferred into the Kingdom of his beloved Son. The salvation God’s people have received is unlike the blessings of this world, and it cannot be traded for anything in the world.

Christians do not live the life of faith in order to gain the world’s blessings; the salvation God has given is already enough on its own. Those who have learned the Word must pass it on to the next person exactly as they were taught it, and only when the life of the one who brings it is pure does that Word become grace. Salvation is not something another keeps safe on their behalf; it is something the faithful hold fast by fighting for it in Christ.