Sermon: The Transfiguration of Our Lord.2011

Text: Matthew 17.1-9
Date: 3.6.2011

Listen to this sermon here.

This is my beloved Son...

Listen to Him.

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

The Festival of the Transfiguration of Our Lord marks the end of the Epiphany Season and so also the end of the Time of Christmas, as called in the Church Year. The reason it is placed at the end: the Transfiguration is the most dramatic Epiphany, or revealing, of our Lord Jesus. The point of the Transfiguration, and the whole point of Epiphany, actually the whole point of the Time of Christmas (beginning way back in Advent), is that Jesus is God. Our life together here is founded upon and centered in this very truth. It is no wonder than that every single one of the 101 days of Christmas Time this year, they are focused upon this One truth, teaching us who Jesus is, that He is God, / so that, (as we move on in the Church Year) every single one of the 102 days of Easter Time can teach us what our God Jesus has done for us and for our salvation.

Sermon: Epiphany 5.2011

Text: Matthew 5:13-20
Date: 2.6.2011

I have not come to abolish the Law or the Prophets,

but to fulfill them.

In the name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

And Jesus continues preaching to his disciples: “you all are the salt of the earth...You all are the light of the world.” You are these things because I am these things in and through you. A saying not unlike what preceded it in this sermon, Jesus just uses some illustrations now.

“You all are the salt of the earth, but if the salt might be made dull [or lose it's saltiness], with what will it be made salty? It is good for nothing more except being cast outside and trampled down under men.”

Salt, a preservative and a preventative, also adding flavor to common nourishment. A hard analogy, for salt is salty, that's just the way it is; it can't be anything else and if it is to remain salt, then it can't ever lose it's saltiness. On the other hand, if salt does somehow cease to be salty then surely it is no longer salt. It's completely improbable then, that there would be salt-less salt. And that's Jesus' point. I'll say it another way, to explain the illustration: A Christian has Christ, nothing else makes Him a Christian except Christ, and if he is to remain a Christian, he can't ever lose Christ. If a Christian does lose Christ, then surely he is no longer a Christian. It's completely improbable, no what's more it's completely impossible then, that there would be a Christ-less Christian.

Sermon: The Baptism of Our Lord.2011

Text: Matthew 3.13-17
Date: 2011.1.9

This One is My Beloved Son,

in whom I am well pleased

In the name of the Father of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“And answering Jesus said unto [John], 'Permit it now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.' Then he permitted him.”

For thus it is fitting. It is suitable. It is becoming of Jesus and John that this fulfillment of righteousness be done in a certain way. Jesus has come, has been born, and in Jesus, the Christ has come, has been born. This is fulfillment in itself; but that is not all. There is more to be fulfilled, more to be revealed, more to do.