Tag Archives: Generosity

Learning – Sermon on Luke 6:36-42 for the Fourth Sunday after Trinity

Luke 6:36–42

36 “Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.

37 “Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven; 38 give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you.”

39 He also told them a parable: “Can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit? 40 A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher. 41 Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 42 How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take out the speck that is in your eye,’ when you yourself do not see the log that is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take out the speck that is in your brother’s eye.”

In the name of Jesus. Amen.

Certain words and phrases get used so often that we easily forget what they actually mean. In Christian circles, one of those words is ‘disciple.’ What does ‘disciple’ mean? Honestly, it can mean a lot of things. Maybe you hear that word and think of the twelve guys Jesus called to follow Him. That’s good. They were the twelve disciples. It also isn’t wrong to understand ‘disciple’ as an alternate term for ‘Christian.’ Totally legit. There are all sorts of books, podcasts, videos, and ministries today that talk about Christian ‘discipleship’ and they basically use that term to refer to a journey of spiritual growth. Sure, that’s fine too. But what is a disciple?

The Greek word that gets translated as ‘disciple’ simply means ‘one who learns from another,’ so let’s shorten that to this – a disciple is a ‘learner.’ So, when Jesus says in Jn. 8:31, “If you abide in My Word, you are truly My disciples,” He is telling us to keep learning from Him as we read, hear, and confess the Scriptures. When Jesus says in Jn. 13:35, “By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another,” He is saying the world will have evidence that we have learned and are learning from Him by our love for one another (1 Jn. 2:3, 3:23).

Well, today Jesus gives us a hint at how long our training as His disciples and learners will be. He says to us, “A disciple/learner is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher”(Lk. 6:40). Your education and learning from Jesus will last until you are like Him. So, don’t worry about throwing a graduation party. God Himself will throw one for you in the Resurrection and the life of the world to come. 

This Gospel reading is from what is called Jesus’ “Sermon on the Plain,” and He teaches some hard and difficult lessons for us learners, disciples, and Christians. These lessons are all intended to make us like Him. “Be merciful even as your Father is merciful. Judge not. Condemn not. And give abundantly.” But before we get into these lessons, I’d like to briefly point out that Jesus has been teaching us those same lessons today through His Word in our liturgy even though you might not realize it.

There’s a great analogy for this in the movie “The Karate Kid,” which is about a high school-aged boy, Daniel, who moved to a new town where he has no friends. He’s an outsider who keeps getting beat up by a bunch bullies. He asks Mr. Miyagi, the handyman for his apartment complex, to teach him karate so he can defend himself. So, Mr. Miyagi tells him to show up early. Daniel arrives, and Miyagi has him wax all of his vintage cars with a certain technique – “Wax on. Wax off. Breathe in through nose, out through mouth. Wax on. Wax off.” Daniel spends the whole day waxing those cars, and Miyagi tells him to come back the next day and has Daniel, “Sand the floor,” with specific motions and breathing. Again, it takes Daniel the whole day to sand the floor. The next day, it was, “Paint the fence.” The fourth day, “Paint the house.” Daniel finishes after sunset and is fed up. He yells that he quits and starts to storm off in anger and frustration because he been worked to the bone but hasn’t learned any karate.

Miyagi calls him back and tells Daniel, “Show me wax on, wax off. Show me sand the floor,” and the other moves. Then Miyagi, without any warning, starts throwing punches at Daniel, and each of those moves are different ways to block the punches. Finally, Miyagi goes berserk throwing all these punches and kicks at Daniel, and he blocks all of them using the moves he instinctively learned doing those tasks. Miyagi stops and bows. Daniel suddenly realizes that he’d been learning karate the whole time he was waxing, sanding, and painting. Our liturgy is doing the same thing Miyagi was doing for Daniel – it teaches us the major lessons we need to train our spiritual instincts as learners and disciples of Jesus.

Today, Jesus teaches us, “Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. Judge not. Condemn not.” We come here each Sunday and confess our sins then sing, “O God the Father in heaven; O God the Son, Redeemer of the world; O God the Holy Ghost, true Comforter, have mercy upon us.” And then, we hear the absolution. That is training us to be merciful, even as our Father is merciful. It might feel like we’re just mindlessly reciting or singing the same words week after week, but we are learning how God is merciful to us so we can be merciful to others.

Even if we are just going through the motions without much thought or sincerity, God is still teaching us how merciful He is by proclaiming His forgiveness. The liturgy is training us so when people sin against us and hurt us and then offer insincere, half-hearted apologies, we remember how God has forgiven us even when we were insincere and didn’t feel particularly guilty. 

The liturgy trains our spiritual instincts beyond the lessons Jesus teaches in this text. We hear God’s Word and learn to say it back to Him and to the world when we confess our faith using the Creeds. The liturgy teaches us how to pray in good times and in bad times. Our liturgy and hymns teach us who God is and how He is toward us to strengthen our faith toward Him and our love toward one another. When our service closes with the benediction and doxology, we are reminded that we have been in God’s gracious presence, and He dismisses us with His abundant blessings as we go from this place singing His praise.

Yes, of course, there are going to be weeks where we might simply be going through the words and actions of the liturgy. That’s going to happen. But I would strongly encourage you to do your best each week to slow down, pay attention, think about what you are doing, and consider why we are doing what we are doing. God, through His Word in our liturgy, is working on you to prepare you for the spiritual battles you face throughout your life.

I could go on and on about the different things Jesus uses in the liturgy to teach us, but I want to close with one more from today’s text. In this text, Jesus teaches us, “Give abundantly.” We bring our tithes and offerings to God, we put them into the plate, and God showers the gifts of His Word and teaching on us. He gives us His mercy and grace. He gives us a family of brothers and sisters in Christ. He gives us His full attention as we pray and ask for His help and His blessing. God gives and gives and gives so that our lap is overflowing.

Dear saints, you cannot out-give God. Because of what Jesus has done for you, because He has suffered, shed His blood, and died for you, you have received abundant, overflowing, eternal treasures. God has done that for you throughout your entire life. He has done it today. And, if Christ tarries, He will be here to do that again for you next week as well. God’s giving knows no end. Because of God’s mercy freely given to you, you also can be merciful and giving toward others. God even invites you to test Him in this. In Malachi 3:6-12, God says, “Bring in the full tithe and watch what I will do. I will open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.”

Dear saints, you have had a forest of logs removed from your eye by the grace of God given because of Christ. May Christ continually teach us this through His Word, and may we be humble enough to continually learn from Him as we are made to be merciful and giving like He is. Amen.

The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Feast & Famine – Sermon on Luke 16:19-31 for the First Sunday after Trinity

Luke 16:19–31

19 “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. 20 And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, 21 who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried, 23 and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. 24 And he called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish. 26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.’ 27 And he said, ‘Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father’s house— 28 for I have five brothers—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.’ 29 But Abraham said, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 And he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ 31 He said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.’ ”

In the name of Jesus. Amen.

Psalm 37:16 says, “Better is the little that the righteous has than the abundance of many wicked” (see also Pro. 15:16).

Today, Jesus puts before us two men. One is fabulously rich, the other pitifully poor. One wears royal clothes, the other painful sores. One feasts sumptuously every day, the other craves crumbs. Jesus makes sure to highlight these major differences between the two men, but Jesus also makes sure that we know what they have in common.

First and most obviously, both die. Both face an eternal existence after death. And that existence is something that all the powers of this world have no influence to change or control. After his death, the rich man is no longer rich, and he is powerless to modify that. After his death, Lazarus is no longer poor. He has eternal riches and gifts that he didn’t earn and cannot be taken away.

But there is something else that these two men have in common with one another. Both men are passive. In other words, things happen to them. Now, this can be easy to miss, but once you see it you can’t ignore it.

To see it, let’s start with Lazarus. Jesus says that Lazarus is located at the rich man’s gate. But notice how Lazarus gets there. Jesus says that Lazarus is laid there. In other words, someone or something puts him there. Lazarus doesn’t intentionally go to the rich man’s gate day after day after day. If you were a destitute beggar but could move on your own, you’d go places where you would get help. And it would make sense to go to a rich man’s gate, but if you saw that rich dude feasting every day and he never gave you crumbs that fell from his table, you’d probably move somewhere else and hope to get noticed and helped in that new location. So, Jesus is clear that Lazarus is laid there (v. 20), but Jesus doesn’t say exactly who put Lazarus there, so let’s keep investigating.

Jesus says that the dogs came and licked Lazarus’ sores. Where did those dogs come from? They weren’t people’s personal pets that are sent to Lazarus. They were likely wild dogs. Psalm 50:10 says that every beast and the cattle on a thousand hills belong to God. Again, it isn’t directly stated that God sent the dogs. So, let’s keep looking.

When Lazarus dies, what happens? Jesus says that the angels are standing there, waiting to carry him to heaven. Now, there’s an important clue. Psalm 103:20 says that the angels are the mighty ones who obey God’s Word. Here, these angels are commanded to not only escort Lazarus to heaven, they are also the ones who carry him there. They wait for God’s command and direction. And in God’s timing, those angels carry Lazarus to heaven but not one moment before God decides.

Now, if God is in total, complete control of the end of Lazarus’ life, it would make sense that God was in control of everything leading up to that as well. No sparrow falls to the ground without God knowing it. Scripture promises that the hairs of your head are numbered (Mt. 10:29-31). The Bible is clear that God was in control of everything happening to Lazarus during his entire life (Ps. 139). God was governing all of his steps and movements. So, Lazarus, poor and sick though he was, was being taken care of by God throughout his entire life. God was the one who laid him at the rich man’s gate. God sent the dogs to comfort him by licking his sores. God sent the angels to carry him to heaven. And after he dies, God comforts Lazarus in paradise. Lazarus is passive. Things happen to him at God’s direction.

Now, consider the rich man. When Abraham is responding to the rich man’s request for Lazarus to give him a drop of water (more on that in a bit), Abraham says, “Remember that you in your lifetime received your good things” (Lk. 16:25). That tells us a lot about the rich man and his riches. All the things he enjoyed in his lifetime were given to him as gifts. His royal, purple clothes were a gift. His sumptuous feasts, a gift. His house and gate, a gift. Even the beggar Lazarus lying at his gate was a gift from God. Lazarus was a God-given opportunity for the rich man to share all the good things he received. But the rich man didn’t see any of his blessings as a gift. By all appearances, the rich man imagined those gifts were all things that he had earned, and he saw Lazarus as an inconvenient nuisance. But from heaven’s perspective, they were all gifts that were given.

That doesn’t mean that the rich man wasn’t a hard worker or a savvy investor. What it means is that He was a recipient of all the good things he enjoyed during his life. God gave it all. Everything he had – even the things he had earned – was given to him by God. But this rich man didn’t receive them as God’s good gifts. Instead, he saw everything revolving around him. If it was good, it was for his own pleasure and use. If it was inconvenient – like a beggar at his gate, it was a hurdle to his pleasure. He never gave thanks to God for the gifts, so he never thought to share the gifts God had given to him with others. He was foolish in his thinking and life (Ro. 1:21-22). All of this meant that he couldn’t enjoy the gifts he had been given. Even his feasting was a famine because he received it in isolation. He didn’t share his bounty with others.

In the end, it didn’t matter how little Lazarus had, and it didn’t matter how much the rich man had. What mattered was faith. Lazarus had faith that was credited to him as righteousness (Gen. 15:6). The rich man didn’t have faith, and when he stood before God to be judged (Heb. 9:27), he lacked the righteousness God demands (Mt. 5:20).

Now, we might feel sorry for the rich man as he’s suffering in hell. It is a pitiful thing to see someone think that a drop of water is merciful. And we certainly don’t want anyone to go to eternal condemnation. But the rich man’s torment doesn’t lead him to repentance. Look at how the rich man acts in hell. It doesn’t seem like the rich man has changed at all. He doesn’t ask to leave hell. He’d rather have Lazarus leave his comfort. Even in torment, the rich man is bossing people around. He still doesn’t talk to Lazarus; instead, he tries to tell Abraham what to do. The rich man thinks it is unfair that he is in hell. Underlying his desire to have Lazarus rise from the dead and warn his brothers is an attitude that arrogantly says that he knows better how to evangelize unbelievers. The rich man is basically saying, “If someone rises from the dead, then there will be a lot more people in heaven and fewer in hell. If I had seen someone rise from the dead, I wouldn’t be here.”

But in the end, the rich man hadn’t listened to the Scriptures. He hadn’t believed God’s Word. He hadn’t repented. He hadn’t believed in God’s mercy. Instead, he neglected God’s Word, and because of that, he was poor. On the other hand, Lazarus had the eternal treasure of God’s Word which made him rich – even in his earthly poverty. In Lazarus, we see the truth of what Pro. 15:15 says, “All the days of the afflicted are evil, but the cheerful of heart has a continual feast.”

Now, where does this leave us? We aren’t as wealthy as the rich man, and we aren’t as poor and destitute as Lazarus. All of us are somewhere in the middle, but that doesn’t change the fact that everything we have – whether it is a feast or a famine – is given to us from the hand of God.

God has given you two hands with two palms which are created to receive the things that God gives. And those hands have five fingers with space between them, which allows the good gifts of God fall through your hands to others. Because He is the Creator of all things, God has an infinite supply of gifts to give to you. He gives you everything freely, and He desires that you receive it as a gift so you don’t clutch at it and try to keep it for yourself. You, dear saints, are a conduit that receives from God and passes His bounty on to others. Proverbs 19:17 says, “Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his deed.”

Most importantly, you were poor miserable sinners. But Jesus saw you in your poverty. He left His feasting and became poor for your sake so you, through His poverty, would become rich (2 Cor. 8:9). Christ has come to give His own Body and Blood unto death for your sake. Now, He is risen forever and invites you not to have just some crumbs that fall from His plate. He invites you to have a seat at His table. Leave the famine of your sin and greed. Come and feast in His presence. Amen.

The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.