Listen to the sermon here.
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
The text that serves as the foundation for our sermon for today is these words of St. Paul at the beginning of our Epistle reading, “Since you are eager for manifestations of the Spirit, strive to excel in building up the church” (1 Corinthians 14:12).
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus,
When we talk about church, when we talk about the church, we often, and rightly so, talk about the church as Christ’s body. We talk about the church as what Christ does. And this is absolutely right. Because it isn’t about us. It’s not about what we do. The church is about what Christ has done for us, how Christ has given Himself to suffer and to die for us so that we may have the forgiveness of sins. And yet, St. Paul says, “Since you are eager for manifestations of the Spirit, strive to excel in building up the church”. If the church is what God does, well then how should we strive to build up the church? Why should we strive to build up the church? Because God works through people. We strive to build up the church because God works through us. Today in our readings we learn that God has given us gifts so that we may work to build up His body, the Church.
Let us pray: Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we give You thanks that although we are sinful, although we are of this flesh, You have given Your Son to suffer and to die for us, so that all we who are part of His body may be the Church called by You through the waters of Holy Baptism. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer, that we may always have the sure and certain comfort that since You have given Your Son to die for us, we too can go and work to build up the Church, not trying to gain salvation by it but as ones who have been saved. It’s through Your Son’s name that we pray. Amen.
We who are by nature sinful and unclean, we don’t use our lives, at least not according to our sinful nature, to build one another up. We don’t use our lives to strengthen one another. After all, it’s not as much fun. It’s not as much fun to go and say, “Oh, good job”, as it is to be, to go behind someone’s back and go, “Man, did you see how bad of a job they actually did?” We don’t like building one another up. And it makes sense. Because in this sinful world, it’s a dog-eat-dog world. If you’re worried about the person in last place and helping them get ahead, well then, you’re the most likely to be attacked. If you’re worried about others, then you’ve left yourself weak. We even see this in the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve sin, and does Adam protect his wife, take responsibility for the sin? Nope. “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she made me eat.” He tries to pass the puck. Tries to throw his wife under the bus. And he also tries to throw God under the bus. And Eve, what does she do? “The serpent tempted me and I ate.” Yeah. We look at our own sinful flesh. We see that we don’t like building one another up. We don’t like encouraging one another. We have a whole list of commandments specifically regarding our interactions with our neighbor. Honor our parents and other authorities? It’s much more fun and easy to complain about those in authority over us, to complain about the government, to complain about our bosses, to complain about those than it is for us to honor them, serve and obey them, love and cherish them. It’s much more fun and easy to say to our neighbor, “Oh what a fool you are”, which Jesus says that’s akin to murder. It’s much more easy to speak poorly of our neighbor than it is to explain everything in the kindest way. Our own sinful flesh doesn’t want to build one another up. It wants to tear one another down so that we can destroy one another. And you know where this is the most prevalent? You know where this happens more than any place else? Right here, in the church. Right here in God’s holy house is where it seems that people are the quickest to gossip about others. Right here in what’s supposed to be God’s holy house is where people seem to be the quickest to talk poorly about one another, to not put the best constructions on things, to be so set on their own sinful ways that they’re not willing to build one another up, to reach out to one another. To be so set on their own sinful ways that they’d rather complain and tear one another down. They’d rather not help. “Oh, I can’t go to be part of the ladies group because man, I just don’t get along with that one person there.” “Oh, I don’t think I’m going to give my offering this month because the pastor said something that made me a little bit upset.” Or whatever it may be. We are so quick in the church to tear one another down.
And God knew this. He knew our own sinful flesh. He knew that we would be this way. And yet He came into this flesh for that purpose. He took on our mortal flesh for that purpose. Jesus got into a boat and He taught the crowds. And then He told Peter, Simon, He said, “Cast down your nets”. Simon’s thinking, “You’re crazy, but okay”. He says it. He goes, “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing!” Fishing was done at night, when the fish were close to the surface, you could get a good catch. “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word.” And they let down the nets and it’s such a great catch of fish that the nets begin to break, that both boats begin to sink. Jesus calls the disciples, He calls Simon, calls James and John, to follow Him to be His disciples. The rivalry would continue among the twelve. We know that throughout the Gospels, they tend to like to argue about who’s the greatest. James and John even go up to Jesus and ask him to be set at his right and at his left. And Jesus says, “That’s not mine to give”. And the 10 make fun of them, ridicule them. Even at the upper room, Simon Peter would tell Jesus, “Even though all the rest of them will fall away, I’m better than them. I will never fall away!” We know the rest of the story. Jesus tells him before the cross twice, he will betray him three times, and Peter does exactly that, deny him three times. And yet Jesus, still in His love for all of His creation, gave that which was the most precious, His very life on the cross, to suffer and to die for you and for me. To suffer and shed his blood for you and for me, for sinners that we are, so that you and I could have the complete and absolute forgiveness of sins. So that even our tearing down of one another would be forgiven. So that even the times that we try to rip one another apart, God forgives that. God forgives even that.
But as ones who are forgiven, we are called to not continue in our old sinful ways. As members of God’s church. of some members of Christ’s body, we are called not to continue in the sinful paths in which we walked, but to walk in the newness of life. We are called to walk in Christ’s footsteps, to do as Christ did, to strive to excel in building up the church. How do we do that? Well, it begins right here in the Divine Service. As the writer of the Hebrews says, “Do not neglect to meet together as is the habit of some”. The purpose for that is for building up the body of Christ. The way that we begin with building up the body of Christ is right here in the Divine Service, where we come together as the body of Christ, and we together, as a congregation, hear God’s word read and proclaimed. As a congregation, we receive the forgiveness of sins renewing us in our baptismal grace. As a congregation, we come and partake of Christ’s body and blood in Communion, and that fellowship with one another, kneeling at the altar, partaking of what God has given us in His Son’s down on the cross. It begins right here. It continues in all the fellowship opportunities that we have as a church. Whether it’s after church, whether that’s special events, whether that’s Bible study, it comes from that. Again, building up one another in the body of Christ. And then it comes from using the gifts that God has given us so that we can do exactly that. We aren’t all given the same gifts. If we were, it’d be quite boring. Some are given the ability to encourage one another. Others are given financial soundness that they can financially help the church. Others are given a whole variety of talents. And we use those talents. We use those talents to build up the church, to build up the body of Christ. Using the gifts that God has given us. And yeah, as we look at ourselves, like Isaiah, we think, “Oh, what can God do through me? I am a sinful man. I am a man of unclean lips”. God, just as he cleansed Isaiah, cleanses you. Not by touching a burning coal to your lips, but through the words of absolution. So that then having been cleansed, when God calls us, we can go, “Here I am. Send me.” Are we always going to perfectly build up the body of Christ? Nope. We’re still sinners. We still are in this weak mortal flesh. Thanks be to God then, that the forgiveness that He won for us on the cross isn’t given to us just once. It’s given to us every time we come and repent of our sins. The forgiveness of sins is here. And through that forgiveness we are again strengthened to build up the church. Through that forgiveness we are again strengthened to build one another up as the body of Christ.
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus, what gifts has God given you? What strengths, what talents, what abilities has God given to you? I know each and every one of you has a whole variety of talents that God has given you. If you have to think of what they are, find me. We’ll figure it out. Those talents that God has given me, how can you use those to build up the body of Christ? How can you use those gifts that God has given you to build up Christ’s church, to encourage and strengthen one another? May God so enable you to use the gifts that He has given you to build up His church, not trying to gain salvation by what you have done, by what you are doing, but out of thankfulness and joy for what God has done for you in His Son’s death on the cross. Amen.
May the peace with God when surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
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