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"So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!" (John 12:13). This Sunday is Palm Sunday when we will hear the word "Hosanna" in our readings, and in some of our hymns. This word was shouted by the crowds as Jesus rode into Jerusalem. But what does the word mean?
"Hosanna" is an old word, quite possibly originally a Hebrew word. We find the word used in the Old Testament especially in the Psalms. The original meaning is basically, "save us!" For example, Psalm 12:1 says, "Save [hosanna], O LORD, for the godly one is gone." Psalm 118:25 says, "Save us [hosanna] we pray, O Lord!" When Jesus rode into Jerusalem, the people likely had a similar sentiment in mind when shouting this word. They believed Jesus was the Messiah, the one anointed to save them, to rescue them, most likely from the oppressive hand of the Romans. They wanted a Messiah who would either restore the kingdom of Israel to its former glory ruled by a Jewish king, or perhaps they were hoping for the eternal reign of God on earth. Whatever their thoughts, they had the right idea. Jesus was indeed the one who was coming into Jerusalem to save them, but not from the Romans. He was coming to save them from their sins. In our Christian understanding, "Hosanna" is now more of a word of praise, than a word of pleading. Of course, we too recognize the need for a Messiah, one who will save us from our sins and we ask Jesus for that salvation. But we apply that word directly to Jesus because of what He has already done for us on the cross in dying for the sins of the world. On our lips, "Hosanna" is a shout of acclamation and adoration recognizing Jesus as the true and only Messiah. He has saved us, and we rejoice in His salvation with our cries of “Hosanna!” Last week I argued that worship isn't special. By that I mean that prayer, reading the Bible, and devotions should be part of our daily routine. Attending church on Sunday should be as routine as all the other things we do once a week. I also argued that worship is holy. Which means it is set apart; it looks different than all the other routine things we do during the week. It is sacred time, dedicated to the things of God, time to let God speak to and feed our bodies and souls, time to return to Him in repentance and faith, and to thank Him for His goodness.
There is another thing that worship is, it is important. As Lutherans we are taught repeatedly, and rightly, that we have nothing to do with our salvation; God does it all in the death and resurrection of Christ. That is true and glorious good news! It is the Lord who brings us to faith and the Lord who sustains our faith. However, we often neglect the second part of thinking about God's work, namely that God works through means. He doesn't zap faith into you. We don't hold to the idea of "once saved always saved." God has established mechanisms through which He works to give and strengthen faith. Those means are His Word and the Sacraments. To minimize or reject worship, is to minimize or reject the means through which God has promised to sustain your faith. So we see that worship isn't about what we do for God, but what He does to and for us. In his book, The Fire and the Staff, Pastor Klemet Preus has this to say about the Divine Service, "If the Divine Service is viewed primarily as our praising God, then you can do that just as well at home. In fact, once we have looked at the topic of vocation, you will see that we can serve God better in the world than in the church building. But if the service is understood as God giving us the forgiveness of sins, then you've got to be there. It is very possible that the low attendance at Sunday services seen in so many churches today is a reflection of how we define the service. If I am acting, then I can do it at another time. If God is acting, I better be there." Think about things you do once a week. Perhaps you go to the grocery store, do your laundry, clean the bathroom, take out the trash, or mow the lawn. These are just ordinary routine things. What about things you do every day? Things like taking a shower, brushing your teeth, going to work, making the bed, and eating come to mind. These activities are also simply routine. We may not even think about them sometimes, but they get done. They are just part of life.
Our Godly worship should be no different. It should be routine. By "worship" I mean worship in the wide sense, any way in which we are hearing from God through His Word or approaching God with our prayer, thanks, and praise. Going to church every week should be as routine as going to the grocery store or doing the laundry. Reading or listening to your Bible, having a devotion, and praying should be as routine as eating or brushing your teeth. Taking time to be with God in prayer and reading His word are just part of the Christian life. They should be ordinary for us. Perhaps the title of this article is a bit provocative. Worship isn't "special" in the sense that it isn't reserved for "special" days. Of course, certain church festivals may have special ceremonies or music on Sunday morning, but worship is to be an everyday/every week part of the Christian's life. Though worship should not be unusual for us, it is "holy." Which means it is set apart; it looks different than all the other routine things we do during the week. It is sacred time, dedicated to the things of God, time to let God speak to and feed our bodies and souls, time to return to Him in repentance and faith, and to thank Him for His goodness. We all know how difficult it can be to start a new habit and likewise how difficult it can be to break an old habit. If you've ever tried to get a child to change some habit one way or the other, you know the challenge. It is the same with our worship. It can be hard to start a habit like reading the Bible every day or prioritizing weekly worship. But it’s worth it, and when it becomes routine it just becomes a part of normal life. And what a blessing it is for worship to be ordinary! During the wilderness temptations, the devil said to Jesus as they looked out upon the nations of the earth, "All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me" (Matt 4:9). Now, that temptation seems ridiculous, right? Why would Jesus worship Satan? Explicit worshippers of Satan notwithstanding, who would ever think it's a good idea to worship the devil?
But the situation isn't that simple. Moses writes, "[The nations] stirred [Israel] to jealousy with strange gods; with abominations they provoked him to anger. They sacrificed to demons that were no gods, to gods they had never known, to new gods that had come recently, whom your fathers had never dreaded" (Deut. 32:16-17). This passage associates pagan gods with demons and warns God’s people not to be involved with idolatry. To worship false gods is to worship the devil and his demons. Paul takes up this idea in 1st Corinthians when discussing the sacrifices the pagans of his day made to false gods. "I imply what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons" (1 Cor. 10:20). Worship of Satan and demons can be quite subtle. Any worship directed toward something other than the true God is akin to worshipping the devil. When we take heed to voices in this world that run counter to what God's Word says, we are in danger of a sort of false worship, a worship of demons. One way to think about this is to consider Luther's explanation to the first commandment. He says, "We should fear, love, and trust in God above all things." Satan would rather you fear, love, and trust in anything other than God. Do you fear illness, your death, the death of a loved one, loneliness, persecution, or hard times more than God? Do you love your family, pleasure, free time, money, or safety more than God? Do you trust your politicians, doctor, financial planner, internet "wisdom", or yourself more than God? Satan wants you put any or all of these above God, and in so doing deny the true God. We all fall into such traps and succumb to such temptations. But unlike Satan's attitude toward us, we have a God who is loving, compassionate, and forgiving. We have Jesus who did not worship the devil, but followed only the will of His Father. And Jesus forgives our false allegiances and false worship to all who turn to Him in repentance. Thanks be to God. As we've been studying the book of Acts during Sunday morning Bible Study, we've read about the miracles performed by Jesus' apostles. Their miracles bear a striking similarity to Jesus' own miracles that we study in the Gospels. But there is one important difference. Jesus performed miracles by His own power. The apostles don't have the power of healing except by calling on the name of Jesus. They must rely on His power, and not their own.
But what is the point of the miracles in the first place? First, Jesus had a great desire to heal the brokenness that He saw around Him. As the crowds were coming to Jesus to be healed, we are told "He had compassion on them" (Matt. 14:14). God created a good and perfect world with no sickness, infirmity, or death. So, it makes sense that when the Creator is with His creatures, He would desire to restore some of that goodness amid so much suffering and evil. But that's not the main point of the miracles, either those performed by Jesus or by His apostles. Those Jesus healed even those he brought back from physical death, would one day die. We get a hint of the real purpose of the miracles throughout scripture, but especially in the book of John where the miracles are referred to as "signs." Signs point to something else. Road signs inform us of what's ahead. The miracles of Jesus point to Him as true God; only God Himself could do the miraculous things that Jesus did. So, if Jesus is God, it would make sense that the people listen to what He says. So, the signs, the miracles, are performed to convince the people that they should listen to Jesus, and later to His apostles. We see in Jesus' day that not all the people who saw miracles became disciples of Jesus. Some of them may have followed for a while, but then later fell away. Toward the end of His earthly ministry, the miracles tapered off, and so did the number of His followers. Many people just wanted to see more miracles and remained uninterested in Jesus' words. This phenomenon is reminiscent of the Israelites after they left Egypt as recorded in Exodus. They had seen the plagues, witnessed the Red Sea parting, yet still didn't trust in God, and doubted his faithfulness and power. But it is only God’s Word that can create true faith. Remember, miracles point to Jesus and His word. Faith in Jesus doesn't come from seeing miracles. "Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ" (Rom 10:17). You may have seen the inscription "ICXC NIKA" in church art or on pieces of church furniture in the chancel area. These letters are frequently found painted or engraved on church altars. But what does this mean?
The 8 letters are sort of an abbreviation (sometimes called a Christogram) that comes from Greek. The first two letters "IC" are the first and last letters of the name Jesus in Greek. "XC" are the first and last letters of the title Christ in Greek. (Christ is equivalent to the Hebrew word Messiah.) Finally, "NIKA" is a single Greek word from which the "Nike" athletic brand takes it's name. It simply means to overcome, conquer, or be victorious over. Put it all together and you get "Jesus Christ conquers," or if you prefer "Victory in (Jesus) Christ!" What or whom does Jesus Christ conquer? On the cross Christ conquered sin. In His resurrection, we see that Christ conquered death. Through His perfect obedience to God's law and by His death and resurrection, Christ has defeated Satan. These are three enemies against which we are powerless. Without Jesus we are slaves to sin, in fear of death, and prisoners of the devil. But Jesus defeats them all and gives us the benefits of His victory. Because of what Jesus has done, it is as if we have defeated sin, death, and the devil. Why have such symbols, like the ICXC NIKA, in the church? They serve as visual reminders. Why have Christ-focused art in the church, or crucifixes? Again, these are reminders for the faithful. Faith comes through hearing the Word of God, it's true. But things we see can reinforce God’s Word. God gave us the gift of sight. This sense can lead us away from a godly life when we look at things we should not, or when we covet things we do not have. But Godly images and symbols can remind us of heavenly things, of what Jesus has done for us, and who He is. So, when we see the ICXC NIKA, we are reminded that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, and He is victorious over all our enemies. "The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!"
“Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” There is perhaps no more concise, compact, beautiful statement of who Jesus is than these words from John the Baptist. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Behold, Look, there, that person you see that man named Jesus of Nazareth, look at Him. He is by all appearances merely a man but He is much more than that. He is the lamb. Which is to say, He is the sacrifice. But not just any lamb not any sacrifice, not a lamb raised by a herdsman, but a lamb from God, the lamb of God, indeed this lamb is God. And He comes for a purpose. He comes to take away the sin of the world. All the world’s sin He will atone for, all of it, all at once, forever. Your sin, my sin, the sin of every man, woman, and child, that ever has lived or ever will, Jesus, the lamb of God, takes away that sin. John continues. “After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me.” John and Jesus are related by birth, cousins of some sort. John is roughly six months older than Jesus. Yet He says of Jesus, “He was before me.” John recognizes that Jesus is the eternal Son of God, begotten of the Father before all things were made. He is the first and the last, the Alpha and the Omega. All things were created through Him. Jesus is greater than every prophet, even John the Baptist, because every word the prophets spoke is a word from Jesus, for He is the Word made flesh. “I myself did not know him, but for this purpose I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel”, says John. John’s purpose is clear. He is but the forerunner. He is but the herald. He himself is not the light, but he bears witness to the light, the light that was coming into the world, Jesus Christ. John’s ministry has a singular purpose, to reveal Jesus as Israel’s Messiah and to reveal Him as the Savior of the nations. “And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God,” says John. And through John’s words recorded in Scripture, John reveals Jesus to us. John is a witness to us about who Jesus is and what He has done. Jesus is God’s eternal Son. He comes as the Lamb of God, to die on the cross for you, to take away your sin, to give you eternal life. "O Christ Thou lamb of God, that takest away the sin of the world, have mercy upon us." Click here to edSamuel, son of Elkanah and Hannah, was dedicated to God's service at a young age. He served at the tabernacle in Shiloh under Eli the priest (1 Sam. 1-2), ministering to the Lord. One day while Samuel was about His duties the voice of the Lord called to Him, "Samuel!" While neither Eli nor Samuel initially understood what was happening, eventually Eli realized it was the Lord calling to Samuel. After calling out to Samuel a fourth time, Samuel replied to the Lord's call, "Speak, for your servant hears" (1 Sam. 3:10). Some translation render Samuel's words as "Speak, for your servant is listening."
Samuel's response to the Lord, should be our response to the Lord. God desires to speak to us as well, regularly. It should be our constant desire to hear and listen. Of course, God speaks to us through His Word, the very words of Scripture. These are God's words to us. Whether we are reading His word or listening to it recorded or in person, God is speaking, and we are to do the hearing. Sometimes parents will make a distinction between whether their children "hear" them and whether they are "listening" to them. When we "hear," the sounds are coming into our ears and we may even perceive what the sounds are, but it's sort of a passive experience. "Listening" is more active. It includes hearing, but also includes acting upon what is heard. If our children are listening to us, they are acting upon what they hear us saying. It is the same with God's word. It is one thing to hear the word, to know what the words mean, to understand what is being said. It is another to listen and put God's word into practice. Samuel would show throughout his life that he not only heard the Lord but also listened to Him, carrying out God's instructions. Whenever we hear God's word, we should pray that His Spirit would give us hearts, minds, and wills to listen to Him, to actively believe what God is saying to us, and to seek to live according to His word.it. Click here to edNo this topic is not a month early. This coming Sunday marks the 1st Sunday in Advent which is the beginning of a new church year. So, Happy New Year!
Many people make New Year resolutions on January 1st, things like eating better, getting in shape, building something, trying to earn a promotion, etc. Such a practice can be good and beneficial. But what about New Church Year resolutions? What sorts of spiritual resolutions can you make? Here's a few ideas (in order of importance). 1. Prioritize regular church attendance. What is "regular" church attendance? Every week is ideal. If you're not there yet maybe try doubling your attendance, or shoot for twice a month. In the Divine Service we receive God's incredible gifts of His Word sung, proclaimed, and preached, and the Lord's Supper. 2. For parents of young children, get your children to church and Sunday School. 3. Commit to reading your Bible every day. There is a reading schedule in the newsletter and weekly word, as well as others online. Or just pick a book of the Bible and read through it at your own pace. Even 10 minutes a day is very beneficial! 4. Have daily devotions. Portals of Prayer are available at church, as well as Advent and Lenten devotions during those seasons. There are video and audio devotions available online as well. 5. Start attending Bible Study. We have Bible Study every Sunday morning at 11, women's Bible study on Tuesday's at 1:30, and men's Bible Study twice a month on Saturday mornings. If you have an idea for another midweek Bible study time/topic, please pass the idea along! 6. Listen to a Lutheran podcast. There's Issues Etc., The Word of the Lord Endures Forever, Sharper Iron, A Brief History of Power, and others. 7. Listen to Lutheran Public Radio.it. “Take care lest you forget the LORD your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes, which I command you today, lest, when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, who led you through the great and terrifying wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water, who brought you water out of the flinty rock, who fed you in the wilderness with manna that your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and test you, to do you good in the end. Beware lest you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.’ You shall remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day." Deuteronomy 8:11-18.
These words were spoken by Moses to God's people as they were about to enter the promised land. It had been a hard 40 years in the wilderness, but now the promise of rest in the land of Canaan was within sight. This would be a prosperous place for them to live. God had promised to drive out all their enemies from the land and settle them in towns and cities. They would have wealth in silver and gold, flocks and herds. But God knows there is a problem with us when we have plenty, and it is a problem about which he warned His people. The danger was that they would "forget the Lord." The danger was that they would start to look highly upon themselves, and not thank God. "Look at all the enemies we have defeated. Look at how successful we have been with our flocks and herds and with acquiring wealth for ourselves." This is an easy trap for any of us to fall into. Moses is reminding them that it is the Lord who brought them out of Egypt, cared for them in the wilderness, and is giving them this land. We must also remember that it is the Lord's hand that gives us all things, and He promises to continue to do that. Afterall, He even sent Jesus to die for our sins. "He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?" (Romans 8:32). As we give thanks this year, let us not be filled with generic feelings of thankfulness. Let us not focus on ourselves and what our hands have accomplished. Instead, let us "remember the LORD your God," and give Him all thanks and praise. |
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