LWML Sunday-St. John 3:16 & St. John 17:1-3, 6-8, 20-26

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son,+ and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

‘ “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”’ (St. Jn. 3:16)

It is this love of God given to you and I through the Son, Jesus, that we see poured out in the only prayer of Jesus that is recorded for our knowledge. This is a prayer like the Lord’s Prayer (St. Mt. 6:9-15), which gives us a form in which to pray.

Like the Lord’s Prayer, we see in our reading from chapter seventeen what it is we are to pray for. We also see Jesus praying the Lord’s Prayer in a more drawn out fashion. He here expands on each of the petitions for us.

An illustration for both of these passages of Christ’s words comes to us as follows. One rainy Sunday afternoon, a father was babysitting his children and had the task of keeping them entertained. He assigned a specific task to each child.

To keep his ten-year old son occupied; the father had torn a full-page map from out of a magazine, cut it into small pieces, and told his son to reassemble it. To his father’s amazement, this son presented him with the completed puzzle in just a few minutes. I would expect he had intended this to occupy the entire afternoon and was shocked when, with so many small pieces, the son returned so quickly. After all, many adults cannot complete even a familiar picture when it is cut up as a jigsaw puzzle usually is.

“How did you do it?” he asked. “It was easy,” the boy replied. “At first, when I tried to fit together all those little lines and dots and the small print on the map, it looked like an impossible job. Then I saw part of a man’s face on the back of one of the pieces. So I turned the pieces over, and when I got the man together, the United States took care of itself.” Depending on the magazine, that man may have been Jesus. Unfortunately for us, the majority of magazines do not seem to include anything about our Christian faith on their pages, much less the image of mankind’s Savior.

This small story illustrates for us that the jigsaw puzzle of this life makes sense and we get it all together when we live our life against the background of Christ. This is to say, faith in Christ as Redeemer and Lord makes all the pieces fit.[1]

As Jesus describes in the verses of chapter seventeen His prayer and plans for His Apostles and other later disciples and believers, we see the love described in St. John 3:16 as it plays out in our own lives. Jesus is again illustrating His own earlier words for us with this High Priestly Prayer.

In all of our lives Jesus wishes for us as His followers that we would behave in this life with mercy. Those of us who have the jigsaw of life put together through our focus on our Savior this becomes easy. We are given power through the Holy Spirit to live a life of love to those around us. This includes both our family and friends, but also our enemies. As we have been shown mercy by our Father through Jesus, so also do we show mercy to our neighbors. Those whom we meet in our daily life.

‘After Jesus had said this, He looked toward heaven and prayed: “Father, the time has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son may glorify You. For You granted Him authority over all people that He might give eternal life to all those You have given Him. Now this is eternal life: that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent.”’ (St. Jn. 17:1-3)

Those first statements of Jesus made in this prayer, that the Father would glorify Him, is the only petition referring to Jesus. The rest of this long prayer is for you and for me and for the Apostles as they, and we, spread the word to a lost world. Jesus is not simply asking for strength to face His passion and the death of the cross, but that He would glorify the Father in all of those actions. Also and especially that in the resurrection and ascension that “Your Son may glorify You.”

The third verse in this chapter, this is a restatement of what Jesus had said to Nicodemus in 3:16: ‘"Now this is eternal life: that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent.”’ (V. 3) The continuing nature of this statement of Jesus, ‘that they may know You’, is better expressed by the Greek text. For there it tells us that Jesus is trying to say something like this: “should keep on knowing”.

As Jesus says here, knowledge of the only true God is through Jesus Christ (see also, 14:6-9).

‘“I have revealed You to those whom You gave Me out of the world. They were Yours; You gave them to Me and they have obeyed Your word. Now they know that everything You have given Me comes from You. For I gave them the words You gave Me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from You, and they believed that You sent Me.”’ (Vv. 6-8)

The word Jesus uses here, translated as “revealed”, is another way of saying that He has accomplished everything. Jesus is speaking of in the future tense here the same thing He will say from the cross later, “It is finished!” As the disciples listen in, Jesus is praying here of His glorification, His crucifixion, as if it has already been completed.

It is interesting to note how Jesus refers to His Apostles here. The same terminology applies to you and me as well. Jesus refers to these men as the Father’s gift to Him. These fishermen and a tax-gatherer and others were not won over by clever arguments. Jesus did not talk them into the faith. Instead, Jesus tells us here that we all as Christians are the Father’s gift to Him. Most especially as shown in this prayer it is the eleven. As you will note if you read it again this evening, and I recommend you do, Judas is not present for this High Priestly Prayer of Jesus, he left earlier in the evening (13:2-3; 18:3-11).

Jesus then goes on to tell us that His disciples now know everything that the Father had given Him to tell them. They knew everything and yet, as we see from the last chapter of St. Luke, these men did not yet understand all that Jesus had taught them. Though, they did understand more than they are sometimes given credit for. At this point though, there were certain things, as John notes periodically in this Gospel, which these eleven men did not understand until after the resurrection. Yet, they still knew these things by this point, on the night that Jesus was to be betrayed.

These men, after all, had been given the words the Father gave to Jesus to give to the Apostles. With the passing of the Transfiguration, as well as other proofs, these men knew with certainty that Jesus had come from the Almighty God. It is interesting to note that this fact is a great comfort to Jesus. We see this in the words of His prayer. We often do not remember to give human feelings to Jesus as we would to another man. We too often view Jesus as somehow more than human. Yet, we are reminded by such passages of Scripture as this, Jesus was no more and no less human than you or me.

We are reminded again in this prayer that as Peter, James, John and all the others were Apostles to all of us and to our ancestors, so also, Christ is God’s Apostle to man (Heb. 3:1). That is, Christ Jesus is God’s “sent one” to man.

This is the final teaching for these men who would be given “beautiful feet” (Is. 52:7) for their mission of spreading the Gospel of God’s mercy in Christ to all men after the resurrection. This is the initial fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy that we heard this morning.

After all, as we commonly pray in the words of the Kyrie: “Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.” (St. Mk. 10:47) What the Father by inspiration of the Holy Spirit tells us through Isaiah, and John, in answer to this prayer of ours is a resounding, glorious beautiful, “YES! Yes, dear child, I will be merciful and forgive your sins for the sake of Jesus.”

This mercy is what we live for. This forgiveness and mercy is what each of us received in our baptisms. This forgiveness and mercy is what we receive again in the Absolution each week. This forgiveness and mercy is what we eat (see Ps. 119:103; Ezek. 3:3-4) and drink each time we partake of the Lord’s Supper. It is in this that our souls, if not our physical mouths, shout for joy with the watchmen of Isaiah’s prophecy. For it is in these places that we are finally and resoundingly told “Yes, my dear child, I will be merciful and will forgive all of your sins for Jesus’ sake,” by our Righteous Father.

And so, as with Simeon when he held the infant Jesus (St. Lk. 2:25-35), we can now joyously depart in peace. We have seen our salvation!

In Jesus’+ Name. Amen.

[1] Encyclopedia of Sermon Illustrations, p. 75 entry #321.

Baked Oatmeal

This is a very yummy meal. It tastes so warm and home-y. My housemother found it here and I put it in the crockpot to cook last night. We all had a wonderful treat for breakfast this morning. It was so wonderful to come into the kitchen and smell. It was so nice for our oldest blessing to not be whining for food constantly while I try to prepare it.

Mix up (using a food processor if you prefer) a generous spoonful of ground flax seeds, a stream of honey, a spoonful of flax oil and about a half cup of milk. (I used to generous spoonfuls of flax seed as we do not yet have any flax oil in the house.)

Meanwhile, in your crockpot, put a bunch of uncooked rolled oats (the old fashioned kind, of which I put three cups for our crew). Add some ground dried beans, too, ground to powder (for this I used a coffee grinder, if you only have one clean it really well first! ;-)). Add the mixture from the crockpot and then a bunch of milk so it is really soupy. Let this sit on your slow cooker all night. In the morning, you will enter the kitchen to the smell of a nutritious, high protein, high fiber, oatmeal with lots of Omega 3 fatty acids to be put into a bowl and eaten!

This will give you a true breakfast of champions.

Nasal Irrigation

Yesterday, on the way home from a pastor's conference, we stopped at the grocery store. While we were in there, my housemother picked up for us what is called a Neti Pot. This is a little ceramic pot that you use to pour a saline solution through your nostrils and sinuses. Last night, I tried this for the first time. It was not what I expected at all. Though, I suppose I did not really have any expectations.

It took me a couple of tries to get the right angle. Once I did though, it was kind of neat to see a steady stream of water running out of my nose. Once I had done this, I felt like my head was finally clear for the first time in years. I do not think I have breathed this well for a while.

Tonight, my wife tried this for the first time. She was scared, even thought it was her idea to get this product. I coached her through it and she did just fine. In fact, she did better than I did the first time. Tonight, I did it again, last night it just did not seem like my head was fully cleared. This was time was much easier!

Pentecost 17-St. James 2:1-5, 8-10, 14-18

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son,+ and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

‘For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say, “You sit here in a good place,” and you say to the poor man, “You stand over there or sit down by my footstool,” have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives?’ (Vv. 2-4)

Is this not something we all do? That is, we give certain people greater standing at table because of who they are or because of how they can help us. This is fine in the world. After all, this is the way the world works. The old adage, “If you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours”, seems to fit well. One problem, the poor are not in a position to do any of this scratching. Yet, this is not to be the way of the church. In the church, we are commanded by Jesus to treat every one as He did.

In the church, you and I as Christians are not supposed to treat some better than others simply because one has money and the other does not. To do so contradicts the teaching of Jesus in the Gospels. This letter of James was written way back when there really were no Gentile Christians to speak of and so the churches that met were entirely Jewish. These are the early Christians to whom James writes. These early Christians were claiming that Jesus was the complete answer to all of the Jewish hopes.

Jesus was the complete and only Messiah needed.

As we all know from the Gospel accounts, Jesus was not a respecter of persons. He did not treat the wealthy any differently than he did anyone else. Jesus did not treat the Pharisees or other religious leaders any different from anyone else. Jesus condemned every one of them and told them all to repent. The only difference found was in each person’s reaction to Jesus’ preaching of repentance.

The people to whom James writes were assuming wealth was a sign of God’s approval. This is still the way our world thinks. We as sinful creatures tend to see someone who has much and think, “that person must have been blessed much by God”. The problem for James’ hearers was that they had stolen for themselves the privilege of judgement that is God’s alone. This they did by despising the poor and treating them differently and less than those who were rich. Think about this. Do we do this ourselves?

We hear of examples of this whenever someone wins the lottery. Not soon after this is announced, the news then reports of those who seek out the winner and look for a handout. It does not matter if these hopeful are related in any way, family or friend, to the winner. Though these hangers-on may not be connected at all, some still try. We may not react to all of this any more than with such thoughts but each of us knows how Jesus taught us about our thoughts. We know that we are to follow His law in thought word and deed or we have broken it (V. 10).

So, just like we may criticize those who go to a rich person or lottery winner and ask for a handout, James criticizes those to whom he writes. He condemns those who would grab for themselves the best place and held that the poor should instead sit off in the corner. James reminds them of the words of Christ, that the rich will enter the kingdom of heaven only with great difficulty.

To treat the poor in any way like what James describes here, ‘you say to the poor man, “You stand over there or sit down by my footstool”’ (V. 3). To act in this way is to despise our Savior’s own poverty. James convicts his hearers with words that are mindful of Jesus’ first beatitude from the Sermon on the Mount (St. Mt. 5:3). ‘Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor out of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?’ (V. 5)

Yes we have many poor among us. Many even within the church. All of these we watch out for and try to help as best as we are able. In fact, it does not matter if these poor are within the church or not, we still help them because we know and believe Jesus’ words that these are those who are among the most blessed. As that beatitude in Matthew reminds us, it is those who are poor in spirit who shall claim the kingdom of God.

Because of Jesus’ own self-poverty as described by Paul to the Philippians (2:5-11), this shabby treatment of the poor among them as we hear in James is a continual affront. As these poor are in Christ, like all of us who are among the Baptized faithful, it is as if the people of the congregation to whom James writes are treating Jesus as only worthy except to sit by a footstool! As co-heirs of Jesus we are recognizable by our acts of mercy to the poor. In such compassion, each of us Christians resembles Jesus.

‘What use is it, my brethren, if a man says he has faith, but he has no works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that?’ (Vv. 14-16)

James has been making an argument for forgiveness between the brethren throughout this chapter. If it had been too outside their experience or outside the realm of the truly possible before, James makes it concrete in the final verses of our reading. Here at the end of chapter, James begins to refer to things as seen from judgment day. As if Christ the Judge is sitting and examining each and we are “flies on the wall” to see how it occurs.

Now the poor are seen as being so destitute as not to have even the very basic needs for survival. These are the ones who above were described as being placed on the floor along side the footstools. That is, in the worst possible place. They were not even provided with a chair of any kind to rest themselves upon. These are those who were without the least ability to find safe rest in this world. Remember in all of this, that James is not saying that the treatments should be reversed. He is not telling us to give the best places to the poor instead of to the rich. That is, to turn on its head the way of the world. Rather, we are to treat all who are within the church equally, the same.

James is asking, how can you say that you have saving faith if you cannot perform these basic acts of mercy? After all, of what use is your faith if when you see one who is poor and all you do is say, “Go in peace”? If this is not followed up with some attempt to feed or clothe such believers, how can you say you have faith at all? This is James’ question.

This is directed straight at those in the congregation who were playing favorites. James’ words are directed at you and at me as we behave in the same way. This is a difficult thing, to not play favorites. As sinful as we are, you and I fail at this time and again and must repent of this lack of mercy. Praying as we do that the Holy Spirit will continue to transform us by the renewing of our minds that we might become ever more Christ-like in all ways.

What James is describing for us is like our physical bodies and breathing. If you are alive physically, you cannot help but to breathe. If you are alive spiritually, that is, if Christ through the Holy Spirit resides in you, then you cannot help but do good works. We see this also in the words the Holy Spirit speaks through St. Paul. We are all familiar with the words from the book of Ephesians that tell us it is faith alone by grace which saves, not any works of ours. Yet, right on the heals of that, the Holy Spirit tells us also that good works have been created for each of us to do since before the creation of the world (Eph. 2:8-10). Again, like life and breathing.

‘But someone may well say, “You have faith, and I have works; show me your faith with out the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.”’ (V. 18)

Again, here we see that James is speaking to us from the point of view of the judgement day. He is telling us what kind of faith will be rewarded on the last day as being a true faith. The reality is spelled out that a work-less faith will be condemned. Jesus was among other things teaching us to be merciful, as our heavenly Father is merciful. All men need mercy; we are all sinners and so are in need of mercy. The poor have been left among us that we may be merciful. Remember to be counted as poor does not simply require a lack of financial wealth. It could be a multitude of things, which cry out for this Christ-like mercy.

Also, do not fall into the trap of playing Paul over against James. Remember that both have been inspired by the Holy Spirit who cannot contradict Himself. Remember that James is not putting works higher than faith. As we read the words of the text, we can see that James is intent on demonstrating that his faith is indeed alive! He would not then undermine his own argument by saying that it is really works that save. Rather, James is telling us here that if he shows you his works, you can in this way see his faith.

James is saying here that works are the visible aspect of faith. We cannot see into someone’s heart but we can see evidence of where their trust is placed by looking at the works they perform. James is telling us here that it is works of mercy, which will count on the last day. It is then our treatment of the poor, however they appear.

These works of mercy are then an imitation of the Father’s mercy upon you and me through His sacrifice of Jesus on the cross for your salvation.[1]

In Jesus’+ Name. Amen.

[1] My thanks are given for the thoughts of this sermon to the work of Dr. David P. Scaer in his commentary, James: The Apostle of Faith.

Flu Update

I am still feeling the effects of having the flu, but most everyone else in the house is feeling better. This has been a frustrating week because I have not been able to get the things done that I know need to get done. I even had to cancel a monthly appointment to visit a number of my shut-in or nursing home bound parishioners that will be difficult to make up.

Yet, thanks be to God that it is only the flu and not something worse that we have all been sick with.

The Cosby Show is 25!

One of my favorite old TV shows is the Cosby Show. Of course, I would rather watch Bill Cosby's other show, The Adventures of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. But that would be another post. I found out on Tuesday night that the show had its 25th anniversary on this past Sunday. I must say, the Cosby Show always had the best music. It still does.

Potato and Leek Soup

I always enjoyed the pre-made potato leek soup that I could get at the grocery store in England when I studied there for a year. I did not have the cookbook or supplies to do the much cooking on my own but that was one of those warm comfort foods that I remember from that time.


Now, this spring, we tried to plant leeks thinking that doing so would be a good way to make this soup. That did not work. My wife injuring her ankle, a couple of vacation trips later and we had so many weeds there was no chance of ever finding the leek shoots. Even if they did survive. Sadly, they did not.


So, the other day when I was in a neighboring town, I stopped at the local vegetable stand and picked up some groceries. He happened to have a few leeks sitting in a dish and so I bought two. I thought that this would be more than enough for leek soup. Boy was I wrong. We made soup anyway and simply added a few more potatoes.


This was a yummy soup and just the right thing for supper on a cool fall day here on the frozen tundra. Though only one out of three of our boys ate all of his soup tonight. This is because we are all recovering from what the doctor thinks is the H1N1 flu (though this is not official). Appetites are not what they usually are.


Smooth Potato Leek Soup (Potage Parmentier)

For extra smoothness, push through a sieve after it has been pureed in a food processor.
Melt in a soup pot, over low heat:
3 Tablespoons butter
Add and cook, stirring, until tender but not browned, about 20 minutes:
8 large leeks (white part only), cleaned thoroughly and chopped (I cut the white parts in half and then diced them)
Stir in:
3 medium or 2 large baking potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced (I left the skins on, more nutrition that way).
5 cups chicken stock or water
Bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer until the potatoes are soft, about 30 minutes. Puree until smooth. Season with:
Salt to taste
1/4 teaspoon ground pepper (we added ours at the table.)
Thin if necessary, with additional:
Stock or water
Reheat gently, then ladle into bowls and serve.

Of course, if you want to have a cream soup and be really fancy, you can always make Vichyssoise. The "classic french" soup was actually invented by French chef Louis Diat around 1910, when he worked at New York's Ritz-Carlton Hotel. During the Second World War, when the french spa town of Vichy became the capital of the collaborationist government, this soup was served in the United States under a variety of names. You can garnish with shipped fresh chives (or dry!).

Thank you to the The Joy of Cooking for the recipe.