Click here for the full story ¶ 8/25/2006 03:03:00 PM 0 Comments
Daily Lectionary
Judges 5:1-18
Acts 2:1-21
Matthew 28:1-10
Psalter
Morning 119:89-128 Evening 119:129ff
Higher Things reflection:
No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except in the Holy Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:3b)
Living in the kingdom of God is not like the empire that Donald Trump has built. Trump can gather the best of the best in his hiring process and can listen as much or as little to George, Carolyn, or any of his advisors. But the bottom line is that he is the one with the authority to say “You’re fired!” or “You’re hired.” He doesn’t get his words or his authority from others; he does what he wants, and he says what he wants.
Not so in God’s kingdom. In God’s Kingdom, we cannot simply decide on our own what we will believe, or do, or say. We cannot decide to confess Christ and suddenly become believers because we want to be.
“No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except in the Holy Spirit.” We have the joy of being “called by the Gospel, enlightened with the Holy Spirit’s gifts, sanctified, and kept in the true faith” (Small Catechism, Explanation to the Third Article of the Apostles’ Creed). We simply have received this gift, no thanks to our wisdom, salesmanship, or business skills.
As poor, miserable sinners, we would know the time of our Lord’s visitation no more than the unbelieving Jews of first century Palestine. Without the Holy Spirit calling us to faith, we would stand before God, worthy of the same destruction (and worse) that befell Jerusalem some 40 years after Jesus’ ascension. On our own, we would not have words worthy to confess the Visiting Savior.
But take heart, because Jesus is not weeping over your lost-ness; He is jubilant that you have been drawn to Him. He is not mourning that you have refused to know Him in His visitation; He is pleased that the Holy Spirit has given you “…the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of sins!” (St. Luke 1:77).
No, in lives of faith, we are in no way, shape, or form like Donald Trump – except that we have been blessed beyond our understanding. However, in regards to our words and deeds, we do not receive the wealth of God’s kingdom due to our own abilities. We receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. And in His coming to us, we receive the gift of faith through His delivery of Christ’s Gospel through Word, Holy Baptism, and His Holy Supper. Without these gifts, we could not truly confess, “Jesus is Lord.” Yet through His tireless work on us, the Holy Spirit makes this confession ours!
¶ 8/25/2006 04:47:00 AM 0 Comments
