The Master's Property

Texts:    2 Timothy 4:1-5; Matthew 25:14-30

    HAVE YOU EVER DONE RENOVATIONS to your house?  Or maybe you watch DIY programs like Holmes Inspection on TV.  If you do, you know how it goes.  You start out to do some improvement, to put in a new bathroom or whatever, but when you do the tear-out you discover there's rot in the walls or the foundation is weak or the plumbing is about to burst.  And instead of getting straight to the fun things like tiling and painting, you have to go back and redo the basic structure.

        We're in that position this morning as we look at Jesus' parable of the talents as it comes to us in Matthew chapter 25, verses 14-30. We've got to do some tearing out before we can begin to build.  The problem is this word "talent."  In ancient times, it had nothing to do with someone's personal endowments or abilities, it was simply a unit of weight, used especially for mass quantities of precious metals.  Over the centuries, however, the English language has taken this word, from this very parable, and changed its meaning to connote our God-given natural abilities, or, as we say, our talents.  So we build on that to conclude that Jesus will hold us accountable for how we put our natural gifts like singing or reasoning or entrepreneurship into service for Him.

    And this is true. He will hold us accountable for that.  But in this parable the word "talents" is referring to something different from our abilities.  Look at verse 15.  It says there that the master gave talents of money to each of his servants, "each according to his ability."  The servants' abilities or natural gifts were something different from the property their master entrusted to them. What profit they would make from it would go along with the abilities-- or, as we would say, the talents-- they already had.

    The talents in this parable do not naturally belong to the servants themselves.  They are, as it says in verse 14, the master's property.  Very valuable property, too.  The weight of a talent varied across the ancient world, but in 1st century occupied Israel it came to 2,080 ounces.  To get an idea of its value, let's reckon it up as gold.  At yesterday's price, one of those talents would have been worth $3,718,728.00.  Just one.  This property is the master's, and it is very, very precious.

    As we heard last week, in these parables our Lord is answering the disciples' question in Matthew 24:3, " . . . what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?"  In the parable of the talents, a master goes away, and after a long time, the master returns.  The Master is Christ, and He warns us to be prepared for His coming at the end of the age. 

    Jesus begins the parable by saying, "Again, it will be like . . . " What will what be like?  Look back at verse 1 of chapter 25: "At that time"-- the time of His coming and the end of the age-- "the kingdom of heaven will be like . . . "  He is speaking of the time of His return.  So when Christ returns as Judge, it will be like a master who has entrusted his great and precious property to his servants and gone away, expecting to find they've turned a profit with it when he returns to settle his accounts. 

    Brothers and sisters, the kingdom of God will not begin with the moment of Christ's return.  We who believe in Him live under Jesus' rulership right now, and it affects how we His servants work with His property in the long weeks and months and years until He comes.

    So what is this property He puts into the hands of His servants?  If it isn't our natural abilities, if it isn't even the spiritual gifts He gives us for ministry, what could it be?

    We can find a clue in Matthew 13, in the parable of the sower.  There, various kinds of soil receive the same seed and yield different amounts of increase, depending on the nature of the soil.  In the parable of the talents, different kinds of servants receive the same kind of money in different amounts and yield different amounts of increase, depending on the nature of their abilities and attitudes.  Jesus tells us in Matthew 13:19 that the seed sown is the message about the kingdom of heaven.  The Master's property in Matthew 25 are the same thing: It is the good news about Jesus Christ the Son of God, come to earth to establish the kingdom of God as its divine Lord and King.  As St. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15,

    [This is] the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. . . .  that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures [and appeared to many faithful witnesses].

Christ's servants the apostles were good and faithful.  By their labors we have received the trust of this good news, too.  His glorious gospel is the currency of the kingdom, and in this parable Jesus our Master charges us to put it to work for Him until He comes.

    So again, if we're talking gold, one servant receives five talents, worth around $18,600,000 at today's prices; one is entrusted with two, about $7,400,000; and the last servant is handed one talent at about $3,700,000.  Verse 16 says the first man immediately put his five talents to work. This man exerted himself to do business with his master's property so it might be increased, and the second servant did the same.

    So how do we exert ourselves in the business of the Gospel?  What is the Gospel's business, anyway?  The Word of Christ on earth has three primary purposes: For grace-- that is, to bring salvation and redemption to the sinner; for growth-- to build up the Church and each individual member in it so we achieve the full likeness of Jesus our Saviour; and for glory-- for the greater glory of God, and for the ultimate glorification of all His saints in Him.

    Each of us is given the Good News of Christ crucified and risen for us and for the sins of the world.  Our depth of understanding may be greater or lesser, but each of us in the Church have heard-- or should be hearing-- what Jesus has done for us.  According to the abilities we have from God, we minister this Word to one another and to the pagan at our door, so that grace, growth, and glory may increase and abound.

    Five-talent people might be those like St. Paul, or, more recently, someone like C. S. Lewis.  When the Holy Spirit brought him out of the darkness of modern paganism, Lewis took the wonderful riches of Christ's gift of salvation and multiplied it in his speaking and writing, and his profit to his Master increases to this day all around the world.

    We can't all be five-talent servants of our Lord.  But we can be good and faithful in our sphere and according to our abilities.  We can be like that wise Sunday School teacher who influenced the children in the church for grace, growth, and God's glory up to the time of her death.  We can be godly parents who lead our children in the way of the Lord, and never take it for granted that they know that Jesus died for them.  We can exert ourselves to increase in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ as we study His word and participate in His sacraments.  We can be good capitalists of the Word-- if I dare use the term in these protesting times-- and follow Paul's charge to Timothy in 2 Timothy chapter 4, being prepared in season and out of season to communicate the Word of Christ.  For all Scripture-- all of which speaks of Christ, as He Himself reminds us-- is God-breathed and is useful-- profitable-- for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness.  So, put it to work, beginning in your own life and the life of your household.  Paul's charge applies especially to us pastors and elders, but all of us who have been entrusted with the good news of Jesus Christ should be prepared at all times to give anyone who asks a reason for the kingdom hope that is within us, so our Master's property might increase.

    What about the third servant?  The other two each increase their master's property 100% and the master commends them, entrusts them even more responsibility, and invites them to share in his great happiness.  But this man buries his $3,700,000 in the ground and very disrespectfully hands it back to his master on his return.  In our understanding of the parable, did he ever truly belong to Jesus Christ at all?

    As any human being belongs to God, yes.  Physically, he was a resident worker in the master's household.  But in his heart and mind, he was not the master's man.  He's like those who sit in church for decades letting the preaching wash over them, but they're never actually converted.  They think they know all about God and what He's really like, and they think they're smarter than He is.  And kinder and more loving, too.  The Jews in Jesus' day knew that God for centuries had made a practice of only saving a remnant of His chosen people. But then He'd go and have mercy on Gentiles.  How was that fair?  "Hey, God, don't You have enough to do taking care of us Jews?  Why meddle with people who pledge allegiance to other gods?  They don't belong to You!"  And so in the parable, "Master, I knew you were a hard man, harvesting where you had not sown and gathering where you had not scattered seed."  A man like that today might reason, "God's going to save whoever He's going to save, whether I say anything to anybody about Jesus or not.  And He'll send to hell anybody He feels like, even if they're really good people.  So why should I get myself in trouble in this world by going around talking about Jesus?  Let God get back what He gave, and keep me out of it."

    This is a terrible distortion of the truth.  But many church members use it so they don't have to exert themselves to increase their Master's property in the kingdom of heaven.  The master in verse 26 in effect says, "So that was your opinion of me?  In that case, you should truly have been afraid to return my money to me profitless.  You should've at least put the money to the bankers so I'd get some interest out of it."

    Now, I humbly admit that I am not certain how our Lord wants us to understand and apply this.  Most Bible commentators I've read skip right over it!  Jews weren't allowed to charge interest, so perhaps the master is saying, "All right, you've called me a cruel man and a thief; why didn't you put my money out at interest so you could call me a usurer, too?"  In that case, it would be a warning against speaking ill of our Lord and God.  But Jesus often used the unrighteous practices and people of this world to illustrate truths about the good of the kingdom of heaven. So Jesus could be saying to so-called followers like that, "You were afraid to speak the Gospel yourself?  Very well, you should at least have opened your home to My apostles who were speaking it.  You should have supported My missionaries and evangelists, even if you never said a word about Me yourself.  Then you would have received for Me some of what they earned."  (This is just a possibility, and if the Holy Spirit commends it to you, good; if not, let it alone.)

    But Jesus' conclusion is clear: As Paul says, when Christ, the righteous Judge, returns on the last day, He will reward His good and faithful servants with a crown of righteousness-- a crown that will signify their responsibility over much more than He entrusted to them on this earth.  But those who take the Gospel for granted, those who think the message of Christ crucified is a word of intolerance and exclusion, those who play it safe in church and bury their Master's property, they will be cast away from His presence into outer darkness forever.  They will find that what they thought they had of Christianity and Jesus will be taken away, but those who truly have laid hold on the truth of the gospel and increased grace, growth, and God's glory in this world, they'll find their share in Jesus Christ and His work wonderfully increased in the world to come.

    Which kind of servant will you and I be?  Our Master Jesus has entrusted His property to us, the infinitely valuable good news of sins forgiven in His blood.  He has also given us abilities, natural and spiritual, so we can put the Gospel to work.  May we be those receive His trust and immediately set to work for the increase of His kingdom.  And when Christ comes again in glory, may He gladly say to us,

    "Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!"

    Amen.

Emergency Preparedness

Text :    Matthew 24:36-44; 25:1-13

   ANYTHING WORTH DOING IN life needs to be prepared for.  You all had to prepare to come to church this morning.  I made preparations so I could be with you to share God's Word.  You prepared when you got married and when you had your children.  People prepare to do their jobs, to go on vacation, to retire.  At least, they do if they're wise.  

        Then there are the kind of things that are bound to come into every life, but we can't know for sure when or how.  Sudden illness or the loss of a job.  And what about those life emergencies we hope won't happen to us, but might?  Nobody plans to undergo natural disasters like floods or wildfires or devastating Fall snowstorms, but it's still wise to be prepared.

    Emergency preparedness is preached to us from all quarters.  Have enough food stored up!  Formulate a meet-up plan for your family!  Buy gold and silver for when the market collapses!  But for the ultimate emergency this world will ever see, how can we be ready?  What do we need to do, what do we need to lay up for ourselves to be prepared?     

    In chapters 24 and 25 of the gospel according to St. Matthew, our Lord Jesus tells what it will be like when the Kingdom of heaven finally emerges in all its stupendous grandeur, on that day when Jesus Christ Himself will return in glory to judge the living and the dead.

    In the portion we read from chapter 24, we see that His coming will indeed be an emergency.  For the most part, people will be living life as normal when the Son of Man returns.  "As it was in the days of Noah," Jesus says in verse 37, people will be eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage.  That's not to say there will be no signs of His coming; no, it's just that we humans have an amazing capacity to be blind to anything that threatens our everyday routine.  When Jesus comes again, believers and unbelievers alike will be going about their ordinary work, making a living, doing what people do.  Two men in a field: one taken, one left.  Two women grinding grain together: one taken, one left.  Incidentally, the Greek word rendered "taken" in our modern translation has a positive meaning in Matthew's gospel; the idea is of taking someone to be with you, not taking them off to destruction. 

    Whichever category we fall into, the coming of Christ will be an unexpected emergency, and Jesus says we believers need to be prepared.  "Therefore keep watch," says Jesus in verse 42, "because you don't know on what day your Lord will come."  In fact, for those who are not prepared, Jesus' second coming will be like having your house broken into in the middle of the night.  "So you must also be ready, because the Son of Man will come when you do not expect him."

    So what does it mean for us to be prepared for His coming?  Jesus tells four parables to help us understand.  The first is the parable of the faithful and wise servant, which Matthew relates in verses 45 to 51 of chapter 24.  We didn't read that section this morning, but it shows us that a big part of being ready consists in doing those acts of service towards one another that Jesus Himself commands for us day after day.  This parable is especially addressed to pastors and elders, whose responsibility it is to give the Master's other servants their food at the proper time-- the food of the Word of God.

    But what happens when we've done all we can to be ready,  and all we can do is wait?  The second part of today's reading helps us with that question.

    If we want to understand the parable of the wise and foolish virgins, it will help to know a little about first century Jewish marriage customs.  The practice was that when a young man took a fancy to a particular young women, he, or his father on his behalf, would approach the girl's father and make an offer for her hand.  The men would settle on the financial arrangements, then the young woman would be brought in to see if she agreed to have the young man.  If so, the marriage covenant was sealed with a glass of wine and the engagement was made.  As we know from the story of Mary and Joseph, this engagement had the effect of marriage, and a formal divorce was necessary to break it.  The only difference was that the couple would not come together for a year or more after this.  The girl continued to live in her father's house, and the young man would return to his father's property, to build a dwelling where he and his new bride would live.  Then, when all was ready, he would come by night with his groomsmen to the bride's house, in a torchlight procession to take her away to be with him.  When they approached her house, the best man would shout out, "Look! The bridegroom has come!  Come out to meet him!"  The groom would lay claim to his bride, and her bridesmaids would join the torchlight procession back to his home and the home of his father, where the marriage would be completed with the formal ceremony, the consummation of relations between the bridal pair, and a week of feasting by the family and their guests.

    Now, it is said that some grooms liked to take their brides totally by surprise.  But in this parable, Jesus says that at the time of His coming, the kingdom of heaven will be like ten bridesmaids who have gotten word that the groom is coming  sometime very soon.  Five are wise, and five are foolish.

    Let me say that with Jesus' parables, we must be careful not to turn them into allegories.  An allegory is a story where every last detail symbolizes something specific, whereas the point of a parable is, well, to make a point.  It is proper to say that the bridegroom who is coming is Jesus the Son of Man Himself.  But the point of this parable is preparedness, especially, preparedness for an event that we know definitely is coming, but we don't know exactly when.

    At first, it looks like all ten of the bridesmaids are ready.  They've all heard the bridegroom is coming tonight, and they've  all taken up their positions in the street near the bride's house.  All of them have lamps-- torches, actually, it would have been-- for the procession back to the house of the groom.  They did all they could do, and now, all they could do was wait.

    So it is with us.  We know Jesus will definitely return someday.  We look around ourselves these days, and we think that perhaps, just maybe, the signs are right that He may well come back in our day.  In contrast to the faithful servant of the previous parable, this teaching is not so much about taking action or doing, but about our attitude of heart and mind.

    For Christ our Bridegroom, for His good purpose, does delay.  And we are weak and human, and like those ten girls we simply cannot be looking out for His coming all the time.  Sometimes we have to sleep.  We have to take care of the ordinary business of life.  Neither the foolish nor the wise virgins are condemned for sleeping; it's just a fact of the situation.  True preparedness is revealed when the emergency occurs, when they're all awakened by the midnight cry, "Here's the bridegroom!  Come out to meet him!"

    It's too late now to take thought about what they will do or what they need.  It's time for them to put their torches in order to light the bridal couple back to the father's house.

    But the foolish girls have brought little or no oil.  Their torches are going out as soon as they are lit.  "Give us some of your oil!" they demand of the others.  But the answer is no.

    Are the wise virgins selfish and cruel not to share?   This detail tells us that when Jesus speaks of "oil" He is referring to something belonging to each person, that can't be shared.  In Scripture, oil tends to signify the Holy Spirit and His anointing.  It'd be foolish of us, though, to think that the Holy Spirit were some sort of commodity, something we can have more or less of.  Rather, think of the ministry of the Holy Spirit in your life.  He's the One who brought you to salvation.  He's the one who confirms the grace of Christ to you in baptism and Holy Communion.  The Spirit illuminates the Word of God to you are you read it and as you hear it preached.  The Spirit causes you to have a wise attitude of heart, full of faith in your Lord Jesus, a heart that can persevere in any kind of trial, no matter how long He may delay. 

    But there are many in the church who simply are going along for the ride.  They think they can enter the kingdom of heaven on someone else's faith.  They believe, foolishly, that they don't need to know anything about Christ and what He has given to them in His death and resurrection.  Their Jesus is only a creature of their own imagining, a mascot to help them get along in this life, but no good for the life of the world to come. Those who are foolish are not really expecting Christ to return as Lord and Judge; even less, they do not eagerly desire to see Him appear as the beloved Bridegroom of the Church.  If that's your attitude, what do you need a heart and mind prepared by the Holy Spirit for? 

    But those who are wise do walk according to the Spirit. They take advantage of the means of grace that He provides them, so they will have light when the crisis comes.

    When Jesus returns, it will be too late to get ready.  The wise virgins literally are sending the foolish girls off on a fool's errand when they tell them to go find someplace to buy oil at midnight.  Interpreted, their words mean, "You should have prepared when there was time.  We cannot share with you; it simply isn't possible, and now you must take the consequences of your foolishness."  But those who are like the foolish virgins will actually think they will be able to purchase the ministry of the Holy Spirit in their lives at the time when Christ returns.  But it will be too late.  The very fact that they will attempt such a thing shows that they do not belong to Christ at all, however much they have appeared to be part of the visible Church, and the door to the marriage feast of the Lamb will be closed against them. 

    "I do not know you" they will hear.  This is not a statement of simple fact on the part of the Bridegroom, but a formal rejection of those who did not care for Him enough to be ready at His coming.

    What of us?  Are we ready for Christ's return, no matter how long He may delay?  Are we improving our baptism by heeding and following the Holy Spirit as He ministers to us in Word and Sacrament?  When the ultimate crisis comes in your life, be it death or the coming of our Lord to judge the living and the dead, will you be firm in your faith that He died for your sins and rose to give you life eternal?  This isn't something you can do in your own strength or your own effort.  This grounding of heart and mind can't be acquired at the last minute when the shout of the archangel announces that the Lord is near.  It is yours only by the gracious gift of Jesus Christ in His Holy Spirit.  Be wise and follow His leading as He strengths you by the Word of Scripture.  Let Him serve you with Christ and all His benefits at the Table of the Lord and as you remember your baptism.  May He confirm to you more and more each day that your Lord Jesus Christ is coming, He is coming soon, and that will be the most glorious, joyful day of your life.

    For although Jesus wants us to see ourselves in the bridesmaids in this parable, we must never forget that ultimately, we who are called and confirmed by His Spirit are also the Bride.  Your Beloved is coming!  Live the life on earth He has given you, but be ready, always ready to run to meet Him when He comes.

    Even so, Lord Jesus, come quickly!  Amen.

Who Will Hear and Obey?

Texts:  Isaiah 49:1-7; Matthew 21:23-32

     WHAT DO YOU THINK?  SUPPOSE you're the CEO of a multinational corporation, and you decide that methods and procedures at a certain branch office need to be radically transformed.  Whom do you think will be more responsive to the changes: the upper-level management types who pride themselves on their work ethic and devotion to the company, or the slackers in the cubicles who do whatever they can to avoid putting in a day's work?

    And suppose you don't communicate your wishes directly, but send a representative to announce and implement the changes.  Would that have any effect on how well the staff listens?  If the representative's credentials are all in order, should it matter?

    If this were just a tale of modern life, you might think that the leaders who acted all gung-ho about the company would be the first to get on board with the CEO's big plans.  And that if somebody in a suit just showed up one day and announced he was from the CEO and the whole product line was about to be revamped, people would be wise to question his authority.

    But of course, my analogy isn't just a tale of modern life.  We have read our passage from the Gospel According to St. Matthew, and we know that when it comes to responsiveness to God's will, talk is cheap, and true faith and devotion are displayed in obedience.

    The chief priests and elders of the people should have known better than to treat Jesus the way they did.  They were the ones to whom God had committed the office of interceding for the people through the sacrifices and temple rituals, so they could be forgiven and blessed.  They had the responsibility of teaching the people the law of Moses, so they could keep the covenant the Lord had made with them back at Mount Sinai, and so live in prosperous, joyful communion with their God.

    But it often happens this way in companies, organizations, and families: The leadership at first identifies their interest with the organization.  They say, "what the organization wants, I want."  But gradually they get entrenched, they start feeling their own power, and they forget what it is they're there for.  Now it's "What I want, the organization should want.  And if it doesn't, I know best."  Never mind what the chief executive, the family patriarch, or whomever might say.

    This attitude isn't always defiant or deliberate.  When we get it into our heads that we know best, we're generally convinced we have the good of the group at heart, but it's really about the good of yours truly.  So when something comes along that truly is about the good of the group, we can't see it, we reject it, we refuse to obey it.

    God Almighty was doing something radically new and fresh in His Son Jesus Christ, only it isn't really new, it's what God has taught His people to expect one day, all along, as our passage from Isaiah testifies.  And it's the leadership elite, those who prided themselves on their devotion and faithfulness, who rebel against it and refuse to obey.  If they can question Jesus' credentials, they can ignore the obligations He lays on their lives.  So St. Matthew reports that a number of chief priests and teachers of the Law came to Jesus as He sat teaching in the Temple courts, and demanded, "By what authority are you doing these things?"

    What things?  Well, in the past day or so Jesus has claimed to be the Messiah by accepting the title of "Son of David" and refusing to shut up the children who are praising Him by that name.  He has overturned the tables of those who were buying and selling in the Temple and called the Temple "My house" as He was driving the merchants out.  He has ridden like a king into Jerusalem and allowed His disciples to render Him praised and worship with their palm branches, their garments laid down on the road, and their shouts of "Hosanna!"  It must have galled the Jewish leaders to see how Jesus took all of this in stride, as if it were His due. 

    And it wasn't just Jesus' behavior in the past day or two that irked them, it was His conduct the past three years.  How He taught the Scriptures as if He were their Author.  How He healed people and cast out demons and did all those miracles they couldn't deny.  Especially, how He went around talking as if the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were His actual Father.  Who gave Jesus the authority to do all that?

    That really is the question, isn't it?  A lot of people show up even today claiming to be somebody, calling people to follow them, and on what basis should we?  If the chief priests and elders really are good stewards of the commonwealth of Israel, if they really do have the glory of God and the best interests of their fellow Jews at heart, it's right that they should investigate Jesus' credibility.  Is He really from God?

    But responsibility and good stewardship isn't really what motivates them, and Jesus knows it.  He turns the question back on them.  Answering a question with a question is a time-honored technique in debate.  It helps reveal the underlying assumptions of the person asking the original question.  So Jesus asks the Jewish leaders, "John's baptism-- where did it come from?  Was it from heaven, or from men?" 

    That gets us to the foundation of it, doesn't it?  John the Baptist said he was sent by God to announce the coming of the Christ who would bring in the kingdom of God.  People came to him at the Jordan River and were baptised by him to testify that they'd turned from their sins and were preparing to meet the King when He came.  So did John really baptise in the power and authority of the God of heaven?  Or was his activity just a sideshow dreamed up by John and his disciples for notoriety and profit?

    The leaders of the people already don't believe John baptised in the authority of God.  They didn't want to believe he baptised in the authority of God.  Believing that would mean believing that the Messiah was at hand.  It'd mean accepting that the Messiah God sent wasn't exactly the kind of Christ they'd envisioned or planned.  It'd mean falling down at Jesus' feet and admitting that they were totally wrong in their schemes for redeeming themselves by their own works.  Their stubborn hearts simply were not prepared to be changed like that.

    Jesus wants us to see the irony in this.  These men claimed to be submitted to the authority of heaven.  The common people thought they were the holiest people alive.  So their discussion among themselves shows how Jesus has boxed them into a corner.  If they truly are the godly ones, and they say John's baptism was from God, why didn't they believe John and repent?  But the fact is that they refuse say John came in the authority of God.  They'd much rather believe his whole ministry was a product of popular enthusiasm-- from men.  But they're not about to stand up like men and say so out loud, because it would outrage the common people.  These held that John the Baptist was a prophet, and wouldn't want his memory insulted.  So the leaders say to Jesus, "We don't know."

    Meaning, they refuse to say.  And Jesus gives them the answer they deserve: "Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things."  John's divinely-granted credentials were right before their eyes all through his ministry, and they refused to believe and repent.  They do not now deserve that Jesus should declare His divine source of power and authority to them.

    Brothers and sisters, we like to think we'd do better than the chief priests, elders, and Pharisees who refused to accept that Jesus Christ was the Son of God.  We'd believe Him to be who He said He was.  And maybe we would.  But mere mental belief isn't enough.  As James the half-brother of Jesus says in his letter, true faith is demonstrated by action.

    Jesus tells a parable to show us this is true: A father has work that needs doing in the family vineyard.  He tells both his boys to get out there and get to work.  First kid says, "No, I'm not going!"  But then he changes his mind and goes and works. Second son says, "Oh, yes, Father, certainly, Father, anything you say, I'm here to do your will, nothing pleases me better!" But he continues to sit on his rear doing the 1st century equivalent of watching television or playing computer games.

    So who actually did the father's will?  The men who'd challenged Jesus are forced to say that it was the first kid who did what his father wanted.  You know, the openly rebellious one.  The slacker.  The goof-off.  The blatant sinner-- who repented, submitted to his father, and went and did what the father commanded.  No hypocritical lip-service, no extravagant claims of devotion followed up by self-seeking disregard of the father's wishes, just genuine repentance with suitable action to follow.

    Friends, don't underestimate what terrible sinners the tax collectors and the prostitutes were!  The tax collectors were traitors to their nation and the prostitutes were and are traitors to their own humanity.  But they were cut to the heart when John came preaching about the kingdom and the King who was coming, and they turned from their sins and were baptised.  God was radically transforming His people, the wonderful effects of it were right before the eyes of the priests and elders, and still they refused to repent and believe what John had to say.

    And now they were refusing to repent and believe what Jesus had to say.  Nothing He said or did, no prophecy He fulfilled could break through their insistence that they knew God's purposes better than God did Himself.

    And so, the tax collectors and prostitutes were entering the kingdom of God ahead of them, and maybe instead of them.

    In the next two chapters Jesus will hammer home the guilt of the Jewish leadership, in shamefully failing to lead the people into the righteousness of the kingdom of heaven.  Why is this necessary?  Why does Jesus have to be so harsh about it?

    Jesus must expose even the sin of those who claim to be the righteous and holy ones, so that every human being is shown to be guilty before God and in need of a savior.  As Paul says in Romans 3:19,

    Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God.

    Who will hear and obey?  Obviously, not those who consider themselves good enough in themselves.  But open sinners aren't capable of hearing and obeying, either.  Not of themselves, not when they're submerged in their sin.  They need the Holy Spirit operating in the power of the word preached, they need the washing of the baptism of Jesus Christ, better than the baptism of John, to apply His blood to their uncleanness and wash their sins away.

    And, brothers and sisters, so do we.  Do you think you have everything under control and don't need Jesus or His prophets to call you to repent?  Or, will you listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit and daily humble yourself, repent of your sins, and follow Him?

    In Matthew chapter 21 we see Jesus in Jerusalem, headed for the cross.  That cross demonstrated once and for all how rebellious we are, how sinful, how apt to ignore the call of our heavenly Father, for it took the blood of the sinless Son of God to wash our sins away.  But the cross of Christ also makes it possible for us to hear, to repent, and to obey.  Not in our own strength, not in our own goodness, not in our pride, do we say, "Yes, Father, I will," and get up and work in His vineyard, but in His strength, goodness, and worthiness alone: to whom be all power and glory, in the unity of the Holy Trinity, now and forever.  Amen. 
   

Never Forget to Forgive

Texts:  Genesis 50:15-21; Matthew 18:21-35

    "NEVER FORGET!"  WE began to say this to each other in the aftermath of that terrible day ten years ago.  Never forget what happened in New York, Washington, and Shanksville.  Never forget the terror, grief, and bravery of the innocent passengers and crew who died on the four hijacked airplanes. Never forget the workers in the World Trade Center and the Pentagon who were killed simply for showing up to put in a day's work.  Never forget the City and Port Authority policemen and the firemen who ran into the inferno and sacrificed their lives that others might live.  Never forget the wives, husbands, parents, children, whose loved ones will never come home and who will live with that pain to their dying day.  Never forget that it was the strength, freedom, and prosperity of America that turned the hijackers' evil against us,  never forget the evil that they did, and never such a thing happen again.

    Never forget!  That is our 9/11 cry. But in Matthew chapter 18, we read of a king who makes it his business to forget.

    Jesus has been teaching His disciples how to be reconciled when a brother-- that is, a fellow-member of the church-- has sinned against us.  This sets Peter to wondering.  Other rabbis put the forgiveness limit at three times, but probably Jesus would say to forgive more.  So, how many times should he forgive the brother or sister who sins against him?  Seven times?

    Jesus' answer is stunning.  He says, "I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times."  He backs it up with a parable of a king settling the accounts with his servants.  Now one of his ministers owes the king a sum that amounts to millions, even billions of dollars in today's money.  How could he run it up like this?  He's invested the king's money badly. Or failed to turn over tax revenue he's collected.  At any rate, it's an extraordinary, astronomical sum and his master has been severely damaged financially.  How can the king forget that?  He orders that the man, his wife, and his children be sold into slavery to pay the debt.  If the man and all his family slaved away for a thousand years and a day, they could never come up with what he owed.  But there would be justice in this condemnation, after the harm this worthless, incompetent servant has done.

     In desperation, the servant falls on his face before his master.  Give him more time, he pleads!  He'll get something going that'll earn both himself and the king thousands of talents!  Just give him another chance! 

    This is ridiculous, and the king knows it..  If this minister were a successful investor, he wouldn't be so far in the hole.  Sell him into slavery and be done with it!  But the king does an amazing, unthinkable thing.  He takes pity on his servant, cancels the debt, and lets him go free.  He chooses to forget.

    Now with the class envy being promoted these days, some people would say that the king could afford to do this.  That he probably got rich off the back of this same servant.  But Jesus doesn't give us any room to think this way.  His parable begins, "The kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants."  Whenever we consider the a king in association with the kingdom of heaven, that king is Christ Himself, the Son of God. No one can claim he's made God rich, no one can charge God with obtaining His power and glory by taking advantage of any human creature, no one can pretend that anything he has on this earth is anything but a loan or a gift from Him.

    How could we every repay Him for the ordinary blessings God gives us?  But we get ourselves further in the hole by withholding what is God's by right: our thanksgiving, our worship of Him alone, our obedience to His laws, our love and care for our neighbor.  From the cradle we've failed to give Him what we owe.  Our offenses are an ocean of red ink on God's books, worse than the United States national debt.  Most sinful of all, we have no idea how massive and unpayable they are.  We imagine we could make it up to Him if we just tried a little harder; we say, "Don't worry, Jesus, I'll start being good tomorrow, then You'll see how perfect I can be." 

    Ridiculous!  We're in the same impossible situation as the servant in the parable.  We can never pay the penalty for our offense;, God the king has the right to bind us over into slavery to sin and death forever and ever.  But He didn't.  Out of His own free grace He chose not to remember our sins against us.  He refused to say, "Never forget!"; He cancelled the debt of sin that stood against us, and let us go free.

    It cost Him, oh, it cost Him.  Our forgiveness cost the life's blood of Jesus the Son of God, spilled in infinite agony on Calvary's cross.

    So now, in Christ, we are forgiven! God has forgotten our sins!  How could you or I or anyone ever forget such a blessing?  That'd be like a servant who'd been forgiven a debt running into the billions forgetting the loss his gracious master had willingly suffered for him!

    But that's the sad point of Jesus' parable. The forgiven servant does forget.  He forgets so thoroughly, that  directly he goes out and finds-- not encounters by accident, but seeks out, looks for, finds-- a fellow servant who owes him a measly hundred denarii.  That'd be about $650.  Immediately he begins choking him and demanding his money back right now.  He refuses to listen even when the other man begs for time to pay.  The other debtor's plea for time was reasonable.  But no, the forgiven debtor initiates legal proceedings and has his fellow servant thrown into debtors' prison.  He wants justice!  That other guy was withholding something that was rightfully his and he should pay up on demand?  "Never forget!" was the first servant's motto, and he'd remember that debt until his fellow-servant had paid the last penny.

    Justice?  Their fellow servants don't think so.  They tell their master the king, and he angrily has the first servant called in.  "You wicked servant!" he cries.  "I cancelled all that debt of yours because you begged me to.  Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?"    And in righteous anger the king turns him over to those who can put the screws on him-- literally-- until he should pay back all he owes.  Which, considering the magnitude of his debt, will be never. 

    Are we listening?   Jesus drives the lesson home: "This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart."

    Oh. 

    But it's worth asking, Who is my brother? The Scripture is clear: it is not Al Qaida hijackers and any other terrorist, Muslim and otherwise, who even now are seeking the destruction of America and Americans.  The brother-- or sister-- is always a fellow-member of Christ's church, born of the blood of Christ and adopted as God's child by the Holy Spirit.  The Bible knows nothing about a universal brotherhood of man.  But this makes the application harder, not easier.  It might be possible for us to extend forgiveness to some faceless Arab we've never seen and who hasn't harmed us personally.  It's a whale of a lot more difficult to forget the sins of the person sitting in the next pew.  I can name numerous wrongs that fellow church members have done to me, and I'm sure you could share the same stories in return.  We've been betrayed and deeply hurt.  How can we not remember?  How can we forgive?

    But that is what Jesus demands, that we forgive one another for the sake of the immeasurable forgiveness He has already extended to us.  We must forgive by a deliberate act of our hearts; that is, by an act of our wills, whether we feel like it or not.  And Jesus commands us to keep on forgiving, seventy-seven times, seventy times seven, until we've lost count and the offense is overwhelmed in love. 

    But how can we?  Again and again those old hurts bubble up and we feel the injustice that was committed against us.  Not one of us is able truly to forgive his brother from the heart.

    But we have a Brother who can forgive like that, Jesus Christ the righteous.  All forgiveness is ultimately from Him and through Him.   He has forgiven us from His heart, and in the daily work of forgiveness we draw on His grace, His strength, His mercy.  We choose to remember the truth we may not feel: that as heinous as any crime committed against us may be, the offenses we have committed against His majesty and love are infinitely greater.  And yet, we are forgiven!  Oh, that God would grant us the dark blessing of knowing the depth of our sins, for then we would see the depth of the grace that Jesus Christ has lavished on us!

    Forgiveness begins with our brothers and sisters in the faith, but it doesn't end there.  As Americans on this tenth anniversary of the 911 attack, it's good for us never to forget the sacrifice and the heroism of that day.  We must never forget to do what we must as citizens under God to defend our country and its liberties from attack.  But when you consider those who perpetrated this attack, and those who would if possible attack us again, remember that they, too, are men for whom Christ died.  The Muslim tragedy is that they cling to "Never forget, never forgive!" and their hatred lasts for centuries.  That is not our calling as Christians.   The blood of Jesus Christ covers their sins as well as ours, and it should grieve us that these desperate men should die without repenting and turning to the Lord of all forgiveness. 

    We are all debtors in the sight of God, but for us, the debt has been cancelled by the atoning death of Jesus our Savior.  Trusting in His grace, walking in His footsteps, let's commit ourselves daily to show everyone the same grace that we have received.  Never forget how much Jesus Christ has forgiven you.  In light of His mercy, let us show mercy to our brothers and sisters, and mercy to those we hope will be our brothers and sisters someday.  And never, ever, forget to forgive.

Value Judgment

 Texts:  Philippians 3:2-11; Matthew 13:44-52

  AROUND TWENTY-THREE YEARS AGO, A father, two grown sons, and a couple of their friends out in Kansas City shared an interest in treasure hunting.  They heard tell of a riverboat called the Arabia that'd gone down in the Missouri River near there in 1856, that she'd carried a cargo of gold and barrel upon barrel of excellent whiskey.  She was said to lie under a certain cornfield-- the Missouri has shifted considerably since the mid-1800s-- and they got permission from the farmer to find her and dig her up if they could.  So the men pooled thousands of dollars of their own money for the necessary equipment and set to work.  For weeks they dug and dug until at last, the wreck of the Arabia emerged from the silt 45 feet down.  And all the time the men were thinking of that valuable whiskey and gold, how they were going to sell it and make their fortunes.

    But a funny thing happened when the steamboat started yielding up its treasures . . . and I'll tell you what it was as I conclude this sermon.  But it's human nature to want to strike it rich.  There's something in us that feels that finding hidden treasure would be the most wonderful thing that could happen to us, and it'd be worth giving up a lot to get at it.  And our Lord Jesus, does He wag His finger at us pathetic human beings and say, "Naughty, naughty!  Stop being so greedy!"?  Not at all.  He totally agrees that nothing would be more joy-inspiring than finding something of infinite value where and when we least expect it.  In fact, our reading from St. Matthew this morning has to do with that very subject.  But what Jesus wants us to understand is that there is a more valuable treasure to be found than gold or silver or jewels.  And when we find it, it's worth giving up everything to gain.

    Matthew 13:44 begins, "The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field."  No use looking for mysterious meanings, there it is: the kingdom of heaven is like a hidden treasure.  But one day a man comes along and finds it.  Unlike the Arabia's salvagers, he isn't looking for it.  Good chance he's a hired man, digging the field for the landowner.  Now, it's not part of Jesus' meaning for us to get tangled up in who buried the treasure and the legal ramifications of the ancient Jewish finders-keepers laws, if they had any.  The point is, that there's a marvellous treasure, the man finds it, and he is struck by its value.  So he hides it again, sells everything he has, and buys that field.  He judged that it was worth the price, so valuable was the treasure he found.

    Jesus says the kingdom of heaven is like that.  Suddenly in the midst of the ordinary pressures and desires and attractions of this earthly life we see our Lord and His kingdom presented to us in all its wonder, and we accept that it's worth giving up everything we have, if only it-- if only He-- might be ours.

    Jesus' disciples would identify with the man in this parable.  From verse 11 of this chapter of Matthew, Jesus has made a distinction between the crowds, who follow Him for what they can get out of Him in the way of healings and food and excitement, and true disciples, who truly want to know Jesus and submit to Him as their Master and Lord.  The disciples were the ones to whom it was given, as Jesus said in that same verse 11, to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven.  So Jesus did not entrust this parable of the treasure hidden in the field to the crowds, but He spoke it in "the house" (probably Simon Peter's home in Capernaum), in private, to the disciples only.  They would hear it and think, "Yes, I was living my everyday life, doing my ordinary work, and all of a sudden this very ordinary-looking Man from Nazareth came along preaching the kingdom of heaven, and somehow in His presence it was like an amazing treasure was revealed to me.   Suddenly I saw that the kingdom of heaven was somehow wrapped up in Him.  And I knew I had to leave everything and follow Him, no matter what it would cost."

    Are you a true disciple of Jesus Christ?  When you look at Him in the pages of Scripture, do you recognize and confess that He, Himself, is the very embodiment of the kingdom of God?  And that He's worth following no matter what? 

    Be sure it is the real Jesus you're following after.  Beware that you don't squander everything you have on treasure that is false.  Some will tell you that the kingdom of heaven is a state of personal fulfilment where believers are continually satisfied with themselves and their lives.  Others say it will be a social utopia where everyone is equal and there are no more wars or thefts or social injustice.  Either way, they'll say it's up to us to bring the kingdom in.  Yes, the kingdom of heaven will include all those good things, but if we wear ourselves out trying to achieve good ends by us making the kingdom come, we've wasted our substance on fool's gold.  The kingdom is something only God can bring in.  It truly comes only when men and women, boys and girls, joyfully submit to Jesus Christ as their Saviour and King.  That's what the kingdom of heaven is: that state of affairs where God is King, beginning in your heart and mine.  And as our King, He's the Source and due Recipient of everything we've got and everything we are.

    And, Jesus begins in verse 45, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls.  Now, this is different. You'd think that He would say, "The kingdom of heaven is like a pearl of great value."  But now the merchant himself and his quest for perfect pearls are an image of God's rulership in the world. 

    A pearl is an interesting gem.  It isn't like other jewel.  Every gemstone has been there since the beginning of the world and you dig them out of the earth.  But pearls represent something new.  They have to be made, by an oyster, and they start with a little piece of dirt that irritates the oyster, and the mollusc coats and coats and coats that piece of grit with mother-of-pearl until it produces the beautiful lustrous orb we see in the jewelry store.  In the ancient world, fine pearls were valued more than diamonds, and the merchant Jesus speaks of is willing to sell everything he has to acquire it.

    And the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant, who comes deliberately seeking this pearl.  Brothers and sisters, Jesus Christ came into this world seeking us, His Church, and it cost Him everything He had, His very life's blood, to win us.  But wait a minute, you might say.  Before we were saved we were anything but pure and lustrous.  True. But the Lord not only sees from the beginning how things will turn out in the end, He also makes sure that things end up the way He's planned them.  In Paul's letter to the Ephesians, we're told that Christ gave Himself up for the Church, and that one day He will present her-- that is, us as a body-- to Himself as a radiant Church, without spot or wrinkle or any sort of blemish.  And in the book of the prophet Malachi the Lord indicates that a day will come when He will "make up His treasured possession," and we will be His, we who fear the Lord and honor His name.  We are His pearl of great price, and when it came time for Him to gain us, He held nothing back.  He paid the price for our sin and won us to Himself to be His holy people, precious in His sight.  It's significant, I think, that a pearl is essentially a bit of dirt covered over by radiant purity.  For in just that way Jesus Christ in His sacrificial love has covered our sins, so they are forgotten and never seen or thought of anymore; all that is seen is the loveliness we have become in Him.

    But there's a problem here.  Have you spotted it?  I'm preaching as if I assumed that all of us in this room have true faith in Jesus Christ.  That all of us have joyfully bowed the knee to Him as our King and our God.  I'm talking as if all of us have had our sins washed away in His blood and are willing, like Paul, to consider everything a loss for the sake of knowing Christ and the power of His resurrection.  I hope and pray that is so.  But it may not be.  Some of you may be like the crowds, only interested in Jesus for what He can do for you in this world.  You may think your kind of sinfulness is no big deal, that if God is offended at it that's His problem.  You may have no interest in the treasure that is the kingdom of heaven, and no desire that Christ should seek long and hard to find and purchase you for His own.

    If this is in your heart, beware.  For Jesus taught His disciples another parable about the kingdom of heaven.  He says that the it's like a great dragnet that is let down into the lake and catches all kinds of fish, both good and bad.  Do the fishermen keep all of them?  No, the bad fish are thrown away. They perish.  This, Jesus says, is how it will be at the end of the age, when He returns to judge the living and the dead.  There are many people who in this world seem to be children of the kingdom; they're all in the net.  But the time will come when mankind will be separated out and judged, the wicked from the righteous, and the wicked will be thrown into the fiery furnace.  There, Jesus says,  there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.  There, people who refused to worship Him as King, who thought they could use Him as a source of good advice, will spend eternity in burning despair and frustration, weeping with rage because they know God is righteous and their sentence was just.

    Please, don't let this happen to you.  Hear the Holy Spirit today as He speaks of Christ's love for you.  There is a remedy for your sin.  He has paid the price already, that you might be His own.  All you have to do is say, "Yes, Lord, You did for me what I could never do for myself.  Please bring me into your heavenly kingdom, for I trust you as my Saviour and Lord."

    After Jesus had finished teaching these parables, Matthew tells us, He asked His disciples, "Have you understood all these things?"  He puts the same question to you. Have you understood the unsurpassable value of the kingdom of heaven, that to gain it, it's worth everything you have and are?  Do you understand that Jesus Himself gave up everything to purchase us for His kingdom?  Do you understand that there will be a time of final judgement, when God will set the true value of every human creature, according to the value they set on the blood of Christ, shed on Calvary's cross?

    The disciples said yes, they understood. Jesus accepted their answer and told another short parable, which applies both to them and to us.  They, and we, are those who have been instructed about the kingdom of heaven.  Under the training of His word, we become teachers of the New Covenant law.  And so we are like householders who possess the old treasures of what God did for His people Israel and the new treasure of His grace to us in Jesus Christ.  And we don't keep these valuable things hidden; we bring them out and put them on display in our behavior and in our words, so that an impoverished and cursed world might be enriched and blessed.

    Which brings us back to the men who spent all that money and did all that work to salvage the steamboat Arabia.  They didn't find any gold or whiskey.  What they discovered was barrel upon barrel, crate upon crate, box upon box of every kind of household good and luxury that a frontier family could desire.  To quote the Arabia website, there was "castor oil and cognac, needles and nutmegs, windowpanes and wedding bands, eyeglasses and earrings"; think of anything you might want in your home, it was there in abundance. For a moment-- just a moment-- the men considered how much money they could get for all this.  But right away, they realized they couldn't sell the Arabia's cargo.  Immediately they began to conserve it, and the work goes on, twenty-two years later.  They raised the money to build a museum.  They put their discoveries on display, so people from all over America and around the world can see and appreciate the amazing treasure they found.

    That is what our Lord wants you and me to do with the treasure that is the kingdom of heaven.  He died and rose again to purchase your eternal membership in His kingdom, that in Him you will find everlasting joy that can never diminish or fade.  Let us not keep the treasure hidden.  Let us bring out the wonders of His grace from our storeroom and put them on display.  In the short time He has given us, let us reveal His glory daily, and shine like the most precious pearl He has purchased us to be.

    In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Let It Grow

Text:  Matthew 13:24-43

HOW IS THE LITTLE CONCERT WE had from the Bible School children this morning like the parables of Jesus?

    Think about it.  The children came up front and sang a couple of the songs they learned in Bible School this past week.  They looked cute, the songs were fun, and when they finished everyone smiled and clapped and the kids went back and sat down.  But is that all there was to it?  Did you have ears to hear the message as the children sang?  What did they tell us about the wonderful works of God and His mercy to His people? Were you moved to praise God's holy name?  Or did you see and hear only how cute the children were?

    Jesus' parables are like the children in their presentation this morning, and as we examine our passage from Matthew we can be like the crowds that flocked to Him from all around Galilee or like the disciples who truly longed to understand His teaching.      When the crowds heard Jesus say, "The kingdom of heaven is like" planting a field or making bread or whatever, they'd smile and nod and say, "Oh, the kingdom of heaven is like our everyday lives, but better."  They only received what was on the surface.  But as Jesus says back in verse 11 of this chapter, to the disciples it was given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven.  True disciples wouldn't stop with listening to the homespun story, they'd go on really to hear the parables' message.  If a disciple didn't fully understand, he'd go to Jesus and ask Him to explain.  Disciples would hear what God was doing to bring in His heavenly kingdom and be moved to praise His holy name.  They'd recognize more and more that Jesus is the King of the kingdom and yield to His claim and authority over their own lives.  They'd have ears to hear.

    So as we examine these parables of Jesus this morning, let us pray that we will be true disciples and not mere members of the crowd.  Let's see beyond the surface attraction of the stories and dig into the deeper meaning that Jesus wants us to hear.

    The parables of the wheat and the weeds, of the mustard seed, and of the leaven all have to do with things growing.  Now I don't know about you, but I get impatient waiting for things to grow.  I keep checking my tomato plants and wondering, "Why does it take so long?  I'm tired of these little green blobs!  I want big juicy red tomatoes now!"  But ripe tomatoes take time.

    It's the same way with the kingdom of heaven.  We have to wait to see its ultimate fruit.  It's not big and obvious and overwhelming all at once.  The kingdom has to grow.  And it grows along with trouble and opposition and counterfeits.

    We'll take the two shorter parables first.  Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed."  The seed in question isn't the round yellow mustard seed we're familiar with, but a tiny, practically weightless variety that can grow fifteen feet tall given half a chance.  It gets so big, the birds can take shelter in its branches.

    And, Jesus says, the kingdom of heaven is like yeast-- or actually, leaven, that a woman mixed in with a batch of dough.  It worked all through, and you know what happens when the dough gets baked-- it keeps rising and grows into the large finished loaf.

    So what do these parables tell us about the kingdom of heaven? 

    Maybe first we should look at what they do not tell us.  I hesitate about bringing up other preachers' bad Biblical interpretation in my sermons. Better just to preach sound doctrine and let the bad ideas die away by themselves.  But I want you to be convinced on this one thing: The things of everyday life that Jesus uses in His parables are just that: Everyday things.  They're neutral.  They can be used to stand for people and ideas and forces that are good and those that are evil.  I mention this because I once heard a preacher say that these two parables taught us that the kingdom of heaven was really a wicked thing.  He argued that in the Bible "the birds of the air" always stood for the Devil and his demons, and if the kingdom of heaven was like a tree giving shelter to the birds, then it was as evil as they were.  And, he said, leaven or yeast was always a symbol of sin in the Scripture.  So if the kingdom of heaven is like leaven, it must be an evil influence in world.

    I don't remember what that preacher's final point was.  I think it was that all churches are corrupt and we should get out of them.  But we can rely on Scripture itself to show us that he was wrong about the kingdom of heaven, and wrong about the way Jesus used the figure of the birds and the yeast in these little parables.

    For what is the kingdom of heaven (or the kingdom of God, as Mark, Luke, and John put it)?  From the very beginning of His ministry, when Jesus comes preaching the kingdom, it's clear that the kingdom of heaven is that state of affairs where God Almighty is Lord and King, where people obey Him and do His will and are blessed because of it.  And it starts in each of our hearts as we are called to repent and follow Him. 

    So the kingdom of heaven starts small, like a mustard seed, and it grows.  The Jews of Jesus' day were expecting the kingdom of God to be the ultimate cosmic force that'd erupt into this world and basically wipe it out and replace it with heaven in a instant.  Jesus' parables teach us that the kingdom is indeed cosmic; more than that, it's divine.  But God begins it in this world, not outside of it, and He brings it in slowly, bit by bit, causing it to grow bigger and stronger and more influential from impossibly small beginnings, until we look up and behold! Everything has changed!

    The parable of the mustard seed shows that one thing that would change was the benefits and scope of the kingdom.  The Jews were used to thinking of it as something that just included them, and maybe those Gentiles who agreed to be circumcised and become Jews.  But all of Jesus' audience would recognize the image of the tree with the birds of the air taking shelter in its branches.  It's a repeated Old Testament metaphor for the great king or emperor who provides nurture and protection for all the peoples and nations under his authority.  The kingdom of God is like that, Jesus says.  It begins in great insignificance, but when it is full-grown the peoples of this world, not just the Jews, will come and find refuge under God's gracious rule.

    It's the same with the parable of the leaven.  The substance referred to would be sourdough starter, not the active dry yeast we use today.  Yes, the Bible does often use leaven as a figure of sin, because the influence of both leaven and sin are pervasive.  But the effect of the kingdom of heaven in the world is also pervasive, in a good way.  The Greek text tells us exactly how much flour the woman was handling, three satas, around a half-bushel.  Depending on which commentator you read, that would make thirty-six to forty full-sized loaves of bread.  And she only uses a little leaven, and she hides it-- a better translation of the Greek than merely  "mixed"-- in all that flour. Then she left it to rise.  I've never made sourdough bread, but I understand you have to let it work for several hours, even overnight.  So, Jesus says, the kingdom of God is like something of very small quantity, concealed in something very large, that works over time, without anyone doing anything about it, until that larger thing is totally lightened, uplifted, and changed. 

    This is how it turned out to be as the kingdom of heaven became apparent in this world.  Think how few people still believed in Jesus after He died.  Think how few in number they were who were gathered in the Upper Room on the day of Pentecost-- only 120.  Think how obscure and insignificant those people were-- fishermen and petty officials and peasants.  But they were children of the kingdom of heaven.  Peter and John and Matthew and the rest were planted and hidden in the unbelieving world by the power of the Holy Spirit, and in time, by God's working, the whole world was changed.  Before long, Gentiles were coming and finding refuge in the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Even today, even those who don't believe in Christ, even those who would never admit to there being any good in what they dismiss as religion, even they benefit from the influence of Christianity in the world.  That's what happens when God's rulership has its natural effect.  It must and will grow.

    But the kingdom of God does not grow without trouble and opposition and counterfeits.  Jesus also tells the parable of a man who sowed good seed in his field, but during the night some enemies sowed weed seeds in among it.  Verse 26 tells us that the weeds didn't become apparent until the wheat had formed heads.  When Jesus told this parable, the farmers in the crowd would recognize the weeds as a species of grass called darnel.  Darnel is a nasty little plant with poisonous seeds.  It looks identical to wheat till the heads form, and it twines its roots in around the roots of the wheat so you can't pull it out without uprooting the wheat as well. 

    So in the parable, the master of the field tells his servants to leave it be until the harvest.  Fortunately, ripe darnel stands tall while the wheat stalks droop, so it's easy to collect it first, as the master orders, and bundled it up to be burnt.  Then the good wheat can be harvested and threshed and stored safely in the barn.

    This is how the kingdom of heaven is, says Jesus.  The sower is the Son of Man; that is, Jesus Christ Himself.  The field is not the Church, but the whole world, and the good seed is the sons of the kingdom.

    Do you have ears to hear this?  The good seed are all those whom Jesus Christ has called to accept Him as King, those who have responded to Him in faith and accepted His death on the cross to atone for their sins.

    But along with the good seed, weed seed is also sown.  These are the sons of the evil one.  Both grow up together.  Both look a lot alike.  But a time will come when God will make a final distinction.  At Last Judgement, Jesus will send His angels and give them the command to uproot out of His kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil.   For in that day the kingdom of this world will fully become the kingdom of our God and of His Christ.  The wicked will be cast into the fiery furnace-- into Hell, but the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of God their Father.

    Yes, we should rejoice in that hope.  But right now I hope this parable causes you some alarm, for your sake and the sake of others.  How do we know who is a son of the kingdom?  By their fruit.  By hearts truly yielded to Christ as King, trusting in Him alone for salvation and exhibiting the fruit of the Spirit in their lives. 

    Now, here's the alarming thing: in this world, the exterior behavior of the children of the evil one can look a lot like that of the children of the kingdom, just like darnel mimics wheat. They reject Jesus Christ, but are kind and funny and nice, and maybe they're people we care about and love.  And we can convince ourselves that that's enough, that their niceness is enough to earn them the benefits of God's kingdom, and we don't have to invite them to church or tell them about Christ, because they're good enough the way they are.

    Brothers and sisters, being a son or daughter of God's kingdom is not about being nice and kind and loving according to the standards of this world!  It's about being submitted to Jesus Christ as your only Saviour and Lord.  And that not because of any volition of your own, but because of the will and calling of Almighty God!  If you and I are wheat in God's field, it's because He planted us there.  And it is His will that through our witness He will plant many others as well, even people we'd never imagine as sons of His righteousness, and like us He can make them grow and bear fruit to His glory.

    The kingdom of heaven is not an event, it is a process.  It is something that grows little by little, until there it is and everything has changed.  The day will come when Christ will give the command and the kingdom of heaven will come in all its fullness.  But until then, however small it may seem, however it may seem to struggle, God's kingdom will grow.  It will grow, people yet unborn will find shelter in its branches, multitudes will be fed on its bounty, and the Son of Man will have His glorious harvest home.  Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.

    In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

What Do You See? What Do You Hear?

Text:  Matthew 13:1-23

    WHY DID JESUS TEACH IN parables?  The answer may surprise you.

    I'd say we're all familiar with what's called "The Parable of the Sower."  It begins with Jesus saying, "A sower went out to sow . . . ," or, as the NIV puts it, "A farmer went out to sow his seed."  We know all about the four kinds of soil and what happened to the seed when it fell on them.  We've heard various interpretations on what the seed is, and we've been taught to examine ourselves to determine what kind of soil we might be.

    But if we only look there, even with the parable's interpretation Jesus gives in verses 18 through 23, we'll cut ourselves off from true spiritual understanding.  Even worse, we'll get ourselves into real spiritual trouble.  The parables of Jesus aren't like Aesop's fables: they're not little moral tales that stand on their own to teach us how to live.  No, they have a greater purpose than that and they're part of a bigger story which is part of a bigger story still.  We-- you and I-- are all part of that biggest story of all, and we need to keep our eyes and ears open if we want it to finish up in joy and blessing for us, instead of taking us down to judgement and woe.

    The parables of our Lord Jesus Christ fit into the larger story of Jesus' earthly ministry.  And the story-- or, I should say, the history-- of Jesus' ministry is crucial to the cosmic story of God the Father's mighty act of rescuing lost humanity from our sins.  Our salvation is tied up with the establishment of God's kingdom on earth and the parables of Jesus are crucial to its coming.  They serve to include us in the great story of salvation-- at least, they do if we have ears to hear and eyes to see.

    Did Jesus always teach in parables?  Actually, no.  This parable of the sower is the first Matthew records, and the second one reported by St. Mark.  Interestingly, both Matthew and Mark record Jesus first teaching in parables on one particular day.  Luke has one or two parables from Jesus before this, but the vast majority of them come after.  When you look at the timeline of Jesus' ministry, He doesn't start teaching in parables till nearly two years after His baptism by John.  So for nearly two years Jesus has mostly been doing straightforward, ordinary teaching.  He's used figures of speech, sure, but not parables.  So what changed?

    From the very beginning, Our Lord's purpose in ministry was to inaugurate the kingdom of God.  More than that, He was making it clear that He was the Lord and King of the kingdom.  It was all about Him.  The Pharisees recognized what He was doing and hated Him for it.  How dared He?  How dared He claim the authority of God and pass judgment on their rules and practices?  The crowds, on the other hand, loved what Jesus was doing.  They loved the miracles, especially the healings.   They loved the way His teaching stuck in the craw of the pompous, self-righteous religious authorities.  But did they see Jesus?  Did they truly hear what He was telling them about the kingdom of heaven and His kingship over it?  For the most part, the answer was no.

    The defining moment came one day when Jesus was talking in the house, most likely the home of Peter and his family in Capernaum.  People are crowding inside and trampling all over the yard, eager to hear what this wonderful Rabbi has to say.  As Matthew records at the end of the twelfth chapter, Jesus' mother Mary and His brothers pick that time to show up from Nazareth and insist on talking to Him.  St. Mark reports that they'd decided to take charge of Him.  They'd decided He was out of His mind and needed to be brought home for His own good.  Jesus refuses to go out to them, and in Matthew 12:48-50 He lays down His rules for who can be a citizen of the kingdom of God and a member of the royal household.  He says,

    "Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?"  Pointing to his disciples, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers.  For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother."

    Jesus points to His disciples.  Not to the crowd in general, but to those He'd called and who followed Him. Then, Matthew records, that same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the Lake of Galilee.  Due to the press of the crowds, He got into a boat to teach, and began to tell them many things-- in parables.   He spoke of a farmer who went out to sow, and what happened to the seed on each of the types of soil it fell upon.  And He concluded the parable with these words, "He who has ears, let him hear."

    That struck the disciples as unusual.  They came to Him and asked, "Why do you speak to the people in parables?"  You can visualize them standing in the shallows next to the boat, bringing Him a drink of water maybe, and taking the opportunity to have a private word with their Teacher.  Master, what's going on here?
    What Jesus replied may shock you.  We've often heard it said that Jesus taught in parables so the people could better understand the mysteries of the kingdom of God.  Not at all.  Just the opposite. 

    He replied, "The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them.  Whoever has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. This is why I speak to them in parables:
        "Though seeing, they do not see;
                   though hearing, they do not hear or understand."

What, Lord?  You mean You tell parables to reveal who's ready and willing to enter the kingdom of God and who's not?

    That's exactly what He's saying.  It was two years into His ministry.  The religious leaders claimed to be champions of God's kingdom but they rejected God's King.  The crowds wanted the King and the kingdom only for what they could get out of them on this earth.  Only to a few, to the called and dedicated disciples, was it given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven. 

    Nobody can know the mysteries of the kingdom of God naturally.  Not you, not I, not the first disciples.  They have to be given to us by divine revelation.  None of us deserve to know these secrets: it's by the sovereign will and grace of God that we come to understand them.  God chose to open those secrets to Jesus' chosen disciples, and now, to us whom He has called to faith in His name.

    Jesus said, "Whoever has will be given more, and he will have an abundance.  Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him."  That doesn't sound fair!  But that's the way it works in economics and how it works in gaining wisdom and understanding.  The disciples had some idea of who Jesus was and what His message was about.  They knew enough to know they wanted to know more what this parable was about.  They brought the little bit of spiritual insight they had and came to Jesus and asked Him to add to it.  But the Pharisees would hear a parable like this and scoff, "This Jesus is a babbler and a fool.  We'll keep on pleasing God the way we see fit."  The crowds would think they knew what the parable meant, but they didn't understand what Jesus was saying about the kingdom of heaven at all.  They thought they understood, but unless they truly had ears to hear, all their understanding would turn out to be nothing.  It'd be hauled away like garbage. 

    Jesus had been declaring the secrets of the kingdom of heaven since He first began His ministry, but only a few gained intimate knowledge of them.  He claimed to be the divine Bridegroom that Israel has been waiting for.  He said He was Lord of the Sabbath.  Jesus centered the hope of salvation and favor with God in His own Person, and He taught that He would rise from the grave after three days.  He said that those who wouldn't repent in response to His preaching will be condemned in the last judgement.  All this He spoke openly, without using parables or figures of speech, but only a few responded in faith.  So from now on He will use parables, to make a distinction between those who truly long to see, and those who think they see enough already or who have blinded themselves and just don't care.

    This includes us.  What do we see?  What do we hear?  Jesus says in John 12, "I did not come to judge the world, but to save it.  There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; that very word which I spoke will condemn him on the last day."  The Letter to the Hebrews speaks of the word of God as being "Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart."  The parables of Jesus reveal our attitudes towards Him and towards the kingdom He establishes in this world and the world to come.

    The Parable of the Sower itself is a parable about the dividing and revealing effect of the Word of God.  Jesus tells us that the seed that is sown is the message about the kingdom.  It's not the message of our own good works, or our love for others, or anything to do with sinful humans at all.  It's the good news about Jesus Christ the Son of God, born of a virgin, crucified for our sins, risen for our eternal life, ascended to the right hand of the Father, coming again to judge the living and the dead, and reigning forever in glory.  It's about that state of affairs where God Almighty is Lord and King, starting in each of our hearts, here and now.  This message of the kingdom was proclaimed by Jesus Himself and it has been proclaimed by faithful ministers of His church down through the centuries.  It is declared to all, whether they have ears to hear or not.

    So hear what the parable of the sower means.  You can sit in your pew Lord's Day after Lord's Day, and hear Christ faithfully  preached as died and risen again for you-- for you!-- and you can think, "That means nothing to me.  I'm good enough without Jesus on the cross.  What do I need a bloody sacrifice for?  That's so barbarian and out of date!"  You have no understanding, and the evil one is right there, snatching away what was sown in your heart. 

    Or you might hear and think, "Oh, this is so wonderful!  Jesus died to redeem me and all sinners!  He's the only way to salvation!"  But then your daughter moves in with her boyfriend and you tell her Jesus accepts it because you don't want her to hate you. Or you find yourself saying to unbelieving friends, "Well, there's lots of different ways to get to God, I just happen to believe in Jesus, I guess . . . " Beware!  You have no understanding, no root.  Persecution has come and your faith is getting scorched and withered.

    Or maybe you receive the good news of the kingdom, and you believe, you really believe you do.  But then you lose your job.  Your son gets arrested for possession of illegal drugs.  Your beloved spouse is diagnosed with terminal cancer.  And you start wondering, "What's this Christianity thing good for, anyway?  I thought Jesus was going to give me the abundant life.  I guess He hates me.  Or God just doesn't care."  Or maybe it's the opposite of that.  Maybe you get a big fat raise and now you can afford a cabin up on Lake Erie.  Or season tickets to all the Steelers' games.  You get attracted and distracted and Jesus and His kingdom seem to pale in comparison.  What do you need church and Jesus for, you might wonder.  Things are going just fine!  You have no understanding of the message of Christ's kingdom, the worries and desires of this life are choking out the good seed, and it ends up unfruitful.

    But suppose you hear Christ faithfully proclaimed as crucified for your sins; yes, yours.  Suppose your spiritual eyes are opened to see Him gloriously risen to give you new life; suppose you joyfully receive God's gracious gift of Christ in you and for you.  God has made you good soil, He has granted you true understanding, and by His grace you will be fruitful as a child of His kingdom.  Even if you feel you don't quite understand, still you desire to hear more about Jesus Christ and what He has done to save you.  That is a sign of good soil, which His Holy Spirit will cultivate in you day by day.

    Jesus spoke in parables to reveal the difference between those who truly desired the kingdom of God and its King, and those who wanted the kingdom to serve their own purposes or who rejected Him altogether.  What do you see?  What do you hear?  Will you accept Jesus Christ as your Saviour and King and joyfully submit to His loving rule?  If so, "Blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear."  Blessed are you, for yours is the kingdom of heaven.