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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
What are you and I stirring-up this Advent? Last Sunday afternoon at our congregation’s Christmas party, there were quite a number of goodies that people had “stirred-up” at home. And, as we get closer to Christmas, no doubt people will be “stirring-up” even more goodies. Get those mixing bowls and spoons ready! Last Wednesday, in the first sermon of our Midweek Series on the traditional Collects for Advent, we reflected on the short, highly structured and focused prayer for Advent I, which asked the Lord Jesus to stir-up His power and come, so that we might be rescued and saved. Tonight, as we continue the Sermon Series, we reflect on the Collect for Advent II (Pfatteicher, 209), which asks God the Father to stir-up our hearts to make ready the way of His Son, so that, by the Son’s coming, we may be enabled to serve the Father. Reportedly the most‑widely used of the Advent Collects, tonight’s essentially asks for “Stirred-up Hearts to Make Ready and Serve”. If you pull out your half-page service outline, printed on its front, you will find the Collect for the Second Sunday in Advent (and the week following). I apologize for the typo: “reign” should be “reigns”. With that correction, let us read it together right now.
Stir up our hearts, O Lord, to make ready the way of Your Only-begotten Son,
that by His coming we may be enabled to serve You with pure minds;
through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord,
Who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
When we think about asking the Lord to stir-up our hearts, we have to move beyond the idea of a literal mixing bowl and spoon! The Lord is not going to use a spoon to stir‑up our hearts, not that we could put our hearts in a mixing bowl to begin with. Of course, as God speaks in the Bible, our hearts are also more than the muscle that pumps our blood through our bodies. For example, in the Old Testament the Hebrew word for “heart” can also refer to such things as our inner beings, mind, will, and understanding; our soul; our thinking; our inclination, resolution, and determination; and our conscience (ESL #3820). The same word can refer to the seat of our moral character, appetites, emotions, and passions. When the heart stirs us up, it incites us to action (TWOT #1421), but the action is not always good.
An Old Testament example of the heart stirring someone up to no good is Amaziah, one‑time king of Judah, whose heart, after Judah had defeated some Edomites, boastfully lifted (or “stirred”) him up to battle Jehoash, then king of Israel. Well, Jehoash captured Amaziah, destroyed a section of Jerusalem’s walls, robbed the Temple, and took hostages. In some ways, Amaziah had been a good king, until he worshipped gods other than the Lord God and refused to listen to a prophet the Lord sent to him, so God determined to destroy Amaziah. (2 Kings 14:7‑14; 2 Chronicles 25:14-25.) We may not be kings of Israel, but, by nature, we suffer from similar problems and ultimately deserve the same destruction. In the New Testament, Jesus says that out of our hearts and so out of our mouths come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander—that is a good chunk of the Commandments right there! (Matthew 15:18-19; Mark 3:5; 7:21; Luke 6:45.) As we are guilty of breaking any one, we are guilty of breaking them all (James 2:10). And, for such guilt we deserve to be destroyed by death here in time and by hellish torment for eternity.
Apart from God, we are no more likely to stir-up our hearts to do anything pleasing to Him than the ingredients we put into a mixing bowl are likely to stir themselves up (and I do not mean vinegar and baking soda that so many used to simulate volcanic eruptions for school projects). In the Gospel Reading Sunday we essentially heard John the Baptizer cry out to us, “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight His paths,” but ultimately, when it comes to our hearts, the Lord is the only one who can fill the valleys, make low the hills, straighten the crooked, and level the rough places. The Lord does all those things, enabling us to repent (turn in sorrow from our sin) and believe (trust Him to forgive our sin) so that as a result we can see the salvation of God, in the person and work of His Only‑begotten Son (confer Harris).
As we heard the angel Gabriel in tonight’s Second Reading (Luke 1:26-35) tell the Virgin Mary would happen—and as was echoed in a somewhat fanciful way in the Office Hymn (Lutheran Service Book 356)—the Holy Spirit came upon the Virgin Mary, and the power of the Most High overshadowed her, so the child that was born of her was not only her Son but also the Son of the Most High God. Mary and Joseph named Him Jesus, for He would save His people from their sins (Matthew 1:21), and so He did. Out of His great love for us, the otherwise sinless God-man Jesus Christ on the cross died for your sins and for mine. After parts of three days, He rose from the dead, showing that God the Father had accepted His sacrifice on our behalf. Now ascended to the right hand of the Father, He sits on the throne of His father David and reigns over the house of Jacob forever, and of His Kingdom there will be no end.
The Lord does not use a spoon to stir‑up our hearts, but He uses His Word: His Word read and preached in the Divine Service, His Word combined with water in Holy Baptism, His Word spoken by our pastor in individual Holy Absolution, and His Word that makes bread His Body and wine His blood in Holy Communion. In all these ways the Lord stirs-up our hearts to make ready the way of His Only-begotten Son, Who Himself comes to us in these very same ways. In all these ways the Lord forgives the sins of all who repent and believe, distributing the benefit of Jesus’s death on the cross. So, we who test and examine our ways and return to the Lord lift up (or “stir-up”) our hearts and hands to God in heaven (Lamentations 3:41). Even that response of faith is ultimately God’s doing, even as His coming enables us to serve Him with pure minds.
An Old Testament example of hearts stirring people up to good is the congregation of the Israelites who contributed more than what was needed for the Tent of Meeting, its service, and the holy garments; who fabricated the raw material; and who otherwise did the work (Exodus 35:21, 26; 36:2). Their hearts stirred them up, as the Collect prays of us, to serve God with pure minds. Tonight’s Closing Hymn (Lutheran Service Book 354), like other Advent hymns, tries to make clear that the action begins with God and then it continues as God works in and through us.
Reflecting tonight on the Collect for Advent II, we have realized that God gives us “Stirred-up Hearts to Make Ready and Serve”. As we hold fast to Him in love, daily repenting and believing, He, as we sang in tonight’s Psalm (91) delivers us, protects us, answers us, is with us in trouble, rescues us, honors us, and satisfies us with long life, showing us His salvation. The long-promised and long‑awaited Savior came once, and that coming assures us that He will both continue to come to us now in His Word and Sacraments and come a final time in glory. Then we will have the perfect and complete peace pictured in tonight’s First Reading (Micah 4:1-7). As we sang in the Opening Hymn (Lutheran Service Book 352) we say again now:
Then when [He] will come again / As the glorious king to reign,
[We] with joy will see [His] face, / Freely ransomed by [His] grace.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +