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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.
Today we have a wonderful providential concurrence of Tori Jane’s Holy Baptism with the Holy Gospel for the Second Sunday in Advent that tells of the ministry of John the Baptizer, who proclaimed and practiced, what the Divinely‑inspired St. Luke called, “A Baptism of Repentance for the Forgiveness of Sins”. And, this morning we consider the Gospel Reading, directing our thoughts to that description, not only of John’s Baptism but also of our Baptism; our them then is “A Baptism of Repentance for the Forgiveness of Sins”.
The Gospel Reading notably describes John the Baptizer’s ministry of proclaiming and practicing “A Baptism of Repentance for the Forgiveness of Sins” as the fulfillment of words that God spoke centuries earlier through Isaiah the prophet, regarding a voice of one crying in the wilderness to prepare the way of the Lord, to make His paths straight, and declaring that all flesh will see the salvation of God. And, see, or “discern”, that salvation apparently the crowds that came out to be baptized by John did, although that salvation might not have looked like much to their naked eyes, just as the Holy Baptism of Tori Jane might not have looked like much to our naked eyes this morning, either: a few words and the application of some water to someone whom many might think either does not need or is not capable of receiving the salvation that they also might deny that the words and water are themselves even capable of accomplishing.
As we heard in the Gospel Reading, John the Baptizer called the crowds that came out to be baptized by him “brood of vipers”, or “offspring” of “snakes” or “serpents”, and we might think of Jesus’s similarly calling the Jews children of the devil, who is a murderer and a liar (John 8:44‑47), and we also might think of the Old Testament background for that statement, which includes God’s prophecy through Isaiah that associates vipers with crooked roads (Isaiah 59:1-8; cited by Egger, CPR 32:1, p.22) and perhaps also the account of the serpent’s deceiving the woman and the man in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:1-13). The crowds’ physical descent from the woman and the man in the garden, and from Abraham after them, did not save them, as John and Jesus pointed out (John 8:39), but instead that physical descent damned them, apart from repentance and the faith that Abraham had, as we have been studying recently in our Sunday Adult Bible Class on Romans (Romans 4:1‑25).
“Brood of vipers” includes Tori Jane and each one of us by nature. Like the crowds that came out to be baptized by John, we share the woman and man’s original sin, and so we are estranged from God, in need of salvation and unable to save ourselves. Even when we have been made to see the salvation of God, as in the proclaiming and practicing of “A Baptism of Repentance for the Forgiveness of Sins”, we might have little regard for that salvation, for example, we might unnecessarily put off Baptism for our offspring, or we might fail to appreciate what Baptism means for us ourselves. We all are in need of faithful preachers’, like John the Baptizer’s, warning us to flee from the wrath to come that we deserve, calling and thereby enabling us—whether we are eight days old, eight years old, or eight decades old—to turn in sorrow from our sin, to trust God to forgive our sin, and to want to stop sinning. When, so enabled by God, we so repent, then God forgives us our sin, all our sin, whatever our sin might be. God forgives us for the sake of His Son Jesus Christ, our Lord. God, as it were, fills every valley and makes low every mountain and hill; He makes the crooked straight and the rough places level ways.
God not only sends the messengers through whom He works, but He also comes Himself. Out of His great love for fallen humankind, God Himself came in the human flesh of the man Jesus, in order both to live the perfect life that we fail to live and to make up for our failure to live that life. On the cross, Jesus died for your sins and my sins and the sins of all people; on the cross, He died the death that we deserved, in our place. There on the cross is the glory of the Lord for us! All flesh, not only Jews but also Gentiles, see that salvation of God, by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. As we prayed in today’s Collect of the Day, He stirs up our hearts to make ready the way of His only-begotten Son. The faith that receives God’s gift of salvation is created by Him in whoever believes, including the infants, like Tori Jane, who are brought to Him, and whom He says also believe in Him (Luke 18:15‑17; Matthew 18:5-6).
In order to create the faith that receives God’s gift of salvation, God gave the ministry of His Word and Sacraments (Augsburg Confession V:1), to which Means of Grace God has bound Himself. Although one might have expected the Word of God to have come to Annas or Caiaphas the high priests in Jerusalem, in the Gospel Reading we heard how instead that Word of God came to John in the wilderness. John then proclaimed and practiced “A Baptism of Repentance for the Forgiveness of Sins”, and later Jesus’s apostles were sent similarly to proclaim repentance for the forgiveness of sins (Luke 24:47). Some of those from the crowds whom John baptized later may well have had table fellowship with Jesus, even as we who are baptized and then individually instructed, examined, and absolved are admitted to this Altar and its Rail (Apology of the Augsburg Confession XV:40), where we have table fellowship with Jesus, eating bread that is His Body given for us and drinking wine that is His Blood shed for us, by which Body and Blood we also receive the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. Whether by the coronavirus or some other means that God might choose, we can depart in peace, as we sing in the Nunc Dimittis, for our eyes have seen the salvation the Lord has prepared in the sight of every people (Lutheran Service Book 165; confer Luke 2:30).
As we heard in today’s Old Testament Reading (Malachi 3:1-7b), having sent His messenger to prepare His way, the Lord Himself purifies us so that we can bring offerings and live lives righteous and pleasing to Him (Egger, CPR 32:1, 22). In the Gospel Reading, three different groups of those who had already repented and believed and been baptized (confer Acts 2:37-41; 16:29-34) catechetically asked John what good fruit they should bear, and John described for them good works in keeping with their vocations, which good works would demonstrate that their faith was present and active by their loving and serving their neighbors, likely already right there in the wilderness (Roehrs-Franzmann, ad loc Luke 3:10-14, p.63), no longer being unnecessarily attached to the things of this world (Just, ad loc Luke 3:1-20, p.153). As we heard in the Epistle Reading (Philippians 1:2-11), we can be confident that God, Who has begun a good work in us, will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ, but only as we permit Him to do so, through frequent regular use of His Word and Sacraments, including bringing our children to Sunday School and ourselves to Adult Bible Class and being present in the Divine Service and receiving Christ’s Body and Blood.
Truly today we have had a wonderful providential concurrence of Tori Jane’s Holy Baptism with the Gospel Reading about the ministry of John the Baptizer, who proclaimed and practiced “A Baptism of Repentance for the Forgiveness of Sins”. Baptism has saved Tori Jane, as Baptism has saved each one of us who receive its blessings through faith. Today’s Psalm (Psalm 66:1-12; antiphon v.12b) recalls an earlier rescue by water in a different wilderness, but our response is the same: we answer the psalmist’s call to bless our God and let the sound of His praise be heard.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +}