Listen to the sermon with the player below, or, download the audio.
+ + + 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. (Amen.)
Hopefully you are here tonight for the same reason that the wise men from the east came to Jerusalem: no, not because You have seen a star when it rose but because You want to worship Him Who has been born King of the Jews, and not worship Him just in some generic way but worship Him specifically by seeking from Him the forgiveness of sins. To be sure, God used a miraculous star of some sort in order to lead the wise men, maybe royal ambassadors, to the Child Jesus, but the star is only a means to the more‑important end. Clearly the star is associated with Jesus Christ, but the star is not Jesus Christ, at least not in the Gospel Reading, although in the Hymn of the Day the “Morning Star” is Jesus Christ, as He identifies Himself at the end of the Revelation to St. John (Revelation 22:16; confer Zager, #395, LSB:CttH, p.178), and in one of the picked Distribution Hymns we sing, as it were, to the star of the Gospel Reading (LSB 400). Similarly, camels like those in the Old Testament Reading (Isaiah 60:1-6) and those that likely carried the wise men from the east to Jerusalem, may be in some ways an important part of what happened in the Gospel Reading, but they are not the main thing. Nor are the main things the gold and frankincense and myrrh, the first two of which are also mentioned in the Old Testament Reading, as the Psalm (Psalm 72:1‑15; antiphon v.18) also mentions gold’s being brought from Sheba. So clearly does the event of the Gospel Reading seem to fulfill the prophecy of the Old Testament Reading and the Psalm that we might have expected the Divinely-inspired St. Matthew’s Gospel account to mention this seeming fulfillment as it mentions other fulfillments (for example, Matthew 1:22)!
The Epiphany of Our Lord sermon provided by the Missouri Synod’s preaching journal, for which I am sometimes asked to write, got my attention with the sermon’s title “The Singing Camels of Sheba”. In that sermon on the Old Testament Reading, Concordia University‑Wisconsin professor the Rev. Dr. Nathan R. Jastram at least initially understands the camels to be bringing not only the gold and frankincense but also the good news, the praises of the Lord, as if the camels themselves are the ones singing the praise of the Lord. Rev. Dr. Jastram later recognizes that “most likely” the camels made possible for the people on them to sing the praise of the Lord, but not before the Rev. Dr. Jastram describes the camels as “ugly beasts, often irritable and nippy, smelly,” that sometimes spit “their foul saliva at bewildered [spectators]” (Jastram, CPR 36:1, pp.65-66).
Rev. Dr. Jastram’s description made me think of the penitential Psalm verse that tells us to “Be not like a horse or mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you” (Psalm 32:9 ESV). Of course, the Divinely‑inspired psalmist does not say that for no reason! On our own, spiritually that is exactly what we are—like horses or mules, without understanding! We are opposed to God and fight against Him and His will for our lives. Getting us to be sorry for our sin and to trust God to forgive us of our sin may be as miraculous as getting camels to sing, or a donkey to talk, as did Balaam’s donkey (Numbers 22:22-35), not long before Balaam prophesied of a star’s coming out of Jacob and a scepter’s rising out of Israel (Numbers 24:17), prophecy also to some extent fulfilled in the event of the Gospel Reading. To paraphrase the Old Testament Reading, the darkness of sin covers the earth, and the thick darkness of death covers the peoples, but the Lord arises upon us, and His glory is seen upon us (confer Isaiah 9:2). As the Lord used His word and sign to lead the wise men to worship the Child Jesus, so the Lord uses His Word and Sacraments to lead us to worship Jesus, to worship Him specifically by seeking from Him the forgiveness of sins. The wise men were, and we are, “Led to seek forgiveness”, which is exactly what they needed and we need, and their and our forgiveness results in their and our praise of the Lord.
The Gospel Reading is clear both that the wise men worship the God Who created the universe and that the wise men worship that God in the human flesh of the Child Jesus, Who was born King of the Jews in the royal line of David, a descendant of Judah, a descendant of Jacob, who is also known as Israel. As the Gospel Reading indicates, even unbelieving Herod understood that the Child in question was the Christ, the long‑promised Messiah, the Savior. Though His coming forth was from old, from ancient days, the Christ was born in time to a line of shepherds, and Christ Jesus is the Good Shepherd of God’s people Israel, Who, out of God’s great love, on the cross laid down His life for His sheep—for us, in our place, as our substitute—and then took His life back up again (John 10:11, 17-18). Bad shepherds, rulers such as Herod when Jesus was a Boy and Annas and Caiaphas when Jesus was a Man, raged and plotted and took counsel together but only in vain, for He Who sits in the heaven laughs and holds them in derision and sets His king in place regardless (Psalm 2:1-2, 4, 6). We know from the Old Testament that, when the people would come to where God was present on earth, one of the things for which they would ask was the forgiveness of sins (1 Kings 8:27-30, 41-43). So, we come asking for forgiveness and receiving it through God’s Word and Sacraments.
God’s Word helped the wise men understand what God was doing with the star, and God’s Word helps us understand what God does with the water of Holy Baptism, with the touch of Holy Absolution, and with both the bread that is the Body of Christ given for us and the wine that is the Blood of Christ shed for us in the Holy Supper. God’s Word and these signs, worked through His messengers, under‑shepherds of the Good Shepherd, ministers, as St. Paul describes himself in the Epistle Reading (Ephesians 3:1-12)—God’s Word and these signs bring us into His Kingdom, forgive our sins, and preserve us in body and soul unto life everlasting. Whether we are Jew or Gentile, male or female, young or old does not matter. All people are sinful, and, though some people reject it, God at least offers forgiveness for Jesus’s sake to all people in all of these ways (confer Matthew 28:19-20).
Like the wise men, who saw the Child Jesus and worshiped Him as the Creator of the Universe, our hearts believe what our human eyes do not see but the eyes of faith do see: that is, we see God present in His Word and Sacraments in order to forgive and actually forgiving our sinful nature and all of our actual sins, whatever our actual sins might be. When we are forgiven, then we respond with great joy and praises of the Lord. With our words and deeds we at least try to tell others the good news of what God has done for us in Christ. And, like the wise men, having opened our treasuries, we offer gifts not to others but first and foremost to God, not gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh, but sacrificial first‑fruits of whatever God has given to us. Our gifts are usually in the form of cash or checks, but also such things as electronic funds transfers. As the wise men’s gifts likely supported the Holy Family as they subsequently fled to Egypt, so our gifts support the work of God’s Kingdom in this place. Our gifts do not buy our salvation, but our gifts are our response to God’s freely‑given salvation.
As I have said, the star, camels, and costly gifts are not the main things on this Epiphany of Our Lord. Rather, the main thing is the Son of God’s being revealed in the flesh of Jesus especially to Gentiles like us for the forgiveness of sins. We are “Led to seek forgiveness”, which forgiveness we sinner‑saints need not only on Sunday mornings but also on midweek feasts and festivals, in short, as often as we can receive it. By God’s mercy and grace, may we continue so to regularly receive His forgiveness, until, as we prayed in the Collect of the Day, we enjoy in heaven the fullness of His Divine Presence.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. (Amen.)
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +