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Sermon for the Sixteenth Sunday After Pentecost Are YOU Talkin’ to ME? Theme: The sermon is about you. You need NOT to concern yourself with whether it might also be about someone else. Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ! Amen. After Jesus preaches a sermon in today’s Gospel, telling His Parable of the Vineyard, St. Matthew adds a little explanation about the impact and result of Jesus’ sermon. “When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His [Jesus’] parables, they perceived that He was speaking about them.” This is an amazing thing: Jesus never once says to the chief priests and the Pharisees, “Hey, this sermon is about YOU!” Nevertheless, upon hearing the powerful Word of God preached to them, “the chief priests and the Pharisees … perceived that He [Jesus] was speaking about them.” Jesus was speaking against Pharisees’ sin and He was calling the chief priests to repentance, so that they themselves would receive the personal benefit and blessing of Jesus’ the forgiveness of their sins. There were probably other people listening to Jesus’ sermon that day, since it was preached in open public at the temple in Jerusalem (Matthew 21:23). Those other people did not matter, as far as the chief priests and the Pharisees were concerned. The Word of God was confronting them. “They perceived that He [Jesus] was speaking about them.” Dear Christian friends, Every once in a while, the absolute best thing you can do for yourself and for your neighbor is to totally ignore your neighbor. This does not happen all the time: God your heavenly Father requires and demands that you pay very close attention to your neighbor. That you guard and protect your neighbor in every way imaginable; that you supply to your neighbor whatever he or she may lack, not matter what it may be; that you especially regard your Christian neighbor as your brother—and that you be your brother’s keeper. Nevertheless, every once in a while—maybe even once a week—the absolute best thing you can do for yourself and for your neighbor is to totally ignore your neighbor. When Jesus is talking to you—in the same way that He was talking in particular to the chief priests and the Pharisees in today’s Gospel—when Jesus is talking to you, the best and most loving thing you can do for your neighbor is to keep your neighbor out of the conversation. As you may already know, when I mention “Jesus talking to you,” I am NOT referring to some Pentecostal, demonic, supposed whispering of Jesus into your heart and mind. When I say, “Jesus is talking to you,” I am referring to the absolution Jesus proclaims to you in here worship, in which all your sins are now forgiven; I am also speaking about the Sunday sermon, which we believe is nothing other than Jesus’ own words spoken personally to you, delivered to you from the lips of Baalam’s donkey. I repeat: When Jesus is talking to you—just as He was talking to the chief priests and the Pharisees in today’s Gospel—when Jesus is talking to you, the best and most loving thing you can do is to keep your neighbor out of the conversation. The General Absolution is One-to-One, Jesus-to-You When you hear the absolution at the beginning of the service, Jesus is speaking about you and to you. “I forgive you all your sins.” With these Words, Jesus wants you to realize and to believe that He is speaking about you personally, in the same way that “the chief priests and the Pharisees … perceived that He [Jesus] was speaking about them” in today’s Gospel. · When you hear your neighbor next to you say, “I a poor miserable sinner,” you might sometimes feel the urge to yell, “Dang right you are!” Keep your neighbor out of the confession-and-absolution conversation. · There again, when you hear Jesus say to your neighbor in the absolution, “I forgive you all your sins,” you might feel the urge to protest. “Are You sure You want to do that, Jesus? He didn’t tell you everything!” Keep your neighbor out of the conversation. Among all the people who were probably listening to Jesus preach in the crowded temple in today’s Gospel, “the chief priests and the Pharisees … perceived that He [Jesus] was speaking about them.” In the same way, when the forgiveness of sins is announced in a general way to all, with many people listening, Jesus is nevertheless speaking personally to you. In the Sermon, Jesus is Likewise Speaking to You The same thing goes for the sermons you hear. On some Sundays, you might sometimes feel as though I have been watching you all week, looking for preaching material. On other Sundays—perhaps more Sundays than not—you might feel as though my 16½ minutes in the pulpit sort of wasted your time. Today’s Gospel does not indicate whether or not the chief priests and the Pharisees found Jesus’ sermon to be applicable, interesting, or even remotely relevant to everyday life. All today’s Gospel says is, “They perceived that He [Jesus] was speaking about them.” Sometimes God’s Christians think the sermon is speaking too much about them, not enough about the other guy. In such times, the best and most loving thing you can do for your neighbor is to keep your neighbor out of the conversation. When I was in Illinois, a man came to me from a neighboring congregation, complaining to me about everything he disliked about his pastor. (The more the man talked, the more convinced I became that God had given him a fine pastor.) Although his pastor could preach well enough, this man particularly did not like it that his pastor always said “you” in the pulpit, rather than “we.” The man did not think the pastor took enough pains to assure the congregation each Sunday that he, the pastor, is just as much a sinner as everyone else is. (“Go home, sir, and thank God you have a preacher.”) My conversation with this man in Illinois reminded me of my seminary days, when we would sit in preaching class and discuss how much the preacher should include himself in his own sermons. Is it better for me to say, “You must repent,” or should I always be more carefully humble and say, “We—you and I together—we must repent”? Should it really matter to you that I listen to my own preaching and take it to heart? If we ponder too many pronouns, we miss the point of preaching. The chief priests and the Pharisees in this Gospel understood the point of preaching. Even though they did not like—they even hated—what they heard from Jesus, they nevertheless “perceived that He was speaking about them.” They carefully kept their neighbor out of the conversation. They wanted nothing to do with deciding whether Jesus’ Parable of the Vineyard applied to those others who were listening that day. Jesus was speaking to them. Yes, Jesus is speaking to me in the Sunday sermon—even when you hear the pronoun “you” instead of “we.” Jesus is speaking to me in every sermon passage, but that is really none of your concern—just as it is none of your concern that Jesus is also speaking to all the others here. As the chief priests and the Pharisees did in today’s Gospel, so you must do with every hearing of the divine Word: perceive that Jesus is speaking to you. Keep your neighbor—pastor or otherwise—out of the conversation. · If the preaching of God’s Word was nothing more than exhortation for people to live better and to improve their lives, then you could get away with thinking that the sermon mainly is for someone else. I will be the first to agree that you probably do a better job at living decently than most other people do. · If preaching were mainly about denouncing sin, yes, you could probably cheer me on while I chew on someone else. No long after I arrived here, a man visited our congregation for only one Sunday. When we later spoke, he enthusiastically described my preaching in terms of what it did to other people. “Go get them, preacher,” he said. “They have it coming.” (Sad to say, I think that man might die and go to hell.) · If preaching were merely speaking information about the Bible, then there is a very good chance that some of you could do a better job preaching than I. Like the Scriptures Themselves, Preaching is God Breath of Life Upon You! Preaching is really none of these things. Like the absolution at the beginning of the service, preaching is the bread-and-butter nourishment of your faith (Matthew 4:4). Like the absolution, preaching is the same breath that God first exhaled into Adam (Genesis 2:7), and likewise now exhales into you for your life. Breathe the air! Disregard your neighbor in these moments. Keep him out of the conversation. Your neighbor is most certainly getting his share, whether he thinks he needs it or not. In today’s Gospel, “the chief priests and the Pharisees … perceived that He [Jesus] was speaking about them.” To their own damnation, they neither accepted nor believed what Jesus was saying. Nevertheless, “They perceived that He [Jesus] was speaking about them.” In the same manner, your resurrected Lord Jesus is right here, right now. He is speaking to you. Perceive that He is speaking to you. Believe that He is speaking to you. Jesus has “the Words of eternal life” (John 6:68) and here in this place, His Words—not my words—His Words deliver eternal life to you. The peace of God which passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Amen. _______________________________________________ Sermons mailing list [email protected] http://cat41.org/mailman/listinfo/sermons
