1 Kings 19:1-8; Ephesians 4:17-5:2; John 6:35-51

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

Once a Christian, always a Christian, right? The perseverance of the saints? Once you are baptized, then you have nothing to worry about? All of these are common sentiments in our “Christian” society today. However, these all couldn’t be further from the truth. We know well that being baptized into the Christian faith doesn’t prevent someone from falling away from faith later in life. So too, just because you have set foot in a church at one point in life, doesn’t immediately make you a member of the church eternal.

But if this is the case, then what do we do with Jesus’ promises? Does Jesus lie to us about protecting and preserving us in the faith? Absolutely not! As we continue to read through John 6 this week, we hear this particular promise from Jesus, “And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day,” John 6:39. Jesus won’t forget or lose one of his dear children. He won’t let us “slip through his fingers.” For he holds us close that he may “raise [you] up on the last day.” For this is the role of faith, the bread of life, which Jesus gives. It connects us to Jesus so that he may never lose us.

Faith, however, is a tricky thing. It’s something we struggle to wrap our minds around. For we’re told that faith isn’t something we do. God alone gives faith. It’s only by God working in us through the Holy Spirit that we believe. Just as Jesus says, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him,” John 6:44. Yet, Scripture also testifies that the fault for unbelief lies solely with man. God seeks and desires to draw all people to himself, but God also allows this call to be resisted or refused. Man may walk away from God’s call and reject the very bread of life which God gives. 

We must come back to Jesus’ promise, however. For this is no little thing. Jesus indeed, holds on tightly to his saints, those who are redeemed by faith alone. For God provides the means by which his saints persevere. Jesus who is the bread of life, comes to his saints regularly through these means to feed and nourish them that they may be strengthened into life everlasting! For Jesus gives his flesh and blood to us on the cross, that the Father may draw our eyes to him. We may see our sins crucified there and have faith born in us by the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, God regularly comes down for us and welcomes us into his presence that this faith may grow and bloom. By Word and Sacrament, God grants us perseverance in the faith that nothing may pull us out of his arms, not even death itself. For Jesus will come again and raise us, all who believe, unto eternal life!

Pastor Sorenson

Prayer:

Gracious Father, Your blessed Son came down from heaven to be the true bread that gives life to the world. Grant that Christ, the bread of life, may live in us and we in Him, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen!

Exodus 16:2-15; Ephesians 4:1-16; John 6:22-35

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

Life is work. Relationships are work. Everything requires work. This is a common truth of life that anything we want or need requires us to work. This is part of why we all are cautious about someone offering something free to us. We know it’s rarely that easy. There’s so often a catch that means we have to do something in order to receive the “free” item. 

Indeed, this is why one of our great virtues is being hardworking. It’s the willingness to do what is necessary to achieve or attain that which we need and want. Because we know that everything requires work, we value those who are willing to work. It’s no wonder why many people think faith is no different. 

In our Gospel reading this week, Jesus is chased by the crowd which he fed miraculously with bread. Jesus teaches them not to labor for food which perishes. But then they ask, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” John 6:28. It seems like a valid question to us. If everyone else requires us to work, why wouldn’t God? 

But as much as we value hard work, we all also try to work as little as possible. We seek after those things that require the least amount of effort from us. What entices us the most are those things that seem to offer immediate pleasure and satisfaction. Free food, quick money, cheap sex, and so on. As Jesus says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves,” John 6:26. The people were seeking Jesus not because they believed in him, but because they got a free meal… and wanted another!

We misunderstand though the “work of God.” It’s not the work we do for God. It’s the work that God does for us! As Jesus says, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent,” John 6:29. The work of God, the work which pleases God is faith. This faith isn’t something that we do, rather, God gives it to us: “Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you,” John 6:27. Jesus gives us this food, this faith so that we may be pleasing to God. God sends Jesus down from heaven to give us this food, just as he rained manna down from heaven for Israel. For Jesus comes down to offer himself as our sacrificial meal. Jesus gives us of his body and blood on the cross so that we may eat and believe. And through this eating, we may be satisfied unto eternal life! 

Pastor Sorenson

Prayer:

Merciful Father, You gave Your Son Jesus as the heavenly bread of life. Grant us faith to feast on Him in Your Word and Sacraments that we may be nourished unto life everlasting; through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen!

Genesis 9:8-17; Ephesians 3:14-21; Mark 6:45-56

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

How much a phrase can change its meaning simply by the inflection has always amazed me. Whatever word you emphasize can alter the entire meaning. Take the phrase, “You shouldn’t be here.” Maybe you shouldn’t be here but someone else should. Maybe you shouldn’t be here because it’s a bad idea to be here or it was downright impossible. Maybe you shouldn’t be here, but rather you’re meant to be somewhere else.

This phrase almost perfectly describes the disciples’ reaction in our Gospel reading this week. Jesus had just fed the five thousand by miraculously multiplying bread and fish. Immediately after, Jesus sends the disciples away on a boat while he stays behind to dismiss the crowds. We don’t know, but it seems likely that the plan was for them to regroup across the lake, that Jesus would catch another boat or find some way to join them there. But that’s not how it goes.

Imagine the disciples in a boat, in the middle of a lake, in the middle of the night (roughly 3am). They have been rowing hard because the wind was against them, so they haven’t made much progress. As most of them are fast asleep in the boat, one or two would be awake to keep watch as they come to see someone walking on the water in the middle of the sea (Mark 6:48). “When they saw him walking on the sea they thought it was a ghost, and cried out for they all saw him and were terrified,” Mark 6:49-50. You shouldn’t be here!

It's not hard to see why the disciples were terrified. We would be too. Jesus shouldn’t have been there. That is, it was impossible. No one could even imagine they would see someone walking IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SEA! But the disciples also thought, Jesus should be back on land. You shouldn’t be here. They thought Jesus was far away, and thus were terrified at who this “phantom” might be. This is why the thought of seeing a ghost has always terrified us too. We see people who shouldn’t possibly be here.

“You shouldn’t be here” is also what Jesus says to us. When the disciples were terrified, Jesus speaks to them, “Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid,” Mark 6:50. Jesus is telling them that even though he shouldn’t be here, he’s here for them. He does the impossible for them! So much is bound up in these few words of Jesus, for he’s also acknowledging the disciples’ difficulty against the wind. You shouldn’t be here; you should have already made it across! But Jesus doesn’t stop there. He comes to us and says, “You shouldn’t be here.” Here in sin, here among the evil and wicked, here under Satan’s reign. Jesus does the impossible to be present with us. So, Jesus shouldn’t be able to be with us as God, yet he is. He comes to die on the cross, doing the impossible by saving us! Take heart then! Jesus is here with us, doing the impossible, coming where he shouldn’t be so that we may go where we couldn’t go… to heaven and eternal paradise!

Pastor Sorenson

Prayer:

Almighty and most merciful God, the protector of all who trust in You, strengthen our faith and give us courage to believe that in Your love You will rescue us from all adversities; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen!

Jeremiah 23:1-6; Ephesians 2:11-22; Mark 6:30-44

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

After a long day of work, the last thing anyone wants to do is to be bombarded with a list of chores. Work can be exhausting, so we just want to come home and put our feet up. However, we all know that isn’t always possible. Taking care of a family requires us to pour every last ounce of effort into meeting the needs of those we love. So, even after working all day, we clean, cook, and serve our spouse and children. No matter how exhausted we are, we tell ourselves it needs to be done. 

So it was for the disciples in our Gospel reading. They return to Jesus after being sent out to preach and to heal the people. Jesus notices how exhausted they are, so they go to rest. However, the crowds follow them. The crowd even beats them to their destination. In their exhausted stupor, they beg Jesus to send the crowd away. Send them to get their own food. But Jesus doesn’t. Rather, he tells the disciples to feed the crowd. So they tell Jesus, two hundred denarii (days’ wages) couldn’t buy enough bread to feed the crowd much more than crumbs. Even after all the miraculous things they did, the disciples are probably feeling insufficient for this task. How could they ever do what Jesus is asking them to do? 

But notice what Jesus does with the disciples. He doesn’t ask them to go out and buy the food. He’s not asking them to prepare a gourmet meal. He asks them, what do you have? “How many loaves do you have?” And they tell him, “Five, and two fish.” For this is where Jesus in essence says, “I can use that.” Jesus’ care for this crowd overshadows the disciple’s insufficiency. For so we’re told, “[Jesus] had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.” Jesus shows in this miraculous meal that he is the Good Shepherd. For Mark also records for us, “Then he commanded them all to sit down in groups on the green grass,” (Mark 6:39). For so we remember from the twenty-third Psalm, “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures.” With just five loaves and two fish, Jesus satisfies the hunger of five thousand men, plus women and children. Jesus uses what little the disciples had to satisfy many.

For so Jesus looks at you with compassion. We’d be foolish to think his compassion stops at the spiritual. No, he cares very deeply about our physical well being also. For you see, this is why Jesus came down from heaven. He came to heal many who were sick; he fed the hungry; he even raised people from the dead. Yes, in our Lord’s compassion, he goes to the cross to wash away all of our sins. But so too, does he use common elements to satisfy our hungry souls. Just as he did for the five thousand, Jesus took bread; he blessed it and he gave, saying, “Take, eat, this is my body;” “Take, drink, this is my blood… given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” By his death and resurrection, Jesus invites us to his table to eat and be satisfied in both body and soul! 

Pastor Sorenson

Prayer:

Heavenly Father, though we do not deserve Your goodness, still You provide for all our needs of body and soul. Grant us Your Holy Spirit that we may acknowledge Your gifts, give thanks for all Your benefits, and serve You in willing obedience; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen!

Amos 7:7-15; Ephesians 1:3-14; Mark 6:14-29

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

If you’ve ever played a game of hide and seek, you know that you can’t hide forever. Even if you found the best hiding place where no one would ever think to look, you eventually will need to leave it behind. The moment you step out from hiding, you’re afraid that someone might find you.

It’s no different with our baggage or our “dead bodies in the closet”. It’s our sin and evil deeds that we wish to keep hidden so that no one may find them. Indeed, like playing a game of hide and seek, we look for the best hiding place. But nothing stays hidden forever.

This is the issue that Herod has in our Gospel reading today. He hears about Jesus going around teaching, preaching, and performing miracles that he assumes Jesus is John raised from the dead (Mark 6:16). For so we read a flashback of the very circumstances that brought about John’s death. Herod had thrown a birthday party and invited all of the nobles. John had been speaking to him about the sinfulness of his current marriage to Herodias, his brother’s wife. Herod’s niece, the daughter of Herodias, “performed” for those in attendance so Herod was pleased. Thus, Herod offers her a gift, up to even half his kingdom! After consulting with her mother, the daughter asks for John the Baptist’s head on a platter.

John’s death is a reminder for us, as Christians, that persecution always follows the preaching of God’s word. However, there’s also this sentiment from Herod that he was sorrowful over John’s death. So, we wonder, why? Just earlier, Mark records this: “When [Herod] heard [John], he was greatly perplexed, and yet he heard him gladly,” Mark 6:20. John was constantly calling out Herod’s unlawful marriage to Herodias. John was calling Herod to repent for all the evil he had done. Yet, John wasn’t just preaching about repentance, he was preaching about Jesus!

Indeed, God’s word is perplexing to us, like it was to Herod. We hear all over that we’re poor, miserable sinners who deserve nothing but death and condemnation. However, God’s word also says that God will give us peace and life and eternity! For the sins that we try to hide will eventually come to light. They will be laid out before God and his almighty throne. For instead of being afraid of them being exposed, John shows us the need to confess them, to lay them on Jesus who shall take them all to the cross. Herodias thought that by killing John, they would be rid of their sin. It was actually the opposite. John was showing that the only way to rid sin from their life was to lay it on Jesus who shall cleanse them by his blood shed on the cross. No longer should we fear our sins being brought to light, for they have been obliterated in the very light and life of Christ!

Pastor Sorenson

Prayer:

O Lord, You granted Your prophets strength to resist the temptations of the devil and courage to proclaim repentance. Give us pure hearts and minds to follow Your Son faithfully even into suffering and death; through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen!

Ezekiel 2:1-5; 2 Corinthians 12:1-10; Mark 6:1-13

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

It’s often said that familiarity breeds contempt. We start to take for granted those things that we’re familiar with, be it a best friend whom we see every day, our house that we live in, our job that we work week after week and so on. When things become overly familiar, we begin to have contempt for them and their imperfections. Because some things are super familiar to us, we begin to look only at the bad parts to see how they could be better.

The corollary to this might just be “the grass is greener on the other side.” We will often sit and daydream about that ideal thing, something without all the flaws and imperfections we perceive from the familiar. We will build up the ideal in our mind as we grow in contempt for what we already have. “I want a new house because this one is too small.” “I need a new car because I don’t like the color.” Etc. etc. 

This is the issue in our Gospel lesson as Jesus goes to visit his hometown of Nazareth. Jesus grew up among these people. Jesus’ own family lives here, those who perhaps know him the best. Jesus lived among them for nearly three decades before he began his public ministry. You might think they would be his biggest fans, but it’s the opposite. Because he’s so well known, they have contempt for him. “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him,” Mark 6:3. Their familiarity with Jesus has bred contempt for him so that Jesus marvels at their unbelief (Mark 6:6). 

I’ve heard this far too often today when it comes to families with unbelieving members. As Christians, we want them to believe and listen to us as we share the good news, as we share Christ with them, but it’s shrugged off because it’s familiar. We marvel at the unbelief that surrounds us in our families, with our friends, and especially in our world. It’s difficult to share the faith with those you know so well because it’s familiar. For so we lament and marvel at the rejection we see when sharing our faith with those we know. 

This isn’t to say though that we should just give up and leave it for someone else. No matter how difficult it is to share our faith with family and friends, we know it’s important. Even Jesus dealt with rejection, so we shouldn’t be surprised when we face it too. But this is what we can learn from Jesus. Don’t give up. For there’s only one remedy for unbelief… and it’s Jesus. Jesus didn’t give up on us when we rejected him, when we sinned against him, when we shrugged him off and said, “Don’t bother me”. Jesus kept teaching, kept healing, kept giving us more of himself. He gave us everything by going to the cross to die for us and our unbelief. For it is God’s goodness and mercy that pursue us to win us over, to bring us out of unbelief and into faith. So too shall it be for those we love. So, keep giving them Jesus, his goodness and mercy so that Jesus may win them for eternal life!

Pastor Sorenson

Prayer:

O God, Your almighty power is made known chiefly in showing mercy. Grant us the fullness of Your grace that we may be called to repentance and made partakers of Your heavenly treasures; through Your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen!

Lamentations 3:22-33; 2 Corinthians 8:1-9, 13-15; Mark 5:21-43

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

Think outside the box. It’s a phrase that has challenged us for years to consider new possibilities that we never before thought were possible. As someone who likes things neat and tidy, it’s easy to fall into the habit of confining ideas, concepts, and reality to an easily described “box”. For instance, if I were to talk about science, I would pull out of the “box” topics like physics, biology, chemistry, and so on.

Topics of theology work this way too. We like to put stuff into a small, neat box. Yet, this often leads us not to consider the bigger picture for many things. One such topic that comes up this week is resurrection. Now, when I mention resurrection, I tend to think of the last day. It’s the common church teaching of the resurrection of the dead on the last day. Resurrection, we believe is only what happens after we die, and when Jesus returns. But resurrection is actually a much bigger topic than the last day.

In our Gospel reading this week, Jesus encounters a ruler of the synagogue, Jairus. Jairus comes before Jesus, pleading for his help because his little daughter is sick and nearing death. Jesus agrees to go with him to his home. On the way, however, we meet another woman who has her own health issues. She has had a discharge of blood for twelve years and nothing anyone has done has helped her. But, like Jairus, this woman had heard reports about Jesus, which brings her before him. “For she said, ‘If I touch even his garments, I will be made well,” Mark 5:28.

These two stories are woven together so that we can see a pattern, a similarity between them. This woman with the discharge of blood has been suffering from her illness for a long time. It was so horrendous that Mark even calls it a “scourge”, like the scourging done to Jesus before his crucifixion. Yet, the similarity is with the daughter of Jairus. She dies before Jesus can make it to her, even being told by a member of the household. These two women show us the sad effects of sin. Due to sin in the world and in our lives, we all face the slow decay of health leading towards death.

But there’s another side to it as well. Jesus performs not just one resurrection, but two! When we talk about resurrection, we talk about those who have died. But a resurrection doesn’t always have to be precipitated by death. Rather, resurrection is the granting of new life. Thus, when the woman who touches Jesus is healed, she experiences (in small measure) a resurrection! She is made new! So too with the daughter. Jesus speaks to the daughter, “Talitha cumi,’ which means, ‘Little girl, I say to you, arise,” Mark 5:41. She who had died is given new life! This is what Jesus does for all of us. Like the little girl, Jesus comes to us and says, “I say to you, arise!” By faith in Jesus and his death upon the cross, Jesus is granting to us the resurrection unto eternal life. He is restoring us through his forgiveness, mercy, grace, and faith so that we may experience even now the new life he won for us through his own resurrection! 

Pastor Sorenson

Prayer:

Heavenly Father, during His earthly ministry Your Son Jesus healed the sick and raised the dead. By the healing medicine of the Word and Sacraments pour into our hearts such love toward You that we may live eternally; through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen!