A Wake-Up Call from Christ

Last Sunday of the Church Year

November 26, 2017

Matthew 25:13

A Wake-Up Call from Christ

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The parable is a warning, ending with this command from Christ:

Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.”

MATTHEW 25:13 NIV 1984

The warning is that it’s possible to lose faith in Christ. It’s possible to give up hope that He is coming back.

The foolish virgins aren’t those who were confirmed and then immediately quit coming to Church. The foolish virgins are those who stuck it out, who served on committees, who pitched in on potlucks, and put their offering envelopes into the plate. But the Bridegroom was delayed, and as time passed they gave up hope that Jesus would ever come.

The wise virgins are not paragons of Christian virtue. They also fell asleep. They were told to stay awake and to watch, but they failed. But despite their sin, the wise virgins still expected the Bridegroom to come. They had more than the outward trappings of Christianity. They had oil, which here means faith in Christ.

And that's what saves: faith, and not good works. When Jesus the Bridegroom comes back, what you need is the faith that receives His promise. And His promise is that He died for those who fail.

This parable is well aware of the wise virgins sleeping, but it doesn't call them hypocrites. They aren’t hypocrites because even in their failure, they have faith. They hang on to the promise that the Bridegroom is coming back.

In the parable oil—faith—is what matters, not staying awake. But don’t read here that good works don’t matter. It matters when we don’t come to church or serve on committees or give of ourselves. While the parable is warning us that those things aren’t enough, it should make us want to dare to examine our lives, even our faith, and see if we’ve been sleeping. Christ told this story to stir us up. He wants to make us uncomfortable.

He wants to do this because He wants us to repent. We have fallen asleep and acted selfishly. We have not believed as we should. We have pushed what we know is right to the back of our minds, we have pretended that God wasn’t watching or wouldn’t care, so that we could enjoy our sins or pretend to not notice.

We have dangled our fingers in shark infested waters. We have neglected our prayers. We have allowed ourselves to become cynics and thought ourselves realists and we have not served our neighbors. We have been told to watch, but none of us has watched as we should. Repent, wake up, for no one knows when the Son of Man will return and we don’t want to be caught in sin.

We should also notice that the Lord treats the wise virgins as though they never fell asleep. He holds nothing against them. He died to save them from their failure to stay awake, so their sins aren’t going to stop Him.

This is why the hymn, “Wake, Awake” is so exuberant. The parable is a warning, but the hymn can’t wait. “Wake, Awake” is a call to repentance that fills the believers with joy. The cry “repent” is welcomed by those who have fallen into sin and want to be rescued.

The Bridegroom doesn’t come in terror to His bride, but in mercy. He comes to bring us into the bridal chamber.

First He declares us to be virgins, to be pure, holy, and innocent that He might bring us to the destiny of virgins. For we aren’t simply bridesmaids at this wedding. He is the groom; we are the bride. He joins us to Himself in Holy Communion by mystic union, His flesh entering into us. And in that sacred act He joins us also to the Father and the Spirit.

Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.”

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many. Amen.

When Thanksgiving Eats

Day of Thanksgiving

November 22, 2017

Luke 10:42

When Thanksgiving Eats

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Thanksgiving in our way of speaking implies us doing something. There are many parts of your body that do the work of thanksgiving.

Your brain by remembering.

Your legs by taking you to church.

Your tongue by speaking and singing.

Your heart and hands by praying.

What about your hands and your stomach? Can they give thanks?

I think Martha from the Gospel of Saint Luke thought so. I think she's right. She was giving thanks to her Savior by feeding Him. She was using her hands to make food for Him and His followers.

Think of Grandma on Thanksgiving. What does she want from you? To gush about the dressing or the turkey or the pie?

No, she just wants you to be there at the table, eat, and get along with everybody. You give thanks by receiving her food and we call that eating. That's thanks enough for her because that's her vocation—to serve and care for her family.

So part of thanksgiving is giving the food. But another part is receiving the food. And this is especially true of how we give thanks to God.

Part of thanksgiving is the remembering, worshiping, speaking, singing, and praying. But another part of thanksgiving is receiving His gifts.

Like the annual coming to Grandma's Thanksgiving table in family unity and eating her food—only far, far better—Christians come to the Lord's table in unity of faith and eat and drink the Lord's supper. This eating and drinking gives us life and salvation because of the Word of Christ.

On the night when He was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took bread, and when He had given thanks, broke it, and said, “This is My body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.”

1 CORINTHIANS 11:23B-24 CSB

Jesus gave thanks as He celebrated His Holy Supper with His friends. He gave them His body under the bread and in thanksgiving they received the bread of life for their salvation.

Jesus wasn't telling Martha that her bread for their stomachs wasn't important; He was telling her that His Word is the bread that gives life whether stomachs are stuffed or empty.

There are many good ways to give thanks: with our brains, hearts, tongues, and hands. But the best way to give thanks is to keep on receiving the one thing needed, the Word of God, that says: “Take, eat, this is My body given for you. Take, drink, this is My blood, poured out for you for the forgiveness of sin.”

In this thanksgiving meal of the Lord,

as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.

1 CORINTHIANS 11:23B-24 CSB

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many. Amen.

You Did It For Me

Second Last Sunday of the Church Year

November 19, 2017

Matthew 25:40

You Did It For Me

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Why do you make sure that your wife knows who fixed the dripping faucet?

Why do you make sure to let your husband know that you changed the dirty diaper?

Why do you tell your parents that you put away your backpack?

What's the common thread here?

All these things justify ourselves to others. We show that we have value; we are worth keeping around.

This is the way much of the world's population has lived and will continue to live: they need to prove that they are good. Some are trying to prove it to God; others are trying to prove it to other people.

Their natural and chosen way of living makes them all shopkeepers. They are always adding things up and balancing the scales.

Am I getting a good enough return on investment?

Are my nice deeds being noticed?

Is my life making me happy?

But it's never enough. On the outside they might do a good job of pretending that things are going well, but the pressure to be worthy is always there. They believe that lasting happiness and endless love are just a day away, if they just try harder.

The one sin they will never commit is confessing this way of life is sinful. It is sinful and deadly because it rejects Jesus as Savior from sin. These people admit they aren't perfect, but they claim to be without sin. And since they reject their sin, they reject the Savior from sin.

They are the ultimate Do-It-Yourself-ers and just like the guy at the K & K who asks what the jig-a-ma-thig is for, they are going to ruin everything.

At the end of life, they will hear Jesus declare His judgment of all their deeds:

‘Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. ⁴²For I was hungry and you gave Me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me nothing to drink, ⁴³I was a stranger and you did not invite Me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe Me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after Me.’ ⁴⁴They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’ ⁴⁵He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’ ⁴⁶Then they will go away to eternal punishment

MATTHEW 25:41b–46a NIV 1984

Even at the end they are trying to argue their case, “When could we have done all these things?” They still cling to the illusion that they can justify themselves—just give us more time and we'll do it and better.

Near the end of the Athanasian Creed, the events of Matthew 25 are summed up:

At His coming all people will rise with their own bodies to answer for their personal deeds. Those who have done good will enter eternal life, but those who have done evil will go into eternal fire.

Jesus speaks of judgment based on personal deeds, our fruits of faith. But He's not judging based on your self-worth or performance. He's giving mercy because of who you are. And who you are is what He's made you to be.

You were a creature with no value and no worth. At birth you were only worthy to be thrown into eternal fire because you were worthless. Scripture is clear:

“There is no one righteous, not even one; ¹¹there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. ¹²All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”

ROMANS 3:10b–12 NIV 1984

You hear these words and protest, but not because it is untrue, but because it is! It's the child who broke the vase who gets defensive when accused of breaking the vase, not the kid who was in another room drawing on the wall. And this is just as true, if not more so, when adults are caught out.

Our hope is not in proving we are worth. We have none. Our hope is not in arguing with God—we have no case, only crates upon crates of damning evidence.

Our only hope is Christ and the worth He gives you. In Holy Baptism He took a corpse and made it alive. He made little Ezekeihal alive yesterday in Baptism; He made you alive in Baptism years ago. Ezekeihal's vocation is to be a baby and a Christian, which are very alike. Both are all about receiving. Good things are done for us and to us. We live because we receive food.

In time we acquire new vocations, new people to care for. And you care for them, not because you are trying to show your worth, but because you're alive. Living people feed other human beings, clothe them, visit them, and care for them when they're sick.

You don't owe God anything for the sake of Christ Jesus. On the cross He gave up His life; His death sends away all owing. It is finished.

And so we live without any debt to God, without pressure to justify our worth, because our worth is Jesus. We now live for others and serve them and care for them. These are our personal deeds that Christ judges as our fruits of faith.

This is why you will be puzzled by Jesus' commendation, “When did we help You, Jesus?” You were just living, the faucet got fixed, the diaper got changed, the backpack got hung up, and all the rest of it. And then Christ will return and

The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for Me.’

MATTHEW 25:40 NIV 1984

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many. Amen.

For a fuller treatment on Vocation, see this Podcast.

The Lord Speaks and We Leave It All Behind

Third Last Sunday of the Church Year

November 12, 2017

Matthew 24:15–16

The Lord Speaks and We Leave It All Behind

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“When you see the abomination of desolation,” says our dear Lord, “flee.” He doesn’t say that we should stay and fight. Even though we really want to.

What we’re fighting for is our stuff. We hang on to dear life with all our power. Why? Do we want to continue in sorrow, in pain? People are forever telling me they aren’t afraid to die, but I don’t believe them. I don’t believe you. You’re hanging on to your stuff and you don’t want to let it go. That not wanting to let it go is fear.

It is as though our dear Lord pops His head in the door and says, “Grab you stuff, we’re going. Wait. Leave your stuff. It’s only stuff. Don’t look back. Don’t bend down to grab your jacket. Leave now.”

But we like that jacket. And we like the earrings our mother left us and a favorite book and a fancy bottle of single malt we’ve been saving. We like our families. We like the grandchildren and the old friends. We like our pets and we like our place. It is all stuff even when wrapped up in pious talk.

The world is coming to an end. Good riddance. What are we afraid of losing? Name the thing you can’t live without. Music? Freedom? A child? Luther says that is your god. That is what you won’t let go off. That is why you fear death. Repent.

We aren’t so prone to turning statues into gods, nor do we normally turn to evil things. We turn to good things. We make gods of wives, jobs, children, reputations. We worship health, money, and pleasure. Those are the things we think we need. But the Lord pops His head in the door and says, “Let’s go. Leave it. Flee.”

This world is coming to an end. It is under a death sentence. It can’t go on. And our hope cannot be in it, cannot be in stuff of this world.

There is the good news here: The Lord can, and the Lord has, and the Lord does bring a clean thing out of an unclean. He has reached into the septic tank where we were feeding, grabbed us, wiped us off, and given us good food and drink, a place in His house, and a Name. Do we now become nostalgic for cucumbers floating in the toilet?

Flee the abomination of desolation. Your body is God’s temple and in it lives your lying flesh that is always trying to get justice, instead of receiving mercy. There are incidents when abominations have been erected in God's house: a Zeus statue in the Temple, a pope masquerading as God’s voice on earth. But the worst is within you.

Leave behind your justifications, your need to excuse your lack of care for the poor, your need to protest that you are not afraid to die, or that you’ve done your best or that, at least, your kids are good people even if they don’t go to church and live in sin.

You don’t need to justify yourself. The Lord has justified you. He has answered for you. In Christ, there is no one left to accuse you, nothing to answer for. You don’t owe anybody anything, not even God.

Does that sound too easy? God’s mercy always chafes against our fallen flesh, but this is what God has done in Christ: He brings a clean thing out of an unclean.

But that is not yet the whole good news: that God brings a clean thing out of an unclean. Here’s a bit more. St. Paul writes:

We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in Him.

1 THESSALONIANS 4:14 NIV 1984

Here hangs our hope, the end of all our need for stuff: Jesus died and rose again. What of those who have fallen asleep? Since Jesus died and rose again they will be brought with Him, with Jesus, through Jesus.

But that is still not all. For what of you who are alive when the end comes? Since Jesus died and rose again, and has ascended to His Father’s right as your Advocate and Savior, He will descend. He will come for you. You don’t go to Him. He comes to you. Since Jesus has died and rose again, you will be caught up, either from beneath the earth where you have been resting or from the surface of the earth, snatched away, into the clouds, to be always with the Lord.

Still, that is not all. For He is not a passive God. He does not sit and wait to see what you will do. He does not ask you to explain yourself. He intervenes for you, answers for you. He who came in lowly, despised ways to be a Sacrifice for sin, He still comes. He comes now, not just in the future, but He comes now to get you. Even if He does not yet come in clouds while the world burns, still He comes now. You don’t go to Him. He comes to you. He bestows life in His risen Body and Blood, separating you from your stuff and from death.

Ours is a faith built upon history, the historic fact of Christ crucified, the innocent and pure desolated as an abomination for all our vile sin. Here is the source of our Life in Christ.

Ours is a faith that also, even as it gathers around the cross, looks forward, eagerly, to the Kingdom of glory. Jesus is coming back. We will be with Him always.

But ours is a faith that lives now, in the present. We confess: “Jesus lives.” He lives now. And now, here in time, here in this building, here upon this altar, the Lord comes with forgiveness, acceptance, and refreshment in His physical Body and Blood for us physical sinners. Jesus lives. He comes also in His Holy Word and Absolution, in Hymn and Chant. He speaks the Baptized clean. And He hears the fervent prayers of His people. His Name is upon us and He comes for us.

Now is the day of salvation. This is the day that the Lord hath made. The world is coming to an end. Good riddance. Come Lord Jesus, come quickly.

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.

Mark 10:45

Adapted from a sermon by the Rev. David H. Petersen.

Feasting at His Table, Now and Then

All Saints' Sunday (observed)

November 5, 2017

Isaiah 25:6–9

Feasting at His Table, Now and Then

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Isaiah is speaking about the reality of heaven in his 25^th chapter. And he talks about the food.

On this mountain the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine—the best of meats and the finest of wines.

ISAIAH 25:6 NIV 1984

This feast is happening right now. And the guests keep coming to the table because Christians keep dying. Every day new eaters come to eat and to drink the best of meats and the finest of wines. Their invitation was their Holy Baptism and their arrival was through their death into eternal life. Their eyes of faith have been replaced with eyes of sight. They have ascended to the mountain of transfiguration. They see Jesus. And they will never leave; they live there always because Jesus is present and they see Him.

They are the Holy Church, God's people, who have triumphed in Christ's death. On the other hand, we still live in the Church militant, God's people who are still fighting the good fight of faith. Like those who have gone before us, we already have God's blessing through the washing of Holy Baptism. This washing drowns us into the death of Christ. St. Paul wrote:

³Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? ⁴We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

ROMANS 6:3–4 NIV 1984

Out of this drowning comes a resurrection of a new person. This new person now has faith in Christ's crucifixion—they know that His death means that even though we die, we will always live.

⁷On this mountain He will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; ⁸He will swallow up death forever. The Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces; He will remove the disgrace of His people from all the earth. The Lord has spoken.

ISAIAH 25:7–8 NIV 1984

Our dear Lord doesn't stop at wiping our tears; He removes our disgrace from all the earth. Occasionally I have wondered how much of our lives here on earth we will recall in heaven. I speculated that remembering any of this life would make us sad since we would remember our past sins and our friends and family who reject Christ. I now think I was trying to answer the wrong question. We will remember our past because we rejoice in what Christ has done for us. The prophet Isaiah wrote:

In that day they will say, “Surely this is our God; we trusted in Him, and He saved us. This is the Lord, we trusted in Him; let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation.”

ISAIAH 25:9 NIV 1984

However, our memory of our past disgraces will no longer disgrace us for the sake of Christ. He is our God; we trusted in Him; He saved us. The shame, pain, and sadness of this world will flee away. Only Christ will remain with us. We will eat at His table and be glad.

“That day” that Isaiah spoke of is coming soon for us. Every day more and more are being gathered up in God's banquet hall. But today we enjoy a taste of heaven: the Lord's Supper.

As we prepare for His feast, we hear these words, just before we sing Holy, Holy, Holy:

Therefore, with all the saints on earth and hosts of heaven, we praise Your holy name and join their glorious song

After receiving His true body and blood under bread and wine for the forgiveness of our sin and the guarantee of salvation, we pray in the liturgy:

We give You thanks, O Lord, for the foretaste of the heavenly banquet You have given us in this Sacrament.

We live now with the real presence of Christ, but soon and very soon we will join the feast of His glorious presence forever. It will be heaven, because heaven is where Jesus is and where He feeds us.

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve,

and to give His life as a ransom for many.

Mark 10:45

David’s Son Saves David

Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost

October 29, 2017

Matthew 22:34–46

David’s Son Saves David

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Pharisees were shocked that Jesus had received the praise of men on Palm Sunday as though He were God. Their question about the greatest command is issued in the Temple sometime between Palm Sunday and Holy Wednesday.

The question is a set up. He offended their religion. They expect Him to answer much as He does. They think that they will then be able to point out that He is a blasphemer because He allowed people to treat Him as God and there is only one God.

He, of course, is two moves ahead of them. He answers their objection with questions before they can even protest. “What do you think of the Christ? You know there is only one God. But who is the Christ? Is He not God? Do you think He is only a man? Whose son is He?”

They say: “He is David’s Son.”

“Yes, of course. He is David’s Son,” says Jesus. “The Messiah must be a man to be the Man of Sorrows. He must be a Man to fulfill the Law and then to suffer the Law’s punishments. But David calls Him ‘Lord.’ This is because the Messiah, true God and true Man, is the Lord whom we should love with our whole, heart, soul, and strength.”

After this, they stop asking questions. No one can accuse Jesus of sin. No one can dispute His miracles. No one can argue with His teaching or find a place where He is inconsistent with Moses, the Prophets, or the Psalms. He has shown Himself to be God and Man, the Christ, the long-awaited Redemption of Israel who has come in the Name of the Lord.

That doesn’t mean they’re going to believe in Him. They harden their hearts. They are like children sticking their fingers in their ears and yelling so they don’t hear what they don’t want to hear. They say to themselves: “You think you are the Son of God? Let’s do an experiment and see how the Son of God bleeds.” Remember: this is holy week. They are days away from killing Him.

And we hear them fulfill this jab. As He is crucified, they say: “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” (Matthew 27:40, ESV) and again: “He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he desires him. For he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’” (Matthew 27:43, ESV)

These statements might be the worst blasphemies in the long, torrid history of sin. For if Jesus is the Son of God He can’t come down from the cross nor can the Father deliver Him. To pit these two things against each other – the Divinity of Christ and His mercy – is to completely misunderstand both. The Pharisees are simply pagans, with a religion that is no different in substance than the Greeks who worship Zeus.

They are a warning for us. Let us not be like them. Let us instead repent and ask for the Spirit to open our hearts to His Word that we would not invent our own religion but would worship Him in spirit and truth. Rather than being children throwing tantrums let us be children lost in the grocery store in a panic calling for their fathers. Let us learn to pray and to listen.

It is necessary for the Son of Man to suffer these terrible things. He does so for the life of the world. This is an act of purest love, not of man loving God with his whole heart, soul, and mind, though the Son of David is a Man and He does love the Father and the Spirit with His whole heart, soul, and mind and He does lay down His life in obedience, but the death of Jesus is primarily an act of God loving humanity. He loves us with His whole Father, Son, and Spirit. This how God loves the world. This is how He loves Pharisees even while they mock and blaspheme Him: He dies for them. He takes on their sin and punishment. He is driven into Hell’s fires with their guilt upon Him so that they would be spared. His Blood is offered for their door posts that the angel of death would pass over. He is wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities, and the chastisement of our peace is upon Him. By His stripes we are healed. This is how God loves and redeems the world. This is the answer to the prayer: Hosanna. The Sacrifice is bound to the altar in love and we confess that Good Friday above all other days is the Day the Lord has made and in which we rejoice.

The Father will deliver the Son after it is finished and humanity is delivered. He will raise Him from the dead and vindicate Him – but not before the Centurion does it by his confession.

“When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, “Truly this was the Son of God!” (Matthew 27:54, ESV)

The centurion saw what the Pharisees refused to see. Let us be like him! Let us rejoice and ask the Spirit to kindle and sustain this faith in us, to keep our Baptisms before us, to feed us with the risen Body and Blood of Jesus, to speak to us in His Word, that we might ever confess that Jesus is the Son of God who has loved us to the end, that we might have the faith of the centurion and recognize Jesus as the Son of God.

The greatest commandment is ‘You shall love Jesus, the Lord your God, with all of your heart, soul, and mind,” and the second is like it, “You shall love your neighbor, who is loved by Jesus and for whom Jesus died, as yourself, as Jesus loves him.” And above those commandments stands the first word: “I am the Lord your God, the Son of David, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, who laid down His life and took it up again to free you from sin. I am your God and you are my people and I am not letting go.”

In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

Sermon

Rev’d David H. Petersen

Redeemer Lutheran Church

Ft. Wayne, Indiana

cyberstones.org/sermon/trinity-18-2017

What Are You Wearing?

Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost

October 15, 2017

Matthew 22:14

What Are You Wearing?

In the name of the Father and of the ☩ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

So a clown walks in and goes up to the front. She stands next to the guy in the tuxedo. A wedding where the bride dresses up as a clown will be remembered.

Jesus described a wedding celebration that His Father is having for us. Of course as with any party it started with the invitations. But the A-list guests rejected His call to come and be with Him and His Son. His reaction is just and right: He destroys these enemies who were sincerely called, but who chose to say no to His Father.

But the party is going to happen, even though the original guests wouldn't be there. So more invitations are sent out to gather up the B-side, both those who look good on the outside and those who don't. Soon the party is full of guests.

These guests were going about their lives and the Father's invitation came unexpectedly. So helpfully and as was the custom in those days, the wedding party provided wedding clothes to the guests. You showed up in your old clothes, you changed into the free new clothes, and then you went into the wedding.

Everyone was wearing their free new clothes, except for one. He insisted on wearing his own clothes. What does this mean? It doesn't mean that Jesus will accidentally allow in an unbeliever to heaven and have to correct it later. It does mean, as Jesus said at the end of the story, that

MATTHEW 22:14 NIV 1984

many are invited, but few are chosen.

The wedding hall was full of guests, so Jesus' point shouldn't end up with us trying to guess the stats of heaven and hell. It means that those who have Jesus have been given Jesus.

They are wearing Jesus because He called them and chose them. They are wearing His perfect life that was full of honoring His heavenly Father and doing His holy will and obeying His earthly parents and speaking the Gospel truth in perfect love to miserable sinners and treasuring the gift of marriage and blessing children. He never had a sinful thought, spoke an angry word, or failed to do the right thing His whole life long. His clothes are perfect, clean, and wholesome. And He gives them to you.

The man who refused Jesus' clothes is the unbeliever who wants to wear good clothes, but insists on doing his own thing. He refuses or ignores God's things. He thinks his life is pretty good and feels that he tried hard to be a nice guy. He worked hard, made money, spent it on his family (and on himself), gave offerings to charities and did the 50/50 raffle at church, and stayed out of the newspaper. He loves his country and even knows the words to the anthem and hold his hand over his heart and says UNDER GOD nice and loud when the pledge is recited.

His funeral obituary is a long list that proves that he was a nice guy, and why everyone at the funeral will say that this guy is in a better place.

But this guy is a clown, like a bride dressed up like a clown at her own wedding. My choice of illustration isn't perfect, but Jesus' point is that what you are wearing matters. Isaiah the prophet told the truth about all our good deeds: to God they are bad.

ISAIAH 64:6a NIV 1984

All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags

Doing your own thing and wearing your own filthy rags, your own sin-twisted goodness, is a rejection of Jesus. I do wonder about those who dress up like Princess Leia and Han Solo to get married. Or those who wear the regular fancy clothes, but write their own wedding vows. More often than not, their vows reveal that they think marriage is about them and their choices and their feelings of love.

But true love is Jesus. And He called you and chose you. He dresses us up in His clothes, His righteousness, so when His Father sees you, He sees Jesus.

You wear Jesus. You can certain of this because He died for all and then He spoke to you. He said, “I baptized you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Because He makes you clean, you are going to the wedding. And it is already in full swing. And probably and hopefully we all will get to join the party today. The apostle John heard Jesus tell this story in real time, and before John was called to the wedding feast, he saw this vision of reality of heaven, filled with sinners who were wearing Jesus.

REVELATION 7:9–17 NIV 1984

⁹After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. ¹⁰And they cried out in a loud voice:

“Salvation belongs to our God,

who sits on the throne,

and to the Lamb." ¹¹All the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell down on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, ¹²saying:

"Amen!

Praise and glory

and wisdom and thanks and honor

and power and strength

be to our God for ever and ever.

Amen!”

¹³Then one of the elders asked me, “These in white robes—who are they, and where did they come from?”

¹⁴I answered, “Sir, you know.”

¹⁵And he said, “These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore,

“they are before the throne of God

and serve Him day and night in His temple;

and He who sits on the throne will spread His tent over them.

¹⁶Never again will they hunger;

never again will they thirst.

The sun will not beat upon them,

nor any scorching heat.

¹⁷For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd;

He will lead them to springs of living water.

And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve,

and to give His life as a ransom for many.

Mark 10:45