The Living, Reliable Word
Sermon
Sermons On The First Readings
Series I, Cycle C
(Holding up a Bible) This is the most important book ever written. We could not imagine the Christian Faith without it. We call it the "sole rule and norm" of our faith. We all want to read it and feel guilty when we don't. We can't imagine having a worship service without reading from it. We want it on our coffee tables for everyone to see. We record our family genealogies inside its cover. We make sure each one of our children has his or her own copy. In court we swear on it. We love to quote from it. The Good Book has more authority than any other book ever written on the face of the earth.
Why? Why is it so important? It surely is great literature. It is filled with great history. It narrates fascinating stories. But none of these reasons can adequately account for its significance. If we were to take a survey of the rank and file of the American population, most would probably say something like this when accounting for the Bible's fame: It tells us what we gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do in order to be saved.
It is one of the great ironies of our day that many so-called "liberals and conservatives," even though they have dramatically different approaches to the Bible, agree that this is the purpose of the Bible. The Bible tells you what you gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do to be saved. They just come at it in dramatically different ways. On the one hand, the so-called "liberals" take very little of the biblical text literally. They are always trying to "get behind" the literal words of scripture to what "really happened." This is so important to them because, if they only knew what actually happened, then they would finally know what they "gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do." On the other hand, the so called "conservatives" take the biblical text very literally. There is no need to "get behind" the words of the text because those words already tell you exactly what you "gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do" to be saved.
The problem with this kind of understanding of the Bible is that, whether you are a liberal or conservative, whether you take the words of the Bible literally or figuratively, you never seem to know enough. The Bible becomes the rule that you can never quite seem to live up to. The Bible becomes the accuser you are never quite able to please.
This became abundantly clear to me once in a Sunday school staff meeting. Do you remember that popular game of some years ago, Trivial Pursuit? During that same period of time there were also various Christian versions of the game. One of those was a game called Bible Trivia. I decided that playing this game would be a good activity for our Sunday school staff. The game had three different levels of difficulty. At first I thought we could play the medium difficulty level. But then I thought we had better play it safe and not embarrass anyone and play the easy level. The most difficult level was out of the question. Surely the easy level ought to be difficult enough for us to have fun and still learn something. Boy, was I wrong! It didn't take very long to see that even the best of us didn't know a lot of Bible trivia. (Is that why they call it "trivia," because it isn't very important?) The game turned into a nightmare for the staff and made all the teachers feel dumb and stupid, as if their knowledge of the Bible was woefully inadequate. They soon wondered how they could be good Christians and why they thought they could ever teach Sunday school since their Bible knowledge was so poor. I decided then and there that I would never use that game again.
Unfortunately that game reflected an understanding of the Bible that is widespread in our culture. It assumed that "faith" is basically a rational exercise. Faith is knowing and accepting various kinds of information and facts contained in the Bible. The game assumed that the Word of God is basically information that tells us what we "gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do." This understanding of the Word of God unfortunately has been more influenced by Greek philosophy than by the Hebrew way of looking at life and the world. The Greeks looked at life, and the world, as if it was an object to be observed or a specimen to be examined, measured, and weighed. To the Greek point of view, the Bible is like an object in a test tube to be tested and measured. But the Bible came from a Hebrew context. Jesus was first and foremost a Hebrew. The Hebrews had a very different view of life and the world than the Greeks. For the Hebrew the world is alive. It is not so much an object to be controlled and observed as it is a "person" with whom to interact.
This different perspective is especially clear when it comes to the Hebrew understanding of "the word." The Hebrew expression for "word" is dabar, which can mean either "he says" or "he acts." The "word" is not a lifeless object but a living address similar to interaction between two people. The Word of God is God in action doing, creating, and making things happen.
For example, in Genesis 1 it is the Word of God that creates the world. God says, "Let there be," and there is. God simply speaks and the world happens. In Genesis 3 after Adam and Eve have eaten of the forbidden fruit and are hiding in the garden in the evening, God comes walking through the garden. He speaks. He utters a word. "Adam, where are you?" This question is not so much a reflection of God's ignorance of Adam's whereabouts, as it is God demanding an explanation for Adam's disappearance. The Word is a living, dynamic address and in this case, a word that challenges and accuses.
In Genesis 12 Abraham receives a very different kind of Word of God. Out of the blue he receives a promise, i.e., that God has chosen him, that he will be given a land that will belong to him, and that he will have children through whom he will be a blessing to all the nations of the world. Faith here is not simply accepting the accuracy of the information but trusting the reliability of a promise. A few chapters later in Genesis, God comes to speak this same word again to Abraham. Again the Word is a living address and not dead information. It was a hot day when three strangers who gave him a most unusual message visited Abraham, sitting in the shade under the oaks at Mamre. Even though aged Abraham and his wife Sarah were on the verge of giving up on the promise God had given them, these three visitors, who turned out to be God himself, reassured Abraham that Sarah would indeed give birth to the promised son the next spring. God came to deliver a word not by sending a book or a letter or an e-mail but personally through three living human beings.
In today's First Lesson we see another example of God's Word. Once again, it is a living, dynamic personal address. The prophet Isaiah, like all the other prophets of ancient Israel, dared to speak on behalf of God. When the prophets spoke, they didn't first sit down and write it out. It wasn't dictated to a stenographer. No, the prophet stood on the street corners, in the thoroughfares, and in the courts of the kings of the ancient world shouting, preaching, and proclaiming his message to the people. It was a living, dynamic, personal word from God.
The context of today's First Lesson is like so many of the passages from the latter half of the book of the prophet Isaiah. Israel is in exile in Babylon. They have lost everything that had made them a nation, their king, their Temple, their capital city, and their land, to the Babylonian hordes. They know that they have suffered the consequences of their sin. They know that they have brought this on themselves. It seemed that God has finally given up on them. But faced with this dismal and hopeless situation, the prophet refuses to give up. He refuses to give up because he is convinced that God won't give up. God will not abandon his word. God will never break his promise. The Israelites can count on the word God has given to them. Then using an illustration from the natural world around him, the prophet proclaims that, as sure as the rain and snow fall to the ground and cause the seed to sprout and bring forth new plants, Israel can count on God to deliver them from their predicament in exile. They can count on God for their deliverance. There will be a new exodus. Just like the first exodus from Egypt, God will rescue his people again, but this time from Babylon.
The word of God is spoken through the mouth of a living person. The prophet speaks a word that is alive and dynamic. It is a promise calling for the faith and trust of its hearers.
The Word of God is most vividly expressed in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the Word of God. Jesus is the Word of God "with skin on." The opening chapter of the Gospel of John puts it most vividly. Jesus literally is the Word of God in human flesh. In him the Word of God literally came to dwell among us, "full of grace and truth." There is no Word more living and dynamic than a human being. That Word is Jesus.
When Jesus speaks the word of God in his ministry, it is a dynamic, life-changing thing. When Jesus calls fishermen to be his disciples, he uses just two words. He simply says, "Follow me," and it changes their lives. He simply says a few words and the blind see and the deaf hear. When Jesus tells stories, he uses parables to change his hearers' lives. These stories don't just serve as packages to deliver religious propositions. Rather they are personal addresses, hearing events, that create a new vision and a new world for their hearers. Jesus speaks of a Samaritan who stopped along the road to nurse a robbed and beaten traveler back to health. He speaks of a farmer who sows seeds, suffers enormous losses, and nevertheless enjoys a bumper crop. He speaks of a father welcoming home a lost son. Through these words God's living Word breaks into the hearts and lives of people and changes them.
And even Saint Paul, whose words and phrases often seem complicated, convoluted and abstract, resorts to a dynamic, interpersonal relationship to portray his central metaphor for the Word of God, justification by faith. In the courtroom of eternity a sinner stands guilty before the judge. But the judge surprises everyone by speaking a word, by making an announcement, by declaring a judgment that no one expected. This sinner is declared innocent, forgiven, justified. The Word of God is a living, dynamic, life-changing event.
But when God speaks his word, he is always doing one of two things. On the one hand, God's word can challenge, confront, accuse, and expose us for the sinners we are. That is what God's word did when in the Garden of Eden God demanded, "Adam, where are you?" That is what Jesus did when in the Sermon on the Mount he radicalized the demands of the commandments. When he asked, "You have heard that it was said, 'Thou shalt not kill,' " you can be sure that most of his hearers were certain that they had never broken this commandment. But when he said, "But I say to you that whoever insults his neighbor is a murderer," you can be sure that every one of his hearers was shaking in his boots. This living Word of God had grabbed them by the throat.
On the other hand, God's word can offer love and mercy, unconditional comfort and grace. This is the word the prophet speaks in today's First Lesson when he assures his discouraged hearers that God will still rescue them. This is the Word that became flesh, was crucified, and is risen in Jesus Christ. This is the word that announces God's love for sinners. This is the word that silences the criticism and accusation of God's "other word" and instead offers freedom and liberation. This is the word that promises the love of God with no strings attached.
We call these two words of God Law and Gospel. We cannot ever talk about the word of God without always making the distinction between these two kinds of divine speech. We must always ask, "Is this word of God addressing us as Law or Gospel?" If it is the Law, it will be language that challenges and accuses us. It will be words that evaluate us on the basis of our performance. It will expose our sin. But if it is the Gospel, it will comfort and bless us unconditionally. The Gospel is the divine speech that offers us the love of God, no questions asked. It pronounces us saints. What makes us Christians is that we believe that God's word of Gospel has overcome God's word of Law. What saves us is that we trust the promise of the Gospel in spite of all kinds of reasons not to. The Gospel is God's last word. It is the word that reflects God's true will for the world. It reveals to us the true heart of God. And that heart is love.
The Bible is certainly God's word. It is God's word in written form. It is the "rule and norm" of our faith. We declare it "inspired" by God. But here again the distinction between Law and Gospel is essential. The Bible is both Law and Gospel. It both kills and makes alive. But the Bible is God's word "for us" and is the "rule and norm" for our faith and life because the Gospel is at the heart of the Bible. The Gospel is what the Bible is ultimately all about. We stake our lives not on the threats of the Law but on the promises of the Gospel. The Bible is the world's most important book for Christians because it is the oldest historical witness to God's gracious and merciful acts in history. It is the oldest historical witness to God's grandest act of grace, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Bible is so important because there we meet Jesus, the Gospel in human flesh.
Martin Luther once used a homely and down-to-earth image to explain the significance of the Bible. At Bethlehem Jesus was held in a manger, a feedbox for animals. Luther taught that the Bible, the written word of God, is like that manger because the Bible holds Christ, the living Word, God's dynamic address to us, the Word of God "with skin on." But we don't worship the manger. We worship the Christ who came in the manger. But there is no Christ without the manger. Likewise, we don't worship the Bible. We worship the Christ in the Bible. But there is no Christ without the Bible. The Bible is just another book without Christ.
The manger was made of wood, ordinary wood. It probably had splinters. The nails may have been rusty. The angles may not have been perfect. In other words, that manger at Bethlehem reflected all the quirks, idiosyncrasies, and imperfections of human life. But at the same time it was the most important manger in the universe, because it held the infant Jesus. The Bible likewise reflects all the quirks, idiosyncrasies, and imperfections of human life. But it is the most important book ever written because it is filled with God's own Spirit, because it contains the power to save us, and because it holds Christ!
All the adjectives that we usually heap on the Bible, that it is inspired, reliable, infallible, trustworthy, and so on, are all intended to do one thing: to assure us that we can count on it and the Christ it brings to us to be sufficient to save us, just as the prophet says in today's First Lesson. We can count on it to save us, just as we can count on the rains and the snow to water the earth and make it bring forth living things. It has the power to renew our faith, to forgive our sins, to raise us to new life.
That same written word that we meet in the Bible, we also meet in ritual and sacrament in the life of the church. As we come to the table to eat and drink, we don't just eat and drink ordinary bread and wine. No, there we meet God in Jesus actively speaking and acting to give us new life. We can count on Holy Communion to accomplish that which God says it will accomplish. It will forgive our sins. It will give us eternal life. It will give us the peace our restless hearts have been seeking.
Today we celebrated the Baptism of Ian Jakob. In the water of the font God spoke his living and reliable word to Ian Jakob. God acted in that word and put a claim on Ian Jakob. For the rest of his life Ian Jakob will always be a son of God, even though just like us he will often struggle to believe it. As sure and as certain as the rain and the snow come down from heaven bringing water and life to the earth, Ian Jakob can be certain for the rest of his life of God's love for him. That water in the baptismal font was just ordinary water from a faucet. But when it was used together with God's living and reliable word, it took on new power and significance. Ian Jakob can count on it. It will accomplish what God wants it to accomplish, namely, the eternal salvation of Ian Jakob.
But that living, reliable word of God doesn't just meet us in the written form of the Bible or in the ritual forms of the sacraments of Baptism and Communion. That word also encounters us in real, live human beings. And I am not just talking about my sermons. One of the great fruits of the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation was the concept of "the priesthood of all believers." The priesthood of all believers is not about institutional or legal power. On the contrary, the priesthood of all believers is about the Gospel. It declares that every baptized Christian is a priest and has the power to work for the salvation of every person. The priesthood of all believers means that every Christian has the power and authority to speak the word of God to anyone. Every Christian now has the power and authority to forgive the sins of others in the name of God and on behalf of God. Speaking the word of God is not just the private privilege of preachers like me. No, getting to speak the word of God is the privilege of every Christian. It is something you also have been authorized to do because God has claimed you in your Baptism.
When we speak the living, reliable word of God, it inevitably moves its hearers to repentance and faith. Those who hear it and trust it now have a new relationship with God. Hearing the word of God is similar to what happens when you are walking down the sidewalk and someone calls out your name. You stop in your tracks. You turn around and walk in a new direction toward the sound of this new voice. The power of the word of God you heard is so winsome, so captivating, and so liberating that it changes the direction of your life.
When God speaks his lively and reliable word, it is similar to an old-fashioned romance when a lover gets on his knees before his beloved to win her affections. He speaks "sweet nothings" and waxes eloquently about his love for her. He begs her to marry him. So, when she finally says, "Yes," to his proposal, her life is changed forever. In the same way God courts us. Through his living, reliable word he tries to win our affections and trust. As members of this priesthood of believers we too have been authorized to speak the word of God to one another and to the world. We have been called to woo and win them for God.
Through our words and deeds we get to proclaim the word and change the lives of people. In a world where everyone is in constant competition always trying to one up the other, where everyone is always keeping score, where the competition can easily turn us into monsters, we can assure one another with the merciful word of God. We can declare, "You are the apple of God's eye. You are God's beloved child, the love of his life. The self-doubt that has been raging in your heart can now end."
Ashamed and embarrassed by what the world merely calls "failures and shortcomings" but what we know is actually "sin," we are offered this good word from God: "Because of and in the name of Jesus your sins are forgiven."
Mourning our loss and burdened with grief, we stand at the graveside in the cemetery struggling to find some way to say good-bye to our loved one. Then we hear those glorious words, "Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38-39). The living, reliable word of God has touched us and comforted us.
The prophet had absolute confidence in the power of the living, reliable word of God to do what it is supposed to do.
So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
-- v. 11
And what is that purpose? To assure us once and for all that even in the midst of our exiles God has not forgotten us. God will keep his promise. God will save us, no questions asked, no "ifs, ands, or buts," no strings attached, unconditionally. As sure as rain and snow will water the earth and make it bring forth and sprout, you can count on it -- the living, reliable word of God.
Why? Why is it so important? It surely is great literature. It is filled with great history. It narrates fascinating stories. But none of these reasons can adequately account for its significance. If we were to take a survey of the rank and file of the American population, most would probably say something like this when accounting for the Bible's fame: It tells us what we gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do in order to be saved.
It is one of the great ironies of our day that many so-called "liberals and conservatives," even though they have dramatically different approaches to the Bible, agree that this is the purpose of the Bible. The Bible tells you what you gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do to be saved. They just come at it in dramatically different ways. On the one hand, the so-called "liberals" take very little of the biblical text literally. They are always trying to "get behind" the literal words of scripture to what "really happened." This is so important to them because, if they only knew what actually happened, then they would finally know what they "gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do." On the other hand, the so called "conservatives" take the biblical text very literally. There is no need to "get behind" the words of the text because those words already tell you exactly what you "gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do" to be saved.
The problem with this kind of understanding of the Bible is that, whether you are a liberal or conservative, whether you take the words of the Bible literally or figuratively, you never seem to know enough. The Bible becomes the rule that you can never quite seem to live up to. The Bible becomes the accuser you are never quite able to please.
This became abundantly clear to me once in a Sunday school staff meeting. Do you remember that popular game of some years ago, Trivial Pursuit? During that same period of time there were also various Christian versions of the game. One of those was a game called Bible Trivia. I decided that playing this game would be a good activity for our Sunday school staff. The game had three different levels of difficulty. At first I thought we could play the medium difficulty level. But then I thought we had better play it safe and not embarrass anyone and play the easy level. The most difficult level was out of the question. Surely the easy level ought to be difficult enough for us to have fun and still learn something. Boy, was I wrong! It didn't take very long to see that even the best of us didn't know a lot of Bible trivia. (Is that why they call it "trivia," because it isn't very important?) The game turned into a nightmare for the staff and made all the teachers feel dumb and stupid, as if their knowledge of the Bible was woefully inadequate. They soon wondered how they could be good Christians and why they thought they could ever teach Sunday school since their Bible knowledge was so poor. I decided then and there that I would never use that game again.
Unfortunately that game reflected an understanding of the Bible that is widespread in our culture. It assumed that "faith" is basically a rational exercise. Faith is knowing and accepting various kinds of information and facts contained in the Bible. The game assumed that the Word of God is basically information that tells us what we "gotta believe, gotta know, and gotta do." This understanding of the Word of God unfortunately has been more influenced by Greek philosophy than by the Hebrew way of looking at life and the world. The Greeks looked at life, and the world, as if it was an object to be observed or a specimen to be examined, measured, and weighed. To the Greek point of view, the Bible is like an object in a test tube to be tested and measured. But the Bible came from a Hebrew context. Jesus was first and foremost a Hebrew. The Hebrews had a very different view of life and the world than the Greeks. For the Hebrew the world is alive. It is not so much an object to be controlled and observed as it is a "person" with whom to interact.
This different perspective is especially clear when it comes to the Hebrew understanding of "the word." The Hebrew expression for "word" is dabar, which can mean either "he says" or "he acts." The "word" is not a lifeless object but a living address similar to interaction between two people. The Word of God is God in action doing, creating, and making things happen.
For example, in Genesis 1 it is the Word of God that creates the world. God says, "Let there be," and there is. God simply speaks and the world happens. In Genesis 3 after Adam and Eve have eaten of the forbidden fruit and are hiding in the garden in the evening, God comes walking through the garden. He speaks. He utters a word. "Adam, where are you?" This question is not so much a reflection of God's ignorance of Adam's whereabouts, as it is God demanding an explanation for Adam's disappearance. The Word is a living, dynamic address and in this case, a word that challenges and accuses.
In Genesis 12 Abraham receives a very different kind of Word of God. Out of the blue he receives a promise, i.e., that God has chosen him, that he will be given a land that will belong to him, and that he will have children through whom he will be a blessing to all the nations of the world. Faith here is not simply accepting the accuracy of the information but trusting the reliability of a promise. A few chapters later in Genesis, God comes to speak this same word again to Abraham. Again the Word is a living address and not dead information. It was a hot day when three strangers who gave him a most unusual message visited Abraham, sitting in the shade under the oaks at Mamre. Even though aged Abraham and his wife Sarah were on the verge of giving up on the promise God had given them, these three visitors, who turned out to be God himself, reassured Abraham that Sarah would indeed give birth to the promised son the next spring. God came to deliver a word not by sending a book or a letter or an e-mail but personally through three living human beings.
In today's First Lesson we see another example of God's Word. Once again, it is a living, dynamic personal address. The prophet Isaiah, like all the other prophets of ancient Israel, dared to speak on behalf of God. When the prophets spoke, they didn't first sit down and write it out. It wasn't dictated to a stenographer. No, the prophet stood on the street corners, in the thoroughfares, and in the courts of the kings of the ancient world shouting, preaching, and proclaiming his message to the people. It was a living, dynamic, personal word from God.
The context of today's First Lesson is like so many of the passages from the latter half of the book of the prophet Isaiah. Israel is in exile in Babylon. They have lost everything that had made them a nation, their king, their Temple, their capital city, and their land, to the Babylonian hordes. They know that they have suffered the consequences of their sin. They know that they have brought this on themselves. It seemed that God has finally given up on them. But faced with this dismal and hopeless situation, the prophet refuses to give up. He refuses to give up because he is convinced that God won't give up. God will not abandon his word. God will never break his promise. The Israelites can count on the word God has given to them. Then using an illustration from the natural world around him, the prophet proclaims that, as sure as the rain and snow fall to the ground and cause the seed to sprout and bring forth new plants, Israel can count on God to deliver them from their predicament in exile. They can count on God for their deliverance. There will be a new exodus. Just like the first exodus from Egypt, God will rescue his people again, but this time from Babylon.
The word of God is spoken through the mouth of a living person. The prophet speaks a word that is alive and dynamic. It is a promise calling for the faith and trust of its hearers.
The Word of God is most vividly expressed in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the Word of God. Jesus is the Word of God "with skin on." The opening chapter of the Gospel of John puts it most vividly. Jesus literally is the Word of God in human flesh. In him the Word of God literally came to dwell among us, "full of grace and truth." There is no Word more living and dynamic than a human being. That Word is Jesus.
When Jesus speaks the word of God in his ministry, it is a dynamic, life-changing thing. When Jesus calls fishermen to be his disciples, he uses just two words. He simply says, "Follow me," and it changes their lives. He simply says a few words and the blind see and the deaf hear. When Jesus tells stories, he uses parables to change his hearers' lives. These stories don't just serve as packages to deliver religious propositions. Rather they are personal addresses, hearing events, that create a new vision and a new world for their hearers. Jesus speaks of a Samaritan who stopped along the road to nurse a robbed and beaten traveler back to health. He speaks of a farmer who sows seeds, suffers enormous losses, and nevertheless enjoys a bumper crop. He speaks of a father welcoming home a lost son. Through these words God's living Word breaks into the hearts and lives of people and changes them.
And even Saint Paul, whose words and phrases often seem complicated, convoluted and abstract, resorts to a dynamic, interpersonal relationship to portray his central metaphor for the Word of God, justification by faith. In the courtroom of eternity a sinner stands guilty before the judge. But the judge surprises everyone by speaking a word, by making an announcement, by declaring a judgment that no one expected. This sinner is declared innocent, forgiven, justified. The Word of God is a living, dynamic, life-changing event.
But when God speaks his word, he is always doing one of two things. On the one hand, God's word can challenge, confront, accuse, and expose us for the sinners we are. That is what God's word did when in the Garden of Eden God demanded, "Adam, where are you?" That is what Jesus did when in the Sermon on the Mount he radicalized the demands of the commandments. When he asked, "You have heard that it was said, 'Thou shalt not kill,' " you can be sure that most of his hearers were certain that they had never broken this commandment. But when he said, "But I say to you that whoever insults his neighbor is a murderer," you can be sure that every one of his hearers was shaking in his boots. This living Word of God had grabbed them by the throat.
On the other hand, God's word can offer love and mercy, unconditional comfort and grace. This is the word the prophet speaks in today's First Lesson when he assures his discouraged hearers that God will still rescue them. This is the Word that became flesh, was crucified, and is risen in Jesus Christ. This is the word that announces God's love for sinners. This is the word that silences the criticism and accusation of God's "other word" and instead offers freedom and liberation. This is the word that promises the love of God with no strings attached.
We call these two words of God Law and Gospel. We cannot ever talk about the word of God without always making the distinction between these two kinds of divine speech. We must always ask, "Is this word of God addressing us as Law or Gospel?" If it is the Law, it will be language that challenges and accuses us. It will be words that evaluate us on the basis of our performance. It will expose our sin. But if it is the Gospel, it will comfort and bless us unconditionally. The Gospel is the divine speech that offers us the love of God, no questions asked. It pronounces us saints. What makes us Christians is that we believe that God's word of Gospel has overcome God's word of Law. What saves us is that we trust the promise of the Gospel in spite of all kinds of reasons not to. The Gospel is God's last word. It is the word that reflects God's true will for the world. It reveals to us the true heart of God. And that heart is love.
The Bible is certainly God's word. It is God's word in written form. It is the "rule and norm" of our faith. We declare it "inspired" by God. But here again the distinction between Law and Gospel is essential. The Bible is both Law and Gospel. It both kills and makes alive. But the Bible is God's word "for us" and is the "rule and norm" for our faith and life because the Gospel is at the heart of the Bible. The Gospel is what the Bible is ultimately all about. We stake our lives not on the threats of the Law but on the promises of the Gospel. The Bible is the world's most important book for Christians because it is the oldest historical witness to God's gracious and merciful acts in history. It is the oldest historical witness to God's grandest act of grace, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Bible is so important because there we meet Jesus, the Gospel in human flesh.
Martin Luther once used a homely and down-to-earth image to explain the significance of the Bible. At Bethlehem Jesus was held in a manger, a feedbox for animals. Luther taught that the Bible, the written word of God, is like that manger because the Bible holds Christ, the living Word, God's dynamic address to us, the Word of God "with skin on." But we don't worship the manger. We worship the Christ who came in the manger. But there is no Christ without the manger. Likewise, we don't worship the Bible. We worship the Christ in the Bible. But there is no Christ without the Bible. The Bible is just another book without Christ.
The manger was made of wood, ordinary wood. It probably had splinters. The nails may have been rusty. The angles may not have been perfect. In other words, that manger at Bethlehem reflected all the quirks, idiosyncrasies, and imperfections of human life. But at the same time it was the most important manger in the universe, because it held the infant Jesus. The Bible likewise reflects all the quirks, idiosyncrasies, and imperfections of human life. But it is the most important book ever written because it is filled with God's own Spirit, because it contains the power to save us, and because it holds Christ!
All the adjectives that we usually heap on the Bible, that it is inspired, reliable, infallible, trustworthy, and so on, are all intended to do one thing: to assure us that we can count on it and the Christ it brings to us to be sufficient to save us, just as the prophet says in today's First Lesson. We can count on it to save us, just as we can count on the rains and the snow to water the earth and make it bring forth living things. It has the power to renew our faith, to forgive our sins, to raise us to new life.
That same written word that we meet in the Bible, we also meet in ritual and sacrament in the life of the church. As we come to the table to eat and drink, we don't just eat and drink ordinary bread and wine. No, there we meet God in Jesus actively speaking and acting to give us new life. We can count on Holy Communion to accomplish that which God says it will accomplish. It will forgive our sins. It will give us eternal life. It will give us the peace our restless hearts have been seeking.
Today we celebrated the Baptism of Ian Jakob. In the water of the font God spoke his living and reliable word to Ian Jakob. God acted in that word and put a claim on Ian Jakob. For the rest of his life Ian Jakob will always be a son of God, even though just like us he will often struggle to believe it. As sure and as certain as the rain and the snow come down from heaven bringing water and life to the earth, Ian Jakob can be certain for the rest of his life of God's love for him. That water in the baptismal font was just ordinary water from a faucet. But when it was used together with God's living and reliable word, it took on new power and significance. Ian Jakob can count on it. It will accomplish what God wants it to accomplish, namely, the eternal salvation of Ian Jakob.
But that living, reliable word of God doesn't just meet us in the written form of the Bible or in the ritual forms of the sacraments of Baptism and Communion. That word also encounters us in real, live human beings. And I am not just talking about my sermons. One of the great fruits of the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation was the concept of "the priesthood of all believers." The priesthood of all believers is not about institutional or legal power. On the contrary, the priesthood of all believers is about the Gospel. It declares that every baptized Christian is a priest and has the power to work for the salvation of every person. The priesthood of all believers means that every Christian has the power and authority to speak the word of God to anyone. Every Christian now has the power and authority to forgive the sins of others in the name of God and on behalf of God. Speaking the word of God is not just the private privilege of preachers like me. No, getting to speak the word of God is the privilege of every Christian. It is something you also have been authorized to do because God has claimed you in your Baptism.
When we speak the living, reliable word of God, it inevitably moves its hearers to repentance and faith. Those who hear it and trust it now have a new relationship with God. Hearing the word of God is similar to what happens when you are walking down the sidewalk and someone calls out your name. You stop in your tracks. You turn around and walk in a new direction toward the sound of this new voice. The power of the word of God you heard is so winsome, so captivating, and so liberating that it changes the direction of your life.
When God speaks his lively and reliable word, it is similar to an old-fashioned romance when a lover gets on his knees before his beloved to win her affections. He speaks "sweet nothings" and waxes eloquently about his love for her. He begs her to marry him. So, when she finally says, "Yes," to his proposal, her life is changed forever. In the same way God courts us. Through his living, reliable word he tries to win our affections and trust. As members of this priesthood of believers we too have been authorized to speak the word of God to one another and to the world. We have been called to woo and win them for God.
Through our words and deeds we get to proclaim the word and change the lives of people. In a world where everyone is in constant competition always trying to one up the other, where everyone is always keeping score, where the competition can easily turn us into monsters, we can assure one another with the merciful word of God. We can declare, "You are the apple of God's eye. You are God's beloved child, the love of his life. The self-doubt that has been raging in your heart can now end."
Ashamed and embarrassed by what the world merely calls "failures and shortcomings" but what we know is actually "sin," we are offered this good word from God: "Because of and in the name of Jesus your sins are forgiven."
Mourning our loss and burdened with grief, we stand at the graveside in the cemetery struggling to find some way to say good-bye to our loved one. Then we hear those glorious words, "Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38-39). The living, reliable word of God has touched us and comforted us.
The prophet had absolute confidence in the power of the living, reliable word of God to do what it is supposed to do.
So shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
-- v. 11
And what is that purpose? To assure us once and for all that even in the midst of our exiles God has not forgotten us. God will keep his promise. God will save us, no questions asked, no "ifs, ands, or buts," no strings attached, unconditionally. As sure as rain and snow will water the earth and make it bring forth and sprout, you can count on it -- the living, reliable word of God.
