By Every Word That Comes from the Lord
Click here to listen to this sermon."The Gathering of Manna" by James Tissot
“The whole commandment
that I command you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and
multiply, and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your
fathers. And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led
you these forty years in the wilderness, that He might humble you, testing you
to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not.
And He humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not
know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man does not
live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of
the Lord” (Deuteronomy 8:1-3).
Grace to you and peace
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!
Thanksgiving is a time
for reflection and remembrance. A time for reflecting upon the bounteous blessings
God has so freely bestowed upon us out of His lavish love and abundant mercy. A
time for remembering the episodes in which He has patiently and lovingly brought
us through trials and tough times.
Reflection and
remembrance: That’s what Moses is doing in our Old Testament reading for this
evening. As the nation of Israel is poised to enter the Promised Land and Moses
is ready to depart this life to be with the Lord, he reminds them of all that
has happened to them, and all that God has been teaching them over the past
forty years. He exhorts them to do everything that the Lord commands them so
that they might continue in the blessings that the Lord has promised to them as
His beloved children and to avoid the curses that come from disobedience. Moses
declares the glory and magnificence of God and urges them to trust the Lord’s
goodness and to fear His wrath.
Moses said that God led
Israel through the wilderness to test them. The purpose of His test was to lead
Israel to trust Him more fully.
So far, they weren’t
doing very well. It wasn’t long after God had led the Israelites to safety
through the Red Sea, that the little bit of food they had packed for themselves
in Egypt ran out. They were starving. There was no food for them to eat in the
wilderness, just a lot of rocks and sand.
The Israelites should
have remembered what God did in Egypt and at the Red Sea, how He had delivered
them out of slavery. They should have trusted Him to take care of them. They
should have prayed for Him to give them food. Instead, they grumbled and
complained.
They had said they
wished that they had stayed in Egypt. They had talked about all the sumptuous food
they could eat there—but they had forgotten how badly the Egyptians had treated
them. They had accused Moses of bringing them out of Egypt so they would die in
the wilderness. Even though God worked so many great miracles to set them free,
they still didn’t trust Him to take care of them. So, God had talked to Moses.
Moses told the Israelites that God would send them bread and meat. Later, when
the sun started going down that evening, huge flocks of quail had flown right
into their camp. The Israelites had gathered them and cooked them for supper.
That was the meat God had promised them.
When the sun had come
up the next morning, dew covered the ground. When the dew dried up, there was a
flaky thing on the ground. The people had asked Moses, “What is it?” Moses told
them it was the bread God had sent from heaven. They called it manna, which is
a Hebrew word that means “What is it?”
Each day they traveled
in the wilderness—for forty years!—God would send just enough manna for the
people to eat that day. If they picked up more than a day’s worth, it would
just spoil. Except for Fridays—God instructed them to pick up enough manna for
two days on Friday so they would rest and listen to His promises and remember
His gifts on the Sabbath. By the Lord’s testing, He wanted His people to trust
in Him for their daily bread and to make time to hear His Word.
Moses says that God had
led Israel through the wilderness to test them. As a man disciplines his son,
the Lord God disciplines His children. The purpose of the Lord’s testing and
discipline was to lead His people to trust Him more fully. The reason He
provided such miraculous physical blessings was to show His people that they
needed, and that He could provide, far more than physical blessings. With His
Word, the Lord could meet all their physical needs as well as the still greater
need of their souls. Without God’s Word, physical blessings by themselves will
never be enough. Life has deeper dimensions that only God can satisfy.
Almost 1,500 years
later, God’s only-begotten Son is led out into the wilderness immediately after
His Baptism. Christ’s personal fast of forty days and forty nights corresponds
to Israel’s forty years in the wilderness. Whereas when Israel was tested, the
people sinned miserably and did not trust God, Jesus does not fail. Though
hungry, He does not murmur against God or doubt God’s purposes.
With the first
temptation, Satan attempts to get Jesus to use His own power to serve Himself
in time of need. The slanderer grants Jesus’ identity as “the Son of God”
(Matthew 4:3), but he seeks to lead Jesus into being the wrong kind of Son. He
acknowledges that Jesus has the power to turn stones into bread, and he tries
to get Jesus to use that power for Himself—something He never does.
The Lord had tried in
vain to teach Israel an important lesson. Moses reminded them: “[The Lord]
humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know,
nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man does not live
by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the
Lord” (Deuteronomy 8:3).
Jesus knew well what
Israel had failed to learn; unlike Israel, Jesus lived according to the divine
Word. Jesus’ life and relationship to God the Father came from what God
provides, and especially from what God speaks. He lives “by every Word that
comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).
Specifically, Jesus
knows that God has already spoken and that from His mouth have come the words
“This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased” (Matthew 3:17). He has no need
to prove it by turning stones to bread. Jesus knows that His time of temptation
in the wilderness is God’s will; it is the Spirit’s leading. So, Jesus will not
use His power to murmur against God or to reject God’s will and purpose, as Israel
did in the wilderness.
The people in their
wilderness wanderings did not realize that “as a man disciplines his son, the
Lord your God disciplines you” (Deuteronomy 8:5), nor did they respond to His
discipline as an obedient son should. Jesus, however, overcomes the slanderer,
knowing the Father’s Word that declared Him to be God’s Son, and living by
every divine word, even and especially in His experience of being tempted in
the wilderness. Jesus came in humility to His Baptism, and He willingly suffers
the time of hunger and temptation, obeying His Father. He lives perfectly and
completely by the Father’s Word and will.
The
application should not be direct as though each of Jesus’ temptations is
intended to correspond directly with something that we Christians experience.
Rather, read holistically, the attacks of Satan against Jesus call up for
review the nature of Jesus’ identity as God’s Son. Satan tries to misunderstand
or contradict what it means for Him to live out His mission as God’s Son. In
other words, it is a question of grasping His own identity.
So, it is also in the
Christian life of temptation and struggle against sin. Matthew 4:1-11 does not
so much teach us that we should “find the right Bible verse with which to
combat temptations.” Rather, as men and women in Christ, we can learn to
recognize Satan’s temptations as attacks on our identity as the children of
God, and on what it means to live out that identity in the world and in our
vocations. Jesus’ paradigm is this: “Know from God’s Word who you are and how
that identity as God’s baptized, adopted son or daughter is to be lived out.”
In that sense, even as
He wins the victory, Jesus, the Son of God prepares us for the battle. Just as
the Spirit led Jesus into temptation and spiritual warfare with the evil one,
so it will be with us as we serve and follow our Master. The Holy Spirit calls,
gathers, enlightens, sanctifies, and keeps us in the family of God by the power
of God’s holy Word.
And so, we come here
tonight to give thanks to our God for all He has blessed us with throughout the
year. We thank Him for our daily bread, which He so richly and daily provides us
with all we that we need to support this body and life. We come here to hear
God’s Word and to worship Him.
The highest worship of
God is faith that receives all that He promises in His Word. Faith comes by
hearing the Word of Christ (Romans 10:17), and faith speaks back to God, using
the words He has given. In a sermon preached at the dedication of a new church,
Luther prayed that “nothing else may ever happen in it except that our dear
Lord Himself may speak to us through His holy Word and we respond to Him
through prayer and praise” (LW 51:333). The Divine Service is structured around
Christ Jesus speaking to us in His Word and the Sacrament of the Altar and our
answering in confession, thanksgiving, praise, and prayer.
The whole service is
centered on the Word of God and the Incarnate Word of God, Jesus Christ.
Confessing our sins and receiving His forgiveness, we glorify our triune God
using words He has given us in the Scriptures: psalms and biblical hymns of
praise. The liturgy (order of worship) seeks to assist us in hearing the whole
counsel of God. The lectionary is a system of Scripture readings from the Old
Testament, the Epistles, and the Gospels arranged according to the Church Year.
Having heard God’s Word, we confess the faith in one of the Church’s creeds.
God’s Law and Gospel are proclaimed by the pastor in the sermon. We answer this
proclamation with our prayers and offerings in grateful response to all of
God’s gifts to us.
God gives us His
promises of forgiveness, life, and salvation in more than one way. Along with
His preached Word, the Lord gives us His body and blood to eat and to drink in
His Supper. We come to the Lord’s Table praising the Savior who comes to us,
acknowledging His saving presence in the words of the angelic hymn from Isaiah
6, and praying the prayer that Jesus taught us. The pastor speaks the Words of
Our Lord over the bread and wine, which give us the true body and blood of the
Lamb of God to eat and drink. Having received Jesus’ body and blood with our
own mouths, we give thanks to Him, praying that this holy gift will strengthen
us in faith toward Him and love for one another.
Throughout the service,
we are reminded of the great truth proclaimed by Moses and Jesus: “Man does not
live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of
the Lord” (Deuteronomy 8:1-3).
A blessed Thanksgiving
to you all; and rejoice, my friends. The Lord is treating you as His beloved
children because you are His beloved children. He has made you His own in water
and Word of Holy Baptism. He speaks His Word of forgiveness through the voice
of His called and ordained servant. He feeds you His visible Word, His very body
and blood for the forgiveness of sins and the strengthening of your faith. He
gives you all that you need for this body and life. He gives you all that you
need for this body and soul for eternal life.
O give thanks unto the
Lord, for He is good; and His mercy endures forever. And you are forgiven for all
your sins.
In the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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