A Famine Not of Bread

Click here to listen to this sermon. The text for today is our Gospel lesson, Luke 12:49-53. Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I know for many of you, “parliamentary procedure” is a dirty word. But I must confess I am a fan of Robert’s Rules of Order . Well-done parliamentary procedure does make for shorter, more orderly meetings, ensuring that while the majority opinion prevails, the rights of the minority are also protected.   One of the more interesting parliamentary procedures originated in the Roman Senate. Ordinarily, the Romans used voice vote. But if there was a vote that was disputed or considered too close to call, one of the members might rise and call for a division of the house. Those who were voting divided themselves—the “ayes” on one side of the house and the “nays” on the other side. The call for a “division of the house” is still useful for verifying the results of a voice vote. It can also be a method of applying pressu...

Click here to listen to this sermon. “Fear not, I am the First and the Last, and the Living One. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades” (Revelation 1:18). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! In our First Reading, an angel of the Lord opens the doors of the prison that hold all the apostles, not with the guards’ keys, but miraculously. In fact, the guards aren’t even disturbed. When the religious officials arrive, they find the jail fully secure, but completely empty. The Gospel has free course that can’t be held back by prison doors. God’s saving purposes are not frustrated by locks. In our Gospel, the apostles are gathered behind locked doors for fear of the Jews and what they might do to them. But there is one whom the locked doors did not keep out—the resurrected Jesus. We don’t know much about Jesus’ resurrected body, but we do know He left a sealed tomb with even the grave clothes still intact and ...

Click here to listen to this sermon. “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You” (Isaiah 26:3). Elaine, Randy, Rick, Shari, and other family and friends of Ronnie: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! Perhaps you’re sensing a theme. Yes, it is peace. When we finish this service today, I would like you to take with you peace, the perfect peace of God. The hymn that we just sang, “When Peace Like a River,” counsels contentment at all times, even in the face of trials, suffering, and death! The hymn explains why: Jesus has borne the soul’s sin on the cross and will return to be with His own. The first stanza reminds the soul that God has taught it to say, “It is well” in all circumstances, using an image from Isaiah’s description of the Messiah’s blessing of Zion (Isaiah 66:12), with peace overflowing “like a river.” Shalom , translated as “peace” here, is more than just a lack of conflict; it is health, ...

Click here to listen to this sermon. “Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace, according to Your word; for my eyes have seen Your salvation that You have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to Your people Israel” (Luke 2:28–32). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! Linda, Rick, and Jim, the words of our text were regularly spoken or sung over the years by your mother as she attended Divine Service at St. James, Memorial, Our Saviour’s and elsewhere. They are the Nunc Dimittis , part of the liturgy of Holy Communion. A few days before the Lord called her home, your mother recited these words, along “with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven,” having received Christ’s body and blood for the forgiveness of her sins and the strengthening and preserving of her body and soul. That individual communion of the Lord’s Supper in her room at Good Samaritan was the last of ...

"Bethlehem" by Vasily Polenov Click here to listen to this sermon. But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah,     who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for Me     One who is to be ruler in Israel, whose origin is from of old,     from ancient days. Therefore He shall give them up until the time     when she who is in labor has given birth; then the rest of His brothers shall return     to the people of Israel. And He shall stand and shepherd His flock in the strength of the Lord,     in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God. And they shall dwell secure, for now He shall be great     to the ends of the earth. And He shall be their peace. (Micah 5:2-5a). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! “A special memory from a pilgrimage to Palestine by one of the great American preachers of the nineteenth century...

"The Disbelief of St. Thomas" by James Tissot  Click here to listen to this sermon. On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent Me, even so I am sending you.” And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of anyone, they are forgiven; if you withhold forgiveness from anyone, it is withheld.” Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into His sid...