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Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father, the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

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Amen.

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In a few moments this morning, you will have the opportunity to come before the altar and

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to receive private absolution.

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On bended knee, with the hand of God's servant placed upon your head, who is sent to speak

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on his behalf concerning the word of holy absolution that forgives your sins through

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the blood of Christ.

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Therefore to prepare our hearts, we hear these words from the Apostle John.

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If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

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If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse

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us from all unrighteousness.

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What prompts John to write these familiar words?

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Yes, we believe it is by the Holy Spirit that he writes them.

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For all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for

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correction and for training in righteousness.

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Yes, we believe these are not words of mere man, they are words of God that are placed

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before us.

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Yes, we know that John writes these words because he himself is an eyewitness of Christ.

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He writes that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you.

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We are writing these things so that your joy may be complete, our joy may be complete.

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Yet I still ask you, why else does John write these words?

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These words of law and gospel, truth and grace, they flow from a pastor's heart.

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John writes, he acts, he shepherds because of his pastoral heart that loves the Lord,

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that loves God's children.

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See how he writes to the flock, Christ entrusted to his care with such affectionate language.

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My beloved, he calls them repeatedly, and little children, he comforts, he guides, he

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warns, he cares for their souls.

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Not out of selfish ambition, but out of genuine pastoral love for God and for his children.

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Just as Jeremiah the prophet foretold, and I will give you shepherds after my own heart,

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who will feed you with knowledge and understanding.

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John doesn't want you to sin, and he especially doesn't want you to deceive yourself by saying

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that you have not sinned.

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If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

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As Luther writes out of deep pastoral concern, have you been disobedient, unfaithful, lazy?

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Have you harmed anyone by word or deed?

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Have you stolen, neglected, wasted, or injured anything?

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And in another place, Luther writes of confession, you dare not come and say how upright you

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are in confession, or how wicked you are.

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If you are a Christian, we know this well already enough.

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But you must do it for this reason, to lament your need and allow yourself to be helped,

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so that you may attain a joyful heart and conscience.

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These are the words of shepherds after God's own heart, who feed the flock with knowledge

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and understanding.

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And they have taught us all that when we go to confession, we go not by force or involuntarily.

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We do not go to torture or burden our consciences.

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But we go because of the words of absolution that are offered there.

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For it is the heart of Christ that meets us in holy absolution.

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Those who are well have no need of a physician, Christ says, but those who are sick.

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I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.

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Christ desires to forgive, to cleanse, to make you new, and to bring you to the knowledge

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of the truth, that which is certain.

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Your sins are forgiven by Him.

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Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.

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He comes for every pastor's heart, still tainted with sin and selfish ambition.

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For every man, woman, and child, encumbered and heavy laden.

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For every seminarian who finds themselves still enslaved to the same sins they thought

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they could shake by coming to this place.

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I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep.

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I will seek the lost.

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I will bring back the strayed.

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And I will bind up the injured.

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And I will strengthen the weak.

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And so the good shepherd sends shepherds after his own heart to speak his word into your

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ears, so that you may hear, and so that you may know, so that your conscience may find

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truth and certainty and assurance in God's promise to surely remove your transgressions

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as far as the east is from the west, to remember your sins no longer.

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Therefore you are invited to come this morning and to receive Christ's forgiveness personally,

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to hear what God himself wants to say to you.

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Holy absolution, that is the main thing offered here, as the pastoral heart of John tells

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us.

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If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us

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from all unrighteousness.

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Amen.

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Now may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guard your hearts and your minds

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in Christ Jesus our Lord.

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Amen.