WEBVTT 1 00:00:02.100 --> 00:00:03.000 In the name of Jesus. 2 00:00:06.400 --> 00:00:07.700 With some trepidation 3 00:00:07.700 --> 00:00:13.600 I have a confession to make I'm not sure that is Seminary Pulpit is 4 00:00:13.600 --> 00:00:16.100 the best place to do this, but it's heavy on my heart, 5 00:00:16.100 --> 00:00:17.900 so bear with me. 6 00:00:19.500 --> 00:00:24.800 I left this place 29 years ago after being a student here become a 7 00:00:24.800 --> 00:00:28.200 pastor. And over those 29 years 8 00:00:28.200 --> 00:00:33.600 I've been involved in dozens and dozens of murders. 9 00:00:35.900 --> 00:00:40.800 In my defense, I was never the person who did the killing. 10 00:00:40.800 --> 00:00:46.300 I was what the authorities would probably call an accessory to murder. 11 00:00:46.300 --> 00:00:53.800 It all started just a few months after I was assigned to Freeburg, 12 00:00:53.800 --> 00:00:53.800 Illinois. 13 00:00:56.400 --> 00:01:01.800 First victim was an elderly man named Charlie dying from cancer 14 00:01:01.800 --> 00:01:06.300 continued all through the years and on the 29th anniversary of 15 00:01:06.300 --> 00:01:13.000 Charlie's death, I was involved in three murders this past December 15th. 16 00:01:14.300 --> 00:01:19.100 A young man and his two infant children. 17 00:01:20.200 --> 00:01:25.800 Over the years every single one of those murders that has been a death 18 00:01:25.800 --> 00:01:27.000 by drowning. 19 00:01:28.600 --> 00:01:33.300 And I should also confess as long as I'm confessing that in every 20 00:01:33.300 --> 00:01:33.500 case 21 00:01:33.500 --> 00:01:36.000 I was also an accessory to grave robbery. 22 00:01:37.700 --> 00:01:45.100 Dead bodies being stolen from there from the resting place. 23 00:01:45.100 --> 00:01:51.200 Oh God was the murderer in every case in case you spend already caught 24 00:01:51.200 --> 00:01:51.300 that. 25 00:01:52.900 --> 00:01:56.700 And I was accomplice because I supplied the water. 26 00:01:58.500 --> 00:02:02.600 And not a single one of those people who were murdered over the years 27 00:02:02.600 --> 00:02:05.200 regrets having that had that happen to them. 28 00:02:05.200 --> 00:02:08.000 Not Charley who died 29 00:02:08.900 --> 00:02:10.600 just four months after 30 00:02:12.000 --> 00:02:15.400 he received the washing of regeneration and renewal by the Holy 31 00:02:15.400 --> 00:02:15.500 Spirit. 32 00:02:17.100 --> 00:02:17.700 And not 33 00:02:17.700 --> 00:02:22.500 Garrick the young man who along with his twin infant son and 34 00:02:22.500 --> 00:02:26.800 daughter Otto and Fiona were baptized on December 15th. 35 00:02:28.000 --> 00:02:30.100 This past Sunday 36 00:02:30.100 --> 00:02:31.200 I was in Norfolk, Nebraska. 37 00:02:32.800 --> 00:02:34.800 I drove all the way there just to witness 38 00:02:36.200 --> 00:02:40.900 another Pastor be an accessory to the murder of my fourth grandchild. 39 00:02:42.900 --> 00:02:44.500 John doesn't know it yet, 40 00:02:44.500 --> 00:02:46.200 That's my grandson's name, 41 00:02:47.100 --> 00:02:50.600 but that was a most blessed event that will happen in his entire life. 42 00:02:50.600 --> 00:02:57.900 Until Jesus comes again, and he gets to enjoy all of the benefits of 43 00:02:57.900 --> 00:03:02.400 fully the benefits of what was given to him on that day that he was 44 00:03:02.400 --> 00:03:05.600 killed and then robbed from the grave. 45 00:03:07.700 --> 00:03:08.300 But you, 46 00:03:09.600 --> 00:03:16.200 were you murdered at font with a pastoras God's accomplice? 47 00:03:17.800 --> 00:03:20.300 Were you robbed from the grave? 48 00:03:22.900 --> 00:03:25.800 Were you dead in your trespasses and sins? 49 00:03:27.400 --> 00:03:34.500 But you now live forever with Christ. Were you snatched out of the 50 00:03:34.500 --> 00:03:37.400 darkness into your saviors marvelous life. 51 00:03:37.400 --> 00:03:42.800 Are you baptized? Rejoice dear Christians this this is an event 52 00:03:42.800 --> 00:03:46.600 never-to-be-forgotten in your life, and it seems to me 53 00:03:47.700 --> 00:03:54.400 that Isaiah 58 our text is nothing else, but an Old Testament way of 54 00:03:54.400 --> 00:03:56.400 saying rejoice in your baptism. 55 00:03:58.500 --> 00:04:05.100 Die and rise daily shine your light in your righteousness and moon the 56 00:04:05.100 --> 00:04:05.600 world. 57 00:04:06.500 --> 00:04:10.600 Yeah, I said that moon the world. I'll explain what I mean in a 58 00:04:10.600 --> 00:04:15.700 second. Isaiah 58, you ask why if we fasted and you see it not why if we 59 00:04:15.700 --> 00:04:18.500 humble ourselves and you take no knowledge of it by the way, I'm 60 00:04:18.500 --> 00:04:21.600 holding the insert for my congregations bulletin. 61 00:04:22.900 --> 00:04:25.900 You and I might say Lord. 62 00:04:25.900 --> 00:04:29.800 Why do we confess every Sunday humbly before you 63 00:04:30.800 --> 00:04:33.600 and you take no notice of our prayers? 64 00:04:33.600 --> 00:04:37.600 You don't give us anything more than you give to to all the 65 00:04:37.600 --> 00:04:38.400 unbelievers. 66 00:04:38.400 --> 00:04:40.000 We don't get any more daily bread. 67 00:04:40.000 --> 00:04:46.000 Maybe we forget daily bread comes to everyone even to evil people 68 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:49.500 without our prayer and I guess we'd be among the evil people when we 69 00:04:49.500 --> 00:04:50.700 examine our lives. 70 00:04:50.700 --> 00:04:54.600 Isn't that what your Lord says to his Old Testament people be hold you 71 00:04:54.600 --> 00:04:57.900 fast only to quarrel and to fight and to hit with a wicked fist and to go 72 00:04:57.900 --> 00:04:59.800 right back to your sinful ways. 73 00:04:59.800 --> 00:05:01.600 Would he look at us and say? 74 00:05:02.900 --> 00:05:04.800 You say you're sorry every Sunday. 75 00:05:05.800 --> 00:05:11.400 But then you just go right back to ignoring your spouse living like 76 00:05:11.400 --> 00:05:13.500 you're the center of everything. 77 00:05:15.300 --> 00:05:19.500 Neglecting the needs of all of those people around you who are hurting. 78 00:05:20.800 --> 00:05:25.300 Would you call this a fast in a day or a day acceptable to the Lord? 79 00:05:26.700 --> 00:05:31.100 Best as I can tell that Isaiah carrying out his ministry of sarcasm. 80 00:05:33.400 --> 00:05:36.700 But isn't he getting at what the catechism asks us? 81 00:05:36.700 --> 00:05:39.200 What a such baptizing with water indicate. 82 00:05:39.200 --> 00:05:42.300 It indicates the old Adam and I should buy daily contrition and 83 00:05:42.300 --> 00:05:46.700 repentance be drowned and died with all sins and evil desires. In other 84 00:05:46.700 --> 00:05:52.200 words that old self in you that loves the darkness that runs to run 85 00:05:52.200 --> 00:05:53.900 back to your old way of life. 86 00:05:53.900 --> 00:05:56.800 It needs to be murdered again every single day. 87 00:05:57.900 --> 00:06:03.800 I suggest that you get a pastor to help you with this Confessor your 88 00:06:03.800 --> 00:06:08.900 home Pastor, your field Ed Pastor, the chaplain here at the Seminary one 89 00:06:08.900 --> 00:06:09.300 of the professors. 90 00:06:09.300 --> 00:06:11.100 Anybody who's willing 91 00:06:13.100 --> 00:06:19.600 to be an accomplice with God in the murder of your old sinful self. To 92 00:06:19.600 --> 00:06:24.800 abet the stealing of your body back from the grave so that you can the 93 00:06:24.800 --> 00:06:30.000 emerge and live before God not in darkness selfishness 94 00:06:31.200 --> 00:06:33.700 but in righteousness and purity forever. 95 00:06:35.200 --> 00:06:39.100 Share your bread with the hungry bring the homeless poor into your 96 00:06:39.100 --> 00:06:39.500 house. 97 00:06:39.500 --> 00:06:44.000 When you see the naked cover him do not hide yourself from your own 98 00:06:44.000 --> 00:06:47.000 flesh because you have a lawyer who did not hide himself from your 99 00:06:47.000 --> 00:06:47.300 flesh. 100 00:06:47.300 --> 00:06:52.300 He took your sin into his flesh and gives you the righteousness of his 101 00:06:52.300 --> 00:06:53.600 flesh to be yours. 102 00:06:53.600 --> 00:06:55.700 Your baptism said so. 103 00:06:57.800 --> 00:07:00.100 You might say but wait a second 104 00:07:00.100 --> 00:07:04.700 if I start getting involved in the lives of hurting people the way 105 00:07:04.700 --> 00:07:07.800 this is talking about I mean really involved in the lives of hurting 106 00:07:07.800 --> 00:07:08.100 people 107 00:07:08.100 --> 00:07:12.300 it's going to be at best inconvenient and at worst dangerous. 108 00:07:12.300 --> 00:07:13.500 Yeah. 109 00:07:15.500 --> 00:07:19.100 Didn't seem to bother Jesus when he got involved in your life and he 110 00:07:19.100 --> 00:07:20.200 knew it was going to kill him. 111 00:07:20.200 --> 00:07:24.800 He was going to do whatever it took to make sure that you'd dwelt for 112 00:07:24.800 --> 00:07:25.400 eternity 113 00:07:25.400 --> 00:07:32.000 not in the darkness, but in his light. I had a seminary classmates when he 114 00:07:32.000 --> 00:07:35.700 went on vicarage he and his wife took in a homeless, man and man did 115 00:07:35.700 --> 00:07:37.400 that make their lives inconvenient. 116 00:07:37.400 --> 00:07:41.600 It wasn't that the guy stole from them or hurt anybody in their 117 00:07:41.600 --> 00:07:42.100 family. 118 00:07:42.100 --> 00:07:45.700 He just didn't know how to live in an ordinary house and left stuff 119 00:07:45.700 --> 00:07:49.300 flung towels, clothes all over the house. 120 00:07:49.300 --> 00:07:51.200 He disrupted their lives. 121 00:07:54.000 --> 00:07:59.900 And that homeless man walking in darkness saw the light of Christ. 122 00:08:01.300 --> 00:08:04.300 And that seminarian that vicar and his wife. 123 00:08:06.000 --> 00:08:06.900 A few years ago 124 00:08:06.900 --> 00:08:11.500 I asked the Deaconess intern at our church to see if she could find 125 00:08:11.500 --> 00:08:15.300 some new ways that our congregation could reach out into our community 126 00:08:15.300 --> 00:08:19.900 to help hurting people. She began and Outreach 127 00:08:21.600 --> 00:08:26.500 to a local institution that cares for people who are struggling with 128 00:08:26.500 --> 00:08:30.800 mental illness. And I thought it was awesome because she was doing all 129 00:08:30.800 --> 00:08:36.000 the work and then her internship ended guess who ended up doing all 130 00:08:36.000 --> 00:08:36.299 the work. 131 00:08:37.500 --> 00:08:39.100 I found that inconvenient. 132 00:08:40.900 --> 00:08:43.000 How many extra hours am I going to have to spend a week? 133 00:08:44.200 --> 00:08:50.000 And now now I look forward every week to that time with those brothers 134 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:50.900 and sisters in Christ. 135 00:08:52.400 --> 00:08:54.200 Who are fighting against 136 00:08:55.200 --> 00:09:00.400 mental illness and therefore can't leave the institution but man do 137 00:09:00.400 --> 00:09:05.400 they hunger and thirst for Christ's Word that I get to speak to them. 138 00:09:05.400 --> 00:09:09.400 They love to talk about their Savior and they never stop thanking us 139 00:09:09.400 --> 00:09:12.200 for coming and visiting even if it's only for an hour a week. 140 00:09:17.700 --> 00:09:23.000 It ends up that they're shining the Light of Christ to me not 141 00:09:23.000 --> 00:09:27.500 me to them and it looks to me like it all started because there was a 142 00:09:27.500 --> 00:09:33.900 Deaconess intern who saw a neighbor in need and didn't walk by on the 143 00:09:33.900 --> 00:09:36.900 other side of the road, but let the light of Christ shine. By the way 144 00:09:36.900 --> 00:09:41.300 that Deaconess intern is now Deaconess Dorothy Glenn her husband 145 00:09:41.300 --> 00:09:44.700 Pastor Mike Glenn and when was instrumental in getting the alumni 146 00:09:44.700 --> 00:09:49.100 basketball game started here that's being played tonight for Hope 147 00:09:49.100 --> 00:09:52.600 Center. Because he used to be the director at the Hope Center and 148 00:09:52.600 --> 00:09:53.500 there's another place. 149 00:09:54.500 --> 00:09:58.800 But the Light of Christ is shining to people who are struggling. 150 00:10:00.300 --> 00:10:04.200 Even when it's difficult convenient even when it's inconvenient 151 00:10:05.400 --> 00:10:10.300 let others see your good works so that they glorify let your light so 152 00:10:10.300 --> 00:10:13.500 shine before others that they see your good works and glorify your 153 00:10:13.500 --> 00:10:15.500 father in Heaven or is Isaiah would put it. 154 00:10:15.500 --> 00:10:20.700 So your light show Break Forth like the dawn your righteousness 155 00:10:20.700 --> 00:10:21.700 go before you. 156 00:10:23.600 --> 00:10:24.900 Not really your righteousness 157 00:10:24.900 --> 00:10:28.100 it it's Christ's righteousness that's shining out you which makes 158 00:10:28.100 --> 00:10:33.400 you like the moon and Christ like the sun. Me like the moon and Christ 159 00:10:33.400 --> 00:10:34.500 like the sun, right? 160 00:10:34.500 --> 00:10:36.200 The moon has no light of its own. 161 00:10:36.200 --> 00:10:40.700 It's simply reflects the light of the sun. 162 00:10:40.700 --> 00:10:43.800 We have no light of our own we reflect the Light of Christ, but the 163 00:10:43.800 --> 00:10:48.100 moon provides a lot of Illumination on a dark night just reflecting 164 00:10:48.100 --> 00:10:53.100 the sun. How much illumination do we provide in this dark world? 165 00:10:54.400 --> 00:10:56.600 Dear Christians go moon the world. 166 00:10:59.500 --> 00:11:03.700 Get involved in the lives of hurting people that's living out your 167 00:11:03.700 --> 00:11:04.300 baptism. 168 00:11:04.300 --> 00:11:07.900 Then you should call in the Lord will answer you she'll cry and he 169 00:11:07.900 --> 00:11:08.400 will say here 170 00:11:08.400 --> 00:11:10.300 I am. You will say but Lord, 171 00:11:11.600 --> 00:11:15.400 I haven't shined the way I should I haven't lived as if I'm baptized. 172 00:11:15.400 --> 00:11:20.100 I lived of unbaptized and he will say yeah, but you're still baptized 173 00:11:20.100 --> 00:11:22.500 and here I am to remind you of it. Here 174 00:11:22.500 --> 00:11:26.600 I am to assure you that those waters are still killing you and raising 175 00:11:26.600 --> 00:11:29.100 you to life all these years later. Here 176 00:11:29.100 --> 00:11:31.400 I am to say I forgive you. Here 177 00:11:31.400 --> 00:11:37.500 I am in bread and wine take eat, take drink swallow my life. 178 00:11:37.500 --> 00:11:38.500 Here 179 00:11:38.500 --> 00:11:39.000 I am. 180 00:11:40.100 --> 00:11:45.600 To unite you with me and dad so that I can unite you with me in 181 00:11:45.600 --> 00:11:46.300 resurrection. 182 00:11:47.800 --> 00:11:53.700 That would be in Jesus's resurrection, life that lasts forever. 183 00:11:53.700 --> 00:11:57.200 Which you have dear Christians. 184 00:11:57.200 --> 00:12:01.800 That's why you can go shine the light of Christ why you 185 00:12:01.800 --> 00:12:02.700 can Moon the world. 186 00:12:04.600 --> 00:12:09.200 Praise the one who breaks your darkness, with the liberating light in 187 00:12:09.200 --> 00:12:09.700 the name of Jesus.