WEBVTT
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Dear brothers and sisters, in Christ, grace is yours, mercy is yours,
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and peace is yours.
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From God, our Father and from our dear Lord and our Savior Jesus the
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Christ.
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Amen.
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Now, concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need
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to have anything written to you.
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But of course, Paul goes on and so too shall we, if only briefly.
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Now, Paul is here addressing one of the concerns of the Thessalonian
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church at that time.
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They were very concerned with the precise time that this eschaton
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would come, that this day of judgment, this day of the Lord would come
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upon them.
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And so Paul assuages these concerns by telling them that they are
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asking entirely the wrong question.
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He's able to do this, of course, because he's already set up in
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chapter four the fate of those who have fallen asleep in the Lord.
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So he doesn't have to concern himself with with those particular
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points.
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He's able to say it will come like a thief in the night, like labor
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pangs on a woman who is giving birth.
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It's the nature of the thing, not really when it will be that you
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should be concerned with. Paul justifies this move in a lot of ways by
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invoking that much feared and much revered phrase of the Old Testament
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the day of the Lord.
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The Day of the Lord is perhaps one of the most ubiquitously addressed
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themes in the entire Old Testament alongside such things as the
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covenant faithfulness of the living God.
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It is necessarily tension filled image, though the Day of the Lord.
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On the one hand, the day of the Lord is a day of wrath, a day of
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judgment, the deus era, that day which inspires great fear in the
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enemies of our God.
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And on the other hand, the Day of the Lord is the day of our salvation
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and deliverance, the cause of rejoicing for us who are God's dearly
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beloved children.
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There are countless sermons and meditations and devotions that could
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be written and could be given about the admonitions that Paul gives
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over the the first portion of our reading throughout even. Be alert,
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oppose these forces of night that surround you, those who get drunk
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get drunk at night.
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Now, I know that that isn't
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always the case around here.
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O you Lutherans.
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But still our Lord is calling us in this passage toward sober judgment
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in all that we do.
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That right there, that sinking feeling, that kick that you just gave
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yourself.
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Now, if you felt self righteous about what I just said, that's a
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different issue and will not be tackling that today.
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But that kick you gave yourself, that's the issue that I want to
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address today.
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That's actually the point of what I'm getting at, is that you probably
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don't even do that, and yet you kicked yourself.
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You had this feeling.
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And I think that this stems from something that plagues me too I won't
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claim to be above it, this idea that we have where we seem to seek out
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in many ways guilt within ourselves.
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We walk around and we take our whip in our hand and like some medieval
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monk, we bloody our knees and our backs trying to prove something.
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Our devotion or our faith, some such thing.
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Our love affair with those words I a poor, miserable sinner.
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Now, don't get me wrong.
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Those are the same words of my confession as they are yours.
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And there's a place for it.
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This season of Lent is want to remind us of our need for repentance.
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And repentance is a good and proper part of the Christian life.
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It is only half of that tension, though.
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See the other half you are children of the day.
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Now, children of light is a metaphor that's used in other places in
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Scripture, an image that is used.
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But Paul is making a more poignant sort of point here when he expounds
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on it you are children of light by saying, following that up with you
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are children of the day.
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You're not just children of day in the sense that day is the time of
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light and life, that it is opposed to night.
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You are children of the Day.
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St.
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Augustine, when he speaks on this verse, hearkens back to those most
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blessed words of the psalmist.
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This is the day which the Lord has made.
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You are children of the Day.
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The Day of the Lord, that day which shall be for us
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salvation and deliverance and not ruination.
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Some of you may have noticed that lately I had shaved my face.
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And while I didn't know it at the time and you didn't know it, behold
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now the deeper and truer reason that the Spirit has worked through
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that act.
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It's imagery for this sermon.
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Now, I also wish that the Spirit had affected about 20 pounds of weight
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loss, because then I really would be for you the spitting image of my
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father.
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I love my father dearly.
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He is a good and kind and wise man.
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I try very hard to be like him.
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I maybe have an overly idealized image of him in my head, but that is
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all right for the sake of this argument is that I strive to live after
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his example of Godly living.
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For example, my dad is great with kids.
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I have to work with kids every now and again.
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It's just a part of the ministry.
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And so because it's not something that is an incredibly natural
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proclivity of mine, I try to emulate my father.
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And part of what can help me out with that is the understanding that
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as I'm dealing with these kids, a sort of basic empathy.
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When they look at me, they see the same face that I saw through my
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whole childhood.
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And so I live into that image.
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And even when I fall short, the Lord has given me by virtue of my
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birth that I will always bear this resemblance to the image of my
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father.
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I'm sure you can see where this is going.
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The same is true for you.
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You are children of the Day.
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By virtue of your birth in water and in the Spirit through your
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baptism, you bear the likeness, the very image of that Day which shall
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be for us salvation and deliverance.
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That's one way to understand what Paul is saying here.
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This difference, this distinction of God's people.
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The reason that that day of the Lord is for us more a day of salvation
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and deliverance than it is a day of wrath and judgment is because when
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that day comes, we shall already be found in the likeness of of it.
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That likeness is the very likeness of our Lord
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Jesus the Christ.
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A very wise man once said to me that it's not that
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it is the things that you come to the seminary with that will make you
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a great pastor or deaconess.
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Not the things that you're given here. Now, surely theological
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training and the formation that takes place here are necessary things
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for the ministry.
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They are things which need to happen and which will shape how that all
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works.
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But it is the spirit at work in you that will actually make that
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ministry happen, is He who will accomplish all good things in you.
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It is my hope that we, dear brothers and sisters, would always seek
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after that Spirit, that same Spirit that lives in me and lives in you,
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so that we could follow the exhortation of Paul at the end of our
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reading, encourage one another and build each other up.
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That we might, seeing our brother in times of trouble, that we might
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remove the whip from his hand.
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That we might see him whole and holy to the end.
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And now may that peace which surpasses all understanding guard your
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hearts and your minds through faith in Christ Jesus to life
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everlasting.
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Amen.