The Third Last Sunday in the Church Year – Sunday 10 November A✠D 2024
✠ Psalmody: Psalm 31:9a, 15b, 17a; 1–2a, 5, 24;74:4, 2a;46:4
✠ Lection: Job 14:1–6;1 Thessalonians 4:13-18;Matthew 24:15-28
(Sermon by guest Pastor Rev. George Hansell. Transcribed by turboscribe.ai.)
Grace, mercy, joy, and peace be multiplied unto you from God our Father and from our crucified, risen, and ascended Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text for our meditation this morning is taken from Saint Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, the fourth chapter, verses 13 through 18.
Please hear these words once again. Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep or to grieve like the rest of men who have no hope. We believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.
According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.
And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore, encourage each other with these words. This is the word of the Lord in the Christian friends.
Hope. The very term seems problematic in the world we live in. As hard as it is just to keep on keeping on, we seem to have lost touch with what keeps us going as Christians.
Our world has learned to look to the future with dread, not knowing when disaster will strike next. By way of example, try to recall the political rhetoric we all were subjected to over the past year or two. One side declared if a particular candidate was elected, it would be the end of the United States as we know it.
The other side declared that if a particular candidate was elected, that democracy in this nation would be replaced with repression and dictatorship. Both sides by their comments expressed a certain lack of hope if things didn’t go their way. No wonder then that Christians too get caught up in the merry-go-round of activities we call living, but in the end are nothing but the fretful, fitful, empty search for meaning in a world that seems to have gone out of control.
All too often, the search leads no farther than the shopping mall, entertainment venues, or Amazon Prime. We have hope, but our hope is in all of the wrong things and is sought in all of the wrong places. It’s just like St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, if in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.
Well, though we may forget it, though we may get caught up in the in the hopelessness of this world, we Christians do in fact hope in the right thing. We hope in Christ, and yet we are not to be pitied because we have hoped in Christ not for this life only. Our hope is in Christ for this life and for the next.
That is a reality for Christians, but that is not to say that Christians are immune in hoping for things that pertain to this world. What young Christian man or woman coming out of college doesn’t hope to land a satisfying job that pays well, or have a stable marriage and obedient loving children that will grow up to make their parents proud, and a comfortable house in a safe neighborhood, and enough money to put the children through college, a nice car or two, and a pension plan and retirement savings sufficient to enjoy the golden years of life. But then you read the newspapers or watch the cable news shows or listen to news radio, and you hear stories of young people, single or married, not being able to make ends meet.
Some not even able to find jobs, and some having to live in their parents or in or in-laws basement. Half of all first marriages suffer the tragedy of divorce, and subsequent marriages have an even higher rate of dissolution. Children all too often become the perpetrators of crime.
Home foreclosures are rampant. College tuition continues to climb. It’s becoming more difficult in today’s economic climate to borrow money to buy one car, much less two.
And with the volatility of the stock markets, 401k plans and pension plans often lose value to the degree that young people and those who have been in the workforce a number of years wonder if retirement is even going to be an option. Yet in the midst of those realities, the Christian’s hope is fixed on Christ as the one who supplies our every need, both physical and spiritual. Luther declares in his explanation of the first article of the Apostles’ Creed, I believe that God has made me and all creatures, that he has given me my body and soul, eyes, ears, and all my members, my reason and my senses, and still preserves them.
Also clothing and shoes, meat and drink, house and home, wife and children, fields, cattle, and all my goods, that he richly and daily provides me with all that I need to support this body and life, that he defends me against all danger and guards and protects me from all evil. In Christ, we have a God who is for us and not against us. This Jesus, in whom is our hope, also provides us with every spiritual blessing.
Through his perfect life, his sacrificial death on the cross, and his glorious and victorious resurrection, we have forgiveness of sin, deliverance from death, and the power of the devil, and everlasting life. Our text declares that he awakens the dead to eternal life, and he gives eternal life to all of the living faithful. Thus, we have hope in the face of death.
But let’s face it, death is not a pleasant subject. It certainly was not intended by God in the beginning to ever have been a part of human existence. Yet death is among us as a consequence of sin, the sin of Adam and Eve in the garden, which has been passed on to all people.
We are conceived and born with the seed of death within us, for we are conceived and born with sin. And as the scriptures declare, the soul that sins, it shall die. Death is not a pleasant subject, for it robs us of the company of those we love.
Death is no respecter of persons, for it claims people who are very old, middle-aged, young adults, youth, young children, and even babies. Death therefore brings sorrow and grief to all. Christians are not immune from grief, for Christians too grieve the death of those we love.
But here is the difference for those who are believers in Jesus. We have hope, we have hope for the future, for we know that our loss is only temporary. It is here that I must share something which I have written about in sermons through the years.
How precious and how inspiring is the faith of a child. Well did Isaiah say it, a little child shall lead them. On two occasions I have witnessed children powerfully proclaim their faith in the Lord who gives eternal life and in the resurrection from the dead.
The first was in Oneida, New York, when one of the girls in my confirmation class comforted her family members at the funeral home, going to each and every one by assuring them that grandma was in heaven because she died as a believer in Jesus. The second was here in Ohio, a number of years ago, when my young cousin who had lost his father in a tragic accident while riding his bicycle comforted a younger cousin by saying, why are you crying? My dad is in heaven because he was a believer in Jesus. We have hope on the day of judgment.
All who live in faith have already passed from death to life. Have you lost a loved one to death either recently or long ago? Isn’t it wonderful to know that they are not really dead? Isn’t it wonderful to know that they are alive enjoying the glory, the beauty, the majesty of their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in heaven? Your loved one is with Jesus and the body which resides in the cemetery right now is simply waiting for the final trumpet to blow and the voice of the archangel at the command of God and in as long as it takes to blink an eye, the bodies of our loved ones will be raised new and glorious and holy and perfect and the souls of our loved ones in heaven will be reunited with those new glorious holy bodies. Isn’t it wonderful to know that when death claims the life of a Christian, we are merely saying see you later, not goodbye.
We do not grieve as those who have no hope. And by the way, hope in the Bible is not a kind of wish that may or may not come true like I hope the Browns go to the playoffs or I hope my 401k gets healthy again or I hope it doesn’t rain or snow today. No, hope in the Bible is sure and certain and as rock solid as the promises of Jesus.
When a Christian says my hope of salvation is in Jesus, what he is saying is my assurance, my certainty of salvation is in Jesus. Since Jesus is our hope, we find comfort in life’s trials, in good economic times or bad, in good health or poor health, in war or in peace, in the midst of hurricanes and tornadoes or unfavorable weather. We know the last chapter of this world’s history.
We know that present suffering will be outweighed by future glory. In addition, we have the promise of the Lord’s own presence in his church. Each and every time the gospel is preached, Christ is there.
Each and every time a person is baptized, Christ is there. Each and every time we take the wafer into our mouth or the wine into our mouth, Jesus Christ is there giving us his true body and his true blood for the forgiveness of our sins and strengthening of our faith. Christ is there giving us hope and it is with that very hope that we encourage one another in all circumstances.
Now I have to confess, I have a lot of what this world calls hope. I hope that our country will always be the land of the free and the home of the brave. I hope that I will, you’ll get love this one, I hope that I will live to see the day that the Cleveland Browns and the Detroit Lions meet each other in a Super Bowl.
I hope that my grandchildren will all grow up to be successful and realize all their dreams. These are some of the things that I hope for which may or may not come to pass. But I also have something far more important, the hope of which the holy scripture speaks, the hope which is sure and certain and will be realized, the hope of which the hymn writer speaks, my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame but wholly lean on Jesus’ name. On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand. May Jesus be our true and certain hope now and always.
To him be the glory and the thanksgiving and the praise now and forevermore. Amen. In the peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and your minds through faith in Christ Jesus until life everlasting.
Amen.
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