John: The Lord is gracious

Posted on June 24, 2026 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for the Nativity of St. John the Baptist

Isaiah 40:1-5 + Luke 1:57-80

On this Feast of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist, you won’t see a holiday aisle at Walmart or at the Home Depot. No colorful lights adorning streets and houses; no trees with presents under them to remind us of the gift of John’s birth. In the same way, when John was born, there were no herald angels singing, no wise men bringing gifts from afar, no guiding star to lead anyone to his house.

And that’s the way it should be. John the Baptist was not the Christ, as he himself freely admitted. John was the forerunner sent by God to run ahead of Jesus and announce to the Jews that the Christ was right behind him. And once Christ appeared, several months after John appeared, John told his disciples, “He must increase, and I must decrease.” So it’s just as well that the Nativity of Christ gets all the attention. John would have wanted it that way.

But it’s also good and right to pause today on June 24th, six months before that greater Nativity celebration, and give thanks to God for John the Baptist, who was just six months older than Jesus, as the angel Gabriel had announced to Mary that her elderly relative, Elizabeth, the wife of the priest named Zacharias, was already six months pregnant when she herself heard the angel’s announcement.

You may remember how that all happened, how Gabriel appeared to Zacharias while he was ministering in the Temple and announced to him that he and his wife, Elizabeth, even though they had been unable to have children and were now old, were finally going to have a son who would be the prophet of the Most High God and would prepare the way for the Messiah. But Zacharias didn’t believe the angel, and so the angel told him that he would be unable to speak until the child was born.

Well, the child was conceived, and then, nine months later, he was born. That’s where today’s Gospel picks up the story. And then one week later, it was time for him to be circumcised and given his name. Their friends and relatives wanted to call the child “Zacharias,” after his father, but Elizabeth and Zacharias obeyed, instead, the angel’s words and gave him the name “John,” “Yo-hanan,” “The Lord—Yahweh—is gracious.”

The people present for the celebration were amazed and asked, “What then will this child be?” But they already had their answer. His name is “John,” the one who proclaims that the Lord has been gracious in finally sending the Christ into the world.

Well, didn’t all the prophets preach about God’s grace, and the apostles, too? Of course they did. Grace is one of those attributes of God that make up the definition of who He is, a God whose love doesn’t depend at all on a person’s worthiness or goodness. It goes out to all, freely, unearned, because that’s who God is. As He said to Moses, The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.

John, when he grew up, certainly did also preach about that other truth about God that Moses recorded, that He will by no means clear the guilty, that He visits the iniquity—the sin—of the fathers on the children. John never minced words. He gathered up the whole people of Israel under sin, and showed them their guilt, and warned them about the coming wrath of God. “Repent!” was John’s message in the wilderness. Repent, for even if you are a good and decent person compared to your neighbor, you are guilty before God, and God will by no means clear the guilty, but visits their iniquity upon them.

But what did Zacharias sing in his Spirit-inspired song? “Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, For He has visited and redeemed His people, And has raised up a horn of salvation for us In the house of His servant David.” God’s wrath is being visited against all the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. But God has also visited and redeemed His people and provided the shelter from His wrath. Where? “In the house of His servant David.”

Now, John, Zacharias’ son, was not from the house of David, but from the house of Levi. Zacharias was not singing about his own son, but about the baby who had been growing for three months now in the virgin Mary’s womb, the virgin Mary of the house of David, who had been staying with them for three months.

So just as John’s father pointed to Jesus on the day his son was circumcised, so his son would point to Jesus in his future ministry and preach how the grace of God had visited the Jews in the person of Jesus Christ, how God, in His grace, had sent the Redeemer into the world, to redeem Israel, to redeem all who would put their trust in Him. All of God’s goodness and promises were wrapped up in that one Person, wrapped up so tightly that there is no grace of God anywhere else. Only in His Son Jesus Christ.

And so Zacharias’s song continues, That we should be saved from our enemies And from the hand of all who hate us, To perform the mercy promised to our fathers And to remember His holy covenant. This is what John would preach—that in Christ there is salvation from our enemies—salvation from sin, salvation from death, salvation from the devil. That in Christ God has shown mercy and continues to show mercy. That this mercy was promised long ago to the people of Israel, in the holy covenant He made with Abraham, to bless all the families of the earth through the Son of Abraham, the promised Christ.

Jesus was the Heir of that covenant. And then He Himself established a new covenant in His blood, in which God continually and fully and freely forgives all the sins of the one who is part of this new covenant. You enter this new covenant through baptism and through faith in Christ, because by His blood Jesus has paid for the sins of the world. And so God invites all people to repent and find forgiveness of their sins in Jesus.

But God doesn’t do that inviting silently or secretly. He doesn’t do that inviting with whispers in your ear, or with trumpets sounding from heaven, or with a burden pressing down on your heart. He calls people to faith in Jesus through the spoken word. That’s the task to which John was appointed from birth, to be a preacher of grace, the last of the Old Testament prophets who would herald the Christ, standing right there at the door. That’s what Zacharias sang, “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Highest; For you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare His ways, To give knowledge of salvation to His people By the remission of their sins.

But again, God doesn’t just throw His grace, life, and forgiveness up in the air, to be scattered on the wind for us to go chasing after, trying to find it, trying to catch it. God locates His grace, His life, His forgiveness in the spoken word, and in water that is connected with that word. John the Baptist preached a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

What John started 2000 years ago is what every preacher of grace has been doing since—showing secure sinners their sins and pointing penitent sinners to Jesus as the location of God’s grace, and bringing Jesus to sinners, with all His grace, with all His forgiveness, in the spoken word and in Holy Baptism, and now, also in the Holy Supper of the forgiveness of sins, the Meal of the New Covenant.

Now pastors are the preachers of grace God sends to His people, to walk in the footsteps of John the Baptist and point people to Christ. John is the chief role model for every preacher, so it’s for good reason we bring him into our Divine Service each and every week. There’s the Baptist, pointing us again to our Baptism in the Invocation, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” John’s there in the Gloria where his own words are quoted, “Lord God, Lamb of God, who takes the sin of the world, have mercy upon us!” He’s there directing us to Jesus’ body and blood on the altar as we sing his words again in the Agnus Dei, “O Christ, Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, have mercy upon us!” Eleison! “Have mercy!” Or another translation would be, “Be gracious to us!” And then there’s John, the preacher of grace, one last time, every week, in the Benediction, “The Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you.”

Yes, the Lord is gracious, and has been gracious to us in sending His Son, the Lord Jesus, who is, as Zacharias so joyfully sang, the Dayspring from on high who has visited us; To give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death, To guide our feet into the way of peace. Amen.

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Let there be joy over each sinner who repents

Posted on June 21, 2026 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Trinity 3

1 Peter 5:6-11 + Luke 15:1-10

Sometimes, during Jesus’ ministry, multitudes of people followed Him and listened to Him. Of course, sometimes, as in the verses that come right before today’s Gospel, Jesus turned to those multitudes and said things to them that ended up driving many of them away. How could He do that? Wasn’t it Jesus’ goal to have as many people following Him as possible? Well, if we’re talking about God’s ultimate purpose, it’s for all mankind to be saved, all the billions of souls that exist. But He wants to save them in a certain way: by bringing them, one by one, to repentance and faith in Him. So, in practice, His goals aren’t accomplished when multitudes are saved. As we learn in today’s Gospel, Jesus’ goals, the goals of God, are accomplished when one sinner repents.

Let’s define repentance. The first part of repentance is contrition, sorrow over sin, a change of attitude toward sin, no longer seeing it as something worthwhile, but as something that is hateful and offensive to the holy God, something that incurs His wrath, something that must be avoided, and atoned for, if you are to escape the eternal punishment your sin has earned for you. When God reveals His righteous standards in His holy Law, and when His Law reveals that you fall short of those standards, whether in your dealings toward God or with other people, repentance means agreeing with God’s Law that you deserve His wrath and punishment.

But the second part of repentance is equally important, and Jesus is clearly including both parts in today’s Gospel. The second part of repentance is when the sorrowful sinner believes the Gospel, when he trusts in God’s promise to receive sinners, to show mercy to sinners for Jesus’ sake, when he comes to Jesus for the promised forgiveness of sins, when he comes to the baptismal waters to have his sins washed away in the sight of God. So repentance includes both contrition and faith in Christ. And both are produced in the sinner’s heart through the preaching of God’s Word, both Law and Gospel.

That preaching is what was bringing all the tax collectors and sinners to approach Jesus, to hear Him. Now, the tax collectors at that time were practically all thieves and extortioners, and the “sinners” here refers to public, well-known sinners, like prostitutes and adulterers. We aren’t told how many of them had experienced both parts of repentance, but God’s Word was clearly doing its work in them. They were at least beginning to listen, and to reevaluate their sinful lives. And some of them, at least, were coming back into God’s house, through the doorway of forgiveness, because Jesus, through the Gospel, was opening it up to them again.

But you heard how the Pharisees reacted to Jesus’ treatment of those people. The Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.” It’s not that He was receiving them in such a way as to condone their sins; He wasn’t. The same Jesus who commands His disciples to love sinners also condemns sin, and the sinners who continue to live in them without repentance. As He later said, through His messenger, the Apostle Paul, Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. No, the Pharisees weren’t angry at Jesus for condoning their sins. They were angry with Him for even associating with them, for offering them a way out of their sins, for receiving them at all.

Now, Jesus had every right to blow up at those merciless, stuck-up, self-righteous Pharisees. But look at the tender mercy and compassion of Jesus! He goes on to tell three beautiful parables, to illustrate to the Pharisees, to the sinners, and to everyone else, how eager God is to rescue those sinners from eternal damnation and to have them back in His family.

Jesus puts it in terms his hearers can understand. Most of us here can’t relate directly to the parable of the lost sheep. You’ve probably never tended and cared for a hundred animals in the desert, only to have one of them go astray. What do you do? Well, obviously, you go looking for the one that got lost. And sometimes, tragically, you may not find it. Sometimes it may perish in the desert. But you still go looking. And then, when you actually find it, you’re filled with joy. Jesus pictures the shepherd carrying the lost sheep back on his shoulders, rejoicing, and then calling friends and neighbors to come over and celebrate, because he found what he was so desperately searching for. It was only one out of a hundred—not a big loss in the grand scheme of things, but to the shepherd, that one was worth all the effort on his part. That’s how it is for God when He actually finds a lost soul and brings it to repentance. Every one is immeasurably valuable. He knows that many, many are and will remain lost. But whenever He finds a single soul, He rejoices, and all who love Him rejoice together with Him, precisely because they love Him, and they love to see Him so happy.

Or then there’s the woman, who has only ten silver coins—not very much to live on for long. When one goes missing, that’s a tenth of all she has. So she desperately sweeps the house and searches for it until she finds it, and breathes a sigh of relief, and rejoices together with her friends, because what was lost and useless to her has now been found and has become useful to her again. So it is with God. He is the Owner of all things, including every soul. But He values each soul individually as much as every other. And once He finds a person with His Gospel, once He brings that person to repentance, He is again able to use that person in His service.

In the third parable Jesus told, which isn’t included in today’s Gospel, He told of a father who had two sons. The younger basically rebelled against his father, demanded his inheritance, and then left his father’s house and squandered all he had on reckless living. Then, finally, when he hit rock bottom and had no food and nothing left to live on, he remembered his father’s goodness, and hoped he might be allowed to return to his father’s house as a servant, because even the servants in his father’s house had plenty to eat. And so he returned in humility, to beg. But when his father saw him coming down the road, he ran to him, threw his arms around him, and welcomed him back, not as a servant, but as a beloved son, forgiven for all his past behavior, a son for whom the father threw a party, because he was so happy that his son had returned.

But it’s the ending of that parable that brings the whole lesson full circle. The older son, who had been working hard in his father’s field the whole time, heard that his brother was back, and that his father was throwing him a party, and he became bitter and angry, not only toward his brother, but toward his father. How dare he receive his prodigal son back so easily! How dare he fail to recognize how the older son had earned his keep in his father’s house!

That older son represents the scribes and Pharisees, and all who take offense at God’s goodness in receiving sinners and forgiving sins to the penitent. Don’t let yourself fall into that category. Because while the haters of God are busy grousing about God’s goodness, God, and those who love Him, including the holy angels in heaven, including the saints on earth, are busy rejoicing with Him. Those who love God rejoice with Him in the things He cares about, especially when it cost Him so much to bring those sinners back, when it cost Him the death of His own beloved Son in order to make atonement for their sins.

Yes, this man Jesus, this man who is also God, receives sinners and eats with them. Not sinners as they cling to their sins and invite Jesus to bless their sinful lifestyle, but sinners who are brought to mourn over their sins and seek the forgiveness that Jesus offers.

So look around you. There are no multitudes gathered here to hear the Word of Jesus. Sometimes we’re tempted to let that fact get us down. Don’t let it. Don’t let it. Wherever you see one sinner, just one person, who has been brought to repentance by hearing the Word of God preached, who is gathered with maybe only one or two others to praise God for His forgiveness through Christ, it’s cause for celebration. It’s cause for rejoicing, not for mourning.

Just be very careful that you never begin to count yourself among the ninety-nine “who have no need of repentance,” as Jesus described them. Because there is no one alive for whom that is actually true. There are only those who think they have no need of repentance. They will be left behind by the Shepherd, left to pat themselves on their backs for being so righteous, left to try to save themselves, without Jesus’ help. I have not come to call the righteous, says the Lord, but sinners, to repentance. Be the one coin. Be the one sheep who hears the Savior’s voice and listens. Live in daily contrition and repentance. Ride on the Shepherd’s shoulders, here within His holy Christian Church, all the way to His heavenly home. And in the meantime, be sure to rejoice with your God over every sinner who repents. Amen.

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The supper has to come before everything else

Posted on June 17, 2026 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for the week of Trinity 2

Isaiah 25:6-9 + Luke 14:25-35

In this evening’s first lesson from the prophet Isaiah, you heard God announcing a great feast, a great supper that He’s preparing for those who love Him. That supper is a picture of a perfect life with God, filled with joy, with the best things. It’s a life that lasts forever, where death itself is defeated and undone. It’s a supper that begins already in this life when sinners are brought into the kingdom of God through faith in Christ Jesus. But it reaches its fulfillment on the Day of Resurrection, and it then lasts into eternity, never to be disturbed by anything bad, ever again.

On Sunday, we heard Jesus telling a parable about the great supper to which a man invited many guests, echoing the image from Isaiah’s prophecy. Do you remember how the invited guests responded when they were told it was time to go to the supper? “Gotta go see my field. Gotta test my oxen. Gotta spend time with my new bride. Sorry. Can’t make it at this time.” In every case, something else took priority over the supper. Something else came first.

As we learn in the continuation of Luke 14, which took place shortly after Jesus told that parable, attending God’s supper—the one He foretold in Isaiah’s prophecy, the one He foreshadowed in the parable—has to come first, before anything else, before everything else. If you love something in this life more than the supper (and the One who is giving it!), then the supper isn’t for you.

You heard those jarring words from Jesus: If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. Let those words jar you. Let them confront your sinful flesh that insists on putting your family before God, putting your own life ahead of God, ahead of His kingdom, ahead of the eternal life He promises. Family is one of the chief idols that people worship—not by bowing down to it, but by putting it ahead of God. It’s what causes Christians to change their views on things like sex outside of marriage, or homosexuality, or divorce, or abortion, or closed Communion, or any number of Scriptural issues—because a close family member is affected by those Scriptural beliefs, and holding to them would mean putting a wedge between them and their family member. And so they choose, so, so often, to abandon the beliefs for the sake of keeping peace in the family. Or, maybe it’s not a family member. Maybe it’s your own life that’s at risk if you follow Jesus faithfully. That’s certainly true in other countries where Islam rules, for example, but even here, you may put your job, or your reputation, or your possessions, or your comfort at risk for following Jesus. But Jesus says that anyone who doesn’t hate his family members, even his own life, cannot be His disciple.

Now, what does He mean with that word “hate”? It has nothing to do with emotional animosity, or even a strong dislike. It certainly has nothing to do with wishing evil on anyone. Here, in this context, to hate means to “choose against.” If it’s between following Jesus or keeping your family member close, or saving your own life, anyone who would not “choose against” his family member, who would not choose against his own life, cannot be Jesus’ disciple. Because, if you dare to call Him Lord, you have to mean it.

And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. How many people do you know who think of themselves as “followers of Jesus,” as Christians, as believers, but who, at the same time, can’t even be bothered to forsake their beds on a Sunday morning in order to go and worship Christ and hear His Word? If they won’t bear the cross of giving up their Sunday morning rest to worship the Lord Jesus, how will they bear the much heavier cross of persecution or pain? The cross is not a symbol of comfort, but of pain, suffering, and death. It symbolizes dying to this world so that you can have what Jesus offers you after this world. If a person will not bear it and follow after Jesus, who bore His cross, loaded down with our sins, to reserve us a place at His eternal supper, then that person might as well stop calling himself a Christian. Because he isn’t one.

Now, it’s worth noting that Jesus spoke these words to the “multitudes that had followed Him.” He saw multitudes of people eagerly following after Him. And instead of being content just to have their bodies there, He spoke this hard truth to them, knowing it would drive many of them away. And it did! Because for Jesus, it isn’t about numbers. It isn’t about filling His train, or the chairs in His churches, with lots and lots of people. It’s about having devoted followers who want what He has to offer more than anything else, even if there are only a handful of such followers left at the end of the day.

And so Jesus calls on all who would follow Him to count the cost of such following before going a step farther. Like calculating the costs of building a tower before you start building it. Because if you start it and then realize you can’t finish it, you look ridiculous. Like considering whether you have enough troops to win a war before going to war. Because if you go to war and don’t have what it takes to win, you’ve wasted all those lives for nothing. And so Jesus lays out the cost for all His disciples from the beginning: So likewise, He says, whoever of you does not forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple.

So, you see, the supper itself is free. God’s forgiveness, eternal life and joy in His presence, adoption as His beloved children—all of that comes at no cost, to you. It cost Jesus’ everything; it costs you nothing. You never have to suffer for your sins, or earn a place at the supper. You never have to make yourself acceptable to God. Forgiveness of sins and eternal life is a free gift, given to all who seek it through Christ, to all who wish to follow Christ. But Jesus is very upfront about what following Him looks like, what it requires in this life. It requires a readiness, a willingness, to part with everything else, as long as you get to have Christ.

The Psalmist puts it this way in Psalm 73: Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart fail; but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Again, St. Paul puts it this way in Philippians 3.  Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

Christ and His righteousness. Resurrection from the dead. A great supper with God, and with all the faithful, that goes on forever and ever. These are the things Jesus offers to those who follow Him. And He tells you plainly, you will have to “choose against” everything in this life in order to follow Him into this supper. Is it worth it? Is He worth it? It is! He is! Don’t let the devil, the world, or your flesh convince you otherwise. Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation. Don’t make any excuses. Choose against everything here, and follow Jesus into eternal life! Amen.

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Only those willing to enter by grace will participate in God’s eternal supper

Posted on June 14, 2026 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Trinity 2

1 John 3:13-18 + Luke 14:16-24

Who will inherit eternal life? Who will eat bread in the kingdom of God? Last week, we saw, in Jesus’ parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus, that it was the poor man Lazarus who had a place in Paradise, while the rich man was eternally tormented in hell. Today’s Gospel comes a little before last week’s Gospel, but we see Jesus teaching a similar message. Today, we see Him focusing more on the reason why some are lost and some are saved. Those who are saved are saved because of God’s grace alone, while those who are lost are lost because they despised God’s grace.

The context is critical.If we look back a few verses in Luke 14, Jesus was having Sabbath-Day supper at the house of one of the rulers of the Pharisees, who had invited Him. He healed a man of dropsy, and the guests weren’t happy about it, because He dared to help the man on their precious Sabbath Day. Then He noticed how the guests all chose the places of honor for themselves. (We’ll focus on that account a few months from now.)Then our text begins. Then He said to him who invited Him, “When you give a dinner or a supper, do not invite your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”

Do you understand what Jesus was teaching? He wasn’t criticizing the man simply for inviting friends to a supper. There’s nothing sinful about that. But He was teaching the man something about grace. When you invite your friends to supper, when you invite good people, popular people, rich people, worthy people to supper at your house, that’s fine, but it’s not grace. Because those people can turn around and invite you to supper, or return your kindness in some other way. You gave them something, with at least the hope or maybe even the expectation that they’ll give you something in return. And so, in giving this supper to them, you haven’t really given away anything. You’re only exchanging one supper today for another supper tomorrow. In the end, neither one actually gains anything, and neither one actually gives up anything. It’s more like an even trade.

Grace, on the other hand, is to give something away freely and generously, expecting nothing in return. No, more than that. It’s to give something away freely, knowing full well that the recipients of your gift will most certainly never be able to repay you for it. It’s goodness shown for goodness’ sake. It’s about giving away things on the side of the giver, and about receiving gifts on the side of the recipient, which is what would happen if you prepared a feast, as Jesus suggested, for the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind. You would be doing all the giving; they would be doing all the receiving. But, Jesus says, there is Another, there is Someone Else who is watching. And He will make sure that you are repaid in the end, at the resurrection of the just—repaid, not by those who received your kindnesses, but by God Himself, because, by giving away free gifts, you show yourself to be truly a child of your heavenly Father, who is the God of grace.

But there was a man sitting there at the table with Jesus who wasn’t interested in all that “grace” talk. He thought he would teach a little lesson of his own to Jesus. He said to Him, “Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God!” That man clearly thought that he (and surely also his Pharisee friends at the supper with him) would be among those blessed people who will take part in God’s eternal supper in heaven. He was clearly looking forward to it! But who are the ones who actually get to take part in God’s eternal supper? Not everyone! Only those who want to receive it as a free gift. Only those who want to enter by God’s grace. In fact, those who despise God’s grace will most certainly not take part in His supper, but will spend their eternity in hell, like the rich man we saw last week in Jesus’ parable. To illustrate that truth, Jesus goes on to tell the parable of the great supper.

Then he said to him, “A certain man prepared a great supper and invited many people. And he sent his servant at supper time to say to those who were invited, ‘Come! All things are now ready!’ This is what God did for the Jews, for the people of Israel. Since the time of Abraham, he his descendants after him were invited to come into the kingdom of God through faith in God and in the coming Messiah. They were invited to wait for Christ, and, when Christ would come, to receive Him as their Lord and Christ, and so to enter into God’s supper, even in this life, to receive God’s free gift of salvation from sin and deliverance from death and the devil. It was an invitation of grace from the beginning—God’s grace, to be revealed in the person of Jesus, who was the true Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

And one after another, they all began to excuse themselves. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of land, and I need to go out and see it. Please have me excused.’ Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out. Please have me excused.’ Still another said, ‘I have married a woman, so I cannot come.’ One excuse after another why the invited guests couldn’t possibly come to the supper. A free gift was being offered to them—had been offered to them since the time of Abraham. But when the gift, who was Christ, finally arrived, they found better things to do.

Why? Because it wasn’t grace, it wasn’t a free gift they wanted. It was recognition the Jews (especially the Pharisees) wanted. It was a reward for their many works that they wanted. They wanted to have the kingdom of God as their wages and as their right for being such good and decent children of Abraham. They didn’t want it on Jesus’ terms, which were (and still are) recognition of and repentance for their badness before God’s holy law, and faith in Him as the One who insisted on (and still insists on) being their righteousness before God.

Is it any different today? Most people want to offer God their terms for entry into heaven, and if He doesn’t like their terms, or if He dares to criticize their works and call out their sins, then He’s not worth their time. They’ll find a different god to worship as they go right on living in their sins and indulging their evil desires. Of course, that god would be a false god. And a false god can’t save anyone from the true God’s wrath that is coming upon all sinners.

The thing is, the true God doesn’t want to pour out wrath on sinners. He sent His Son into the world to save sinners, to save the world, to suffer for our sins and to pay the penalty for them. He offers eternal life as a gift of His grace through faith in Christ Jesus. And He wants all people to take advantage of that gift, to come to Christ and so be counted no longer as sinners but as saints through faith alone in Christ Jesus. We see that in the next part of Jesus’ parable.

“So the servant came and told his lord these things. Then the master of the house became angry and said to his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the city, and bring the poor, and the crippled, and the lame, and the blind in here.’ And the servant said, ‘Lord, what you have commanded has been done, and still there is room.’ Then the lord said to the servant, ‘Go out into the highways and hedges, and make them come in, so that my house may be filled. For I say to you that none of those men who were invited will taste my supper.’” See, this is how God wants people to enter His kingdom. He does what He told the host at the supper to do: He calls the poor, the lame, the maimed, and the blind. That is, He calls people who are not worthy, who can’t even begin to repay Him, who need His grace, and who will receive it through Christ.

In reality, no one can repay God. He is the Owner of all things. No one is worthy, because all have broken His commandments and His laws. No one, by nature, worships Him with true fear, love and trust. No one gives His name and His word the honor they deserve. No one respects God-given authority as they ought, or protects the life of the innocent, or remains sexually pure, or is content with what he has, or guards his neighbor’s reputation, or keeps his desires and passions in check—not with the holiness that God’s law requires. That’s why everyone needs His grace—grace that is offered to all, the free gift of forgiveness and eternal life through Christ crucified.

Many despise God’s grace and will not submit to it or listen to what Jesus has to say. They will not taste God’s supper. They will not see eternal life, not because God didn’t want them there, but because He only wants people there who wish to enter by the path of His grace, by the way of His beloved Son. Be among those people! Recognize yourself among the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind, who are called and urged to the supper, and then enter, by grace, through faith in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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Living this life with the next life in mind

Posted on June 7, 2026 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Trinity 1

1 John 4:16-21 + Luke 16:19-31

The parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus always starts off the long Trinity season, almost like the beginning of a long race, like a marathon. The finish line at the end of the Trinity season  is Judgment Day. The whole season, starting today, is heading in that direction, heading toward that goal. The finish line seems a long way off right now, and there’s a lot of running to do to get there. But throughout all that running, you have to keep the goal in mind. It will affect how you run, how you pace yourself, and the decisions you make along the way.

So it is with the Christian life, as both the rich man and Lazarus learned in the end. The rich man’s riches and the poor man’s poverty were part of the running path of each man’s life. But after the running was over, it was what waited beyond the finish line that really mattered for both of them, and if the rich man, especially, had kept that in mind during his earthly life, he would have run a much different race.

How does Jesus describe the rich man? There was a certain rich man. He was clothed in purple and fine linen, feasting lavishly every day. It certainly isn’t a sin to be rich, as long as you acquired your riches legally and honestly, and there’s no indication in Jesus’ story that this rich man was a thief of any kind. But, as we see here, having riches isn’t necessarily a sign that a person is close to God. There are certain advantages that come with being rich, besides the obvious earthly advantages. For one thing, having lots of money enables a person to be extremely generous and benevolent. On the other hand, having riches also comes with some very real spiritual challenges. In fact, it can become a great hindrance to entering the kingdom of heaven. As Jesus once put it, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.

Why? Well, we see an example of why in today’s parable. The rich man had it so good, was so happy with this life that he gave no thought to the next. He became engrossed in this life. He fell in love with it and lived it up every day. He relied on himself and his riches. Meanwhile, God and His word, God and His commandments, were out of sight, out of mind. And as for his neighbor, Lazarus, lying right there at his gate, his brother Israelite, his brother in the Church of Israel, well, this particular rich man paid him no heed at all, not sharing even a crumb of his daily banquets with Lazarus. He was focused on enjoying the good life he had. He may not have been greedy, but he was certainly indifferent toward God and his neighbor.

Meanwhile, we’re told of Lazarus’ miserable life. There was a certain poor man named Lazarus, who lay at the rich man’s gate, full of sores, and longing to be fed with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table. And the dogs would come and lick his sores. It certainly isn’t a privilege to be poor. It isn’t an enviable position, and a person gets no special credit for it. But neither is it necessarily a curse from God, as we see here in the end in the case of Lazarus. There are spiritual risks associated with poverty; the poor are tempted to envy the rich, to be bitter and discontented with their lot in life, which is a sin against the Ninth and Tenth Commandments. But poverty does come with certain spiritual advantages. The poor (and sick) are less tempted to get wrapped up in this life, more willing to look beyond it, to yearn for the better life with God, and are often more prone to seek God and to rely on Him and His mercy.

Lazarus didn’t have much enjoyment in this life, and it may have looked, to some, as if he had been abandoned by God. But then it was over. He died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s bosom, where he was comforted. It turns out, Lazarus was not abandoned by God at all. The angels were right there when he died, waiting to take his soul straight to Abraham’s bosom. Abraham’s bosom is a tender picture of the loving reception Abraham’s children, the believing Jews, would have in heaven when they died. Those who shared the faith of Abraham, in God and in His promises, would rest from their labors and sit at the heavenly banquet with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as Jesus pictures it elsewhere. Lazarus had run a hard and miserable race in this earthly life, but as he learned firsthand, the misery was nothing compared with the eternal rest and the joy of the next life.

The rich man learned the opposite lesson. For all the enjoyment he pulled out of this life, it was nothing compared with the eternal pain and torture that followed. The rich man also died and was buried. And, in hell, in the midst of his torments, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus lying in Abraham’s bosom. And he cried, “Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.”

Hell is real. And worse than that, hell is forever. It’s pictured with flames, or as a lake that burns with fire and brimstone. In the Old Testament it’s described as a place where their worm does not die, and their fire is not quenched.

Why did the rich man end up there? Well, as Scripture clearly teaches, all men are headed there by nature, because all have sinned, and so all must die. But God, in His mercy, has made one way for sinners to avoid those flames. He calls all men to repent of their sin and to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, who died for our sins and was raised to life again, who conquered death and hell for all who believe in Him. Now, for those who died before Jesus paid for our sins on the cross, like Lazarus in the parable, it was still the same faith that saved them, even as Abraham was justified by faith in God, faith in God’s mercy, and faith in the coming Christ. The rich man had no such faith. He was a physical son of Abraham, but not a spiritual son. Who has time for God, when money can buy so much happiness? Who has any need for God, when this life is going so well? His indifference toward God, and the resulting indifference toward his neighbor, was just as damning, in the end, as the willful sins that people commit against God and against His commandments. The adulterer and the murderer will perish right alongside the indifferent man who cares neither for God nor for his neighbor.

Now, it’s very unlikely that there’s actually communication between the souls in heaven and the souls in hell, but Jesus wants to teach a lesson here, so He includes one instance of such a communication in His parable, where the tormented rich man calls out to “father Abraham,” asking him to send Lazarus with a drop of water to cool his tongue. But Abraham said, “Son, remember that you received your good things during your lifetime, while Lazarus received bad. But now he is comforted here, and you are tormented. And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who wish to cross over from here to you cannot, nor can they cross from there to us.”

The rich man could have gone over to Lazarus and offered him a little comfort during his lifetime; no chasm was fixed between them then. But instead the rich man chose to run his race alone, enjoying his riches, and left Lazarus to run his race alone, comfortless and miserable. After this life, after the finish line has been crossed, there are no such opportunities to help our fellow man, just as there are no more opportunities to seek God and His forgiveness.

And so, realizing that, the rich man’s heart goes out to his brothers, who are still alive, and with a sense of urgency for them, pleads with Abraham, I beg you, then, father, to send Lazarus to my father’s house. For I have five brothers—that he may warn them, lest they also come to this place of torment. You see, the rich man wasn’t completely heartless. He loved his family; he loved his own. But that love doesn’t save; it doesn’t wipe out any sins. Only trust in God and His mercy for Christ’s sake will save, and after a person dies, there are no more opportunities to repent and believe. Still, even if there was no hope for the rich man, was there no hope for his brothers?

Abraham said to him, “They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them!” And he said, “No, father Abraham. But if someone were to go to them from the dead, they would repent.” But Abraham said to him, “If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, then they will not be persuaded, even if someone were to rise from the dead.”

Once a person crosses the finish line of this life, there is no going back to guide those who are still running. There’s no information, no encouragement, no help to be given from the other side of the grave. The only help people have in this life—and the only help they need—is “Moses and the prophets,” that is the living and powerful Word of God which He inspired to be written down in the Old Testament, and now also in the New Testament Scriptures. Moses and the Prophets preached the Law and the Gospel, sin and grace, repentance and faith. They pointed forward to the Christ who would come. The New Testament preaches the same things, pointing back to the Christ who came. God, through the Holy Scriptures, calls all men to repent of their self-centered indifference toward God and man. He shows all men, through the Scriptures, how serious He is about sin, how desperate man’s situation is because of our sin, and how He has provided a Savior for all men in the person of His beloved Son. All are called to repent and believe in Christ Jesus. All are invited to be saved and forgiven through Him. But if all of those warnings and all of those invitations to believe mean nothing to you in this life, if you’re just going do what you’re going to do, live how you’re going to live, enjoy this life as much as possible, for as long as possible, then the finish line will come upon you suddenly. And then you will see how much you squandered your time here. Then you will wish you could go back and run your race differently, because you will not like what awaits you beyond the finish line.

But your race isn’t over yet. Your time of grace remains. Moses, and the prophets, and apostles still speak to you, and there’s still time for you to listen. If you see that you have been running wildly, mindlessly, selfishly, there is time to correct course, which is why Jesus told this parable in the first place. Repent today. Turn to the Lord today and receive His pardon today. And while it’s still called today, consider the finish line, the goal of this life and what lies beyond it in the next, and live your life accordingly. If you’re rich here, don’t become absorbed in enjoying what you have. Remember God and what He has prepared for you in the next life. And then look around and see if there’s someone who truly has a need with whom you might share. If you’re poor, don’t despair. Remember God and what He has prepared for you in the next life. And then trust in Him to provide you with daily bread, and be content with that. Whatever your situation in life, dear Christians, live this life with the next life in mind. Set your minds on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. And run in such a way as to win the prize at the end! Amen.

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