Sunday, June 7, 2020

Trust the Lord of mercy and truth.


Sermon for confirmation, June 7, 2020

To Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by His own blood and made us a kingdom and priests to God His Father—to Him be the glory and the power forever and ever.  Amen.



Dear fellow members of the kingdom of grace, and especially you who are confirming your Christian faith, Allison, Ella, Jillian, and Will,

The wisest man who ever lived (according to God’s own Word) used these words to instruct his son on the one most important thing in life.  Now, many modern commentators and more than a few pastors might use these words to say that God is telling you to be merciful and honest with those around you, and truly we are to be that for our neighbors.  Yet, in focusing on what we should do, those modern-minded teachers miss the main point.  Solomon most certainly wasn’t advising his son how to live to please his God; he was telling him and everyone to Trust the Lord of mercy and truth.

Solomon put two words at the very front of this passage, dramatically emphasizing their importance.  Literally, he said, “Mercy!” and “Truth!”  “Do not allow them to get away from you.”  The Hebrew words emphasized are hesid and emet.  They are worth studying in detail.

Hesid is a word for which English doesn’t have an exact representative.  You will see it translated as “love” or “mercy” or “loyalty” or lovingkindness.”  All of these get at the meaning of the word, but essentially, hesid is a firm, committed willingness to be mercifully kind in doing what is best for you.  As much as we might be commanded to do this for our neighbors, we could never measure up to its full intent.  But there is one who does and who did for you.

Dear friends in the confirmation class, you have grown so very dear to me these past two years, and I implore you never to let go of the mercy and love God has shown to rescue you out of this world of sorrow, trouble, and pain.  When Solomon emphasized this word for his son, he was telling that child never to forget the love and commitment God has shown for you.  “Do not allow mercy and truth to leave you.”  Never let go of the truth that Jesus lived for you and died to take away all your sins.  Never let go of the relationship the Holy Spirit established with you at your baptism, because even though you likely don’t remember that rebirth any better than you do your physical birth, God was making you His own dear child that day.  By water and Word, the Lord claimed you for eternal life and peace in heaven.

The second word, emet, is truth or faithfulness.  Our society has decided that truth is subject to the whims of the beholder—you may have your truth while someone else has a different truth.  The word in our text knows nothing like that.  God’s truth is always perfectly reliable.  It doesn’t change with the emotions of the moment, nor is it dependent upon one’s point of view.  Our God promises, “Certainly I, the Lord, do not change.” (Malachi 3:6)  When God promised to send a Savior, He meant it.  He prophesied it hundreds of times so that no one could mistake the coming of our salvation as some accidental incident of history.  God then worked the course of events so that His plan to rescue us would take place exactly as foretold.  Let it never be forgotten that Jesus fulfilled every one of those prophecies.

God’s Word remains perfectly true and faithful today.  When God commanded that we would be holy, He meant it.  And though we couldn’t accomplish it, God’s Son lived and died to make it true just as His Father had planned before the creation of the world.  Therefore, when God’s Son tells you that “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned,” (Mark 16:16) Trust the Lord of mercy and truth for His judgment is absolutely certain.

Hundreds of years before Solomon, Moses had commanded Israel “Put these words of mine in your hearts and in your soul, and tie them on your wrists as signs and as symbols on your forehead.  Teach them to your children by talking about them when you sit in your house and when you travel on the road, when you lie down and when you get up.” (Deuteronomy 11:18-19)  Solomon paraphrases that instruction as he reminds us to “Fasten them around your neck.  Write them on the tablet of your heart.  Then you will find favor and approval in the eyes of God and man.” 

The Jews eventually took these instructions in a hyper-literal way and tied little boxes containing bits of Scripture to their wrists, but again they missed God’s point.  God doesn’t want us to wear His Word as some sort of lucky charm.  Salvation is by faith and faith comes from hearing the message and believing it.  The passage literally says to engrave God’s message in the stone slab of our hearts.  Without God’s rescuing Word, we were all dead in trespasses and sins.  There was nothing we could do about it, so God came to our rescue, both with the life and death of His Son, and with the message of the Gospel through which His Holy Spirit works new life and faith in us. 

Solomon said, “Fasten mercy and truth around your neck.”  Accordingly, having been given new life and faith, we can wear that good news as our most precious treasure.  The world we live in has been throwing terrible accusations, temptations, and trials at every believer, but we can and should stand firm in the faith, for we have God and His promises on our side.  That is our most precious treasure because it opens heaven to us, and nothing this world tries can take that away.  Martin Luther wrote, “Take they our life, goods, fame, child, and wife, let these all be gone, they yet have nothing won; the kingdom ours remaineth.”

Today, we celebrate the Holy Trinity.  What a marvelous day to be confirming your faith in the Triune God.  There is no other way to life and salvation but through Him.  As a boy, Jesus devoted Himself to hearing and learning the messages of the scriptures, and for our benefit, Luke reports, “Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and with people.” (Luke 2:52)  Just as Solomon promised his son, God’s Word blessed God’s Son, and by faith God credits us with the perfect growth in wisdom that Jesus lived for us.  What more incentive do we need to immerse ourselves in the saving message the Holy Spirit had recorded for us?

My young friends, this fall you will enter high school, and it won’t be long until you go off to college away from home and your home church.  Soon enough you will be out of your own, starting your adult life and maybe raising a family of your own.  Jesus warned us that the world would be against us.  We have to live in this hostile place as strangers travelling through, knowing it is full of dangerous paths and deceptive enemies seeking to lead you away from the path of life. 

Now, I’m sure you’ve already experienced many challenges to your trust in the Bible.  Our whole world pretends that God’s Word is unreliable and old fashioned, because the natural man is firmly under Satan’s control in our world.  At the same time, you have the Scriptures’ assurance that you will not be alone in the battle.  Near the end of his life, Moses assured Israel, “Be strong and courageous.  Do not be afraid and do not be terrified before them, because the Lord your God is going with you.  He will not abandon you and he will not forsake you.”  Trust the Lord of mercy and truth.

The final verse of our sermon text is one of my very favorites.  It reminds me that I can’t, and I don’t need to, go it alone.  No matter what you or I might face in the future, we have help and salvation in our Lord Jesus.  Solomon told his son, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own understanding.”  Solomon understood that human reason is fickle and frail.  He knew that this world can turn against us at any moment.  What is painfully obvious from Solomon’s life is that even success in this world can lead to one’s downfall, if we let it lead us away from the Lord.  When Solomon began his reign over Israel, he trusted wholly and completely in God’s grace.  However, later in his life, even mighty Solomon allowed his head to be turned by the pleasures and responsibilities of the world.  I know it might seem like a case of do as I say, not as I do, but Solomon gives us a graphic picture of how easily a man can stumble.

Dear Christian friends, we need God’s mercy and truth.  We need it more than we need food, water, and air.  We need it when we lie down, when we get up, when we go down whatever road God leads us, and we need it the day we draw our last breath here on earth, for it is God’s mercy and truth that gives us freedom to live and freedom to enter His heaven to live and praise Him forever.  Today, and for the rest of your natural lives, Trust the Lord of mercy and truth, and “you will find favor and approval in the eyes of God.”  Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus unto life everlasting.  Amen.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)