Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost
‘Nevertheless know
this, that the kingdom of God has come near.’
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The Kingdom is coming; the Lord has sent out his servants to prepare the way.
You call these men pastors, for you are respectful. The Lord calls them laborers, for there is work to do.
‘Servant’ is a kindly word. In Greek, the word is ‘slave’. Those who preach and teach and baptize in our Lord’s
churches are slaves. They wear a tight white collar, because it is a symbol of
the shackle about their throats, a sign that all which they say must be taken
captive to the Word of God.
They wear a stole over their shoulders, which is a symbol of a yoke, for they
are but beasts of burden to carry forward the will of God.
They are to ‘carry no moneybag,’ for
they are to have nothing to do with the honors of this world, or its comforts.
Rather, they wear the black of the priest; black representing nothingness,
void; black which professes that they have abandoned all the colors and
pageantry of secular success; for the glory of a man is in the success which
can acquire nice watches, beautiful rings, and Italian suits. Even as the
deaconess and nun cover their hair, renouncing the glory of their own beauty;
so the priest and pastor wear their clerical, renouncing the glory of their own
potential.
They are to ‘carry no knapsack’, for
nowhere to them will be made into a home. Even as their Lord, they shall have no place to lay their head; they
shall wander, they must wander, for all places must hear the Word they now bear
on their tongues. They must go wherever the Lord shall come.
They are to ‘carry no sandals’ for
one does not shod one’s feet when walking upon holy ground, and in the coming
of Christ, all the Earth shall be sanctified. Therefore, they are to cast off
their shoes, for the sacred blood of the cross has made all the world holy.
They are to ‘greet no one on the road’, for
to greet someone, one must first know them. But none shall know these whom the
Lord sends out, for they no longer belong to themselves. Indeed, they no longer
are themselves; they have no name; they are but emissaries of the Lord. They
have died to their old life, even as St. Paul teaches, writing: ‘the world has been crucified to me, and I
to the world.’ ‘Greet no one’,
for the dead greet no one, and the Lord’s servants are dead men.
The Holy One of God declares: ‘Behold, I
am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves.’
They are lambs, for they are defenseless, and lost without the guidance of
their Good Shepherd. They are sent to wolves, for the Good Shepherd shall
forsake the ninety-nine in seeking the one. The one may be a wolf; and the
ninety nine shall seek the wolf, that it may be made a lamb. If they are
devoured in the process, let it be so. Such is still an imitation of our Lord,
for our Lord has chosen to redeem the violent and vicious by His own flesh and
blood.
The pastor must enter the town, enter the home, saying ‘peace be upon this house.’ For though he greets not a friend on
the way, he shall bring grace to the stranger at his end.
The must eat what is set before him, for having no wealth of his own, his
wealth shall be only the charity of those to whom he speaks in love; he shall
live by the pity of others, that he may never know arrogance, pride,
prosperity, no kingdom of his own making, for he is to ‘carry no moneybag, no knapsack.’
And if the Word which
he bears be rejected, he shall ‘shake the
dust from his feet’ for ‘even the
dust that clings shall be wiped off against you.’ For the pastor treads
upon holy ground, and if he find unholy ground, let him no longer tread upon
it, for it, and all things unholy, shall be destroyed in the Lord’s coming.
They shall be ‘brought down to Hades’.
The Lord’s servants must go wherever He Himself is about to go. Do you see
the Lord’s servants in your midst? Behold, if these servants, shackled and
yoked, have arrived, is not the Lord ‘about
to come’?
He is coming this day, as a lamb in the
midst of wolves. You are wolves, for you must eat flesh to live. He is
coming this day, as a lamb in the midst
of wolves. He is a lamb, that His flesh might be eaten to life.
Eat of His body, and drink of His cup, all you who are burdened with the sins
of your life, for our Lord has chosen to redeem the violent and vicious by His
own flesh and blood.
Listen, eat, and drink. For in these you see a humble thing, and rightly so,
for God has taken on humanity and become a humiliation. You hear a word, you
see bread, you taste wine, then you depart
in peace. Verily, I say to you, even as you walk away from this altar, ‘Satan has fallen like lightning from
heaven.’
Do not be insulted to be called a wolf, a creature of might and power, even as
a priest must not be insulted to be called a lamb, a creature of docility and
simplicity. For the Lord who is both Almighty God and crucified man shall
reconcile all things in Himself. Behold, he does this even now, for in this
congregation, lamb and lion dwell together, and together are fed by Him who is
both the Good Shepherd and Sacrificial Lamb; Him who is both the Pillar of Fire
and the still, small voice. For the Lord was made man, and born of a Virgin, an
infant meek and lowly, that both power and poverty might be united in Himself.
This is the Will of God, for it is His desire from all eternity, that:
‘The wolf will live with the lamb, and a
little child shall lead them.’
‘The kingdom of God has come near.’
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Preached by Pastor Fields
Sermon texts: Isaiah
66:10-14; Galatians 6:1-18; Luke 10:1-20