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Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Good morning, St. Paul Lutheran Church. Pastor Wolf Mueller. This is the Sunday drive to church for the 8th Sunday after Pentecost, July 14, the year of our Lord 2024.
[00:00:12] Recording live from the O'Hare airport, getting ready to get on the flight to come back home tonight. We'll be there tomorrow morning, Lord willing. We'll see you there at church and Sunday school.
[00:00:24] It is the this 8th Sunday after Pentecost, we continue to read in our kind of continual reading in Mark, matching that up also with the Old Testament lessons, the epistle switches to Ephesians. What a text from ephesians. It's really glorious. But I'm looking at the bulletin. Jonathan's been putting the stained glass window pictures in the bulletin.
[00:00:50] I think it's the gospel of John, but I can't remember this window. So this is a good thing, especially for the kids to play hide and go seek with the pictures of the stained glass windows on the bullets and see if they can find them in the sanctuary. In fact, we should do something like a stained glass window treasure hunt someday. That'd be kind of good. Let's start with a collect, a prayer for a pure heart and mind, knowing that that pure heart and mind is the result of the Lord's purifying work.
[00:01:23] Let's pray. O Lord, you granted your prophets strength to resist the temptations of the devil and courage to proclaim repentance.
[00:01:32] Give us pure hearts and minds to follow your son faithfully, even unto suffering and death. Do the same, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
[00:01:48] Our psalm is the last half of the beautiful psalm 85.
[00:01:54] I don't know why it's just the last half. Because the psalm is only 13 verses. That doesn't seem too long to me. But Jonathan's given us the last half. This is the first few verses of the psalm. Might be fun to look over. It's a beautiful prayer. So this might be one of those places you want to look over before the service. Psalm 85. Lord, you're favorable to your land. You restored the fortunes of Jacob. You forgave the iniquity of your people. You covered all their sins. And that double picture of forgiving. So taking away and covering is you withdrew all your wrath. You turned from your hot anger. Beautiful verses. Show us verse seven. Show us your steadfast love, O Lord, and grant us your salvation.
[00:02:37] We'll start with verse eight.
[00:02:39] Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, to his saints, but let them not turn back to folly. Surely his salvation is near to those who fear him that glory may dwell on our land. Steadfast love and faithfulness meet righteousness and peace. Kiss each other. Oh, isn't this beautiful, that picture? I'll hear what God's going to say. Why? Because he's going to say peaceful things, good and glorious things. He's going to speak wonderful, wonderful things. That's why we're so pleased to listen to what he says.
[00:03:14] To do that, we'll have the scriptures. I'm looking first at the Old Testament lesson from Amos. Now, Amos is very interesting because it's one of the earliest prophets.
[00:03:32] You guys say, pastor, are you sure you're in the airport? Because I hear a dog in the background.
[00:03:38] I'm sure there's a wiener dog over here behind us. Anyhow, Amos, chapters. Okay. Amos 750 in Bethel. Now, that's pretty important. Amos is one of the old prophets. So remember, in our top ten dates of events in the Old Testament, those dates they're important are 1010, David becomes king.
[00:04:01] 710. Sorry.
[00:04:04] 970, David dies, Solomon becomes king.
[00:04:09] 930, Solomon dies. Maybe 931, Solomon dies, and the kingdom is divided. Remember, at the death of Solomon, the kingdom divides into the north and the south. Jeroboam on the north, israel in the north, the ten tribes on the north, and rehoboam on the south. The ten two tribes, Judah, Bethlehem, the Levites, around Jerusalem, and Jeroboam. To what? To stop the people from joining back with Israel. Sorry. To stop the people of Israel from joining up with Judah. Says, oh, man, we need a different church. Because if everybody's going down to Jerusalem and go to church all the time, then they'll be drawn to Jerusalem, drawn to the family of David. They'll go back and stop their rebellious ways. So Jeroboam sets up two major false temples, one in Dan Way, way, way up north, and the other in Bethel, which is on the southern border between Israel in the north and Judah in the south.
[00:05:15] And it was in Bethel that they set up this false worship. They got their own priests, not Levites. They set up the golden calf. They had all these different things for worship. And so the people would be traveling down from Galilee or whatever, and they'd have to go through Bethel anyways. And they were there. The priests are there, like, saying, hey, you don't need to go down to Jerusalem. Just stop here. You can worship here. It's great. In fact, I think they would have said, remember, Jerusalem is brand new. I mean, David built the temple in Jerusalem put the tabernacle in Jerusalem in like the year 1003.
[00:05:52] But Jacob saw the vision of the ladder going to heaven in Bethel in the year 1680 or something like that, way, way back. So we've been worshiping here for almost a thousand years, and they've only been worshiping in Jerusalem for like 120 years. Jerusalem was the contemporary worship. It was a new one. This is the very, very old worship over here at Bethel. And so they were tempting the people to stay there. Well, that continued for a while until the next major date. So, 931, division of kingdoms.
[00:06:27] 722 is the destruction of the north. 586, destruction of Jerusalem. So 722, the Assyrians wipe out the north. That's the beginning of the Samaritans. 586, the Babylonians wipe out the south. Destruction of Jerusalem. Those are two major days. Well, here's Amos. He's from Tekoa, so nearby Jerusalem. He's from the south, he's from Judah.
[00:06:50] But God calls him to go up north to Israel, to Bethel, to preach there.
[00:06:57] And that distinction between Israel and Bethel is going to be key to understanding the text in Amos, chapter seven.
[00:07:07] Behold, I'm setting a plumb line in the midst of my people, Israel.
[00:07:12] The high places of ISAaC shall be made desolate. The sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste. I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword. So this is specifically a prophet sent from the south to preach against the worship and false worship and idolatry of the north.
[00:07:30] Then Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, sent to Jeroboam, king of Israel, saying, amos has conspired. And I think this is a second jeroboam, not the original.
[00:07:40] Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel.
[00:07:45] The land is not able to bear his words.
[00:07:49] Amaziah said, skipping down a few verses, Amaziah said to Amos, o seer, go. Flee away from the land of. Flee away to the land of Judah. Eat bread there, prophesy there, but never again prophesy at Bethel. It's the king's sanctuary. It's a temple of the kingdom.
[00:08:06] So he says, look, go back home, go down south, mind your own business.
[00:08:14] And Amos says to Amaziah, I was no prophet. I wasn't a prophet's son. I was a herdsmandeh. I was a dresser of sycamore figs.
[00:08:23] But the lord took me from following the flock. And the lord said to me, go prophesy to my people, Israel. Now, here's maybe the amazing thing about this text.
[00:08:33] And that is that the Lord calls the rebellious ten tribes in the north, my people.
[00:08:41] He is slow to excommunicate. There he is, patient and long suffering. A lot of text. Okay, the epistle lesson is from Ephesians chapter one, verses three to 14.
[00:08:55] And this whole first one, two chapters of Ephesians is very dense. It is. The theology in here is tight. It's like a cheesecake. It's not fluffy at all. It is just some really dense theology.
[00:09:15] And especially here in Ephesians chapter one, Paul's unfolding the comfort of the doctrine of election.
[00:09:24] It's.
[00:09:25] I don't know exactly how to. I mean, you'd say, what's the theme of this? But there's like, five, six themes. All things are united in Christ. We've obtained an inheritance. We've been sealed by the promised Holy Spirit, and maybe even in verse four. Well, let me read the first couple verses. Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who's blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
[00:09:49] Paul's working in Ephesians one and two with the idea that we already by faith are in heaven.
[00:09:57] We already by faith are participating in heavenly blessings. We already ingested by faith, are seated with Christ at the right hand of the Father. Already. It's a present reality. It's not. You know, we think heaven and eternal life is what we're waiting for. Paul says, no, you have all these things already.
[00:10:20] That's in chapter two. You're seated with Christ in the heavenly places, and we say, Paul, look, we're sitting here driving on, stuck in traffic on I 35, driving it. What do you mean, we're seated in heavenly places? Well, this is the idea that by faith, all these gifts of God already belong to us, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, we should be holy and blameless before him. In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of his will.
[00:10:52] That.
[00:10:54] Well, there's a lot of. There's so much there. But that key phrase is in love. He predestined us. This is always the accusation that the Lutherans make against the Calvinists is that they have a double predestination. They have a predestination of love and a predestination of wrath. We say, no, no. He predestines us in love to the praise of his glorious grace. It's great. It's only the predestination of grace, not of condemnation. In him, we have redemption through his blood. The forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace. Grace, grace, grace over and over, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. Now you say, pastor, could you please explain that text to me? And I say, no, it's just. It's impossible. It's so high. This is. I cannot reach that high. I need to quadruple my height to be able to reach up to the mysteries of this text. It's so profound.
[00:11:58] But then he kind of drives it home. In him we have obtained an inheritance predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.
[00:12:16] So that's a good piece of homework to read that epistle lesson a few times this week and meditate on it. It's great. Now brings us to the gospel gospels. Mark, chapter six, verses 14 to 29. It's really a.
[00:12:30] If we were making a movie of the Gospel of Mark, this would be one of those where it kind of does a flashback and goes back to fill in some details.
[00:12:41] It starts with King Herod hearing of Jesus miracles.
[00:12:45] And the response of King Herod is he says, john the Baptist rises from the dead and that's why all these miracles are happening. Other people say it's Elijah. Others says he's a prophet.
[00:12:58] But when Herod heard of it, looking at verse 16, he said, John, whom I beheaded, had been raised.
[00:13:03] So Herod up in his castle over in Galilee or over on the other side of the Dead Sea or whatever, hears of this prophet who's preaching named Jesus and doing all these miracles. And he says, oh, John is back. That, dear friends, is what happens when you have a guilty conscience.
[00:13:23] You hear of whatever strange things and you relate it to your own sin. Well, that's what John did because he says, I beheaded him. And it's just there he's having nightmares about John the Baptist. He sees visions of John the Baptist's head on a platter and he probably imagines the eyes popping open and the mouth starting to talk. Look what you did to me. So Herod has this terrible conscience that's bothering him. So he hears about Jesus and he says, it must be John.
[00:13:48] And then Mark's going to give us the backstory it was Herod who had sent and seized John, bound him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife, because he had married her.
[00:13:58] This reminds us of the number one rule of teaching a Bible study. Never talk about King Herod without looking at your notes. So Herod had all these kids, and one of them was Philip, and one of them was Herod.
[00:14:10] That's Herod the great, had these kids, and Herod, the son of Herod the great, got married to Philip's wife, his brother's wife. They divorced, he married her, and her name is Herodias. So you got Herod, son of Herod, husband of Herodias.
[00:14:29] John was saying to Herod, it's not right for you to have your brother's wife.
[00:14:33] And now Herodias is mad and she wants to put John to death. But Herod was afraid, so he arrested him and he kept him safe. But remember the story. The opportunity came. Herod, on his birthday, had a banquet, and Herodias daughter came and danced. This would be his what? Herod's daughter in law, I guess.
[00:14:58] And everyone is so taken by it that the king says to the girl, ask whatever you want, I'll give it to you. This is the way the kings of old would kind of do things. They want to show their generosity. Ask for whatever you want. Half of my kingdom. And you weren't supposed to ask for half of the kingdom, but you also weren't supposed to ask for, like, a box of lucky charms. You're supposed to ask something impressive so the king can show his glory and his might by giving it to you. Well, she goes and talks to her mom, Herodias, and says, you know, it'd be great. Why don't we get John the Baptist's head?
[00:15:32] So they asked for his head on the platter. And the king says, it's exceedingly sorry because he made an oath. And all the guests are looking at him. He doesn't want to break his word. And he sent an executioner and brought John's head, and the disciples came and buried it. So it flashes back to how in the world John died in the first place. And it's because he preached marriage to Herod, who was an adulterer, or at least had a wrong marriage, and he got killed for that. That reminds me, by the way, of I was joking around one time.
[00:16:06] I think it's kind of funny, but Carrie always says, brian, that's not really a funny joke that, you know, the old martyrs got to get killed for saying Christ is Lord and we have to get killed for saying marriage is a man and a woman.
[00:16:23] And I think it was my friend Pastor Katzelmeyer who reminded me, hey, Herod was executed for preaching the 6th commandment, you shall not commit adultery. We're no better than him, that's for sure.
[00:16:37] We're called to preach the Lord's truth no matter what and suffer the consequences.
[00:16:42] That's what happened to Herod. Now, in the gospels, and this doesn't really show up in our reading because it's just this kind of little flashback picture. But in the gospel, it's really interesting to see how the things that happened to John then happened to Jesus, but in an even more amplified way.
[00:17:00] So remember, John is conceived in Elizabeth and Zechariah, even though they were very old. And then Jesus is conceived in the Virgin Mary.
[00:17:10] John is preaching. Jesus is preaching.
[00:17:13] In fact, John is preaching the kingdom. Jesus is preaching. The kingdom of heaven is here.
[00:17:18] And then John dies. And in a way, Jesus knows now, he's going to die also not beheaded, but crucified and raised.
[00:17:27] So that the way it goes with John is the way it's going to go with Jesus. So Jesus hears about it, the death of John, and he goes into the wilderness and he prays and meditates on what it all means. But this is the flashback that tells us how we got there. The hymn of the day.
[00:17:46] Jesus priceless treasure.
[00:17:50] Jesus priceless treasure fount of purest pleasure dearest friend to me it's a beautiful hymn. It's kind of a. There's a melancholy sound to it, at least to me, but it talks about how the Lord is with us in the midst of all trouble. It's one of these old lutheran hymns that's very moving. It's very. It's a touching hymn because it talks about how Jesus is everything for us. Really, really wonderful. Oh, God, we praise for that.
[00:18:25] Well, that's a. Let's do. Let's call it quits for Sunday drive to church. Let's see how you're doing on time. We have a. We're going to continue to study Hebrews, chapter ten tomorrow, which is great. We're headed towards the hard stuff, you know, the.
[00:18:39] What does it mean to fall away from the faith? We'll touch on that like we did in chapter six. And really, it's probably blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. So we'll talk about that if we have a chance. Don't forget to pray for Aaron and Rachel, who will be married this afternoon. That the Lord would bless their marriage. Also, we have Sarah and Harrison getting married next Saturday. You guys are all invited to join the families and congregation for that wedding. That'll be really wonderful as well. All right. God be praised. We'll see you soon.