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Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Good morning, St. Paul Lutheran Church. It's Pastor Wolfeheather and this is the Sunday Drive to church podcast for July 19, year of our Lord 2026, the seventh Sunday after Trinity Sunday.
[00:00:12] Back on track for the Sunday drive to church today. Sorry we didn't get one recorded last week. I had this hope to send you a little audio missive as we were in the middle of all of this stuff, but it's. Yeah, yeah. There was just too much going on. Anyway, sorry, but we're back after it today. Let's start with the collect and then we'll look at these texts. Beautiful. For Vicar's farewell Sunday today. Wow, that was a fast year.
[00:00:40] Could someone count it up? Make sure it was a year? Because it.
[00:00:43] Anyhow, let's pray. Oh God, whose never failing Providence orders all things, both in heaven and earth. We humbly implore you to put away from us all hurtful things and to give us those things that are profitable for us. Through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
[00:01:05] We should use the word providence, by the way, to talk about God more that reformed are always talking about that evangelicals, God's providence. But that's also our word too. It's a beautiful word that means the Lord governs according to his good and gracious will.
[00:01:21] The opening Psalm is Psalm 33, a beautiful. The first 11 verses. A beautiful psalm of creation.
[00:01:30] I just have it. I've got my King James open here. I don't have the hymnal open, but. So it'll be a little bit different when we sing it in church. But look at what it says here. For the word of the Lord is right.
[00:01:41] All his work is done in truth. So the Lord works and he works through His Word. And then look at verse 6. By the word of the Lord, the heavens were made. Remember that the Lord spoke, Let there be, and there was, and all the hosts of them by the breath of his mouth, the lights and everything. He gathers the water, the sea, together as a heap. That was his work. On day two, he lays up the deep in storehouses. Let all the earth fear the Lord. Let the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
[00:02:16] He spoke and it was done.
[00:02:19] He commanded and it stood fast.
[00:02:24] Now that's our confidence, is that our God is the God who speaks, and it's done.
[00:02:29] And he not only does that in creation, he also does that in salvation, which is where he works our rescue from the world, the flesh and the devil. Look at verse 10 says the Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing.
[00:02:45] Well, that's good, because the council of the nations, this is what we mean by the world. By the way, in the world, the flesh of the devil, it is out to destroy the Lord.
[00:02:55] I was thinking about it this morning.
[00:02:58] Sorry. It can't destroy the Lord. It's out to destroy everything that belongs to the Lord.
[00:03:03] Everything that's good, everything that the Lord establishes. The world along with the devil and our sinful flesh are out to get it, out to destroy it.
[00:03:15] This morning. And I don't know exactly, this is an unbaked thought. It's just I was kind of cooking on it a little bit.
[00:03:23] You know, there's a real sense that the. Well, as, like we sing in the hymn, the world is very evil, and there's these structures that are just built to draw us away from all the good gifts of God and we should just be wary of it. And one of the things that that should do is it should set us free from trying to make the world happy.
[00:03:55] It should set us free from trying to please the world.
[00:04:00] That's not our goal because it's not trying to please us, it's trying to destroy us. We're not talking about the world here in the sense of, like the planet. We're talking about the world as the sense of this sort of institutional antichrist that exists out there.
[00:04:19] That's the Council of the Nations. But it comes to nothing because the Lord speaks.
[00:04:23] That's Psalm 33. That's beautiful. The council. This is verse 11, the last one. The council of the Lord stands forever, his plans to the heart of all generations.
[00:04:34] That's our confidence there.
[00:04:38] The Old Testament takes us all the way back to the beginning.
[00:04:41] And then one page to the right, Genesis 2.
[00:04:45] You know, we studied Genesis 2 on our trip this week because we did a biblical study on the rivers of the Bible. And it took me all week to figure this out, because the very first page of the Bible has these four rivers coming out of the Garden of Eden. And then the very last page of the Bible has this river flowing out of the throne of Jesus.
[00:05:06] And there's a bunch of rivers in the. In between. The Jordan river, there's the Nile river, the Khabar river, that's where the river of exile, there's the Jabbok river, where the Lord wrestles with God, where Jacob wrestles with God, and so forth. There's all these different rivers. And all those other rivers are places really of death or of struggle, of crossing over the river at the beginning, here in Genesis 2, we have it and the rivers at the end are different.
[00:05:40] You don't ever see, you mostly see in this now when you find a river that they converge, they're joining together like the Ohio river flows into the Mississippi river. And the two, they become one bigger river. They're more normally converging. But in the Garden of Eden, there's this fountain and from this fountain flow four rivers. That's this sort of abundance and that's the difference in and after restoration. It's this fountain of overflowing abundance. And that's the rivers that are coming out of the Garden of Eden. It's really beautiful. It's this description of the garden and this life that's there.
[00:06:21] And it's what we were built for, to be stewards of this great abundance of God's creation.
[00:06:30] We see a little bit of it today. I mean, things are not nearly as narrow, thin as we like to think of it.
[00:06:43] There's a bit more margin than there really should be because God is always generous and gracious, but not as much as it was intended in the first place.
[00:06:53] And when we see this guy, I remember there was.
[00:06:56] Oh, I gotta go back.
[00:06:58] Some guy was arguing with something I said online one time. I know it's amazing, like, who would ever argue with anything on the Internet? But some guy was fussing, oh yeah, about why do people, why are people hungry? Why, why is there poverty? Why is there scarcity?
[00:07:18] And why, why do we have to work for our food and, and for a living and all of this? And I, and I responded to him. I said, it sounds like you're longing for a place where we could, we could live with this abundance and just walk around and pick fruit and live.
[00:07:39] And that's what we were made for.
[00:07:41] So your argument, the fact that you're complaining about the scarcity in this life is an indication that, you know, something was lost.
[00:07:51] If we, It's Blaise Pascal makes the argument. Sorry, I must still be a little jet lagged thinking about five things at once. But Blaise Pascal makes this argument about how the fact that we know things are not how they're supposed to be indicates that they used to be different.
[00:08:14] In other words, if all we ever knew, from the beginning of humanity until now, if all we ever knew was all bad, then we wouldn't know the difference. It would just be what it is.
[00:08:25] We wouldn't know that it's bad. Just be what is.
[00:08:28] And if all that's ever, if we were living in Perfection. We wouldn't know anything bad either, because everything would be good.
[00:08:36] So the fact that we recognize that there's evil in the world, that there's things that are broken, that there's things that's not right. It's all indications of the fact that we've fallen, that it used to be better. And we have some sort of memory of the glory that was.
[00:08:56] And that's at work at us.
[00:09:01] It's our great hope too, because the Lord is going to restore that.
[00:09:06] We see it already begun in the miracle that's coming. But hold on for a few minutes. First we have Romans 6. I think we had Romans 6 last week too.
[00:09:15] Romans 6, 1923.
[00:09:19] Paul starts by talking about how you're going to have to be slaves. You're going to have to present yourself as a servant or slave of something.
[00:09:27] It used to be that you presented your members as slaves to impurity and lawlessness, leading to more lawlessness. That's the way of death. In other words, you used to chase after your own lusts and desires, and that was just handing yourself over as a slave to your belly. But now it's different. Present your members as slaves to righteousness, leading to sanctification.
[00:09:51] So that you have your members, that is your eyes and your ears and your nose and your mind and your body, your hands and your feet. You have these things to serve something. What should it serve?
[00:10:03] Not lawlessness and disobedience, but righteousness and life.
[00:10:08] In other words, the Lord Jesus.
[00:10:10] And then he says, look, when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.
[00:10:17] Righteousness had nothing on you.
[00:10:19] But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things which you're now ashamed? The end of those things is death.
[00:10:25] We have to be sure. By the way, this is just a little sort of check in that we are ashamed of lawlessness, that we are ashamed of sin. There's a real morality of repugnance here, that we should just be disgusted with our own old sinful flesh.
[00:10:43] But verse 22, now that you've been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end. Eternal life for the wages of sin is death. But the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. If you want a one verse beautiful summary of long gospel, there it is. Romans 6:23.
[00:11:08] The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. And notice it's not a parable or sorry A parallel. It's not the wages of sin is death, but the wages of Christ is eternal life.
[00:11:23] It's wages versus gift.
[00:11:26] So you've earned death, but Christ gives you life.
[00:11:31] You've earned condemnation.
[00:11:33] Christ gives you salvation.
[00:11:35] You've earned how Christ gives you freely. The new heaven and the new earth where the righteous dwell.
[00:11:43] Mark 8 is the feeding of the 4000. Now you think this story sounds awfully familiar because in Lent we heard about the feeding of the 5,000.
[00:11:52] I think we heard that from Matthew. So did Mark just get the numbers wrong? No, there's two feeding miracles.
[00:12:01] The feeding of the 5,000 is over there by Galilee, in the Jewish part of town.
[00:12:09] Five loaves, two fish. The feeding of the 4,000 is over in the Decampolis, the area of the 10 cities. It's in the pagan place.
[00:12:17] Pagan crowd. The people have been with Jesus for three days.
[00:12:21] 4000 with seven loaves and some fish.
[00:12:24] The leftovers are different too, I think. In the feeding of the 5,000, there's 12 loaves left over. In the feeding of the 4,000, there's 7 loaves.
[00:12:32] Baskets. Sorry, baskets. Baskets left over.
[00:12:35] So all the details and all the numbers are different. The basic idea is the same. And remember how the Syro Venetian woman had just said, even the dogs get to eat the crumbs that fall from the table. And now look at all these crumbs falling from the Master's table that Jesus is feeding even the Gentiles.
[00:12:55] So there's something beautiful there as well. And I just think that.
[00:13:00] And Jesus is going to talk about both of these miracles later on when he's warning the disciples about the Pharisees false doctrine. Beware the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. And they think that they're upset because he didn't get enough bread. And he says, do you not remember? Don't be so concerned about the bread stuff. I've got the bread covered.
[00:13:23] That's never the real problem.
[00:13:26] It's a good kind of church lesson too, because the bread is never the problem.
[00:13:32] Sometimes we worry about the symptoms stuff. We worry about the external stuff. We worry about the finances, or we worry about the physical plant. That's never the real problem. We have to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. And all these things will be added to us. And even if they're not added to us, if we seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness, then we don't mind if they're not added.
[00:13:53] So we have to keep the focus.
[00:13:55] I Think this is why Jesus, Jesus does this miracle twice. I mean, on one hand, he's rubbing it in the devil's face who wanted him to turn the stones into bread. And he just wouldn't do it for himself. But he'll take care of the people.
[00:14:09] He'll provide you what you need for this body and life. That's not the hard part.
[00:14:13] And I think that's why he does it twice, to impress it upon the disciples. This is not the hard part. The hard part is to fight the devil.
[00:14:22] The spiritual warfare that we're in, to hold fast to the doctrine that brings life, that's the tough part. The Lord can feed us, you know, he fed all the children of Israel. He made it rain bread from heaven for 40 years. It's not a deal.
[00:14:39] 4,000 in the wilderness, not a deal. The Lord will take care of it. And he wants us to live in that confidence, too, that we're his dear children and that he's going to take care of us. It's so. I don't know why it's so easy for us to forget that the Lord wants to care for us.
[00:14:59] Maybe we think, here's probably the problem. We think, well, look, if I'm not doing something, like if I don't go plant the seeds this year, then the wheat doesn't grow up, and then we don't have any bread for next year.
[00:15:10] And we think, if I don't worry about it, then maybe I won't do it.
[00:15:17] If I don't worry about how I'm going to pay the bills, how I'm going to keep a roof over the head, how I'm going to take care of the kids or whatever.
[00:15:26] I stay off the street. If I don't worry about it, then I'm not going to do anything about it.
[00:15:32] It's not like when Jesus says, don't worry about it. He doesn't want us to work hard.
[00:15:37] He doesn't want us to get after it. He doesn't want us to throw the net over the side of the boat and try to bring in some fish.
[00:15:46] It's not like he doesn't want us to go out and plant the seeds so that we have something to harvest. He's not like Jesus wants us to be lazy and just sort of go and lay out in the backyard and open our mouths and wait for a hamburger to fly into it or something like that.
[00:16:03] But it's not like that's the only options, like worrying and hard work or not worrying and being lazy.
[00:16:16] There's Another option there, which is where we work hard and trust the Lord. Or in the other way, we trust the Lord and then we get after it. Precisely because we trust the Lord.
[00:16:25] We're working hard to provide, but knowing that it's the Lord who does it. It's the Lord who.
[00:16:33] He makes the sun to come up in the morning.
[00:16:38] He makes the flowers grow. He's the one that puts the, you know, gives the command and the. And the trees start to bear fruit. It's his Word that makes all these things happen.
[00:16:50] So the feeding of the 4000 is reminding us that he's the one that answers the prayer, give us this day our daily bread.
[00:16:56] It's not like we sort of pray that, but we don't really need to because the world is just automatically producing food or whatever.
[00:17:06] This is all according to the Lord's will.
[00:17:09] Luther says it like this, that, you know, the reason why the wheat comes up in the field is because the church prays, give us our daily bread. It's nice.
[00:17:17] It's really nice, actually, to think about it that way. So we got the feeding of the 4000. We'll think about that. And the vicar will have his farewell sermon for us today, which will be really wonderful to hear from him. He's also teaching Bible class.
[00:17:32] He was planning on going through Matthew. I told him today, I said, hey, you can do Matthew, or if you want to, just all the wisdom you've got that you have not unloaded on us yet, you can do that, too. So we'll see what happens.
[00:17:44] I might have to set him free from his. You know, he's been under restriction all year. The number one rule of the vicar is he's not allowed to know anything more than what the senior pastor knows. And that's been a hard rule for him to keep this year because this guy, he paid attention in school. I don't know what classes he took, classes I never took.
[00:18:07] I think he secretly knows a bunch of stuff I've never even heard of before. But he's kept it mostly under ramps in obedience to that number one rule. But I might lift the sanction tomorrow and see what he's been thinking about. And then we'll have our farewell luncheon for the vicar. So church is providing the meat. I think we're having barbecue.
[00:18:26] If you want to bring a side or a dessert, that'd be really wonderful. That'll be after the late service. And we'll celebrate Owen and Abigail and the kids and send them off well back to seminary for their last year. And praise the Lord for another great year of vicarage. How wonderful is that?
[00:18:47] So that's good. Also want to be thinking about the synod and convention. So last night, Saturday night was the opening service. And if we're driving to church, well, it's in Phoenix, so they're probably still sleeping, but it's underway. All the business is underway this morning already.
[00:19:06] I don't know if I have had a chance to tell you guys, but President Harrison asked if I would come and do a couple of presentations at the convention. So I wasn't planning on going. But I'm going to go tonight, late after Deaf Church, fly out to Phoenix for a couple of days. I'll be back Wednesday night, but I've got a presentation. Just a 10. Well, not just. It's precious 10 minutes.
[00:19:29] Reflecting on the essay on Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday. So if you think of it, to say a prayer not only for the synod and convention, but you can also ask the Lord to help me and give me wisdom on what I ought to say to be encouraging to the folks that are gathered in my little presentations each of those days as well.
[00:19:51] All right, that's Sunday. Oh, boy. Sunday. Drive to church probably next week. I'll give you guys a little lowdown on some of the highlights from our trip, but we got to go to church with the Evangelical Lutheran Church of France in Strasbourg and meet Philippe Wolff, the pastor that was there. That was wonderful. Got to check in with our missionary in Germany, Nathaniel Jensen, and his vicar who's serving in France in Paris. That's kind of a cool story.
[00:20:20] I got to visit with the media folks from the Selk, the free Evangelical Lutheran Church over there as well. So that was a lot of fun. So I'll try to give you that report probably next Sunday when we got some time in Sunday school. So drive safe. We'll see you in a few minutes. God's peace be with you.