Although my editor-in-chief, my Mom, didn’t fully appreciate the “Visit with Dr. Luther” part, I really enjoyed thinking about, writing and delivering this sermon. I bucked my editor this time and said I was happy with it and that altering the “visit” scene would gut the central conceit of the entire sermon. She eventually agreed, but still didn’t like it. I’ll chalk it up to generational difference. It might be a little too playful. Maybe this will be one of those sermons that a short time from now I’ll look at and say how did I even go into the pulpit with that!?! But right now. I still like it. It felt blessed by the gospel from the start.

This sermon had one core idea. We are made in the image of God, hence rendering unto God the things that are his includes all that we are. Very simple and very radical idea. We have an easier time getting lost in politics or sports or just the stuff of life. God isn’t there emailing you directly every day. What he send are preachers and books and friends and blessings, and they are easy enought to dodge or leave on the shelf or mistake for our work.

In that sense the sermon was like an image. You can look at it from different angles. You can ponder the image, but everything you need to know is captured very quickly. Any effect is in personal examination.

This particular sermon had very strong roots in a couple of discussions with the church community. Rita F., celebrating her 80th birthday, and in Bible study brought up a very deep question. What exactly is God? What we have been revealed as God is Jesus. Jesus said if you have seen me you have seen the Father. Trying to get go outside of that revelation gets us into the position like Job being questioned or like Paul’s pot of clay asking the potter. What we have been revealed is the image of God, the icon, Jesus. And as Christians, his is the imgage to which we are being conformed.

Caesar deserves his due as a type and shadow of that ultimate reality. Caesar points us the ultimate rule of all by God.

I’m a little late in posting this sermon. My parents came into town and the days were just too nice to waste. I was also a little conflicted about this sermon.

The primary Lutheran dynamic is Law and Gospel. What that means is short is that the law convicts the person of their sin, and the Gospel proclaims what God has done about that problem through Jesus. It is held that the good news of the gospel must predominate, but that it should always come after the conviction of the law. The central topic of the sermon was the judgement. That topic seems to me to be simultaneously law and gospel. If you are ready, the judgment is the longed for revelation and pure gospel. If you are not, the very thought of judgment strikes fear or denial. I could practice the sermon and think – this is all law – not good. I could then practice it again and say – no, correct message from the text. Ultimately, the preacher does not control how the Word is heard. Things we intend as law, may be gospel. Things that we take as pure gospel, may put the fear of God into people. Some people are just hard ground and nothing is heard as far as we can tell. How the Word is heard, how it is used/applied is the Holy Spirit.

The second reason I was hesitant is that the interpretation of the three parables together was probably complicated and maybe too cute for comfort. As I spent the last three week immursed in the three parables, the more convinced I became that the order and presentation had meaning as a unit. As much as I like stages of the christian life presented, I’m not sure that my abilities or time were enough to really address in an authentic and meaningful way.

Many are called, but few are chosen. I’m not sure that there is a more frightening phrase in the entire Bible. The Judgment is so central to Matthew’s gospel, but also just so beyond the mental props that we normally use. As the collect of the day expressed, Lord, judge us not by our fruits, but out of your mercy.

This sermon was a joy to give. One of the saying around the seminary was that the preacher has to read three books: The Bible, The Book of the Congregation and the Book of the Self. A preacher new to a congregation starts out with The Bible and hopefully the self, but never the congregation. The book of the congregation is the length of War and Peace without the cliffs notes. What complicates that as well is that with each new location the book of the self might change. In getting to see this congregation putting on the Beef on Weck, I think I got to read an important chapter in that Book of the Congregation. This was the 14th sermon given at St. Mark’s, and probably the first one that was able to weave in other themes more fairly. I’m always going to be very Biblical, that is part of who this preacher is, but the databank of congregation and the congregation and self interaction is starting to get large enough to actually not return null set.