FOUNDATIONS FOR PEACE

June 18, 2006
Deuteronomy 5:12-15
2nd Sunday After Pentecost
Pastor Don Sutton
Deuteronomy 5:12-15
“Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the LORD your God has commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor the alien within your gates, so that your manservant and maidservant may rest, as you do. 15 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the LORD your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.

Introduction

Early most mornings I walk. Occasionally as I’m walking, my neighbor, who hauls hogs, stops to talk as he is leaving to pick up a load. Sometimes he comments, “Ya know, if you had a real job you wouldn’t have to do that.” … Before I became a pastor I worked some “real jobs” to make money for school. I worked for a farm corporation. I did construction. I did warehouse work. I drove a delivery truck. I’ll be honest with you, in some of my work experiences from those days, after the words, “It’s quittin’ time,” my next favorite words were, “Take a break.” I don’t think I was lazy. I just enjoyed the rest.

In the Old Testament reading for today we hear God saying to his people, “Take a Break.” Today we focus on what God was saying to his Old Testament people and what God is saying to us.

1. What God was Saying to His Old Testament People

Setting

Moses spoke the words of our text as he met with the people of Israel on the plains to the east of the Jordan River as Israel prepared to enter the majority of the Promised Land of Canaan. Forty years before God had led them out of slavery in Egypt. 38 years before God had given his law for the first time. Now only those who had been young at the time of the Exodus and those born since the Exodus were in this group about to enter Canaan. Just as a parent might feel the need to re-emphasize caution to the son or daughter going solo in the car for the first time since getting his or her driver’s license, God decides it’s a good time to give his law a second time to Israel.

The verses we consider today are the Third Commandment as we number them. God says, “Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy as the Lord your God commanded you (v.12).” Sabbath means rest. The Sabbath day was the 7^th day of the week – Saturday. What the NIV translates “observe” could just as well be “exercise great care over.” God is telling his people that his will about the Sabbath is no trifling matter. It was an item of great importance to God that was to be the same to his people. God’s people were to exercise great care over the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

Physical Rest

How were they to keep it holy? In verses 12 –14 God said that were to do so first of all by doing no work on Saturday. This applied to humans and animals alike. Obviously there would be a practical side to this. The human body can only take so much and then it needs a rest. You perhaps have experienced this if you have worked a lot of days in a row or if you are a dairy farmer. I remember a few years ago when two of my sons worked at a bottling company where we used to live and one of them worked seven days a week for weeks. He said he felt like he was getting burned out and needed a break.

Spiritual Rest

But this physical rest was to be a pointer and a symbol of a spiritual rest on which the Lord wanted his people to focus and which he wanted his people to enjoy. God said, “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the LORD your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.” God wanted his people to recall his love, faithfulness, and power put to work in behalf of Israel as he delivered them from Egypt and sustained them through their wilderness journey. Repeatedly God forgave his people their sins and promised to be with them. This was something God wanted his people to remember every day of their lives. As they, on Saturday, stopped to rest from their physical labor, this physical rest would be a reminder of God’s forgiveness and mercy, God’s presence and power not only in the past but also in the future. I t was a reminder, “As God has been with us and had mercy on us in the past, he will be with us and have mercy on us in the present and the future.” The Sabbath day was also a pointer to the coming Savior who would be the foundation for all spiritual rest.At the same time that the stopping of work symbolized a greater rest in God’s love, this rest was reinforced by the fact that the Israelites on the Sabbath, according to God’s will, assembled to listen to God’s word and observe rituals of worship. In Leviticus 23:3, God said through Moses, “The seventh day is a day of rest, a day of sacred assembly.”

As the Israelites on the seventh day stop their labors, focused on the Lord and his word, and, trusted the Lord and his Word, they enjoyed inner rest. They took a break from their spiritual labors.

Nut & Shell

The relationship of physical rest and spiritual rest is like a pecan. The pecan is made up of the shell on the outside and the nut or meat on the inside. Which is more important? More desirable? It’s what’s on the inside isn’t it? But the outside, the shell performs an important function. It protects the nut or meat. Likewise, the physical rest on the Sabbath was the shell in that not only did it bring something good for the body, it protected and pointed to the spiritual rest that God in his grace and mercy gave to the souls of his people.

Honor & Worship

But as God’s people obeyed God by observing the Sabbath they honored and worshipped the Lord. Obeying God, focusing on his love, and setting aside special time for assembling to the Lord, show honor and give worship to God. They say, “Lord, you are good. You are special. You created all in six days and rested from creating on the seventh. You saved us from slavery with your mercy and deliverance. I worship you.”

2. What This Says to God’s People Today

No Prescribed Day

How does this apply to us, God’s people, today? In New Testament times God no longer binds us to not working on the seventh day of the week – Saturday. In today’s gospel reading Jesus indicated that as God he has the authority to make such changes. Yet, it is common sense that we should regularly rest our bodies. To work ourselves to death would violate the thought that we are to care for our bodies because they are the temples of the Holy Spirit (1Co6:19). To hurt our harm our own body is a violation of the 5^th commandment – “You shall not murder.”

As for observance of special days through the apostle Paul in Colossians 2 the Lord says, “Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ (16-17).” In Romans 14:5 the Lord tells us through Paul, “One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. He who regards one day as special, does so to the Lord.” The point is that we are no longer bound by a day.

What about Sunday – isn’t that the Lord’s Day? This was the day that the early Christians chose to gather because it was the day on which Jesus rose from the dead. But we aren’t bound to Sunday either. We can gather any and every day of the week if we choose. We are not bound to a day.

Still Bound

But there are some things to which the Lord binds us. He binds to hearing and using his word, “Let the word of God dwell in you richly…”“Like newborn babies,crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation.” God binds us to believing his Word and trusting in him. “Jesus said, ‘The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” “Trust in the Lord with all you heart and lean not on your own understanding…(Prov. 3).” God binds us to obeying his word. Jesus said, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching (Jn14:23).” God binds us to gather to worship and fellowship. “Let us not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage each other all the more as you see the Day approaching (Heb. 10:25).” “Worship the Lord with gladness…enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise (Ps.100).”

When we fail to hear and use God’s Word, don’t believe and trust in him, fall down in obeying him, become lax in gathering with Christian to worship God, we dishonor and fail to worship him. We fail to put God first in our lives and give what is due. We also rob ourselves of the spiritual rest that comes to us through the gospel of Jesus Christ and the working of the Holy Spirit. We put ourselves through unnecessary turmoil and as a result may rob others of love we might show them if we had a greater sense of peace within ourselves. We disobey the 3^rd commandment. We fail to take a needed break.

Rest in the Gospel

When we take a break giving time in our lives and a place in our hearts for the Gospel, we find rest for our souls. We hear of how Jesus, in our place, perfectly honored his Father by taking time for his word as we are reminded in the account of the twelve-year-old Jesus in the temple courts hearing the Word of God. That Jesus was perfect for us, gives rest to our souls. We don’t have to be and do what is impossible for us. Jesus was and did it for us. Through the gospel we sadly see Jesus suffering and dying for our sins, but gladly hear the result of this as God says, “Your sins are forgiven in Jesus.” Through the gospel we hear that we are delivered from the damnation we deserve. In the gospel we hear, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved (Acts 16).” Through the gospel the Holy Spirit enables us to believe. Through the gospel we are strengthened as the Lord reminds us of the life everlasting the resurrection of the body, as the Spirit works in us to give us strength to overcome our weakness, as the Lord lights up our lives and helps us overcome the darkness of doubt and fear, and as the love of the Lord helps us to love him and others.

Take a break. Use God’s word. Worship. Honor God. Then as a by-product of worship to enjoy the rest that comes through the word. Amen

June 11, 2006
Trinity Sunday
Jeremiah 10:1-11
Pastor Tim Smith

10 Hear what the LORD says to you, O house of Israel. 2 This is what the LORD says: “Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by signs in the sky, though the nations are terrified by them. 3 For the customs of the peoples are worthless; they cut a tree out of the forest, and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel. 4 They adorn it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so it will not totter. 5 Like a scarecrow in a melon patch, their idols cannot speak; they must be carried because they cannot walk. Do not fear them; they can do no harm nor can they do any good.” 6 No one is like you, O LORD; you are great, and your name is mighty in power. 7 Who should not revere you, O King of the nations? This is your due. Among all the wise men of the nations and in all their kingdoms, there is no one like you. 8 They are all senseless and foolish; they are taught by worthless wooden idols. 9 Hammered silver is brought from Tarshish and gold from Uphaz. What the craftsman and goldsmith have made is then dressed in blue and purple — all made by skilled workers. 10 But the LORD is the true God; he is the living God, the eternal King. When he is angry, the earth trembles; the nations cannot endure his wrath. 11 “Tell them this: ‘These gods, who did not make the heavens and the earth, will perish from the earth and from under the heavens.’” (NIV)

Have you ever heard the expression, “Don’t take any wooden nickels”? A wooden nickel used to be an advertising gimmick used by drug stores, dime stores, gas stations. They were given out with the name of the store stamped on them, and could be used as a nickel in that store only. It was a way of getting return business — and as any professional will tell you, in the world of business, any publicity is good publicity. The trouble with a wooden nickel was that it didn’t have any value anyplace else.

In the ancient world, it was said that there were as many gods as there were towns. Every place had its own local deity — and those false gods didn’t move around. A family that moved to a new place might have to worship a new god — the old one had as much value in the new place as — a wooden nickel.

As the Seventh Century, BC was drawing to a close, God commanded the prophet Jeremiah to stand at the gate of the temple in Jerusalem and proclaim a message. That message is contained in Jeremiah chapters 7-10, and our text comes at the end of that message. The earlier parts might be summed up this way: People of Jerusalem, don’t think that because you are the Lord’s special people, that the Lord’s wrath will not descend on you like a plague from the days of Moses. The Lord calls for a reformation (7:3)! If the people do not repent, then this temple — Solomon’s own temple — will be destroyed just as surely as the old tabernacle at Shiloh was destroyed by the Philistines in the days of Samuel.

In fact, the Lord says, the end is already on the way. Jerusalem will fall, the temple will be destroyed. The women of Jerusalem should learn to wail and mourn, and the men have nothing to learn — they are going to die. A few, a very few, will survive. They are the ones who will get carried away before the destruction comes. They are going to be the exiles.

Now, the prophet delivers a message from God to those exiles: When you get to your new home, so far away, don’t take any wooden nickels

The exiles weren’t going to have FEMA to help them with housing and job searches. They weren’t going to have a local WELS or ELS church to welcome them into fellowship. They didn’t have Builders for Christ to put up a new facility. They didn’t have a cell phone, they didn’t have the Yellow Pages; they were actually going into a place and into a situation where they didn’t even know what they were going to do for worship! God had commanded them not to worship anyplace except at the temple, and the temple was about to be destroyed.

But, God says: Don’t fall into the trap of worshiping in the local voodoo hut. The problem with other gods — any other god who is not the true God — is that on the inside, they’re worthless. The prophet Isaiah had said all this a hundred years or so before this to people going into captivity up in Assyria — the other gods are — at most — just carved wood or chiseled stone. They’re just scarecrows, and they have less value than a scarecrow — at least a scarecrow sits in a field and helps chase the birds away. An idol sits like a lump of nothing in a shrine and does no good to anyone. For those who ignore them, they just take up space. For those who worship them and fear them, they are just pathways away from God.

Don’t forget that the devil doesn’t care what we worship, as long as it isn’t Jesus Christ. The devil doesn’t have to make us all Satanists, butchering chickens on April 30th and chanting Latin phrases backwards. No — all the devil needs to do is cause us to veer ever so slightly away from the true path of Jesus. All he needs to do is coax us, distract us, nudge us away from trusting in Jesus.

That sounds like a pretty easy job, doesn’t it. Especially knowing what people are like, it’s much easier to distract someone a little bit than to get them to completely change their ideology.

So in this passage, God gives his people some help in a completely new way — something that had never happened before. And in our text, it happens in verse 11. It shouldn’t come as a surprise to most of you that the Old Testament was written in the Hebrew language — from Moses to Malachi, Hebrew. When the New Testament came along, it would be written in Greek. But here, suddenly, and we must admit, from out of nowhere, for one verse only, the book of Jeremiah jumps out of Hebrew into another language — Aramaic.

Aramaic is similar to Hebrew in some of the same ways that German is similar to English — just about the same alphabet, some of the same words or at least roots of words are similar — but most of the endings and much of the grammar and style is different.

But the people of Judah who were about to go off into Babylon were going to be learning this language. Some of them may already have known it. But here it is, actually in the text of God’s Holy Word. Some of the later Old Testament writers going into or coming out of the exile (like Daniel) would use Aramaic about half the time. But here, for one verse, God is telling his people something important.

Literally: These gods, who the heavens or the earth did not make, perish from under the earth and from under the heavens these will. If you look at it carefully, you will see that this verse is put together like a peanut-butter and jelly sandwich (the technical term is a chiasm) — where the middle is important (the words “did not make” and “perish” actually rhyme in Hebrew) and the other parts come together as you progress from the inside out, like in a PBJ Sandwich, peanut-butter to peanut putter, bread to bread. And the point of that here is that people would be able to memorize and recite this one passage easily. They could commit it to their memories and they could repeat it to, as God says, “Them.” And there are two different “thems,” if you will pardon the expression.

“Tell them this,” God says at the beginning of verse 11, and the first “them” we think of is the people of Judah themselves, the ones going off into exile. This was a little thing to memorize to help them get through the years away from home. This was really just a new way of summarizing the First Commandment: DON’T HAVE ANY OTHER GODS, with the added promise, the gospel promise from God — all of those other gods will be destroyed by the true God.

The other “them” is the other group in the text of verse 10 — “The nations cannot endure his wrath.” The words “Tell them this” come right after that, and so it’s easy to understand these words as being directed also to the other nations of the world, which means that this little Aramaic peanut-butter-and-jelly Catechism (These gods who didn’t make the heavens and the earth – destroyed from under the earth and heavens they will) isn’t just a reminder for the people, it’s also a way of reaching out with God’s word to the people of the world. Warn them: Their gods are not gods at all. They’re like scarecrows made of suet, they’re worse than useless. But the true God is a God that can be known. He isn’t a mystery.

And that brings us to the connection of this passage and the festival we celebrate today: Our God is also the TRIUNE GOD.

At different times in the Bible, from Moses throughout the whole Old Testament, God is frequently described as being a unified, single God — and yet the unified, one God, also has a divine “three-ness,” that turns up again and again. When he made the universe, he referred to himself as “us.” When Moses gave the Ten Commandments to the people the second time, he also said about this one Lord: “Hear, O Israel, (count the names on your fingers) the LORD our God, the LORD is ONE.” (Deut. 6:4). God has a threeness and a unified oneness. And here in Jeremiah, that is shown again, as the prophet declares, “But the LORD is the true God; he is the living God, the eternal King.“

In other words, our Triune God is everything that all other gods are not — they are dead, lifeless, mindless, created, unfeeling, insensitive, and worse than useless. On top of that, their followers actually make them out to be cruel and even wicked. But God, our God, the God who made the heavens and the earth — he is the living God, the Risen Savior, all-knowing, all-seeing, all-holy and eternal, good and loving, kind, passionate and compassionate, tender and merciful. Not made by human hands, but the one who made humans with his own hands, and breathed life into us with his own breath, and who will on the last day raise the dead once again and give eternal life.

God is forgiving. And although all of these things separate the false gods from the true, Triune God, maybe that’s the most important point of all.

He forgives. We have all sinned against the First Commandment in so many ways. We talk about relying on anything else — our looks, our own talents, our luck, our astrological sign or our zodiackle (is it zodiacal?) circumstances. We humans count on playing the odds as we calculate just how many scratch-games we’d have to buy before we win our millions (we have better odds at being struck by lightning). We rely money. We rely on a rabbit’s foot.

Ultimately, all these sins are relying on one thing more than God — myself. The ultimate idol is the one that we always carry around with us. We rely on our reason, on our experiences, on our own wisdom, and set God aside or hope that he pops out like an air bag to save us when things get really, really bad and just in time.

How cheap are we that we don’t even take the time to fashion our idols out of wood anymore? We get so indolent and lazy that the idol in the mirror is good enough for us — but an idol it is, nevertheless.

Woe to us, when we hold ourselves up above the Almighty Creator of the Universe. It would be better never to have a scrap of self confidence and trust in God completely. So let us take ourselves down a peg or two — or twenty — and repent. We need to turn away even from ourselves and lay our sins down, asking God’s forgiveness.

The glorious thing about our Triune God is that he forgives the repentant. He forgives us. The First Person of the Holy Trinity gave up his one and only Son to be the atoning sacrifice for all our sins. The Second Person of the Trinity actually permitted himself to become that sacrifice for our sins — even our idolatrous sins — being born of a woman, suffering, dying, and thanks be to God rising again from the dead to assure us all of the victory over hell, death, and sin. And the Third Person of the Trinity has given us the Gospel that proclaims that message of forgiveness and by placing that message in our hearts, along with faith and trust in the Gospel message.

This is our Triune God, the true God; he is the living God, the eternal King. He has forgiven us. He will bring an end to idols as he has brought an end to sin, to death, and to the power of the devil. He has given us the peace of God, that transcends all our understanding, and guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, Amen.