All Saints'

Revelation 7:2-19 & Matthew 5:1-12 - All Saints’ Sunday - November 4, 2012
Being Blessed

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. 

Those portions of Scripture, which we just heard a moment ago, which the Holy Spirit caused to be recorded in Revelation 7 and in Matthew 5, we now consider in Jesus’ name.  Let us pray: These are Your words, Holy Father; sanctify us by Your truth; Your word is truth.  Amen. 

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Amen. 

Consider with me, so far, since I have stepped up into this pulpit, what you have heard me say.  I began by invoking the name of God that is familiar to all Christians: the triune name, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  St. Paul tells us in Romans 10:13, that “whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”  And so that’s what we do.  I then proceeded to, if not actually read the words of Scripture, to direct your attention to the word of God that we just heard.  St. Paul tells us in 1^st Timothy 4:5 that all things are “sanctified by the word of God and prayer.”  And so that’s what we did next.  We prayed.  We prayed to the God who reveals Himself in His word, that He would, by His word, make us holy.  After that, I spoke a blessing to you: grace, mercy, and peace.  The Apostles would frequently begin their epistles with this same blessing or one similar to it.  When God blesses you in this way, grace, mercy, and peace actually become yours.  God gives it to you.  God’s words are not mere sentiments or wishes.  They are operative.  They accomplish what God sends them out to accomplish. 

Now, right here we have just condensed in few words a little mini-Divine Service.  Think of it.  This is the structure that we see fleshed out Sunday after Sunday after Sunday.  Invocation—word—prayer—blessing.  * 

I don’t know if anyone noticed or not, but today, when I spoke those opening words of invocation, “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” I did not face you and make the sign of the cross, the way I did last Sunday, but instead what I did (and what I’ll be doing from now on) is face the altar – I faced God – I faced the direction where God speaks to us.  Now, the reason for the change is really quite simple.  First of all, even pastors can be corrected and learn new things here and there.  Second of all, when the pastor in the church service is facing you, he is speaking those things, which God speaks to you.  When the pastor is facing the altar, he is saying those things that we all say to God.  When we gather here as Christians coming to hear God’s word, the first thing we do is call upon God in order that we may come into His presence.  Just look at the word.  Invocation – we invoke God.  We call upon God – that’s what “invoke” means.  I don’t invoke you.  We invoke God.  So let’s ask a couple of questions about the significance of this. 

First, what gives us the right to call upon God!?  Our Baptism does!  And so when we call upon God, we use the same name that was placed upon us in our Baptism.  Jesus reveals the triune God as He is: as the Father who sends His Son to bear the world’s sin and to reconcile us to Him whose law we have transgressed.  And from this message of reconciliation, God sends forth His Holy Spirit to work faith in those who hear the Gospel.   In our Baptism, we are joined to Christ’s death and resurrection.  This being the case, it is by means of our Baptism that God claims us and seals us as His own.  He gives us a birth from above, and sends His Holy Spirit into our hearts so that we may with all boldness and confidence come before God as dear children approach their dear father.  There’s our right to invoke God!  When we call upon God, we make use of our Baptism! 

So our second question: why?  For what purpose do we invoke God’s name?  Well, we want good things from Him, don’t we?  We want Him to bless us, right?  There is no blessing from God without God giving us the right to call upon Him; that much is certain.  And so we begin our services by calling on the name of God that He has placed upon us, and then what is the first thing that we do?  What is the first blessing we ask for?  I turn around and say to you: “Beloved in the Lord, let us draw near with a true heart and confess our sins – and to whom? – unto God our Father – our Father – beseeching Him in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to grant us what? – what do we want? – what blessing? – to grant us forgiveness.” 

And so to answer our question, why? – for what purpose do we invoke God’s name?  We invoke God’s name in order to be saved from our sins.  It is, again, as St. Paul says, quoting from the prophet Joel: “Whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”  And so we do.  And we ask for salvation.  

Paul continues his train of thought in Romans 10, and so brings us to our next point of consideration.  He says: “How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed?  And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?”

The reason we come to church, the reason we invoke God’s name and step into his presence, is so that we might hear God’s word.  We don’t come here in order to hear a charming voice.  We don’t come here in order to listen to our own voices.  We come here in order to learn, and re-learn, and hear again and again what God has to say.  The first thing that God says to you here is the Absolution.  He forgives you your sins through the mouth of your pastor.  And then God continues to teach you through the Scripture readings that you hear, and even through the words that you recite and chant and sing, and through the words that your pastor so carefully crafts in his sermon.  God speaks.  What God speaks, we repeat.  This is the essence of praise.  It is our response to God’s word.  It is faith. 

St. Paul writes in that same chapter of Romans (chapter 10) that I keep quoting from:

“But what does [Scripture] say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’ (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” 

We come here to hear about Jesus.  We come here because Jesus is here.  We come before God and sing His praises.  Our praises correspond to what we hear.  Our praises are our confession.  When we praise, we confess what we believe.     

In the 2^nd Commandment, which forbids us to take God’s name in vain, we are taught that, instead of abusing God’s name, we should use it.  We should “call upon it in every trouble, pray, praise, and give thanks.”  In the 1^st Petition of the Lord's Prayer, we pray that we might keep this very commandment by praying that God’s name be kept holy among us.  How is this done, we ask.  And here we find the only one of Luther’s explanations in the Small Catechism that actually breaks out into a little prayer itself: “When the Word of God is taught in its truth and purity,” we say, “and when we as the children of God also lead holy lives according to it.  Help us to do this, dear Father in heaven. But he who teaches and lives contrary to God's Word profanes the name of God among us. Protect us from this, Heavenly Father.” 

God blesses us with His word.  We come here for blessing.  We come here with prayers for good things we lack.  We come here with thanksgiving for the good things that God gives us.  We come here with sin and regret, and a heart in need of cleansing.  And if you don’t, I sure hope that while you are here, you learn that that is what you’ve got.  You’ve got a need that only God can satisfy, because it is a need for peace with Him.  And for that peace, you need God’s grace and mercy.  You need God to bless you with what you do not deserve.  It is precisely because we have not kept our own lives pure and holy that we need God’s word to be kept pure for us. 

And that is why our songs and hymns and everything we proclaim and confess in our church services revolve around this: not on what we do for God, but what God does for us in Christ.  This is what we sing about.  This is what we do.  All we do as Christians revolves around this.  Our life – both here in time as it is marked by tribulation and suffering and failure and the need for mercy – and even our life in heaven, as it is marked by endless peace and joy and righteousness – our whole life revolves around the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.  And so we sing about Him. We sing about what He has accomplished for us.  Not simply because there is no better subject to sing about, but because it is for Jesus’ sake that we are able to approach God and sing in the first place.  And it is because of Jesus that this singing and praising will have no end. 

The entire Divine Service is marked first and foremost by God’s service to us.  Our sacrifices to God – both the ones that we present with our voices, and the ones we offer as we live our lives for God in service to one another – all our sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving are both offered and accepted with Christ’s service to us as their focus.  And so this is the focus of our life.  The Divine Service reflects the Christian life, because it is by God serving us regularly through the forgiveness of sins that we have and hold onto the life that Christ gives. 

Now, it might look at this point like I have not really addressed our texts for this morning.  I even said as much that we will be considering Revelation 7 and Matthew 5.  What wonderful portions of Scripture!  But I have not failed to address them.  Having spent so much time talking about what goes on in the Divine Service here, take a moment and consider what takes place in heaven too!  The Divine Service reflects the Christian life not only here in time, but hereafter in eternity as well.  In St. John’s vision, he describes a heaven that is filled with praise to the Lamb to whom salvation belongs.  There will be no more sin, no more temptation, no more regret.  No more sadness at the death of loved ones, but there will be a happy reunion with all who have died in Christian faith, and there will be no more separation. 

All the wonders of heaven are mostly described in terms of what heaven is not.  No pain, no sorrow, no hunger, no thirst, and so on.  These will not be there.  But the most significant thing about heaven is actually described in terms of what will be there.  Jesus will be there.   All sin will be gone.  It will be forgotten as a dream that is passed.  But we will most certainly know and remember why and how we are there – just as we know why and how we are here.  All tears in heaven will be wiped away; but in heaven we will continue to be with the Lamb who shepherds us through this valley of tears today.  He has guided us to the still waters of His word.  He has clothed us in white robes washed and made clean and spotless in His own blood shed for sinners.  If we want to know eternal joy in heaven, we must become acquainted with it here on earth. 

But first, we must become acquainted with tribulation.  Here we struggle.  The great tribulation that we hear about in Revelation 7, and from which the great multitude of saints comes forth, is not some future time in history when things get really bad.  No.  It is today.  It is your life on earth.  It is you trying to be poor in spirit and meek.  It is you trying and failing to hunger and thirst for righteousness as you ought to.  It is you regretting and bemoaning the fact that you have foolishly sought worldly pleasures instead.  It is you not being merciful, not making peace, and not forgiving as you ought to.  It is you seeing that blessing comes by being pure in heart – they will see God – but what is in your heart?  The tribulation of life comes not only in the form of persecution from without – although there is plenty of that.  But persecution comes also in the form of temptation from within.

The hatred of the world toward those who claim to have a righteousness so pure that it shines before God in heaven is at its root no different than the doubt in your heart that seeks to be blessed by fulfilling the law.  But you can’t.  The world hates the idea that the Son of God must shed His innocent blood to redeem sinners from hell.  And your flesh agrees.  This is where persecution begins.  “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”  The kingdom of heaven.  The reign of Christ.  The forgiveness of sins.  Blessed are those who see no cause to be blessed within themselves, who suffer under the burden of the law that demands what they cannot render, but who see in the life of Christ the blessing they need. 

The blessings that Jesus enumerates in His sermon on the mount as recorded in Matthew 5, are the blessings that you need.  They are the blessings that you receive.  They are the blessings that define your life here by faith, and by sight in heaven.  Those saints who gather around God above first become saints by gathering around God below.  And so we gather, by calling upon His name, confessing our sins to Him who sent His Son to live a perfect life in our place, and to bear our punishment and earn our blessing.  We come here to hear His word, and to begin here in prayer what will continue forever in heaven as endless praise.  We come here to be blessed.  We come here to have God place His name upon us in the Benediction at the end of the service – the same name that we received in our Baptism, and that seals us forever as saints marked with the sign of the cross on their foreheads.  We stand here as brothers and sisters to approach our God so that we may – with all the saints – our believing parents and children, grandparents and siblings – stand in heaven forever around God and the Lamb who saves us. 

In Jesus’ name, Amen.