Rely on the Name of the Lord

[00:00:00] From God our father and from our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. [00:00:08] This morning, our readings are compiled in kind of an interesting way. [00:00:15] Here's what I mean. [00:00:19] There's a connection between all of them that kind of interprets the gospel reading. So in the gospel reading, we have Jesus healing a man who is deaf and mute. [00:00:37] And not just that, but it's a. There's evil behind it, right? It's a. It's an evil spirit possessing him, and it makes him deaf and mute, unable to hear. His ears are blocked and unable to speak. [00:00:53] And then not just that, but it kind of ruins him. Like it wants to cast him into fire and water and destroy him. [00:01:05] Okay, so there's the gospel reading, and then we have the epistle reading set next to it where the tongue. We just had a mute man, right? The tongue is this evil that destroys it, starts forest fires, and then we have the Old Testament reading where Jesus is the one whose ears are open, who's obedient, you could say, who speaks the truth, who looks to God for help, who will declare me guilty. He's obedient completely. [00:01:45] Let him who walks in darkness and has no light, trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God. [00:01:52] So taking all of that back to the gospel reading, I just find it really interesting seeing all those together. [00:01:59] I think at least the arrangement of the readings is pointing us to read this gospel story of Jesus healing this man who's deaf and mute as more than just a nice physical thing that Jesus did for him, and even as more than just another casting out of a demon, but as commenting on sin and what it does to us. [00:02:31] And this as an image of unbelief, the hearing, right? The not having our ears open of unbelief, and then, well, problems with our tongue. [00:02:55] My prayer, when I get in front of you like this, is that God would conform my words to his words. You know? And that's like, an easy one is, o Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. It's like, okay, but, God, you make that happen. You know, you open my lips, make my mouth declare your praise. Right? Conform my words to your words. [00:03:21] But that's the prayer of every Christian. That's our prayer for every day that God would open our ears to hear his word in whatever situation we find ourselves, that he would open our ears and that then he would fill us with his words, and then our words would be his words. [00:03:44] Not like Eve, who turned to the serpent, right? Opened her ears to the serpent, and the serpent spoke his words, and then her words were conformed to the serpent's words. [00:03:55] Not like my experience, where my ears are open to other sources or thoughts that I shouldn't even entertain. [00:04:07] We all have those. [00:04:09] There are a lot of thoughts that go on in our minds, and not all of them are worth thinking or worth holding onto. And so part of the daily struggle is to discern which thoughts should we listen to, and which thoughts shouldn't we listen to? [00:04:24] Or another way to put it would be which thoughts conform to God's word and which ones don't. [00:04:32] And then if you want your thoughts to conform more to God's word, then it really helps to hear his word, to come to church, gather among his people, and to hear his word read and proclaimed, spoken to you by one another. As we encourage each other in Christ, as we listen to each other and discern, does that conform with Christ? Or what does my neighbor, my brother or sister in Christ need to hear right now so that maybe their thoughts or their mindset or words are brought back into alignment with God's word? [00:05:11] This is the daily struggle, is to discern what thoughts conform to God's word and then receiving God's word to speak them. When we speak words, then we bring them out into the open and they happen. [00:05:32] When you tell someone you love them, it happens. [00:05:36] They hear it, and it does something to them. And the same is true for harmful words. You put it out there in the open and boom, it does something, and then you can't take it back. [00:05:50] I can't take it back. [00:05:53] Again, the struggle. [00:05:56] And that's why fewer words often is a good idea, rather than just blurting something out, stopping and thinking about it first. Should I really say this? [00:06:09] That's true in the context of a relationship, when maybe you think of mean words to say, or you're angry and all riled up, and words are coming really easily, they're just not the ones that are going to be helpful. [00:06:23] Yeah, then you want to check yourself and slow it down. But it's true in all kinds of contexts, words can destroy, even when maybe there's no immediate consequence. Maybe the immediate consequence is that people are happy to hear it. [00:06:41] Maybe you're talking badly about somebody behind their back. That can be an awful lot of fun. And it can kind of, you know, build a relationship. Like you can build a relationship making fun of people. [00:06:54] And it's. It's fun for a time, but it's destroying somebody else. [00:07:00] See, when the words come out and you're complaining about somebody or something, there's time to complain. Just recognize that those words are doing something and think about whether they're tearing somebody down or building somebody up again, sometimes things need to be torn down. We're talking about what it means to be Lutheran and in Bible study these seven weeks, this is week two. And I mean, in a sense, a reformation or a reforming anything is about tearing it down. First. You put the words out there, it's going to do something, and you just have to really carefully evaluate, is this something that needs to be torn down, or am I tearing it down for selfish reasons? That kind of thing. [00:07:49] Words matter, but it goes the other way, too. [00:07:54] Words that ought to be said, thoughts that ought to be entertained and spoken, they need to be said. [00:08:01] Because without those words, whatever needs to be built up doesn't get built up. [00:08:09] So people need to know that there is such thing as male and female. [00:08:16] People need to know that marriage is a good thing and that husband and wife can get along together, that a family is wonderful, that children are a gift from the Lord, and it's worth the work. Like all these kinds of messages that our culture needs to hear, they need to be said, we need to say them. [00:08:39] It can be a little scary because there are consequences for saying things like that these days. Some things more than others, but there are people out there saying them, and it's encouraging. Every time I hear it, things need to be said so that things are built up. The same thing is true in our relationships with one another. [00:09:02] There's opportunity to give thanks to God for one another. [00:09:09] When you give thanks for somebody's service to you or your community or your family, or even just in small ways, you're giving thanks to God and you're building somebody up. [00:09:24] We need to use our words to build up. [00:09:30] And this is true on the level of the church as well. [00:09:37] We need to confess our faith. We say the words of the creeds to put it out there. This is what we believe. If you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord, you'll be saved. I mean, it's about confessing with your mouth as well. And so when you say the Nicene creed with me or, or the apostles creed with me, I hear you say it. And that's encouraging. That builds me up. It builds the church up. It unites us all together as we say the same words, as we say our faith together. [00:10:13] And when you sing a hymn like Jesus, thy boundless love to me, you're preaching to me, you're speaking those words for yourself. Like, how nice that the words are provided for you. [00:10:26] I didn't have that prayer in my mind before I sang it, but now I do, and I get to speak God's word to myself and to the people around me. So when we sing, and Lutherans are known for singing, isn't that a gift? That's fun. [00:10:42] When we sing to each other, we're singing to each other. We're speaking God's word, putting it out there in the air. And when we do that, something happens, right? The words do something. They're out there, and you can't take them back. And they just may have meant something to somebody. [00:11:01] Maybe they pointed somebody to Christ, right? Or brought home for them the meaning of his forgiveness or his love or all that God has done for us. [00:11:14] Words can be a dangerous fire setting, setting a forest on fire. [00:11:21] Strong language, but they can also build up. [00:11:28] Words can be. I mean, words are like a rudder on the ship, you know? They really set the course of a conversation or of one's thoughts or one's life that can be for worse or for better. [00:11:45] How do you get the better in Jesus faith? In Jesus, looking to him, listening to his words, being conformed by his words, being conformed to his words, right? Governed by his words. [00:12:00] His words coming out of our mouths for the sake of one another. [00:12:07] Thank God for Jesus. [00:12:10] We see in Isaiah here him going to the cross. [00:12:15] Morning by morning, he awakens. He awakens my ear to hear. As those who are taught jesus is wise and understanding because he has his ears opened to God, because he's not listening to the serpent. The serpent tells him something, make bread out of these stones. And he says, I was just telling the kids this. Nuh uh. You know, I'm not listening to you and your ideas. [00:12:44] I'm listening to God, right? I'm gonna be shaped by God's word. [00:12:49] Of course, you know, Jesus was already set in that. But he does it. He does this whole drama in the desert for our sake. He defeats the devil in the flesh for our sake. And then he makes that true in us by faith as we look to him. He unites us to himself, makes our thoughts, his thoughts in our words, his words. [00:13:15] It's not that Jesus wasn't tempted. He was tempted in the wilderness, in the desert, by the devil. [00:13:21] But even on the cross, there he is. He's being made fun of. He's being tempted. They're hoping that he's going to curse God and die a failure, but he doesn't. [00:13:35] He sets his face like a flint. [00:13:39] And that's just a cool image. [00:13:42] He is grounded and rooted in a way that he's not going to budge. [00:13:48] Lord, make that true for me and for us in times of temptation and trial, set our eyes so firmly on you that we don't have anything else to say but to repeat your word, to be conformed to your will. [00:14:09] The Lord God helps me. He helps you and me too, in Jesus. Therefore, I have not been disgraced. Therefore, I have set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame. [00:14:26] God is our fortress. [00:14:30] He's our strength, our shield. [00:14:34] In Jesus we have unchangeability. There's a better word for that. [00:14:41] It's like Jesus just doesn't change. He's just set in the right way. [00:14:47] And you and I, even in our life of faith, that's not always true, not at all. [00:14:55] But we look to Jesus who's done it for us, who forgives our sins, who's the same yesterday, today and forever. And by his grace, he's working in us right to will and work according to good purpose. He's working in us to conform us to God's will, to open our ears to his word and close our ears to what we shouldn't be listening to either. Let him who walks in darkness and has no light, trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God. [00:15:29] When you're going through the fire, when you're experiencing the darkness, what do you do? [00:15:36] Let him who walks in darkness and has no light, trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God. Trust in Jesus Christ. He does not fail. In Jesus name, amen.