We're Holding Sacred Truth!

1st Sunday of End Time, Reformation, 10/31/10
Luke 12:48b


We’re Holding Sacred Truth!
I. We’ve been given so much.
II. We’ve been entrusted with so much.


I guess it speaks volumes about the culture we live in. You never hear someone say, “You’ve got to see this. It’s the holiest thing I’ve ever seen.” Instead, they want to you see something that shouldn’t really be shared, especially among decent people. Few people anymore share with each other the holy experience they had. Instead they can’t wait to share the latest story of sin and corruption. Perhaps only at Christmas and Easter will the local TV news carry a minute or two of Christians worshipping. The other 363 days of the year it’s a steady diet of the depths of degradation. You know the stories. I don’t have to mention the subject matter.

Like water, our world always seeks the lowest level. And it’s come to the point where it almost seems as if no one is impressed with what is holy or sacred.

But that couldn’t include us, could it? After all, we’re in God’s house on this Festival of the Reformation praising God for sharing the truth of his word with us. We’re enjoying a holy experience. But is that all it is? Just 60 minutes of nice sounding praise? An hour-long pep talk for confessional Lutherans?

Fellow Lutheran Christians committed to the holy truth of God’s word, we have been blessed not just to hear God’s sacred truth today, but to hold it. Do we realize what a blessing that is?

In a world that cares nothing for what is holy, we hold something sacred. In a world which denies objective truth, we hold it in our hands and hearts. And to those who possess such a tremendous blessing, Jesus speaks these words this morning, “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” Brothers and sisters in Christ, united by a common confession of faith grounded in the precious word of our God, we’re holding sacred truth! May God the Holy Spirit impress that truth on our hearts and minds so that we more deeply appreciate that treasure!

Part I.

I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know when I say we’re living in tough times. The other day I saw a stat flash across my TV screen that 1 in 25 homes is either in foreclosure or in danger of foreclosure. Even if that stat is only close to being true, it’s sobering, isn’t it? I’ve heard some economists warn that we might have a jobless recovery from this recession. In other words, the jobs that were lost aren’t coming back. Economic stimulus funds have been spent so now what do we do to pay for roads and revitalization? Food prices are going up. You can bet fuel prices will too. Not good news.

Things aren’t much better in the church, are they? Our congregation and synod declined in membership slightly last year. Some other denominations have lost tens of thousands of members. More and more church bodies are caving in on moral issues, even one that shares the name Lutheran. Church budgets are tight all over. Pay attention as you’re driving around town and notice how many church buildings have changed hands or have closed completely. For all those reasons and more, it would be easy for us to ponder from our puddle of pity that we just don’t have much anymore.

But Jesus begs to differ. No, Jesus demands to differ. Just look what he has given us! We have sacred truth! We’re holding the truth that will even withstand the assaults of Satan and all his evil henchmen. It’s the truth that the Lord returned to his church through his faithful servant, Martin Luther. That truth is that we are justified. God the Father has declared the sins of the world—the whole world—to be forgiven by the life and death of Jesus Christ. We’re here to celebrate that truth today. We know and believe that we add nothing to our salvation by our works or decisions and we take nothing from that truth by excusing sin or proclaiming that Jesus is only one of the ways to heaven. No, we confess that we are justified, declared holy and forgiven, by Jesus alone. That’s sacred truth!

And it’s ours by grace. When God chose to share that truth with us, he didn’t look out over the mass humanity and ask, “Who wants my sacred truth?” and we responded by raising our hand and shouting in response, “I do! I do!” That’s not the way it happened. Truth be told, none of us by nature wants anything to do with the holy God or his sacred truth. By nature we gravitate towards eternal darkness, not sacred truth. But God in his grace shared that sacred truth with us. By his gospel in word and sacrament he implanted sacred, saving truth in our hearts. An amazing miracle indeed! Sacred truth!

And by God’s grace that sacred truth is still ours. In a sea of religious pluralism in which even Christians do and believe whatever they think is best for them, we still have God’s sacred truth. Paul warned Timothy 2,000 years ago that people won’t put up with sound doctrine, and yet we still have it. We’ve haven’t changed God’s sacred truth. We’re still holding to it.

We’re holding sacred truth! Indeed, we’ve been given much.

I’m not trying to minimize the issues we face as a congregation or as a synod of confessional Lutherans. We’ve got problems. We all know them. And it’s no use hiding our heads in the ecclesiastical sand. But the sky isn’t falling on our heads either. In fact, we’ve been given much. Jesus says so. And when he states, “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded” he’s talking about gratitude. We, more than any other Christians, have reason to be grateful today because we’re still holding sacred truth. So when we sing the words of Luther’s famous Reformation hymn, mean them. The devil can take away all our possessions and even our life, but we still hold sacred truth and that’s all that matters. The pendulum of our lives swings constantly from happiness to sorrow, but the sacred truth of our God remains unchanged and we’re holding it! Jesus’ death and resurrection mean you belong to him forever. That’s sacred truth and we’re holding it. Indeed we’ve been given much!

Part II.

People who’ve been given much. You hear stories about such people quite frequently. Those stories always begin with overwhelming joy at the huge blessing they’ve been given. But in some cases—and even in many cases when the blessing is a huge amount of money—the story ends in sadness or tragedy. It never ceases to amaze me how people who have earned or received millions of dollars can end up broke. They’ve wasted their fortune. What a shame!

But wait a minute! We just reminded ourselves of the tremendous gift that we’ve received—the sacred truth of God which we’re holding in our hearts and hands. What’s our story with that tremendous blessing? It always begins in happiness. We’re overjoyed on our confirmation day to vow our faithfulness to our Lord and his truth. Or we became a member of this church later in life and we were overjoyed to finally find a church home. But has the joy, the gratitude, the enthusiasm fizzled? In many respects, is it back to life as normal, grinding out the routine? Has our use of God’s sacred truth become only academic? Does our spiritual life tend more to form than substance? Do we have to admit that there are times when we just go through the motions of listening to, applying and proclaiming God’s sacred truth? If so, shame on us!

Jesus said, “From the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” It’s no secret among us that God’s holy will is for us to be faithful with what he has entrusted to us. Sure that includes our wealth and our abilities. But he’s much more concerned with what we do with the sacred truth he has entrusted to us. We have his sacred truth to share with others. What a unique privilege that is! Of the millions of Christians here in our country, far fewer than a million have the sacred truth—all of the sacred truth—to share. Our God has entrusted that truth to us! It’s ours to share!

And what a high calling that is! The Apostle Peter stated that God has made us his chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, and a people belonging to him (1 Pe. 2:9), so that we can declare his praises to others. He elevated us to that high status and gave us the most glorious task of sharing his sacred, saving truth with others. He didn’t entrust that to his holy angels. He entrusted it to us.

We’re holding sacred truth! Indeed, we’ve been entrusted with much!

I see that the BP Gulf oil spill is in the news again. This time it’s about the investigation into the disaster, specifically who knew what, when did they know it, and what did they do with that information. The authorities will investigate any negligence and cover-ups. They want to know what people did with the truth. Because some people knew the truth and kept it to themselves, a tragedy occurred.

An eternal tragedy occurs when we keep sacred truth to ourselves. We’re holding that sacred truth. Our God has entrusted it to us. What are we doing with it? The excuse, “These are difficult times” doesn’t hold water. That’s all the more reason to share sacred truth with others and give them eternal hope. To say we don’t have the resources isn’t just a lame excuse, it’s a lie. We may not have as many earthly resources as we used to, but we still have been blessed with much and we still hold sacred truth. To the extent that we have lost our zeal to share sacred truth, we need to beg for our God’s mercy. And then hear and believe his gracious promise of forgiveness and the glorious message that he has made us his people and has entrusted his truth to us so that we can share it.

We’re holding sacred truth. It’s the most precious gift our God can give us. And while our world despises it and blasphemes it, it’s the only truth that can change hearts and win souls eternally. And we’re holding it! May we hold and share it until the day our Lord returns for the final reformation of his people! Amen.