Reformation C

Reformation Sunday, Year C

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

Brothers and sisters in Christ: grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

In the fall of 2019, at the beginning of the school year, we started a new Confirmation Class with the 4 students you see before you today. This was intended to be a 2-year program, in which we would take a journey through Luther’s Small Catechism, using the workbooks from the NALC’s publishing house - Sola. We got off to a fairly good start, until the pandemic hit. In discussion with the families, we decided NOT to do Confirmation by Zoom… so we lost almost a full year of classes. But we eventually got back in our classroom and finished the fundamentals.

We’ve covered the 10 Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and the Sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion. These are the very basic beliefs that we hold as Christians in the Lutheran Tradition. Last week, you may recall that we welcomed some new members into our church family who did not come from a Lutheran background. I took them through the Small Catechism as well. It may be a small book, but it’s a solid foundation to build your faith on as a Lutheran Christian.

Now - Breanna, Jaylen, John, Veda - I’m going to tell you something that you’re not going to believe…but I’m going to tell you anyway: I still can remember being your age. Hard to believe, I know, but I do. I remember thinking to myself at my own Confirmation: “yes, I’m done with Sunday School!” I don’t know if I said that out loud or not, but I KNOW that I was thinking it. And that was very much the thinking of a 15-year-old kid. I’m not going to ask you if you’re thinking that now.

But I do want to ask you to think about something. You now have the very same knowledge that just about every adult here has when it comes to Lutheran teaching. With respect to your Christian Education, you have earned your “diploma”. So, in a sense, you have been given the tools you need to go out and face the big, wide, and often cruel world. The world is going to challenge your beliefs. The world is going to make you question your faith. The world is going to ask you to defend what you’ve been taught, and will absolutely ridicule you if you don’t know how to answer. Think about that; are you ready?

If someone asks you, “what do you believe as a Christian?” I hope the first thing you think of is that thing we do every Sunday that starts with the words “I believe... in God the Father...” The Creed is the very statement of our beliefs. You can always start there. And you can explain it line-by-line now. Or, you can go with the simple answer and say “I believe that we all need Jesus.” That’s always a good answer.

“Why does God restrict your life?” is another question you’ll hear. Where would you go for that? I hope you thought of the 10 Commandments. Those are the Laws the God gave us. He did that so that we could enjoy the world the way He intended us to. Remember those 10 Commandments come in 2 sections: how to love God the right way, and how to love our neighbor the right way. That’s what those laws are all about. God’s gave us Laws because He Loves us.

“How do you pray?” is also a question sometimes thrown at us. We have been given a prayer by the Son of God Himself. It’s sometimes called the Perfect Prayer. We call it the Lord’s Prayer. I know you all know it by heart. The challenge now is whether you can explain it and what you’re praying. Praise, adoration, request, thanksgiving, confession…those are all parts of a prayer, but it doesn’t have to be that complex. God listens to all of our prayers, even when we can’t put those prayers into words. And if we really want words, we can use Jesus’ own words of prayer. And because God loves us, we know He will listen to our prayers.

Baptism is how God claims us and brings us into His family, making us His children. It is God’s action. God adopts us as His children so that we are included in everything that He promised. We haven’t earned it, and we don’t deserve it. And He does it anyway.

Holy Communion is the meal of the Baptized. We take that bread and wine that somehow, mysteriously, Jesus is in there somehow. Or “in, with, and under” the bread and wine, if you want to give an A+ Lutheran answer. We can take Jesus into ourselves and recall the promises he made to us by allowing his body to be broken and tortured, and his precious blood to be shed, all for each one of us…all because of his love for us. We remember this each time we come to the Lord’s Supper, as we do today.

If you can remember these things that I just summarized for you, you can at least begin a friendly conversation with people who are genuinely curious about your faith. You can help them understand what these things mean, but above all, you will be able to tell them that God loves them. You can tell them that Jesus died for them, too. You can tell them that we all need a Savior, and we have one who loves us so much that he endured all that pain and suffering on our behalf.

This will also provide you with a reasonable answer to those who challenge you, even if they don’t want to be reasonable with you. Some just want to make you doubt yourself and your beliefs. Be kind, but don’t waste your breath if they don’t want to hear your side.

In this Confirmation Class (and all your Sunday School leading up to it), we’ve given you the basics (teachers - raise your hands). You now have what you need to begin your journey as adult Christians. Yes, you heard me correctly: your Confirmation today marks the end of your journey as children and the beginning of your status as adults in the church. When the secretary comes into the office on Monday, we change your status from “Baptized member” to “full member”. That will not change again as long as you are a member of this church.

But the most important thing I just said is that although this is an end for you, it is also a beginning. Do you know what happens to a tool that you don’t use? If it’s a blade, the blade will get rusty and dull. If it has a wooden handle, the wood will get dry and brittle. If it has paint on it, the paint will become discolored and faded. These teachings that you have now received are your tools. It’s up to you to use them.

Did you hear what Jesus said in the Gospel this morning? “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples,...”

Let me give you a little easier translation: “If you obey my teaching, you are really my disciples...”

What was his teaching? To pray to the Father, to help the poor, to gather for worship, to share the Good News with the world around us, to obey God’s Commandments…

If you are going to obey Jesus’ word, you have to know what his word is. Guess what that means? It means you have to read it. You need to read your Bible. Would it hurt to read your Small Catechism now and then? How often should you be reading them? Well, how often do you need to read them to be confident in your knowledge of them?

Let me share with you what Martin Luther said about how often he read the Small Catechism. Remember: he WROTE that little book: “7 As for myself, let me say that I, too, am a doctor and a preacher—yes, and as learned and experienced as any of those who act so high and mighty. Yet I do as a child who is being taught the Catechism. Every morning, and whenever else I have time, I read and recite word for word the Lord’s Prayer, the Ten Commandments, the Creed, the Psalms, etc.

8 I must still read and study the Catechism daily, yet I cannot master it as I wish, but must remain a child and pupil of the Catechism, and I do it gladly.” [Theodore G. Tappert, ed., The Book of Concord the Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. (Philadelphia: Mühlenberg Press, 1959), 359.]

After this, he described people who thought they could read the Catechism once and know everything they need to know. I don’t have to tell you that Luther didn’t think very much of those people.

Can you imagine? He wrote the book, and he still read it at least once a day. AT LEAST once a day. Do you think he also read his Bible too? Yeah, I guarantee you he did. By the way, there’s a Small Catechism app, and a many different Bible apps…you can read them on your phone.

If you’ve been listening to any of my sermons this year, I hope you heard the word “discipleship” more than once. This is something all of us are working on. What I’m describing to you are the different ways to grow as disciples. Reading the Bible daily, praying, sharing our faith… same stuff. “If you obey my teaching, you are really my disciples...” We are on a journey to “really” be disciples of Jesus. To do that, we need to know God’s Word. We need to know our Bible.

And maybe the best reason is the very next thing that Jesus said in the Gospel today: “...and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” You have your whole lives ahead of you. And yes, it’s a big world out there, but it’s not always a nice world. I want to make sure you’re prepared to face it, and to do that, you have to know right from wrong. You have to know what’s true and what isn’t. God is truth. The Bible is truth. But you have to know your Bible to know that. THAT is why I harp and nag about reading your Bible. I want you to have that armor and shield to protect you. I want you to be confident that whatever the world throws at you, you KNOW that God is with you, that God loves you, and that you know deeply what you believe. That is what the rest of your journey of faith is intended to help you with.

When this service is over today, I hope you’ll talk with your family about this stuff. I hope you’ll continue to think and ask questions. And I don’t mean softball questions. I mean HARD ones. The kind that your parents go “I don’t know - let’s ask Pastor Todd.” When you ask those questions, it helps all of us grow. Some of you have already done that. I’ve gotten more than one text from a parent going “HELP - I don’t know how to answer this!” Newsflash - that’s exactly how it’s supposed to go! Families talk about it together, and then come to me when you hit a rough spot. That’s the best kind of faith education.

If you look around, there are a few dozen people in here who are your grandparent’s age, and they went through Confirmation Class in this very same church. They studied the same Bible, and the same Small Catechism, and I can promise you, they’ve had some of the same questions you’ve had. Some of us adults STILL have those questions. We’re still working on our faith. We’re still growing. And Jesus is still calling us to walk a little bit closer to him every day. God will always want us to be a little closer to Him than we are now.

Right now, you know the Small Catechism better than many adult Lutherans in our denomination. It’s fresh for you. You have an expertise that is very useful and helpful. I encourage you to use it. Help your family to get back into it. Help them remember what Pastor Moebius taught them back in the day. Have discussions. Get them to ask you questions. And then just see how God blesses your household as you do.

As I’ve been up here this morning, I’ve been looking down at these teenagers…but I hope everyone here knows that everything I said to them really applies to all of us. That Small Catechism is an underutilized, powerful little book. You can read the whole thing in probably 15 minutes. But ultimately, Luther’s book does what he did very consistently: points us back to the Bible.

Our first Vision Point is to “Be a Great Commission Church”. Matthew 28 - make disciples of all nations, baptizing them…and teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you.” This is step #1 - making disciples in our own church family…disciples who are prepared and equipped to go out into the world and make disciples out there. This is how we get started.

So when I call these young women and men up front this morning to Affirm their Baptism, know that this is an Affirmation for all of us - their church family - and the part we’ve played in getting them here. We’re on this journey together, and we’ll affirm our faith together with them, too. I want us all to go out into the world today, having ALL affirmed our faith, and ready to face whatever the world throws our way. And let’s all take a moment to shake the hands of these Confirmands and express to them our joy and our pride in what they’ve accomplished with God’s help and guidance, and encourage them to continue their walk with Him.

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