He Found Me
Rev. Delwyn and Sis. Lenita Campbell
A New Day • Sermon • Submitted
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· 156 viewsWe reject and isolate because we are sinners. Jesus receives and unites because He is the Savior and Shepherd.
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4/19/2018
4/19/2018
INDIANAPOLIS – Today the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a federal district court’s ruling striking down House Enrolled Act 1337, which would have banned women from obtaining abortions based on their reason for seeking one.
Seventh Circuit Judge William J. Bauer wrote that these “provisions clearly violate this well-established Supreme Court precedent, and are therefore, unconstitutional.”
ACLU of Indiana Executive Director Jane Henegar made this statement: “In striking down this extreme abortion ban, the Court once again affirmed a woman’s fundamental right to make her own personal medical decisions. This ruling is a victory for women and another repudiation of attempts by Indiana politicians to restrict – and even ban – access to abortion care. Deeply personal decisions about abortion should be made by women in consultation with their doctors—not by politicians or government bureaucrats.”
House Enrolled Act 1337, signed into law by former Governor Mike Pence on March 24, 2016, would have imposed unprecedented restrictions on abortion. HEA 1337 barred a woman from getting an abortion based on her reason. Specifically, it would have prohibited abortions if the sole reason for the abortion is the fetus’s race, color, national origin, ancestry, sex or diagnosis of a statutorily-defined “disability” or “potential diagnosis” of a “disability.”
The case, Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky, et al., v. Commissioner, Indiana State Department of Health, Prosecutors of Marion, Lake, Monroe, and Tippecanoe Counties; Individual Members of the Medical Licensing Board of Indiana, Case No. 1:16-cv-00763-TWP-DML, was filed on Thurs. April 7, 2016 in the U.S. District Court, Southern District of Indiana, Indianapolis Division.
Lord God, bless Your Word wherever it is proclaimed. Make it a Word of power and peace to convert those not yet Your own and to confirm those who have come to saving faith. May Your Word pass from the ear to the heart, from the heart to the lip, and from the lip to the life that, as You have promised, Your Word may achieve the purpose for which You send it, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen
As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” Having said these things, he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man’s eyes with the mud and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). So he went and washed and came back seeing.
Dealing with Special Needs
Dealing with Special Needs
http://raisingtheextraordinary.com/isolation-special-needs-parenting/ is an article that talks about the challenges of being the parent of a Special Needs child. One of the worst aspects of it is that the problem develops in such a way that we don’t even notice it. The same things apply to those who are care-givers to the elderly. This is a portion of that article.
WHEN THE ISOLATION ESCALATES
WHEN THE ISOLATION ESCALATES
Then it happens. Our kids start getting older, but they’re not meeting milestones. Not only that, but the gap between our special needs child’s abilities and that of their peers grows. What was once a small dip we could easily step over has suddenly become as wide as the grand canyon.
Suddenly, we can’t do play dates. On the rare occasion we’re still invited for a play date we find ourselves facing hard choices. While other kids are now free to run and play, our child isn’t capable. For special needs moms, this means we have to choose. We stay with our child and help them participate with the other kids as much as possible; or, we sit and socialize with the other moms (making our child sit with us).
No one wins in this scenario. Either we as moms miss out on conversation with other moms, or our child misses out on being with her peers. This of course is happening at a time when these relationships are crucial to us. The worst part is, those on the outside of special needs parenting don’t see it.
The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight, until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight and asked them, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?” His parents answered, “We know that this is our son and that he was born blind. But how he now sees we do not know, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself.” (His parents said these things because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess Jesus to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue.) Therefore his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.”
As humans, we desire to be part of a community. Most of us prefer living in the city to living in an isolated piece of land reliant upon the work of our own hands to supply all of our needs and creature comforts. How many of you could build a house with your own hands, kill and butcher a deer, or grow and harvest a crop of fruit, grain and vegetables while maintaining a supply of milk cows and steers for breeding and food? I know that I can’t!
We need each other, and we want each other, unless the other person is a burden. Then we want to separate them from us, lest we somehow become “defiled.” Jesus, however, did not run from them; He comes to them - to us. He brings His healing virtue into our lives and we are healed, no longer subject to rejection because we are united by baptism into His death and resurrection, and sustained by His life giving Spirit through Word and Sacrament.
(ESV) says,
45 Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
Jesus Heals a Man Born Blind
We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
The world, that does not know Him, nor His voice, rejects this. It therefore rejects those who have been healed by Him, because the world despises the foolishness of preaching.
45 Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
9 As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. 2 And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3 Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. 4 We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work. 5 As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” 6 Having said these things, he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man’s eyes with the mud 7 and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). So he went and washed and came back seeing.
45 Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
So for the second time they called the man who had been blind and said to him, “Give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner.” He answered, “Whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.”
Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own, but they had everything in common. And with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.
We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.” They answered him, “You were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?” And they cast him out.
They cast him out for telling the truth as it is in Christ. They rejected the pure Gospel as presented by this man. They chose broken cisterns over the Fountain of Living Waters.
Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
We who once were fragmented by our selfishness, by our greed, by our pain, by our guilt, have been made whole through the blood of Christ. We are now one in Him.
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.
The Book of Concord Third
[9–10] How can water do such great things? Answer:
Clearly the water does not do it, but the Word of God, which is with and alongside the water, and faith, which trusts this Word of God in the water. For without the Word of God the water is plain water and not a baptism, but with the Word of God it is a baptism, that is, a grace-filled water of life and a “bath of the new birth in the Holy Spirit,” as St. Paul says to Titus in chapter 3[:5–8*], “through the bath of rebirth and renewal of the Holy Spirit, which he richly poured out over us through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that through that very grace we may be righteous and heirs in hope of eternal life. This is surely80 most certainly true.”
I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
There are no sub-saints, no second-class Christians. Unlike our Constitution, the Word of God declares that no one in the Kingdom of God is less equal, less holy, less beloved of the Father.
As indeed he says in Hosea, “Those who were not my people I will call ‘my people,’ and her who was not beloved I will call ‘beloved.’ ” “And in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’ ”
But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.
The Lord Jesus Christ, the same One who gave sight to a blind man, empowers His Church to speak His life-giving Word today. The same authority that empowered Peter in empowers us today. The Gospel is not weakened, nor are we inferior Christians. But do we believe that God is still watching over His Word to perform it? Are we willing to proclaim the pure Gospel to our neighbor? Are we willing to be ambassadors of the Kingdom through Witness - Mercy - Life Together?
The
The parents of that blind man were afraid, afraid of rejection, afraid of ridicule, afraid of being alone - so they stepped back. Some who were baptized into Christ have done the same, and the witness of the church has suffered because of that, but today is a brand new day. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, seeks for the sheep that get lost, and leads the sheep who do not.
Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience, again he appoints a certain day, “Today,” saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”
Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.
… and let the peace of God, that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.