Christ is For You
Funeral: Frances Eldridge McDowell • Sermon • Submitted
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1000 Illustrations for Preaching & Teaching Don’t Forget God!
Don’t Forget God!
In Stay of Execution, Stewart Alsop discussed what it was like to live with incurable leukemia. The disease was temporarily arrested. During this time, the not-too-active Episcopalian and noted journalist discussed a number of variables with his physician. Finally Alsop said, “There is one variable you keep leaving out.”
“What’s that?”
“God,” he said.
The doctor and patient smiled. Alsop continued, “I don’t really believe in God, or at least I don’t think I do, and I doubt if my doctor does; but I think we both had in the back of our minds the irrational notion that God might have something to do with what happened all the same.”
(his book, Stay of Execution, )
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.
I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
There are, basically, two ways to live this life: in Christ, or apart from Christ. According to Scripture, most people will do the latter. They will have various reason why this is the case - a crisis that seemed unjust, being busy with the cares of life, no one around them who cared enough to tell them that Christ is for them. In truth, those reasons and myriads more coalesce around one reason: They didn’t hear the pure Gospel in faith. They had ears to hear, for God created them with them, They had the possibility of believing, for as it is written:
The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
In fact, God is so patient with us that He brings us into contact with His children in order that through them we might have opportunities to hear His Good News for us. He places us in families, gives us friends, classmates, neighbors and coworkers, not all of whom are Christians, but He never leaves Himself without a witness.
Frances was one of those people. She had been united to Christ in Holy Baptism, confirmed in the faith, and redeemed the time as the Lord gave her opportunity. She heard the exceeding great an precious promise that God so loved her that He gave His only Son to die for her sins, and for yours as well. She rested in His promises even as she worked to show you the love that God had poured out in her heart by the Holy Spirit who was given to her in Baptism as God brought her to the new birth of water and of the Spirit.
The Lord Jesus showed Himself faithful, giving to her the peace that passes all understanding, which she shared with those whom the Lord blessed to bring into her life. Now, before someone out there says, “Wait a minute, She was ok, but she wasn’t perfect” - in fact, that is why God would work through her, so that He would get the glory.
A lot of people misunderstand what God does through Law and Gospel. They labor under the impression that the Law was God’s plan “A,” and the Gospel was His Plan “B.” That isn’t how it works at all. God’s Word - Law and Gospel - is the plan. It’s the only plan that God ever uses, ever had, and will ever need.
The Law of God tells us how God designed His creation to operate. The Gospel of Christ tells us how God overcame the weakness of human flesh by bringing that experience into His eternal existence. the Law tells you that God is just and good, and the Gospel tells you that He is merciful and gracious. The Law shows you how to love, while the Gospel shows you that you can recover from your missteps that occur along the way, because God has more forgiveness than you have failures.
Those of us who, like Frances, believe the Gospel, learn that loving your neighbor is what enables us for live in harmony, but when we get things wrong, the Gospel tells us that there is a way to get back up again - repent and trust God.
I know - it sounds too good to be true - but it’s real. It’s the truth that the Church has shared for over 2000 years, since that first Pentecost day. It’s the message that has been handed down from generation to generation.
And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.
Sometimes people get things a little twisted, but God is greater. Sometimes we don’t live the life we sing about in our song, but God is greater. Sometimes we even do the opposite of what we have learned, but God is greater. He still works through His Word, His sacramental gifts, and through our prayers.The Church has endured good and bad, times easy and hard. The Gospel has always been, and always will be, what Paul says about it in
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”
Not the so-called “faith” that you stir up through grit and determination, or that you use that hangs on nothing but your wish that things were the way you’d like them to be. No, I’m talking about the faith that Frances received in Holy Baptism, the faith that got nurtured as she heard God’s promise declared in the Small Catechism as she learned the Apostles’ Creed and the Lord’s Prayer, that she learned about in every preaching of the pure Gospel from pastors who were called to deliver the Gospel and administer the Lord’s Body and Blood in the Lord’s Supper, and she heard again the words, “This is My Body, which is given for you,” and “This cup is the New Covenant in My Blood, poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”
It’s a mystery,
the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints. To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
but it isn’t magic. God isn’t doing parlor tricks, but He is watching over His word to perform it. He isn’t making you obey Him against your will, but He is working in you, both to will and to do for His good pleasure as you hide His Word in your heart. It’s impossible for you to do it on your own, but, as Paul wrote in Phi 4:13, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
A few days ago, Our Father invited His daughter to come home. Today, He invites you to cling to Him in faith, to trust in His exceeding great and precious promise of eternal life that enables you to escape the corruption that is in the world through selfish desires.
Jesus came that we might have life, and that abundantly. When He said that, He offered us two contrasting lifestyles. The devil offers a lifestyle that promises to cater to your every whim, and he even shows you some of his best clients. But whether you get those nice shiny toys or they always seem just out of reach, the day will come when you must leave them behind.
Jesus offers something totally different: He offers LIFE: a spirit-filled joy that transcends circumstances in time and is yours throughout eternity. He offers communion - a connection that spans borders, crosses generations, and connects Heaven and earth.
Frances has received her inheritance, and you can become a partaker in it too, For Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever. His love covered her sins, and they cover yours.
He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.
Healed from doubt, healed from the fear of death, healed from the need to be better than someone else. Jesus offers you the Way that can’t be found in fame or fortune:
I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
It’s a gift that no one but God can offer, and it is found in Him.
You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.
So let the peace of God, that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds, through Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
