A sermon preached by Pastor Lewis Polzin on November 15, 2020 at St. Peter–Immanuel Lutheran Church in Milwaukee, WI, on 1 Thessalonians. You may play the audio of the sermon here.
A mostly unedited transcript of the sermon follows the jump:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
The text this morning is from Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, the 5th chapter:
Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation. For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.
Thus far the text.
My dear friends in Christ,
The Thessalonians thought that they missed it, the day of the Lord. We find that out in Paul’s second letter to them. They were new Christians, a new congregation, and they had people coming to them and telling them that Jesus had come back and they were left behind. They grieved over that, thinking that, if they were left behind, what hope could there be for those already dead? Paul, here in his first letter, is writing to them saying have no fear, to not grieve the death of the saints without hope.
It must have been very comforting to them to hear this from the apostle. I mean, after all, if we're going to pick one apostle to say, This is THE apostle, it’s got to be Paul, right? For him to speak to them and say you haven't missed the day of the Lord’s coming, that he spoke with Jesus and you haven't missed it, must have been good news to them. He's still coming; be ready. But the Thessalonians still probably had a hard time. It's hard to shake that that false doctrine that's preached, that you're holding on to so tightly because, after all, they were looking for this day of the Lord and it was supposed to come soon. Ever since Jesus ascended into the heavens, all his disciples have expected him to come pretty immediately.
But it was not so. In fact, we know that even now Jesus has tarried almost 2,000 years. It's kind of sad in a way. We wish that he could come back any day now, but it is because of his mercy that he has not. Because he’s waited, you have been welcomed into the Church. Your children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren are also part of the Church. And if Jesus were to have come back, they would not be a part of it. So Jesus has tarried, even for you, that you may be a part of him forever.
The Thessalonians then were asking Paul, Well, if Jesus hasn't come back yet, how do we know that he's coming back at all? Paul answers this and John answers this, too, that Jesus is coming back any moment. Jesus himself actually gives us an answer that you'll hear wars and rumors of wars, that they'll be famines and plagues. What have we had here for the last nine months, but a plague? We should expect Jesus to come back anytime.
And so it is that, the day he ascended, truly, he could have come back any day. But thank God he has not, again, for he has brought you into his Church, but we are to look at the signs and the seasons and see that Jesus is coming back soon. After all, has not the world gotten darker? Has not the world become more sinful? When we look at the seasons and the times, just as Paul is telling the Thessalonians to do, do we not see that Jesus can come back at any moment?
The Church, truly, should expect Jesus by the minute. Instead, we get off track with that. Instead, we think that we're okay, that we're going to live our life, then that at least we can grow old and die. That’s the wrong thing. I’m not sure I would go so far to say is it's sinful but it certainly is not wise. When I was younger, I thought, Well, Jesus can come back after I get married. I should experience that att least, right? I can enjoy that for a while. Well, I got married and it's been almost 10 years and Jesus hasn’t come back.
When I was younger, I thought these things. As I've grown older now, especially that my kids are here, I keep asking Jesus to come back and to spare them all the pain and the suffering that I know is in store for them, not because President Biden is going to make it worse, not because President Trump is going to make it worse, not because the LGBTQ agenda is going to make it worse, not because there's some economic downturn coming, but because the world is just a horrible place to be. It’s full of suffering and pain and death. Would that Jesus come back and rescue my children, even me from that.What a wonderful thing that would be.
I've grown into that. It's taken a little bit of time and I'm still learning how to do that. I pray that you're learning also to ask Jesus come, right? In fact, when we pray at our table prayer we do it. What's the most common prayer that we pray as Lutherans? Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest… We're not asking Jesus to come and have a seat at the table. We're asking him to return, that this would even be our last meal, that Jesus would come back and rescue us.
The Thessalonians really wanted this to happen. They just thought that they had missed it. You can kind of anticipate some of the pain that comes in that, to think that you've missed Jesus’ return. Does that mean that you weren't worthy? Does that mean that you were found wanting? Does that mean that Jesus wants you to suffer just a little bit more and then he'll finally come back and rescue you? I think you can understand what they're going through here. But Paul is looking at this and he says, Look at the time, look at the seasons. You really have no reason for me to be writing to you about this. You know that things are getting worse. They are not getting better. If they’re getting worse, Jesus hasn’t returned. When Jesus returns, he will make all things new.
The times and seasons tell us that Jesus has not yet come back. Paul says they should be fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. After all, who expects a thief to break into their house? I remember there was one night, my wife and I were sleeping, and at three o'clock in the morning, in the middle of winter, our doorbell began to ring and ring and ring and ring and I thought surely there must be a malfunction in it, but I grabbed what I could to beat somebody back. I wasn’t prepared for someone to be there, but, bleary-eyed, I went to the door and I answered it and there was a person there and he was looking for some help to get his car out of a snow drift. Why he was ringing my bell at three o'clock in the morning, I don't know. I expected the worst before I opened that door because I never expected it at all.
And so it is that we do not expect the thief in the night. But Jesus tells us to be prepared for it, nonetheless. We rest in our security, don’t we? We lock the doors at night. We hop into our beds. We pull the sheets up over our heads and we fall asleep never expecting any danger or threat. We have become very comfortable in this way. I think back to Martin Luther, the reformer, and, truly, he had no expectation that, from one day to the next, he would wake up. After all there was a bounty on his head. People could kill him without any fear of the emperor and you never knew if someone would sneak into the Black Cloister, where he lived, and slit his throat in the middle of the night. And if it was not somebody from the emperor, he feared also what he called the Turk. We would call them Muslims today. They were banging at the doors of Vienna, literally at the gates of Vienna. And finally they had been turned away. But before that, they had marched across Europe and all Europeans, especially the Germans lived in fear, for their armies were engaged in other wars. They never knew if the Muslims would come in and kill them in their sleep. Nobody knew what to expect the next day.
We've grown a little too comfortable. I think we don't expect death to come for us. But nobody ever does. It's like a thief in the night. But Jesus, through Paul, is telling us expect the thief in the night, prepare for him. If you knew that a thief was coming to your house in the middle of the night, you might arm yourself or maybe you'll just call the police ahead of time to wait and they'll take care of it. You will be ready for when they come.
So it is that we should be ready for Jesus to return. Though we do not know the day or the hour, we know that he is coming. We should be so prepared. But people cry, here is peace, here is security. Don't we live in a time of a utopian dream? That we can somehow make the world better through love and peace and tolerance and acceptance? It sure seems like people are saying that all the time, right? They cry out for peace and unity through their version of love, but then all of a sudden, destruction will come upon them like a woman who goes into labor when she's pregnant.
I think many of you have probably experienced this, that you just never know when that day is coming Of course, when Paul's writing, this is before the days of C-sections, when you could schedule your delivery. This is before people knew when a baby really was conceived. You don't know when the baby will be born. People back then had a basic idea that it might be about 40 weeks. But who knows? After all, I came out late. My mom was very pregnant and probably very upset, but I came, and as little as she expected it, there was joy in that.
But destruction comes in this way. Destruction for the world. The world is in its birth pangs and yet never expected it and the world will be destroyed when Christ returns. For the world, there will be no joy. For the Christian, it’s joy everlasting.
The world looks at us and it looks at Jesus and doesn't know what to do with us. That's why they hate us so much, the Church, because we live in a world that is beyond this one. We live in a world that is to come. Though we don't see it yet, we know that that is our home. And the world looks at us and they say, Well, why not make this place the best place you can be? And I would say to that,Yeah, let's do that. Let's make this a wonderful place to live. And yet, as wonderful as we can make it, still death and destruction reign in this world.
You can build a beautiful building but you have no idea if it's ever going to fall down on you. I was at historic Trinity down in Milwaukee the other day. I was looking at its architecture and all the ways that these people who, in the 1800s, put this church together. Gorgeous. Just gorgeous. The woodwork alone was incredible. The fleur-de-lis that they have at the tops of their columns was so intricate. I mean, who does that today? But in the 1800s, they built it that way, and beauty was so important to them, and it's gorgeous and it lasted there for a hundred and seventy years almost. And then, just a couple years ago, it burned to the ground. The inside was gutted. Nobody expected that fire. I remember calling our circuit visitor and saying Trinity's on fire. We were all so upset by this because we don't expect the destruction. We could have been sitting there, enjoying its beauty, and if we had been in there, nobody would have known what to do. We would have been running around like ants who are fried with a magnifying glass.
So it is in the last day that the world will find itself surrounded by death and destruction because they are in the darkness. But you are not. Paul says you are of the light, you are children of the day. We are not of the night. We're not of Darkness. We are of the light. What a wonderful thing it is that Paul is telling us, that we belong to Christ, who is the light of the world, and, in him, we have been given small lights to light this world, to light the way to Christ. That light in us is faith. This is what we see with the parable of the talents. Their talents aren't the skills and abilities that they had. A talent was a way to count money. It’s how much the money weighed. It’d be like saying I gave the least of the servant 250 pounds of gold, and the most touted servant had over half a ton of gold. Money here stands for something other than a skill, a talent you have. And Jesus in this way is using that money to point us not to money ,not to material things but to faith, for our faith lights the way to Jesus Christ for this world. It's so because we are children of the light. We cannot help but burn with the light of Christ within us, that light that has been placed in there in our baptisms.
And so Paul says then if you are a child of the light, do not sleep.What's sleep mean in the New Testament? Death. Do not be dead. Paul says do not sleep for indeed you have died and have now been raised to new life in your baptism. Do not sleep, but stay awake and stay sober. Now whether Paul's really here talking about being sober from alcohol, I don't know. I think he's talking about having your wits about you, be wise as serpents and gentle as doves as you deal with this world, not in death, but in life. Be awake, be ready, do not pass out on the things of this world, but look at the light of Christ who is coming. Wear for yourselves that breastplate of faith and love, wear for yourself a helmet which is the hope of salvation. The slings and arrows of this world will attack you, but with faith and hope and love built onto you by Christ, what chance do they have of striking a wealth blow? They have none, they will indeed find no purchase for you. You, my friends, you will be protected.
Even should you fall asleep in this world while staying awake, even though you might die before Jesus comes back, Christ has given you life. Our Lord has not destined us for wrath, but he has destined us to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Jesus is coming to save you. Even as we look now in these dark times toward the advent of his coming, towards his revelation in this world, as we look forward to him returning that second time, we look to our Jesus who came the first time in our flesh to bear our sins and to be our savior, to die for you that you may be forgiven of all your sins and you may inherit eternal life. Jesus, he is the one that you should love more than anything in this world, and, for him, you should be willing to do whatever it is that he asks, which is to bear up in faith and hope and love, to stay awake, to stay sober, to look for the day of his coming, to encourage one another to that end.
Have you thought about that? We do need to encourage one another and build each other up. When was the last time you looked at someone and said, Have no fear, the Lord will redeem this when he returns. If you have not said it lately, build one another up in this. This is our Lord's command, that we focus each other on the day of his coming. That's what we do here. That's why we gather together in this place to look forward to his day, to show that he is coming back, and to be prepared to be awake, to be sober. We hear his word, we receive his absolution, we receive his body and blood for the strengthening of faith unto life everlasting, we remember our baptisms, in which we receive that life, that promise that is coming to us. This is why we gather, to lift one another up together with our voices, with our prayers, with our thanksgiving, with our praise to God. We do not praise each other. We build one another up.
And if we are building one another up, then we know we are not yet complete. We are not yet as he is. We are not yet perfect and, my friends, if we are not yet perfect, then we still have hope because our Lord Jesus has not yet returned. He has not left you behind. We still have the opportunity to keep turning away from our sin and to turn into repentance and the forgiveness of sins. We still have the opportunity to preach to the world the hope that we have in Jesus Christ, even if our lives may be required of us. That is our mission in this world, that people come into this place to hear the good news of salvation, just as we hear that good news. It is for you, my friends, and that is why we preach it every week, every time we gather in season and out of season. Paul says we gather together that we may look to Christ. So turn your eyes to him this day and see the hope of your salvation coming. Truly he is coming soon. Come ,Lord Jesus. In his name, amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord! Amen.
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