Category: Epiphany 2

Jesus, the Bridegroom, the Example of Manliness

1/22/2025

Epiphany 2
John 2:1-11; Ephesians 5:22-33
Pastor James Preus
Trinity Lutheran Church
January 19, 2025
“This, the first of His signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested His glory. And His disciples believed in Him.” His disciples believed in Him. What did His disciples believe? They believed that Jesus is the heavenly Bridegroom. When the master of the feast tasted the water, which had become wine, he called the bridegroom to tell him how good the wine was. Why did he call the bridegroom? Because the bridegroom is responsible for providing the wine for the wedding banquet. By providing the wine for this wedding, Jesus behaved as the bridegroom, and He foreshadowed how He would provide for His own wedding banquet.
Scripture is quite clear that Jesus is the heavenly Bridegroom. In the next chapter, John the Baptist speaks of Jesus when he says, “The one who has the bride is the Bridegroom. The friend of the Bridegroom, who stands and hears Him, rejoices greatly at the Bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease.” (John 3:29-30) And Jesus calls Himself the Bridegroom when John’s disciples asked Him why His disciples did not fast like the disciples of John and the Pharisees did, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them?” (Matthew 9:16) The Old Testament also prophesied that God Himself would come as the Bridegroom of His Church. God spoke to His Church through the prophet Hosea, “And I will betroth you to Me forever. I will betroth you to Me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy.” (Hosea 2:19)
So, Christ’s manifestation of being the heavenly Bridegroom is no small thing! It means that He is our God. He is our Savior from heaven. But what does the heavenly Bridegroom do? From our Epistle lesson from Ephesians 5 and from our Gospel lesson in John 2, I want to tell you two things that Christ does as the heavenly Bridegroom.
First, St. Paul writes in Ephesians 5, “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her.” The first thing the heavenly Bridegroom does is give His life for the Church. That is the type of love that Christ has for His bride, self-sacrificial love. Jesus tells His disciples in John 15, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” Christ demonstrates the greatest love by laying down His life for His bride. His bride is the Holy Christian Church. And you are a member of that bride if you have been joined to His washing of water and the word and have faith in Him.
St. Paul tells us that Christ laid down His life for His bride to cleanse her from sin. At the wedding in Cana, there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification. These stone water jars represented the Law, because the Law can only govern your outward actions, but the Law cannot change your heart. So, you can wash yourself on the outside, you can try to obey the commandments, but that will not make you clean on the inside. By turning the water into wine, Jesus shows how He fulfills the Law for us and makes us clean on the inside. He doesn’t simply wash us outwardly, but He cleanses our very hearts through faith. As wine is made through crushing grapes, so Jesus made atonement for our sins by suffering violence. Having paid for our sins with His blood, He offers us true cleansing on the inside and out, which the Law could never give us on account of our sins.
And this leads us to the second thing the heavenly Bridegroom does. He provides good wine for His wedding banquet. Earthly wine is a gift from God. While it can certainly be abused, and Scripture warns that drunkards will not inherit the kingdom of heaven (1 Corinthians 6:10), it is not a sin to drink wine. Scripture says that God caused the plants to grow to make “wine to gladden the heart of man.” (Psalm 104:15) Yet, the benefits of earthly wine are very limited and short-lived. But our heavenly Bridegroom gives us heavenly wine which is infinitely better, the benefits of which last eternally. While earthly wine may make you glad for a moment, this heavenly wine gives joy even in the midst of sadness, and it doesn’t make you groggy or hungover in the morning. While earthly wine gives you the delusion that you are strong, this heavenly wine gives your heart strength to battle Satan and this world and be victorious.
The heavenly wine our heavenly Bridegroom gives us is the Gospel, which offers free forgiveness of sins and eternal life to all who drink it. As wine is produced by the crushing of grapes, so this heavenly wine was produced by the Lord crushing Christ and putting Him to grief (Isaiah 53:10). We drink of this wine when we listen to the good message that God loves us, so that He has forgiven us for the sake of Christ, who made atonement for our sins on the cross. We drink this wine when we sing hymns and chant Psalms, which articulate God’s love and mercy for us in Christ. And we especially drink this heavenly wine when we eat and drink the very body and blood of Christ, which He provides for us in the Sacrament of the Altar. The water Jesus turned into wine amounted to between 640 and 960 bottles of wine. Certainly, that was more than the guests could possibly drink. And so, in Christ’s Church, which is the heavenly Bridegroom’s wedding banquet on earth, He supplies an inexhaustible supply of wine. As often as you repent of your sins and come to receive forgiveness, Christ has forgiveness for you. His blood will never run dry from His Sacrament, but He has an infinite source of strength, comfort, and pardon. This is what our heavenly Bridegroom does. He sacrifices Himself for His bride. And He provides her with the wine of gladness, that is, everything she will ever need.
Yet, Christ as our heavenly Bridegroom is not only our Redeemer and Savior. He is also our example. And while He is certainly the example for every Christian, as St. Peter writes in his first Epistle, “For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in His steps.” (1 Peter 2:21), as a Bridegroom Christ is also an example to men. It is most important to remember Christ’s humanity by which He redeemed humanity, both men and women. Yet, it is still important to remember that Christ is a male, and so, He serves as an example to men. As pious Christian women look to Sarah as an example of a good wife, to Hannah as an example of a good mother, and to Ruth as an example of a good daughter-in-law, so pious Christian men should look to the saintly men in the Bible as their examples. And there is no better example of Christian manliness than Christ Jesus. Christ is a better son than Isaac, a better brother than Joseph, a better warrior than David, a better father than Abraham, and a better husband than Boaz. Christ teaches men how to be men. I believe a major reason so many men are missing from the church is because we have forgotten that.
By being the heavenly Bridegroom, Christ teaches men to be men. The world does a terrible job teaching what manliness is. It has spent much of the past century trying to convince us that there is no difference between men and women. And when the world does speak of manliness it often does it in either a superficial or degenerate way. But being manly does not mean to go fishing, hunting, to watch sports, to work with wood or on cars, or drink beer. Being manly certainly does not mean to look at pornography or sleep around or pay for an abortion to avoid your responsibility. Being manly isn’t about making lots of money or belittling other people. Being manly, as Jesus teaches men to be, involves self-sacrifice. That’s what makes a manly man. Self-sacrifice.
In the Old Testament, it was the firstborn sons who were called holy to the Lord and required a redemption price (Exodus 13:13; Num. 18:15-16). And the Lord required all the males of Israel to gather three times a year to make sacrifices to the Lord (Deut. 16:16-17). Thus, the Old Testament established that God calls men to live lives of self-sacrifice. Jesus teaches men to sacrifice themselves for their brides, for their children, for their family in Christ. This self-sacrifice is the activity of love. The love Jesus teaches men to do is not self-serving lust, not infatuation. It is looking to the interests of others before their own.
Scripture tells women to submit to their husbands (Eph. 5:22), even to obey them (1 Peter 3). Most women today scoff at this instruction. But their incredulity does not come from a reverence for Christ, but from their sinful flesh, as God spoke to Eve in Genesis 3, “Your desire shall be against your husband, but he shall rule over you;” (vs. 16) and from the manipulation of Satan, who first stuck a wedge between man and wife; and from the wicked world, which in the last century has brought us increased fornication, divorce, children born outside of wedlock, abortion, same-sex so-called marriage, transgenderism, and general unhappiness by insisting that men and women have identical roles in marriage instead of the unique roles God designed for them.
Yet, Scripture teaches that a woman should submit to her husband as to the Lord and that a man sacrifice himself for his wife. So, when a woman submits to her husband, she is submitting to his self-sacrificial love. She is trusting that his decisions are done out of love for her and for her children’s best interest in mind. Now consider, a woman doesn’t scoff at the fact that she must submit to and obey her boss at work. If she doesn’t, she’ll get fired. But her boss doesn’t make his decisions out of love for his employee, but for the profitability of the company. And if the employee ceases to be profitable, he is expected to end her employment. Yet, our godless world teaches girls and women to submit to such a boss, and work hard to prove she is profitable, but to resent the very notion of submitting to her husband, whom God has commanded to sacrifice his very flesh for her wellbeing, to not consider her profitability at all, but to love and care for her in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, till death parts them, indeed, to care for her as for his own body.
So, women and girls, don’t learn from the world how to be women and wives, but learn from Holy Scripture. And men and boys, don’t learn from the world how to be men, but learn from Christ, the perfect man. Sacrifice yourselves for your wives, for your children, and not simply for their physical care, but especially for their spiritual care. Step between them and Satan’s arrows by bringing God’s Word and prayer into your home and leading your family in it, and by taking them to church, by making decisions for your family with their eternal salvation in mind. Be the spiritual heads of your homes which God has called you to be. That is what a bridegroom is!
And as Christ provides good wine to bless His wedding banquet, so manly Christian men provide good wine for their wedding celebration. People make too much of wedding receptions. They aren’t very important. The marriage is what’s important. It’s not so important what type of wine you have at your wedding reception, but rather that you continue to drink the wine of gladness at the family dinner table and throughout your marriage. That wine of gladness is the Gospel. Scripture says, “Fathers, do not exasperate your children, but bring them up in the fear and instruction of the Lord.” (Eph. 6:4) And so, husbands and dads, not only ought you sacrifice yourself for your wife and children, but you should make sure that the cheering wine of the Gospel is always provided in your home. You do this by forgiving your children when they do wrong and encouraging reconciliation among them, by being gentle to your wife, forgiving her, and repenting to her when you do wrong. Let Christ’s Gospel dwell richly in your home, so that it is your constant drink. Let your home be a constant wedding banquet for the Lord, where the finest heavenly wine is always drunk.
Men, Christ Jesus is your example of manliness. He is the Bridegroom after all. Yet, He is first and foremost your Bridegroom, that is, your Savior, who gave His life for you and provides you with the wine of gladness and salvation. Being a man is rough. In fact, most men are bad at it. They avoid sacrificing themselves for the good of their family, and instead think their family exists to serve them. Or they major in the minors and minor in the majors thinking that the temporary things of this world are more important than the eternal wedding banquet for which they ought to prepare their family to enter. This is why manliness has been redefined by very unmanly and ungodly people. In the end, there is only one good heavenly Bridegroom. That is Jesus Christ. He came to make up for your failures and to provide what you fail to provide. He can’t be your example unless He is first your Bridegroom, your Savior, and you are a member of His bride, the Church. Receive from Christ the wine of the Gospel, so that you may be strengthened to follow His example. Amen.

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Christ's Marital Union

1/14/2024

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Audio of Bible Lessons and Sermon.

Epiphany 2
John 2:1-11
Pastor James Preus
Trinity Lutheran Church
January 14, 2024

The overarching theme of Christmas, obviously, is the incarnation of Christ, that God became a man in human flesh. Epiphany means manifestation, that is, that Christ shows Himself to us. Our Gospel lesson concludes, “And He manifested His glory and His disciples believed in Him.” The purpose of Christ’s Epiphany is so that we will believe in Him. So, the overarching theme of the Epiphany season is faith.
What is faith? Faith is the marital union of the Church (the Bride) to her Bridegroom, Christ Jesus. Through faith the Church is united to her Husband. And through faith we are joined to Christ our Head. This is the meaning of Jesus turning water into wine at a wedding. Why is it this miracle that caused His disciples to believe in Him? Because this miracle manifested Christ’s love, kindness, generosity, and mercy.
Faith comes from hearing the Gospel, not the Law. The Law demands, but what it demands is never accomplished. The Law threatens, but its threats never succeed in producing the desired result. There were six stone water jars there for the Jewish rite of purification. Stone symbolizes the Law, which was inscribed in stone. Six represents incompleteness. Seven is complete. Seven is perfect. Six is incomplete and never reaches perfection. Through the Law, we never reach perfection. Through the Law’s commands, we are always missing what we need to be whole.
So, Christ cannot make us His bride through the Law. The Law only exposes our sins, our wrinkles, spots, and blemishes, that we are an unfit bride. The Law only tells us to become what we cannot make ourselves: a holy bride for a holy Bridegroom. So, Christ must come down to make us His bride. He must lavish His love upon us, so that we may believe in Him.
This is how St. Paul tells us that Christ made the Church His bride, when He instructed husbands on their conduct with their wives, “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her, that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that He might present the church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.” And so, we learn that in Baptism, Christ makes you a member of His bride the Church. Baptism is Gospel. It is Christ’s work of cleansing you of your sin through water and the Word, and its benefits are received through faith alone.
Participating in the Lord’s Supper is participating in the Marital Union between Christ and His Church; it is a foretaste of the wedding banquet in heaven. The Sacrament of the Altar is an exclusive meal meant only for the Bride of Christ, that is, for the baptized, who are united to Christ through faith. Martin Luther wrote a preface to his Small Catechism (which is part of our Lutheran Confessions), where he instructs pastors on how to teach the Catechism. In it, he points out that the people had been abusing the freedom they had received in the Lutheran Reformation from the laws of the papacy by keeping themselves from the Lord’s Supper. Yet, instead of laying down a new law, Luther instructs pastors to encourage the people to receive the Sacrament willingly through faith by warning of the dangers against their souls and their great need to receive the Sacrament and by proclaiming the benefits of receiving the Lord’s Supper. Luther writes:
Last, since the tyranny of the pope has been abolished, people are no longer willing to go to the Sacrament, and thus they despise it. Here again encouragement is necessary, yet with this understanding: We are to force no one to believe or to receive the Sacrament. Nor should we set up any law, time, or place for it. Instead, preach in such a way that by their own will, without our law, they will urge themselves and, as it were, compel us pastors to administer the Sacrament. This is done by telling them, “When someone does not seek or desire the Sacrament at least four times a year, it is to be feared that he despises the Sacrament and is not a Christian, just as a person is not a Christian who does not believe or hear the Gospel.” For Christ did not say, “Leave this out, or, despise this,” but, “Do this, as often as you drink it” [1 Corinthians 11:25], and other such words. Truly, He wants it done, and not entirely neglected and despised. “Do this.” He says.
Now, whoever does not highly value the Sacrament shows that he has no sin, no flesh, no devil, no world, no death, no danger, no hell. In other words, he does not believe any such things, although he is in them up over his head and his ears and is doubly the devil’s own. On the other hand, he needs no grace, no life, no paradise, no heaven, no Christ, no God, nor anything good. For if he believed that he had so much evil around him, and needed so much that is good, he would not neglect the Sacrament, by which such evil is remedied and so much good is bestowed. Nor would it be necessary to force him to go to the Sacrament by any law. He would come running and racing of his own will, would force himself, and beg that you must give him the Sacrament.
Therefore, you must not make any law about this, as the pope does. Only set forth clearly the benefit and harm, the need and use, the danger and blessing, connected with this Sacrament. (Preface of Dr. Martin Luther: Enchiridion: The Small Catechism)
The Sacrament of the Altar can only be received worthily through faith. And so, it is only faith that can draw a person to worthily receive it. The Sacrament of the Altar is a blessing of the Marital Union between Christ and His Church, so it must be received willingly through faith. So, Martin Luther instructs pastors to convince people of three things. First, they are in great danger of the devil, the world, and their sinful flesh, which seek to drive them to death and hell. Apart from Christ, we are under the control of Satan, filthy in our own sins, wrinkled, spotted, and blemished, and doomed to death and hell.
Second, that in the Sacrament Christ offers deliverance from Satan, the world, and our sinful flesh. This Meal is not something we must do to make ourselves holy. Rather, in this Supper, we receive what Christ has prepared for us. Jesus turned water into wine quite remarkably, instantaneously. And so, he does in the Supper by turning wine into His blood and bread into His body. Yet, we must not forget the labor Christ did to prepare this Meal for us. As wine is produced through violence done to grapes, so the wine of this Supper was produced by violence done to our Lord Jesus, his blood being pressed out of His body and his body being baked on the cross like bread. The body given for you in the Supper was nailed to the cross for your sins. The blood shed for you in the Supper once poured out of Jesus’ wounds. By His stripes, we are healed. We like sheep went astray, but the Lord laid on Him our iniquities. No, this Meal is not at all about our works, neither is it a simple memorial meal. This meal is prepared for us at the great labor of our Lord, who laid down His life for His Bride. And so, we know participating in this Meal grants us deliverance of all the things Christ strove with on the cross: our sin, our flesh, our Satan.
Third, refusing this Meal is refusing Christ. If you had faith in Christ, you would urge yourself to be with Him. It is to be feared that if you continue to keep yourself from this Meal that you despise this Meal and do not have faith in the One who has prepared it. That is the most terrifying thing a Christian can hear.
These three points emphasize that the Lord’s Supper is Gospel. It is a means by which Christ comes to us in His grace and mercy. He comes to us as a beloved Bridegroom to His Bride. And the Bride, if she is the Bride, hastens to meet Him! This is the message Jesus conveys by turning water into wine at a wedding as His first miracle. He comes as a loving Bridegroom to bless us. Only His love can produce faith in our hearts. And only faith can unite us to Him.
Jesus loves marriage. His union with His Church is the apotheosis of marriage. Apotheosis means the most divine example. As Christ enjoys eternal companionship and chastity with His bride and their union produces many children of God, so God blesses marriage with lifelong companionship, chastity, and children. Yet our earthly marriages are not as perfect as Jesus’ union with His Church. As God told Eve when He cursed her and all women after her for her part in the fall into sin, women will resist submission to their husbands. And as God told Adam when He cursed him and all men after him for his part in man’s fall, men will toil under the sun to provide for themselves and their families. While children remain a blessing, they come at the cost of great pain for the woman and toil for the man.
Yet, why does a wife find it so difficult to submit to her husband as Scripture teaches? Is it not because she lacks faith that her husband will look out for her best interest? And why does a husband find it difficult to lay down his life for his bride as Scripture teaches? Is it not because he lacks faith that his sacrifice will be worth it? And why do couples now think that the blessing of children is not a blessing, but an expensive curse that should be limited, so that they can secure other earthly treasures? Is it not that they lack faith that God will provide for His children both now and in eternity? But Scripture does not teach that a wife submits to her husband, because she has faith in her husband. But rather, she submits to her husband, because she has faith in Christ. And a husband knows his sacrifice for his wife is worth it, because Christ’s sacrifice on the cross secures the reward of every cross he bears for Christ’s sake. And people drink wine at weddings to celebrate the future blessings they pray God will bestow on the couple, especially children, so Christians should pray for children in their marriages just as they pray that Christ’s Church would grow with more children of God.
Faith is the uniting of the Church to her Bridegroom, Christ. She is united to Him when she trusts in His goodness. And so, faith can be created in no other way than through the promises of God’s grace, to forgive, strengthen, and save, for Christ’s sake. May we hasten as a bride to meet Christ in His grace and mercy, so that our union to Him will grow ever stronger. Amen.

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The Joy of the Gospel

1/18/2022

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Wedding at Cana, James Tissot, 1886-94. Public Domain.

Epiphany 2
John 2:1-11
Pastor James Preus

Trinity Lutheran Church
January 16, 2022

St. John tells us that there were six stone water jars at this wedding for the Jewish rites of purification. These six stone water jars are a symbol of the Law. They are made of stone. God gave the Ten Commandments to Moses on tablets of stone. Stone has no feeling, no emotion. The commandments of the Law are cold and calculated. They tell you what to do and what not to do. They do not ask you what you feel about it. They don’t care if you find them difficult.

These stone water jars held water for the Jewish rites of purification. This shows that the Law can only affect the outside, but it can do nothing to improve the inside. The Commandments can tell your hands and feet what to do, your tongue, eyes, and ears. The commandments can even tell your heart how to be, but it cannot change your heart. Like water used for ceremonial washing, it touches only the outside skin, but never purifies the heart within.

And there are six stone water jars. The Lord said in the Law, “Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work.” (Exodus 20:9-10a) Sabbath means rest. But there are only six stone jars. There is no seventh. That is because there is no true Sabbath rest under the Law. The Law gives you no rest. It commands you to do, but it never rewards you for having done, because you cannot fulfill what the Law commands. These six stone water jars are a symbol of the six days of labor. Yet, since there is no Sabbath, these six days roll into the next in an endless cycle of incomplete, imperfect work that never accomplishes what it is intended to accomplish.

And these six stone jars are at a wedding feast. And this shows that marriage too is under the Law. It has to be. The Law was added because of sin (Galatians 3:19). Sin is the destruction of what is good. God made marriage good in the Garden of Eden. Sin ruined marriage. So, the Law is added to marriage to keep it in tact, lest it be completely destroyed. So, these six stone jars sit at this wedding as a reminder that the Law must govern marriage as well.

“First comes love, then comes marriage”, so says the children’s rhyme. Yet, wisdom tells us that love alone cannot hold a marriage together, if love is interpreted as a mere emotion. Love as an emotion is fickle and quickly gives way to hate. If what is holding your relationship together is simply a good feeling, well that relationship will soon fall apart when feelings change. And because we are sinners, feelings do change, and for the worse! Sinners don’t think about others, but about themselves and what they want. But that cannot hold a marriage together.

So, the Law must govern marriage with dos and do-nots. And because we are so inclined to sin, rules are added on to the rules God has made. If you want a list of rules on how to keep your marriage in tact you can find plenty of used books for sale, books filled with dos and don’ts for a successful marriage. This is always how the Law works. Even those six stone water jars were not commanded by God, but were invented by men as an additional rule to keep people in line. Yet, if God’s own commands are ineffective in changing our hearts so that we truly love and desire to do what is right, our man-made rules certainly fail. In fact, they often have the opposite effect than what is desired.

And so, sinners despise the Law. They don’t like being told not to do what they want to do. So, they try to reform the Law to be easier to keep. This is no truer than with marriage. God has given us good commandments concerning marriage. Scripture gives three purposes to marriage: 1. Life long companionship; 2. Chastity; and 3. Children. And the rules God gives seek to protect these purposes for marriage. Yet, people are dissatisfied with these rules. They’re hard to keep. So, they try to change them.

Christ said of marriage, “What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.” (Matthew 19:6) This rule was so strict, it even caused his own disciples to say, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.” (vs 10) And because many find it too hard, they have changed the rule. What God has joined together many have separated without biblical grounds. Calling divorce a sin is considered archaic. Jesus must have been naïve when he preached against divorce. He set an unrealistic standard. And so, Jesus’ standard is dismissed. God’s first purpose of marriage, companionship is rejected.

Most people no longer consider sex outside of marriage a sin. It’s the norm now. Only a prude would make a big deal of it. Of course, to maintain this norm millions of babies have been sacrificed at the altar of sexual freedom. Many more have been deprived a stable home with a mother and father. Millions of young women and men have suffered incredible heartbreak on account of this foolhardy sexual reform, but no one will admit the mistake. The next generation is already being indoctrinated into the new sexual orthodoxy by countless media. Jesus’ warning to keep even your eyes free from adultery has been ignored. And so, countless hearts and souls have been stolen not only from spouses but from God in this age of readily available obscene material. But, because many find it difficult to resist temptation, they simply deny that such lusts are a sin. God’s second purpose for marriage, chastity, is also rejected.

Finally, people despise children. They don’t think they do. They just value other things much more. But God doesn’t. Children are rejected, because people fear that they won’t be able to have all the other things they want. God must not have been serious when he said, “Be fruitful and multiply.” People do not trust that God will actually feed every mouth he creates and provide for their little ones. And so, instead of letting God’s Law transform their view of marriage, people change the Law to fit their own views.

People hate the Law, so they change the rules. They hate those stone jars, so they want to destroy them. This is called antinomianism. Antinomianism means to be opposed to the Law.

Yet, Jesus comes and turns the water into wine. He has the servants fill the water to the top. He does not destroy the six stone jars. Jesus comes to fulfill the Law, not to abolish it. Now, the contents of the jars are not useless water for ceremonial cleansing, which never actually clean the inside or change the heart. Now the jars are filled with wine.

The wine is a symbol of the Gospel. The Gospel changes your heart as wine works on the inside to gladden the heart of man (Psalm 104:15). The Gospel doesn’t just pour over your body. It isn’t like cold hard stone. It is lively. It reaches inside of you and changes your heart, so that you feel and think differently.

The Gospel does not make you hate the Law. The Gospel does not make you resent the rules God has given you or turn you into an antinomian. No, the Gospel gives you an affection toward the righteousness of the Law, because Christ has fulfilled it perfectly. The Gospel creates an affection for Christ and his work of righteousness.

The Gospel is the good news that Jesus, true God and true man, has fulfilled the Law in your place and died for all your sins against the Law, so that you are forgiven and saved through faith alone. So, one who believes in the forgiveness of sins, does not hate the Law, even though the Law formerly condemned him. No, the one who believes the Gospel rejoices in the righteousness of the Law, because Christ has fulfilled it in love. Not a mere emotional love, but a love that is made known in action; a love, which causes the lover to sacrifice himself and to suffer for others.

Jesus loved the Lord God with all his heart, soul, strength and mind. You do not resent that the Law commands that of you, because Christ Jesus has fulfilled it perfectly and gives his obedience to you as a gift. You do not resent that the Law commands that you love your neighbor as yourself, because Jesus has perfectly loved the world, even his enemies who murdered him. You rejoice that God’s Law commands such great love, because Jesus has fulfilled it perfectly and gives you the credit to be received through faith.

And so too, you do not resent God’s Law, which governs marriage, even though you often find the rules too difficult. Jesus has perfectly kept God’s Law concerning marriage, and anyone who believes the Gospel sees that this is very good! St. Paul compares marriage to Jesus’ relationship with his Church. Wives are to submit to their husbands as to the Lord and husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her. The teaching that wives should submit to their husbands is another rule of the Law, which has been rejected. People don’t like the rule, so they change it. But St. Paul shows us how we should not hate this rule or reject it, but rejoice in it.

The Church is Jesus’ bride. He is faithful to her. He will never divorce her. Rather he forgives all her sins. He baptizes her and presents her holy and without blemish. He provides for her all that she needs. And the Church willingly submits to Christ. It is not a burden to her. Submitting to Christ means that she submits to his love, forgiveness, and faithfulness. It means that she trusts in him for every good thing and is not disappointed. And so, Christian wives too should not resent submitting to their husbands, because this is pleasing to Christ. By submitting to her husband, a wife submits to her Lord Jesus, who bought her with his own blood, forgives her, and will always provide for her.

Likewise, Christian husbands should not resent the command to lay down their lives out of love for their wives. By loving his wife, caring and providing for her and forgiving her, a husband confesses what Christ Jesus has done for him and his whole Church. And neither husband or wife should resent these standards, because they fail to keep them. Rather they should rejoice that Jesus has perfected them. No husband will love his wife perfectly as Christ loved the Church, but through faith both husband and wife receive that perfect love. And this perfect love of Christ not only secures eternal salvation to husband and wife and all who believe, but it also preserves and strengthens marriage. Emotional love can’t keep marriage together. Rules and regulations build a fragile veneer. But faith in the love of Christ produces an active love that considers the needs of the other above its own. When husband and wife are willing to repent to each other and to forgive each other as Christ has forgiven them, their marriage is secure.

When Jesus turned water into wine, he saved the wedding. He didn’t cause the problem, but he certainly solved the problem. Jesus fixes what he does not break. He pays for sins he did not commit. And so, we find in Jesus, forgiveness of all our sins. In Jesus’ Gospel, we find the Law we have failed to keep, perfectly fulfilled, so that it no longer condemns us. In the Gospel we have a drink that will never run out, but will gladden our hearts forever. Amen.

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God’s Glory Is Revealed in Love

1/18/2021

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Marriage at Cana of Galilee by Adelaide Ironside, 1861, Public Domain

Epiphany 2
John 2:1-11

January 17, 2021

What do you think? Is God’s glory revealed more prominently in his power or in his love? This is a major question, the answer to which determines very much how you perceive your relationship with God. Jesus performed his first sign at a wedding in Cana in Galilee, manifesting his glory, so that his disciples believed in him. While turning water into wine is certainly a miracle, it does not demonstrate the immense power of dividing the Red Sea in two or walking on water or raising the dead. Yet, by turning water into wine at a wedding, Jesus showed that his glory is not revealed primarily in his power, but rather in his love.
This is not to say that Jesus is not all powerful. Jesus is omnipotent, the almighty God. But we don’t believe in Jesus through the revelation of his power alone, but through the revelation of his love. And in turning water into wine at a wedding, Jesus shows his love and commitment both to our earthly marriages and to Christ’s heavenly marriage with his Church. The stone jars Jesus filled with wine were not meant for wine. They were meant for water used in ceremonial washing after the tradition of the Jews. Yet, by using them for wine, Jesus demonstrates that it is not human traditions that determine what marriage is, but God. And God has made both earthly marriage and the marriage between Christ and his Church to be a joy.
There are three God-given purposes for marriage: Companionship, Chastity, and Children. First, Companionship: God said in the Garden, “It is not good for man to be alone; I will make a helper fit for him.” (Genesis 2:18) So, God made a woman for the man and joined them together as one flesh (Genesis 2:24), so that Jesus says, “What God has joined together, let no man separate.” (Matthew 19:6) So, it comes as no surprise that God says that he hates divorce (Malachi 2:16 NKJV). Who doesn’t hate divorce? But God doesn’t simply hate divorce the way Tammy Wynette sings about it. God hates divorce so much that he undoes divorce and will never again be separated from his Bride.
When Adam and Eve sinned against God, they caused a great divorce between man and God. Sin separates us from God. And through Adam we are all born in sin. Yet, this divorce did not just separate man from God, but man from one another. The first man ever born murdered his first brother. And mankind was divided into factions; families dividing in hatred, nations rising in enmity against other nations. Yet, God did not stop loving our race, and so he sent a Savior, as it is beautifully described in that great hymn,
“The Church’s one foundation/ Is Jesus Christ, her Lord;
She is His new creation/ By water and the Word.
From heav’n He came and sought her/ To be His holy bride;
With His own blood He bought her, And for her life He died. (Samuel Stone, The Church’s One Foundation, LSB 644).
And this is the reason Scripture says that husbands should love their wives as Christ loved the Church (Ephesians 5:25). Neither the threats of the Law nor God’s demonstrations of power through a world-wide flood, plagues, and the destruction of nations could reunite his people to himself, but rather in love sending his only begotten Son to die for us. (That is where God’s greatest glory is revealed!) Likewise, a husband cannot get his wife to respect him by exerting force, but rather through love, even by laying down his life for hers.
This also leads to the discussion of wives submitting to their husbands. Few passages in Scripture are met with as much resistance as the passages, which tell a wife to submit to her husband (Ephesians 5:22-24; 1 Peter 3:1-6). And many women (and men) reject this, either dismissing it outright or trying soften it by saying that husbands and wives should submit to each other. Yet, that is not what the word means. Submit means to subordinate. Two people cannot submit to each other. One submits to the other. When St. Paul tells us to submit to one another out of reverence for Christ, he is not telling every single person to submit to every single person. Rather, he is telling each of us to submit to those whom God has placed over us, even as we submit to Christ. God has created an order (1 Corinthians 11:1-3). The husband is the head and the wife the body just as Christ is the head of his body the Church. The Church submits to Christ. Christ does not submit to the Church, rather, he lays down his life for her in love. Yet, Christ does submit to the Father’s will, even though he is equal to the Father. Likewise, the husband does not submit to his wife, but rather loves her, serves her, and lays down his life for her.
And so, you see that it is actually a strange thing to protest that wives should submit to their husbands. Except for God the Father, there is not a being who must not submit to another. All of us must submit to many people on a regular basis, from employers to people in government and the church. Yet, God here tells the wife to submit to her husband, the man whom God has commanded to love her unconditionally and to sacrifice all for her welfare. Of all the people a woman must submit to in her life, she should be most willing to do so to her husband, because by submitting to him, she is putting her trust in him. This is how the Church submits to Christ. The Church submits to Christ by trusting in his love, believing that everything he does for her is for her good. Yet, even if a husband does not love his wife as he should (which they never do perfectly), Scripture still tells wives to submit to their husbands to the glory of Christ, so that they may win them over by their Christian conduct (1 Peter 3:1). And Scripture spends many more words commanding a husband to love his wife, so that when his wife submits to him, she is putting her trust in his love for her.
It is through this relationship of love being given and love being trusted that God designed the companionship of marriage to survive. It involves continued repentance and forgiveness, patience and kindness, humility and selflessness. And this is what our Lord Jesus has demonstrated to us by continuing to forgive us with patience. And he promises never to divorce us.
Chastity is sexual purity. Sexual relations are only permitted within marriage between husband and wife. Outside of that bond it is called fornication and adultery. Yet, within marriage it is a blessing from God, which helps prevent sin, as St. Paul says, “But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each wife her own husband.” (1 Corinthians 7:2) Sex outside of marriage is a sin and an attack on marriage. It harms men, women, and children, and cannot be considered an act of love, but of selfishness. Therefore, all Christians should abstain from sex until they are married and then be faithful to their spouse. Such faithfulness God rewards with happiness and children.
Faithfulness in marriage relates to faithfulness to Christ. We are to have no other gods and we are to trust in Christ alone for salvation. So, just as husband and wife should be faithful to each other and remember their wedding vows, so each Christian should remember that we have one Lord who has bought us and joined us to himself forever. He is our Redeemer.
When God first joined man and woman together in marriage, he blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and multiply.” (Genesis 1:18) And the Psalmist declares, “Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward.” (Psalm 127) And so, children have always been a God given blessing to marriage and the fruit of marital fidelity. So likewise, Christ’s union with his bride the Church begets children born of water and the Spirit. And within the household of God, these children are nourished by the proclamation of the Gospel, Absolution, and the Sacrament of Christ’s body and blood. In the Church he strengthens and shelters his children by forgiving their sins and filling them with his Holy Spirit. And everything he gives to his children, they receive from their Mother, the Church.
Yet, despite how Scripture praises children as a wonderful blessing from God, children are often despised. People think they get in the way of life. They disrupt plans. They’re expensive. They wreck things. So, more and more married couples choose to prevent having children so that they can save more money to spend on stuff or they wait to have children until they think they have enough money, as if God would let their children starve or go naked. And of course, many learn that it isn’t for them to choose anyway. God is the one who gives and withholds children.
Marriage took multiple blows even before so-called “same-sex marriage” became a thing. Divorce destroyed the lifelong companionship instituted by God. Fornication has defiled the marriage bed. And people value stuff that will turn in to junk in a few years more than children they can baptize and teach the Gospel to, so that they can live with them forever in heaven! And many young people are forsaking marriage all together, choosing rather to fornicate, since it is now socially acceptable. Marriage is looked at as a burdensome undesirable thing.
This is sad. God didn’t create marriage to be a burden. He doesn’t give us children, because he hates us. Marriage isn’t a life-long prison sentence. God gives us marriage, because he loves us. Outside of the Mystical Union between the Church and Christ, marriage is the most blessed union on earth! God created marriage to be a joy! This is shown in how Jesus blesses this wedding with wine. Wine is considered a non-essential, a luxury you can do without. Yet, Jesus uses his first miracle to make wine, because, as Scripture says, wine gladdens the heart of man. (Psalm 104:15) He does this to show that joy is not a non-essential. God created marriage to be a joy, just as he sent his Son to rescue us from our sins, so that we may have joy with him forever in heaven.
Yet, we must not confuse the joy God gives to marriage and to his Church with the lusts and passions of the sinful flesh, which pass away, give headaches, and fill you with regret. The joy God gives his Church stems from the forgiveness he won for us for Christ’s sake, which brings us into Communion with him and one another. God gives joy to marriage even when our sin tries to ruin it. God honors marriage by likening it to Christ’s union with the Church. He gives joy to marriage by blessing it with his children, whom you raise as God’s holy instruments. Even when God withholds children from a marriage, he still blesses it with love. He blesses marriage with the forgiveness of sins, so that husbands who fail to love their wives and wives who fail to respect their husbands can be reconciled. And in his Church, Christ even gives joy to those who have unlawfully divorced, who have committed adultery, fornication, or have otherwise dishonored marriage, by forgiving them and joining them to himself again.
Jesus turned water into good wine even after the wedding guests had already drunk enough wine. He did this to show that he gives his joy to those who don’t deserve it out of his own grace and mercy. He forgives us sinners. He blesses our marriages. He gives us laughter even in the midst of this sinful world.
Jesus performed this first miracle in the village of Cana in Galilee, a town forgotten by history. This shows us that Christ values our marriages and our families and desires to dwell in them to make them holy. Although history will most likely forget you, your marriage and children, God will never forget you. The most sacred house is not the Capitol or even some ancient cathedral, but the Christian home where husband and wife dwell with their children in the Word of God. That is where Christ desires to dwell, to forgive and strengthen them through his word. To such a meek and despised setting, Christ continues to reveal his glory through his love in the Gospel. Amen.

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Epiphany 2: Jesus Loves His Bride

1/15/2018

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Ephesians 5:22-33
John 2:1-11

January 14, 2018

Jesus chose to do his first miracle at a wedding. That makes sense. Jesus loves marriage. By turning water into wine, Jesus not only manifested his glory to his disciples, so that they would believe in him, Jesus also blessed the marriage of the wedding couple with very good wine. Jesus loves marriage. That is why he also teaches, "From the beginning God made them male and female. Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So, they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate." (Matthew 19:4-6)

God gives three reasons for marriage in Scripture: companionship, chastity, and children. Companionship: God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him." (Gen. 2:18) And so, God created the woman. Marriage is a lifelong union between a man and a woman. This life-long companionship is a gift from God. God did not give the man another man. That would not be a helper fit for him. God gave the man a woman. "Same-sex marriage" is not marriage. Just as you can't have two bodies without a head or two heads without a body, two of the same sex cannot have the companionship designated by God for marriage, nor can they live a chaste life or beget children. Not a single pillar of marriage established by God stands in so-called "same-sex marriage."

God intends for the man and the woman to be joined together for the rest of their lives as one flesh. Yet, people tear apart what God put together. This doesn't just break God's commandment, but it hurts the people in the divided family. Life-long companionship helps men and protects women and children. Dividing this companionship brings hardship to husband, wife, and children. For this reason, God forbids divorce except in the cases of marital unfaithfulness and malicious abandonment.

Chastity: Marriage is a union where a man and woman can live together in purity, not in sinful lust. St. Paul writes, "But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband." (1 Corinthians 7:2) Sex belongs between a man and a woman within marriage. Sex outside of marriage is called fornication. Fornication is a sin. Sex is not a sin. It is a gift of God to marriage. Within marriage it is a pure gift. Outside of marriage it is a sin against God.

Fornication is not only breaking God's commandment, but it is harmful to people. It objectifies women and men and robs them of their dignity. The reason why sexual harassment scandals are so rampant on the news, is because fornication was accepted as okay. Despite what romantic movies and books will tell you, sex outside of marriage is not an expression of love. Love is selfless. Fornication is selfish. When a man commits this sin with a woman, he is stealing what does not belong to him. If he loves the woman, he should bind himself to her lawfully and promise to care for her in sickness and in health, for better for worse, till death parts them. Young people, pay attention to these words. They are words of wisdom spoken by Solomon the Wise, himself, "Drink water from your own cistern, flowing water from your own well. ... Let your fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of your youth... (Proverbs 5:15, 18)

Children: Scripture calls children "a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Blessed is the man, who fills his quiver with them." (Psalm 127:3-5) Yet, children have not been accepted as a gift from God. Part of this is because of the prevalence of fornication. Children are no longer looked at as a reward from God, but as an inconvenience and outside of marriage it becomes all the more difficult when the parents are not committed to each other for the rest of their lives. And so, in our country we have a multibillion dollar industry to prevent and dispose of children, as if God is being shortsighted by trying to give them to us. Nevertheless, God still gives children as a blessing and we should regard them as such. You can't baptize your car. You can't teach your vacation home about Jesus. But God does promise that he will feed and clothe your children and he invites you to bring them to Jesus.

Companionship, chastity, and children are certainly wonderful gifts to marriage, which shows why Jesus would honor a wedding with his first miracle. Yet, there is something more that shows how greatly God loves marriage. Marriage is a picture of Christ's relationship with his bride, the Church.

The Holy Spirit caused St. Paul to write in Ephesians 5, "Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord." Now, these have become some of the most hated words in all the Bible and even Christian women blush when they hear them. But this shouldn't be. These are beautiful words from our God. We should not let the secular world define the meaning of words God gave to us Christians. For a wife to submit to her husband does not mean that she becomes her husband's doormat or slave. Listen to the words from Scripture, "Submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands."

How does the church submit to Christ? By obeying laws and ordinances? No, but by receiving Jesus' love. The church submits to Christ through faith in Jesus' love, his death and resurrection. The church submits to Christ by hearing and believing the Gospel, which forgives sins and grants eternal life. The church submits to Christ by being washed in his baptism, by eating at his banquet, by trusting in him to protect her from all danger, from sin, from death, and from the power of the devil. This is a completely different picture than what the world would paint.

And so, how does a wife model her relationship with her husband after the church's relationship to Christ? This too is a fruit of faith. A wife submits to her husband by trusting him, trusting that he will care for her, love her, and will do what is best for her. This is how the church submits to Christ.

"Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her." Now, this is an interesting balance to submit isn't it? If a master leaves and tells his servants to submit to the foreman, he'd then tell the foreman to keep the servants on track, to rule over them well. But God doesn't tell husbands to domineer over their wives, but to love their wives. This means that they put their wives' needs before their own, so that when a wife submits to her loving husband, she is submitting to being loved and cared for. Husbands should love their wives as Christ loved the church. Jesus gave himself for the church as the hymn states, "The Church's one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord, she is his new creation by water and the word. From heaven he came and sought her to be his holy bride, with his own blood he bought her and for her life he died."

Christ did not consider his own needs when he went to the cross. He thought of the need of his Church to be saved. Jesus didn't even think of the worthiness of his Church. She was covered in her own sins, filthy, and undeserving of a husband. We are that bride. We didn't love Christ or submit to him. Yet, even so, Christ loved us and gave himself for us, so that he might cleanse us of our sins through the washing of water in the word. And so, through Baptism, Christ washes us by joining us to his death on the cross, so that he might present us as a holy Church, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. And so, husbands you should love your wives regardless of whether they submit to you. And you should cover their sins and forgive them, protecting their honor and reputation.

But wives don't submit to their husbands. They don't trust them as they should. And husbands often don't give them much confidence to trust in them. They fail to love their wives, to sacrifice their time, talents, and bodies for their wives. And they often fail to cover their shame as they ought. Likewise, we make a mess of the gift of companionship through bickering and selfishness and divorce. We can't stay chaste, even with the gift of marriage. And we're often afraid to welcome children as the gift they are and we fail to bring them to Jesus as we ought. In short, we make a mess of marriage. No wonder it is so despised in this generation.

Yet, Jesus still loves and blesses marriage. And his favorite marriage is his own with his beloved Bride, you his church. Although we crumble the companionship within our marriages, Jesus stays committed to his Bride. She is his body and he is her head. They cannot be separated forever. Christ Jesus is wholly committed to his Bride, even as he chose you to be his own before the foundation of the world. We fail to keep our lives chaste, yet Christ has made his bride pure through the washing in his own blood. He presents each of us, who have been unfaithful to him and to our spouses, holy through this spiritual washing.

Jesus gave himself to death, so that he could remove the sins of the whole world. He did this, so that he could forgive and save those, who have fallen into homosexuality and those, who have divorced their spouses wrongfully. Jesus died for fornicators and those, who hurt children. Jesus died for wives, who fail to submit to their husbands, and for husbands, who fail to love their wives. Jesus died for all these filthy sins, so that he could present you as his holy bride; so that he could make you chaste and his marriage to his church pure.

In our materialistic world, we can lose sight of the blessing of children. But Christ never loses sight of this blessing. And so, he blesses his church with many children. Through the preaching of Christ's crucified and through Baptism children of God are born to the Church. And within the Church, they will continue to be nurtured and cared for forever, through the grace and mercy that rains down from the cross of Christ. Marriage is a profound mystery. And Scripture says that it refers to Christ and the church. And we will rejoice in that blessed marriage forever. Amen.

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"For faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ." ~ Romans 10:17

Jesus, the Bridegroom, the Example of Manliness

Christ's Marital Union

The Joy of the Gospel

God’s Glory Is Revealed in Love

Epiphany 2: Jesus Loves His Bride

Rev. James Preus

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