“Only the Best”

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“Only the Best” (Romans 4:1-5,13-17)

Series: Exactly What I Needed

by Pastor Nate Walther

The 2nd Sunday of Lent (3/1/2026)

            ONLY THE BEST.  It’s kind of a motto for our lives.  As Americans, we expect our country to have the best standard of living, the best military, and the best medical care.  Professionally, we want to be the best at what we do, get the best pay, and receive the best benefits.  For our kids, we look for the best schools, the best dental care, the best sports opportunities.  In our homes, we want the best materials: that nice hardwood furniture, those striking stone countertops, or those energy-efficient windows & appliances…

            If we think that way everywhere elsewhere in our lives, we don’t easily “turn it off” when it comes to our faith.  And that’s OK. God wants us to have the best for our faith too!  The problem comes when we make faith about what we do, choose, or think.  Like so many other things in my life, it’s easy to take matters into my own hands to ensure that I get the best! But if we want the best for our faith, God paints a dramatically different picture for us today in his Word. 

            As we look again to our sermon text from Romans 5, it intersects so well with our theme today. Abraham is the father of the Jewish faith & a great paradigm for faith in general.  What we heard at the beginning of verse 2 only makes sense, if anyone had reason to boast it was Abraham!  Yet that only makes what we heard at the end of verse 2 even more striking, “But not before God…” As God expects “only the best,” this is him telling us in his Word that not even Abraham could cut it — Abraham, who moved a month’s journey away from his family to some place he had never seen before, all because God told him so.  Abraham, who washed the feet of random strangers that showed up on his tent-step and served them with the finest meat from his flock & produce from his field. Abraham, who risked life and limb not just to rescue his nephew Lot from powerful kings who had captured him, but he also rescued many other unworthy, evil citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah (whom God would later destroy!).

            Granted, God does commend Abraham, but did you notice it was for a completely different reason? Verse 3, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”  Abraham did have something going for him, but that something was faith.  Which is interesting when you consider that faith is always contrasted to works in the Bible.  Here and in verse 4, God doesn’t say he credits righteousness to people for what they do, as something they earn; rather, he credits it for the opposite reason: for faith.  And the thing about faith in the Bible is that it’s not just some abstract, “you’ve just got to believe.” Faith always has an object, it always relies on something else.  In particular, Abraham’s faith was about what someone else did.  “Abraham believed God” That’s what was “credited (or calculated) to him as righteousness.” 

I’m sure Abraham wanted the best in his life just like us, and there was plenty a guy like him could earn for himself. But what about all the things he couldn’t earn for himself?  For all his accolades, Abraham had sin.  He questioned God at times, one time even sleeping with his own maidservant (Hagar) to try to fulfill God’s promise about having a child that would lead to blessing for the world.  It didn’t work.  The world’s Savior from sin did not come from that child born to him (Ishmael).  Abraham and all nations were still in their sin… But give Abraham credit for one thing: he didn’t settle for what he could do, and he continued to live by faith that God could do something better.  That’s what God eventually did give him “credit” for, since God eventually would provide a child for him & his wife (Sarah) in their old age (Isaac) who would lead to a Savior for the world.

So also, dear brothers & sisters of Jesus, do you want the best?  Good!  God has wired that into your heart and mine.  Don’t settle for anything less. So every time we’re tempted to think more highly of ourselves because we go to church when others don’t, or we go about our career in a godly and respectable way even when our coworkers don’t, or we are being honest in our classes when classmates are cheating and trying to us AI… stop!  Don’t settle for that!  Because what good is a gold star before the one who made the stars?  And every time we’re tempted to make faith about how much more we know than others, or how committed we are in our convictions, or the fact that we go to the right church when others don’t… stop!  Don’t settle for that!  God knows more than us and expects a lot more than that from us.  And every time we’re tempted to minimize our own sin, and we revel in the fact that we haven’t done the bad things that others have, or we pretend those sinful thoughts we have aren’t affecting the way we look at our spouses or at the success of others… stop!  Don’t settle for that!  After all, God is pure holiness and wants us to enjoy such perfection with him, not some cheap, sin-corrupted version of it.

Don’t hear what I’m not saying.  Do those good things too, just realize they won’t cut it. And more than anything, live by faith.  Because we get more by focusing on the object of our faith and what he does.  It’s what this season of Lent is all about.  Last week we began Lent with the traditional reading about how Jesus overcame the devil’s temptations for 40 days in the wilderness – it’s a reminder of how Jesus perfectly overcame every temptation to sin for us as our substitute!  During Holy Week we will end Lent with the traditional readings about how Jesus went on trial and died on the cross– it’s a reminder of how Jesus perfectly suffered the penalty for all sin for us as our sacrifice!  This time of the year is all about focusing on how Jesus can do more for than we can do for ourselves.  And it’s exactly what we need.  When God calculates Christ and his good deeds to our account, he is able to credit so much more to us than if he were to calculate only our deeds (good & bad) to our account. 

Have you ever been there yourself?  You’re trying to solve a problem at work, or maybe you’re just looking at the family budget, and the numbers don’t add up.  But then some extra funds come along, the math changes, and everything works out! One of my favorite real-life examples of something like this is when UPS implemented software that prioritized right-hand turns over left-hand turns.  It seemed extremely minor, but changing that one variable meant that in one year their drivers drove nearly 30 million less miles, they saved 3 million gallons of fuel, and they required 1,000 fewer trucks. Such a seemingly small change made a huge difference… Now take a huge change and apply it to our faith.  If faith were only about what we do, God must add up all our sins and factor them into the equation too.  Then, if you consider two possible outcomes for eternity – one without any imperfection in heaven and one with imperfection in hell – there’s just no way around it, we’re spending eternity with our sin!  But if you add Jesus as Savior from sin to the equation, and the math completely changes.  That’s where God is able to keep all of his promises to us in full. 

Help others see it.  In a world that longs for “only the best,” anything short of it can throw people into a tailspin.  Which is really bad, because it’s rare for anyone truly to be the best at something.  Even if they are the best at one thing, they will usually struggle with other things that relate to what they are trying to accomplish. The world’s best three-point shooter may not be a particularly good defender.  Or the most brilliant scientific mind may not have the best people-skills, which limits what he or she can get done.  Even the best presidents have ton of flaws (anyone would when put under a microscope)…  If only the best will do, then no one will do; which means what everyone really needs at the end of the day is Christ, who was the best at everything for them!  If you love someone, always be thinking about how you can bring Jesus into their lives.

And don’t miss ithist for yourself either, dear Christian.  Whenever you look at yourself and struggle and think, “I’m not the best! I should be a better mom, a better husband, a better person…” – And you and I should be! – or if ever we think, “How could God ever settle for someone like me to spend eternity with him in heaven?”, remember what we heard earlier, “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life!” (John 3:16)  That’s not my take on the subject as a pastor, nor is it some inspirational quote AI fashioned for a coffee mug.  The words from our Gospel reading are Jesus himself saying that faith in him will make all the difference.  Christ’s love, forgiveness, and power can make a real difference for you in your God-given callings. Don’t underestimate how everything can change with one variable, especially when that one variable is Jesus. He really does bring “only the best.”

Abraham had a lot going for him humanly-speaking, and he was a wealthy man.  Yet God always kept Abraham looking for more.  For years promising a child, but not giving him that child; and even what God gave Abraham that child, he still promised a great nation from this son that Abraham would never live to see!… It worked.  It kept Abraham looking for something better.  The Book of Hebrews tells us that Abraham lived as a sojourner on earth.  Despite all that he had, he saw that heaven was what he needed all along. His story is our story.  Whenever we find that we’re lacking, and when we are kept waiting, we don’t have to settle for something less than the best or do anything to fix it.  Just live by faith.  Just let God do what he’s promised all along.  That’s when Christ will give us EXACTLY WHAT WE NEED.  Amen.

Hope Held in Holy Hands

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Matthew 4

Lent 1 February 22, 2026

Pastor Horton

Are you familiar with Edward Martin Grylls, better known as Bear Grylls?  Born in northern Ireland he served in the British Special Forces and has made a name for himself as a tv reality show host and outdoor adventure enthusiast.  By that I mean he puts himself into crazy survival situations….often taking a famous person along with him.  You may remember him scaling a cliff with Shaquille O’Neil, hunting wild boar with Marshawn Lynch, or dodging bear while exploring a glacier with the then-sitting President Barak Obama.  Most times these famous people find themselves looking to Bear as a guide through all the dangers of the wild.  They have high hopes in his survivalist skills to get them safely out of the wilderness.  Admittedly, much of that show was made for tv with the danger perhaps more imagined than real.

When we find Jesus out in the wilderness, it is a very different scenario.  He is going alone.  In fact, the interaction he does have is only problematic.  It’s with the devil, described in unflattering words, “the diabolic one”, the “one who slanders God by slandering God’s truth”, and the one “who constantly tempts”.  This is who he is.  And his sights are set on Jesus.  Why?  Because of these exceptionally high stakes.  If Jesus, the chosen one of God, appointed to be our sacrificial substitute, and live under the law perfectly, and carry our sins to his cross for full payment, if this Jesus were to be tempted to sin just once, he would be disqualified as our needed Savior and we, along with every soul that’s ever lived, would be lost to hell forever.  The stakes were exceptionally high. 

And yet, did you notice that into the wilderness Jesus will go!  “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the Devil.”  He wasn’t lost or in this situation by accident.  This is a divine strategy to guide him into battle.  Jesus is going to face and to overcome temptation.  The Second Adam is going to go into the arena of the First Adam…and win.  Jesus is more than a really good example.  He is our Substitute.  He has told us as much in the gospels that he is here to “Finish the work of his Father who sent him.”  During this battle our hope for heaven is held in his holy hands.

And here comes the temptor, “After he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.  The Tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread.”  But Jesus answered, “It is written: Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes out of the mouth of God.”  It’s hard for me to wrap my head around exactly how weak, weary, and worn Jesus is during these 40 days of temptation – especially hearing that he had been fasting.  I know that I get hangry in the late afternoon if I’m not eating that day, add in a headache, and it doesn’t take long before I am in a miserable mindset.  Jesus is focused and determined in spite of the devil targeting his mission to be our perfect substitute.

What is at the heart of the first temptation we have listed?  “Prove that God is who he says he is: both you, Jesus, and your heavenly Father who provides for all your needs.”  Especially during this time when Jesus was operating without, the temptation was to take matters into his own hands and fix the problem.  This temptation is a call back to the Garden of Eden, to imply Jesus is not given enough from his Father, and to act out of line with the Father’s will.  

Jesus’ response?  He quotes Deuteronomy 8:3, proving that God’s Word fills more fully than any earthly bread.  And that he has complete trust in his Father to extend his earthly life – even if it meant a bit more suffering in the moment by way of human hunger.  His Father would see him through.  And the Father would make a far better wilderness companion than Bear Grylls.

The next temptation?  To the top of the temple they went – either to the tippy top of the main structure, or some have speculated to the southeastern corner with its 450 foot drop into the Kidron valley – we don’t know.  We do know the challenge,  “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down.  For it is written: He will command his angels concerning you.  And they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”  Jesus said to him, “Again, it is written: You shall not test the Lord your God.”  And so moving from the temptation of distrust, Satan twists God’s Word to the other extreme that he might incite false trust.  “Oh you have this wonderful relationship with your Father?  Let’s see it in action.  You want to quote the Scripture?  Here’s one from the psalms.”  Only if you know Psalm 91 by heart, you know that the devil purposely left out “concerning you…in all your ways.”  But again, our Savior properly responds using the great gift of God’s Word.  This temptation would not push him over the edge, so to speak, and he would continue to embrace, not exploit, his day of grace with God.  He would not test God, but be a caretaker of the blessings that were his –  including that gift of his life and breath.

Then the final temptation we have listed (out of the countless ones Jesus faced during these days of testing), verses 8-10, “Again the Devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.  He said to him, “I will give you all of these things, if you will bow down and worship me.”  Then Jesus said to him, “Go away, Satan!  For it is written: Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.”  I don’t know how the devil did this, but God permitted him to present before Jesus all the kingdoms of the world.  And what would he have seen?   Those Chinese dynasties and their armies?  The grandeur of Rome?  The freedoms earned and found here in the United States?  “Look, Jesus, you came to win the world – here it is!”  And with an alluring shortcut!  Why go through all that suffering, agony, and death?  Here is a far easier way!  

And yet Jesus recognized that the devil’s promises – glimmering and shining as they so often do – are empty and on the inside reek of sin and death.  Ultimate glory, comfort, and control are not the devil’s to give.  Jesus returns again to God’s Word, that full of armour of God, (which is yours and mine as well!).  He goes to the top of the list and quotes the first commandment.  Jesus would remain faithful to his heavenly Father and committed to his heavenly Father’s plan for our salvation.  This Lent we find Jesus remaining on that gruesome path to fix the fall of Adam, to pay for all our sin, and to resolve that echoing chorus of death brought about by Adam in our lesson moments ago from Genesis.

And we needed such a Savior.  Think for a moment if our salvation was left up to us!  Imagine if it was you out there in the desert!  We so often act like we can walk in step with our perfect Savior – as if his work maybe isn’t all that important – as if we could do something too.  But what would that look like if your salvation was left in your hands?  How quickly would you fall into temptation?  There have been plenty of times when we face immediate challenges in the physical world and do what?  Despair, complain, worry, fear and doubt our Father in heaven.  Even if you are a life-long believer, how often do you stand at the edge and break to the temptations to play loose and free with sin?  Maybe jumping off the temple isn’t something you face, but being reckless with God’s grace and jumping headfirst into various evil wants – that is our regular problem!  And then I probably don’t have to ask how often, how constantly do our hearts bow to other things of this world and we find ourselves so often chasing the deep desire for glory, for comfort, and for control?  Sadly if our salvation was left in our hands we would quickly fumble it all away.

But this Lent, behold again the Lamb of God, once again in Christ Jesus!  He is out there in the wilderness for you and for me.  His holiness and his heart are on display.  He goes forward to cross and through the grave for you.  He holds us in his hands through Word and Sacrament.  There we are reassured of our personal forgiveness with God.  And Jesus remains committed to us, helping guide us through our many constant daily temptations.  Jesus is with you in the wilderness of this world and he will bring you home to heaven – he has made you that promise.  Because Jesus stands, we stand.  Because Jesus wins, we win.  Because Jesus holds our salvation in his holy hands, we have heaven forever with him.  Amen.

“Trust Your Eyes” (2 Peter 1:16-21)

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Series: Identity Revealed

by Pastor Nate Walther

The Festival of Transfiguration (2/15/2026)

As Peter looked back on his life now at the end, it had been tough.  Growing up with his brother Andrew on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, those were good memories.  But life never remains as simple as it was when you were a kid.  Sure, he had his brother’s company as they grew older and got into the local fishing trade, but problems came along with age: bills to pay, issues with coworkers, dying relatives … that’s life.

But then he met Jesus, and everything changed. Miracles that offered a glimpse of something far bigger: Jesus curing diseases, providing for those in need, even raising the dead – even Peter was able to walk on waters of the Sea around which he grew up, just like Jesus had!  Was this finally the one God had promised?  Yet at other times, Jesus appeared to be so human. He talked about his death as if it was inevitable.  How could the Messiah—who was supposed to rescue them from sin—succumb to sin?  But then, there was the Mount of Transfiguration, that indescribable scene! Surely this was the Son of God!!! But then, there was Jesus’ arrest, trial, and crucifixion.  For three days Peter could interpret nothing good in this mess, and all hope seemed lost.  Except… Jesus rose from the dead!  Hope was restored when Jesus appeared to Peter alive again on that first East morning!!!  Except… it had now been a generation since Jesus went back to heaven.  Since then, other Disciples had been killed for the faith, including his own brother. Peter’s life was constantly under threat also, and looked like this would take his life soon too… So what was Peter supposed to think here at the end? 

It’s the quintessential picture of faith: always ebbing and flowing, like light which grows brighter in the darkness of this world and then wanes some too. But a key thought?  Throughout all the darkness of sin, we still keep seeing that light… That’s what Peter goes back to in this letter, which effectively serves as his last will and testament, and he tells his readers the same: TRUST YOUR EYES, eyes which see Jesus.  In our sermon text, Peter makes that clear right away.  How can we be sure Jesus is the answer?  He says it’s as simple as eyewitness testimony.  Jesus was the answer for those who saw him.  And among the many things Peter must have saw in his life, it’s interesting how Jesus’ transfiguration stood out, which we are celebrating today.  Again, 17 He received honor and glory from God the Father, when the voice came to him from within the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” 18 We heard this voice, which came out of heaven when we were with him on the holy mountain.  Peter still remembered hearing the Father’s own voice and seeing Jesus in all of his glory, which would serve as a source of light for the rest of his life. 

But notice that it didn’t immediately solve everything.  In verse 19 notice how Peter talks about a lamp in a dark place, waiting until the day dawns, and a morning star rising (which only rises when it is still dark). It calls to mind the fact that there is still darkness!  Life will still be hard!  But Peter just keeps going back to this message, and he tells his listeners to do the same.  Why?  Because it is reliable.  Because it offers precisely light for those situations of darkness.  That’s because it comes from the source of all light.  Peter reminds us this comes from God, it’s not just some human interpretation of things.  In fact, in the Greek language and in the word order in which this was first written, people are actually the last thought of the last sentence of our sermon text.  Literally in verse 21, Peter wraps up this entire section by saying, “by the Holy Spirit were carried, as they spoke from God, men…”  

It’s been said before in our world, “don’t trust your lying eyes”, but ironically so.  It’s actually meant to demonstrate the opposite: when things get messy in this world – as they tend to do in politics, for example, where the phrase originates – what else are you supposed to believe other than what you can see right before you? 

So also, trust what you see. First of all, trust the darkness you see around you.  When you see death in the news, when you see pain in your body, when you see trouble in your family, when you see chaos in this world…  trust that sin is real, that it’s serious, and it needs to be fixed.  Along with it, trust that no manmade solution will do.  We’ve had thousands of years to get it right and it’s not getting better, we need something else!  Then trust the light you see in Scripture.  Trust what no man has ever come up with on his own (indeed, no other religion has ever conceived of anything like it): full forgiveness from sin & guilt that is not earned, and hope that has no business being in the room when what you see is evil. You’re at your parents’ or your friends’ or your child’s funeral, and yet this hope says you will see them again even after you die – with your own eyes in their own bodies…  Trust that there something different here, because you’ve seen everything else in this world and you realize, there is something different here.

In other words, like Peter see the morning star, even if morning itself hasn’t yet dawned.  Because despite the darkness we do see around us, we also see Christ.  He’s dawned on our hearts already, and he will dawn on our risen bodies someday when they are glorified to be like his transfigured body.  We can be sure of it because this message of Jesus is reliable.  It’s reliable in the eyewitnesses who saw his glory, then saw Jesus crucified for sin, then saw him raised to life for our justification.  It’s as reliable as any other historical event anyone saw.  Maybe it feels different when we see dark things and we haven’t seen Jesus personally, but this is based on the same eyewitness testimony that all of history is based on.  It is no fiction.  

Finally, if that’s not enough, trust what you see because it’s exactly what we need.  Look, sometimes there is just trouble in this world.  Even after the glorious sight he saw on the Mount of Transfiguration, Peter still experienced that.  Shortly after our Gospel account Peter would live through the darkest, gloomiest period of his life.  Jesus was not only arrested and killed, but Peter had a hand in betraying him.  Can you imagine the suffocating guilt Peter felt without a Savior (at least, as he thought of it).  We’ll hear all of that again soon during Lent… So could that be why Jesus wanted Peter to be one of three men to see the transfiguration?  So that he would have something, anything to hang onto and not lose his faith in the end?  So that he could provide the same meaningful testimony to others who find themselves in such hopeless darkness?

How might God be doing the same for you?  Life is just hard sometimes in a dark world, so he gives you just the right kind of light for it.  Could your family life be good because he’s got some challenges in store for you at work?  Or does he make you love what you find at church because you’ve got extended family that’s hell-bent against it?  Maybe he’s given you sickness preciously because you have a strong faith and can witness to it?…  I know, maybe you’re thinking, “Pastor, you don’t get it, that doesn’t really explain what I’m going through…” And you’re right. I don’t know.  As our sermon text reminded us, our interpretation & our understanding is the absolute end of the equation!  I don’t know any better than the next guy… But God does.  So what could God be doing right now to give you light where you need it, or make it so that you can shine that light for others in a meaningful way precisely because of what you have experienced?    

Light & sight are interesting things.  You can be in absolutely, pitch-black darkness, but even the tiniest, most minute light will inevitably draw your eye to it.  It’s why they charge double to put those tiny little indicators on light switches: you’ll see it from across a dark room, and you can find more light.  That’s our faith too, and always go back to it.  Christ is light, and in his transfiguration today we remember just how much light he has as the son of God.  In the darkness of the things we don’t understand or guilt of sin that smothers us, see that.  In fact, see more than that.  See Jesus somehow shining out even more brightly on another mount: on a cross where he pierced through the darkest clouds of hell.  Then see Jesus somehow shining out even more brightly than that from the gloom of a grave for you…  Dear Christian, TRUST YOUR EYES, eyes of faith that see Jesus.  Amen.

Identity: Lost & Found

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February 8, 2026

Epiphany 5

Pastor Horton

Have you ever looked around in the lost and found, and happened to find something that belongs to you?  If so, there is a certain sense of joy in what was lost now being found.  Was this introduction inspired (perhaps) by our lost and found now outside the church in the entryway, and a longing for you to look over and take your things home?  Yes.  But the joy in discovering what was lost remains.  This happened in a more remarkable way to a college professor.  Years earlier, she had lost a book and gave up her search.  Years later, she bought a used copy online, and would you believe it?  The very book she purchased was her book once lost.  The inside cover had her name in her handwriting with the date she placed there all those years ago!  She had to share her joyful story with others!  

As human beings we understand this in a more profound way.  We too like to find our place.  We don’t want to feel lost.  Be it in the family, in the community, at school or in our career, we are more settled when we find our footing and often tend to project our identity and define it based upon who we are, what we do, and how we think.  Identity is by definition, “the fact of who or what a person or thing is.” And we kind of like to have those known facts about ourselves solidified and secure.  I hold this job and get paid that salary.  I have these political beliefs and have that outlook.  I live in this community and have that hobby.  I am known for this sense of style, I have achieved that accomplishment.  Switch up those reliable facts about ourselves, and we go through a phase of “identity crisis.”  If you have moved away from home, or are retired after years in the workforce, or have graduated from school and are looking to the future, or come home from a war, or have faced personal tragedy, you know how your projected identity can be challenged.  You know how you can feel a bit lost in life.  Maybe you know what that is like right now – maybe you have been wrestling this feeling of being lost for most of your life.  

God gives to us today something more sure and certain than our vantage point from wherever we are at in life.  He gives us a God-given identity in Jesus that raises our eyes of faith no matter what we are going through.  He speaks reassurance to our troubled hearts, and the inspired writer Peter had an audience filled with suffering believers, who certainly had their own doubts soon to follow.  We, like those early Christians, often wonder about God’s guiding hand in our life.  Is he even there?  And does he even care?  Most reassuringly “yes” we are told today in our reading.  For your God has revealed your salvation accomplished through Jesus – and here is what your identity now looks like in Christ – for we are found thanks to the mercy of God.  

Listen, dear child of God, reborn through Jesus, and given a living faith to believe, to verses 9-10,  “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, the people who are God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.  At one time you were not a people, but now you are the people of God.  At one time you were not shown mercy, but now you have been shown mercy.”  That verse 10 simply shouts both law and gospel!  The law is blunt.  More than identity confusion or crisis, we were utterly lost.  “One time you were not a people!”  This was our identity upon entrance into this world: “sinful” at our conception.  David is clear on that in Psalm 51.  Walk it back further and we find Adam and Eve, desiring to be like God, doubting his steadfast love poured out in abundance, and wondering if they needed to take matters into their own hands to improve upon what they were….as if they could improve upon their own identity.  “Hang on to what you said there, God, we see a chance to better ourselves.”  And they were wrong.  Dead wrong.  Sin and death went spilling through the ages.  That was our status by birth: lost.  What’s more is this phrase, “At one time you were not shown mercy.”  A tough talk for any and every one of us who try, as we so often do, that we can by our own thinking and choosing do something to earn God’s favor, maybe just a smile from the Almighty, be it ever so small.  A tough talk for the religious peoples…in the words leading up to our verses, many in Israel would stumble at salvation through Jesus alone.  And the temptation still exists for us.  You and I know the extreme excuses we tell ourselves to try and quell our guilty consciences.  And yet our handmade badges of honor and good deeds earn us nothing before the Lord.  Apart from his acting to save, we have nothing.  He should turn his back to us, and close the door on our eternity forever.  We should be lost to hell for good.  But that is not what he has done.

Rather, he looks upon us and shows us “mercy,” he undertook the great plan to save you and to “bring you into his marvelous light.”  He saved you and claimed you as his very own that you know with confidence that “you are the people of God.”  This has been accomplished through Jesus.  This is Jesus’ identity revealed.  Our God has FOUND you lost ones.  Why would God do such great things for us?  Entirely because of mercy!  Out of mercy his plan was created from before time and he knew and chose you to be found as his own.  Out of mercy Jesus lived, died, and rose to remove your curse of our sin and throw off death so that you might have a future in heaven.  Out of mercy God has revealed to you the saving message of the gospel and helps you live with your new identity, not lost but found and secure in Jesus. 

And what does your identity look like to God?  It’s shockingly different from the viewpoint of the surrounding world.  How would the world view those persecuted and mistreated early believers?  How does the world often ID you and me?  As a people who are embarrassingly optimistic? Seeking self-help? Foolish individuals with misplaced hope?  Lowly?  Downtrodden?  Listen instead to how God describes you: “But (rather) you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, the people who are God’s own possession.”  Chosen to be part of the royal priesthood!  Look around the church and find royalty all around you – those whom God has highly valued, sacrificed for, those whom we can respect and serve.  For they, and you, now have a place next to Jesus upon his royal throne in heaven.  You are part of God’s dearly loved family, and cared for by the Almighty himself.  You are also a royal priest, having full access to the Father through Jesus in prayer.  Your life includes selfless, sacrificial acts of service to God.  You may not be an ordained pastor, but carry the gospel of salvation in Jesus with you wherever God directs you.  You have your identity there in the cross of Jesus – and in his mercy.  As people cleansed by the blood of Jesus, we have been gifted a kingdom ID badge.  And our identification is shared with our brothers and sisters in the faith alongside us.  View each other as part of the holy nation, unified by faith in Jesus, richly sharing the gifts and abilities God the Holy Spirit has given to his church.  Moved by God’s great mercy, that impacts the way we think and speak about our brothers and sisters around us.  Now we will want to encourage, support, and build each other up with prayer and thanksgiving – operating within the bonds of Jesus’ love.

And we are also given purpose, “so that you may proclaim the praises of him” who accomplished such great acts of salvation for us!   Moved by that mercy God has given you, many more still are in need of the saving message of the cross.  It is with this perspective, Peter writes an inspired plea, “Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and temporary residents in the world, to abstain from the desires of the sinful flesh, which war against your soul.  Live an honorable life among the Gentiles so that even though they slander you as evildoers, when they observe your noble deeds, they may glorify God on the day he visits us.”  Dear friends keep yourselves always in this message of Christ Jesus.  And God will help you keep your eyes and hearts upon your Savior.  The big picture is important!  Eternity is coming.  Don’t launch yourself back into the box of “Lost souls.”  Watch out for those sins which blemish your ID in Jesus.  Be careful not to dishonor his name, and worse, be careful you do not become that stumbling block to another soul in need of knowing about the gift of eternal life through Christ.  

Once lost, we have been found and saved by our God.  What an incredible comfort to find our identity not in how we think about ourselves, or in the current facts we know to be true about ourselves, but rather we find comfort in finding our ID in Jesus.  We are his and he is ours.  What great perspective we now have as a people belonging to God!  What great acts of service with which he now includes us for the salvation of souls!  Thank you Lord Jesus, for your great acts of mercy to us!  Thank you for finding us, equipping us with your gospel, and helping us show mercy.  May your kingdom continue to be revealed as you seek and save the lost that many more may be found in you!  Amen.

“Boast in Blessings” (1 Corinthians 1:26-31)

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Series: Identity Revealed

by Pastor Nate Walther

Fourth Sunday of Epiphany, 02/01/2026

            “No one likes a braggart… but everyone likes to brag.”  That’s not to say you will brag – again, we know people don’t like that! – but who doesn’t bristle when you don’t get credit for something you did well?  If others are praised for a job you know you could have done better?    If they get the raise, or the award, or the promotion that should have been yours?

            Here’s something interesting: do you know what God doesn’t tell us today in his Word?  God doesn’t say, “don’t boast!” Isn’t that something?  It shows us there can actually be something godly in boasting, something good in ascribing credit to what is useful, virtuous, and productive.  Granted, like all good things in the world, Sata & sin quickly attempt to twist boasting into a matter of selfishness & arrogance, but there’s a reason why the Bible writer Paul speaks positively of boasting.  The key question is when & where should we boast? 

            Today we answer that by saying BOAST IN BLESSINGS.  Since blessing comes from God, that means we should boast in what God has done.  Our sermon text makes that point.  The Apostle Paul wrote these words to the Christian congregation in Corinth, which may have been the most gifted church he served.  They spoke in tongues, they had received prophecies from the Lord, and they possessed wisdom and intelligence.  And you never would have expected all of that from this group.  Listen again to what we heard in our sermon text,

“26 Consider your call, brothers. Not many of you were wise from a human point of view—literally, what Paul says is, “you were not wise according to the flesh”—inthings our world looks at that affect flesh and blood, the Corinthians seemed to have nothing to contribute!  “Not many (of you) were powerful—that’s a word for them that would have suggested a political kind of power, which mean tthese weren’t the movers and shakers in their society.    “Not many were born with high status”—no Kennedys or Clintons among them, nor Schroeders or Gurgels if we want to think of it in terms of big WELS families…  However, “27God chose the foolish things of the world… the weak things of the world… the lowly things, the despised things, and the things that are not… to do away with the things that are…”   Why was that?    If God is perfect, why not at least start with those who are less imperfect then others? It was “29 so that no one may boast before God.” 

You see, there may be different capabilities among people, but that doesn’t make any of us is capable or “good enough” before God.  That’s actually why God chose a lesser group with the Corinthians, so there would be no confusion: “30 Because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us the wisdom from God, namely, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption.  God did this so that, just as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the LORD.’” The fact that good things did come out of such an unlikely group only proved it wasn’t about what they could do, but about what God could do.

It’s a picture for our lives too, if only we look for it.  Because how gifted are any one of us really?  How wise or powerful are any one of us?  For that matter, what mistakes have we made that could have turned out so much worse?  Perhaps along with me you can think of ways you’ve treated your spouse poorly, yet instead of it devolving into divorce they only showed you grace!  Or have you ever been distracted while driving, you know the danger in picking up your phone but you do it anyway, yet you’ve never gotten into an accident or hit anything or anyone!  Or what about when you’ve done the bare minimum in your calling, you’ve wasted so much time and talent through laziness or pride that could have been used to accomplish more & help more people, yet here is someone is in tears thanking you for making such a difference in their lives!…  And all you can say is, “It was nothing,” because it was nothing. 

How is it that when others look at you and me, they see is good Christians? They see well put-together families, good law-abiding citizens, people using their gifts and talents only to help people?  It’s just one example where—if we are honest about all God’s blessings to us—we may wonder how our lives ever turned out so good!… And how did they?…  In the mirror of our sin, don’t let Satan blind you of the Gospel.  God stepped in.  God chose you.  God lovingly claimed you in baptism and washed away your sin… Then God “wisened” you up with his Word.   He warmed your heart with the love a Son who died for you.  Now he manages to do some good through me and through you… Again, boasting is good when it’s about blessings, when it’s not subjective and meant only to build oneself up, but identifies things from God that are righteous and holy…  So yes, boast!  Boast in others, boast in your coworkers and friends and kids and grandkids when you see God working in their lives, and give God the glory for it!  And when others praise you, boast about what God has worked through (and indeed, in spite of!) you; and again, give him the glory. 

It’s boasting that will sound different in the ears of this world. I was reminded of that in an interview with the New England Patriots’ young star quarterback, Drake Maye.  That’s right, the Patriots are back in the Super Bowl after the shortest rebuild ever.  You’d think after six Super Bowls under Tom Brady, they wouldn’t be any good for at least a few decades, yet here they are just a few years later.  And maybe like me, that means you don’t want them to win! Except, I find it hard to root against a guy like Drake Maye.  Do you know what he said when he was asked about their success?  He boasted like all good athletes!… but not in himself or his teammates.  Rather, he boasted in the Lord.  He said, “I’m just here for the good Lord, and blessed with all that he’s given to me, and I want to live all my life through that.”  Drake Maye is a strong believer in Jesus, it’s the first thing you see on his Instagram profile!  That’s what we want our identity to be as Christians too.  Our question in everything should be, “how can I use what God has given me to bring Him glory?”  As we do so, we will be amazed at the things God produces in our lives, just as he has done for an NFL Quarterback in the 21st Century or like he did for a Corinthian Congregation in the 1st Century.

On that note, let’s just take a minute before we end this sermon to think of all the blessings God has produced in our lives.  Because it’s not just that we so often get credit for what God has done for us, there are so many other blessings God gives to us that we enjoy!  Nice vacations, great homes, delicious and plentiful food, vehicles that can transport us thousands of miles on a day’s pay, tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars (perhaps even more than that) in our savings or retirement accounts, and that’s to say nothing of our families, kids, and grandkids…  Then, on top of that, God worked eternity for us?   We will live forever in luxury better than this –even if you’re lacking some of that in this world, you’re still going to get so much better?…  And finally, wherever you & I fall into sin, and maybe things didn’t turn out so well in our lives, and we painfully realize it should disqualify us from all of God’s blessings?  For that the only one who ever had every right to boast in himself because he had no sin still humbled himself to suffer and die for our sins?  Are you kidding me?!… In a world that says, “don’t boast”, boast in your God!  Call a good thing a good thing, and let everyone know it!  Amen. 

“God’s Light, Our Lives”

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“God’s Light, Our Lives” (1 John 2:3-11)

Series: Identity Revealed

by Pastor Nate Walther

Third Sunday of Epiphany – Jan. 25th, 2026

            These days I’m not so much missing the cold winters we used to experience when living out in the Dakotas, but if there’s one thing I do miss it’s the night skies.  There’s nothing like being out on the wide-open, high-northern plains without any light pollution so you can truly experience the milky way or the northern lights streaming overhead in their full glory. And one thing you would immediately notice out there?  Those points of light, sometimes 20 or 30 miles away on the horizon, yet somehow you could still see them clearly in a sea of darkness, where even something as small as a tiny family homestead with its one yard light could not be missed.

            It’s kind of daunting when we consider that God tells us to be such light in a world of darkness, doing what is right and letting our faith shine for all to see.  But that is what God tells us today.  Go back to our sermon text again… Verse 3, do we keep God’s commandments as he wants us to – like how we should use our money, our bodies, or our speech – or are we liars that only pretend that what God wants is important to us?…  Verse 5, do we appreciate what God says is true inhis Word – like how he must choose us to come to faith to him (we can’t choose that), or how all sexual acts outside of marriage are wrong (not just those of the homosexual or transexual variety), or how he wants us to help the poor & less fortunate (yes, even if they’ve made some bad decisions along the way)  – or are we bothered when God disagrees with our sensibilities?… Verse 6, do we remain in the Lord – by regularly gathering with God’s people, or readily reading our Bibles, or routinely taking our concerns to God in prayer – or does our walk look quite a bit different than Jesus’ walk, who always delighted in doing all these things?  Skipping ahead a few verses to verse 9, do we love it when God places others into our lives to serve – a needy next door neighbor, a hurting co-worker, even our own children – or do we actually hate this, and we see them more as burdens that get in the way of what we want to do ourselves?

Do I need to go on?  As I think of my own sin, I don’t want to go on!  Yet in words such as these, God shows the damning difference between light & darkness – between doing right & wrong –

which leads to a warning for us in that last example: “The one who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes…”   Do I live with that pressing reality?  Or am I blind to the fact that darkness is so close to me and it could truly overcome me!  After all, John is warning Christians here just like me, his audience is not some hopelessly lost heathens!

So also dear fellow sinner, see the darkness in your heart that I see in mine this morning, repent of this sin before it overcomes you… then see the light of the Gospel which shines even more brilliantly for it!  (The darker the night on those Dakota prairies, the more those lights stood out, especially the few cities out there that you would come across.)

Because notice that right here in the middle of our text – in the middle of all this darkness – God places a light which cannot be missed.  “(All this is) true in Jesus… and (therefore) in you, because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining.” In no uncertain terms, this is God telling us that Jesus can produce the light we cannot produce.  It’s the same thing we heard in our Old Testament reading earlier (Isaiah 9), which Jesus repeated in our Gospel reading (Matthew 4).  “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.  For those living in the land of the shadow of death, the light has dawned.”

Fellow redeemed, whenever you feel lost in darkness without any way out, God tells us today that we don’t have to pull ourselves out of this hopeless gloom of sin on our own.  Anybody can have light dawn on them, and it has dawned on us too.  Christ was born into this world. Christ already walked in that perfection; yes, for you too.  Christ shines a bright light into this world that cannot be unseen.  It’s light that even managed to pierce through all the darkness and gloominess of hell.  Even after the sun ceased to shine over a cross on Good Friday, when all hope seemed lost and our Savior died, still it rose again over an empty tomb on Easter Sunday, and all hope returned when our Savior rose.

That’s finally what explains our theme. In the light of Christ, listen again to the end of our sermon text when God talks about us living in this light, “The one who says he is in the light and yet hates his brother is still in the darkness.  The one who loves his brother remains in the light… and nothing causes him to stumble.”  Again, Jesus already came to be the light, we don’t have to produce it. But now to change OUR LIVES, God stresses the importance of being in HIS LIGHT. 

To put it all in another way, God is telling you and me to be the moon.  The full moon is 10,000 times brighter than the next brightest star, you can even navigate outside in the dark just by its light.   Yet think of how passive the moon really is – just a dead hunk of rock, incapable of producing any light of its own!  So how do we see it?  It’s all about the sun, which shine s400,000 times brighter than the moon. If the sun is not shining on it, the moon reflects no light and its surface remains at a frigid -200 degrees F. But if the sun is shining on it, the moon reflects that light and its surface skyrockets to above 200 degrees F, above boiling!  In other words, the moon is really just a big mirror, it is impossible for it to produce light on its own.

            That’s you and me also. By ourselves we are cold, dead bodies who can produce no light on our own.  God’s Word tells us that: Ephesians 2 says we are born dead in sin, and Hebrews 11that without faith it is impossible to please God.  It mirrors the language of 1 John 2: in the darkness of this world we cannot see and we cannot produce any light on our own… but then came the one about whom the prophet Malachi once said “he is the sun that rises with healing in his rays.”  And when that bright light 400,000 times brighter than us (really, more than that) shines on us?  Well, just the slightest ray from the sun extending past the curvature of the earth will reflect itself on the moon as the thinnest, yet most unmistakable crescent.  So also, if there is any light of Christ on us, we will reflect it.  We go from cold and dead to alive and warm, but not because of anything that is in us.  Rather, the warmth we feel in our hearts and the good we produce with our lives is all a reflection of Jesus’ warmth & goodness.  We shine nowhere near as brightly, but neither are we shining like those stars, cold & distant human traditions and beliefs where you must produce the light on your own and at best can flicker feebly and ultimately uselessly.  The light produced doesn’t help anyone see.  But the more fully we reflect Jesus light, the more we become like a full moon that can make a difference in the night of this world.  We do not light things up entirely, only Jesus can do that.  But we can still make a difference and show a better way, all as we borrow his light.

            It’s why the pressure’s off!  You don’t have to worry about doing enough good things or producing more light, that’s not what our faith is about.  But if we do see that we are lacking that light, the answer is to get back into that light.  To put it simply, today God is telling us to be in Church more, to be studying our Bibles more, to be in prayer more.  Because this is where we find Christ’s light, and the more we have it the more we will reflect it, just like the moon can’t help but reflect the light of the sun…  So what does that look like in a church of 500-600 such as ours?  Well, how can we have about 300 more people in worship every week?  And how can we have about 400-500 more people in Bible Study every week?  And how can we have all 500-600 of us be praying more or reading our Bibles every day?  If that sounds crazy, I’m not kidding.  What else am I supposed to tell you if that’s where GOD says the light is found?… And how can we make that happen?  Let’s start having those conversations among church leadership, among each other, and among our family & friends. If you’re already doing this personally, great – do it even more!  Because only in the Gospel message of Jesus we find eternal life itself and walk in the light of God’s presence.  And as we see differently, that’s what will also change our lives on earth too. 

Dear Christian, from miles away in this dark world God wants people to see you… but not you.  He wants them to see HIS LIGHT reflected in OUR LIVES.  And if people aren’t seeing that when they look at us, the first and last question we ask should not be “what must I do?” or “how can I produce this light?”, but “how can I get back into God’s light?”  Fortunately, it’s easy to find again.  We just need to lift our eyes where we see it shining brightly on the horizon; in fact, it’s already dawned on us, brighter and more brilliant than anything else we’ve ever seen.  It’s right there in Word and Sacrament.  It’s right there in the cross and empty tomb.  It’s right there in Jesus…  Dear Christian, do you want to be a better person?…  Be in Christ more.  It’s all about Jesus and what he does.  Amen.

“No Empty Ritual”

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“No Empty Ritual” (Isaiah 42:2-7)

Series: Identity Revealed

by Pastor Nate Walther

Baptism of Christ, January 11th, 2026

            Are there any EMPTY RITUALS in your life?  Perhaps it’s those cheesy team-building exercises at work that you have to put up with.  Maybe it’s an outdated family tradition where nobody knows why you do what you do, it’s just what you’ve always done!  Or it might be performative social gestures – putting up yard signs, participating in protests, or putting those fancy frames about particular causes around your Facebook profile picture…  It’s not that these are all bad things, but do they really accomplish anything? Likewise, given our focus today, it seems fair to ask whether JESUS’ BAPTISM qualifies as such.  Seriously, why did Jesus need to get baptized?  He had no sins to wash away, and he was already God’s child from eternity!  Was Jesus’ Baptism merely an “empty ritual”? 

Today in his Word God shows us how it’s not.  Our sermon text contains the first of what we call Isaiah’s four Servant Songs, which connects to the truth throughout Scripture that the Lord often worked through servants to accomplish his purposes.  That included men like Saul & David, who were anointed with oil then filled with the Holy Spirit for the important task of leading God’s people.  Earlier in the book of Isaiah, God also calls the entire nation of Israel his servant, and he even calls a foreign king like Cyrus of Persia his servant, since Cyrus would return God’s people to the Promised Land after their exile in Babylon.  That last one’s especially interesting: Isaiah literally mentions Cyrus by name in this book – even calling him God’s “Anointed One”, which literally translated is “Christ” – but Isaiah lived a full 200 years before anyone else knew that name.

Unfortunately, the problem with all these servants is that they were men who had sin.  Israel constantly rebelled against God.  Despite a strong start, Saul completely turned his back on the Lord in the end.  Even David, “a man after God’s own heart”, as the Bible so eloquently puts it?  God didn’t call him that when David was committing adultery with Uriah’s wife.  Finally there’s Cyrus, the man who returned Israel to the Promised Land.  Like Saul, we’re not even sure if he died a believer!  How could any of these men finally be God’s servant, and get the job done as his “anointed one.”  It’s why God needed someone else to be his servant, someone better…

That’s what God talks about in Isaiah’s first “Servant Song”.  Listen again to the words of the first verse of our sermon text, “Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight. I am placing my Spirit on him. He will announce a just verdict for the nations.”

There’s a lot packed into these words.  First of all, we can see the entire Triune God in this verse.  God the Father is speaking.  He mentions God the Holy Spirit.  And what about God the Son?  Again, “Here is my Servant, whom I uphold.”  At first glance, that may not sound like the Son.  When God says he will “uphold” him, what help did Jesus require as the Son of God himself?  But notice how the Father also describes him as “my chosen one in whom I delight.”  There’s only one person about whom God could truly say that, and we heard it in our Gospel reading from Matthew 3.  At Jesus’ baptism the Father said, “with HIM I am well pleased”, God really did “delight” in Jesus!”  Then, God goes on to say “I am placing my Spirit on him.”  That may also seem a little strange to us, because did Jesus really need that kind help like sinful those sinful kings from the past?  Yet, about this same servant God says, “He will announce a just verdict for the nations.” It’s a picture of a judge announcing God’s verdict over all people in the heavenly courtroom.  Other than the God the Father himself, only Jesus is described with such authority in Scripture.

The rest of our sermon text reinforces the truth that Jesus is God’s true servant.  Verses 3 & 4 describe how the servant himself has the authority to “bring forth” and “establish” justice from God!  Verses 4 & 6 describe how he has authority “over all the earth”, as only God does. Verses 6 & 7 then describe how such justice will result in good things for all people despite their sin – that means this servant is able to overcome it!… In the end, we have to look a full 700 years into the future after Isaiah’s prophecy to find the proper fulfillment of these words, but that’s what we finally find in Jesus, who offers something so necessary in a world of empty rituals… especially when our own faith is full of them also.    

Seriously, how often do we treat baptism or our confirmation vows as such? Maybe you never think these words, but do we essentially live by the mantra, “I don’t always have to live as the child God says I am in baptism or listen to what God says as my Heavenly Father. It’s alright if I renege on those confirmation vows about being faithful to God’s Word and all that.”  Or when does church attendance become such? We go through the ritual not so much because we see the purpose in it, it’s just what we do.  And slowly – as our faith becomes more performative, as our relationship with God becomes less meaningful – we fall short as God’s servants.  It’s the sad reality of sin at work in our hearts.

            It’s why Jesus needed to come and do better than I did, which he did perfectly.  Think of it, the only one who didn’t need any help from angels, nor assistance at all as God himself… He willingly placed himself below angels for a time, as we just heard at Christmas; he willingly became subject to God’s law also, as he took on of human flesh.  Then, to overcome all sin as our substitute, he didn’t just blow away temptation, death, and the devil with his own power as the Son of God.  Instead he used what God has equally put at our disposal as sons of men: the Gospel, found in Word & Sacrament, where the Holy Spirit effectually delivers all of God’s power.

            Baptism was NO EMPTY RITUAL for Jesus.  It was him doing what God wanted us to do by relying on the power of God the Holy Spirit & having in a perfect relationship that always listened to God the Father. That’s why, when the Spirit descended on Jesus in Baptism, he followed that Spirit.   For example, in the words right after our Gospel reading, Matthew tells us that it was the Holy Spirit who led Jesus into the desert to be tempted. Jesus didn’t choose that on his own, but he did choose to rely on God to get him through that episode (we’ll hear more about that in the first week of Lent).  It’s a pattern Jesus follows throughout his life: constantly praying to the Father for guidance & direction as it led him straight to the cross, but not because Jesus lacked anything or needed that punishment. It was because we lacked everything and needed someone to suffer that punishment for us.

            So also, dear Christian, your baptism is NO EMPTY RITUAL.  In this same anointing God has poured out his power on you through his Spirit.  If that’s what Jesus relied upon in our place to overcome all the forces of sin, death, and the devil, it can work for you and for me too.  That means whatever commandments God has placed before me, and whatever tasks he’s assigned to you in your life – even if we think we are not able to do it! – we are able to do it.  The same goes for you kids out there who have been baptized – and you parents don’t you doubt it! – you can do what God says.  Simply trust God like Christ did, then do what God says like Christ did… and wherever you & I still fall short, know that Christ didn’t.  That’s where BAPTISM offers us one more gift that Jesus never needed from his Father & the Holy Spirit: washing for these sins, assurance that we are still God’s children.  That’s exactly what Jesus earned for us starting with his baptism and his work as God’s perfect servant. Someone finally got the job done right.

            In a world filled with EMPTY RITUALS – with superstitions ranging from what socks you’re going to wear on gameday to when you’re going to bathe, all in a futile effort to ensure your favorite team wins – that’s not what we find in baptism.  Jesus never would have gotten baptized otherwise, he never wasted his time on meaningless motions & outward show.  So also, Christian, you are baptized… and thank God for it!  Amen.

“The Gift of Perspective” (Isaiah 61:10-62:3)

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Series: Christ The Savior is Born

Pastor Nate Walther

New Years Eve, 2025

Another year is in the books.  In just a few short hours, 2025 will be in the rear-view mirror.  How are you feeling about the past year?  This one is hitting me more than most.  After a decade of raising our kids and starting a church in North Dakota, I couldn’t have imagined how different life would be just one short year later in Madison.  And so many things seemed like a big deal back then.  So many problems to figure out a year ago!  But now they hardly matter.  In their place are plenty of other problems! 

Not here at church, mind you.  I love being here and just “being a pastor” after a decade of being all things that a small mission church requires.  But suddenly, I own a house after living in a parsonage for a decade – plenty of additional stressors come with that!  Then, both Heather and I are working full time for the first time since we had kids – plenty of juggling of the schedules there!  With that it dawns on me how quickly we forget what we’ve made it through, and how quickly we get fixated on new problems. Over the last few years, Heather and I even came up with a saying whenever we solved something: “onto the next crisis!”, because there’s always another crisis.

I know you can relate, and it’s also something Isaiah’s audience from our sermon text could relate to.  Like us, they faced plenty of crises.  Listen to how Isaiah describes it the first half of his prophecy.  First there’s God responding to his people’s sin in Isaiah 1:“Woe to the sinful nation, a people whose guilt is great. Your country is desolate, your cities burned with fire; your fields are being stripped by foreigners right before you…”  Then, there’s God explaining the consequences when they continued their sin, Isaiah 24:“The ruined city lies desolate; the entrance to every house is barred.  In the streets they cry out for wine; all joy turns to gloom, all joyful sounds are banished from the earth. The city is left in ruins, its gate is battered to pieces…” Finally, there’s God’s Word to the king in Isaiah 39:“The time will surely come when everything in your palace, and all that your predecessors have stored up until this day, will be carried off to Babylon. Nothing will be left, says the Lord…”  It’s just one hit after another, and if these times and these problems were all they had, they would be doomed.  But that’s also why God sent Isaiah to them, to give them the GIFT OF PERSPECTIVE. The second half of his prophecy – especially, what we hear in our sermon text – does just that. 

In the first part of our sermon text, God’s people are speaking. And what’s immediately clear?  Things have completely turned around.  Verse 10 describes an emphatic joy – it’s even pictured with the language of a wedding, one of the most joyful times of life – and it’s all because the people have found salvation & righteousness… Then, in the second part of our sermon text, starting with chapter 62, God himself starts speaking, and what stands out there?  Again, things have completely turned around.  Verse 2 describes how all those nations and kings – who previously attacked and conquered and exiled them –would now see Israel differently!  Why was that?  From start to finish in this text, it’s simply because of the Lord.  Verse 10, God is the one who clothes his people in salvation & righteousness; Verse 11, God is the one who causes his people’s praise to sprout up; Chapter 62, verse 1, God is the one who will not rest or be silent, Verse 2, God is the one who assigns to his people a new name; finally, verse 3, God is the one who holds his loved ones in his palm.

Dear friends in Christ, a new year with its new problems is an opportunity to remember God will always work things out.  We need that reminder, because the passage of time wears on us just as surely.  We face trouble like God’s people in the past, and we worry about it.  For all our faith & desire to follow God, we also have days where we think everything is falling apart & we don’t trust God to put it back together.  It’s why we don’t deserve salvation, nor are we worthy to bear God’s holy name.  Far from being symbols of God’s strength, we are symbols of weakness….

Yet, we just heard the opposite.  God tells us through Isaiah that we are God’s crown and we are God’s scepter – both symbols of a king’s strength.  How can that be?  It starts with Christmas: God showing his strength in weakness – in an infant child born in human flesh, a child who suffered under all human frailty & sin, a child who was born to die on the cross in payment for all sin… all so we could be adopted into God’s name by being baptized into Jesus name, all to show a strength from God that could overcome all human weakness, all bring us into the light.

Now that this light has dawned, it changes our perspective on things, much like the first light of morning.  Have you ever noticed that?  Maybe you are in your tree stand, and it is dark, and you can’t make out much in the shapes around you.  But then the sun rises, and everything is clear, and maybe that’s when you suddenly notice that buck standing in the clearing!…  So also, it’s the GIFT OF PERSPECTIVE God shows us in the light of the Christ child.  That’s what can make a real difference in your life this new year if you look at things in that light.  And not just for you.

As we heard in our sermon text, this wasn’t just for the Israelites to see – or, by extension, us Christians today as spiritual children of Abraham – this is for all nations to see!   Think about it: life is hard enough with Christ.  Can you imagine how much your friends and family and coworkers are struggling without Christ?  They may put on a good face, but what war do they face?  What siege surrounds them?  What has been exiled and carried from their lives – and they don’t have an answer for it?

We can’t settle for that!  We love these people in our lives!  So what can we do to shine this light on them?… Maybe that’s the New Years’ resolution you’ve been searching for.  Have you been trying to figure ot out?  So often, we think of New Years’ resolutions in terms of self, and so often we fail because of the shortcomings of our sinful selves.  But what if we thought if it in terms of others, in terms of service?   What can we do in the new year to shine this light on others in word or deed, through invitations to church or acts of love that meet others’ needs?

It’s something to think about.  It’s a different perspective.  Finally, it’s the Christmas gift God gives us in Jesus.  Everything looks different in that light. And also, that includes our new year.  Whatever you face, know that God will get you through it too.  See it in the light of the Christ child.  Amen.

“Salvation in the Flesh” (John 1:1-14)

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Series: Christ The Savior is Born

Pastor Nate Walther

Christmas Day, 2025

Have you ever met someone famous?  Maybe it was a president, or an all-pro athlete, or a famous singer.  But when you told someone else about it, perhaps you were immediately met with skepticism: “No you didn’t!”  That’s where you may have responded with something like, “I’m not kidding!…  I saw him with my own eyes. I saw her IN THE FLESH.”  Those final words are an appeal to the senses: this was so real that I could actually see, hear, and touch this person as I shook their hand.

It’s those same words that illustrate for us the blessing of Christmas.  Sometimes the things that religion offers can seem to be “pie in the sky”, too good to be true.  I mean, how can the divine and miraculous and transcendent actually cross paths with me?  Sure, God says he’s there for me, but how does that help me with the unexpected bill in my hand that needs to be paid, or the cancer in your body that is literally destroying it, or the sinful temptation in our hearts that keeps rearing its ugly head just when we think we’ve got it under control?  How can I be sure that I really will go to heaven, or that there really are good things waiting for me after I die, or that I really will see my loved ones again?

God’s simple, yet brilliant answer at Christmas is this: SALVATION IN THE FLESH.  i.e. Christmas is all about what’s standing right before us in skin & bone.  Through his birth into human flesh, Jesus offers the one place in all of time & space where the divine actually crossed paths with our human flesh, as unbelievable as it may seem. 

That’s exactly what God talks about in our sermon text today. Listen again to what we heard in verse 14 “The Word became flesh and dwelled among us. We have seen his glory, the glory he has as the only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth…”  It’s a special title the Bible uses for Jesus.  What we heard at the beginning of our reading is also repeated here: Jesus is the Word.  Somehow, miraculously, Jesus is the same Word we pick up and read as we gather around it at home and in church.  Somehow, Jesus is also the same Word through which God once spoke and all things were created, as we were told back in verse 3. But he’s not just Word: metaphysical & abstract. No, “The Word BECAME FLESH and dwelled among us.” That’s really interesting. The Bible doesn’t just tell us that Jesus became a human being or a man – there were other words they would use back then for that.  No, the Bible takes it a step farther and says Jesus became flesh.  It’s a gritty, dirty kind of word.  The Bible even uses this word flesh elsewhere to describe our sinful flesh!  Of course, as the Son of God, Jesus didn’t have sinful flesh himself.  But this inspired word choice does remind us that Jesus got his hands dirty – he entered into our universe and our lives (tainted by sin) in a very real way – as real as the flesh on our hands that we can hold right before us…

Do you realize how much that changes everything?  Now we can look at all the other things God promises that may seem abstract – divine power to help us, which created everything we see with just a word; warm light, which can drive out the darkness of the sin in our hearts and evil in our lives; new life, which gives us hope even when we’re staring into the hopelessness of a grave – and we can finally believe that these impossible things really are true.  How?  It’s SALVATION IN THE FLESH.  It’s as real as a child lying in flesh in a manger, whom those shepherds first laid their very eyes on.  It’s as real as that child beginning to grow up found in the temple, whose understanding of God’s Word blew away the sharpest minds of his day.  It’s as real as that child now a man, who offered a glimmer of light through his love & his teachings to those lost in darkness with nowhere else to turn.  It’s as real as that same man raising the dead to life, who gave back to a grieving father his daughter & sisters their brother & masters their servants…

Dear friends in Christ, your help and your hope in this world doesn’t rest on dead prophets who once said some thought-provoking things, but whose words now ring hollow and distant when you’re hurting and suffering.  Your help and your hope rest on a living Savior whose birth is as real as any other event in history. That also includes the end of this child’s story: he died on a cross, for your sin and for mine; he rose from a grave, to deliver us from death undo the very worst thing this flesh does to us!

Again, it’s the value of something actually being in the flesh.  Granted, maybe you and I haven’t seen Jesus in the flesh personally.  But the fact is that he was seen in the flesh by others.  Countless thousands saw him, many of whom wrote about him, including the Apostle John who penned the words of our sermon text.  That makes it no less real to us.  Finally, if Jesus was going to enter our time and space, this is just the reality of it.  He could only come at one time, like all real things that have happened, and he could only come in one body, like all real people who have lived.  That means that not all the world would see it. But that doesn’t mean all the world couldn’t benefit from what he did. Just like the Caesars or the Popes, Johannes Gutenberg or Isaac Newton, George Washington or Abraham Lincoln had a lasting impact on things after them, though we have not seen them… so also Jesus, only in a far better and far more lasting way, and for all people.  In particular, this child was born to bring salvation to all who believe in him. Today, on this festival celebration, find a simple joy in the fact that you have all of God’s power, you have light in darkness, you have new life – as unbelievable and impossible as these things may seem!  Where is it all found? IN THE FLESH.  In Christ.  Your SALVATION is as real as a warm baby lying in his mother’s arms.  Amen. 

The Power of Imminence

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Theme: The Power of Imminence (James 5:7-12)

by Pastor Nate Walther

Do you know the tale of the Sword of Damocles?  It’s a Greek parable about a man named Damocles, who served under powerful king Dionysius.  One day as Damocles raved about the king’s power & position, Dionysius unexpectedly offered to trade places with him for a day.  Damocles gladly accepted and immediately enjoyed the feeling of sitting on the throne, surrounded by the finest wares with all the best food brought to him by servants. But then he noticed above his throne the point of a sword hanging right over his head, suspended by a single strand of horsehair and looking as if it could fall at any second.  Just as quickly as he noticed it, Damocles no longer wanted to be sitting on the throne…  As the fable goes, Dionysius put the sword there because he also had many enemies who wanted to kill him, so the sword was a reminder of the IMMINENCE of their threats.  And that was hard, it’s why Damocles didn’t want to sit on the throne!  But there was also a POWER in that sword, it prompted Dionysius to act swiftly and decisively in his actions as king since he was constantly reminded it this could all be over at any second.  As people interpret this parable today, it helps to explain why his real-life counterpart (also named Dionysius) was considered such a tyrant ruler.

            Perhaps we don’t have an actual sword hanging over our heads, but we get the idea. You’re playing a game and the hourglass is running out – it’s never quite clear when that will be just by looking at it! – and as the pressure mounts, you frantically shout out last-second guesses.  Or it’s the end of the year and deductibles are met, or the warranty is running out on your home or car, so there’s pressure get something looked at by the doctor, or to get your car or home inspected before it’s too late!  That’s the POWER OF IMMINENCE.  When we know something could happen at any time, it prompts us to action. There’s nothing like a deadline to get things done.  So also, God shows us today in his Word that the imminence of Christ’s return has the same power to change how we live our lives.

            A little background for our sermon text: James’s audience struggled to treat others well, including fellow Christians.  They often spoke poorly of each other, even cursing one other. And even when they talked a good talk, they still didn’t actually do anything for those in need.  Meanwhile, they showed favoritism to the rich who took advantage of the poor they weren’t helping.  Now, at the end of a letter James sent to help correct their behavior, James reminds them of the power of imminence in Christ’s return so it might motivate new behavior in them.

            We see that right in the heart of our sermon text.  Take another look at verse eight.  Under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, James writes, “You be patient too. Strengthen your hearts… because the coming of the Lord is near” — It’s imminent, it could happen at any time!  And in that light that James goes on to say things like verse nine, “Do not complain about one another, brothers, so that you will not be judged. Look! The Judge is standing at the door…” 

In a world that so often directs people to themselves to power through challenges and difficulties and to be a better person, God does not direct us Christians to our own heroic capabilities; rather, he directs us to the certain knowledge that Christ will return again soon. That’s what he means to empower our behavior.  It’s the same picture James painted with the farmer in the first verses of our sermon text.  The farmer doesn’t know when the rains will come, but still he prepares and perseveres because he knows it could be at any time.

            That said, how often does the imminence of Christ’s return not show in our lives?  Honestly, what would I say different, how would I treat people differently, what would look different in my life if I knew Jesus was coming tomorrow, or perhaps even this evening?… You realize he could, right?  That hourglass may only have one grain of sand left in it, we’ve seen all the signs of the end of time that Scripture talks about spill out into the bottom of the it!  Yet how often do we not live with such urgency, and we do things that wouldn’t matter to us the moment Jesus returned?  Even worse, how often do we live in sin and figure we could always come back to what God wants later?… What if God did the same?  What if he put off saving us and doing what’s best for us?  After all, he could always come back to us!  Hopefully we won’t be dead and in hell by then, or we won’t be too far gone and our hearts so hardened that we just reject him!

            Except, that’s never what God has done. In fact, the entire Bible is really the story of how our sin created an IMMINENCE in God’s behavior, which prompted him to use all of his POWER to act with urgency and love.  It’s why in the garden God’s immediate response to Adam & Eve was not, “here are the consequences for your sin”, but rather, “here’s what I will do to fix it!”  It’s why whenever God’s people cried out to him for help in the Old Testament after rebelling against him, his heart could never bear it and he would quickly send a Moses, or a judge, or a king to help them.  It’s why at the very moment king David confessed his ugly sins of covetousness and adultery and murder to Nathan the prophet, God forgave him.  Yes, there were earthly consequences to all these sins too, but one such consequence was never the removal of God’s grace and eternal pardon.  And that’s true for you and for me as well.  Even when we have shown so little concern for the signs of Christ’s coming, or even when we continue to live in sin by putting off whatever God wants us to do today, still we repent and believe. And then when the water pours over your skin in baptism, when Christ’s true body & blood in the bread & wine are tasted on your lips in Lord’s Supper, when the Gospel promise enters ears opened by repentant hearts – God only continues to save us through his Son Jesus, who felt the imminence of our condition, which powerfully prompted him to take all of his power and pour it into human flesh so that he would save us from our sin through his perfect life and innocent death on the cross.

            Dear Christian, there’s POWER IN IMMINENCE, especially when it comes from the God of all power. It’s why you don’t have to “try harder” or “find it in yourself” to be a better person. Jesus has already taken all that pressure off our shoulders.  Instead as James shows us, we just need to see more and more that Christ has come & Christ will return.  We may not know exactly when, but like we see the signs of the season – leaves changing & temperatures dropping, and you knew this past fall that winter was coming even though it took a while for it to happen; and sure enough, here it is – so also we know Christ could come at any time. Finally, that’s why tomorrow is not the day to talk to your loved one about their sin or tell that friend about Jesus.  Tomorrow is not the day to get your kids baptized or get that pet sin out of your life.  Tomorrow is not the day to start taking your family’s devotional life seriously with Bible Study and prayer or make church a bigger priority in your life.  No, today is the day for that…  There’s no other option, not when we consider Jesus’ IMMINENT ARRIVAL.  In fact, we don’t even want another option.  Because we don’t have a sword hanging over us like the rest of the world does, fearing the end of time and death and what it means for us.  We have salvation hanging over our heads.  We want to be in this chair, it’s only good, and it can only change our lives for the better.  Amen.