On the Descent

Our Lord Christ did descend into hell, battered hell open, overcame the devil, and delivered those who were held captive by the devil. (Blessed Martin Luther: House Postil I:480)

Christ has crushed hell, opened up heaven, bound and taken captive the devil, and delivered the prisoners. (Blessed Martin Luther: House Postil I:480)

The soul, having obtained union with the Word; descended into hell; but using its divine power and efficacy, it said to the ones in bondage, "Go forth!" (St. Cyril of Alexandria, as cited in Catalog of Testimonies VI)

Our Second Year

With full LSB rites for Chief Service at noon, and Tenebrae Vespers. No question that Tenebrae Vespers continues to be the more popular in our parish, with over 200 in attendance tonight, but only slightly more than 30 for the "Chief" (!!!) Service. But those who attended both can attest that they are very different liturgies, and each seems to me to be an important part of Good Friday.

At the Vespers I especially love the praying of the 4 psalms. We don't pray the psalms nearly as often as we should, and on a day like today, well, they are just perfect. When all our words fail, God gives us the gift of these Words for our prayer that are both prayer to Him and Words from Him.

Now we eagerly wait for the joy of Pascha breaking into the darkness tomorrow evening.

Holy Cow!

I never realized how much meat a side of cow was. I think we might be set for, what? A year??? Just let's not have the freezer go out any time soon.

REMINDER

I've had numerous folks contact me, asking me to call them in regards to Issues, Etc. I am not trying to be rude, folks, but I will NOT be picking this matter up again until AFTER Easter. Pr. Wilken has told us what to do: go to church, receive Jesus' body and blood, celebrate the most important days in the history of the human race. What to do about Issues, Etc. can wait till Monday. A blessed Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Pascha to you all!

Homily for Good Friday - Chief Service

St. John tells the Passion of our Lord in his own unique way, and he provides little hints along the way as to what it was all about. Here are some of the hints: Mary and Jesus’ words to her; the fact that it is after he dies, that his side is pierced; and what comes out of his side: blood and water. By these hints John would have us learn to see in the Passion of Christ that Jesus is the new Adam and the Church is His Bride, his new Eve.

Let’s take the hints and unfold them: Mary first. You meet Mary only twice in St. John’s gospel. The first time is in chapter two, at a wedding feast. That is significant! There, you remember, Mary interceded for the young couple with Jesus, but he replied: “Woman, my hour is not yet.” Nevertheless, there He worked His first sign, turning water into wine. And His disciples believed in Him.

The next place you meet Mary is under the cross where she stands next to John, the beloved disciple. And Jesus speaks those tender words to her: “Woman, behold your son!” and to John “behold, your mother.” But what is it that is going on in those words? Quite simply, Jesus is bidding His mother good-bye. Now, ask yourself, when is it in Scripture that a man leaves his father and mother? Is it not when he is to be joined to his wife and become one flesh with her?

And when at the creation of the world, God created woman, did he not do so by first putting the man to sleep, and then taking from his side, a bride? So in John’s Passion, it is after our Lord has been put into the sleep of death that his side is opened by a spear.

And then there is the mystery of what flowed from His side: blood and water. The Church has long looked at this in awe and recognized here the very fountain from which the Sacraments spring. For this water is the water of Baptism, mingled with the blood of Christ. And this Blood is the Blood of the Eucharist, mingled with the water of life. And through these sacraments, Christ’s own life creates His Church, His beloved Bride. And why? That she and He might become one.

For that is what the cross of Jesus is all about. He becoming one with us in our sin, bearing it to death, that by being joined to us His death might be the death of our sin and that we by being joined to Him might be given His pure and sinless life. Think of it! When a couple marries and one of them is wealthy and having everything while the other is impoverished and having nothing, what happens? In their becoming one, the debt is assumed and answered for, and the wealth is given to the impoverished one. So it is between us our Lord Jesus Christ. That’s what Good Friday is all about. It’s just one of the reasons we call this day alone in all the year “good” because on this day the greatest good, way beyond our imagining, befell us.

As you ponder the Passion reading you have just heard, hear in it with ears of faith this wondrous story of the how Your Lord Jesus suffered and died in order that He might be joined to you as a Bridegroom to a Bride, that His life might flow into you and overcome and destroy your death, that His forgiveness might come to you and wipe out the entirety of your sinful indebtedness. “Thy Bridegroom dead! God's Lamb has bled Upon thy sin forever; Pouring out His sinless self In that vast endeavor."

Calvary and the Altar

At the Altar is the cresset where we get our fire of the Calvary love. How this love is needed! We have lost much of it. We have to invent all kinds of methods to attract people. We must advertise, we must entertain. Why? Because the Church has lost its way to the Altar it has also lost its way into the heart of the world. For the pure love of Calvary alone can save the world. It is that love for which this world is aching. But we must first recapture it ourselves.

Let us find the reality of Calvary, of love, by way of the Altar. There we can touch again the wounds of Christ; and by touching the wounds of Christ, we shall touch the wounds of the world.

--Von Schenk, *The Presence* pp. 91,92

from the Good Friday Liturgy

...graciously behold this Your family, for whom our Lord Jesus Christ was willing to be betrayed and delivered into the hands of sinful men to suffer death upon the cross...

...grant that our hearts may be so fixed with steadfast faith in Him that we fear not the power of sin, death, and the devil.

...You willed that Your Son should bear for us the pains of the cross and so remove from us the power of the adversary...

...Behold, the life-giving cross on which was hung the salvation of the world. O come, let us worship Him...

...What have I done to you, O my people, and wherein have I offended you? Answer Me...

...All sins thou borest for us, else had despair reigned o'er us: Have mercy on us, O Jesus! O Jesus!...

...Holy Lord God, Holy and mighty God, Holy and most merciful Redeemer, God eternal, leave us not to bitter death. O Lord, have mercy...

...We adore You, O Lord, and we praise and glorify Your holy resurrection. For behold, by the wood of Your cross, joy has come into all the world!...

...that Your abundant blessing may be upon Your people who have held the passion and death of Your Son in devout remembrance, that we may receive Your pardon and the gift of Your comfort, and may increase in faith and take hold of eternal salvation.

Again to Paradise - St. Romanos the Melodist

Pilate fixed three crosses on Golgotha: two for the thieves, and one for the Giver of life. When Hell saw it, he said to those below, “My ministers and powers, who has fixed a nail in my heart? A wooden lance has suddenly pierced me and I am being torn apart! My insides are in pain, my belly in agony, my senses make my spirit tremble, and I am compelled to disgorge Adam and Adam’s race. All men were given to me by the Garden’s tree–but now a tree is bringing them back again to Paradise.”

When he heard this, Satan, the cunning serpent ran crawling and said, “What is it, hell? Why do you groan for no reason? Why produce these wailings? This Tree, at which you tremble, I carpentered up there for Mary’s Child. I suggested it to his enemies for our advantage, for it is a Cross, to which I have nailed Christ, wishing by a tree to do away with the second Adam, just as I did away with the first one. So do not be afraid. It is dry and barren. It will not harm you. Keep hold of those you have. Of those we rule, not one will escape again to Paradise.”

Hell replied to Satan, “You have lost your senses–you, the cunning snake of old! All your wisdom has been swallowed up by the cross, and you have been caught in your own snare. Lift up your eyes and see that you have fallen into the pit you dug! Behold that Tree, which you call dry and barren, bears fruit: a thief tasted it and has become heir to the good things of Eden. Moses’ rod led the people out of Egypt, but this tree brings mankind back again to Paradise.”

Satan answered, “Wretched hell–cease this cowardly talk! Your words reveal your thoughts. Are you afraid of a cross and of the Crucified? Not one of your words has shaken me, for these deeds are part of my plan. I will also open a grave and entomb Christ, so that you may enjoy your cowardice doubly–from his tomb as well as from his cross. When I see you, I will mock you. For when Christ is buried I will come to you and say, “Who now brings Adam back again to Paradise?”

Then hell spoke back, “Now is the moment for you to listen, Satan. Now you will see the power of the Cross and the great authority of the Crucified. For you, the cross is folly. But the world sees it as a throne, on which, as though seated, Jesus is nailed and hears the thief cry to him, ‘Lord, remember me in your kingdom.’  Listen now as he answers, kingly, ‘Today, poor beggar, you will reign with me. For with me, you will go in again to Paradise.”

 At these words, Satan began to wilt, and what he heard he saw: a thief witnessing to Christ crucified. And so, amazed, he struck his breast and said, “Christ did not answer his accusers, and yet he speaks to a thief? To Pilate he never spoke a word; but now he addresses a murderer, saying, “Come, live in pleasure”? What is this? Who has seen words or deeds done by this thief, by means of which he goes again to Paradise?

Again the devil called out, “Receive me, Hell. I turn to you; I submit to your views, I, who did not believe them. I saw the Tree at which you shuddered, made red with blood and water. And I shuddered, not, I tell you, at the blood, but at the water. For the blood shows Jesus’ slaughter, but the water shows his life, for life has gushed from his side. For it was not the first but the second Adam who carried Eve, the mother of all the living, again to Paradise.”

Now Hell and Satan cried out together, “Let us lament as we see the Tree which we planted transformed into a holy trunk, beneath which thieves, murderers, tax collectors and harlots will find shelter, and reap sweet fruit from what seemed barren. For they cling to the Cross as the Tree of Life. Pressed against it and swimming, through it they escape, and come again as to a harbor, again to Paradise.”

Hell said to Satan, “Swear, tyrant, finally to crucify no one.” And Satan replied, “You take an oath to kill no one. We have had our experience, let us draw back our hand. Let neither of us ever again tyrannize the race of Adam, for it has been sealed by the Cross, it has been given life, like a treasure of a precious pearl in a fragile pot; life, which a thief, well-suited to his trade, took on the Cross. For stealing he was nailed up to die ; and having thieved he was called again to Paradise.”

O most high and glorious, God of fathers and of youths, your willing outrage has become our honor. For in your Cross, we all may boast. To it we have nailed our hearts, that on it we may hang our instruments and sing to you, the Lord of all, from the songs of Zion. The ship from Tarshish once brought gold to Solomon; but to us your Tree gives back, every day and every moment, wealth beyond price. For it brings us all again to Paradise.

Homily for Maundy Thursday

Exodus 12:1-14 / 1 Cor. 11:23-32 / John 13:1-15, 34-35

Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end. Such is His life. A life that loves to the end. And so a life that serves.

He wanted them to understand this. He showed His almighty power with a bowl of water and a towel. He showed them that this is who God is: the one who came not to be served, but to serve. The one who serves with a bowl of water and a washing that gives a share with Him in His life.

It was to fill the water with life-giving power that He was preparing to go to His cross. There His love would reach out to the end: loving all, even His enemies, especially His enemies, to destroy the power of Satan over their lives. Love is His power. Love is His indestructible weapon. Love is His might. Love that can never be conquered by bitterness, hatred, or anger. Love that triumphs over all.

And Love dies in the place of all, bearing the sins of all in His own body, pouring out His blood to blot out forever the accusations that were against us.

Such Love would live in us. “I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you.” And this is what is new in His commandment tonight: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”

What’s new is the “just as I have.” Love has always been the summary of the Law. Love the Lord your God with your all. Love your neighbor as yourself. It had always been about love. But who would ever have dreamt such love as He showed us? “Love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be.” Who would have guessed that Love could be so strong as to die in utter weakness, so mighty as to give up life itself so that we might be pardoned, forgiven, restored and healed? “He loved them to the end.” And because His life was love all the way to the end, it could not and did not end. But more on that on Sunday.

Tonight we think instead of how Love in our flesh loved us so much as to establish a memorial that would be ours for all our days. A memorial of His great love. A memorial that would NOT have us remember an absent Lord, but taste and see the goodness of a present one. Has anyone ever been so remembered as Jesus of Nazareth? At His table Sunday by Sunday, week by week, decade by decade, century by century, millennium by millennium, His people have gathered to Him as He yields to them His body under the bread, His blood under the wine, and whispers to them that He did it for them, for the forgiveness of sins. Such a Lord of love we have!

And it is by His gift of love that He would change us, set us free from the chains of our sinful fears, worries, hatreds and angers, and let His washing cleanse us through and through of them. It is by His gift of the Eucharist that Love Himself would live in us, would heal us with His peace, would honor us with His life, would transform us with His joy.

And whenever we would say: “But I can’t.” I can’t break with this sin. I can’t overcome this bitterness. I can’t stop this worry. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t. He comes to us in such gentleness and says: “I know you can’t. That’s why you need Me. Because I have, I can, and I will. And if you let me, I will do so also in you. I will be in you a Love that loves to the end. I will be in you forgiveness for your sin and healing for your hurts. I will be in you strength in your temptations and hope for all your despair. I come to you as I have always come, to serve you, you whom I loved so much as to go the way of sorrows, shouldering your sin, bearing your curse, loving you all the while without fail. All the way to my cross. Love forever and love for always. That’s who I would be in you.”

And so we welcome Him yet again tonight as He comes to us in His holy meal. A king with a bowl and a towel, ready to wash us, to serve us. A king with a feast of His own body and blood, ready to nourish us. A king who is a lamb, slain in our stead that death might finally and forever passover us. This is our Jesus who loves His own to the end with a love that never ends. Tomorrow we will stand in awe before that love as it shines on a cross, and the day after we will shout for joy in that love as it breaks forth from the tomb.

Who could ever have dreamed of love so amazing, so divine? Glory to You, O Lord Jesus! Glory to You, our Lamb, and glory to Your holy blood forever! Amen.

Maundy Thursday

Here's a Beautiful Meditation for Maundy Thursday by Pastor McCain. Highly recommended reading.

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

We are united to Him, not only because He hath assumed our nature, but also because His body and blood are communicated to us in the Holy Supper. I do not therefore ask with the unbelieving Jews - "How can this man give us His flesh to eat?", but I rather exclaim: "How marvelous it is that the Lord hath given us His body to eat and His blood to drink!" I do not pry into the mysteries of His power, but I do wonder at the marvels of His mercy. -- Blessed Johann Gerhard, *Sacred Meditations* XVIII

Patristic Quote of the Day

It was fitting, therefore, for Him to be in us both divinely by the Holy Spirit, and also, so to speak, to be mingled with our bodies by His holy flesh and precious blood; which things also we possess as a life-giving Eucharist, in the form of bread and wine. For lest we should be terrified by seeing actual flesh and blood placed upon the holy tables of our churches, God, humbling Himself to our infirmities, infuses into the things set before us the power of life, and transforms them into the efficacy of His flesh, that we may have them for a life-giving participation, and that the body of Him Who is the Life may be found in us as a life-producing seed. And do not doubt that this is true, since Himself plainly says, This is My body; This is My blood; but rather receive in faith the Savior's word; for He, being Truth, cannot lie. -- St. Cyril of Alexandria, Homily 142 on St. Luke

A Petition

Thanks to Jenn!

www.petitiononline.com/Issues/petition.html

Moratorium for Maundy Thursday through Easter

Let's not forget our brothers, Pr. Wilken and Jeff, but let us join them tomorrow morning in entering into the great Three Days. Our attention tomorrow needs to turn from this fiasco to another moment that looked like a fiasco and ended up being the salvation of the whole world. Feel free to comment on the Issues threads, if you think you have to, but come tomorrow until Easter Monday *I* will not be commenting further upon the matter (though I will delete "over the top" posts if I think it called for; have already done so and will do so again if need be). After the great joy of Pascha has refreshed our hearts and soothed our souls, we'll be ready to take up the task, renewed and without sinful passion. We can then pick up the conversation on scheduling a protest and other ways we can communicate to Synod that we want this valuable resource for our Christian walk restored.

A Most Intriguing Idea

Pastor Beisel suggests an actual protest outside the gates of the Purple Pad. How many of you are in the St. Louis area and who would be willing to join in such a protest, demanding them to "Bring Issues Back!"? It would give a chance for all us Issue fans to show our faces to each other, and maybe plan a nice get together banquet of sort afterwards to thank Pr. Wilken and Jeff for what they've done. Hmm. I admit it. I'm a boomer. A protest. It sounds so nostalgic! ;) Who would be willing to show up???

Here's KFUO's "Explanation"

"For programmatic and business reasons, the decision was made this week to discontinue the "Issues, Etc." program on KFUO-AM. We look forward to bringing you new programming in this time slot in the near future. Also, we thank "Issues" host Rev. Todd Wilken and producer Mr. Jeff Schwarz for their years of service on behalf of the station. Those interested may still download past "Issues, Program Etc." programs from the "Issues" archive on this website. Thank you sincerely for your continued support of KFUO's radio ministry."

Passives allow you to avoid saying WHO did the action. Yes, we all know the decision "was made." What we want is the name of the man who made it.

We would also like an explanation instead of business-babble - WHAT are the "programmatic and business reasons"?

In this, Synodical "trust us" hooey ain't gonna cut it, guys! We want you to own up to WHO did it AND WHY.

Issues Etc. Testimonials

Friends, I'd invite all of you who have been blessed across the years to write a brief account of what Issues, Etc. has meant to you and post it in response to this. I'd especially love to hear from folks who have been brought into the Lutheran Church by Issues, Etc., but I'd welcome hearing from any and all testimonies to the blessing this shown has been.

Rerun from Last Year, but boy do we need to hear them today!

Holy week... The most important seven days in the history of man... Although the exact sequence of events is not always clear to us, we can discern, even now, the straight lines of divine order... Sunday: The garments in the dust - the Hosannahs as the prelude to the "Crucify."... Monday: Sermons with the urgent note of finality - the withered fig tree - Caesar's coin... Tuesday: The terrifying wrath of the Lamb over institutionalized and personal sin among the Scribes and Pharisees - the fire and color of His last sermon to the city and the world - the sureness of justice and the coming of judgment... Night and prayer in the light of the Easter moon on the Mount of Olives...

Wednesday is silent... If anything happened, the holy writers have drawn the veil... Everything that God could say before the Upper Room had been said... It was man's turn now... Perhaps there were quiet words in a corner of the Garden, both to His children who would flee and to His Father who would stay... Wednesday was His... The heart of that mad, crowded Holy Week was quiet... Tomorrow the soliders would come, and Friday there would be God's great signature in the sky... Thursday and Friday would belong to time and eternity, but Wednesday was of heaven alone...

Silent Wednesday... If our Lord needed it, how much more we whose life is the story of the Hosannah and the Crucify... Time for prayer, for adoration... Time to call the soul into the inner court and the Garden... In our crowded world we are lonely because we are never alone... No time to go where prayer is the only sound and God is the only light... We need more silent Wednesdays... In the glory of the Cross above our dust our silence can become purging and peace... God speaks most clearly to the heart that is silent before Him... [O.P. Kretzmann, The Pilgrim, pp. 27, 28]

Divine Service and Confirmation at St. Paul's - Palmarum

Courtesy of Pr. David Gallas