In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Confirmation is the most beloved tradition in the Lutheran Church. Many of us still look back with fondness on the day when we were Confirmed and remember it as one of the most influential times of our lives. I can still remember how my hand was shaking when I reached out to receive the cup for the first time, because apparently, my parents and my pastor, had done a pretty good job of teaching me that it’s actually the real Body and Blood of Christ. Personally, I like Confirmation. And I’m glad that we still do it.

But I also think that we need to be careful about how we approach it. Like every man-made tradition, there’s always the danger that we would elevate it into something that it isn’t supposed to be, and because of that, put aside the real Word of God instead. This is literally what Jesus accused the Pharisees of doing in the Bible. They were teaching as doctrines the commandments of men, and making void God’s actual Word for the sake of their own made-up practices. We don’t want to do that with Confirmation. 

So, what I’m going to try and do in this morning’s sermon is clear up some of the most common misconceptions about this practice, so that we can truly honor Christ in the way that we observe it.

The first misconception about Confirmation is that it’s a Sacrament. That’s isn’t true. In the Lutheran Church we teach that in order for something to be considered a Sacrament it has to have three things. First, it needs a clear command from God in the Bible. Second, it has to join God’s Word of promise to a visible element. And third, it needs to offer us the forgiveness of our sins. Confirmation, of course, has none of those things. God doesn’t tell us that we have to do it anywhere in the Scriptures. It doesn’t join His Word of promise to any visible element. And we don’t get the forgiveness of our sins by going through it. So, Confirmation isn’t a Sacrament, and we can’t make it a requirement as if it is one.

But just because something isn’t a Sacrament, that doesn’t mean that its unimportant or useless. There are all kinds of things that we do in Church, which even though God hasn’t specifically commanded us to, we can observe in Christian freedom because of what they teach us. A good example of this would be something like the vestments. There’s nothing in the Bible that explicitly says that our pastors have to wear certain robes during the worship service. But we still choose to do it in order to communicate the importance of the Office of the Ministry. What matters most isn’t the man who stands in from of us and forgiveness us of our sins, it’s the Office in which he stands. It’s the Word that he proclaims.

And there is something similar going on with Confirmation. Because even though Jesus doesn’t tell us that we have to do it anywhere in the Bible, even though He never explicitly commands us that we need to get up in front of the Church and make certain vows if we want to be Christians, He does tell us that we need to confess Him before others. As our Lord Himself says in Matthew chapter 10, which by the way, is one of the main verses used at the beginning of the Confirmation liturgy, “Whoever confesses Me before men, I also will confess before My Father who is in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny before My Father who is in heaven.” 

God’s Word calls upon us to confess the faith. Under the threat of eternal damnation, it tells us that we need to “let our light shine before others” and not shy away from identifying ourselves with Jesus and His teaching. This shows the world around us that we actually do believe what’s in the Scriptures and aren’t ashamed of them. And that’s one of the reasons why we have Confirmation. It gives our young people, in particular, the opportunity to publicly confess their faith in Christ. We give them a chance to do what Jesus says in the Bible.

As a side note here, we should also mention the fact that when someone takes their Confirmation vows in our church, we aren’t asking them to simply make a generic confession that fits every single denomination out there. We’re asking them specifically to pledge their fidelity to the Lutheran confession. As one of the questions says, “Do you confess the doctrine of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, drawn from the Scriptures, as you have learned to know it from the small Catechism to be faithful and true?” Nowhere have we ever said that only Lutherans go to heaven, but we aren’t ashamed to assert that in the Lutheran Church, we have pure doctrine. The teachings of the Small Catechism are the same teachings that we find in the Bible. That’s where we got them from! So, having someone voice their support of the Catechism, and reject everything that disagrees with it, isn’t being arrogant. It’s being faithful.

Not every person who calls himself a Christian believes that Baptism has the power to wash away our sins or that you should baptized babies. Not everybody agrees that the Lord’s Supper is the true Body and Blood of Christ, and that we are saved through faith alone and not our works. Some people even teach that faith is a decision of our free will that we have to make for ourselves if we want to go to heaven. Well, is that what the Bible teaches us? No. So, we make our confirmands be clear. We ask them whether or not they want to be Lutherans, so that they can make a specifc confession about Jesus and not just a generic one, which isn’t really a real confession at all.

The second misconception about Confirmation, and this is very much related to that first one about it not being a Sacrament, is that Confirmation somehow secures us a place in heaven by the mere act of going through it. We’ve probably all encountered that individual before, or maybe we even know someone personally, who doesn’t go to church anymore or live a Christian life at all, but still makes a big deal about how they got Confirmed once, as if that’s some kind of get out of hell free card. But that’s not what Confirmation is supposed to be about. In fact, we could even say the same thing about the actual Sacraments, like Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Yes, God does offer us the forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation through them, but nowhere in the Bible does it teach us that they save us automatically. They only save us through faith. They save us because they present to us something that faith can trust and grab onto, namely, the promises of God. As Jesus says in Mark 16:16, “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved,” not simply “whoever is baptized.” 

And the same thing applies to Confirmation. The mere act of saying certain things out loud in front of other people is not by itself the cause of anyone’s salvation. In fact, it’s possible to go through the motions, and take all of these vows, without actually believing in a single one of them. That’s the kind of scenario that Jesus is getting at in Matthew chapter 15 when He says, “These people honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.” We need to be clear that no one will be saved who doesn’t believe in Jesus. No matter what else they say and do, even if they get Baptized, Confirmed, and take the Lord’s Supper every week, if they don’t repent of their sins and trust in Christ for forgiveness, they won’t go to heaven when they die. It doesn’t matter what else happens in their life, even if they get Confirmed in 8th grade.

The third misconception about Confirmation, and this one also has to do with the Sacraments, is that Confirmation is a sort of pre-requisite for Communion and that it entitles you to receive it whenever you want. Since we’ve chosen to observe the practice of Confirmation in conjunction with first Communion, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it’s also had some unintended consequences. One of them is the idea that going through Rite of Confirmation itself, and taking the vows, is what makes a person eligible for the Sacrament of the Altar. But that can’t possibly be true. How could the Rite of Confirmation do that when Confirmation isn’t even commanded in the Bible? That doesn’t make any sense.

However, the Bible does tell us that people need to be prepared before they receive Communion. This includes general instruction over the basic teachings of God’s Word, and specific instruction about the Lord’s Supper itself. As Saint Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 11, “Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself.” If we choose to link together instruction with the practice of Confirmation, we can certainly do that. And asking someone if they are confirmed before we offer them Communion as a quick way to figure out what they’ve been taught and what they’re supposed to believe isn’t bad either.  But we shouldn’t confuse the ceremony itself, with the Catechesis that happened before it. What prepares someone to receive Communion is having the right faith. It’s about knowing what God’s Word says and believing it. Can a person know what God’s Word says and believe it before 8th grade? Sure. Can a person in 8th grade not know what God’s Word says at all and not believe any of it. Yep. So, we need to be careful not to give the impression that being a certain age, or having said certain vows, is what allows you to take Communion. 

Along those same lines, another issue that we run into here is the idea that once a person has been confirmed, they are automatically eligible to receive the Sacrament in the Lutheran Church for the rest of their lives. Confirmation becomes kind of a like a punch-card at the YMCA that gets you into the club whenever you want. You can just come and go as you choose. I can’t tell you how many times in my Ministry I’ve dealt with this exact situation. A person was raised in the Lutheran Church and got confirmed here as a young adult. Then they grew up and left the Lutheran Church and started attending somewhere else. But when they come back home for the holidays to see mom and dad, or whoever, they march right up to the Altar and demand to receive the Sacrament just like they did before. Sometimes they literally say, “I was confirmed here,” as if that makes a difference now when they go to a different church. But what church did we promise to go to when we said in our Confirmation vows that we would continue in this confession until we die? Were we promising to be Methodist or Baptist? Were we promising to be Roman Catholic or Reformed? No, we were saying that we were going to stay a Lutheran. We weren’t not going to depart from the teachings of the Catechism, which are the teachings of the Bible. And what do you think it means when we take that vow that we intend to receive the Lord’s Supper faithfully? Well, it certainly doesn’t mean receiving at a Church that doesn’t even teach that it’s the actual Body and Blood of Christ, or puts up with false doctrine.

Confirmation was never meant to be something that allowed us to avoid doctrinal differences. It was supposed to be something that made it clear which side we took on them. It wasn’t supposed to be passport stamp for getting the Sacrament whenever we want it. It was supposed to be a way to make sure that everyone who received the Sacrament together held to the same beliefs. We’re supposed to have unity in our confession, before we have unity at the table. That’s the point of having Confirmation in conjunction with first Communion.

And, the last misconception about Confirmation, which is probably the biggest one of all, is that Confirmation is some sort of graduation. It’s just another rite of passage like drinking a beer with your dad, or driving a car for the very first time. And once you get it over with, you’re good to go, and you don’t have to do any of the stuff that went along with it ever again.

My father, who was also Lutheran pastor, used to tell a joke that I bet you’ve heard before. It goes like this. What do you do to get rid of bats in the Church attic?  Just Confirm them, and then they’ll leave. It’s terrible. But the only reason why it makes any sense, is because there’s also some sad truth to it. I haven’t been a pastor for very long myself, but even in my short time in the Ministry, I’ve already lost track of how many kids I’ve seen come and go and never come back. It breaks your heart every time.

When then attitude is, “Great, now I don’t have to study the Bible anymore” or “Sweet, now I don’t have to pay attention to the sermon,” or worst of all, “Awesome, now no one is going to force me to go to Church,” you know that that kid doesn’t stand a chance. At least, not unless something drastically changes soon. 

Confirmation isn’t about being done with all the “Church stuff,” it’s about accepting more responsibility for yourself. The Bible teaches us that we are life-long students of the Scriptures. That’s literally what the word “disciple” means. It means a “student.” We never stop needing to hear God’s Word and receive His Sacraments. Even if no one is watching us, even if we don’t have a pastor grading our assignments anymore, or making us do memory work, that doesn’t mean that we can just coast through life and our faith will be fine. On the contrary, it will wither and die if it isn’t fed properly. So, we need to stay close to where God feeds it, and not neglect His gifts. We don’t treat Confirmation like graduation. We treat it like initiation. It’s closer to the beginning of our walk with Christ, not the end of it.

I love Confirmation. I think it’s a wonderful tradition in the Lutheran Church. If this sermon gave you the impression that it isn’t, that’s not what I intended at all. My only point was that we need to do it for the right reasons. It isn’t a Sacrament. It isn’t a get out of hell free card. It doesn’t entitle you to Communion whenever you want it. And it’s not some sort of graduation from going to church and studying the Bible. But it is a good practice. It reminds us of the importance of being instructed in God’s Word and the necessity of being prepared to take Communion. It gives us an opportunity to confess our faith, and makes it very clear which faith we are confessing. 

Mason and Devin, that’s what you’re doing today. It’s not your act of confession that saves you. It’s what you’re confessing. Christ is your righteousness. His death and resurrection ransomed you from your sin. And in His Word and Sacraments He offers you forgiveness for every last one of them. What you learned in the Catechism is the Word of God, because the Catechism takes everything from the Bible. And what you have here in the Lutheran Church might not be automatic salvation, but it is access to the pure teachings of the Scriptures, which save those who believe them.

God is giving you so much today. He’s given you so much already. When you’re old, I hope that you’ll look back on this day with fondness too. But above all I pray that you’ll never forget the promises you made, and more importantly, the promises God’s made to you. “Whoever confesses Me before men,” Jesus says, “I also will confess before My Father who is in heaven.” May you live in this confession all the days of your life, and suffer all, even death, rather than fall away from it. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Just because a person claims to be a true child of God that doesn’t necessarily mean that they are one. Take, for example, what we see happening in our Gospel lesson today from John chapter 8. That’s the account of Jesus’ tense interaction with the Jews. They had the revealed knowledge of God in the Old Testament Scriptures. They had the blood ancestry of Abraham, and the covenant of circumcision. They had the witness of the temple, the daily sacrifices, and the direct promises about the coming Messiah. And yet, in spite of all that, Jesus said that they were liars and enemies of the truth. Even though they considered themselves to be God’s special people, Christ had to forcefully show them that wasn’t the case.

A true child of God has to love Jesus. It doesn’t get more basic than that. As our Lord said to the Jews in verse 42 our reading, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I came from God and I am here.” The easiest way to tell if someone is on God’s side is by asking them what they think of God’s Son. What do they think about Jesus? Do they love Him? Do they even believe that He exists? Do they confess Him as their Lord and Savior? If the answer is “no,” to any of those questions then the case is closed. We don’t need to do this whole thing about how only God knows what’s going in their heart. Of course, only God knows what’s going on in their heart, but we don’t need to see inside a person’s heart when we can clearly hear what’s coming out of their mouth. When people tell us openly and plainly that they don’t love Jesus, we should take them at their word.

The Jews in our text today said that Christ was a Samaritan and that He had a demon. They made fun of Him, and called Him all kinds of terrible names, even accusing Him of being the offspring of infidelity. They argued with Him over every single point of His teaching, and then, in the end, they even tried to stone Him to death. Now, if you can do all that, and still be God’s child, and have His blessing and favor, then what on earth do you have to do to lose it?

No! All those who openly reject Christ and do not love Him are not part of God’s family. That doesn’t mean that God didn’t create them in His own image and likeness, or that doesn’t want them to be saved. But it does mean that in their current spiritual state, they’re not His children. In fact, they are the children of the devil. That’s what Jesus literally says in our reading today. He says to the unbelieving Jews, “You are of your father the devil.” Everyone who denies the divinity of Christ, and doesn’t acknowledge Him as the only Savior of sinners is on Satan’s side. That includes the atheists and the agnostics. It includes the Muslims and the Mormons. And, yes, it includes even the present-day Jews, who do not accept Him as the Messiah.

Sometimes, because of our context today, and especially the ongoing war with Iran, we hear all sorts of rhetoric from Evangelical Christians about how the Jews are God’s special people. They make it seem like supporting the modern nation state of Israel isn’t just a good political move, which maybe it is, but that its some sort of a theological necessity. They point to passages like Genesis 12, which say, “I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you,” and they make it seem like that is about present-day Jews who reject Jesus as the Christ. But Jesus’ words are clear as day, “If God were your Father, you would love me.” The true children of God are not those who can simply trace their ancestry back to the likes of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It’s those who love Christ. 

As John the Baptist tells us in Matthew chapter 3, “Do not presume to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.” Who you’re related to in this life, and who’s in your family tree, doesn’t do you any good if you reject the true Tree of Life, Jesus Christ. As Saint Paul also writes in Romans chapter 9, “Not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but ‘Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.’ This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring.” What Paul is arguing here is that you can be descended from the man Israel, and still not belong to the true Israel. You can be a biological Jew, but not a real child of Abraham. And that’s because the true children of Abraham are those who share the same faith as Abraham. They are those believe in the same Christ. You and I, the Church, we are the true Israel of God because we are to ones who actually believe in Jesus. As Saint Paul also writes in Galatians 5, “For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God.” A true child of God is first and foremost someone who loves Christ. And loving Christ starts with actually saying and acknowledging that we do. 

But, that, of course, isn’t’ where it ends. As Jesus also tells us in our reading, “Whoever is of God hears the words of God.” A true child of God listens to God’s Word. They don’t just say that they love Jesus with their mouth, but they bear witness to that love for Him with how they live their life. They want to learn from God, and grow in their faith. They care about what the Bible teaches and they want to do what it tells them. Just looking at someone’s outward confessing, and whether or not they say that they believe is Jesus, is definitely a good place to start to know whether they are a child of God, but we should remember that that’s the floor and not the ceiling. Plenty of people are willing to pay lip service to Christ, and say that they believe in Jesus. But when push comes to shove, what they do, and how they act, reveals something different. 

You know how this goes. “So and so” doesn’t go to church. They don’t pray. They don’t read the Bible. And they don’t give. They don’t even try to keep God’s Commandments. More or less, their life is completely indistinguishable from that of their heathen neighbor. They sleep around and get drunk. They take God’s name in vain. They hold grudges. They gossip. They lie. They cheat. And they steal. They do what they want to do when they want to do it. But because they were brought up in a Christian household, and because when they get asked if they love Jesus, they nod their head along and say that they do, we say about them, “Well maybe deep down they really do believe.” Dear brothers and sister in Christ, we have got to stop doing this. It’s dishonest, and worse than that, it’s unbiblical. True faith in Jesus is living and active. It’s shows itself in real fruit, no matter how meager that fruit might be. It’s not just about what you say you believe, but about what you do because you believe. No, good works will not save anyone. But we should not image that true faith can exist without them. That’s literally what Saint James tells us in His epistle, “faith without works is dead.” What he means by that is that it isn’t true faith at all. And that’s what Jesus is getting at in our text today too, when He says, “Whoever is of God hears the words of God” and “The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God.” The Lord is reminding us that His true children, that is, true believers, want to hear what He has to say and they want to do it. They want to live by it, even though sometimes they fail. And when they do fail, they repent and seek God’s forgiveness. They trust in Christ as their Savior, not as their enabler. They look to the Him for forgiveness, and the strength to do better in the future.

They reason why we need to be so clear about who a true child of God is, and why all of matters, is because of what Jesus tells us at the end of our text today. He says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.” Now, that, of course, isn’t a promise about how true believers won’t physically die. That sort of thing happens every single day. Rather, it’s a promise about living eternally with God even if we do die. Yes, as the Jews pointed out somewhat correctly, Abraham died, as did the prophets. But where they went wrong was in assuming that because they died, they were truly dead. That’s not true. In fact, its blasphemous. Christ wasn’t talking here about a when a person’s lungs stop breathing and their heart stops beating. He was talking about the eternal nature of the soul. He was talking about how anyone who believes in Him will never experience everlasting punishment; how His true children will reside with the Him in heavenly bliss, even as they await the resurrection of their bodies.

A true child of God will never see hell. They will be spared from the agony of eternal judgment because they trust in the One who already suffered that judgment for them. They believe in Jesus and love him, because they know that He loves them, and that in that love He died to save them on the cross. As Christ said to the Jews, “Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad.” When Abraham took his son Isaac up on the mountain to sacrifice him, and God intervened at the very last minute, providing him with a ram to kill instead, he was given a picture of what the Messiah would do to rescue the world from their sins. He was given a picture of how God would provide His only begotten Son, as a spotless lamb and substitute in our place. Abraham saw Jesus’ day by faith, and God counted that faith to him as righteousness. Therefore, Abraham is not dead, but is alive with the Lord. He is alive because he believed. And the same is true for all our Christian friends and family who share Abraham’s faith too.  

Being a child of God is the greatest blessing we could ever have in this life. It’s a blessing we should want not just for ourselves, but all those around us too. We pray that God would open the eyes of everyone who reject His Son. We pray for all those who are hostile to the Christ and critical of His Word. We pray for our enemies who curse Jesus and mock the Scriptures. We pray for those who have walked away from their Confirmation vows and abandoned their first love. And we pray for the Jewish people who though they had the right and privilege to hear the Gospel before anyone else, have still refused to believe it. We pray for their salvation. But we don’t act as if they, or anyone else, will somehow be saved apart from the Savior. We don’t act as if it’s possible to still be a true Child of God with loving God’s Only Begotten Son. 

What makes us God’s children is not the blood that runs through our veins. It’s the blood of Christ that cleanses us from our sin. It’s Jesus, who not only loosens our tongues to confess His Name, but equips us in this life for every good deed. He is our treasure. He is our inheritance. He is our Lord and Savior. He is the eternal Son of God. And it’s only in Him that we are God’s children too. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Bible tells us that after the feeding of the 5000, the people from the crowd tried to take Jesus by force and make Him their King, but our Lord would not allow it. As we read in verse 15 of our Gospel lesson: “Perceiving then that they were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king, Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by Himself.” 

Now, obviously, the reason why our Lord didn’t allow the people to make Him their king that day, wasn’t because He isn’t a true king or that He doesn’t really want to be known as one. On the contrary, the Scriptures repeatedly teach us that not only is Jesus a King, but He is the greatest King of all. As it says in 1 Timothy 6, “He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords.” And remember what Jesus Himself once said to Pontus Pilate when he was asked whether or not He was a king at His trial? Our Lord did not deny it, but openly declared, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world – to bear witness to the truth.” And, of course, very importantly, Jesus also specified to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.” So, no, it’s not that Jesus isn’t a King all, it’s the kind of King that He is.

And the problem with the people in crowd who tried to make Jesus their king by force was that they didn’t recognize it. They wanted Him to be their king on their own terms. They didn’t want to receive Christ’s Kingdom for what it is, or have it in the way that He chooses to give it. Rather, they wanted Him to be a part of their Kingdom, and do their own bidding instead. Literally, they wanted Jesus around so that He could do more miracles, and give them more free food. But that’s not what His Kingdom is about! It’s a spiritual Kingdom where the main focus is the eternal salvation of our souls.

In the same way that the crowd at the feeding of the 5000 tried to make Jesus their king on their own terms, and for their own purposes, many people still try and do the same thing today. I’ll give you two different examples in this morning’s sermon. One of the ways this happens is when someone tries to claim a Christian identity, at the same time that they refuse to repent of their sins. They want to be known as member of Christ’s Kingdom to others, even though they aren’t actually interested in what His kingly reign is supposed to be for. They don’t want the forgiveness which Christ purchased for them on the cross, instead, they want God’s blessing and approval to keep on committing their sin instead.

The most obvious expression of what this looks like in our time comes from those who falsely assert that it’s okay for Christians to live as open homosexuals and adulterers, even though the Bible says otherwise. Recently, I listened to a sermon from an ELCA pastor who stated that his church affirms and accepts the whole LGBTQ community without exception. The basis for his argument was that each individual Christian has the “right of conscience” to interpret the Bible differently. But that makes each individual person, and their own personal opinion, the ultimate source of truth instead of God’s Word. It literally lets people ignore God’s Word, and be their own judge of it instead. It encourages them to try and take Jesus by force, and make Him the kind of king that they want Him to be. A king who apparently allows them to live in their sexual sin without repentance.

But, that, of course, isn’t the only instance where this sort of thing can happen. What about those who claim that they don’t have to go to church and worship with the rest of the Body of Christ because they can “do Christianity on their own?” Have you ever come across someone who thought that way before? I know I have. You tell them that they need to be in God’s house because that’s where God promises to be present to give us His Word and Sacraments, which strengthen our faith, and they respond by saying they already have a strong faith. In their mind, they’re still on good terms with God, even though they’re literally despising His means of grace. But it’s a lie! They aren’t on good terms with Him. In fact, they are doing exactly what the crowd did in our reading today, and trying to take Jesus by force and have Him on their own terms. But what did Jesus do in response? He slipped away from them and would not allow it to happen. So, those who will not have Christ in the ways that He chooses to give Himself, namely in His Word and Sacraments, will lose Him. Even if they think that they currently have Him, they will find out someday that they don’t.

And the same is true, by the way, for those who do come to church, but are secretively living a different life on the side. This is even more dangerous than the other situation because it’s easier to convince ourselves and those around us that we aren’t in danger. “I listen to the sermon. I sing the hymns. I take Communion.” Okay, but do you repent of your sins? Are you sorry for the ways that you offend God, and do you want the help of His Holy Spirit to do better in the future? Do you mourn your anger, lust, greed, and pride, and do you want to be rid of it? Why are you even here in Church today? Is it because your parents made you? Is it because you want other people to like you? It is just because that’s part of your Sunday morning routine? Or, is it to get the forgiveness of your sins from Jesus, and be strengthened to do God’s will? If it’s not that last one, you’re here for the wrong reasons, and you’re trying to take Jesus by force too.

Now, as I mentioned earlier on in the sermon, I said I was going to give two different examples of what it looks like to act like the crowd from the feeding of the 5000. One of them, again, is when people want to be known as a Christian, but refuse to repent of their sins. You can’t have Jesus that way. The other one, though, is when people try and turn the message of Christianity, or the focus of the Christian life in general, on temporal things instead of eternal ones.

The crowd in our reading today wanted to take Jesus by force and make Him their King because they liked getting free food from Him. They didn’t want to have to work for what they ate, and they thought that Jesus would be a kind of short cut to making their life easier here and now. They assumed that their greatest needs were physical ones, and so that’s all that they looked for when it came to Christ. But they completely missed the point of His ministry. As our Lord said to the same people later on when they followed Him all the way to the other side of the sea of Galilee, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you.”

The question is always, what do you want from God? Why do you want to be a Christian? And if the answer isn’t, first and foremost, “because I know that I need salvation for my soul, and its only Christ who has to power to give it to me,” then nothing else that you get from Him will make a difference. In fact, all the other stuff in your life might only get in the way of you entering into eternal life.  Remember what Jesus tells us in Mark chapter 8, “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” And remember what He says in Matthew 6, “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you.”  No, it’s not that we Christians should completely ignore the needs of our bodies and neglect them. After all, the same Christ who told us to not worry about what we will eat, drink, and wear, also tells us that we can pray for those things. That’s what it means in the Lord’s Prayer when we say “give us this day our daily bread.” But the point is that there are more important things in life than food and clothing, and material possessions. What we need to get through this day is not as significant as what we need for the Last Day. And when the order of those two things gets mixed up, or reversed, we can end up missing out on the real treasure.

For instance, if the expectation is that when we become a Christian, Jesus will immediately take away all of our problems, and whatever struggles we’re going through will just disappear overnight, we’ll soon find out that that’s not how it works. That is a false version of Christianity. Sometimes being a Christian is hard. Sometimes we even end up suffering more in this life because of it. As the Bible tells in Acts chapter 14, “through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.” So, those who seek only good days in God’s Kingdom, and won’t receive from Him the bad one’s too, have it wrong. Their faith is a sham, and it won’t result in the blessing that they think it will. Eventually it will cause them to walk away from Jesus completely, and give up on His Kingdom entirely.

The fact of the matter is that regardless of how we try and do it we can’t take Jesus by force and make Him king on our own terms. Jesus will always slip out of our grasp, and so will our eternal life. Rather, God’s Word tells us that we need receive His Kingdom in another way. We don’t make Him our King at all. He already is the King. We don’t force our way into His Kingdom. His Kingdom comes to us by itself. As we learn in the Small Catechism, “God’s Kingdom comes when our Heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by grace we believe His holy Word and lead godly lives here in time and there in eternity.”

That’s how you enter into God’s Kingdom. That’s the right way to receive Jesus as your King. It happens through the power of the Holy Spirit who brings us to repentance and faith. What was the first message that Jesus ever preached in the New Testament? He said, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” When you listen to God’s Law, and turn away from your sins, and when you listen to His Gospel, and believe that for Jesus’ sake all of your sins truly have been forgiven, that’s when God’s Kingdom comes to you. That’s what makes you part of it. And that’s what His Kingdom is all about.

It isn’t about health, wealth, and prosperity. It’s about forgiveness, life, and salvation. Yes, Jesus fed the crowd in the wilderness with food for their bodies, and He promises to take care of your bodily needs too. But in His Church, He takes care of your greatest need. He saves your soul. Just like the baskets were overflowing with bread, in His Word and Sacraments, you have access to the Bread of Life. You have a never-ending supply of God’s grace and mercy. You have everything that you need to strengthen your faith so that one day you can make it to your heavenly home. God will heal you from your diseases. He will bless you with joy, happiness, and long life. But the place where that happens completely is not here in this life. It is only in the life of the world to come.

So, don’t try and take Jesus by force and make Him king on your own terms. That won’t work. Instead, listen to His decree. Repent of your sins, and trust in Him for forgiveness. Be content with what you have below, and set your minds on things above. Recognize that you already have everything that you could possibly need when you have the righteousness of Christ through faith. Because, in that case, even if you have nothing else, you still have a place in the Kingdom of God. In Jesus Name. Amen.