The Lord reigns
4b Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.
To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, 6 and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father—to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.
7 ‘Look, he is coming with the clouds,’
and ‘every eye will see him,
even those who pierced him’;
and all peoples on earth ‘will mourn because of him.’So shall it be! Amen.
8 ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega,’ says the Lord God, ‘who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.’
Revelation 1:4b–8 (NIVUK)
Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come. As the Church Year concludes before we enter the season of Advent, we praise our Lord Jesus for who He is: the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth (v. 5). His dominion will never pass away, and His kingdom will never be destroyed (Da. 7:14).
As God’s people, we live in the victory over sin that He has won for us by His blood, but that doesn’t mean we are completely insulated from the troubles of this world in the meantime. Psalm 93 says that the seas have lifted up (Ps. 93:3) and chaos goes on all around us, but the Lord reigns. His throne was established long ago, his statutes stand firm today, and holiness adorns his house for endless days (Ps. 93:5). He was, and is, and is to come.
God’s people can live with complete confidence in our Lord’s complete authority over all things, His redemptive work which we are privileged to participate in, and His return as judge and king over all the world.
These will be our three foci for today: Christ’s eternal authority, His redemptive work, and His return as judge and king.
Christ’s eternal authority
We are living in a time of massive uncertainty. The pace of change is ever-increasing and it can be difficult to keep up. Even our Ladies Fellowship is an example: the search for a new secretary was a challenge because, even though several of them were willing to take on the role, they didn’t feel confident to do it because they assumed computer skills are now a necessary part of the job. The way we live our day-to-day lives is changing rapidly and some of us feel like we’ve been left behind.
I am sensing that this congregation is in the middle of its own wave of change at the moment:
We’re experiencing a significant change in leadership in Council and Ministry Team.
Rosie is finishing up in the office secretary role.
Gather + Grow will have its last service in December without anything else to take its place. It’ll be the first time St Martin’s has had only the single Sunday morning worship service for many years.
Some LCA clergy and laity have already joined Lutheran Mission—Australia and new congregations are being planted. We’ll need to deal with that ourselves eventually as well.
I could probably keep going. We are experiencing a massive amount of change all at once, locally and in the wider church. The world around us is always changing and evolving, and even the church goes through phases of transformation and renewal, but what we’re dealing with right now is not normal. These are particularly turbulent and uncertain times.
With so much going on around us, it can feel like the ground is moving under our feet. When that happens, we really only have two options: resist the change, or adapt to the change. Different situations call for different responses. It depends on what is changing: is it peripheral or central to who we are and what we do?
Example: accessing daily news. If you were accustomed to reading the daily paper but can’t anymore, you could either buy the paper when it is available—maybe once or twice a week—or you could find a new way to access the news every day. You can resist or adapt.
Example: maintaining your beliefs about what Scripture says. If you believe that only men should be ordained as pastors based on Scripture, you could either leave the LCA to join a whole new synod that has the teaching you agree with, or you could remain in the LCA and find a way to live with people who may not see that issue the way you do. You can resist or adapt.
Again, whether you resist or adapt depends on whether that issue is central to you, or peripheral. Of course, that varies between us on just about everything, so we end up with division and pain.
With all this change to cope with, we can take great comfort in these words today from Psalm 93: the Lord reigns.
So, what’s our answer to the waves of change we find ourselves in? The Lord reigns.
Our congregation’s future? The Lord reigns.
Our LCA’s future? The Lord reigns.
The political turmoil in the world? The Lord reigns.
Living in a post-Christian society? The Lord reigns.
The rise of technology? The Lord reigns.
A sudden change in my life circumstances? The Lord reigns.
A tragedy in the community or my own family? The Lord reigns.
Whatever comes, we know that our God is the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. He is the Almighty who was, who is, and who is to come. Christ’s authority is unchanging, unshakable, eternal. When it feels like no one is in control, He is. The Lord reigns.
Christ’s redemptive work
21 For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son gives life to whom he is pleased to give it.
John 5:21 (NIVUK)
Jesus only has power to give life because he is Life. He is Life because the Father made Him the firstborn of the dead—Jesus’ resurrection is the first of many. The Father, who breathed His life into Adam, has given that power to Christ. The baton doesn’t stop there.
Revelation 1:5–6 says that Christ loves us and has freed us from our sins by His blood. Not only that: “He has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve His God and Father…”
Priests have the job of being the bridge between God and people. They bring the Word of God to the people, and they bring the prayers of the people to God. This word says that we are all priests who serve our God and Father. We all participate in Christ’s redemptive work and giving life to people, not because it’s ours to give, but because we have received it from Christ Himself.
We talk about mission in the church all the time and we tend to think about things like feeding the hungry, bold evangelism projects, and taking retiring offerings for ALWS. These are all missional projects, sure, but we are completely missing the point if we really think that’s all it is.
Christ’s redemptive work—freeing us from sin by His blood—is the mission we participate in as His kingdom and priests. We come here every week to be forgiven our sin and hear God speak—how can we help the people that aren’t here to receive that for themselves? That’s the question that should drive everything we do as His priests and as a community of believers.
So, yes, we might have specific mission projects that focus on social justice or practical needs. However, as Christ has made us His priests in the world, everything we do should have the end goal of bringing the gospel to people. When we think about mission like that, everything is mission.
Christ loves us and has freed us from sin by His blood—His redemptive work is both complete and continuing. He has freed us, but not everyone has received that freedom. So, Christ calls us to proclaim it.
Christ’s return as Judge and King
Our God has always had absolute authority over all things, He is at work in us today through the redemptive work of Christ, and He will return as judge and king over all things for all eternity.
As the world around us becomes less and less familiar with the Church and the faith we confess, it can feel like Jesus is becoming less and less relevant for people. Most people in our community simply could not care less about the church or the Christian faith.
Earlier, we touched on the changes going on around us. Another change our society is experiencing is that families and individuals are busier. It’s normal for both parents to work full-time to be able to afford rent or mortgage payments. I read recently that, within a few years, the government is aiming to have the capacity for every single child under five to access something like 30 hours of care every week. As parents work more, kids are spending more and more time in childcare or school. Criticise that all you want, but it is the way the world has shifted. We are not called to change how people live. We are called to bring the gospel to them, which gives life.
All this means that people, particularly families, simply don’t have space in their lives for church or even to think about faith. I think this is the greatest challenge facing the Church at the moment: how can we share the gospel with people who don’t have time for it? Our internal challenges only take our focus away from that question.
This is a matter of urgency because we know that Jesus will return as judge over all people. Revelation 1:7 says that every single person will see Jesus when He returns, “and all peoples on earth will mourn because of Him.” As people who are saved, we won’t mourn for ourselves, but for those who never came to faith in Jesus. For some of you, that could be your closest friends or even your family.
In John 5, we read that everyone who believes in Jesus “has eternal life and will not be judged but has crossed over from death to life.” Past tense. We have already crossed over from death to life. We are living this eternal life even now, Jesus says, because He has the power to give it.
Jesus has the power and authority to give us life. He has done so by redeeming us by His blood. While we wait for His return as judge and king, we have the privilege of carrying this great message of hope for all the world.
To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, 6 and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father—to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.
Revelation 1:5b–6 (NIVUK)
