All Saints Day – Pr. Anderson sermon
St. Matthew 5:1-12 “Rejoice and be Glad, for Your Reward is Great in Heaven”
November 3, 2024 | Christ Lutheran Church
In Nomine Iesu
+ + +
O almighty and everlasting God, through Your only-begotten and beloved Son, Jesus Christ, You will sanctify all Your elect and beloved: Give us grace to follow their faith, hope, and love, that we together with all Your saints may obtain eternal life; through Your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one true God, now and forever. Amen. (Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary, by Veit Dietrich, p. 165-166)
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. (Rom. 1:7, etc.)
The sermon text for today is taken from the 5th chapter of the Gospel according to St. Matthew. We read selected verses in Jesus’ name:
Seeing the crowds, [Jesus] went up on the mountain, and when He sat down, His disciples came to Him. And He opened His mouth and taught them, saying:
“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on My account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”
These are Your words, heavenly Father. Sanctify us by Your truth, Your Word is truth. Amen. (Joh. 17:17)
In Christ Jesus, who suffered the ultimate persecution for you, by dying on the cross, and through His glorious resurrection, you will rise and be with those who have gone before you, dear fellow redeemed:
Now that November is here, we are roughly a month and a half away from receiving new things. Who knows what those new things might be. It could be new toys for the children. It could be new appliances for the adults. The thought of receiving something new is a running theme in Scripture. Scripture teaches us about the newness of life and a new kingdom that is to come. Now we should be rejoicing about what is to come, but it is this newness that our bodies can struggle receiving. There can be times we are enticed to try and get it ourselves because maybe we can hold on to the old stuff we already have. To realize how great it is to receive this new kingdom, we look to the teachings of our text for today. Jesus is teaching us who we are and who we will be forever, just like those who have gone before us.
Those who have gone before us certainly have been lights for our paths. They didn’t become those lights without also hearing about the new kingdom that is to come. They had to hear their whole lives the teachings of Jesus just like those who believed in Him when He walked this earth. Seeing the crowds, [Jesus] went up on the mountain, and when He sat down, His disciples came to Him. And He opened His mouth and taught them. The scene is set. Jesus has sat down and those who believe in Him are waiting to hear what He has to say. Here you sit, waiting to hear what He has to say. You are here because of your faith in Him, just like His disciples up on this mountain. It is here Jesus is going to instruct you, telling you who you are.
He began teaching the people, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Now at first glance, the people can hear the physical nature of these blessings. They know what it looks like if a person is poor. When there is poor living, there will be mourning because of the ways of this world, and because of death which plagues everyone. The people understand being meek as they deal with their Roman rulers and the religious leaders who are over them. As the people heard physical aspects of their lives, there is a spiritual aspect as well. The devil assaults their spirits, eternal death seeks them, and they have lived through oppression from the world. Now as they deal with these issues, it doesn’t look like there is a lot to look forward to. Jesus says, there is something. There are blessings out there. The people just have to remember what Isaiah prophesied. “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind” (Isaiah 65:17). In a seven-hundred-year-old message, something new is out there. Their forefathers waited for it and it came to them in faith.
There are many times we think that we don’t have the faith of our forefathers. We may even think they had it easy. They were just like us. They had to wait for the promise of this new kingdom. They waited and waited, and they were tempted and sinned. There were many times the blessings looked out of reach for them as well. As Jesus’ continues pointing out more ways in which we are blessed for following Him, we hear these next blessings and a pit can start to dig in our stomachs. He continued, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. He tells us that we have to want it. How can we live like this all the time? We have mercy on the people we know personally, but it is hard to have mercy on our enemies as Jesus teaches us. And where on earth do we find ourselves a pure heart? Some days it looks pure, but we know how much we try and disguise it to make it look pure.
In those first six blessings we can easily find ourselves. We have tried to do these things and we have found ourselves short of them. The world will try to tell us to just give it a try and do your best. Jesus tells us there is more to it than that. We receive these blessings by being perfect and we know that being perfect is one of our struggles. No matter how much we try to make it look like we are perfect or try to change the rules and perception, our standards will never be God’s standards. The world’s lies about this place being great or will get better, fall flat. In our search for new things, we find God’s law pointing out our same old sins. While the world and the devil want us to think we are alone in our endeavors, we see that we aren’t alone. We have watched our loved ones make it because Jesus says, “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you” (John 14:18).
Like the people’s forefathers who waited, they had to wait no longer. Their patience had paid off. As Jesus continued to teach them how they were blessed, the next blessings pointed the people to the Messiah they were waiting for. Jesus continued, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Jesus had come teaching them about the kingdom of heaven and it came upon them as He brought the truth and healing. He came to them as the Prince of Peace and at the end of His ministry was persecuted worse than any person who has ever lived. As the people learned from Jesus who they were for believing in Him, Jesus reveals they are truly blessed because He has come to them just as He came for their forefathers. The forefathers heard it through promise and they witnessed the promise kept.
Through this kept promise, the people were receiving something new and this new day came from a message that hadn’t changed. This is why the light of their forefathers shone brightly to them. Their forefathers heard, My righteousness draws near, my salvation has gone out, and my arms will judge the peoples; the coast lands hope for me, and for my arm they wait. Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath; for the heavens vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment, and they who dwell in it will die in like manner; but my salvation will be forever, and my righteousness will never be dismayed (Isaiah 51:5-6). They were blessed through all of their problems and persecutions because of faith in the promise to come. And as they died, they were taken and given a perfect reward won for them with the best blessings yet to come. But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3:13).
Now those who heard Jesus teaching how they were blessed would not have an easy life. They would understand what it would take when Jesus told them, “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on My account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” They held onto the promise of their forefathers. Their lights burned even when they were faced with death. Like their forefathers they also were faced with death and gladly faced it because great was their reward in heaven. The disciples now had newness of life. They were not able to get this on their own as they heard how they were supposed to be and they knew they could not do it. The disciples weren’t perfect, but their teacher was.
Jesus is sitting there teaching the people, teaching you, that you are indeed blessed. You didn’t earn these blessings. In your failings, you don’t deserve these blessings. You are blessed through the One who helped the poor, comforted those who mourned, was perfectly meek, satisfied the hunger and thirst of the people, was merciful, had a pure heart, and was the Son of God. All of these blessings point to the cross they come from. They point to the One who comes to you, destroying the very sting of death. As He destroys its sting, you can rejoice for those who have gone before you. They did not die in vain. They died in the death of their Savior and their bodies will rise again on the last day. Their reward and the reward you will inherit is great in heaven because it is freely given to you. You will be blessed forever.
St. Paul summarizes how you see these blessings right now. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too” (2 Corinthians 1:3-5). This comfort and these blessings were won for all on the cross. And as people hear them and see their Savior come to them in the Means of Grace, there is relief. There will be times you struggle, not wanting to get rid of the old, but as you see who you are, you are reminded of the cross and the righteousness you wear from it. Your Savior has won for you a great reward. A reward you freely receive just like those who have gone before you. St. John writes how this place of sorrow will end. Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more (Revelation 21:1). And in the new Jerusalem that descends, you will have a home forever with all the righteous in Christ. Amen.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
+ + +