The First Sunday after Christmas – Pr. Anderson sermon
Jeremiah 31:15-17 “There is Hope for Your Future”
December 28, 2025 | Christ Lutheran Church
In Nomine Iesu
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Most merciful God, who out of love gave Your only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life, grant unto us the precious gift of faith, whereby we may know that the Son of God is come, and, being always rooted and grounded in the mystery of the Word made flesh, may have power to overcome the world and gain the blessed immortality of heaven; through the merits of this same incarnate Christ, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, ever one God, now and forever. Amen. (The Lutheran Liturgy, companion altar book for The Lutheran Hymnal, p. 61)
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 31st chapter from the Prophet Jeremiah. We read the verses once more in Jesus’ name:
Thus says the LORD: “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.”
Thus says the LORD: “Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares the LORD, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy. There is hope for your future, declares the LORD, and your children shall come back to their own country.”
These are Your words, heavenly Father. Sanctify us by Your truth, Your Word is truth. Amen. (Joh. 17:17)
In Christ Jesus, who truly hears our cries, as He cried out for us on the cross, receiving no answer for our Salvation, dear fellow redeemed:
Have you ever studied the word innocent? If you Google the definition, you will find that as an adjective it means, not guilty of a crime or offense, not responsible for or directly involved in an event yet suffering its consequences, free from moral wrong; not corrupted and not intended to cause harm or offense; harmless. As a noun it means, a pure, guileless, or naive person, and a person involved by chance in a situation, especially a victim of crime or war. If that last definition sounds familiar, it is because even Google puts as an example what happened in the town of Bethlehem. Our Scripture texts for today remind us of the tragedy around us. No one is safe, even if they are labeled “innocent.” From the tragedies of Scripture to the tragedies we see in our lives, our Scripture texts also speak of something else. Even when there is tragedy, there is hope for your future.
And this is the season of hope. We get to see and hear about the greatest gift of all. This faith in the Word made flesh is all we have otherwise as St. Paul tells us, living life would be worthless. This hope will sustain us because it is the same hope that has sustained many, many others. The Prophet Jeremiah was preaching this hope because he would and the people would need it. He was watching them be taken from the land God gave them. The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD after Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard had let him go from Ramah, when he took him bound in chains along with all the captives of Jerusalem and Judah who were being exiled to Babylon (Jeremiah 40:1). He himself wore chains and there they were in Ramah. The end had come and God was holding His people to account. They had disobeyed Him, served false gods, and as He told them from the beginning, He was removing them from the Promised Land. The people were weeping and being killed.
And here taking place, is Rachel losing her children. Rachel’s children settled in the land of Ephraim, Manasseh, and Benjamin. As prophesied, Ephraim was a trained calf that loved to thresh, and I spared her fair neck; but I will put Ephraim to the yoke; Judah must plow; Jacob must harrow for himself (Hosea 10:11). After Assyria, Ephraim and Manasseh are gone. The northern country of Israel for many years had abandoned God for the false gods of the land. And while the southern land of Judah was able to last for a little bit longer, the time had come. Rachel’s remaining child was about to be taken away. Once the people come back from Babylon, the land of Judah isn’t really the original Judah anymore. Therefore, Rachel had lost her children. She lost them because they had disobeyed the One who wanted to love them forever. So, Jeremiah, in this dire situation where it looks as though all is lost, is able to prophesy that the children will come back to their own country.
Until that day, what was taking place was a tragedy. It shouldn’t have had to come to this. All they had to do was follow God and His commands and He would be with them. He was with them before this. Before they came to the Promised Land, it looked as though they were going to be destroyed in their infancy. As the Pharaoh’s enslaved the people in the land of Goshen, God was with them when the baby boys were condemned to death. The hope of the baby boys was found in God’s protecting hand through the work of the Hebrew midwives. So God dealt well with the midwives. And the people multiplied and grew very strong. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families. Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every son that is born to the Hebrews you shall cast into the Nile, but you shall let every daughter live” (Exodus 1:20-22). The people made it through this, but it wasn’t because they could do anything. God worked this out for their good.
Even knowing this, and hearing this, it is still hard to fathom when the tragedy strikes. The world dares us to try and find the good in a tragic situation. There is even a growing trend to bash someone when they say thoughts and prayers because prayers to God don’t work. If God was good and loving, He wouldn’t allow the innocent to be destroyed. He is the One who is pointing out Rachel’s sadness. The text says, thus says the LORD: “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.” Since we know this is fulfilled with the slaughter of innocents, doesn’t this show that God really does not care about us? As the world tries to point out the innocence that gets caught in the crossfire of problems, Scripture reveals the hard truth for mankind when we are told no one is perfectly innocent. Innocence is pure, and we are not. From conception on, we have been sinful, from little on we have deserved an eternal death.
For some, they might even understand this point where everyone is deserving of eternal death. What about the infants? Is it right for this to happen? The right is found as the children who died because of Jesus were waiting for Jesus’ arrival. The baby who saves, saves them from future pain and suffering. They would be the first martyrs who died for their Savior. The Savior who would grow up and take away the sins of their very short lives. With this happening, the words of Jeremiah then ring out. Thus says the LORD: “Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares the LORD, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy. God works this out for the good of those who love Him. He brought a remnant back to the land of Israel to keep His promise for the Savior to be born. He brought the babies of Bethlehem into His loving arms as they revealed the ultimate love for Him as they gave up their lives in the baby Jesus’ flee to Egypt.
Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son” (Matthew 2:13-15). Before the tragedy of Bethlehem took place, the only innocence in the world was now the baby under Joseph’s care. He was perfect in every way. True innocence, that would do more than those little boys by giving up His life for the salvation of the world.
With the survival of the baby from the manger, the words of Jeremiah speak truth into our ears. “There is hope for your future, declares the LORD, and your children shall come back to their own country.” There is hope for us because He is not bringing us back into the land. He is bringing us into His glorious kingdom. A kingdom that provides us safety because of where it is located. We will dwell in the place where there will be no pain, suffering, or tragedy. And this is all there for us to see take place not because of anything we can do, but because the innocent Man who sacrificed His innocence, marks us as His own. St. John recorded, Then I looked, and behold, on Mount Zion stood the Lamb, and with him 144,000 who had his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads…These have been redeemed from mankind as firstfruits for God and the Lamb, and in their mouth no lie was found, for they are blameless (Revelation 14:1,4b-5). Blameless and innocent because their sin was washed away and not counted against them.
Here is your hope. You are witnessing the work of the baby in the manger even in the worst of times. You see His work of salvation. The infant boys were saved, not from the physical death, but from the spiritual death that tried to cling to them even as infants. They weren’t innocent spiritually and you aren’t spiritually innocent either. But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus (Romans 3:21-24). You are justified because the One who was perfectly innocent and had done nothing wrong, died your physical and spiritual death on the cross. This is the greatest tragedy everyone deserves and here is Jesus dying for all. The reason He was born in the precious manger bed. The tragedy of God in the flesh being betrayed, suffered, and was killed. Yet, He endured this tragedy so He could be with you in yours. You have hope in your future because it is with the baby who grew up and suffered for you. And like the infants who died for the Lord, you will have the same inheritance as you have been marked like them on the forehead. Your hope is present with you and with His name on your head and heart forever. 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.
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