Audio of the sermon is here:

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

            Jesus tells us how things are and it’s not a great situation. The poor are blessed, the hungry are blessed, the weeping are blessed, and the hated ones are blessed. Well, I guess it’s not great—unless you happen to be poor, hungry, weeping, or hated! But it’s still exactly upside-down, and exactly backwards of how we would like things to be. It’s the opposite of everything the world thinks is good. Who wants to be poor, hungry, weeping, and hated? And it gets worse, because Jesus says woe, curse, death, to those who are rich, full, and laughing; those about whom everyone speaks well. The things that Jesus says are woeful are what everyone wants; and the things that are related to blessing are the things that no one wants. And it’s not just the world. There are Christians who preach that all the things in the woe category are what you should be trying to get, and if you just believe enough, pray hard enough, etc., then they will be yours. But an easy way to tell if something belongs properly to Christians in this world is to look at Christ. And unfortunately for our flesh, Jesus did not have a place to lay His head. He was poor, and He was hungry; He wept, and people hated Him. They betrayed Him, handed Him over to the authorities, crucified Him; He suffered and died. So if the lives of Christians are nothing like Jesus’ own life, we might want to reconsider what we’re all about.

            But Jesus says that if you’re rich, and that’s what your life is about, you’ve already received your reward. He says if you’re satisfied in the things of this world, you’ve already received your blessing. If you’re filled up with happiness here and now, if you are seeking happiness in this world, you already have your reward. And if everyone says nice things about you, and that’s what you work at, that’s the only blessing you will have. On the other hand, if you take what you have and use it for your neighbor; if you know you will never be satisfied in this world; if you know that you must grieve and weep in a world full of sin; if people hate you simply because you bear the name of Jesus; if you’re hated because Jesus was hated, then you are the blessed ones of the Father, and He will give you the entire Kingdom. He will satisfy you with eternal life, rather than just temporary life. He will give you a joy and laughter that cannot be ended, and your reward is great in heaven, kept safe with Christ.

            And yet I wonder. These are not necessarily things you can aim at. You can give away what you have, and you will. Eventually you will be hungry and you won’t be able to eat. You will grieve and weep, because death is all around us. You should not aim at being hated; it will happen because the devil is trying anything and everything he can to tear you from your Lord. These sorts of things and more are not things to go out and find. All you have to do is carry out your vocation faithfully, serve those whom God gives you according to the gifts He gives you, and the cross will find you. We should not compare crosses, but you can count on the fact that each Christian will bear the cross according to the place and time where God puts you. This is all another way of saying that if you try to keep your life in this world, you will lose it entirely. But if you pour out your life as a living sacrifice, because you know that your life is actually hidden in Christ, then you will save it, because He already has.

            How is any of this possible? How can you rejoice in your suffering? When you are like a dried-up tree and you feel like you are lost without God; you feel nothing; the heat is on, and the drought is in full effect; what should you do? What if you only feel your sin? What if all you can see is guilt? Is faith real? Is God? Are you even a Christian? All you can see and feel are your poverty, your hunger, your tears, the hatred. Strangely, for those with faith in Christ, those are signs of blessing, not curse. And this is true if you feel close to God as well. It’s true if things are going well. It’s true if you’re rich, full, happy, and people speak well of you—because you know that’s not your reward. You know none of that lasts forever. Money can go away like that. You can eat well, but you know you will be hungry again. You can laugh now, and just like that, your laughter can turn to tears. People are fickle, and their friendly words can turn bitter in a second. Your reward is not in any of that.

            Whether things are good or bad, your faith is tied to Jesus. And Jeremiah tells you that your faith is not like the branches, which sometimes have buds, sometimes look healthy, sometimes have fruit. Faith is, rather, like the roots, driving deep into the soil of Christ, reaching out into the living water of the eternal spring of Jesus’ life. Look at the trees in the winter: if you didn’t know better, you might think they die every winter and come back to life every spring. It can look like that. Don’t mistake a season of emptiness and dryness for a lack of life and health. The novelist Flannery O’Connor once wrote in a letter, “I wouldn’t spend much time worrying about [spiritual] dryness. It’s hard to steer a path between indifference and presumption and [there’s] a kind of constant spiritual temperature-taking that don’t do any good or tell you anything either.”  

Instead, your life is in Christ, not in what you can see of yourself and the results of your life. That’s all hidden. But what is revealed to you is where Jesus is, so that your roots of faith can drink deeply of the water of life in His word, His body, His blood; His forgiveness and salvation that run far deeper than any of the things that steal wealth, satisfaction, happiness, and people’s good opinion of you. The blessing is not there, in those things. Instead, “Blessed is the man who trusts in Yahweh, whose trust is in Yahweh. He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit” (Jeremiah 17:7-8). That water and that stream are what Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians 15. Your roots are holding fast to what is of first importance: Christ died for your sins, He was buried, He was raised on the third day, and He appeared to so many people that it is not possible that they made it up. You are not in your sins, because Jesus took them on the cross, and then He was raised, without them. Your faith is not empty or futile; it is full and fertile and fruitful. Because, in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, and nothing can change that.

This is why you are blessed. This is why the Kingdom of heaven is yours. This is why you will be filled up with the goodness of God. This is why your tears and grief will be turned to laughter and joy. This is why it does not matter what people say about you, because the baptismal water of Christ’s life has identified you by the only word that matters: the holy Name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The source of your life is flowing freely beneath the sight of the Church of Jesus, accessible to faith. It is the life of the resurrection, the life that is God. And it is yours. Blessed are you! Especially when you are poor. Christ became poor so that you would have His riches. Blessed are you, when you hunger; Christ will satisfy you with the true food of His body and the true drink of His blood. Blessed are you when you grieve; you will be raised from the dead in true and full joy. Blessed are you when you are hated and people speak evil of you. You bear the cross of Christ; where else would you go? He has the words of eternal life, and you belong to Him. Blessed are you!

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7, ESV). Amen.

– Pr. Timothy Winterstein, 2/15/25