Audio of the sermon is here:

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

We are prepared to enter the Divine Service as God’s baptized people by acknowledging that we still need Jesus for the forgiveness of our sins, which we confess. In the baptismal Name of God, He does forgive. Our ears have been opened by Jesus to hear and understand the Scriptures, which He always opens and expands wider and wider. We can never exhaust or get to the end of His Word, just as we can never comprehend God Himself. To those apostles, whose mind He opened to understand the Scripture, He promised the Holy Spirit’s power to proclaim Jesus in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the end of the earth (Acts 2:8), which is pretty much where we are, relative to Jerusalem.

After Jesus’ ascension and the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, after God added to their number 3,000 by faith and baptism, what did that very early Church do? They devoted themselves to the teaching of the apostles and the fellowship, the breaking of the bread and the prayers (2:42). As they did these seemingly mundane things, fear came upon every person and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. They made sure that no one among them lacked anything. They rejoiced in the temple together in the fulfillment of Christ’s words, and they continued Jesus’ command to “do this” by breaking the bread in their homes, since they had no separate churches. They were glad and generous and praised God. As they did the things God had given to them, God did what He always does and added to their number those who were being saved.

They devoted themselves to these things. They busied themselves with them: they devoted themselves to the doctrine of the apostles, which is nothing other than the teaching Jesus had given them; they devoted themselves to the fellowship, the koinonia, which is sharing together in the faith created and sustained by that teaching; they devoted themselves to the breaking of the bread, which is Luke’s short-hand for the Lord’s Supper; they devoted themselves to the prayers of the congregation, to which they had already been devoted in Acts 1:14; and they devoted themselves to the mutual care they had for one another. These five things shaped and determined their Christian life. Without exaggeration, these things outline what it means to be a Christian.

Last week, we spent time with the doctrine—which just means teaching—of the apostles. Those who believed that teaching that they had received from Jesus shared together in the one Lord, one faith, and one baptism. They were united in the teaching, and therefore, they shared together in the breaking of the bread. The prayers of the Church, or the prayers of the Faithful, as they are sometimes called, began the part of the Divine Service that was, in many places, open only to those who had become part of the Family of God, members of Christ’s body by baptism. These are the prayers the Church prays for all the baptized members and for all people. The Church, enlightened by God’s word and sharing the same faith, prays together these prayers as priests on behalf of other people and the world. This is the intercession of the Church in and for the world, and God hears these prayers and answers them, because they are prayed in Christ.

Then the breaking of the bread, named for what Jesus did to distribute the meal to His disciples. This is the second summit of the Divine Service, the Service of the Sacrament. And what comes before and after the eating and drinking upholds Jesus’ holy words. If you want to see it in the hymnal, it begins on page 194. The oldest part of the entire Divine Service is the Preface and Proper Preface, going back to the second century or even perhaps to the end of the first. Notice that we do this salutation three times in Setting III: once before the collect at the beginning of the Service of the Word, once here at the beginning of the Service of the Sacrament, and once at the end, before the Benediction. There is a unity to the Divine Service that requires both Word and Sacrament. These words spoken between the pastor and the people remind us all of our unity: I bless you with the Lord’s blessing and you return the blessing, as the unity of pastor and people is reaffirmed. This is what God called me here to do, and you are acknowledging that.

The “ordinary” of the Preface gives way to the “proper” of the Proper Preface, which brings the emphasis of the day or season to the praise of God’s people. The Proper Preface leads into one of the most profound canticles or songs in the liturgy: the Sanctus, which means “Holy.” The first part comes from Isaiah 6, when the prophet saw God and fell down on his face, saying, essentially, I am a dead man, because I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips, and I have seen God! To see God in His full glory means death to sinners, as He said to Moses in Exodus 33. Holy Father, Holy Son, Holy Spirit. Isaiah hears those angels around the throne say “The whole earth is full of the glory of God,” and we join them by singing that the heavens are full of His glory. Heaven and earth cannot contain God.

Why doesn’t Isaiah die? Because a seraph, which is related to the word for burning, takes a glowing coal from the heavenly altar and touches Isaiah’s lips and says, “Look, this has touched your lips; your guilt is turned aside and your sin is covered.” We sing with those burning beings of God’s holiness, and we do not die, though we are no less unclean than Isaiah. God does not come to us in all His glory to destroy us. Instead, He comes covered up in flesh, riding on a donkey, and so we sing with the joy of those Jerusalem crowds, “Hosanna! Save us!” Three times holy, three times to save us, three times blessed is the one who comes to us in the Name of the Lord, so that the body and blood by which He entered the heavenly holy places might touch our lips and we will be forgiven and our sin will be covered before God.

We who sing with the angels pray with Jesus the table prayer of the Church. He has made His Name holy, and in that Name the blessed one comes to us; His very Kingdom comes to us and His will is done as we do this in remembrance of Him. Indeed, He gives us not only the bread we need for this body and life, but the bread we need for eternal life, Jesus Himself, who is the bread from heaven. By this meal He forgives our sins, and we are sent out with that forgiveness to give freely what we have been given. If this forgiveness were not enough to cover everyone whom we have to forgive, then it would not be enough to cover us. But it is enough, it is infinite, for us and for everyone else. By this Food we are strengthened in temptation, and by this Food we are kept from the evil one. He prepares a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

Then the Words. The very Words of Jesus, which He spoke on the night when He was betrayed, and the eating and drinking of His body and blood. This is the high point of the entire Divine Service. To do this in remembrance of Jesus is to do what He did: He took, He blessed, He broke, He gave. The words the pastor says are not his own words, but Christ’s. Since He is the Word through whom all things were made, His word creates and does what He says, always. It is not our faith that makes Jesus present here, as if belief or unbelief could help or hinder what Jesus says. It is not the special position of the priest or the pastor, although God has put the pastor here to do these things. It is Jesus’ word and only Jesus’ word that continues the blessing of that final Passover meal with His disciples, and gives us not the Passover’s lamb and bitter herbs, but the Lamb of God, according to His crucified and resurrected body and blood. You cannot have just the divine nature or just the human nature of Jesus. It is the whole Jesus, or it is not Jesus at all. And so He gives Himself to us. His flesh is true food and His blood is true drink, and His life-giving flesh is given for the life of the world. Jesus did not accomplish our salvation on this altar; He accomplished on the altar of the cross. But He did not deliver that salvation to sinners there, at the cross. He delivers it here. That is His good order and His gracious gift.

We cannot answer the question “how,” because Jesus does not explain. He simply speaks and gives. We can only answer the question “what”: His body and blood with the bread and the wine. No explanation needed other than, “what Jesus says must happen.” Nowhere is it explained, or explained away. The words simply stand as they are, and believers take them as they stand. We cannot say less or more than what Jesus gives. We simply believe His words, no matter how difficult they are to human understanding or reason. His words are not like our words, which we may or may not do. His promises are not like our promises, which we may or may not keep. He does what He says and He always keeps His promises. This flesh and this blood are unlike any other. All other flesh and blood is like the grass; it is here today and gone tomorrow. The grass withers and the flower falls, but the Word of our God stands forever. And so it does: This is My body and this is My blood, given and shed for you, for the forgiveness of your sins. This is the purest Gospel. We can mess up a lot of things—God forbid the pastor could fail to preach the Gospel. But if we stick to the words there is nothing that we can corrupt here. It is all Him.

Here is the closest we can get to Jesus, which means the closest we can get to God, and the closest we can get on earth to those we love who have died in the faith. Where Christ is, His body must be. We enter with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven, that great cloud of witnesses that surrounds us.

All of this means peace. Count up the number of times the word “peace” shows up in the Service of the Sacrament. The peace between people and God that Jesus created on the cross, He gives it here. This Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, has mercy on us and gives us His peace. Our Passover Lamb is sacrificed; oh, let us keep the feast! The holy things for the holy people: it is for you, for you, for you. Without that “for you,” it may be general truth, but it is not Gospel. With the “for you,” you know for whom it is meant, and you believe the words of your Lord to you. This body and blood of the God who became Man strengthens and preserves you in both body and soul. That is not a wish, not a “may it happen.” It is a blessing that comes to faith when Jesus gives Himself. You depart the table in peace, just like Simeon departed the temple: “Lord, lettest now Thy servant depart in peace according to Thy word, for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all people,” a light that enlightens all the nations, and the glory for which Israel had been prepared and preparing for millennia. To depart in peace means that we are prepared to die. So we go to the altar as if we were going, like Isaiah thought, to death. But this burning coal from the altar has touched our lips, so when we finally enter death, we go to the same Lord who met us here at this altar.

Taste and see that the Lord is good, and His mercy endureth forever. For this we bless the Lord with thanksgiving for all that He has given to us. But even here, God won’t let us have the last word. We bless the Lord, and He blesses us right back. At the end, as at the beginning, He puts His Name on us as He had commanded Aaron to do: The Lord bless and keep you; the Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift His face toward you in mercy and not away from you in wrath. And in that, in Him, there is peace. To the triple blessing a triple “amen,” which means, “this is true.”

By this meal, we are forgiven, but more than that. The living Jesus freely gives us His body and blood, which is eternal life, and that strengthens our faith toward God. But the Jesus who healed the sick, fed the hungry, and raised the dead—who heals us of all our sickness of body and soul—turns us outward to others in fervent, active, abundant love. The Lord has taken all our burdens on Himself, so now we bear the burdens of those who eat this one bread with us and so are one body with us. We weep with those who weep and rejoice with those who rejoice. We forgive others. We take care of them. We give to them what they need from us.

Christ has given His body and blood to us, St. John Chrysostom says, “to lead us to a closer friendship, and to show His love for us; He hath given to those who desire Him not only to see Him, but even to touch, and eat Him, and fix their teeth in His flesh, and to embrace Him, and satisfy all their love. Let us then return from that table like lions breathing fire, having become terrible to the devil; thinking on our Head [Christ], and on the love which He hath shown for us. … This blood causeth the image of our King to be fresh within us, produceth beauty unspeakable, permitteth not the nobleness of our souls to waste away, watering it continually, and nourishing it. The blood derived from our food becomes not at once blood, but something else; while this doth not so, but straightway watereth our souls, and worketh in them some mighty power. This blood, if rightly taken, driveth away devils, and keepeth them afar off from us, while it calleth to us Angels and the Lord of Angels. For wherever they see the Lord’s blood, devils flee, and Angels run together. … Take we then heed to ourselves, beloved, we who enjoy such blessings; and if we desire to utter any shameful word, or perceive ourselves hurried away by wrath or any like passion, let us consider of what things we have been deemed worthy, of how great a Spirit we have partaken, and this consideration shall be a sobering of our unreasonable passions. For how long shall we be nailed to present things? How long shall it be before we rouse ourselves? How long shall we neglect our own salvation? Let us bear in mind of what things Christ has deemed us worthy, let us give thanks, let us glorify Him, not by our faith alone, but also by our very works, that we may obtain the good things that are to come, through the grace and lovingkindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom and with whom, to the Father and the Holy Ghost be glory, now and ever and world without end. Amen.”¹

Let us devote ourselves to these things of which Christ has made us worthy by faith and so eat the Meal prepared, served, and given by the slain Lamb who is our living Good Shepherd. At peace with God, we return from the table like lions breathing fire, made terrible to the devil. O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! His mercy endures forever! Go in peace.

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

– Pr. Timothy Winterstein, 4/23/26

1 St. John Chrysostom, Homily on John XLVI (John 6:41-42): 3-4.