KEEPING FOCUSED | Pentecost 9 | 10.08.2025 | Luke 12: 32-40 | David Zersen |

³²“Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. ³³Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. ³⁴For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. ³⁵“Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; ³⁶be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. ³⁷Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them. ³⁸If he comes during the middle of the night, or near dawn, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves. ³⁹“But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁰You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.”

⁴¹Peter said, “Lord, are you telling this parable for us or for everyone?” ⁴²And the Lord said, “Who then is the faithful and prudent manager whom his master will put in charge of his slaves, to give them their allowance of food at the proper time? ⁴³Blessed is that slave whom his master will find at work when he arrives. ⁴⁴Truly I tell you, he will put that one in charge of all his possessions. ⁴⁵But if that slave says to himself, ‘My master is delayed in coming,’ and if he begins to beat the other slaves, men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk, ⁴⁶the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour that he does not know, and will cut him in pieces, and put him with the unfaithful. ⁴⁷That slave who knew what his master wanted, but did not prepare himself or do what was wanted, will receive a severe beating. ⁴⁸But the one who did not know and did what deserved a beating will receive a light beating. From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded.

KEEPING FOCUSED

When I think about today’s text, the first thing that comes to mind is Heinz Werner Zimmerman. He was a Lutheran composer and professor at several music schools in Germany who was

interested in renewing Lutheran church music by using contemporary styles. He died three years ago, at the age of 91. I first heard his well-known “Have No Fear Little Flock” when I was a student in Germany and happened to attend the Albanikirche in Göttingen one Sunday morning. The choir sang the syncopated tune with plucked double-bass, and I’ve loved it ever since.

Jesus uses those words to introduce our two challenging parables this morning that might easily put us on edge if we worry about the unexpected. There is, after all, a likelihood that dramatic things may happen when we are least prepared. Jesus encourages, “Have no fear, little flock, it is your Father’s good pleasure (eudokesen) to give you the kingdom.” There is a loveliness to that thought. The infinite creator of all has you at heart when the future is planned. God wants us to live together, not in chaos or strife or discouragement. Rather, as Paul summarizes in Gal. 5:22, we should center our lives in love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. To strive to express those spiritual gifts in our daily lives is to experience the kingdom that God enjoys giving us. And when I think of Zimmerman’s setting those thoughts to a jazz rhythm, I like to picture God taking pleasure in our celebration of the gifts he brings to the Kingdom along with us.

I just finished a book by John Grisham and Jim McCloskey entitled Framed (Doubleday, 2024) that dramatizes these thoughts for us. The book’s chapter details the experience of men and women who were charged with crimes that led to their imprisonment, their execution, and occasionally, their release from prison. The chapters are filled with horrible details about the lives of people who live very far from the Kingdom of God. However, the chapters also make it clear that amid low-class kingdoms filled with petty criminals, deranged murderers, and dishonest judges and lawyers, there are some innocent people! Upon occasion, after many years in prison, they are freed from their hell-on-earth trials and try to live out their lives as humble,

caring, servant-like citizens. Finishing the book, the reader feels emancipated to have lived through the trials of the prisoners, but, at times, in the end, to experience words like Jesus’s own, “Fear not little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.”

Today’s text offers two parables, both leading the protagonists to dead-ends, but also set within the reminder that no matter what happens in life, it is still the Father’s good pleasure to give us the Kingdom. In the first parable, we are reminded that people are often focused on self-centered things, forgetting that they have greater possibilities in store for them. If we are properly prepared, when the one who put us in charge returns, blessings will abound. The disciples don’t get it, so they ask if this is true for some or everyone? Patiently, Jesus tells a second parable. People are put in charge when the master goes away. But if they ignore their privileges because the master doesn’t seem to be returning, he may surprise them by coming in when no one expects him. Jesus says, if you’ve been entrusted with great privileges, why slack off? It is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. Do you get it now?

The point of Jesus’ clarifying parables is not to make us anxious or afraid. It is to assure us that a gracious and loving God envisions a new kind of world being created through us. Our God is a God of the present… and the future, a God who wants us to work with him to bring in the Kingdom, a world which operates through love and forgiveness, service and self-control. When some tell the story of Jesus’ crucifixion, the focus is often on cancelling generic sin. However, the specific sin that is cancelled at the cross is the very sin that brought Jesus to the cross: sin like envy, resentment, hatred, greed, jealousy, and getting even! Such sins were present in those who crucified Jesus and can still be present in us today. But our loving God tells us those sins have been put to death. We don’t have to allow those sins to destroy us and others again. We now have a new possibility. Through the resurrection of Jesus, God empowers us to enter the Kingdom, the prospect of a life that lasts, that overcomes death, that sees a future in which we make better choices.

Let me share a story few Christians know, a story about a man who was not worried that the Kingdom was coming tomorrow. He was a log-cabin preacher in Texas by the name of Jan Kilian. He was a theology graduate of the University of Leipzig in Germany and was asked by some 600 people who wanted to immigrate to the U.S. if he would serve as their pastor. He agreed and served as their pastor for thirty years in a back-country world in central Texas. At the same time, a fellow student of his at Leipzig by the name of Carl Ferdinand Walther had become president of a Lutheran Church denomination centered in St. Louis. The St. Louis leader, to encourage right behavior, often quoted the very passage in today’s text to remind that there was little time, and that at any moment, Christ might return in judgment. Be prepared. The words are, after all, seemingly clear in the text. Kilian, from his log cabin in Serbin, Texas, did a major biblical study and replied in writing that Walther should be careful about using such language about an imminent end of time because there were too many biblical prophecies that had not yet been fulfilled.

The story is an interesting one because two theologians, both with the same education, one who had become a country parson and another an urban academic in the same church body, laid a challenge before the church. Both were saying that Christians should stay focused as they accepted the privilege to allow Jesus’ preaching, as well as their trust in the power of his death and resurrection, help them enter and make personal the Kingdom of God. They did, however, differ about levels of anxiety in fixing a time when we will be called to account for our discipleship.

We also may differ from one another in our views about when and how we will be called to give account for our faith and life, but we don’t have to worry whether our loving Father is present to love us into a Kingdom-quality stewardship. Some have been misled to hate, reject, despise, and condemn others. Let us rather ask our loving Father to help us look for simple incentives to serve, support, love, and cherish those around us. Let the Kingdom come, through you and me! Stay focused. Let the end of time come when it comes. I’m not worried about it. Nor should you be. Let’s enjoy letting the Kingdom come to your family, your neighborhood, your place of business, your school, and your church. After all, it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.

Hymn: “Have No Fear, Little Flock” LW #410, ELW #764, LSB #735

David Zersen, D.Min., Ed.D., FRHistS
President Emeritus, Concordia University Texas
zersendj@gmail.com
414 727 3890