{"id":9690,"date":"2021-02-07T19:49:41","date_gmt":"2021-02-07T19:49:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theologie.whp.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/?p=9690"},"modified":"2022-10-03T13:33:39","modified_gmt":"2022-10-03T11:33:39","slug":"luke-3-7-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/luke-3-7-18\/","title":{"rendered":"Luke 3: 7-18"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Rejoice in the Warning<\/strong><\/p>\n

Two years ago, a barge hit a support beam on the causeway going from
\nPort Isabel to South Padre Island in far south Texas. As a result a portion
\nof the causeway plunged into the Laguna Madre. This all happened during
\nthe very early morning hours. Before any indication of this accident
\nwas conveyed to anybody, several, I think it was 7 or 8 automobiles drove
\nthrough the opening, plummeted into the water several hundred feet below
\nand were killed. Every person in those cars died.<\/p>\n

It took several hours before authorities on both ends of the causeway
\nwere notified and all traffic warned of the disaster and the tragedy.
\nIt was a horrible event. Even worse business on the island suffered greatly
\nas this was the only way for trucks, cars, for vacationers to reach the
\nisland. Many were angry that plans needed to be canceled, businesses
\nshut down, and only ferries could be used to enter and exit the island.<\/p>\n

Now if it was you heading for South Padre Island that morning, would
\nyou not have rejoiced that the warning was there and glad you had been
\nwarned and not let to discover, tragically, the emptiness of the broken
\ncauseway?<\/p>\n

In our Words from God for today written by St. Luke, this character
\nJohn is warning a „brood of vipers“ that there was a coming
\nwrath. This crowd of people did not come to be anything more than perhaps
\nentertained by this „new“ preacher on the block. John sees
\nthem as vipers, snakes who scuttle to avoid injury, who can inflict terrible
\nharm on people. „Who warned you?“ asked this John.<\/p>\n

Do we need this warning? It’s so close to Christmas! We who’ve been
\nscurrying like moths who have but hours to live, to get all the preparations
\ndone for the big holiday this week, do we need a warning? And about „wrath“ coming?
\nAnd we should „rejoice“ in that? Well, now….<\/p>\n

We don’t need a warning, do we? Why, we’ve been Christians, Lutherans,
\nbaptized, confirmed and married in the church people. We’ve been faithful
\nin prayer, in giving, in following the rules. And who here has not been,
\nat least, trying to be a good person? Do we who are here and not out
\nthere shopping like the others need a warning?<\/p>\n

A warning? Yes! A warning that wrath is coming and the old ways of doing
\nthings, of behaving, of carrying on have to be changed! Disaster is ahead
\nfor us if we don’t change. God doesn’t need us. If God wanted, he could
\ntake every single stone out there and there are lots of them around here,
\nand make them into praising children of the promise.<\/p>\n

What’s coming? It’s like the man sharpening his axe, his saw, his pruning
\nshears. He is going out as we soon here in Texas will, to see what the
\ntrees have done. We all may be bare of leaf and flower, but he knows.
\nHe knows. He knows the tree that is pretty, but pretty bad because it’s
\na peach tree and doesn’t produce any fruit. It’s going to be cut down
\nand thrown into the fire. It has missed its purpose in this world. There
\nwill be severe pruning, sawing off limbs which are useless. Fruit, fruit–that’s
\nthe name of this game. Without it, it’s the brush fire for you!<\/p>\n

What fruit does this axe-man want? So ask the crowd, the tax collectors,
\nthe soldiers. This John’s answers seem so ordinary, so common, so much
\nof what we are doing. Right? I hardly think so.<\/p>\n

At this time of year we share, the poor are laden with turkeys, cast
\noff clothes, tinned goods, candy, and toys, that you could actually begin
\nto believe that there is a Santa Claus. Many are helped, well, at least
\nonce a year.<\/p>\n

John says, „You want to avoid the axe? Then if you’ve got two shirts
\ngive the other away. You’ve got food to share, share it.“ This is
\nno one time a year giving and helping and feeling good. This is a life-style
\nchange that for most of us (all of us?) requires a kind of fruit we have
\nnever thought was necessary.<\/p>\n

We say that Jesus was kidding, wasn’t he? When he told the rich man
\nto see all he had and give it to the poor, and then he could come and
\nfollow him and in that way have eternal life. It isn’t true, is it, that „the
\nlove of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for
\nmoney, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many
\ngriefs (1 Timothy 6:10)? You know people like this? Has that happened
\nto you?<\/p>\n

How true this is: „Whoever loves money never has money enough;
\nwhoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income (Ecclesiastes
\n5:10). Do you complain about your wages? Never satisfied? Try to get
\nevery penney out of every deal or you feel cheated? You young people,
\never complain about how cheap, and I mean cheap, the parents are?<\/p>\n

Fruit– that is in keeping with a person who has a changed heart. The
\nresult in a person who has been warned about the coming wrath. So ordinary,
\nso common, so mundane the behavior, but who of us doesn’t want to best
\nbargain and would be willing to stretch the truth to get the better of
\nanother?<\/p>\n

Not the crowds now, but the people, the laity were eagerly waiting for
\nthe Christ. What were they waiting for? The Christ? Who is that?<\/p>\n

The Christ, the Anointed One, the King who would set every thing, every
\nsituation, right again. The Expected One who would bring justice for
\nall. This Christ would be the mighty One who would wash his people with
\nthe Spirit of God and with fire. This Figure of Promise and Hope would
\ncleanse with fire the lives of all who were expecting him and would expose
\nthe emptiness of others and blow them away like empty chaff, worthless,
\nfaithless, ruthless and senseless.<\/p>\n

What are you expecting this year? A smooth ride to heaven on the basis
\nof what you have done? A smooth ride in this world because you have discovered
\nall by yourself the way, the truth and life in this world?<\/p>\n

I have presided over a number of people’s funerals in my ministry. Some
\njust stand out. One was eulogized and asked the Lord to give him what
\nhe deserved. Well, he drank a bottle of Jack Daniels (whiskey) every
\nday and ruined his marriage, children and grandchildren. Another who
\nwas never able to hold a job and had to be supported by his wife who
\nhad a PhD and was an international lecturer was praised as being a good
\nfamily man. Before he drank himself to death, she finally found that
\nthe way to keep him from spending all the family money was by having
\nhim go to school full time.<\/p>\n

This coming Christ will bring justice and fairness. He will see through
\nour shabby good deeds as being a sham. I am reminded of the story Jesus
\ntold about the rich man and Lazarus. The rich man feasted every day,
\ndress in the latest fashions (you all do know what they are, don’t you?),
\nand subscribed to every charity that was around. He permitted this scum-bag
\nLazarus to hang around the garbage cans. There Lazarus could eat the
\nrolls that got too hard, the tough pieces of the filet mignon, the chocolate
\ncake that wasn’t appetizing anymore. He hobnobbed with the best, and
\ncouldn’t figure out why that bum Lazarus wouldn’t help him in hell. And
\nafter what he had done for him. Here was justice. Here was a warning.
\nHere is where we live.<\/p>\n

Will the Christ who is so near be fair with you. His fairness is better
\nthan you ever imagined. He wants every injustice paid for and he pays
\nfor it. He takes our fruits which are so small they could have been raised
\non the bonsai tree and makes them into perfect fruits through his life.
\nHe destroys our anxiety about how it will all turn out, how we will get
\nto the island of paradise where we can rest and becomes the only bridge
\nand it’s a free bridge, no toll required bridge to be in his presence.<\/p>\n

In everything after praying about it, after thanking God for how good
\nhe is and has been and will continue to be, and knowing that Jesus didn’t
\nstand far off and tell you with a terrifying voice that he loved you,
\nbut comes to us, in a shape and form we can understand, and who comes
\nto us today in that same form in Bread and Wine in the Blessed Sacrament,
\nthen give it over to him to be your care taker.<\/p>\n

That’s tough for men who want to solve every problem by themselves,
\nbut you just drive over that causeway that isn’t there. See how far your
\nself designed car will go. Well, actually don’t do that. Rather, the
\npeace of God which transcends all your understanding of how things should
\nbe, that peace, better than any lock or bolt, better than anything we
\ncan create will guard your heart, your emotions, and your mind, your
\nthought. Because that peace is through this Christ, this Savior, this
\nLord Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n

I have passed over that causeway to South Padre Island many times since
\nit has been repaired. I always think of those who had no warning.<\/p>\n

I think daily of you, and of those who know what’s coming. Why don’t
\nwe rejoice more, worry less, give ourselves to serve others? Why worry
\nabout what’s going to happen, when he has already scooped you up and
\ntaken you into his house.
\nWhy don’t we tell people why we rejoice? That we want them to have joy
\nas we have joy? Why don’t we warn others so they to may rejoice?<\/p>\n

And rejoice in the Lord always. I’ll say it again. Rejoice! Rejoice
\nin the warning and change by being gentle to all. What a fruit of repentance
\nthat would be! Amen.<\/p>\n

Walter W. Harms, Retired Pastor
\nwaltpast@AOL.com<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rejoice in the Warning Two years ago, a barge hit a support beam on the causeway going from Port Isabel to South Padre Island in far south Texas. As a result a portion of the causeway plunged into the Laguna Madre. This all happened during the very early morning hours. Before any indication of this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8543,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,727,108,110,3,109],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-9690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lukas","category-archiv","category-current","category-engl","category-nt","category-predigten"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9690"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9690\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13880,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9690\/revisions\/13880"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9690"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=9690"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=9690"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=9690"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=9690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}