Luke 13:14-15.                   Why is Sunday so important???                                 21/8/16

¹⁴ Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

¹⁵ The Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water?

Hebrews 12:28-29.

²⁸ Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, ²⁹ for our “God is a consuming fire.”

Isaiah 58:13-14.

¹³ “If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
    and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
    and the Lord’s holy day honourable,
and if you honour it by not going your own way
    and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
¹⁴ then you will find your joy in the Lord,
    and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the land
    and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob.”
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

This morning in our readings we are confronted with what our Sunday worship is all about. Here in particular it is addressing why it is that we have so many problems with, not only our worship, but life itself.

These days we hear all too often that worship is boring or not fitting to our societal thinking today: or that it doesn’t do anything for me; or even that it is not done right. Along with that we think that we can worship when and where it suits us; or that I don’t need to go because I still have my faith. Then there are also those who think that we can change almost anything and everything about worship to suit what I and the people around me think would be good and nice.

But already just in that I think we can already begin to see a major problem with our attitude today about Sunday worship. It is all about me and what I think and feel. Our Christianity has thereby become a religion, rather than a faith. It is more about what I and we do, than about Christ and what he has done. Therein we have a major problem. Also we find that we have lost the joy and strength that God desires for our lives.

In the first of these three readings we have God very clearly addressing this issue. He says:  “If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
    and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
    and the Lord’s holy day honourable,
and if you honour it by not going your own way
    and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
 then you will find your joy in the Lord,
    and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the land
    and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob.”

Here God is talking about consequences that flow from the decisions we make with regard to what is important in life; and particularly here with our attitude toward God and our worship of him. If you – then you will…. If you take God seriously and follow what he says and wants, then we will find joy and blessings.

Conversely then, if Sunday is all about me and what I want, then the opposite is also true. If we make no attempt to keep the Sabbath holy and just do as we please: and if we fail to see Sundays as God’s special day for us and honour it as such: and if we go our own way and do our thing; then it should not surprise us if we find no joy in the Lord, and no real blessings in our daily lives.

Sunday is about taking God and what he has to say seriously. It is about following what he has to say is right, good and beneficial for us, rather than we doing what we think we would like. He is Lord. In other words, he is all important and what he says goes. This is vital that we get our heads around this. Our sinful human nature always wants to turn the focus to ourselves, and we get into real trouble as a result.

God tells us in the Ten Commandments that we are to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. And Luther’s explanation of this in the Catechism goes like this: We should fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and his Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.

Yet we all too readily worship only when we feel like it and have little regard for God’s Word. This is readily seen today as more and more we change and ignore what God has to say in his Word to suit what we and our society would like it to be. Then we wonder why everything goes wrong for us. We wonder why there is a huge drop off in church attendance.

Then when we look at the Gospel reading this morning we see another aspect to this that is equally a big problem. Again however, the same underlying problem is there. The synagogue leader was so focussed on doing the right according to the rules that they had made up as an extension to what God hold told them. In the process they had forgotten that God and his love for sinners was to be ever present.

¹⁴ Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

¹⁵ The Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water?

He points out that they look after their own animals on the Sabbath but do not have the same compassion for a cripple. They are more concerned about everything going the way they want, so that everything looks and feels good for them and their own worship. Again it is ‘all about me’, rather than who God is and what he would have for us.

Here it is that Jesus reminded the Pharisees of his day, as well as us today, that there is a far more central issue involved here, than what we do and how we do it. This day has to do with us being freed from that which binds us and grinds us into the ground. He speaks of being freed from Satan. It has to do with forgiveness of sins, life and salvation. It has to do with our Lord and who he is and what he does.

It has to do with, as Paul says to the Hebrews:

But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the judge of all men, to the spirits of righteous men made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.

Yes, that is what God has in mind for you and me here this morning and every time we gather here in his presence. He wants to meet with you here, together with all the saints, and he wants to reassure you that you are part of a new covenant where we can have that guarantee that we are forgiven for all our selfishness and sin, and that he has many blessings surrounding that for you and me. God and what he has to offer is what is essential for this life and the next. He is here to do just that and along with that he gives us the directives that we need for our worship and for life.

So also as Paul said to the Hebrews:  See to it that you do not refuse him who speaks. [That is Jesus and his word of forgiveness] If they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, how much less will we, if we turn away from him who warns us from heaven? At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, "Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens." The words "once more" indicate the removing of what can be shaken--that is, created things--so that what cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our "God is a consuming fire."

We certainly do have a great God who has done something truly remarkable for us who in no way deserve it. We who have turned our backs on him and even the worship that he has in mind for us. We have made ourselves the centre of life and worship and brought nothing but misery and hardship on ourselves. By doing what we want and changing to be all about ourselves we have lost the joy and blessings that God has in mind for us.

Yet he still loves us and still wants to remind us again that he is Lord of the Sabbath. He still calls us back to himself and seeks to impart to us the joy and blessing that is so much needed in our worship and in our lives. He calls for us to look beyond ourselves and our wants and desires, so that he can give us those things that are truly needed in our lives. He wants to serve us so that we receive what we need in order to get through this life and into eternity with himself.

So we have a great, awesome, and loving God who calls us week by week into his day of rest and receiving of all the good things that he has in mind for us. Through Word and Sacrament he seeks to richly bless us.  Who then are we to deny him this opportunity. Or do we think that we are greater, stronger and wiser than God himself. No let us be challenged and encouraged to see the Sabbath as God’s gift to us for our welfare and good. And through it all may all glory and honour go to our great God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN.

Pastor Roger Atze

Glandore/Underdale Lutheran Parish