The Poor Have Good News Preached to Them

Kongsvinger Lutheran Church

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Welcome to the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern

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Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone.

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And now here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. The holy gospel according to Saint Matthew chapter 2 verses chapter 11 verses 2 through 15.

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Now when John heard in prison about the deeds of Christ he sent word by his disciples and said to him, are you the one who is to come or shall we look for another?

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Jesus answered them, you go and tell John what you hear and you see. The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear and the dead are raised and the poor have good news preached to them.

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And blessed is the one who is not offended by me. As they went away Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John.

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What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? No, what then did you go out to see?

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A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold those who wear soft clothing are in king's houses.

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So what then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you and more than a prophet.

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This is he of whom it is written, behold I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way before you.

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Truly I say to you among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist, yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

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From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence and the violent take it by force.

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For all the prophets in the law prophesied until John and if you are willing to accept it he is the

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Elijah who is to come. He who has an ear to hear let him hear. In the name of Jesus.

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All right I got to confess when I was doing my sermon prep on this text I actually nerded out.

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It happens. Yeah I found as I was reading this kind of the question I was having as I was trying to work through the text was was

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John the Baptist having a moment of doubt? Was he really actually wondering if Jesus was really the messiah?

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And well I started looking in the writings of the church fathers and what I found fascinating is in the sermons of the church fathers to a man they all defended

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John the Baptist and pointed to Jesus's statement where he says did you go out into the wilderness to see a reed blown by the wind as proof that John the

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Baptist was not really asking this question for his own benefit. He was asking this for the benefit of the men that he sent.

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John was getting ready to finish his course by this time he's in prison and well that sometimes happens when you are a repentance preacher and you tell the guy who's in charge of the land that well the woman that he's sleeping with he shouldn't be sleeping with.

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Sometimes sinners don't like it when their idols are destroyed and so they well they react negatively.

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So John finds himself in prison and true to John's form where he says I must decrease he must increase.

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He sends his disciples for the benefit of his disciples because he's about ready to die and so the idea here is that he wants them to know for sure

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Jesus is the one I was always pointing to and I find that to be an interesting way of looking at the text and I find it difficult to argue with especially given

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Jesus's words later. So with that we're going to work our way through our gospel text and we're going to braid into it you know kind of like you know what the women do with their hair.

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We're going to braid into it our Old Testament text and we'll let James have the final say as we get to the end of our sermon today.

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So Matthew chapter 11 verse 2. When John heard in prison about the deeds of Christ he sent word by his disciples and said to him are you the one who is to come or shall we look for another?

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Jesus answered them you go and tell John what you see and what you hear. The blind receive their sight the lame walk the lepers are cleansed the deaf hear the dead are raised the poor have good news preach to them.

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Now this particular list you know these are a list of the deeds that Jesus did and if you were noting what was said in our psalm today a messianic psalm.

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Psalm 146 verse 8. The Lord opens the eyes of the blind the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down the

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Lord loves the righteous the Lord sets the captive free. You see there was this ongoing litany a list of things that the

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Israelites at this time were expecting the Messiah to do and you'll notice Jesus says the blind see the lame walk lepers are cleansed the deaf hear the dead are raised but notice

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Jesus doesn't quote that part of Psalm 146 where he says and the captives are set free.

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He doesn't want word coming back to John that would give him any hope that he's about to get out of prison because he's not getting out of there alive.

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Something to keep in mind but it's also important to note this that these particular human malities blindness lameness deafness poverty leprosy are also used in scriptures as well ways of describing our sinful condition.

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Scripture says that we are born dead and trespasses and sins that those who are following false teachers are the blind following the blind and over and again and even in this gospel text we hear

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Jesus use this refrain the one who has ears to hear let him hear and so in a very real way we can look at this list and say that Jesus is still opening the eyes of the blind those who are blind by their sin opening their ears to hear the gospel cleansing them of their sins and we have to think of sins as a well leprous condition and so there's a way in which you can understand these things in fact regarding poverty remember what

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Jesus said in Matthew chapter 5 verse 3 in the opening portion of the sermon on the mount blessed are the poor in spirit theirs is the kingdom of heaven and what exactly does it mean to be poor in spirit this is the one who recognizes that because of his sinful condition or her sinful condition that they are spiritually bankrupt they have nothing to offer

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God they cannot pay God well any amount of money or any amount of good works that will spring them out of the clink set them free from sin or earn them salvation the poor in spirit are those who say i've got nothing and it's only the one who says i've got nothing that has an empty hand in which

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God can place everything and that's what scripture teaches now let me weave into this you know this theme of the blind the poor the lepers all these things from isaiah 35 isaiah 35 verse 1 says the wilderness and the dry land shall be glad now this is an eschatological look at the future coming the new earth the new heavens the the new jerusalem the new zion the wilderness and the dry land shall be glad the desert shall be rejoice and blossom like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly and rejoice with joy and singing the glory of lebanon shall be given to it majesty of carmel and sharon they shall see the glory of the lord the majesty of our god strengthen the weak hands make firm the feeble knees so notice here in this opening portion of isaiah we have this again eschatological hope for the coming future the second advent of christ and it's describing the new earth in such a way well it's as if the garden of eden has returned overstepped its fence and is now becoming well the whole earth itself so that we will no longer be able to look at photographs of the sahara desert there will be no such thing the whole earth will be lush and garden -like that's a picture of the coming kingdom and so because of all of this we are told strengthen the weak hands make firm the feeble knees say to those who have an anxious heart be strong fear not weak hands feeble knees anxious heart sounds like us doesn't it sounds like me at times go through a difficult circumstance one of those things you don't know what you're going to get out of or wake up in the middle of the night with a start because you realize that you're going to die someday and stand before god it's a something that'll create anxiety like you wouldn't believe but see here these are comforting words of the gospel and god wants your weak hands your feeble knees your anxious heart to be comforted and so we are comforted with these words be strong fear not behold your god will come with vengeance and reckon the recompense of god and he will come not to judge you to save you his vengeance is saved up for those who persist in sin and unbelief those who continue to do the work of the devil and the devil and all of his demons themselves he will come with vengeance and get rid of them once and for all none of their influences will have anything to say in the coming new earth then the eyes of the blind shall be open isaiah says the ears of the deaf unstop notice the theme then shall the lame man leap like a deer the tongue of the mute sing for joy that's right there will be no blindness deafness paraplegics quadriplegics anybody who needs a walker in the new kingdom the waters will break forth in the wilderness streams in the desert the burning sand shall become a pool and the thirsty springs of water and the haunt of jackals where they lie the grass shall become reeds and rushes what a picture of the coming new earth and a highway shall be there it shall be called the highway of holiness now by way of a little bit of an interesting kind of sad bizarre story 10 years ago there was a group of charismatics associated with what's called the new apostolic reformation and one of their apostles her name is cindy jacobs she literally called a news crew up in dallas and got them to come out to highway 35 in dallas now if you're familiar with this highway it runs from texas through oklahoma on up to minnesota you have to say it like that around here people you get what i'm saying but and she literally had a film crew film her and her followers claiming that highway 35 in the u .s

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is the fulfillment of this prophecy and it's the highway of holiness is it the highway of holiness no it's not and if you just pay attention to the details it's like impossible last time i checked there's a bunch of sinners from texas all the way up to minnesota anyway so this is not highway 35 i'm just saying okay so a highway shall be there it shall be called the way of holiness the unclean shall not pass over it you sit there and go well that rules me out actually it doesn't and here's the reason why is because you have come to the waters of baptism you've had your sins washed away you've been brought to penitent faith in christ and you are clothed in his righteousness his sinless righteousness covers you much the same way this white all covers the sin of your pastor and that's what this all visually represents you have been made holy today you have heard the words of the absolution i forgive you all of your sins in the name of the father son and holy spirit last week we feasted on the body and the blood of christ and we heard these important words broken and shed for you for the forgiveness of your sins you see you have been made holy you have been made righteous all as a gift by our great god and savior who wants words of comfort given to you so that you can know that when he comes he's not coming to judge you he's coming to save you so the unclean will not pass over it and you are among those who've been made clean by christ it shall belong to those who walk on the way what a fascinating passage of scripture it shall belong to those who walk on the way if you know your bible what was the very first name given for christianity it wasn't called christianity it was called the way yeah yeah you say wait can that mean yes it does see it means that it should belong to those who walk on the way and you are those who are part of the way and it says this even if they are fools they shall not go astray that's good news for me sometimes i behave very foolishly no lion shall be there nor any ravenous beast come upon it they shall not be found there but the redeemed shall walk there that's you and the ransom of the lord shall return and come to zion with singing that's you everlasting joy shall be upon their heads they shall obtain gladness and joy and sorrow and sighing shall flee away what a beautiful picture of what is coming and all of this is because of god's great love and mercy to you and for you in christ and so then jesus then continues in our gospel text with these words blessed is the one who is not offended by me now there's this weird statement that people make from time to time in the church world and that is they say something to the effect of well unbelievers really like jesus but they don't really like his followers so much and i understand what they're kind of getting at i mean have you ever run into a cranky christian they're kind of difficult to deal with but i don't think that's really quite right because jesus says blessed is the one who's not offended by me and you think well what has jesus done that's so offensive well read your bible i mean what were the people who are always grumbling and offended by jesus saying oh he eats with sinners i can't believe he's hanging out with the tax collectors and those prostitutes and that riffraff it was offensive well see the thing is the reason why it would be offensive is because the person making such a claim doesn't realize that they too are part of that riffraff they think that they're not when in fact they are and so the offense of jesus is the offense of the forgiveness of sins for all sinners and so this is why paul says in romans chapter 1 starting at verse 16 i'm not ashamed of the gospel and the gospel truly is shameful for those who well are trying to save themselves for it is the power of god for salvation to everyone who believes first to the jew and also to the greek for in the gospel the righteousness of god is revealed from faith for faith as it is written the righteous shall live by faith the apostle paul in first corinthians chapter 1 starting at verse 18 talks more about this offense of the cross the offense of christ and he writes the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing you ever thought about that it's folly seriously you believe that the son of god died for my sins really you're saying that god is wrathful and that that my bad deeds have to be atoned for in such a terrible way well yeah without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins so the word of the cross well it's folly to those who are perishing but to us who are being saved it's the power of god it is written i will destroy the wisdom of the wise the discernment of the discerning i will thwart where is the wise one where is the scribe where is the debater of this age has not god made foolish the wisdom of the world where's the self -help guru the vision casting leader yeah the people who say oh it's really easy to live a victorious life all you have to do is apply these three simple steps that i have discovered and then people will sit there and go it worked for me and if you sign up now you can pay for this program with three easy payments of 99 .95