Still Haven't Found What You're Looking For?

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 St. John, the first chapter.

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The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Behold, the

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Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This is He of whom I said,

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After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me. I myself did not know him, but for this purpose

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I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel. And John bore witness,

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I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me,

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He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is He who baptizes with the

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Holy Spirit. And I have seen and I have borne witness that this is the Son of God.

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The next day again John was standing with two of his disciples and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said,

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Behold, the Lamb of God. The two disciples heard him say this and they followed Jesus.

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Jesus turned and saw them following and said to them, What are you seeking? And they said to him,

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Rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? He said to them, Come and you will see. So they came and saw where he was staying and they stayed with him that day.

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For it was about the tenth hour. One of the two who heard John speak and followed Jesus was

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Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. He first found his own brother Simon and said to him,

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We have found the Messiah, which means Christ, and he brought him to Jesus. This is the gospel of the

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Lord. So Jesus asked the question in our gospel text, What are you seeking?

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What are you seeking? And when I hear a question like that, I cannot help but think of U2. Now I'm not talking about U2, I'm actually talking about the band

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U2, the rock and roll band with Bono, right? And that song of theirs, it gets stuck in my head from time to time,

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I still haven't found what I'm looking for, right? Still haven't found what

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I'm looking for. So in our gospel text today, something interesting is happening. In fact, quite fascinating if you consider its implications.

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Here John the Baptist is about ready to finish all of his work and I wish

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I could say that from here he retired in Bermuda and lived happily ever after, but that's not the fate of John the

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Baptist. Remember, John the Baptist was prophesied by the Old Testament prophets to be the forerunner of Christ who would prepare the way before him and make straight the paths of, well, people before God.

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And how did he do it? Well, by preaching repentance. That's what he preached, repentance. But you'll note, something interesting happens because as John is getting ready to finish his course,

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Jesus is baptized by him. We talked about that last week. Jesus was baptized by John the

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Baptist and while he was being baptized, the heavens opened up, the Holy Spirit descended on him in the form of a dove and remained on him and the voice of the

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Father was heard, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. And John the

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Baptist now, you can legitimately say he's done his bit. His job is over.

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He can be done with it, right? But here's the thing, is that you'll note that always and again when you're on your last day of work or your last week of work, there's always a couple of loose ends you have to tie up.

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And in this particular case, John the Baptist has to tie up the loose ends of he has disciples whom he's been teaching and it's time to pass them off to Jesus because John ain't gonna be here for much longer.

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It's important that he pass them off to Jesus because it was never about them being disciples of John the

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Baptist in the first place. It was always about him preparing the way for Christ. But in so doing,

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John the Baptist does something very interesting in our gospel text. He says while Jesus is passing by, behold the

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Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Notice he doesn't say there's the

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Messiah. That's important that he didn't say that.

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And here's your reason why. Messiah was one of these words that was hijacked and false meanings were poured into it.

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Back in Christ's day, the expectation, because it was taught by the Pharisees, is that when

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Messiah shows up, he's going to flex his Davidic muscles. He's gonna kick out those evil

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Roman idolaters, free them from the oppression of the Roman empire and usher in a second glorious kingdom age of the

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Davidic reign of Israel. Here's the issue.

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That's not why Jesus came. And so if John the Baptist had said there's the

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Messiah right there, it would have led to all kinds of trouble. Which again comes to our question that Jesus asked, what exactly are you seeking?

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And you'll note in our day and age, we kind of have the same problem. And it goes something like this.

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Is that we kind of think that we intuitively know what we want and what we need as it relates to God and Jesus and things like this.

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And as a result of it, our intuition has led us astray. I can give you kind of an analogy.

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When I really got going again on photography, there were certain pieces of equipment that I thought that I needed.

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And the reason I thought that I needed them is because, well, some of my favorite photographers use those pieces of equipment.

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But the thing is, is that they're different artists than I am. And so I have a few pieces of camera equipment that I don't use that very often because it doesn't fit my artistic vision.

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It doesn't really work with who I am and how I photograph. As a result of it, what I thought

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I needed actually turned out to be not what I needed. And what I needed, I didn't know that I needed it until I figured it all out.

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You kind of get the idea. And so oftentimes when it comes to Christianity, we think we know what we need.

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We look at the world around us. Have you noticed that the world has a few problems? Things can be a little bumpy in our lifetime, right?

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Especially if you're married and you have kids, things can be a little bumpy. Or if you have any kind of relationship with any other human being, if you're not a recluse and you're dealing with other human beings, especially when you're at work in the office, remember where two or more are gathered, there is politics, right?

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Things can be a little dicey, a little dangerous. And so we think we know what we need.

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We need a God who's going to help us solve all of our little life problems, right?

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We need a God who's going to help us get more money. We need a God who's going to help us to have a little bit more influence, maybe to build some kind of an influencer platform on social media.

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We need a God who's going to make us healthy because you'll note how many people their lives are falling apart because their health is failing.

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So we need a God who's going to solve that problem. We need a God, well, and then I think about how the seeker -driven guys talk about Jesus.

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Have you noticed this, what the seeker -driven big box megachurches do? They kind of like take out one of these big strip mining sandblaster things to the

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Bible and they blow away everything that they don't think is practical. Because we need a relevant

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God. And so they kind of turn Jesus into one of those, what are those videos that are on Facebook and things like that, like the artsy panda thing, you know what

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I'm talking about? Where they reduce Jesus to like, he's the guy who gives us life hacks to make our lives better.

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You know, Jesus is the guy that you can take a bendy straw, a little bit of duct tape and a pair of scissors and you can create the most amazing thing ever that will make it so that your food cooks in 15 minutes faster than you could ever thought, right?

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The crafty panda video. So they're looking for crafty panda Jesus who's going to give us these life hacks to make our lives easy and stuff like this.

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And you'll note that that's not what Jesus is really about. And so John the

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Baptist, rather than say, behold the Messiah, he instead invokes the reason why

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Christ came. And here's the thorny bit. If you're not looking for this

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Messiah to solve this particular problem that he legitimately came to solve, then there's a really good chance that the

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Jesus that you're worshiping is an idol that you've created. Sad, but actually true.

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That's really what this deals with. You're breaking the first commandment. So what does John the Baptist say of Jesus?

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Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Now we look at our sin problem and we see the consequences of it in the pain and the suffering and the difficulties that we go through in our life.

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And we think if you just deal with the symptoms, the problem will go away.

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No it won't. Have you noticed that when you have a cold, that you can take NyQuil and DayQuil and you still have a cold?

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The reason why you still have a cold is because NyQuil and DayQuil only apply to the symptoms.

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They ease the suffering, but ultimately they don't get rid of the cold. They just mask it so that you can endure it a little bit better.

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You still have the virus. And when it comes to sin, all of the problems that we have in our life, these are the symptoms of sin.

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And Christ didn't come to mask the symptoms. He came to address the root problem itself, which means he's going to have to go to the cross.

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He's going to have to suffer in your place. He is indeed the spotless Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

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And here's where I will take issue with the Calvinists. Jesus is not the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the elect.

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He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And the Calvinists will protest and say, well, then you believe in universalism.

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And you sit there and go, no, we do not believe in universalism. You're missing a category in your theology, but we'll save that for another time.

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Indeed, Jesus comes to bleed and die for the sins of the world. And this is what we need.

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It's not exactly what we're looking for. It's not who we're seeking. And intuitively, our intuitions and our own selfish and sinful desires make it so that this kind of Savior, this kind of Messiah, is most likely not the one that we want.

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But believe me when I tell you, this is exactly the Messiah you need. So John then testifies.

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He says, this is he of whom I said, after me comes a man who ranks before me because he was before me.

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Now wait a second. My memory may be failing as I get older, but I can remember the

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Advent text. I can remember the Christmas text. Remember during Advent we read Luke chapter 1 and the account of Zechariah and Elizabeth and the conception of John the

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Baptist? You'll note that Elizabeth was six months pregnant before the angel

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Gabriel appeared to the Virgin Mary, which means John the Baptist got a quicker start.

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He came before Jesus. How can John the Baptist, who's six months older than Christ, say he ranks me because he was before me?

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You're going to note John the Baptist had a good Christology. He understood that Jesus Christ is 100 % man and 100 %

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God all in one hypostasis, in one personal union.

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Just like you have a body and a soul and the two come together to make the one person that you are,

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Christ has a human nature and a divine nature. They come together in the incarnation to make the one

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Jesus. And because of that, by virtue of his divine nature, which is united with his human nature,

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John the Baptist is right. Jesus does come before him and he ranks not only

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John the Baptist, he ranks us all. And then he says, I myself, I didn't know him. But for this purpose,

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I came baptizing with water so that he might be revealed to Israel. And John bore witness.

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I saw the spirit descend from heaven like a dove and it remained on Jesus. I myself did not know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, he on whom you see the spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the

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Holy Spirit. And you'll note John the Baptist legitimately was hearing directly from God and the orders that God gave him are the things that he actually did.

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John the Baptist didn't willy nilly decide to one day begin baptizing. God spoke to him and told him to do these things in preparation for the arrival of Jesus Christ.

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And so he, as Christ says, is truly a prophet and even more than a prophet.

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Then he goes on. I have seen, I have borne witness that this is the son of God.

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That's a good witness that he's bearing. And so you'll note, basically John the Baptist is saying, listen, he's on the scene here.

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He's the son of God. I'm not. He ranks me. He's before me.

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And that's a pretty good sales pitch if you're asking me, because who's he saying this to? His disciples.

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He's the one. He's the one. He's the one. And that's exactly correct.

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So the next day, John was standing with two of his disciples. And as he looked, and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, again, behold the

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Lamb of God. And two of his disciples heard him say this. And then they followed

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Jesus. We get what you're saying here, John. It was great.

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It was great working with you. Thank you so much for your teaching. Thank you so much for calling us to repent.

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Thank you so much for pointing us to this fellow. We are leaving now to go and follow

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Christ. And so they returned and they followed

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Jesus. Jesus turned and saw them following and he said to them, what are you seeking?

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And they said to him, Rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? He said, then come and you will see.

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So they came and they saw where he was staying. And they stayed with him that day, for it was about the 10th hour.

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Now one of the two who heard John speak and followed Jesus was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother.

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And he first found his own brother, Simon, and said to him, listen to the words, we have found the

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Messiah. So John the Baptist points to Christ, says behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, and Andrew and this other disciple of John the

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Baptist, they begin following Jesus and now Andrew goes and shares the good news that they have found the

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Messiah with his brother, Peter. And so we see now how this is starting to cascade, the effect that this is having.

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Christ is now drawing his disciples to himself. John the Baptist is about ready to leave the scene when it comes to human history and his last chapter is about to be written.

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And now his disciples are coming to Christ and they are going and letting everybody know. But notice that Andrew didn't say that behold the

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Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He was able to put two and two together and was able to say, this is the

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Messiah. We have found him. So he brought Peter to Jesus and Jesus looked at him and said, so you are

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Simon the son of John. You shall be called Cephas, which means

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Peter. I always remember one of my old pastors, Ron Hodel, he took this text and did something kind of funny with it.

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He would say, well look at here, Jesus is changing his name to Peter and Peter is John's son.

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He's the son of John. So he said, he basically from day one renamed him Rocky Johnson.

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And here's the thing, he's not wrong. Pastor Hodel was not wrong in this account.

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So what does it all mean for us? What does this text mean, this second Sunday of the Epiphany?

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As Christ continues to be manifested and revealed to us through these texts, it's important for us to recognize that our sinful nature intuitively seeks after and creates idols.

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And the Jesus we may be intuitively looking for may be a figment of our sinful imaginations.

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The Jesus we need is the one who takes away the sin of the world, your sin and mine.

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And no point in seeking after a different Jesus, one that will only mask the symptoms of sin.

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You need the Savior, the one revealed in Scripture, the one who is true, who has come to take away your sins so that he might lead you through death and the resurrection to life eternal in a world where there will be no sin.

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In this world we will continue to experience the consequences and the result of our sin, the world's sin, your neighbor's sin, your wife's sin, your husband's sins, your brother's sins, your sister's sins, your cousin's sins, on and on and on and on.

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Christ has not come to put a band -aid on our problem. He's saving us through all of this.

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So if the Jesus you are seeking only gives you temporal relief, that's Pepto -Bismol

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Jesus and that's not what you need. You need something more than temporal relief, you need true relief and only

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Jesus, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, is capable of giving that. So let us again consider what our motivations are, what our intents are, what our desires are regarding Christ and the church and let us put away our idolatrous desires and instead seek the one who takes away our sin and promises eternal life because he took our sins upon himself and he suffered in our place so that we can be forgiven and reconciled and promised an inheritance.

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So I'll ask the question that Christ asked his disciples, what exactly are you seeking?

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Seek the one who truly can save you. In the name of Jesus, Amen. Oslo, Minnesota 56744

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And again that address is Kungsvinger Lutheran Church 15950 470th

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Avenue NW Oslo, Minnesota 56744 We thank you for your support.

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All of our teaching messages may be freely distributed as long as you do not edit or change the content of the message.