Christ Survived So that We Could Come Back From Death

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. In the name of Jesus, Amen. So hear these words from our epistle text today, taken from Galatians.

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When the fullness of time had come, the fullness of time, God sent forth

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His Son, born of a woman, born under the law to redeem those who were under the law. Think of it this way, fullness of time means that God planned this all out ahead of time.

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In fact, I would kind of ask a question, when has God prophesied that something would take place through one of His prophets or even

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Jesus or one of His apostles and it's not gonna happen or didn't happen? Yeah, that's kind of the point.

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You see, everything is going according to plan. We just celebrated the birth of our

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Savior, Jesus Christ, and you'll note He comes to us humble. He comes to us in a tiny little package, a tiny little package with ten fingers and ten toes and a tiny little nose and all these little cute things that infants have, and you'll note that He's utterly powerless, completely dependent upon His parents,

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His mother in particular, for everything, for changing His diapers and things of that nature, and yet He's already in mortal danger.

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Thus is the insanity of sin. But also hear these words in our Gospel text, that all of this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the

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Lord by the prophet out of Egypt, I called my son, this is the prophecy found in Hosea chapter 11, and then in Micah 5 we hear the fulfillment of Micah 5 here in these words in our

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Gospel text, and He went and lived in a city called Nazareth that was spoken by the prophets that might be fulfilled that He shall be called a

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Nazarene. You see, when God speaks and says something's gonna happen, it's gonna happen. I think a good way to frame it, if you're familiar with the

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Chronicles of Narnia, a little bit of a side note here, Chronicles of Narnia, I'm a guy who grew up with the

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Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe being the first in the series of the Chronicles of Narnia. I don't know what's happened, but there's this weird heresy, they've rearranged the numbers of the books, and this makes no sense to me.

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So I'm a Lion, Witch, and Wardrobe kind of guy as being the first in the series. But all that being said, if you're familiar with the story, that there is a land called

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Narnia, and it's been taken over, hostile takeover, by a wicked, wicked woman by the name of Jadus.

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She has made herself the Queen of Narnia, and to make matters worse, it is always winter there, and never

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Christmas. Now, it seems to be always winter here in North Dakota and Minnesota, but we at least get to celebrate

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Christmas. Looking outside is pretty bad. But you'll note that what ends up happening in the

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Chronicles of Narnia is that there was a prophecy that had been given long ago regarding the four thrones that sit in a palace called

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Ker -Paravel. There are four thrones, and that the prophecy was that when two sons of Adam and two daughters of Eve sit on the thrones of Ker -Paravel, that the witch's power would be broken, and that a new age would be dawning.

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And as the story goes, as these four children come into Narnia, one of them ends up siding with the witch through her deceptive practices, and the question is, will the prophecy be broken?

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Can the prophecy be broken? And of course, it wasn't broken, it was fulfilled.

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But as we take a look at our Gospel text today, and we consider the madness of sin in Herod, you know, the question is, can a prophecy of the

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Lord be thwarted? Can it be undone? When you consider what

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Herod did or attempted to do, you have to sit there and wonder, was that even a close call?

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You know, you see, when does the Lord speak something and it not be true? When does the Lord say something's gonna happen and it not happen?

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Answer. I'm pretty sure that when God says something, it's pretty final.

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And so the Lord prophesied that the Virgin would be with child and give birth to a son and call his name

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Immanuel, which means God with us, and that he would be the suffering servant of Isaiah, that he would be pierced for our transgressions, that he would be bruised for our iniquities, and the chastisement, the punishment that brought us peace would be upon him.

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I mean, all of that being said, you'll note that, well, our Lord is in danger as a small child, and so here's where I get to take a little bit of liberty because we don't get a proper epiphany this year.

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I'm gonna read out Matthew chapter 2, starting at verse 1, and this is the epiphany text, if we were gonna have a proper epiphany service.

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Now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east, they came to Jerusalem, saying,

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Where is he who has been born the king of the Jews? For we saw his star when he rose, and we have come to...

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and this is where you got to kind of have to pay attention to the language. We have come to worship him, the

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ESV says, but it makes me wonder. The word here for worship could also mean we've come to bow down before him, to pay our respects in homage, in obeisance to him as king.

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And so, you know, these magi from the east, they know that the Jews has been born, why they've been given a sign.

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And when you read Gregory the Great's homily on this text, he makes an interesting distinction, and one that I think is kind of fascinating, maybe insightful.

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Gregory the Great notes that unbelievers, they receive signs. Believers, they receive the prophetic utterances of God.

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And he cites as his text for making this distinction 1st Corinthians chapter 14, verse 22.

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Kind of an interesting idea. And you'll note, believers, well, they do get revelation from God, whereas unbelievers, well, maybe he's right.

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They seem to get signs from inanimate objects, from things that are technically not living creatures, or at least how we think about it.

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I mean, think of it this way. They saw a sign in the stars regarding the king of the

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Jews being born. And then you think of, you know, while Jesus was being crucified, the earth itself, there was an earthquake.

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It shuddered that its creator was being crucified. And then you think about the fact that the sun and the moon, they were darkened while Christ was on the cross.

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You see, these are all signs from things that were created, but these are not messages from, like, angels or things like that.

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Kind of a fascinating distinction. And so you'll note that these Magi from the East, they're not believers yet, and they are following a sign that they have seen, knowing that the king of the

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Jews has been born. Now, Herod, he knows enough of his Bible, and Herod, by the way, is not a Jew.

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He's an Idumaean. He wants so badly for everybody to think of him as the king of the

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Jews, but he's not a Jew. He's not a Jew at all. But he knows enough of his Tanakh that he knows a thing or two about the coming

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Messiah. And so the Magi are looking for the king of the Jews, but watch what

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Herod does. Herod, when he heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. So assembling the chief priests and the scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the

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Messiah, where the Christ, was to be born. See, he knows enough of his Bible to know that the king of the Jews is also the

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Messiah. And so they told him, in Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the Prophet, and you,

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O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah are by no means least among the rulers of Judah, for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people.

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And he's here quoting from Micah. And so you'll note that this is a fascinating thing going on here, that this prophecy is fulfilled.

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And so let me kind of now set this up properly. But Herod is fully immersed, baptized beyond his eyeballs, if you would, steeped in sin.

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This is a fellow who is so self -centered, so all about himself and his power, and being the king of the

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Jews. There was a saying regarding Herod that it was safer to be Herod's dog than to be

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Herod's son. Because Herod, you know, he was jealously protecting his power.

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And how long did he get to hang on to that? Not very long. Jealously protecting his power that even if he detected true intent by one of his sons to become the king, or it fabricated it in his sin -fevered mind, well, he put that fellow to death.

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Yeah, he had several of his sons killed in order to protect his throne.

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And you'll note here that what happens next tells us something about just when sin completely runs its course, how insane and self -focused it is.

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All obsessed about protecting his right to be the king of the Jews, which he's not. He now is willing, willing and attempting to murder the promised prophesied

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Messiah. That's how sick this puppy is.

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But let me kind of point this out, though. It's really easy for us to cast stones at Herod and sit there and go, yeah, the guy's just absolutely steeped in sin and mad.

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But the thing is, we've all tested positive for the exact same disease that he has.

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And we're all guilty in one way or another of, well, wanting

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God dead, wanting to do our own thing, hang on to our power to call the shots, to say to God, you can't control me.

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I will control my own fate and my own destiny, my own desires, my own...

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Yeah, you kind of get the idea. We're all like Herod in that effect. And so the text goes on to say that so Herod summoned the wise men, the fellows who are the

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Magi from the East. He summoned them secretly. Now, he knows he can't enlist their help in murdering the

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Messiah, so he's going to feign piety. He's going to feign true love and concern and a desire to see the

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Messiah and all this kind of stuff. But none of that's true. So he met with the wise men secretly, ascertained from what time the star had appeared, and then he sent them to Bethlehem saying, you go and you search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word so that I too may come and worship him.

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He has no intent of worshiping him unless, of course, he's going to worship the Messiah at the end of a sword or a spear.

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So after listening to the king, they went on their way, and behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was.

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And when they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And going into the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and they, and here

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I think the right word is worshipped him, they worshipped him. Opening their treasures, they offered

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Jesus gifts, gold befitting of a king, frankincense, which is befitting of God himself, because that is an incense.

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Let my prayers rise before you as incense, the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice, as well as that embalming spice known as myrrh.

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So in the gifts, we can see who Jesus is. He's God, he's King, and he's come to die.

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It's there in the gifts. And then now God no longer sends them signs, not a sign in the stars, he warns them directly in a dream not to return to Herod, and they departed to their own country by another way.

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Makes you wonder if Gregory the Great properly understood 1st

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Corinthians 14, that signs are for unbelievers, but prophecy is for the believer. If that means here that these fellows depart back to their own country, it's kind of the first Gentile believers in Jesus Christ.

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Of course, they don't know what the Gospel is yet, but yet they believe, they trust in him, and so rather than giving a sign leading him back, they are given revelation directly from God.

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Now all of that is preface as we get now into our Gospel text.

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And our Gospel text says, What does the psalmist say?

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Why did the nation's rage and the people's plot in vain against the Lord's anointed?

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Do you think that Herod can somehow snuff out the life of the one who is the self -existing one?

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Of course not. You see, and that is the madness of sin, that somehow you can stop what

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God has said is going to take place. And so God knows exactly what's going to happen, and so he warns

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Joseph in a dream and tells him to flee to Egypt. And Joseph responds in faith.

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You can see it through his actions, because he rose and took the child and his mother by night.

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As soon as he wakes up, he wakes up from the dream and says, The Lord told me Herod's gonna try to kill our son.

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Let's flee now. In the day before flashlights, they head out in the middle of the night and they depart to Egypt.

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They skedaddle immediately. And they remain there until the death of Herod.

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And this was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet out of Egypt, I called my son.

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And now the next part of this, probably one of the toughest, toughest texts to preach on, because atheists like to throw this text around or things like this.

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If you're familiar with the concept of theodicy, this idea, well, if God is good and God is all -powerful, then why doesn't

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God stop evil from happening? And the person who engages in these theodic arguments seems to forget that they're numbered among evil, the evil ones.

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And so if God were to just say, All right, I'm gonna get rid of all evil, well that evil atheist would be snuffed out quickly as well.

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And so they fail to recognize this. But this is a tough one, and this is a tough one, and so I'm gonna refer back to our

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Intruit. And here's what I mean by it's tough. You'll note that the Lord warns Joseph.

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And some people, sadly and understandably, say, Well, why didn't the

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Lord warn the other parents in Bethlehem so that their children would not be destroyed?

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And so for this, we'll have to consider what the Prophet Jeremiah says further in his prophecy, as we look at this portion that's so tough to work through.

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So Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he became furious. And he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem, and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men.

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What was the evil that these boys had done? They merely looked like Jesus.

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He wasn't even sure what Jesus looked like, so anybody who even resembled him was put to death.

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It's absolutely terrible. And Matthew goes on to say, Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the

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Prophet Jeremiah. Again, I ask the question, when has God spoken and his word not come true?

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Never. And so all of this, all of this, even this wickedness on the part of Herod was prophesied.

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And so this was to fulfill what was spoken by the Prophet. A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping in loud lamentation,

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Rachel weeping for her children, for she refused to be comforted, for they are no more.

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So I cannot give you the answer as to why God didn't warn the other parents, I just know that he didn't.

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But I want you to consider further the prophecy from Jeremiah. And it's found in our intro, it is up on the screen.

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And so you can see here that our intro today kind of had two parts, the first was Hosea chapter 11 verse 1, when

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Israel was a child I loved him and out of Egypt I called my son, that was the first part of our intro.

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But then you'll note Jeremiah 31 15 through 17 is then quoted, and there's more to this prophecy.

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Listen to what the prophecy says. Thus says Yahweh, a voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping,

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Rachel is weeping for her children, she refuses to be comforted for her children because they are no more.

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That's where Matthew stopped, but Jeremiah continues. Thus says Yahweh, keep your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares

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Yahweh, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy. There is hope for your future, declares the

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Lord, and your children shall come back to their own country. And now you can kind of see the fuller picture here.

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And the fuller picture is this, Christ escaped, and by escaping he lived, and by living he matured and went to the cross, and he bled and died for Rachel's sins, for your sins, and mine.

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Reconciling us to God the Father, although we were steep, born dead in trespasses and sins, completely fevered in our own minds under the subjugation of the dominion of darkness, following all of the passions of this world in our own sinful flesh, and were by nature objects of God's wrath, every bit as much as Herod was.

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That God has had mercy on us, and now today he has spoken prophetic words over us, and these prophetic words are, your sins are forgiven, you are reconciled to God, your sins have been washed away in the waters of baptism.

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Behold, the old is gone, the new has come. And I ask again, when has God ever spoken?

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And it not been true. And so here then, the prophetic words that were spoken to you in the words of the absolution today,

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I as a called and ordained servant of Christ, I forgive you all of your sins. I do this by His authority, not mine.

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Christ is the one who has forgiven you. And so because Christ lived, because he survived, he went to Egypt as the prophet said he would.

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And because he survived and was not cut down with the other children of Bethlehem, he survived only in order to be slaughtered so that we can live.

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He died later so that we might live. So he became flesh so that we can see

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God with our own flesh on the day of the resurrection. And so you'll note then, the gospel changes everything, and in the midst of our most tragic of circumstances, even as tragic and ruthless as something as the slaughtering of these little boys in Bethlehem, we are not like those who do not have hope.

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And so Jeremiah says, keep your voice from weeping, your eyes from tears. There is a reward for your work, declares the

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Lord. Your children will come back from the land of the enemy. There's hope for your future, declares the

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Lord. Your children shall come back from their own country. You will be reunited with them in the resurrection, in a world without end.

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Although they have been taken for you for a time, they will be restored to you when

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Christ returns in glory to judge the living and the dead, and he restores all things and makes them all right.

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And so you'll note that because Christ survived, we have this hope.

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And so God is not sitting there going, well, what do I do? I'm almighty and I'm good, and if I let evil win, then either

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I'm neither good or almighty. God doesn't think this way, because God was already in human flesh come to save us.

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So our text continues, but when Herod died, and he, like everybody else, dies, so much for all of his efforts to hang on to being the king of Israel, that only lasted for a time, and then it was taken from him by force.

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Behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt. Hey, wait a second,

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I seem to recall some guy named Joseph who had dreams in Egypt. Never mind.

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You can see the connections, I mean, it's just teeming here with these connections back to the Old Testament.

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So the angel of the Lord told him, rise and take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who sought the child's life are dead.

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He rose and took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel, but when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea in place of his father

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Herod, he was afraid to go there, and being warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, and he went and lived in a city called

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Nazareth, so that what was spoken by the prophets might be fulfilled, that he would be called a

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Nazarene. So brothers and sisters, here again the words of the Apostle Paul from our Epistle text, when the fullness of time had come,

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God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem, to buy, purchase out of slavery, you and me, those who are under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.

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And brothers and sisters, you have, because Jesus survived and then went to die on the cross, and you have been reconciled to the

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Father by his blood, you have now been adopted as sons and children of God, because you are sons, you are sons.

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God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, and we now cry out, Abba Father. So brothers and sisters, you are no longer slaves.

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Slaves to sin, slaves to the devil, slaves under the law. No, you are sons, and if you are a son, then you are an heir through God.

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All of this, because God never speaks a word, and it doesn't come to pass.

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It always comes to pass. So believe these prophetic words, that you are forgiven, that you are redeemed, that you are reconciled to the

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Father, that you have an inheritance and a hope, because you do.

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And repent of your unbelief, and repent of all the ways in which you are like Herod, because we all recognize those portions of ourselves.

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And note that despite that, you have much of Herod in you. You have been reconciled to God, and you are no longer a slave.

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You are a son. In the name of Jesus, Amen. If you would like to support the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church, you can do so by sending a tax -free donation to Kungsvinger Lutheran Church, 15950 470th

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Avenue NW, Oslo, MN 56744, and again that address is

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Kungsvinger Lutheran Church, 15950 470th

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

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