Devotions for the Fourth Week of Lent

Monday of Lent IV – Prayer of the Week

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, Your mercies are new every morning; and though we deserve only punishment, You receive us as Your children and provide for all our needs of body and soul. Grant that we may heartily acknowledge Your merciful goodness, and serve You in willing obedience; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

I know someone who had a tough time during the pandemic. This person confided in me that he sometimes went down to a local grocery store and bought something he did not need. He did this because if you use the self-checkout and enter your loyalty program ID number, the voice in the machine says, “Welcome, valued customer!” He said he just needed to hear that sometimes, someone who was glad to see him, no questions asked.

I haven’t quite gotten that low, yet, but there have been times in my life when I leaned heavily upon the unconditional love of those who love me that way, the people who are just glad to see me, regardless of how glad I am to be me. I find such people to be a true gift from God. I pray you have a life filled with such folks.

God’s mercy is new every morning. He never gets tired of forgiving us. He never rolls his eyes and wishes he was with someone else. He is always glad to see you, to hear your voice, and to love you. It isn’t something in you that makes Him glad. It is His nature. There isn’t anything you can do to change it. He made a promise to you in your baptism. He keeps it. If you need that today, count on it. More likely, however, someone else you know needs that. Through you, God loves that person today. Call them, just to say hi and hear that person’s voice. Tell them how glad you are to be their friend, parent, sibling, whoever you are. This will be a better day for hearing it from you.

Tuesday of Lent IV – Isaiah 12:1-6

1 You will say in that day:
“I will give thanks to you, O Lord,
    for though you were angry with me,
your anger turned away,
    that you might comfort me.

2 “Behold, God is my salvation;
    I will trust, and will not be afraid;
for the Lord God is my strength and my song,
    and he has become my salvation.”

3 With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. 4 And you will say in that day:

“Give thanks to the Lord,
    call upon his name,
make known his deeds among the peoples,
    proclaim that his name is exalted.

5 “Sing praises to the Lord, for he has done gloriously;
    let this be made known in all the earth.
6 Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion,
    for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.”

He was a gruff old fellow, not given to emotion or even a great deal of talk. He had been a surveyor by trade for many years. That meant endless hours tramping about outside in all sorts of weather. Most of his surveying career had been before the modern laser levels and GPS technology had revolutionized the field. He had done it the old-fashioned way, the hard way.

The conversation had turned to the sacrament. I was surprised when this quiet fellow suddenly got very talkative. The words tumble out of him. His voice cracked. He swallowed. He spoke of his sense of holy awe when he knelt at the rail and received the body and blood of Christ. I knew I was in a sacred space with him. We let him pause, compose himself, and go on. It was a holy moment for us all.

Isaiah speaks of forgiveness in this chapter. These six verses form the whole of chapter 12 of his book. Isaiah wrote in the days of Israel’s diminution, when the once might empire of David was but a shell of its former self. Did you catch that last line? The Holy One of Israel is great or strong in your midst, he said. As my old friend had come to the diminution of his own life, his once vital strength was quickly ebbing, he was given to see the presence of the Gracious One of Israel as well, the forgiver of all his sins, the one who made him holy and fit for heaven. In the elements of that meal, God is great in our midst.

As you come to the table the next time you come to church, as a pastor gives you that host, I pray you have a bit of this man’s holy awe. The Holy One of Israel is great in your midst. He is your strength and song; He is your salvation. Trust and do not be afraid. God Himself comes to dwell in you.

Wednesday of Lent IV – Psalm 32

1 Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven,
    whose sin is covered.
2 Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity,
    and in whose spirit there is no deceit.

3 For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away
    through my groaning all day long.
4 For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
    my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Selah

5 I acknowledged my sin to you,
    and I did not cover my iniquity;
I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,”
    and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah

6 Therefore let everyone who is godly
    offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found;
surely in the rush of great waters,
    they shall not reach him.
7 You are a hiding place for me;
    you preserve me from trouble;
    you surround me with shouts of deliverance. Selah

8 I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go;
    I will counsel you with my eye upon you.
9 Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding,
    which must be curbed with bit and bridle,
    or it will not stay near you.

10 Many are the sorrows of the wicked,
    but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord.
11 Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous,
    and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!

When I first entered the ministry, I was blessed to have some senior members of our circuit, neighboring pastors who had many years of experience. They really helped me step into ministry with love and joy. Good mentors and teachers are a treasure from God. This psalm lets us sit at the feet and listen to one of the greatest teachers of all time, King David whom God raised from following the flock to become the king and shepherd of the whole nation of Israel. He offers us wisdom in this poem. But since we are not poetic people anymore, we may need to hear his words in another form.

Vss. 1-2: Blessed is the one who is forgiven – It is a good thing to be forgiven, not understood, not tolerated, not accepted for who we are – forgiven. Forgiveness is so much better than all those things. Forgiven we are not just OK with God; we are restored and enjoy his favor. He smiles on us.

Vss. 3-4: When I kept silent my bones wasted away – It might seem like a good idea to hide our sins and pretend they don’t exist. It isn’t a good idea at all, especially in the long-term view. Not only is this course of action unhealthy, but God will lay his hand heavily upon us. Repentance is what we need to do. 

Vs. 5: I said I will confess...and God forgave. The foolish thing about denying our sin is that we are denying ourselves the good that God would give us. God is gracious.

Vss. 6-7: Let everyone who is godly offer a prayer while God may be found. The end of the world started on the day of Jesus’ resurrection. We are hurtling toward the last day. There is a limited time frame for this to happen. Use it, this works!

Vss. 8-9: I will instruct you – don’t be like the horse or the mule. Don’t be foolish!

Vss. 10-11: The wicked have it bad. The one who trusts in God has it good.

Now read the psalm slowly and carefully. David says it so much more gracefully than I did.

Thursday of Lent IV – II Corinthians 5:16-21

16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

There are a lot of verses in the Bible which you might imagine compete for the affection of believers. John 3:16 is obvious. Ephesians 2:8-9 or Joshua 1:9 or Joshua’s words in 24:15 about serving the Lord are regularly cited. David’s 23rd Psalm is dear to many folks. My confirmation verse is John 14:27. Do you know your confirmation verse? Do you have one? Do you have a dear verse of the Bible which guides or comforts you?

I think a strong case could be made for verse 21 in this reading today. This whole passage is potent comfort for the sinners. This last verse, however, is awesome. For our sake, God made Jesus, who did not know sin, to be sin itself. Jesus does not just know what sin is or even become a sinner Himself, but He becomes sin. Jesus gathers the whole world of sin and all that is wrong, and He takes that to himself, becoming the very thing that God hates.

This is purposeful. God does this to Jesus so that we might become not simply righteous people, but the very righteousness of God. Just as Jesus has become sin, we become God’s righteousness. We are not talking about putting on a characteristic or some moral improvement here. This is an essential change to our very nature.

This Holy Week we will once more look upon Jesus hanging on that tree. We will hear his anguished cry, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The answer to that question is right here. God made the sinless one to become sin. As you hear those words and pray. Remember that the purpose is that you become the very righteousness of God. He has begun this good work in you in Baptism. He brings it to completion on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ (Philippians 1:6, yet another contender for favorite verse). You might memorize this verse and recite it regularly. It defines what you are in Christ.

Friday of Lent IV – Luke 15:1-3, 11-32

1 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. 2 And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.”

3 So he told them this parable:

11 And he said, “There was a man who had two sons. 12 And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.’ And he divided his property between them. 13 Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. 14 And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. 16 And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything.

17 “But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! 18 I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.”’ 20 And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. 21 And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ 22 But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. 23 And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. 24 For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to celebrate.

25 “Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 27 And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.’ 28 But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, 29 but he answered his father, ‘Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!’ 31 And he said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32 It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.’”

It was a tense time in the little community in which I grew up and which my father served as pastor. There was conflict at church and church was the center of that little community. The actual material of the conflict was somewhat trivial. But as is often the case, people rarely fight about what is really bothering them. I don’t know if it is because they realize that their anger is irrational or something else causes this to be the case. In my experience, however, it is almost always true. One must dig down to discover the real reason for the conflict.

The parish was fighting about whether to adopt a new hymnal, but that wasn’t what some folks were truly mad about. It got so tense at one point that a parishioner called my father to warn him that another and particularly volatile member of the parish had threatened his life. “He said he was gonna kill you, Pastor! I’ve known him for a long time. You shouldn’t just blow this off. I think he’s capable of doing it.”

What caused this rage and spite? It was complex, but over a hundred years prior to my father’s ministry, during the American Civil War, the Germans had largely been abolitionist and unionist in their leanings. That part of Missouri, however, had been a center of confederate sympathizers, called Bushwhackers, who had terrorized the German community and murdered scores of people. The end of the war had not ended the intimidation. It remained a sharply divided community for generations. My father, oblivious to these tensions, had reached out, baptized, and admitted the descendants of the Bushwhackers into the German Lutheran congregation. I believe this was the reason the passions ran so deeply in those days of conflict in my youth. I remain proud of my father’s work and amazed by his bravery in continuing to serve in the face of that threat.  

Jesus’ love is scandalous. He does not love only the people I approve of. He loves all people, including my enemies, the people I am afraid of, even those who persecute and abuse me. My father understood he loved the descendants of Bushwhackers and the fellow who was so angry as to threaten his life. Today, as always, our Lord stands outside that cheerful home and invites every faithful human being into the party called heaven. He invites you too.