Holy Cross 2025

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On September 14 in the year 320, St. Helena supposedly discovered the wood of Christ’s cross. Helena was the mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine, who decriminalized Christianity in Rome.

Did Helena really find the wood of the true cross? I don’t know. There were many such claims. Luther once joked that if you gathered all the pieces of the true cross in Germany, you’d have enough wood to build a barn!

I do know one thing, though: If I found a piece of the true cross, I would keep it. It would be important, because the history is important. Christ is the center of all human history. The Christian faith is grounded in history….

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Invocabit sermon 2023

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Temptations are rarely grandiose. On occasion temptation to a front-page-headline kind of sin comes along. Most of our temptations appear as innocuous choices. Small, daily things tempt us to take baby steps away from God’s Word.

Frequently we should pray the Lord’s Prayer. Jesus teaches us there to ask for help: “Lead us not into temptation.” This takes on urgency once we realize we are constantly under spiritual assault….

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Judica Sermon 2022

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“You are of your father the devil.” If we want the comforting words of Jesus to apply to us, we must first wrestle with the confrontational ones. “You are of your father the devil.” The words address the entire human race.

The first three Sundays of Lent show Jesus in combat with the devil, first in the wilderness temptations, then in two exorcisms. The fourth Sunday is a kind of interlude, with rose vestments and food in the wilderness. Now the fifth Sunday of Lent holds up a mirror and says, “If you want to know where the devil is busy, take a look at your own life.” …

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Invocabit (Lent I) 2019

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What we see in the account of Jesus’ temptation is the One Man who does not succumb to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. He is the One Man who does the will of the Father. And He does it under the harshest conditions. Jesus redoes, relives, recapitulates the whole history of Israel, and passes every test they failed.

And this means that He has endured every suffering that you know, and has resisted and overcome every temptation you experience. How does He overcome temptation? By means of the Word. Jesus is confident that the Father will be faithful to Him, that He will not go back on His Word, that He will not break His promise.

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