• Home
• Services
• About Augsburg
• About Pastor
• Sermons
• Links

• 2007
• 2006
• 2005
• 2004

It must be the term "servant" which is so off-putting; distasteful to you the sinner. No one wants to be the maid or the butler, the garbage man or the dish washer. You would much prefer to be the one in charge, the one being served. You would choose to be called "sir" not "Jeeves." The Greek word used by Saint Matthew is a derivation of the same word which Saint Paul constantly refers to himself in the Epistles: "doulos." It can also be translated slave, or bond-servant. Slaves have masters. Part of our Lord's audience for these words was a group of Pharisees; part was also made up of fearful, sinful men who lived in very tenuous times. The hypocrites were "lovers of money" as Jesus called them. The scared people were those of "little faith" as Jesus called them. Your own sinful nature is comprised of both sins (and many more); greed, pride, covetousness and lack of trust.

Not wanting to be what one is. That's the biggest sin of all. That is the sin of ingratitude and selfishness. Some men don't want to be fathers so they abandon their families. Some women don't want to be mothers so they murder their unborn babies. Some couples don't want to be husbands and wives any longer so they divorce. People mostly do what they want to do! If there is no creator it's no big deal. In fact if there is no creator, no God, no, "thus saith the Lord", then doing just anything, anyway at anytime is acceptable. You know better.

You are slaves of God. That's just the way it is whether you like it or not. Maybe if we used the term house-steward (which is an acceptable translation found in St. Luke's own account of this sermon) you won't bristle as much. But house-steward, servant, or slave...it's what you are. Normal slaves are told to do certain things; they have tasks, jobs, duties, and even responsibilities. In our world, nobody is perfect; that is, all slaves are sinners and thus fail in their assigned tasks. Some failures are just the result of human limitations; some lack of obedience is due to incompetence or error. These failings a good master will take into consideration when doling out discipline. But the one thing a Lord cannot countenance is revolt or abandonment--intentional wrongdoing--bad motives. This is also why desertion or shooting your own Lieutenant are the worse crimes that a soldier can commit. Nothing is worse than treason. The worse treason, the Government's propaganda notwithstanding, is to betray a friend or family member. King David knew the deep acid-sting of treachery when his son Absalom and his close personal advisor Ahithophel staged their military coup. David knew and the Holy Spirit let him write: "Even my own familiar friend in whom I trusted. Who ate my bread, has lifted up his heal against me..." [Ps 41.9] And again, speaking of the treachery of friends, David wrote: "For it is not an enemy who reproaches me; then I could bear it. Nor is it one who hates me who has magnified himself against me...But it was you...my companion and my acquaintance. We took sweet counsel together, and walked to the house of God..." [Ps 55.12-13] David's pain also pre-figured and served as a "type" of what the Christ would experience. Jesus was denied by Peter, abandoned by all of the Disciples, and betrayed into the hands of his destroyers by His own friend Judas. This is the bitter poignancy of betrayal. This is why your pain is rawer and more inconsolable when your children, your parents, your own spouse (flesh of your flesh and bone of your bone) violates your trust and confidence and betrays you; big hurts and even little hurts.

You are not the victim only. You are the betrayer. You are Absalom, Peter, and Judas, for you are your father's son. You are children of Adam and Eve. Your sinful nature is even named for your first parent.

Jesus is correct: "No one can serve two masters," and "you cannot serve God and Mammon."

Satan was an angel, a powerful servant spirit. He rebelled and helped others to follow him in his treason. Banishment and hell was to be their temporary punishment, with the lake of fire and endless solitary torments, their eternal doom. Satan used Eve's own flesh, and the world, to seduce her to sin. But Eve could have remained loyal, so too Adam. Our first parents could have kept their own Baptismal and Confirmation vows, if you will, but they chose to rebel. They decided to turn on their dearest friend the Lord. The serpent convinced Eve that she should serve a different master, herself. Eve decided that being a slave wasn't what she wanted. God's first children opted for the mammon of carnality and autonomy. You do the same. We all do. Nothing is worse than an ungrateful child; Adam, Eve, and you...oh how it breaks the heart of Jesus. Nothing is worse than apostasy: denying or leaving the faith. You cannot serve two masters. Either you serve the modern unholy sacrament of choice, "freedom," or you serve the jealous Lord of Life, the Holy Trinity.

To serve God is to serve Him perfectly. To serve God is to keep all of His law inviolate. To serve God is to love Him with everything you have and to love your neighbor with servitude and giving.

But "YOU" can't do it. You bow and do reverence to Mammon, for it is your second illegitimate master. Your Lords are money, reputation, comfort, insurance, life-style, and a whole panoply of "created things." Your Mammon King is ultimately yourself. You are your own Lord. You need Help! Rescue.

Only the true Master Himself could drive the false master out of the garden. Only Jesus sets you free to be what you really are, what you have always been meant to be: His servants. A servanthood of the family. Servants yes, but also His brothers and sisters, royal siblings in a grand family where you have the joy of serving the Father and one another. Only Jesus gives up being the Master, the Lord, in order to make you a Kingdom of Lords, a Royal Priesthood. Jesus served only one Master, His Father Who art in heaven. Jesus gave up all Mammon to love His neighbors: the world.

Good news brothers and sisters, there is One Who serves One Master. The Lord Himself became your Savior by becoming the perfect Slave, the obedient servant. The Christ obeyed the Master both ways. He obeyed and served only God by fearing, loving and trusting in His Father above all things. He obeyed and served only God by loving His neighbors to the point that He took all of their places, all of your places, in suffering and dying for your treason and betrayal.

In Christ, by faith, you are now declared to be the perfect servant! By being one with the Son, the suffering servant, in your Baptisms you are now the dutiful slave. By being one with your bloody and fleshly Jesus you now serve God and not Mammon. You serve the way God has always meant you to serve; by Grace, in Faith, through Christ Jesus, your Servant and Lord.