“THAT MY HOUSE MAY BE FILLED”
Saint Luke 14: 16-28
2nd Sunday after Trinity: 26 June Anno Domini 2022
Fr Jay Watson, SSP
God loved (loves) the world—all of it. The Lord loves Africans, Asians, Haitians, Kansans . . . God loves older people and middle-aged people. Jesus, God, loves babies—all babies. “…Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God” [Mk. 10.14b; Mt. 19.14; Lk. 18.16]. For more than 2,000 years (or more accurately—since Adam) The Church—Her priests, pastors, professors, theologians, women and men—have confessed that Christ’s love for his little children includes babies. Jesus loves babies 12 months old and 8 days old; babies 2 hours old and babies two hours before birth; babies 7 months in the womb 7 days in the womb and 7 seconds in the womb; babies perfect, babies deformed, and babies who are sinful. He loves all you sinners as well.
Jesus wants babies at His “great supper” and yesterdays “Kingdom of the Left” decision in America is to be joyously celebrated today in His Church as the victory it is.
More work for all of you to do—not for your salvation but because you are still (always) called upon to “love your neighbor as yourself.” This, of course, included your un-born, pre-born, in-the-womb, littlest neighbor. Register to vote. Vote in the August primary. Vote yes on the constitutional question. “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” [Mt. 22.39b]. As this morning’s Introit was sounded forth, “Gospelled,” you heard the Psalmist (Ps. 18 as well as 2 Samuel 22) sing out “The Lord was my Stay; He brought me forth also into a large place.” Indeed: The Word of The Lord.
That Word, which was with God, (The Father) and was God, (The Son, 2nd Person) became flesh and dwelt among us (Jn 1.ff). God as an embryo, fetus, and…the term which is more true—God as an unborn Baby in the womb of the Virgin Mary, sanctifies and makes holy all pregnancies. Again, King David: “…my mother…conceive me. Behold, Thou desirest truth in the inward parts…” [Ps. 51.5]. And Jeremias: “then The Word of the Lord came unto me, saying, before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee” [Jer. 1. 4-5].
This “forming” One, this creating and sanctifying One is The Lord. He claims His own, He saves His own young tender lambs by His Word and by His Sacrament!
“A certain Man (The God/Man Jesus) made a great supper and bade many.” You were brought to the entrance of the great banquet hall in + Baptism. You were given your entry gown—Jesus’ own righteous blood drench robes—so stained with blood from Immanuel’s veins that you were/are blazing white. His precious Blood so powerful and atoning that even the blood of all the slaughtered and butchered babies, “Rachel’s children” is atoned for. The Holy Innocents await your arrival to Abraham’s bosom; and they expect your good works to continue in the here and now—that there would be no more babies sacrificed to Moloch—to Satan!
And now, you The Saints, the warriors (Christian Soldiers) fight for life. The Lord wants His army of Light and Life to fight—FIRST, by being fed, nourished, energized with The very Energy of God in The Blessed Sacrament. “Come; for all things are now ready.” “But you all with one consent began to make excuse.” “The first said unto Him” I have overslept—I guess I was up too late last night. “And another said” I had to go on a trip…there was a tournament, a special camp-out, a club event, a soft-ball, swimming, baseball, event and yarn-collector’s convention. I had a headache. “And another said, I have married a wife…” I have a family and relatives from out of town, and our traditions take precedence over the Feast Day, and therefore I cannot come.
All the unborn babies want to come. But many, millions and millions are no more. The ones yet to be conceived and carried and born NEED YOU! Jesus needs you here every Lord’s Day to “be The Lord’s!” You need The Word lest you slip away to condoning the work of devils.
No, you may never have had an abortion and may not know anyone who has. But do you agree with “the right to choose?” Do you countenance the “woman’s control over her own body” as the inane and insane mantra is hissed?
“[Jesus] The Master of The House (Church Catholic] being angry said to His Pastors…bring in hither the poor, and the maimed, and the halt, and the blind.” Brothers, Sisters…that isn’t just the literal cripples, whores, drunks, druggies, and street people. That is all of you. We are all beggars. We all need His Great Supper. Period. There is room.
I don’t think it is a mere coincidence that the Dobbs decision was delivered by 5 Christian Justices on the Feast Day of The Nativity of Saint John The Baptist. It is providential—Gospel! The Lord spoke through Gabriel to Zacharias about John: “…he shall be filled with The Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb” [Luke 1.15]. The same angel Gospelled the Blessed Virgin: “thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS.” That unborn was the gestating God/Man. All babies made in His image (though the babes like all are fallen and old-Adam corrupted) and re-made in the Watery + entrance to the Supper Hall. It just gets better and better with John The Baptist’s pre-born story: “Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost: and she spake out with a loud voice, and said, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For, lo, as soon as the voice of thy salutation sounded in mine ears, the babe leaped in my womb for joy” [Lk. 1. 41b-44].
Repent and turn away from your past inactivity, lethargy, and cowardice (AWOL) in the good-works Holy Ghost constrained battle for life, on behalf of life, led by and placed in He Who is The Lord of Life—The Prince of Peace—and believe.
“That My (His) house may be filled.”
“And in this mountain (this house and banquet chamber: Augsburg) shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined (The True Body and Blood of Christ). And He will destroy in this mountain (This Church—This Redeemed People) the face of the covering cast over all people, and the vail (the vail of demonic child-sacrifice and all ego-enshrined sins against His Law of Life) that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death in victory; and The Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces” [Is. 25. 6-8a].
Let death be swallowed up, for you swallow The Very Blood of The Lamb—Who taketh away the sin of the world!
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of The Holy Ghost
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