Pentecost 15 “Rest for Your Soul”
September 18, 2022 – Luke 16:15
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
In light of our Word from God, let us identify and apply this word to us.
Among us I think I see: striving, building/working/maintaining, exhaustion,
Fear (war/others who could harm/disease/death),
Anger and Rage over injustice. Perceived hurt. Being taken from.
Are any of these things – striving, fear, anger and rage – things you can identify and concern you in your life?
If they are, perhaps I can offer you a bit of peace in the face of them. After all, today is our Sabbath. Today is a day of rest, where we rest in the promises and the treasures of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
I’ll offer this to you this morning in the form of our readings. I will explain what God is telling us about these things in the readings. They may give you peace in the face of striving, your fear, and your anger.
You need rest from all these things. You need rest for your soul. God provides your rest.
Amos.
Leaders should be fair and just, but in this time they were opressing, hurting, and being unfair to their people. The great, sad irony is that God’s people were enslaved and oppressed, then rescued by God, but here they had become the oppressors of their own people.
For us who may feel hurt, like we are coming from behind, like we don’t have enough or have been taken from, like the people of Amos‘s time, we have a message from God fulfilled in Christ Jesus.
God will not forget those who hurt you. God will not forget the offences committed against you. God is just and will bring punishment for the evils done against you. Your oppressors will not get away with it.
Yet, in Christ their debt has been paid. That is why we can forgive those who hurt us. God has paid their debt in Jesus’ wound on the cross.
He has also paid our debt on the cross. He has paid the debt we owe others when we hurt them and take from them. God does not forget our deeds of evil. He does not forget about them until He brings them to justice whether to eternity in hell or to the cross of Christ.
We ought to have peace in the promise from God that He will bring justice where we cannot. When we see others hurt and we can do nothing about it, or we ourselves are attacked and hurt and we cannot get the vengeance we desire, God has promised to bring it. We have rest in what God does for us. We have rest in what God will do to or has done for others.
In first Timothy we see God asking us and encouraging us to pray for all people. He even encourages us to pray for those in authority over us. Those who have power of life and death, who we ought to fear and love. In the context this was written, the government was Rome and the leader was the Caesar who was considered a god. The people were encouraged and commanded to pray to him. Saint Paul writes in the face of this to pray not to, but for, those in authority.
We are to see those in authority as put there by God, but to also see their humanity. In humility we are called to pray for them as those who are imperfect and oppressed and plagued by sin. We can have peace knowing God will bring their justice, but that God works through even them to accomplish His will.
We see God’s ordering continued in Saint Paul’s commendation for the men to pray and the role women are to take. It is the same ordering God has given to us as citizens who are to be submissive to our authorities. It is the same role we as the church are to take in our relationship to our bridegroom Christ Jesus. We are to focus on our good works, on the gifts of Christ in the Word and Sacrament as our true treasures, not the earthly goods of money and material wealth.
This leads us into the gospel from Saint Luke. Jesus tells a long story about a manager and his steward. If we focus on the steward, we miss the truth of what is being communicated in the story. If we get hung up on how dishonesty is commended, we lose the character of the individual who is doing the commending. This parable tells us more about the merciful master. The merciful master is our Lord God. Even in our shrewdness, He does not immediately cast us out. Even though we are wicked and deserve to be immediately bound and thrown in jail, He gives us time and He commands us to trust in His mercy. He commands that we show mercy to those who owe us debts.
We can see ourselves in the Pharisees. We can see our lack of peace as we think we must find our safety, security, and significance in the things of this world. We can see our striving, our building, and working as we try to find peace and rest in the treasures of this world.
Jesus has given us His peace in the heavenly treasures of His body and blood, his washing and joining us to Him. Jesus has given us peace in His Word which tells of His justice for the poor and oppressed but also for His forgiveness for evil.
May you have peace, may you find rest for your soul this morning, knowing that whatever plagues you Jesus has already given the answer. We need not struggle, we need not fear, we need not be angry. We have the privilege to claim Christ and Him crucified. We have the forgiveness, love, and peace that He gives to us and our enemies. That love, that gospel message from God, which changes hearts and gives us a reason to do good – we have that. May God’s love in the proclamation of Christ change the world, and ourselves, as we continue to do well and rest in it for our peace in this world of chaos.