Today is the second Sunday after the Epiphany. Epiphany, you might remember, is the day we celebrate the visit of the Magi, the wise men who were the first Gentiles to visit the Messiah, a reminder that Jesus was born to save all people. Last Sunday we celebrated the baptism of Jesus, which was His identification as one of us, so that He might be our substitute, and His baptism marked the beginning of His earthly ministry. Today in our Gospel reading we have the account of Jesus’ first miracle, the changing of water into wine at the wedding of Cana. This miracle was the beginning of the miracles, the signs and wonders Jesus would perform to demonstrate His divinity, that is that along with being truly human, born of a woman, He was also truly God, conceived by the Holy Spirit. In our Epistle lesson for this morning Paul reminds us that we do not choose Jesus, “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit,” rather God chooses us, and He gives us all the good gifts and blessings He has to give including the gifts and abilities to be His people in whatever place we may be. Today is also the Sunday we honor as Life Sunday, the Sunday we take the time to remember the atrocities that have been legally committed in our country for the last thirty plus years and the countless number of unborn children that have been murdered. And we are reminded of how the open door of killing at the beginning of life has begun opening the door to legally killing those at the end of life and those deemed unfit by society to live. I will speak more on this briefly a little later.
Our text for this morning is the Old Testament reading and another reminder of how special and important we are to God, not that we are special or important in and of ourselves, but that we are special and important because He makes us special and important. As we have talked about from time to time, although the Children of Israel were God’s chosen people, they had a tendency to stray from time to time and the Lord would discipline them and bring them back, yet the status, if you will, of the Children of Israel was always that they were God’s people.
Beginning at verse one of our text, Isaiah declares the position of Israel: “1For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet, until her righteousness goes forth as brightness, and her salvation as a burning torch. 2The nations shall see your righteousness, and all the kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name that the mouth of the Lord will give” (v. 1-2). God’s promise was that through this nation of Israel the Savior of the world would be born. Thus, Israel was not to be a separate people, the only nation to be saved, rather they were set to be a beacon of light for all nations so that all people might see the Messiah born of the tribe of Judah who came to give His life for all.
As we move on in our text, Isaiah declares the Lord’s favor on Israel: “3You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God. 4You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate, but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her, and your land Married; for the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married” (v. 3-4). These are God’s chosen people, not because of some innate goodness within them, but simply because God chose them. God chose them. He set them apart. And His purpose for choosing them was so that through this nation the Savior of the world would be born.
And in the last verse of our text Isaiah declares the Lord’s relationship with Israel, “5For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your sons marry you, and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you” (v. 5). God’s promise is that although Israel may be in exile, they will once again be restored to the promised land. And we know that before Jesus was born there were may Israelites who were living in Jerusalem.
So, what does our text mean? God’s desire for Israel was to remind her that she was God’s chosen nation. God chose Abraham and promised that through his seed the Savior of the world would be born. God made Israel a great nation. God brought Israel out of bondage of slavery in Egypt. God disciplined Israel and continually brought her back into a right relationship with Himself.
Through the prophet Isaiah, God is reminding Israel that He made her righteous. Although Israel strayed time and again, God was always the One sending discipline and calling her back into a right relationship with Himself.
And, because God is the prime mover, God is the One doing the doing, Israel was to exemplify what it meant to be God’s people. God’s desire was that Israel would be the people He called them to be.
And who were the people God called Israel to be? They were to be God’s bride. So that as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, God’s desire was to rejoice over His bride, Israel and even today, the Church. Which brings us to today and what our text means to us today.
First our text reminds us of our status as God’s children. God has chosen us, and as we have said, even before the world was created God had us in mind and had already chosen us to be His people and His children. We have not chosen Him. Just as a child does not choose to be born, so we do not choose God, nor do we choose to be born again. God is the prime mover. It all, always begins with the Lord. And what comfort we can find in the fact that it all begins and ends with the Lord. We are wishy washy. We tend to stray and fall for temptation and sin. We tend to reject God and refuse His good gifts and blessings. So we rejoice that we do not depend on ourselves, but we depend on God.
Just as God had favor on the children of Israel, before they completely rejected Him, so He has favor on us and has covered us with His righteousness. He has redeemed us, bought us back. He has purchase and won us, not with gold or silver, but with His holy precious blood and His innocent suffering and death. Our status before God is that we are His people and He is our God.
Because we are God’s people and because He is our God, His desire for us is that we live life accordingly. We are God’s chosen people, He is the prime mover, thus our thoughts, words and actions are to demonstrate this fact. Of course, we know, because we are conceived and born in sin, because every inclination of our heart is evil all the time, in and of ourselves we are not able to be the people God would have us to be, we are not able to live the lives of faith He would have us to live, thus, we cling to Him and His infinite mercy to be given forgiveness of sins, and a renewal of faith and the motivation to be His people.
As we honor life Sunday, we are reminded that life begins at conception. Ask anyone in the medical field, in the field of babies, what is called the neonatal field, and you will find that scientifically speaking life begins at conception. For us Christians we know that it is at conception that God gives us a soul, that before we are conceived God knows us and that in the womb God knits us together so that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. As I said earlier, we do not choose to be born. Our conception, our birth, our life are all gifts from our great Creator God. Thus, we do not choose to die as well. Death was never a part of God’s plan. Death entered the world as a result of sin. And so pain, suffering and dying are a result of sin. Yet, God’s plan was never for us to deem His people as unfit for life, nor has He given us the ultimate authority to determine when a person should die (except in the case of capital punishment). This authority is in His hands. And today we pray God’s forgiveness on us as a society for what we allow to happen to His people, those unborn and those living. At the same time we are also reminded that even though we as a society and even as individuals to often sin against God’s good and gracious will, with our good and gracious Lord there is always forgiveness when we fail.
Life begins at conception and life is a gift from God, that is, physical life. As for our spiritual life, our eternal life, this also is a gift from God. For most of us we were first called by God and given faith through Holy baptism. As Peter reminds us, “Baptism now saves us.” Here again, just as we do not choose to be born, so we do not choose to be baptized. For most of us our parents brought us to be baptized. For others, God called us through His Word to be baptized, as the Ethiopian said when God gave him faith through Philip’s words of explanation of the prophet Isaiah, “Here is water, what is to keep me from being baptized?”
As we grow in our life, in our physical being and as we grow in our faith, in our spiritual being, God continues to lavish us with His gifts through the means of grace. God loves you so much. God has so much He wants to give to you. I am continually shocked and surprised each and every Sunday when so many people have something more important to do, so that they refuse and reject the gifts God has to give on Sunday morning in divine service. I have to tell you, personally, I hurt for Jesus on Sunday mornings when His gifts and blessings are rejected by so many people. Again, God loves you so much and He has so much that He wants to give.
Not only does God give us all His good gifts and blessings, He also stirs in us to be His people, to live lives of faith. This living a life of faith is what we call living out our vocation. God has called us to be His people in the various vocations He gives us, such as a man or a woman, a mother or a father, a grandmother or a grandfather, an aunt or an uncle, a brother or a sister, a teacher or a student, a worker or a foreman, a husband or a wife, a laborer or a hirer. God calls us and works in and through us, no matter what our vocation, to live and work in our vocation as His people so that others might see our good works and give glory to Him.
Finally God moves in us our response of faith. Our good works, our response of faith is not ours alone. We do not do anything good apart from God. Our good works are our response of faith and are good works because they have been motivated by God, worked in and through us by God and done to His glory. Notice, again, and again, and again, it all points to God.
This morning, we are reminded, that just as in the Old Testament God rejoiced over the salvation of His people Israel, so today the Lord rejoices over the salvation of His people, His Church, the Israel of faith, you and me, whom He has redeemed and made righteous, by His grace through faith which He gives through His means of grace. God has given us life. He gives us new life. He gives us grace and every blessings. He pours out on us and lavishes us with all the good gifts and blessings He has to give and He stirs in us to say, to God be the glory, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
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