Resurrection Lutheran Church, St Catharines

It seems that after every new political leader is elected, or a new chairman takes over the board, or a new pastor is called, or a new round of officers is chosen for the local congregation or for Lutheran Church-Canada (as will happen at our synodical convention next Spring), there is a period of anxious expectation, but after a while disappointment all too easily sets in. We have high hopes for what the new guy in power is going to accomplish, how he will put people in their place, speak boldly, and make all kinds of dramatic changes to move things forward in leaps and bounds.

 

But all too often, the new guy we have elected does not accomplish all that we had hoped to see. There seem to be no dramatic changes. The powerful words we had hoped to hear sound far far too tame compared to what we expected. And all of our anticipation and hope turns to dejection and disappointment.

 

The prophet Elijah was ready and waiting for the LORD God to act and to act dramatically and boldly to get rid of the wicked king of Israel and make some real changes for God’s people. The prophet was in hiding after dramatically defeating and executing the 450 Baal prophets. Elijah had hoped that the nation was ready for a new regime, but instead he found himself alone and hiding in a cave (1 Kings 19) from the wrath of Queen Jezebel. Things did not go as he had hoped. It was getting difficult to wait for the LORD God to follow up on the victory of Mount Carmel. Perhaps it was too late already.

 

And then the LORD came and spoke to Elijah and he was ready for God to rip through the land like a whirlwind to blast away all of the Baal worshipers, like an unquenchable fire to purify the people from all of the dross of their sins. He was ready for the LORD to shake the nation like a mighty earthquake which would split the rocks and the stony hearts of the unrepentant.

 

Isn’t that how we would sometimes like to see the LORD tear through our wayward nation, rip into our unrepentant relatives, and even purify and purge our church? If the LORD would only let His Word fly forth in full fury, then something dramatic would happen, there might finally be a turn of the tide, some great shift away from the downward spiral things appear to be in. We think that we want to see the full blast of God’s great glory pass before our very eyes.

 

But we are so often disappointed. The fiery blast comes off as a fizzle. The whirling storm arrives as a mere puff. The shattering earthquake is but a twitch. There seems to be nothing to the LORD but that still small voice that Elijah heard, a gentle whisper, and what is that going to do about all of the problems out there. Our nation’s leaders won’t budge at that. Our relatives will not be stirred to any positive change in life. Our church is just going to coast along on the same torturous slow track. Why doesn’t our LORD give the blast of His whirlwind or shake things up with His earthquake or rage through like a blazing fire?

 

When God came into the world in human flesh He did not come as the giant Goliath. If He had, perhaps more people would have boldly rallied behind Him or fled from before Him. He did not come on the waves of a flood as in Noah’s day and wash away all the wicked in order to give us the real chance of a new start. He did not come like the LORD came to Moses on Mount Sinai with thunder and lightning to lead the people as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night through sea and wilderness.

 

Although the people were initially excited about Jesus multiplying the loaves and fishes to feed the multitudes, their expectations rather quickly expired. They thought perhaps He would continue to do more wondrous things as the LORD did through the hand of Moses in the wilderness. But instead, Jesus deliberately avoided that path. He had no intention of bringing manna for the people every morning, or having water gush from the rocks so that they wouldn’t have to go to the wells to draw.

 

Instead of giving them bread all around on the ground, He offered them His body. And it was like Elijah expecting a thundering whirlwind and getting nothing but a gentle whisper. Jesus offered one man’s body, and not a giant body either, nothing really special about that body born of the flesh of Mary.

 

If He was talking about giving His life for the people, well that wasn’t much better. He would die for their cause but then what? All who followed Him would likely be put to death too. The Romans were good at that. So when Jesus declared, “the bread that I will give for the life of the world is My flesh,” (John 6:51), “many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him” (6:66).

 

And this is the kind of stuff that the Lord Jesus has left with us, so we question ‘What good does it do?’. No earthquakes, no whirlwinds, no blazing fires, no miraculous feeding of multitudes. How is this going to change our nation, our relatives, our church? It’s the same old stuff that we have been doing for centuries, for thousands of years. The still, small voice of some mediocre preacher, the body of Jesus in a wafer of bread, and a splash of water that is supposed to unite us to the humble life of Jesus the Christ (Romans 6:3).

 

Come on LORD, we need another Lutheran Hour preacher like Ozzie Hoffman. We need an evangelist like Billy Graham. We need more apologists like Charlie Kirk. How about a real miracle worker, not one of those quacks who live in mansions. What about a real natural disaster to shake up the world. These little wars and tsunamis are not getting the job done. We need You to cause a huge asteroid to crash into the earth, or to send a virus that kills a more significant number of people worldwide, or a climate crisis that sends us all to living in caves, like Elijah. It is time to bring out the heavy artillery. Enough of this still, small voice, of this worthless bread, of this little sprinkling of water. Why haven’t you done something, O LORD?

 

And the LORD comes to us when we feel defeated and disappointed and even angry that things have not changed. Our nation continues to slide farther into all kinds of gross abomination, our sons and daughters have turned away from the faith and are on the path to hell, our church has fewer and fewer bodies in the pews and no one in the community even knows that we are here anymore. We are like Elijah hiding in the cave, waiting and hoping that the LORD God will act. We are sure that it will take His coming in an earthquake or whirlwind or fire.

 

But He comes to us in the sound of a low whisper. It is not what we are expecting. It is not what we think we need. It is at times even a disappointment. But that low whisper of the Lord is the voice of Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, coming to you in the humblest of ways. It is the whisper of the Lord taking action for the salvation of the world, to save your church, to save your sons and daughters, and to save you from your sins of doubt and disappointment with the way He comes and with what looks like His absolute ineffectiveness to illicit any change.

 

We pray in the Lord’s Prayer: “Lead us not into temptation” (6th Petition). “We pray in this petition that God would guard and keep us so that the devil, the world, and our sinful nature may not deceive us or mislead us into false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice. Although we are attacked by these things, we pray that we may finally overcome them and win the victory.”

 

The truth is that there would be no change if the LORD came as an overwhelming flood of wrath. He has done that already. There would be no change if He came as fire raining down from heaven destroying cities overrun by abominable sins. He has already done that, too. There would be no change if He came bringing bread for all every morning for forty years. He did that and there were no dramatic changes among His people. They continued to sin, to be disappointed with the LORD, and to be in need of His forgiving grace and mercy. And He continued to supply it to those who would receive it.

 

The Lord Jesus came and offered Himself, the living bread come down from heaven to give life to the whole world, and “many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him.” What more can He do, than to keep communicating His love and grace, calling sinners to repentance, holding back His wrath in order to give the wicked yet another chance to hear the whisper of His love?

 

So in the stammering and stuttering voices of the preachers and prophets that He sends, we hear of His plan to save His people; of the advent of our King, who came in our lowly flesh to offer Himself for the life of the world, to pay for our sins of disappointment with His display of grace, and to call us back to His forgiving love; to receive what is so easily rejected as ineffective, the true body and blood of the King of the Universe, freely given for the salvation of all; to live with confidence and trust in our baptismal union to the one who died and rose again so that we might walk in newness of life now and live forever in His kingdom, united to Him even now as we face the disappointments and fears of life in this world.

 

When we are disappointed with newly elected leaders, we resolve that we will switch our allegiances and vote for others next time. We send angry letters about how disgusted we are with inaction and the lack of any change. We look to get new blood on the church council and seek out a better candidate or a better structure to the system.

 

And so knowing your disappointment with the way things are going in the world, in your family, and in the church; and knowing that you do not see from Him what you expected to bring about change, the Lord asks you: “Do you want to go away as well?” (John 6:67) And perhaps we do. Perhaps we want to go elsewhere, to change churches, or to walk away from our family members, or even move to another country. Perhaps we want to give up even on the LORD God Himself.

 

And then we remember the words of Simon Peter, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). There is nowhere else to go. And the changes that we hope and long for are not changes that will come about in this life apart from the One who can give us eternal life. It is the humble sacrifice of our Lord and God upon the cross that wipes away the wickedness of a world; that turns sinful hearts to repentance; and that gives life and growth to a church that appears to be dwindling into death. There is nowhere else to go. There is no life apart from Christ.

 

And we know it because the dramatic change has happened. The Lord has come with His power and glory and might and He has changed us. He has brought us to repentance of our sins of complaint and disillusionment. He has brought us to confess that it is wrong for us to question His grace and mercy and His humble offer of salvation to a world enwrapped in its own wickedness.

 

Against every expectation we see that the Lord by His gentle whisper has forgiven all our sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. He has made us together one through the humble waters of our Baptism into Christ. He has fed us even while hiding in our cave with the body and blood of His dear Son crucified and risen to give us victory over sin, death, and devil.

 

With a gentle whisper the LORD deposed the wicked King Ahaz and installed the mightier prophet Elisha. In a humble birth He brought His divine holiness into the flesh of sinful mankind. And with the same humble means He continues to come to bring about the change that we need. Perhaps beyond our expectation for change in the world out there and change in the people around us, He has wrought the greatest change within us—a humble repentance of our sins of false belief and despair in His unchanging power at work in the church that does not change the proclamation of His Word and the distribution of His humble means of grace.

 

Simon Peter realized that the Lord Jesus had done a mighty work, beyond the multiplication of loaves and fishes, beyond the bringing of daily manna for God’s people. There was nowhere else to go for the Lord Jesus had accomplished the impossible for Simon Peter and the others who remained with the Lord. He effected the needed change in them. “We have believed, and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God” (John 6:69). May the Lord’s humble coming continue the same mighty work in us.