Our Father in Heaven is Always Near to Us

Advent Devotion on the Lord’s Prayer 

by Pastor Paul Wolff 

Jesus said, “Pray then like this, ‘Our father, who art in heaven …’” (Matthew 6:9)

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The angel Gabriel was in heaven and on earth at the same time showing us that heaven is not far away.

We know from the Holy Bible that God resides in heaven, and that is a place which seems far away from us because it is a place which we have absolutely no way to get to on our own. Yet, God is never far away from us. Just before Jesus ascended into heaven, He told His followers, “I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28:20) This is not metaphorical (or “spiritual”), but it is real. Jesus is never far away even though He is in heaven. Jesus is with us always as He has promised. Those who say otherwise are calling Jesus a liar. We cannot get to Him in heaven, but He can easily get to us because He is with us always, even when He is in God’s heavenly kingdom. 

If you read Scripture carefully you can see that heaven really is not far from us here on earth, though we cannot access it ourselves. One of the earliest examples of God being near us is found in Genesis 9:16. This happens after the great flood when God gives the rainbow as a sign of His mercy and He promises not to punish us with another great flood, though our sins deserve it and much more. God says, “Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.” It is interesting to note that the sign of the rainbow is for God to see and remember His covenant. The sign is not only for us. Though we should note that rainbows are only visible as bows to people standing on earth. I remember sitting in an airplane flying above the clouds during the middle of the day, and looking out the window and seeing on the clouds below the shadow of the plane surrounded by a complete circular prism of light. It wasn’t a half-circle like a bow, but a full circle. For God to see something shaped like a bow, He has to be here on earth with us, not above the clouds. This is a comfort because of the promise of the rainbow – that God will not destroy us because of our disobedience and sin, but will rescue us through Jesus. 

We also see that heaven is not far from us when the angel, Gabriel visited the priest, Zechariah in Luke 1:19. The angel told Zechariah, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news.” Now, Gabriel was standing in the temple in Jerusalem talking with Zechariah, but he was also, at the same time, standing in the presence of God (though Zechariah could not see God as the angel did). This is yet another example that heaven is not somewhere far away, but is very near to us, as God, who is in heaven, is very near to us. Our problem is that, as sinners, we do not have access to God, or His heaven, except through those earthly Means of Grace which God gives us to bring us a taste of heaven here on earth. Those Means of Grace are God’s Word, and the Sacraments of Holy Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Through these earthly gifts, God gives us a little bit of heaven so that we may receive the forgiveness of our sins, and be strengthened in our faith, so that we may at last receive the complete fulfillment of God’s promises in Christ – the resurrection and sanctification of our bodies, and everlasting life in God’s paradise as His Holy children who have been redeemed by Christ Jesus, our crucified savior. 

God’s merciful promise of the rainbow also shows that He is near us always as He also promised.

Those who think heaven is somewhere far away do themselves a disservice by also thinking that Jesus is far away. The world very quickly starts to feel quite threatening and dangerous if we find that we are here alone and Jesus is far away. That is why Jesus reassured His followers at His ascension that He is with us always. (see Matthew 28:20 above) We should believe Jesus even (and especially) when it seems like we are all alone and in danger from worldly and spiritual temptations and dangers. 

We all can understand why Jesus seems so far away from us. We are physical creatures, and we cannot sense God’s heavenly kingdom with our physical senses, so we can feel vulnerable and alone when temptations and dangers are near. It is in those times when we rely on faith in Jesus to give comfort and assurance. Everything in the world may tell us that the situation is hopeless, and that the “great” powers of the world are too powerful to be overcome, yet, when we trust God’s Word, we can be assured that God is in control, and “all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to (Jesus)”. (Matthew 28:18) We also have the assurance that, on account of Christ, God will protect us and give us good things so that nothing can steal away our salvation. (See Romans 8:31-39) God indeed is Sovereign and powerful, but He doesn’t use His power to force us to serve Him. God gave us His Son, Jesus, to win our salvation through His life and death, and then God gives us His Word to tell us all He has done to save us so that we might believe. Through this faith (i.e. believing God’s Word) and Holy Baptism, God adopts us as His beloved, redeemed, children. 

Since God now considers us as His children, He will not abandon us to sin, nor to our enemies in this world, nor to our enemies in the spiritual world. We cannot fully access the heavenly realm as sinners in a sinful world, but we don’t have to. We have God’s Word and His assurance that He is near and that He is in control – despite all evidence that we are alone and in danger. Christians need to believe God’s Word and trust in Him to protect us when in danger, and to rescue us from all sin and death as necessary. God keeps His promises and is unfailingly trustworthy.

What was Jesus Like as a Boy?

by Pastor Paul Wolff

Most images of this event in Luke 2 can be somewhat misleading. The boy Jesus came to learn, not to teach.

“And the child (Jesus) grew and became strong, filled with wisdom. And the favor of God was upon him. Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the Feast of the Passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up according to custom. And when the feast was ended, as they were returning, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. His parents did not know it, but supposing him to be in the group they went a day’s journey, but then they began to search for him among their relatives and acquaintances, and when they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem, searching for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. And when his parents saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.” And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them. And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.” (Luke 2:40-52)

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God’s Word is the greatest treasure on earth. There is nothing on earth that can give you the blessings that God’s word can give. God had the Holy Bible written to show us what He has done to save us, so that we might trust in Him and be saved through that faith. God Himself works through His Word to bring you forgiveness and salvation. Nothing else in all the world can save you from sin and death and give you eternal life in God’s paradise. That is why God’s Word is such a great treasure.

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14)

God’s Word is such a treasure that God has made sure that from the time that Moses wrote the first five books about 3,500 years ago until now, the Holy Bible has been preserved so that at all times in history God’s people could hear it or read it and learn that God is our loving Father and creator and redeemer. God’s Word first shows us that we are all sinners, descended from Adam and Eve, and we would all be under God’s condemnation, but for God’s mercy. This is likely why more people do not appreciate this great treasure. Sinners don’t like to be reminded of the truth of our sin. We like to think we are better than we are, and more holy. The truth, however, is that we are rebellious sinners, and we all desperately need God to save us from death, which is the condemnation of sin. Every person who ever lived on earth before 1903 has died. That includes the one man who never sinned nor deserved death, but who gave His life to redeem us all from the curse of sin. That man is Jesus. We need to hear the truth of our sin, no matter if we want to or not. If we deny the truth of our sin, then we will deny the blessings God has provided for us in Jesus. But, as Saint John wrote, “If we confess our sins, (God) is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)

God became incarnate as a man to redeem sinners from sin and death.

God’s Word does not only tell us how bad we are, and how much we need a savior, but it also shows us what God has done through Jesus to rescue and redeem us from the consequences of our sin. God, in His essence, is a Spirit, and He is eternal and cannot die. In order for Him to provide for our redemption the Second Person of the Trinity became incarnate as a baby who grew into a man. He is like us in every way, except without sin. Jesus had to be a man so that He could not only keep and fulfill God’s Law, but so that He could offer His life in payment for the lives of all of us sinners. We might not know any of this, except for the fact that God had it written down and preserved for us to hear and read and know, so that we may be saved.

The Bible was not just written for you and me. God also had it written and preserved for Jesus, also. When Jesus read the Bible it was a little different! The Bible Jesus read was not different than what we read today, but Jesus is a little different than us because He is holy and sinless. Also, because the Bible is all about Jesus, it affected Him a little differently. Jesus once told the Pharisees, “You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.” (John 5:39-40)

In His state of humiliation, Jesus did not remember being equal with God the Father, and the Holy Spirit. He had to learn about God the same way we do – by reading the Holy Bible. Jesus also had to trust that the Bible is God’s Word, and is completely true. This was especially important when Jesus was dying on the cross. When He was suffering the Father’s wrath for the sins of the world, He only had to rely on God’s promises in the Holy Scriptures that this was God’s will, and that everything He was doing would work out for the glory of God, and the salvation of the human race.

God’s Law is good and righteous but it condemns sinners. Jesus had no sin and was not condemned by God’s Law.

God’s Law did not condemn Jesus – because He did not inherit the corruption of sin from His mother, and He committed no sin in His life. Jesus happily obeyed God’s Law because as the Son of God, the Commandments of God completely fit with His holy nature. Where we would naturally rebel against God’s commands, Jesus naturally obeyed God’s commands, and was happy to do so. We, too should be happy to obey God’s commands, because they are good and right and beneficial to each one of us and to our neighbors, but because we are corrupted by sin, we don’t always do so.

Also, Jesus had a slightly different perspective concerning the salvation promised for us. Jesus did not need salvation from sin, since He had no inherited sin. Also, because Jesus was sinless in everything He did, He was not condemned by God’s Law. However, Jesus was the one sent from God to pay the price for the salvation of us sinners. Though, because the price was the sacrifice of His life, the promise of salvation which gives us great hope and comfort was a death sentence for Jesus, if He was willing to endure it. Jesus would need to trust in God the Father to rescue Him from death if He accepted the Father’s will and desire that He would give His life in exchange for our forgiveness and salvation. The Father did not force Jesus to give up His life, and suffer and die for sinners, but because it was the Father’s will that Jesus would redeem us from our sins, then Jesus was willing to please the Father and do what was needed to save us from our sins – including innocently suffering crucifixion and God’s wrath over our sins, and dying to pay the price for sin.

Luke tells us that Joseph and Mary went to Jerusalem every year for the feast of the Passover. He doesn’t tell us if Jesus went with them also, but, whether He did nor not, the year he turned 12 was special. He had attained a certain level of maturity, and was likely allowed a little more freedom and autonomy than before. I’m sure it helped that Jesus was perfectly obedient and sinless, because Joseph and Mary knew they could trust Him to do what He ought to do. Though, on this occasion, what Jesus rightly did, was not particularly what they expected Him to do.

It is likely that Jesus came to learn about God’s mercy for His people in the events of the Passover.

Luke doesn’t tell us what Jesus and the teachers talked about, but an obvious topic of conversation would have been the Passover, and its meaning for Israel, and for the Messiah. He might have asked something like, “What was the Passover all about?” They would have told Him, “The Passover was the salvation of the people of Israel. God had decreed that the firstborn in every household of Egypt would die. However, among the Israelites, God would accept a substitute – a lamb – who would be sacrificed instead of the firstborn. The substitute, the lamb, would die, so that the firstborn child would live. This showed God’s mercy and love.” Jesus would have learned that it is good and right to love God with all His heart, soul, mind and strength. God is a just and righteous God, but He is also merciful and forgiving to sinners, and loves them. Because Jesus is one with the Father and the Holy Spirit, He also felt the same way about sinners, even as a boy, and even later as a man.

If people sin against you, you likely would want revenge, or at least just punishment. You are not likely to suffer and die for the people who betrayed you, or hurt you, or murdered you. But Jesus is different.

When the twelve year old Jesus was talking with the teachers in the temple, He might also have asked what the events of the Passover had to do with the Messiah. If they didn’t have a quick answer, Jesus likely would have quoted other Scriptures which would have led them to the correct answer. “Why does Isaiah write, ‘Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.’”? Something like this is likely why the teachers were impressed with the questions that Jesus asked. The events of the Passover were a prophetic type of how the Messiah would come and save the world from the condemnation of their sins. The Messiah would offer His life in place of all people – like a substitutionary sacrificial lamb, so that He would take the punishment of death, and so all people would have forgiveness. Not everyone would receive the benefits of this forgiveness, only those who believe, but the forgiveness was there for everyone, if they wanted it.

What this meant for Jesus was that He was the sacrificial lamb of God who was going to have to offer His life to God the Father in place of all sinners in the world, so that He would bear the punishment for our sin, so that we would be forgiven and live. The amazing thing about the love that Jesus had for God the Father, is that when Jesus realized that He would have to endure God’s wrath for all the sins of the world, and die for wicked, rebellious sinners like all the rest of us, Jesus did not reject this plan, but agreed to do it because it was God’s Will. Jesus was willing to suffer and die as an innocent lamb to pay for the sins of every wicked sinner who ever was conceived on earth, and whoever would be conceived until the last day. This is the great love that God has for us – that He would live as a man in a sinful world, and still die to save sinners!

Jesus is the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

The Word of God brings all this to us, but that is not the only treasure that God gives us. God also combines His holy Word with water in Holy Baptism to wash away our sins and to give us a new birth as God’s beloved children. Jesus also combines His holy Word with bread and wine to give each one of us His body and blood which he sacrificed to pay for our sins. Just as the Israelites in Moses’ day ate the sacrificial lamb who saved the firstborn from the Angel of Death, and thus received the blessings of that sacrifice, Jesus offers us His body and blood in the Lord’s Supper that we may receive the blessings of His sacrifice. These blessings include the forgiveness of sins, and victory over sin and death. Jesus shares these treasures with us to make us His children and keep us in the faith until he comes to take all His children to His heavenly kingdom where we will live forever in holiness with Jesus.

When Joseph and Mary found Jesus in the temple in Jerusalem He told them that He had to be doing His Father’s business, but Jesus also submitted to His earthly parents and obeyed them like a good and holy child. All this Jesus did out of love for you, so that you may know the love of God, and trust in Jesus to save you from your sins. What a great treasure we have here today. May you treasure God’s Word as the most valuable thing on earth, and trust in Jesus to save you from your sins and give you everlasting life.

Jesus is always doing His Father’s Business

God is Your Great Reward

by Pastor Paul Wolff

“The word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: ‘Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.’” Genesis 15:1

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Abram Believed God and He credited it to him as Righteousness

It is natural for people to think that we have to do something to make God think favorably toward us. This is yet another way that our sinful nature has corrupted our thinking and our attitude toward God. This is the pagan way of thinking about God. The pagan must manipulate his god in order to get something good, but in doing so, the pagan thinks he is greater than his god because if he gets what he wants, then the pagan is telling the god what to do. Then he views his god as his servant and he is the master.

The True God is much different than the pagan view of god. God tells Abram (later renamed “Abraham”), “I am your shield.” That is to say that God is the one who protects His people, of whom Abram is one. God needs no protection because God is almighty, but in His mercy and love He protects His people who are weak and vulnerable to the evil plans of sinners in the world.

God also tells Abram, “I am your great reward.” In the context of Genesis 15 Abram had just rescued his nephew Lot after he was kidnapped by evil armies. Abram assembled a small army of his household workers and defeated the armies of the four kings that overthrew the five kings of Sodom and Gomorrah and the nearby kingdoms. Abram did not accept a reward for this valuable service, but gave honor and praise to God who gave him the victory. In return, God tells Abram, “I am your great reward.”

Abram recognizes that God is saying that He will give Abram some great blessing, but Abram knows he is old, and whatever good thing that God gives him will pass to his heir, of which he has none, and because of his advanced age, and the age of his elderly wife, he is not likely to produce an heir. Yet God promises Abram that his wife, Sarah, will give birth to a son and Abram’s descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the sky. Then the Scriptures say that “Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness.”

Jesus said, “Be faithful unto death and I will give you a crown of life.” Jesus is our very great reward.“”“”

The blessing that God promised Abram was not only worldly wealth, though Abram was a somewhat wealthy person in worldly terms. The great blessing God gave to Abram was God, Himself. God said, “I am your great reward.” One of Abram’s descendants would be God in the flesh who would be the savior of the world – the salvation of all who trust in God to save them from their sins. This promise was first made to Adam and Eve on the day that they rebelled against God and fell into sin, and here it was repeated to Abram.

Scriptures say “Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness.” This is why Christians look to Abraham as our Spiritual ancestor, even though he may not be our physical ancestor. We believe in the same God that Abraham knew and trusted. We recognize Jesus as the Christ, the fulfillment of God’s promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and to all faithful people since Adam and Eve fell into sin.

God, Himself is our great reward. He is our savior from sin and death. He became incarnate as a man to take the punishment that we deserved because of our sin. Jesus endured God the Father’s wrath over our sin, and suffered the death that we deserved. He did this to rescue you from that same fate. We receive this salvation through faith, just as Abram was considered righteous by believing God’s promises. Do not be afraid. God is your shield and your very great reward.

How Far does God go to Keep His Promises?

(and promises made in His name)
by Pastor Paul Wolff
 

David playing the harp

There is an odd little story in 2 Samuel 21 about God sending a famine against the Kingdom of Israel in the days of King David. What is strange is that by this time the Kingdom is pretty well established, and seemingly out of nowhere, God is punishing His people with an extended famine. When David asked God what was the reason for the famine, God answered that this was in response to something King Saul had done. What Saul had done was to attempt to destroy the Gibeonites, who were an Amorite people living in the land since before the days of Joshua.

The beginning of the story is found in Deuteronomy 7:1-6 in the days of Moses. God tells Moses and the Israelites that when He brings them into the land He had promised to Abraham and his descendants, they are to completely destroy all the peoples living there, including the Amorites and others. The Israelites were not to intermarry with them, nor make any treaty or covenant with them, but they must devote them to complete destruction. The peoples of Canaan were idolaters, and the Israelites were to completely destroy their altars and places of worship lest they fall into idolatry and come under God’s curse themselves (which they did from time to time.) God was very clear in His instructions about how they ought to deal with the people of Canaan.

Joshua made a treaty in God's name with the Gibeonites

Many years later, in the days of Joshua (see Joshua 9), the inhabitants of Gibeon heard that the Israelites had destroyed Jericho and Ai and they feared that they soon would be next. They devised a plan to trick the Israelites to make a treaty with them and not destroy them. The Gibeonites sent a delegation to Joshua dressed in old worn out clothes and shoes. The bread they had with them was dry and moldy, and their wine-skins were old and patched. They said they were from a very distant country and wanted to make a treaty with the Israelites. They said that when they left their home their bread was fresh out of the oven, and their wine-skins and shoes were new. The Israelites sampled their provisions, but they did not seek the counsel of the Lord. Joshua made a covenant with them and swore in the name of the Lord to let them live.

Three days later, Joshua heard that the Gibeonites were their neighbors. The Israelites did not attack them, because of the oath that they made not to harm them, but they summoned their leaders and said, “Why did you deceive us?” The Gibeonites were very gracious, and humbled themselves before Joshua and the Israelites. They told of how they had heard how God had commanded Moses to destroy all the inhabitants in the land, and they feared for their lives. They said, “We are your servants, do whatever seems good and right.” Joshua cursed the Gibeonites to be the servants of the Israelites, being woodcutters and water bearers, but he honored the treaty he made with them and let them live. For their part, it seems that the Gibeonites were just glad to escape God’s judgment on the Canaanites, and they lived at peace with the Israelites and did not betray their part of the treaty.

The Israelites also kept their part of the treaty until King Saul tried to destroy the Gibeonites. Another strange part of this story is that Saul’s part in this story is not found elsewhere in Scripture. Apparently the chronicler who wrote the Book of Samuel did not think this particular misdeed of Saul’s was an important part of the story in a chronological telling, and he did not mention it until he wrote of God bringing the famine in 2 Samuel 21. David, however, knew the history (or looked it up in Scripture), and called the surviving Gibeonite leaders and said, “What shall I do for you to make atonement that you may bless the Lord’s inheritance?”

The rainbow is God's sign to Noah that He would not destroy the earth again with a flood even though the thoughts of man are only evil all the time. Genesis 6:5 and 8:21

The Gibeonites were still very humble and submissive before King David, as their ancestors had been hundreds of years earlier with Joshua, and hesitated to make demands to the King, but David repeated, “What shall I do for you?” They asked that seven of Saul’s remaining male descendants would be given to them to be put to death for justice for all the Gibeonites that Saul killed. David agreed to their terms, but he spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, because of the friendship he had with the son of King Saul. God honored this agreement and lifted the famine.

All of this begs the question: Why would God go to such great lengths to punish Israel for Saul’s misdeeds, many years after Saul had died, on behalf of a people whom He had condemned for destruction hundreds of years earlier, for the sake of a treaty Joshua had made against God’s command? The answer is that God keeps His promises. Or, in this case, God honors the promises made by His people in His name and on His behalf. Despite the fact that God had intended for the Gibeonites to be destroyed with all the inhabitants of Canaan, Joshua had sworn an oath in God’s name that the Gibeonites would not be harmed by the Israelites, and when Saul broke that treaty, God allowed the Gibeonites restitution for the sake of justice, and the honor of God’s name.

If God would go to these great lengths to keep this promise made in His name, even though He never wanted it in the first place, then what does this say about how God will regard His other promises? It shows that God can absolutely be trusted to keep all His promises, no matter what happens.

The very day that Adam and Eve sinned God promised to send a savior who would rescue them from their sin.

The main promise that God fulfilled was the promise He made to Adam and Eve when He cursed the serpent in Genesis 3:15. God promised to send the seed of the woman to crush the serpent’s head, though the serpent would bruise his heel. God remembered this promise, even though he destroyed the evil people in the days of Noah, but he saved Noah and his three sons, and each man’s wife (eight people). Likewise when Israel had turned against God and refused to listen to the prophets calling for repentance, God destroyed the ten northern tribes, and nearly wiped out the kingdom of Judah, but He saved a remnant among whom were the descendants of King David who would be the ancestors of Jesus. Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s greatest promise. He is a descendant of Adam and Eve through His mother, Mary, and conceived miraculously by the work of the Holy Spirit, Jesus is God incarnate, who paid for the sins of the world with His perfect obedience, and His innocent suffering and death in our place on the cross.

Compared with the Incarnation of God in Jesus, and the redemption He won for our forgiveness and salvation, the incident with the Gibeonites is of little consequence, but it shows that God honors His promises, and He can be trusted to remain faithful in big promises, and small.

We all ought to see ourselves in a similar situation as the Gibeonites. As the Gibeonites were condemned to destruction for their idolatry, so we are condemned to destruction for our idolatry and other sins. As Joshua promised to spare the Gibeonites, so the greater Joshua (the name “Jesus” is the Greek version of the name, Joshua, meaning, “savior”) has promised to spare us from the punishment due us on account of our sin, because He paid the price and satisfied God’s wrath by dying in our place.

Job’s friends were no comfort when they misrepresented God’s promises. Worldly wealth is not a sign of God’s favor, and poverty is not a sign of God’s disfavor.

Christians ought to be careful when their preachers or anyone make claims about the things God has promised. False teachers make claims about God’s promises which are not true. For example, the “prosperity gospel (sic)” heretics will tell you all day long that you will be rich and successful. However, just because God blessed Abraham and Job with great riches, that doesn’t mean that you will be likewise blessed. God could ask you to suffer like Job, or it is possible that you life may be like the beggar, Lazarus, in the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. Our reward is in heaven, not on earth. Always check your pastor’s claims against the Holy Scriptures. Even when your pastor quotes the Scriptures, double check the context of the passages which are being quoted, to make sure they really say what is being claimed. This goes for my parishioners, too. We all ought to be like the Berean Christians in Acts 17:11 who examined the Scriptures daily to see that the things that Saint Paul was preaching were true. (They found that indeed, he was preaching the truth. Jesus is the promised savior that the Old Testament foretold.)

Here is a sampling of a few of God’s promises which we can rely upon:

Hebrews 13:5-6 says, “Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for (God) has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we can confidently say, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?’” God will never leave us, though, in His mercy, He remains hidden from our senses. This is a matter of faith, but since we can trust in God’s promises we can trust that it is true even (and especially) when it seems like we are alone and abandoned. This passage quotes from several places where it is repeated in the Old Testament. Some common sources are Deuteronomy 31, Psalm 37, and a couple phrases in Isaiah 41 also teach this.

Jesus said, “I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Jesus also repeats this at His final teaching before His ascension into heaven. In Matthew 28:20 Jesus says, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” This is a great comfort especially when it seems like God is far away from us and the world is falling apart around us.

More of Christ’s promises are found in Matthew 10:32-42 where Jesus said, “Everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven. Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me. The one who receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and the one who receives a righteous person because he is a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward. And whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward.” This is a comforting passage in times of antagonism and persecution, when the world turns against us and tries to get us to deny the forgiveness and salvation we have in Christ, our Lord. The world wants us to consider that they are gods and to worship and honor them, as they worship and honor themselves and others. There is no salvation there, but only in Christ Jesus. Jesus promises us persecution, but when we remember that He is always with us, and that He will honor a faithful confession in His heavenly Kingdom, then we can stand against the world even if we otherwise stand alone. Christ will have the final word on Judgment day, when He will bring His people with Him to live with Him forever in glory.

The Promise of Christ in Water & Light

by Pastor Paul Wolff

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Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him: “I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that was with you – the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you – every living creature on earth. I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”

And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.” (Genesis 9:8-16)

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Fish graphic supplied by GospelGifs.com. It is copyrighted and used with permission.

The early Christians had a clever way to describe Jesus. They made an acronym out of the phrase, “Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior,” which in Greek spelled the word for “fish.” This is one of the reasons why the fish became a symbol for the Christian faith. The fish is still a popular symbol for the Christian faith. The second century Church father, Tertullian, used this image in an essay on Baptism where he said, “We are born in water as little fish in the way of our fish Jesus Christ.” Tertullian was responding to a false Gnostic–influenced teacher who was trying to abolish the practice of Baptism in the church. Tertullian explained that the little fish can only survive in the water. If the little fish leave the water of Baptism to follow a false teacher, then they will perish.

This is a wonderful image of the life-giving and sustaining power of Holy Baptism, but it doesn’t seem to work well with our Scripture from Genesis 9. Man is not a fish, and in the great flood every person on earth drowned except Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and each man’s wife – eight people in the whole world survived the flood.

The story of the flood is frightening because in it we see a just God rightly bringing judgment to a world full of sinners. Yet, we are all sinners. We have all sinned against God and deserve His wrath and punishment. What is more, we are born sinners. We are guilty from the moment of our conception – having inherited the sinful condition from our parents. Even if there was something we could do to make up for our actual sins (there isn’t) there is nothing we can do to change our inherited sin.

How do we know that God won’t bring His righteous judgment down on us? Well, that is exactly the question which is answered in Genesis 9.

Noah trusted in God’s promise of a savior.

The first thing we need to remember is that God spared eight people from the flood – along with two of every kind of living creature, and seven of all the ‘clean’ animals. Now, you may ask, “What is eight people among the thousands, perhaps, millions of people on the earth at the time?” In response I will ask a more pertinent question, “Why did God bother to save Noah’s family at all?”


Scripture describes Noah as a righteous man (Genesis 6:9), but the scriptures also show that neither Noah, nor his sons, were sinless. After the flood God said, “I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake, although the imagination of man’s heart is is evil from his youth; nor will I destroy every living thing as I have done.” (Genesis 8:21) This is almost exactly what God said before the flood. (See Genesis 6:5-7) So, if God did not eliminate sinners from the world, then why did He save Noah and his family? It was purely out of His grace for the sake of a promise God had given Adam and Eve that one of their descendants would crush the serpent’s head and bring redemption to all people. Christ had not yet come in the days of Noah, so God saved Noah’s family in order to keep His promise and bring salvation to the world through Christ.

God keeps His promises, so when He says, “Never again will I destroy every living thing as I have done,” we can rest assured that God will keep this promise. Also God designates the rainbow as a sign of this promise. A rainbow is nothing but raindrops and light, and although it is one of the most beautiful things in creation, it is not the colors which make it a symbol of God’s promise, but its shape. It is shaped like a bow – a weapon of war. But instead of shooting arrows, the rain was God’s weapon to destroy all the unbelieving, violent people on earth.

God has set his bow in the clouds, and has promised never to use it against us again.

Then, after the flood, God said, “I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth.” (v. 13) Here God is saying that He is hanging up His weapon – out in the open, for all to see. Though you should notice that when God establishes the rainbow as a symbol of His promise that it isn’t primarily a symbol for you and me. It is a reminder for God Himself! He says, “The rainbow shall be in the cloud, and I will look on it to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” (v. 16) This should be a triple comfort for us. 1) God promises not to destroy us, despite our sin. 2) The sign is not for us to remember, but for Him, and He will never forget, even if we do forget. 3) God is not up in heaven somewhere far away, but that He is right here with us, because rainbows are only visible on the earth.

That third comfort is a little hard to imagine for us who are used to seeing rainbows here on earth. I remember one time I was in an airplane in the middle of the day. We were flying above the clouds, and I looked out the window and saw the shadow of the airplane on the clouds beneath us. Surrounding the shadow of the plane on the clouds was a circular prism of light. It wasn’t shaped like a bow, but a perfect, full ring of light. If we imagine that God is somewhere in the heavens, high above the clouds, then He would not see a rainbow, but a full circle of light. For God to see the rainbow (as He said He would), He must be down here with us, standing on the earth. God is not far away – high above the clouds. He is right here with us at all times. 

If you remember that I said earlier that the image of the fish didn’t seem to work so well with this story, but in St. Peter’s first Epistle he makes the connection between the flood and Baptism. He says,

“God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him.” (1 Peter 3:19-21)

You should remember that Noah took two of every kind of land animal and bird, but he did not take any fish on the ark, because the flood was not a great danger to the fish. (Though we can see from the fossil record that some fish were caught in the sediment from the flood, but it wasn’t a great extinction threat compared to the land animals.) But God treated Noah and his family as if they were fish. God spared Noah and his family for the sake of our fish – Jesus Christ, God’s Son, our savior.

Noah and his family trusted in God. They built the ark and they went inside with all the animals trusting that God would not only bring the flood, but would protect them and see them safely through it. Their trust in God to save them made them little fishes belonging to our savior Jesus Christ.

It is very sad that there were likely no believers that drowned in the flood. St. Peter also called Noah a “preacher of righteousness,” but no one besides his immediate family joined him on the ark. The way of the world is that sinners do not acknowledge their sin. We do not see the great peril that we are in, nor acknowledge that the judgment of God is just. The way of the world is seductive. The world thinks that its wicked ways are great fun, and tries to lure the little fish away from the protection of the Baptismal waters. But the little fish cannot survive if lured away from the water.

Jesus was baptized into the guilt of your sin so you could be baptized out of it.

If you have been baptized you have salvation in Christ. Would you live in God’s Baptismal grace as a child of Christ your savior, or would you rather follow the ways of the world? If the whole world decides to abandon Christ, is it wise to follow only for the pleasure of the moment? In the days of Noah the whole world did abandon God as their savior, and they all perished. But Noah and His family were saved on account of Christ, by believing God’s promise to send a savior (Jesus).

The covenant God made to not destroy the world again with a flood was made on account of Christ. God has every right to punish us for our sins, but He poured out His wrath on Jesus instead. Jesus suffered and died on the cross, taking the punishment for the sins of the whole world so that we need never fear the wrath of God. Through Holy Baptism, not only are our sins washed away, but we are given a new birth as God’s Children. Like Noah, we are saved by God’s grace for Christ’s sake. If “Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior” is the fish, then through Baptism we are born as little fishes. We need not fear the coming judgment, nor the wrath of God. We are safe in the waters of Holy Baptism. Even if the whole world turn away from Christ, we will remain with Him, both now and for all eternity – little fish under the protection of our one, true fish Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Our Savior.