"What should we fear?" F.C.D. Wyneken on the New Year

You exit the old year as one accursed. Will you now enter the new year, still accursed, only to die cursed? O my God, be merciful! Behold the picture once more. Behold the blood of Jesus, [which] cries out still today as mercy for you. The name Jesus calls to you: “Why will you die, you of the house of Israel?” Have mercy also upon yourself and upon your poor soul, and cry out to this man! “O Jesus, Savior and Redeemer, have mercy on me; give me Your grace unto repentance and let me not die in my sins. Turn me and I will be turned! Purify me and I will be pure!” Do this and hold to Him in silence. Flee to repentance and faith, so this year will bring nothing but pure joy and blessing. Here, with His first drops of blood, this little child is guarantor against the Law that judges and condemns, and [He is] the righteousness of god. For the one who has faith in this little child and has held to the name of Jesus can head into the new year with joy and confidence. He is called “Jesus” because He shall save His people from their sins. For this little child, after He completed His work of redemption, sat down at the right hand of almighty God. Through His crucified hands He governs the entire world. His hand sends you everything that will come upon you this year, and His name is the guarantee that out of this hand must flow pure blessings to you.



It is true, He has not promised that no want, plague, or trouble shall befall you this year. to the contrary, He has said to you beforehand: “Unless a man take up his cross daily and follow Me, he cannot be My disciple” [Luke 9:23, Luther Bibel]. Thus, as at Baptism, He has allowed you to be marked by a cross. This is [the case] so that at all times, you think about this cross and about the fact that you belong to the cruciform kingdom of the Crucified One. As His disciples, we must pass through many troubles to enter the kingdom of heaven. As certain as you are a Christian, so certain will you experience cross and need. Indeed, dear friends, seeing the accumulating sin of this nation and the mounting apostasy from the gospel and the horrid rage against it, we can make a calculation on two matters: The judgment of God will finally and all the more harshly come to bear upon this land, proportionate to God’s blessings upon her and to the duration of His patience; finally, open persecution against the gospel and those who confess it will break out in the land that hitherto has been its sanctuary.

But “nevertheless,” it says for us Christians, “nevertheless Israel has god for its consolation.” That gives us assurance for the present, [and] promises protection by the gospel. The circumcision of Christ teaches us who have a Savior that every cause of fear and angst and concern is removed. For the Law with its curses and judgments has been removed. Thus, in the misfortune that may affect us, we no longer see any punishment or anger of god, but rather the disciplining hand of a loving Father. The name Jesus encompasses all compassion, all love, all promises, and all blessedness. It guarantees us that God is with us and is our reconciled Father. As such, He can only let good things come to us. Indeed! What should we fear? The Almighty, who sits on the throne of glory, who rules in the midst of His enemies, before whom all His enemies must bow down, before whom every knee must bow, whether in heaven or on earth or under the earth—He is our Savior, Brother, Bridegroom, and Judge.


Friedrich Wyneken
2^nd President of the LCMS
Sermon for the Eve of the Name of Jesus, January 1, 1868
At Home in The House of My Fathers, pp. 433-34

The New Testament Veil

They said that God veils himself in a cloud in the Old Testament (Exod 19:16-19; 20:21).  How does he veil himself in the New Testament?  What’s the cloud that he covers himself with, so that he can come even closer to us than the people of Israel?  His humanity.  Yes, the flesh and blood of Jesus (John 1:14). So he hides himself there in flesh and blood.  Look at Luther’s Christmas hymns where he expresses that particular theme! Take the verse:

"He whom the world cannot enclose
doth in Mary’s arms repose.
To be an infant small He deigns
who all things by His power sustains.”

So the cloud which veils the glory of God present with us is the humanity of Jesus.

Notice that you can’t capture the glory!  You can’t put it in a box.  You can’t even lock it up there in the Holy of Holies.  It is mobile.

- John Kleinig

The Addictive Desire For More

The addictive desire for more is never so glaring than in the days preceding Christmas.  While we know that the thirst for more power, money, and stuff is a never satisfying pursuit, and though we believe that the acquisition of what we desire will not provide an antidote to our addiction, we still find ourselves pining over what presents are under the tree. 

But on December 25th, after the presents are all unwrapped, there will come a moment of slight disappointment.  Not because we didn’t get enough “stuff” or because the “stuff” we got is not good enough “stuff,” but for the simple reason that the more we get, the more we want.  It is a symptom of the addictive desire for more.

The season of Christmas, when this desire becomes most evident, is not an avenue to legitimize such desire.  On the contrary, Christmas provides a remedy, an antidote.  One that does not negotiate or moderate our addiction but one that kills it.  Luther said it well: "The remedy for curing desire does not lie in satisfying it, but in extinguishing it."

Christmas provides this remedy in a manger.  A manger that leads to a cross. There, on the cross, the old life with it’s incessant addiction for more is killed in the flesh and blood of the Christ, and there the new, restored, redeemed life begins. 

So after your eyes have feasted on the gifts under the tree… look to the top.  Look to the star or the angel atop the tree declaring the remedy, the death, of our addictive desire for more in the life and the death of the Christ.  For this reason, “unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”

Triple Advent

The Church celebrates the triple advent (or "coming") of Christ. 

First is the advent into flesh, which is despised and humble before the world, of which Zechariah 9 says, "Behold, Your King comes to you, gentle and poor, sitting upon a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden."

The second is the spiritual advent, which happens daily into the minds of the righteous, since He is present constantly with the Church, hears her, helps and consoles her, concerning which Christ said, John 14: "I will not leave you orphans, but will come to you." Again, "If anyone loves Me, We will come to him and make Our dwelling with him."

The third advent of Christ is His glorious return to judgment, concerning which Isaiah 3 says, "The Lord will come into judgment." And Matthew 24 says, "And they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with much power and majesty."

It is useful always to consider these three advents of the Son of God... and to have them set forth in the Chruch for stirring up faith in minds, invocation, and fear of God or repentance. St. Augustine says thus on Luke "This time is called the Advent of hte Lord for good reason: so that every believer will prepare himself and mend his ways, so that he may have strength worthily to celebrate the nativity of his God."

- Lucas Lossius

A Christmas WE

Behold, Your Salvation Comes

“There are also those who say:

"Jesus was once in my heart, but I have lost Him again.  I have cast Him out by my sins. I have sunk back into the cares and desires of the world, and there I must stay. Jesus has already often returned to me, but I told Him to go away, and now, I fear, He is eternally gone from me.”

Poor man, know this: Jesus does not tire of returning to the house of your heart… It is also to you that Isaiah speaks the words, “Behold, your salvation comes!”

C.F.W. Walther, excerpt on Isaiah 62:11

Cow Love (and Justifiable Other Vices)