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LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 2019, Page 78

Scan: The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

This is the joy of Jesus, and this joy gives birth to your
joy. What does our Scripture lesson for today tell us?
“Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of
Jerusalem. The Lord has taken away the judgments
against you” (Zeph. 3:14–15).
“Rejoice,” Paul says. Not because you’re good. No, if you
look at your life and the things you’ve said and done
and thought, you’re more likely to lament, aren’t you?
Rejoice. Not because of your accomplishments. If you
compare them to what the Ten Commandments
require, you will shrivel in shame. Rejoice. Not on
account of your intellect, not on account of your piety,
not on account of your reputation or your strength or
your good looks or your money or your health. All these
are like a flower that blooms one day and is cut down
the next. We are dust and to dust we shall return; we
are a shadow that flees away and all our
accomplishments and all our strength are vanity.

78 | PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2019 (67TH) LCMS CONVENTION

But we rejoice, always, because we are righteous before
God. But can we really rejoice always? Yes, because, in
the face of grief, we have Jesus’ promise that he will end
all our sorrow. In the midst of trouble, we have Jesus’
promise, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy
laden, and I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28). In the
midst of death, we have Jesus’ promise, “Everyone who
lives and believes in me shall never die” (John 11:26).
And so this exhortation of Paul to rejoice is not so much
a command as it is an invitation, a call to live a life of
rejoicing with the joy the Holy Spirit gives you through
faith in Jesus whose joy it is to have you stand righteous
before Him.
God calls you to a life of rejoicing and “He who calls you
is faithful; he will surely do it” (1 Thess. 5:24).

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