LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 2016, Page 113

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Transport us to that happy place
Beyond all tears and sinning!
		 Amen! Amen!
Come Lord Jesus
Crown of gladness!
		 We are yearning
For the day of your returning!
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And on that day, He will confess you before the Father.
Luther writes about this text in Matthew:
Who would not be afire and for joy desire
not only to confess but even to die confessing
Christ? These things which Christ here speaks
to comfort His own are priceless, for He knows
our infirmity and the intensity of persecution
in the world from our flesh and from the devil.
Against this distress, therefore, He sets Himself
in all his majesty and boasts that He Himself is
the one who preaches us, that His Father and the
angels are the audience, and that heaven is the
place, or church, where He preaches.

for confession! Because now is the day of salvation,
Jesus is even now confessing you and me to the Father. Therefore, it is the time for us to confess—and we
want to confess—as individuals in our daily lives and
vocations, as congregations when we gather together
around Word and Sacrament, and as a church body
to the world around us. It is the time for us to confess
that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father and
to proclaim to all that everyone who calls upon Him
will be saved. It is the time for us to confess, for the
day of His return is drawing near. Bo Giertz describes
the significance of that day for us who are built upon
Jesus:
Now another storm is raging, the breath from
the four winds that breathes upon these slain,
that they may live (Ezekiel 37:9). Everything
that doesn’t belong to Christ is swept away.
However, everything that is born of the Spirit
will rise up and sing and rejoice in the coming
of the Lord. It turns out there’s a dwelling-place
that isn’t made by hand, a building that comes
from God. It rests on the Rock, Jesus, and not
even the gates of hell are too much for it.

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What a marvelous explanation of the text Luther
gives us. We preach Jesus to everyone on earth, and
He preaches us to everyone in heaven. On the Last
Day, Jesus will confess you and me to the Father in
heaven and to the angels. But He confesses us even
now. He is a mediator. This is what He does. “Father,
forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke
23:34). He pleads from the cross for those who have
sinned against Him. He pleads for us also, for us who
have sinned against Him. The Book of Hebrews says,
“He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw
near to God through him, since he always lives to make
intercession for them” (7:25).

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May God lead us always to confess the One who
confesses us. Amen.
By the way, Matthew survived his struggle with leukemia. God heard his prayer and answered him and
restored him. Today he is married and lives in Ohio
with his wife and children.

My brothers and sisters, The Lutheran Church—
Missouri Synod is a confessional church. And it is not
only because we subscribe to the Lutheran Confessions.
That is one reason. But it is also because we believe in
confessing. And now is the time for confessing! The
apostle Paul says in his Second Epistle to the Corinthians: “For he says, ‘In a favorable time I listened
to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.’
Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the
day of salvation” (6:2). Well, if now is the day of salvation, it is then irrefutable that now is also the day
LSB, 395:6
Luther’s Works, Christopher Boyd Brown, ed. (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing
House, 2015), 67:110

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7

“Built on the Rock—Confess”

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Bo Giertz, To Live with Christ, (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2008), 595

U P O N T H I S R O C K Essay

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