Strengthening the Inner Man: A Meditation on Ephesians 3 for the Season of Pentecost

For this cause I bow my knees

 unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,

Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,

That he would grant you,

 according to the riches of his glory,

to be strengthened with might

by his Spirit in the inner man;

That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith;

that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,

May be able to comprehend with all saints

 what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;

And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge,

that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.

Now unto him that is able to do

exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think,

 according to the power that worketh in us,

Unto him be glory in the church

by Christ Jesus throughout all ages,

world without end. Amen.

 

It strikes me that one of the foibles of our social media age, is a growing fascination with what other people think is true, right, or salutary.  People have sought to know other’s opinions over the course of history by both speech and writing, but never have so many individual opinions at the moment of their genesis, been so broadly published and consumed by so many others.  With the underlying software and hardware technologies of the social media age, enormous efforts are made to typify, normalize, or project value on this sea of popular opinion, which in turn becomes the source of much of what passes as journalism and education today.  Surveys of opinion in various media become the subject of research and analysis, turned into political and economic policies, speeches, or articles… all of which are re-imbibed by those who generated it.  Below the surface of noble intentions to connect people and data, social media as a construct caters to at least two native flaws in a broken humanity:  prideful narcissism, and communal insecurity.  Pride, in that everyone has a platform on which to publish their opinions regardless of their opinion’s relative value, and insecurity in wanting to be liked and accepted within a group.  The result is an emerging form of selfish tribalism which can tear apart families and long time friends, all over who shared what meme, or who laughed at what post.

 

Lost in this outward fascination with other people’s opinions, is the concept St. Paul writes about in Ephesians 3 regarding the “inner man.”  Philosophers of many stripes had advocated for centuries before St. Paul that people should live an examined life of introspection, refining the mind and building character from the inside out—a point not lost on Hebrew Prophets and Philosophers like David and Solomon, who themselves wrote centuries before thinkers like Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle broadened Greek perspectives.  This inner life, or inner man, was broadly conceived as the seat of reasonable thinking which shared something with a rational universe and a rational creator which could help align a person’s physical actions and feelings with what was objectively true, good, right, and salutary.  Such an approach was intended to lift human beings above the emotions and instincts of mere animals, or the unthinking flora and fauna all around them.  Even among pagan philosophers, an alignment of the inner man with the world around them and their reasonable Creator gave them the best possible attempt at a good life in harmony with Natural Law and the Natural Law Giver.  Like so much of the better thinking in the pagan world, it is not far from the truth St. Paul offers to the Church at Ephesus—it just doesn’t have sufficient power to accomplish what it sets out to do.

 

St. Paul does not throw away the concept of the inner rational man, but shows its fulfilment in Jesus Christ, the Logos of God.  In concert with the ancient Hebrew Prophets who themselves were filled with the Holy Spirit and testified to the coming of Jesus, Paul invites the Christians at Ephesus to be renewed inwardly by the Holy Spirit into the image of Jesus.  Only then can the inner man perceive the length and width and depth of the wisdom of God, being transformed by the love of Jesus into a new creature restored to harmony with God and all creation.  What the pagan philosophers hoped for but could not attain through their own fallen powers of intellect and perception, Jesus accomplished by his life, death, and resurrection, then gave freely to everyone by grace through faith.  The restoration of the inner man, therefore, is not fundamentally a human work but the work of Jesus and His Spirit transforming a fallen person into a child of the Living God.  Such children of God never need fear death, nor evil, nor any calamity that might approach them in this broken world, because the restored life inside them is as eternal as the Creator who has saved them.  Thus the strengthening of the inner man, of the soul and mind of a person, can be aided by human attempts at logic and reason, but is only fulfilled and made truly strong in Jesus Christ.

 

Such a pursuit of inner strength does not preclude interaction with those around us, but it centers us amidst the tumult of raging popular opinion.  Regardless of what someone says or does across the vast backdrop of social media, or what artificially intelligent bots might aggregate into surveys and conglomerate as data sets, or what marketers and political action committees might curate to feed your narcissism and insecurity, your inner man formed and strengthened in Jesus is impervious to the vicissitudes of human corruption.  With a mind and soul enlivened by God’s Living and written Word, empowered by the omnipotence of God the Holy Spirit, and in harmony with God the Father, Creator of Heaven and Earth, pride is swallowed up in grace and insecurity is scattered by love.  No longer does such a mind or soul need to aggrandize one’s self through ceaseless public proclamations, nor does it feed upon public opinion to satiate personal insecurity through tribal affiliations.  Rather, that soul which is born from above by Water and Spirit walks in the eternal life and wisdom of Jesus through every passage of the world, secure in the love and mercy of God.  This is the truly free man who cannot be manipulated by fear or pride, but offers to everyone around them the free gift of saving grace which has promised to set all people free.

 

In a world awash with new technologies which seek to enslave and distract countless people by both pandering to and enflaming our fallen weaknesses to pride and insecurity, there is an eternal and liberating truth which transcends every age of man:  the Man, Jesus Christ.  It is Jesus who restores our inner man, who builds our virtue and character from the inside out; Jesus who takes away our sinful pride and who heals our insecurities by His grace; Jesus who sends to us His Holy Spirit that we might be empowered to victory over every evil and deception; Jesus who expands and enlivens our intellect to perceive the width, and depth, and height of His wonderous grace.  All glory and honor be to Him forever, who is always and everywhere that which is most fully true and right and salutary, and the highest aspiration of every inner man.  Amen.

 

Built Together Upon the Prophets and the Apostles: A Pentecost Meditation on Ephesians 2

For by grace are ye saved through faith;

and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

For we are his workmanship,

created in Christ Jesus unto good works,

which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

 

Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands;

That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:

But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace;

And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:  And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh.

 

For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.

Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners,

but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God;

And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets,

Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;

In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord:

In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.

 

St. Paul, in his address to the Christians in the city of Ephesus, maked a strong appeal to unity between Gentile and Jewish followers of Jesus which is sorely needed in our day.  Not because we have the same specific social dynamics of the ancient church in Ephesus, hybrid together from Jews in the local synagogue with their Hebrew culture and converted pagans with their Greek patrimony, but because the principle which unites pagans and Hebrews is the same principle that unites every person under the sun.  Paul makes the universal claim that everyone is naturally under the burden and judgment of God by virtue of their own fallen nature—not only of their peculiar acts of evil they physically do or have done, but also of the hearts they carry which are constantly inclined toward all sorts of evil they never get around to acting out.  In this common tragedy Hebrews and Gentiles were united, even if many pagans were less aware of the nuance of their situation, having leaned more upon their darkened intellect, traditions, or intuition, than the Word of God.

 

And of course, even though the Hebrews had inherited that Word of God through the Prophets, they were also the ones who persecuted and murdered the Prophets repeatedly throughout their history, often ignoring that Word and inviting calamity upon themselves.  The Hebrews were beloved of God and a special people because of the Covenant which God had made with their forefathers, not because they were any better in nature than the pagan cultures which surrounded them.  It was the Hebrews, after all, who murdered Jesus through intrigue, plots, and deceptions in partnership with the occupying pagan Roman authorities.  The people born of Abraham were of the same fallen nature as those born by patriarchs in other cultures and other lands, because eventually they were all descended of Adam and Eve’s corrupted parentage, inheriting the same darkened hearts and minds which were inclined toward evil.  This is the universal plight of man, and somewhere deep in the recesses of every world culture is a knowledge that everyone stands before their Creator as inferior and corrupted creatures destined for an inescapable judgement and death.  The universal judgement of God upon the fallen human race is death, and deep in every human heart is the knowledge that we are worthy of this condemnation by the twisted nature we find inside ourselves.

 

And so, as a humanity united in our common Fall and judgment, we are in need of a common Savior and a universal grace.  Paul is clear that Jesus came not just to save fallen Jews, but fallen pagans, as well—a message the ancient Prophets declared hundreds of years before Jesus’ Advent.  The fallen Hebrews of antiquity who lived by grace through faith in God’s Word looked forward through history to the day in which God would reconcile the world to Himself through His Messiah, even as many pagan cultures floundered in the darkness of their fallen intellect to find hope in their lives relative to their Creator.  Pagan cultures devised numerous systems of religious ritual and philosophy to explain the corruption within themselves, their destiny to die, and their perception of virtue before God in a Natural Law which they could never fully achieve.  So when Jesus finally came to be the Lamb of God who took away the sins of the whole world, He gave to His Apostles a universal grace and salvation that was for Jew and Gentile alike—for relatively faithful and faithless Hebrews, and for relatively noble or evil minded pagans.  The curse of sin and death was the same for all, as was the promise of salvation made open to all through the Blood of Christ.  Jesus came to save all sinners, no matter where they came from, their parentage, their patrimony, or their culture.

 

This is the faith which is built upon the Word of God handed down by His Prophets and Apostles, of whom Jesus Christ is the Chief Cornerstone.  It is not a system of philosophy, a cultural morality, or a ritualistic practice.  It is not the product of human reason, or of political actors, or of celebrity endorsement.  It is not a fiction of poets modern or ancient, nor a tale told around campfires to keep the shadows at bay.  This Word of God which framed the universe has been with mankind from our beginning, calling us to faith and repentance that we might find life instead of death, grace instead of judgement, reconciliation instead of war, and communion instead of alienation.  This is the Word which comes in the power of His Holy Spirit to create faith in the hearts of those who hear it, to bring forth fruits worthy of repentance, and to begin the transformation of a fallen nature back into harmony with the Divine Nature.  It is not a Word which is contradictory to logic or reason, but a Word which fulfills and surpasses all human attempts to find God on our own—a Word born of the Supreme Rational Being who once gave to mankind a rational nature in His image, which we twisted and marred through our own evil intent, and who in love beyond fathoming reached down to rescue us all from our self-induced depravity that we might be restored to His eternal fellowship.

 

This is how the walls which separate and divide mankind are pulled down, not by the powers of man but by the grace of God.  We are built together not by philosophy or culture or ritual, but by our common salvation in Jesus Christ, declared to the whole world through His Word given to His Prophets and Apostles, empowered by His Spirit to accomplish the task for which it is sent, to the eternal glory of God the Father.  It is a household of faith composed of every tribe and tongue under heaven, of refined intellectuals and roughneck pragmatists, of engineers and farmers, of masters and apprentices, of captains of industry and craftsmen of endless variety.  It is a household composed of young and old, of saints and sinners, all with a common malady and a common salvation.  Here, in this eternal household, we are built together in the Word and Promise of God, where the best of humanity’s thoughts, words, and deeds find their fullness, and the lesser works of mankind are set aside.  Here our Good Shepherd leads His people into green pastures, through the valley of the shadow of death, securely past every evil foe, and into life everlasting in a blessed fellowship with all the saints from the beginning of time, unto time without end.  Glory be to God on high, and peace, good will toward men.  Amen.

 

 

Politicians and the Word of God: A Meditation on Mark 6 for the Season of Pentecost

And they went out,

and preached that men should repent.

And they cast out many devils,

and anointed with oil many that were sick,

 and healed them.

 

And king Herod heard of him;

(for his name was spread abroad:) and he said,

That John the Baptist was risen from the dead,

and therefore mighty works do shew forth themselves in him.

Others said, That it is Elias. And others said,

That it is a prophet, or as one of the prophets.

But when Herod heard thereof, he said,

It is John, whom I beheaded: he is risen from the dead.

 For Herod himself had sent forth and laid hold upon John,

and bound him in prison for Herodias' sake,

his brother Philip's wife: for he had married her.

For John had said unto Herod,

                                       It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife.          

 

The 6^th chapter of St. Mark’s Gospel begins with a description of how Jesus’ preaching among his own kin in his home town was generally disregarded, reflecting the old aphorism that Jesus shared which said that a prophet is not without honor except in his own country.  Next Jesus commissioned his 12 disciples to go out and preach repentance, heal the sick, cast out demons, and to shake the dust off their feet in testimony against anyone who refused to hear them.  And while the disciples worked many wonders in the Name and power of Jesus, they must also have met resistance, too, for Mark includes a parenthetical story about the persecution and death of St. John the Baptist.  John the Baptist was not one of Jesus’ 12 disciples, but the last of the line of Old Testament Prophets who was sent to proclaim the coming of the Messiah, to declare the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.  John told his own disciples to follow Jesus, teaching them that with the coming of the Messiah, the old Prophetic ministry was coming to an end as Jesus was come to fulfill the Law and the Prophets.  John rejoiced as the friend of the Bridegroom, noting that his prophetic influence must decrease as Jesus’ saving Gospel must increase to fill the whole world.  And as Jesus told his own disciples, that of those born of women, none had arisen in the history of the world, who was greater than John the Baptist.

 

But there were similarities in the preaching of John the Baptist, Jesus, and Jesus’ disciples.  They all called for repentance and faith, to return to God by the power of His Word and Spirit.  They condemned sin in every human heart, regardless of the trappings of power and prestige the hearer may have wrapped around themselves, from poor to rich, weak to powerful.  They taught that faith and repentance was the path to reconciliation with God, because only by faith and repentance could the saving grace of forgiveness and life be received.  Trusting in the Word of the Lord, empowered by His Spirit to turn from evil and strive for the good, was the only way to be at peace with God.  This same message rang down through the centuries in every ancient Hebrew Prophet, from Moses and Joshua, to Samuel and David, to Isaiah and Jeremiah, to Amos and Malachi, and every other Prophet in between.  John the Baptist preached it, as did Jesus and His disciples, until Jesus as the very Incarnate Word of God died for the sins of all people so that His grace might pour out upon every faithful and repentant heart in every age of the world.  And just to ensure no one missed the point of Jesus’ fulfillment of the Law and Prophets, He rose from the dead three days after His crucifixion, ascended into heaven, made Apostles of His disciples and sent them in the power of His Word and Spirit to preach repentance and the forgiveness of sins to every tribe and tongue in every corner of the world, in Jesus’ Name alone.  The Church of Jesus Christ has continued this mission until this day, and will continue it until the Last Day, when Jesus returns to consummate all history by His final judgement of the living and the dead.  Ever since the Fall of Adam and Eve, the Word of the Lord has been calling all people to faith and repentance that they might receive forgiveness, life, and salvation from Him by the grace earned only by the shed Blood of Jesus.  The ancient Prophets looked forward to it, and the Apostolic Church looks backward toward it, even as we all look forward to the final removal of all evil from the world at the Last Day.

 

As one might expect, and as history has recorded, there are a lot of people who don’t appreciate a message of faith or repentance.  Many people, particularly those in positions of political power, don’t like being told to stop doing some evil they enjoy.  From evil King Ahab with his despicable Queen Jezebel who hunted the Prophet Elijah in the deserts of Israel after having killed most of the remaining prophets in their land, to King Herod who imprisoned and beheaded John the Baptist for pointing out his adultery, to Jesus who was sentenced to death by the offended Jewish and Roman authorities, to the Apostles who all suffered persecution and most suffered a martyr’s death, to Christian pastors murdered by Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot, or imprisoned in Communist Chinese slave labor camps to this day, those who bear the Word of God often find themselves attacked by politicians, ecclesiastical and secular.  As persecution of the preaching of God’s Word grows in previously Christian western countries, we will continue to see those in positions of power and authority using their resources to persecute God’s messengers.  This isn’t new—it’s been happening since Cain rose up to kill his brother Abel, and according to the Prophets and Apostles who were granted visions of the End of Days, it will get much worse as we approach the Last Day.  But until then, these cycles of peace and persecution, particularly by those in positions of power and authority, will continue just as the wickedness in every human heart continues to wrestle between faith and unbelief.  We might mourn the transition from peace to persecution in our times and places, but it should not shock us, as Jesus Himself told us that we would have trouble in this world even as He has conquered it.

 

But notice the pattern which emerges in the text of Mark 6:  where persecution of the Word increases, the proclamation of the Word increases even more.  With the imprisonment and execution of John the Baptist, came the preaching and discipleship of Jesus Christ.  With the persecution and murder of the Apostles, came the great missionary journeys of St. Paul across the Mediterranean basin, of St. Mark to North Africa, of St. Thomas to India, of the converted Ethiopian Eunuch to East Africa.  Out of the crucible of rising persecution by Roman emperors and local governors, came the emergence of the great Christian Creeds and the beginning of the great Ecumenical Councils.  Out of the persecution of corrupt popes and emperors in the West came the various Reformers, Monastics, and Missionaries who eventually brought the Light of Christ to the Americas, the Pacific Islands, and the Far East.  Everywhere the power of tyrants and bureaucrats have tried to suppress or remove the Word of God by attacking those who proclaim it, God has sent even more messengers with His call to repentance and the forgiveness of sins.  While John’s prison cell with the executioner’s ax falling upon his hallowed neck may have looked dark and conquered by evil, the countryside exploded with the proclamation of Jesus and His disciples, bringing many to new life reconciled with God.  As the sun grew dark during Jesus’ crucifixion, the powers of hell were sent reeling as the Lord of Life took from them the power of death, returning to give His Apostles the Keys of the Kingdom of heaven.  Wherever the blood of Apostles and martyrs were spilled, the Word of the Lord broke forth in the conversion of many hearts and souls.  Even today, the courage and heroic faith of martyrs from Middle Eastern sands to African jungles, from Communist slave camps to Islamic torture cells, from cosmopolitan cities to rural villages, the Word of the Lord is not stopped.  To the contrary, every drop of martyrs’ blood fuels a new explosion of evangelism, and the Lord of Hosts sends even more messengers with His life-giving Word of faith and repentance, grace and salvation, in Jesus Christ alone.

 

It is tempting to despair of the persecutions growing in our day, in lands which used to ring with the freedom to preach the Gospel to every creature, to make disciples of all nations in the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and to teach everyone who will listen all that the Lord Jesus taught us by His Word.  We may rightly lament that so many of our secular and ecclesiastical leaders have not only abandoned the Word of God, but seek to write laws and inspire mobs to attack those who bear that Word today.  Yet our calling has not changed to preach repentance and the forgiveness of sins to all people in Jesus’ Name alone, from home and hearth to the public square.  And whether we see times of peace or persecution, we may remain confident that the Word of the Lord endures forever, that no political force of man or demon can withstand the Lord of Hosts, and that even if our faithfulness to the Word of God costs us our lives or livelihoods, every persecution of the faithful eventually becomes even greater conquest over the kingdom of darkness.  Soli Deo Gloria!  Amen.

 

Strength and Weakness: A Meditation on 2nd Corinthians 12 for the Season of Pentecost

For though I would desire to glory,

I shall not be a fool;

for I will say the truth: but now I forbear,

lest any man should think of me

above that which he seeth me to be,

 or that he heareth of me.

And lest I should be exalted above measure

through the abundance of the revelations,

there was given to me a thorn in the flesh,

the messenger of Satan to buffet me,

lest I should be exalted above measure.

For this thing I besought the Lord thrice,

that it might depart from me.

And he said unto me,

My grace is sufficient for thee:

for my strength is made perfect in weakness.

Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities,

 that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

 Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities,

in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions,

in distresses for Christ's sake:

for when I am weak, then am I strong.

 

The ancient city of Corinth, sitting on the isthmus between northern mainland Greece (home of Thebes and Athens) and the Peloponnesian peninsula (home of the Spartans) had a 1000 year history before St. Paul ever set foot there.  It had gone through wars and alliances, economic rises and falls, cultural explosions, and a couple hundred years before Paul showed up it had been destroyed and rebuilt as a Roman colony.  Given its location, it was blessed with a profusion of trade and the rich international culture that comes with it, together with agricultural, artistic, and military exploits.  It was a Greek and Roman center of culture and politics in the 1^st century AD, and the church which was planted there through the preaching and missionary journeys of St. Paul took on an air of sophistication—perhaps even arrogance.  The people who composed the church at Corinth were, after all, Corinthians, and like most sophisticated, erudite, and wealthy societies, they seemed to think themselves intellectually and politically above most everyone else.

 

And why wouldn’t they?  They were strong in every worldly measure.  They had plenty of food to eat, theater to watch, philosophy to imbibe, political clout both locally and throughout the Empire, and a roaring economy.  They had their battle scars, and were still a major international player.  Of course, in their opulence, they also had a number of sins and debaucheries to which they were accustomed, but being as enlightened as they were, they couldn’t believe these things were really all that important.  Why would God really care about who slept with who, with adultery, incest, homosexuality, prostitution, public displays of pornography, and the consequent waves of abortion or infanticide that came with all those inconvenient children born of their parents’ self-indulgent play?  Obviously, the city of Corinth was a successful metropolis, and their strength was a sign of their superiority over any backward religious teachings that stood in the way of their enlightened progress.  The letters of St. Paul to Corinth seem to reveal this prideful spirit within the cosmopolitan church, which were echoes of the sentiment commonly held among the people of the city.  This is likely why St. Paul had to finish his second letter to them by resisting appeals to pride, position, or earthly power, relying solely on the power of God’s Word and Holy Spirit to convict them of the truth.

 

And the truth was then as it currently is, and as it has always been:  the Word of the Lord endures forever, as do those who abide with Him by grace through faith in His living and eternal Word.  Kingdoms of the world large and small rise and fall across the expanses of time, together with their opulence, and all the trappings of their cultures which made them believe they were somehow superior to the Lord of Hosts.  Today, the ruins of ancient Corinth contain the shattered remains of their economic, political, artistic, and religious affairs, including several Christian basilicas.  Is it so hard to imagine what the great modern cities of New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle will look like a thousand years from now?  Cities known for their opulence, cultural superiority, economic advantage, political clout, and their general disdain for the Word of God upon their public morals, have much to learn from the example of ancient Corinth—as do the churches within and allied to them, who have drunk more deeply from those poisoned wells of popular opinion than they have from the living waters of the Holy Scriptures.  Should the Lord tarry another thousand years, how shall the archeologists of future generations behold the shattered remains of such once great cities, entombed as ancient Corinth with the wreckage of their cathedrals, missions, and churches which fell through their common embrace of what seemed so reasonable in their times?

 

Yet it is the common curse of every generation see themselves as the pinnacle of progress, and the height of human history.  To us, in our times and places, in our cities great or small, the Word of the Lord through St. Paul reminds us that the Lord’s strength is made perfect in weakness—that His measure of what is worthy of eternal endurance is not the dark machinations of prideful men, but the harmony of faith and repentance in His grace for Jesus’ sake.  The Words of ancient Prophets and Apostles, who have testified across millennia to the will and work of the Lord God Almighty in this world, may seem like the smallest and weakest of things when compared with the mighty words and works of modern titans of industry, politics, or academe.  But it is this Word which brought forth the world, which has sustained it to our day, and shall bring it to its close.  It is this Word which reveals to us who we are, where we came from, and where we are going—of the unseen heavenly or infernal company we keep, depending on the present company we keep either in the Communion of the Saints or in the nefarious cabals of the world.  It is a Word which not only declares to us the futility of our vacuous pride, but heals us through forgiveness and grace unto eternal life.  It is a Word which has already passed from life, to death, to life which never dies again, so that all those who trust in that Living Word shall do the same.  It is a Word which does not build mansions and reputations and glories in this transitory world, but walks on streets of gold in the Kingdom which never ends.

 

This simple Word of Law and Gospel in Jesus Christ is the sure hope of the faithful in every age and place, no matter the convulsions of the world all around it.  Like St. Paul we might pray for the thorns in our flesh and in our societies to be taken from us, but to us also the Lord declares that His grace is sufficient for us.  For if we could but see the eternity which stretches out before us, the trials and tribulations of our short years of sojourn in this world would fall away into insignificance, together with the corrupt trappings and accolades of tempestuous mankind.  For we stand today in the Eternal Kingdom of the King of Glory by grace through faith in Christ alone, with the future mystery of the resurrection made present to us in the waters of our Baptism, the Holy Supper which we share, and the Absolution which we speak in Christ’s Name to one another.  These are the weak things which the Creator of the Universe has established to show forth His redemptive power, and we are the even weaker things in which He works the perfection of His saving omnipotence.  Gory be to our Saving King forever, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, one God, now and unto ages of ages.  Amen.