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INJ
Psalm 25:17-18
'Troubled, Distressed, Afflicted and in Pain'
Divine Service
Reminiscere | March 4th, 2007
Dear Saints,
The troubles of my heart have enlarged;
Bring me out of my distresses!
Look on my affliction and my pain,
and forgive all my sins. [Psalm 25:17-18]
That is the prayer that we all just prayed together in the Gradual, Psalm 25:17-18. Do you think, dear saints, that David was smiling when he prayed that prayer, that he was filled with glee?
There is a wrong and wicked caricature of the Lord's church these days, that it's only a happy, smiley place for only happy smiley people where you can go to escape from trouble and hardship. Church is like some sort of spiritual Botox, a facade factory where sorrow scampers away like bunnies scared out of the bushes, like this is a miniature Disney Land with shorter lines and slightly less exciting shows. “The Happiest Place on Earth.”
But does this sound like a prayer from the happiest place on earth:
The troubles of my heart have enlarged;
Bring me out of my distresses!
Look on my affliction and my pain...
Troubled, distressed, afflicted, in pain, and if we look back a verse we can include desolate. That's how the Lord's Christians are, that's how life is in this fallen world with the devil as our neighbor and the sinful flesh hanging around our neck.
Now in this life things aren't always terrible, but this is the point, they are not always great either, and we need to be honest about this. You do not have to smile when you come into church. You do not have to answer “Great” or “Good” whenever someone here asks you how you are doing. You do not have to pretend, before God, and before your brothers and sisters sitting next to you, that everything is fantastic. It's not, or if it is, it won't be for long.
Now I'm not trying to induce you to whine or complain, but simply to be honest. There is no pretending in the Lord's church, before His altar. We live in a world full of death, full of sadness, full of tears, full of temptation, full of trouble, full of sin. Our lives are full of the same. “In this world you will have trouble.” [St John 16:33] That's what Jesus promises to His disciples, and so if you say that you don't have trouble you are calling Jesus a liar.
This is the desperate and difficult honesty that the Lord's Law is drawing out of us, the confession that we are sinners, that we're in trouble, that we need help. In all of our sorrows and tribulations the Lord is teaching us to pray and to trust in Him for our deliverance, to look to Him for all good and help in our time of need.
Are you sad, sick, lonely, guilty, troubled, anxious, are you going to die this year, or will a loved one die, are you mourning, are you paying attention, are you addicted, are you suffering, are you hurt? You're not the only one, so was King David, and he knew why.
King David, troubled, afflicted, distressed, and in pain King David gets to the root of our problem and our pain when he prays, “And forgive all my sins.” Look at the person next to you, they are a sinner. Look at me, I'm a sinner. Look at yourself, you are a sinner. And the only answer for you, the only help possible is if, somehow, some way, our sins can be forgiven. Else all there is for us in the dark flames of hell.
Three times in Psalm 25 David is begging the Lord for forgiveness:
7Do not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions.
11For Your name's sake, O Lord, Pardon my iniquity, for it is great.
18Forgive all my sins.
And this, dear saints, is what the Lord's church is about, this is the hall of forgiveness, the altar of mercy, the font of grace, the pulpit of the Gospel, the absolution, the promise of the forgiveness of all sin for Christ's sake. This church stands, by the grace of God, to give out that grace and mercy and forgiveness.
[54] We further believe that in this Christian Church we have forgiveness of sin, which is wrought through the holy Sacraments and Absolution, moreover, through all manner of consolatory promises of the entire Gospel. Therefore, whatever is to be preached concerning the Sacraments belongs here, and, in short, the whole Gospel and all the offices of Christianity, which also must be preached and taught without ceasing. For although the grace of God is secured through Christ, and sanctification is wrought by the Holy Ghost through the Word of God in the unity of the Christian Church, yet on account of our flesh which we bear about with us we are never without sin.
[55] Everything, therefore, in the Christian Church is ordered to the end that we shall daily obtain there nothing but the forgiveness of sin through the Word and signs, to comfort and encourage our consciences as long as we live here. Thus, although we have sins, the [grace of the] Holy Ghost does not allow them to injure us, because we are in the Christian Church, where there is nothing but [continuous, uninterrupted] forgiveness of sin, both in that God forgives us, and in that we forgive, bear with, and help each other.
Martin Luther, The Large Catechism, II.54,55
“There is nothing in the church,” did you hear that? “Nothing but the continuous, uninterrupted forgiveness of sin.”
So the Lord Jesus gathers us here, not to entertain us, not to take away our troubles, not to make us rich and happy, not so that we can act as if we've attained such a high level of holiness that we don't have any difficulties, Jesus has put us here this morning so that He could forgive us all of our sins, so that He could feed us with the crumbs that fall from His table of grace. That's what He died for, the reason He suffered, the purpose behind His becoming a man, taking on our flesh and blood, so that He could win for us forgiveness.
That forgiveness He has given you, and He will continue to give to you until your last breath. Jesus never tires of forgiving our sin and washing away our iniquity. He never gets bored with speaking the absolution. He never despises our prayers, but it always glad to hear and answer them.
The troubles of my heart have enlarged;
Bring me out of my distresses!
Look on my affliction and my pain,
and forgive all my sins.
Dear saints, hear the Lord's answer to your prayer: As a called and ordained servant of the Word, I announce the grace of God to all of you, and in the stead and by the command of my Lord Jesus Christ, I forgive you all your sins, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Amen.
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Pastor Bryan Wolfmueller
Hope Lutheran Church | Aurora, CO