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Series B – Nineteenth Sunday of Pentecost – Sunday, October 3, 2021 | Pr. Chris Rosebrough

Welcome to the Teaching Ministry of Kongsvinger Lutheran Church. Kongsvinger is a beacon for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of Northwestern Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone, and now, here’s a message from Pastor Chris Rosebrough:

Time Stamp	Transcript
0:28	the holy gospel according to saint mark the 10th chapter [Music]
0:38	the pharisees came up in order to test Jesus and asked is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife and he answered them
0:46	what did moses command you they said well moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her
0:51	away and Jesus said to them because of your hardness of heart he wrote this commandment but from the beginning of
0:58	creation god created the male and female therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife
1:04	and they shall become one flesh so they are no longer two but one flesh what therefore god has joined together let
1:10	not man separate and in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter and he said to
1:15	them whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her and if she divorces her husband and
1:21	marries another she commits adultery and they were bringing children to him that he might touch them and the disciples
1:28	rebuked them but when Jesus saw it he was indignant and said to them let the children come to me do not hinder them
1:35	for to such belong the kingdom of god truly i say to you whoever does not receive the kingdom of god like a child
1:42	shall not enter it and he took them in his arms and blessed them laying his hands on them this is the gospel of the
1:48	lord in the name of Jesus here again these words from our epistle text taken from hebrews chapter 2
1:56	how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation neglect
2:02	i know a few things about neglect now i’ve bragged here from the pulpit that i am the most gifted weed farmer in all of
2:09	north dakota i i’ve got to tell you i’ve got quite a crop this year right i don’t
2:14	know i mean i’m surprised that people aren’t stopping and going how do you do it
2:19	what is your secret well let me tell you what the secret is the secret is neglect
2:26	let me explain okay because not having a crop of weeds you’ll note
2:31	that everybody gets those automatically thank you curse right okay we all get a crop of weeds but in order to not get a
2:38	crop of weeds you know what you got to do you got to put effort into it that means you’re going to have to get out
2:44	there and you’re going to have to whack the weeds you’re going to have to spray the weeds you’re going to have to pull the weeds you’re going to have to
2:50	maintain the status quo and you know what i hate doing that
2:57	right and i load the idea of paying somebody else to do it i think i’m getting to the point where i’m thinking
3:02	you know what i just need to bite the bullet and pay somebody to do this do i have an amen i have a name amen
3:10	right now as far as neglect goes to we all know how neglect goes i don’t know what it is i’ve said before that
3:17	if you were to like take my body and cut it in half this way like a log right you can count the rings of fat going back in
3:23	years to when i was married right and what’s really funny is is that this is all because of what
3:31	all right nobody looks at me and goes you know that pastor roseboro he really just exemplifies planet fitness
3:39	no he doesn’t exemplify planet fitness he exemplifies planet cellulite right
3:46	and there’s a reason for this it’s called neglect because you know what i hate doing i hate going to the gym i
3:52	hate getting on a treadmill i hate having to burn calories i hate it i loathe it and yet
3:59	neglect leads to well problems and what’s really funny there was a joke running around the internet
4:05	i think it may have been on tick tock talking about how it is that men after they are well they are married they kind
4:12	of blow it out a little bit and what was really funny the way the joke goes it has everything to do with women being
4:18	territorial okay because you think about it when you first met your husband i mean he had six
4:24	pack abs he had a 28 inch waist he had huge biceps and then
4:30	what happened right well it’s real simple the wife said to herself you know what i gotta keep this guy now that he’s
4:36	off the market i don’t want him shopping around so what i’m gonna do is i’m just gonna keep feeding him
4:41	and therefore i’m gonna basically claim my he’s my territory right that’s a great narrative but it’s not
4:47	true it’s not true at least not in my case i mean yeah my wife she makes decent meals
4:52	she doesn’t over feed me at all it’s all about neglect
4:58	now when we hear the third commandment in our catechism third commandment is
5:03	thou shalt let’s see you remember the sabbath day to keep it holy right what does this mean that we should fear and love god so
5:10	that we do not despise preaching in his word but gladly hear and learn it you see
5:17	that third commandment is all about not having neglect for the word and it’s in the word that we hear the wonderful good
5:25	news of the forgiveness of our sins one by Christ but have you noticed that as the temperature has gotten a little
5:31	cooler maybe it’s just me maybe it’s just me that you know one of my favorite times
5:36	of the year it’s like right now because in the morning while it’s still dark because we haven’t switched over to that
5:42	time thing again right it’s still dark outside and in my room it is like 50
5:49	degrees too cold to get out but i’m in a warm little cocoon that i’ve created
5:55	right and the thing i don’t want to do in the morning is get cold okay so i just want to sit there in my warm little
6:02	spot and then it’s sunday you sit there and go do i really want to go to my church
6:08	right now in my case i don’t have a choice i get paid to go here so you all don’t get paid to come
6:14	but but you get the idea we all have these temptations and before i was a pastor there was always that temptation
6:19	it’s like oh couldn’t i just sleep in but see the thing is is that yeah that’s a breaking of that third commandment
6:25	remember the sabbath day we should fear and love god so that we do not despise preaching in his word but we gladly hear
6:32	and learn it but we all can point to the fact that we’re not always all that keen
6:38	on hearing god’s word sometimes that bible collects dust sometimes well
6:44	church attendance can be a little spotty but i’m going to point something out here and that is is that when we
6:50	consider this sin of ours i’m guilty of it too we must pay attention to how the bible
6:57	addresses it if i were to say you know what it’s just absolutely rotten of you that you do not want to hear god’s word
7:04	how dare you what you better get your act together and you better be more intentional about not neglecting god’s
7:10	word what’s the problem with this well i’ve rightly pointed out the problem with the law
7:16	and i’ve made the solution the law that ain’t going to work
7:23	so what we’re going to do today we’re going to back up a little bit in the context and i want to show something
7:29	to you from the book of hebrews because you’ll note that our epistle text begins with the word
7:34	therefore which means we’re kind of like mid-thought all right and i want you to see what’s going on here the book of
7:40	hebrews was written to well people who grew up in judaism at the time of Christ or immediately after
7:48	they grew up in judaism and they had all the smells and bells of the mosaic covenant and now that Christ has come
7:54	he’s fulfilled the mosaic covenant he’s fulfilled the law he’s died he’s risen again ascended into heaven and the types
8:02	and shadows of the old testament have given away to the real substance which is Christ
8:07	and there were people in that first generation coming out of judaism who legitimately were struggling with the
8:13	change and thinking you know maybe we should go back to judaism this Christianity is
8:19	weird right it’s it’s not what we’re used to we didn’t grow up with this and so the
8:25	divine author and we don’t know who the author of hebrews is the divine author
8:30	does something very important and that is rather than brow beating for them for
8:36	thinking even anything along those lines instead he does what we are supposed to
8:42	do we he preaches the gospel he does law and gospel beautifully and the solution
8:48	is reminding them of the great salvation that they have think of it this way when
8:53	i was growing up in evangelicalism in the nazarene church there was a notorious group of people people that
9:00	you kind of wanted to avoid and they were called pks you know what a pk is
9:06	preacher’s kid right all right preachers kids they were hellions man okay nothing
9:12	godly about them and it was it’s still a phenomenon to this day and there’s a
9:17	reason for it there’s a reason for it and that is is that in much of evangelicalism what do you hear law
9:24	with more law with a side of law with with law gravy and more law
9:31	okay you don’t ever hear law and gospel and as a result of it you know it’s just nuts and so
9:38	preachers kids they grow up hearing dad from the pulpit or the stage saying you need to be more intentional about doing
9:45	the will of the lord and so they’ll give you a list every single week on how you
9:50	can become more holy but here’s the issue the pks go home with pastor all
9:55	right and the pks who go home with pastor they get to see pastor be grumpy
10:01	they get to see pastor upset because the vikings lost again they get to see which by the way i don’t know why you would
10:07	get upset about that that’s just like a normal thing isn’t it okay
10:12	they get to see pastor being upset because his coffee’s too cold or he’s in
10:18	a bad mood or he gets to see mom and dad fight and then he gets to see mom and grandma fight and then he gets to see
10:24	dad get in a fight with the neighbors and he gets to see dad being short with the kids and what happens is that the pk
10:31	figures it out dad preaches the law but he don’t keep it
10:37	Christianity’s bogus it’s the same conclusion if you think
10:42	about it because the law has no power to make you obey it so here we’ve got a presenting issue contempt for salvation
10:50	contempt for the gospel contempt for the word of god do you think me brow beating you is going to make you go well right
10:57	okay i’ll pay more attention to it no and even if you said that give it two
11:03	days you’re not interested so what the author of hebrews does
11:09	rather than browbeat them with the law he placards Christ and he shows how amazing and wonderful
11:17	beautiful gracious he is and one of the it’s actually one of the most beautiful sections of all of
11:24	scripture as it relates to Jesus so backing up in our context hebrews 1 says this long ago and many times in many
11:31	ways god spoke to our fathers by the prophets so he’s talking to these jews oh yes he spoke to our fathers by the
11:38	prophets but in these last days god has spoken to us by his son
11:43	whom he appointed the heir of all things through whom also he created the world
11:48	he is the radiance of the glory of god the exact imprint of his nature and he
11:53	upholds the universe by the power of his word and after making purifications for
11:59	sins he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high did you catch that
12:05	not only is he telling us how amazing Jesus is who he really is god in human
12:10	flesh that we have been graced in these last days of not of god not speaking to us through an intermediary through a
12:17	prophet but speaking to us directly to the son of god and then he can’t even get three sentences in
12:24	without saying oh and by the way he bled and died for you right
12:29	after making purification for sins oh man we all know how sin makes us impure unholy mucked up
12:39	might as well be rolling around in the mud right but Christ bleeding and dying for our sins purifies us before god
12:46	purifies our hearts purifies our consciences ah this is a different way of
12:52	approaching things altogether after making purifications for sins he sat down at the right hand of the majesty
12:58	having become as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs
13:05	this is where it gets really interesting he’s going to remind them who Jesus is and there were heresies
13:12	already running around the Christian church basically denying that Jesus is god in human flesh i mean that’s too
13:19	crazy to think about but what the divine author here does is he compares Jesus to angels is Jesus an angel
13:26	no but you’ll note that for a while Christ in the incarnation
13:33	humbled himself and became lower than the angels that’s part of the scandal of this thing so he does some great
13:39	Christology here for to which of the angels did god ever say you are my son today i have begotten you
13:47	answer none or again i will be to him a father he shall be to me a son
13:54	again none of the angels god has spoken this way to and again he brings the firstborn into the world
14:01	and note here this is a fascinating text the father bringing forth Christ he
14:06	brings him into the world and he says let all god’s angels worship him
14:12	now consider completely how weird and out of place this is if Christ isn’t god
14:18	all right because what is the first commandment you will have no other gods
14:23	when tempted in the wilderness by the devil and the devil said i’m going to give you all of the kingdoms of the earth if you’ll just bow down and
14:29	worship me Christ fires back with deuteronomy it is written you shall worship the lord your god and him only shall you serve and
14:37	then you have that awkward moment in the book of revelation where the apostle john who’s
14:42	he has a sherpa in heaven who’s kind of guiding him and walking him around showing him different things and that
14:47	sherpa is an angel and at one point the apostle john gets down on his face to
14:52	worship the angel and the angel says you mustn’t do that i’m a servant just like you
15:00	and here it says the father says to all of the angels of heaven
15:05	worship Jesus if Jesus isn’t god then
15:12	god’s lost his mind and what is the implication he is
15:17	exactly that of the angels though he says he makes his angels winds his is a flame
15:25	of fire but of the son of the son he says your throne o god is forever and
15:32	ever wait what the father says that Jesus is god you betcha
15:39	right your throne oh god is forever and ever the scepter of uprightness is the
15:44	scepter of your kingdom you have loved righteousness you have hated wickedness therefore god your god has anointed you
15:51	with the oil of gladness beyond your compassion companions and
15:56	you lord laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning and the heavens are the work of your hands they will
16:03	perish but you will remain they will all wear out like a garment like a robe you will roll them up like a garment
16:10	they will be changed but you are the same and your years have no end and to which of the angels has he
16:17	ever said sit at my right hand until i make your enemies a footstool for your feet are they not all ministering
16:23	spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are watch the words
16:29	to inherit salvation
16:34	are you guys feeling brow beaten right now not even close right right the solution is Christ and what he’s
16:41	done and oh man this author of hebrews has just poured it out
16:48	poured it out in such degrees that it’s hard to take in and yet how can your
16:53	eyes took to look away from what it is that you’re seeing how can your ears turn away to something else in this in
17:00	hearing just how great it is and then listen to those words the angels are sent to serve those who
17:08	are to inherit salvation that’s you that’s me
17:14	this is glorious it’s almost beyond comprehension and now we get to our epistle text
17:20	therefore he said oh okay in light of how amazing Jesus is how
17:26	even the angels of god who are in dialogue with the father who worship Jesus they’re now ministering
17:32	spirits to you you who are inheriting salvation therefore oh we must pay closer
17:38	attention to what we’ve heard lest we drift away from it i always love that line from hook
17:44	neverland makes you forget right keep that in mind the world we live in
17:49	you know we’ve got the unholy trinity always working against that faith of ours the devil the world our own sinful
17:56	flesh neverland makes you forget and that’s the point the divine author here knows
18:02	this and so what does he do he starts preaching Christ again
18:09	for since the message declared by angels proved to be reliable and listen to these next words
18:15	every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution and this is the thing that we all know
18:20	that we deserve right on the day of judgment if god were to say to all of us
18:26	forget it off to hell with you right just as just right that’s just none of
18:31	us would say to be able to say that’s not fair no that is fair that’s exactly
18:37	what we deserve you see every transgression and disobedience should receive a just retribution but there’s
18:43	where the gospel comes in and rescues us yet again Christ bleeds and dies for
18:49	every just retribution you have earned because of your sin
18:56	how then shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation
19:02	the answer is we can’t we won’t there is salvation only in Christ
19:08	it was declared at first by the lord it was attested to us by those who heard while god also bore witness by signs and
19:16	wonders of various miracles by gifts of the holy spirit distributed according to his will now a little bit of a note here
19:22	this is an aside so you’ll put a little asterisk here in your mind that in the charismatic pentecostal nar
19:30	movements right always and again there’s this big emphasis you need to be performing signs and wonders why because
19:36	it’s only by demonstrations of god’s power that people are going to believe the gospel that they’re going to believe
19:43	in Jesus as if somehow the reason why people don’t believe in god is because they haven’t seen a miracle hog wash
19:50	right what does abraham say they have moses and the prophets let them hear them right no no no no the rich man says
19:57	from hell no no no if somebody rises from the dead and abraham says listen they won’t even listen if they won’t
20:02	listen to moses and you know moses and the prophets it’s not going to matter if somebody rises from the dead right
20:09	but you’ll note that in the pentecostal movement it’s always like hokey
20:15	stupid false signs and wonders oh i feel the lord right now is giving me a download and he’s going to give me he’s
20:20	going to give you all an anointing those of you who are suffering from blood ailments right now the lord has healed that right now and you know and it’s
20:26	always stuff you can’t see right okay or something silly like they go and they say oh well you got one leg that’s
20:32	longer than another here the holy spirit’s like pulling that one out it’s just they’re just pulling your leg
20:38	okay sorry pastor joke okay they’re just pulling your leg
20:44	but you’re gonna note this real signs and wonders occurred in the
20:50	scriptures and they always confirm the message of the bible the gospel itself was attested
20:58	to by none other than the greatest sign and wonder of all time Jesus walked out of the tomb on the
21:04	third day after he was crucified nobody has even come close to replicating anything
21:10	even approaching that and so there are real signs and wonders in the scripture and i would point you to them
21:17	notably the resurrection of Christ and then we also know that god the holy spirit in his church has given gifts to
21:25	various people i always like to point out that dwayne cleven has the gift of excel spreadsheets it’s it’s a valid
21:31	gift from god maybe from the devil but mostly from god right right
21:37	so that’s the gift of administration pastors have the gift of teaching people also have hospitality and faith and
21:45	generosity these are all gifts given by god for the purpose of building up the body of Christ he still gives them to
21:51	this day aside finished so we continue for it was not to angels that god subjected the
21:57	world to come of which we are speaking that’s important note he’s making reference to what’s coming Jesus says
22:03	i’m making all things new new heavens new earth coming coming new jerusalem and you know who’s going to be running
22:09	the place not the angels nope
22:15	Christ and we will reign with him
22:20	that’s what the scripture says we will reign with him it was not to angels that god subjected the world to
22:26	come of which we are speaking it has been testified somewhere what is man that you are mindful of him or the son
22:32	of man that you care for him you made him for a little while lower than the angels
22:37	now we’re talking about Christ but note this important thing what is man that you are mindful of him
22:44	i mean when you think about it we’re all just a screwed up messed up mortal lot
22:50	you know our lives are mean they’re short they’re filled with all kinds of suffering we don’t get along well with
22:57	each other if you don’t believe me just look at twitter or politics right
23:03	or come to church sometimes right you get the idea right and why on
23:08	earth would god pay any attention to us but that’s the thing god has honored humanity
23:16	by taking on human flesh and it’s pointing here to Christ what is man that you’re mindful of him or the
23:22	son of man that you even care for him you made him for a little while lower than the angels you’ve crowned him with glory and honor putting everything in
23:29	subjection under his feet now in putting everything in subjection to him he left nothing outside of his control and at
23:36	present we do not yet see everything in subjection to him but we see him who for a little while was made lower than the
23:42	angels namely Jesus crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering
23:47	of death so that by the grace of god he might taste death for everyone
23:55	these are amazing words and again just in the
24:00	chapter and a half that we’ve read how many times has this author pointed us back to the sufferings of Christ now by
24:06	the way i know a thing or two about tasting i like food okay you all know what i’m talking about yeah
24:11	you ever go to a good restaurant or maybe you’ve cooked something up it’s like your favorite meal that first bite
24:19	right you can feel the tension leaving the room and the savory goodness is just
24:24	overwhelming all of your senses we love a good taste right but you know there’s nothing worse than eating something
24:29	that’s gross right you know there’s there’s a legendary story told in my wife’s family
24:36	my wife tells the story about one time that her mother made spinach souffle and
24:41	it didn’t turn out so hot okay and after one bite my wife realized she’s not gonna want to eat this and so she tried
24:47	to find a way to surreptitiously make it look like she had eaten it without having eaten it her her idea was
24:54	sneak it and give it to the dog right that’s how bad it tasted
25:02	but here’s the problem that particular spinach souffle turned out so terribly
25:07	that when she gave a bite to the dog the dog gagged
25:18	and she was found out right
25:24	now i imagine that death tastes far worse than a burnt spinach souffle that
25:29	even the dogs don’t like but you’re going to note this that Christ in his great mercy he’s not
25:35	only suffered death in your place he’s suffered death so that by the grace of god you would never ever know what death
25:43	even tastes like you will never even have to take a spoonful of it
25:49	that is what that’s some good gospel right there and one that we can all understand
25:55	because i don’t want to taste death i don’t want to taste it at all Jesus says i am the resurrection and the life
26:01	anyone who believes in me even though he die yet shall he live and anyone who believes in me he will never taste
26:08	death all because of great gracious merciful Jesus who rather than giving us what we
26:13	deserve rather than sitting there and saying you sit there and you eat up all of that death you’re not getting up from
26:20	the table until you’re done says no i will never let you have that i will eat it for you
26:25	beautiful picture so that it was fitting then that he for whom and by whom all things exist in
26:32	bringing many sons to glory should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering and that’s exactly
26:38	right Christ is made perfect through suffering and note then he has also called us to suffer with him to suffer
26:45	persecution for his name to note then that we too also god uses
26:50	our sufferings for the purpose of sanctifying us bringing us to the end of ourselves so that we
26:56	have only to trust in him for he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source that is
27:02	why he’s not ashamed to call them brothers saying i will tell of your name my brothers in the midst of the
27:08	congregation i will sing your praise now a little not note here great gospel pick that
27:14	that i think is in here he’s not ashamed to call them brothers now in our comedy
27:20	you know in our comedy on netflix or on television television shows always and again there’s a theme you know a theme
27:26	like somebody says what’s wrong with your brother he’s adopted
27:33	okay that’s always how this goes right oh that explains everything i see why there’s the big disconnect because he’s
27:38	adopted but you’re going to know Jesus doesn’t do that at all Jesus doesn’t sit there and go all right yeah you’re my
27:44	brother but you’re adopted nothing like that at all instead
27:51	Jesus is not ashamed to call us all brothers and sisters
27:57	never even mentioning the fact that we were born to a different father born to the devil embracing us as true brothers
28:03	as blood brothers in fact we are that you know why because of the blood of Christ
28:09	because of the blood of Christ so that is why he’s not ashamed to call them brothers saying i will tell of your
28:14	name to my brothers in the midst of the congregation i will sing your praise and again i will put my trust in him and
28:20	again behold i and all the children that god has given me
28:25	so let me ask you after hearing all of these amazing things about Christ
28:33	the magnitude of his grace all of the things that he’s done for us
28:38	all of the beautiful pictures of his love his mercy his salvation the fact that he’s given us salvation doesn’t
28:44	give us what we deserve made sure that we would never have to taste death that he calls us his brothers that he is the
28:50	one who has purified us how could we neglect
28:56	so great of salvation doesn’t even seem right
29:01	so let us repent let us repent of neglecting god’s word and neglecting the salvation
29:07	and receive so freely the forgiveness of even that sin and let us bear fruit in keeping with
29:13	repentance and gladly hear and learn about Jesus in the name of Jesus amen

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