St. Matthew Lutheran Church

Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 9, 2022

“But the Word of God Is Not Bound!” (2 Timothy 2:1-13)

Do you ever feel constrained or held back, like you’re the prisoner of things that are too powerful for you to overcome? Maybe it’s age. You feel the advancing years taking their toll on you. Maybe it’s sickness. You get over one thing, and then it’s something else. More pills, more trips to the doctor. You feel like a prisoner in your own body. Or maybe it’s a guilty conscience weighing you down. You sense your own failings. Your past sins keep on dogging you. Then there’s the approach of death. We don’t know when that will come, regardless of our age. It’s like how Scrooge saw Marley’s ghost, shackled with chains, rattling and haunting him in the night. The inevitability of death can haunt us like that. All these things–the sadnesses and sorrows of life; the lack of connectedness with people we know we ought to be closer to; the sense of alienation from God, tucked in the back of our head–all these things are like chains wrapped around us, holding us back, weighing us down, binding us up.

“But the Word of God Is Not Bound!” And it is through this word that God frees you from your chains and makes you alive in his love. Today I want you to hear this freeing word that God has for you. And you can hear it in all of our Scripture readings today.

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Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 2, 2022

“Timothy and the Women Who Raised Him in the Faith” (2 Timothy 1:1-14)

In today’s Epistle, Paul writes to Timothy to encourage him in his faith. Paul also reminds Timothy of the ladies who passed on the faith to him. Their names were Lois and Eunice. One was Timothy’s mother; the other, Timothy’s grandmother. Let’s see, now which one was which? Here’s the way I have of keeping them straight: “Lois” sounds like “oldest,” so she was the grandma. “Eunice” sounds like “youngest,” so she was Timothy’s mom. So now let’s hear more about “Timothy and the Women Who Raised Him in the Faith.” Let’s hear what that faith is, and what it means for us today.

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Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 20, 2019

“Sound Doctrine or Itching Ears?” (2 Timothy 3:14 – 4:5)

Our text this morning is the Epistle reading from 2 Timothy. In his two letters to his young assistant Timothy, St. Paul emphasizes, over and over again, the importance of teaching in accord with sound doctrine. For instance, Paul instructs Timothy to “follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me” and to “guard the good deposit entrusted to you.” Likewise, today he says to “continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed.”

Paul puts a high priority on sound doctrine. It is in that vein, then, that he gives Timothy this solemn charge: “I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.”

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Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 6, 2019

“Encouragement for St. Timidity” (2 Timothy 1:1-14)

Fear, or timidity, can paralyze a person and render him ineffective. This is true when it comes to our life as Christians. We live in a hostile world. We’re in enemy territory. The world is not friendly to the Christian faith. Where will we find the courage we need to be faithful Christians? Faithful Christians are those not ashamed of the gospel, nor afraid of suffering for it. Not ashamed, not afraid. The alternative is that we turn into tame and timid “people-pleasers.” St. Paul addresses this issue when he writes to Timothy in our Epistle reading. And the question comes to us also: Will you be a faithful St. Timothy or a fearful “St. Timidity”?

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Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost
October 16, 2016

“Continue in the Sacred Writings” (2 Timothy 3:14 – 4:5)

In our Epistle reading today, St. Paul commends Timothy–and I would commend all of us–to the word of God. More specifically, I commend you to the continued study of Scripture, to a firm faith in the word of God, and to the living out of the Bible’s teachings in the form of a righteous life. And so our theme this morning, “Continue in the Sacred Writings.”

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Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost
October 9, 2016

“Remember Jesus Christ” (2 Timothy 2:1-13)

Do you ever get a little worried or fearful about what you might have to go through in order to live out your calling as a Christian? I mean, that your being a Christian and living for Christ will cause you to suffer in some way? Does that ever weigh on your mind? If so, you’re in good company. Because that seems to have been a problem for St. Timothy in the New Testament. Timothy apparently had a problem with timidity, with fearfulness, over what might happen to him because of his calling to serve the Lord. But in our Epistle for today, Timothy’s mentor, the apostle Paul, writes to him and encourages Timothy to “be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus.” How that strengthening takes place, for Timothy and for you, is the subject for our sermon today, under the theme, “Remember Jesus Christ.”

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