Readings

• Proverbs 25:6–14
• Ephesians 4:1–6
• Luke 14:1–11

Hymns

• 784  Take My Life and Let It Be
• 557  Seek Where You May to Find a Way
• 618  I Come, O Savior, to Thy Table
• 813  Rejoice, O Pilgrim Throng

Whoever Humbles Himself Will Be Exalted

“Do not put yourself forward in the king’s presence” (Prov. 25:6–14). Rather, take the lowest position at the table. Humble yourself before Him. For your place is not for you to take but for Him to give. Conduct yourself with all lowliness and gentleness, bearing with one another in love (Eph. 4:1–6), that the King may give you glory in the presence of those at the table with you. “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 14:1–11). Is this not the way of Christ? He is the one who took the lowest place, who humbled Himself even to the point of death for us. He is now exalted to the highest place at the right hand of the Father that penitent believers may be exalted together with Him in the resurrection. To the humble at His Supper He says, “Friend, move up higher,” giving you His very body and blood for your forgiveness that you may ascend to take part in the great wedding feast which has no end.

16th Sunday after Trinity

Readings

• 1 Kings 17:17–24
• Ephesians 3:13–21
• Luke 7:11–17

Hymns

• 697   Awake, O Sleeper, Rise from Death
• 758   The Will of God Is Always Best
• 461   I Know That My Redeemer Lives
• 763   When Peace, like a River

Jesus Calls forth Life from Death

A large funeral procession carrying the only son of a widow is confronted by another large procession, Jesus and His followers. Death and Life meet face to face at the gate of the city (Luke 7:11–17). Filled with compassion, Jesus comes into direct contact with our mortality in order to overcome it. He touches the coffin and speaks His creative words of life, “Young man, I say to you, arise.” Jesus does what is neither expected nor requested. For through Christ, God the Father “is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think” (Eph. 3:14–21). Jesus bore our death in His body that we may share in His resurrection. Even as Elijah stretched himself out three times over the Zarephath woman’s son (2 Kings 17:17–24), God stretched Himself out over us in the threefold application of His name in the baptismal water, breathing new and everlasting life into us. “To Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”