church

INI
Cantate, the Fourth Sunday after Easter
May 22, 2011
Ascension Lutheran Church, Tacoma WA
Paul Naumann, Pastor

The Lord has Made Your Life
A DREAM COME TRUE
Psalm 126:1-6

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
Today's text is the 126th Psalm, vv. one through six, as follows:

When the LORD brought back the captivity of Zion, We were like those who
dream. 2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter, And our tongue with singing.
Then they said among the nations, "The LORD has done great things for
them." 3 The LORD has done great things for us, And we are glad. 4 Bring
back our captivity, O LORD, As the streams in the South. 5 Those who sow in
tears Shall reap in joy. 6 He who continually goes forth weeping, Bearing seed
for sowing, Shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, Bringing his sheaves with
him. Here ends our text.

In the Name of our Risen Savior, Jesus Christ, at whose throne we will soon
present ourselves, and at whose feet we will soon lay our sheaves, Dear Fellow
Redeemed,

It was the middle of the second century BC., and things looked pretty dark for
the nation of Greece. In a series of bitter battles, the Greeks had been
completely conquered by the world's new super-power, Rome. They were
utterly vanquished and defeated. It seemed to the people of Greece that they
had nothing to look forward to but a life of abject slavery under a Roman
military occupation. Then one day a ship arrived from Rome. On board was a
herald, with an official proclamation from the Roman consul, Flaminius. It was
a simple message: by official order of Rome, Greece was free! Free to govern
themselves and order their own affairs. The historian Livy says that, when the
herald had finished reading this amazing proclamation, there was more good
news than the people could take in all at once. They stood there open-mouthed,
thinking they had somehow heard him wrong. "They were looking on each
other wonderingly," says Livy, "like sleepers on an empty dream." A dream,
perhaps. The Greeks soon found out, however, that this was a dream come
true.

Has that ever happened to you? Have you ever received such good news that
you worried - for one horrible moment - that you might after all only be
dreaming? Sadly, dreams don't come true very often, and that kind of good
news doesn't come along every day. Maybe it seems like a long time since
you've had much good news at all in your life! Well, this morning I've got some
good news for you. Today I have a message to bring you from God's Word; a
message so wonderful that, if you can absorb even a part of it, it will leave you
absolutely open-mouthed with relief and joy. To put it simply, today's text
demonstrates that,

The Lord has Made Your Life
A DREAM COME TRUE
I. Your captivity to sin is ended.
II. Your final deliverance is coming.
III. Your joyful harvest is guaranteed.

Every dreamt you were a prisoner, in jail? I had that dream a lot when I was a
kid. I guess, as a child, being in jail was the worst thing my imagination could
come up with. Really not a dream at all, but rather a nightmare.

Well, for the Old Testament people of Zion, it was a nightmare that came true.
The people who lived in Zion (another name for the city of Jerusalem) had been
warned again and again to repent of their idolatry and turn back to the Lord.
But they refused. Finally, the Lord's patience ran out. He sent the armies of
Babylon, who besieged Jerusalem, destroyed it, and carried the inhabitants off
into captivity. For seventy long years they languished as prisoners in a foreign
land. They dreamed of seeing their beloved city of Zion once again.

Then an amazing thing happened. God caused King Cyrus to let them go! He
released them from captivity, and allowed the exiles to return to Jerusalem. It
was the only time in history, by the way, that an exiled people had ever returned
to their homeland. How did the people take this miraculous news? The words
of our text fit perfectly: When the LORD brought back the captivity of Zion,
We were like those who dream. 2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter, And
our tongue with singing. Then they said among the nations, "The LORD has
done great things for them." It was so wonderful that even their heathen
neighbors couldn't believe it. The Lord had done great things for the people of
Zion! The Lord had made their lives a dream come true!

"What's it got to do with me?" you ask. "I've never been a prisoner - I've never
even seen the inside of a jail!" But haven't you? The Bible says, Prov 5:22, "His
own iniquities entrap the wicked man, And he is caught in the cords of his sin."
Sins and iniquities are the ropes and handcuffs that bind a human being.
Transgressions against God's commandments are the bars that form his prison.
And my friend, you've seen the inside of that prison! Spouses: each time you
spoke hurting words to your husband or wife, a few of those prison bars went
up. Children, when you disobeyed your parents, you added a few more bars.
Whenever unclean words came from your lips, whenever impure thoughts
lingered on your mind, whenever you skipped church, broke the speed limit, or
gossiped about your neighbor -- bars were going up. These are the prison bars of
sin that had you completely surrounded, that separated you from God, and
condemned you to eternal death. On your own, you could never break these
bars. On your own, escaping from this prison would be an unreachable dream.

But I have Good News for you: that dream has come true! The Lord has
brought back the captivity of His people. Your captivity to sin is ended!

Way back in the Old Testament, God promised to send His Son, the Savior
who would release us sinners from the prison of our sin. Through Isaiah, He
said to His Son, Isa 42:6-7 "I, the LORD, have called You in righteousness,
And will hold Your hand; I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the
people, As a light to the Gentiles, 7 To open blind eyes, To bring out prisoners
from the prison, Those who sit in darkness from the prison house." Jesus came
to earth and took up that assignment. He purposely stepped into your place.
Every commandment you've broken, Jesus kept. Every bar you put up, Jesus
tore down. Finally, Jesus Christ stepped into your place and endured the
punishment that your sins deserved. When He suffered and died on the cross of
Calvary, the door of your prison swung open. Every last sin of yours has been
paid for with His blood. Every last bar of sin that separated you from God has
been torn down. You have quite literally been rescued from death row by Jesus
Christ, says Peter, "For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust,
that He might bring us to God." 1 Peter 3:18.

And now is Christ risen from the dead, establishing your justification and
securing your freedom! Through Jesus Christ, the Lord has made your life a
dream come true! He has solved the biggest problem in your life - the problem
of sin. Other people go to bed at night with a guilty conscience over the sins
they've committed. Christ has freed you from that, for you have brought your
sins to the cross of your Savior and been assured of His forgiveness. Other
people struggle in vain to make up for their sins by doing good works. Christ
has freed you from that - the good works you perform are the natural fruits of
your faith. Gifts of love for the One who has already done everything necessary
for your salvation. Other people puzzle over how to set their priorities in life.
Christ has freed you from that - you know that when you make Jesus number
one in your life, everything else will follow as a matter of course. Our Lord has
promised us, Mt 6:33, "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,
and all these things shall be added unto you."

Did you ever wonder what your neighbors and co-workers say about you when
you're not around? I think we all wonder that from time to time. Sometimes I
think it's a mercy that we don't know! Well, when God brought the people of
Jerusalem back to their homeland, here's what their neighbors said about them:
"Then they said among the nations, 'The LORD has done great things for
them!'" Yes, the Psalmist writes, "The LORD has done great things for us, and
we are glad!"

That last word isn't a very good translation of the Hebrew verb. It means more
than just, "to be glad." It really means "to be highly elated," or, "to be wildly
happy." When was the last time you had that wildly happy feeling, the feeling
that your dreams had really come true? Shouldn't we Christians have that highly
elated feeling all the time? After all, the Lord has done great things for us! He's
given us His Son, who's solved our problem of sin once and for all. And that's
reason enough to kick our heels up and laugh out loud! As Isaiah said, Is 61:10,
"I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, My soul shall be joyful in my God; For He
has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the
robe of righteousness." You know, I hope your neighbors will comment about
you! I hope they'll see your life and your attitude and say, "Wow! Look at how
happy that man is! The Lord sure has done great things for him.” Or, “How
could that woman be so cheerful and content, with all the problems she’s got?
The Lord must certainly be blessing her!"

Through Christ, God has already delivered you from the power and punishment
of sin. But our struggle isn't quite over yet; we're still living in this world held
captive by sin. In fact, you might have wondered about that part of our text.
After describing this wonderful deliverance from captivity, it goes on to
mention a different delivery yet to come. The text says, "Bring back our
captivity, O LORD, as the streams in the South." This is our prayer: that soon
our Lord Jesus will come back to earth to release us from the final bonds that
tie us to this sinful world. And His answering promise to us is a sure one: Yes,
your final deliverance is coming!

We don’t know when it will come, of course. Unlike radio evangelist Harold
Camping, we believe God’s Word, which tells us, “No man knoweth the day
nor the hour.” We do know one thing, however – it will come suddenly. How
suddenly will that deliverance come? –No doubt you saw some of the video of
the Japanese tsunami, the giant tidal wave that devastated northern Japan
following their largest earthquake in a century. One moment you see a peaceful
seaside community, the next moment a giant wall of dirty, debris-filled water,
fifty feet high, comes surging in, destroying everything, carrying whole buildings
in its wake. They say the people in the hardest-hit areas had less than 20
minutes after the earthquake to find higher ground before the tsunami hit. It
was that sudden. Thousands of them didn’t make it. Well, that's how sudden
the Last Day will arrive. Our text says it will be like a flash flood. The "streams
in the South" - the riverbeds in the Negev desert in southern Palestine - fill up
just that suddenly with water when the rainy season of winter arrives. One
moment, dry as a bone -- the next moment, flood! And that's just how suddenly
our Lord Jesus is going to reappear on earth on Judgment Day. In other words,
in a flash! "For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west,"
Jesus said, "so also will the coming of the Son of Man be." Mt 24:27. "Then
they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.
Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads,
because your redemption draws near." Lk 12:27-28.

Yes, your final deliverance is coming, and coming quickly. For Christians,
however, it won’t be a disaster, but a glorious deliverance. It will be a dream
come true! Every sorrow will be replaced with joy. Everything that was painful
for you on this earth will be replaced with the wildest happiness. Our text
promises, "Those who sow in tears shall reap in joy." Your labor for the Lord in
this life may at times be difficult and sorrowful. But God promises you that, on
the Day of Judgment, your joyful harvest is guaranteed.

One of the most amusing things for city people who visit the country is all the
commercials on TV for agricultural products, feed and seed, and so forth.
-When planting season rolls around, Monsanto and Funks and De Kalb and all
the other the seed companies are running commercials, trying to convince
farmers that their seed will produce the biggest crops. They have to be a little
careful of what they say, though, because none of them can actually guarantee
success. Sometimes plants grow well, and sometimes they don’t. Sometimes you
get a good crop, and sometimes you get a bad crop. God's Word is different.
God's Word is one Seed that the Lord guarantees will produce an abundant
harvest. The efforts of this congregation to spread the Gospel in our community
-- the work of our CLC in bringing the Good News to mission areas in the U.S.
and overseas -- your own work of witnessing the Gospel to the people you
know and meet - all this is mission work. And that work will not always be
easy. But it will bear fruit. In fact, God promises that it will bear fruit. In Isaiah
he says, "So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth;" the Lord says.
"It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it
shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it." 55:11.

"He who continually goes forth weeping," our text says, "bearing seed for
sowing, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with
him." What sheaves will you bring with you, when you come to your Savior's
throne on Judgment Day? How much work done for Christ? How many
precious souls, won through the witness of your faith? I mentioned last week
the old saying: "Only one life, 'twill soon be past, only what's done for Christ
will last." You can be the tool God uses to bring more redeemed souls into His
heavenly kingdom. Study God’s Word! Prepare yourself for those opportunities!
The Lord has made your life a dream come true; perhaps with a few well-chosen
words, you can be Holy Spirit's instrument for making that same dream come
true for someone else: your friend, your neighbor, your loved one or your
coworker. So spread the Word around! "He who sows sparingly will also reap
sparingly," said the Apostle Paul, "but he who sows bountifully will also reap
bountifully." II Cor 9:6.

In Christ Jesus, your captivity to sin is ended, your final deliverance is coming,
and your joyful harvest is guaranteed. So let your mouth be filled with laughter,
and your tongue with singing! Let people look and you and say, the Lord has
made his life -- A DREAM COME TRUE. Amen.