| Catechesis Notes for Week — The Third and Fourth Commandments — “Remember the Sabbath Day by keeping it holy” (Third Commandment) is more accurately translated, “You shall sanctify the day of rest.” The Third Commandment is not mainly about “a day” but more importantly about the Word of God. The seven-day week of creation teaches us that there is a rhythm to our lives. We work, but we also require rest. But Christians began worshiping on Sunday (the first day of the week) instead of Saturday (the Old Testament Sabbath day of rest) because they properly understood that the Sabbath Day (or Rest Day) was chiefly about Jesus and His Word of life. Jesus is the source of Sabbath rest and He gives that rest to us through the Word of the Gospel that we receive by preaching, teaching, and the Sacraments. To highlight this important understanding, Christians began to worship on Sunday—the day of our Lord’s resurrection from the dead. On Sunday, the first Easter, Jesus spoke a Word that gave a “rest” that was far greater than the mere cessation of work. He gave the “rest” of sins forgiven through the Word of absolution: “Peace be with you.” That is why the explanation from the Catechism states that we are “not to despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.” The Third Commandment calls us to “sanctify” the day of rest (whatever that day might be) by hearing the Word of God through which we are renewed in repentance and faith in Christ.
Under the Fourth Commandment — “Honor your father and your mother” — we are taught to believe that God stands behind our fathers, mothers, and other authorities and works through them. We are to honor the authorities, not because they deserve it but because of the commandment of God and the office that He has given them. Parents and civil authorities are also to remember the awesome responsibilities they have been given by God lest they abuse the authority they have received. This week’s Bible Stories highlight the Third and Fourth Commandments. In The Boy Jesus in the Temple, Jesus, at Twelve years of age, honors His father and mother by beginning to take on the responsibilities of a man in hearing the preaching and teaching of God’s Word in the Temple. Mary Sits at Jesus’ Feet in the second story of the week “gladly hearing Jesus’ Word” as that which is the most important thing for her life and salvation. Martha was not engaged in sinful behavior, but she, like us, allowed the other priorities of life to usurp “the one thing needful”—Jesus’ Word. In the tragic story of The Rebellion of Absolom, we see the devastating consequences and judgment of God against a son who despised his father. “It did not go well with Absolom, nor did he enjoy long life upon the earth.” In the last story of the week, Ruth & Her Kinsman Redeemer, we see the power and result of the Word of the Gospel that had been received by the Moabite woman, Ruth. Though she was not a Jew, she heard the Word of the Gospel through the Israelite family that she had married into. This “hearing of God’s Word” resulted not only in a love and devotion to the Lord but also in honor and faithfulness toward her mother-in-law, Naomi. Finally, this week’s Bible Verse describes the ordinary life of prayer to which we are called. We receive the Word of God in Catechism, Scripture, and hymnody that we might “teach it to our children, talk about it when we sit in our houses, when we walk by the way, and when we lie down and rise up.” By the Word of God, received and believed, EVERY day is sanctified, and we learn to walk by faith in Christ with honor and respect toward all those in authority over us. |
Congregation at Prayer
Monthly Archives: August 2025
Catechism: Ten Commandments — Third and Fourth Commandments
August 31, 2025
Download (Adobe PDF)Catechism: Ten Commandments — First and Second Commandments
August 24, 2025
Download (Adobe PDF)Catechesis Notes for Week — “I Am the Lord Your God and Savior! Trust Me!” The first week of a new catechetical year begins another pilgrimage through the Six Chief Parts and Table of Duties from the Small Catechism. During this week we hear the Holy Trinity speak to us in the first two commandments. “Trust Me!” (First Commandment) and “Pray to Me!” (Second Commandment). It is as if He were saying, “I am the only true and living God. I have created You. I have redeemed and sanctified You. I love You with an everlasting love. I have called you by My name—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—in the waters of Holy Baptism. There is no other God and Savior! Trust Me! I will take care of you!” This is the deep meaning of the First Commandment: “You shall have no other gods!” There is only one true and living God who provides for all that we need for our life and salvation. All other things or people that we might trust in have not made us, nor can they save us. The Three Men in the Fiery Furnace and Daniel cast into the Lions’ Den showed forth this miracle of faith. In the Second Commandment, “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord Your God,” we are called to pray to the Lord for everything, to always praise Him, and to give thanks to Him, even for the difficulties and hardships of life. Through the things we suffer He calls us to trust in Him and to pray to Him for help. Our Lord demonstrates this in Jesus’ Prayer in Gethsemane. In contrast, Peter Denies His Lord gives us an example of the swearing that is forbidden under the Second Commandment. Thus the first and second commandments go together. Out of the proper trust of the heart (first commandment) we pray (second commandment), “calling upon His name in every trouble, praying, praising, and giving of thanks.” This week’s verse is the creed of ancient Israel, the Shema Israel, which means “Hear, O Israel!” What we cannot do by our own reason or strength, God gives by His Word and Spirit. “Hearing” speaks of faith. We confess what is true. There is only one true God. We love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength because He has opened our hearts by His Word to trust in Him above all things.
Catechism: Table of Duties — What Hearers Owe Their Pastors (first part)
August 17, 2025
Download (Adobe PDF)Catechesis Notes for Week — Summer Stories from the Gospel of Luke — The Sadducees Question Jesus about the Resurrection because they did not believe in the resurrection or life after death, yet they claimed to be faithful to the Law of Moses. Jesus used Moses’ words to counter them: “Now even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised, when he called the Lord ‘the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ For He is not the God of the dead but of the living.” The account of the Widow’s Two Mites contrasts the false faith of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Scribes with the true faith of the widow who, without pretense or an attempt to justify herself before others, put into the Temple treasury all she had. Jesus catechesis during Holy Week then shifts to a discussion of the Signs of the End and the Destruction of Jerusalem. The destruction of the Temple, the rise of false doctrine, wars, earthquakes, famine, pestilence, and persecution will all characterize the end times before the Second Coming of Christ. Finally, the Parable of the Fig Tree concludes Jesus’ catechesis on the end times. As the change in the leaves of the fig tree indicate that summer is near, so these signs of the end times indicate that Christ’s coming is near. The Church is to live each day in anticipation of His coming with fervent faith in His Words to the end: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away. But take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that day come on you unexpectedly. For it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man.”CP250817
Catechism: Lord’s Prayer — Seventh Petition and Explanation
August 10, 2025
Download (Adobe PDF)Catechesis Notes for Week — Summer Stories from the Gospel of Luke — Jesus Comes to Zacchaeus’s House shows us that the call to repentance and the result of repentant faith manifests itself in Zacchaeus giving back his stolen property. In the Parable of the Minas (unit of weight) Jesus speaks about the gift of salvation in the Gospel that is to be put to use in repentant faith and faithful service in the Church and the Christian’s vocation until He comes again. On Palm Sunday we see the beginning of the climax of Jesus’ work of salvation. All things unfold according to God’s Word and plan of salvation in Christ. Those who believe in Him rightly sing the Passover psalm to Him: “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” He weeps over the impenitence of the people of Jerusalem, who did not realize the visitation of God’s salvation in Jesus, who called them away from reliance upon self to reliance upon the mercy of God that He came to bring. Repentance and faith in Christ’s atoning sacrifice is the only thing that can give us peace with God. The story of Israel’s pattern of impenitence and hardness of heart is described in the Parable of the Wicked Vinedressers. Time and time again God sent them His prophets. Time and time again they rejected the call to repentance. Finally, He sent them His Son—the only One who could make for their peace with God—but they rejected Him and nailed Him to the cross. Yet the irony of all of this is that the very act of their rejection in the crucifixion of Jesus became God’s instrument of salvation for a sinful world. After Jesus’ joyful entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday in which thousands hailed Him as Messiah, the opposition to His ministry began in earnest by the chief priests, Sadducees, scribes, and Pharisees. Always looking for ways to trap Jesus in a contradiction, the Pharisees are the first to challenge Jesus. Luke records that they “pretended to be righteous” but they could not catch Him in His words. Should one be loyal to God or loyal to the government? Jesus silenced them in His famous words: “Render to Caesar the Things that Are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
Catechism: Sacrament of the Altar—What is the benefit of this eating and drinking? How can bodily eating and drinking do such great things?
August 3, 2025
Download (Adobe PDF)Catechesis Notes for Week — Summer Stories from the Gospel of Luke — In the Kingdom of God, Jesus emphasizes themes we hear in the explanations to the Lord’s Prayer in the Small Catechism. The kingdom of God is about the gift of the Holy Spirit and faith in Christ. The kingdom of God is Christ and the salvation He came to bring. The kingdom of God is “in our midst” wherever Jesus’ Word and Sacraments are preached and administered, and wherever Jesus’ Church suffers under persecution. In the Parable of the Persistent Widow, we learn that “the Christian prays continually because he believes that God can be relied upon to deliver him from his enemies. Prayer flows from the faith that God is righteous toward us for Christ’s sake, and that He will vindicate us and right all wrongs at last. If a man who neither fears God nor respects any man will deliver you from an enemy because you continually bother him for his help, how much more shall God, who has called us in His son, deliver us when we cry out to Him?” In the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, Jesus spoke to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others. It teaches us that “the highest worship [of God] in the Gospel is the desire to receive forgiveness of sins, grace, and righteousness.” The Call to Repentance and the Things that Make for our Peace focuses upon the word of Jesus as He wept over Jerusalem: “If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes…because you did not know the time of your visitation” (19:42, 44b). The ministry of Jesus was not all that different from the ministry of the Old Testament prophets. He called sinners to repentance that they might receive His peace and salvation. The call to repentance is necessary, in order that we turn away from trusting in ourselves and in our own righteousness and accomplishments, to trusting in the mercy of God in Christ. This call to repentance is always based upon our Savior’s love for us. We see this compassion and call to repentance in Jesus’ ministry to the Rich Young Ruler. The “one thing” this man lacked was Christ and His righteousness. In Jesus Heals Blind Bartimaeus, we hear the prayer of this repentant faith when Bartimaeus cries out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Though he was pushed away by others, Jesus received this poor blind beggar. (Excerpts from New Testament Catechesis in the Lutheran Catechesis Series) CP250803