Sermon text: Colossians 3:1–4
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
On this Easter morning, we say: Christ is risen.
He is risen indeed. Alleluia.
Easter morning is a good morning for lots of reasons, but one of them is that on Easter morning, we can find what some musicians call our middle C.
First, before I explain the middle C, a short story. A short story from the late, great Paul Harvey, from many years ago. For those of us that are a little bit past our prime — just a little bit — Paul Harvey’s trademark broadcast is to conclude virtually every story that he tells with the phrase, “And now you know the rest of the story.”
This particular story is of a one-room schoolhouse in remote Wyoming, whose teacher one day brought a violin with him to school. Later in the day, he got out the violin to play it, but it became quickly evident that it was seriously out of tune, and his efforts to fix that were inadequate. They were of no avail.
At that point, Paul Harvey interrupted the story for a final commercial break, which was rather common practice for him, assuring his listeners that he would return to tell the rest of the story. Upon returning, Paul Harvey told how the teacher wrote a note to the manager of the Castor radio station, requesting that each Sunday night at 8:00 precisely, do him a favor and play the middle C on the piano, so that he could tune his violin to the middle C.
The station manager complied, and that Sunday night a middle C, loud and clear, went across the entire territory of Wyoming at 8:00 precisely. Thus, as requested, the middle C was heard loud and clear that Sunday night, and for many Sunday nights to come. Paul Harvey ended the story by signing off the broadcast with his customary closing: “And now you know the rest of the story.”
And you — you now have all heard in the readings and in the liturgy and in the hymns — you now know, you now believe, you now rejoice in the rest of the Easter story. Or at least that’s what you think, that it’s the rest of the Easter story. But have you heard? And do you really know the rest of the story?
The glorious story of Christ’s resurrection gives rise to the beginning of each one of our own middle C stories. In Paul Harvey’s story, the middle C on the piano was all-important for the teacher to be able to tune his violin and play it. But much more important for us, we who are baptized: this is the Sunday to reset our middle C. Colossians 3:2 and 3: “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
Staying in tune was also the dire need of the early Christians in the city of Colossae. The early Christians confessed their faith and identified with one another and supported one another by a simple acrostic trick. If they met someone they thought was a Christian, they drew in the sand, or wrote on something, the image of a fish and five letters. The letters spell ICHTHYS, which means fish in Greek. It was a way of confessing Christ as the Son of God and the Son of Man, the atoning sacrifice for sin. It carried with it the understanding of the full doctrines taught in the Old Testament Scriptures, and now being circulated in the epistles and Gospel lessons of the apostles.
We are, by the way, a confessional church. That means our faith is based on a certain body of teachings drawn from the Bible and rightly confessed in the Book of Concord. The Book of Concord rightly places Jesus’s person and work — His life, His death, His resurrection — as the middle C of the Christian congregation, and of those truly pious Christians on earth.
In the fifth century, a missionary was led to Ireland. You know him as St. Patrick. He was likewise determined to keep his very difficult ministry centered on the middle C, which stands for Christ. He wrote for his own good what is now called St. Patrick’s Breastplate. Here’s part of it: “Christ with me. Christ before me. Christ behind me. Christ in me. Christ beneath me. Christ above me. Christ on my right, Christ on my left. Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I rise. Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me. Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me. Christ in every eye that sees me. Christ in every ear that hears me.”
Now, no one has been more intent on maintaining the middle C of the Christian proclamation than Dr. Martin Luther. As it’s expressed in the Small Catechism, the Second Article of the Creed: “I believe that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the Virgin Mary, is my Lord, who has redeemed me, a lost and condemned person, purchased and won me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil; not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death, that I may be His own and live under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness, just as He is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity. This is most certainly true.”
The thing is, staying in tune with the middle C can be a very difficult thing for Christians and Christian congregations and church bodies, given the opposition we face from the old evil foe, the world around us, and our old sinful natures.
In the case of the Christians of Colossae, it was increasingly difficult with the rise of false doctrines and false teachers invading the new Christian congregations, especially in the Greek world. They had to struggle with what it meant to call God, or Jesus, the Son of God and the Son of Man. The apostle Paul had become aware of the struggle of the Christians in Colossae from the rising threat of false teachers, whose opposition to the gospel truth was growing stronger and stronger by the day. They were promoting the dabbling with cosmic beings, with secret initiation rites, asceticism — things of this world.
In the verses preceding our text, Paul wrote in 2:20 and 22: “If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of this world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations — ‘Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch’?” Here Paul’s referring to things that perish once used. And according to human precepts and teachings, the teachings of the world were crowding out the mission and the doctrines of the church. They were confusing the middle C with all kinds of other things.
In the first two chapters of his letter to the Christians at Colossae, Paul had already warned all who read it, including us today, that human precepts and teachings may have the appearance of wisdom, but in reality are always contrary to the middle C of a true Christian confession.
Today, the distractions have for the most part changed. Asceticism is not such a big problem. We overindulge. And worship of angels has long since been replaced by human precepts such as the teaching of what’s called the historical-critical method of the Bible. That’s a view that the Bible is not divinely inspired, but rather, in an evolutionary process, came to be by the imagination of human authors.
In addition to the historical-critical method, we have rationalism and modernism and socialism and communism and evolution and postmodernism and progressivism and globalism and transgenderism. And then don’t forget the DEI stuff and the wokeness and the critical race theory and abortion and LGBTQ and the rest of the pagan nonsense that dominates popular media and crushes out the middle C in Christians’ confessions and in the mission of many churches — all in the pursuit of wisdom wrapped in a self-made religion, which is of no value in stopping the overindulgence of our sinful flesh.
In the verses following our text, Paul instructs and exhorts Christians at Colossae, and us, to stay in tune with Christ — with His word, with His doctrine, with His teachings, our middle C — and to, quote, “put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.” “You must put them all away,” he writes: “anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to each other, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices, and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.”
“Instead, put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.” That’s what it means to reclaim the middle C in the Christian faith.
After hearing Paul Harvey’s story, a question or two might come to mind, like: why did the teacher bring his violin in the first place? Was it to teach his students music, or to teach them to sing in harmony with one another? Or that they participate in some kind of music contest of some kind? Or perhaps it was for the students, so they could entertain their parents in an upcoming open house. We’ll never know the rest of that story.
But here’s the good thing: today, you have the answer for the rest of your story. The resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is given to you through the Word and Sacrament ministry of the church. Here’s the good thing: you can know the rest of your own story, provided that, with the help of the Holy Spirit, and along with your baptism, the word of God, and true Christian faith, you can strive to stay in tune with the middle C.
His death, His life, His resurrection is the rest of our story. For all who are baptized, and thereby have been raised with Christ, and who seek things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God, who have set their minds on things that are above, not things on the earth, who have put off the old self with its practices and put on the new self, which is being renewed in the knowledge and the image of the Creator — we know what’s coming. We know that when Christ who is our life appears, we will also appear with Him in glory. This is our happy ending.
Verse four of the text is good news for all who are baptized. Our life is now hidden with Christ, so that when Christ, who is your life, appears on this earth’s final day, then you will also appear with Christ in glory, to participate in the rest of your eternal story — the story that has no end, the story wherein we will be numbered with the saints who, having lived and died on earth with the middle C at the center of their lives, will forever be saved from their earthly labors. That’ll be the whole new story. And the most marvelous details have yet to be manifested.
But the glorious story of Christ’s resurrection is the beginning of your middle C. For now, as we live in this sinful world, in this vale of tears, our lives are hidden with Christ in God. But when Christ comes again, He will raise the dead to the new life, to the story that never ends. And you’ll know the story, because you’ll be in it — centered in the middle C, where Christ has risen indeed. And you will also. Amen.
May the peace that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.