Sunday, November 9, 2025
Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
One hundred percent
The revelation of the mystery
Kept secret for long ages
Has now been made known to all nations
Through the prophetic writings
By the eternal God
To bring about the obedience of faith.
Reading along in the Bible, you get to Romans, and then to Romans 5, and the sudden glory experienced at midnight by the suffering monk Martin Luther appears to you. No more whipping your seared conscience, no more flagellation in the closet, no more doubt and no more fear. Because there is no fear in love, and without doubt, 100 percent, you are loved by God.
This “obedience of faith” precludes, overshadows, out-performs any “obedience from duty” that ever lived or ever will. Who knew?
But that was yesterday’s lectionary text. Today we head back into the “prophetic writings.” Ezekiel is probably one of most everybody’s favorite prophets. I imagine him wandering around the highways and byways, sometimes with clothes on, sometimes not. I see him skinny and frowning, although his laugh is contagious when he finds a reason to laugh. Ezekiel’s vision might be cloudy at times, and he might suffer from double vision too, because he is always seeing bones and stuff when nobody else sees anything.
This time he sees water.
The angel brought me
back to the entrance of the temple,
and I saw water flowing out
from beneath the threshold of the temple toward the east.
This is living water, water that the angels will flow into the salt sea, making it fresh. Receive it, wash in it, drink it, and with both eyes open, just watch and see:
Along both banks of the river, fruit trees of every kind shall grow;
their leaves shall not fade, nor their fruit fail.
Every month they shall bear fresh fruit,
for they shall be watered by the flow from the sanctuary.
Their fruit shall serve for food, and their leaves for medicine.
So of course we read the words, but they don’t sink in. The world we’ve made for ourselves has become a world where abundance for all is replaced by fear and the false certainty that there will never be enough unless I keep more than I need, in the present and for the future.
Paul’s assurance which echoes Jesus’ assurance turns us around, if we notice. In this life and in the next our “obedience of faith” is all we need. Heaven is now and not yet.
Therefore, we fear not, though the earth be shaken
and mountains plunge into the depths of the sea.
Matt shared a famous story about Queen Victoria in his Romans 5 sermon last week. After a service at the great St. Paul’s cathedral she asked the vicar about heaven. “Can I be absolutely sure of eternal safety, sir?”
The chaplain looked sad. “No, I don’t know any way we can be certain.”
The Court News published the conversation. A pastor named John Townsend prayed for his queen and wrote her a short note.
To her gracious Majesty, our beloved Queen Victoria,
from one of her most humble subjects.
With trembling hand but heartfelt love and because I know we can be absolutely sure now of our eternal life in the home that Jesus went to prepare, may I ask your most gracious Majesty to read the following passages of Scripture: John 3:16 and Romans 10:9-10.
These passages prove that there is full assurance of salvation by faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, for those who believe and accept His finished work.
I sign myself your servant for Jesus’ sake,
John Townsend
Pastor Townsend’s congregation prayed every day for their queen. A few weeks later she responded:
To John Townsend:
Your letter of recent date I received, and in reply would state that I have carefully and prayerfully read the portions of Scripture referred to. I believe in the finished work of Christ for me and trust by God’s grace to meet you in that home of which He said “I go to prepare a place for you.”
Victoria
The queen, acknowledging her humanity before her noble position, used only her first name. That’s how God sees us. He knows all our first names.
(Ezekiel 47, Psalm 6, 1 Corinthians 3, 2 Chronicles 7, John 2)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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