Allen Holthus, Vacancy Pastor
417 Oak Street North
PO Box 124
Carver, MN 55315

Pastor's Study: 952-448-7808
E-mail:
Church Phone: 952-448-3628
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Copyright © 2010

The End -- It's Here Again

It is that time of the church year again: the end. The lessons assigned to the last Sundays of the church year point us to the end of this world. In last November’s newsletter article I reminded us that we are prepared for this end, whenever it may happen, by faith in the gospel. That was before one giant tsunami that killed close to 300.000 human individuals, a record-breaking hurricane season that has severely affected thousands of lives in this country, and a major earthquake that killed 80.000 in Pakistan and India. And now we’re looking at the sketchy threat of a bird flue pandemic that could again kill thousands, if not more.

Clearly, if we ever needed proof, here it is. This world is out of whack in a major way. Sure, there are scientific explanations for why tsunamis, hurricanes, and earthquakes happen. But we shouldn’t think that these explanations give us the whole picture. In fact, these explanations can give us the false idea that, given the sorry state of the world, we’d better party and shop all the more (enhanced by drugs and sex) and forget worrying about all the bad stuff in our lives (1 Cor. 15:32). Because by nature this kind of explanation leaves one factor out of the equation all men do well to consider. And this factor is the living God himself, who is the Creator of this world and who, “only out of fatherly divine goodness and mercy,” preserves his creation to this very day.

But the Creator has not only preserved the world to this day. He’s also subjected it to futility and frustration. Why? Because of man’s sin. When Adam and Eve sinned in paradise, death entered into this world as sin’s wages – and with it came disease, pain, destruction, not just in the world in general (earthquakes), but in each of our lives personally (cancer). In other words, ever since man’s fall into sin the world is aging, and it is aging fast. We all are aging with it. And this is a hard truth that often comes with many fears. So we often try to drown them out by trying to lead busy lives till we die, preferably a sudden death without much suffering.

In tsunamis, in earthquakes, in hurricanes, in fires, and in all the war and bloodshed we see a fallen creation that is dying. In this situation we can do no more than to cling by faith to what Christ has won for us in his life and death. He spilled his precious blood on the cross, so that he could sprinkle it over us in baptism, in absolution, in preaching; yes so that he could it give it to us to drink in the Lord’s Supper. Building higher levees and stronger buildings is not the only lesson God wants everyone to draw out of the disastrous events we’ve seen on TV. For in these catastrophes, and in the crises of our personal lives, God himself is at work: He is leading us away from the temporal goods of this world, including wealth and health, and leading us to the eternal gospel of his Son, Jesus Christ. He is mankind’s one Savior from all sin, death, and the power of the devil. This is why he is also our Savior from all the fearful things surrounding us today and tomorrow. This gospel remains true and unchanging regardless of how many gales go over our lives in this world.