LEARNING FROM LUTHER HOW TO PREACH IN ADVENT AND CHRISTMAS

Advent-Christmas Preaching Seminar

University Lutheran Chapel

Minneapolis, MN

4 November 1996



"For whatever reason, in the ineffable wisdom of God, the speech of

Martin Luther rang clear where others merely mumbled," says American

Evangelical theologian Mark Noll.1 The clarity of Luther's voice is

surely apparent in his Advent and Christmas preaching. In the presence

of the great scriptural narratives of the Lord's Palm Sunday entry

into Jerusalem, the preaching of John the Baptist, the annunciation,

and the nativity , Luther did not mumble. With vivid imagery and

graphic descriptions of the biblical stories, Luther articulated the

mystery of the Word made flesh with theological depth and pastoral

warmth as he crafts pictures of the meanness and misery of the Lord's

birth. Ulrich Asendorf writes that "Luther's Advent sermons are a

microcosm of his spiritual world."2 All the great themes of Luther's

theology- incarnation, justification, the "happy exchange,"

sacraments, the theology of the cross are present in these

sermons. Advent and Christmas evoke the best in Luther's preaching as

he proclaims Bethlehem's crib in light of the cross.



Luther's preaching in Advent and Christmas is extensive. No less than

110 of Luther's Christmas sermons have been preserved. Roughly half of

these sermons are based on Luke 2:1-20, although Luther clearly

delighted in preaching the prologue of the Fourth Gospel. Reading

Luther's Advent and Christmas sermons confirms the observation of

Johann Gerhard that Luther's preaching was "heroic disorder."3 It is

not the aim of this paper to attempt to systematize Luther's preaching

(that would be an impossible task) but rather to lift up several

central themes in his Advent and Christmas preaching that can shape,

inform, and enliven our preaching in this segment of the Church

Year. To that end we will look primarily to Luther's church postils of

15214 and his house postils of 1532-15345.



Some of Luther's most potent Advent preaching is based on Matthew

21:1-9, the Gospel for the First Sunday in Advent. Luther's preaching

of the Palm Sunday account focuses on the character of the

"Beggar-King" as Luther calls Jesus and the nature of our reception of

him. Luther glories in the lowliness of the Beggar-King, noting in a

1533 sermon that "Christ comes riding along like a beggar on a

borrowed donkey without saddle or other trappings, necessitating that

the disciples place their cloaks and garments on the donkey in a

makeshift arrangement for the poor king. Accordingly in no way could

the Jews excuse themselves. The prophecy had been so perfectly clear:

when Christ would ride into Jerusalem, he would not do so as some

earthly monarch with armor, spear, sword, and weaponry, all of which

betoken bloodshed, severity, and force; but as the Evangelist says,

meekly, or in the words of the prophet, poor and lowly. It is as

though the prophet wanted to forewarn everyone to take good note of

the donkey and realize that the one riding it is the Messiah

indeed. So be aware and don't be gawking for a golden throne, velvet

garments and pieces of gold, or impressive mounted retinue. For Christ

will come in lowliness, meekness, and sorrowful of heart, for all to

see, riding on a donkey. That would be the extent of the pomp and

splendor he would display with his entry into Jerusalem" (Klug, 26).



Yet hidden in the weakness of the Beggar-King is God's own power to

rescue sinners. Here Luther's theology of the cross leaves its imprint

on his preaching as he vividly describes the outcome of the Lord's

coming in our flesh: "This King is and shall be called sin's devourer

and death's strangler, who extirpates sin and knock's death teeth out;

he disembowels the devil and rescues those who believe on him from sin

and death, conducting them to be among the angels where eternal life

and blessedness are" (Klug, 27). In his coming to die for the sins of

the world, Jesus "is life personified," says Luther, "and he comes to

give you life" (Klug, 18). The fact that Christ comes not on a proud

steed with pomp and power, but on a donkey demonstrates that he is

coming not to make war against sinners but to save them. "He indicates

by this that he comes not to frighten man, nor to drive him or crush

him, but to help him and carry his burden for him" (Lenker,

19). Christ comes as gift and blessing.



Therefore Luther's Advent preaching is a call to faith. Luther warns

his hearers not to be like the Jews who rejected their Messiah,

failing to discern that would not be like a secular lord. Instead

Luther points to the humility of the Lord Christ as a very sign that

He is the Savior promised by the prophets, saying to the congregation,

"Don't gawk with your eyes but let your ears give insight to your

eyes" (Klug, 27).



In his preaching on the First Sunday in Advent, Luther does not grow

weary of emphasizing that we do not come to the King, but that the

King comes to us. In a 1521 sermon Luther drives home this point

saying, "This is what is meant by 'Thy king cometh.' You do not seek

him, but he seeks you. You do not find him, he finds you. For

preachers come from him, not from you; their sermons come from him,

not from you; your faith comes from him, not from you; and where he

does not come, you remain outside; and where there is no Gospel there

is no God, but only sin and damnation, free will may do, suffer, work,

and live as it may and can. Therefore you should not ask, where to

begin to be godly; there is no beginning, except where the king enters

and is proclaimed" (Lenker, 27).



It should come as no surprise, then, that Luther's directs his hearers

to the preached Word 6 and the sacraments as the concrete places where

the King makes his entry. Even as Christ humbled himself in his

incarnation, so he stoops to us in the lowliness of the preaching,

Baptism, and the Sacrament of the Altar. According to Luther, the

lowliness of the means which the Lord uses to distribute the gifts of

salvation parallels the humility of his coming in the flesh. In both

cases, faith clings to what is heard, not to what is seen. "If we

don't want to understand this with our ears, but accept only that

which our eyes see and our hands touch, we will miss our King and be

lost. There's a big difference between this King and other kings. With

the latter everything is outward pomp, great and gallant appearance,

magnificent air. But not so with Christ. His mission and work is to

help against sin and death, to justify and bring to life. He has

placed his help in baptism and the Sacrament, and incorporated it in

the Word and preaching. To our eyes Baptism appears to be nothing more

than ordinary water, and the Sacrament of Christ's body and blood

simple bread and wine, like other bread and wine, and the sermon, hot

air from a man's mouth. But we must not trust what our eyes see, but

listen to what this King is teaching us in his Word and Sacrament,

namely, I poured out my blood to save you from your sins, to rescue

you from death and bring you to heaven; to that end I have given you

baptism as a gift for the forgiveness of sins, and preach to you

unceasingly by word of mouth concerning this treasure, sealing it to

you with the Sacrament of my body and blood, so that you need never

doubt. True, it seems little and insignificant, that by the washing of

water, the Word, and the Sacrament this should all be effected. But

don't let your eyes deceive you. At that time, it seemed like a small

and insignificant thing for him to come riding on a borrowed donkey

and later be crucified, in order to take away sin, death, and hell. No

one could tell this by his appearance, but the prophet foretold it,

and his work later fulfilled it. Therefore we must simply grasp it

with our ears and believe it with our hearts, for our eyes are blind"

(Klug, 28).



Luther located the rejection of Jesus by the Jews in "their carnally

minded thinking" which did not recognize the eternal God clothed in

human flesh. As Luther preaches the offense of Advent, he identifies

the same "carnally minded thinking" as the cause for continued

contempt of Christ as he comes in Word and Sacrament. "But the

rejection of Christ does not happen only with the Jews, but also among

us, for the high and mighty scorn us because of our gospel and

sacraments. What folly, they say, that I should let myself be baptized

with water poured on my head, supposedly to be saved thereby; or that

some poor parish preacher, barely able to put a coat on his back,

should pronounce forgiveness and absolve me from my sins; or that

receiving bread and wine in the Sacrament I should be saved. On that

basis they despise a Christ-preacher. For it goes with the territory

to be despised by reason of Christ's poverty. As a result, when a man

becomes a preacher he is more despised than some lowly knave of no

reputation. There is no station in life quite as scorned and humble as

that of a preacher. That happens not because of us or the preacher,

but because Christ is despised on all sides in the world. No wonder

that the aristocrats and plutocrats say, Why should we believe some

tramp-like, beggarly cleric? Why doesn't our Lord God send us a fine

pulpit-prince to preach to us? Him we would believe. However, just as

Christ's preachers are despised, so people despise his baptism and the

Sacrament of the Altar. Virtually no peasant retains respect for them,

let alone burghers and nobles. Under the papacy people mocked at

indulgences and pilgrimages, and yet they were highly regarded. Now,

however, the prevailing word is, Huh, if all you can do is preach

about Christ and faith, I'm fed up with that already, I've heard it

all many times before" (Klug, 35).



In the traditional lectionary, the Second Sunday in Advent sounds an

eschatological note based on Luke 21:25-36. Luther contrasted the

previous Sunday's focus on the coming of Christ to suffer with

apocalyptic message of the Gospel for the Second Sunday in Advent:

"Last Sunday you heard about his riding into Jerusalem on a donkey,

minus all pretentious show. He had no place to call his own, not even

a foot of space; and besides, he later was crucified. He is facing a

poor, miserable future, not as a master but as a servant, whose desire

was to serve in such a way as to die for us....To sum up, during his

first advent he rendered the greatest service which no angel, no

creature was able to render, and prepared a kingdom for his believers

and elect, but when the number of elect is complete, he will return

not as a servant but as a master, in order to free us from earth,

maggoty mire, death, and decay" (Klug, 38).



Compared with much of the eschatological preaching of the late Middle

Ages, Luther's preaching seems mild.7 While Luther's preaching for the

Second Sunday in Advent is replete with warnings regarding the

quickness of the Lord's return to judgement and the need for constant

watchfulness lest that Day overtake people unprepared, he strives to

have his hearers "discern Judgement Day correctly, to know what he

(Christ) means for us and why we hope and await his return" (Klug,

51).  After describing how the pope preaches a Christ who is a stern

judge with whom we must be reconciled by our works, Luther goes on to

preach the comfort which is to be found in Christ's final advent:

"...in this Gospel he teaches us differently, namely, that he will

come not to judge and damn us but to redeem and save us, and to

fulfill all for which we have petitioned him, and to bring us his

kingdom. To the ungodly and the unbelievers he will come as judge and

punish them as his enemies and the Christians' foes, who have

afflicted Christians with all kinds of misery. But to the believers

and Christians he will come as a redeemer" (Klug, 51).



In a similar fashion, Luther chides the fanatics for robbing

Christians of the comfort of the Lord's return. "The godless fanatical

preachers are to be censured who in their sermons deprive people of

these words of Christ and faith in them, who desire to make people

devout by terrifying them and who teach them to prepare for the last

day by relying on their good works as satisfaction for their

sins. Here despair, fear, and terror must remain and grow and with it

hatred, aversion, and abhorrence for the coming of the Lord, and

enmity against God be established in the heart; for they picture

Christ as nothing but a stern judge whose wrath must be appeased by

works, and they never present him as the Redeemer, as he calls and

offers himself, of whom we are to expect that out of pure grace he

will redeem us from sin and evil" (Lenker, 78).



While Luther expresses his personal opinion that the end times are

near8 , he does not engage in detailed speculation regarding the

parousia. Instead, Luther's preaching on this theme is "an eschatology

of faith" to use the words of T.F. Torrance9 as Luther urges his

hearers to find joy in the glad announcement that "your redemption

draweth nigh."



The traditional Gospel pericopes for the Third and Fourth Sundays in

Advent tell of John the Baptist. Luther develops two major themes in

his preaching on Matthew 11:2-10 and John 1:19-28-the offense of

Christ and the function of John the Baptist as God's finger.  In his

sermons for the Third Sunday in Advent, Luther underscores our Lord's

words to the disciples of John, "And blessed is he who is not offended

because of me" (MT. 11:6). Here Luther notes that the Jews are

offended by the Christ who establishes his kingdom among the poor, the

lame, and the blind. John the Baptist points to a Savior who offends

the spiritual instincts of the self-righteous. "The world is offended

that Christ is so miserable and poor" (Klug, 66).



Originally, God sent John the Baptist to the Jews. Thus Luther says in

a sermon on Matthew 11:2-10, that Jesus did not preach this sermon for

the sake of John the Baptist . "Rather he preached this sermon for the

sake of the Jews that they might recognize John the Baptist and

understand his mission" (Klug, 69). Now John the Baptist preaches to

us for "To the Jews he (Christ) came in the flesh; to us he comes in

the Word" (Klug, 95).It is the mission of John the Baptist that Luther

takes up in his sermons for the Fourth Sunday in Advent. Here Luther

holds up John the Baptist as finger of God. "Let us look to the mouth

and finger of John with which he bears witness and points, so that we

do not close our eyes and lose our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ; for

to the present day John still very diligently, faithfully, and richly

points and directs us here, in order that we may be saved" (Klug,

91). According to Luther, John is the great preacher of the law, but

he is an even greater preacher of the Gospel. Luther calls John "an

image, and a type, and also a pioneer, the first of all preachers of

the Gospel" (Lenker, 130), because he points to the Lamb of God who

takes away the sin of the world.



John's proclamation of the Lamb of God prepares the way for the

preaching of Christmas. Thomas Wabel has characterized Luther's

Christmas sermons as reflecting "the simplicity of Scripture". 10 At

the beginning of a 1522 Christmas sermon on Luke 2:1-14, Luther

suggests that "This Gospel is so clear that it requires very little

explanation, but it should be well considered and taken deeply to the

heart" (Lenker, 137). For the most part, Luther follows his own rule;

he simply narrates the events of the nativity. Luther's Christmas

preaching is marked by a simplicity that assists the hearer in

pondering the profound things that are taking place as God's Son is

born.



Luther sees the incarnation of Jesus in light of his atonement, his

birth in light of his death. We have already noted how Luther's

theology of the cross left its imprint on the Advent sermons; this is

true to an even greater degree with the Christmas sermons. 11 Hermann

Sasse observes that Luther's theology of the cross permeates Luther's

theological thinking, "Obviously the 'theology of the cross' does not

mean that for a theologian the church year shrinks together into

nothing but Good Friday. Rather it means that Christmas, Easter, and

Pentecost cannot be understood without Good Friday. Next to Irenaeus

and Athanasius, Luther was the greatest theologian of the

incarnation. He was this because in the background of the manger he

saw the cross. His understanding of the Easter victory was equal to

that of any theologian of the Eastern Church. He understood it because

he understood the victory of the Crucified One."12



Luther saw Bethlehem through the lens of Calvary. Luther's theology of

the cross, formulated in the Heidelberg Theses of 1518 (LW 31:35-70)

is given expression in his commentary on the Magnificat three years

later where Luther speaks of God's work in Mary as a work that "is

done in the depths," a work that cannot be perceived by carnal

eyes. Luther writes: "Even now and to the end of the world, all His

works are such that out of that which is nothing, worthless, despised,

wretched, and dead, He makes that which is something, precious,

honorable, blessed, and living" (LW 21:299). Mary, no more than "a

simple maiden, tending the cattle and doing the housework" (LW

21:301), hardly esteemed in the eyes of the world is chosen and

exalted by the Most High God to be the mother of the Savior. "Thus

God's work and His eyes are in the depths, but man's only in the

height" (LW 21:302). The "foolishness of God" (I Corinthians 1:27) is

not confined to Calvary, but embraces the incarnation as well.



Luther sees God operating "in the depths" at Bethlehem. Drawing

attention to the ordinariness of the circumstances surrounding the

Lord's birth-the poverty of Mary and Joseph, the arduous journey from

Nazareth to Bethlehem, and the birth in the stable, Luther concludes:

"Nobody notices or understands what God performs in the stable....Thus

God indicates that he pays no attention at all to what the world is or

has or can do, and on the other hand the world proves that it knows

nothing at all of, and pays no attention to what God is or has or

does. Behold, this is the first symbol wherewith Christ puts to shame

the world and indicates that all of its doing, knowledge, and being

are contemptible to us, that the greatest wisdom is in reality

foolishness, that its best performance is wrongdoing, and that the

greatest good is evil" (LW 52:9-10). In obscure Bethlehem, God

demonstrates his goodness "by stepping down so deep into flesh and

blood" (LW 52:12).



Luther's Christmas preaching hangs on to the flesh and blood of God in

the manger. Sentimental reflections on the "little baby Jesus" are not

to be found in Luther's preaching. Rather Luther leads his hearers to

the crib that now holds the enfleshed God. In a 1534 sermon, Luther

exults in the fact that God did not become an angel but a man: "The

angels are much more glorious creatures by nature than we human

beings. But God did not consider that; he is not an angel, nor did he

become an angel. The angels, moreover, are blameless and holy. But he

sets the course, chooses the lowly, poor human nature, lost in sin and

subject under the devil's rule and power of death, plagued and

troubled through and through by the devil and his ceaseless

pressure. That meant sinking to the lowest depths" (Klug, 113). In

"sinking to the lowest depths" God raises our humanity above and

beyond the angels; He exalts our flesh to the right hand of God. "That

is why we can boast that God has become our brother" (Klug, 133).



As Luther preaches the Lukan birth narrative, he approaches Christmas

from the perspective of Mary, the angels, and the shepherds.  Luther

emphasizes the naturalness of our Lord's birth in a sermon for

Christmas Eve in 1522: "...there are some who express opinions

concerning how this birth took place, claiming Mary was delivered of

her child while she was praying, in great joy, before she was aware of

it, without any pains. I do not condemn these devotional

considerations-perhaps they were devised for the benefit of

simple-minded folk-but we must stay with the Gospel text which says

'born of the Virgin Mary.' There is no deception here, but, as the

words indicate, it was a real birth....The birth happened to her

exactly as to other women, consciously with her mind functioning

normally and with the other parts of her body helping along, as is

proper at the time of birth, in order that she should be his natural

mother and he her natural normal son. For this reason her body did not

abandon its natural functions which belong to childbirth, except that

she gave birth without sin, without shame, without pain, and without

injury, just as she had conceived without sin. The curse of Eve, which

reads: 'In pain you shall bear your children (Gen. 3:16) did not apply

to her. In other respects things happened to her exactly as they

happen to any woman giving birth (LW 52:11-12). From the body of the

Virgin, the Son of God takes on our flesh and blood and so is born to

be our Redeemer. Luther's christology controls his view of Mary,

enabling him to acknowledge her as the Mother of God.



Luther esteems Mary as the mother of the incarnate Savior and he

honors her as the model of faith for all believers. It is from Mary

that we learn to rightly meditate on the Lord's birth. In an

illustration which he attributes to St. Bernard, Luther declares:

"there are three miracles here (in the incarnation): that God and man

should be joined in this Child; that a mother should remain a virgin;

that Mary should have such faith as to believe that this mystery would

be accomplished in her. The last is not the least of the three. The

Virgin birth is a mere trifle for God; that God should become a man is

a greater miracle; but the most amazing of all is that this maiden

should credit the announcement that she, rather than some other

virgin, had been chosen to be the mother of God....Had she not

believed, she could not have conceived. She held fast to the word of

the angel because she had become a new creature. Even so must we be

transformed and renewed in heart from day to day. This is the word of

the prophet: 'Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given'

(Isa. 9:6). This is the hardest point, not so much to believe that He

is the son of the Virgin and God himself, as to believe that this Son

of God is ours" 13



As Mary heard the heavenly words of the angel, believed those words,

and so conceived and carried the Son of God in her womb, so we hear

the words of God and by those words faith is conceived. In fact,

Luther says "he is more mine than Mary's" (LW 51:215).



The first Christmas sermon was preached by angels to a congregation of

shepherds. In a 1532 sermon on the Lukan pericope, Luther points out

that "This Gospel has two parts. The first has to do with the account

itself and its meaning for us today. The second part is the message of

the angels telling of its fruit and power, and how we are to profit

from it" (Klug, 100).  It is not enough that Christ is born. Without

the proclamation of his birth, we would left without its blessing; the

new born Savior would still be the "hidden God."14 God not preached

remains hidden and inaccessible, that is, we left under the terror of

his silence. In the same sermon, Luther asserts that "Christ might

have been born a hundred times over, but it would all have been in

vain if it had not been preached and revealed to us" (Klug,

109). Through the gift of preaching, the angel brings joy to the

shepherds for he proclaims "For there is born to you this day in the

city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord" (Lk. 2:11). This

angelic message, says Luther, is short sermon but one which

"compresses the entire Holy Scripture in one bundle" (Klug, 119).



In a 1533 sermon Luther dwells on the doxological character of the

angelic anthem. "It could justly be called the true SANCTUS, in

letters of gold, even as the message might rightly be called the

angel's sermon, because it was an angel, not a human being, that

delivered it. So this song is properly the angels' hymn, because a

heavenly host sang it, not human beings." 15



In their hymn, angels tutor human beings in the true worship of God, a

worship that is grounded in the flesh of Jesus. Luther understands the

true worship of God in light of the First Commandment.16 As Luther

knows of no God apart from the one who sleeps in Mary's lap and hangs

dead on the cross, his understanding of worship is normed by the First

Commandment and given incarnational content with the flesh of

Jesus. Thus Luther preaches on the Gloria: "Accordingly this angel

anthem proclaims that whatever is outside of or apart from Christ

stands condemned before God as blasphemy, idolatry, and

abomination. God can only be honored in and through this child who is

Christ the Lord. Apart from him no person can find and worship God,

but grossly offends and dishonors him. That means that everything

across the world that is called worship and service of God must

end. Truly holy and God-pleasing offerings, genuine service of God,

will bear Christ's name or is in Christ; otherwise it is no divine

service. God has channeled his worship in this child, and where he is

not worshipped in this way, true worship is not present" (italics

mine- Klug, 122-123).



The angels deliver their sermon to the shepherds, held captive by sin,

death, and the devil. As "this hymn did not originate on earth but was

brought down from heaven to the earth by the angels" (Klug, 143) it

gives joy and courage to the shepherds. As good preachers, the angels

direct the shepherds to the place where Christ is, to the manger in

Bethlehem. "If these shepherds had not believed the angel, they would

not have gone to Bethlehem nor would they have done any of the things

which are related of them in the Gospel" (LW 52:32). From the

shepherds we learn "that the preaching and singing of the angels were

not in vain" (Klug, 144).



For Luther, the revelation of the glory of God in the birth of His Son

to the shepherds is consistent with the way in which God uses what the

world holds to be weak and foolish to make His mercy manifest. Like

Mary, the shepherds are models of faith which lives from the

Word. Luther also sees in the shepherds a model for Christian

vocation. "Here is another excellent and helpful lesson, namely, that

after the shepherds have been enlightened and have come to a true

knowledge of Christ, they do not run out into the desert-which is what

the crazy monks and nuns in the cloisters did! No the shepherds

continue in their vocation, and in the process they also serve their

fellowmen. For true faith does not create people who abandon their

secular vocation and begin a totally different kind of living, a way

of life which the totally irrational monks considered essential to

being saved, even though it was only an externally different way of

existence" (Klug, 148).17



Although most of Luther's preaching was based on the Lukan account of

the nativity, he demonstrates a fondness for John's Gospel18 and his

preaching of the Christmas story often echoes John 1:1-14. Luther

asserts that this pericope "is the most important of all the Gospels

of the church year, and yet it is not, as some think, obscure or

difficult. For upon it is clearly founded the important article of

faith concerning the divinity of Christ" (Lenker, 173). In a sermon on

John's prologue, Luther says "John begins his Gospel in such an

exalted tone and continues in the same vein so that in almost every

single letter he preaches the deity of Christ, which is done by no

other evangelist" (LW 52:53). Luther loves John's Gospel because the

evangelist makes it clear that "Whoever has touched Christ's skin has

actually touched God"19-



The Christian's comfort is only to be found in the Word made flesh. A

Christmas sermon from 1527 makes this point in a most striking way:

"He has power to cast us into hell and yet he took soul and body like

ours...If he were against us he would not have clothed himself in our

flesh...Here God is not to be feared but loved, and that love brings

the joy of which the angel speaks...Satan, on the other hand, brings

home to me the Majesty and my sin, and terrifies me so that I

despair...But the angel does not declare that he is in heaven... 'You

shall find...' He points out that he has come to us in our flesh and

blood...Our joy is not that we ascend and put on his nature as is the

case when the Mass is made a boastful decking of ourselves in

divinity. Do not be driven to distraction, but remain down here and

listen, 'Unto you a Saviour.' He does not come with horses but in a

stable...Reason and will would ascend and seek above, but if you will

have joy, bend yourself down to this place. There you will find that

boy given for you who is your Creator lying in a manger. I will stay

with that boy as he sucks, is washed, and dies....There is no joy but

in this boy. Take him away and you face the Majesty which

terrifies...I know of no God but this one in the manger...Do not let

yourself be turned away from this humanity...What wonderful words

(Col. 2:9)! He is not only a man and a servant, but that person lying

in the manger is both man and God essentially, not seperated one from

the other but as born of a virgin. If you separate them, the joy is

gone. O Thou boy, lying in the manger, thou art truly God who hast

created me, and thou wilt not be wrathful with me because thou comest

to me in this loving way- more loving cannot be imagined"20- In

Luther's preaching christology and soteriology are never separated. Or

as Ulrich Asendorf puts "Christ shares all He is and has with those

who belong to Him. In this way christological facts are directly

transformed soteriologically."21



Luther's Advent and Christmas preaching, like all good preaching,

isgfinally doxological. In many respects his ballad-like "From Heaven

Above to Earth I Come" (85 TLH; 37/38 LW) is a summation of Luther's

Christmas preaching.



In his book Against the Protestant Gnostics, Philip Lee suggests that

if contemporary Protestantism is to be delivered from its enslavement

to gnostic captivity, preaching which is faithful to the biblical

narrative, christological in content, and liturgical in shape will

need to be restored to our pulpits.22 Perhaps the gnostic forces of

our age threaten the church nowhere as much as they do in December as

the clear preaching of repentance in Advent is often muted by the

sentimentalism encouraged by the hungry consumerism of our culture and

Christmas is transformed into a festival of moralisms. Our preaching,

it seems to me, cannot but benefit greatly from that preacher of

Wittenberg who could not get over the fact that we have God in the

flesh for our forgiveness, life, and salvation.23



-John T. Pless

  University Lutheran Chapel

  Minneapolis, MN

  XI. 11.1996





1 -Mark Noll, "The Lutheran Difference" First Things (February 1992), 31.



2 - Ulrich Asendorf, "Luther's Sermons on Advent as a Summary of His

Theology" in A Lively Legacy: Essays in Honor of Robert Preus edited

by Kurt Marquart, John Stephenson, and Bjarne W. Teigen (Fort Wayne:

Concordia Theological Seminary, 1985), 13.



3 -Fred Meuser, Luther the Preacher (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing

House, 1983), 57. On Luther's preaching, also see Ulrich Asendorf, Die

Theologie Martin Luther nach Seinen Predigten (Goettingen: Vandenhoeck

& Ruprecht, 1988);Martin Brecht, Martin Luther: Shaping and Defining

the Reformation 1521-1532 translated by James Schaaf (Minneapolis:

Fortress Press, 1990), 284-288; Richard Lischer, "Luther and

Contemporary Preaching: Narrative and Anthropology" Scottish Journal

of Theology (1983), 487-504.



4 - Sermons of Martin Luther - Volume I edited by John Nicholas Lenker

(Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983). All citations from this volume

will be identified in the body of the paper as Lenker.



5 -The House Postils- Volume I edited by Eugene Klug (Grand Rapids:

Baker Book House, 1996). All citations from this volume will be

identified in the body of the paper as Klug.



6 -Luther accents the preached word. Note his comment in his 1521

sermon on the First Sunday in Advent: "This agrees with the word

'Bethphage,' which means, as some say, mouth-house, for St. Paul says

in Rom.1, 2, that the Gospel was promised afore in the Holy

Scriptures, but it was not preached orally and publicly until Christ

came and sent out his apostles. Therefore the church is a mouth house,

not a pen-house, for since Christ's advent that Gospel is preached

orally which before was hidden in written books" (Lenker, 44).



7 - John Dolan describes such preaching at the threshold of the

Reformation: "Preachers were preoccupied with the theme of sin and the

grim face of death waiting for the moment of merited punishment. There

was an emphasis on the horrors of hell and the suffering of the

damned. Their sermons were filled with descriptions of burning trees

on which hung the souls of those who did not attend church services,

vultures gnawing at men's vitals, venomous serpents stinging the

unholy, boiling lakes, frozen fens, heated ovens and vile

dungeons....Everywhere the emphasis was on the negative side of man's

salvation, his sins and punishment" Stanley Schneider, "Luther,

Preaching, and the Reformation" Interpreting Luther's Legacy edited by

Fred Meuser and Stanley Schneider (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing

House, 1969), 124.



8 -For example, in a 1521 Advent sermon Luther states " I do not wish

to force any one to believe as I do; neither will I permit anyone to

deny me the right to believe that the last day is near at hand. These

words and signs of Christ compel me to believe that such is the case"

(Lenker, 62). For a treatment of Luther's apocalyptic views, see Mark

Edwards, Luther's Last Battles (Ithaca: Cornell University Press,

1983), 97-114.



9 -T.F. Torrance, "The Eschatology of Faith: Martin Luther" Luther:

Theologian for Catholics and Protestants edited by George Yule

(Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1986), 145-213.



10 - Thomas Wabel, "The Simplicity of Scripture in Luther's Christmas

Sermons" Lutheran Quarterly (Autumn 1995), 241.



11 - For the influence of the theology of the cross on Luther's

preaching, see John T. Pless "Martin Luther: Preacher of the Cross"

Concordia Theological Quarterly (April-July 1987), 83-101.



12 -Hermann Sasse, We Confess Jesus Christ trans. Norman Nagel

(St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1984), 39.



13 -Roland Bainton, The Martin Luther Christmas Book (Philadelphia:

Fortress Press, 1967), 22-23.



14 -See Chapter 4, "The Preached God" in Gerhard Forde's Theology is

for Proclamation (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990), 87-133.



15 - Note the implications here for liturgical preaching. The Divine

Service is founded on the twin pillars of Word and Supper. As Christ

comes to us in His Word, the congregation welcomes Him with the

angelic hymn that announces the incarnation. As the same Lord comes to

us in His body and blood, the congregation anticipates this gift with

the angelic hymn (the Sanctus) that proclaims his presence. Note the

way in which the Gloria and the Sanctus are parallel in the liturgical

structure of the Divine Service.



16-See Vilmos Vatja, Luther on Worship trans. Ulrich Leupold

(Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1958), 3-63.



17 - In Luther's homiletical treatment of the shepherds, we are given

an excellent window into his doctrine of vocation-a doctrine which

contemporary Lutheranism desperately needs to recover in light of the

"neo-monasticism" of contemporary American Evangelicalism. See Harold

Senkbeil, Sanctification: Christ in Action (Milwaukee: Northwestern

Publishing House, 1989), 12-15. In his treatise of 1520, "On the

Freedom of a Christian", Luther writes "We conclude, therefore, that a

Christian lives not in himself, but in Christ and in the

neighbor. Otherwise he is not a Christian. He lives in Christ through

faith, in his neighbor through love. By faith he is caught up beyond

himself into God. By love he descends beneath himself into his

neighbor" (LW 31:371). That which Luther expressed theologically in

"On the Freedom of a Christian" is expressed liturgically in the

Post-Communion Collect ("We give thanks to you, almighty God, that you

have refreshed us this salutary gift, and we implore you that of your

mercy you would strengthen us through the same in faith toward you and

in fervent love toward one another..."). Homiletically, Luther gives

expression to this in his Christmas sermons. For example in a 1521

Christmas sermon Luther says "These are the two things in which a

Christian is to exercise himself, the one that he draws Christ into

himself, and that by faith he makes him his own, appropriates to

himself the treasures of Christ and confidently builds upon them; the

other that he condescends to his neighbor and lets him share in that

which he has received, even as he shares in the treasures of Christ"

(Lenker, 146).  Contra Richard Caemmerer's distinction of "faith-goal

sermons" from "life-goal sermons," Luther preaches faith which is

active in love.



18 -On Luther and the Fourth Gospel see Victor Pfitzner, "Luther as

Interpreter of John's Gospel" Lutheran Theological Journal (August

1984), 65-73; Carl Stange, "The Johannine Character of Luther's

Doctrine" Lutheran World Review (October 1949), 65-77.



19- Ian Siggins, Martin Luther's Doctrine of Christ (New Haven: Yale

University Press, 1970), 232. In addition to Siggins outstanding

treatment of Luther's incarnational christology see Marc Lienhard,

Luther: Witness to Jesus Christ (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing

House, 1982), 153-194; Norman Nagel, "Martinus: 'Heresy, Doctor

Luther, Heresy!' The Person and Work of Christ" Seven-Headed Luther

edited by Peter Newman Brooks (New York: Oxford University Press,

1983), 25-49; and Franz Posset, Luther's Catholic Christology

(Milwaukee: Northwestern Publishing House, 1988).



20- Quoted in Nagel, 48.



21 -Asendorf, 2.



22 - Philip J. Lee, Against the Protestant Gnostics (New York: Oxford

University Press, 1987), 218-225. Also see Maxwell Johnson, "Let's

Keep Advent Right Where It Is" Lutheran Forum (November 1994), 45--47;

Neil Alexander, The Liturgical Meaning of Advent, Christmas,

Epiphany:Waiting for the Coming (Washington, DC: The Pastoral Press,

1993), 29-57.



23 - Recommended for the pastor's own devotional reading and spiritual

formation in preparation for Advent-Christmas preaching (and

liturgical preaching in general) are Day By Day We Magnify Thee: Daily

Readings for the Church Year From the Writings of Martin Luther edited

and translated by M. Steiner and P. Scott (Minneapolis: Fortress

Press, 1982); Luther's Family Devotions edited by Georg Link and trans

by Joel Baseley (Dearborn: Mark V Publications, 1996).