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Grace, mercy, and peace be upon you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen.

In Bible class this morning, the four confirmands gave a short profession of their faith. I reminded you all that confirmation is not a Lutheran invention. It's been a part of the Christian Church since the beginning where there would be a time set aside for whether youth or adult to be trained up in the Word of God, to be given the truths of Scripture so that their confession of faith would be at one with the congregation of which they were a part, and it would last years.

And at each point in time, the faithful pastors and teachers who taught that faith always had in the back of their mind, I pray they remember what they were taught. No different than you moms and dads as you have raised up your own children not only with the things of this world that you hope they remember, but first and foremost the things of God's Word that you taught them.

That's one of those things where, "Remember what I say more than what I do." That they remember what they were taught. Because in four short years, they will be gone. That time fleets by very quickly. Now for them, while they're going through that phase in their life, it seems like each day is 62 hours long and each week 14 days. And it takes forever to get through life at home. But it goes so quickly. And you pray they remember what they were taught.

This morning we celebrate the ascension of our Lord where Jesus Christ visibly and bodily ascended into heaven. And the apostles and the disciples were gathered around and watched Him ascend into heaven. And the weight of responsibility grew upon their shoulders because now, now they were on their own. A lot like y'all in a few short years. A lot like you parents as you remember when you stepped out of the womb of your household, the nest, as it were, and kind of took it out on your own and made your own chances, made your own decisions, consequences of some you wish you would never have made. Others, you're very proud that you have made.

Either way, what was always the touchstone was what you were taught. When Christ left these apostles and disciples to begin the Church, He did not give them or leave them in a situation or an environment that was greatly appreciative of what the Church brought. In fact, if anything, He left them in the midst of the mouth of a wolf for the Roman Empire in which the Church began despised the Christians. It was one more headache for them to govern. And it was the problem between the Jews and the Christians because the Jews still are waiting for the Messiah to come; the Christians said Jesus was the Messiah. And then there was all this infighting among the region there.

So when Christ ascended into heaven and left them, He left them in the mouth of the lion. And many of you parents, you know that feeling having departed from your own children and seeing them go out on their own too. Some of the decisions they made made you greatly proud. Some of them reminded you of your own mistakes, sadly. When Christ left His disciples, He summarized it with this statement: "Remember what you were taught." But He did not use those exact words. Instead, He used these words when He said, "These are My words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled." And the text says, "He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures."

Though the secular institutions of our great state are fine institutions, the secular institutions of this world and of this state do not…do not…affirm Christianity as the way, the truth, and the life. They proclaim people like you and me as having closed and myopic minds, of unenlightened thoughts seeing the world through this narrow prism known as Christianity. Well, they're right on that account. That's exactly how we see things. But they're wrong on the account as if what is being proclaimed in those institutions of enlightenment is that we somehow are less than enlightened.

Brothers and sisters, when Christ said those words that He opened their minds to the Scriptures, He is making it very clear that their minds had been clouded by fears, by anxieties, by doubts, by concerns, by things that cause them to be frozen at times in their tracks, and at other times pushes them to lash out. Either way, driven not by love and forgiveness, but by fear. As you look at your and my life, think about how often we have either been frozen in our tracks because of fear or anxiety or have lashed out because of fear and anxiety. And either way, our minds were clouded and needed to be opened by God's Holy Spirit working through this Word.

As I said earlier, there is only one place God has said He will reveal Himself, and only one. His Holy Word and sacraments. He will not be in your emotions or feelings, though that comes and that goes. He has bound Himself to His words so you can find assurance and so you can find where He is found. You don't have to go searching every which way high and low to find Him. He desires to be found by you there in that Holy Word and there in that Lord's Supper and there in that water.

He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures about everything in this life that centers back upon one thing…repentance and forgiveness. As was said earlier, in your and my life personally, God has allowed (and does often times) Satan to have his way with us, to ruffle our tail feathers, to unravel that which we had wound up so beautifully from our perspective, to challenge us and to crush us even. He allows that to happen. And we only know of one reason why that Scripture declares, and that is to drive us to repentance, which is not a once in a moment or once in a lifetime or once a year kind of a thing. It is our daily life.

You and I are where we are not because of our hard work and divine intervention withstanding because of our disciplined life, but because of God's grace. You wake up this morning with your eyes able to be open and able to breathe and eat and drink coffee not because you have this inherent thing within you that says, "I can." Because God allowed you to. He chose to give you and continue to sustain your life. Why is it that you are allowed to have the ability to perambulate to this place, to be fed by your Lord? Because you desired it? Because He pulled you here again, and He wants you back here often to be fed and nurtured.

Repentance and forgiveness is what to be preached by the Church and has been to this day. But repentance and forgiveness is not wrapped up into a moment in your life when you were against the ropes and realized it finally, and God brought you up out of that. Having brought you out of that, it is just kind of shoved to the side, reserved for those really difficult situations. That's your flesh and Satan talking to you, not God's Holy Spirit.

God's Holy Spirit says, "Daily we must repent, for daily we are wrestling with the same evil foe, the flesh that beats within our bosom, Satan, which is calling to us each and every moment, and this world which does not support your faith, nor Christ being the only way, the truth, and the life." There are only two religions in this world. There is the religion that says, "I must make God happy by my work in this world, by my efforts in this life, by my lifestyle in this life in order to make Him happy so that He says, 'Yea and verily shall you come into heaven.'"

That will end you up in hell quicker than a whistle because that's the work of Satan. It is a religion of works. No matter how good it looks, no matter how attractive it may be, it is a religion of works, not mercy, because the only other religion besides works is a religion of God's grace and mercy that says God's wrath was appeased by Christ Jesus, that that blood covered you, that that forgiveness is what you and I are succored by each and every day as we live out our lives in repentance and forgiveness. This one religion that is the only true religion promises eternal life, and it promises it to you not because you've been a good boy or a good girl, but because you were called to faith by Christ.

Remember what you were taught. You were taught regularly and continuously that God has been made our Friend and our Creator and our Redeemer and Father again by virtue of Christ and Him alone. And you are continually called back to that as you are this day. He has opened your mind to the Scriptures. He has given you again that Good News. So having been given such things, as we read in the Bible class this morning, what kind of people ought we to be then? Fearful people? Anxious people? People upon whom everything depends and not on God's grace and mercy? Lazy people? Apathetic or indifferent people? Worried people?

We are only to be a people who rely upon repentance and forgiveness, God's grace and mercy in Christ Jesus. That is what we will close our eyes in upon our death. You, Christopher, and you, Kyle, and Kelli and Joshua, and you moms and dads and grandparents and brothers and sisters and those who have seen them born, baptized, and raised…remember what you were taught. It is all that we have upon which to live, for without which we shall die. In Jesus' name, Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and your minds on Christ Jesus to life everlasting, Amen.