
That’s my text for the 35th Ministry Anniversary of my baby brudder, Pastor Larry Ross Schwanke. Larry is 9 years younger than me. So if you start juggling some math gymnastics in your mind, you soon realize that makes me older than dirt.
Our Lord willing, Larry’s ministry anniversary will be celebrated May 18th, 2025, at St. John’s Ev. Lutheran Church, Milton, WI. I have the honor of being preacher and liturgist for the day. Because of this, I will be missing the youth confirmation service at Trinity. That bothers me a bit, but short of cloning I can’t be in two places at once. Yet my thoughts and prayers can be in both places, through the sermon I plan to preach. Here it is.
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Dear members of St. John, friends and family of the celebrant, visitors, and especially you—Pastor Larry Ross Schwanke,
For the last few weeks, I’ve been trying to figure out why I was asked to preach for this festive occasion. Well, it’s not as if I don’t have a few ideas. Perhaps Pastor Schwanke and his wife, Martha, wanted me because Larry is my baby brudder, and I was involved with Larry’s ordination into the holy ministry at Resurrection Ev. Lutheran Church, Aurora, Illinois on August 6, 1990. Perhaps this time they were hoping after I had so many more years of practice, I could get the sermon right.
Or perhaps the congregation wanted me to preach for this anniversary, because I was privileged to serve on various Synodical committees over the years, and I’ve done some writing. I also served as a Vice-President of the Northern Wisconsin District Praesidium for 12 years, so my presence today could lend this celebration a little “gravitas.”
But I doubt it. I think we all know the real reason I’ve been asked to be your guest preacher today. You are hoping that this message will be filled with amusing anecdotes about your pastor! Ah, the stories I could tell, because I have known Larry since he came home from the hospital as a newborn, a tiny package red as hamburger—that’s what I said when I first saw him. And then this tiny package tipped our dairy-farm home upside down because his delicate digestive system couldn’t handle cow’s milk. So—scandal of scandals--we had to buy Similac soy-bean milk—by the case. He went through it like there was no tomorrow.
But if I steer this sermon down the anecdote pothole, the old adage will ring true. What goes around, comes around. That means during the potluck meal and fellowship time after this service, not to mention time with family back at the house, Larry might request “equal time” for sharing amusing anecdotes about me—of which there will be more than a few. And more than a few a little embarrassing. So I think it wiser not to go there!
And then there’s this. I’d rather that we not leave this day with only a few amusing stories to remember about a pastor. I’d rather we remember the Lord of the Church who blesses us with faithful called workers! So today We Celebrate God’s Changeless Grace. II. As We Remember Your Leaders. (vs. 7) II. As We Rejoice in our Savior Jesus Christ. (v. 8)
I. As We Remember Your Leaders.
It is a celebration of God’s changeless grace that stands as the heart and core of the book of Hebrews and also chapter 13. In this concluding chapter, the inspired author is imploring God’s people to stand firm in the faith and not grow weary in the daily fight. That’s why he urges faithfulness in marriage and warns against the love of money—two nasty tripping points for Christians of every age.
Beyond that, the inspired author knows how important good role models can be. So he urges us, “Remember your leaders.” Keep on remembering--that’s what he’s urging. Not just for a 35th anniversary. Nor for that matter only in the month of October which someone decided should be “Pastor Appreciation month.” But always remember your leaders.
But what do we keep on remembering about them? The amusing anecdotes? The clothes they once wore: bell-bottom jeans; leisure suits, or white shoes worn for boogieing the disco night away? The cut of their hair, when they still had more of it? Their body shape before age and gravity took a toll?
The gifts they had: the really good preacher; the one with a special gift for hospital visits; the one with a heart for outreach who had mastered the art of cold calls in evangelism; the gifted educator who excelled in teaching Bible classes and confirmation class; the one who was a consummate administrator guiding the church through building projects yet also steering the congregation on a path of fiscal responsibility and good stewardship as it paid off all its debts?
In the body of Christ, the gifts of our called workers, our spiritual leaders, the messengers will vary—one to the next. But what dare never change is the message, “Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you.” Nothing is more important! Whether standing in the pulpit, or shepherding the confirmation class; whether counseling a couple whose marriage is unraveling, or sitting in a coffee shop with a skeptic who thinks religion is the height of folly—nothing is more important than faithfully sharing God’s Word.
It is the Apostle Paul who once observed, “This is the way a person should think of us: as servants of Christ and stewards of God’s mysteries. 2In this connection, moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful. “(1 Corinthians 4:2) In season or out of season. Whether the ministry is going well, or going bust. But how can we gauge that faithfulness? Paul explained that in his letter to the young pastor Timothy: “15Make every effort to present yourself to God as one who is approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, correctly handling the word of truth.” (2 Timothy 2:15) That’s the mark of a true spiritual leader. Someone who is never ashamed to say, “This is what the Lord says.” This is what the writer to Hebrews wants us to keep remembering. And when you’ve been blessed to be served by someone like that, you’ve also found a faith worth copying! “Carefully consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.” Such a faith stands firm through all the changes in life.
And oh, there are so many. I think you see that more clearly once you have a few years of experience under life’s belt. Huge changes when it comes to technology. As part of my extensive, time-consuming research for this sermon, I shot Larry a few messages on Facebook. And one of the questions I asked was, “When did you get your first computer?” Answer? He got an Amiga “after Christmas of (his) first year at Sem. So 87.” What? Larry, how in the world did you live before that? Through high school? Through college? You must have relied instead on your smartphone? What? Are you telling me you didn’t even own a cell phone back then? Oh, the humanity! Not even the internet? How did you research before Google and Wikipedia?
Technology’s fast-paced changes sometimes frustrate an older guy like me, but that’s nothing compared to the dizzying changes our society is undergoing. Secularism which is bulldozing the mores and absolutes of Christianity further and further off into the ditch. Science which claims the answers to life’s big questions can all be found in a laboratory and dismisses religion as superstitious and silly. Gender issues—no more are we to believe “And God created them male and female,” but we now have transgender, fluid gender, genderqueer, non-binary, agender and dozens more terms that are multiplying almost daily.
For that matter, even our spiritual leaders change. They take another call, just when we’ve broken them in and are comfortable with them. They retire. Or the Lord promotes them to heaven and eternity.
And we change. These days when I look in the mirror, I immediately think of the line from the hymn, “Change and decay in all around I see.” Oh, well. So be it! “Oh, thou, who changest not, abide with me!”
The only way we can weather the tsunami of all the changes in our life is when we go back to God’s Word, and we listen to the inspired writer; when we Celebrate God’s Changeless Grace. . .
II. As We Rejoice in Our Savior Jesus Christ.
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Here is the key verse to hold in our heads and our hearts, as we move forward from this weekend celebration. Here is the verse that stands at the heart and core of that Word of God shared by countless generations of faithful Christian leaders. Here is our Lord’s precious guarantee that gives us hope when we witness another group of confirmands pledging to “suffer everything, even death, rather than fall away from the faith.” Here is the Lord’s anchor to give us strength when we hold our loved ones hands as they take their final breath. Here is our comfort as we change, age, and sense that our health is failing and our strength is ebbing away. And here is our peace, when we fall yet again into the same old mud-puddle of sin which sometimes can simply be crabbiness at all the changes we are forced to endure in this life!
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Let that be our confession that we shout before the world!
I wonder, could we do that right now? Would you please say that verse with me? “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Those are the words I pray a faithful leader will share with me when I’m ready to take my final breath on this earth.
Which leader? Do I have a preference? No. Frankly, I have no inkling as to when that might be, or where, or what congregation I might be a member of at that time. And it really doesn’t make any difference.
Any more than it did for the first readers of the book of Hebrews. For did you notice—none of those leaders are named. (Except in the conclusion of this letter, brother Timothy.) So we don’t know exactly which leaders the readers were encouraged to remember or imitate. Some scholars would say this refers back to the Apostles—maybe Peter. Maybe Paul. Others claim it might refer to someone like Stephen, the first martyr recorded in Scripture in the book of Acts. Others, James. Theologians debate such things until the cows come home, but we can’t be certain.
For that matter, we don’t even know who the writer to the Hebrews is. Was it the Apostle Paul? Was it Barnabas? Was it Apollos, Luke, Clement, or Philip? It seems clear the very first readers knew, but we’re not told--—and that’s purposeful--by inspiration! And that tells me it’s not that important who the writer is. And the writer himself would agree. Because after urging us to remember our leaders who spoke the word of God to us, after urging us to imitate their faith—their hope, their trust, their peace, their confidence at the end of life, this sentence stands all by itself on the printed page. “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”
Leaders who faithfully share the Word of God point first and foremost to Jesus, the Word made flesh. To the One whose birth we celebrate at Christmas. The one who was given the name “Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:21) That’s the Only Name by which we must be saved, for there is salvation in no one else. (Acts 4:12)
Faithful leaders will always point to the Christ. To the Chosen One, the Anointed one, the One our children tell us about at Christmas, when they shout out their memory verse with childlike excitement: “6For to us a child is born. To us a son is given. The authority to rule will rest on his shoulders. He will be named: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” (Isaiah 9:6)
Jesus Christ—the same yesterday and today and forever. Technology changes. Society changes. We change. We stand before the Lord’s altar as a teen and promise Him our undying love, but sometimes we forget our vow and become a wandering sheep. But the Shepherd never changes. He leaves the ninety and nine and seeks after the lost sheep.
Couples stand before the Lord’s altar and plight their troth. Well—that’s what we used to say but nobody talks that way anymore. We “pledge our faithfulness till death do us part,” but sometimes the stresses of married life unravel that pledge. Yet the Heavenly Bridegroom remains ever faithful, never forgetting his promises and never failing to keep them. What a comfort to changeable, sometimes fickle sinners like you and me!
How many more changes will the next 35 years bring? In technology? Maybe we’ll finally all have the flying cars like the Jetsons had in the cartoons way back when. Or maybe at least we’ll all have autonomous cars, which will be kind of nice. I won’t have to bother my daughter for a ride to the bait shop when I’m 105.
In society? If it continues on its current course, may God help the generations of Christians yet to come! But I’m confident he will, for he has assured us that even the gates of hell won’t be able to prevail against his church, and that even the hardest days in end time will be cut short for the sake of the elect. We’d expect nothing less from the God whose changeless grace we celebrate on this anniversary today. Amen.
Privileged to serve,
Rev. Glenn Schwanke