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In the name of Jesus, amen. So Saint Paul starts us off on the right foot in today's reading in Romans. He points our hearts and our minds in the right direction. He says, whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction. But why? So that through endurance and through the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope. For Christians, hope has a purpose. It's not some sweet, fleeting mindset of the naive, but hope actually clings to something tangible. When we have hope, we have hope in something. We don't just have hope in hope. Telling someone to just have hope is like telling someone to just have faith. Having faith in faith is nothing. Like hope, you must have faith in something. And for us as Christians, we have faith in Christ. Likewise, hope is the same for us. Our hope is in the promises of Christ. And the promises of Christ are all found, all of them, in Scripture. In fact, we need not look any further or place our hope anywhere else than the Word of God. Because God gives us His Word for our certainty. The Scriptures have endured. They are in fact steadfast because the word of the Lord endures forever. And because they have endured, we can be encouraged by them. But the scriptures are not just some conglomeration of stories tied together by the whim of man, like some might think. They speak to us. They speak only the truth. They convict our hearts of sin and they point all our eyes to Jesus. From where does our hope come? But the Word of God. So that we might be encouraged to endure, especially when life gets difficult. And all of you know what I mean. Especially in these last days as we wait for the Lord to come again. And if St. Paul places such emphasis on Scripture, then how are we to see them in relation to hope? Together, together we believe, teach, and confess that all of Scripture is inspired by the Holy Spirit, that God Himself is the author behind every word written in the canonical books of Scripture. Just as St. Paul tells young Pastor Timothy in his letter to him, all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete. For Paul, the purpose of Scripture is obvious. Maybe it should be to us. As people living in this sin-filled, broken, mixed-up world, dear saints, we need the truth. And that truth must be delivered into our ears and into our hearts. Even as the baptized believers in Christ, we too always need to be catechized, that is, taught by repetition in the faith. From the least of these to the greatest. We will always need to be taught, to be reproofed, to be corrected by the Word of God. We will always need training and righteousness in order to be complete. For this reason, Christ is the one who sends men out and places them in the office of holy ministry to speak to you the oracles of God in Christ Jesus. To speak to you God's word with absolute certainty, so that you might have hope. And for those who receive it, for those who believe it, the word of God is given from the lips of those sent and proclaimed into your ears, in order that you would repeat back to God what He has already said to us, so that you might have confidence, so that you may have certainty, so that when all else fails, we know that we have something that lasts forever. That is the Word of God written onto our hearts by His Holy Spirit, not just in our eyes or in our hands. This is why we teach little ones to learn things by heart. Because although heaven and earth will pass away as we know it, his word will never pass away, dear saints. When Scripture speaks, the triune God is speaking. When the Father speaks, the Holy Spirit proceeds. When the Son is speaking, the Holy Spirit is sent. God's Holy Spirit is the one instructing us unto righteousness, rebuking us, encouraging us, returning us to the Lord, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, so that through His word we might have endurance and hope. Remember what we teach in our small catechism. It is the Holy Spirit that calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies us in the one true faith. It is the Holy Spirit which creates faith in Jesus in our hearts and brings to mind all that He promises. And therein lies our hope. Not in our feelings, not in our emotions, not in our relationships, not because we live in the right neighborhood or have the right people in office. Rather, our hope endures because the word of God endures. But there are those who receive it and look to the promises that God gives in Christ, and there are those who reject it. Most despise the word and will not come to the wedding feast. The cause for this contempt for the word of God is not God's foreknowledge, but the perverse human will. The human will rejects or perverts the means and the instrument of the Holy Spirit, which God offers it through the call. It resists the Holy Spirit, who wants to be effective, who works through the word, as Christ says, how often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not. Our confessions. So then we too, we too need to watch ourselves and receive God's word lest we grieve his spirit. If the word of God has declared something to you, dear beloved, then it's true. If the Holy Spirit has told us that God has placed all his promises in Christ Jesus, then we must receive it. If the word made flesh has placed his promises in tangible means, in water and word, and body and blood, then who are we to doubt it? You want to know the promises that God Himself has placed in baptism? Well, then see what the word of God says. You want to know why holy absolution delivers the forgiveness it promises? Well, look no further than the word of Christ's own mouth found in the scriptures. You want to know how you're united to Christ in his holy communion, then inwardly digest what the scripture pours out in detail about how your Lord comes to you now in his holy supper. As Jesus spoke to those he sends out into the office of holy ministry, he says, He who hears you hears me. He who rejects you rejects me, and rejects the one who sent me. This is the word of God made flesh speaking. And as he speaks, the Holy Spirit goes forth and rings in your ears, not unlike these bells here. But if you reject Christ's word, then you reject the Holy Spirit's word and you reject the one who sent our Lord Jesus Christ. So then, dear saints, place your hope and your confidence in Christ Jesus' own word. It's for you. It's for your certainty. You want to know that you're justified before God? You want to know that you're forgiven? Then look no further than what God's word promises and all that he attaches that to. Again, where does St. Paul point us to have hope? Not in our jobs, not in how much work we do, even for the church, not in our own personal piety. He does not base our hope on what is going great in our lives or what's going terrible, but he places all hope in what the scriptures declare is true. And all of Scripture points to Jesus. It points all our eyes to the Word of God enfleshed in the body and blood of Jesus. The Lord gives us all that we need to have hope, to endure until our very last breath, or until Christ Himself comes back again, so that God gives us his word so that we can endure. It contains all the promises which find their meaning in the flesh and blood of Jesus. Dear friends in Christ, God has always covered his word with flesh and blood. It is the way in which God works. He did it when he preached his word through the mouth of the prophets. He did it through the apostles, and he still does it today when he sends men of flesh and blood to preach and teach his word and administer his sacraments rightly in the office of holy ministry. But I'm here to tell you that all flesh and blood will confess that it was the flesh and blood of Jesus who paid the price for all our sins on the cross. All of it. And so with us, he does the same as Jesus did for the disciples on the road to Emmaus after his resurrection. He does this for you. He tells them, and beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interprets to them all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. Dear baptized, that is why your hope is in him. That is why your hope is in Jesus. His word is not the goal, but Jesus is. Just as he told the Pharisees, you search the scriptures because you think in them you have eternal life. But I tell you, it is they that bear witness to me. The scriptures are not the goal. Christ is. In the name of Jesus. Amen.