Sermons 2026

Text: Matthew 4:12-17

 Theme: Light amid Darkness 

Outline 

1. JC comes as John is imprisoned

 2. Proclaims same message of Repentance, goes to land in midst of darkness and death to proclaim repent 

3. Bring Repentance through disciples He calls, bears witness that He has power to forgives by healing all kinds of diseases 

4. We bear the same message today in our lives in the midst of a world full of darkness and death 

Sermon 

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. My dear beloved flock, the text for our mediation today is the Holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew the Fourth chapter, verses twelve through seventeen. 

Beloved lambs, I pray that you are doing well today. What do you think would happen if we turned off all of the lights. Do so! It got pretty dark. Was it scary? It makes you really enjoy the light we have from candles, flashlights, and the sun even more. Without light, we would be very scared. In our text for today, Matthew records that Jesus goes into a land so in darkness that it can be felt and touched through sicknesses and death. How does Jesus show that He is the light of the world, even in the middle of sickness and death? Ponder that question as you hear the rest of the sermon. You may go back to your seats and those who love you. 

1. JC comes as John is imprisoned 

Our text for today opens on a very much down note as John the Baptist is imprisoned under King Herod facing eventual death. Our Lords response is to leave the city of his childhood in Nazareth and begins His public ministry by settling in the town of Capernaum, a major town located on the northwest coast of the Sea of Galilee. He comes to an area made up of majority Jews. The Jewish Historian Josephus estimates that there were three million Jews in Galilee alone, an area roughly the size of Connecticut today. Galilee at the time belonged to the territory of Antipas, a Herodian client-king who served at the whim of the Romans but had some degree of autonomy, estimates are around 1,500 gentiles lived in Capernaum. In the eighth century b.c. the Assyrians under TiglathPileser had taken many Galileans into captivity and had replaced them with Assyrians and other Gentiles. Heavily Jewish but Gentile influenced. Jesus comes to a land that Matthew records is a land of darkness and death. This mixture of Jews and Gentiles had its effect upon the religious life of the people. The God of Israel was not unknown there, but the worship of God had departed considerably from the forms of worship that the Law of Moses called for. The people were “living in darkness,” as Isaiah had foretold. This land, whose inhabitants are spiritually dead, belongs to Death as the realm of his government. 

2. JC Proclaims Repentance

 It is upon this land that our Lord steps forth and makes His home base of operations. To them He comes proclaiming the same message as John the Baptist, Repent for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand. Change your hearts and minds. Turn from the darkness that envelopes you into the light. Turn from your darkness and death to the One who can erase all your darkness and death forever. This is a message that we still need to hear in our world today. We still live in the midst of a sinful and fallen world. We see the control of death and decay all around us, as service men and women die in wars. People die in earthquakes, landslides, freeze to death in the cold. Even we are not immune. Our bodies decay every moment. Another grey hair, another ache or pain that was not there last night, another wrinkle, another friendship that has faded with the passage of time. Another outburst spoken in anger and rebellion that we wish we could take back, but the words have already been spoken. Even as we try to be good people. Even as we try to do the right thing, it is never good enough. As Yoda tells Luke, “Do or do not, there is no try.” 

Our trying cannot and does not save us no matter how many good things we try to do. We are still stained by sin, both within and without, in our thoughts, words, and deeds. 

3. JC Brings Repentance

 So, what do we do? We turn towards He who is the light made flesh. We turn in faith towards Jesus Christ. Here is the One who not only proclaims repentance but gives repentance and causes it within people’s hearts through the power of His Holy Spirit. He calls His disciples to come and follow Him. That they turn from being fishermen to fishers of men. They catch people! How? By being with our Lord, seeing Jesus’ great miracles with their own eyes, participating as He feeds four and five thousand through their own hands, touching Him with their own hands, as John and Thomas declare, This is the Word Made Flesh, my Lord and my God. Jesus is the Light in the midst of darkness and death. He took on the darkness of our sins in His holy flesh. He saw the effects of sin, fallenness, and death as the people “brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having seizures, and paralytics, and he healed them. ” Jesus did not stand idly by. He used His power to bring healing and light in the midst of pain and death. He healed them of both physical as well as spiritual afflictions. Even greater, Jesus goes to the cross. There, He suffers and dies that all of the world might have life and light everlasting. He does not give only mere temporary relief of pain and death. Rather, He destroys sin and death forever by dying for you and me. He gives you His perfection. He gives you His everlasting light and salvation forever. 

4. Same message today 

How, you may ask, does Jesus still give this today? He died and rose over 2,000 years ago. He has ascended to the right hand of the Father. How? How does He still cause repentance and give forgiveness still today? Jesus still does so the same way He called the disciples, though the call given through the pastoral office. You have rightly called me as your pastor. My job is simple. To proclaim God’s Law, that people may indeed turn in repentance over their sins, and God’s grace given in His Gospel. When hearts are mourning in repentant sorrow over their sins that they may hear the blessed words of Absolution, “Your sins are forgiven in and by the authority of Christ.” That they might receive Jesus’ very body and blood in, with, and under, the bread and the wine, given and shed for you, for the forgiveness of your sins. Your sins are forgiven because of Jesus’ death and resurrection on the cross. Sadly, we cannot stay here in church forever. Rather, we go out, strengthened by our Lord, to do the work He has given us to do, whatever that may look like in our various vocations. We depart here in joy and peace. We go out into a world still in darkness, pain, and death. We are with people as they hurt. We mourn with those who mourn. We weep with those who weep. We proclaim that this is not the end. The darkness and death do not have the final say. There is light. There is hope. There is life everlasting. How? Because for those dwelling in the region and shadow of death, on them a light has dawned.” The light of Jesus Christ, and His great love seen in His death and resurrection from the dead. 

The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard, and keep, your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.