Rev. Michael Holmen's Sermons
282 episodes - English - Latest episode: 14 days ago - ★★★★★ - 1 ratingSermons preached at Peace Lutheran Church, Oelwein, IA and Our Redeemer Lutheran Church, Independence, IA. This is a dual parish of The Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod. We use the one year, historic lectionary.
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Episodes
220313 Sermon on how Christians should act toward governing authorities (Lent 2) March 13, 2022
March 13, 2022 14:30Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Today I’d like to speak about how we, as Christians, are to act towards the authorities that have been placed over us. Our Gospel reading today affords us that opportunity because Jesus is teaching the Pharisees how they should deal with Herod. This is applicable also to us, even though our authorities are quite different than Herod. Before we get into that, however, let’s say a little bit about these Pharisees. Pharisees were Jews who were especially ...
220306 Sermon on Luke 4:1-13 (Lent 1) March 6, 2022
March 06, 2022 19:07Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Nobody had to teach us to have an unbelieving attitude towards life. What I mean by an unbelieving attitude is that we ignore God. He is the one from whom all things come. As we are by nature our thoughts do not rise up that high. We get up, make breakfast, and start in on whatever it is that we do. Little thought, or, more likely, no thought at all is given to the one who gave us a comfortable bed, who made the sun shine, who gives us good things to eat...
220302 Sermon on the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (Ash Wednesday) March 2, 2022
March 06, 2022 19:01Audio recording Sermon manuscript: John the Baptist testifies: “Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” We are beginning our Lent series tonight with this witness’s testimony: “Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” The main thing here is the action. Sin is being removed. The way that it is removed is by the sacrifice of the Lamb of God, who is Jesus. The only way that sin can be taken away or removed is by the sacrifice of Jesus. This is not...
220227 Sermon on Moses and Jesus (Transfiguration) February 27, 2022
February 27, 2022 19:01Audio recording God did many important things through Moses. God did many “new” things through Moses. We are not accustomed to thinking about things being “new” when it comes to God, and that is not a bad attitude to have. When it comes to God, new things are probably lies, coming from the father of lies, who loves to deal in all things spiritual. Nevertheless, with Moses God did all kinds of new things. First of all, the number and power of miracles that are done through Moses is a defi...
220220 Sermon on Genesis 45:3-15 (Epiphany 7C) February 20, 2022
February 20, 2022 19:06Audio recording Sermon manuscript: The shortest creed in Christendom is this: I believe that Jesus Christ is my Lord. Jesus being our Lord is a wonderful thing. He is King of kings and Lord of lords, but he is so different than all these other lords. All these other lords are very eager to “lord it over us.” That is to say, they’d like to sit at the head of the table. They’d like tributes and praises brought to them. They’d like to skim as much cream off the top as they can get away with....
220213 Sermon on Luke 6:17-26 (Epiphany 6C) February 13, 2022
February 13, 2022 15:30Audio recording Sermon manuscript: How did Jesus’s words strike you this morning? “Blessed are you who are poor, because yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, because you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, because you will laugh. Blessed are you whenever people hate you because of the Son of Man.” Then, on the other hand: “Woe to you who are rich, because you are receiving your comfort now. Woe to you who are well fed now, because you will be hungry....
220206 Sermon on Luke 5:1-11 (Epiphany 5C) February 6, 2022
February 06, 2022 19:04Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Everyone has something that he or she wants. Everybody’s calling has its own challenges and disappointments. We take it as a given that not everything is going to go right all the time. It would be quite a surprise if all of a sudden all those things that we want were suddenly to fall into our lap. This is what happened to Peter. He was a fisherman together with at least three of the other apostles—his brother Andrew, and James and John. Being a fisher...
220130 Sermon on 1 Corinthians 13 (Epiphany 4C) January 30, 2022
January 30, 2022 19:04Audio recording Sermon manuscript: I’d like to begin today by talking about lovelessness. There is a kind of lovelessness that is irrational and there is a kind that is rational. Irrational lovelenssness just doesn’t make sense. Rational lovelessness makes sense. Irrational lovelessness is when people do things that are mean for no good reason. Rational lovelessness is when people do things that will make them get ahead of others. Both kinds of lovelessness are real problems for us hum...
220123 Sermon on 1 Corinthians 12:12-31a (Epiphany 3) January 23, 2022
January 23, 2022 15:45Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Our epistle reading today picks up where our epistle reading from last week left off. Last week, if you remember, Paul was talking about spiritual gifts. One and the same Spirit gives different gifts to Christians. Among the gifts that he mentioned were the word of wisdom and the word of knowledge. Faith is given by the same Spirit. Then he talked about gifts that were more common at apostolic times like miracles, prophesy, and speaking in tongues. In...
220116 Sermon on 1 Corinthians 12:1-11 (Epiphany 2) January 16, 2022
January 16, 2022 15:51Audio recording Sermon manuscript: It is not uncommon for people to think that if the Bible is true, then there should be lots of miracles. The Bible records many unusual signs and wonders that God has performed. The way the thinking goes is that if the Bible is true concerning these things, then these miracles need to keep happening. It is understandable how a person could arrive at such an opinion, but it is not right. The Bible does, indeed, record unusual things that God did. But Go...
220109 Sermon on Luke 3:15-22 (Baptism of our Lord) January 9, 2022
January 09, 2022 19:36Audio recording Sermon manuscript: We entered the season of Epiphany with the festival of Epiphany this past Thursday. The word “epiphany” means, “to be revealed.” So Epiphany and the season of Epiphany has as one of its main emphases the way that this person named Jesus was revealed to be something more than an ordinary person. The Epiphany festival itself is about the way that wise men came from the east. They gave gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh to Jesus. What is of greatest ...
220102 Sermon on Ephesians 1:3-14 (Christmas 2) January 2, 2022
January 02, 2022 15:43Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Let me begin with a story that some of you will get and some of you will not get. A person went to a mechanic one day because their car wasn’t working right. They went into the waiting room while the mechanic looked over their car, high and low, left and right. The mechanic walked into the waiting room, wiping his hands on a rag, and said, “It’s the muffler belt. It’s shot. You need a new muffler belt.” Some of you are going to understand that this is ...
211226 Sermon for St. Stephen, December 26, 2021
December 26, 2021 18:41Audio recording Sermon manuscript: It’s a little jarring, the day after Christmas, to celebrate the martyrdom of St. Stephen. Talking about a fiery man, who wouldn’t shut up, to the point where people pelted him with stones until he died—that stands in stark contrast with a certain view of the Christmas spirit. For many Christmas is a celebration of celebrating. Here we might ask, “What happened to the party?” Now we are talking about somebody who said such stark and stringent things that...
211225 Sermon for Christmas Day, December 25, 2021
December 26, 2021 18:35Audio recording Sermon manuscript: The message that the Bible gives us is that God dwells with his people. In our Old Testament reading today we heard about God entering the tent that God had instructed Moses to build. For about ten chapter of Exodus there are very specific and elaborate instructions that are recorded. The tent had three parts. There was a curtain placed around the whole perimeter, kind of like a wall. The tent itself was to be inside this courtyard. There were two chambe...
211224 Sermon on Isaiah 9:2-7 (Christmas Eve) December 24, 2021
December 25, 2021 14:06Audio recording Sermon manuscript: The prophet Isaiah speaks about the coming Christ hundreds of years before he was born. Isaiah says in our reading tonight: “People walking in darkness have seen a great light. For those living in the land of the shadow of death, the light has dawned.” Walking in darkness is bewildering. You cannot see where you are going. You cannot anticipate problems or dangers. You might not get to where you are going because you don’t know the way. You might not e...
211219 Sermon on Luke 1:39-56 (Advent 4) December 19, 2021
December 19, 2021 21:13Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Let’s begin by setting the scene for our Gospel reading this morning. Earlier in this first chapter of Luke he speaks of the way that two baby boys were miraculously conceived. One of them was John the Baptist. The other was Jesus. John the Baptist’s father, Zechariah, was a priest. One day he had the honor of doing the priestly duties in the Temple when an angel of the Lord appeared to him. Zechariah was frightened, but the angel said to him, “Do not...
211212 Sermon on Philippians 4:4 (Advent 3) December 12, 2021
December 12, 2021 15:37Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I say rejoice. Rejoicing is celebrating, being happy. We know how to rejoice. We rejoice when good things happen to us. We rejoice when we get some unexpected money, when we get a good deal, when it’s time to have fun with friends. Nobody has to tell us to rejoice. The circumstances prompt us to rejoice. We might not even be able to help it. There are two modifiers, though, to Paul’s command to rejoice. We are to rejoi...
211208 Sermon on work (Advent 2 Midweek) December 8, 2021
December 09, 2021 16:30Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Last week’s reading was the first two chapters of Ecclesiastes. Our reading tonight is chapters 5 and 6. Our reading next week will be the last chapter of Ecclesiastes. So our reading tonight is from the middle of the book. It is a continuation of the theme that was established right away at the beginning. We talked about this last week: All is vanity. All is vapor, totally vapor. It vanishes in the wind. Nothing lasts on this earth. Our reading tonigh...
211205 Sermon on Luke 3:1-20 (Advent 2) December 5, 2021
December 05, 2021 20:32Audio recording Sermon manuscript: We spend a lot of our lives getting prepared. Children get prepared to go to school. Those in school get prepared to go to college. Those in college prepare for getting a job. Those with a job prepare for getting a house. We get prepared for marrying a spouse. We get prepared for having a child. We get prepared for grandchildren. We get prepared for retirement. We get prepared by writing a will. We get prepared for having a funeral. We prepare for a lot ...
211201 Sermon on Ecclesiastes 1-2 (Advent 1 Midweek) December 1, 2021
December 05, 2021 20:25Audio recording Sermon manuscript: We tend to get comfortable with certain interpretations and understandings of our life where we figure we know what things are all about and we take that for granted. Who we are, and what we hope for, end up being pretty stable. We know who we are and we know what we would like to have happen. We might accumulate some wisdom for ourselves. We lay down some rules for ourselves, which we figure should help us get what we want. We are something of a work-in...
211128 Sermon on Luke 19:28-40 (Advent 1) November 28, 2021
November 28, 2021 19:48Audio recording Sermon manuscript: To the disciples it appeared that everything was going well as Jesus made his way into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. In fact, things were going very well. If they would have thought back on the past few years they would have recalled things that kings and prophets would have liked to have seen and heard. Jesus did many powerful signs. He made the blind see and the deaf hear. He fed the 5,000 and the 4,000. Jesus taught as one having authority, instead of lik...
211121 Sermon on Matthew 25:1-13 (Last Sunday of the Church Year) November 21, 2021
November 21, 2021 19:07Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Our Gospel reading today is a rich text that is worthy of being meditated upon for a long time. I’ve known this text for many years and have taught it for many years, but I do not feel as though I’ve understood it completely. There are texts in the Bible that are like this. A person can profitably wonder about them for years or even a lifetime. We will take it up again today. The broad outlines of the parable are clear. This is talking about Christ’s s...
211114 Sermon on Matthew 25:31-46 (2nd to Last Sunday of the Church Year) November 14, 2021
November 14, 2021 19:31Audio recording Sermon manuscript: We have come to the last Sundays of the Church Year. At the end of the Church Year the lectionary directs our attention to the end of the world. Our readings today are especially concerned with that line in the Creed that says, “He shall come again with glory to judge both the living and the dead. His kingdom shall have no end.” Almost 2,000 years have passed since Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead. A person might wonder: “Where is this pr...
211107 Sermon for All Saints' Day, November 7, 2021
November 07, 2021 20:48Audio recording Sermon manuscript: With the observation of All Saints’ Day we think of those who have died with faith in Jesus. They have been made holy and are in heaven. Since we are talking about people who have died, this gives us a good opportunity to talk about the important topic of death. The world is full of thoughts and teachings about death. The Bible teaches quite differently about death compared to the world. So today I’d like to speak about what the Bible says about death. ...
211031 Sermon for Reformation Sunday, October 31, 2021
October 31, 2021 14:44Audio recording Sermon manuscript: 504 years ago today, October 31, 1517, Martin Luther posted 95 theses, or statements, against the Church’s sale of indulgences to the door of St. Mary’s Church in Wittenberg. Luther making this protest is the reason why October 31st was the date that is chosen to commemorate the Lutheran Reformation of the Catholic Church. But October 31, 1517 was just the beginning of the story. The pope’s sale of indulgences was not going to be the main point of con...
211024 Sermon on Ephesians 6:10-17 (Trinity 21) October 24, 2021
October 24, 2021 14:52Audio recording Sermon manuscript: There are two common errors when it comes to fighting against the devil and other evil powers. A person can either think too highly of these enemies and have an exagerrated response against them, or a person can think too little of them as though no response were needed at all. Those who think too highly of the devil, demons, and other evil things can get carried away. They often want to know more about these things than what the Bible tells us. The B...
211017 Sermon on Isaiah 55:1-9 (Trinity 20) October 17, 2021
October 17, 2021 14:52Audio recording Sermon manuscript: It is a part of our human nature that we like to fix things. Wherever there might be a problem, let’s figure out a way to fix it. So if you’re naked, go make some clothes. If there is pain with childbirth, let’s give an epidural. If there’s oppression against women, let’s start a movement. If the work is heavy or boring let’s get some hydraulics and robotics. If thorns and thistles come up let’s spray some Roundup. If there is sweat on our brow, let’s fi...
211010 Sermon on Genesis 28:10-17 (Trinity 19) October 10, 2021
October 10, 2021 14:37Audio recording Sermon manuscript: In our Old Testament reading we heard about a man named Jacob—a name with which you are surely familiar. But oftentimes our Bible reading is not what it should be, so we have a hard time putting together the things that we have learned over the years. So today I’d like to talk about the events leading up to what happened with Jacob so we can better understand and apply to ourselves the way God works. Where I’d like to begin today is with Jacob’s grandf...
211003 Sermon on Matthew 22:34-46 (Trinity 18) October 3, 2021
October 03, 2021 18:23Audio recording Sermon manuscript: You’ve probably heard it said that there are two tables or tablets of the Law. The Ten Commandments can be divided into two groups. There are commandments that have to do with God—that’s the first table of the Law. Then there are commandments that have to do with other people—that’s the second table of the Law. The first three commandments, “You shall have no other Gods,” “You shall not misuse the Name of the Lord your God,” and “Remember the Sabbath day...
210926 Sermon on Proverbs 25:6-14, Luke 14:1-11 (Trinity 17) September 26, 2021
September 26, 2021 20:27Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Let me tell you something strange: On the one hand, nobody likes being corrected. On the other hand, everybody likes correcting others. It’s like there’s a one way street. All correction is to issue forth from us unto others. We resent it when any correction might come from others upon us. Jesus once asked, “Why do you focus on the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the beam that is in your own eye? How will you tell your brother,...
210919 Sermon on Luke 7:11-17 (Trinity 16) September 19, 2021
September 19, 2021 18:07Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Probably none of you have seen someone resurrected from the dead. Sometimes you hear unusual stories about people’s hearts stopping for a period of time, and then they are revived. I’ve never heard of someone being revived after they are placed into the morgue or in a coffin. That’s what happened one day, though, on the outskirts of a town called Nain. A sad scene was unfolding there. A young man had died. He was his mother’s only child. She was a wido...
210912 Sermon on Matthew 6:24-34 (Trinity 15) September 12, 2021
September 12, 2021 14:45Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Not believing in God, not believing that God will act, is behind much of the rationale that we tell ourselves in order to justify our sins. Our internal dialogue inside our heads convinces us that other factors are much more important for our happiness rather than God. God is nowhere to be seen, so we have to do things on our own. Take the fourth commandment, “You shall honor your father and your mother,” for example. God attaches a promise to this com...
210905 Sermon on Luke 17:11-19 (Trinity 14) September 5, 2021
September 05, 2021 14:44Audio recording Sermon manuscript: At Mt. Sinai God gave Moses and the Israelites laws about cleanness and uncleanness. Things that are clean are available for use and consumption. Unclean things are to be avoided if at all possible. Unclean things make the person who comes into contact with them also unclean. Those who are unclean need to be made clean before they can participate in worship or be exposed in any way to God’s presence. Generally speaking, practically all things in this w...
210829 Sermon for the Marytrdom of St. John the Baptist, August 29, 2021
August 29, 2021 14:50Audio recording Sermon manuscript: John the Baptist was put in prison for telling his ruler, Herod Antipas, that it was not right for him to divorce his own wife and to marry the divorced wife of his half-brother. John the Baptist was in jail for telling Herod that divorce is wrong, and marrying someone who has wrongfully divorced is adultery. This was the same thing that Jesus taught. He was once asked about whether it was allowable to get divorced. He responded by saying that it betra...
210822 Sermon on 2 Corinthians 3:4-11 (Trinity 12), August 22, 2021
August 23, 2021 13:42Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Mt. Sinai was the place where God led Moses and the Israelites after they came out of Egypt. Mt. Sinai is in the Sinai peninsula—a very desolate, desert-like place. God had to feed them with manna, and water them with water from a rock, otherwise they certainly would have died. At Mt. Sinai God took up residence at the top and manifested his glory. Moses tells us that his glory was such that there was thunder and lightning, a thick cloud that covered the...
210815 Sermon for St. Mary, Mother of our Lord, August 15, 2021
August 15, 2021 14:49Audio recording Sermon manuscript: It is kind of hard for a protestant to observe the festival that we are observing today. Whereas Catholics and Eastern Orthodox love their ideas of who Mary is, protestants are a little leery of talking about her. That is understandable. Both of these confessions go too far with their devotion for Mary. They say things about her that aren’t true. Then, because of these false beliefs, they often believe in Mary more firmly than they might believe in Jesus...
210808 Sermon on Jeremiah 8:4-14 (Trinity 10) August 8, 2021
August 08, 2021 14:42Audio recording Sermon text: Knowing what is wrong in any given situation is usually more than half the battle. If you know what is wrong you can efficiently go about fixing it. For example, ever since we moved into our house we would occasionally hear mice running around in the attic. We’ve dealt with it over the years by throwing some mice poison up there. Usually after a day or two we wouldn’t hear the mice anymore. But then, after some time passed, they’d come back again. Obviously ...
210801 Sermon on 1 Corinthians 10:6-13 (Trinity 9) August 1, 2021
August 01, 2021 14:48Audio recording Sermon manuscript: The natural heart of man, darkened by sin, has a very poor understanding of God and what he is like. We can’t help but apply our own standards and think that they are good enough. So, for example, we might think, “I’ve gone to church my whole life. I must be among those who will be saved.” Or, “I’ve never murdered anyone. I’ve never done drugs. I’ve never done this, that, and the other thing that I see everybody else doing.” “I’ve been able to keep a j...
210725 Sermon on Mark 10:35-45 (St. James the Elder) July 25, 2021
July 25, 2021 14:50Audio recording Sermon manuscript: July 25 is the day that has been set aside in the church calendar to commemorate James the Elder or James the Greater. Calling him the elder or greater differentiates him from James the Younger or James the Lesser. There are two men named James in the New Testament who are rather important. The James who is commemorated today is one of the twelve apostles. The other James is known as the brother of Jesus. He ends up becoming the bishop of the congregatio...
210718 Sermon on Genesis 2:7-17 (Trinity 7) July 18, 2021
July 18, 2021 14:44Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Over the centuries there have been a lot of different ideas about what an ideal human existence might be like. The Egyptians had their views. The Greeks had their views. So on and so forth. There is also a certain view of what our existence as human beings should be in our own time and place. An important component of our own views that we should mention right off the bat is that we don’t really care about those ancient views because we have advanced ...
210711 Sermon on Matthew 5:17-26 (Trinity 6) July 11, 2021
July 11, 2021 14:42Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Why do people sin? Isn’t it because sinning gives us pleasure? It can feel good. It might be more convenient or easier than doing what is right. It might be more interesting than plain old vanilla. Simply put, people sin because they want to. There is a certain view of the Christian life where this love of ours for sinning doesn’t have to change. According to this view of how we can live as Christians we can continue to live in sin and God’s grace will...
210704 Sermon on 1 Corinthians 1:18-25 (Trinity 5) July 4, 2021
July 04, 2021 14:53Audio recording Sermon manuscript: The message of the cross is that Jesus, who knew no sin, became sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Jesus brought about a change by his death on the cross. We have a couple special, theological terms for what happened at the cross: redemption and atonement. With the cross God redeemed us from the devil to whom all human beings belong because of the fall into sin. The sinless Jesus was handed in, thereby all human being...
210620 Sermon on Luke 15:11-32 (Trinity 3) June 20, 2021
July 04, 2021 14:48Audio recording Sermon manuscript: That we already understand forgiveness is something that we can take for granted—particularly as Christians. There is nothing more central to Christianity than the forgiveness of sins. Accordingly, we talk about forgiveness a lot. Since we talk about it a lot, we assume that we must already understand it. But maybe familiarity is not enough to understand forgiveness. For example, if forgiveness is to be forgiveness it seems to need to be somewhat surpris...
210613 Sermon on Luke 14:15-24 (Trinity 2) June 13, 2021
June 13, 2021 14:30Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Birds of a feather flock together. People with the same tastes or interests gather themselves together. Oftentimes you can just look at a person and know a lot about them. What kind of clothes do they wear? How is their hair cut? Do they have piercings or tattoos? With simple questions like these you will have a pretty good idea of what their social class is, what kind of work they do or don’t do, who their friends are, what their family life is probably...
210606 Sermon on 1 John 4:16-21 Luke 16:19-31 (Trinity 1) June 6, 2021
June 06, 2021 14:44Audio recording Sermon manuscript: One reading sticks out more than the others today. What sticks out in that reading is punishment. The rich man is in torment in hell. He just wants one drop of water from the tip of Lazarus’s finger. This is what you might call the ultimate punishment. Punishments have a way of capturing our attention. I remember as a kid that Mom and Dad didn’t really care too much about seatbelts. That is, they didn’t care too much until the law added punishment. They...
210530 Sermon on Isaiah 6:1-7 (Trinity Sunday) May 30, 2021
June 02, 2021 19:29Audio recording Sermon manuscript: In many situations in life we are able to disassociate ourselves if we really want to. We can leave. It might be hard to leave, but if things get bad enough we can do it. If our work gets bad enough, we can quit. If our church does things we don’t like, we can quit going. If our marriage gets dysfunctional enough, we can get divorced. If our own children get unruly enough, we can cut them off from our lives. These are terribly dreadful things, and hopefu...
210523 Sermon for Pentecost, May 23, 2021
May 25, 2021 14:38Audio recording Sermon manuscript: There are three great festivals that the Christian church celebrates every year: Christmas, Easter, and today’s festival of Pentecost. During these festivals we often learn and speak about the significance of them. Therefore, with Christmas, we learn how very changed the universe has become by the Son of God being joined to our human race and born of the Virgin Mary. By this union of God and man in Jesus Christ we have been intertwined with God. At Eas...
210516 Sermon on Ezekiel 36:22-28
May 16, 2021 14:45Audio recording Sermon manuscript: King David was an exceptionally keen observer of mankind. There is nobody else who even comes close understanding the way that people are, except, perhaps, the apostle Paul. But I’m quite sure that even Paul learned what he knew from David’s psalms. So I’d like to begin today with some of David’s thinking concerning man. The psalm I’d like to look at is Psalm 36. The Hebrew wording is a bit obscure for the very first verse of this psalm, so it gets tra...