The time when Mary, the mother of Jesus, visits her cousin Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, is called The Visitation. While the two mothers meet, the real visitation occurs with the children in the womb. John, the forerunner for the Christ, is brought into the presence of Jesus, and leaps for joy in his mother’s womb. Already now the new creation is beginning and the baby in Elizabeth’s womb knows, believes, and hails his redeemer.

Why don’t we do this more often? Why don’t we leap for joy when we come to church? We are brought by the Spirit so that Jesus could visit us in His Word and Sacrament, so why don’t we jump with joy at His presence?  Why don’t we jump at the chance to serve our brothers and sisters in Christ and our community with the Gospel, of making introductions and fostering the relationships between God and man?

Instead, we treat it more like drudgery, like a chore. I have to say, I sometimes look out into the congregation and see people who look bored out of their minds throughout the service. Who mumble along the words of Scripture, tight lipped when singing songs of praise to God, and stare at the ceiling during the sermon.  We’re all guilty of this, there’s no denying it.

Your inattention doesn’t stop God from visiting His people, in fact, He comes because you are prone to not pay attention to Him. He comes to take sinners like you and me to forgive us, to save us, to renew us, to lead and conform us into His image. That’s why we here, that’s why God has gathered us to Himself this morning. We come to church because Jesus visits His people here. The church is about Christ and His gifts. The Church is here to give you Christ through the Word, forgiveness, and His Sacraments.

At the beginning of Romans 12, St. Paul urges, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

We all fail to live up to this standard. But as living sacrifices, as recipients of God’s visitation, we have been transformed to live according to God’s loving will. This serves as a powerful witness to others. God in Christ has first loved us, and by His mercy, God considers us according to His love for us and not our love for Him. How can we not rejoice at this?  How can we be any different than John the Baptist? Than Elizabeth and Mary? Than Paul? Than the saints of God throughout the centuries?

God does not want you to conform. He wants you to be transformed in the likeness of Christ.  Once the Gospel transforms us, God calls us to service toward others. We serve the Lord as He enables us with our own gifts. God wants you to actively serve your church family and your community through His Church. We have received everything freely from the hand of God, how can we not share what our Lord has given to us? How can we not use it for the glory of God? How can we not have genuine love for others?

Unfortunately, a harmful concern plagues the Church, and we at Zion are just as guilty as anyone.  A handful of people end up doing much of the work while the rest sit by and do little to nothing, paralyzed by disappointment, by fear, by ignorance.  Our own pride and impatience gets in our way and it discourages others. Why should anyone come to church, hear of God’s love, receive his gifts, if we treat it so lightly ourselves? How many of you have thought that you don’t want to be on a committee or a board because you feel like it’ll be too much time in a meeting, too much arguing, too much frustration?  Is there some truth in that? Probably. How many stay at home because you feel like you’re neither needed nor wanted nor appreciated? Or probably the excuse I hear more often that not, “I don’t know how, I don’t know what to do.”

All too often we fill our time with things that do not encourage us or anyone else in the faith. Christ and His body, the Church, often takes backseat to work, sports, staying out late on Saturday night, and the list goes on and on and on.  It’s no wonder we feel inadequate, we don’t visit our Lord in His Word and prayer as we ought.  As Christians, we should occupy our time with those things that are good, right, and salutary before all people that they may also glorify God.  He wants you to leap with joy in His merciful presence, just as John the Baptist did while still in the womb. He wants you to remember His mercy in Christ. By virtue of your Baptism, you a child of God, given His mercies and continues to renew us daily by His Holy Spirit. He has given the life of His Son, Jesus, for your salvation. In Jesus, He continues to bless you and sustain you in this life and into the next, for He has already prepared a place for you in His kingdom.

Paul explains what a life of genuine love looks like in our Epistle for this morning. This is what it looks like to have been visited by grace of God in Jesus. This “genuine” love is one that is without hypocrisy. It’s real, authentic, true, and good.  In other words, it gives with no expectations in return. This is so important nowadays.  The younger generations in our world smell out hypocrisy, bait and switch schemes, ulterior motives. We don’t have a school or a daycare so that we can back door people into the pews of our church. We have a school to teach our children what is good and acceptable and perfect in the eyes of God and to point them to Jesus. The same goes for our Daycare. We don’t decorate our church building or keep up the grounds so that others may pat us on the back for doing such good work. We don’t give our time, our effort, our money because it’s deserved.  We do it because it is good. It is right. It is genuine love. We do it so that others might see Jesus and glorify God because of what He does in this place through His Word and Sacraments. So that Jesus might meet them, stuck in the dirt and muck of this fallen world.

People loved by God, Christ has come to visit His people, He has come to visit you. Welcome Him with open arms, with faithful heart, with leaps of joy and genuine love throughout your life. Do not be discouraged, nor worry if it is enough, if you are enough. For Jesus visits His creation to forgive sin, to save sinners, to bless those who believe that there would be a fulfillment of the Lord’s Word, and that fulfillment is in Jesus.