Today's Reading: Luther's Small Catechism: The Office of the Keys

Daily Lectionary: Deuteronomy 30:1-20,  Matthew 19:1-15

In the Name + of Jesus. Amen. When you go to a doctor, maybe you have a small issue that bothers you. Maybe it’s a larger issue that you can’t handle.  You’ve tried to give yourself a remedy but nothing works. The doctor enters privately, examines you and gives you a path forward for healing.  What is said and shown to the doctor remains with the doctor.  This is how you should view your pastor with private confession.  Luther calls the pastor the “soul physician”.  

In private confession Jesus is doing the forgiving when pastors forgive the sins of the people given into their spiritual care. Jesus says “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven” (Matthew 16:19).  Unlike a doctor, the pastor’s medicine always works because Jesus is always the medicine you need.  Go to your pastor just like you go to your doctor.  Confess your sins as the self inflicted wounds that need help and healing.  Just like others wound you and a doctor heals those wounds, absolution heals the wounds done against you.  Jesus will take all sins away, even the ones done against you because by His cross, His death brings life and the medicine of immortality to you.  In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.