Delivered on the evening before Michaelmas, Sept. 28, 1533, on the Gospel Matth. 18, 1-12.
Today and tomorrow we celebrate the feast of St. Michael and of all the angels; we want to act on this as much as God gives grace.
So writes St. Matthew on the 18th chapter:
At the same hour the disciples came to JEsu etc. (Follows the text until v. 10.)
(1) In this gospel, beloved in the Lord, you hear that the Lord remembers the dear angels and admonishes that no one should despise the little ones and the lowly, that is, the young children and believers. For where this happens, the mighty lords, namely the dear angels, Christ himself and the Father in heaven, whose face the angels see without ceasing, are thereby despised.
2 Because the feast of St. Michael and all the angels is here, we want to keep it in our churches. Because the feast of St. Michael and of all the angels is here, we also want to keep them in our churches, not only for worldly reasons, so that interest can be collected, but much more for spiritual reasons, so that it is necessary and useful that a right understanding of the angels remains among Christians, so that the young people do not grow up and neither learn nor know what the dear angels intend or do, and have no joy from it and never thank God the Lord for this gift and benefit. For even without this, even if one has long been preaching about the dear angels and other gifts of God, the world remains in its hardening and darkness, and does not believe that there is a God, angel or devil; as the 14th Psalm, v. 1, and the 53rd Psalm, v. 2, say: "The fools say in their hearts, 'There is no God,'" etc. Nefarious people do not believe that there is a God. Because,
Where they truly and earnestly believed that God, angels and devils were, they would shy away and refrain from doing much that they usually do.
But we leave such a pitch-black world. Christians should know that angels are not few, but many; and again, that devils are not few, but many. Some doctors and teachers write that no man's head can comprehend or grasp the number of the dear angels. And the holy prophet Daniel cannot name as many of them as there are; let the Christians believe this. On the other hand, they should also believe that many devils, indeed, that the world is full of devils; as we read in the Gospel that in one man there went a legion. Summa Summarum, to know these things serves the Christians, that they know how to send themselves, both against the devils and the good angels.
(4) In the papacy there has been a great abuse in making idols out of the angels, as well as out of the Virgin Mary and other saints. For they preached that we should call upon the angels and the Virgin Mary to forgive our sins and to help us. Especially of St. Barbara they wrote and taught that whoever served her would not die without the sacrament. And such things have been done and heaped up so much that heaven and earth have become full of idols. The papists would like to adorn themselves now and deny this; but read the legends of the saints and look at their paintings, especially St. Barbara with the chalice and the host above, and you will find how cheaply they adorn themselves now. In all their collections and prayers, they have done nothing.
1038 is, S7-Z9. l. Of the Christian faith in particular - first article. W. x, 1251-1253. 1039
know how to boast other than the saints' merit.
(5) Therefore, it is necessary that people be instructed so that such shameful abuses of worshiping angels and saints do not arise again, but only the one, eternal, living God, who forgives sin and saves from death, be invoked and worshiped. For these are not the works of angels, creatures, saints or our Lady, but of the one God who justifies sinners and gives life to the dead.
The legend says that St. Michael lived on Mount Gargano in Apulia, and by a miracle - if it is to be called a miracle otherwise, that he drove an arrow, which was shot by a bow or crossbow at an ox, back in the air to the one who had shot the arrow - moved the people to worship him, to build a church and to establish services. This is no different than accusing the dear St. Michael as if he had wanted to push God from his throne and chair and be God himself; since the dear angels sing on the feast of the birth of Christ, Luc. 2, 14: "Glory to God in the highest" etc. They expressly confess that they are not God, and want to be unadored and uncalled for, saying that only God deserves glory. Therefore, we keep this feast to prevent such abuse and idolatry, that St. Michael and other angels are raised up for God.
(7) So now we celebrate the day of Michaelmas to praise and glorify our dear Lord God for having ordained the holy angels to serve us. For you have often heard that we celebrate the Day of Pentecost not because of the apostles, but because God gave the Holy Spirit and appointed the apostles. Thus we celebrate the day of the birth of our Lord Christ not for the sake of the Virgin Mary, but because God caused His Son to be born of her as a man, who was to be our brother and Savior. In the same way, we celebrate all other festivals for the sake of our dear God and praise the benefits that God has bestowed on such festivals.
The feast of St. John the Baptist. We celebrate the feast of St. John the Baptist not for the sake of St. John, but for the sake of our dear Lord God, who has given such an excellent preacher to the world. So we also keep the feast of the dear angels today, that we thank God the Lord for this benefit, comfort and joy, that he has given us the protection and assistance of his dear angels, so that we do not live like the ungrateful godless people, of whom there are unfortunately too many on earth. So I honor my prince, not that I worship him for a god; and yet it is a great and excellent blessing that God has given the worldly government and the authority of the world. For if God had not established authority through His word, one man would devour another. etc. So that we may enjoy the fruits and goods that God gives for our bodily needs, he has also given the authorities to govern, protect and punish the world, and to distribute the goods that God gives, so that we may serve God, preach about him and give thanks to him; just as all states are God's orders, and yet we do not worship them: so, even though the angels are God's creatures, we still do not worship them. It is a great grace of God that our parents are given to us, from whom we are born human beings and have body and soul. So it is also a great gift that we have pastors and preachers. In the same way, this benefit should also be recognized by us, that angels, who are the highest emperors, kings, princes, father and mother, are also ordained for us to serve by God Almighty. So a righteous, truthful mind remains that we look at the dear angels rightly, recognize God's good deeds and yet do not honor the angels above God. Just as I now know what a benefit and gift of God is worldly power and authority, so I can also send myself to recognize God's gift and thank God for it, and yet not honor the authorities above God.
(8) But if you preach about the angels, you cannot avoid it, you must also preach about devils, since the devils are also angels. As when I preach about
of righteousness, I cannot avoid saying I must also speak of sin. Or, if I speak of good men, I must also speak of evil men. So the angels are divided into two parts: pious angels and devils. For the holy scripture calls the evil spirits also angels. Just as an evil man is and is called a man, and often has better reason and understanding than a pious and God-fearing man, but in worldly matters: so the devils have an English and spiritual nature, like the good and holy angels. But just as an obdurate man uses the reason and wisdom of his body to take money and harm all the world, so the devils are angels by nature, but so evil that they are enemies of God, hate Him and envy Him in all that belongs to Him. All their works also testify to this. For the devil, together with all his evil angels, is so hostile to God's word that he keeps man from it wherever he can and is able, so that he does not learn the Catechism, does not keep God's commandment, does not believe in Christ, becomes lax in faith, falls away from God, and the like; all these are the devil's works. Just as the devil is hostile to the word of God and does not like to let man come to it or stay with it, he is also hostile to all the works of God. If he could kill us all and tear down heaven and earth at once, he would do so; for he is God's rejected enemy, very angry, who never stops his raging; and if he cannot hinder or destroy God's word and work, he still challenges it forever. This knowledge also belongs to Christianity, that just as we know that there are good angels, we also know that there are devils and evil angels, so that we do not live like the Sadducees, who believed in none, Acts 23:8. 23, 8.
(9) We should now know that evil spirits and devils are created as a spiritual nature, have a great mind, anger and power, and with their great wisdom, power and malice fight against God's word and works and especially against the holy Christian church. Whoever wants to belong to God and be His creature must stand in danger. Therefore Christ calls
the devil, Joh. 14, 30. and 16, 11., the "prince of the world". His power is greater than ten Turkish emperors; his wisdom is too high for all men; his wickedness is greater than all men's wickedness. When he possesses men, they become so hard that no one can win them. If all men, with their highest wisdom, would join together and submit to break the mind of such a man, hardened by the devil, it cannot happen. God must strike with his spirit as with thunder; otherwise it is lost. For the devil is too strong and blows it into people's heads so firmly through his wisdom that they want to kill themselves over it, and yet they say they are right; no one can persuade them otherwise. Thus the devil is such an excellent, wise and prudent spirit; when he finds man alone, there is no one so high, learned and wise whom he does not blind. How did he do to Saint David, who was so highly enlightened by God and a man after God's heart, yet he blinded him so that he did not see God and committed adultery with Bathsheba. Is this not great wisdom and art, to blind so holy a man? who had slain so many enemies and done so great deeds, should now so easily fall? And when this happened, the devil blinded him even more, so that he had his faithful servant, Urias, and others beaten to death, and caused such trouble that God's name and the temple were blasphemed. That is why I have often said, "Let no man be so wise on earth, for the devil has given him a defeat. For the devil's wisdom is so high that he takes all men captive; his reason is three miles wide, as my reason is hardly the width of a finger. He easily makes a nose at me, so that I think it is right, which is quite wrong. So his little wickedness is so great that all men's wickedness cannot be compared to it. You often hear terrible, horrible stories, that often a father murders his son and the mothers the children, and otherwise many innocent murders happen. The devil laughs at this in his fist, for he is so wicked that he cannot satisfy his wickedness. If
If he were to destroy and ruin all of us and then plunge us into the abyss of hell, it is only his pleasure; his power is infinite. But my power, yes, of the Roman and Turkish emperor, is a downy feather compared to that.
(10) Therefore we are not to do as the heathen do, who have made a goddess out of happiness and attributed everything that has happened to that goddess; but we Christians, on the contrary, are to know that we are in the world and in the devil's kingdom, where there are many thousands of devils; and whatever evil and misfortune happens, we are to know that it happens from the devil. "God is a God that helpeth," as the 68th Psalm, v. 21, says. For he is the Creator, who created everything from nothing, and what he created is all very good. Again, the devil is a corrupter and destroyer of God's creatures; if he can, he makes man blind, deaf, or helps man to break a leg; as one often reads in the Gospel that Christ says that the blind and deaf are possessed by the devil, Luc. 13, 16. That we now see such great avarice in the world, contempt and ingratitude against God's word, is nothing but the sorrowful devil's specter. If someone breaks a leg, or if someone murders another, these are the affairs of the devil, who strengthens people in their wickedness, so that they go and do such evil deeds. This is to be known of the devil, for the Scriptures teach us that God did not intend for there to be many gods, but says, "Whatever God does, God does.
(11) The heathen have devised many gods; a special god against pestilence, a special one against fever, a special one against sudden death, and so on. Against all sickness they have made a god of their own: a god of their own, who would bring the grain out of the earth and preserve it against the worms; and there is no creature to which they have not made a god of their own. When a woman conceived and gave birth, she had to have her own god. This would still be happening today if we did not properly distinguish the works that God does through the good angels and those that he does through the evil angels and devils. Thus
Now learn to discern. For if God only removes His hand and leaves room for the devil, you are blind or an adulterer and murderer, like David, falling and breaking a leg, or drowning in the water, where God does not hold over you with full power as your Creator.
Sometimes God allows you to fear Him and turn your heart to Him. Whoever does not know this, soon runs to the saints and says: "My child has the heart-strain, the elves (nightmares), I must pledge it here or there. But this is wrong. For every saint does not have his own office to help the sick, as the pope and the pagans have lied; but it belongs to God alone, who does good to men, gives sun, moon, body and life, his Holy Spirit and his dear Son. But if we want to be ungrateful and despise him, he has the world full of devils, and removes his hand a little, leaving room for the devil to cause weather, to kill the people and the cattle, as happened to dear Job, and to spoil the wine and the grain, to cause pestilence etc. When God removes the hand, you shall walk in a straight path and yet break a leg. God often removes the hand, so that you may learn what you have in Him. For that one little hair on thy head may remain unbroken is God's guard and watch over thee. For if the devil should come to thee, he would soon pluck out thine eyes, and shoot a rifle through thy heart. Therefore, if you see one going blind, say that it is the work of the devil, who can do nothing but harm; just as God can do nothing but good, protecting and preserving what is in the world. The devil, however, does the opposite; what he cannot destroy and break, he nevertheless hinders and attacks.
From this you see how mighty a regiment our Lord GQn must have to preserve his creature against the devil, and how much the pious holy angels have to do, and how many more of them there must be than there are of the devil. For it is still the case in the world that where one man receives a misfortune or harm, a thousand remain unharmed.
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and undamaged. Where a woman gives birth to a dead child, a hundred living children are born. If the devil had his way, if he saw one person healthy, he would make a thousand blind and lame.
(14) Therefore, children should be taught and instructed from their youth what our Lord God does through the good angels, who were not created to kill you, but their function is that God should rule the world through them. On the other hand, God also needs the devil and evil angels. They would like to destroy everything, but God does not allow it, unless there is a ruthlessness, which we well deserve. He allows pestilence, war, or any other plague to come, so that we may humble ourselves before Him and fear Him, and so that we may stand by Him and call upon Him. When God has directed this through the ruths, the good angels again take the lead in their office and call the devil to cease with pestilence, war and evil time. So the devil must serve us with this very thing, so that he intends to do harm. For God is such a master who can use the devil's wickedness to make good out of it. The devil deceives, deludes and delights in taking the gospel from us completely. God sometimes allows him to do this and uses him to punish ungrateful people and full spirits; as St. Paul teaches in his first epistle to the Corinthians in the eleventh chapter and in the other to the Thessalonians in the second chapter.
15. such ruths we see now also therefore
go; for there is no longer any desire for truth in the world. God has begun to bind up the ruths, and the devil desires to tear away the gospel; if we continue, it will be said: "Because they have not received the love of the truth, God will send strong error," 2 Thess. 2:10, 11. He will send us enough error to awaken the Anabaptists and Sacramentans, who will make it so that we will not know where the gospel remains.
16. Therefore learn that both good and evil angels are ordained of God: the good for service, the evil and devils for our rod and punishment. We live in the midst of the devils, who work to tear down everything that is God's word and works, especially in Christianity. Because they also see that temporal life is God's gift, they do not like it that there is a good and peaceful time, that the crops grow and prosper. They especially do not like to see the gospel being preached and us going to heaven; that is where the devil first rages and fights. He does not allow you to see for an hour and keep fresh eyes or a healthy finger. He is not ten thousand miles away when evil comes; but when thou seest a calamity come, know that the devil hath wrought it. That is enough to say at the beginning of this feast of good and evil angels; we will leave it at that this time and tomorrow, God willing, we will deal with it further in two sermons. Praise and glory be to God for eternity, amen.