NOTE: This article is written for the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity 15), which was yesterday. However, because the feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary takes liturgical precedence, the devotion for Trinity 15 is being offered today.
Bow down Thine ear, O Lord, hear me:
O Thou, my God, save Thy servant that trusteth in Thee.
Be merciful to me, O Lord:
For I cry unto Thee daily.
Rejoice the soul of Thy servant:
For unto Thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul.
—Psalm 86:1a, 2b, 3–4
A writing for the Holy Gospel, Matthew 6:24–34:
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?”
Matthew 6:25
It is impossible to serve two masters. One must only be devoted wholly and entirely to one master, for to serve more than one master is to serve multiple masters halfheartedly, and therefore, unfaithfully. Our Lord says in Matthew 6:24, “You cannot serve both God and money.” If one serves God, he must forsake all else; if one serves both God and money, it would be as if he serves only money.
Consider soldiers. They cannot pledge allegiance to two masters, but must dedicate themselves only to one cause. One cannot serve their own allegiance and the enemy. To serve one’s enemy is counterintuitive to the cause to which you have pledged allegiance. Halfhearted devotion deflates the cause by which one is motivated to serve and counteracts the work one does in positions of servanthood.
But service and dedication to one’s master goes beyond taking direct orders or honoring the master’s wishes. It also includes trust—trust that the master acts with the best intentions, that they will not only give orders or pronounce desires, but provide guidance and direction to those who serve him. He not only declares his desires, but grants discernment and wisdom to those who serve him.
This is most certainly true of our heavenly Father. God does not only reveal His will through the Law; He provides guidance and direction. He provides for all our needs, and equips us with every good thing necessary to do His will and walk in His ways. The Psalmist writes, “The steps of a man are established by the Lord, when he delights in his way; though he fall, he shall not be cast headlong, for the Lord upholds his hand” (Psalm 37:23-24). The writer of Habakkuk likewise says, “For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay” (Habakkuk 2:3).
As we serve our only Master, our Father in heaven above, we must recognize that this service is two-fold, as Christ teaches in the Gospel text. This service is first a singular, wholehearted service to God; we serve our Father in heaven alone. We cannot serve money and God, just as we cannot likewise serve mammon, laziness, wealth, reason, science, and the like. Second, this service is trustful. We believe that God will provide for our every need. He not only declares His will but provides guidance and endurance. God will make straight our paths and grant vision and direction.
Martin Luther faithfully teaches this in the Small Catechism. In the Explanation of the First Article of the Apostles Creed, Luther writes, “I believe […] that He provides me richly and daily with all that I need to support this body and life, protects me from all danger, and guards me and preserves me from all evil.” Luther similarly teaches in the Explanation of the Third Article that “the Holy Ghost has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith.”
While we indeed endure hardship, trials, and tribulation, God provides for our every need. Luther also connects this to service when he teaches that the Holy Ghost “keeps [us] in the true faith.” As we are kept in the true faith, we serve God. We believe and have faith in Him; as His servants, we trust in God. As those who trust in God, He provides for us. And as He provides for us, He loves us with an everlasting love and sanctifies us in the true Christian faith.
When Christ exhorts the Church not to serve two masters, He thus commands the faithful to trust wholly in God and depend entirely on His guidance and providence. You should not serve two masters, but instead serve only God. Likewise, one shall not trust in anything or anyone except God. He alone is our foundation. He alone is our Master. In Him only we trust, for Him only do we serve.
Luther on Matthew 6:24-34:
The sum of all is, it is God's will that we serve not gold and riches, and that we be not overanxious for our life; but that we labor and commend our anxiety to him. Whoever possesses riches is lord of the riches. Whoever serves them, is their slave and does not possess them, but they possess him; for he dare not make use of them when he desires, and cannot serve others with them; yea, he is not bold enough to dare to touch it. However, is he lord over his riches, then they serve him, and he does not serve them; then he dare use them, as Abraham, David, Job and other rich persons, and he casts his care only upon God, as St. Paul teaches in 1 Cor. 7, 32. Hence he aids the poor with his wealth and gives to those who have nothing. When he sees a person without a coat, he says to his money: Go out, Messrs. Dollars, there is a poor, naked man, who has no coat, you must be of service to him! There lies one sick, who has no medicine. Go forth, Squires Anneberger and Joachinesthaler, you must hasten and help him! Those, who act thus with their riches, are their lords; and all true Christians surely do this. But those who save piles of money, and ever scheme to make their heap larger instead of smaller, are servants and slaves of mammon.
He is a lord of mammon who lays hold of and uses it for the sake of those who need it and lets God rule, who says in Luke 6, 38: Give, and it shall be given unto you; have you nothing more, you surely have me still, and I have still enough, yea, I have more than I have given away and more than can ever be given away. We see here and there many pious poor people only for the purpose that the wealthy may help and serve them with their riches. If you do it not, you have the sure proof that you hate God. He, whom the sentence does not terrify, that he will hear on the day of judgment, can be moved by nothing. For he will hear then from God: Behold, thou hast hated me and loved that which could not protect itself against rust and moth. Ay, how firmly you will then stand!
Hence the sense is, we must own some possessions, but are not to cleave to them with our hearts; as Ps. 62, 10 says: "If riches increase, set not your heart thereon." We are to labor; but we are not to be anxious about our existence. This the Master says here in our Gospel in plain and clear words, when he thus concludes: “Be not anxious for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink: nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.”
—Martin Luther, Sermon for the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity, Matthew 6:24-34, taken from Martin Luther’s Church Postils.
Hymn of the Day for Trinity 15 (LSB 760):
1 What God ordains is always good:
His will is just and holy.
As He directs my life for me,
I follow meek and lowly.
My God indeed
In ev'ry need
Knows well how He will shield me;
To Him, then, I will yield me.
2 What God ordains is always good:
He never will deceive me;
He leads me in His righteous way,
And never will He leave me.
I take content
What He has sent;
His hand that sends me sadness
Will turn my tears to gladness.
3 What God ordains is always good:
His loving thought attends me;
No poison can be in the cup
That my physician sends me.
My God is true;
Each morning new
I trust His grace unending,
My life to Him commending.
4 What God ordains is always good:
He is my friend and Father;
He suffers naught to do me harm
Though many storms may gather.
Now I may know
Both joy and woe;
Some day I shall see clearly
That He has loved me dearly.
5 What God ordains is always good:
Though I the cup am drinking
Which savors now of bitterness,
I take it without shrinking.
For after grief
God gives relief,
My heart with comfort filling
And all my sorrow stilling.
6 What God ordains is always good:
This truth remains unshaken.
Though sorrow, need, or death be mine,
I shall not be forsaken.
I fear no harm,
For with His arm
He shall embrace and shield me;
So to my God I yield me.
Collect of the Day for Trinity 15:
Lord we beseech Thee, let Thy continual pity cleanse and defend Thy Church; and because she cannot continue in safety without Thy help, preserve her evermore by Thy help and goodness; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.