allsaintsjonesboro Sermons

Earthly & Heavenly Bread – A Homily on Mark 8:1-9

On the Seventh Sunday after Trinity (Aug. 3), Father Leigeber preached on Christ’s miraculous feeding of the four thousand (Mark 8:1–9), reminding us that God alone provides our daily bread—both for this life and for the life to come.

The multitude in the Gospel lesson left everything behind to hear Jesus’ Word, going without food for three days. Their hunger for the Word of God outweighed their bodily needs—a striking example of the truth that “man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

Jesus, seeing their need, feeds them miraculously with seven loaves of bread and a few small fish—showing that God is the giver of all things, physical and spiritual. Father Leigeber reminded us that our meals, our homes, our families—everything—are gracious gifts from our heavenly Father. This is why Christians pause to pray before meals, following the example of Christ Himself.

Yet the feeding miracle points beyond mere daily sustenance. The language of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving the bread to the disciples draws our attention to the Holy Eucharist, where Christ feeds His Church with His very Body and Blood. Just as He used the disciples to distribute bread to the people, so today He uses pastors to deliver His heavenly gifts in Word and Sacrament.

In a world of busyness and distraction, we are tempted to neglect this miraculous Meal. But Jesus’ compassion remains. Even if we’ve been forgetful or careless, He still offers Himself to us. Every Sunday, Christ performs a miracle—nourishing and sustaining His people with the Bread of Life, for the strengthening of faith and the hope of resurrection.

Let us never forget the Source of all good things. And let us give thanks, both at our tables and at His altar: “O give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good, and His mercy endures forever.”

Listen to the entire sermon:

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Do we venerate the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist?

For about eight hundred years, the Church has dedicated the Thursday after Holy Trinity Day to be a feast day dedicated entirely to the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist. This past Thursday, then, was that feast day–the Feast of Corpus Christi, also known as the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ.

In the Epistle from 1 Corinthians 11, we heard about Jesus’ institution of this holy supper and the words He has given through which He converts simple bread and wine into the Body and Blood of our Lord, and in the Gospel lesson, Jesus’ words from John 6, “He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him.”

But it was, especially, the traditional collect (prayer) of the day that focused our contemplation on this miraculous gift. We prayed:

O God, who under this wondrous Sacrament hast left us a memorial of Thy Passion: grant us, we beseech Thee, so to venerate the sacred mysteries of Thy Body and Blood, that we may ever have in ourselves the fruit of the redemption which Thou hast wrought; who with the Father and the Holy Ghost livest and reignest, ever one God, world without end.

Do Lutherans venerate and adore the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist? For many American Lutherans and other Protestants, that may sound more than a little bit strange. But if Christ says that the bread and wine of the Sacrament are actually His true Body and Blood, is it strange? Or simply Christian? Listen to Father Leigeber’s sermon below for more.

allsaintsjonesboro Sermons

Homily for Maundy Thursday

O Lord God, who hast left unto us in a wonderful Sacrament a memorial of Thy Passion, grant, we beseech Thee, that we may so use this Sacrament of Thy Body and Blood that the fruits of Thy redemption may continually be manifest in us; Thou, who livest and reignest with the Father, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

“Take, eat; this is my body…. Drink of it all of you; this is my blood.” -Jesus