“Create in Me a Clean Heart”
Psalm 51:10

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Pastor Kevin Vogts
Trinity Lutheran Church
Paola, Kansas
Trinity Sunday–Confirmation Sunday—May 30, 2021

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

In her book “A Change of Heart” Claire Sylvia wrote about her very odd, mysterious experience when she was 48 years old.  She was near death from heart disease when she received a heart transplant.  Waking up from the operation they asked how she felt, and the first thing she said was “I could use a beer.”  That really puzzled her family and friends, because she had never before really liked or drank beer.  Over the next several years she discovered that her personality had changed in many ways, including many other foods and drinks that now she liked or disliked.

Who the donor of her new heart had been was confidential, but through some detective work she was able to track him down and visited his family.  He was a college-age student killed in a car accident.  When she finally met his family, she discovered that what she had suspected for the past several years really was true.

Though the doctors said it was impossible, the changes in her personality, and especially her new likes and dislikes, definitely reflected him and his tastes and personality. She asked his family, “What’s the first thing he would have said after coming out of surgery?” and they replied, “He probably would have said, ‘I could use a beer.’” 

The doctors cannot explain how this could happen.  This strange medical mystery reminds us of a profound spiritual mystery.  As Psalm 51 says, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew and right Spirit within me.”

All of us, according to the Bible, are born with a defective heart, a spiritually sick and defective heart.  As Genesis says, “The Lord saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. . . from his youth.”

If left untreated, this spiritual heart disease we are all born with would be fatal, eternally fatal.  As Paul says in Romans, “The wages of sin is death.”  If left untreated, our spiritual heart disease would end in eternal death and damnation.  But, just as those with heart disease can receive a new heart through a miracle of modern medicine, through the true miracle of his Word and Sacraments God gives you a SPIRITUAL heart transplant. 

You young women being confirmed today underwent a spiritual heart transplant when you were children.  Your parents brought you for that heart transplant to a baptismal font like this.  “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right Spirit within me.”  That is what God did for you in your Baptism.  Through this Sacrament, you were born again with a new heart as a child of God.

With any transplant, the greatest danger is rejection.  For the rest of their lives, transplant recipients must have ongoing treatment and regular doses of anti-rejection medicine. It is the same with the spiritual heart transplant you have received.  What we call “the old sinful self,” your old, sick, sinful flesh, is always trying to reject the Lord and his ways. 

That is why Jesus tells us, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, AND TEACHING THEM to observe everything I have commanded you.”  The spiritual teaching you have received since your Baptism is part of your ongoing treatment regimen to prevent rejection of the new heart you were born again with in your Baptism.

But, CONFIRMATION must not become GRADUATION.  Just as a heart transplant recipient needs constant infusions of medicine for the rest of his life to prevent rejection, YOU will never graduate from needing regular doses of God’s Word and Sacraments.  Your regular worship here in God’s house, your eating and drinking the Sacrament of Christ’s body and blood, your own Bible reading and prayer, these are all your regular infusions of spiritual anti-rejection medicine for the pure, clean, new heart your heavenly Father has transplanted within you.  But, if you make Confirmation GRADUATION from worship and Word and Sacrament, if you stop taking this spiritual medicine, the new heart within you will die.

Peter says, “Grow in the grace and knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”  In order to grow you need food.  Without the spiritual food of Word and Sacrament you will not grow, you will spiritually wither and die.

So, make your Confirmation not a termination, but a launching pad, not a graduation, but a renewed beginning of your life in Christ.  For the rest of your life, continually infuse yourself with God’s medicine for you: worship, Word, Sacrament.

And just as Claire Sylvia’s new heart changed her personality, her desires, her likes and dislikes, your new heart will also change you.  “Create in me a CLEAN heart, O God, and renew a RIGHT Spirit within me.”  You are entering a particularly dangerous time in your lives, when Satan, and the world, and your own sinful flesh will all tempt you to reject the clean heart and right Spirit the Lord has transplanted within you.  As Peter says, “Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith.”

Psalm 119 says, “How can a young person keep their way pure?  By living according to your Word.”  The Apostle Paul told Timothy, “Flee the evil desires of youth, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.”  One of your memory verses this year from Proverbs puts it this way: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.”

“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right Spirit within me.”

Amen.