Will You Die in Peace? | Christ For You

Text: Luke 2:22–40 | Christmas 1 & The Baptism of Luke Pirino

Simeon holds a forty-day-old baby and says something outrageous: “Now I can die in peace.” Why? Because salvation isn’t an idea or a feeling. Salvation has a face. Salvation is a Person. And Simeon is holding Him.

On Christmas 1, we see what Christmas really means: God puts salvation into a baby, small enough to be held and strong enough to hold you forever. And in Holy Baptism, that same Savior comes to you personally, by name, with forgiveness, the Holy Spirit, and a future that ends in life.

If you fear death, if your conscience accuses you, if you find yourself doing spiritual math, this sermon is for you. You don’t depart in peace because you got your life together. You depart in peace because Christ got you.

Subscribe & Share:

Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

Spotify: Christ For You

Português: Cristo Para Você

Website: ZionWG.org

What’s The Most Christmassy Event? | Christ For You

Text: Matthew 2:13-18 | Holy Innocents 2025

Why would the Church make you hear about Herod’s slaughter right in the middle of Christmas? Why put blood on the floor while the lights are still up and the hymns are still sweet? What if this “least Christmassy” text actually tells you what Christmas really is?

Christmas does not happen in a safe world. It happens in this one. God moved in. The Son of God entered enemy territory in real flesh and blood, and the world greeted Him with a sword. And Herod is not just an “out there” problem. He exposes the crown we try to keep on our own heads.

But this sermon does not leave you in the darkness. Jesus came to take the world’s hatred into His own body, to atone for your sin, and to break death’s teeth. Herod doesn’t get to keep those children. The devil doesn’t get to keep what he takes. The grave doesn’t get the final word. As this year closes and a new one begins, you do not know what evils you will see, but you do know who reigns, and you do know where your future is.

Subscribe & Share:

Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

Spotify: Christ For You

Português: Cristo Para Você

Website: ZionWG.org

Contact: [email protected]

Subscribe & Share:

• Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

• Spotify: Listen on Spotify

• Website: ZionWG.org/podcast

Stay Connected:

• Email: [email protected]

• Website: ZionWG.org

If this recording strengthened your faith, share it with others and leave a review. Your support helps more people hear the faithful preaching of Christ crucified and risen for you.

Support Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church

Subscribe & Share:

• Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

• Spotify: Listen on Spotify

• Website: ZionWG.org/podcast

Stay Connected:

• Email: [email protected]

• Website: ZionWG.org

If this recording strengthened your faith, share it with others and leave a review. Your support helps more people hear the faithful preaching of Christ crucified and risen for you.

Support Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church

What Do You Really Need This Christmas? | Christ For You

Text: Luke 2:15-20| Christmas Day

Why does Christmas sometimes feel useless? Why can the day be beautiful, and yet nothing in your life actually changes? The pain is still there. The loneliness is still there. The guilt is still there. And church can start to feel like a strange little ritual that doesn’t touch the real problems.

But underneath that frustration sits a deeper lie: that your biggest problem is your situation. If the money came, if the marriage improved, if the grief lifted, then you’d finally be okay. Scripture says your biggest problem is not around you. It’s in you: sin, a haunted conscience, and the death that follows.

So God does not give you what you think you need. He gives you what you actually need. He gives you Himself. The Baby in the manger is the Man on the cross, and the Man on the cross is the Lord who forgives you day after day. Christmas is not God offering advice or upgrades. Christmas is God coming near, in real flesh and blood, to save you.

If you feel empty, disappointed, or even numb this Christmas, this sermon is for you.

Subscribe & Share:

Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

Spotify: Christ For You

Português: Cristo Para Você

Website: ZionWG.org

Contact: [email protected]

Why Does Christmas Hurt Sometimes? | Christ For You

Text: Revelation 21:3-5 | Christmas Eve

Why do we start Christmas so early? Why do the lights and music feel like a lifeline, especially when life has felt heavy? Under the nostalgia sits a real ache: we want to hold onto joy, rewind time, and get back what we can’t get back.

But Christmas is not a mood we manufacture. It’s not a memory we chase. It’s God stepping into our darkness in real flesh and blood. The eternal Son of God does not wait for you to get yourself together. He comes to you in a manger, and He comes to you even now with mercy that does not fade when the season ends.

If you feel the joy of Christmas and also the grief underneath it, this sermon is for you.

Subscribe & Share:

Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

Spotify: Christ For You

Português: Cristo Para Você

Website: ZionWG.org

Contact: [email protected]

How Can I Have Comfort When I Still Feel Guilty? | Christ For You

Text: Isaiah 40:1–8 | Fourth Sunday in Advent

Advent says, “Get ready. The Lord is coming.” But what happens when you don’t feel ready? What happens when your conscience starts shaking because you know you’re guilty? And what do you do when guilt won’t shut up and you start to fear that God is angry with you?

In this sermon from Isaiah 40, God speaks to a trembling conscience with a verdict, not advice: “Comfort, comfort My people… her warfare is ended… her iniquity is pardoned.” This is not sentimental comfort. It’s courtroom comfort. The war between God and sinners ends because God Himself comes near to pardon the guilty.

Learn why comfort is not first a feeling but God’s objective Word of forgiveness, why your conscience can lag behind the Gospel, and how God anchors your peace outside of you in what does not wither or fade: His enduring Word, delivered to you in Baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

Subscribe & Share:

Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

Spotify: Christ For You

Website: ZionWG.org

Contact:

[email protected]

Is Christianity a New Religion? | Christ For You

Text: Luke 2:36–38 | Midweek Advent 3

Did Christians make Christmas up? Is it only a New Testament idea? Did the Church turn Jesus into a legend and force the Old Testament to fit Him? Is Christianity a new religion? Modern skepticism says the Incarnation is a later invention. Scripture says something very different.

In this sermon, you learn of Anna. Forgotten by history, overlooked in the Nativity, yet standing right in the center of God’s plan. Anna waited for redemption her entire life—not because she imagined it, but because Scripture promised it. She didn’t twist the Bible to fit Jesus. She recognized Jesus because the Bible had prepared her for Him.

Anna’s witness dismantles the myth that Christmas was constructed by Christians. Before creeds, councils, or theologians ever existed, she saw God in the flesh and told everyone who would listen. Christmas wasn’t invented. It was fulfilled.

Learn how the Incarnation anchors your faith in reality, how fulfilled prophecy gives you confidence in every promise of God, and how the Christ Anna met is the same Christ who meets you now, in flesh and blood, for your salvation.

Subscribe & Share:

Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

Spotify: Christ For You

Website: ZionWG.org

Contact:

[email protected]

Subscribe & Share:

• Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

• Spotify: Listen on Spotify

• Website: ZionWG.org/podcast

Stay Connected:

• Email: [email protected]

• Website: ZionWG.org

If this recording strengthened your faith, share it with others and leave a review. Your support helps more people hear the faithful preaching of Christ crucified and risen for you.

Support Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church

What Happens When I Start to Doubt? | Christ For You

Text: Matthew 11:2–11 | Third Sunday in Advent (Gaudete)

What do you do when faith feels weak and God feels distant?

What happens when prayers go unanswered and nothing in your life seems to change? Does doubt mean something is wrong with your faith—or is something else happening?

From a prison cell, John the Baptist asks Jesus the unthinkable: “Are You the One, or should we look for another?” This sermon confronts the dangerous idea that real Christians never doubt and shows why even the strongest believers need to hear the Gospel again and again. Doubt is not cured by distance, memory, or willpower—it is answered by Christ’s Word.

When circumstances don’t change, Jesus doesn’t give explanations or fixes. He gives a promise. And that promise is enough.

If even John the Baptist needed Christ preached into his doubt, what does that say about you?

Subscribe & Share:

Apple Podcasts: Christ For You

Spotify: Christ For You

Website: ZionWG.org

Contact:

[email protected]