John 8:31–36 • October 27, 2025 • Banks Lutheran Church, Watford City

This sermon was offered during worship celebrating the rite of confirmation at Banks Lutheran Church near Watford City, ND. A fantastic congregation on the prairies of North Dakota.

Brothers and sisters, friends in Christ, grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus, who is the Christ. Amen.

It’s a joy and a privilege to be with you, Banks Lutheran Church, on this Reformation Sunday. Today is a day when we are invited to give thanks once again for the many ways that the good news of Jesus still reforms and renews Christ’s Church.

And it’s especially good to be here as we celebrate with KC on her confirmation day—a day that centers on one of the most important and beautiful realities of our faith: promises.

So, let’s start with a question:
How many of us gathered for worship today—whether here in this beautiful sanctuary or joining us online—have ever made a promise?

Now… keep your hand in the air if you have kept every single promise, you have ever made.

Exactly. Not one of us should still have our hands raised.

And if we’re being honest – with ourselves and each other, we all know the truth: our promises sometimes fall short. Promises are often really hard to keep.

But the good news we celebrate today—the good news at the heart of the Reformation and at the heart of every confirmation—is that God’s promises never fail.

This is a day in which the people of God gather to celebrate promises.
The question before us is: how many of those promises will last beyond today?

The promises we talk about in worship have been part of the Church since its very early days.
And for 508 years, every time a Lutheran Christian has gathered around the waters of baptism, we’ve heard words like these, or very similar to them, but probably spoken in a language other than English – in the case of western North Dakota, maybe German or Norwegian or Swedish.

“In baptism, our gracious heavenly Father frees us from sin and death by joining us to the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. We are born children of a fallen humanity; by water and the Holy Spirit, we are reborn children of God and made members of the church, the body of Christ. Living with Christ and in the communion of the saints, we grow in faith, love, and obedience to the will of God.”

Those words, spoken in Lutheran churches around the world, set our life in Christ in motion. And, set us free. They contain a promise. A promise from God. In the sacred and holy waters of the sacrament of Holy Baptism, God promises you and claims you as God’s own child. And that promise is the only one that will never be broken. As we live into the promise we have received from God, we realize that it isn’t just between me and God.

These promises are lived out in community—here in this congregation on the beautiful prairies of our great state, across the congregations of the Western North Dakota Synod, throughout the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, and in relationships that we have with millions of Lutherans around the world.

Together, we are part of a global community of promise-caretakers…sometimes stumbling, always forgiven, and always renewed by God’s faithfulness.

KC, today is a milestone in your journey of faith. A journey of promise.
On this day, your confirmation day, you stand before this congregation, and before God, to affirm the promises made at your baptism.

My prayer for you—as your bishop, and a fellow child of God—is that you’ll live out these promises every day of your life in Christ.

That you’ll keep them joyfully, because you trust that God is present in your life, and that Jesus loves you and walks with you wherever you may go.

The white robe you wear today is not a graduation gown—it’s a reminder.

It’s a sign of your baptism, of your belonging, and of the promises God made to you long before you could make any promises in return.

And for all of us gathered here today or joining online, this is our moment to remember, too.
Every confirmation Sunday is a community promise day.

We promise to surround KC and all young people in faith across this church today, with our support, our prayers, and our example of living as beloved children of God each and every day.
We promise to live as people freed by grace.

People who embody Christ’s love in the world.

In a few minutes, KC will make some bold and beautiful promises.
She’ll promise, and you and I promise with her, to…

• Pray for God’s world and to invite God’s presence into her daily life.
  Prayer isn’t just what we do before meals or tests or big games. Prayer is how we stay connected to the One who never leaves us, in every ordinary moment of the day.
• Worship among God’s faithful people.
  Worship doesn’t stop when confirmation is done or when Sunday’s worship services are over. It’s a rhythm of daily life. A way of remembering who we are and whose we are. Wherever life takes you, KC, find a faith community where you can worship and continue to grow in in what it means to be a follower of Jesus.
• Hear the Word of God and share in the Lord’s Supper.
  Scripture and communion keep us rooted and nourished. The Bible may feel like an irrelevant and ancient collection of books, but its promises are alive and meant for you today. Let it speak to you, shape you, and surprise you.
• Serve all people, following the example of Jesus, and to strive for justice and peace in all the earth.
  Service begins right where you are—at school, at work, in your home, in Watford City and McKenzie County.
  And justice and peace? They’re not abstract ideas. They look like kindness when someone is left out.
  They look like compassion when the world feels anything but that.
  They look like the church standing with the hurting and speaking up for the voiceless.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, this is what it means to be part of the Reformation story.
To trust in the promise that God’s grace is enough.
To believe that God’s mercy is bigger than our failures.
To know that the freedom Christ gives us is freedom for others, not freedom from responsibility.

Today, we celebrate the promises God made in claiming each one of us as children of God in baptism.
We give thanks for the promises kept by parents, pastors, sponsors, and faith communities.
And we rejoice in the promises that God will keep in and through you, KC—and through all of us—as our life in Christ continues to unfold.

KC, our sister in Christ, my hope and prayer is that you are richly blessed by the promises made today.
And even more so, that you continue to become a rich blessing to others because of the promises you make today.

Thanks be to God. Amen.