Reformation Sunday
at St. Paul's Lutheran Church
October 31, 2010
The Righteous Will Live By Faith
Romans 1:17
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Dear friends,
The two most important events in the last 2,010 years are the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ and, coming in at a distant second place, the Reformation. An atheist who's had a pint of good Wittenberg beer has to be honest and admit that these events changed the world. If you really wanted to write a good sci-fi thriller, get into your Way Back Machine or DeLorean and travel to the year 1517 and remove the doors of the Castle Church, so that Martin Luther, the Augustinian friar, can't post his 95 Theses.
But do you really want to know why the Reformation happened? Luther posting the 95 Theses is a good touchstone for the Reformation, just like the Fourth of July is a good reference point for the Revolutionary War. We celebrate these days not because King George threw in the towel or because the pope took off his tiara, but because they have become days that we can point to as a bookmark into history.
So even though the 95 Theses were important, it wasn't Luther's concerns about bribing God with money—indulgences—that God used to spark the Reformation. For years good Catholic folks had been fed up with the false teaching that you could use money to buy forgiveness from the Church. Martin Luther was hardly original in his thinking on that point.
Here's secret of the Reformation. It happened because Luther went head-to-head with the question: “What is God's righteousness?” This is the key question of the Reformation.
For his whole life, Herr Doktor Luther had been taught and he believed that God's righteousness was the Law. He believed that whenever Holy Scriptures talked about God's righteousness—and they talk about it a lot—it meant that you needed to be perfect just like God is perfect (see Matthew 5:48). It was a demand to be holy without assistance in being holy. In fact God's righteousness was a death sentence.
And this freaked him out far more than any haunted house or corn maze. You can walk out of those; you can't just walk away from God's righteousness and what that means. Luther was a smart guy who was honest with himself—he knew he was bad by nature and by deed. His unrighteousness was the haunted house he lived in, day after day, with no escape.
Luther hated himself and hated God for what he thought God was doing to him. He hated the demand to be righteousness like God. Near the end of his life he wrote about his past,
“I hated that word, the righteousness of God... [meaning that] God is righteous and punishes the unrighteous sinner... Though I lived as a monk with reproach, I felt, with the most disturbed conscience imaginable, that I was a sinner before God. I did not love, indeed I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners and secretly I was angry with God.”1
He hated righteousness... until he read Romans 1:17 and read it again and again and again and the Holy Spirit opened his eyes to the secret of the Reformation.
For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed,
a righteousness that is by faith from first to last,
just as it is written: "The righteous will live by faith."
When the Bible talks about God's righteousness, it means that God was, is, and always will be righteous and that He demands every human be just like Him. But God's righteousness also means the righteousness that God gives to you in Christ. God's righteousness is the Gospel.
This means that instead of going up to heaven and trying to grab righteousness from God, Christ came down to earth. You can't do a song and dance that will make God like you. But so to speak, Jesus sang and danced for you, in your place. He did this by living up to His own standard of righteousness and then transferring His righteousness to your favor. He transfers His righteousness to your favor through the Sacraments, when He washes away your sin and gives you His holiness in Baptism, Absolution, and Communion.
The secret of the Reformation—that God's righteousness isn't a demand, but a promise—changed everything for Luther. Now instead of trying to earn God's righteousness, he trusted that he already possessed God's righteousness in Christ and through the Sacraments. Instead of gazing at his navel, searching for something good, by faith in Christ he looked to his Savior's cross and to his holy Baptism. These are the concrete events in the world's history and in his own life and yours that changed everything.
But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify.
This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.
There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood...
For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law...
Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an obligation. However, to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness. David says the same thing when he speaks of the blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:
"Blessed are they
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the man
whose sin the Lord will never count against him. (Romans 3:21-25, 28; 4:4-8)
Now that the secret of the Reformation was no longer a secret, Luther read the rest of Romans and the Psalms and Galatians and indeed the whole Bible with new eyes of faith. And as he read God's Word, he saw the most important event in history with joy and gladness, because it was the day he died to sin and was raised to life in Christ through Baptism. He and you and all believers are righteous and will live by faith!
Praise be to Christ, who is literally our Righteousness!
Amen!
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost
Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost
10/10/10
Slaves to Righteousness
Romans 6:18
You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
Dear friends,
As I prepared for the sermon, I went over my notes on sermon text, Romans 6. I found a poem in margin of my notes that I had taken seven years ago. It is the poem Invictus and it ends like this:
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
Invictus was written in 1875 by William Ernest Henley. This poet is convinced that he's in complete control of his future. This statement is based on personal observation, but concerning the one things that he needed, he was dead wrong. Humans do have ability to pick which crop to grow and who to marry and even sometimes correct injustice from a time. But when it comes to salvation, we are not in control. So the reason I made a note of this poem next to Romans 6:18 in my class notes was because this poem and verse 18 are opposites.
Mr. Henley the poet wrote, “I am the master of my fate.” St. Paul wrote, “You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness” (Romans 6:18). The poet thought that he was in control of his fate. Paul knew the truth. We used to be slaves to sin, but now we are slaves to righteousness.
Slaves don't control anything. They are told what to do and when to do it. So slaves hope that they have a good master. But when your master is evil, life's bad.
St. Paul talked about this bad life. He described it from personal experience.
We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! (Romans 7:14-25)
When we were conceived in our mother's womb, we were sold into slavery. And we were slaves to our evil impluses and desires. Our old master was the devil. But it goes deeper. Our sinful nature was our master, too. Like Paul said, he wanted good, but he did evil. There was a civil war going on inside of Paul, but it was a war Paul would have lost on his own.
But see how Paul ends? Not in defeat, but in victory! Who won? Jesus did and so did Paul because of Jesus. Jesus traded places with Paul on the cross. On the cross Jesus took responsibility for Paul by being punished for Paul's wretchedness. But Jesus also happily gave Paul the credit for Jesus' own lifetime of righteousness and perfection and goodness. God now looks at Paul and sees Jesus.
When we were born, we were slaves to sin. When we were baptized, we were born again as slaves to righteousness. Our new master, Jesus Christ, bought us. Dr. Luther said it best.
[Jesus] has redeemed me, a lost and condemned creature, purchased and won me from all sins, from death and from the power of the devil, not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death.
All this He did that I should be His own, and live under Him in His kingdom, and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness, just as He has risen from death and lives and rules eternally. (Luther's Explanation to the Second Article)
We serve Jesus in righteousness. Because Jesus has set us free from our slavery to sin, we are now different kind of slaves. In the upper room on the night Jesus was betrayed by Judas, Jesus said to His disciples, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in My name. This is My command: Love each other.” (John 15:14-17)
Slaves to righteousness love to love and love to do good. But the most important thing we share is our Master, who calls Himself our Friend and who died as our Savior. We were slaves to sin, but now we thank our Savior Jesus for our new status as slaves to Him, our righteousness, the One who God sees when He looks at us.
Therefore, I speak to you on behalf of Christ, our many sins have been forgiven and therefore we love much. Your sins are forgiven. Go in peace (cf. Luke 7).
Amen.
10/10/10
Slaves to Righteousness
Romans 6:18
You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
Dear friends,
As I prepared for the sermon, I went over my notes on sermon text, Romans 6. I found a poem in margin of my notes that I had taken seven years ago. It is the poem Invictus and it ends like this:
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
Invictus was written in 1875 by William Ernest Henley. This poet is convinced that he's in complete control of his future. This statement is based on personal observation, but concerning the one things that he needed, he was dead wrong. Humans do have ability to pick which crop to grow and who to marry and even sometimes correct injustice from a time. But when it comes to salvation, we are not in control. So the reason I made a note of this poem next to Romans 6:18 in my class notes was because this poem and verse 18 are opposites.
Mr. Henley the poet wrote, “I am the master of my fate.” St. Paul wrote, “You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness” (Romans 6:18). The poet thought that he was in control of his fate. Paul knew the truth. We used to be slaves to sin, but now we are slaves to righteousness.
Slaves don't control anything. They are told what to do and when to do it. So slaves hope that they have a good master. But when your master is evil, life's bad.
St. Paul talked about this bad life. He described it from personal experience.
We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! (Romans 7:14-25)
When we were conceived in our mother's womb, we were sold into slavery. And we were slaves to our evil impluses and desires. Our old master was the devil. But it goes deeper. Our sinful nature was our master, too. Like Paul said, he wanted good, but he did evil. There was a civil war going on inside of Paul, but it was a war Paul would have lost on his own.
But see how Paul ends? Not in defeat, but in victory! Who won? Jesus did and so did Paul because of Jesus. Jesus traded places with Paul on the cross. On the cross Jesus took responsibility for Paul by being punished for Paul's wretchedness. But Jesus also happily gave Paul the credit for Jesus' own lifetime of righteousness and perfection and goodness. God now looks at Paul and sees Jesus.
When we were born, we were slaves to sin. When we were baptized, we were born again as slaves to righteousness. Our new master, Jesus Christ, bought us. Dr. Luther said it best.
[Jesus] has redeemed me, a lost and condemned creature, purchased and won me from all sins, from death and from the power of the devil, not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death.
All this He did that I should be His own, and live under Him in His kingdom, and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness, just as He has risen from death and lives and rules eternally. (Luther's Explanation to the Second Article)
We serve Jesus in righteousness. Because Jesus has set us free from our slavery to sin, we are now different kind of slaves. In the upper room on the night Jesus was betrayed by Judas, Jesus said to His disciples, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in My name. This is My command: Love each other.” (John 15:14-17)
Slaves to righteousness love to love and love to do good. But the most important thing we share is our Master, who calls Himself our Friend and who died as our Savior. We were slaves to sin, but now we thank our Savior Jesus for our new status as slaves to Him, our righteousness, the One who God sees when He looks at us.
Therefore, I speak to you on behalf of Christ, our many sins have been forgiven and therefore we love much. Your sins are forgiven. Go in peace (cf. Luke 7).
Amen.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 3, 2010
Jesus Brings More of Everything
Revelation 2:8-11
To the angel of the church in Smyrna write:
These are the words of Him who is the First and the Last, who died and came to life again. I know your afflictions and your poverty—yet you are rich! I know the slander of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer. I tell you, the devil will put some of you in prison to test you, and you will suffer persecution for ten days. Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt at all by the second death.
Dear friends,
The final book of the Bible is a book that is filled with comfort. Jesus' revelation to St. John is a message of free forgiveness and accomplished victory. We see this victory that was won on the cross when Jesus introduces Himself as the Savior who died and came to life again.
He died and came back to life. He died and came back to life. This is too good to be true, but God does impossible things. So He died and came back to life. This is Jesus talking and when He speaks, we listen.
And this is what Jesus says. He tells you that He knows you, just like He knew each individual believer who lived in Smyrna around AD 90. (Smyrna was a port city on the eastern coast of Turkey. It was the location of an early Christian church.)
Jesus says that He knows your problems, just like He knew the problems in Smyrna. And listen carefully: He doesn't know about your problems; He knows your problems. We often know about the problems of others. And maybe for a moment we feel bad. But Jesus' concern and empathy—feeling the misery of others—isn't a fleeting feeling. He knows our problems, because He has experienced the same problems and suffered from them, too.
Hebrews 2:9, 17, 18 says that Jesus suffered death, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone... For this reason He had to be made like His brothers in every way, in order that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that He might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because He Himself suffered when He was tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted.
Jesus knows how you suffer. And in this revelation to the church in Smyrna, Jesus knew the suffering that came to them because they were Christians. This kind of suffering is different than the suffering that believers and unbelievers alike endure from disease, calamity, and other people.
Jesus is telling those in Smyrna, “You are standing firm in My hidden glory because I have made you My people. Stand firm until this suffering is over. What waits for you when this is over is My glory made visible in you to all the earth.” Here's how He actually said it: I know your afflictions and your poverty—yet you are rich!
We are poor and rich at the same time. We look poor to the world. We look poor to our children and friends. We even look poor to ourselves. We look poor to everyone because bad things do happen to us.
The Christians in Smyrna faced evil words, jail time, and violence. Today we face cruel words. Christians face these things because we follow Jesus. We look poor because we are Christians. Our lives are more difficult because we are Christians.
When an unbelieving relative dies, we can't sugarcoat it by pretending that they'll be in heaven. We take this tragedy personally and it hurts. Unbelievers can lie to themselves, but we can't. Knowing the truth can bring more pain into your life. But knowing the truth of Jesus and His cross also bring us peace.
As Jesus' followers we have more of everything: more pain, but also more peace. Just go to the deathbed of a believer and be amazed at the peace they possess and confess in Christ. They know they have a crown. Jesus gave them this crown. It is a crown that proclaims that they are forgiven. This victory wreath on top of their heads shouts that when Jesus died and rose from the dead, they too were connected to this victory in Baptism. Perhaps they remember their confirmation verse: Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life. What sweet comfort this sentence gives!
Our suffering and pain often threaten to hide our crowns. But in a strange way, they are marks of our Christian faith. When you are agonizing over a sin that you know is too cruel to be forgiven, remember that you are in agony because you take God's Word seriously. John's fellow apostle Peter urged his fellow believers to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. (1 Peter 2:11)
When you feel this war in your soul, remember not only the Law, but also the Gospel. Hear the words of Paul in Romans 5 as he rejoices: The law was added so that [sin] might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 5:20-21)
This grace, this crown which He puts on your head, these riches that He pours out on you are gifts from Jesus. He wants you to have them because He knows that since you belong to Him, your life will tougher. You will suffer more. You will experience more pain. So He gives you more comfort, more peace, more joy because He died and came back to life. He died and came back to life.
Amen.
October 3, 2010
Jesus Brings More of Everything
Revelation 2:8-11
To the angel of the church in Smyrna write:
These are the words of Him who is the First and the Last, who died and came to life again. I know your afflictions and your poverty—yet you are rich! I know the slander of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer. I tell you, the devil will put some of you in prison to test you, and you will suffer persecution for ten days. Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt at all by the second death.
Dear friends,
The final book of the Bible is a book that is filled with comfort. Jesus' revelation to St. John is a message of free forgiveness and accomplished victory. We see this victory that was won on the cross when Jesus introduces Himself as the Savior who died and came to life again.
He died and came back to life. He died and came back to life. This is too good to be true, but God does impossible things. So He died and came back to life. This is Jesus talking and when He speaks, we listen.
And this is what Jesus says. He tells you that He knows you, just like He knew each individual believer who lived in Smyrna around AD 90. (Smyrna was a port city on the eastern coast of Turkey. It was the location of an early Christian church.)
Jesus says that He knows your problems, just like He knew the problems in Smyrna. And listen carefully: He doesn't know about your problems; He knows your problems. We often know about the problems of others. And maybe for a moment we feel bad. But Jesus' concern and empathy—feeling the misery of others—isn't a fleeting feeling. He knows our problems, because He has experienced the same problems and suffered from them, too.
Hebrews 2:9, 17, 18 says that Jesus suffered death, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone... For this reason He had to be made like His brothers in every way, in order that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that He might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because He Himself suffered when He was tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted.
Jesus knows how you suffer. And in this revelation to the church in Smyrna, Jesus knew the suffering that came to them because they were Christians. This kind of suffering is different than the suffering that believers and unbelievers alike endure from disease, calamity, and other people.
Jesus is telling those in Smyrna, “You are standing firm in My hidden glory because I have made you My people. Stand firm until this suffering is over. What waits for you when this is over is My glory made visible in you to all the earth.” Here's how He actually said it: I know your afflictions and your poverty—yet you are rich!
We are poor and rich at the same time. We look poor to the world. We look poor to our children and friends. We even look poor to ourselves. We look poor to everyone because bad things do happen to us.
The Christians in Smyrna faced evil words, jail time, and violence. Today we face cruel words. Christians face these things because we follow Jesus. We look poor because we are Christians. Our lives are more difficult because we are Christians.
When an unbelieving relative dies, we can't sugarcoat it by pretending that they'll be in heaven. We take this tragedy personally and it hurts. Unbelievers can lie to themselves, but we can't. Knowing the truth can bring more pain into your life. But knowing the truth of Jesus and His cross also bring us peace.
As Jesus' followers we have more of everything: more pain, but also more peace. Just go to the deathbed of a believer and be amazed at the peace they possess and confess in Christ. They know they have a crown. Jesus gave them this crown. It is a crown that proclaims that they are forgiven. This victory wreath on top of their heads shouts that when Jesus died and rose from the dead, they too were connected to this victory in Baptism. Perhaps they remember their confirmation verse: Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life. What sweet comfort this sentence gives!
Our suffering and pain often threaten to hide our crowns. But in a strange way, they are marks of our Christian faith. When you are agonizing over a sin that you know is too cruel to be forgiven, remember that you are in agony because you take God's Word seriously. John's fellow apostle Peter urged his fellow believers to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. (1 Peter 2:11)
When you feel this war in your soul, remember not only the Law, but also the Gospel. Hear the words of Paul in Romans 5 as he rejoices: The law was added so that [sin] might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 5:20-21)
This grace, this crown which He puts on your head, these riches that He pours out on you are gifts from Jesus. He wants you to have them because He knows that since you belong to Him, your life will tougher. You will suffer more. You will experience more pain. So He gives you more comfort, more peace, more joy because He died and came back to life. He died and came back to life.
Amen.
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