Sermon for the Festival of the Reformation - Rom 3:19-28

 

   Reformation

                                                                                                            Rom 3:19-28

                                                                                                            10/26/25

 

           

“Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience.  I could not believe that he was placated by my satisfaction.  I did not love, yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners, and secretly, if not blasphemously, certainly murmuring greatly, I was angry with God, and said, ‘As if, indeed, it is not enough, that miserable sinners, eternally lost through original sin, are crushed by every kind of calamity by the law of the decalogue, without having God add pain to pain by the gospel and also by the gospel threatening us with his righteousness and wrath!”

In 1545, the year before he died, Martin Luther finally acquiesced to requests for an authoritative edition of his Latin works to be published. He wrote a preface to that volume in which he described his journey in the Reformation. In the words that I just quoted, we hear how he feared, and even hated, the righteous God who punishes sinners. For him, the phrase “the righteousness of God” was a source of dread because it described how the holy God righteously judges and condemns all who sin.

At the beginning of the sixteenth century, the theology that came from the medieval Church had turned God’s saving work in Christ into something in which man had to do his part. It was the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ that made it possible. God’s grace was the cause of the individual’s salvation. But this grace was a kind of supernatural substance that equipped a person for the role he had to play in being saved. The Church described faith as “faith formed by love.” Saving faith was not trust and belief in Jesus Christ. Instead, it was the work that faith did.

The Christian life was defined by penance. Since the time of Anselm in the twelfth century, the Church had said that absolution forgave the guilt of sin, but not the penalty. Sin was forgiven, but the person had offended God by sinning and so he owed God a debt that was paid by penance.  This debt was computed based on earlier systems that spoke of years of penance. The priest assigned a penance to the person. But since the penitent had to perform the assigned penance or suffer serious consequences, the priest assigned a light penance that a person could perform – perhaps even before leaving church.

However, this light penance did not exhaust the penalty that was owed to God. Instead, it was a system in which people accumulated thousands of years of penance. The penance was owed to God, and if it had not been paid at the time of death, then the person went to purgatory. This was described as a place of fiery suffering where people would endure thousands of years until the penalty was paid and they could enter heaven.

No one wanted to experience this. And so the faithful did all kinds of things to gain merit and pay off their penance. They paid for masses to be said, and went on pilgrimages, and bought indulgences.  If you were really serious about your salvation, then you embarked on the “religious life” – you became a monk or a nun – because this was itself a whole life of penance.

Martin Luther was indeed very serious about his salvation. He became an Augustinian monk and engaged in this religious life with a fervor that permanently damaged his health. Luther knew that he would face God’s judgment on the Last Day. As Paul told the Romans, “For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.” He believed that he had to have a faith formed by love – a faith that had done enough. He believed that he had to do enough penance. Luther knew that God is the just God who judges by what we have done. Paul says in the chapter before our text, “For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified.”

But Luther found that when salvation involved his actions, he could never do enough.  Sin was instead, a constant presence in his life.  If salvation involved his faith formed by love – what he did – then he could never know if he had done enough because all of his actions were tainted by sin.

Luther was experiencing what St. Paul describes in our text. There the apostle says, “Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.”  Paul says that the Law – the way of doing – shuts every mouth and makes the whole world accountable to God. Then he added, “For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.”

The act of doing can never provide the verdict of “not guilty” on the Last Day.  It can’t because as Paul says earlier in this chapter, “For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin.” Sin is a power that controls us from the moment of our conception. It has since the original sin of Adam. Because of our sinful condition, our actions can never be involved in giving us a righteous standing before God.  As Paul says in our text, “For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Instead, through the law – through the way of doing – comes knowledge of sin. The law reveals all the ways that we put other things before God. It shows how in thought, word, and deed we do not love our neighbor has ourselves.

This is true. But Paul wants us to know that God has done something about it.  He says, “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it.” Paul refers to the “righteousness of God.” This righteousness of God – this saving action of God to put all things right – has been manifested – it has been made known. Earlier in the letter, Paul had described how it had been revealed in the world through the Gospel.  He said, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’”

Paul says in our text that this righteousness of God is “through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.” When Paul talks about faith here, it has nothing to do with our actions. That is why he says we “are justified by his grace as a gift.” God’s grace is his attitude toward us – his unmerited loving favor.  This justification – this status of being declared not guilty on the Last Day is a gift. It is not something that is earned in any way.

Paul tells us that it is a gift made possible “through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”  Redemption is to free from slavery. God redeemed us from the slavery of sin.  And Paul tells us that God did this in Christ “whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.”  The word translated here as “propitiation” has its background in the sacrifices of the Old Testament by which Israel received atonement for sin.

God is the just and holy God.  He is the One who judges sin in his wrath.  God judged our sin in his wrath.  He did it on Good Friday as Jesus hung on the cross.  Christ the holy One had no sin. But he took our sins as his own. He received the judgment of God in our place.  He was the sacrifice by which we now have forgiveness before God.  And then God the Father demonstrated that the cross had been his saving action when he raised Jesus from the dead.

God is just, and holy, and wrathful.  He is also gracious, merciful, and loving. In the cross God was true to himself as he acted to save us.  Paul says that “It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”  God was just as he judged sin in Christ. But he is gracious and merciful as he justifies all who believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus. This justification – this status of being holy before God and knowing the verdict of the Last Day – is something that is received through faith alone. It is something that is already true now. Paul says later in Romans, “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

This is what Martin Luther came to realize as he studied God’s Word. The righteousness of God doesn’t describe his action to judge us. Instead, it is his action to save us. Luther went to say in the preface to his Latin works: “At last, by the mercy of God, meditating day and night, I gave heed to the context of the words, namely, ‘In it the righteousness of God is revealed, as it is written, ‘He who through faith is righteous shall live.’ There I began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith. And this is the meaning: the righteousness of faith is revealed by the Gospel, namely, the passive righteousness which merciful God justifies us by faith, as it is written, ‘He who through faith is righteous shall live.’ Here I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates.”

This is the Reformation truth of God’s Word by which we live. We are saved by grace alone. It is God’s unmerited gift. We are saved by faith alone. We receive this gift purely through trust and belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and not through anything that we do in any way. This faith itself is a gift of God worked by the Holy Spirit. And all of this means that we are saved by Christ alone.

This truth of the Reformation is just as relevant today as it was in the sixteenth century. Luther thought that the Church would rejoice in hearing the clear message of the Gospel. And while many did, what has become the Roman Catholic church responded by doubling down in rejecting the biblical truth of the Reformation. Today the Catechism of the Catholic Church says that grace “is needed to arouse and sustain our collaboration in justification through faith, and in sanctification through charity.” Do not allow Roman Catholic apologists on a podcast or YouTube to tell you otherwise. The Roman Catholic church continues to teach that your works are part of the reason you are saved.

But it’s not just the Roman Catholic church that continues to place the focus on works. It also happens in those who claim to be embrace the Reformation truth. At the end of the sixteenth century the Dutch theologian Jacobus Arminius reacted against John Calvin’s false teaching of double predestination by saying that all people have free will to choose to believe in Christ.  This Arminianism became the dominant view among Methodists, Baptists, and so called non-denominational churches.

Here the certainty of salvation becomes the result of my choice to believe. Faith becomes the work that I have done. And so in the search for assurance a person returns to that act of decision again and again. It becomes the testimony that is repeated over and over.  Or it becomes something that is done again in repeatedly going forth in altar calls, or even being rebaptized.

The emphasis on works is also found in the theology of John Wesley as it is present in Methodism and the Holiness movement. Here the true purpose of faith is sanctification – holiness of living.  The proof and assurance of faith that is person is saved is found in how a person lives. And so works become the focus of the Christian life as an individual seeks assurance.

However, God’s Word teaches that you are saved by grace alone, faith alone, and Christ alone. You do not look to your works as part of the reason you are saved, or as the reason that you have assurance.  Instead, you trust and in believe in Christ. You find assurance in those means by which he continues to come to you and gives you forgiveness. You find it in his Word. You have it in our baptism for there you shared in Christ’s saving death. You hear it in absolution as the crucified and risen Lord forgives your sins. And you receive it in the Sacrament of the Altar for there the incarnate Lord gives you his true body and blood, given and shed for you. Through these means God declares that you are justified on account of Christ. And if God says it, then it is certain and true.

  

 

 

 

Sermon for the Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity - Mt 22:34-46

 

   Trinity 18

                                                                                                                        Mt 22:34-46

                                                                                                                        10/19/25

 

            I learned the hard way that you can’t engage in real discussion about serous topics on social media. It just doesn’t work. First, there is the problem of having multiple different people all trying to talk about something at the same time.

            And then there is the dynamic of people trying to have the final word. There often seems to be the impression that the last person to comment in making the argument for their point has “won.” This is especially so because on social media, people know that others are watching what is being said. And so everyone wants the final word. Response leads to response, leads to response in a series that seems to never end. 

            In our Gospel lesson today, Jesus has been engaged in a back and forth with his opponents during Holy Week as they try to trap him in something he has said. Yet in our text, Jesus gets the final word. In doing so the Lord shows us that that he is the center of all of Scripture. We learn that the focus of the Christian faith – the thing that sets it apart is the Gospel and not the Law.

            Our text takes place during Holy Week after Jesus had entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. We are left in no doubt about what is happening. After Jesus had told a series of parables which were clearly aimed at his opponents we learn: “Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words.”

            First the Pharisees come to Jesus with a question about whether it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. Next the Sadducees approach Jesus with a question that is based on their denial of the resurrection of the body. Then we learn at the beginning of our text, “But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.”

            The Pharisee was a lawyer. He was someone who had been trained in the interpretation of the Law of Moses – the Torah. And of course, he was someone who interpreted it according to the beliefs of the Pharisees. The Pharisees sent him to take another run at Jesus. He asked a question that was meant to test Jesus.

He asked, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”  Jesus replied with the words of Deuteronomy as he said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.” And then he added, “And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

The Pharisee asks what he believes is a question that will test Jesus – a question that will trap him. The Lord responds with a very easy and simple answer. He says the first great and first commandment is to love God with all that we are. This is simply another way of stating the first of the Ten Commandments, “You shall have no other gods,” and what it means for our life. As the Small Catechism says, this means that “We should fear, love, and trust in God above all things.”

Then Jesus adds that there is a second great commandment that accompanies it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” If the first great commandment summarizes the first table of the law – the first three of the Ten Commandments – then this second great commandment taken from Leviticus summarizes the second table of the law – the next seven of the Ten Commandments.

Love God with all that you are. Love your neighbor as yourself. And then Jesus makes a remarkable statement: “On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” The Pharisees wanted to get into questions about how to interpret the Law of Moses. They were focused on the Law, as the lawyer asked Jesus about which is the great commandment in the Law.

But Jesus says that ultimately all of the law and the prophets – all of the Old Testament - comes down to two things: love God with all that you are, and love your neighbor has yourself. Now we know that the Law of Moses contains many specific commands about what food can be eaten, and how sacrifices are to be done. It describes how males are to be circumcised and what festivals are to be celebrated. Yet the Lord tells us that what it is really all about is love God with all that you are, and love your neighbor as yourself.

It should not escape our notice that Jesus summarizes a question about the Law in this way. He points us to God’s ordering of the world that is true for all people. This is why Paul could say, “For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts.”

All people have this law. Paul says that we have been “hardwired” to understand and recognize it. Jesus says that this is really what the Law in the Old Testament was all about. We see in our Lord’s words how misguided it is when Christians think that they need to keep some aspect of the Torah such as worshipping God on Saturday, or keeping the food laws of the Old Testament. These were things commanded only for Israel until the coming of Christ. Instead, the Ten Commandments provide us with a summary of what continues to be true for us and for all people of all times: Love God with all that you are.  Love your neighbor as yourself.

It is significant that the Pharisee comes to Jesus with a question about the Law. This was their focus. When they thought about their relation to God, they did so on the basis of the law – on the basis of what they did.

They are not alone. This is the natural inclination of every person. We have the law written on our heart. We understand the way of the law.  You must do something to get something.  There is no such thing as a free lunch. And we want to believe that we can do something – that we have a role to play because then we get some credit. This is a description of every other religion in the world. It is description of the world around us. When a person dies we are told, “He was a good person” and so he is now looking down on us.

Love God with all that you are.  Love your neighbor as yourself. They are simple statements that summarize the whole of God’s will. They also diagnose that the way of doing – the way of the law - can never be the means for fellowship with God. The truth is that very often our actions show that we love our hobbies and sports more than we love God. When there is a choice between the truth of God’s word and our relation with family, we choose family. The truth is that very often there is no one I love more than myself.  I am not going to help my neighbor if it means I am going to be inconvenienced or it is going to disrupt my schedule.

The Pharisees framed their relationship with God in terms of law. They understood law to be the center of God’s Word. And so while the Pharisees were still gathered together, Jesus asked them a question. He said, “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he?”

He asked what seemed to be simple question. And so they answered, “The son of David.”  Everyone knew that God had promised David to establish the throne of his kingdom forever. He had promised that the offspring of David was the One upon whom the Spirit would rest – the One would strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he would kill the wicked.

And then Jesus asked them something they did not expect. He said to them, “How is it then that David, in the Spirit, calls him Lord, saying, “‘The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet”’? If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?”

Jesus quotes the first verse of Psalm 110. He points out that this is David speaking in Scripture inspired by the Spirit of God. He says that this is a text about the Messiah. Here Yahweh speaks to David’s Lord and tells him sit at the right hand of his throne until all enemies are subjected to him.  So if the Messiah is the son of David, how can also be David’s Lord? We could also add, how is the Messiah someone who can take part in the authority of God?

Matthew tells us, “And no one was able to answer him a word, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.”  Jesus had gotten the final word. He did because he said something they did not expect. The available evidence indicates that Jews of this time did not understand Psalm 110 to be speaking about the Messiah.  Jesus was using Scripture in a way for which they had no answer.

This statement by Jesus is important because it shows us that he is the true center of God’s Word. It shows that we are not to frame our relationship to God in terms of law, but instead in terms of Christ – in terms of Gospel.

Matthew’s Gospel makes it clear that Jesus is the son of David.  Joseph is from the house of David, and takes Jesus to be his son, thus making him part of the line of David. Jesus is born in Bethlehem, the city of David. 

But Jospeh only takes the pregnant Mary to be his wife because the angel tells him, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Jesus is conceived by the Holy Spirit because he is more than just the son of David.  He is the Son of God, begotten of the Father from eternity.  He is the One of whom Paul wrote, “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.”

            Jesus is true God and true man, and so as the son of David he is David’s Lord. And he is your Lord because he has redeemed you by his holy precious blood, and innocent suffering and death. Everyone in first century Judaism who believed in the Christ expected him to be mighty, powerful, and victorious. But Jesus came as the Christ who suffered and offered himself as the sacrifice for our sins on the cross. Because of Jesus we are forgiven for all the ways we fail to do the law. Because of Jesus we once again have fellowship with God.

            On Easter Jesus rose from the dead. Forty days later he ascended into heaven in fulfillment of God’s Word: “Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet.” Exalted to the right hand of God, he exercises all power and might. He has taken humanity into the presence of God, and because of this we know that we will dwell in God’s presence as well.

            Love God with all that you are.  Love your neighbor as yourself. These words continue to summarize God’s will. But because of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ these are not words in which we see the means by which we can have fellowship with God. Instead as those who have been baptized in Christ, and born again of water and the Spirit, they now describe the way in which we seek to live.

            So place the Means of Grace at the center of your life. Let the Divine Service on Sunday be the thing that starts each week. Punctuate your days with the reading of God’s Word and prayer.  Believe and trust that God who has acted to save you in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ will care for you day by day.

            Help your spouse or parent with the things at home that need to be done. Speak encouragement and praise to your neighbor or co-worker. Protect the reputation of others by refusing to pass on gossip, and by speaking the truth in defense of your neighbor.  You are a new creation in Christ, created by the Spirit to love God with all that you are, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

           

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

Sermon for the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity - Eph 3:13-21

                                                                                                                    Trinity 16

                                                                                                                    Eph 3:13-21

                                                                                                                     10/5/25

 

     The apostle Paul begins our text this morning by saying, “For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.” He describes the position of prayer, and then in most of our text expresses the content of his prayer.  He states what he wants God to do in the lives of the Ephesians, and in the same way in the life of every Christian – in your life.

     Paul introduces this prayer by saying “for this reason.” It is apparent that the apostle is drawing a conclusion from what he has just said. But just like you and I, sometimes Paul goes off in a digression that wanders away from his main point. And it turns out that this is what he has done in the beginning of chapter three.

     He begins the chapter by saying, “For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles— assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace that was given to me for you, how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly.” Again, we find that the apostle is drawing a conclusion from what he has just said. But instead of actually drawing the conclusion, he gets thrown off track as the thinks about God’s grace for the Gentiles – something that he describes as a mystery.

     He says, “When you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.” Paul refers to a mystery that had not been known in the past – a mystery that now has been revealed by the Spirit of God to the apostles.

     What is this mystery? He says, “This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.”  The surprise that had not been known in the past is that those who are not Jewish and descend from Abraham – that means most of you – are fellow heirs in God’s salvation. You are part of the body of Christ – the Church which is God’s people.

     And so in our text, Paul finally gets back on track as he says, “For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.” What is the reason for his prayer? It is what he has been taking about in chapter two.

     There Paul had described what the Ephesians had once been. He said, “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.”

     Dead in trespasses and sins; those walking the ways of the devil; by nature those receiving God’s wrath – that’s what the Ephesians were. And that’s what you were like the rest of mankind. If you are looking for a positive affirmation about yourself apart from Christ, don’t go looking for it in the Bible.  Because you won’t find it there.

     Instead, you will learn the ugly, unvarnished truth. Adam was created in the image of God. But after the fall into sin, Eve gave birth to a child who was born in the image of Adam. We have lost the image of God, and everyone born since has entered this world as a sinner cut off from God by sin. Jesus said that flesh gives birth to flesh. Sinful fallen nature brings forth more sinful fallen nature. And sinners do as sinners do, as soon as they are able to do. In thought, word, and deed we put ourselves first as God and our neighbor come in a distant second. 

We were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. Yet then Paul adds, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,

even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ— by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” In his grace – his unmerited loving favor – God acted to save us through his Son. The apostle had already said in the beginning of the letter that in Christ, “we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses.”

     You have been baptized into Christ, the crucified and risen Lord. Paul told the Colossians that you have “been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.” Because of Christ’s death you are holy in God’s eyes. Because of his resurrection, you will share in the resurrection. In fact because you are in Christ, Paul can say that you are already raised and seated with him in the heavenly places.

     And so in our text Paul says, “For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner man.”  Paul’s prayer is that according to God’s glorious riches the Ephesians – and all believers - will be strengthened with power in their inner man through the work of the Spirit.

     The “inner man” to which he refers is your whole person as you live in Christ.  It is the new man that exists because as Paul tells the Corinthians, “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”  This inner man – this being in Christ – is the work of the Holy Spirit.  It began when you received the washing of regeneration and renewal by the Spirit in baptism.

     The Spirit who does this the Spirit of Christ. And so Paul further explains what this means in our text as he adds, “so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.” Baptized into Christ – united with his death and resurrection - it is now Christ who dwells in us.  Or as Paul told the Galatians, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

     Christ dwells in you through the work of his Spirit. This means that there is great power at work in you. In the first chapter Paul expressed the wish that God would lead the Ephesians to recognize the “immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.” It is the power of the risen Lord. It is the power of God the Father, in Christ, through the Spirit, and so at the end of our text Paul exclaims, “Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us.”

     You are being strengthened through the Spirit in the inner man. Christ dwells in your heart through faith. In Christ, through the work of the Spirit, God’s power is at work in you. So what does this mean for us? Immediately after our text Paul says, “I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

     We have been called to be the people of God in Christ. And so Paul urges us to walk in a manner worthy of what God has called us to be. The very fact that the apostle feels the need to say this indicates that this isn’t automatic – it doesn’t “just happen” all the time. While Paul has strongly asserted the power that is at work in us as we live in Christ, he also knows that the old Adam is still present as well. The remnants of sin and the fallen nature continue to weigh us down. Paul expressed this succinctly when he told the Galatians, “For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.”

     But Paul also tells us that the power of Christ and his Spirit is greater than sin and the old Adam. The Spirit who created new spiritual life continues to sustain and empower that life so that we can walk in a manner worthy of our calling. Our will has been freed so that we can follow the Spirit’s leading by the power that he provides. And so in this way we cooperate in living a God pleasing life. We commit and exert ourselves to living according to God’s will.

     The apostle teaches us that this life is one of humility and gentleness. Humility is not a characteristic the world praises. Big and brash as you call attention to yourself on social media – that is the way of the world. But Jesus Christ is the One who humbled himself to save us.  He is the One who served others – who served us. And so humility is the way of those who are in Christ. This is the humility of faithfully serving in the vocation where God has placed you. It is the act of being a supportive husband or wife; of a father or mother who cares for the needs of the family; of the employee who serve as unto the Lord and not unto man.

     Paul says that we are to live “with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”  So don’t overreact. Be willing to give people time to see their error and change their ways. Recognize the challenges that they may be facing and how it impacts their behavior.

     Paul says that we are to bear with one another in love. Sometimes, living in Christ means that we endure each other. When the other person is tired, or sick, or just in a bad mood choose not to respond as you bear one another in love.

This is true as we deal with all people. But it is especially true as we deal with other Christians. Paul says that we are to be “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” After all, we are those who have been united in Christ through the work of the Spirit. We have all been baptized into Christ. As the apostle goes on to say, “There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call - one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

     Paul’s prayer is that Christians be strengthened with power through the Spirit in their inner man.  It is that Christ may dwell in our heart through faith.  Where this is happening it serves the goal that he expresses near the end of our text as he says “that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.”

     It is through the work of the Spirit that we recognize how broad and long and high and deep God’s love for us is. This love in Christ – this love of Christ - has given us the status of those who are saints through our share in the death and resurrection of Jesus. We have received the mercy of God. We have been blessed by God’s grace. And so we are able to rest in God’s love no matter what is happening in life. We trust his love and care because of what he has done for us through Christ.

 

 

    

 

 

      

 

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mark's thoughts: Hey Lutheran - No, the Law doesn't always accuse

 

“The law always accuses.” This is a Lutheran assumption that guides thought about the law.  It certainly did for me. Yet the challenge arises when we operate with this assumption and come to Formula of Concord article VI as it talks about the third use of the law. Article VI states that the law provides a sure guide for the Christian: “The law has been given to people for three reasons; … third, after they have been reborn – since nevertheless the flesh still clings to them – that precisely because of the flesh they may have a sure guide according to which they can orient and conduct their entire life” (FC Ep VI.1).  But how can the law serve as a guide if it is always accusing? The confusion deepens as the article goes on to expound about this guide and says:

Instead, the Holy Spirit, who is given and received not through the law but through the proclamation of the gospel (Gal. 3[:2, 14]) renews the heart. Thereafter, the Holy Spirit uses the law to instruct the reborn and to show and demonstrate to them in the Ten Commandments what is the “acceptable will of God” (Rom. 12[:2]) and in which good works, “which God prepared beforehand,” they are “supposed to walk” (Eph 2[:10). (SD VI.12).

I have come to recognize that the “The law always accuses” is a “Lutheran assumption” applied to the law in general only because it is an unexamined assumption.  It is powerful because the Apology explicitly states that “the law always accuses”: 

Paul says [Rom. 4:15]: “The law brings wrath.”  He does not say that through the law people merit forgiveness of sins. For the law always accuses (lex enim semper accusat) and terrifies consciences.  Therefore it does not justify since the conscience that is terrified by the law flees the judgment of God. They err, therefore, who trust that they merit the forgiveness of sins through the law and through their own works (Ap. IV.38).

However what we must note about this text is that this describes the situation when people try to merit forgiveness through the law and their own works.

 

The Apology can even say that “the law only accuses”:

Thus in the preaching of penitence it is not enough to preach the law, the Word that convicts of sin. For the law works wrath; it only accuses (tantum accusat); it only terrifies consciences. Consciences cannot find peace unless they hear the voice of God, clearly promising the forgiveness of sins.  Therefore it is necessary to add the Gospel promise, that for Christ’s sake sins are forgiven and that by faith in Christ we obtain the forgiveness of sins.  If our opponents exclude the Gospel of Christ from the preaching of penitence, they deserve to be regarded as blasphemers against Christ (Ap. IV.257).

Yet again, this is what happens when people consider the law apart from faith in Christ.

 

On the other hand, the Apology also states that “the law cannot accuse”:

Paul teaches this when he says in Gal 3:13, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us.” That is, the law condemns all men, but by undergoing the punishment of sins and becoming a sacrifice for us, the sinless Christ took away the right of the law to accuse and condemn those who believe in him, because he himself is their propitiation, for whose sake they are now accounted righteous. But when they are accounted righteous, the law cannot accuse or condemn them even though they have not really satisfied the law (Ap. IV. 179).

Note that this is the situation when the law is considered on the basis of faith in Christ.

 

Statements in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession about the law “always accusing” or “only accusing” describe the experience of the law apart from Christ.  However, the situation is completely different for the those who believe in Christ.  In their case, the law cannot accuse them.  When the expression “The law always accuses” is taken out this context and used by itself, this gives the impression that the law is always a negative force, and associates it only with the second use of the Law.  Yet this is not what Lutherans believe and confess about the law.

 

Sometimes one hears it said, “The law always accuses, but the law doesn’t only accuse.” This too still operates on the basis of the false assumption. It senses that that law does more than accuse since it is a guide that teaches.  But by saying “the always accuses” it is still taking the statement from Apology IV and applying it outside of the context for which it is true: when people try to merit forgiveness through the law and their own works apart from faith in Christ.  When we are talking about baptized Christians who have faith in Christ the statement “the law always accuses” is simply not true. It doesn’t apply to them, and therefore should be abandoned in our discussion about how the Spirit utilizes the law in relation to Christians.

 

Instead, Formula of Concord article VI should guide our thinking as it states about the three uses of the law:

The law has been given to people for three reasons: first, that through it external discipline may be maintained against the unruly and the disobedient; second, that people may be led through it to a recognition of their sins; third, after they have been reborn—since nevertheless the flesh still clings to them—that precisely because of the flesh they may have a sure guide, according to which they can orient and conduct their entire life. In this connection a dispute occurred among a few theologians over the third use of the law (FC Ep VI.1).

The first use of the law deals with the unruly and disobedient who do not have faith in Christ.  It maintains order as it restrains sin in the world.  Naturally, this is not the primary concern for the Church.  Instead, the focus is on the second and third use of the law. 

 

In the second use of the law, the Spirit utilizes the law to reveal sin.  The Formula of Concord states that the second reason the law has been is given so “that people may be led through it to a recognition of their sins” (FC Ep. VI.1).  It functions to lead people to a knowledge of their sin:

We therefore unanimously believe, teach, and confess that in its strict sense the law is a divine teaching in which the righteous, unchanging will of God revealed how human beings were created in their nature, thoughts, words, and deeds to be pleasing and acceptable to God. This law also threatens those who transgress it with God’s wrath and temporal and eternal punishments. For, as Luther stated against the nomoclasts, “Everything that reproves sin is and belongs to the law. Its proper function is to reprove sin and to lead to the knowledge of sin” (Rom. 3[:20*] and 7[:7*]) (FC SD V.17).

However, the Spirit does not only utilize the law to reveal sin.  There is also the third use of the law.  The term “use” has been subject to misunderstanding.  The term sounds like it describes how a person uses the law.  But in fact, the law’s use is the effect it has on the sinner.

 

The Formula of Concord is clear that only the Holy Spirit utilizes the law and determines the use (the effect it has on the sinner).  It states, “the Holy Spirit uses the written law on them to teach them” (FC SD VI.3). Likewise it notes, “Thereafter, the Holy Spirit uses the law to instruct the reborn and to show and demonstrate to them in the Ten Commandments what is the ‘acceptable will of God’ (Rom. 12[:2*]) and in which good works, ‘which God prepared beforehand,’ they are ‘supposed to walk” (Eph. 2[:10*])  (FC SD VI.12).  The individual Christian is the recipient of the Law and not the user.  In the same way, the preacher can’t control how the Spirit will utilize the Law.

 

The “use of the law” is the effect or effects on the individual that are caused by the reception of that law, and that effect – that “use” – is what the Spirit intends as he utilizes the law.  There is only one law that the Spirit uses as it pleases him.  The Spirit utilizes the law based on what the hearer needs. Because of the complexity of the sinner, the Spirit may do several things at once.

 

The third use of the law is needed because of the flesh/old Adam that continues to plague the Christian.  The Formula of Concord explains, “Indeed, if the faithful and elect children of God were perfectly renewed through the indwelling Spirit in this life, so that in their nature and all their powers they were completely free from sin, they would need no law and therefore no prodding” (FC VI.6).  We live as those for whom rebirth and renewal is not yet perfect: “For even if they are reborn and ‘renewed in the spirit of their minds’ [Eph. 4:23], this rebirth and renewal is not perfect in this world. Instead it has only begun” (FC Ep VI.4).

 

The Spirit utilizes the law in the third use to accomplish two goals. First, it teaches Christians to live according to God’s will, and not their own.  Article VI states that the law provides a sure guide for the Christian: “The law has been given to people for three reasons; … third, after they have been reborn – since nevertheless the flesh still clings to them – that precisely because of the flesh they may have a sure guide according to which they can orient and conduct their entire life” (FC Ep VI.1).  We learn how we are to live from the law.  As we have already seen, the Formula of Concord also says the law serves to teach the Christian:

Instead, the Holy Spirit, who is given and received not through the law but through the proclamation of the gospel (Gal. 3[:2, 14]) renews the heart. Thereafter, the Holy Spirit uses the law to instruct the reborn and to show and demonstrate to them in the Ten Commandments what is the “acceptable will of God” (Rom. 12[:2]) and in which good works, “which God prepared beforehand,” they are “supposed to walk” (Eph 2[:10). (SD VI.12).

The law teaches the Christian how to live according to God’s will. This provides needed guidance and understanding.  It also prevents our tendency to make up our own way of serving God.  Article VI states,  “This teaching of God’s will opposes …nevertheless the Holy Spirit uses the written law on them to teach them, so that through it believers in Christ learn to serve God not according to their own ideas but according to his written law and Word, which is a certain rule and guiding principle for directing the godly life and behavior according to the eternal and unchanging will of God” (FC SD VI.2-3).  It also notes: “In order that people do not resolve to perform service to God on the basis of their pious imagination in an arbitrary way of their own choosing, it is necessary for the law of God to light their way” (FC Ep VI.4).

 

The second aspect of the third use is that the Spirit utilizes the law to compel and repress the old Adam.  Discussions of the third use often overlook this.  However, article VI is replete with language describing this effect of the law.  The metaphor of “rule” that is frequently used to explain the third use indicates the teaching function of the law.  Yet when our explanation of the third use stops there, we have not conveyed the full truth confessed by the Formula of Concord.

 

Article VI explains, “Likewise it is necessary so that the old man not act according to its own will but instead be compelled against its own will, not only through the admonition and threats of the law, but also with punishments and plagues to follow the Spirit and let itself be made captive (1 Cor. 9[:27]; Rom 6[:12]; Gal 6[:14]; Ps. 119[:1]; Heb. 13[21]) (FC Ep. VI.4).  It goes on to say:

Indeed, if the faithful and elect children of God were perfectly renewed through the indwelling Spirit in this life, so that in their nature and all their powers they were completely free from sin, they would need no law and therefore no prodding. Instead, they would do in and of themselves, completely voluntarily, without any teaching, admonition, exhortation, or prodding of the law, what they are obligated to do according to God’s will, just as in and of themselves the sun, the moon, and all the stars follow unimpeded the regular course God gave them once and for all, apart from any admonition, exhortation, impulse, coercion, or compulsion. The holy angels perform their obedience completely of their own free will (FC SD VI.6).

It also adds:

For the old man, like a stubborn, recalcitrant donkey, is also still a part of them, and it needs to be forced into obedience to Christ not only through the law’s teaching, admonition, compulsion, and threat but also often with the cudgel of punishments and tribulations until the sinful flesh is completely stripped away and people are perfectly renewed in the resurrection. Then they will need neither the proclamation of the law nor its threats and punishment, just as they will no longer need the gospel, for both belong to this imperfect life (FC SD VI.24).

Thankfully, the Christian is not only old Adam.  He is also new man in Christ. In the third use, the new man’s response is one of delighting in the law.  Article VI explains, “Instead, Paul holds that the law cannot burden those whom Christ has reconciled with God with its curse and cannot torment the reborn with its coercion because they delight in the law of the Lord according to their inward persons” (FC SD VI.5).  In the same way, it states, “However, when people are born again through the Spirit of God and set free from the law (that is, liberated from its driving powers and driven by the Spirit of Christ), they live according to the unchanging will of God, as comprehended in the law, and do everything, insofar as they are reborn, from a free and merry spirit” (FC SD VI.17).  For the new man, the law is something he wants to hear.  Christians hear descriptions of God’s will in the law, and through the work of the Spirit they experience the response: “Yes, that’s exactly what I want to do!” 

 

In the third use the Spirit utilizes the Law so that the actual behavior of a Christian reflects God’s will.  It is the Spirit who always supports the new man in Christ through the Gospel so that he can struggle against the old Adam. The new man struggles against the old Adam. New obedience and good works are produced by the Spirit working through the Gospel. New obedience and good works are considered good by God because of Christ.

 

It is the Spirit who applies the law in the third use.  The Spirit utilizes the law to teach the Christian how to live according to God’s will.  He also utilizes the law to compel and repress the old Adam.  Both of these actions aid the new man so that the new man determines what the individual actually does. In this way (and this way alone) it is entirely correct to say that the law helps the Christian live according to God’s will.