Biblical Emphases: The Piety of the Cross

Posted on March 21, 2018 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Midweek of Judica – Lent 5

1 Corinthians 1:18-31  +  John 12:23-33

The final Biblical emphasis we’ll consider during our Lenten services this year I’m calling the ‘piety of the cross.’ It’s another emphasis found throughout the Bible, although the term ‘cross’ doesn’t show up until the New Testament, for obvious reasons. It’s also another somewhat unique emphasis of the Lutheran Church, sometimes referred to as the “theology of the cross” (Luther’s own term), as opposed to the “theology of glory.” But the term “piety” is also heavily used in our Lutheran writings, and the bearing of the cross is a large part of piety.

First, what is ‘piety’? It’s godliness. It’s religious devotion. Devoutness. To acknowledge that man owes devotion and reverence to God. Fulfilling one’s duties to God, what we would call the First Table of the Law, the first three Commandments. The opposite is ‘impiety,’ ‘wickedness,’ ‘godlessness’ or ‘ungodliness.’ The word ‘ungodly’ is another word for ‘impious.’ The ungodly behave as if they didn’t owe anything to God. They are ‘irreligious.’

The pagans actually understood piety relatively well; it’s part of the Law that God has written into the hearts of all men by nature, and it shows up in many mythologies, like the Aeneid, for example. Remembering to offer sacrifices, prayers, acknowledging the hand of the gods in one’s life, to give the gods the proper credit for the good that has happened, to appease their wrath for the bad, offering the right prayers for things you wanted, doing what the gods told you to do, regardless of the consequences you might face.

The pagans, of course, directed their devotion to the wrong gods, and therefore, made up their own sacrifices and their own duties, and they wrongly thought that their pious devotion earned them God’s favor.

As Christians, we know who the true God is, and we understand that it’s not a person’s piety or devotion that earns God’s favor or that makes up for our sins. Original sin makes that impossible, as we’ve learned. We’re justified by faith alone, as we’ve learned. But for believers, piety is still important, the sense of devotion toward God and the focus on devotion toward God, toward fulfilling the First Table of the Law. Trusting in God for everything. Regular prayer. Honoring the name of God and the reputation of God, first in your heart, but also before the world. Taking time to read and study God’s Word, to hear the preaching of it, and to devoutly observe the Sacraments God has given to be observed.

Piety flows from faith in Christ. We live to imitate our Lord Jesus. Look at the examples in Scripture of His devotion to His Father, from twelve years old in the Temple, to all the time He set aside for prayer, and for living to accomplish the work His Father had given Him to do.

What is that special piety or devotion ‘of the cross’? Jesus teaches us that, too. We heard in John 12, The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified…Now My soul is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save Me from this hour’? But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify Your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, saying, “I have both glorified it and will glorify it again.

Last night, we watched The Passion of the Christ. It showed the great pain Jesus endured, but it also conveyed rather well His resoluteness, His willingness, His unflinching faith in His Father’s goodness through it all. He didn’t approach the cross ignorantly or fatalistically, nor did He approach it “gladly” or easily. He approached the cross, walked right up to it and embraced it, out of pure devotion to His Father, without any complaining or bitterness for having to endure it. That’s piety.

A large part of piety is to bear the cross patiently, to recognize God’s love and faithfulness even in the midst of suffering, and sometimes to choose suffering for God’s sake rather than to choose an easy path that leads away from God. No one should choose to suffer for suffering’s sake. But to accept suffering patiently, if it’s God’s will that you suffer, or to choose the cross because it’s God’s will, because to choose a different path would be against God’s Word—that’s what we mean by the piety of the cross.

That’s what we heard Jesus talk about in the second lesson tonight…He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there My servant will be also. If anyone serves Me, him My Father will honor.

The Christian serves God, renders devotion to God, by following Jesus, and that path inevitably includes the cross.

But God’s glory is there behind the suffering, behind the loss, behind the foolishness of what we preach and what we believe, even as Christ was glorified in His suffering.

And God’s choosing is there in the weak things of this world, as we heard Paul tell the Corinthians in the first lesson. God chooses the weak things, the foolish things, the ignoble things to shame the wise.

So, instead of being ashamed of our lowliness or suffering or foolishness in the eyes of the world, piety means accepting it, embracing it, choosing it when you have a choice between being faithful to God or being faithless, and even giving thanks to God for it. As Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

The world can’t understand the piety of the cross. As soon as things start to go poorly, as soon as life on earth becomes hard, the world says, do whatever it takes to make the pain go away. When the world sees the Christian bearing the cross, the world taunts and asks, Where is your God? Well, we know where our God was. He was being whipped and beaten and scourged. He was being tried and condemned to death. He was up there on a cross. That’s what next week is all about, a focus on the cross. With the strength of that focus, we’ll all be better equipped for that daily piety of the cross, for all the daily self-denial and the struggles that await us this side of heaven. And when people ask, Where is your God?, we’ll be able to answer with conviction, my God was there, bearing the cross for me, but now He’s risen and exalted and reigning at the right hand of God, and where He is, there will I be. Amen.

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The truth is sweet to some, bitter to others

Posted on March 18, 2018 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

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Sermon for Judica – Lent 5

Genesis 12:1-3  +  Hebrews 9:11-15  +  John 8:46-59

Did you notice in the Propers today all the references to the world’s opposition to the righteous and the Lord’s deliverance of the righteous? Introit: “Vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause against an ungodly people.” Gradual: “Deliver me, O LORD, from my enemies.” And then, “He delivers me from my enemies.” Tract: “Many a time they have afflicted me from my youth.” And then, “The LORD is righteous; He has cut in pieces the cords of the wicked.”

Those prayers to God for help against the enemy are not just the prayers of the Psalmist. They are the prayers of many Christians, and actually, they are the prayers of Christ Himself. And the vindication that God promises is first for Christ, and then for the Christian.

You see Jesus’ enemies lining up before Him today in the Gospel, and Jesus doesn’t back down. On the contrary, He riles them up. He riles them up by simply telling them the truth, and He tells it so directly in our text, so “in your face,” that no one can misunderstand, no one pretend that there’s a gray area where interpretations may differ, no one can sit on the fence. The truth of Jesus is sweet to some and bitter to others. Believe it and live! Deny it and die! It doesn’t get any more serious than this.

Jesus had been telling the truth to the Jews all along. God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Whoever believes in the Son has life. Whoever does not believe will not see life. I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to Me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in Me shall not thirst. And in the words just prior to our Gospel today, Jesus said, Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever. Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed…If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

Now, to you who know and love Jesus, those words are sweet, aren’t they? That truth is precious and dear. You wouldn’t trade it for all the wealth in the world, I hope. But that very same truth is bitter medicine for the one who wants to go on practicing sin; for the one who refuses to admit that he is a slave to sin in need of the freedom that only Christ can give; for the one who doesn’t want to abide in the word of Jesus, but go on believing whatever “truth” he wants. Jesus promised the world to his fellow Jews; He offered them Himself. But they didn’t want Him. They didn’t believe His words. They didn’t want His help.

Why not? Jesus tells them plainly. He drives the truth home: He who is of God hears God’s words; therefore you do not hear, because you are not of God. Bitter medicine. A hard truth to swallow, to be told you don’t belong to God, because you won’t listen to Jesus. Which means, as Jesus pointed out earlier in John 8, that they belonged to the devil. It’s either one or the other.

Jesus knew that truth wouldn’t go over well, and it didn’t. The Jews resorted to mockery and ridicule. “Do we not say rightly that You are a Samaritan and have a demon?” No, Jesus said. You’re not right. You dishonor Me with your ridicule. And while I don’t seek My own glory, God the Father seeks it and He will judge those who dishonor His Son.

But what are the next words out of Jesus’ mouth? Most assuredly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word he shall never see death. Even then, the Jews who had dishonored Jesus didn’t have to die for the horrible sin of mocking the Son of God. Jesus offers life to anyone who would keep His word, that is, to anyone who would hear it, believe it, and keep holding onto it. Good, sweet news for the believer! Bad, bitter news for the one who wants to choose a different path.

To the Jews, it was more bad news, because they were not about to keep Jesus’ word, and the fact that He made such a bold claim just riled them up even more. Now we know that You have a demon! Abraham is dead, and the prophets; and You say, ‘If anyone keeps My word he shall never taste death.’ See how the world mocks and ridicules when Jesus claims to be able to keep people from dying! The Jews mocked, not because they didn’t believe in the resurrection from the dead, but because they didn’t believe Jesus was the Lord over life and death who could do it.

That same Jewish mockery is practiced by many people today. “Don’t tell me I have to keep Jesus’ words in order to go to heaven. That’s just plain intolerant. That’s just plain elitist and exclusivist. Jesus may be one path among many to God. But don’t you dare make the claim that He’s the only path to God, and that His word must be heard and kept!” Most assuredly I say to you, such people will see death.

Of course, in our age (and even in the Greek world at that time), people mock the whole concept of resurrection. We are the heirs of the Enlightenment, after all. We live in a scientific age. We know (they say) that the universe came from a Big Bang, not from a special creation. And we know (they say) that death is irreversible, or, if it is reversible someday, it will be due to man’s scientific ingenuity, not an act of God. How ridiculous for Jesus to claim that death doesn’t happen to those who believe in Him! And how foolish are the Christians who believe it!

But you who keep Jesus’ word, who repent of your sins and believe in Jesus’ promise to free you, to feed you, to give you life – you will never see death. You will never taste death, because Jesus tasted death for you and so became a perfect High Priest, as the Epistle reminded us today, a perfect High Priest who offered His own holy, precious blood to make atonement for your sins, such a perfect atonement that, if every person in the world were to believe in Him, even the worst criminal, then every person in the world would be justified and received into eternal life.

If you believe Jesus’ words, then you understand what He meant when He promised that anyone who keeps His word will never see death. You know that He meant that, although your body will stop working and will sleep in the earth for a time, your soul will not be buried in the earth with your body; your soul will not suffer the wrath of God or the torment of hell; your soul will be carried by the angels to Abraham’s side in the presence of God, where you will wait for the day of resurrection.

That’s a huge promise, a massive promise, a truth you can’t prove by any scientific method in the world. But it’s still the truth. And the truth has the power of the Holy Spirit behind it to bring people to believe it.

If Jesus’ words hadn’t riled up the unbelieving Jews enough before, His final claim in today’s Gospel certainly did the trick. “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.” Then the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?” Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.”

I AM, the name by which God revealed Himself to Moses in the burning bush. I AM, the one who was in the beginning, before time itself began. I AM, the one who promised to Adam and Eve a Seed of the woman who would crush the serpent’s head. I AM, who appeared to Abraham and promised him a Seed who would be a blessing to all nations.

Now it all comes together. Jesus, this man not yet fifty years old, claimed to be the very God – in unity with the Father and the Holy Spirit – who created the world, who delivered Israel throughout the Old Testament, who was about to be killed by the unbelieving world so that He could redeem His fallen creatures, who would rise from the dead on the third day.

That’s the truth, and the world can’t handle it. But at the same time, this very truth is what sustains our faith and hands out to us again the forgiveness of sins. At the same time, when we speak this truth, God is speaking through us to call unbelievers to faith in Christ, and some will be converted and saved.

It doesn’t get any more serious than this. If you don’t believe the truth, you are lost. If you claim to believe in God but don’t rely on Jesus’ words, then you’re a liar. If you do believe, you have God’s forgiveness and life. You will never see death. All who believe in Him will suffer in this life, too, but, like Jesus, you, too, will be vindicated and brought back to life, even as you now live and will never die. Amen.

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Biblical Emphases: Vocation

Posted on March 14, 2018 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Midweek of Laetare – Lent 4

1 Corinthians 7:17-24  +  Luke 10:1-16

So far on these Wednesdays in Lent we’ve considered Original Sin, Justification by Faith Alone, and the Means of Grace. It was through the Means of Grace, through the preaching of the Gospel that God the Holy Spirit called us to the kingdom of Christ. As we confess in the Third Article of the Creed, “The Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel.”

That’s one kind of “calling” that we talk about, the Gospel call to faith. It goes out to everyone: Repent and believe in Christ! Come into the Master’s vineyard! Come to the wedding banquet of the Son! It’s essentially a call to Holy Baptism, a call that has been heeded by every baptized Christian.

Now, among those who have been called to faith in Christ by the Gospel, among the baptized, we speak of two other types of “calling,” two kinds of “vocation” in the Church. (You may know that the Latin word for “calling” is vocatio, where we get our word “vocation” from.) This evening we’re going to consider the Biblical emphasis on Vocation as it applies to Christians.

There is a calling—a divine call, we say—into the office of the Holy Ministry. And then there is also the calling or the vocation that describes all the various responsibilities that God has given to Christians within their calling to be Christians.

Let’s talk first about the divine call into the office of the ministry.

The divine call isn’t normally what we mean when we talk about vocation. It’s a special call that goes out to men whom God has specifically chosen to preach His Word and to administer His Sacraments. It may be a call that comes directly from God, directly from Jesus, as in the case of the Old Testament Prophets, or the apostles, or the 70 that we heard about this evening. We call that kind of divine call an immediate call, that is, a call made directly by God without any human means.

But since the time of the Apostle Paul, God doesn’t call people that way. Instead He calls them through or by means of the Church. We call that a mediate or a mediated call. To the men who were appointed as ministers in the city of Ephesus, not by Jesus directly, but by the apostles and the churches in Ephesus, Paul said, Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. The Holy Spirit had made them overseers of the church, but He did it through the call they received from the Church into that ministry, as He still does today. That’s the teaching of the Lutheran Church, and very different from the modern Evangelical churches, whose pastors are expected to feel a burning in the heart or a whispering in the ear that comes directly from God.

The divine call carries with it the authority of Christ Himself. We are ambassadors for Christ, Paul wrote to the Corinthians, as though God were pleading through us. We are stewards of the mysteries of God, he also wrote. And because ministers are called and sent by Christ, whether directly or indirectly, His words from Luke 10 apply to all the same: He who hears you hears Me, he who rejects you rejects Me, and he who rejects Me rejects Him who sent Me.

Now let’s talk for a moment about the other calling or “vocation” that describes all the various responsibilities that God has given to Christians within their calling to be Christians.

One’s vocation includes all the roles and responsibilities that God has assigned to His people for the purpose of serving our neighbor in love. It includes preachers, who have a divine call. But it also includes the hearer of the Word. It includes man, woman, boy, girl, father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister, husband, wife, widow, employer, employee, master, servant, king, ruler, soldier, citizen, teacher, student, neighbor, farmer, truck driver, garbage man, bank teller, engineer, computer repairman, plumber, electrician, doctor, nurse, lawyer, chef, food server, the list goes on and on and on.

Some of these vocations are chosen by us, like whether to be a doctor or a lawyer, a farmer or a truck driver, although even then, the talents and opportunities necessary for each aren’t given equally to everyone. Other vocations are assigned to us by God without any choice on our part, through our parents or other circumstances of life, like if you’re a boy or a girl, a son or a daughter, of royal birth or not, born to a wealthy or a poor family, and so on.

The Christian usually has many vocations at once, and the Table of Duties at the end of Luther’s Small Catechism is a good place to start, if you want to know what God has said in His Word about the various categories of vocation and stations in life.

The important truth of vocation is that every role and responsibility a Christian has is designed by God so that Christians can show love in all the ways people need to be loved and served on this earth. And every vocation approved by God’s Word and motivated by love is just as pleasing to God as any of the rest. As St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, as God has distributed to each one, as the Lord has called each one, so let him walk.

This teaching of vocation is sorely needed. It means that you can be content in any station, because God has given you a way to serve Him in any station by faithfully and patiently serving your neighbor, by simply carrying out the mundane tasks of your vocation, even the ones that seem insignificant. These are the good works for which God has created us and prepared beforehand that we should walk in them, the regular, everyday works of a person’s vocation. So think about your various vocations, and recognize that God has called you to the ones you now have, and is even now preparing you for others. Let love for your neighbor be the driving force behind them all. Amen.

 

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Man lives on bread, but not bread alone

Posted on March 11, 2018 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Laetare – Lent 4

Isaiah 49:8-13  +  Galatians 4:21-31  +  John 6:1-15

There’s an intentional focus on food during this Lenten season. Bread for the body. There’s also an intentional focus on demons. To fight against the demons and win, we need more than bread for the body. We need bread for the soul. On the first Sunday in Lent, Jesus had been deprived of food for 40 days and nights. And when the devil tried to get Him to turn some stones into bread, you remember His reply? Man does live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Bread for the body, and spiritual bread—the Word of God—for the soul.

In today’s Gospel we see God’s recognition that, yes, man does live on bread, and He graciously provides it. But we also learn that man does not live on bread alone, and yet, tragically, the people in our Gospel wanted nothing but bread from Jesus, who offered them so much more.

Jesus was trying to get away from the crowds for a little while. He got in boat with His disciples and crossed the sea to a deserted place. But the multitudes saw Him leave and left on foot to meet Him on the other side. It tells us why: Because they saw all the signs He was doing and they wanted to see more. Some of them arrived before Jesus did. Others kept coming. It says in Mark’s Gospel that Jesus had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd, wandering aimlessly, attracted by the signs Jesus did.

So the other Gospels tell us that Jesus spent the rest of the day teaching them and healing their diseases. When evening came, the disciples suggested that Jesus dismiss them so that they could go buy bread for themselves; they weren’t that far from town; there’s no indication that they were too poor to buy themselves a meal; they would have been all right. But Jesus had one more gift to give them. After all, as John tells us, Passover was near. Passover—and with it, the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

People’s minds should have been fixed on that important annual celebration, just as most of us think about and plan for Christmas, and (hopefully) also Easter, weeks in advance. Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread—a reminder of God’s physical providence in redeeming Israel from slavery in Egypt, and of Moses leading them through the wilderness where God provided bread for them every day in the form of Manna. But the Passover was also a reminder of God’s spiritual providence in His promise to redeem Israel by the blood of Christ, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, the Prophet who is greater than Moses, who offers the true Bread from heaven: Himself as the one Mediator between God and man. There it is again: bread for the body and bread for the soul.

First, He tests Philip and the other disciples. Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat? He wanted Philip not to despair, but to trust with hope that the One who asked the question had the power and the desire to provide the answer Himself.

Philip admitted the simple truth. We don’t have the money. We can’t provide bread for all these people. Andrew then came and pointed out the extent of their ability. Five loaves of bread and two fish. Here’s what we do have, Jesus, but human reason says it’s not enough. Andrew does well to put the question back to Jesus. “What are they among so many?”

Then we have the miracle itself. The people sitting down in groups of 50 (which made it easy to count them and tell us how many there were). Jesus gave thanks to the Father and started handing out bread and fish to disciples, and the disciples to the multitudes, and the food just kept coming. All 5,000 ate their fill, with twelve baskets of broken pieces left over, “crumbs from the master’s table” with which to feed the poor afterwards.

Yes, man does live on bread. But who provides it? Where does it come from? It comes from God; it comes from Jesus, the Son of God who is true God, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit. It comes from God usually through parents or through hard work. But God can also rain it down from heaven or multiply what’s in the pantry, if that’s how He has to keep His promise to provide for His people. Recognize the Giver. Recognize Jesus as the Giver. And receive your daily bread with thanksgiving. Receive it with gladness. Enjoy it while you have it, and share the leftover pieces with the poor and needy.

But recognize that man does not live on bread alone. Go ahead and eat your bread. Eat it every day. Eat it for years to come. But you know very well that eating bread every day—taking care of your body, obeying every one of the doctor’s orders—still won’t keep you alive on this earth for more than a few more decades, maybe less. Your body is dying, no matter how healthy you are at the moment. You were conceived in your mother’s womb with an expiration date, known only to God, with death already programmed into your genes, not because of some evolutionary mechanism, but because of sin. Eating bread regularly just means prolonging the time until your death. It does nothing for your soul—for your eternal well-being.

Your soul lives only on “every word that proceeds from the mouth of God,” as Moses and Jesus said. God’s word is what keeps your soul alive. God’s teaching about sin—your sin, and the sin of everyone else, and the sin that has corrupted even nature itself, the sin that will result in the death of your body; and God’s teaching about His grace—His gracious plan of salvation through faith in Christ Jesus, His gracious acceptance of all who believe in Christ, His gracious gift of His Holy Spirit to begin a new obedience in the Christian, His gracious help in bearing the cross each and every day, until you reach the goal of the undying life.

The multitudes in our Gospel today wanted bread alone, like most of the rest of the Jews, who wanted to stick with Hagar, if you recall the Epistle today from Galatians 4. They wanted to stick with “Jerusalem below,” with the First Covenant of the Law instead of the Second Covenant of grace and of the Promise of forgiveness through Christ. The people in our Gospel believed that Jesus was the Prophet who was to come, but all they wanted from and expected from the Christ was an earthly king to feed their bellies, to fight their battles, to give them a pleasant and glorious earthly life. As it says at the end of the Gospel, the people who ate the bread were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king. This is the kind of Savior we want! One who can give us bread for our bodies! And so, as we learn from the rest of John 6, those very crowds walked away from Jesus the very next day when He insisted on offering them Himself, not as an earthly bread-king, but as the Bread from heaven who would give His very flesh and blood to reconcile them with God and bestow on them, not an earthly kingdom, but a heavenly one.

Like those crowds, people today are happy to follow Jesus, if it’s the Jesus who feeds the poor, who gives us a better life, who makes us feel good. They’re happy to have a Jesus who didn’t create the world, who doesn’t demand an accounting for sin. They’re happy to follow a Jesus who makes people behave better, who works together with other religions to solve social problems, who doesn’t judge. Such a Jesus the people of this world might have for a king.

But the real Jesus appeared, teaching that He is the Creator and the Judge, the very Son of God, who came to call poor sinners to repentance, to recognize their sins and to be terrified by the fiery judgment that awaits. The real Christ came to suffer the judgment we deserved for our sins and to offer forgiveness of sins and eternal life through faith in Him. The real Christ calls people to repent and be baptized, and to sit at the feet of the pastors whom He has sent, to be active in a church that teaches His truth purely, to receive His very body and blood in His Sacrament, and to recognize His Word and Sacraments as the true food for your souls and as the source of a life that’s so much bigger than what we can see here.

But that Jesus was not accepted then, and He still isn’t accepted now—not by most of the world, even by most of our neighbors, even by many churches that bear His name.

And so our joyful Gospel of Jesus’ compassion and providence for the 5,000 ends on a sad note, the note of a gift that was given and then squandered, a sign that was given and went unrecognized, a Savior who offered Himself to men who then turned away from Him because He offered more than they were willing to receive.

Be careful not to follow their example. Look to God for daily bread and receive it with thanksgiving. But even more importantly, look to Christ for something better than bread: for the forgiveness of sins, life and salvation which He earned for you through His suffering and death, and which He now hands out for free in His Word and Sacrament. Then and only then will you be able to “rejoice with Jerusalem,” because the true Jerusalem is not below, but above, the home of all the blessed who are saved by faith alone in Christ Jesus. Amen.

 

 

 

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Biblical Emphases: Means of Grace

Posted on March 7, 2018 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Midweek of Oculi – Lent 3

Romans 10:5-17  +  John 6:47-63

Original sin means that all people are corrupt by nature and incurable. Justification by faith alone means there’s hope for sinners, because our acceptance by God into eternal life doesn’t depend on our sinlessness, but on faith in Jesus Christ, the Sinless One, whom faith lays hold of, whose benefits faith receives. But where does this faith come from? If we’re truly corrupt and even dead by nature and hostile to God in spiritual things, if we have no true fear of God or true faith in God by nature, as the doctrine of original sin reveals, how can we ever believe in Christ Jesus so as to be justified by faith?

Our Augsburg Confession puts it beautifully: That we may obtain such faith, God has instituted the preaching office; He has given the Gospel and the Sacraments, through which, as through means, He gives the Holy Spirit, who works faith, where and when He wishes, in those who hear the Gospel—the Gospel that teaches that, through Christ’s merit, not through our own merit, we have a gracious God, if we believe this.

It’s so rare to find this basic teaching in modern Christian churches. The idea that God works through instruments, through means—what we call the Means of Grace—is completely foreign to American Evangelicalism and Pentecostalism, who may speak very highly of the Bible as being the inspired Word of God, but then they come right out and deny that God uses preaching and the Sacraments as His chosen instruments to create faith in men’s hearts. And yet, this is an integral part of the doctrine of Christ. The Holy Ghost works through the instruments, the means of preaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments. This is how He stirs up faith in the hearts of men. This is how He nourishes and strengthens and sustains faith.  Everything depends on the Word.

This is the same thing Jesus taught His apostles when He told them the Parable of the Sower and the Seed. The seed that sprouts into faith in men’s hearts is the Word of God, according to Jesus. And what did He say in the lesson you heard tonight? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. And when Jesus gave His apostles the great commission, He said, Go into all the world and preach the Gospel. Or, Go and make disciples of all nations. How?  By what means?  By reasoning with them? By doing miracles? By telling them to find God within themselves? No. Baptizing them…and teaching them.

Paul says to the Romans in chapter 1, For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes.

And what did Paul say in our lesson from Romans 10? For “whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.” How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? … So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

So let’s make sure we have a solid understanding of the Means of Grace. The phrase which we so commonly use in the Lutheran Church, the ‘means of grace,’ refers to the instrument or tool that God the Holy Spirit uses to bring people to faith, to preserve them in the faith, and thus to save people from sin, death, and the devil.

What is that tool? What is that instrument? It’s the Word of God, specifically the Gospel of Christ: God’s promise to be merciful and gracious, to forgive poor sinners their sins for Christ’s sake, through faith. The Gospel is preached to the ears with words alone. But the Gospel is also preached to the eyes and to the other senses when those words, when those promises are attached also to visible things, like water, bread and wine. That’s why we sometimes say that the Sacraments are “the visible Word.”

So the message of Christ is proclaimed in the world. That’s a tool of the Holy Spirit for applying grace to men, for bringing them to faith and, through faith, applying the merits of Christ to them.

Water is applied to a person in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, with the promise that “He who believes and is baptized will be saved,” or, “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins,” or, “Baptism now saves you,” or, “God saved us through—by means of—the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.” Those promises attached to Baptism make it a tool of the Holy Spirit, applying the promises of the Gospel to the individual who is baptized.

Bread and wine are consecrated with the Words of Christ’s institution, then distributed, eaten and drunk by communicants, with the promise that “This is My body; this is My blood of the New Testament, shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” That promise, “for the forgiveness of sins,” attached to the bread and wine which each communicant receives, makes the Lord’s Supper a tool of the Holy Spirit, a means of applying grace to sinners, to each and every one, each and every time you receive it.

What things are not means of grace? For one, prayer. Prayer is good. Prayer is powerful. But prayer itself isn’t a tool of the Holy Spirit for conferring grace on sinners, for creating or preserving faith. You talking to God, you asking God for things doesn’t bring His grace and forgiveness to you. Only His appointed means do that.

For another, the heart of man. Your heart is not a means of grace. Neither are your feelings or emotions. If you’re feeling guilty for sins you’ve committed, don’t look inside yourself, don’t look to your feelings in order to find forgiveness or a gracious God. God doesn’t work directly on your heart. He doesn’t forgive you on the inside or communicate with you through your feelings. He communicates with you through His Word and works forgiveness through the appointed means of grace.

Another non-means of grace is things that happen in your life—success or failure, a good day or a bad day, sickness or health, good fortune or bad. God doesn’t tell you whether He accepts you or rejects you through any such things. He’s given you a better way, a dependable way to know His will with certainty, to receive His grace and favor, to be strengthened and confirmed in your faith and preserved in it till the end: His Word preached to you by the servant whom he specifically sent to do it, and His Sacraments administered according to His command.

Be thankful for this doctrine of the means of grace! Rejoice in it! Because it gives you a firm and dependable place to find God in the world, a channel to Christ that is open to all, intended for all, and powerful to work in all people the faith by which alone we must be justified. Amen.

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