Slaves and Sons
Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Jesus said, “If you abide in My word,
you are My disciples indeed.” It would not be a mistake to say that
these words explain the central truth of the Reformation. Abiding in the
truth of the Word of God was Martin Luther’s main point. That main
point was reflected in his translation of the Holy Scriptures into
German, so that anyone—not just the clergy—could read the Bible. That
main point was reflected in Luther's Catechism, written so that anyone could
understand and teach their children the basic doctrine of the Bible.
Jesus
said, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you
shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Sadly, the
people who heard Him took offense to His words. The astonishing thing is
that those who took offense were those described as “those who believed
Him.” But if they truly believed Jesus, why would they be offended by
what He had to say? And the answer is simple: though they believed what
Jesus said to them, their confidence was in their ancestry, their
heritage. “We are Abraham’s descendents,” they said. Abraham was their
idol; it was as if he was a god to them, and their heritage as his sons
was their salvation.
Many
of you have been Lutherans since the day you were baptized as an
infant. Some of you come from generations of Lutherans. Some of you are
descendents of founding members of St. Peter. Some of you even attended
our day school. You know the Bible, the Catechism, and the great hymns
of the faith. You’ve learned the truth of the Word from your parents and
from faithful pastors and teachers. You come to this place to hear the
truth. You sit in your pew and you listen as your pastor preaches the
Law to you and then speaks to you the comforting message that Christ has
delivered forgiveness to you through His death and resurrection. You
come here to return to your baptism through repentance and faith. You
come here to hear the word of Holy Absolution, spoken to you by your
pastor as by Christ Himself. You come here to receive in your mouth the
body and blood of Jesus Christ, given and shed for you. You have a
heritage of faith, and that’s a wonderful blessing from the Lord.
And
yet…and yet, there are times when the message is not what you think you
should be hearing. Your pastor preaches, and you can’t help but think
that the sermon is being preached to the choir, that there’s no need for
the pastor to preach to life-long, every-Sunday churchgoers the way he
does to real sinners. It makes you uncomfortable, for example, when he
speaks of individual confession and absolution. It irritates when he
preaches about the Lord’s Supper on days when it’s not offered. His
message makes you squirm in your pew because he’s telling you that ‘the
way things have always been,’ the way your parents and grandparents did
things, does not cut it as a reason to refuse the gifts of God. “But
isn’t it enough that St. Peter has been a faithful outpost in Campbell
Hill for nearly 125 years?” “Isn’t it enough that our Lutheran
Church—Missouri Synod has been bringing the Word to our country and the
world for 165 years?” “Isn’t it enough that, 482 years ago, Martin
Luther gave us a theological heritage?” These earthly institutions
become idols, slave chains that bind you to sin. Being called “Lutheran”
or even “Christian” cannot save you. Many who claim those names have abandoned the Word. Neither Martin Luther nor CFW
Walther can free you from slavery to sin. Membership here does not give
you an eternal heritage.
Only the truth of the Word of God
sets free repentant sinners. That is the true, eternal heritage we have
as sons of our heavenly Father, disciples who abide in the Word of God.
Our true heritage as sons is that our Father’s dwelling place is our
home as well. The Divine Service is our family gathering. In this house
we are clothed with the white robe of Christ’s righteousness in Holy
Baptism. In this house we are fed with the body and blood of Christ, our
Brother—a meal which fully nourishes us and quenches our thirst. Our
Father spends quality time with us in the Word, where Christ’s faithful
preachers share our family history, telling us the good news of how our
Brother took our sins upon Himself, bearing them to the cross, suffering
and dying in our place, and then raising us up with Him in baptismal
waters. That sacrifice has broken the chains that bound us to sin.
The
Gospel is an offense. The Word of God will never be popular in the eyes
of the world. The children of the world are happy to be slaves. They
have their reward: earthly treasures of fame, popularity, and
fortune—all of which will fade away, all of which leave them as slaves
of sin. But as sons of our heavenly Father, our heritage, our eternal
inheritance, is freedom from sin and a place in the house of our
heavenly Father. “The Kingdom ours remaineth.” In the name of the Father
and of the Son (+) and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The peace of God which passes all understanding will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus always. Amen.
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