March 12, 2017 Text: Romans 4:1-8, 13-17

Dear Friends in Christ,

Back in the eighteenth century, the mystic Emmanuel Swedenborg sarcastically described the Lutheran as a man locked up in a dark room pacing back and forth repeating to himself: “I am justified by faith alone. I am justified by faith alone. I am justified by faith alone.” Justification by faith alone – is it really such a big deal? Or is it a merely a threadbare mantra chanted with monotony with no real purpose? After all isn’t there more than one entrée at the biblical buffet. This morning the Apostle Paul asserts that . . .
“JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH ALONE REALLY IS A BIG DEAL”
For us justification by faith alone means either being under a curse or blessing. Justification by faith alone means condemnation or acquittal. Justification by faith alone means it is a matter of life or death.
To bring this all home to his hearers, Paul showcases Abraham. Was Abraham made righteous because of his faith or his works? Here is the forefather of the Jews who had done works that were worth boasting about. But not before God.
The question of justification is quite inescapable for Abraham and for us. If you are not justified by faith, you will seek it elsewhere. Pay attention to the way people speak. Pay attention to your own language. No one wants to be wrong. We will find whatever words we can to declare ourselves and our actions and our attitudes as right. All of us are continuing to justify ourselves to each other that we talk right past one another.
Listen to eulogies at the funerals of unbelievers. Isn’t it curious that those who claimed not to believe in God are so pressed in the face of death to declare that the life now ended was right and good? They are feeble attempts to reckon the deceased as righteous with an appeal to his virtues as a husband and father, his athletic allegiance to The Illinois State University, his membership in the Kiwanis and his work on the board of the local bird sanctuary. Eulogies like this are empty and shallow at best; they do nothing to account the person as righteous before God. It works well in the obituary, but obituaries never get the dead out of the grave.
Here are just a few snippets from one day of obituaries in The Pantagraph. “He greatly enjoyed helping others, serving on the ESDA, camping, and gardening.” “He was an avid White Sox fan. He was a high school star athlete in football, basketball, and baseball. He coached Little League and was also a Boy Scout leader for many years.” “She enjoyed playing games with her grandchildren, quilting, and spending time watching wildlife at her home in Wisconsin.” “She was a hard worker who loved to make others happy with her delicious meals and helpful nature.” What would go in your obituary? Ours would read the same way. But how many of them have anything to do with saving faith?
Circumcision would not cut it for Abraham. Faith was there before circumcision. It is by faith, not the cutting of the flesh, that Abraham is reckoned righteous. Likewise to us, the righteousness that is ours is through faith in Christ Jesus and not by works of the Law.
And what is this faith that justifies? Trust, not in our works, which we sometimes use as measuring rods to make it clear we are in the right. Faith lets go of that and throws it in the garbage heap. In its place is trust in God, who justifies the ungodly. Listen to verse 5, “And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.”
Please remember this is not faith in faith. Faith must have an object outside of itself. It is faith in the promise. Abraham was the model of one who believed in the coming Messiah and so his faith was credited to him as righteousness.
It does not end with Abraham. For God who accounted him righteous does the same for you. Paul says these things were written not for Abraham’s sake alone but also for us, for the promise extends through Old Testament history into your hearing right now, for faith comes by hearing and the hearing, not of any word, but the Word of Christ, the words of the cross.
Faith in the cross of Jesus counts where our work as parent and spouse does not. Faith in the cross of Jesus counts where are allegiance to a university does not. Faith in the cross of Jesus counts where are work in a service organization does not. Faith in the cross of Jesus counts where our helpful nature and meal making and athletic skills do not. Faith in the cross of Jesus counts where were always having to be right does not. Faith in the cross of Jesus counts today in our daily life and tomorrow in our life to come. The cross of Jesus points to our righteousness.
Let’s make a deal – a big deal – out of justification by faith alone!
Amen.

March 5, 2017                                                                       Text:  Genesis 3:1-21

 

Dear Friends in Christ,

 

The marquee of a theater showed a man dressed as the devil because the current movie was about Satan.  The man was dressed in red, had a long tail, pitchfork, and horns.  A little girl, walking by with her mother, looked at the figure and was frightened.  “What’s that?” she asked her mother.  “Oh,” mother replied, “don’t be afraid.  That’s only the devil.”

That is our world.  Make the devil a caricature and he becomes less real, less frightening, and does he really exist?  Hell and damnation are not on many people’s radar so they can easily live the life they want.

Adam and Eve know the devil is all too real.  He comes to them today in the form of a snake created by God.  Do you ever think to yourself, “How could they be so dumb?  They had perfection as husband and wife.  No arguing about finances or who takes out the garbage or where on earth will we vacation this year.”  Would you or I have given in?  10 chances out of 9, we would!  Satan’s temptations are hard to resist.  That sneaky old snake is a forceful factor in the world.  He can deceive and seduce the best the human race has to offer.  Until Christ comes again this is our predicament.  Let’s take him seriously . . .

“THAT SNEAKY OLD SNAKE”

Satan has several descriptions in Scripture:  accuser, slanderer, adversary, enemy, opponent.  Jesus calls him a murderer, a liar, and the father of lies.  The Catechism reminds us that the devil was once a holy angel but then fell away from God.  He and his cohorts were created holy, sinned and are forever rejected by God.  They are great in number.

“That sneaky old snake” still challenges and seduces. Talking snakes?  Are you serious?  Who would be dumb enough to believe that?  That’s just some writer’s way of explaining how this world ended up as it is now.  Besides, do you believe Adam and Eve were real people and the only people in the world?  That’s just a way of describing the origins of the human race.  Satan doesn’t seduce today?  Satan laughs and laughs and laughs if we think like that.

What he did in the garden was to get our first parents to doubt God’s Word.  He lies to them.  The lying continues in our day.  People brought up in the church and who know God’s Word still think living together before marriage is not a sin.  Wake up!  Satan is winning.  He lies and tells men and women that gay marriage is just about love, not unnatural relations as described in the Bible.  Wake up!  Satan is winning.  He slithers past us and mentions we can be like God, because what does He really know anyways.  Wake up!  Satan is winning.  He turned Cain against Abel and he did quite the number on David and Bathsheba.  No one is off limits.  He even tries his seduction with Jesus as we see in today’s Gospel.

Be on guard, because he attacks all Christians, including you and me.  The noose of sin strangles and suffocates.  Take the sneaky old snake seriously.  Adam and Eve didn’t and it cost them and us death.  I’m naked, where can I hide?!

When preaching on this text it always is a reminder that we want to make the message of how to overcome simplistic.  Things like, “resist Satan’s assaults. Don’t do what Adam and Eve did.  Be strong against the wily one.”  Does this ever work?

We need help.  We need powerful, perfect help.  We need the strongest of the strong.  We need someone who overcame the sneaky old snake.  What’s that, someone did triumph over the devil?  Someone did resist and watched the devil walk away with his head in shame.

Isn’t the symmetry of the Scripture lessons beautiful this day?  Christ met the foe and he slithered away.  In His human nature he resisted the taunts and the goading and the challenge.  In His human nature He took the verbal punches and the subversive tactics to a place called Golgotha.  There for all the world of sinners to see He gave His life so that the old evil foe would be defeated.  Before His glorious resurrection, He took a little trip to tell Satan that He had won.  Satan would still have power but it would be limited and it would not last forever.  Through the one man free grace and righteousness is ours.  Grace reigns eternal.  While Satan is winning small battles here, the Eternal One passes on the eternal victory to us.

To resist this sneaky old snake we daily need these reminders.  Where are those found?  In the Holy Book.  Jesus used it.  Each time Satan came to attack him he said, “It is written.”  It is not enough to know the Scriptures so well that you can quote them.  Anyone – including Satan – can do that.  We must know what the Scriptures say and mean for us.  We must believe their message.

Take the devil seriously.  He is not some goofball in a 10 cent costume straight from a Hollywood back lot.  He is a formidable foe and his crafty and cunning seem to be working the world over.  Remember Christ holds the power.  Christ lived the perfection.  Christ is the ultimate snake handler and this belly crawling despot has met his match.  Good riddance sneaky old snake – now crawl away from here – I’ve got a Savior watching over me!

Amen.