Words of Lutheran Wisdom

[ChiRho]

THREAD FOR POSTING LUTHERAN WORDS OF WISDOM:
(website links, quotes, Homilies/Sermons, etc)


Here is a collection of links to some of the greatest material produced by some of the greatest Pastors that the LCMS has got!

[/URL]


Pastor Joel A. Brondos -Pastor (Historic Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church, Ft. Wayne, IN); Headmaster (Zion Lutheran Academy)

http://www.zionluthac.org/ (http://joelbrondos.worldmagblog.com )

Pastor Brondos is the Pastor that Catechized and Baptized me, last October. He is a man of rare quality and has a knack for cutting away the garbage and exposing the truth. He is one of the founders of LOGIA, a Lutheran quarterly, filled with invaluable Lutheran articles.

[URL]http://www.logia.org

Currently Pastor Brondos is also the author of a weblog entitled Collarbones, located here:

http://joelbrondos.worldmagblog.com/

Pastor Chad L. Bird - Pastor (Redeemer Lutheran Church, Ft. Wayne, IN/ Kramer Chapel Ft. Wayne Seminary); Asst. Prof. Exegetical Theology

Rev. Bird most recently served as Pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church, Wellston, Okla., which was his first call into the Holy Ministry in 1997. He has also taught Biblical Hermeneutics on two occasions at Lutheran Theological Seminary, Novosibirsk, Siberia, and is a departmental editor of Gottesdienst: A Quarterly Journal of the Evangelical Lutheran Liturgy in which he writes on Lutheran hymnody. Rev. Bird has had several hymns published, one of which appears in the Hymnal Supplement 98. He is currently a doctoral student at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, OH.

Pastor Bird is the best sermon writer I have ever had the pleasure of hearing or reading. Truly, this man gets Lutheranism like few have ever got it! I cannot wait until I have grandchildren to tell them, that I heard him preach on my first Reformation Celebration!

http://redeemer-fortwayne.org/Sermons.php

I will add more links as we go! Enjoy!

Pax Christi,

ChiRho

[ChiRho]

2004-04-25
Misericordias Domini

John 10:11-16
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. . . anything beyond what my heart desires. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, but I spy grass that is greener on the other side of the fence. He leadeth me beside the still waters, but I thirst for what I see yonder shimmering in the distant desert sand. But He restoreth my soul, squelching the wanderlust within me to live life the way I see fit. He maketh me to walk in the paths of righteousness when I want to run in the open fields of the world - eating where I want, sleeping with whomever I want, living like the beast I am. He leads me for His name's sake, but I want to make a name for myself, I want others to envy me, to speak ill of me if they wish, but secretly to covet who I am and what I've done. O the Shepherd's rod is restrictive and His staff is stifling to my animalistic heart! Come valleys of the shadow of death, come storm and wind, hail and rain, I shall not fear, for I know the lay of the land, I've been around the block, and I'm not sheepish about telling you so.

So I, so you, boast in the psalms we sing from our untamed hearts. We do not really want a Good Shepherd but a hireling, one who does not own us. For we want our freedoms - freedom to walk in unrighteousness paths if the end justifies the means; freedom to lie down in the Green's bed, or the Jones' bed, or the Smith's bed, or whatever bed our lower appetites choose; freedom to pull the wool over men's eyes, twisting every story to paint ourselves in the best light, lying when we ought to confess, and confessing other men's lies to make our own wool seem that much whiter than theirs.

Repent. For you are sheep going astray; return to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls. For the freedoms you crave are enemies in disguise, and O what big teeth they have.

The Lord is your Good Shepherd. And all He wants is you. I who so often turn my back on the fold and its Shepherd? Yes, you. I who have cursed His staff, ignored His call, gone my own way? Yes, you. I who have been more like a wolf than a sheep, angrily tearing away at those around me? Yes, the Good Shepherd only wants you.

Consider the heavens, the work of His fingers, the moon and the stars which He has made. What is man, that He is mindful of him? All of us, that He cares for us? Yet for us, who are but dust of dust, He who is God of God came down, was beaten down, and beat down Satan under our feet. For us, who are the sheep that love to wander, the Lamb of God is bound to the altar in order to bind us to Himself. For us, whose mouths are open far too often, He did not open His mouth, like a Lamb that is led to the slaughter.

The hireling sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep, and flees. But our David went after him, attacked him, and rescued us from his jaws. When the lion of hell rose up against Him, our David seized him by his beard and struck him and killed him. No, more than that. He rescued you, but not as the shepherd David did. He laid down His life for you. He laid down His body between you and the satanic wolf, between you and the lion of hell, and gave Himself over to be devoured. The beast of Hades licked up the blood of the slain Shepherd, chewed His flesh, and wolfed Him down.

But that which the beast devoured could not be digested in the tomb of his stomach. And when He who laid down His life took it back again, that tomb could not contain Him. The Good Shepherd vacated the stomach that had entombed Him, leaving behind him a predator that you, O little flock, need fear no more. Shall you fear the wolf of hell with his belly burst, his teeth broken, and his accusations the mere whimperings of his own defeat? Shall you fear what mere mortals think of you when God Himself calls you His child, His friend, His beloved? Shall you fear that your rebellious ways have separated you from God when He makes you bone of His bone and flesh and flesh? Have no fear, little flock, for He who is known by the Father knows you, calls you by name, and has made you His own.

The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord for by the humiliation of His Son, God has raised up our fallen world. He has raised you up from the pit into which you have fallen. He has placed you upon His shoulders and rejoiced to carry you home. He has washed you in cleansing waters, bound up that which was broken, and healed all your wounds. He preparest an altar before you, anointest your head with oil, and His chalice runneth over -over your lips, over your sins, quenching your thirst while making you yearn, yearn for more.

All this He does for you. And because He is the Good Shepherd you are named His good sheep. For He gives His life for you and makes your life His own and His life your own. He became what you are in order to make you what He is. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow you, shall precede you, shall be on your right and on your left, above you and below you, and you shall dwell in the flock of the Good Shepherd forever. Amen.


Professor Chad Bird

[JVAC]

Sure!
AWESOME! (Plans on saving some quotes over the summer for his papers next year) Mwahahahahahaha

"Thus we do not despise ceremonies and works, but we set great store by them; but we despise the false estimate placed upon works in order that no one may think that they are true righteousness," -Martin Luther "Freedom of a Christian Man" 1520

-James

[ChiRho]

2004-04-10
Holy Saturday

None
This is no night for you sons of Adam and daughters of Eve to sit afar off and pine away for Paradise Lost. For to everything there is a season, a time for every purpose of heaven. There was a time for licking your wounds left by the serpent's attack; for weeping at the grave of your murdered son; for working the thorn-infested soil and bearing children in labor's travail. But gone are the days when Eden is a ghost town and flaming swords barricade the way to the Tree of Life. For this is the night of Paradise Regained. Rise and return! For the Lord who kills and makes alive has been killed and made alive for you. He has sucked up the venom in his fang-pierced heel. He has commanded the angels to sheathe their swords. And He beckons you, "Ho! You who thirst, come to the waters! And you who have no money, come buy and eat! Wash in the river whose streams make glad the city of God. Dine in Eden's orchard on the heavenly Tree of Life. For this is the night when He who most wonderfully created your human nature yet more wonderfully redeemed it, that you might be conformed to the image of Him who makes all things new.

This is no night for you children of Noah to remain outside the ark built from virgin timber. Will you go on eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the door slams shut? Will you continue living as if God did not matter and as if you mattered most? The Lord has promised grace to the repentant sinner, but He has not promised a tommorow. Lo, this is the hour of repentance, today is the day of salvation. Rise, repent, enter the ark! For the Lord who kills and makes alive has been killed and made alive for you. A door has been hewn in His side by a Roman spear. The water that spilled out carries you back inside - back in to join Noah and his family safe from the deluge of wrath, back in to where God and man are united as a single body, cloistered in the vessel of flesh that will ship you safely to the harbor of heaven. For this is the night when God who brought the flood on a wicked and perverse generation yet saved Noah and his family saves you by Baptism through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

This is no night for you children of Israel to remain wrapped in the chains of Egypt. Gird up your loins; place sandals on your feet; take your staff in your hands; rise and leave. Out of Egypt God has called His son. The Passover Lamb has been chosen and slaughtered. His blood has painted your doorposts and lentil. The Angel of Death has visited wrath upon the Firstborn. You are free. Rise and depart! For the Lord who kills and makes alive has been killed and made alive for you. Leave the land of death by passing through the crimson sea. Do you not hear what He says as you step between the liquid walls? "You are my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased!" Do you not see that behind you He drowns all that has been born in you from Adam and which you yourself haved added thereto? Do you not taste the manna of flesh He places within your mouth? And doesn't your mouth water for the milk and honey that await you beyond the Jordan? This is no night to remain in the land of darkness and in the shadow of death. For this is the night when you who believe in Christ are delivered from bondage to sin and are restored to life and immortality.

Indeed, this is no night. For the seal of the grave is broken and the morning of the new creation breaks forth out of night. The Sun of Righteousness has risen over the sepluchre's horizon, dawning upon all who have sat outside Eden, fettered in the shadow of Egypt. Take heart, Adam, for He has given you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. Be of good cheer, children of Noah, for He has placed His Spirit within you and the dove of peace has built His nest within your soul. Fear not, sons of Jacob, for Esau's jealousy cannot overtake you, Laban's deceit will not ensnare you, and Pharaoh's chariots lie rusting at the bottom of the Font.

The Lord Jesus has passed over from death to life, and He has taken you with Him. Oh, how wonderful and beyond all telling is His mercy towards us. For the Lord is our Lamb, and we shall never want.

Professor Chad Bird
This sets the standard by which all sermons are judge by. :cool:

[Rechtgläubig]

Some one sent to know whether it was permissible to use warm water in baptism? The Doctor replied: "Tell the blockhead that water, warm or cold, is water." (Table Talk)

:D

[ChiRho]

"But others make a detour and purposely, as it were, avoid Christ, so do they put off approaching Him with the text. As for me, when I have a text that is like a nut with a hard shell, I immediately dash it against the Rock and find the sweetest kernel."

-Martin Luther

[ChiRho]

"The Holy Spirit is the simplest writer and adviser in heaven and on earth. That is why his words could have no more than the one simplest meaning which we call the grammatical, or the literal meaning of the tongue."

-Martin Luther

[ChiRho]

Faith is not what some people think it is. Their human dream
is a delusion. Because they observe that faith is not followed by
good works or a better life, they fall into error, even though they
speak and hear much about faith. ``Faith is not enough,'' they
say, ``You must do good works, you must be pious to be saved.''
They think that, when you hear the gospel, you start working,
creating by your own strength a thankful heart which says, ``I
believe.'' That is what they think true faith is. But, because
this is a human idea, a dream, the heart never learns anything
from it, so it does nothing and reform doesn't come from this
`faith,' either.

Instead, faith is God's work in us, that changes us and gives
new birth from God. (John 1:13). It kills the Old Adam and makes us
completely different people. It changes our hearts, our spirits,
our thoughts and all our powers. It brings the Holy Spirit with
it. Yes, it is a living, creative, active and powerful thing, this
faith. Faith cannot help doing good works constantly. It doesn't
stop to ask if good works ought to be done, but before anyone
asks, it already has done them and continues to do them without
ceasing. Anyone who does not do good works in this manner is an
unbeliever. He stumbles around and looks for faith and good
works, even though he does not know what faith or good works are.
Yet he gossips and chatters about faith and good works with many
words.

Faith is a living, bold trust in God's grace, so certain of
God's favor that it would risk death a thousand times trusting in it.
Such confidence and knowledge of God's grace makes you happy,
joyful and bold in your relationship to God and all creatures. The
Holy Spirit makes this happen through faith. Because of it, you
freely, willingly and joyfully do good to everyone, serve
everyone, suffer all kinds of things, love and praise the God who
has shown you such grace. Thus, it is just as impossible to
separate faith and works as it is to separate heat and light from
fire! Therefore, watch out for your own false ideas and guard
against good-for-nothing gossips, who think they're smart enough
to define faith and works, but really are the greatest of fools.
Ask God to work faith in you, or you will remain forever without
faith, no matter what you wish, say or can do.

-Martin Luther

[ChiRho]

Christ Died to Save God-Haters

By Rod Rosenbladt

We incline to moralism by nature. In other words, not all theologies equally draw us. The theologies which draw us, as iron fillings to a magnet, are the ones that have to do with self-improvement, with the righteousness of the Law. As children of Adam, we are drawn to those that say: "I stuck in my thumb and pulled out a plum and what a good boy am I." We are not neutral toward the various theologies.

The one that is true - that Christ's death alone saves - we are hostile to, because we are children of Adam. Somebody will ask you, "Gee, don't you believe that we contributed anything to our salvation?" The Reformation answers, "Sure: sin, hostility, alienation, death, guilt." It's not the answer they are looking for, but sure we contribute all of those things and more. But we don't like that answer; we are resistant to this theology.

The reformers said that faith is of its very nature, assurance, the opposite of doubt. It rests upon the validity of the divine promise of the Gospel. Faith doubts not, though the Christian doubts often. This doubt must be reproved and combated.

But how is doubt combated? It is combated by hearing the doctrine done well. Somebody should answer back to you in terms of what the doctrine is in the promises of the Word. This is how the Spirit produces reliance and assurance. If you say, "Gee, I wonder if I'm really a Christian," and your friend asks you, "Why?" "Well, my life's just a total mess, maybe I'm not really a believer." If your friend tells you to pray harder, cry more, read the Scriptures longer, fast, and so forth - go find another friend.

Find a friend who will talk to you about Christ, what he did at the cross, the sufficiency of his death, the truth of the imputation of his righteousness to you; those are the things we need to hear. If the reformers were correct, you can relax about whether you're going to heaven, even if a lot of times you hate God. Christ died to save God-haters. And the death of Christ is greater than your hatred of God. The death of Christ is greater than your and my flabby Christian life. It is greater than that. The doctrine of justification is greater than our sin.

This doctrine is what makes Christianity Christianity. You've got to get across that the righteousness that saves isn't a change in the human heart, it's a declared sentence, "I declare you innocent." And we say, "But I'm not innocent, I'm guilty as sin!" But the judge says, "I know, but I didn't say that, I said I declared you innocent." That's what Christianity is. It's a declaration of innocence based on another's righteousness, and reckoned to you as if it were yours.


I read this last year and finally obtained another copy!

Pax Christi,

ChiRho

[ChiRho]

In the Image of God
By the Rev. Chad Bird



When God starts something, it almost always seems as if nothing will come of it. Take, for example, His creation of Adam and Eve. Masterpieces are not crafted from brown dirt and a white rib, no matter how resourceful the artist. Yet there stands God, dirt in hand, then rib in hand, ready to make a man and woman in His own image. That, however, is the way God works. He deliberately chooses what we think is silly, foolish, or downright worthless to pull off His most important acts. He is the God who makes everything out of nothing.

So from the "nothingness" of dirt and a rib we have a very good man and a very good woman. They are made in the image of God, according to His likeness (Genesis 1:26-27). That means, simply put, that who they are reflects who God is. So, for example, that as God is righteous and holy, so they are righteous and holy; God loves so they too love; God rules over creation as they also rule. They are what God wants them to be -* like He is. They are creatures that mirror the Creator. Divine fingerprints cover every inch of their bodies and souls as proof-positive of whose they are.

Well, not quite. Make that, instead, whose they were. In no time at all, the Snake had coiled himself around the neck of their souls and strangled spiritual life from them. They broke God's word, and when they did, they also shattered themselves as the mirror of God. They stood, naked and ashamed, around the broken shards of the image they had been. Later, when fallen Adam fathered a fallen son, Seth, we are told he became "the father of a son in his own likeness, according to his own image" (Genesis 5:3). Like father, like son, but no longer like God. It really did seem as if nothing would come of what God had done. Nothing, that is, except chaos and bloodshed -* funeral after funeral after funeral.

God's solution to the problem was not, however, to crumple up the whole ruined mess and toss it into a cosmic trash can. If you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself. So God did. The Virgin's womb became the new Garden of Eden. From the "dust" of Mary's flesh, a New Adam was made. And not only a New Adam, but a Better Adam, an Adam who is not only dust but divinity. He, the Creator, Jesus the Son, became what He had created.

This Divine Son is the Image of God (2 Cor 3:18; Col 1:15). Adam and Eve were created IN the image of God but Jesus IS the image. "He who has seen Me has seen the Father," Jesus tells us (John 14:9). In Him the broken image is restored and improved. And in Him you see not only one who mirrors God; you see God Himself, wrapped in flesh and blood, your flesh and your blood, just like you and just like God.

So do you finally get back what Adam and Eve lost? No, you do not. You get something better. You get God and Adam in one person. You get the Godman. In Him you see God and in Him God sees you as He wishes you to be. You're back in the image of God for you're in the Image Himself. Just as He became what you are -* a human being -* so you become what He is -* sons of God. He's holy so you're holy; He's alive so you're alive; His God is your God; His Father is your Father.

To be in the image of God, then, is to be in Jesus. You are brought to Him as nothing and you leave as everything. Sins are banished. Death is killed. You come to Him naked and He dresses you with Himself at the baptismal Font. You slip into His skin. You sink into His Body. You assume His identity. God calls you, "My son," and you pray, "Our Father." You are given all, and then some.

In the beginning, there was brown dirt and a white rib. What God made from that was very good. But in the end, there was the Babe in the manger, the Sacrifice on the tree, the Man on God¹s throne. And what God has made from that is not only very good -* it is perfection, and it is all for you.

The Rev. Chad Bird is professor of Old Testament at Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana. He will be the main speaker for the IN HIS FACE Lutheran Youth Conference in 2003.

[ChiRho]

http://www.fbb.nu/gif/chemnitz.jpg

How about we hear from one of its most articulate defenders and apologists, the man more responsible than just about anyone for the survival of Lutheranism after Martin Luther died in 1546. I'm speaking about the one they called "The Second Martin" . . . it was said of him, "If the second Martin had not come, the first Martin would not have stood."

Pastor Paul McCain, on Martin Chemnitz (CyberBrethren)

[Lotar]

The Second Martin :) In some ways I prefer him over the first.

-----------


You see, loved ones, how great and amazing love is; there can be no exposition of its perfection. Who is adequate to be found in it, except those whom God has made worthy? And so we should implore and plead for His mercy, that we may be found in His love, removed from any human partisanship, blameless. All the generations from Adam till today have passed away, but those perfected in His love through the gracious gift of God have a place among the godly. And they will be revealed when the kingdom of Christ appears.
-First Letter of Clement to the Corinthians

[Lotar]

"He who does not love remains in death." Therefore it is impossible to say that a person is righteous by faith alone.
I agree with the above if you understand that faith must not be alone. But it does not follow from this that love is the cause of the remission of sins, just as it is necessary to add patience to faith, but it does not follow that our patience is a cause of our remission of sins. The exclusive particle does not exclude our vitues from being present, but it does exclude them as being the cause of our reconciliation, and this exclusionary idea does mean that the merit of Christ alone is the cause of our reconciliation. And we must also understand that it is necessary to remove our human imaginings from the righteousness of the Law which arises out of love for God. If human nature were without sin, it could truly love God, but because it is covered over with sin, it must first receive the remission of sins, and love cannot be kindled unless the remission of sins has been recognized and laid hold upon. And those who think that this can be recieved without the struggle of faith are thinking to weakly regarding the remission of sins.

-Philip Melanchthon, Loci Communes

[Lotar]

And now the second commandment of the teaching. Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not engage in pederasty, do not engage in sexual immorality. Do not steal, do not practice magic, do not use enchanted potions, do not abort a fetus or kill a child that is born.
-Didache, emphasis mine

[Lotar]

WWLS!!!


Assert Yourself When Loyalty to the Word Is Endangered
People speak of two kinds of humility: one which we are said to owe when doctrine and faith are concerned, the other when love toward our neighbor is concerned. But may God never grant me humility when ther articles of faith are concerned. For then no action is called for which is a yielding for the sake of love, for the sake of peace and unity, for the sake of keeping the church from being ruined, or for the love of the imperial majesty. THe fanatics and sectarians are complaining about us as though no humility and love were found among us. But we reply: First abolish the Word, doctrine, and faith; for in these matters we will not budge a handbreadth though heaven and earth were to fall because of our firmness. For the Word does not belong to me; neither do Baptism and the Lord's Supper belong to me. God has reserved these for Himself and has said: You are to teach this way! I cannot pass this injuction by. Therefore your will must yield. But when we speak like this, they say that we are proud people. In reality, however, this is true humility. God has commanded us to take this attitude. We are to connive at no omissions from His Word.

But come, touch on a matter that concerns love. If I then do not humble myself before you and do not bear injuries that are inflicted upon me, if I the do not yield what is mine and God has given me, if I then do not forgive you and wash your feet, then you may rebuke me... By the grace of God we would be glad to lie at the feet of everybody if only the Word of God remained pure and people did not inerfere with God's affairs. Then men would find us humble and patient as any sheep may be. We have been of greater service to them than they have been to us. Still they say we are proud and cannot love the brethren or pardon anything in them, that when enrage us, we can neither forgive nor forget. The devil thanks you for saying this. I should grant you what is not mine? If only my finger or my body were conserned, you would find me ready to serve you promptly. But neither my coat nor my body is at stake; rather we are expected to yield in God's affairs. This we find impossible to do.

- Martin Luther

[Lotar]

The Testimonies of Scripture are clear, that the renewal of the new man, as also the mortification of the old, is not perfect and complete in this life but that it grows and is increased day by day until it is perfected in the next life, when this corruptible will have put on incorruption. Profitable also and necessary in the church are exhortations that the the regenerate should not neglect, extinguish, or cast away the gifts of the Spirit which they have recieved but that they stir them up with true and earnest exercises, calling on the help of the Holy Spirit, that He may give an increase of faith, hope, love, and of the other spiritual gifts; for what the punishment of spiritual neglligence is the parable of spiritual negligence is the parable of the talents shows. There is also no doubt that faith is effectual through love, that it is the mother goods works, and that good works please God through faith for the sake of Christ. And in this sense the statement in James 2:21-24 can be understood and accepted appropriately and rightly, that through the numerous good works that followed Abraham is declared to have been truly justified by faith, and it is shown that faith is not empty and dead, but true and living.

-Martin Chemnitz, Examination of the Council of Trent

[Lotar]

Thus when they say: Because it is necessary that a man assent and recieve grace, therefore man himself does not do altogether nothing, we can rightly reply with Augustine: "It could be understood in a good sense, if it were not spoken by those whose opinion is known." For let there be added that man has this, that he wills and is able to assent, accept, and act in conversion, or in spiritual matters, not through his own natural powers, either entirely or in part, but that he recieves it from Him who works both to will and to do, then there will be no controversy. For it is certian that we will to assent, accept, act, etc., but God works to will and to do. For what do you have which you did not recieve? Augustine shows that it is Pelagian to understand this statement of natural gifts. Although they could easily have explained these ambiguities with a few words, what shall we consider the reasons to be why they preferred to play with these generalities, unless it was in order that, with these actors' stilts fitted to both feet, they might be able to bring back into the theater for unwary spectators the ancient fable of the masters of sentences.
But what they seriously try to prove, that a man can dissent and reject grace when it is offered, is, sad to say, only too true. For we do not suppose that grace is so thrust upon the will in conversion that no matter whether he is willing or unwilling, he is compelled to have it, as when a brand is burned into the body. But this is what we say, that it is a gift and work of the Holy Spirit that grace is recieved with desire, delight, and joy. But that it is repudated, rejected, and wasted is the corruption and ill will of our flesh.

-Martin Chemnitz

[JMRE5150]

I made this a Sticky Thread



This has been made a sticky thread as a request from Lotar. However, this will only remain a sticky as long as the comments remain somewhat formal, and no debate takes place between us Lutherans. If a debate or posting of a particular point of view (LCMS, ELCA, WELS, etc) is made to contradict the other, I'll have to un-sticky it.

Please post any organizational Lutheran points of view in seperate threads already created.

This is simply to remain Lutheran words of wisdom. Enjoy, mates.


Robb

[JVAC]

For the law hath his bounds unto Christ, as Paul saith afterwards: 'The end of the law is Christ' [Gal. 3:24; Rom. 10:4]; who being come, Moses ceaseth with his law, circumcision, the sacrifices, the sabbaths, yea and all the prophets. -- Martin Luther
-James

[ChiRho]

A dispute about predestination should be avoided entirely... I forget everything about Christ and God when I come upon these thoughts and actually get to the point to imagining that God is a rogue. We must stay in the word, in which God is revealed to us and salvation is offered, if we believe Him. But in thinking about predestination, we forget God . . However, in Christ are hid all the treasures (Col. 2:3); outside him all are locked up. Therefore, we should simply refuse to argue about election.
Such a disputation is so very displeasing to God that he has instituted Baptism, the spoken Word, and the Lord’s Supper to counteract the temptation to engage in it. In these, let us persist and constantly say, I am baptized I believe in Jesus. I care nothing about the disputation concerning predestination.
-Martin Luther


Unfortunately, I am not so wise.


No, we do not believe in irresistible grace.

I like how Martin Chemnitz addresses the topic:

Thus when they say: Because it is necessary that a man assent and recieve grace, therefore man himself does not do altogether nothing, we can rightly reply with Augustine: "It could be understood in a good sense, if it were not spoken by those whose opinion is known." For let there be added that man has this, that he wills and is able to assent, accept, and act in conversion, or in spiritual matters, not through his own natural powers, either entirely or in part, but that he recieves it from Him who works both to will and to do, then there will be no controversy. For it is certian that we will to assent, accept, act, etc., but God works to will and to do. For what do you have which you did not recieve? Augustine shows that it is Pelagian to understand this statement of natural gifts. Although they could easily have explained these ambiguities with a few words, what shall we consider the reasons to be why they preferred to play with these generalities, unless it was in order that, with these actors' stilts fitted to both feet, they might be able to bring back into the theater for unwary spectators the ancient fable of the masters of sentences.
But what they seriously try to prove, that a man can dissent and reject grace when it is offered, is, sad to say, only too true. For we do not suppose that grace is so thrust upon the will in conversion that no matter whether he is willing or unwilling, he is compelled to have it, as when a brand is burned into the body. But this is what we say, that it is a gift and work of the Holy Spirit that grace is recieved with desire, delight, and joy. But that it is repudated, rejected, and wasted is the corruption and ill will of our flesh.
This also is not said clearly enough, that the free will of man, moved and incited by God, cooperates by assenting when God incites and calls. For it is necessary that Augustine's distinction between operating grace and cooperating grace be clearly explained, namely, whether free will cooperates with God throught its natural powers, so that, when God works in us to will and assent, some natural power or efficacy of the old man cooperates to produce that willing or assent. Or when grace moves and incites the will, that then the assent emerges through the natural powers of the will. Augustine certainly says: "That we will God works without us," as has been explained above. But there is no doubt that once the firstfruits of spiritual gifts have been recieved, the regenerate will is a co-worker of God through the capabilities which it has recieved from the Spirit of regeneration.
Besides, the deceitful equivocation in the word "to assist" must be observed. Augustine says clearly in De correptione et gratia, ch. 1: "If the Son has made you free, you will be free indeed. Not in such a way that when someone has been freed from the condemnation of sin, he no longer needs the help of his liberator but rather in this way, that hearing Him 'Without Me you can do nothing,' he also himself says to Him, 'Be Thou my Helper!'"

LOTAR (by way of ChiRho)

This should be here.

[ChiRho]

...I am bound, not only to assert, but to defend the truth with my blood and death. I want to believe freely and be a slave to the authority of no one, whether council, university, or pope. I will confidently confess what appears to me to be true, whether it has been asserted by a Catholic or a heretic, whether it has been approved or reproved by a council.
--Martin Luther

[ChiRho]

bump

[JVAC]

What more complete fulfilment is there than obedience in all things? This obedience, however, is not rendered by works, but by faith alone. On the other hand, what greater rebellion against God, what greater wickedness, what greater contempt of God is there than not believing in his promise? For what is this but to make God a liar or doubt that he is truthful? -- that is, to ascribe truthfulness to one's self but lying and vanity to God? Does not a man who does this deny God and set himself up as an idol in his heart? Then what good are works done in such wickedness, even if they were the works of angels and apostles?

-- Martin Luther ("Freedom of a Christian Man" 1520)

Posted By:
-James

[JVAC]

And although the devil set upon him (faithful christian) with all might and main, and go about with all the terrors of the world to oppress him, yet he saith: 'Sir Devil, I fear not they threatenings and terrors, for there is one whose name is Jesus Christ, in whom I believe; he hath abolished the law, condemned sin, vanquished death, and destroyed hell; and he is thy tormentor, O Satan, for he hath bound thee and holdeth thee captive, to the end that thou shouldest no more hurt me, or any that believeth in him.' This faith the devil cannot overcome, but is overcome of it.

-- Martin Luther ("A Commentary on St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians" 1531)

posted by,
-James

[Lotar]

Creator God, O lord of all,
who rule the skies, you clothe the day
in radiant color, bid the night
in quietness serve the gratious sway
of sleep, that weary limbs, restored
to labor's use, may rise again,
and jaded minds abate their fret,
and mourners find release from pain.

-St. Ambrose of Milan

[Rechtgläubig]

5/23/04 sermon...


sermon text... http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?passage=John+17:20-26
...This is the unity Jesus is praying for, the unity that brings you and God back together because 1] Jesus took away the guilt of your sin by paying for it with his life and 2] You believe that he did that for you and for all people. Faith in Jesus has reunited you with God so that now you can look forward to spending eternity in heaven and not hell.
Some Christian denominations misuse this prayer of Jesus and claim that he is asking God to unite all Christian denominations into one super-church. They think that Jesus is praying for the organization, the visible church, rather than for believers, the invisible church. Jesus prays (v 22). As Jesus and his Father are united spiritually so Christians are united spiritually to Jesus through faith. And Jesus is praying that those who are Christians will always remain united to Jesus in faith and not fall away from faith and throw away eternal life in heaven.

There are super-churches who claim to be united. But that is not a unity of faith. It is rather a unity of organizational purpose to send lobbyists to Washington and food to third world countries. It is an organizational unity that will talk about Jesus love for all people but will, in the same breath, make the claim that it is not necessary to believe in Jesus as the world’s only Savior and Son of God who reunited us with God by paying for the world’s sins. Such claims divide the Christian church because Jesus is willingly removed from the plan of salvation that God devised in order not to hurt the feelings of the Muslim or Buddhist or Brahmin or any other pagan religion. Those who desire only outward, ecumenical, across denominational lines unity without being united in faith in Jesus as the world’s only Savior are not doing anyone a favor by holding to the belief that Jesus is not the only way to heaven...

http://www.atonement.org/membership/view_sermon.asp

[Lotar]

You do not baptize children because, as you say, they do not believe. Why, then, do you preach the Word to old folks who do not believe who may, in the course of time, probably come to believe? You certianly do this only because God has commanded it. For if you baptize me because I am able to say the words "I believe," then you baptize me on the basis of me myself and in my own name and on no other basis. Since, then, it is unkown to you whether the person being baptized is believing or unbelieving, the baptizing is done solely because of God's command and behest.
-Martin Luther

[Lotar]

Let us look at the reason why they hold that children do not believe. They say: Since they have as yet not come to use their reason, they cannot hear God's Word; but where God's Word cannot be heard, there can be no faith; Rom 10:17: "Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God," ect. Tell me, is one who judges God's works in this way, according to our ideas, speaking like a Christian? Children have not come to the use of their reason, you say, therefore they cannot believe? What if you have fallen from faith through this reason and children have come to faith through their unreason? My friend, what good does reason do when faith and God's Word are concerned? Is it not a fact that reason most violently resists faith and the Word of God so that because of it, no one can come to faith and accept God's grace, as Christ says Matt. 18:3: "Except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven." How often Christ points out to us that we must become children and fools and how often He condemns reason!
Again, tell me, what sort of reason did the little children have whom Christ caressed and blessed and assigned to heaven? Surely they, too, were as yet without reason. Why, then, does He order that they be brought to Him, and why does He bless them? Where did they get the faith that made them children of the kingdom of heaven? The fact is that just because they are unreasoning and foolish, they are better fitted to come to faith than the old and reasoning people whose way is always blocked by reason, which does not want to force its big head through the narrow door....
But since their reason so besets men, we must attack them with their own wisdom. Tell me, why do you baptize a man after he has come to the use of his reason? You reply: Hears the Word of God and believes. I ask: How do you know? You say: He confesses as much with his mouth. Should I say: What if he is lying and deceiving? After all, you cannot see his heart. Well then, if in this instance you baptize only because a man has outwardly professed faith but are uncertian of his faith and must wonder whether he has more within his heart than you observe, then neither his hearing nor confessing nor faith is of any avail; for it may be mere delusion and not a real faith. Who, then, are you to say that outward hearing and confessing are necessary for Baptism, that where these are not present we should not baptize, and that where they are present we should?... Is it not true that you must admit: You have no right to do or to know more than the person to be baptized be brought before you and that you are asked to administer Baptism; and you should believe, or rather, simply commit to God whether or not he really believes in his heart. Thereby you are excused, and you baptize correctly....
Besides, tell me, where is the reason of the Christian believer while he is asleep, since his faith and God's grace admittedly never leave him? If, then, faith can continue without reason, why should it not also begin in children before reason is aware of is?...
Commit the faith to Him who commands them to be brought and baptize them at His command, saying: Lord, Thou dost bring them here and dost command them to be baptized. Therefore Thou wilt surely answer for them to be baptized. Therefore Thou wilt surely answer for them; on this I depend. I dare not drive them away or forbid them Baptism....
-Martin Luther

[ChiRho]

The Relationship Between Justification and Sanctification
"Are we paying so much attention to justification that we ignore
sanctification?"

What IS the relationship between justification and sanctification? Should we prefer a 50%-50% ratio or a 30% - 70% or 60%-40% in an attempt to keep things "balanced" between justification and sanctification? If we paid attention only to justification, would not sanctification follow? Is it possible to have justification and not sanctification?

Luther: "You ask, how shall we begin to be godly and what shall we do that God may begin His work in us? Answer: Do you not understand? It is not for you to work or to begin to be godly, AS LITTLE AS IT IS TO FURTHER AND COMPLETE IT. Everything that you begin is in and remains in sin, though it shines ever so brightly; you cannot do anything but sin, do what you will." Lenker, Sermons of Martin Luther, 1:25-27

Koeberle: "Sanctification must also be understood as an exclusive act of God. Just as forgiveness is exclusively God's work and every cooperation or conditioning activity on man's part is completely excluded, so regeneration is an energy that comes simply out of Christ's victory and does not require our supplementary efforts. It is not fitting to teach justification evangelically and then in the doctrine of sanctification to turn synergistic. . . . the unity of justification and sanctification given in the act of faith becomes mingled in a confused promiscuity, instead of keeping justification in a place of clear logical per-eminence over the sanctification that is given with it. As we have seen, neither can be separated from the other." The Quest for Hoiness, 95-96.

Sasse: "For the church does not live by morals, by the knowledge and observance of God's law nor does it live by religion, by lofty experiences of the divine and an awareness of the mysteries of God. It lives solely by the forgiveness of sins. Hence the reformation does not consist as the later Middle Ages believed, and has even been believed in wide circles of the Protestant world, of an ethico-religious correction, of a moral quickening and a spiritual deepening throughout the church. In consists, rather, according to its own peculiar nature, of the revival of the preaching fo the Gospel of forgiveness of sins for Christ's sake." Here We Stand, 60.

Scaer: "The desire to see the church as a congregation of the virtuous rather than an assembly of sinners is characteristic of Calvinism and Protestantism, not Lutheranism. The reformations under Zwingli and Calvin were so committed to making good works, at least as they understood them, a part of society, that they placed the government under the moral direction of the church." "Sanctification in the Lutheran Confessions," CTQ 53:3, 167.

[UberLutheran]

He started every service with this statement -- and it was the statement which FINALLY got my attention enough so that I stopped trying to "earn" my way into Heaven by being "the best person in the world" and collecting as many Sacraments and sacramentals as I could, and accepted God's gift of grace, through faith.

And that is NOT an easy thing for a former Anglo-Catholic to do.

(James Qualben died four years ago on New Year's Day, 2000 -- but he remains the person who had the strongest influence on the development of my faith.)

[ChiRho]

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Could oppression, or anguish, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? No, in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
-St. Paul's Letter to the Romans

This deserves it's own post!

[UberLutheran]

This deserves it's own post!

That is, when we're not down at the airport wearing saffron robes and passing out flowers to people who are walking by! ;)

[JVAC]

Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.

Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field; for the sake of it a man will gladly go and sell all that he has. It is the pearl of great price to buy which the merchant will sell all his goods. It is the kingly rule of Christ, for whose sake man will pluck out the eye which causes him to stumble; it is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him.

Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock.

Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: "ye were bought at a price," and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. Costly grace is the Incarnation of God.
This is an awesome peace of true Christian Theology!!

-James

[Lotar]

Martin Chemnitz speaks yet again:

Against the misrepresentations of the papalists, therefore, and against the Epicurean opinions, the Augsburg Confession sets forth from Scripture this mark of true faith, that exists in true repentance, and that it works by love. However, on the question how faith justifies we say that faith lays hold of the only Mediator, Christ, for righteousness and salvation, without our works.
In this question Paul sets forth the doctrine of justification quite simply but adds many and varied exclusive particles, lest something be patched on it by any show of right whatsoever, but that the cause of our justification may be claimed solely for the free mercy of God, who remits sins; the merit for the obedience of Christ, the only Mediator; the application for faith alone.
Now these are commonly the exclusive particles with Paul:
1. The word "grace" with its equivalents. Eph. 2:8: "By grace you have been saved through faith; this is not of your own doing." Rom. 11:6: "If it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace." Titus 3:5: "He saved us, not because of deeds done by us in righteousness but in virtue of His own purpose and the grace which He gave us in Christ Jesus ages ago." Ps. 71:16: "I will praise Thy righteousness, Thine alone," where for the sake of greater emphasis the affixed phrase is doubled, "Thy righteousness, Thine alone."
2. The little word "gratis" with it's synonyms. Rom. 3:24: They are justified by His grace as a gift." Rom. 6:22: "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life." Eph. 2:8: "This is not your own doing, it is the gift of God." Gal. 3:18: "If the inheritance is by the Law, it is no longer by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise."
3. The stress in the word "one." Rom. 5:15,17,18: "The grace of that one Man Jesus Christ abounded for many." "They will reign in life through the one Man Jesus Christ." Through one Man's righteousness for all. "One man's act of righteousness leads to acquittal and life for all men." Heb. 10:14: "By a single offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified."
4. Rom. 3:21: "Apart from law." Gal. 2:16: "Not by works of the Law." Gal.3:11: "Not by the Law."
5. Works. Rom. 4:6: "Apart from works." Titus 3:5: "Not because of deeds." 2 Tim. 1:9: "Not in virtue of our works." Eph. 2:8: "Not your own doing." Phil. 3:9: "Not having a righteousness of my own." Rom. 10:3: "Seeking to establish their own righteousness."
6. The word "imputation." Rom. 4:5: "To one who does not work but trusts, . . . his faith is reckoned as righteousness." Righteouness is imputed without works; it is imputed according to grace, not according to debt.
7. The remission of sins. Rom. 4:6: "David pronounces a blessing upon the man to whom God reckons righteousness without works: 'Blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven.'" 2 Cor. 5:19: "Reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them."
8. The word "faith." Rom. 4:28: "By faith apart from works." Eph. 2:8-9: "Through faith; and this is not your own doing ... not because of works." Rom. 3:27: "Boasting is excluded, ... not on the principle of works but on the principle of faith." Acts 13:39: "Everyone who believes is freed from everything from which you could not be by the Law." In Gal. 2:16, there is found the special exclusive "who knows that a man is not justified by works of the Law but (eau mh) through faith." For many examples in Scripture show that the particles ei mh and eau mh exclude the preceeding members of the sentence. In Rev. 9:4 the locusts "were told not to harm the grass ... or any green growth or any tree but only (ei mh) those of mankind who have not the seal of God on their foreheads." Rev. 21:27: "Nothing unclean shall enter it ... but only (ei mh) those who are written in the Lamb's book of life." Mark 13:32: "Of that day... no on knows, not even the angels... nor the Son, but only (ei mh) the Father." John 15:4: "The branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless (eau mh) it abides in the vine." In 1 Kings 22:31: the Greek translators rendered the adversative particle (hebrew text, can't find font) with all h, which elsewhere they often render with eau mh. And in the same way they use the particle eau mh in Ex. 4:1. Therefore, the meaning of Paul in Gal. 2:16, is this: "Man is not justified by works of the Law but through faith in Christ." And presently he explains the exclusive particle, saying: "We have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified in Christ, and not by works of the Law."
These are the exclusive particles commonly employed by Paul. We cannot express these more briefly and fittingly in our languages than through the little word sola ("only," "alone"). For this particle in a most meaningfull way gathers in one embrace, as it were, all the exclusive particles of Paul and sets them before the hearers. And because this particle has at all times always been employed in the church in the article of justification, as can be shown by testimonies from the writings of almost all the fathers, it has become custom in our churches when we want to embrace all the exclusives of Paul, that we say: We are justified solely by the grace of God, solely by faith, solely by the imputation of righteousness of the only Mediator Christ.
We understand this exclusive particle thus: (1) that the condition of our merit or worthiness is excluded; (2) that the cause of reconciliation is taken away from our works or virtues and transferred to the grace of God alone, on account of the merit of Christ the Mediator; (3) that the medium, or organ, of application is shown. For not by works but by faith alone is the free promise of reconciliation on account of Christ the Mediator apprehended, recieved, and applied. However, we condemn, as do also Chrysostom and Augustine, those also in our midst who understand the exclusive particles as if those who persist and continue in gross sins without repentance were justified by a dead faith, that is, by an Epicurean persuasion that they will not be punished. ALso we do not understand the "faith only" as only a knowledge or external profession of dogmas of the church, such as can be present in many hypocrites and ungodly people.
These things which have been explained at length by our men I quote briefly that it may become clear how the particle IsolaI is attacked and corrupted by dastardly misrepresentations on the Council of Trent and that the reader may understand that, when the particle sola, in the sense in which we have explained it, is condemned, all the exclusives of Paul are at the same time condemned. And this the papalists seek, that they may with the particle sola silence all the exclusives of Paul.
Furthermore, because Andrada vociferously declares that Luther, by the particle sola, understood a faith that is alone and dead, I shall here quote a passage from his commentary on the 15th chapter of Genesis, where he most clearly explained the sense of this exclusive. These are his words: "I know that the other virtues are exellent gifts of God; I know that faith does not exist without these gifts. However, the question is what belongs to what. You hold in the hand various seeds. I do no, however, ask which are related to which but what is the peculiar virtue of each. Here say openly what faith alone does, not with what virtues it is connected. Faith alone apprehends the promise; this is the peculiar work of faith alone. The remaining virtues have other things with which they deal." Likewise: "We know that faith is never alone but brings with it love and other manifold gifts; it is never alone but things must not for this reason be confused, and what belongs solely to faith must not be attributed to other virtues." So says Luther.

[JVAC]

But don't you forget the main point here, namely, that God wants to make his dwelling here. Therefore, when the hand is laid upon your head and the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you in the words: "I absolve you from all your sins in the name of Christ," you should take hold of this Word with a sure faith and be strengthened out of the mourth of the preacher. And this is what Christ and St. Peter are saying: He, the Lord, wants to dwell in this church; the Word alone must resound in it.

In short, the church is a dwelling, in order that God may be loved and heard. Not wood or stones, not dumb animals, it should be people, who know, love, and praise God. And that you may be able to trust God with certainty in all things, including cross and suffering, you should know that it is the true church, even though it be made up of scarcely two believing persons. That's why Christ says: He who loves me keeps my Word; there I will dwell, there you have my church.
-James

[theologia crucis]

An oldie but a goodie, worth posting again:

Evangelical Catholics & Confessional Evangelicals: The ecumenical polarities of Lutheranism (http://www.touchstonemag.com/docs/issues/11.3docs/evangelical%2C%20confessional.html)

by Gene Edward Veith

Introduction

Imagine a church that is both evangelical-proclaiming the free forgiveness of sins through faith in Jesus Christ-and sacramental, centering its spiritual life in the regenerating waters of baptism and the Real Presence of Christ in Holy Communion. Imagine further a church that is strongly grounded on Scripture, but yet avoids the solipsism of individual interpretation in favor of a comprehensive, intellectually rigorous and eminently orthodox theological system. Imagine a worship service that features both strong preaching and the historic liturgy. Imagine that this is a historical church with a rich spiritual tradition, but without legalism. Imagine, in short, a church that has some of the best parts of Protestantism and the best parts of Catholicism. Finally, imagine that this church body is not some little made-up sect, but one of the largest bodies of Christians in the world.

Such a church might seem like what many Christians-disaffected by both the vacuity of liberal theology and the shallowness of American evangelicalism-are dreaming of. For millions of Christians such a church actually exists-it goes by the admittedly inadequate name "Lutheran."

Worldwide, there are some 60 million Lutherans on the books, making it the largest Protestant tradition of them all. There are around 9 million Lutherans in the United States, but 5 million in Africa and another 5 million in Asia. Brazil has over a million Lutherans, and it is one of the dominant religions of Papua New Guinea. In the United States, there are about the same number of Missouri Synod Lutherans (2.5 million) as there are Episcopalians.

To be sure, these numbers are uncertain and doubtless inflated, including state churches and those that have all but abandoned their heritage in favor of liberal theology or quasi-evangelicalism. Just as not all Catholics actually believe and practice their Catholicism, the same is true for Lutherans. Nevertheless, this many people consider themselves Lutherans and affirm, in their formal subscriptions, the Real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament and salvation by grace through faith in the work of Jesus Christ.

Despite its size, the Lutheran Church seems almost unknown in American Christianity. Catholics, Episcopalians, Baptists, charismatics, and Calvinists are well represented in theological debates, opinion polls, and articles in Christian publications, but Lutherans-who have their own distinctive approach to everything from salvation to politics-are often theological wallflowers.

Billy Graham called Lutherans "the sleeping giant." If Lutheranism is the invisible Church, or, to paraphrase what Luther said of God, the Church that hides itself, this is partly its own fault and partly the result of its theological tension with American culture. Nevertheless, Lutheranism has much to offer Christendom as a whole. As a Church body with a thoroughly worked-out theology, which it actually follows, Lutheran denominations have retained their orthodoxy more successfully than most. But more than that, Lutheran theology-and spirituality-is animated by a dynamic polarity in which divisive theological controversies are put into balance and thus resolved.

Paradoxy

The distinctive characteristic of Lutheran theology is its affirmation of paradox. Calvin and Arminius both constructed systematic theologies, explaining away any contrary biblical data in a rationalistic system of belief. Luther developed his theology in Bible commentaries, following the contours of Scripture wherever they led and developing its most profound polarities: law and gospel; Christ as both true God and true Man; the Christian as simultaneously saint and sinner; justification by faith and baptismal regeneration; Holy Communion as the Real Presence of Christ in material bread and wine.

Not only have Lutherans always affirmed both "evangelical" and "Catholic" ideas, their way with paradox also resolves issues that have divided Protestants. Calvinists insist on salvation by grace alone to the extent of double predestination; Arminians insist that everyone, potentially, can be saved, and so stress the utter freedom of the will. Lutherans stress grace above all, that God does literally everything for our salvation, dying on the cross, with his Spirit breaking into our lives through Word and Sacrament, the means of grace. But Jesus died for all, and potentially anyone might be saved. Lutheranism affirms the best of both Calvinism and Arminianism, while avoiding the exclusivity of the one and the potential Pelagianism of the other. Charismatics emphasize the Holy Spirit-so do Lutherans, finding that Spirit not in the vagaries of human emotion but even more tangibly as being genuinely operative in the Word and Sacraments. Lutherans are fundamentalist in their doctrinal rigor, while excluding separatism and legalism. Lutheran cultural theology affirms Two Kingdoms, preventing the secular from swallowing up the sacred, and the sacred from swallowing up the secular. This explains why Lutherans can seem both inwardly focused and free and easy, why they seem conservative yet apolitical, and why they often have beer at their church dinners.

Lutheranism-with its sacramentalism and liturgical worship synthesized with its biblicism and evangelical proclamation-might serve as a bridge between the various factions of Christianity. Of course, it is not that simple.

If Lutheranism represents an "evangelical Catholicism" (a term favored by many confessional Lutherans), its paradoxes mean that it is likewise subject to attack from every side. Evangelicals consider it "too Catholic"-making fun of what they consider its stiff formality, its old-fashioned music, and its ancient liturgy and, more seriously, questioning how Lutherans can say salvation is by faith if they believe in baptismal regeneration and being appalled at the way the pastor says when he gives the absolution that he forgives people their sins. Catholics and Orthodox lump Lutheranism with all other Protestants-in fact, Lutherans are the worst Protestants because they started the dissolution of Christendom.

Within Protestantism, Calvinists attack Lutherans for "not going far enough in the Reformation," for keeping papistical practices and idolatrous worship. Arminians attack Lutherans for not believing in the freedom of the will and for leaving the door open to anti-nomianism. Charismatics think Lutherans are "cold." Fundamentalists say Lutherans are strong on doctrine but weak on morals.

And, just as the Lutheran framework seems to invite attacks from every side, Lutherans counterattack everyone else. Lutherans condemn Arminians for not believing in predestination and Calvinists for believing in double predestination. Catholics and charismatics are considered alike in believing that the Holy Spirit reveals himself in human beings, apart from the Word. Fundamentalists are savaged for their legalism. In fact, many Lutherans do not see themselves as being Protestant at all.

The Lutheran synthesis is a baroque structure that can only be held together by a doctrinal rigor that constantly reinforces every point. Anglicans attempt a via media between Catholicism and Protestantism, which works through compromise, broad consensus, and a tolerance for differences. The Lutheran way, on the other hand, is one of polarities. Each pole of the paradox must be maintained and heightened. What Chesterton said in Orthodoxy of the paradoxes of Christianity is particularly descriptive of Lutheran theology: "We want not an amalgam or compromise, but both things at the top of their energy; love and wrath both burning." Christianity does not approach doctrinal issues, such as the nature of Christ or the moral status of a human being, in terms of the Aristotelian golden mean. Rather, "Christianity got over the difficulty of combining furious opposites, by keeping them both, and keeping them both furious."

Thus, Lutherans are very sacramental and very evangelical. Anglicanism, even in its high-church phase, has always been dismissed by continental Lutherans as merely another variety of Reformed Calvinism, its articles being so wishy-washy in not clearly affirming the Real Presence. Evangelicals are not evangelical enough, falling as they do into the trap of "decision theology" and moralism, not trusting God to accomplish literally everything that is needful.

As a result, Lutheran theology, though embracing in one sense the whole range of Christian spirituality, is nevertheless an entity unto itself, with its own spiritual disciplines that are quite alien to those of other traditions. Consider, for example, the way Lutheranism opposes the so-called Theology (or rather, spirituality) of Glory-with its pretensions of power, victory, and earthly success-with the Theology of the Cross, in which God reveals himself in weakness, defeat, and failure. Or the Word of God, not merely as a sourcebook of information, but as a sacramental means of grace. Or the way God hides himself in what seems to be his opposite, in the material elements of the Sacraments, in humiliation and defeat, in what seems most secular and nonreligious. Or the exhilaration, under the gospel, of Christian freedom.

The Roots of American Lutheranism

An immigrant faith, like Catholicism and Orthodoxy, Lutheran churches had always been somewhat culturally isolated and highly conscious of their differences with mainstream American Protestantism. While German Lutherans came to Pennsylvania in colonial times and Scandinavian Lutherans settled in the upper Midwest, bringing their churches with them, another group came for a different reason.

In nineteenth-century Germany, efforts were being made by the post-Enlightenment princes to combine the various Protestant factions into a single, ecumenical, state church. Calvinists and Lutherans were forced to give up their doctrinal distinctiveness and combine into an "Evangelical and Reformed" church. ("Evangelical"-referring to the centrality of the gospel-is the preferred continental term for Lutheranism, as opposed to the "Reformed" Calvinists. Lutherans were thus the

first, and one might argue, the most quintessential Evangelicals.) The state churches so formed tended to foster a rationalistic, cultural religion-preaching new agricultural techniques and doctrines of social progress rather than the gospel-the fruit of the new liberal theology being developed in German seminaries. In the typical heavy-handed German way, pastors who opposed the ecumenical union were actually imprisoned, and the so-called "Old Lutherans" were persecuted. Scores of congregations that insisted on classical Lutheranism left everything they owned and settled in America. (Substantial numbers also went to other countries such as Australia, Africa, and Brazil.)

These formed the more conservative Lutheran denominations, such as the Missouri Synod and the Wisconsin Synod (terms that refer to the place of their historical origins and denominational headquarters), churches that, because of their history, would naturally be suspicious of ecumenism. Like the Catholics, these confessional Lutherans, recognizing that the Protestant civil religion of the public schools was inimical to their faith, established an extensive system of parochial schools to educate their children in a way that would be supportive of their faith. This strain of Lutherans thus resisted assimilation into the mainstream of American religious life. In terms of their "Two Kingdoms" theology, they assimilated quite well into American society and economic life, but their church was kept separate, untouched by the revivalism, the social gospel, religious individualism, and other trends of American religion.

--continued--

[theologia crucis]

Between Separatism & Accommodationism

But if one tendency in American Lutheranism is a certain separatism, the other part of the inevitable polarity is accomodationism. The colonial-era Lutherans and many of the Scandinavian settlers were not so strict as the religious refugees. Quite early, these Lutherans debated about to what extent they should adapt to the religious life of their new homeland. An important nineteenth-century theologian, Samuel *******er, went so far as to amend the Augsburg Confession to accommodate the new revivalism and a more Reformed view of the Sacraments. While many Lutherans went in this direction, another theologian, Charles Krauth, in a movement paralleling the Oxford movement within Anglicanism, championed a revival of confessionalism and liturgical renewal.

Ever since, American Lutherans have tended to vacillate between the poles of separatism and accommodationism. Historically, Lutheran denominations in America have tended to drift towards the religious mainstream, only to lurch back into their distinctiveness.

In this century, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS) has gone through a particularly traumatic "civil war." Its seminary in St. Louis gradually began accepting other mainline Protestant denominations' approach to the Scriptures, employing the historical-critical method to cast doubt on the authority of the Bible and adopting other tenets of liberal theology. In the 1970s, "the battle of the Bible" erupted, as conservatives called "the moderates" on their unorthodox view of the Scriptures-the latter were expelled, set up a seminary of their own, and every congregation had to choose which side it would be on. Unlike what happened in other denominations, the liberals left and the conservatives retained control of the institution (rather than the conservatives leaving, which has usually been the case in other church bodies).

Today, the LCMS is facing a similar issue, only now the American religious mainstream is no longer liberalism but evangelicalism. Many Lutheran churches have been jettisoning their liturgy and their distinctive beliefs, in favor of emulating the Evangelicals, adapting techniques from the church-growth movement, singing "praise songs," preaching sermons on pop-psychology, and otherwise abandoning their spiritual heritage in favor of generic American Protestantism.

In the meantime, the moderates' exodus from the LCMS served as the catalyst for the union of the nation's more liberal Lutherans. The resulting Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) continued going the way of the rest of mainline Protestantism. The ordination of women, left-wing political advocacy, and the ecumenical movement have made them less distinctive, and more and more like generic American liberal Protestantism.

In some places, genuine Lutheranism-for all of the Lutheran churches-has become hard to find. But, as it always has, the pendulum may be starting to swing in the other direction.

Lutheran Confessionalism

Today, a new confessionalism is emerging in Lutheran circles. Just as many Lutheran churches are going the way of American evangelicalism in using praise bands and overhead projectors, others are reemphasizing the historic liturgy, chanting the service and signing themselves with the Holy Cross. Many parishes have reinstituted the ancient Lutheran practice of private confession and absolution.

The most rigorously confessional Lutheran pastors can be recognized by their black shirts and white clerical collars, the priest-like garb worn by traditional holders of the pastoral office before they adopted the American-style minister's coat and tie. All Lutheran pastors wear the collar; the arch-confessionalists are distinguished by wearing it practically all the time.

This confessionalism can appear formidable. Closed Communion (sharing the Lord's Supper only with those who agree on every point of doctrine), a genuine pastoral authority, rigorous catechetical instruction for converts, and forthright practices (such as no weddings during Lent, and no congratulatory eulogies during funerals), can be off-putting in America's easy-going culture. But confessionalism is not the same as conservatism. During the LCMS controversy over the Bible, high-church ceremonialists tended to be on the liberal side; today, while theologically orthodox, they stand against the evangelical and fundamentalist tendencies within the church.

Lutherans allow a measure of freedom in practice, while insisting on agreement in doctrine (unlike, say, the Anglican tradition which has tended to stress uniformity of worship forms while allowing for doctrinal latitude). Conservative denominations such as the Missouri and Wisconsin Synods remain rigorously confessional, in the sense of upholding the creeds and formulas of the Book of Concord, though they are presently torn by controversies over worship styles. That style is expressive of confession, though, is becoming more and more evident, and serious fault lines seem to be manifesting themselves within the conservative Lutheran denominations. Most Lutherans today are somewhere along the spectrum between the two poles of low-church informality and high-church ceremonialism.

Nevertheless, it is surely significant that many of the most ardently confessional pastors, those who are most concerned to bring back the Lutheran traditions in both doctrine and worship, are those straight out of seminary. The younger pastors, the new generation, seem to be the ones most concerned to recover their Lutheran distinctiveness.

In the meantime, Lutherans are starting to get their share of disaffected Evangelicals-casualties of megachurches and refugees from generic American Protestantism, Christians looking for meaningful worship and theological depth-as well as Catholics dismayed by the post-Vatican II liberalism within their Church, and burnt-out secularists who, broken by the law and renewed by the gospel, have come to Christ.

Anti-Ecumenism

Confessional Lutherans are not ecumenical. They will never join the National Association of Evangelicals, nor the World Council of Churches. Lutheran institutions are so big-with their network of schools, colleges, publishing houses, and denominational services-that they can be rather insulated and self-contained. Though the ELCA has pioneered ecumenical dialogue with the Reformed, Anglicans, and even Roman Catholics-to the point of claiming to have found agreement with Rome on justification by faith-the Missouri and Wisconsin Synods will have none of that. Their wariness of ecumenical union and, even more profoundly, of American-style Christianity has kept them out of the mainstream, but it has kept them relatively true to their theology.

Any genuine ecumenism must avoid simply emptying Christianity of its distinctive content and must somehow affirm what is most salient, what is most "Christian," in the whole spectrum of Christian belief, from traditional Catholicism to Protestant fundamentalism. Lutheranism, while eschewing ecumenism as such, provides a framework-or, rather, a set of polarities-by which this might be done.

Many confessional Lutherans have taken to calling themselves "evangelical catholics." They are catholic in their historic creeds, their worship, and their sacramentalism, and they are evangelical in their trust in the good news of Christ, that in his cross he has saved us by sheer grace for a life of Christian freedom. Others are calling themselves "confessing Evangelicals," allying with Reformed Christians to call today's doctrinally shallow Evangelicals to the historic confessions of faith forged by the Reformation. From the Lutheran perspective, mere Catholics are in need of evangelical reformation, and mere Evangelicals are in need of historic orthodoxy. The theological formulas that purport to show how both of these tasks can be done are collected in a volume appropriately titled The Book of Concord. For Lutherans, such an approach represents nothing other than mere Christianity.

[JVAC]

"men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her 'Theotokos'. No one can say anything greater of her or to her, though he had as many tongues as there are leaves on the trees, or grass in the fields, or stars in the sky, or sand by the sea. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God."

--Martin Luther


Posted by:
-James

[Lotar]

God has surely promised His grace to the humbled: that is, to those who mourn over and despair of themselves. But a man cannot be thoroughly humbled till he realises that his salvation is utterly beyond his own powers, councels, efforts, will and works, and depends absolutely on the will, counsel, pleasure and work of Another - God alone. As long as he is persuaded that he can make even the smallest contribution to his salvation, he remains self-confident does not utterly despair himself, and so is not humbled before God; but plans out for himself (or at least hopes and longs for) a position, an occasion, a work, which shall bring him final salvation. But he who is out of doubt that his destiny depends entirely upon the will of God despairs entirely for himself, chooses nothing for himself, but waits for God to work in him; and such a man is very near to grace for his salvation.
-Martin Luther

[ByzantineDixie]

From Pastor Joel Brondos Blog site. May 18, 2004

http://joelbrondos.worldmagblog.com/archives/004595.html
Who can believe and be baptized? Luther speaks here to those who would deny baptism to infants and who would rebaptize people who have been baptized as children. This excerpt comes from AE 40:239-241.

Herewith I have sufficiently proved that no one ought to have doubts as to his baptism, as if he did not know that he is baptized. He sins against God who will not believe it. For he is much more certain of his baptism through the witness of Christians, than if he himself had witnessed it. For the devil could easily have made him uncertain so that he imagined he had been dreaming or had an hallucination instead of being properly baptized. So he would have to fall back finally on the testimony of Christian to be at peace. This kind of testimony the devil cannot confuse or make dubious.

In the third place, it is said, as I also have read that they base their faith on this verse, “He who believes and is baptized will be saved” [Mark 16:16]. This they interpret to mean that no man should be baptized before he believes. I must say that they are guilty of a great presumption. For if they follow this principle they cannot venture to baptize before they are certain that the one to be baptized believes. How and when can they ever know that for certain? Have they now become gods so that they can discern the hearts of men and know whether or not they believe?

If they are not certain if they believe, why then do they baptize, since they contend so strenuously that faith must precede baptism? Are they not contradicting themselves when they baptize without being certain if faith is there or not? For whoever bases baptism on faith and baptizes on chance and not on certainty that faith is present does nothing better than he who baptizes him who has no faith. For unbelief and uncertain belief are one and the same thing and both are contrary to the verse, “Whoever believes,” which speaks of a sure faith which they who are to be baptized should have.

You say, “I know, that he confesses that he believes,” etc. Dear sir, confession is neither here nor there. The text does not say, “He who confesses,” but “He who believes.” To have his confession is not to know his faith. With all your reasoning you cannot do justice to this verse unless you also know he has faith, since all men are liars and God alone knows the heart.

So whoever bases baptism on the faith of the one to be baptized can never baptize anyone. Even if you baptized a person a hundred times a day you would not at all know if he believes. Why then do you carry on with your rebaptizing, since you contradict yourself and baptize when you are not sure that faith is present, and yet you teach that faith must most certainly be present. This verse, “Whoever believes,” altogether opposes their rebaptizing, since the verse speaks of a certain faith. They base their rebaptizing on an uncertain faith, and they do not follow the meaning of the verse in even a single syllable.

I say the same thing about the baptized one who receives or grounds his baptism on his faith. For he is not sure of his own faith. I would compare the man who lets himself be rebaptized with the man who broods and has scruples because perhaps he did not believe as a child. So when next day the devil comes, his heart is filled with scruples and he says, “Ah, now for the first time I feel I have the right faith. Yesterday I don't think I truly believed. So I need to be baptized a third time, the second baptism not being of any avail.”

You think the devil can't do such things? You had better get to know him better. He can do worse than that, dear friend. He can go on and cast doubt on the third, and the fourth and so on incessantly (as he indeed has in mind to do), just as he has done with me and many in the matter of confession. We never seemed able to confess sufficiently certain sins, and incessantly and restlessly sought one absolution after the other, one father confessor after the other. Just because we sought to rely on our confession, as those to be baptized now want to rely on their faith What is the end result? Baptizing without end would result.

All this is nonsense. Neither the baptizer nor the baptized can base baptism on a certain faith. This verse of Scripture is far more a judgment on them than on us. And these are the people who don't want to trust the men who are witnesses of their baptism, but now as men are ready to trust themselves that they are baptized as if they were not men, or as if they were more certain of their faith than the witness of Christendom allows.

So I contend that if they want to do justice to this passage, “Whoever believes,” according to their understanding, they must condemn rebaptism much more earnestly than the first baptism. Neither the baptizer nor the baptized can maintain his position, for both are uncertain of their faith, or at least are in constant peril and anxiety. For it happens, indeed, it is so in this matter of faith, that often he who claims to believe does not at all believe; and on the other hand, he who doesn't think he believes, but is in despair, has the greatest faith. So this verse, “Whoever believes,” does not compel us to determine who has faith or not. Rather, it makes it a matter of every man’s conscience to realize that if he is to be saved he must believe and not pretend that it is sufficient for a Christian to be baptized. For the verse does not say, “Whoever knows that he believes,” or, “if you know that anyone believes,” but it says, “Whoever believes.” Who has it, has it. One must believe, but we neither should nor can know it for certain.

Since our baptizing has been thus from the beginning of Christianity and the custom has been to baptize children, and since no one can prove with good reasons that they do not have faith, we should not make changes and build on such weak arguments. For if we are going to change or do away with customs that are traditional, it is necessary to prove convincingly that these are contrary to the Word of God. Otherwise (as Christ says), “For he that is not against us is for us” [Mark 9:40]. We have indeed overthrown monasteries, mass-priests, and clerical celibacy, but only by showing the clear and certain scriptural arguments against them. Had we not done this, we should truly have let them stand as they previously existed.

When they say, “Children cannot believe,” how can they be sure of that? Where is the Scripture by which they would prove it and on which they would build? They imagine this, I suppose, because children do not speak or have understanding. But such a fancy is deceptive, yes, altogether false, and we cannot build on what we imagine.

There are Scripture passages that tell us that children may and can believe, though they do not speak or understand [Ps. 22:9]. So, Psalm 72 (Psalm 106:37-38) describes how the Jews offered their sons and daughters to idols shedding innocent blood. If, as the text says, it was innocent blood, then the children have to be considered pure and holy—this they could not be without spirit and faith. Likewise the innocent children who Herod has murdered were not over two years of age (Matthew 2:16). Admittedly, they could not speak or understand. Yet they were holy and blessed. Christ Himself says in Matthew 19:14, “The kingdom of heaven belongs to children.” And St. John was a child in his mother’s womb (Luke 1:41) but, as I believe, could have faith [as he leapt in the womb at the news of the promised Christ].

“Yes,” you say, “but John was an exception. This is not proof that all baptized children have faith.” I answer, “Wait a minute. I am not yet at the point of proving that children believe. I am giving proof that your foundation for rebaptism is uncertain and false inasmuch as you cannot prove that there may not be faith in children. Inasmuch as John has faith, though he could not speak or understand, your argument fails that children are not able to believe.” To hold that a child believes, as St. John, is an example, is not contrary to Scripture. If it is not contrary to the Scripture to hold that children believe, but rather in accord with Scripture, then your argument, that children cannot believe, must be unscriptural. That is my first point.

Who has made you so sure that baptized children do not believe in the face of what I here prove that they can believe? But if you are not sure, why then are you so bold as to discard the first baptism, since you do not and cannot know that this is meaning-less? What if all children in baptism not only were able to believe but believed as well as John in his mother’s womb? Now it is up to you to bring forth a single Scripture verse which proves that children cannot believe in baptism. I have cited these verses showing that they can believe and that it is reasonable to hold that they do believe. I grant that we do not understand how they believe, or how faith is created. But that is not the point here.

[Lotar]

Matthew 13:33 tells of the leaven which the woman mixes in three measures of meal until it is thoroughly leavened. The new leaven is the faith and grace of the Spirit. It does not leaven the whole lump at once but gently, and gradually, we become like this new leaven and eventually, a bread of God. This life, therefore, is not godliness but the process of becoming godly, not health but getting well, not being but becoming, not rest but exercise. We are not now what we shall be, but we are on the way. The process is not yet finished, but it is actively going on. This is not the goal but it is the right road. At present everything does not gleam and sparkle, but everything is being cleansed.--Martin Luther

[Lotar]

“I take the case of a minister who is quite a scoundrel, and even an epicurean, and who believes that he administers nothing but bread and wine, although the entire church believes that it is body and blood. What should be done in this case? I answer: The mouth is deceived, but faith is not deceived. Nevertheless, if the minister should say the words [of institution] so that the church hears them, it is the unbelieving priest who is in peril and not the church which believes the words and receives what the words say and faith relies upon, so long as there is no public preaching against the sacrament, as there is today among the sacramentarians. For where a church is taught that there is only bread and where it may be that there are one, two, or three persons who believe, the people don’t receive the body of Christ. Only the mouth is deceived, but faith is not deceived. Faith doesn’t sin. But if only one person is unbelieving, this doesn’t take anything away from the sacrament. For Christ established the sacrament on himself and not on the person of the minister. It rests on the Word. Accordingly, when there is a confession of the Word, no matter what kind of knave the minister may be, this detracts not at all from the sacrament. The reason is that a scoundrel, too, swears by the name of the Lord, and it is the true name of the Lord, for unless it is the true name of the Lord he commits no sin. God’s name doesn’t become the devil’s name even when I sin, but I sin for the very reason that it is the true name of God. The pope also misuses the Word. One must assert the substance, and abuse doesn’t remove it. The sacramentarians get rid of the substance and have nothing but bread and wine.” (Table Talk #574, Luther’s Works, Vol. 54 [Philadelphia: Fortress Press, ], pp. 100-01).

[Lotar]

I will glory not because I am righteous but because I am redeemed; I will glory not because I am free from sins but because my sins are forgiven me. I will glory not because I have done good nor because someone has done good to me but because Christ is my advocate with the Father and because the blood of Christ has been shed for me.
-St. Ambrose

[theologia crucis]

No. 3345: Effect of the Fall on Snakes and Fleas Between June and September, 1533

“When God saw all the good things he had made, it was fitting that they should all be good, and therefore they were good [Gen. 1:31]. Consequently we might have played with snakes as we do with little dogs. After the fall, however, many things, like fleas and gnats, became harmful to us. Therefore God also said, ‘The ground shall bring forth to you thorns and thistles’ [Gen. 3:18]. Power was then withdrawn from all men, and the annoyances that were permitted, and even the commands, were to many a reminder of disobedience. Instead of serving [creatures] men were commanded to rule over them."

LW 54:198

[theologia crucis]

Words of wisdom from the Great Reformer:

That children turn out well, does not stand in our power and at our command, but in that of God. If He is not aboard ship, one does not fare well.

Parents should not cease to seek what is best for their children, even if the children are ungrateful.

A father and a mother can deserve Heaven or Hell, depending on whether they look after their children well or ill.

There is no greater harm done in Christendom than to neglect children. For if one wishes to help Christendom again, then one must indeed begin with the children, as was the case long ago.

Since Christ wanted to teach human beings, he had to become a human being Himself. If we are to teach children, we must also become children.

Heaven and earth, life and death are great matters, faith in Christ is even greater.

A draught of water or beer banishes thirst, a piece of bread hunger, Christ banishes death.

All quotes from "Luther and Melancthon rediscovered: A Guide-Historical sites of the Reformation", ed. Paul Metzger and Stefan Rhein, marsbach verlag, 1997.

[theologia crucis]

Sanctification: By Grace Alone (http://www.lifeoftheworld.com/lotw/article.php?m_vol=2&m_num=3&a_num=2)

By Rev. Dr. David P. Scaer
Professor of Systematic Theology, Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana

Luther placed justification, the doctrine of God's free grace in Jesus Christ, at the heart of his theology. Man is saved not by anything he does or could hope to do, but by what God has done once and for all in Jesus Christ. Since the Reformation, God's accepting the death of Christ in place of the sinner's death has been the hallmark of Protestantism and more specifically of Lutheran churches. Salvation is sola gratia and sola fide. God justifies the sinner purely out of His grace through faith without works. Just as no one raises himself from the dead, so no one makes himself a Christian. God, who brought Jesus back from the dead, alone brings believers to Christ and declares them righteous. Lutherans hold that justification is monergistic, a Greek derivative, which means that a thing has only one cause. God alone converts Christians. He alone justifies believers. This principle also applies to sanctification. He alone makes us holy. God is the cause and content of our sanctification.

Traditional Roman Catholicism shares with Lutheranism a monergistic view of the general plan of salvation. God alone sent His Son into the flesh (incarnation) and sacrificed Him for the world's sin (atonement); however, the certainty of individual salvation is made dependent on the level of believers' personal holiness. Sanctification requires cooperating with divine grace in doing good works. At the center of this system is a doctrine of sanctification which holds that man cooperates with God for the certainty of salvation. There is no place for the total justification of sinful humanity as God's completed activity in Christ. Man cooperates with God in becoming holy and so sanctification is defined in ethical terms, which can be measured.

A majority of other Protestant denominations agree with Luther's monergistic doctrine of justification, but like Roman Catholics they see sanctification, the working of the Holy Spirit in Christian lives, in synergistic terms, another Greek derivative, which means that a thing has two or more causes. Believers are required to play a part in developing their personal holiness by living lives disciplined by the Law and by special ethical regulations set down by the church. Christians can and must cooperate with God's grace to increase the level of personal sanctification. Cooperation, a Latin derivative, is a synonym of synergism, and also means two or more things or persons working together. As a rule most Protestants agree with Luther that God alone justifies sinners and initiates the work of sanctification, but many differ in holding that believers are responsible for completing it. They oppose the Roman Catholic view that pilgrimages, novenas, penance and masses as good works; however, they agree with Catholicism that man cooperates with God in his sanctification to attain personal holiness. God alone justifies, but sanctification is a combined divine-human activity, which even though God begins, each believer is obligated to complete. In this system, the Gospel, which alone creates faith, is replaced by the Law which instructs in moral requirements and warns against immorality. Justification by grace is seen as a past event and the present focus is on man cooperating with God to reach a complete sanctification.

Lutherans recognize that Christians as sinners are never immune to the Law's moral demands and its threats against sin, but in the strictest sense these warnings do not belong to Christian sanctification, the life believers live in Christ and in which Christ lives in them. In Roman Catholic and some Protestant systems, the Gospel brings the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ, but is replaced by the Law which sets down directives for Christian life and warns and threatens the Christian as Christian. Law, and not the Gospel, becomes God's last and real word for the believer. So Christianity deteriorates into an implicit and eventually coarse legalism and abject moralism. Jesus faced this understanding of an ethically determined concept of sanctification among the Pharisees. Holiness was defined in terms of fulfilling ritual requirements. Sixteen centuries later for similar reasons, Luther raised his protest against medieval Catholicism.

At times, the New Testament uses the words sanctify and sanctification of God's entire activity of God in bringing about man's salvation. More specifically it refers to the work of the Holy Spirit to bring people to salvation, to keep them in the true faith and finally to raise them from the dead and give them eternal life (Small Catechism). All these works are also performed by the Father and the Son. Since God is not morally neutral and does not choose to be holy, but He is holy, all His works necessarily share in His holiness. The connection between the Holy Spirit and sanctification is seen in the Latin for the Third Person of the Trinity, Spiritus Sanctus. The Spirit who is holy in Himself makes believers holy, sanctifies them, by working faith in Christ in them and He becomes the sources of all their good works. Sanctification means that the Spirit permeates everything the Christian thinks, says and does. The Christian's personal holiness is as much a monergistic activity of the Holy Spirit as is his justification and conversion. The Spirit who alone creates faith is no less active after conversion than He was before.

Our Augsburg Confession recognizes those things which keep society and government together as good works, but strictly speaking, they do not belong to a Christian's personal holiness and have no necessary relationship to justification. Unbelievers can do these works as can Christians. The works of sanctification are, strictly speaking, only those which Christians can do. They find their source, content and form in Christ's offering of Himself for others and are given to Christians by the Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son and who is sent into the world by the Son. Sanctification is a Trinitarian act. God dwells in the believer in order to accomplish what He wants. The petition of the Lord's Prayer that "God's will be done" is a prayer for our own sanctification.

The Spirit who assisted Christ during the days of humiliation to do good to others and to offer Himself as a sacrifice to His Father is the same Spirit whom Christ by His death, resurrection and ascension gave to His Christians. Jesus, in requiring that we love God with our whole being and our neighbors more than ourselves, was not giving us an impossible goal to awaken in us a morbid sense of sinfulness. Nor was He speaking in exaggerated terms to make a point, but He was describing His own life and the life of His Christians who live their lives and die in Him. Like Christ, Christians trust only in God and sacrifice themselves for others. Sanctification not only defines the Christian life, but in the first and real sense it defines Christ's life.

Jesus Himself loved God with everything which He was and had and made us His neighbors by loving us more than He loved His own life. Sanctification is first christological, that is, it is Christ's own life in God and then our life in Him. His life did not follow a system of codes, a pattern of regulations or list of moral demands and constraints and restraints. Just as Christ's life had to do with self-giving, our sanctification has to do with presenting our bodies as living sacrifices.

Our sanctification finds its closest point of contact in the earthly life of Jesus who gave Himself for us. Christ's giving of Himself is in turn an extension of Father's giving of His Son, "God so loved the world that He gave His only Son." The sending of the Son as a sacrifice reflects the Father's eternal giving of Himself in begetting the Son, "begotten of His Father before all worlds." So the Christian doctrine of sanctification draws its substance from atonement, incarnation and even the mystery of the Holy Trinity itself. This self-giving of God and of Christ take form in the lives of believers and saints, especially those who are persecuted for the sake of the Gospel and martyred. On that account St. Paul sets himself and his companions in their sufferings as patterns of sanctification for those to whom they preached the Gospel.

As magnificently monergistic as our sanctification is, that is, God works in us to create and confirm faith and to do good to others, we Christians are plagued by sin. In actual practice our sanctification is only a weak reflection of Christ's life. Good motives often turn into evil desires. Good works come to be valued as our own ethical accomplishments. Moral self-admiration and ethical self-absorption soon replace total reliance on God. The sanctified life constantly needs to be fully and only informed by Christ's life and death or our personal holiness will soon deteriorate into a degenerate legalism and barren moralism. God allows us Christians to be plagued by sin and a sense of moral inadequacy to force us to see the impossibility of a self-generated holiness. Our only hope is to look to Christ in whom alone we have a perfect and complete sanctification. "He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption" (1 Cor. 1:30).

[Lotar]

I only desire to have the conscience free and to have all Christians make the sign of the cross against a faith which believes that the pope is right in his rule. For such a faith destroys faith in Christ and drowns the whole world in nothing but sin and destruction. The pope and you papists are the pious heirs of this sort of thing. You, who do no more than propagate such superstition, seduce the world, destroy Christian faith, and lead all souls to the devil when you should believe only in Christ and preach freedom from human laws so as to remain “ministers of the Spirit” and not “of the letter” [cf. II Cor. 3:6]. (“Answer to the Hyperchristian, Hyperspiritual, and Hyperlearned Book by Goat Emser in Leipzig,” Luther’s Works, Vol. 39 [Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970], p. 202)

[theologia crucis]

After Abraham has received the command, he sees nothing else. Everything fades out in him: Sarah, the domestics, his home, and Isaac. This is true mortification; this is sitting in ashes and sackcloth.

It is a great and truly bitter sorrow to lose the son obtained by so many prayers and tears, and to lose the hope and glory through which he had hoped that he would be the father of the Blessed Seed. In this sorrow he nevertheless comforts himself and maintains that he will have descendants, if not within his lifetime yet after his death, just as Sarah comforted herself (ch. 16) when she thought: “I shall not be the mother of this Seed, for I have not been worthy. Therefore let another be the mother, namely, my slave woman Hagar. Only may the Lord give some offspring!” These are true mortifications. They do not happen in deserts, away from the society of human beings. No, they happen in the household itself and in the government, and from this one can surely form an opinion about Abraham’s extraordinary obedience, which extended to his innermost being.

I am truly surprised that the father did not die from that bitter and persistent grief, for he had to make a journey of three days. If that struggle had lasted one or two hours, he would have prevailed rather easily. Therefore this delay makes his obedience greater. Meanwhile he thought: “Behold, I am walking along with my son, who is my greatest hope and a young man; he has to die.” During these three days he endured this kind of torture of his flesh and at the same time the darts of Satan. Nevertheless, he had to endure it in silence because of the command, and since he relied on this, he was strengthened and preserved.

If the slaves had been present, they would not have allowed the father to do What he intended; or they would have suspected that he was out of his mind. But if they had been unable to prevent him, they would nevertheless have shouted aloud, and by closing their eyes they would have avoided seeing so great a crime.

There is another delay, and Abraham’s grief breaks out anew when he places the wood on his son. “O my son, if you or your mother knew what kind of wood you are carrying! You think that you are carrying it to a sacrifice, but you do not know that you yourself will be the burnt offering.”

It was not a sword, and the picture commonly painted of Abraham about to kill his son is incorrect. It was a knife, such as butchers and priests were accustomed to use. Isaac lay on his back on the heap of wood. His face was turned toward heaven, and Abraham wanted to strike his throat, as butchers commonly kill calves. First the ass carried the wood, and the slaves carried the fire. But Abraham took these from them and placed the wood, a burden for asses, on his son, because he was not a boy but a young man about 25 years old. He himself carried the fire. Then indeed various ideas must have arisen in the minds of the slaves.

At this point there is surely profound emotion, and there is powerful pathos. Moses did not want to pass this over. Isaac, the victim, addresses his father and stirs up his natural love, as though he were saying: “You are my father.” And the father says in turn: “You are my son.” These words penetrated into and upset the heart of the father. For the son says: “Behold, the wood; but where is the lamb?” It is evident that he is solicitous about the glory of God, for he knows that his father is about to offer a burnt offering at which he himself wants to be the onlooker. Therefore he gives him a reminder lest perchance he forget the sacrifice because of the very great intentness and devotion of his heart. “Where is the lamb,” he says, “for the burnt offering?” Then his father should have answered him: “You will be the lamb.” But he does not say this. Then he adds: “God will provide it”; and in this statement he at the same time included God’s command.

Abraham does not want to torment his son with a long torture and trial. Therefore he does not yet disclose that Isaac himself must die. Nor does Moses point out that while they were walking along during these three days Abraham urged his son to become accustomed to thoughts of death. Abraham seems to have said nothing about this and to have waited until the very moment he would put the knife to Isaac’s throat.

It is certainly amazing how Isaac was able to cast aside so suddenly all fondness for this life and to forget father, mother, home, the promise, and Finally life itself, which he had barely begun. All this could not be overcome without great sorrow and grief. For the saints are not blocks of wood and devoid of feeling; but they are human beings, and the emotions and affections implanted in human nature are present in them to a higher degree than they are in others. It was surely extraordinary faith through which Isaac was able to turn away so suddenly from life and to hand himself over to death. For he thought of nothing else, and with his physical eyes he saw nothing else than the destruction that confronted him.

Up to this point Moses has described the example of obedience of both, the father as well as the son, in a long narrative and has kept the reader in suspense to the point of weariness with extraordinary expectation. Now that the altar has been built and the epitasis has come, Moses has nothing to say. He either does not venture to state what took place, because the subject matter is greater than can be expressed by any eloquence, or his tears made it impossible for him to write. He lets the amazement and surprise remain in the hearts of his readers and wants them to form their own idea of a situation which he is unable to describe adequately with words.

Now that the altar was built, the knife ready, and the fire kindled, some conversation between the father and the son must have occurred—a conversation through which Isaac was apprised of the will and command of God. The father said: “You, my dearly beloved son, whom God has given me, have been destined for the burnt offering.” Then the son was undoubtedly struck with amazement and in turn reminded his father of the promise: “Consider, father, that I am the offspring to whom descendants, kings, peoples, etc., have been promised. God gave me to my mother Sarah through a great miracle. How, then, will it be possible for the promise to be fulfilled if I have been killed? Nevertheless, let us first confer about this matter and talk it over.”

All this should have been recorded here. I do not know why Moses omitted it. But I have no doubt that the father’s address to his son was extraordinary, and I think that its main topic was the command of God and the resurrection of the dead. He probably said: “God has given a command; therefore we must obey Him, and, since He is almighty, He can keep His promise even when you are dead and have been reduced to ashes.” No doubt Isaac was previously instructed in this doctrine, understood it very clearly, and believed it just as much as Abraham did, because they are examples of faith. But faith includes the promise which has been related above (ch. 15).

Thus it was the father’s address to his son which reconciled these two contradictory propositions: Isaac will be the seed and father of kings and of peoples; Isaac will die and will not be the father of peoples. Those contradictory statements cannot be reconciled by any human reason or philosophy. But the Word reconciles these two, namely, that he who is dead lives, and he who lives dies. Thus we live, and yet we die; for even though we are now living, we are reckoned as dead because of sin, and though we have died, we are reckoned as living. On this occasion these statements were treated and discussed between the father and the son, and they were believed not only by Abraham but also by Isaac. For Isaac dies in faith in the promise that he will be a father. Therefore Isaac dies and lives; he becomes ashes and the father of peoples.

Moses sums up that remarkable and amazing account in one short sentence. At this very moment the father is about to cut the throat of his son. The son, with his eyes lifted up to heaven, presents his throat and waits to be reduced to ashes. Thus God brings both into extreme danger of their lives. If on that occasion there had been no faith, or if God had slept for a single moment, the life of the son would have been done for, because the knife is ready, the son is bound and placed upon the heap of wood, and the thrust is aimed at his throat. These are works of God by which He shows that He takes care of us in the greatest dangers and in the midst of death.

But why does Abraham bind Isaac? Not because Isaac was thinking of running away and did not want to obey his father, but in order to conform to the rite of the burnt offering. For Abraham had to assume the mood and procedure of a priest who is killing a calf. Therefore he employs a similar procedure and rite. He places Isaac on top of the wood, like a calf that is now to be killed, and at the same time he moves the knife close to the throat. Why is no compulsion or restraint indicated in this passage, but only the rite and procedure of the priest or slayer?

I could not have been an onlooker, much less the performer and slayer. It is an astounding situation that the dearly beloved father moves his knife close to the throat of the dearly beloved son, and I surely admit that I cannot attain to these thoughts and sentiments either by means of words or by reflecting on them. No one else should have expounded this passage than St. Paul. We are not moved by those sentiments, because we do not desire to feel and experience them. The son is obedient, like a sheep for the slaughter, and he does not open his mouth. He thought: “Let the will of the Lord be done,” because he was brought up to conduct himself properly and to be obedient to his father. With the exception of Christ we have no similar example of obedience.

Here you see with what unconcern the Divine Majesty toys with death and all the power of death. Here God is playing with His patriarch and his son, who together experienced the utmost distress and won a very great victory over death. For not only was Isaac ready to die, but his father Abraham actually dies seven times because he is wholly preoccupied with thoughts about the sacrifice and death of his son.

But the victory of Abraham, Isaac, and all the saints is faith. He who has faith overcomes the fear of death and conquers and triumphs eternally. About this 2 Cor. 1:9 says: “We have set our hope on the living God who raises the dead.” Indeed, we have scarcely a single trace of this faith. For we believe so long as we do not feel death; but when death makes its appearance, fear and horror follow at once.

For who will associate and reconcile these statements: Death is not death; it is life? Moses himself asserts the opposite. For if you listen to the Law, it will tell you: In the midst of life we are in death, according to that ancient and pious hymn in the church. But this has reference to the Law alone. The Gospel, however, and faith invert this hymn and sing thus: “In the midst of death we are in life. Thee we praise as our Redeemer. Thou hast raised us from death and hast saved us.” For the Gospel teaches that in death itself there is life, something which is unknown to and impossible for the Law and reason. Hence Paul exults in Col. 2:15: “He disarmed the principalities and powers and made a public example of them.” Likewise in 2 Cor. 6:9: “As dying, and behold we live.” This is the power of faith, which mediates in this way between death and life, and changes death into life and immortality, which, as faith knows, has been bestowed through Christ.

By this deed, as though by some show, God wanted to point out that in His sight death is nothing but a sport and empty little bugaboo of the human race, yes, an annoyance and a trial, as, for example, if a father sports with his son, takes an apple away from him, and meanwhile is thinking of leaving him the entire inheritance. But this is difficult to believe; and for this reason the heathen, who have no knowledge of this will of God, which He reveals in His Word, are altogether without hope (1 Thess. 4:13).

But Christians, who have the Word, should hear it with all eagerness and should meditate on it, in order that their hearts may be stirred up, so that, however much they may be weighed down by the burden of sin and the hindrances of Satan, they nevertheless may attain to that glory and knowledge of God’s mind and of immortality and be able to believe that this statement is true and unshakable: “Death is a sport.” This is what Abraham believed and felt, and with this confidence he conquered death. The thoughts of his heart were these: “My son Isaac, whom I am killing, is the father of the promise, and this proposition is absolutely true. Consequently, my son will live forever and will be the heir. Therefore even if he has to die now, he will nevertheless not die in reality but will rise again.”

LW 4:109-117 (excerpts)

Luther, Martin. Vol. 4, Luther's Works, Vol. 4 : Lectures on Genesis: Chapters 21-25. Edited by Pelikan, Jaroslav Jan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann. Luther's Works. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1999, c1964.

[theologia crucis]

Luther once read this story [the above post] for family devotions. Whe he had finished, Katie said, "I do not believe it. God would not have treated his son like that."

"But Katie," answered Luther, "he did."

Hear Luther also has he describes the passion of Christ. The narrative is placed on a most human level. We are remind