While it is true that Easter is the high festival of the church year, a close second for Lutherans is Reformation Sunday being celebrated in 2007 on Oct. 28. The three assigned readings are Revelation 14:6-7 (Angel flying); Romans 3:19-28 (Righteousness apart from the law) and either John 8:31-36 (Truth make you free) or Matthew 11:12-19 (Jesus a glutton). Chosen to preach on is Romans 3:19, “Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.”
A person’s understanding of how the law is spiritually used tells a lot about his understanding of salvation. In every religion outside of Christianity, the purpose of the Law is to help one get right with God through obedience or some other spiritual activity. However, in Christianity, the purpose of the Law in the spiritual realm is to reveal that there is nothing an unbeliever can do, say or think to get right with God.
Instead of comforting a person that they now know the direction God wants them to travel in order to get right with Him, the Law stops all mouths from boasting of works as the reason for one’s salvation. The purpose of the Law is not to provide directions for getting right with God; instead the purpose is to declare the entire world as guilty before God.
Now if all are guilty before God, how does one get saved? The world’s religions would suggest that one either stops disobeying and therefore is no longer guilty or else makes it up to God to pay for the punishment of that guilt. Christianity, on the other hand, reveals that God Himself declares us righteous by faith apart from the deeds of the law (verse 28).
The real barrier between man and God is not sin but the resulting curse of the Law that demands eternal punishment. What Jesus Christ did was to take upon Himself the curse of the Law by dying the death which included being forsaken by the Father as the Sinner He became by carrying our sins to the cross. The “It is finished” signaled the end of the curse upon all who trust that His death and resurrection did indeed result in victory over our sin, death and the devil.
The Reformation insight argues that our good works avail for nothing. Our salvation is grounded, based and founded on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness which both paid the debt we owed and dressed us in His glorious good works in the sight of God the Father. He died so that we live and live eternally by grace, through faith on account of Jesus Christ. This is most certainly true.
Name:Tom Baker
Pastor,
again, it can be said that there are those who will quickly agree with others devoid of the Spirit, that we are without a doubt, off base and wackey! Gandi comes to mind in that he poked holes in the apparent contradictions of Scripture when he was a voice for change and peace. There will come a flood of other “experts” who will scoff too.
That one verse makes it clear:::>(KJVR) Rom. 3:31 Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.
Of the many translations of this verse, KJV and several others use the strong language of “ESTABLISH THE LAW”!
It does seem odd to those without revelation that we would speak of the Law in a manner as that that cannot help us become RIGHTEOUS and on the other hand go about ESTABLISHING IT AS THE ONLY WAY TO BECOME RIGHTEOUS IN CHRIST!
Jesus, He is the end of the Law for Righteousness.
How am I doing with that? Sorely!
But as you and others make very clear, it is not based on or a lack of it, what I am doing that makes me Righteous or Good! I can try harder next time or be perfectly obedient this time, but there is no way I can be Righteous in myself or by my works before God in this life or the next!
I like Paul’s thought carried beyond the Law in cutting into the way those who think they know and understand it, teach the Law as the way to Righteousness:::>
1Ti 1:5 The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.
1Ti 1:6 Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion,
1Ti 1:7 desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions.
1Ti 1:8 Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully,
1Ti 1:9 understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers,
1Ti 1:10 the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine,
1Ti 1:11 in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted.
Ok, rhetorically asking, WHICH IS IT? Is it by the Law or is it by the Gospel that I am Righteous before God in this life and the next?
And our infamous answer around here, now, after you so graciously blessed us when you came and taught us these distinctions between the Law and the Gospel is, it’s BOTH!
Michael
Eureka, Ca.