Justification - February 14, 2018 - Ash Wednesday - Text: Augsburg Confession, Article IV. Justification

Text: It is also taught among us that we cannot obtain forgiveness of sin and righteousness before God by our own merits, works, or satisfactions, but that we receive forgiveness of sin and become righteous before God by grace, for Christ’s sake, through faith, when we believe that Christ suffered for us and that for his sake our sin is forgiven and righteousness and eternal life are given to us. For God will regard and reckon this faith as righteousness, as Paul says in Romans 3:21-26 and 4:5.

This year during the season of Lent through Easter Sunrise and Easter morning we will be continuing our celebration of the 500th Anniversary of the Reformation as we did at Advent through Christmas. During Lent through Easter we will cover what is considered the most important doctrine of the Church and the Lutheran Church, Article IV of the Augsburg Confession and the Apology of the Augsburg Confession. Article IV is the article on Justification and how we are made just and right in God’s eyes. Indeed, this article is the article on which the Church stands or falls, because we are saved either by ourselves, our good deeds, our obedience, and so forth or our salvation comes from outside of us, namely it comes from Jesus, who has earned and paid for our sins by His suffering and death and the cross and which He gives freely to us with out any merit or worthiness within us.

Forgiveness of sins and righteousness are gifts from God. To better help us to understand what it means that these are gifts from God we will first look at what is not considered a gift. Certainly we know that to merit, earn, or work for or gain anything through oneself means that what is merited, earned or paid for is not a gift, but is something that is earned. A gift is that thing which is given, freely given, merited, paid for and earned by the one giving the gift.

Nor is a gift that thing which comes with conditions attached, in other words, one giving with a condition, such as, I will give you this to you but only if you will do this, that or the other thing means it is no longer a gift that is given. As you have heard me say before, grace, which is gift, plus anything is no long grace and gift but the anything. As we learn in elementary math, zero plus anything is the anything, it is no longer zero. Gift is zero. Gift plus “all you gotta do” is the “all you gotta do.” Gift plus “if only you,” is the “if only you.”

So what is gift? Gift is that which is freely given. Gift is that which is merited, earned and paid for by the one giving the gift. Not only is gift that which is freely given but it is also that which is freely being given to, in other words the one being given the gift has no part in being given to. The one being given to does not add to the gift such ideas as having to accept, or receive, or claim. The one being given to has only the option of refusing and rejecting the gift being given. Or, if so moved by the gift giver the one being given to may rejoice in thanks and praise, yet even the thanks and praise are no condition for being given to.

Which brings us back to the fact that being given to also means there are no conditions attached, that is that the one being given to must react or respond in any particular way. For to add conditions removes the process from gift giving to wage earning or meriting.

Which brings us to understand faith and grace. There are many Christians who do not understand grace and even have redefined grace as being an action or work to merit salvation such as suggesting that grace is God’s giving one the ability to claim the gifts of God. With that mis-definition we then see that grace has been redefined as a good work which is not necessary for salvation. We would simply define grace as gift. Gift is that thing which is given without any condition or expectation.

Faith is best understood as an instrument. It is that thing that is given which reaches out and makes the gifts ours. I like to think of faith as the spoon that takes the ice cream from the bowl and moves it to my mouth. Of course, in my thinking the bowl, spoon and ice cream are all given to by the giver, we provide nothing. Indeed, who would serve ice cream without bowl or spoon.

What does this mean? Lent points us to ourselves and our part in Jesus’ suffering. Indeed the whole season of lent is known as a penitential season, a time to reflect on our sins and our part in putting Jesus on the cross. During Lent we are reminded of our sins of thought, word and deed. Sin begins in our hearts and minds, in our thoughts. Sin makes its way to our mouths so that we express it in our words, words which are spoken, words which hurt and harm our neighbor and their reputation. Sin makes its way in our deeds and actions, doing those things we should not do and failing to do those things which we should do. Indeed we see how we sin both by what we do as well as by what we fail to do.

The Law points us to ourselves and our inability to do good. The laws shows us our sin and that is its purpose. Indeed as we run through the ten commandments we can only see our sin and how we have failed to keep the commandments either by doing or not doing what is commanded. We must hear the Law which is intended to convict us so that we might also hear the Gospel, yet we must never hear the Law without the Gospel nor the Gospel without the Law. To hear the Gospel without the Law may lead us to think we do not need a Savior. To hear the Law without the Gospel may lead us to think we can keep the Law or to despair.

Article four of the Augsburg confession and the article on which the church stands or falls is the article on how we are made just and right in the eyes of God. Justification points us to Jesus. Just as a drowning person cannot save themself or they would not actually be drowning, so we cannot save ourselves or we would not be condemned. There is nothing we can do, nor need to do for our own justification. And just as a lifeguard will push off a drowning person trying to help save themself lest they both drown, so anytime we attempt to add any of our own doing to our justification we are simply bring our own condemnation. Justification points only to Jesus.

Likewise the Gospel points to Jesus. The Law points us to ourselves and our own ineptness, our own condemnation so the Gospel points us only to Jesus and all that He has done to save us. The Gospel reminds us that Jesus has done all that needs to be done for us. The Gospel reminds us that Jesus has fulfilled the Law for us. What the Law demands Jesus did. Jesus was prefect for us in our place. Jesus took our sins for us in our place. Jesus suffered hell for us in our place. Jesus gives His life for ours. He earned, merited, paid for our sins, the price of eternal spiritual death on the cross. Jesus gives forgiveness to us, unconditionally. He gives and we are given to.

It is as we hear the Law and the Gospel that we are moved to confess. Our confession is a result of the Gospel not the Law. The Law does not move us to confess, rather the Law moves us to run and hide as Adam and Eve did in the garden. It is the Gospel, the good news of sins forgiven that move us to acknowledge and confess our sins. Forgiveness is already there. All sins, even those we have yet to commit have already been paid for by Jesus’ blood on the cross. All we can do is refuse and reject such forgiveness which we do when we refuse to repent. Refusal to repent means the sin stays with us and thus there is no forgiveness. The Gospel which speaks forgiveness gives forgiveness and moves one to repent.

As Martin Luther said, even on his deathbed, “We are beggars it is true.” Thanks be to God that He hears our begging, that He gives us forgiveness, that He gives us His Gospel good news. Thus we hear again and again the good news that we have been made just and right in God’s eyes through the very faith that He gives us, faith in Jesus who lived, suffered and died for us.

During this Lenten season as we are reminded of our sin and our part in putting Jesus on the cross, so too are we reminded of God’s great love for us so much that He took on flesh in Jesus, lived the perfect life demanded of us, for us in our place, suffered, died and rose, defeating sin, death and the devil, and gives us the forgiveness He earned, merited, won and paid for, through the faith He also gives so that we rejoice in our forgiveness, life and salvation and say, to God be the glory for Jesus’ sake. Amen.