To Live by Faith: A Reformation Day Meditation on Romans 3

Therefore we conclude

 that a man is justified by faith

 without the deeds of the law.

 

If the Reformation could be said to have been inaugurated by any human author, I would argue it was St. Paul.  Like the Church Fathers of the first five centuries who leaned heavily on the Prophetic and Apostolic writers to combat heresy and develop the ancient Creeds, Luther came to understand the clarity of the Gospel against the murky corruption and semi-Pelagianism of medieval Rome through a close reading of St. Paul’s Epistles—not least his magisterial letter to the church at Rome.  While all of Paul’s inspired writings are worthy of deep meditation, as is every word of the Holy Scriptures breathed out by God through their human authors, this letter to the 1^st century Christians gathered in the capitol of the Roman Empire and sitting in the shadow of brutally pagan emperors, is a magnum opus of theology.  Pastors and laity have been radically transformed by their close reading of Romans even since Paul penned it, and it will transform our age as well, if we will listen to it.

 

Anytime one sees the word, “therefore,” in a writing, one should ask what it’s there for.  Paul had spent the past two and half chapters explaining in inescapable detail why the whole world, Jew and Greek, Roman and barbarian, slave and free, of every tribe, tongue, and tradition, stood guilty before the Law of God.  God is holy, righteous, perfect, all powerful, all knowing, and all present; what God speaks creates reality, as His Word framed the cosmos, and breathed life into every creature of this world, including mankind.  When our first parents rebelled against the Word of God, they rebelled against their own life, falling into the condemnation of sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil through their own fault in separating themselves from God, and bringing upon themselves the deadly justice of their crimes.  And not only did our first parents fall by their own free will, but they bequeathed to every one of their children afterward a corrupted nature that was constantly inclined toward sin and rebellion against God—a sinful nature that was damnable before it could even turn its evil inclinations into wicked thoughts, words, or actions.  As St. Paul would sum up, in Adam, we all died, becoming creatures of wrath under the just curse of our sin, condemned to an eternity of separation from our Creator.

 

I think the reason St. Paul spends so much ink to explain the fallen situation of mankind before the holy Law of God, is that misunderstanding sin (either Original Sin which we inherit, or the manifest sins which we individually commit) will lead us to misunderstand the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  If all have sinned, by nature and by deed, falling short of the glory of God from the moment of our conception, then no one has any standing before God to present their works as merit for redemption or salvation.  No matter what good we think we may do, which are more often than not self-serving designs of our own pride, greed, lust, or avarice, no corrupted works of sinful people can erase the justice we are due for the corruption which reaches to our very core.  We stand before a holy God whose standard is perfection against the absolute commands of His Law to love Him before all things, and to love our neighbors as ourselves.  And yet, as we spurn His Word and abuse our neighbors, we show forth in both our fallen nature and our practical works that we are creatures of wrath, deserving our judgement into a hellish prison built to contain and torment the devil and the rebellious angels forever.  This is the reality of fallen man’s condition, and the severity of his need.  By no works of the Law can a man be justified before God, because no fallen man can keep the Law of God whole and entire, for the entirety of one’s existence.  We are conceived in sin, born into sin, and by our own works, all we can do is die in our sins.

 

Thus our only hope of salvation is that which comes to us, apart from our works.  The debt we owe is an eternal debt, and only God who is infinitely righteous and holy, could pay that debt even for one of us, let alone the whole of humanity across every age and place.  Thanks be to God that while we were yet sinners He first loved us, not desiring that any should perish in their sins, but have everlasting life in a blessed and restored communion with Him.  This love of God moved Him to send His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to be the satisfaction for our sins, to take upon Himself our justice and our judgment, so that we might no longer stand in the eternal calamity of our own works, but in the infinite magnificence of His Works, whose merits are given to us by grace alone.  These are the Works of Jesus which no man could do:  to be the incarnate God, fully human and fully divine; to live a perfect human life in fulfilment of the Law on our behalf; to teach mankind to see the Kingdom of God for what it really is, and our desperate need for His redemption that we might partake in it; to be the Word of God made flesh, dwelling among us full of grace and truth; to suffer unjustly on our behalf upon a Roman cross, abandoned and betrayed by his own countrymen, with the sins of the whole world placed upon Him; to be the Lamb of God sacrificed for the sins of every man, woman, and child who would ever be conceived upon this globe; to die, to descend triumphantly into hell, and to rise the third day from the dead; to show forth His eternal victory over sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil; to call all men to faith and repentance, that everyone who believes and is baptized shall be saved; to send forth His disciples in the power of His Holy Spirit to proclaim His saving Word of Gospel to every creature; to abide with, enliven, and empower His people in every generation, even as He promises to come again in glory to judge the living and the dead; to be the King of a Kingdom which has no end, in which death is swallowed up by Life, and evil is forever chained; to be the Savior of the world.

 

It is these works of Jesus which the Reformers hailed as the Vicarious Atonement, and in which all Christians are called to place their faith, rather than in their own paltry works.  These works of Jesus which only He could do, accomplish the salvation of every soul who puts their trust in Him, so that eternal life and the forgiveness of sins comes to each of us by grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, known to us most surely and incontrovertibly by His Holy Word alone.  Thus the Solas of the Reformation do not come by the dreams of philosophers or mystics, but from the teachings of Christ through His Prophets and Apostles, perhaps nowhere quite so clearly presented as St. Paul’s letter to the 1^st century church at Rome.  And so we are called to conclude with St. Paul, that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law for Jesus’ sake, called into a new and eternal life in which we are enlivened to bring forth fruitful works worthy of repentance, which reflect the love and grace we have first been given.  In this blessed Gospel we give thanks to God Almighty for His Word and Works of Redemption through His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, and for sending His servants to proclaim His Gospel in every generation.  Here we stand in Christ alone, alive by faith forever.  Amen.