Life and Death: A Meditation on Deuteronomy 30, for the 13th Sunday in Pentecost

See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil;

In that I command thee this day to love the Lord thy God,

 to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments

and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply:

and the Lord thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it.

 

But if thine heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear,

but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them;

I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely perish,

and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land,

whither thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it.

 

 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you,

that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing:

therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:

That thou mayest love the Lord thy God,

and that thou mayest obey his voice,

and that thou mayest cleave unto him:

for he is thy life, and the length of thy days:

that thou mayest dwell in the land

which the Lord sware unto thy fathers,

to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.

 

What Moses presents to the people of Israel just before they finish the Exodus and enter into the Promised Land, Jesus makes even more poignant for those who listened to Him over 1500 years later:   So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.  There’s a totality in the way God approaches His creation, and it demands that everyone either be all in, or all out—no half measures or divided loyalties.  To hear, believe, keep, and abide in God’s Word is to live forever in Him, yet to reject that Word is to cast one’s self away from the Author of Life.  There could be no higher stakes for both individuals and the whole of humanity, than how they either receive or reject their Maker, because their Maker is also poised to be either their Judge or their Savior.  And what Moses casts in the context of the Hebrews in their Promised Land, Jesus makes universal when He emphatically claims that He alone is the path of eternal life.  While the paths which lead to death and destruction may be as multitudinous as the number of people who will ever breath the air of this world, the path of life and salvation is singular, rooted in the person and work and Word of Jesus.

 

It seems to me that this severity and austerity is often lost in modern thinking, particularly in western cultures.  Though it was not always so, contemporary sensibilities often demand all claims to truth be equally valued, no matter how contradictory or irrational they may be.  Christianity finds little persecution if it does not condemn Atheism, Marxism, Mohammadism, Paganism, or any other ideology which presents itself as truth.  Where Christianity finds its most ardent and violent opponents is when it stands clearly on the Word of God, declaring the reality of Life and Death—and that the only path of Life is found in the One who is Himself the Eternal Word of the Father, Jesus Christ.  It is an absolute claim made by Jesus, which echoes the absolute claim of God to Moses when He wrote the First Commandment upon tablets of stone at Mt. Sinai:  I am the Lord thy God, you shall have no other gods before Me. People may want the individual freedom to imagine truth in any way that appeals to them, but personal desire and personal perception do not change the realities which God has spoken into the fabric of the cosmos.  By His Word alone was the universe created, and by His Word alone shall it be judged.

 

In ages past, knowledge of this reality of good and evil, of eternal Life and Death, motivated great missionary expeditions to bring the Word of God to everyone who might hear it, repent, believe, and live.  This knowledge that there is only one Way to live forever and avoid the eternal fires of hell, moved evangelistic societies to translate the Scriptures into every language under heaven, to risk their very lives to smuggle these Scriptures into some of the most vile and hostile places on the planet, liberating whole regions and countries and even continents from the slavery of sin, death, hell, and the devil.  Conviction for the saving Truth of Jesus Christ moved people in love to carry the Medicine of Immortality—the Word and Sacraments of Jesus—to the spiritually sick and dying of every tribe, tongue, and locale.  Yet today, especially in American churches, personal safety, comfort, and social respectability seem far higher priorities than any singular message of Life and Death.  Unlike our forebearers who carried the Gospel into plague infested areas, were hunted and massacred by bloodthirsty barbarians, braved harsh cold and scorching heat to reach distant lands with the hope of Jesus, most of our churches closed their doors for months or even years at the hint of manipulative threats and cajoling from hostile government leaders.  Our churches may or may not open if the air conditioner or furnace is malfunctioning, if the coffee pot or overhead projector is broken, or if it’s just generally inconvenient to be there.  Our churches may or may not be filled, depending on how many people in an area think almost anything else on their agenda on any given Sunday is more important than the Word of God.

 

Yet this is a folly of which we must repent, regardless of how common place it may be in our age.  There is only one Way to eternal life, only one God who is the Creator, Sustainer, Savior and Judge of the entire world, and only one Hope that is given to all of mankind.  It is a Love we cannot earn, but only receive; a grace we cannot deserve, but must freely be washed in; a faith we could not generate in ourselves, but once given we must cling to above all other things.  There is only one Jesus, and He is the only Savior of any and every person who has ever been, or ever shall be.  He alone is our life, our sweetness, and our hope, and He demands that no other god be countenanced before Him.  It is a matter of Life and Death, not only in this world where the Word of the Lord brings blessings and curses upon those who either receive or reject it, but in the eternal age to come, into which every soul must press.  A life of minutes or decades in this world is the swiftest of memories when compared with the eternity which lays before every person, yet how we live in this brief present life shall echo forever in the life yet to come.  There is no room for timidity, or doubt, or double-mindedness, for the Word of the Lord has come to each and every soul to lay before us Life or Death, that we might by grace through faith in Christ alone choose Life.

 

Hear the Word of the Lord as it comes to you this day, that the shadows of doubt and weakness of spirit so endemic in our fallen race might be washed away in the Blood of the Lamb who alone takes away the sins of the whole world.  See clearly the path of Life that is set before you, and the promise of grace which calls you into a blessed and eternal fellowship with your Maker, who desires to be your Savior rather than your Judge.  Let go every other idol that clouds your vision or infatuates your heart, that the Cross of Christ and His Everlasting Gospel might broker no other contenders in your mind.  Then forgiven and free, in the promise of eternal life made sure in the Word of God given to you, carry that saving Word out into the world around you with the same compassion and urgency that once moved our Lord to His Cross, thus taking up our own daily crosses and following Him, reflecting His love and grace to all we meet as we bear His saving Word to all.  Soli Deo Gloria, unto ages of ages without end!  Amen.

 

Self-Defeating Pride: A Meditation on Luke 14 for the 12th Sunday after Pentecost

And he put forth a parable to those which were bidden,

when he marked how they chose out the chief rooms; saying unto them.

When thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit not down in the highest room;

lest a more honourable man than thou be bidden of him;

And he that bade thee and him come and say to thee, Give this man place;

and thou begin with shame to take the lowest room.

But when thou art bidden, go and sit down in the lowest room;

that when he that bade thee cometh, he may say unto thee,

Friend, go up higher: then shalt thou have worship

in the presence of them that sit at meat with thee.

For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased;

and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

 

Arrogance and pride are elements of fallen human nature that plague every generation.  In Jesus’ day, not so unlike our own, weddings were among the most carefully planned and extravagant parties in a community.  They celebrated the union of a man and a woman into an indissoluble partnership this side of heaven, and echoed the promises God made to mankind in the Garden when He blessed them to be fruitful and multiply, and to have dominion over the earth.  The wedding feast would be full of guests, from the parents of the bide and groom, to friends and neighbors, and people of various social standing.  Seating arrangements for the guests would be made based on their role in the wedding, their relation to the wedding party, and their rank or position in the civil realm.  The master of the feast would carefully plan such places for each guest, and the guests would be expected to take their respective places.  After all, they were guests at the wedding feast, and in no position to dictate to the master of the feast where they would be seated.  In the parable above, Jesus ratified an ancient Proverb of Solomon that it is better to enter into such situations with humility than with pride, since being asked to take a more honorable seat would give honor to the guest in the presence of those assembled, rather than the humiliation of being told to get out of someone’s seat who outranked you.

 

While the example Jesus offered seems egregious, it is indicative of human nature.  There are few people with such unbridled arrogance that they would come as a guest to a wedding, then supplant a bridesmaid or groomsman or parents of the wedded couple by taking their seats.  But there are plenty of examples of people coming to weddings and using them as a forum to put the spotlight on themselves, declaring in effect that they think themselves more important than the people throwing the celebration.  Yet well beyond the context of a wedding party, the inclination every person has to arrogance and pride shows up far more often.  It can be revealed in the facial expressions and body language of a person who feels their time is being wasted by listening to another’s issues; in the avoidance of help and support when a neighbor is in need; in gossip and slander of another person, with the presumption of superiority over the one who suffers; in our choices of who we help and who we disregard in our own sense of pious worthiness; in those we invite to our tables and into our homes, versus those we think unworthy of our time, talents, and resources.  Pride is a flaw we carry in our bones, a corruption that has leached deep down into our minds, affecting so much of what we think, say, and do.  Not to be outdone, own generation seems to have asked other generations to “hold our beer,” while multiple times in any given year across nearly every major metropolitan area, hundreds of thousands of people who embrace evil lifestyles and horrific practices march in the streets declaring their Pride, and communities, civic leaders, and even church bureaucrats root them on, as if pride in any context were to celebrated rather than rebuked.

 

And lest we think pride is so ubiquitous that we ought not worry about it, Jesus speaks directly to us and to every human being, when He warns us that those who exalt or praise themselves will be brought low by God—while those who walk in humility before their Maker will be lifted up and honored.  Pride, perhaps unlike any other sin, makes us more like the devil than we’d like to admit.  It was Satan who presumed, as a creature who lived by the grace of God alone, that he should rule as God in the creation of which he was a part.  Satan deified himself by refusing to give God the glory and honor He alone is due, and in return, God banished and passed judgment upon Satan, taking what honor he was created to have and making it into the ultimate dishonor before the entire cosmos.  Likewise, when we, as creatures who cannot give ourselves life, presume upon the Author of Life to deify ourselves in our own eyes, we follow in the way of Satan and risk the same judgment he received.  Pride is a disavowal of our own reality and that of God Himself, and like all attacks on reality by a delusional mind, reality eventually wins.  We can sit in our own little corner of the world and presume ourselves our own gods, but at the end of the day, or at the end of our lives, all usurpers of God’s throne will be marched out of the wedding feast and into the fires of perdition.

 

The solution to our problem with pride is not found in ourselves, but in Jesus.  As fully God, He condescended to become fully man and walk among His creation, to suffer and die at the hands of sinful men, and to rise victoriously over sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil.  Jesus had every right to take the highest seat at His own wedding feast, but instead he took the lowliest, that His Father might exalt His Name above every name in heaven and on earth.  Jesus’ humility becomes the salvation of us all, as He gives us the mercy and forgiveness and life we don’t deserve, taking the punishment and suffering upon Himself in our place.  Then, by His Word and Spirit, He begins to transform us into His image, that we might also learn to walk as He walked, speak as He spoke, eschewing pride for humility just as He has done, that others around us might be transformed by Jesus working and speaking through us.  Our solution to our pride is not to seek to transform ourselves by our own power—a denial of the reality of our corruption and of our own depleted powers to effect our own change—but to be transformed by Jesus and His Word that we might be more like Him.  What we cannot do no matter how hard we try, Jesus has promised to do by His Gospel given to us, that we might live by grace through faith in Him alone, now and forever more.

 

See with honest candor the satanic pride which dwells so deeply within you, but see more fully the cure for your infernal disease in Jesus.  He has come to make all things new, including you and me, and has worked everything necessary through His Cross that you might be forgiven and free in Him.  Let go your presumptions and arrogance and wrestling for position or prestige, and instead set your eyes on Jesus, whose Word and Spirit will transform you into His humble likeness, that with Him you might be escorted by the Father into the place established for you in His Kingdom, to the roars of joyous celebration by all the saints and angels of every time and place.  It is Jesus alone who is our Savior, our Captain, and our King, to whom belong glory, laud, and honor, in this age and unto ages of ages unending.  Soli Deo Gloria!  Amen.

 

 

Strive to Enter by the Narrow Gate: A Meditation on Luke 13 for the 11th Sunday after Pentecost

And he went through the cities and villages,

teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem.

Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved?

And he said unto them,

Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you,

will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.

When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door,

and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying,

Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you,

I know you not whence ye are:

Then shall ye begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence,

and thou hast taught in our streets.

But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are;

depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.

 

There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth,

when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,

and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God,

and you yourselves thrust out.

And they shall come from the east, and from the west,

 and from the north, and from the south,

and shall sit down in the kingdom of God.

And, behold, there are last which shall be first,

and there are first which shall be last.

 

The question asked of Jesus in Luke 13 regarding how many would be saved did not elicit the kind of answer they were likely looking for.  The inquiry, Lord, are there few that be saved?, is followed by an answer that commands action, Strive to enter in at the strait gate.  The Greek word translated in the KJV as “straight” is also rendered as “narrow,” and either way indicates a portal to eternal life that many will fail to pass through.  Jesus made the point even more emphatic by describing the eschaton, or end of the age, when He would close that portal with many on the outside clambering to enter.  In direct reference to the people who were standing around Him yet did not believe in Him, Jesus noted that many will claim to have had some proximity to Jesus and will still be cast out with the horrifying words, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.  The inescapable question Jesus left with those He was teaching was not how many or how few would be saved, but on which side of that portal each individual listener would be found.

 

The Greek used in this passage helps clarify and amplify the context of Jesus’ teaching.  When Jesus told His disciples to strive for the narrow gate to eternal life, that root word has the connotation of competition, conflict, and even agony.  In this sense, to strive was not just an intellectual pursuit or inquiry, but a consuming pursuit of a goal that would not be dissuaded by suffering or pain.  To strive in this context was to exert a full force of the personal will as if in mortal combat, bringing every faculty of the mind, body, and soul to bear upon the goal.  This sense of striving is contrasted with another Greek word Jesus used that many would seek to enter but not be able.  The root of the word translated as seek pertains to inquiry and desire, but not particularly to action.  The person who asked Jesus the question about eternal life was inquiring of Jesus how many might be saved, but Jesus flipped the question back upon him by noting that inquiry and desire are insufficient to enter eternal life.  Rather, the questioner would now have to reflect on whether his curiosity or desire would become an all-consuming pursuit in that quest to be saved.

 

And that’s a question every person must ask themselves as they encounter Jesus.  Far from an intellectual curiosity or philosophical rumination, Jesus is the Word Made Flesh who dwells among us, full of grace and truth.  To follow Jesus is not simply a matter of desire, or an inquiry into theological questions, but a life spent in fervent pursuit of Him.  When Jesus said that many would desire to enter in after the door was closed but not be able, the underlying Greek suggests that they will no longer have the power or might to pass through that portal.  For as St. Matthew adds in the seventh chapter of his Gospel regarding the same teaching, the way to eternal life is narrow and rugged, and Jesus notes that few find it, while the path to perdition and eternal condemnation is wide, broad, and easy, and that many take that road instead.  To follow Jesus has never been the easy path in this world, regardless of what the external trappings of society might suggest.  In every age and in every place, Jesus’ call to follow Him is one that commands the totality of our powers, the entirety of our lives, the whole of our being.  There is no authentic disciple of Jesus who follows Him at a distance, picking and choosing which of His Words they will accept or decline, as if proximity to Jesus will make of Him a totem that saves them without true and living faith.  Jesus is not a t-shirt logo or piece of jewelry or periodic dalliance, but the Author of Life and the Eternal Word of God.  There is no half-way with Jesus:  we’re either all in, or we’re all out.

 

But how, precisely, do we go all in with Jesus?  Jesus Himself tells us, as do His Apostles who wrote down His testimony and expounded it their epistles:  the just shall live by faith.  Faith in Jesus, as the gift of God through the Word and Spirit of God, grants the grace and power to follow Him in this life and the next.  To be sure, no one has the power on their own to believe in Jesus and pursue Him with all their powers, but Jesus gives His life and power and Spirit to His people that they might be born again with new powers and new life.  It is not our works which save us, nor the power of our striving, but the grace of God which comes through faith in Jesus that creates something new in us that is able to love, trust, and follow Him no matter where He may lead us.  Even as apart from Jesus He tells us we can do nothing, we know from both Jesus and St. Paul that in Him we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.  The narrow gate is not achieved by virtue of those who strive to enter it, but by Him who is the narrow Way, the Truth, and the Life, through whom alone we may be reconciled to the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit.  It is Jesus alone who gives faith to those who hear Him, forgiveness and life to those who trust in Him, that they might strive victoriously through all the struggles and persecutions of this life, and enter at last by the power of His grace into the joy of their Master.  The narrow way is not countless billions of people all trying to save themselves by their own convoluted thoughts, words, and deeds, but the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, gathering all who will receive Him unto Himself.  Every other way can only end in despair.

 

Hear the Word of the Lord as it comes to you this day, calling you out of a tepid and weak inquiry of desire, and into the saving power of His grace.  Be renewed in your mind, your soul, and your body, as the Word and Spirit of the Living God descends upon you, giving you a new life and a new power to rise up in Him forever.  Set aside the half measures and divided loyalties of a fallen mind, as the Gospel of Jesus Christ takes hold of you and makes of you a new creation in His image—born again unto the good works which He has ordained for you from before the foundation of the world, striving in victorious hope of the eternal life which lies before you.  Behold, the portal is open unto you, and the Word of the Living God speaks His goodness, forgiveness, and life into you, that you might abide with Him forever.  Soli Deo Gloria!  Amen.

  

Truth and Division: A Meditation on Luke 12, for the 10th Sunday after Pentecost

I am come to send fire on the earth;

and what will I, if it be already kindled?

But I have a baptism to be baptized with;

and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!

Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth?

I tell you, Nay; but rather division:

 For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided,

 three against two, and two against three.

 The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father;

 the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother;

 the mother in law against her daughter in law,

and the daughter in law against her mother in law.

 

On first read, Jesus’ words in Luke 12 would seem to conflict with what Luke records in his second chapter with the angels singing at Jesus’ birth:  Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men!  Yet we know that all Scripture is God-breathed from the same Holy Spirit, so it does harmonize across all its centuries and human authors.  What was announced at Jesus’ birth was the dawn of redeeming grace that reconciles mankind with God through the Vicarious Atonement which would be made by the Son—the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.  Jesus as the only Way, Truth, and Life would bring peace between God and men.  What would remain in a sinful and fallen world is the conflict between men; those who would accept reconciliation with God by grace through faith in Christ alone, and those who would prefer the enslaving darkness of fellowship with the devil.  The fire Jesus was kindling on the earth was that of the Gospel, and His baptism would be His death on the Cross as a substitute for the whole world.  After His resurrection, He gave that victory over sin, death, hell, and the devil, to His disciples, that they might further make disciples of all nations, baptizing, teaching, and forgiving them just as freely as they had received the same.

 

Unfortunately, one of the gravest consequences of evil, is a suicidal insanity—a departure from truth and reason that could end only in destruction.  An individual mind and will that rejects the Mind and Will of their Maker, is one that is cut off from the source of its own life, and can do no other than fall ever further into darkness.  As Jesus, the very Word and Will, Light and Life of Almighty God walked among His people, there were those who gladly heard and followed Him, and those who angrily heard and rejected Him.  The Word of God came to all, freely calling all people in divine love and grace to receive forgiveness, life, and salvation in Jesus.  That Word never called for violence or coercion, because true love and grace can never be coerced or forced.  The Holy Spirit, working through the Living Word, gave then and gives now the ability of a fallen mind to freely receive the gift of life which Jesus alone can offer.  Yet the Holy Spirit coerces no one to love God, and allows all those who reject Him to receive the consequences of their insane death wish:  the judgment of hell which they have freely earned through their evil and rebellion.  Though some Christians at different times and in different places across the centuries have erred gravely in arrogating to themselves the judgment of God against their neighbors, Jesus is clear in His commission to His people that the Gospel is to be proclaimed in freedom and grace, while judgment is to be left to God alone.  The sporadic failure of man, either Christian or non-Christian, to abide by the Word of Christ, does not impugn or diminish that Eternal Word.  Rather, it reflects the reality of division among men which Jesus prophesied.

 

Sometimes this looks mysterious in our modern world, just as it did in times before ours.  There’s a kind of unity which comes with evil, even as it devours itself with an endless variety of malicious intentions and actions.  Every individual soul that idolizes itself is at the same time both at war and in harmony with all the other souls doing the same, which generally leads to some kind of violence and tyranny of the strong over the weak.  Evil is always about power and coercion, seeking to take what is not given from those who can be swindled or bent to the will of others.  The devil has orchestrated a marvelous global cacophony of selfishness and hatred that finds titular heads in tyrants of every shape and kind.  The tyranny of force and compulsion from one will to another is the antithesis of love and freedom, and so the devil continually guides men into the service of their own passions, where they find only slavery and death in his demonic worldly system, even as they become in themselves agents of slavery and death to others.  The devil and his entire worldly system can tolerate every form of evil and oppression, every variation of selfishness and pride, but what it cannot tolerate is the Truth.  The devil’s enslavement is built on a lie that the creature can dethrone the Creator, and the Truth of God’s Law and Gospel shatter that illusion.  As the greatest threat to the devil’s kingdom is the Truth of God’s Eternal Word which has come to seek and to save the lost, it should surprise no one that the devil’s greatest effort is spent persecuting the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

But of course, the devil has all the wrong tools to suppress the Gospel.  The devil brought a Roman cross, and Jesus accepted it for the salvation of the world.  The devil inspired Saul to persecute and murder the disciples of Jesus, and Jesus made him the greatest missionary Evangelist in history, even changing his name to Paul.  Everywhere the devil tries to murder and suppress and malign those who carry forth the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Gospel continues to be proclaimed as the free gift of forgiveness which no man could earn—a reconciliation and peace with God than no man could coerce by his own power.  Every lying powerplay of the devil dissolves in the freedom, mercy, grace, and love of Almighty God.  The irony of the devil’s insanity is brought fully into the light, as he with his inferior power cannot achieve what he demands, while God with His omnipotent power achieves total victory by grace.  In the end, God will show forth His power by placing all those who choose evil into their final infernal prison, but the Wisdom of God in this time is that He makes His power perfect in weakness:  the victory of the Cross, the preaching of the Gospel, the conversion of the heart, mind, and will of fallen people that they become reflective lenses of their Creator’s Light, Life, and Word.  While the devil will inspire fallen men to take up swords and weapons and intrigues to terrorize their fellow men, the Lord God Almighty gives the sword of His Word and the fire of His Holy Spirit that all men might repent, believe, and live forever in Him, forgiven and free.

 

If you are disturbed by the division of the world around you, be of good cheer, for the Word of God has come to you in your time, just as it has come to everyone in their times across history.  Only the Eternal Word of the Living God can reconcile you to your Maker, and will transform you into one of His people, united across all time and space in His Kingdom which has no end.  The devil’s empty promises may be received by the insanity of evil minds, but his time is short, and he knows it.  Stand fast in the Gospel which has made you free, and the forgiveness which has made you whole.  Reflect the love which is given so freely to you, that the love of God might touch the hearts and minds of those around you, and the dawn of redeeming grace may shine upon those whom God has placed around you.  Soli Deo Gloria! Amen.

 

Faith and Righteousness: A Meditation on Hebrews 11 for the 9th Sunday after Pentecost

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for,

the evidence of things not seen.

For by it the elders obtained a good report.

Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God,

so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain,

by which he obtained witness that he was righteous,

God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.

 By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death;

and was not found, because God had translated him:

for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.

But without faith it is impossible to please him:

for he that cometh to God must believe that he is,

and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

 

It is easy, I think, to consider faith only as an abstraction.  It might seem as if faith is a matter only of the individual conscience or a meditation of the individual mind, bound only to the shifting considerations or values which people assign to them.  Yet Scripture presents a different image of faith, particularly in regard to the true and living God:  faith in Him is imputed as righteousness to those who believe in Him.  Far from an individual abstraction of passing whimsy, the faith St. Paul elucidates from the Old Testament Scriptures in his letter to the Hebrews is one that lives, trusts, and walks according to the promises of God.  Abel trusted God, and his testimony of the blood sacrifice forever echoes as a foreshadowing of the Cross of Christ, even though Abel has been dead and buried since time immemorial.  Similarly with Enoch, who walked with God in faith and one day was simply translated into God’s Kingdom, leaving behind the ancient testimony that God found Enoch’s faith pleasing in His sight.  This kind of faith is not simply an individual exercise without external consequence, but a living relationship with God by His Eternal Word that unites the individual with their Maker, and through Him to all those who put their trust in Him.  The Kingdom of God is built together and united by the faith of those who trust in Him to be their Savior, creating the reality not only of our individual salvation, but of our unity as the redeemed People of God.

 

Thus it is not surprising that Paul would write, Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.  Faith is more than a human idea, but a reality created by the Word of God.  The testimony of Abel’s faith differs from that of Cain who slew him, because Abel trusted in the Word of God which foreshadowed the coming of the Messiah, and Cain tried to approach God on his own terms—or perhaps said differently, Abel trusted in God’s Word, and Cain trusted in his own.  In turn, Abel’s witness endured by the power of the living God’s Promise even after he was slain, while Cain’s witness was cemented in judgment according God’s Law.  The Word of God governed them both, but only by faith did the one receive grace which transcended death, while the other received condemnation despite the continuance of his cursed life in this world.  Likewise with Enoch who walked with God while the whole world was falling into the depravity which soon would prompt the universal deluge and Noah’s building of the ark.  Enoch’s faith received grace from his saving Lord and eternal life in God’s Kingdom, while the unbelief of the world received wrath under the judgment of God’s Law.  Unlike human words and ideas that flit into or out of our minds every day, the Word of the Lord endures forever, and His ideas frame the whole of reality.  We will either live in that Word by faith, or we will perish under that Word by unbelief, for there is nothing more real and consequential to our very existence as rational beings, and of the whole creation, than the Word of the Living God.

 

It is therefore necessary that we understand what faith is, as it is the only means by which the Lord is pleased with us, and through which He imputes to us His righteousness.  Such faith cannot be a human work begun in the human mind, because the fallen minds of men cannot in their depravity ascend to the King of the Universe.  Our thoughts, our words, and the deeds which follow from them, originate in our fallen nature which seems adept only in corruption and evil.  Any faith generated solely from inside ourselves will be disordered and misplaced, either creating pagan idols of the natural order around us, developing vain philosophies of aggrandizement and despair, or attempting to deify ourselves in some selfish quest for money, fame, power, or pleasure.  For faith to be saving and unite us to God, it must first come to us from God, which is precisely why God speaks His Word to us in the first place.  The Word, will, and thought of God presses toward us and into our corrupted minds, giving us something far greater to trust in than we could ever develop on our own.  His Word teaches us where we come from, how we’ve fallen, the righteousness we cannot attain by our own powers, and the promise of salvation made to us by the life, death, and resurrection of His Only Begotten Son.  His Word comes to us as the Way, the Truth, and the Life which only He can provide, and which we can only hope to receive as the free gift of His saving love for us.  This Word of Law of Gospel creates in us the only kind of faith that can transform a condemned sinner into a child of God; a faith which repents before the revelation of our unrighteousness, lives by trusting in His promise of forgiveness and eternal life, that He might impute to us the saving righteousness of Jesus Christ.

 

Far from faith as a work or action or contemplation on the part of sinful men, faith is revealed as a work of God alone through His Eternal Word.  The ability to receive that Word and trust in it is an effect of the Holy Spirit working through that Word, which reconciles sinful people to the Father.  Thus even as faith declares the reality of the Holy Trinity, it is the Holy Trinity which is revealed as the source and summit of our faith:  The Father as the Creator of all things, seen and unseen; the Son, though Whom all things were made; the Spirit, the giver of life, who proceeding from the Father and the Son, testifies and draws all men into that blessed Trinitarian fellowship.  This One God in Three Persons, undivided and unconfused, is the sole source, means, and surety of saving faith, through which alone we receive grace and mercy and eternal life.  Here is reconciled the tandem truth that the just shall live by faith, and that by faith we are justified in His sight.  For we know that by the works of the Law no flesh shall be justified in His sight, and that if grace is received as the wages of human works, it is no longer grace, and the Cross of Christ is made meaningless.  Such revelation might seem like folly to a fallen and finite mind which cannot perceive how faith in God originates from outside himself, but the reality revealed in Christ alone is that only by an alien faith which produces an alien righteousness, can we be saved by an alien grace so rich and free.  Only our saving God could conceive such a thing to make it an eternal reality, and only He could bring such salvation to us by the power of His Eternal Word.

 

If today you have lamented your lack of faith, or the weakness of your mind and heart and will to build an enduring bridge of fellowship with your Maker, be of good cheer:  for God Himself has accomplished what you could not, so that you might have what you could never earn, and live as you could never imagine possible.  In Christ alone is the salvation of the world accomplished, that by Christ alone all might hear the Gospel of redemption, and faith would come by hearing the Word of God—not by the power of human hearing or the charisma of human preaching, but by the omnipotent power of the Holy Spirit, reconciling the world to the Father through the Son.  Hear His Word to you this day, that today and everyday unto ages of ages, you may live in Him by grace through faith in Christ alone.  Amen.