“Word for Today” – 1 John 3 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
I have never had much of a green thumb. Just the other day, my wife and I received an email asking us to purchase some poinsettias as part of a fundraiser. After agreeing to the offer because the proceeds go to a good cause, we also agreed to find good homes for them. After all, if we were to keep them, they wouldn’t last a week. For I never have had much of a green thumb.
I can remember, when I was in second grade, how my class planted seeds in Dixie cups and placed them on the windowsill and waited for them to grow. Many of my classmates’ seeds sprouted quickly, beautiful, and heartily. Mine, on the other hand, never broke its soil. Indeed, the only seed I have ever had that has done anything impressive is birdseed. The pigeons loved me.
In our reading for today from 1 John 3, the apostle speaks of a Christian’s life in Jesus: “No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God” (verse 9). A Christian, John says, has God’s seed in him. What seed is this? It is the same seed promised by God as he cursed Satan for his beguilement: “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel” (Genesis 3:15). God promised a Seed from Eve who would crush Satan’s head. Who is this Seed? None other than Jesus Christ. Indeed, Jesus even speaks of himself as Seed when he foretells his death: “I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds” (John 12:24). Jesus, through his death on the cross as the Seed of Eve, produces many seeds. These seeds, in turn, are we who are “called children of God” (verse 1). We are the seeds of God.
Commenting on the Lord’s Prayer, Martin Luther writes, “God would tenderly encourage us to believe that he is our true father and that we are his true children, so that we may ask him confidently with all assurance, as dear children ask their dear father” (SC III:2). This is John’s encouragement as well. We, as Christians, are invited to approach God as our Father, for we are his children – we are his seeds.
With what do you need to approach God today? Is there something heavy on your heart? Is there a trial that you face? Perhaps there is a daunting decision that you have to make. Whatever it is, don’t forget to turn to your heavenly Father for the guidance and strength you need. He will always be there to here and to help. After all, you are family. You are his child. You are his seed.
“Word for Today” – 1 John 2 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
I suppose it was bound to happen sooner or later. A couple of months ago, I received a link in my email inbox to a YouTube video which made the unfounded claim that our president was the antichrist. Honestly, I just groaned a little bit. My heart also sank, knowing that this video was frightening some beloved Christian friends of mine with its polemical antics and misconstrued exegesis.
It seems as though just about everyone and everything has been called the antichrist at one time or another. The Roman Empire was seen as the antichrist in the first century. The Protestant reformers thought of the papacy as the antichrist. Then, there have been the usual more recent historical suspects: Hitler, Mussolini, our former president, and yes, our current president. I’ve even seen a few people try to argue that Billy Graham is the antichrist!
Blessedly, our reading for today from 1 John 2 encourages us to dispose of such juvenile and foolish speculation and leads us toward a more reasoned theology of the antichrist:
Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us. (verses 18-19)
A few things are notable about this passage. First, worries about the antichrist are nothing new. Apparently, Christians in John’s day were also worried about this mysterious figure. Second, lest we recklessly dump the title of “antichrist” on any politician for whom we might not particularly care, John seems to indicate in verse 19 that the antichrist will come out of the church, not the secular world: “They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us.” The Lutheran reformers picked up on this line and on Paul’s words in 2 Thessalonians 2 and so wrote: The antichrist is “someone reigning in the church, not a pagan ruler…because he will invent doctrine that conflicts with the gospel and will arrogate to himself divine authority” (Tr. 39). Thus, the antichrist seems to be someone who is interested in perverting true doctrine, not just in gaining secular power. Third, notice that John mentions not just one antichrist, but “many antichrists.” In other words, looking for just one antichrist is a fool’s chase. For there are many antichrists.
The Greek prefix anti- means “in place of.” An antichrist, then, is anyone who sets him or her self up in place of the true Christ who is God. And John warns that there are many who do this. In fact, if you want to know who the first antichrists were, you need look no farther than Genesis 3:
Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’? The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’” “You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Genesis 3:1-5)
“You will be like God.” That’s the very definition of an antichrist – one who wants to be in the place of God. And so the very first antichrists are born. Their names? Adam and Eve.
On September 10, 1813, after defeating the British fleet in the Battle of Lake Erie, Commander Oliver Perry, sent the following message Major General William Harrison concerning their victory: “We have met the enemy, and they are ours.” This famous saying was later paraphrased in 1971 by Walt Kelly in his Pogo cartoon strip as, “We have met the enemy, and he is us.” Sadly, this is the case when it comes to John’s antichrist. So often, people speculate wildly about the identity of the antichrist. We are blind, however, to the fact that, at least in one sense, we have met the antichrist, and he is us. For all we seek to put ourselves in God’s place every time we sin. We all have a little bit of antichrist in us.
Of course, the good news of the gospel is that we don’t have to continue to play the role of Christ. After all, playing the role Christ is hard work. Playing the role Christ involves the cross. No, we don’t have to save the world and rule the universe, for we have someone who saves and rules it sovereignly, lovingly, and more efficiently than we ever could. And he is the true God. So let’s leave that to him.
Finally, we need not fear antichrists. Indeed, we need not fear even the great antichrist, spoken of in 2 Thessalonians 2, who will arise at the end of the time. For as powerful as that final antichrist might be, he’s no match for the real Christ. And it’s the real Christ who we trust. It’s the real Christ who we worship. It’s the real Christ who holds our salvation secure. Don’t settle for anything less than him.
“Word for Today” – 1 John 1 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
On a fairly consistent basis, I am called upon to answer questions from people who email the church looking for information concerning Concordia’s beliefs, practices, or ministries. Because these emails are not sent specifically to me, but to the church in general, I try to stay keenly aware that I am answering on behalf of my beloved congregation. Therefore, I am very careful and precise in how I answer these questions because I want to present Concordia in the best light possible. It is with this in mind that I have developed an intentional grammatical habit. Whenever I write someone on behalf of Concordia, I use first person plural pronouns rather than first person singular ones. For example, if I was to share Concordia’s mission, I would write, “We want to shine like stars in the universe” rather than “I want to shine like a star in the universe” because I am writing on behalf of the congregation. My hope, when writing such letters, is that the person to whom I am writing will eventually become a part of that first personal plural pronoun. For we at Concordia have a deep and abiding passion to welcome more and more people into our beloved family of faith.
The deep and abiding passion that runs through Concordia is clearly shared by the apostle John in our reading for today from 1 John 1. John, although writing personally, begins his letter with a communal pronoun: “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched – this we proclaim concerning the Word of life” (verse 1). If John is the singular author of this letter, why would he use the plural pronoun “we”? Because John is not just writing for himself, he’s writing on behalf of the apostles. For all of the apostles had seen with their eyes and touched with their hand God’s very Word of life, Jesus Christ. And not only that, they received a message from him:
This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. (verses 5-8)
A significant shift in the referent of the first person plural pronouns occurs at verse 6. In verses 1-4, John’s “we” refers only to John and his apostolic band. But in verses 6-9, John uses the first person plural pronoun “we” to refer to the sinfulness of all Christians and how they are all purified by the blood of Christ. In other words, the “we” of verses 6-9 includes a lot more people than does the “we” of verses 1-4. And it’s in these pronouns that John’s deep and abiding passion is to be found. For the “we” of apostles in verses 1-4 proclaims the gospel message to the “you” of verse 5, who subsequently are included in the “we” of all Christians in verses 6-9. This, then, is the mission of God: to take people from being “you’s” of the world and make them into “we’s” in the family of God. God wants his first person plural pronoun of his church to grow larger and larger.
“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in his there is no darkness at all” (verse 5). With whom can you share this message today? There are so many people going through dark times who need the light of Christ to shine on their hearts. And when his light does shine on their hearts, they become part of us – they become part of God’s “we.” For they have been purified from all unrighteousness by the blood of Jesus. Here’s to the growing “we” of God’s Kingdom.
“Word for Today” – Ephesians 6 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
The iconic, even if somewhat aloof, CEO of Apple Inc., Steve Jobs, is well known for his highly anticipated keynote addresses, known as Stevenotes, delivered at Apple events all over the country. His “Stevenotes” follow a predictable pattern. He begins by presenting sales figures and reviews for Apple products released over the past few months. He continues by presenting new products of moderate importance. After that, he feigns some concluding remarks, turns to leave the stage, but then turns back and says, “But there is one more thing…” And that “one more thing” is always his biggest announcement. With this phrase he has introduced the wireless AirPort base station, the MacBook Pro, and the iPod Touch. The “one more thing,” it turns out, always seems to be the most important thing.
The book of Ephesians could be considered a keynote address of sorts. For in this little epistle, Paul covers many issues of importance to the Christian faith: God’s divine choice in election (cf. 1:3-14), salvation by grace through faith (cf. 2:1-10), Jewish and Gentile relations (cf. 3:1-13), unity in Christ (cf. 4:1-6), and the order of a Christian household (cf. 5:22-6:9). Indeed, some scholars believe this letter is written as a primer in Christian doctrine, intended not only for the Ephesians, but as a circular letter for all Christians everywhere. This theory is derived in part from the fact that the earliest manuscripts of this letter omit the reference to Ephesus in 1:1. Thus, although I would contend this letter was indeed for the Ephesian church because of other testimonies from antiquity, I would also contend that this letter was not for the Ephesians alone. It was intended to be passed around as a keynote address.
In our reading for today from Ephesians 6, Paul is wrapping up his keynote address. He has addressed both towering points of Christian doctrine and practical points of Christian life. It seems as though Paul has finished. But then, we read this word: “Finally” (verse 10). In Greek, this is the word loipos, most often translated in the New Testament as “other.” The scene is this: Paul has addressed many things in his letter. His address now at last seems to be at its terminus. He has wrapped things up, is walking off stage, but then, pauses, turns, and announces: “Loipos. This is one other thing. There is one more thing.” And Paul’s “one more thing” is a huge thing:
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. (verses 10-12)
Paul’s “one more thing” turns out to be a treatise on spiritual warfare. For Satan will relentlessly try to entice and attack those who believe and confess the doctrine contained in this letter. So Paul issues a call to Christians to gird themselves with God’s spiritual armor. In his explanation of this armor, Paul mentions “the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God” (verse 17). Satan is helpless against the sure and certain promises of God’s Word. Martin Luther reminds us:
You will surely have the devil around you…Now, what is the devil? Nothing else than what the Scriptures call him: a liar and a murderer. A liar who entices the heart away from God’s Word and blinds it, making you unable to feel your need or to come to Christ. A murderer who begrudges you every hour of your life…Try this, therefore, and practice it well. Just examine yourself, or look around a little, and cling only to the Scriptures. (LC V:80-83)
“Cling only to the Scriptures.” For this is God’s effective armor against Satan. Indeed, no piety, no work, and no effort of our own can defeat the evil one. Only God’s Word and the message of Christ can accomplish such a feat. And so we cling to that.
Is Satan attacking you? Open the Scriptures, ponder their promises, and trust in the One whom the Scriptures reveal, Jesus Christ. For his victory over sin, death, and the devil and for you is assured. And that’s not just “one more thing,” that’s the very best thing. For that is the gospel. Praise be to God.
“Word for Today” – Ephesians 5 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
“A man has the rule of this household by nature, for the deliberative faculty of a woman is inferior, in children it does not yet exist, and in the case of slaves, it is completely absent” (1 Hezekiah 14:7). Actually, Hezekiah didn’t really say this. In fact, the book of 1 Hezekiah doesn’t even exist. Rather, these words were said by Arius Didymus, the great Stoic philosopher, who is here quoting Caesar Augustus’ position on how a household is to be ordered. And Didymus’ delineations for a household are clear, crisp, and concise: The man is at the top and everyone else is beneath him.
Such instructions were not unusual in and were widely accepted by ancient Roman society. What is unusual, however, are the instructions that Paul offers concerning the first century, and twenty-first century, household in our reading for today from Ephesians 5:
Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. (verses 22-28)
Paul continues in Ephesians 6 by speaking to other members of the family:
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother” – which is the first commandment with a promise – “that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.” Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but like slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not men, because you know that the Lord will reward everyone for whatever good he does, whether he is slave or free. And masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him. (verses 1-9)
A few things are notable about the way that Paul addresses a family’s order compared to how others addressed this same order. First, Paul addresses all the members of the family, not just the father. Because it was assumed, as demonstrated by the quote from Didymus above, that only the father had the rational abilities necessary to keep his family in order, only fathers were addressed. In Paul’s delineation of household duties, however, each member is addressed as a competent, rational human being who has something to contribute to the harmony of the family.
Second, Roman household structures assumed that a man was fit for command over his house simply by his natural aptitude as a male. As Aristotle says, “The male is by nature fitter for command than the female” (Politics 1.12). Paul says that a man is head over a household not because of some sort of innate superior aptitude, but because God has placed him there. Thus, a man is answerable to the God who places him in such an important position and thus ought to discharge his duties carefully and with much grace, following the lead of his heavenly Father.
Finally, we must not overlook how Paul opens his instructions concerning Christian households: “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ” (verse 21). For Paul, a healthy household is built not on power, but on loving submission – a desire to consider the needs and prerogatives of others before considering your own. For this is what Christ has done with us. He willingly submitted himself to the tortures of the cross so that we could be reconciled to God and be reckoned as “fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household” (Ephesians 2:19).
So today, give thanks to God for your family and ask yourself, “How can I discharge my duties toward my family in a godly, faithful, and loving way?” It won’t always be easy, but it will always be worth it. For we each have a roll to play in our families.
“Word for Today” – Ephesians 4 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
E pluribus unum. “Out of many, one.” If only it were true. Yes, this motto appears on our currency and on the seals of our president and vice-president. It was even the de facto motto of our country before “In God we trust” was adopted in 1956. But a perusal of a newspaper or a surf through some cable news channels quickly jars anyone who might be serenely snoring in the dust of an imaginary national unity and drags them wide awake into the harsh reality of our prevailing partisanship. E pluribus plures. “Out of many, many.” We can’t seem to agree on much of anything.
I suppose it was bound to happen. For trying to unify different people with different ideologies is no small feat. And even if such a conglomerate of people is unified for a time, such unity never lasts. For humans, thanks to sin, have a proclivity to fracture from each other rather than to walk with each other.
There is an old story about a man who is marooned on a desert island for nearly a decade. One day, mercifully, some rescuers finally come along. Upon arriving, the rescuers find two shacks. Thinking there is another castaway on the island, they ask the man, “Why are there two shacks? Is someone else with you?” “No,” replies the man. “I sleep under the stars. The shack is where I go to church.” “What about the other shack?” inquire the rescuers. “What’s that for?” “Oh,” replies the man with an edge of indignation in his voice, “That’s where I used to go to church.” E pluribus plures. It seems humans will find a way to separate from each other – even when there’s only one human.
Like our nation’s historic motto, the Scriptures also issue a clarion call toward unity, as can be found in today’s reading from Ephesians 4: “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace” (verse 3). The difference between Scripture’s call to unity and our nation’s call to unity, however, is that whereas our nation takes the many and in vain tries to make them one, Scripture begins with the one God who then serves as the great unifier for his many people. Indeed, this is exactly how the apostle Paul delineates Christian unity in this chapter. He begins with the unity of God and his gifts:
There is one body and one Spirit – just as you were called to one hope when you were called – one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. (verses 4-6).
Paul uses the word “one” seven times in these verses. Thus, the things of this list, describing God and his gifts, are the hallmark, source, and sustainer of true unity. Paul then continues by explaining how this divine unity brings together the many in the body of Christ:
It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. (verses 11-13)
The one Christ gives gifts to his many people so that they may experience the joy and blessing of being unified by Christ. Ex uno plures. “Out of one, many.” This is how true and lasting unity happens – not by taking many disparate, dissident factions and striving to unify them by human effort, but by beginning with the unified Godhead whose unity can bring even the most dis-unified people together. Praise be to God that we are one, not of ourselves, but in Christ!
“Word for Today” – Ephesians 3 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
It seems as though almost every person goes through a season in life where they feel the need to “prove themselves.” In my case, I have gone through several such seasons. For instance, when I was a first year student at seminary, studying to become a pastor, I felt the need to prove myself intellectually. This sometimes meant feigning knowledge about things which I did not understand.
I can remember one evening when I, a lowly first year seminary student, was chatting with some more educated, more insightful, more erudite fourth year seminary students. They were talking to me about the centrality of the Verba in worship. What? You don’t what the Verba is? That’s okay, neither did I. But I pretended I did and tried my best to sound intelligent while, in the final analysis, contributing nothing of substance to the conversation because I didn’t even understand what was being talked about.
The Verba is Latin for “words” and refers to the Words of Institution spoken by the pastor when the Lord’s Supper is celebrated. If I would have been humble enough to admit my own ignorance, perhaps I could have learned something from that conversation that evening rather than walking away confused and bewildered.
Humility, it seems, is a lost virtue on many people. Sadly, it is regularly replaced by two other sinful dispositions – that of haughtiness on the one hand and self-hatred on the other. Haughtiness is when a person refuses to admit there is a God, and they’re not it! A haughty person will not fess up to their mistakes and shortcomings. Self-hatred, although it may masquerade as humility, is really a refusal to be thankful for life. Like a haughty person, a self-hating person refuses to admit there is a God who made them “fearfully and wonderfully” (cf. Psalm 139:14). For both the haughty and the self-hating, humility is sorely needed.
The apostle Paul, in our reading for today from Ephesians 3, models what it means to live a humble life. On the one hand, Paul certainly does not hate himself. Indeed, he defends himself against those who would seek to disparage him and his ministry:
Surely you have heard about the administration of God’s grace that was given to me for you, that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have already written briefly. In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to men in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets. (verses 2-5)
With these words, Paul claims apostolic authority and “insight into the mystery of Christ.” He further asks that his words be read by the Ephesians. This does not mean that Paul asks that his words be scanned personally and silently, but that his words be read aloud publicly in the context of an Ephesian worship service. Paul, then, seems to have quite a high estimation of his words and authority. Indeed, elsewhere, he claims that his words are God’s words (cf. 2 Corinthians 13:3), a claim which is defended by the Christian doctrine of the inspiration of all Scripture. Yet, Paul is no haughty egotist with false messianic delusions. For his confidence in the grace of God, not in himself, as he says just verses later:
Although I am less than the least of all God’s people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things. (verses 8-9)
Paul freely and fully admits that he is the “less than the least of all God’s people,” for he once fiercely persecuted the church, “breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples” (Acts 9:1). Thus, he does not seek to minimize or marginalize his sin.
This, then, is true humility: To be confident in God and the gifts and authority which he has given you by his grace while also having a sober estimation of yourself and your sin. Humility is not haughtiness nor is it self-hatred. Rather, it is seeing yourself as God sees you: As his imperfect, yet beloved child. Do you see yourself this way?
“Word for Today” – Ephesians 2 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
The other day, I was updating some information on my Facebook profile. Under a section titled “Personal Interests,” I came across the obligatory list of “Favorites,” a standard feature of every social networking site. Favorite music? Anything country. Favorite movie? Shawshank Redemption. Favorite book? Hmmm, let me think real hard. Perhaps I should go with the Bible. Favorite quotation? From my favorite book, of course: “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).
We all have favorites. My favorite color is green. My favorite team is the Texas Longhorns. My favorite food is cheese. For all the favorites we’re allowed to have, however, there are some instances when playing favorites is generally considered taboo. Parents, for instance, are not supposed play favorites amongst their children. Pastors, like myself, are not supposed to play favorites amongst people in their congregation. Do you want to know a secret, though? I play favorites. In fact, I have a favorite member. She’s five foot four, has curly brown hair, beautiful blue eyes, and an effervescent personality that brings me ever-increasing joy. Her name is Melody. And the best part is, she’s not only a congregational member, she’s also my wife.
This may come as a surprise to you, but just like I play favorites with my wife, God plays favorites too. Indeed, this is precisely Paul’s assertion in our reading for today from Ephesians 2: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast” (verses 8-9). Paul here decries the deficiency of human works while extolling the complete sufficiency of God’s grace for salvation. The Greek word for “grace” is charis, meaning “favor.” In other words, God’s favor toward you serves as the source of your salvation. You are God’s favorite!
On Saturday, the Christian Church will celebrate the 492nd anniversary of its Reformation, traditionally commemorated when a monk named Martin Luther nailed ninety-five theses to a church door in Wittenberg, Germany, protesting the false doctrines and practices which had arisen in the Roman Catholic Church of his day. At the heart of Luther’s Reformation was an insistence that we cannot earn God’s favor, or grace, but that God freely gives it because of the death and resurrection of his Son, Jesus Christ.
Before Luther properly understood God’s grace, he lived in paralyzing anxiety, always afraid that his sin would turn back God’s favor and instead incite God’s wrath. But then he discovered the beautiful promise of Ephesians 2: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves…” Our works, no matter how pious, do not make us God’s favorites. Rather, God freely and recklessly plays favorites with those who are undeserving and ill-deserving out of his love and because of his Son. As Luther himself so eloquently says:
Grace is freely given to the most undeserving and unworthy and is not obtained by any strenuous efforts, endeavors, or works, either small or great, not even by the efforts of the best and most honorable men who have sought and followed righteousness with a burning zeal. (What Luther Says, 1840)
You are God’s favorite! This is the message of the Reformation and, more importantly, this is the message of the gospel. When humans play favorites with others, it usually leads to jealousy, suspicion, and dissension. But when God plays favorites with us, it leads to our salvation. Praise be to God for his charis – his favoritism!
“Word for Today” – Ephesians 1 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
Our reading for today from Ephesians 1 addresses one of Scripture’s most infamous doctrines: predestination. As with other difficult theological questions, many people have a tendency to fall into one of two traps: a trap of anger or a trap of avoidance. Those tending toward the former trap become fixated on the controversial doctrines of Scripture and angrily decry anyone who would disagree with them, even if a disagreement has some Scriptural merit. Those tending to the latter trap offhandedly dismiss the tough doctrines of Scripture, no matter how salutary they might be. Of course, both responses to difficult doctrinal questions are unhelpful and, finally, ungodly. For we are called to engage with Scripture both humbly and intently. What follows is an attempt to do just that with the doctrine of predestination.
Because of the complexity of this doctrine, I thought it might be helpful to offer my best definition of predestination, gleaned from Ephesians 1, and then comment on the individual components of this definition. Here, then, is my definition of the doctrine: Predestination is when, to his praise, God chooses, by his grace, you for salvation.
“To his praise…” Predestination is doxological.
In the face of a doctrine which all too often invokes self-righteous anger on the one hand and timid avoidance on the other, Paul offers a different response to predestination: the response of praise. “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ…” (verse 3). This doctrine is so precious to Paul that it makes him burst out in a song of celebration. The Greek word for “praise” is eulogia, meaning, “to speak well.” In Greek, Paul uses this word twice more in this one verse. Thus, Paul’s intent in speaking of predestination is to speak well of this doctrine.
“God chooses…” Predestination is unilateral.
Predestination is not of ourselves. It is wholly and unilaterally God’s work. God chooses us. We do not choose God. This becomes clear when one considers the timing of predestination: “God chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight” (verse 4). Before we were born – yes, even before the world was created – God chose us to be his own. This stands contrary to those who hold to Arminiasm, which teaches that the human will cooperates with the divine will to choose salvation. As Augustine pointedly says: “God chose us according to the good pleasure of his will, so that nobody might glory concerning his own will, but about God’s will towards himself” (On The Predestination of the Saints, Ch. 37). Predestination finds its beginning and end in God’s will, not in humanity’s.
“By his grace…” Predestination is evangelical.
By saying that predestination is “evangelical,” I mean to say that predestination is of the gospel. Indeed, the Greek word for “gospel” is euangelion. That predestination is of the gospel seems to be precisely Paul’s assertion in this chapter. For Paul lumps predestination together with other terms commonly associated with the gospel: “love,” “adopted,” “grace,” “redemption,” “blood,” “forgiveness of sins” (cf. verses 4-7). Predestination, then, is simply another way to describe God’s good news: that God saved us when we could not save ourselves. He chose us to be his own. As Gerhard Forde aptly states: “Justification by faith and predestination are simply two sides of the same coin…Predestination is merely the article of justification stated with respect to God” (Justification by Faith: A Matter of Death and Life, 67).
“You for salvation…” Predestination is personal.
People’s problems with predestination often center on the doctrine’s philosophical corollaries rather than on the actual doctrine itself, as it is given to us in Scripture. Here’s what I mean. If predestination is wholly God’s choice, decree, and work, then that means we are trapped in a divinely wrought determinism, headed for either heaven or hell, helpless and hapless in the face of God’s whim. All we can do, then, is cry, “Que sera sera.” For we are merely puppets in the hands of a mysterious and capricious God. Indeed, this is the stance of Calvinism, which teaches a “double predestination” – that God, in his mysterious sovereignty, chooses some for salvation and some for damnation. Which one are you? Que sera sera.
This is not the way Paul speaks of predestination. As I have already mentioned above, predestination is connected to salvation, not to damnation. “Yes,” someone might protest, “But if God chooses some for salvation, but not everyone is saved, doesn’t that mean that God has, by default, chosen some for damnation?” Paul dispenses with such questions in short order by declaring:
And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession – to the praise of his glory. (verses 13-14)
Paul, rather than quibbling over the philosophical difficulties of this doctrine, simply says, “Predestination is not a philosophical theory, it is a theological and personal reality! You are included in salvation! God has chosen you! How do you know you are God’s predestined child? You have the Holy Spirit. He is your guarantee of salvation.”
Predestination, then, is not meant to be a doctrine which sends our heads spinning and our hearts worrying; rather, it is meant to be a doctrine which comforts us in our salvation and assures us of God’s love. For God loves us so much that he has taken care of every detail, even the detail of our choice. Rather than leaving our salvation up to our choice, God went through the trouble of choosing for us. And the best part is, God has chosen you.
“Word for Today” – Acts 28 – www.concordialutheranchurch.com
From a murderer to a god – this is the estimation of Paul by some islanders in our reading for today from Acts 28. Paul and his shipmates have just washed up on the shore of Malta after being shipwrecked by a storm (cf. Acts 27:27-44). Once safely ashore, Paul and his companion Luke recount their experience with the indigenous people thusly:
The islanders showed us unusual kindness. They built a fire and welcomed us all because it was raining and cold. Paul gathered a pile of brushwood and, as he put it on the fire, a viper, driven out by the heat, fastened itself on his hand. When the islanders saw the snake hanging from his hand, they said to each other, “This man must be a murderer; for though he escaped from the sea, Justice has not allowed him to live.” But Paul shook the snake off into the fire and suffered no ill effects. The people expected him to swell up or suddenly fall dead, but after waiting a long time and seeing nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god. (verses 2-6)
That’s quite a shift in these islanders’ evaluation of this man from Tarsus! And it makes Paul quite a sorry god. For any man who can at one moment be a common murderer and at the next moment be divine is not much of a deity.
The islanders at Malta, it seems, are fair-weather fans of all things divine. When a man is doing poorly, they treat him as a dissolute thug. When he is doing well, however, they are right there to cheer him on and even hail him as supernatural. It all depends on the fortuitous state of the man’s life as to whether or not he is called “god.”
We, of course, are much more enlightened about and faithful to the divine than were those superstitious islander brutes at Malta. Or are we? May I suggest that we, like those islanders, are all too often fair-weather fans of divinity? At a happy moment we may praise God for his marvelous work in our lives. But then again, in the midst of a hard trial, we may curse God for sabotaging our plans. At a time of need, we may call out to God in desperation. But then again, in a season of seeming self-sufficiency, we may all but forget that God even exists. We too are fair-weather fans of divinity.
Thankfully, even though we act as fair-weather fans of God, God never acts as a fair-weather fan of us! No, God is not a fair-weather, but a faithful fan of his people. Moses describes God’s faithfulness like this: “Know therefore that the LORD your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations” (Deuteronomy 7:9). Steadfast love indeed! After all, God has shown love to those who have rejected him, disobeyed him, cheated on him, and even disbelieved in his very existence. Yes, our God is not anything if not steadfast. Indeed, he is so steadfast that he even sent his Son, knowing that we, as sad fair-weather fans of divinity, would kill him.
The islanders took a man and made him a god in Paul. The proclamation of the Scriptures is that there is a God who made himself man in Jesus as testimony to God’s steadfast love. Do you trust him in good times and bad? Do you praise him – not only when he saves you, but when the snake of life bites you? Hold steadfastly to God. For he is holding steadfastly to you.
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