St. John 12:35-38

So Jesus said to them, “The light is among you for a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.”

When Jesus had said these things, he departed and hid himself from them. Though he had done so many signs before them, they still did not believe in him, so that the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:

“Lord, who has believed what he heard from us,
    and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”

The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. On their surface, those words from Jesus in our text are clear enough. The LORD said, “Let there be light” in His creating of the world, and He gave us eyes; because we’re meant to be able see. To not see is a disability for a person. But Jesus is talking about more than a person’s physical sight, as He has just recently come into Jerusalem on the week in which He would be arrested and crucified.

Old Testament Lesson

Our Old Testament lesson takes place during a time in Israel, when the people were walking around in spiritual darkness. Of their previous king, Ahaz (King David’s son), it says that contrary to his father, in his sixteen years as king, [Ahaz] did not do what was right in the eyes of the Lord (2 Chronicles 28:1). He had set up metal images of false gods, even burn[ing] his sons as an offering (like the ungodly people around tended to do). The writer notes, that the Lord humbled Judah because of Ahaz king of Israel, for he had made Judah act sinfully and had been very unfaithful to the Lord (28:19). He had led them wrongly.

Ahaz only got more wicked and idolatrous as the years went on. Before his death, it says of him, that he gathered together the vessels of the house of God and cut in pieces the vessels of the house of God, and he shut up the doors of the house of the Lord, and he made himself altars in every corner of Jerusalem. In every city of Judah he made high places to make offerings to other gods, provoking to anger the Lord, the God of his fathers (28:24-25).

This text from 2 Chronicles is our Old Testament lesson for this Reformation Day, because it’s about a time of spiritual darkness among God’s people, like the Reformation time was. The people were being led away from the light of God’s grace as proclaimed in the coming Messiah, into the darkness of false teaching and unbelief, led from safety into danger.

Reformation Time

Again, similarly, in Martin Luther’s time, in the late 1400s, people were being led away from the light of Jesus (God’s grace for them, the One Who makes them right with God), into the false teaching that said they must make themselves right before God, whether by their works, or even in the buying of indulgences—purchased-entrance into God’s kingdom. Many other false things people were being led to believe, demonstrate that it was a time of spiritual darkness for God’s people. They were walking in darkness, not knowing where they were going.

Of the time’s ungodly teaching, that people must pay honor to relics of saints—even praying to those saints and relying on them for help getting to heaven, Martin Luther would write:

The Word of God is the true holy thing above all holy things. Indeed, it is the only one we Christians acknowledge and have. Though we had all the bones of all the saints or all the holy and deconsecrated vestments gathered together in one heap, they could not help us in the slightest degree, for they are all dead things that can sanctify no one. But God’s Word is the treasure that sanctifies all things. By it all the saints themselves have been sanctified (LC, Third Commandment, 91)

Martin Luther had grown up afraid of God, unsure of his place with Him, unsure whether in his future he would be experiencing the joys of heaven, or the flames of hell. His insecurities had gotten even worse in early adulthood. He was so afraid of being consigned to suffering in Purgatory (one of the time’s fictional teachings), that he determined he must abandon the world, and seek to earn his way into heaven within the monastic life. As a monk in a monastery, He would pray, and study, and work, and even sort of punish himself, punish his body. He was doing it with the thought that if he did it to himself, less might be done to him by God.

A common theme in these texts, then: people being led away from the light of Christ, and into the darkness of false teaching. In the same chapter in which Jesus says the words of our text—before He says them, one of the things that’s happened is that, as people are curious to see Lazarus, whom, recently, Jesus has raised from the dead, the chief priests—these spiritual leaders—have been planning to kill Lazarus in order to end the talk. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going.

Our Time

How can it happen, that people who have the light end up in the darkness? Jesus said, as recorded in John’s gospel: the light has come into the world [speaking of Himself], and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed (John 3:19,20). Jesus (the light) would say to Pharisees and Scribes one time (who were concerned about whether or not his disciples washed their hands before eating): it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person (Matthew 15:11)…out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person. But to eat with unwashed hands does not defile anyone (15:19,20).”

He was commenting on the condition that all human beings share: their inherited sinful nature. All that’s needed for there to be a time like that described in our Old Testament lesson, and like Martin Luther’s time is for there to human beings present. All of them are corrupted with sin (you and me, too). Jesus’ urging in our text to, Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you, is as relevant as when He said it—as relevant for you as for them.

After all, Jesus would have your whole heart (Prov. 23:26). Has it ever really been the case? Has it been the case when you’ve thought of how to spend your time, how to spend your money, how to use the gifts and abilities He has given to you? Twice in our text, Jesus says the words: while you have the light. Before our text, He’d advised people, that anyone wanting eternal life must follow Him (12:25). Here, He kind of continues that thought. He’s instructing them to focus their attention on Him while they have opportunity to do so.

But the LORD fights for your attention amongst a lot of other things. Out of your own heart comes all of the sins Jesus mentioned. At times, your own life has been spent walking in the darkness, avoiding the light in this time when it is available to you.

Not so your Savior. His attention was always directed toward God’s kingdom, as exemplified in His statement as a twelve-year-old: “Didn’t you know I had to be in My Father’s House?” (Luke 2:49). Every morning when He woke from sleep He was on His way to God’s kingdom. He was on His way to ascending to glory in heaven, even knowing what would precede that ascension, knowing the cross and grave looming in the distance. On His way to it He would see what was necessitating it, see the hearts of people who were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd (Matthew 9:36), of spiritual leaders—even, whose envy would cause them to plan to kill Lazarus, and ultimately…Himself.

It didn’t deter Him even for a moment. He’d predicted His death twice just before our text, stating it as His purpose for having come. It was for you, who have walked in the darkness, not knowing where you were going. It was for your forgiveness and eternal life.

God’s people in our Old Testament lesson saw a reformation of sorts in their time. God sent the good king, Hezekiah, who oversaw the cleansing of God’s House, and the bringing back of His things that had been discarded under the wicked king—the one who’d been leading the people into darkness.

God’s people of Martin Luther’s time saw a Reformation. God sent Luther and other godly men, who restored Jesus to His rightful place among the people—the true teaching of Him from Scripture. The light was brought back to people who’d been walking in darkness.

There was the same need in your life, and all peoples’ lives, of being led from darkness into the light. For you personally, it came through your Baptism, or through your conversion through the hearing of God’s Word. Through those means, the Holy Spirit enabled you to see, see that in Jesus there’s no need to be fearful of God. He has made payment for all sins. He has opened God’s kingdom for you to enter without the doing of any works, without the further payment of any indulgence. Forgiveness for your sins was all that you needed; and you have it fully and freely in Jesus. God be praised. Amen.

John 8:31 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." 33 They answered him, "We are Abraham's descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?" 34 Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. 35 Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

Our text talks about being free. Martin Luther wanted that. I hope that the reason you leave your comfortable homes on Sunday mornings to come to this place, is because you want that too. I hope that it’s worth everything to you, in fact. Reformation Day is a good day to consider how gathering like this on these mornings relates to making you free.

To Luther, the desire to be free was worth closing himself away from 16th century Germany, becoming a monk in a monastery. There, with a heavily regimented and spiritually-directed life, maybe—he thought, he could escape the temptations of the world and avoid being sent to hell for his sins. Luther wasn’t imagining this need to be free from sin. He knew enough of the Bible to know that. Jesus says right in our text, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.

But in the monastery, Luther found he couldn’t escape the world’s temptations. They were still there. The sin was inside him (Jesus says that too). It’s an inherited condition—a person’s guilt, his inability to stop sinning. The more Luther tried not to sin, the more burdened and guilty he felt. He would confess to his superior, “What if I do resist temptation?  Am I not then proud of that resisting?” (Another sin). No matter what he did, Luther still felt imperfect before the perfect God who would surly send him to hell. Looking back on this time, Luther wrote: “I lived without reproach as a monk, but my conscience was disturbed to its very depths and all I knew about myself was that I was a sinner. I could not believe that anything that I thought or did or prayed satisfied God. I did not love, nay, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners.”

Again from our text:

John 8:31 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

Again, that’s what Luther wanted; to be spiritually free. He didn’t want to feel guilty (or be guilty) anymore. He found that freedom; but it wasn’t because of any effort to live a better life.

Jesus had said, “If you hold to my teaching…the truth will set you free.”  Jesus’ teaching was available in Bibles. Therein the Spirit could instruct a person. Very few had them though. Bibles. They were costly, and rarely (if ever) in the language regular people could understand. So people weren’t really reading the Bible. And the problem is that, spiritually, a person is always being instructed by someone—either by the Spirit through the Bible or by someone else (something for you to keep in mind this morning). The Bible not being available to people in Luther’s time was big problem.

To make matters worse, the church on earth on earth had lost its way in that time. Due to its earthly-minded teaching, what people generally believed is that you had to do enough good things to make up for the bad things you’ve done. Good things were acts of penance; pilgrimages; prayers to saints (who could potentially make you better with their goodness), viewing relics (religious junk the church had collected); even purchasing indulgences (papers that announced forgiveness to people living and dead). As a monk in the monastery, Martin Luther even abused his body, hoping it would make payment for his sins. He thought of Jesus as an angry judge (certainly not anyone to whom he could turn to be made free). It’s sad to say that in that day, the church’s way of making a person spiritually free didn’t work. It’s often said that the liturgy of the church is to be credited with a lot people’s salvation because God’s Word is the basis of it (it remains so today, by the way; that’s why we continue to hold to it today). The Scripturally-based Liturgy was reliable to make people free even though the church’s teachers were peddling worthless human doctrines.

By God’s grace, Luther’s superiors at the monastery ordered him to study the Bible.

But when he did so, he noticed that the church wasn’t teaching the message of the Bible. He hadn’t known the Biblical Jesus; He’d known someone else who was called that—someone that scared him. The Bible certainly taught that people need to be freed from the spiritual bondage of sin. But it wasn’t saying that that freedom comes from penance or pilgrimages, saints or relics, or indulgences. It wasn’t to be found by traveling to the “holy” city of Rome, or joining a monastery.

“If you hold to my teaching…the truth will set you free.” That’s what Jesus says in our text. In studying the Psalms, Luther learned that God is not merely an angry judge who wants to punish people for their sins, but rather a merciful God who wants to give people His righteousness. In studying Paul’s letter to the Romans, Luther found that salvation is by God’s grace alone through faith in Christ. God gives us faith through His Word and in baptism. He preserves that faith in us as we receive the Lord’s Supper.

Luther wrote these words in a letter after making this discovery: “Therefore, my sweet brother, learn Christ and him crucified: despairing of yourself, learn to pray to him. Saying, ‘You, Lord Jesus, are my righteousness, but I am your sin; you have taken on yourself what you were not and have given me what I was not.’ Beware of aspiring to such purity that you no longer wish to appear to yourself, or to be, a sinner.”

He meant, you’re never going to be perfect and sinless no matter how hard you try. God doesn’t want us to think of ourselves as being in a position to ever be deserving of good things from Him, or to somehow save ourselves. He wants us to do exactly as Luther advised his friend: “Pray to Jesus, saying, ‘You, Lord Jesus, are my righteousness, but I am your sin; you have taken on yourself what you were not and have given me what I was not.’”

In his commentary on the book of Romans, Luther wrote, “Note well that you will really be pious and free from sin if you believe that Christ makes you free by dying for you, shedding His blood, rising from the dead, and sitting at the right hand of God.” (vol.23,p.410)

• Christ has made the payment for your sins. You need only believe that to be saved.

• You know the truth, and the truth has set you free.

Martin Luther couldn’t keep this to himself. As the famous seller of indulgences, Johann Tetzel was approaching the town of Wittenberg, Germany on October 31, 1517, Martin Luther walked up to door of the Castle Church and posted 95 theses against the selling of indulgences. He wanted to discuss; to debate with theologians of the University and church. But it wasn’t meant to be. Before the Holy Roman Emperor, who demanded that Luther take back what he had said in opposition to the church, Luther said the famous words: Unless I am convinced with evidence from the Holy Scriptures or with open, clear, and distinct grounds and reasoning –and my conscience is captive to the Word of God – then I cannot and will not recant, because it is neither safe nor wise to act against conscience. Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me! Amen.”

Martin Luther had wanted to be free. He’d found the means of attaining—through the blood of Christ as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. Luther translated the Bible into German so that his people could know the truth, and compare the church’s teachings to the Word of God. They could hold to [Jesus’] teachings, and be his disciples, as it says in our text, knowing the truth that makes a person spiritually free.

When you are burdened by sins, robbed by Satan of the freedom that Christ has secured for you and wants you to experience for yourself, then consider Martin Luther’s strong statement on the subject:

“For if some complaint should be registered against a heart that believes in Christ, and testify against it concerning some evil deed, then the heart turns itself away, and turns to Christ, and says, ‘But he made satisfaction. He is the righteous One, and this is my defense. He died for me, He made my sin His own; and if He made my sin His own, then I do not have it, and I am free.’”

You are free. AMEN.

Reformation Service - 10/31/21

Acts 20:17-38

17 Now from Miletus he sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the church to come to him. 18 And when they came to him, he said to them:

“You yourselves know how I lived among you the whole time from the first day that I set foot in Asia, 19 serving the Lord with all humility and with tears and with trials that happened to me through the plots of the Jews; 20 how I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to house, 21 testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. 22 And now, behold, I am going to Jerusalem, constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, 23 except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me. 24 But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. 25 And now, behold, I know that none of you among whom I have gone about proclaiming the kingdom will see my face again. 26 Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all, 27 for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God. 28 Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. 29 I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; 30 and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things, to draw away the disciples after them. 31 Therefore be alert, remembering that for three years I did not cease night or day to admonish every one with tears. 32 And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified. 33 I coveted no one's silver or gold or apparel. 34 You yourselves know that these hands ministered to my necessities and to those who were with me. 35 In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”

36 And when he had said these things, he knelt down and prayed with them all. 37 And there was much weeping on the part of all; they embraced Paul and kissed him, 38 being sorrowful most of all because of the word he had spoken, that they would not see his face again. And they accompanied him to the ship.

St. Paul says goodbye in our text, to the elders at the church at Ephesus. He won’t be coming back this way again. The Spirit has made known to him that he must go to Jerusalem, and that he must testify of Christ to those who mean to do him harm (he won’t die there; but he is headed in that direction). No doubt Martin Luther had Paul in mind (among others) when he said in a letter in 1518: “From the beginning God's word is on this wise, that all who cleave to it must with the apostles be hourly prepared to suffer the loss of all things, nay, even to meet death itself.” In another letter a couple of years later, he said, “Take care not to hope that the cause of Christ can be advanced in the world peacefully and sweetly, since you see the battle has been waged with his own blood and that of the martyrs.”

The cause of Christ has been Paul’s very urgent business since being handpicked by Him on the road to Damascus to be His witness to both Jews and Gentiles. He reminds the Ephesian elders in our text, that he has done this work humbly and faithfully in the face of trials. He hasn’t shrunk in the past three years from declaring to them the whole counsel of God (in other words, everything that is necessary for them to know in order to have God’s grace that saves from sin and death). He has spoken of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the gospel of the grace of God, the news of Christ having obtained His Church with the shedding of His own blood. As Paul prepares to take his leave from them, he gives one last exhortation: Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock. 

We observe the Reformation today, and Martin Luther as someone who did just that. Reformation Day is really the anniversary of his having posted on the church door in 1517, in Wittenberg (in what’s now Germany), Ninety-Five Theses (or points of debate). He had come to the conclusion that a long-accepted practice of the church was ungodly, and taught people to put their trust somewhere other than in Christ. The practice was that of selling indulgences. Luther wrote of it in a letter: 

The poor souls [believe] that when they have purchased such letters they have secured their salvation, also, that the moment the money tingles in the box souls are delivered from purgatory, and that all sins will be forgiven through a letter of Indulgence… 

Of course, this wasn’t the truth according to Scripture. Luther wrote to the Archbishop a number of times on behalf of the people, encouraging him to do away with this practice. In one of his later attempts (with his patience having been exhausted) Luther said: I humbly request that your Grace would prove yourself to be a bishop, and not a wolf, permitting the poor flock to be robbed. You know that the Indulgence is sheer knavery, and that Christ alone ought to be preached to the people. He went on to say: Therefore I openly declare that unless the Indulgence is done away with, I must publicly attack your Grace…and [let] the world see the difference between a bishop and a wolf.

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, Paul says in our text. To do so is to do as Luther said in his letter, to preach Christ alone. He followed in Paul’s footsteps, who says in our text: I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified. 

The “word” he means is the word about Christ, Who obtained the Church with His own blood. It is the Word about God so loving the world that He gave His only-begotten Son as its Savior from sin. It’s the Word that proclaims God’s righteousness given free of charge to all who believe on Christ. It's the Word that promises resurrection from death to eternal life.

But Paul’s exhortation to pay careful attention is not given without good reason. Fierce wolves mingle among the flock to draw away the disciples after them. They draw them away from the flock by drawing them away from God’s Word. It doesn’t happen through some sort of loudly spoken invitation to leave the Word behind, but more subtly. It happens through a suggestion like was given to our first mother: Did God really say [basically, that you can’t have, that you can’t do - anything you want - is what he meant? Who is God to stand in the way of your happiness, anyway? Why should you be the only one around who limits yourself in this way? There isn’t really going to be any consequence for it. Our first mother was drawn away from God when His Word became less important to her than what she could reason out herself. Her reason told her that she’d be better off disobeying; so she disobeyed.

Fierce wolves mingle among us as well. There is a certain word, relevant, that kind of describes a thing or things that matter, that are kind of worth our time and attention. Relevant things grab our attention, in fact. They’re the things that are important to us. As far as society is concerned, some things are relevant, and others aren’t. The serpent convinced our first parents that God’s Word was irrelevant to them. 

Fierce wolves that attack Christ’s flock today, aim to convince you of the same. So, as far as you are concerned, then, is God’s Word relevant? What would demonstrate that to you, it is relevant? Has it been important to you compared to other things? Has it grabbed your attention? Have you considered it worth your time? Or, is it the case that the things the world considers relevant have occupied your mind and heart to a greater extent? Has their appeal become so substantial in your life that God’s Word is a speck off in the distance by comparison? In Luther’s time the indulgence was an example of something that was replacing Christ in the lives of church people. It was something they were grabbing hold of instead of Christ. The devil has worked hard in your life like in Eve’s life to offer you things to grab hold of instead of Christ. Hasn’t he succeed sometimes? Hasn’t he shown you just the right thing that has turned your head, that has repositioned your heart so that God’s Word was no longer the most important thing to you?

For a little perspective, consider how important it is to St. Paul, as he says to people weeping over him, and embracing him, and kissing him, and praying with him, that they will not see his face again. Testifying of this Word of Christ is so important that even continuing to live in this world isn’t more important than it. 

We observe the Reformation today because by God’s grace, he provided for us about fourteen hundred years after Paul, confessors who believed the same, and who paid careful attention to themselves and to all the flock. They knew that the message about Christ, Who makes sinners right with God was worth fighting for, and worth dying for. It’s the message about the One Whose absolute devotion to God’s Word stands in the place of yours and my occasional indifference to it, makes up for yours and my treating of it at times as irrelevant to us in the pattern of our first parents. It’s the message of the One Who obtained with His own blood your forgiveness for that sin and for all others. 

It was into faith in this message that you were baptized and brought into God’s family. Through it the Spirit has preserved your faith throughout these years of your life. It’s of the same message that Luther writes:

We are unable to accomplish anything against sin, death, and the devil by our own works. Therefore, Another appears for us and in our stead who definitely can do better; he gives us the victory, and commands us to accept it and not to doubt it. He says, ‘Be of good cheer; I have overcome the world’; and again: ‘I live, and you will live also, and no one will take your joy from you.’  

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock. Paul’s words were being spoken to elders in the congregation who were kind of overseeing the members (maybe like pastors do). But his exhortation is relevant to all of us, isn’t it? The message about Christ is the most precious treasure because it makes us right with God. Nothing else does. Christ’s righteousness covers your sins. In Him you are forgiven of sins. The Lutheran Confessors paid careful attention to themselves and to all the flock by uncovering the message of Christ that had been hidden under false teaching, and allowing it to shine so that sinners could know God’s grace, and the eternal peace that comes from it. Nothing is more relevant than that. 

The cause of Christ was Paul’s very urgent business. It was Martin Luther’s. Make it yours as well. No other suggestion, no other promise that would be made as an alternative to it will ever make you right with God. That cause alone is one through which you have forgiveness and eternal life. Amen.