Justification Archives - Page 3 of 8

June 7, 2024June 9, 2024

Catholicity and Fellowship in the One True Church

One of the key marks of the Church mentioned in the Apostles’, Nicene, and Athanasian Creeds is catholicity: “I believe in one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.”¹ This reflects the New Testament’s emphasis on the Church’s universality, unity, and harmony as delivered by the Holy Spirit. Humans are sinful and remain so even after being converted to the faith. As a result, resistance to the Spirit can disrupt this unity. However, sin can never ultimately shatter the fundamental unity of the catholic Church. Hence, in his high priestly prayer, Jesus famously prays that “they [the Church] may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (Jn. 17:21). Similarly, Paul spends most of 1 Corinthians advising the congregation at Corinth to humbly put aside their differences under the cross and engage in practices that will promote unity, as opposed to division, in the body of Christ.

Modern Christian theologians treat many of these calls for unity in the New Testament as carte blanche orders to impose institutional unity on the Church.² However, these passages must be counterbalanced by calls for members of the Church to separate themselves from the wicked (Matt. 18:17, 1 Cor. 5, 2 Cor. 6:14, 1 Jn. 2:19, Rev. 18:4). We often think of sin primarily in terms of individual actions that violate the commands to love our neighbor in the second table of the Ten Commandments. Yet, we just as frequently violate the commands of the first table of the law. This occurs when Christians spread or embrace false teachings about God and fail to honor and love him above all things. Sins against the first table of the law also constitute “wickedness.” Heresy, therefore, cannot be tolerated in the body of Christ, and separation must occur on an individual or corporate scale when false teaching occurs.

The New Testament admonishes believers not to have fellowship with those in grave moral error. It follows that Christians cannot have fellowship with groups or individuals who error in the fundamental articles of the faith. For example, St. Paul is quite clear that Christians should not participate in pagan worship or have fellowship with those who engage in such worship (1 Cor. 10:18-22). Participation in sacrifice to an idol and the consumption of sacrificed meat in an idolatrous setting is an act of fellowship with those who worship false gods and through them have unwitting fellowship with demons. Paul also compares the false fellowship of pagan worship with real communion with the true God conveyed by the sacrifices of the old covenantal order (1 Cor. 10:18), as well as the Christian Eucharist (1 Cor. 10:14-17).³

June 5, 2024June 5, 2024

For You: Certain Salvation In The Sacraments

The connection between the Word of God and something physical and tangible does not necessarily differentiate the ministry of the Word and the Sacrament for Martin Luther. But perhaps the function of the sacraments in the Christian life does differentiate them. The difficulty in most Protestant accounts of justification is a kind of monism of the auditory Word of God.¹ The believer hears the Word of God and appropriates it by faith. Luther would not disagree with this, but he extends the principle to the sacraments as well. Sacraments are visible promises, and promises must be believed.

Christians retain their sinful nature, which tempts them into unbelief. As a result, when believers rely upon the ministry of the Word of God alone without the complement of the sacraments, doubts about individual appropriation of the gospel can creep in. How does one know with certainty that the divine Word was meant for him or that he has actually received it?

The typical Protestant response has been to attempt to demonstrate faith’s authenticity through supplementary signs of the Spirit’s interior work. The problem is that all these alleged signs of the Spirit’s work can be easily faked, either consciously or unconsciously. By contrast, Luther sees the sacraments as ways of redirecting the sinner away from his own subjective doubt and into the objectivity of the Gospel promise in the tangible means of grace. In one fascinating passage in The Sacrament: Against the Fanatics of 1526, Luther writes:

When I preach his [Christ’s] death, it is in a public sermon in the congregation, in which I am addressing myself to no one individually; who grasp it, grasps it. But when I distribute the sacrament, I designate it for the individual who is receiving it; I give him Christ’s body and blood that he may have forgiveness, obtained through his death and preached in the congregation. This is something more than the congregational sermon; for although the same thing is present in the sermon as in the sacrament, here there is the advantage that it is directed at definite individuals. In the sermon one does not point out or portray any particular person, but in the sacrament it is given to you and to me in particular, so that the sermon comes to be our own. For when I say: “This is the body, which is given for you, this is the blood which is poured out for you for he forgiveness of sins,” I am therefore commemorating him; I proclaim and announce his death. Only it is not done publicly in the congregation but is directed at you alone.²

May 30, 2024May 30, 2024

Reconciliation through the Spirit in the Means of Grace

The same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead works through the Word and Sacrament ministry of the Church to share the universal and objective “not guilty” verdict of the Father. This verdict comes through the message of the death and resurrection of the Messiah. Those who receive the proclamation of justification by faith secure the very presence of the risen Jesus in the power of the Spirit. As the great cosmic judge, the Son of Man, Jesus now mediates the same verdict and presence he proleptically shared with the eschatological Israel in his earthly ministry through the Church.

The Church is defined by the means of grace to which Jesus has attached his Name, that is, his presence. Therefore, to be in contact with the means of grace is to both be in contact with the risen Jesus, and his body/bride the Church. The Church and the Divine Service (Gottesdienst) is the replacement for the Temple (Eph. 2:19-22) and its service. This is because the Church and its Divine Service are now the body of Jesus, the true eschatological Temple in the flesh (Jn. 1:14). As the Son of Man, Jesus proleptically elected and worked justification in the midst of the outcastes of Israel. He told his hearers beforehand what verdict he would render on them in light of their belief or unbelief in his words of judgment and grace.¹

May 28, 2024May 28, 2024

The Death of Christ as a Revelation of Sin

Christ’s regal and sacerdotal activity find their ultimate fulfillment in his prophetic office. Christ’s prophetic office does not merely encompass his teachings prior to his crucifixion, but is finally and most supremely fulfilled in his actualization of the testament of the gospel. The saving testament of the gospel is the message of his salvific cross and empty tomb. The cross and the empty tomb are the supreme act of revelation of the Triune God. St. Paul tells us that the omega-point of God’s revelatory activity, and the center of all proper Christian teaching, is the death and resurrection of Christ: “For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2). Martin Luther echoed this in his slogan: “The cross alone is our theology” (crux sola est nostra theologia).¹ In his Epistle to the Romans, the Apostle summarized the content of the revelation of the cross as: “[Christ] was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification” (Rom. 4:25).

Although the message of the cross’s ultimate telos is salvation, in Scripture salvation never comes apart from a corresponding act of judgment. Hence, the cross is not only a revelation of grace, but it is the means by which “[God] will destroy the wisdom of the wise [and] the intelligence of the intelligent” (1 Cor. 1:19). Jesus is “The stone that the builders rejected [that] has become the cornerstone” (Matt. 21:42). Hence, the crucifixion and empty tomb not only reveal the hidden plan of redemption, but also expose the true depths of human sin. The New Testament emphasizes that the exposure of the true depths of human sin in the cross occurs on two horizons: coram Deo (i.e., the divine-human relationship) and coram mundo (i.e., the human-human relationship).

February 10, 2022February 10, 2022

Words are Sacraments and Sacraments are a Kind of Word

In other words, for Luther, the Eucharist (and by implication Baptism as well), confirms for the individual what the word universally proclaims. The word of the gospel is addressed to everyone in the congregation, and therefore it is possible to worry that this promise may not apply to you as an individual, or you have not genuinely received it by faith. Nevertheless, the Lord’s Supper contains within it the same promise and presence of the risen Jesus as the sermon. For Luther, words are sacraments and sacraments are a kind of word. The difference between the sermon and the sacrament is that the latter is applied to the individual who directly receives it. When reflective faith invariably worries about whether or not one has individually received Jesus and his promise of forgiveness, the believer may rely on the sacraments to give them assurance. There can be here no doubt that you have personally received the promise in the form of the sacrament since it was you as an individual who heard the promise and consumed the elements. By receiving the Eucharistic elements, the promise and presence of Jesus are given to you as an in tangible and physical way that draws you out of your subjectivity and enthusiasm (Did I truly believe? Did I truly receive the promise?) to the objectivity of the gospel.