St Matthew 5:17-26/Exodus 20:1-17/Romans 6:1-11
Reception of new members by Transfer/Profession of Faith
In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.
When our Lord God delivered His Ten Commandments He didn’t do so in a vacuum. They must be received in the entire context of the call of Moses, the plagues, the Exodus, the miracle at the Red Sea, the water and manna and quail. It was God who did all these things on behalf of His people, not on account of their goodness, but according to His great mercy.
Thus He calls them to Himself at Mount Sinai and God spoke all these words, saying, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” He grounds the commandments in that historical act of redemption. They have their origin in His own essence. Thus the Law is good and right and holy because it is the holy will of God, who alone is good and right and holy. And a holy God calls to Himself a people, whom He makes holy by His Word and Spirit.
The Ten Commandments establish a kind of constitutional monarchy. Our God is not a tyrant. He could be. It is not wrong to speak of Him as sovereign, though we ought to be careful about pressing that too far. But He is not a tyrant. He is the Lord and He is our God. He ties Himself to the Law. He is not above it. And He gives it as His holy will for the ordering of the holy lives of His holy people.
How this actually works in your daily life is where the difficulty lies. We are Lutheran. We understand that there is at least a distinction between Law and Gospel. But how this plays itself out is easier said than done. Dr Luther once quipped that one who could rightly divide Law and Gospel is worthy of being called a doctor of the Church. By this he meant there are no doctors of the Church! Including himself.
We have all memorized the Ten Commandments. We had to. How well we remember them remains to be seen. But they are still important, 40, 50, or even 60 years after confirmation; as we’ll hear in a few moments at the Reaffirmation of Faith of six adults. A six year old can recite the Ten Commandments and comprehend their meaning. And we ought consider this and take it seriously.
But it is in the school of experience and by the work of the Holy Spirit, that they begin to take their full effect. We soon learn that we have broken them all, repeatedly. Likely none have taken a life in cold blood, but assuredly we have not kept our hearts from anger and our lips from slander. Our righteousness most certainly does not exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, not even close. Our Lord called them white washed tombs! What does that say of us?
Our holy God’s gift of His holy Law is for our good. They call us to repentance; to despair of our own righteousness and seek a whole other kind of righteousness – one manifest apart from the Law, though the Law points to it.
But here is an aspect of the Ten Commandments most of us did not learn: they are not imperatives. Well, they are, but not only. There is an ambiguity in the Hebrew language of the Ten Words. We usually read them, and we certainly keep them in our heads and hearts, as moral imperatives, as rules and commands. And they are. But they are also indicatives. Now if we have forgotten the Ten Commandments, likely we have forgotten ninth grade English, too. An indicative is a statement of fact, a description.
The Ten Words of God begin with His redemptive promise – I am the Lord your God who rescued and redeemed – and they continue with a description of His holy people: You will have no other gods than Me, the one, true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who called you out of slavery and rescued you from death. You will not take My Name in vain; the Name with which I have marked you as My people, holy as I am holy, imputing to you My righteousness. You will honor preaching and My Word. You will not kill. You will not steal. You will not lie. You will not covet.
And here we see the difficulty of applying the proper distinction of Law and Gospel. None of us deserve to be called doctors! In our fallen state, our Old Adam hears the commandments as just that – as rules. He hears them as a checklist that he can keep for God’s good favor. But the adequate completion of the chore list you give your kids doesn’t make them your kids! Rather, as your children, as members of your household, they will make their beds, they will take out the trash, they will clean up their toys. When they don’t they disappoint mom and dad and they feel guilty about it.
God has given His description of us as His sons and daughters in His Law. We have not lived up to that description. If we deny that, if we attempt to excuse ourselves, to relax one of the least of these commandments, we make God a liar. His holy Word, His Law and His Prophets, remain to call us to return to Him in repentance and faith. And they direct us to a whole other kind of righteousness that exists outside of the Law; a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, and must therefore be a righteousness that is not our own.
Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets, says Jesus; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. As the Law and the Prophets are the holy Word of a holy God, and have their origin in Him, so too do they have their fulfillment in Him.
When Jesus delivered His Sermon on the Mount, He didn’t do so in a vacuum. It must be understood in the wider context of His incarnation, baptism and fasting, His cross and passion, suffering and death, His resurrection and ascension. The Word of the Lord did not take up flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary to do away with the Old Testament. He came in the flesh to fulfill it! He came in the flesh to redeem His people from bondage to sin, to bring them out of the house of slavery to death and the devil. And He grounds His holy Gospel in the historical act of your redemption – His Cross!
Jesus is not a tyrant. He is our Lord and our God. And upon the cross He completes in His flesh all the Law and the Prophets. For He is the Word of God and He is His only Son. The description of that is the Ten Commandments do not rightly fit us, not if we are honest with ourselves. But they do describe Jesus. He feared, loved, and trusted in God His Father above all things. He called upon His Name in every trouble, prayed, praised, and gave thanks. He gave highest honor to preaching and the Word. Not only did He not kill, but He was never angry, never insulted, never said, “You fool!” He kept the Law. The Ten Words describe Him. His righteousness exceeded that of the scribes and Pharisees.
But for you, He went down into the hell of fire. He endured the punishment the breakers of the Law deserve. He is the perfect gift offered on the Altar of the Cross, by which you have been reconciled to the Father.
The death He died, He died to sin, once for all. And He was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. There is now no one to accuse you - not the Law, not the devil, not your conscience. In seeking to murder Jesus they spent themselves at the Cross; they are ones who are who are dead. Your debt has been paid, down to the last penny. And for you there is no judgment.
What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? You have died to sin. Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We where buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
You have been set free from sin, set free from the Law. But it has not been abolished. It remains, though not as imperatives or commands. It remains as a description of what sort of people you ought to be in lives of holiness and godliness (2 Pt 3:11). Jesus preaches His sermon to His Church, that is, to you, who have died with Him and also live with Him; a holy people gathered by a holy God called to live holy lives.
And this newness of life in which you walk looks like the Ten Words. It is a life lived not for yourself and certainly not for God, but for your neighbor, your brother. You are sons and daughters of your heavenly Father, not by your goodness, but according to His great mercy and love for you. You will help and support your neighbor in every physical need. You will help him to improve and protect his possessions and income. You will defend him, speak well of him, and explain everything in the kindest way. You will let go of grudges and anger and hatred. You will be reconciled to one another even as God has reconciled you to Himself in the death and resurrection of His Son.
These are the commandments of Jesus. And they are not burdensome (1 Jn 5:3). It is, in fact, the preaching of His Gospel, which is the free forgiveness of all your sins, the bestowal of a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, a righteousness apart from the Law that comes by faith in Christ. Your old self was crucified with Christ. You are no longer enslaved to sin; but servants of righteousness. Consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Reception of new members by Transfer/Profession of Faith
In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.
When our Lord God delivered His Ten Commandments He didn’t do so in a vacuum. They must be received in the entire context of the call of Moses, the plagues, the Exodus, the miracle at the Red Sea, the water and manna and quail. It was God who did all these things on behalf of His people, not on account of their goodness, but according to His great mercy.
Thus He calls them to Himself at Mount Sinai and God spoke all these words, saying, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” He grounds the commandments in that historical act of redemption. They have their origin in His own essence. Thus the Law is good and right and holy because it is the holy will of God, who alone is good and right and holy. And a holy God calls to Himself a people, whom He makes holy by His Word and Spirit.
The Ten Commandments establish a kind of constitutional monarchy. Our God is not a tyrant. He could be. It is not wrong to speak of Him as sovereign, though we ought to be careful about pressing that too far. But He is not a tyrant. He is the Lord and He is our God. He ties Himself to the Law. He is not above it. And He gives it as His holy will for the ordering of the holy lives of His holy people.
How this actually works in your daily life is where the difficulty lies. We are Lutheran. We understand that there is at least a distinction between Law and Gospel. But how this plays itself out is easier said than done. Dr Luther once quipped that one who could rightly divide Law and Gospel is worthy of being called a doctor of the Church. By this he meant there are no doctors of the Church! Including himself.
We have all memorized the Ten Commandments. We had to. How well we remember them remains to be seen. But they are still important, 40, 50, or even 60 years after confirmation; as we’ll hear in a few moments at the Reaffirmation of Faith of six adults. A six year old can recite the Ten Commandments and comprehend their meaning. And we ought consider this and take it seriously.
But it is in the school of experience and by the work of the Holy Spirit, that they begin to take their full effect. We soon learn that we have broken them all, repeatedly. Likely none have taken a life in cold blood, but assuredly we have not kept our hearts from anger and our lips from slander. Our righteousness most certainly does not exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees, not even close. Our Lord called them white washed tombs! What does that say of us?
Our holy God’s gift of His holy Law is for our good. They call us to repentance; to despair of our own righteousness and seek a whole other kind of righteousness – one manifest apart from the Law, though the Law points to it.
But here is an aspect of the Ten Commandments most of us did not learn: they are not imperatives. Well, they are, but not only. There is an ambiguity in the Hebrew language of the Ten Words. We usually read them, and we certainly keep them in our heads and hearts, as moral imperatives, as rules and commands. And they are. But they are also indicatives. Now if we have forgotten the Ten Commandments, likely we have forgotten ninth grade English, too. An indicative is a statement of fact, a description.
The Ten Words of God begin with His redemptive promise – I am the Lord your God who rescued and redeemed – and they continue with a description of His holy people: You will have no other gods than Me, the one, true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who called you out of slavery and rescued you from death. You will not take My Name in vain; the Name with which I have marked you as My people, holy as I am holy, imputing to you My righteousness. You will honor preaching and My Word. You will not kill. You will not steal. You will not lie. You will not covet.
And here we see the difficulty of applying the proper distinction of Law and Gospel. None of us deserve to be called doctors! In our fallen state, our Old Adam hears the commandments as just that – as rules. He hears them as a checklist that he can keep for God’s good favor. But the adequate completion of the chore list you give your kids doesn’t make them your kids! Rather, as your children, as members of your household, they will make their beds, they will take out the trash, they will clean up their toys. When they don’t they disappoint mom and dad and they feel guilty about it.
God has given His description of us as His sons and daughters in His Law. We have not lived up to that description. If we deny that, if we attempt to excuse ourselves, to relax one of the least of these commandments, we make God a liar. His holy Word, His Law and His Prophets, remain to call us to return to Him in repentance and faith. And they direct us to a whole other kind of righteousness that exists outside of the Law; a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, and must therefore be a righteousness that is not our own.
Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets, says Jesus; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. As the Law and the Prophets are the holy Word of a holy God, and have their origin in Him, so too do they have their fulfillment in Him.
When Jesus delivered His Sermon on the Mount, He didn’t do so in a vacuum. It must be understood in the wider context of His incarnation, baptism and fasting, His cross and passion, suffering and death, His resurrection and ascension. The Word of the Lord did not take up flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary to do away with the Old Testament. He came in the flesh to fulfill it! He came in the flesh to redeem His people from bondage to sin, to bring them out of the house of slavery to death and the devil. And He grounds His holy Gospel in the historical act of your redemption – His Cross!
Jesus is not a tyrant. He is our Lord and our God. And upon the cross He completes in His flesh all the Law and the Prophets. For He is the Word of God and He is His only Son. The description of that is the Ten Commandments do not rightly fit us, not if we are honest with ourselves. But they do describe Jesus. He feared, loved, and trusted in God His Father above all things. He called upon His Name in every trouble, prayed, praised, and gave thanks. He gave highest honor to preaching and the Word. Not only did He not kill, but He was never angry, never insulted, never said, “You fool!” He kept the Law. The Ten Words describe Him. His righteousness exceeded that of the scribes and Pharisees.
But for you, He went down into the hell of fire. He endured the punishment the breakers of the Law deserve. He is the perfect gift offered on the Altar of the Cross, by which you have been reconciled to the Father.
The death He died, He died to sin, once for all. And He was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. There is now no one to accuse you - not the Law, not the devil, not your conscience. In seeking to murder Jesus they spent themselves at the Cross; they are ones who are who are dead. Your debt has been paid, down to the last penny. And for you there is no judgment.
What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? You have died to sin. Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We where buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
You have been set free from sin, set free from the Law. But it has not been abolished. It remains, though not as imperatives or commands. It remains as a description of what sort of people you ought to be in lives of holiness and godliness (2 Pt 3:11). Jesus preaches His sermon to His Church, that is, to you, who have died with Him and also live with Him; a holy people gathered by a holy God called to live holy lives.
And this newness of life in which you walk looks like the Ten Words. It is a life lived not for yourself and certainly not for God, but for your neighbor, your brother. You are sons and daughters of your heavenly Father, not by your goodness, but according to His great mercy and love for you. You will help and support your neighbor in every physical need. You will help him to improve and protect his possessions and income. You will defend him, speak well of him, and explain everything in the kindest way. You will let go of grudges and anger and hatred. You will be reconciled to one another even as God has reconciled you to Himself in the death and resurrection of His Son.
These are the commandments of Jesus. And they are not burdensome (1 Jn 5:3). It is, in fact, the preaching of His Gospel, which is the free forgiveness of all your sins, the bestowal of a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, a righteousness apart from the Law that comes by faith in Christ. Your old self was crucified with Christ. You are no longer enslaved to sin; but servants of righteousness. Consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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