If you had the chance to look at the bulletin before the service and noticed the sermon theme, you may be a bit puzzled. “Saved by Works”? How can a Lutheran pastor preach about being saved by works, and on Reformation of all Sundays! Today is when you expect to hear how Martin Luther rediscovered the biblical truth that we are saved by grace through faith in Jesus, not saved by any of our efforts. But I stand by my sermon theme because we are saved by works – God’s works of course. Our sermon text from Romans 3 highlights what those works are and teaches us that while we have no hand in securing our eternal salvation, we can be absolutely certain of it.
Let me continue by reviewing a little Reformation history with you. Most historians mark October 31, 1517 as the beginning of the Reformation. That’s when a German monk named Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses or statements on a church door which served as a bulletin board for academics in the eastern German town of Wittenberg. Luther was concerned that the church in his day taught that one could get right with God if he tried hard enough to obey God’s commands. Luther had tried that. He had even left behind a promising career as a lawyer to join a monastery. But instead feeling satisfied that he was well on his way to heaven because of choices like these, Luther felt himself sliding uncontrollably towards God’s eternal anger, like a wagon full of potatoes careening down a hill towards a mighty oak tree. The reason Luther felt this way is because the better acquainted he became with God’s law, the better able he was to see his sin. That’s the point that the Apostle Paul was getting at in our text when he wrote: “Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin” (Romans 3:20).
As I watch our new building being constructed, I’m glad to see how often the workmen use a level. This instrument lets them know when they’ve poured too much concrete in one area or nailed a piece of wood at the wrong angle. Without a level, the church floor would slant and the concrete crack. Likewise God wants us to line ourselves up next to the straight edge of his law and commands. What will it show? Just how crooked we are! Unfortunately we don’t usually compare our actions and attitudes with God’s law as carefully as Luther did. We’re like the boy who scrubs his hands and therefore thinks he’s ready and “washed” for dinner, but when his mother sees him she sends him back to the washroom. Why? Because his face is smeared with mud – something the boy wouldn’t have missed had he bothered to look in the mirror (David Kuske).
Likewise I may pat myself on the back for having regular family devotions, but conveniently overlook how I’m often just trying to get through them as if reading God’s Word is not a blessing but an obligation, like reading the kids’ school agendas. What sins would the law reveal if you would carefully line it up next to your life? How about the disappointment you feel when no one thanks you for the meal you made? You’re disappointed because you believe that you ought to be recognized for the kind things you do for others. But doesn’t this attitude reveal how egocentric you really are? You think that the world does revolve around you. The straight edge of God’s law also reveals that sin doesn’t start when we misuse our hands by punching a sibling for example; it starts when we misuse what we’ve got between the ears like when we entertain sinful thoughts (John Jeske).
If I have not hit upon a sin that you struggle with, then consider this verse from our text. “…all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Paul did not say “all of them have sinned.” He said “all have sinned.” ALL - not just the mafia in Russia, or the terrorists of the Middle East, or the drug dealers downtown. I have sinned. You have sinned. We ALL fall short of God’s approval because we harbor bitterness, shave the truth to our advantage, fail to put the best construction on our sister’s words, and roll our eyes when our parents ask us to do something. God should chuck sinners like us onto the rubbish heap just as you would throw a rotten tomato into the compost rather than judging it “good enough” to serve to guests. And this is where Luther was stuck for many years. He knew he deserved to be punished for his sins. And so he tried harder to be better behaved but continued to fail and continued to despair of any hope of eternal salvation.
But then, by God’s grace, Luther discovered another message in the Bible. A message of good news which Paul put like this in our text: “But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:21-24).
A common theme at Reformation services is that we are saved by grace, that is, God’s undeserved love. I’m trying to highlight that same truth by saying it a little differently: we’re saved by works – God’s work on our behalf. I’m saying it like this because when we hear that we are saved by grace, I wonder if we don’t have the impression that it didn’t cost God anything to forgive our sins. I’m mean if you owed me a thousand dollars, that would be a big-ish deal. I would probably want to collect on that debt because a thousand dollars could easily fly grandpa and grandma out to see the grandkids. But if you owed Bill Gates a thousand dollars, what’s that to him? It’s chump change compared to all the money he has. Is that how we think of forgiveness – that God can afford to turn a blind eye to our sins because really, what does my misbehavior matter to an omnipotent God? Such an attitude shows that we really don’t understand God. Sure he made us all, all seven billion of us that inhabit the earth right now, but God is such that as far as he is concerned, you’re his only child. And so God takes personally every sin we commit because with every sin we’re really saying, “God, I don’t want you to be my heavenly Father. I don’t really like you.”
But sin is not just a matter of hurting God’s feelings; sin poisons our relationship with God. If you’ve ever had to visit someone in the Intensive Care unit at the hospital, the nurses may have made you gown up with gloves and mask. It’s usually because they don’t want you making the patient any worse, but sometimes it’s because the patient has a disease that could easily be transferred to you. Only when the germs causing the sickness has been destroyed can you visit and interact with that patiently normally. Likewise until sin is dealt with, we can never interact with God as Adam and Eve once did. And that’s what God wants - for us to be able to walk and talk with him!
So what did God do to remedy the situation? He sent Jesus to die for our sins. Paul wrote: “God presented [Jesus] as a sacrifice of atonement” (Romans 3:25a). A sacrifice! That sounds extreme – like selling one of your organs, a lung say, to pay off a car loan. But if you think of it like that, you’re minimizing sin and making God seem unreasonable. What Jesus did for us is more like a first responder giving his life to save someone from his flood-ravaged home even though that stubborn individual had been ordered well in advance to flee the flood. And Jesus didn’t just die to save one person, he died to save and forgive everyone.
That doesn’t mean, of course, that everyone will go to heaven. Without faith, the benefit of Jesus’ life and death is of no use to us. Paul made that clear too in our text when he wrote: “[God is] the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus…we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law” (Romans 3:26b, 28). Please don’t think that having faith is the one thing that we do for our salvation. No. In Ephesians 2:8, 9 Paul declares that even faith is a gift from God. Without the Holy Spirit to work faith in our hearts we would be like the 3-year-old trick-or-treating for the first time. He is so overwhelmed by the other costumed kids and afraid of the stranger on whose doorstep he stands to get candy that he doesn’t even hold out his bag when offered a delicious chocolate bar. Dad has to gently take the hands of the child and extend them to receive the gift. When that child gets home to count all the candy he received, he can’t claim any credit for the stash. He didn’t buy any of the candy with money he had earned. He didn’t even hold out his bag to receive the candy. Dad had to stand behind him at every house and do that. That’s why I like today’s sermon theme: Saved by Works. We are saved because God worked when he sent Jesus to die for our sins, and we are saved because God worked when he sent the Holy Spirit to create faith in our hearts.
It’s been said that if you want something done right, do it yourself. That’s not true when it comes to salvation, however. If any part of our salvation depended on our works, we would always wonder whether or not we had done enough. It’s the way I would feel if you expected me to build our new church. I would try my best. I would watch all the how-to-build-a-church videos on YouTube, but I would never be sure that I got anything right. I would be afraid that at any moment the roof could collapse. No, better leave the church building to experts. It’s the same with our salvation. Leave it to the experts: God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. On this Reformation Sunday we are reminded that they’ve done enough to wipe away our sins. We will not only rejoice in this truth, we will live in it as we gladly serve our Savior-God and one another. Amen.
SERMON NOTES
What caused Martin Luther to leave a promising career as a lawyer to join a monastery?
According to our text, what is the purpose of God’s law (his commands)?
In what way(s) are we spiritually like the boy who thought he was “washed” and ready for dinner because he had scrubbed his hands, but didn’t notice the mud on his face?
Sin poisons our relationship with God. What (or who) is the remedy?
A Christian friend says to you: “Jesus died to pay for your sins. Now all you have to do is put your faith in him when you invite him into your life.” How could you use the illustration of a three-year-old trick-or-treating to explain that faith is not our work but God’s? What Bible passage would back up your point?
