Grace, mercy and peace
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ
If
you want to succeed in life what does it take? Hard work, skill, and a little
bit of luck… so it goes in the world. Even then, if you make a little measuring
mistake the cake falls. If you go a hair too fast on a curve you slide off the
road. You get the contract, unless someone doesn’t like your looks. And when it
comes to spiritual matters, we don’t even get close to success. If we bake our
own cake, it comes out devil’s-food. If
it is a rat race, we can’t find the track. If it is a contract, good looks
don’t count, and thank God since salvation is not by works but by grace alone.
Christ declared us righteous. There is nothing you need to bake, no race to the
starting line, and no contract you must fulfill to be loved by God. He baked
the cake; He ran the race; and He gives you His contract, His New Testament,
where the terms are all in your favor. There you were made heirs of the Son, by
grace.
It is because of grace the Apostle
Paul says “for grace, I bow in devotion before the Father (literally) the Pater, out of whom every patria in heaven and on earth is named.”
Every patria comes out of the Pater, the Father. Because of that grace Paul
worships; because the Father chose to be our
Father, naming us with His name. That’s why we too worship as His patria, His
family. That means something very real. The Apostle points out we will succeed
spiritually, enabled and en-willed in a very real way, in every real way
because we, the justified, the forgiven, the redeemed, are chosen by the Father
to be His. The Apostle points out that our
heavenly Father is willing and able to do good for us. He who named us as His
strengthens us in the one Holy Christian Church. His willingness and ability to
save and to impart his sanctifying life in us is clearly revealed in Scripture:
“For you created all things, and by your
will they existed and were created” (Rev 4:11); And, He “desires
all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth” (I Tim 2:4);
And, “Consequently, he is able to
save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him” (Heb 7:25);
and “For nothing will be impossible
with God” (Lk 1:37).
Scripture is emphatic. Our Lord is
willing and able to help. Consider our reading from Ephesians. Given salvation
(the imputation of Christ’s righteousness as ours) Paul worships, and unfolds
some implications of that salvation, of the Father having chosen us in Christ. He points out what riches of
glory are given us, received by faith.
He points out that faith is a gift, rooted and grounded in the Triune
God’s love. He points out this love is given that we know the fullness of
God. God’s love “surpasses knowledge,”
surpassing even our ability to understand. His compassion literally
“super-abounds” to strengthen us unto salvation. He “is able to do far more
abundantly than all that we ask or think,” so that we share in the riches of
his glory. Remember that when troubles arise; remember who holds all things in
His hand. Be encouraged when our loving Lord lets hell break loose, for a
time. Be assured that when the church is
troubled, tested, tempted and seemingly forsaken, He will not leave us or
forsake us. The Triune God loves us
beyond our comprehension and is doing super-abundantly for our good, right now.
And it isn’t just in crisis we need to
know that, and receive that. We need His strength in ordinary times, everyday.
For an ordinary example, what do you say if a neighbor says “I’m a good person.
Don’t talk to me about that Jesus stuff.” Will you shrivel up or confess the
faith? What do you do when the world calls “good” what Scripture calls “evil”?
At a company party, do you parrot the party line to hell or confess the
faith? What will we do when the
government says “Church, you must violate your conscience?” Will we agree or
pay the price of a clean conscience? And
the trouble isn’t just “out there.” Are you ever dry, spiritually? Does going to church seem like one more thing
to do when the alarm clock rings? Is the Bible too heavy to lift off the table,
the words too difficult to ponder? We won’t mention sins that make us feel miserable
or ought to; the failures, the attitudes and the faults we confess before God.
We won’t mention all these because they are under the blood of Christ,
forgiven. We confessed our sin, we are absolved, and now we ask “how is that
superabundant love, that vibrant life, manifest as mine?”
The Apostle answers that question with
God’s words to you, for you. He gives words that inform you, for example, in
your prayer life. We can ask of our
Father, “You tell us of your superabundant love and promise to effectively
empower us. So Lord, come!” (Maranatha!) Work in and through me. That’s a
legitimate way to pray the Scriptures, exemplified by the prophets and
apostles. Read some of their prayers, when Abraham, Moses or David ask the Lord
to fulfill His world. And let us pray the Psalms. Let us pray, reciting our
Lord’s promises, promises given for our benefit, relief, rest and rejuvenation.
Remind God of his promises, for your sake. That’s also how we pray the Lord’s
prayer, the one He taught us to pray, the one in
which are hidden all the promises of God for us. We pray asking, “Lord, you’ve promised me these things. I wait on
you.”
Our
willing Lord rejuvenates us with promises like “a bruised reed he will not
break and a faintly burning wick he will not quench” (Isa 42:3). Into a desert He came, the water of
life poured out in the love of Jesus Christ, poured out through His word with
water, and poured into us in His blood to drink. So in Word and Sacraments Paul
says “here is His willingness and ability to strengthen you,” the gifts of the
Triune God are for you. The one God is willing and able to strengthen us. He
sent His Son as the sacrificial Lamb, to name Himself “our Father,” applying
that holy death to us in water in the name: the Father, the Son, and the Holy
Spirit. The Father chose us in Him before the foundation of the world as his
family, calling us from among all tribes and tongues, by grace. As our loving
Father, He gives us “riches of his glory.”
You might think it an odd glory, but
that includes as the Father was glorified by Christ lifted up, so the church
glorifies Christ in like manner… and for the purpose intended by God. From the beginning of the church, the tiny
few who professed “the name” suffered for that name; yet grew in 300 years to
fill the Roman Empire . So too in our day,
Christians suffer for their faith, yet receive strength to endure with joy,
because we belong to “the name.” And at the end of days, as Christ ascended we
too will be raised to the presence of the Father. We shall in glory shine. Not
only God the Father, also God the Son willingly and ably strengthens us. The
chief evidence is His death for sinners and His resurrection for life. He is
the source of absolution, who now dwells in us through faith. As His Holy Nation,
He settles and governs you who receive far more than our reason can comprehend.
(17) Likewise God the Holy Spirit is willing and able to strengthen us. He
empowers our inner being (16). He gives you divine life that you are willing
and able to resist sin and to live for God. The Spirit strengthens you through
hearing, including when you received the word with water and when you receive
the word with bread and wine.
The Triune God’s willingness and
ability has a purpose for your renewal and strengthening. You were born from
above by water and the Word and are sustained in Christ’s life day by day for
this reason: to live eternally with the Heavenly Father. You were named by the
Name, made children of the Father, to inherit the riches of His glory. According
to the Father’s will, the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ dwell in you, filling
the church with the fullness of God.
What mystery this, that while we are still sinners we are being restored
to the image of God? We shall be righteous. We shall enjoy unhindered
fellowship in the Triune God. That is the definition of paradise. The church
shall be fulfilled, united in Christ, one body, one faith, one baptism, one God
and Father of us all. For this eternal purpose, for a heavenly end we are being
renewed by Christ today. Christ plants us in His abiding love, and enables us,
telling us to grasp, lay hold of, to seize that love, by faith in His promises.
And the Christ whose blood cleanses us from all sin strengthens us to believe
what is ours in His love, so that today we are enabled to live in what He daily
gives. Jesus Christ renews our
confidence, and although we don’t know what we shall know, we are growing in
what we shall become; for the Triune God is willing and able to strengthen us,
and in fact He is doing that very thing, “according to the power at work within
us” (20).
Although we struggle as sinners, our
Lord works His power in us for good. Although we slip and slide in living the
faith, our Lord teaches us the faith, by letting us share in Christ’s
sufferings. Although we are weak and often trip, His power works in us, in the
church of faith; and we who are called out of the world share His mercy in the
world. Because the Triune God is willing and able He does far more than we know
and ask. He is our justification and our sanctification, our imputed
righteousness and our daily strength, our confident hope and the power in us to
give glory to God. He will preserve us to the end, to His end purpose, to be
filled with His fullness, to rejoice in Him and in the fellowship of the saints
in glory. Therefore today, let us repent our sin and rely on His grace; let us
call upon Him who hears and strengthens us through His Spirit in Christ. If you
want to succeed in life it takes hard
work, skill and a bit of luck… says the world. If you want to succeed in death, through death and into eternal
life, it takes the Father’s pardon, Christ’s grace, and the Spirit’s presence.
And you have received that success. Your sins are forgiven; and you are given
the life of God in the love of Christ Jesus our Lord. You are named the patria
of the pater.
The peace of God which
passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord
(Amen)
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