8TH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY
Text: Romans 8:12-17.
Source from Back to Luther with German archive reference. Back to Walther's Epistle Sermons.
Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord. Amen.
Dear friends in Christ Jesus.
As it is impossible for a person to become a Christian without God's Word, just so is it impossible for him to remain a Christian without it. Therefore, St. Paul calls the Word of God not only the incorruptible seed from which
one is born again, but Peter also calls it the sincere milk of the Word which the newborn child must desire, in order to thrive.
Hence, it is not enough to be awakened once through God's Word to spiritual life, to have come to a saving knowledge and true faith. If we want to keep this spiritual life, this true knowledge, this true faith, this must take place through the precious Word of God. As our body needs daily nourishment, so does our soul, if it is not to sink back soon into spiritual death. As no fire can keep burning of itself, so the fire of true faith must very soon die if it is not nourished daily through the Word of God. Though a person may have for a time shown ever so great a zeal for godliness, though an ever so bright a light of the saving knowledge may have glowed in him, he will again become lazy in the use of God's Word, if he perhaps for weeks and months at a time stops reading and hearing it. His zeal will very soon grow cold, and the old darkness will cover his soul. If a Christian ceases completely dealing with God's Word, the only result is the complete fall from divine grace.
A Christian who knows himself, his weakness, and his ruin, who knows how easily one can become lukewarm and forget the danger of losing his soul, will also know how necessary it is to awaken his heart anew through the daily study of the divine Word, and to draw from it instruction, admonition, warning, reprimand, and comfort. Certainly, if a Christian does not let himself be persuaded through the indolence of his flesh to study earnestly and devoutly at least something from God's Word, he will not so easily wander from the way of truth and piety.
Therefore, God at one time said to Joshua: "This book of the Law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein; for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success." Josh 1: 8. Therefore, David also says in his First Psalm: "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the Law of the Lord; and in his Law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." Ps 1:1-3. And elsewhere: "Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." Ps 119:105. "Unless thy Law had been my delights, I should have perished in mine affliction." Ps 119:92.
Therefore, the apostles say to their converted Christians: "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your heart to the Lord." Col 3:16. But they also show us through their own example how necessary incessant and ever new admonitions, warning, reminders, and encouragements from God's Word are for converted Christians. The apostolic letters are the clearest proof; our today's text contains a few such necessary reminders from God's Word to all who wish to be Christians. With heartfelt devotion let us today consider them.
The text. Romans 8:12-17.
My friends, they are glorious, precious words of God which we have just heard. They are just as rousing for such who wish to live as true Christians, as they condemn and sentence those who have the appearance of piety, but deny its power; they are full of boundless comfort for all who bear the testimony of their godly adoption in their souls. Oh, that today none of these
precious words of God might fall to the ground! Oh, that they all might become really clear, powerful, and alive in our hearts; then this precious seed would bring forth glorious fruits for time and eternity. Well, then, let us now with God's assistance consider them. They contain, as we will see
THREE APOSTOLIC REMINDERS FOR ALL WHO WISH TO BE CHRISTIANS
1. A Reminder Serving As Encouragement By Reminding Them Of Their Duty;
2. A Reminder Serving As Warning And Examination By Reminding Them Of Who They Are;
3. A Reminder Serving As Comfort By Reminding Them Of Their Blessed State If They Actually Are True Christians.
Oh Lord God ! you wish to help us so that for none of us today your holy Word becomes a savor of death unto death, but a savor of life unto life, for the sake of your unfathomable love and mercy. Amen.
I.
My dear hearers, even the holy Apostle Paul at his time had the same sad experiences in the preaching of the Gospel which the preachers have today. If today we preach than man is not saved by works but alone by grace through faith in Christ, very many, who wish to be Christians, are very much pleased with this precious, comforting doctrine, but they misuse it to become secure and disregard sin. Well, many say, if we cannot merit heaven by a single work we do, if it is all grace alone, sin will give us no trouble; it would be very foolish to wrestle much with sin; in our last hour we will cry: Lord Jesus, have mercy on us! We shall not fail to enter heaven. And alas', how many, perhaps also among us are they we still knowingly serve many a sin, and always quiet their consciences with the comfort: You will be saved; it is all by grac e!
St. Paul in also this letter to the Romans tries with all his might to prevent this fearful misuse of the doctrine of grace; in many ways he tries to show that the grace of God indeed offers us the forgiveness of sins, but in no way gives us permission to sin; yes, the very preparation of grace which God in Christ has done for our redemption, reconciliation, deliverance, and salvation has as its ultimate purpose the complete, permanent cleansing from sin, the permanent complete sanctification through God's Spirit, the restoration of the divine image in us, and having our spirit again become capable of eternal perfect union with the holy God.
Our today's text proceeds to show how the apostle tries to encourage the Christians at Rome first of all to walk a holy walk by telling them that they really owe this to their God. He, therefore, says: " Therefore, brethren, we are debtors not to the flesh, to live after the flesh." V.12. The apostle means t o say: My dear brethren, it is indeed true, this is a precious, esteemed word that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners; it is true, you dare not doubt it, oven if your sins are ever so great and frightful, even if they were red like crimson; through Christ they will become white as wool; it is true, with our works we can merit nothing; nothing but faith in Christ makes us righteous and saves us; but my dear brethren, if through your works you can merit nothing and God offers you grace and forgiveness for all your sins, do you want to misuse this in order to continue in sin? God has become gracious to you; do you now wish the more to do that whereby God becomes angry anew with you: God wants to forgive and forget everything; now should his thanks be that you continue to serve your flesh, i.e., your sinful desires, and despise God?
Alas, dear Christians, you can merit nothing by your works, yet bear
in mind, that you through God's grace have become " debtors "! Bear in mind, God has created you; everything which you have, body, soul, life, and all your possessions are God's gifts; are you not God's debtor for even these things? Are you not for that reason already obligated to serve him, to live to him, to surrender yourselves to him body and soul and everything which you have?
But that is not enough ! God has made you debtors anew; you have fallen from him by sin, you have become his enemy, you had lost heaven and salvation, and had fallen into death and eternal damnation, and behold! God has graciously received you again; he has given you his Son; he no longer wishes to remember your shameful apostasy and your sin against him in all eternity; he has brought you back again into his blessed kingdom through Christ and has lovingly received you again. Now tell me, are you not a double " debtor " of God? You admit that even though the angels did not fall to be redeemed again, they are debtors to serve God and praise and glorify him forever and ever. Are not you fallen sinners, who have been received again, not a thousand times more liable than the angels in heaven, who have not experienced such grace? Therefore, is it not a frightful, horrible word at which heaven and earth must shudder and tremble if you mean to say: God forgives us our sins, hence we need not stop serving sin? God is gracious, our sins will not harm us? Christ has died for us, we no longer need good works ?
If you must confess that God is gracious, is that not also confessing how much you owe your God? If you must confess that the Son of God died on the bloody cross for your sins, do you not thereby also confess that your soul, your life, your service belongs to him, to the precious merciful Savior? Hence, is it not terrible to say: Since I cannot merit heaven with my works, I will do none? Is that not as much as saying: Since God is gracious toward me, I will indeed despise him, trample on his commands, remain his enemy? Is that not as much as saying: God has indeed done great things to me, given me body and soul, and delivered me from my eternal ruin through giving his Son into death, but God is not worth any thanks? No, no, a Christian thinks, if I cannot merit any grace with my works, I still truly owe it to my God not to live according to my flesh, but according to his Word; though everything may be pure grace, that is reason enough for God to be my God, and my soul his offering and possession.
Ah, my dear hearers, you who are gathered here and who wish to be Christians, let also this remonstrance of the apostle pierce your hearts: " Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh." V.12. Never ask in unthankfulness, is a holy lif e necessary for salvation? Ah, faithless question! You should firmly believe, that there is grace for all your sins; none of you should despair in his sins; God demands no works of any of you in order to merit salvation; this work has taken place; Jesus has already won salvation for you; just accept Christ and you are helped. But tell me yourself, have you not then become God's great debtor for time and eternity?
Therefore, if your corrupt heart or Satan whispers to you: You are in grace, why do you want to be so exact about sins ! become frightened at such thoughts, and rather think this way: Since we are in grace with God, since God has delivered us from sin, out of which we could not have delivered ourselves, since God has given us salvation, which we could not have earned by ourselves, we are doubly and a thousandfold under great obligation to God, we can never repay him for what he has done for us poor sinners; yes, we want to deny the accursed sins which had so long separated us from this faithful, gracious, and merciful God; we want to serve God forever out of thankfulness and love, who has earned that so faithfully for us afflicted persons.
II.
However, my dear hearers, many, many who wish to be Christians are so
sold under sin with their false trust in Christ, that they can never decide by themselves to forsake their miserable walk according to the flesh, even if the fact that they truly owe this a thousand times to their gracious God is movingly presented to them. They think: Yes, to be sure, we owe God this, but God is merciful; he will have mercy on us poor weak men, even if we do not succeed 100%.
For such miserable servants of sin, the apostle in the second place adds a reminder to warn them and for their self-examination, and says to them: No, my man, you do not only owe it to God, but you should also know that all your praise of grace is in vain as long as you still live according to your flesh. The apostle continues thus: " For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God." Vv.13.14. The apostle says in these words, that also in true Christians the flesh is constantly busy, i.e., true Christians are always attacked, incited, and enticed by all manner of evil lusts, thoughts, and desires, but at the same time, they have in themselves a new spirit, a new divine power, a new holy drive, which unceasingly opposes the impulses of sin. The heart of a true Christian is no longer dead; it no longer willingly obeys the suggestions of his flesh and blood; but there is a continual battle, a continual killing, quenching, and conquering of sinful lusts. Sin does not let the true Christian have one hour of rest, but as soon as it arises in the heart, so soon the good spirit living in him flies into a holy agitation and it is busy fighting the foe who wishes to enter in.
Whoever does not have this continual battle of the flesh and spirit, whoever upon hearing this description must not immediately say: Yes, that is the way it is in me, I experience that daily, let him give up the sweet dream that he is in grace; let him know that grace is in his thoughts, but not in his heart; let him know that sin which is in him and against which he does not battle still rules over him; that all spiritual life is mission; hence, he is spiritually dead and, therefore, also without the hope of eternal life and is already the booty of eternal death. " For," says the apostle, " if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die." V.13a.
There it is, my dear hearers. Thus reads the words of the living God. Who may dare to extinguish these words? Who may dare to contradict the great God? We read: " If ye live after the flesh, ye shall die." Eternal sentence is irreversibly pronounced on all false Christians. If you still live after the flesh, if you still consider the sinful product of your heart like a pet which you cherish and nourish, if any sin is still so dear that you would not gladly kill it, God draws this conclusion: If you do not let every sin die in you, then YOU must die; God says to you: You are a man marked for death! for through the love of sin you reject grace. Your false trust in grace makes you completely incapable of any true grace; as you remain in sin so you also remain in death and willingly renounce the redemption of Jesus Christ, who has come to free you from the prison of sin, and destroy the works of the devil.
Oh, the folly of wanting to comfort oneself in the redemption of Jesus Christ from sin, when one still of one's own free will remains a servant of sin! Oh, the folly to hope for eternal life, when one daily presses ever deeper into the death of sin! Oh, the folly of dreaming of God’s grace when one daily stirs up God's wrath against himself! Of what avail is the cleansing through Christ's blood, if one daily defiles himself again through new sins? Of what avail is the cross of Christ, if one does not want to kill and crucify his flesh, but daily crucifies Christ anew through his walk in the flesh? And if Christ would die a thousand times for the sins of the world it would still be impossible for a person, who continues in his sins, to come into heaven, be righteous, and be saved.
" For," the apostle continues, " as many as are led by the Spirit of God. they are the sons of God." V.14. With these words the apostle presents a new
touchstone for our Christianity. He means to say: If you want to be a Christian, you also call yourself a child of God; only those are children of God whom the Spirit of God drives. Oh, how many a Christian's reputation brings shame also on this word! We cannot conceal ourselves; sad to say, even in our congregation signs of earthly ideas, of envy, of pride and haughtiness, of contempt of one's neighbor, of hardheartedness and irreconcilableness, yes, of lies and slander clearly show themselves. What sort of a spirit is it which drives one to such works of the flesh? To be sure, it is not God's Spirit but the evil spirit, the spirit of impurity, of darkness, of the world, and of sin; wherever this spirit moves the heart there is no grace, there one boasts in vain of being a Christian. Therefore, let each one of us hear the word of the Lord: " As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. "
And now let each one ask himself this question: Which spirit drives me? Some spirit must rule me; either it is the spirit of sin or the Spirit from God. What drives me to think as I think, to speak as I speak, to act as I act? Can I say: God, it is you who lives in me? who rules my thoughts, words, and deeds? Lord, when I lay down to sleep I think of you; when I awake I speak of you? (Is 63:7); you guide me according to your counsel, you teach me to act according to your will, for you are my God, your good Spirit leads me upon the level way? I live but not I but Christ lives in me ?
Oh, how many will have to admit that they are driven by their own spirit, or that the Spirit of God awakens, warns, entices them only now and then, but an abiding dwelling place or power he has not yet established in their hearts! You who call yourselves Christians and children of God, if you are not yet born by the Spirit of God and not yet under his mild discipline and rule, let this be your boast. First of all, throw yourselves down before his throne as God's enemy, and beg for grace in Christ, for change of heart and mind, then you will become someone of whom you can boast, and then you will recognize how inexpressibly glorious it is to be in grace with God and his dear child. Finally, the apostle points
III.
in our text to this, when he says: " For ye have not received the Spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry. Abba. Father." V.15. The apostle means to say: If nothing can move anyone to give up his miserable life according to the flesh, neither that he owes it to his God, nor the certainty that he is lost, then the condition of those who walk according to the Spirit should move him to let him be driven and ruled by his Spirit as God's child; for this condition is absolutely blessed and glorious.
Whoever still sins against his conscience, strives in vain to lay hold of a childlike confidence in God; he tries in vain to heal up his way of life with the salve of a false comfort; he strives in vain to imagine that God's threatenings against sin will not strike him and to appropriate to himself the promises which are given to God’s children. Of course, for a time a false comfort can give a false rest, but this rest is always of short duration; pretty soon the wounds of sin, which fester only the more inwardly, open again with even greater pain; often a single verse strikes so deeply into the soul of the hypocrite, that all at once he sees the entire vanity of his self-made faith, his imagined hope, and his false trust. He can often from habit bend his knee in prayer, or in slavish fear sigh to God, but he is not capable of pouring out his heart before God in childlike confidence; he pretends to love God, but his heart is full of slavish fear of him; the Law of God with its threatenings still lies upon him, and finally gives him an unblessed death into an unhappy, immeasurably frightful eternity.
334 8th Sunday after Trinity
But he who does not wait with his fright over his sins until the hour of death or until he is in eternity, but through God's Law his sin's greatness, number, and damnableness be presented even here, then in his misery lets himself be led by the Holy Spirit through the Gospel to Christ, and then through the power of his faith daily mortifies sin in himself, crucifies his flesh together with the affections and lusts, and lets himself be led by God's Spirit into all wisdom and righteousness, he has protection against all the accusations of his conscience, peace and rest of soul, and a daily approach to God as his dear heavenly Father. If misery comes to him, God is his refuge and strength, whom he knows will never forsake him; yes, if out of weakness he falls into sin, he quickly hurries again to his dear Father in heaven, reconciles him through Christ's blood, and in faith comforts himself in his grace and forgiveness. Though everything may condemn and reject him, slander and cast suspicion upon him, he is joyful and happy. The Spirit of God gives him an all-conquering testimony, that he is God's child.
Therefore, how blessed are all they who rightly bear the name of God's children ! They need not envy the world with its glory, their glory is greater; they can laugh at sin, Satan, and death, for they have conquered all these; they need not fear the future, for God is for them, who can be against them?
However, the life of God's children is still hidden with Christ in God; the world does not suspect their glory and blessedness. But when Christ their Light will reveal himself, then they also will be revealed. For that reason St. Paul concludes our text in the words: " And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together." V.17. Oh, glorious day when God will break the seal of his eternal testimony and divide the heavenly inheritance among his children! Ah, therefore, let us be faithful until death, in order that we may receive the crown of life. Let us seize Christ and hold him fast in life and death. Amen.