[Machine transcription]
Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that
every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.
You may be seated.
In the name of Jesus, Amen.
Dear Harrison, and all the baptized, I want to begin today by meditating and thinking
carefully about the law of God, and what the law is, what the law does, and what the law
means.
We have a God who speaks, and His speaking to us is first instruction or commands.
In other words, law.
He tells us what to do and what not to do.
The first question that we need to ask is, do we do it?
Do we keep the law?
Do we keep God’s commands?
Now you all are shaking, I can see some of you shaking your head no, but that’s because
you come to church.”
I just think of our natural reason, how it answers that question.
I’m not sure it says yes, I’m not sure it says no either, it’s kind of a soft no.
Not really, but nobody’s perfect.
I try to do my best, but I probably fail.
But this fact at last becomes apparent to us as we reflect on what God requires and
what we do and don’t do, that all of us are in fact lawbreakers.
All have sinned, this is how Paul says it, all have sinned and fall short of the glory
of God from the beginning.
When Adam and Eve were in the garden and forbidden from eating the tree, from the
tree that was in the middle of the garden until now, all of us have sinned.
That means we’ve broken God’s law and that means we’re guilty.
In fact, our guilt is so bad that we confess that because of it we deserve God’s anger,
his wrath, and his punishment.
We don’t keep the law.
But there’s another question that really needs some consideration and it is this, can we
keep the law?
Now, our reason, our sinful flesh, and really every moral philosophy and every religion
says, yes, we can.
We might need some help, we might need some training, we might need the grace of God or
the infusion of the Holy Spirit, but surely we must be able to keep the law.
After all, why would God give a command that couldn’t be kept?
And if we couldn’t keep the law, if we said, no you can’t keep the law, then how in the
world could you be guilty for not doing something that you couldn’t do in the first place?
If you could imagine it this way, can you imagine if you were walking the dog in your
neighborhood and you came across a home where the father and the son were out in the front
yard playing basketball, and the dad handed his son the basketball, and he says,
“‘Dunk it.'” Now, this is curious because the boy is 12 years old and 4 feet tall.
There’s not a chance. So you pause to watch. “‘Dunk the basketball. Right now,
dunk it.'” And the father is serious. He goes on not only to give a command
that is absolutely impossible, he adds threats to that command. He says,
Because if you don’t dunk the basketball, and if you don’t dunk it right now, then you’re
going straight to bed without dinner.
What would you think of such a man?
What would you think about that conversation?
How dare he?
How dare he give a command that can’t be kept?
And how dare he threaten to punish this child for not keeping an impossible command?
So our sinful flesh brings this logic to the law of God.
In fact, it was a big part of the Reformation.
You remember Erasmus?
He was one of the big guys that Luther was fighting against.
Erasmus published a famous essay on the freedom of the will, and he makes that same argument.
Only an unjust God would give commands that cannot be kept.
Only an unrighteous God would threaten to punish people for something that they couldn’t
do in the first place.
So it must be, Erasmus argued, it must be that we are able to keep the law of God by
our own free will.
Now this has results, theological results.
Because if it’s true that I don’t keep the law, but I could keep the law, then not only
can I keep the law, but I should keep the law, and more than that, I must keep the law.
I must do something in obedience to the Lord in order to be good enough to be saved.
So just about every error in the Christian church comes down to this, that we have a
part in our salvation.
How could it be anything otherwise?
How could God be righteous if He punishes us for not keeping commands that we can’t possibly
keep?
Well, Luther and the Lutherans come into the argument and they have something to add.
They say this, they say, now hold on, before we get too carried away about our ability
to keep the law, let’s pay close attention to the scriptures.
And it seems to us, when we read the scriptures and what the scriptures say about the law
of God, they say something quite different.
In fact, the scriptures teach us that the most important function and use of the law
is not to guide us on the way to righteousness,
but rather to expose our sin,
to show forth our sinful nature.
This is how Paul said it in the epistle lesson.
He says, now we know that whatever the law says,
it speaks to those who are under the law,
so that every mouth will be stopped
and the whole world would be held accountable to God,
for by the works of the law,
no human being will be justified in his sight
God, since through the law comes the knowledge of sin.
It turns out that our sinfulness is not so obvious as it would appear.
Remember the first question, do I keep God’s law?
We have a soft no, but that no is too soft.
We think that we at least have a chance at keeping it, that sometimes we keep it, that
we’re really not that bad.
This is why the early church used the picture of leprosy to describe our sinful nature.
Remember, one of the problems with leprosy is not only does it corrupt your skin, but
it corrupts your nerves.
So that you can’t feel if you’re wounded or harmed.
If you have leprosy in your leg, you can’t feel it if someone stomps on your toe, or
in your hand you can’t feel it if you cut your hand, and so you’ve lost the ability
to know how badly you’re injured.
The picture, remember, that we use is the difference between someone who falls off a
ladder and breaks their leg and someone who falls off a ladder and breaks their leg and
their neck.
If you come across someone with a broken leg, you say, how are you?
And he says, not good, I’ve broken my leg, I need help.
But if you come across someone who’s broken their leg and their neck and you ask them,
how are you doing?
They say, I don’t know, I can’t feel my legs.
And this is how badly we were damaged in the fall so that we don’t even
recognize how badly we’re wounded, how deep the corruption is, how much of a
sinner we are. And so the law comes along to show us our own sin. Remember the dad
playing basketball with his son? Here’s the full story. If you would just rewind
the clock 30 minutes earlier and you could be sitting at the dinner table
with them, you would have heard this little pipsqueak of a son bragging about
how good he was at basketball.
In fact, he said to his mom and his dad, his brothers and sisters, he says, I’m the greatest
basketball player that ever lived.
He says, I can win the slam dunk contest right now.
I could beat a whole NBA team by myself, single-handedly, and I don’t need you, mom and dad.
I don’t need dinner.
In fact, I don’t need to eat this Brussels sprouts.
Because I’m the greatest basketball player ever to live.
And now the father takes him out in the front yard and gives him the ball and says dunk it you see you see
the command to do something impossible
shows
our own weakness
our own failure our own sin our own guilt it
silences our
Boasting mouth before the throne of God now. We know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law
So, so that every mouth may be stopped.
So that we would know that not only have we broken God’s law, not only have we not done
what the law commanded, but that we can’t do what the law commands.
Which means that you cannot save yourself.
You cannot add to your salvation.
You cannot help your way on the way to salvation.
salvation, you cannot start your salvation, finish your salvation, or do anything at all
to add to it.
That is the stopped mouth that the law brings about.
But if that’s the case, then what are we to do?
If we can’t save ourselves or add to our own salvation, if we can’t somehow make God pleasing
with us by our works and our efforts or help along the way, what are we to do?
Dear saints, this is the whole point.
There’s nothing to do. Jesus is the Savior. He is the one who does the work.
He is the one who accomplishes salvation and our salvation is found not in
ourselves but in Him and in Him alone. Christ alone is good. Christ alone is
holy. Christ alone is righteous. Christ alone is perfect. But in His death and in
his resurrection, he brings that perfection and that holiness and that
righteousness and gives it to you in your baptism, Harrison. It’s given to you
in your baptism, dear saints. It’s given to you. All your sins are washed away
and you are accepted by God. But I haven’t done anything. Right. He has done
it all and he’s done it all out of grace, all out of mercy. Jesus loves you.
And we sit there in our sin and say why, why would he possibly love me?
And the answer is I’ve got no idea. But he does.
He loves you. He loves me. He died for us
so that he would be the Savior. So let us rejoice
that the law brings this knowledge of sin so that all this business of
of keeping the law and making God happy with us
and somehow being pleased with us,
that all of that is thrown in the trash.
And we put all of our eggs in one basket,
all of our faith in one man,
all of our trust in one promise.
Christ died for sinners.
Christ died for you.
May God grant to us this comfort and this peace.
In the name of Jesus, amen.
And the peace of God which passes all understanding,
encouraging. Guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
