John 8:31–36

Reformation Day

“If you abide in my Word you are truly my disciples and you will know the truth and the truth shall set you free.”

It was the year 1517. The Word of God was locked up inside the church and the door was sealed shut. The truth that sets us free was itself captive. The truth that breaks the chains of slavery was bound in chains. So man was a slave chained to ignorance, superstition, idolatry and sin.

Since the beginning of time Satan has tried to make us his slaves. So if God’s word sets us free; if God’s word is the power of salvation to all who believe; if God’s word is the power to create life then Satan has to silence that word.. He does so by planting the seed of doubt. When Satan told Eve, “Surely you will not die, but your eyes will be opened and you will be like God,” he was casting that pale of doubt. Since the beginning Satan has tried to silence God by making us doubt God’s Word. Satan wants to make us his slave.

And because they doubted the word of God, Adam and Eve fell into sin and from that moment on we are all slaves to sin and death. By doubting the word which makes us free, we became slaves.

And there is no way we can free ourselves. “For by the works of the law no man shall be righteous,” declares St. Paul. Martin Luther expresses the hopelessness of our situation when he says that if our works of the law, that is our good works, do not make us righteous, then there is nothing we can do to become righteous before God. We are sinners! We are slaves to sin. We are in chains. We are bound and tied by sin. We are whipped and lashed by the law. We are condemned to die the curse of sin. There is no way out on our own, because all of our efforts to get free merely tighten the shackles. We are bound and chained by sin and death. We are all by nature sinful and unclean. We are separated from God; we have become his enemies; and we deserve eternal death and damnation.

But “if you abide in my Word, you will know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” The word of Christ sets us free. In the year 1517, the gospel, which is the power of God unto salvation, was hidden from the people by none other than the church itself. It was forbidden. The people were not even allowed to read the Bible. And those who did discover the gospel of salvation by faith, such as John Huss, were brutally murdered.

Not having the power of the gospel to set them free from God’s wrath, people tried any way they could to free themselves. They spent endless hours in prayer. Venerated relics. Made grueling pilgrimages. Entered cloisters to became monks and nuns. They suffered self-inflicted tortures by lashing themselves, cutting themselves, and fasting to the point of passing out. They even tried to buy forgiveness with money by purchasing indulgences. But they could not ease their conscious. They could not appease an angry and just God. They were slaves to sin and death. Just as we, without the Gospel of Jesus Christ, are slaves to sin and death.

Then on October 31 in 1517, Dr. Martin Luther exposed these futile practices by nailing his 95 theses to the church door. The Reformation had begun. Once again, the Word of God which sets us free from sin and death was heard ringing in the streets, first in Wittenberg, then in all Saxony, then in all of Europe until today it is preached from pulpits, sung by choirs, and shouted by Christians in all the world.

Satan’s opposition was fierce. His fury raged. The Lutheran confessors risked their lives. They bowed to the Emperor and told him he would have to cut off their heads before they would deny the Word of Christ which sets men free. Luther himself had a bounty placed on his life. But they stood firm in the power of God’s word. Luther wrote in a hymn: “Though devils all the world should fill…we tremble not, we fear no ill. This world’s prince may still scowl fierce…but he can harm us none. One little word can fell him.”

The battle cry of the reformation was: (see banner) Sole Gratia, Sola fide, Sola scriptura. The three great solas of the Reformation.

Sola Gratia: grace alone, tells us that although we are sinners we are saved by God’s grace. It tells us that God offers us forgiveness and salvation by sending his own Son to die on the cross and pay for our sins. Our sins are forgiven and washed away because Jesus Christ became a slave in our place in order to set us free. The Son of God became a slave to sin and death in exchange for us.

We can picture it like this. Suppose a wealthy man had a slave on a plantation. He needed the slaves because without their labor in the fields he would become bankrupt. But his son had great compassion and love for the slaves. So his son made a deal with his father. He said, “Dad, I’ll go out and work in the fields for you. I will become your slave and do your work. Then you can set the slaves free. I will be your slave in their place.” It pleased the father and he went along with the plan. The son went out to work in the fields and the wealthy farmer set his slaves free.

That is what Jesus Christ; the holy, righteous Son of God did for us. He set us free from slavery to sin and death by becoming sin for us and dying on a cross in our place all in exchange for our freedom. By the power of this message, the gospel, we are set free. The gospel is God’s emancipation proclamation. The Gospel is the news to all the world that mankind has been set free from slavery to sin and death. The gospel is God’s proclamation: I FORGIVE YOU ALL YOUR SINS! The Word has set us free!

That is what sola gratia is all about.

Sola Fide: faith alone, means that only by faith is this forgiveness bestowed upon us. Our sins are forgiven, but by not believing one rejects the grace of God. By faith alone are we made righteous before God.

Sola Scriptura: Word alone, means that “faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.” The only way to have faith is to hear that absolution of our sins proclaimed in the Word of God. The word that sets us free comes to us in spoken form, written form, in song, and in sacrament. It is the Word that declares us forgiven and sets us free from slavery. God’s word delivers forgiveness from the cross to you and me. “If you remain in my word you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.”

But today in 2007, Satan is still raging. He is still trying to silence the word. He is trying to strip the gospel of its power. He creates doubt by bringing into question not just the truth of the message but the very concept of truth. Today he tells us that truth does not even exist at all. Satan has convinced our entire western civilization that the very concept of truth is suspect. Everything is relative. All meaning and truth is only a construct of each person or of each individual culture or ethnic group. There is no truth that applies for all time and for all people. Everyone has their own truth; everyone creates their own reality. The philosophers have called this philosophy “postmodernism.”

What is postmodernism? It is throwing overboard the idea of truth. It is the belief that no absolute or universal truth exists. It replaces reason with feeling. The postmodern man creates his own reality. Let me illustrate with a baseball game. Before postmodernism, when people still believed in truth, you could go to a baseball game and an umpire would call a strike. If you asked him “why?” he would tell you, “I called it a strike because it was a strike.” But a postmodern umpire will tell you, “It was a strike because I called it a strike.” Postmodern man creates his own reality.

How can we see postmodernism? It manifests itself in the statement: “If it feels good, do it.” Do what feels good to you. It’s not about right or wrong, it’s about what each person feels. Each person creates his own right and wrong. Each person creates his own truth. There is no absolute right or wrong, no true or false, no good or bad that applies to everyone. There is no absolute truth; no objective reality, only the truth and reality that each individual creates for himself. Most of us adults today grew up in a day where there was absolute truth. So you tell your daughter that abortion is wrong and she responds, “You’re old school.” You tell your son that it’s a sin to shack up with his girlfriend without being married and he tells you, “You’re old fashioned.” These phrases that have entered our vocabulary are evidence of postmodernism. The response people give today, “Whatever?” is a postmodern response.

If there is no objective reality and no absolute truth then everything is a matter of personal choice. That is why abortion is the sacrament of postmodernism. Abortion is about more than just deciding whether or not to have a baby. It’s the expression of an entire worldview. It is the embodiment of postmodernism.

Therefore, if reality is what we create in our own minds, then religion is merely a matter of choice, it is “Whatever works for you.” All religions are seen as the same. All are equal. People are told to pick and choose the one that works for them, or even mix bits and pieces of different religions to meet your fancy.

This is the lie that Satan has created for today. It is the lie that there is no such thing as truth. Its purpose is to make us doubt the word of God. It is designed to strip the power out of the Gospel. It is designed to keep us as his slaves.

But thanks to the Reformation the church today has the truth. Jesus says, “If you remain in my word you will know the truth.” (See the banner keep in the word.) The truth is the eternal gospel which sets us free.

The Old Testament reading spoke of an angel proclaiming the “eternal gospel.” The Gospel is the truth for all times and it is eternal. The angel proclaimed it to all nations and tribes and languages and people because it is universal. It is the truth for all people and for all times. It is not postmodern. It is the absolute and objective truth that sets us free from sin and death. It is the universal truth that frees us from the wrath of God. It is the Sola gratia, sola fide, and sola scriptura of the Reformation.

The truth of the gospel has been given to the church. That angel that John saw proclaiming the eternal gospel is the church. We are the stewards of the gospel and it is our job to set all nations and tribes free from sin by proclaiming the gospel in all the world. By preaching and administering the sacraments, the church dispenses forgiveness of sins to all people.

We face a fierce enemy. We live in a world hostile to truth. Postmodernism calls us “intolerant” when we claim to have the truth. But we remain firm and bold in our testimony of the gospel. In the very face of death we are called to proclaim the truth. The Lutheran confessors faced the threat of death for their faith and we might too. But we remain faithful (see banner) as Jesus tells us. That is sola scriptura. Though “devils all the world fill, we tremble not…one little word can fell them.”

We, at Emmanuel will continue to proclaim that word. It is God’s “strong word that bespeaks us righteous.” And the devil shall fall before us, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church, because that word is the power of God unto salvation. The word of Christ stands sure: “Those who remain in His word are his disciples indeed, and they shall know the truth and the truth shall set them free.”

Amen.