CLICK HERE for the AUDIO of this MESSAGE.
Mark Wheeler
Romans 11:33-36
Always Being Reformed: “Soli Deo Gloria”
10/08/2017
Lidgerwood Presbyterian Church
Grant, Almighty God, that as we are at this day tossed here and there by so many troubles, and almost all things in the world are in confusion, so that wherever we turn our eyes nothing but thick darkness meets us, O grant that we may learn to surmount all obstacles and to raise our eyes of faith above the world, so that we may acknowledge that governed by [Your] wonderful counsel is everything that seems to us to happen by chance, in order that we may seek [You] and know that help will be ready for us through [Your] mercy whenever we humbly seek the pardon of our sins, through Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen. (John Calvin, prayer for faith from his Commentary on Lamentations 3:39)
Friday night I went to see the new Blade Runner movie – this tells the story of a futuristic world where both humans and “replicants” (androids, “fake humans”) co-exist. As I left the theater I was forced to ask myself what true artificial intelligence really is, what it means to have real humanity, to have a soul, and, while we don’t live in a world filled with androids yet – or do we? – the question the movie itself asks, can androids be more human than humans? Their answer has something to do with sacrificing themselves for something/someone else….
I start with this today, because while I do not recommend this movie as a religious experience, or as a story which will encourage your Christian faith, it did force me to wonder about truth, and about existence, and about who is responsible for life. And I came back to our Christian faith!
This Fall marks the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. This movement was the hope of the Church. A few hundred years later the British Lord Acton wrote a letter to Church of England Bishop Mandell Creighton in 1887, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.” The Church of the early 16th Century had all the power – religious and political – over most of the known world, and history tells us how corrupt it had gotten.
The truth is, the Reformation got its start nearly 300 years earlier with the work and the words of people like Peter Waldo (1218) and then 150 years after that with John Wycliffe (late 1300s). But it was Martin Luther’s October 31, 1517, act of posting his 95 theological debate topics that really got the ball rolling.
For every one of the men and women involved in this movement among the people of God, the central truth of their message was to insist that “salvation is of the Lord!” Ultimately, we cannot earn it or buy it, and the Church is not the gateway by which we enter eternity – the Church IS, as the Body of Christ, as the Temple of the Holy Spirit, God’s chosen means of Gospel communication and transmission, but we are not the Final Judge…
Someone has said that “the only contribution we make is the sin that was laid upon Jesus Christ at the cross.”
• Not the sins we commit, the problem is that we are sinners! Not that we sin (not what we do), but that we are sinners (who we are).
• “Salvation is of the Lord” concerns the work of Christ: Christ takes our sin upon Himself when He dies on the cross, and Christ gives us His righteousness, through faith.
For Luther it is Sola Scriptura, the Bible alone, which teaches us God’s truths; it is Solus Christus, Christ alone, by which we find salvation; it is Sola Gratia, grace alone which saves us; and it is Sola Fide, faith alone, that opens us to receive this gift from God! Therefore, it is Soli Deo Gloria, to the glory of God alone, that our lives should always give tribute!
Today we read from Luther’s study in the New Testament Epistle from Paul to the Church in Rome, chapter 11, verses 33-36 where-in he quotes from the Old Testament story of Job and the Old Testament prophet Isaiah ….—-
33 Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!
34 “Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?”
35 “Who has ever given to God, that God should repay them?”
36 For from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen.
This passage, all three of them actually, tell us that salvation is God determined, God purchased, God applied, and God secured. From start to finish, salvation is of the Lord alone!
This truth is best summarized in John Calvin’s doctrines of God’s amazing grace!
There are five points of this doctrine – each of them points to God’s ultimate rule wherein we sing songs like Our God Reigns, How Great Is Our God, A Mighty Fortress Is Our God, Amazing Grace, The Earth Is the Lord’s, Rock of Ages, O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing.
Those five points are these:
• Total depravity – the first man, Adam sinned and by his sin death entered the world. His corruption was then transmitted to his natural offspring, and has then become an undeniable part of every human. The rest of the Bible tells the story of how God has been pursuing us ever since – the stories of Noah and Abraham and Moses and David, the stories of the flood, the Ten Commandments, famines and exiles. They all point us to Jesus who is finally revealed in the New Testament.
• Unconditional election – before Adam and Eve even sinned God had already decreed and determined salvation for sinners. He chose a people through whom He would deliver this salvation (check out Genesis 3 and 6 and 9 and 12). Our monthly Adult Sunday School class is discovering how the entire Old Testament leads us to God’s Son, our Savior – and we are told over and over again that this salvation is offered simply as a gift from God that we are able to attain through faith.
• Definite atonement – in the fullness of time God sent forth His Son to enter this fallen world on a mission to redeem His people. We deserved the death that God foretold Adam about, but Jesus took our sin on Himself making all mankind potentially savable! “God so loved the whole world and everyone in it that He sent His only begotten Son – so that who ever believes in Him, who ever received Him, might not suffer that eternal death of actually receive the gift of eternal life!” (John 3:16) But notice, while He would wish that all would believe, only some actually do. Atonement, salvation, is limited to those whom He has called as his own, who have believed in Him! God is in charge!
• Effectual calling – with oneness and purpose, the Father and the Son sent the Holy Spirit into the world to apply this salvation to those chosen and redeemed. The Holy Spirit comes alongside, fills us from within, covers us as protection, so that we have the faith and strength to persevere. And God’s grace is perfectly effectual, meaning it is irresistible. As Isaiah 55 tells us, God’s Word is never wasted, every time it is read it has power, so is His grace!
• And, Preserving grace – once we come to know God’s amazing grace, once we have been adopted into the family of God, John 10 tells us, we are secure in His grasp!
From beginning to end, salvation is of the Lord. Jesus met two disciples on the road to Emmaus, in Luke 24, and starting from Moses (that means Genesis) and going through the prophets (that means Malachi) He told them how they all pointed to Himself – God’s amazing grace!
When it is rightly understood that God alone – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – saves us sinners, then all glory goes to Him – Soli Deo Gloria!
In my effort to be shorter for these sermons I’ll stop talking here, and offer a little feedback time – so if you have comments you’d like to add, or questions you might want to ask, now’s your chance.
And, if they’re a little more private or personal, I’ll be downstairs during the Fellowship Time where we can talk even more. And for anyone who is able, we have a class on the Reformation, lunch provided, starting today at noon – that’s another place to go deeper….
Any thoughts, questions, criticisms, concerns?
Grant, O God, that we may learn to surmount all obstacles and to raise our eyes of faith above the world, so that we may acknowledge that governed by [Your] wonderful counsel is everything that seems to us to happen by chance, in order that we may seek [You] and know that help will be ready for us through [Your] mercy whenever we humbly seek the pardon of our sins, through Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.
Resources:
Lawson, Steven J.; “Salvation is of the Lord”; TableTalk; May 2017; Pp. 17-19.
Nichols, Stephen J.; “The Ninety-Five Theses of Martin Luther, October 31, 1517”; TableTalk; October 2017; P. 71.
Thomas, Derek W. H.; “God’s Sovereignty and Glory”; TableTalk; May 2017; Pp. 6-8.
lidgerwoodpresbychurch 