Seventh Sunday after Epiphany
February 23rd, A+D
2025
Our Redeemer and Our Savior’s Lutheran Churches
Custer and
Hill City, SD
The Righteous By Faith Shall Live
Genesis 45:1-15, Luke
6:27-38, Romans 1:16-17
Those who are righteous by faith will live
eternally. They will live by faith each day.
And they will live faithfully. The
theme versus for the 63rd convention of the South Dakota District of the LCMS,
which concluded last Tuesday, are Romans 1:16 and 17. The apostle Paul proclaims: For I am not ashamed of the Gospel for it
is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes the Jew first and
also to the green For in the Gospel the righteousness of God is revealed from
faith for faith, as it is written: the righteous shall live by faith. “The righteous shall live by faith,” literally
in the Greek “the righteous by faith shall live.” What does this mean? Is Paul here talking about conversion? Is he
stressing that salvation is received only by believing only by favor only by
faith not by the works that we do, not earned by our good works? Or is Paul talking about the Christian life, about
the life of good works, that is to say, “everyone who is righteous will live a
faithful life”?
Well at least since the Reformation 500
years ago, there’s been a great deal of arguing over this “either/or”
proposition. The righteous by faith shall live. Does this refer to conversion
or does this refer to the life of love and good works? Indeed the English standard version offers
two options for this phrase. In their
main text, they have “the righteous shall live by faith. This leans toward the idea that this phrase is
about the life of good works, the righteous shall live out of their faith. But in a footnote the ESV also suggests it
could be “the one who by faith is righteous shall live,” which emphasizes that
salvation happens when faith in the Gospel receives the righteousness of
Christ, and so also eternal life. Which
is it?
At the convention our Bible study leader, Dr.
Jeffrey Oschwald of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, suggested a both/and solution to this either/or
question. He argues that Paul means both,
that those who receive righteousness and salvation by faith will also live out
their faith in their daily lives. I like
that. And it is certainly true, however,
we decide to translate this passage. Dr.
Oschwald’s point is proved by other texts of scripture such as Ephesians 2:8-10. For by grace you have been saved through faith;
and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not
as a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For
we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works,
which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
And, to take it a step further,
righteousness by faith is true in at least three different ways. In John’s Gospel, Jesus says “For God
so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that
whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.” Simply believing in Jesus receives
eternal life.
He also says “he who believes in Me has
eternal life. He has crossed over from death to life.” (John 5:24) Right now, by my faith connection
to Jesus, I am alive, with Him.
Jesus also says “he who believes in me
will do the works I do,” (John 14:12).
The one who believes in Jesus will live the faithful life of fleeing
from sin and doing good, loving our neighbors telling forth the truth the Gospel. It is
as Luther said: “faith alone saves, but faith is never alone.” It is always active in good works. Faith is
always producing a life of love because it is always connected to Christ, the
source of life and love.
Those who are righteous by faith will live
eternally. They will live by faith each day.
And they will live faithfully. Which
brings us to Joseph being merciful to his brothers. Joseph‘s life is a story of
a long faith struggle. Joseph is the second youngest of the 12 sons of Jacob. Joseph is his father’s favorite because he is
the first son of Jacob‘s favorite wife, Rachel.
The twelve sons of Jacob, who
became the heads of the 12 tribes of Israel, were born of 4 different
women. Unsurprisingly, they did not get
along well. In particular, because Jacob
favored him, and because Joseph told his brother of his dreams, in which his
older brothers bowed down to him, Joseph’s 10 older brothers hated him. And, when the opportunity presented itself,
they took their revenge. They faked
Joseph’s death, to tell their father, and sold Joseph into slavery in
Egypt.
Joseph’s faith, amazingly, was
sustained. He was enslaved and also
imprisoned, but he never quit hoping, nor working hard. Finally, by God’s grace, Joseph’s life turned
around, until he was put in charge of all Egypt. Told by God of a coming famine, Joseph built
up great stores of grain, so that Egypt wouldn’t starve.
The famine that came also hit Canaan, where
Jacob and his other sons and their families lived. Jacob eventually sends the ten oldest
brothers to Epypt to buy grain. When
they arrive, they don’t recognized Joseph, but they must come and bow down
before him to beg for the right to buy grain.
Dream fulfilled!
Joseph struggles to react faithfully to his
brothers return. There’s a lot of
fascinating back and forth, but in the end, as we heard in our Old Testament
reading, Joseph finally reveals himself to his ten older brothers. They are terrified, but Joseph shows
mercy. He is filled with forgiveness,
and joy at the chance to rescue his father and his family. Joseph welcomes his brother and tells him to
bring his whole family into Egypt and he will take care of them by God‘s grace.
Joseph knew that the mercy he had received
from God meant that he should be merciful.
Joseph knew the promises God had made to his forebears, Abraham and
Isaac and Jacob, that God would protect and keep them, and eventually would
send a Savior to rescue them from sin and death and every evil. Joseph may not have understood every detail,
but He trusted that God was forgiving and merciful. So he was forgiving and merciful.
The reason that sin and death would be
defeated, the foundation of the mercy and forgiveness that Joseph believed in,
was and is the blood of Jesus. In the
Old Testament, in the New Testament, and today, yesterday and today and forever, the
foundation of God‘s mercy and forgiveness and the new life that He granted to
those who he loves, this foundation is the blood of Jesus.
For Jesus is the Lamb of God who was slain
before the foundation of the world.
God’s plan to rescue sinful humanity was already in place in God‘s mind and
in God‘s heart before humanity was even created. And now, today, Jesus is eternally ruling at
the father‘s right hand. Jesus sits on
the throne of heaven, bearing the scars from which flow the forgiveness and
mercy. Christ is the enduring source of forgiveness
and mercy that will never run out, and is then intended to be shared. This is
the fruit of faith: that the love and mercy we receive flow to others.
Which brings us to what Jesus was talking
about in the sermon on the plane in our Gospel reading this morning. The most striking line of the sermon for me
is when our Lord says: Be merciful as your father in heaven is merciful. Jesus calls His followers to many things, to
bear up under suffering for the Son of Man, to endure scorn, to love not just
friends, but even enemies. All of which
flows from the mercy of the Father. We are
to do good to those who love us and we do good even to our enemies because our
father in heaven was merciful to us by giving us Jesus when we were enemies to
Him. We cling to the promise of God‘s
mercy because this is the source of our life.
And we know that God‘s mercy is greater than everything. God‘s mercy is
greater than any earthly gift we could ever receive. God‘s mercy is more powerful than any evil we
could ever face. And so we as children
of the heavenly father seek to be merciful as the father is merciful to us.
Of
course we know it is so hard to be merciful. It is easy to love those who love
you, but so difficult to love someone sins against you. When someone is cruel to you or to your loved
ones, it is very hard to be merciful to them.
It’s hard to believe in mercy, especially when we know that the dark
thoughts that are in our own hearts. Indeed
this call to be merciful as God the father is merciful is impossible for us. It
is impossible for us because of our nature, the sinful nature we have all
inherited.
It’s impossible for us to achieve this mercy,
unless. Unless we see again or for the
very first time the revelation of the father‘s mercy in the death of Jesus. All of history flows to the cross of Jesus,
or flows from the cross of Jesus. For it
is there that all of God‘s anger against our sin has been used up, extinguished
in the blood of Christ. It is there that
new life is revealed through the death of the only One who is perfectly holy.
It is very hard to live faithfully very hard
to live mercifully. And so we pray: O
Lord, increase our faith! and he will the deeper we go into the mystery of cry
of the cross, the more deeply we understand and receive the benefits that
Christ won for us on His Cross. The more
we understand the profound divine love that was poured out on the cross, the
more that this Gospel, this Good News will form you, the more it will give you
a new heart. The more it will give you
the mind of Christ and the desire to love your neighbors. The more it will lead you to live that life
of faith that God calls you too.
All this, I pray prepares us to finish this
morning by talking about the massacre that happened about 10 days ago in the
Democratic Republic of Congo. As I said
before the service, 50 Christians were taken out of their homes in a village in
the Congo, gathered into the church where they worshiped. They weren’t even
worshiping there anymore because they were too afraid of the Islamic militants,
the Islamic terrorists, who had been threatening them and prosecuting them. These Islamic murderers took these Christians
into the church and killed them, they beheaded them.
This is horrifying. Horrifying, and unimaginable for us, because
we can hardly understand. We live such peaceful lives. We enjoy such freedom
and protection. Such persecution is hard
to imagine. But it is real. Simply for trusting in Jesus, evil people
hated them and murdered them.
This is enraging to think about, that in
this supposedly advanced age, the governments of the world don’t do something
to stop such persecution of Christians.
And this is not all that rare.
Fifty souls in a day, that is rare.
But Christians, especially in Islamic countries, are persecuted every
day, many unto death. We should
rightfully ask our representatives what our government is doing to protect
Christians.
This is a call is the call for us as
Christians to open our eyes. We can and
should love this life God has given us.
We can love this land that we are privileged to live in. But we need to open our eyes and know that the
reality around the world is not all the same.
We have Christian brothers and sisters who suffered for the name of
Jesus. They need our prayers, and our
support. This is a call for us to use
our freedom to not be ashamed of the Gospel, but rather to use the freedom we
have, free to speak of Christ and to tell his name to others and to love our
neighbors and to seek they’re good. And
even to love our enemies.
This is also a call to celebrate. This is hard to take, but we can celebrate this
horror, in Christ. To be sure to
celebrate what happened in the Congo will be a tearful celebration, and otherworldly
celebration. This is a repentant celebration.
And yet it is to be celebrated, that these Christians were willing to
give up their lives instead of give up their faith. It is to be celebrated that even in the face
of such horror, God sustained those saints so that they would endure in the
faith to the very end. It is to be
celebrated, because now they are in glory.
Now they are with Christ. Now
their souls await that last day when the final victory will be revealed.
Romans 1:16-17 is a good way for us to round
this out. For I am not ashamed of the
Gospel for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes the
Jew first and also to the green For in the Gospel the righteousness of God is
revealed from faith for faith, as it is written: the righteous shall live by
faith.
Those who are righteous by faith will live
eternally. And the Righteous will live
by faith each day, depending on Christ, who is their righteousness. And the Righteous will also live faith
faithfully, they will live out the calling that God has given them as
Christians in the world, to love their neighbors and to confess Christ to the
nations.
All of this is true about you. All of this
is true about you because you are connected to the Faithful One. You are connected to Christ Jesus, who holds
you up, who feeds you and reminds you of His love. He moves you to love your neighbor and your
enemies. He moves you to speak His name
to others.
And so rejoice and be glad, in good days and
bad days. No matter what comes, rejoice
and be glad, for great is your reward in heaven,
In the name
of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
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