# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1971_S72
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

IIE /-—

72 THE CONVENTION ESSAY

wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all un-
godliness and wickedness of men who by their wicked-
ness suppress the truth.”

However, the principle of God’s wrath does not cancel
the principle of God’s love. It has been well said that
the more a father loves his son, the more he hates in
him the drunkard, the liar, or the traitor.

Moreover, the fact that Christ was required to die

sins only, but also for the sins of the whole world.”
(1 John 2: 2)

Martin Franzmann put it clearly when he wrote:
“The Atonement, accordingly, is an act of God, who is
therefore both the wrathful One and the Expiator, both
the insulted One and the Propitiator, . . - The grace
of God meets us in Jesus Christ. This grace is the cause
and the origin, not merely the result of the incarnation
of the Son. But the holiness and righteousness of God
are nevertheless full reality. The Law of God is His
Serious will. His wrath is not mere illusion on the part
of guilty man, but a divine reality... . And this wrath
had to be satisfied: ‘Even God’s grace proceeds on holy
ways’ {Althaus) ,” 12

The Lutheran Confessions strongly endorse this posi-
tion. The Augsburg Confession declares: “The Son of
God... one Christ, true God and true man, who was

reconciliation, for in verse 3 he says: “Abraham be.
lieved God, and it was reckoned to him as righteous-
ness.” In verse 8 he says, “Blessed is the man against
whom the Lord will not reckon his sin.” The reverse
order is followed in 2 Corinthians 9:19 where Paul says
that God is “not counting their trespasses against them,”
ang in verse 21 he speaks of us thus becoming the

righteousness of God through this forgiveness and rec-
onciliation. Thus it is clear that not imputing sin involves
imputing righteousness,

the domain of personal relationships.” Althaus con-
cludes, “Reconciliation is actualized as justification; jus-
tification involves reconciliation,” 13

Luther ties justification and reconciliation together
when he Says, “You are righteous when you believe that

tion seem to be practically interchangeable.” 13

It adds up to this, then, that God has restored us to
the status of being His children and has forgiven all our
sins (reconciled) so that we stand before Him clothed
with the white raiment of Christ’s righteousness (justi-
fied). This is the world-revolutionizing message of the
Gospel. This is the message we carry in the church,
we who are ambassadors for Christ,

in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that He gave
His only begotten Son,”

reconcile, when he writes, “We cannot Say in English,
God reconciled us to Himself, without conceiving the
persons referred to as being actually at peace with
God, as having laid aside all fear, distrust, and love of
evil, and entered in Point of fact into relations of peace