# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_2016_S79
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

CONVENTION
SERMON • 4

Saying What God Says
1 JOHN 1:8–2:2

by t he R ev. Dr . Herb ert C. Muel ler , Jr ., L C M S Firs t Vic e -Pres id en t
66th Regular Convention of The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod • July 11, 2016 • Service of Confession and Absolution

Dear fellow sinners, washed in the blood! What a
great opportunity to be here! To confess Christ, yes!
But also, what a great opportunity to SIN—against
God and against one another.

us.” But tell me, who is the Word of God in the flesh?
Who is the truth of God incarnate? Jesus is. So if we
say we have not sinned, then we are saying Jesus is
not in us.

Does that surprise you? Or did we all check our sinful
natures at the door? Perhaps the devil will stay home
from the convention. Not that we need the devil’s
help to sin against one another. We are quite capable
of that all by ourselves. In the church postils, Martin
Luther writes:

The truth is, we are sinners through and through.
When we confess our sins, we are simply saying what
God says. Homologeo. Yes, God, Your Word tells the
truth about me. But if that’s the truth about us, we
confess an even greater truth about God. If we confess our sins, God is faithful—God keeps His promise.
God is righteous in Jesus to forgive us our sins and
to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That’s because in Jesus, God Himself did what we could never
do. The Book of Hebrews says Jesus was like us “in
every respect, so that he might become a merciful
and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make
propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he

	When self-conceit gains the upper hand, so
that someone wants to be more learned, wiser, better, and holier than another, he then
begins to despise the others. Thus he draws
people to himself away from the united
understanding and mind which makes us all
equal in Christ, so that they are supposed to
praise and exalt his teaching, preaching, and
doing over others. Then harm has already
been done, faith has been abolished, and
the Church has been torn. (Luther’s Works
78:189)
It’s almost as though Luther is walking these halls,
listening to our side comments. He certainly knows
the sinful heart.
Hear again our text: “If we say we have no sin, we
deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we
confess our sins . . .” To confess is to “say the same
thing,” to say what God says. There is no escaping the
searchlight of God’s Law. So, “if we say we have not
sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in

“Saying What God Says”

U P O N T H I S R O C K • Sermon

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