LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 2010, Page 93

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CONVENTION BIBLE STUDIES

forgiveness that was shared by His people in their respective
vocations through what Dr . Martin Luther of blessed memory and our confessing fathers would unashamedly call in
the Smalcald Articles, “the mutual conversation and consolation of brothers and sisters .” For we also believe, teach, and
confess our desire “that the world may know … the Gospel,
which gives guidance and help against sin … because God is
extravagantly rich in His grace … through the spoken Word,
in which the forgiveness of sins is preached to the whole world
(which is the proper function of the Gospel), through Baptism,
through the Holy Sacrament of the Altar and through the
power of the keys .”6 We are not one people forgiven through
Christ for ourselves alone; we are one people forgiven through
Christ to share forgiveness with the community—with the
world—with the cosmos .
There, on a blustery cold street corner in the midst of a
cold–blooded crime scene in a community in which post–
modern claims of post–Christian value–less virtues are
often cherished for the sake of fostering self–centered liberties and universal yet individualistic fleeting entitlements,
the notions of separation, disengagement and self–righteousness were torn asunder by the praises and presence of people
who were brought together in the thick, blood–filled, baptismal waters that spewed from the pierced side of the crucified
Christ on the throne of His cross . There, in that community
of faith, a community made a community by the power and
grace of the Holy Spirit, a community that had become what
that community had received—the body of Christ in and for
the world—Christ Jesus Himself came to a corner and a community in the Bronx as the King of all glory, capturing hearts
with the heavenly story .
Jesus has come as the mighty Redeemer .
See now the threatening strong one disarmed!
Jesus breaks down all the walls of death’s fortress,
Brings forth the pris’ners triumphant, unharmed .
Satan, you wicked one, own now your master,
Jesus has come! He, the mighty Redeemer .7
This congregation as a praying community of service was
one people forgiven through Christ to forgive in the community . Singing hymns while placing flowers, candles, crosses,
posters, small figures of Christ, and other treasures that they
had which they were willing to leave behind as a witness to
others, these mosaic children of the Augustana knew that they
had freely received from Christ and could now freely give .
They had been forgiven; now they were chosen to bring forgiveness and posture that forgiveness for their neighbors . And
who was their neighbor? All people were to be their neighbors .
And many neighbors gathered . Cars stopped . Horns
honked . People crossed themselves . They left their apartments . They left their cars . They put their groceries on the
icy pavement and folded their hands . They gathered with a
forgiving community on an unlikely corner in the corner of an
unlikely city with an unlikely crew who followed an unlikely
Redeemer . Yet they came from all sectors of life—white collar, blue collar, no collar . They had bandanas and tattoos . They

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had earrings, nose rings, and tongue rings . They wore their
colors on their backs while they wore their emotions on their
sleeves . They were everyday people . They were the people
of “New York—concrete jungle where dreams are made of .”8
And yet, in that “fast fleeting hour,”9 a Lutheran catechism
class was being conducted in the street .
The proclamation was intense . “These murders are wrong;
‘You shall not murder,’ our Lord tells us .” The people who
died were sinners and so was the murderer . We are sinners and
the wages of our sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord .10 We have been saved
by God’s grace through faith on account of Jesus Christ . God,
who is rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He
loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made
us alive together with Christ and seated us with Him in the
heavenly places in Christ Jesus so that in the coming ages He
might show the immeasurable richness of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus . We remember that we were
separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of
Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having not
hope and without God in the world, but now we who were
once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ .
For He Himself is our peace, who has made us both one and
broken down in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility, so that
through Him we have access in one Spirit to the Father as fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household
of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets,
Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone .11
And because we are one people forgiven through Christ to
forgive in the community, you as members of the congregations of The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod were there
with us, just as you have been there with us every time we have
called on the name of the Lord in prayer through Jesus Christ
our Savior . We do believe in one holy catholic and apostolic
Church . We are one people forgiven through Christ . And nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our
Lord .12 And because we are one in Christ Jesus, nothing can
separate us from each other . For we have been reconciled to
God through our Lord Jesus Christ . “We are members of one
another,”13 as St . Paul reminds us in his letter to the Ephesians,
so that we may be kind to another, tenderhearted, forgiving
one another as God in Christ has forgiven us .14
As God’s people had received daily bread from the Father’s
hands that day, they prayed for forgiveness in the street—forgiveness from God for thick–skinned and heartless attitudes
toward life, forgiveness for not helping neighbors in times of
need, forgiveness for turning blind eyes to senseless cycles
of sin, forgiveness for letting tragedy become the motivation
for why people gathered for prayer on the street when God’s
people are free to do so at any time . Prayers were offered for
the family of those who died . Prayers were offered for the
murderer and his family—praying, as Jesus instructed, for
enemies, our enemies, and all who persecute us . We prayed
that the walls of hostility that divide us would be broken and
that God would bring peace again to His people . We prayed
2010 Convention Proceedings