LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2019, Page 273

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II. THEOLOGICAL DOCUMENTS­­—COMMISSION ON THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS
Sometimes we need the perspective of a nonbeliever to help
us realize how incredible this sounds. One of the authors of
this study was once questioned about his faith by a fellow
passenger on a long overseas flight. That passenger was
simply astounded to find that anyone “still believed that
stuff.” With amazement rather than sarcasm in his voice, he
asked, “So you really believe that God came down to earth
and walked around on it as a human being?” Hearing the
question put that way restored the author’s sense of wonder
in the “old, old story” that we so often tell with equal parts
pride and nonchalance.
5. What does it mean to you that God’s own Son was
“born of woman”?

It remains for us, then, only to comment on the idea of
redemption. We turn back to Gal. 3:10–14 to read how Paul
has already described Christ’s work of redemption.

curse which others, by their failure to fulfil it, had
incurred. Only so could he accomplish the purpose
of redeeming those who were ‘under law’ (v 5).47

These words portray Christ truly and accurately.
They do not ascribe to Him the work of establishing
a new Law; they ascribe to Him the work of redeeming those who were under the Law.49
9. How do these two characteristics — “born of woman”
and “born under the law” — find expression in the
Christmas narratives of Matthew and Luke? As you
skim over Matthew 1 and Luke 2, note the vulnerability
of the Holy Family, the need to provide for basic
necessities and the prominent (and sometimes hostile)
presence of political authorities.

6. How would you explain to your children or to your
siblings the importance of this first characteristic of the
One sent out by God?

And how difficult it can be to hold fast to such a view!
Therefore you must contend with all your might, in
order that you may learn to acknowledge and regard
Christ as Paul portrays Him in this passage.50
With regard to the redemption itself, Luther waxes
eloquent. We must not, however, let his signature language
— both powerful and colorful — encourage us to enjoy
it as Luther’s and thus miss the point. Taking up and
expanding Paul’s metaphor of Law as the master to whom
we were enslaved, Luther writes,
This was truly a remarkable duel, when the Law,
a creature, came into conflict with the Creator,
exceeding its every jurisdiction to vex the Son of
God with the same tyranny with which it vexed
us, the sons of wrath (Eph. 2:3). Because the Law
has sinned so horribly and wickedly against its
God, it is summoned to court and accused. Here
Christ says: “Lady Law, you empress, you cruel
and powerful tyrant over the whole human race,
what did I commit that you accused, intimidated,
and condemned Me in My innocence?” Here the
Law, which once condemned and killed all men,
has nothing with which to defend or cleanse itself.
Therefore it is condemned and killed in turn, so that
it loses its jurisdiction not only over Christ — whom
it attacked and killed without any right anyway —
but also over all who believe in Him. Here Christ
says (Matt. 11:28): “Come to Me, all who labor under
the yoke of the Law. I could have overcome the Law
by My supreme authority, without any injury to Me;
for I am the Lord of the Law, and therefore it has
no jurisdiction over Me. But for the sake of you,
who were under the Law, I assumed your flesh and

5a “to redeem those who were under the law”

7. How can we help rekindle and enhance for each other
this year our sense of wonder at the Christmas story?

We have already spent some time on the idea of being
“under the law.” At this point, we need only add that those
who argue that the Jews are the only people properly “under
the law” would be forced to also regard the redemption
Paul speaks of here as solely for the Jews as well. Surely that
cannot be Paul’s meaning. Bruce presents a view that is
much easier to defend based on Paul’s own language in this
section:
Even if Paul begins this section (vv 3–7) by thinking
in particular of Jewish Christians ([“and we”]), who
had lived more directly [“under law”], it is plain now
that the beneficiaries of Christ’s redeeming work
(as in 3:13f.) include Gentiles as well as Jews. The
oscillation between ‘we’ ([“in order that . . . we might
receive”], v 5; cf. [“into our hearts”], v 6), ‘you’ ([“and
because you *plural* are sons”], v 6) and ‘thou’
([“you *singular* are no longer a slave”], v 7), attests
the inclusive emphasis of Paul’s wording and argument (as in 3:23–26).48

4d “born under the law”
Born under the Law, Christ was the perfect slave and found
this subjection no slavery to Him, yet this is not the first
time in this epistle where Paul has talked about what it
means to be “under the law.” As F. F. Bruce explains,
Paul might have put on the lips of Christ the language of Ps. 40:8, ‘I delight to do thy will, O my God;
thy law is within my heart’ … but when he speaks
here of Christ having been born under law he bears
in mind what he has already said about the curse of
the law (3:10, 13). In Paul’s thinking, for the Son of
God to be born under that law which he rejoiced to
fulfil involved his voluntarily taking on himself the

F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Galatians: A Commentary on the Greek Text, New
International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982), 196.

47

Bruce, The Epistle to the Galatians, 196. For readability, Bruce’s Greek phrases
have been replaced by English translations.

48

Justifying Christmas — Participant’s Guide |

17

believers are free of the Law through Christ, who
“triumphed over it in Him” (Col. 2:15). This glorious
triumph, accomplished for us through Christ, is
grasped not by works but by faith alone. Therefore
faith alone justifies.55

11. Why should Christmas make us feel like everything is
“thrown into ferment,” that this world’s old rules about
the way things work no longer apply and that nothing
will ever be the same again because this Child has
been born?

49

AE 26:368.

50

AE 26:368.

Earlier [Paul] had named righteousness, life, the
promise of the Spirit, redemption from the Law,
the covenant, and the promise as the blessing given
to the offspring of Abraham. Here he names sonship and the inheritance of eternal life, for these
things flow from the blessing. Once the curse that
is sin, death, etc., has been removed by this blessed
Offspring, its place is taken by the blessing that is
righteousness, life, and everything good.54

Concluding Discussion
This passage has much to teach us concerning the doctrine
of justification by grace through faith. Luther summarizes
nicely for us the most obvious connection:
This [duel] also serves to support the idea that we are
justified by faith alone. For when this duel between
the Law and Christ was going on, no works or merits
of ours intervened. Christ alone remains there;
having put on our person, He serves the Law and in
supreme innocence suffers all its tyranny. Therefore
the Law is guilty of stealing, of sacrilege, and of the
murder of the Son of God. It loses its rights and
deserves to be damned. Wherever Christ is present
or is at least named, it is forced to yield and to flee
this name as the devil flees the cross. Therefore we
53
Ernest De Witt Burton, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle
to the Galatians, International Critical Commentary (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark,
1921), 221.
54

AE 26:374.

Ignatius, “The Letters of Ignatius to the Ephesians,” from The Apostolic Fathers
in English, 3rd ed., trans. and ed. Michael W. Holmes (Grand Rapids: Baker
Academic, 2006), 102.

52

The son he heard obediently;
And, by a maiden mother,
Pure, tender — down he came to me,
For he must be my brother!
Concealed he brought his strength enorm,
And went about in my poor form,
Meaning to catch the devil.

Setting those two conclusions from the academic study
of the New Testament side by side makes it all the more
remarkable that Paul should here, in one of his earliest if not
his earliest epistle, speak of the birth of Christ and couple
that with His work of redeeming us out from under the
power of the Law. Paul’s proclamation that Christ was born
of woman so that we might become the sons of God is a
powerful statement of the “for us” nature of Christ’s birth
that we studied in Session 3.
Luther spoke above of the connection between our passage
and justification by faith alone. What about by grace alone?
Of course, the point made above that no works of ours ever
entered into the equation and that this sonship is received
solely by faith — neither earned nor bartered for through
the commerce of our own works — necessarily implies that
this comes to us solely by the grace of God. Commenting on
Galatians 4:3, Luther calls Christ Himself, who redeemed

AE 26:371–372.

He said unto me: Hold by me,
Thy matters I will settle;
I give myself all up for thee,
And I will fight thy battle.
For I am thine, and thou art mine,
And my house also shall be thine;
The enemy shall not part us.
Like water he will shed my blood,
Of life my heart bereaving;
All this I suffer for thy good —
That hold with firm believing;
My Life shall swallow up that Death;
My innocence bears thy sins, He saith,
So henceforth thou art happy.59
And this Christmastide and henceforth, forevermore happy
shall we be.
58

See the fairly balanced discussion in James D. G. Dunn, The Theology of Paul the
Apostle (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), 182–206.

56

See Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, 26–32.

Justifying Christmas — Participant’s Guide |

AE 26:370–371. Luther speaks very strongly against the Law here, but it is
important to keep in mind, especially for those less familiar with Luther’s writings,
that he is speaking specifically of the Law in the context of justification. A little bit
earlier in this commentary, Luther wrote “Apart from the matter of justification, on
the other hand, we, like Paul, should think reverently of the Law. We should endow
it with the highest praises and call it holy, righteous, good, spiritual, divine, etc.”
See AE 26:365.

51

To his dear son he said: Go down;
Things go in piteous fashion;
Go thou, my heart’s exalted crown,
Be the poor man’s salvation.
Lift him from out sin’s scorn and scathe;
Strangle for him that cruel Death,
And take him to live with thee.

With regard to the birth of our Lord, it is also often theorized that reflection on Christ’s birth was one of the final
dimensions of Christological reflection in terms of the
Gospels as we have them.57

57

all magic and every kind of spell were dissolved, the
ignorance so characteristic of wickedness vanished,
and the ancient kingdom was abolished when God
appeared in human form to bring the newness of
eternal life; and what had been prepared by God began to take effect. As a result, all things were thrown
into ferment, because the abolition of death was
being carried out.52

Then God was sorry on his throne
To see such torment rend me;
His tender mercy he thought on,
And his good help would send me.
He turned to me his father-heart:
Ah, then was His no easy part;
His very best it cost him!

It is often said of Paul that his writings tell us very little
about the earthly life and ministry of our Lord. Some have
wrongly concluded on the basis of superficial reading that
Paul showed little interest in such biographical information
and that his sole concern was the death of Christ. Although
there is much material to show both Paul’s knowledge of
and high regard for the details of Christ’s life and ministry,
the direct references to those details are admittedly few.56

55

There are probably few of us who would answer the question above with the words “Free!” or “Alive!” Writing
centuries before Luther, but expressing some of the same
thoughts, Ignatius of Antioch wrote to the Christians at
Ephesus that, when God had accomplished the mystery of
the birth of His Son,

us from the curse of the Law, “the throne of grace.”58 The
“sending out” of the Son by the Father, moreover, calls to
mind verses from Luther’s hymn “Dear Christians, One and
All, Rejoice”:

5b “That we might receive adoption as sons”

We allow Luther to conclude this section for us:

10. How does Christmas make you feel? Merry? Jolly?
Bright? Tired? Overwhelmed? Guilty? At what
moments are you most tempted to think that Christ
comes to you as a Lawgiver rather than as your
Redeemer?

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12. What other connections to the doctrine of justification
come to mind?

Ernest Burton has described adoption for Paul as “the
establishment of those who have previously not had the
privileges of a son in the full enjoyment of them.”53 If
“adoption” means something less than full sonship, then
it should not be used here to express Paul’s meaning.

subjected Myself to the Law. That is, beyond the call
of duty I went down into the same imprisonment,
tyranny, and slavery of the Law under which you
were serving as captives. I permitted the Law to lord
it over Me, its Lord, to terrify Me, to subject Me to
sin, death, and the wrath of God — none of which it
had any right to do. Therefore
I have conquered the Law by a double claim: first,
as the Son of God, the Lord of the Law; secondly, in
your person, which is tantamount to your having
conquered the Law yourselves.51

In his comments on Gal. 4:4–5, Luther emphasizes the picture of Christ Paul gives us:

8. Does the phrase “under the law” mean nothing more
than “Jewish”?

273

19

AE 26:362.

59
Martin Luther, “Luther’s Song-Book,” in The Project Gutenberg EBook of
Rampolli, trans. George MacDonald (Posting Date: August 29, 2003 [EBook
#8949]). Cf. LSB 556.

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2019 Convention Workbook