LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1995, Page 77

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78 150TH ANNIVERSARY BIBLE STUDY

done this for the sake of the merits of Jesus Christ, my Sav-
ior.
And even that faith is “not of ourselves, it is the gift of
God.” “For no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the

Holy Ghost.” Hear Walther again, who says, “Faith is the

confident appropriation of what has happened in Christ

and through Christ. It does not make reconciliation,” mark

it, “It does not make reconciliation faith, but seizes it.

Therefore the apostle does not say ‘Let God be reconciled to

you,’ but says, ‘Be reconciled to God,’ that is, believe that

through the merit of Christ, death is swallowed up, the fire

of hell has been quenched, and heaven has been opened.”
Luther reminds us that even Judas and all the rest who

lost their souls had their sins forgiven though they did not

know it. But it is through faith that this becomes our pre-

cious possession.

Now let me turn back again to the objectives that are
mentioned on page 7 as we summarize. “By the power of
the Holy Spirit working through God’s Word, we will °

1. affirm justification by God’s grace through faith in
Christ Jesus as the key teaching of the Christian church.

What is more important today in your life than this? In-
deed, all the Scriptures have been given “to make us wise
unto salvation.” Whether that is the story of the Fall and
with it the promise of the Seed of the woman, who would
crush the head of the serpent, the story of Abraham, who
was blessed to be a blessing; all those lovely, magnificent
Psalms which speak of the Messiah; the prophecies of Isa-
iah that He was wounded for our transgressions and
bruised for our iniquities. This is the focus from Adam and
Eve until finally it comes to the manger and then spreads
out again from the cross and the open tomb to Jerusalem,
Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the
earth. What is more important?

2. Second, affirm the need for a proper understanding
and. teaching of justification. The other teacher, on page 9,
Mrs. Thompson, had Quinlin in her class. He was making
such a nuisance of himself, that finally out of frustration
the teacher yelled “Quinlin, Jesus does not love people who
constantly sin. There is only so much Jesus will forgive.”

And how often, even though we know the story, we
mixed these two up, namely, Law and Gospel. About two
miles from our house in Elm Grove, there is a big, big bill-
board that was put up a couple of months ago by some non-
denominational church. I’m sure that Sunday after Sunday
in that church you will hear about Jesus and the blood of
Christ and that they believe in an inerrant Scripture and
the resurrection of the dead. Let me read to you what the
billboard says. If you want to get to heaven, (1) turn away
from sin {good idea}, (2) believe in Jesus, (3) accept Him as
Lord, (4) be born again, and then (5) obey Him in this life.
Obey Him if you want to get to heaven. You see how this
thing gets mixed up. People take away with the left hand
what they give with the right hand. And soI am a searcher.
I am an inquirer. I am the rich young ruler, and I am look-
ing to see how I can be saved. I go through those first four,
and that sounds pretty good, but then I “obey Him.” Well, I
know I don’t always do that. I rolled my window down just
yesterday and gave that guy “what for” for cutting me off.

How wonderful to know objective 3 of this lesson, Rejoice
in our church’s, past, present, and future proclamation of -
this chief teaching of God’s Word. And for that.we take no
credit. It’s not because of us but in spite of us..God has been

so gracious and good in preserving in our beloved Synod this

article on which the church stands or falls. So often we talk
about the heroes of our church in the past. We don’t often
mention the heroines. Heroines like Rosa Young, that black
woman who was really, under God, responsible for the
Lutheran church coming to Alabama and for the founding
of dozen of churches and schools. There are few books that
have touched me personally more than her autobiography,
Light in the Dark Belt. Rosa Young knew what justification
is all about. She knew the difference between Lutheran
preaching and sectarian preaching. And although she had
been a very pious young lady long before she joined the
Lutheran church, it was in her dear Lutheran church, she
confessed, that she first learned about the seriousness of sin
and what her Savior meant to her. That’s why she spoke
about “my dear Lutheran church, my precious Lutheran
teachings,” and even mentioned “those sweet German
hymns.”

She wrote, “God knew the Lutheran church from of old.
He knew her works, the preaching of the pure Gospel, the
true administration of the Holy Sacraments, the Christian
day schools where His lambs are fed daily, the hymns of
praise and adoration to Jesus which are sung by millions of
Lutherans throughout the world today and willed to bring
me and my race in touch with the Lutheran church in order
that we might have the light of the Gospel.”

And, dear people, what she suffered because of that con-
viction, actually put out of a home one night, the home of
people who had been her friends but who threw her out on
the street because she refused to go to communion in their

‘sectarian church. Other preachers in other denominations

called her a she-devil who had come to “upset Alabama
with her Lutheranism.” Now hear a voice from the more re-
cent past, that of my sainted professor Martin Franzman,
who tells us what this Gospel that Rosa Young so loved is
all about when he says, “There are no conditions, only be-
lieve. We demand no performance. We ask no one to climb
laborious ladders to a probable heaven. We ask men to be-
lieve and to let God work. We place no bars, racial, political,
or social. The Lutheran church is not a German church, an
English church, or a Chinese church. It is neither a white
man’s church nor a black man’s church; neither a rich
man’s church nor a poor man’s church. The Gospel we
preach is a universal gospel andthe grace it offers is uni-
versal grace. So we preach. We cannot do otherwise ... In so
preaching lies the only hope of our future.” And note this.
He says, “There is no conflict between conserving this our
life and going forward; for unless we conserve this, our life,
we shall not go forward at all.” And because your heart is
filled with joy, we are going to close this Bible study singing
the hymn “By grace I’m saved, grace free and boundless.”

Bible Study 2

The Lord be with you. I would ask that you again take
the Bible study guide that was so graciously given to all of
us by CPH. And again this morning I should like to begin