LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 2013, Page 83

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subject to all.” Before God, the baptized priest is free. He lives in
Christ by faith. Before his neighbor, he is bound by holy orders to
do God’s goodness and mercy. He lives in his neighbor by love.
He is as Christ to the man in the ditch, and the man in the ditch,
who bears a striking resemblance to the One who was beaten and
bloodied and crucified among the thieves, is Christ incognito for
him to serve. “For as often as you have done it to the least of these,
My brother, you have done it unto Me,” says the Lord. And you
do it as free men and women in Christ, for “there is therefore now
no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1).
Priests are never alone. There is no such thing as a solitary priest.
Priest have a “hood,” a priesthood, a community of koinonia, a common life together. Koinonia means to have something in common
that binds you together. No one lives to himself alone; no one dies
to himself alone. If we live, we live to the Lord; if we die, we die to
the Lord. But with the Lord, we are never alone. Jesus taught us to
pray “our Father” not “my Father.” There is no notion whatsoever in
the New Testament of the isolated, individual believer, the rugged
individualist, the priest who pulls himself up by his own sandal
straps. The Church is always a corporate thing—a people, a body,
a nation, a temple. Even the “Bride of Christ” image is a corporate
one, which means all you men can relax. You’re not individually
brides of Christ. Nor are the women, for that matter. The Church
corporately is the Body and Bride of Christ. As Christians, we
are members of Christ’s body, stones of a temple, citizens of a
kingdom, a chosen people, a holy nation, a royal priesthood. A
koinonia of saints.
The apostle Paul describes our common life together in the Book
of Romans. It is a body of diverse members all working together
in harmony, each doing his or her vocation as he or she is gifted
by God.
For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you
not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think,
but to think with sober judgment, each according to the
measure of faith that God has assigned. For as in one body
we have many members, and the members do not all have
the same function, so we, though many, are one body in
Christ, and individually members one of another. Having
gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use
them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in
our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; the one
who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in
generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does
acts of mercy, with cheerfulness. (Rom. 12:3–8)
This communion of saints loves and honors each other; it strives
together in hope and prayer.
Let love be genuine [ἀνυπόκριτος: unhypocritical, not hiding behind a mask]. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what
is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo
one another in showing honor. Do not be slothful in zeal, be
fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient
in tribulation, be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs
of the saints and seek to show hospitality. (Rom. 12:9–13)
There is nothing quite like this community anywhere else on the
earth. It blesses not only the friend but the enemy. It rejoices and
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weeps together. It bends down in Christlike humility to serve the
least, the lost, the lowly, the despised of this world.
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.
Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.
Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but
associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight.
Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is
honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends
on you, live peaceably with all. (Rom. 12:14–18)
This kind of koinonia sounds like a tall order to fill, until we recognize that this is by faith and not by works, a gift of grace from
the Father through the Son by the Spirit who baptizes and words
and bodies and bloodies us together into a communion of saints.
God makes koinonia; we live in the koinonia God makes.
This is not some idyllic fairy tale utopia where all the men are strong,
the women are good looking, the children are above average, and
everyone brings just the right hot dish to the potluck. It wasn’t
rainbows and unicorns in the first century, and it isn’t in our day.
The New Testament tells of palpable tensions between Hebraic and
Hellenistic Jew, between Jew and Gentile convert, between Paul
and Barnabas, Paul and James, Paul and Peter, Peter and John,
the Philippian women Euodia and Syntyche. But the power of the
cross of Jesus works in, with, and under our weakness, division,
error, faithlessness and even our stubborn stupidity. One of the
ongoing wonders if not miracles of history is that the Church has
survived nearly 2,000 years of what can only be described as gross
mismanagement on our part.
The priesthood of Christ must daily pray with and for one another,
“Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against
us.” To live together in koinonia is to have Christ stand between us.
We poor, miserable sinners dare not deal directly with one another
or we will be at each other’s throats and destroy one another. Christ
must be mediator not only between God and man, but between us.
The church is to be a “mouthhouse of forgiveness” as Luther once
said, where 200-proof forgiveness is poured out generously not
just once, or three time, or seven times, but seventy times seven
for the very same thing. And when that inner bookkeeper starts
to lose count, then you get a glimpse of what living grace-fully
means: Forgiving one another as you yourself have been forgiven,
putting up with one another as God in Christ puts up with you.

Baptism as Paradoxical Moment
The baptismal moment is a moment of paradox. A sinner is declared
dead to sin; a saint is declared alive to God. God speaks and so
it is, and yet we wait for something to happen. Now and not yet.
Little Jacob goes kicking and screaming to his Baptism, and he
continues kicking and screaming long after the baptismal water
dries. Did something go wrong, we wonder? Didn’t his Baptism
take? Do we need to do it all over again?
Welcome to the mystery of being simul justus et peccator, sinful and
righteous at one and the same time. When you are speaking to a
baptized believer, a Christian, you are speaking to two completely
different people at one and the same time. One is a total, dyed in
the wool, 100 percent sinner born of the flesh of Adam. The other
is a completely righteous and holy saint, born from above by water
and Spirit, a child of God. Of the sinner, we can have doubt—we
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