LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 2016, Page 72

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crowd again. And they told him, “We want to hear one
word from you, Luther: Revoco. Revoco. I recant.”
Luther was nervous the day before, but he was very
confident that day. He apologized. He said, “I’m
sorry, I was not brought up in the court. If I used
the wrong title for some of you, it is not meant to
be rude.” You could hear a pin drop. He said, “Some
of my books deal with simple Christian matters and
simple morality based on the central teaching of
the Gospel, and even my enemies would concede
they are right. Some of my writings are against
the pope.” Then Luther went on a rant against the
pope, and it was so intense that the emperor told
him to stop. A third part of his writings, Luther
said, were against the enemies of the faith. Though
he had overdone it sometimes in his invective, he
would not say the word Revoco.
The emperor and his advisers left the room for a few
minutes. When they returned, they asked Luther one
more time, “Are you prepared to answer without evasion and without horns, Luther? Say the word Revoco.”
And Luther responded with one sentence. And at this
moment in the history of the Church, in the Western
world particularly, it was a very consequential sentence. He said it in both Latin and German: “Unless I am convinced by the testimonies of the Holy
Scriptures or evident reason, for I believe neither in
the pope nor councils alone, since it has been established that they have often erred and contradicted
themselves, I am bound by the Scriptures adduced
by me, and my conscience has been taken captive by
the Word of God, and I am neither able nor willing to
recant, since it is neither safe nor right to act against
conscience. God help me. Amen.”
To the great frustration of his opponents, he quickly
left. He was taken outside. And he held up his arms
in front of the crowd, “I’m through. I’m through.”
There were thousands waiting. And from that point
on almost, he had a death sentence over his head.
It was Luther’s moment. And it was the moment of the
birth of our church, really. A great moment of confession. “You, who do you say that I am?” And Luther
responded, “Thou art the Christ, the Christ of Holy
Scripture. The Christ of the Gospel. You are the Christ
who teaches aright about natural law and conscience.
And a conscience bound by the Word of God.”
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U P O N T H I S R O C K • Sermon

Luther refused to revoke Christ’s teaching. Christ is
the Rock. If we lose the Rock, what do we have left?
And he also asserted—and this is important for us
today—that the conscience is free from external coercion by anything but the Word of God.
And Luther held forth, even though our culture today
does not recognize the fact. Luther, in a big way, for the
first time, held forth the idea that the government has
no right to coerce the religious conscience. None. And
that teaching is a teaching of the Lutheran Church.
“Who do you say that I am?” The first thing we do is
confess, like John the Baptizer, “I am not the Christ.”
Every one of us, from me to the last person in this
hall, should get up right now and confess, “I am not
the Christ.” It says that in John 1. John the Baptizer
confessed, “I am not the Christ.”
How often in your life would you be the Christ, the
know-it-all, the religious expert, the one who doesn’t
need to repent? You are the redeemer, you’re the
savior of your congregation—if it doesn’t do what you
want it to do.
I’ve got news for you. You are not Jesus. And neither
am I. And the Missouri Synod and the future of the
Missouri Synod doesn’t depend on you or me or anybody else. It depends on Christ, the Rock. Luther said,
“I am a maggot sack. It’s the doctrine. It’s the doctrine.”
And we confess not only our sins, but we confess the
strong content of the faith. “You are the Christ, the
Messiah.” This Jesus has died on the cross for your
sins and the sins of the world. “There is no other
name under heaven given among men by which we
must be saved” (Acts 4:12). Your sins are covered.
Your sins are but a drop in the ocean. Your sins are
covered by Christ’s blood. You are baptized and
covered with His free, wonderful righteousness. No
matter how troubled your conscience is at times;
no matter how terrified you are of your sins or past
deeds; no matter if you are sluggish in the faith.
Only believe. Christ is yours. He is all yours. You are
forgiven. And your conscience is captive to the Word
of God. Flesh and blood doesn’t reveal this. It’s your
Father in heaven who has grabbed hold of you. And
He’s not going to let you out of His hand.
And notice also what this text teaches us. All of us
have the keys. Now this text says the keys are given to
“Upon This Rock”