Romans 9:1-5
- It would be easy to think, “I’ll go to hell…so you can go to heaven!”
But it isn’t that simple. You cannot enter heaven on another person’s merits.
You can’t avoid condemnation. By allowing someone else to take your place. For
it is Christ alone who became your substitute.
Hence the question. “Did the Father also die for you?” He did not. The Father is God
only as is the Holy Spirit; but the Son is both true God and true man. He died
for me and shed His blood for me. [2]
The Lord demands perfection and rightness. He has
said, ‘You shall be holy as I the Lord am
holy.” (Leviticus 20:26) To keep us from being separated Christ entered
time and space.
He was abandoned by God and by men for your salvation.
As Isaiah predicted, “He was oppressed,
and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to
the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he
opened not his mouth. By oppression and judgment, he was taken away; and as for
his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the
living, stricken for the transgression of my people? And they made his grave
with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no
violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.” (Isaiah 53:7-9)
The Church is literally a hospital and a hospice for
sinners if we are going to speak of salvation in medical terms. Here the means
of grace, the Word and the Sacraments, “the
medicine of immortality"[3]
is dispensed, as the Great Physician prescribes them. Christ is your Divine
Healer.
Man is sick and dying with sin and the grace-filled
Word and Sacraments give him life and healing. Sure, there are those who seem
to think the Church is nothing but a sort of "museum of the saved" or
the "collection of the already sanctified brethren" as the unwashed
dare not enter.
But you’ll never find a “No Vacancy” sign outside the
church door. May the Lord give us a
passion for those who are missing. There is still room - in the Father’s house.
Almighty God,
You invite us to trust in You for our salvation. Deal with us not in the
severity of Your judgment but by the greatness of Your mercy; through Jesus
Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever.[4]
[1] The Lord's Supper image copyright © Ed Riojas, Higher Things
[2] Christian Questions with Their Answers,
Luther’s Small Catechism © 2006 Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis
[3] St.
Ignatius of Antioch
[4]
Lutheran Service Book © 2006 Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis
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