Lutherna View of Church and State

LESSON NINE

2007-2008

SANCTIFICATION

I. Introduction

A. Continuing discussion of “mystery”/“sacraments”.

B. Hidden yet revealed.

II. Who Is the Actor? (p. 152)

A. Most Evangelicals see the sacraments as “ordinances”.

1. Commands for actions for us to do.

2. Thus, Communion becomes our way of fulfilling Jesus’ will to be memorialized in this meal until He returns.

3. Baptism becomes act of confirming prior decision to accept Jesus, a public demonstration of commitment.

B. Issue goes to very heart of the Gospel.

1. Who is at work in God’s relationship with man?

a. Man?, or

b. God?

2. Are sacraments our offerings to God, or His to us?

3. In and through them, God actively conveys Himself and His grace.

4. As I participate in faith, man’s relationship with Him is established, repaired, and maintained.

C. God is the actor!

1. He made first move; He has come to earth.

2. He has placed within reach of man’s senses, first in the Incarnation, then in the sacraments.

3. What we could never arrive at through logic, God gives us power to believe.

III. Logic and Mystery (p. 153)

A. Inability of mind to “contact” God outside His self-revelation goes against our grain.

B. We want “the driver’s seat”.

C. To a society staking its spirituality on knowledge instead of wisdom, mystery must remain the enemy.

D. We must take Him at His word, letting God be God, regarding the reality of sacramental power.

E. After all, the very wisdom of God is hidden in a mystery, the Incarnation and the cross.

IV. Outward Action or Inner Experience? (p. 153)

A. Evangelicals tend to see sacramental churches as dead.

1. Sacramental churches rely merely on outward acts.

2. They believe genuine commitment and exciting power are to be found in the inner experience of faith.

3. Not true.

B. A proper understanding of the power of the sacraments enhances the new life in Christ.

C. These outward acts are the very means by which God works on our inner experience.

D. In these external means we meet Christ!

E. This is Christ at work!

V. The Sure Foundation (p. 155)

A. To have any certainty in the Christian faith.

1. It must be grounded on the objective promise of the Word.

2. Jn 20:31.

3. Ro 15:4.

4. 1Co 10:11.

5. IJn 5:13.

B. The experience of faith is a result, not the cause, of our salvation.

C. The real experience which saves.

1. Is the experience of Jesus on the cross.

2. Col 2:15.

3. In what appeared to be defeat, He won the final victory.

D. The message of the cross.

1. May look like foolishness to the world.

2. 1Co 1:18.

3. Ro 1:16.

4. 1Jn 5:11 (“in His Son”).

E. The same divine life which gives life to the world is made available to us in the sacraments.