Monday, October 31, 2022

 

Monday, October 31, 2022


Psalm 83

Nehemiah 8:13-9:5

Revelation 1:1-8


Observance: Martin Luther (d. 1546) and other Continental Reformers


To Him who loves us and freed us from our sins by His blood, and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.


Happy Reformation Day! Today, all over the world, our Reformed brothers and sisters are dressing up in funny hats, singing A Mighty Fortress, and feasting in fellowship. The great gift, the blood of Christ, was re-appropriated back into the mainstream church 500 years ago, cleansing not only the individual from the burden of inescapable sin, but also Christendom itself from centuries of spiritual abuse under such terrors as indulgences, purgatory, and Thomistic scholasticism.


Ever the consummate politician, Martin Luther condensed his teachings into easily remembered slogans. Other Reformers picked up on this and so now we can study the Reformation as revolving around five “solas”. (Sola being the Latin word for “alone”.) The Reformers taught that humanity receives salvation by faith, in Christ, by God’s grace, according to Scripture, to the glory of God: alone. The readings today are giving us some good examples about how, in the Bible, all is to God’s glory. Nehemiah records a national repentance, and observe the phrase which is a direct quote from the day: it is a doxology, a proclamation of praise and glory to God. This thread runs through to the final book in the Bible, where John begins the Revelation with a similar sentiment.


God is above all things, created all things, is the source of all things, holds all the power. This alone should be enough to deserve praise. Imagine a world with no incarnation, no cross, no Easter, no salvation: God would still deserve all this from us, if only for the short time we humans would be on His earth. But John, ever the sweetheart, reminds us we have been given something even greater than this life from “Him who loves us”. The very blood of Jesus has been given to us by His grace; as a free gift. It is simply by receiving and trusting the power of this blood (that is, our “faith”) that Christ raises us up to be a kingdom, a royal priesthood, living forever in the presence of Him who loves us.


If God, simply by being who God is, is enough for us to praise and worship Him, how much more can and should we praise Him for saving us, by taking the just punishment we deserve on His own head and thereby cleansing us and raising us up to where He is? Everything we have is His by right as our Creator; but because He is the one who loves us and proved it, we hand our lives over to Him happily and with rejoicing. Christ is ours, and we are Christs, and all that is left is praise and rejoicing.


Did we in our own strength confide,
our striving would be losing,
were not the right Man on our side,
the Man of God's own choosing.
You ask who that may be?
Christ Jesus, it is he;
Lord Sabaoth his name,
from age to age the same;
and he must win the battle.



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