500 years ago, man did not dare lift his eyes to heaven. For heaven, it was taught and believed, was ruled by an angry tyrant who sought to punish those who displeased him and, if the church was to be believed, everyone displeased him. Man lived in fear of heaven’s tyrant and spent his days trying desperately to appease him. Men beat their sinful flesh with rods and whips, they fasted, and denied themselves the most rudimentary creature comforts in the hopes that the tyrant would find satisfaction in their suffering. They took vows of silence and celibacy, performed religious rituals, and prayed prescribed prayers in the hopes the tyrant would be placated with their devotion. They collected religious artifacts, wore sacred medallions, and purchased papal dispensations in the hopes the tyrant might be distracted by their donations. Man worked hard to appease heaven’s tyrant, but he knew his efforts were in vain. So, man began to call upon the tyrant’s friends and family hoping that these saints and the blessed mother might have some influence over him and be able to convince the tyrant to spare their miserable lives from the torments of hell, but they knew this too was a fool’s hope.
Lest you think I am exaggerating man’s view of heaven’s tyrant, listen to these words written by a German monk in 1519. “Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience. I could not believe that he was placated by my satisfaction. I did not love, yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners, and secretly, if not blasphemously, certainly murmuring greatly, I was angry with God, and said, "As if, indeed, it is not enough, that miserable sinners, eternally lost through original sin, are crushed by every kind of calamity by the law of the decalogue, without having God add pain to pain by the gospel and also by the gospel threatening us with his righteousness and wrath!" Thus, I raged with a fierce and troubled conscience.”[1]
We cannot blame the monk for his harsh words. It is hard to love a tyrant. Thankfully, we don’t have to. When that same monk began to read the bible, he discovered that the one who ruled heaven was not an angry tyrant, as he was led to believe. In Romans 3:21-22 the monk read, “21 But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.” The monk meditated on these words day and night until, at last, by the work of the Spirit, the meaning of the words “through faith” became clear to him. The monk exclaimed, “Here I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates. There a totally other face of the entire Scripture showed itself to me.”1 The monk realized the ruler of heaven was not an angry tyrant who sought to punish his people, rather He is the loving giver of gifts who seeks to pardon His people. As a result, the monk said these verses were to him “the gate to paradise.”1
Today, largely because of the work the Holy Spirit accomplished through that monk, we see God as the giver of gifts. We simply call the gift God gives us “salvation”, but that is only because we lack the imagination to comprehend the value of the gift He gives. It is worth noting and noting again and again that the gift God gives us, while free to us, cost him dearly. God had to watch as His Son, whom He loves, was beaten bloody and nails were driven into his hands and feet. If it were our child, we would say the cost was too great, but God allowed His Son to be sacrificed so that we could be given the gift of salvation. And rarely do we take the time to truly contemplate what it is we have been saved from. To us the lake of fire, the outer darkness, the place of torment where the damned weep and gnash their teeth is but a curiosity. We know that it is a real place, but we also know that it is a place we will never visit. I do not mean to suggest otherwise, however, if we are to truly appreciate the gift that God gives us, we ought to spend an occasional moment realizing hell is where we deserve to go and if it were not for the gift God gives us it is where we would go. More often, I think, we find ourselves trying to imagine what we have been saved for. We try to imagine what lies beyond the pearly gates in the city that’s streets are paved with gold where there is no crying or mourning or pain. We imagine ourselves standing beside the white robed martyrs and listening to the heavenly host sing their songs of praise as we bask in the radiating glory of our God. If we want to truly appreciate the gift that God gives us then I am not sure we can spend too much time celebrating the fact that, because of God’s gift, heaven is where we get to go.
Salvation, purchased with the blood of God’s beloved Son so that we can avoid hell and go to heaven is the gift the ruler of heaven seeks to give to us. The problem is, how do we get that gift? In the first verse of our epistle lesson the Holy Spirit says, “1 you were dead in your transgressions”. Dead bodies, in my experience, don’t do much, in truth they don’t do anything. Which means there is nothing we can do to get the gift God wants to give us. There is no service we can offer and no penance we can perform. To make matters worse, we cannot make a case that we deserve the gift based on our devotion to the ruler of heaven. In the second verse of our epistle lesson the Holy Spirit says, “you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.” As unbelievers we were devoted not to the ruler of heaven but to the ruler of the kingdom of air or kingdom of nothingness. That is a poetic description of the devil. It is impossible to make a case we deserve the gift God gives based on our devotion when our devotion was to the devil. Finally, our hopes of using influential friends to get us the gift are dashed. In the third verse of our epistle lesson the Holy Spirit says we and all the people around us who gratified the cravings of our sinful natures and followed its desires and thoughts “were by nature objects of wrath.” In other words, we didn’t have anyone who could put in a good word for us with the ruler of heaven.
So, it turns out the men of our age are no more successful in obtaining salvation than men 500 years ago were at avoiding damnation. But before we start to secretly, if not blasphemously murmur against a God who gives a gift that we cannot receive, let’s take a close look at what the Holy Spirit says in Ephesians 2:8-9. There the Spirit tells us, “8… it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast.” Just as an understanding of the words “through faith” in Romans 3:21-22 were a gate to paradise for a German monk who was unable to escape damnation, so also an understanding of the words “through faith” in Ephesians 2:8-9 are a gate to paradise for those of us who are unable to grab hold of salvation.
The Holy Spirit tells us we are saved “through faith”. In the Greek the word “through” is a small three letter word that has a profound impact on our salvation. It is the word διά and it is used to indicate the tool or instrument used to get the job done. The word διά tells us faith is the instrument used to obtain salvation. Faith is the hand that grabs hold of the gift that God gives. But how can the hand of a dead, devil worshiping, object of wrath do such a thing? The answer is, it can’t. A fact the Holy Spirit readily recognizes with the words “this not from yourselves”, this “not by works” that you do. But look closer at what the Holy Spirit is saying here, and you will see the hand that holds on to the gift is not animated from within but from without. One of my favorite things to do in Bible Information Class to illustrate this is to pick up a pen place it in the persons hand, close their fingers over the pen, and hold on to their hand so that they can hold on to the pen. We are able to hold on to the gift God gives us because God gives us the strength to hold on to the gift He gives us. We are saved “through faith” and our faith like salvation is a “gift of God”.
Understanding that we are saved “through faith” not only changed the German monk’s view of God, but it changed the way he lived his life. He wanted others to see God as he now saw Him. And so, the monk wrote books, preached sermons, taught classes, debated with priests and princes, and defied a pope and an emperor. From the moment he understood he was saved “through faith” till the day he died the monk did everything he could to show people the ruler of heaven was not an angry tyrant seeking to punish but rather a loving giver of gifts seeking to pardon. Today, we celebrate what the Holy Spirit accomplished through that German monk as the great reformation of the church. It can be argued that monk accomplished more in his remaining years than a thousand monks had accomplished before or after him. But his great accomplishment was nothing more and nothing less than a fruit of his faith.
In verse 10 the Holy Spirit describes those who have been saved “through faith” as, “10… God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” I often describe this verse as the thank you verse. It naturally follows the verses that tell us about the gift God gives us. It is a fitting conclusion to this section of scripture and being described as “God’s workmanship” is a beautiful contrast to the opening verses where we were described as dead, devil worshiping, objects of wrath. In this verse the Holy Spirit tells us being saved through faith changes how we live our lives. God has already prepared opportunities for you to thank Him for your salvation. You may not write a book, preach a sermon, teach a class, debate with priest or prince, or defy a pope and an emperor but you who have been saved “through faith” can, and you will produce fruits of faith. Be they expressions of compassion to a family member, favors to a friend, or random acts of kindness to a stranger, they are nothing more and nothing less than fruits of your faith.
Today we confidently lift our eyes to heaven in gratitude to the giver of gifts Who has saved us “through faith”. Amen.
[1] from the Preface to the Complete Edition of Luther's Latin Writings. It was written by Luther in Wittenberg, 1545. This English edition is availble in Luther's Works Volume 34, Career of the Reformer IV (St. Louis, Concordia Publishing House, 1960), p. 336-337.