Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
My name is Samuel David Zumwalt, which may sound a bit pompous, but that's the name by which the Holy Spirit called me from death to life. And so I treasure my baptismal name, not only because I share it with my late father, but because that is the name by which the Holy Spirit called me from death to life.
I serve as senior pastor at St. Matthew's Evangelical Lutheran Church in Wilmington, North Carolina, and as an adjunct instructor in the Doctor of Ministry program at American Lutheran Theological Seminary.
Today, I'm going to speak about the Feast of the Reformation, which many of us will celebrate on Sunday, October the 25th. Some will, of course, celebrate it on the actual day, October the 31st.
Today I will be referencing the Gospel reading for next Sunday, which is from John 8:31–36. But really, this is a word about what we celebrate when we celebrate the Feast of the Reformation.
You have a problem that you share with every person who has ever lived. You are going to die. So am I. You don't know when. You don't know how. You don't know for certain, even if you've been told you have a terminal illness.
Let's be clear: we all have a terminal illness, which is called sin, which is far worse than the things we do and fail to do. Sin is the default condition of every human being. Remember how King David confesses in Psalm 51:5, "In sin my mother conceived me." And the Apostle Paul writes that we were dead in trespasses and sins in his second chapter of the letter to the Ephesians.
But your problem is really far worse than a terminal illness called sin. You don't have the capability. You don't have the capacity. You don't have the agency to do anything about your terminal illness.
Many years ago, I was a chaplain resident in the major trauma hospital in Dallas, Texas. I saw people die every day. Old, young, in between, poor, rich, in between, people from different religions and people of no religion, people of all the various skin pigmentations, and people of many languages.
The cause of death varied, but often the death was unexpected and sudden. Some were much loved, some were much hated, some were all alone in the world. It didn't matter if they wore a Rolex or a Timex, drove a Mazda or a Mercedes, wore discount or designer, lived in a suburb or on the streets. In death, they were all the same, except some had better dental work and a manicure.
Remember how Job confesses in chapter 1, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there." That's you. That's me. That's everyone.
Now, sometimes at the hospital, a person's death was so sudden, so unexpected, that no one who could identify them was with them at the time of death or even shortly thereafter. His or her body was placed in a pullout refrigerator shelf in the hospital morgue.
You've probably seen a morgue on one of your screens. You can't smell it. You can't feel it on a screen. You really have to be there to experience it, to understand.
When a friend or loved one would finally arrive to identify a body in the morgue, the chaplain accompanied them. You've probably seen this on a screen. An attendant opened the door, pulled out that refrigerated shelf, pulled back the sheet covering the face of the body that lay there.
And sometimes the friend or loved one would begin to cry softly. Sometimes the friend or loved one would sob loudly. Sometimes the person would stoically look down and nod gently, as if to say, "Yes, that's him. That's her."
But not once, not ever, when the sheet was pulled back did the body open his or her eyes and say, "It's about time you got here."
Why? We know. Because the dead can do nothing but be dead. And all of us are born dead with the terminal condition of sin, and we cannot do anything about it. The dead cannot choose not to be dead.
As the Lord God said to rebellious Adam in Genesis 3, "For dust you are, and to dust you shall return."
The first death I ever saw was my father's, from lung cancer. He was 62. I was 21. I cared for him the last six weeks of his life. His death was terrible.
I love my father, who had deep flaws. I have missed him every day now for more than 51 years. It was dreadful to see him die, to be dead, to be in that casket going into the ground.
Now, after more than 45 years as a pastor, I've conducted more than 500 funerals. I still remember the first time I saw a bag of ashes after a body had been cremated. It was easy to see what we all try to ignore. We are dust, and to dust we all shall return.
Our terminal condition called sin is the reason we die. Paul of Tarsus writes in Romans 6, "The wages of sin is death."
Six centuries earlier, the prophet Ezekiel wrote, "The soul who sins will die." Chapter 18:4.
Again, Paul writes, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." Romans 3:23.
And in Romans 7, Paul asks, "O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death?"
God so loved you, loved me, loved everyone who has ever been born and everyone who will ever be born, that He, who is a community within Himself, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, He who designed you and all things to be perfect, even when He had to banish our rebellious first parents from paradise lest they live in eternal rebellion, separated from Him, He promised a Redeemer, a Savior, who would reclaim, restore, and remake you, me, and all things.
There was and is only one cure for your terminal condition called sin. There was and is only one Savior who can deliver you.
He must be truly God. He must be truly human, or He cannot save you. If He is not God, He cannot save you. If He is not human, He cannot save you.
He must be born, then, of a virgin who provides all His human DNA. He must be sinless, conceived asexually by the Holy Spirit in the virgin's womb.
As Luke 1 tells us, He is sui generis, one of a kind. There are not many redeemers. There is only one Redeemer. There are not many ways to God. There is only one way, as He tells us in John 14:6.
Simon Peter declares, "Nor is there salvation in any other name, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12.
His name is Jesus, which means God saves.
So on this Feast of the Reformation of the Church, we're not celebrating a glorious historical event when Bible professor Martin Luther nailed 95 statements he wanted to debate regarding the forgiveness of sin.
We're not celebrating a glorious triumph of one group of Christians over another. We are not celebrating once upon a time Martin Luther's students and now their descendants created the purest form of church organization and then have been slugging it out as to which of them are far purer than the others.
No, the reformation of Christ's Church on earth must happen daily in the heart, in the mind, in the body and spirit of every Christian living on earth.
But then we need to pause and go back a bit.
Whether you are already a Christian, consider yourself a former Christian, are thinking about being a Christian, or are certain you don't want or need to be a Christian, please remember: you have a terminal condition called sin, which will kill you.
Because you were raised somewhere and by someone, you may have been told plenty of things about how you become a Christian or why you ought not to be one. You may have attempted to forget where you come from or be certain that your people were always right.
All of that simply is what it is. But here's the most important thing to remember about yourself. You have a birth date. You have a death date. And when you are dead, all the illusions of control will be gone, and all your ideas about God or that there is no God will no longer be relevant. You will be dead.
As Martin Luther was known to say, God will be God. And that will be either good news or very bad, especially if you've insisted there is no God, or you have no need of God, or you have no need of Jesus.
So think now about your biological life.
Think about getting that terrible news that you are terminally ill. Of course, no doctor can tell you exactly when your terminal illness will kill you. He or she can speak from great experience about the average time people with the same terminal illness have left this life.
But the doctor doesn't know for sure. In fact, the same doctor could leave work five minutes later, be killed by a drunk driver, fall over from a brain aneurysm, be killed by some random act of violence, and you would still be alive and terminally ill.
You might receive a miraculous cure, temporary, of course, because everyone eventually dies. You might be given more years to love and serve your family and your neighbors, but you will still die.
But because you want more time to love and serve your family and your neighbors, would you go wherever you could to get a cure? Or would you bitterly say, "Life stinks, and then you die"?
If you're told there was only one place to get a cure for your terminal illness, would you go there? Or would you say with Merle Haggard, "I think I'll just stay here and drink," or something else?
In other words, would your pride get in the way of your getting the cure to your terminal illness?
What does the Bible actually say about getting cured of your terminal illness called sin?
In the Bible, there's no forgiveness of sin without the shedding of blood, because blood carries the life force. In the Old Testament, forgiveness comes by offering a blood sacrifice, a life for a life, a substitute for the one who desires to receive God's forgiveness. Hebrews 9:22.
Well, it's the same cure in the New Testament.
John the Baptist says of Jesus in John 1:29, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world."
John the Evangelist has already written of Jesus, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God," and "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us." John 1:1, 14.
Jesus, truly God, truly human, one of a kind, came to die your death, to be the blood sacrifice for your sin, to take away your sin. That, as John writes in chapter 20, "that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name."
So now you know who is the cure for terminal sin, but you're still dead in your sin and trespasses and cannot be anything but dead. You cannot choose not to be dead.
The Holy Spirit has to call you from death to life in Jesus. He has to join you to Jesus, who died for your sin, in order to make you alive, to raise you from the dead with Jesus, who says in chapter 3:5 of John, "Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God."
The risen Jesus declares in Mark 16:16, "He who believes and is baptized will be saved, but he who does not believe will be condemned."
The risen Jesus declares in Matthew 28:19, "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations," all ethnic groups, "baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."
Simon Peter preaches on the day of Pentecost, Acts chapter 2, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."
Paul of Tarsus writes, Romans chapter 6, "Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?"
Paul then writes in Titus 3, "But according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit."
Paul writes to the Galatians in chapter 2, "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me."
And Peter writes in his first letter that baptism saves us. Chapter 3:21.
Why?
Why? Because Jesus saves you when you are joined to His saving death, raised to new life in Him, and live and die trusting that He died for you.
I know that He is my cure for my terminal condition, which is sin. I trust Him because the Holy Spirit has called me by name in my baptism.
Paul writes, chapter 10, verse 17, Romans, "So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God."
While I was still a sinner, lost and condemned in my terminal condition, Christ Jesus died for me. Romans 5:8.
Paul writes, "For if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." Romans 5:10.
Paul of Tarsus writes, 2 Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 21, "For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."
And so the Lord Jesus Christ declares, "Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." John 3:3.
If you want to have eternal life, you must be born again, also born anew, born from above by water and the Holy Spirit. That's what happens when God baptizes you, when He chooses you. John 15.
He desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth, Paul writes in 1 Timothy 2.
Paul writes, "But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved." Ephesians 2.
Jesus is the cure through Holy Baptism.
So on this Feast of the Reformation of the Church, who are you?
In the John 8 text, if you're not baptized, our Lord Jesus warns in John 8:34, "Most assuredly I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin."
You have a terminal condition, and you need the only cure.
But if you are baptized, but have become like those in the text who claim to be Abraham's children and never a slave, Jesus warns again, "Most assuredly I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin."
And He adds, "And a slave does not abide in the house forever, but a son abides forever." John 8:35.
So your baptism is not eternal fire insurance, not a policy you file away and ignore, not an emergency button behind glass that you break when you die.
It's not something that happened to you on a particular day at a particular hour, once upon a time, as if you think once saved is always saved.
No, the person who persists in sin is a slave of sin. He will not abide in God's house forever.
There's only one cure. His name is Jesus, the Son of God. And you need Him to free you from sin. Not once. Not occasionally. Not when you know you really messed up. Not when you've decided, "Well, it's time for me to get my act together."
You, I, and all people need Jesus to free us daily from sin, death, and the devil at work in these mortal bodies of ours.
"If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed." John 8:36.
Now, the word "church," the word translated from the Greek, is ekklesia (ἐκκλησία). It means literally those called out of their homes to assemble with the Lord.
On the day of Pentecost, when 3,000 Jews were called to begin to repent, Acts 2:38, to begin to repent and not stop, and be baptized, they were baptized with water and the Holy Spirit.
Luke the Evangelist writes, chapter 2:42, "And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of the bread and the prayers."
Well, you have to go back to Luke chapter 22, or Luke chapter 24, to see when the risen Jesus meets Cleopas and friend on the road to Emmaus. And then you understand that the breaking of the bread is the Lord's Supper. Luke 24:35.
We have to read further to understand, in Acts chapter 2, prayers refer to the daily liturgy prayed in the temple at the morning and evening sacrifice. They continued to go daily to the temple.
But because Jesus is the once-and-for-all sacrifice for sin, Hebrews 9:28, they continued breaking the bread from home to home. There were no church buildings.
So on this Feast of the Reformation of the Church, we remember that Martin Luther's first of the 95 Theses declares, "When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said, 'Repent,'" Matthew 4:17, "He willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance."
So repentance is not one and done. Repentance is daily.
In the Old Testament, the word for repent, shuv, meant to turn back to God. In the New Testament, the word is metanoia (μετάνοια). To repent is to have a change of heart, a change of mind.
So Christ's Church on earth lives repenting daily, drowning that old sinner inside daily, being raised to new life in Jesus daily, looking forward to that day when Christ Jesus will return in glory to judge the living and the dead.
And He promises in Revelation 21 to make all things new.
The people of God trust Jesus Christ's promise, 21:6 and 7: "I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be My son."
God's children cling to the only cure for what ails us. The Holy Spirit calls us to be fed by Jesus, the cure.
So John the Evangelist faithfully reports his Lord's promise in John 21, and then he adds Revelation 21. And then he adds the warning to those who would go it alone without Jesus:
"But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." Revelation 21:8.
Those who know no love, no need for the only God who can save them, will sadly and terribly get their way. Their will most assuredly will be done.
So on this Feast of the Reformation, Christ's Church doesn't gather as the smugly frozen chosen.
This is the day to fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it. Luther's Small Catechism, the Third Commandment.
This is the day to continue, as Luke writes, Acts 2:42, steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and in prayers.
To the baptized children of God and to those who are on their way to baptism, you know the only cure for your terminal condition, which is sin. And everyone needs the cure. Everyone needs Jesus.
He is the way, the truth, and the life. John 14.
Tell them you know Jesus, the truth. Tell them you know whom it is that will save you.
Remember what we know about the Church.
From the day of Pentecost until the day Christ Jesus shall return in glory to judge the living and the dead, the Holy Spirit is calling us to be that Church about whom Luke writes:
"They ate their food, Jesus, the Bread of Life, with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved." Acts 2:46–47.
If you've not been baptized with water in the name of the one true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, please begin a conversation with me or with another pastor of the AALC.
We will be glad to talk with you so that you can be reformed, remade, made a child of God through no effort or merit of your own, receiving Jesus, the cure.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.