Christ, the First Word in Christianity

Who Do You Say that I Am?

Two years ago this month we started a monthly event called "Conversations on Christ." This project is the product of a self-conscious recognition that the Person of Jesus is the central reality of Christianity. It has always been my hope and prayer that these conversations can lead to true Christian unity by keeping all eyes focused on the Person who is Himself the union of God and man.

Rev. Larry Beane, recently blogged about the brouhaha concerning the religion of the president. In his remarks, he concisely states the point. I highly recommend it.

The Terrible Price of Freedom from God

C.S. Lewis, in his book, Mere Christianity, points out that whenever people quarrel with one another using arguments about what is right and what is wrong, they are, by this very fact, conceding the existence and reality of God. For without some ultimate authority, such categories simply have no meaning.


More recently, Professor Thomas Nagel, himself an atheist, candidly addressed the question: “why are atheists afraid of religion?”

I speak from experience, being strongly subject to this fear myself: I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn't just that I don't believe in God, and naturally, hope that I'm right in my belief. It's that I hope there is no God! I don't want there to be a God; I don't want the universe to be like that." (Thomas Nagel, The Last Word, New York, Oxford University Press, 2001)

Reacting to this open admission, Mr. Peter Hitchens, observes that such absolute and utter freedom comes at a tremendous price.

If they [atheists] know, or are reasonably certain, that there is no ultimate authority and no judgement issuing from some unalterable law, they are instantly quite extraordinarily free. But this freedom is also as available to monsters and power-seekers as it is to advanced intellectuals dwelling in comfortable suburbs... If atheists or anti-theists have the good fortune to live in a society still governed by religious belief, or even its afterglow, they may feel free from absolute moral bonds, while those around them are not. This is a tremendous liberation for anyone who is even slightly selfish. And what clever person is not imaginatively and cunningly selfish?

Oddly enough, very few atheists are as delighted by this prospect as they ought to be. At least they are not delighted openly or in public. Could this be because they really do not grasp this astonishingly simple point, based as it is on their own insistence that the most plausible external source of law and morality does not exist? Why create such a difficulty for themselves at all? Might it be because they fear that, by admitting their delight at the non-existence of good and evil, they are revealing something of their motives for their belief? Could it be that the last thing on earth they wish to acknowledge is that they HAVE motives for their belief, since, by doing so they would open up their flanks to attack?" (Peter Hitchens, The Rage Against God, Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 2010)

Mortality, Thrash Metal, and the Church

Rev. Gregory P. Alms from incarnatus est blog has written a beautifully relavent and insightful article for Lutheran Forum online.

“Martin Luther once wrote a hymn that asked the question: In the midst of earthly life, Snares of death surround us; Who shall help us in the strife? It is the eternal question but it is one that cannot be answered if it is not asked. Churches today must hear this question in the experience of those they seek to serve and answer. It is, finally, the only question worth answering.”

To read the whole article, click here or, on the title above.

God the Crucified - The Trinity in Action

(part 4 of 9)

What about the Holy Trinity—Father, Son and Holy Spirit? Mightn’t our singular focus on the crucifixion of Jesus cause us to forget or diminish the Father and the Holy Spirit and thus undermine our confession of the Holy Trinity?

It would, indeed, be a grave error to deny or diminish the doctrine of the Holy Trinity as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. The United Pentecostal Church has done this, and in the process become altogether non-christian. Their rejection of the Holy Trinity, for instance, leads them to insist that anyone who has received a Trinitarian baptism should, instead, be baptized in the name of “Jesus only.” But, perhaps surprisingly, this heretical Christo-monism did not come about because of an over emphasis on the crucified Lord. In fact, it is unlikely that you could find the crucified Jesus depicted anywhere in their church building. Instead, this anti-trinitarian heresy is the end result of an isolated focus on the Holy Spirit—as the name “Pentecostal” implies.

Similarly, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, for all it's emphasis on Jesus, cannot bring itself to look at the crucifixion — or even upon the cross — substituting a bare spire in its place. This is only the most visible manifestation of their own particular brand of anti-trinitarianism which has much to say about “heavenly father” but nothing about the cross.

It would certainly be an evil thing if we were to do the same. If our emphasis on the cross of Christ were at fault, we should immediately dispose of it. But the cross is not at fault. Rather, the anti-trinitarian evil is avoided only by viewing each distinct Person of the Holy Trinity in proper relationship with the other Persons. Jesus’ words from the cross teach us this in the very moment of the crucifixion.

Jesus’ first word from the cross is, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” Here we see the forgiveness won by Jesus on the cross as the Father’s own gift to the world. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son.” (John 3:16). Also, by drinking the cup of suffering which the Father gives Him, Jesus becomes the only One who truly submits to the Father’s will.

Jesus’ last word from the cross is also addressed to the Father, “Father, into your hands I commit My Spirit.” With these words, Jesus commits the Holy Spirit back into the hands of the Father in order that the Spirit might convey the fruits of Jesus’ crucifixion to the entire world.

The evils of denying the Trinity are not avoided by making sure we give equal time to looking at and talking about each of the three Persons separately. (For this, activity—in itself—denies the unity of the Trinity and sets one Person over against another Person causing us to see not One God but Three Gods.) Quite the opposite, we extol Father, Son and Holy Spirit most especially as we see the Father giving His only-begotten Son into death for the whole world and the Son giving His Holy Spirit from the cross that we might believe and be saved.

That is why Christians believe in the Holy Trinity—because the crucifixion is the Holy Trinity at work for our salvation.

Where is the True Church Found?

Martin Luther addresses this question not by looking for marks of success but by pointing to the seven marks of Jesus' presence.

“First, the holy Christian people are recognized by their possession of the holy word of God. ...wherever you hear or see this word preached, believed, professed, and lived, do not doubt that the true ecclesia sancta catholica, “a Christian holy people” must be there, even though their number is very small.

“Second, God’s people or the Christian holy people are recognized by the holy sacrament of baptism, wherever it is taught, believed, and administered correctly according to Christ’s ordinance.

“Third, God’s people, or Christian holy people, are recognized by the holy sacrament of the altar, wherever it is rightly administered, believed, and received, according to Christ’s institution.
...don’t be led astray by the question of whether the man who administers the sacrament is holy… Wherever you see this sacrament properly administered, there you may be assured of the presence of God’s people.

“Fourth, God’s people or holy Christians are recognized by the office of the keys exercised publicly. That is, as Christ decrees in Matthew 18 [:15–20], if a Christian sins, he should be reproved; and if he does not mend his ways, he should be bound in his sin and cast out. If he does mend his ways, he should be absolved.

“Fifth, the church is recognized externally by the fact that it consecrates or calls ministers... Wherever you see this done, be assured that God’s people, the holy Christian people, are present…

“Sixth, the holy Christian people are externally recognized by prayer, public praise, and thanksgiving to God. Where you see and hear the Lord’s Prayer prayed and taught; or psalms or other spiritual songs sung, in accordance with the word of God and the true faith; also the creed, the Ten Commandments, and the catechism used in public, you may rest assured that a holy Christian people of God are present.

“Seventh, the holy Christian people are externally recognized by the holy possession of the sacred cross. They must endure every misfortune and persecution, all kinds of trials and evil from the devil, the world, and the flesh (as the Lord’s Prayer indicates)...”

"On the Councils and the Church" 1539 in Luther's Works 41.

The Holiness of Christ’s Church

Ubi Christus, ibi ecclesia, “Where Christ is, there is the church.” With this saying one of the oldest church fathers spoke of the mystery of the church. The saying also sums up Luther’s faith in the church. It is not the power of our faith, nor the holiness of our life that constitutes the church, but rather that “Where Christ is, there is the church.” When the church is called a holy people, a communion of saints, it is not to be understood in the way it has often been understood in the history of the church: “the church should be a holy people, therefore only the holy shall belong to her. Away with all the unholy! The honour of Christ demands it!” When the worst of sinners must be excluded from the fellowship, one must then begin to classify sins in order to determine which ones lead to exclusion. How often has not that been attempted, both in the past and more recently. How imposing was the strictness of the ancient church, when people sought to create a holy and pure church (as also happens now). Or consider the Donatists, who demanded that at least the clergy should be free of mortal sin. Whenever the attempt has been made to create an ideal church, the end result has always been bitter disappointment. The community of saints turns into a community of Pharisees.

— Hermann Sasse

(Brought to my attention by Rev. Paul T. McCain)