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from the district pastor ...

Rev. Mark Jamison

Article 4 of the Augsburg Confession (Article IV) is about the justification of sinners before God or sinners being put into a right relationship with God. Since this Article has been misunderstood, relativized, and dismissed as no longer of central importance for the church I will discuss in it two parts. In this newsletter we'll discuss Article IV ‘s content and its rejection of any form of works righteousness present in the 16th century or our own century. In the next newsletter, we will discuss the relevance of justification for both the Church and the unchurched.

The basic content of Article IV can be summed up in this way. People can't justify themselves before God or do anything to put themselves into a right relationship with God because original sin has ruined the relationship with God for all of humanity. People can't make themselves acceptable to or right with God by anything they do or don't do. To miss the relational character of this doctrine was a 16th century mistake, but also a lingering one. St. Paul may very well have borrowed some of the legal and forensic freight of the Greek word translated as justified. After all, he knew of God from the Old Testament as the judge of all. But for Paul and the reformers justification is also a relationship term. In modern parlance you may want to think of a person screwing up a relationship with another person so badly because of abuse, addiction or abandonment that the relationship can't be repaired no matter what that person tries to do in terms of trying to make up for past mistakes. That is the irreparable damage done by sin to humanity's relationship with God. People's best actions--their willpower and good intentions, even their religious devotion--do not make up for the fact they are bound to want independence from God, to do their own will instead of living totally in dependent trust on God. People then can't earn enough brownie points with God for God to say, "Okay. You've done enough good stuff so that I am obligated to say we are in a good relationship again." If original sin is what screws up humanity's relationship with God, as sinners we're in dire straits. Both the cross and the grave prove that humanity can't get rid of original sin in this life by its own power or efforts.

The positive side of Article IV is that God makes the relationship right again by the death of his Son Jesus Christ for the
sins of the world. Sinners are made right with God or "justified" when they believe they are forgiven for the sake of the crucified Christ. Faith trusts in the promise that we are made righteous or justified when we heard the word declaring the forgiveness of sins. That is what the word imputed in the Article is getting at. The righteousness comes from outside the self in the word of declaration. Faith in this justification before God means you are at the mercy of God to keep his promise that for Christ's sake God declares you in an acceptable, right relationship with him apart from anything you do. In other words, you have no leverage against God to force him to forgive you and give you eternal life. Who can stop God from changing his mind and saying he isn't going to be merciful to sinners for Christ's sake? Faith really isn't defined here in Article IV but is talked about later in the Augsburg Confession. But Phillip Melancthon makes it pretty clear in Article IV of the Apology to the Augsburg Confession that faith is not a good work you drum up in yourself to force God to save you. When you are at someone's mercy and have no control over the situation, all there is is dependence on another's good will and character. Babies are a great example of that.

Since justification is all God's doing and promise, it can only be received passively in faith. The reformers, following St. Paul's lead, called it a free gift or by grace. Even the Roman Catholic Church of the early 16th century could go along with saying people are justified by grace. The sticking point came over their failure to see that original sin remains in people after baptism. Whereas the reformers described the problem of justification of sinners as a problem of our relationship with God, the Roman Catholic Church insisted that after some jumpstart grace by God, justification involved some good works to complete the process. They would cringe when the reformers used the phrase " by faith alone" in conjunction with justification. The Roman Catholics talked of human spiritual powers and capabilities in regard to justification. But justification as relationship with God was either not understood or dismissed. Righteousness as an internal human quality was thought to be produced by human cooperation with God through good works as well as faith. God justifying sinners then was like mixing up a batch of Kool-Aid. A big dose of water (God's grace) was mixed in the Kool-Aid packet (faith), then blended with sugar (good works).

But the Lutheran reformers wouldn't accept that kind of talk about righteousness. They said if you could make yourself even partially righteous by doing works of the law, why would you need grace or the cross? They also said partial righteousness, or justification by the law, makes one independent of totally relying on God's grace and mercy that he really will forgive you and give you eternal life. If the law gets used to assert independence from God in this way, you accomplish the opposite of what the law demands. Independence from God is the essence of sinfulness. Unless you are totally dependent on the mercy of God to make your relationship right with him there can be no true faith. That means only Christ himself alone can make us right with God. Therefore, He alone can be called be our righteousness with God. Nothing in us of ourselves makes us righteous before God. Lutheranism has no place for Kool-Aid justification.

Discussion questions:

1. In the movie "U.S. Marshals" Wesley Snipes plays a CIA type trying to clear his name from being falsely charged with treason and murder. He said if he did that he would be righteous again. What do you think his character meant by that? What might that term, righteous mean, outside the church?

2. How do Christians try to justify themselves or make themselves righteous before God by doing good deeds? What negative results can this lead to?

3. Have you ever had to be totally dependent on someone so that you were totally at that person's mercy and you had no control over a situation? What is uncomfortable with being at someone's mercy? How then can faith be uncomfortable?

4. Have you known of relationships that have been ruined and can't be repaired? What is it like for those who try but can't mend relationships? How then is justification by faith a comfort for Christians?


 

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THE AUGSBURG CONFESSION: The Son of God
Mark Jamison                                

As a continuation of the last newsletter article on Article 3 of the Augsburg Confession, "The Son of God," I would like to offer some other points of contact it has with contemporary American culture. At the risk of oversimplifying Article 3, it boils down to the Son of God being incarnated to offer himself as a sacrifice for our sins, thereby reconciling us to the Heavenly Father. These two themes of sacrifice and reconciliation are often found in popular cultural symbols as well as in real life experiences.
The children of Baby Boomers have grown up with the Star Wars saga. Most likely, their parents also have more than a passing knowledge of these movies. In episodes 4, 5, and 6, there is a special emphasis on the themes of sacrifice, reconciliation, and redemption. Luke Skywalker in "Return of the Jedi" is willing to sacrifice his own life rather than take the life of his enemy and estranged father, Darth Vader, caught in the grip of the dark side of the force. His willingness to give up his own life frees his father from evil and brings about reconciliation between them as Darth dies in his son's arms. In addition, the last two generations of the 20th century and the first one of the new Millennium have seen their comic book heroes come to life on the big screen. These heroes usually sacrifice some personal fulfillment in the form of love, marriage, family, and personal transparency for the sake of a cause greater than themselves, namely, justice and overcoming evil. In the Superman comic book and in the movie "The Matrix" there are savior figures who die saving the world and are resurrected. These suggestions are only the tip of the iceberg. The themes of Article 3 are all over the place. Even the most inane sitcom on TV can bring about reconciliation between characters in an hour or less.

But what is even more impressive is the correlation of Article 3 to the events of 9/11. The whole world now knows how Todd Beamers and his friends made sure the terrorist hijacked plane was not going to crash into the White House at the same time they knew they were going to die. The efforts of rescue workers who died trying to the save the lives of those trapped in the burning and collapsing World Trade towers will be forever etched into the American memory too. No one will forget the noble sacrifice of the Space Shuttle astronauts.

Both cultural symbols and real life then point to Article 3. And that is no accident. God made us in his image, and is conforming us into the likeness of Christ. So we can say to those outside the faith that the one who made us all holds nothing back even from those who don't trust him or love him back. We can say that the Son of God gave up all the splendor and majesty of heaven to become one of us, speak to us at our level, and put himself through what we experience, and to overcome it, even death itself. We can say that God was so bound and determined to love sinners even if it killed him, and in the person of his Son, it did. We can say to unbelief your culture and your real life experiences confirm these themes of Article 3.

Of course correlation to culture and real life may not give anyone faith. Nothing can take the place of the proclamation of the Gospel. But the correlation could be the starting point of a conversation as our witness to those outside the faith. To help that along, I listed some discussion questions below:

1. What examples of selfless sacrifice have you experienced or witnessed?

2. How would it make life better for people if they knew and trusted that the creative force and being that made everything understands them and has gone through human experience?

3. What does it feel like and mean to you to be reconciled with family members or friends? How are confession and forgiveness tied together in our lives?

4. If there is truly such a being as God, what sacrifices would you want God to make for you? What lengths would you want God to go to love and help you?

5. What are some causes people get caught up in, and even give up comfort and convenience to do so?

Rev. Mark G. Jamison is the District Pastor of the Augsburg Lutheran District, and the Senior Pastor of Hope Lutheran Church in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

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