This Sunday, September 24, is the Seventeenth Sunday
after Pentecost.
Verse of the Stewardship Season:
This week’s sermon is: Generous
This week's readings are :
Message: The Church – One, Holy, Christian, and Apostolic
Some years ago I had coffee with the mayor of Hudson. In our
conversation, he leveled some criticisms that are worth considering –
especially that there were two of every kind of church in town!
In truth
there are more!
Yet we confess in the Apostles’ Creed that there is one,
holy, Christian (catholic), apostolic church. What gives?
In Ephesians 2:16 it says that Jesus has reconciled all
believers (Jews and Gentiles) into one body. There truly is only one Church,
and it is those who believe in Jesus, the Son of God and Son of Man, who is our
Lord and our God. However, as sinful people, we don’t always listen to, obey,
or trust our Lord and God.
Giertz wrote in 1939, “This is the foundation for the
church’s unity: the connection with the same Savior in the same mystic
fellowship, participation in the same reconciling sacrifice, which is received
in one faith, conveyed through one baptism (Eph 4:5), and comprehended in one
bread (1 Cor 10:17). This mystic fellowship of all Christ’s followers is
something far more than any human community of common interests. It emanates
from God Himself: it is He who does the binding together, when He, in
inconceivable love, with inexhaustible gifts of His grace, lowers Himself to
everyone who believes, making them all into one.”
To be sure, one of the greatest shames within the
earthly/visible church is the deep division we see within her. But, how can it
be otherwise?
Unity is
in Christ, Word and Sacrament
These
are sometimes misunderstood, wrongly emphasized or de-emphasized, denied and
even attacked within the earthly/visible church.
If we
cut out the source of unity there will be division.
However, as I said earlier, we confess there is one Church –
all those who believe in Jesus, the Lord and Giver of life, who became one of
us, bore our sin on the cross, and rose from death to give us a new and
everlasting life.
Unity is
in Him.
In the
hope of the forgiveness of sins and a holiness that comes from Him.
In the
hope of resurrection and restoration on the Last Day.
It is right to long for the unity of all Christians – and the
unity of the church on earth.
But not
at the cost of the Word and the Sacraments.
We are
not to compromise God’s Word, the Truth of His Law, or the Glory of His Gospel.
When
there is disagreement on these points we must acknowledge there is division.
But here, again, we find wisdom from Giertz. He writes,
“Even where confessional disagreements raise insurmountable walls between
Christian brethren …, thousands and again thousands invisible hands join before
God’s throne, lifted in one and the same prayer: the prayer for the
re-unification of all Christians in one holy catholic Church.”
We do well to echo that prayer, and walk in repentance –
turning from the wisdom of this world for our unifying efforts and turn to
Christ our Savior from sin and death.
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