The day was June 25--today's date--the year 1530--470 years ago.
A great storm of controversy had been swirling
over Europe for a little more than a quarter century
The foundations of faith were shifting and moving. June 25, 1530--the
place was Augsburg, Germany. For weeks the crowds had been gathering.
There was not a room to be had anywhere in town. The streets were
lined with vendors, setting up tents to sell food and souvenirs.
This was the scene of a diet, the highest political body of the
German empire in the 16th century
The business of most diets during the decade leading up to 1530 had focused on events relating to the reformation. Martin Luther had appeared at the diet in Worms, Germany in 1521 while other diets had met in Nurnberg in 1522 and 1524 and in Speyer in 1526 and 1529, but this diet at Augsburg in 1530 was special.
This time the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, Charles V would be present in person. Still a young man, just turned 30, Charles V was now ready after his military and political victories of the previous decade over the king of France, and the Roman pope Charles V was now ready to turn his attention again to Germany.
Two items of business were on the agenda:
1) The war against the Turks and the Reformation. It was the threat
of the Turks surrounding Vienna in 1529 that had made it necessary
for Charles V to solicit the help of the Protestant princes and
cities to help in the defense of the empire.
2) The controversy of the Reformation. The tension between the Roman Catholic pope and the emerging Protestant communities. Most committed to following some form of Luther's teachings-needed to find some compromise. The emperor was seeking some common ground for peace. Thus the followers of Luther had been invited to present a statement of their beliefs to be read to the Emperor on June 25, 1530.
Forged in the heat of a great spiritual battle with the threat of execution for false teaching and facing the threat of Moslem armies, those who signed the Augsburg Confession and read it to the Emperor risked life and property.
Yet this confession of 28 articles of faith
stands as a central declaration of our Lutheran identity.
What makes us Lutheran is the fact that 470 years ago a collection
of believers were willing to summarize the essentials of our faith
as derived from scripture. In so far as and because these articles
of faith are true expressions of the Bible we have been able for
almost 500 years to clearly express our faith.
This is one of the distinctive marks of the
Lutheran faith. We are a confessional church--willing to clearly
state the central points of our faith. As a community we embrace
certain essentials--28 articles of faith. But not all articles
of faith are of equal importance.
Over the years we have come to recognize that the fourth article
of the Augsburg Confession
is probably the most distinctively Lutheran and important to our
faith. Admittedly we do not require that confirmands memorize
Article four and most members of the congregation probably could
not tell you what this article is about. Yet most everyone who
worships here today will recognize the key word--Grace.
The question article four addresses is justification.
How do we get right with God?
What do we have to do to be saved? And the answer offered was
as unsettling in 1530 as it is today.
What do you have to do? Nothing.
What really matters, says the Augsburg Confession, is that God
loves you and that he has shown that love for you and all humanity
in Jesus who is the Christ.
In 1530 this was as revolutionary an assertion
as it is today. It goes against all our customary religious thinking.
The notion that we are saved by our good works is probably the
most universally held belief of humanity. It is the "common
faith" of all people regardless of their pretended religion
or lack of it.
Most people can reduce their faith statement to the slogan, "God
loves good people and hates bad people." If you are good
and do good then God loves you and rewards you. If you are not
good and don't do good you'd better watch out!
Article four sets forth the radical Biblical truth that God loves all people because God is good--not because we are. God revealed this truth to us in the form of Jesus and wants us to be like him. God actually wants us to be good and do good not because it is good for God but because it is good for us.
God cares about us. Of course God cares
about us, but most of us want to believe God cares a little more
about those of us who are good who do good--who go to church--have
our children baptized and maybe especially on those of us who
are Lutheran. Yet--have you ever noticed that bad things do happen
to very good people?
Our first lesson for today is one of the oldest stories in the
Bible and it deals with exactly this point. If God rewards good
people--favors good people, then why do bad things happen to good
people?
Job was one of God's prime examples of "good people."
Yet over the course of the story of Job
his life becomes one giant tragedy. His children are killed, his
business collapses, his friends desert him and his health begins
to fail. Job wonders why God has abandoned him and what he has
been doing wrong to deserve such suffering.
In our lesson for today we find the beginning
of God's response to Job's questions. The short answer God gives
is to ask the simple question, "Who do you think you are?"
God looks at Job and asks, "Are you the one who created the
world? Are you the one who made all the animals-established the
rules of physics, set forth the parameters of time and space sending
galaxies into motion and began the bonding of atoms into matter?"
"Who do you think you are?" God asks. "Are you
the one who brought forth life from chaos, instilled truths in
human minds, fixed emotions of love and faithfulness in human
hearts, created harmonies of music and rhythm of words?"
God basically says, "I don't remember you being there when
I began all this."
And that should have been the death of Job. There would be no
purpose to go on living except that God keeps talking to him.
God does not abandon Job to his own misery. It is God's nature
to care about and love his creation even when things are going
badly in the midst of suffering and pain.
What Job suddenly realizes is that God is there. God is there
with the grace to see beyond the moment. Grace to see God's love
and God's future.
We have a hard time opening ourselves to the
future. Our world is limited. To live by faith is not easy,
even when we think we know where we are and what is coming next.
But the future is seldom what we expect--rarely what we plan--never
what we anticipate. Sometimes a day turns out better then we expected,
sometimes it turns out worse, always it is different--God's future
is like that. The disciples found that out one evening when they
got into a boat with Jesus.
There is no one who hears the Gospel lesson for today who does
not in their mind at least get into that boat with the disciples
and Jesus. This is a story about us on a journey with Jesus. Most
every preacher who takes to the pulpit today with this Gospel
text in mind will undoubtedly point out to their congregation
that they are seated in that part of the church normally referred
to as the nave. This is a word for the central part of the church-nave,
derived from the Latin word navis which means "ship."
Most churches, if you look at the ceiling bear some resemblance
to an upturned ship, so the journey of faith is a voyage into
the world. Only sailing with Jesus is not a placid cruise. There
are storms--storms that spring forth without warning.
This past week Chris and I had opportunity
to do some canoeing on Gull Lake in Northern Minnesota.
(curiously the lake has almost the same dimensions as the Sea
of Galilee.) The one day we set out with the sky a bit overcast
but the lake quite calm. A few boats with fishermen were scattered
around the lake, loons popping up and then vanishing beneath the
lake's surface. We had been warned and sure enough the wind picked
up. The ride out had been calm and easy but as we turned back
to our harbor resort we found ourselves attempting to paddle into
the waves and wind. A few sprinkles began and for a moment we
thought we might have to make for shore, some distance from home.
But the wind gusted high--a few waves washed us back, and then
the clouds parted and all was calm. I suppose I should claim some
special prayer power in stilling the storm but I had exhausted
my prayers on the golf course earlier that morning. This was simply
a grace moment--the turning of a June summer day. The rains would
come later--for the moment a clearing--a grace moment.
It is easy to sit in the air conditioned comfort of our church home and forget about the storms outside--or maybe not. Maybe we really do know that the unexpected moments are an all too real part of our lives; the phone calls in the night--the diagnosis of disease, the challenge to find peace and meaning. The disciples cried out to Jesus, "Do you not care that we are perishing?"
In the story Jesus was not concerned about
the wind or the waves--he slept on. But he did care about his
disciples--he heard their cries of fear, he entered into the storm
that surrounded them, and he spoke a word, "Peace. Be still."
The storm stopped.
But I cannot help but wonder if Jesus was speaking to the storm
or to the disciples.
"Peace. Be still."
Be still and know that I am God--it's the same word that was given
to Job.
This is what is known as a grace moment.
Article four--remember?
That in the midst of all the frenzy and activity that we would
define as our lives, in the midst of all the efforts we make to
give our lives meaning and purpose, there comes a moment when
God reveals to us what it truly means to believe----to live by
grace.
Did you notice how the disciples reacted at the end of our story? When the storm hit there is terror in the disciple's question but when the calm arrives there is awe-wonder-amazement. "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?" We know our God and our God knows us-our God is with us.
Grace is amazing.
From the miracle of baptism to the mystery of bread and wine,
in the midst of moments of joy and the trials of life struggles,
in faith we find God's grace and that is what we are called to
live by.
There will be storms--but there will also be grace moments that
open us to the future--God's future.
470 years ago this day-close to this very hour they read to the
emperor their confession of faith--Article 4 on Justification
by grace alone--amazing grace.
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