Sermon for “Reformation Sunday”, October 31st, 2021: “Yet more light and truth…” (Please read John 9; Romans 3: 18-28)
I want you to imagine going to church and hearing the bible being read to you by someone in a language you did not know or understand. This morning we had a brief experience of just that ourselves: Ann read (in Latin) from Romans 3: 18-28. Well-done! But that’s exactly how it was for millions of people before Martin Luther who, with other brave souls, “kick-started” the Reformation in Germany more than 500 years ago…
At last weeks’ Anniversary Service we marked our Non-Conformist beginnings; but their courage would have been impossible without the reformers who, having gone before them, translated Scripture into the common tongue. Many people will be “celebrating” Halloween today. We will mark “Reformation Sunday” instead. We will celebrate the “Light of the World”, Jesus. We “hallow” him, the Light of the World, not the prince of darkness!
Imagine a world where the truth of God was hidden from you; where the “light” was only the preserve of a few so-called religious men who told you that they alone could read and interpret what God was saying. They could tell you just about anything; that the way to get your relative out of purgatory was to drop another coin in the box; that, to get to heaven yourself, though unlikely, you had to work so impossibly hard to gain the favour of God. It was a graceless, cruel and deceptive religion, full of rules and traditions that God never said or meant. People languished in the darkness of despair…
After being narrowly missed by a bolt of lightning, Martin Luther vowed to serve God as a monk but he lived in the constant fear of failing; he would never be good enough; he was tormented by the prospect of God’s wrath and the thought that, even after all his attempts to work for God, his soul would be lost. But light and peace began to dawn on Martin Luther as he sat down to read the scriptures for himself, and began to translate them.
As he read Psalm 22 he began to realise that Christ himself experienced god-forsakenness on the cross. But why did God forsake His Son? The answer came back, clear as a bell, brilliant, like a pinprick of light in an inky sky: God forsook Christ for Martin Luther! That was the truth that Luther unearthed…and he would risk life and limb to bring that to the people; he would infuriate the authorities and, using God’s own Word, bring judgment upon their lies:-
The Pope, the cardinals, the priests and the Emperor, of course, were (so they thought) guaranteed their tickets to paradise on a leisurely boat, but the poor folk had no such assurance; they reached blindly for the frayed ropes thrown out to them as they drowned in a sea of torment. It was no accident that access to God – and His Light and Truth - was denied to the layman.
But it is the experts who were really the blind ones. It wasn’t the hapless congregation that would be judged and condemned…but the leaders. In John 9 our experts come to examine Jesus and the man born blind, now given sight. The leaders have witnessed a miracle, they had irrefutable proof; they can see the light and the truth standing before their very eyes…but most are simply not interested.
24 The leaders called the man back and said, “Swear by God to tell the truth! We know that Jesus is a sinner. ” They don’t want to know the truth and they don’t want others to know it either. The Word-become-flesh has shed His light into their spiritual darkness. That light is uncomfortable. Jesus was the first true Reformer. He was hard on those who used the law, who were prepared to change it for their own selfish ends.
13 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. 14 You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. 15 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are. 16 “Woe to you, blind guides! (Matthew 23)
Only when the gift of God’s Word became the common property of others, does the God of grace and kindness emerge, Spirit-aided, from the pages of the bible we have. Only when (like Luther did) we translate the Latin into our mother-tongue, do we discover light in the darkness and how God “...made his light shine in our hearts to fire us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ...” (2 Cor 4: 5-6)
They see that, because 10 The Scriptures tell us, “No one is acceptable to God! 20 God doesn’t accept people simply because they obey the Law. No, indeed! All the Law does is to point out our sin. 22 God treats everyone alike. He accepts people only because they have faith in Jesus Christ. 23 All of us have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory. 24 But God treats us much better than we deserve - and because of Christ Jesus, he freely accepts us and sets us free from our sins. 25-26 God sent Christ to be our sacrifice. Christ offered his life’s blood, so that by faith in him we could come to God. 27 What is left for us to brag about? Not a thing! Is it because we obeyed some law? No! It is because of faith. 28 We see that people are acceptable to God because they have faith, and not because they obey the Law. (Romans 3)
All I know is that I used to be blind, but now I can see!” So said the man who used to be blind. So say all of us.
It was a beautiful thing to learn, at last, that this is what God was like…that He had promised to put His law in their minds and write it in their hearts. He doesn’t want people to be in the dark. You don’t have to do anything but believe!
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8)
You have been reading God’s Word for many years. But have you allowed God’s Word to read you, to challenge you, to change you…to reform you? See, God’s word will do that to us. It’s like a mirror.
For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. (Hebrews 4: 12)
39 Jesus (said), “I came to judge the people of this world. I am here to give sight to the blind and to make blind everyone who can see.”
It is part of God’s job to judge us and that can be painful. We often prefer not to see. There is yet more light and truth. But judgment is not the same as condemnation. What freedom there was for the church when the lights went on and its members found…
…there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son… (Romans 8)
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Lord, reform your people and change us, day-by-day into the likeness of Jesus. For His sake, we pray…Amen
MFR 29/10/21