Bedrock for Protestants

         Galatians 2:15-21 is one of those scriptures that we Protestants have an asterisk beside – but would just as soon not try to explain.  It is one of those defining scripture passages for the thoughts of Martin Luther as he struggled with the idea of indulgences and whether we could DO anything to effect our salvation.  “Justification by faith” is a Protestant by-word and its roots include this scripture passage.

         Richard B. Hays, Professor of New Testament, The Divinity School, Duke University, suggests  four questions to help in “unpacking” this scriptural passage:

         “1.  Who sets things right?

          2.  What role has Jesus played in setting things right?

          3.  What is the character of the new life that the death and resurrection of Jesus have inaugurated?

          4.  How is the truth of the gospel embodied in social practice.”  [The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. XI, Galatians, page 245]

         Let’s use these questions as our guide.

         1.  Who sets things right?  Paul says loud and clear that it is God whose actions set things right.  That was Martin Luther big “ah ha” moment.  He had been thinking he needed to pray longer, work harder, buy more indulgences (a practice of giving to the church and getting time in purgatory removed on your behalf because you had pleased God.).  The more he tried to please God the more he felt he fell short and was trapped in his own sin.  It is hard for a lot of folks to get beyond their own feelings of unworthiness.  After reading this passage of the Bible, he suddenly realized that it wasn’t what he DID that justified him (made him right with God) but what GOD did.  It’s all about God’s Grace – God’s action.

         For Paul, as he wrote to his congregation, it wasn’t about which half of the congregation followed Jewish protocol and beliefs in their Christian journey and which did not.  God’s action was what defined them as Christians and not what they did or did not do or what they ate or did not eat.  They were now new creations – all of them – because of God’s doing.  We can let go of the need we feel we have to make things right and bring people back to living religion as we do.

         2.  What role has Jesus played in setting things right?  God has set things right through the faithfulness of Jesus, not our own doing.  Faithfulness of Jesus is an appropriate focus in Lent (and throughout the year).  Read and reread the stories of Jesus’ life on earth.  How did he speak truth to power when it was easier to just “go along”?  How did he reach out to others when it would have been easier, and religiously acceptable in those days, to avoid impurity and walk on the other side?  How did everything he said and did move him closer to the confrontation with power that resulted in the cross?  How was Jesus always faithful to God’s vision of what God wanted the world to be (the realm of God)?  How was Jesus always faithful to Love made known to every person he encountered.  As Richard Hayes also says:  “It is unintelligible to preach Gal. 2:11-21 apart from the passion and resurrection narratives.”

         3.  What is the character of the new life that the death and resurrection of Jesus have inaugurated?  We often talk about having our sins forgiven – and that’s it.  Our “ticket is punched.”  In Galatians Paul ups the ante.  I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.  Paul is talking about a transformation of oneself into a person who indeed allows that person to be Christ in the world.  We are loath to change on a good day.  And a statement like this from Paul makes us think of “goodie two shoes” folks who really make us uncomfortable with their overt piety.  Paul is not saying that we become caricatures of a person of faith.  Paul is saying that if we want to say we are Christian then that faith ought to be authentic in our daily lives.  It should impact the way we treat others, what we call others, what decisions we make about how we live on this planet.  We are to become transformed into service for the sake of others, an instrument of God’s reconciling love for each person in the world.

          4.  How is the truth of the gospel embodied in social practice?  If you have gotten this far, you have probably already thought about ways this question is answered.  If we are to be agents of Christ’s reconciling love in this world then we have something to say and to be to those who are posting hate language on the houses of worship of our Jewish and Muslim neighbors.  We have something to say and to be to those who are ridiculing and condemning our LGBTQ friends and family.  We have something to say and to be to those who are fleeing war and destruction and live as refugees without a documented past and with a dubious future.  We have something to say and to be to those who define our future by military might yet downplay the “soft force” of diplomacy.  We have something to say and be to those who privilege education for some and not for all.  The list can go on and on.

        

         Life is “made right” – all life, including ours – by God’s action – by God’s Grace.  That action was made manifest in Jesus Christ, in his life, in his passion, and in his resurrection.  We are invited into Christ – to die to our old ways of thinking and being in the world – and to be transformed inwardly into Christ’s servants in the world to reconcile the world to God and God’s vision of shalom, wholeness.  Because we are no longer living for ourselves, we can no longer long for those things  the world defines as beneficial to some at the expense of others.  We must be about living as Christ to the world, even though that’s not popular.

Grace and Peace

Rev. Clara