Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our resurrected Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen
Pray with me: “0 Lord, speak in this place, in our minds, in our hearts, by the words of my mouth, and in the thoughts we form. Speak, 0 Lord, we, your servants, are listening. Amen.”
In Luther’s day, nailing some thoughts on a church door was not at all unusual. In fact, it seemed like the communication method of the day. There was no other forum for engaging others in a philosophical discussion about any topic unless you posted your thoughts in public for others to see. So, that is what Martin Luther did.
He nailed a document containing 95 theses to the door of a big church in Wittenberg, Germany.
He only intended to create some conversation around these many thoughts that he had. His hope was to reform some of the thinking within the Catholic Church, in accordance with what he understood the Bible to be saying.
But Luther was asking some tough questions, and war soon broke out over the dissension that his words caused.
War was not what Luther intended when he posted his 95 theses. He only intended his 95 theses to be some topics for debate to address some of the corruptions he perceived in the Church.
But the discussion quickly turned into a battle over what was true and right and Christian … as conversations often do. The debate, in one way … a big way, centered around this word “sola” … a Latin term meaning “alone”
The question was … are we saved by what Christ has done alone? Or, are we saved by BOTH what Christ has done, AND by what we add? Many still struggle with this question today.
The basic question is, “Does God work individually apart from us, or cooperatively with us when it comes to our salvation?”
When God was ready to judge the world with a flood, He came to Noah.
When He desired to build a nation for Himself, He turned to Abraham.
When He heard His children groaning under Egyptian bondage, He appeared in a burning bush to Moses.
They were three very ordinary men. They had no extraordinary skills and gifts that set them apart from others. But God had work to do, and He knew just who to do it through.
God has always given His people assignments that are too big for them to handle alone, so that as others watch them – they do not see what they can do – but they only see what God can do through people. It is always about God.
A traveler stopped to observe the curious behavior of a farmer who was plowing his field. A single mule hitched to the plow was wearing blinders, and the farmer was yelling, “Giddyup, Pete! Giddyup, Herb! Giddyup, Ol’ Bill! Giddyup, Jeb!”
After watching the farmer carry on like this for a while, the traveler asked, “Say, mister, how many names does that mule have?”
“Just one, his name is Pete.” “Then why do you call out Herb and Bill and Jeb?”
“It’s like this,” explained the farmer. “If Old Pete knew he was doing all this work alone, I couldn’t make him do it. But if he thinks he’s got three other mules working alongside of him, he does the whole job all by himself.”
Just like the mule Pete, God works alone. The theme of the reformers’ work in the early 1500’s of course was “Sola, which means “alone”. God works alone.
And so, the reformers came up with five solas … five “alones” to describe what this looks like in God’s Kingdom…
• Solus Christus: Christ Alone – Christ alone does all the work for our salvation on the cross.
• Sola Gratia: Grace Alone – Christ gives us His work not because we are deserving, but because He is loving.
• Sola Fide: Faith Alone – We receive what Christ has done not because of something we do, but because of who we trust.
• Sola Scriptura: Scripture Alone – We know all this not because we are really smart, but because God has revealed it to us in His Word.
• Soli Deo Gloria: To God’s Glory Alone – Because of all that God has done for us, we don’t live for ourselves, but for Him.
So today, we are going to highlight the first one because it is so central to our faith and salvation …
Solus Christus … Christ alone. The meaning obviously is that Christ alone has done all the work for our salvation.
That statement is the heart and soul of this sola. In fact, here’s how alone Jesus was when He did His work on the cross.
Remember that Jesus had been hanging on the cross for several hours, He had been through most of His torment, and He was nearing the end of His earthly life, when He cried out in a loud voice…
“Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?”, which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken Me?”. Mark 15:34
In those moments, Jesus was carrying on the cross the sins of the entire world … all of the sins of the world. And He had no help … God turned away … Jesus was literally alone.
Jesus was so alone on the cross that even His Father forsook Him. And so this brings us to one of our texts for today. Let’s look at this Sola through the life of John the Baptist.
John and Jesus were cousins, and in fact, John was the forerunner of Jesus. John’s message was quite simple really … his message was that the Messiah has arrived in the world.
“John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.” John 1:4-5
Think about what is being said here. Throngs of people … people coming to John … you could say he was at the PEAK of his popularity.
John was certainly popular, but popularity tends to work on a bell curve. And now, John is on the downward slope, but only because Jesus is on the uptick. Things have begun to dramatically shift for both these men.
“John’s disciples came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan – the One you testified about – look, He is baptizing, and everyone is going to Him.” John 3:26
If you have ever had something you were known for, then you can empathize with John. He was a fiery preacher, he was famous, people walked for miles to see him. His disciples were obviously very excited to be following him.
But now, someone else is known for His preaching and His baptizing – that person was Jesus, and people are walking for miles to see Him.
And John’s disciples are trying to recoup their losses … who should we follow to get the biggest bang for our buck.
So, things were changing. We know that John was known for fiery preaching that led people to repentance and baptism. That is why he is called “John the Baptist.”
John also had a great perspective. He understood who he was, and how God intended to use him as a proclaimer for the coming Messiah.
Listen to what John said in verse 27 of our Gospel lesson…
“A person can receive only what is given them from heaven. 28 You yourselves can testify that I said, ‘I am not the Messiah, but am sent ahead of Him.’ 29 The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete.”
This is an amazing contrast. John’s disciples were afraid of losing their importance, but John on the other hand, is very comfortable in losing his importance and taking a backseat to Jesus.
John is not worried like his disciples are because he knows his place. He knows that his whole ministry is not to be the Messiah, but to announce Him. And this is huge.
Because I think that this is something we all struggle with. This is what grinds against the solas – the fact that we want to be our own Savior, or, at least we want to be a big part of it.
We always seem to work at being in control. We find it very difficult to let go and trust God completely.
There is a book titled, “The Three Christ’s of Ypsilanti”.
It seems there were 3 men, who all believed that they were the Messiah.
The author got them in a group session and began to question them.
He started with Leon and asked him, “Why do you think you are the Messiah?”
“I was sent to save the world.” Why do you think that?”
When Leon said, “God told me,” immediately one of the others responded, “I never said any such thing!”
The author was not able to help any of the three men. They continue to believe that they are the Messiah to this day.
My point is that in a sense we all struggle somewhat with the Messiah complex. Maybe not to the extent of Leon and the other two, but I know we all struggle with the idea of being important, being significant, being at the center of things in our lives.
We may not wind up in therapy over our Messiah delusions, but we all have Messiah delusions. We try to save ourselves in a bunch of ways, such as…
• Money
• Success
• Ability
• Morality
But the bottom line is … we cannot save ourselves! We cannot even help save ourselves. There is not a single thing I can do to help my salvation. It is entirely based on Solus Christus … Christ Alone.
And John the Baptist certainly understood this. For example, he comes across very clearly in his parable when he says the bride belongs to the bridegroom, and the friend of the bridegroom was to assist in bringing joy to all of them.
This friend of the groom at a wedding is of course what we would call today the best man. And his point is that the best man is not the point of the wedding. But the best man points to the POINT of the wedding … the groom.
And that’s what John has come to do, and nothing more! So, it’s okay that not everyone is looking at John because his whole ministry was to point to Jesus.
“He (Jesus) must become greater; I must become less.” John 3:30
This should be the prayer of every Christian.
So, how do we point to Jesus? Let’s be clear, we can point to Jesus in three simple ways … first, we can point to Jesus by exhibiting humility.
Humility is something we talk about often, and we try to remember that humility is never about weakness, but it is always about strength REIGNED IN for a purpose.
One author said this about humility…
“Humility comes not from a low opinion of self, but rather from a high opinion of God.”
This is how the Apostle Paul put it…
“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves.” Philippians 2:3
Humility is not about putting yourself down, it’s about lifting others up. It just comes from knowing that you’re not the main thing.
And once you understand that you are not the main thing, then you can focus on other things.
We can point to Jesus by exhibiting HUMILITY. But we can also point to Jesus by our. SERVICE. Here is how Mark put it…
“Truly I tell you, anyone who gives you a cup of water in My name because you belong to the Messiah will certainly not lose their reward.” Mark 9:41
Obviously, Jesus is not really talking about water here.
He is talking about service to others.
When we have opportunities to touch families, we want to always try to point them to Jesus. Sometimes by what we say, but mostly by what we do.
Finally, we want to point to Jesus by our MISSION.
Think about humility as our attitude, service as our actions, and our mission as our witness to Jesus.
We know service involves our actions. And we know that our mission just takes our actions, and adds our words, which reflects God’s Word.
It always comes down to this … do we speak of Jesus when we have the opportunity? People are often worried about whether they will be able to speak of Jesus.
Here are some thoughts from the Apostle Paul on speaking about Jesus…
“When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. 2 For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” 1 Corinthians 2:1-2
Martin Luther actually used these verses as the basis for one of his famous sayings…
“The cross alone is our theology.”
There’s also an irony in Paul’s words … Paul says he’s not eloquent or wise and yet, he says it so eloquently and wisely!
Here’s a secret … you may think you’re not eloquent or wise, but when you proclaim Jesus, you are always eloquent and wise … simply because He is. He alone is. And that’s what we are all about … Solus Christus … Christ Alone. Amen.