Following Jesus Home
An article examining growing and retaining our faith in the Savior.
We have celebrated Easter, the festival of our resurrected Lord, but we continue to think about the resurrection and the lessons that can be learned from that first Easter. By now, we have entered the Pentecost season and observed the drastic change in the disciples’ faith and behavior. They saw Jesus physically, the one who had risen from the dead, and so there was no more reason to have fears or doubts about the future. Rather, they surely knew that the one who had risen from the dead had conquered death, and there was no reason to fear being martyred by the Pharisees, Romans, or other groups hostile to the message of the cross. During the festival of Pentecost, we observe how the Holy Spirit came to the disciples and how it equipped them with gifts special to the ministry of the Apostles. God also sends this same Spirit to us in his Word and blesses each of us with different spiritual gifts. As we focus on growth in our faith this Pentecost, let us also consider how we are saved, how we remain faithful, and how God uses His Spirit to justify, sanctify, and preserve us in life and death.
One important piece of theology that Christians should consider is how we are saved. Paul tells us that God “wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” – 1 Timothy 2:4. God performs this work of bringing salvation to all people by using His Word, especially the saving words of the Gospel. It is the power of the Gospel that brings people – who are unable to save themselves – to a saving faith in the living Savior. We receive this message simply by attentively listening at Jesus’s feet. We know that “faith comes from hearing the message, and the message comes through the word of Christ” – Romans 10:17. Salvation comes to us solely because of God’s grace and mercy that he has shown towards us. It is not of our own abilities or doings that we are offered salvation, rather, God does all the work of saving us. “Indeed, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast” – Ephesians 2:8-9. In our sinfulness, we are unable to choose God or come to him because we are spiritually dead in our trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1-5). We are unable to raise ourselves from this condition of spiritual death. Due to our fallen state, God instead comes to us through the “Means of Grace.” The pastor whom I had confirmation classes with would ask us how we arrived at confirmation to demonstrate what is meant by “Means of Grace.” We would often respond that we arrived by vehicle (car, truck, etc.) This, he said, was our means of transportation. It was one of many ways to arrive at confirmation class. In the same way, the “Means of Grace” includes all the ways that God brings his grace to us. These all ultimately come back to God’s Word which is the primary means by which God brings his gracious salvation to us. However, Christ also instituted the sacraments as additional means of grace to save us by water and by his body and blood. In Baptism, infants, children, adults, and all people of every nation are saved by the water because of God’s Word (Matthew 28:19-20), by which he promises us “baptism now saves you” (1 Peter 3:21). In the Lord’s Supper or Holy Communion, Christ also offers such salvation through his body and blood as he tells us that this meal is “for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:26-28). God uses these means to bring to us the salvation that Jesus won for us on the cross, assuring us that we are forgiven and have the hope of eternal salvation.
When we understand that we are saved by God’s doing and grace alone, we realize that we cannot be faithful on our own and stand up against the wiles of the devil by ourselves. God knows that, due to our sinful nature, we are unable to withstand this powerful enemy who “prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8). For this reason, he blesses us with his Holy Spirit – the Comforter. The main work of the Holy Spirit is sanctification, and he does this by converting us, preserving us, and enabling us as believers to live a new life in his name. When we are converted to the faith, as we have seen in the verses mentioned previously, the Holy Spirit does the work of washing us clean and creating faith in our sinful hearts of stone. After working faith in our hearts, he does not stop there, but he continues to preserve us in the faith by causing daily repentance (or sorrow) over our sins and causing us to cling to the rock of Christ. God is reminding us of the messages of both Law (that we are sinners) and Gospel (that we have been saved by God’s free grace and favor). Finally, because of this, he enables us to live a truly good life because we are no longer motivated by the slavery of the Law and our sins. Instead, we have been set free by the work of the cross through the perfect sacrifice of our Lord Jesus. We no longer need to dwell in our sins because we are seen as holy and righteous before God as his children who have washed their robes in the Blood of the Lamb.
Despite God blessing us with the Holy Spirit to preserve us in the faith, we still face danger on every hand and should be alert and vigilant as Christians. The hymn, “I Walk in Danger All the Way,” expresses the danger we face throughout life.
“I walk in danger all the way;
The thought shall never leave me
That Satan, who has marked his prey,
Is plotting to deceive me.
This foe with hidden snares
May seize me unawares
If e'er I fail to watch and pray;
I walk in danger all the way.” – ELH 252:1
This is why regularly hearing God’s Word is very important because, without it, we can be caught in the deceitful traps of the devil and fall prey to him being fully unaware. Therefore, we should spend time reading God’s Word and regularly hearing it at church. We are then able to defend ourselves against such traps of the devil and his attempts to seize us in his jaws; we realize that he can deceive, taunt, and jeer us in vain, but he cannot take the Gospel away from us. What the devil says is untrue, but God does not lie, and he will neither leave us nor forsake us (Deuteronomy 31:8). He will see us through all trials, temptations, and crosses that we bear and pass through. We are never alone, because he surely is with us always to the very end of the age (Matthew 28:20). We are in God’s gracious hands when we regularly, gladly, and joyfully hear and learn His Word. We can know as the hymn continues:
“I walk with Jesus all the way;
His guidance never fails me.
Within His wounds I find a stay
When Satan's pow'r assails me,
And, by His footsteps led,
My path I safely tread.
In spite of ills that threaten may,
I walk with Jesus all the way.” – ELH 252:5
Our walk with Jesus is a walk with our Lord, who has saved us, and who is guiding and leading us through the valley of the shadow of death. We should fear nothing, but trust in him because he is with us throughout our lives and through the path of danger which we tread. We will experience sorrows in this life, but Jesus has overcome the world and has promised eternal life to all who believe in his name. Our sorrows will be turned into joy, and he will wipe away all our tears. This path that we tread, leads to the narrow gate of heaven, as the hymn concludes:
“My walk is heav'nward all the way;
Await my soul, the morrow,
When thou shalt find release for aye
From all thy sin and sorrow.
All worldly pomp, begone!
To heav'n I now press on.
For all the world I would not stay;
My walk is heav'nward all the way.” – ELH 252:6
May God grant us his grace so that we may persevere throughout life’s weary travels and be preserved in true faith, always remembering that he is with us. Amen.