Author: Nina Schmidt

The devil, Satan, holds the power of death. The power of death binds the whole creation so tightly that it groans (Ro. 8:32). Death enslaves by fear, and death enslaves those who know they are going to die. This knowledge of death has been passed down from generation to generation ever since God announced to Adam, “In the day you eat of it (the fruit of the tree of knowledge), you shall surely die” (Ge. 2:17). This knowledge—terrible, fearsome, and enslaving—forces the descendants of Adam and Eve to seek remedies. The Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ernest Becker has described these human-devised remedies to avoid or deny this enslaving knowledge. They use religion, culture, family, and personal achievement (among other things) to build what Becker calls immortality projects. These projects give people a sense that they will live on even though they die (Jn. 11:25). This sense comforts them and reduces what Becker calls Generative Death Anxiety.

Applying Becker’s insights to the text today: the devil, Satan, uses Generative Death Anxiety to bind people to their immortality projects. Satan enslaves them, putting them to work through performing pious religious deeds, participating and contributing to an enduring culture, forming a family that is generations long, and establishing a life of moral beauty and good works memorialized into the future. By their very visibility, these immortality projects, helpful and beneficial in themselves, take away hope (Ro. 8:24) and replace faith (2 Cor. 5:17). Christianity becomes a religion of works, a mere series of immortality projects useful for Christians to reduce their Generative Death Anxiety.

Jesus changes all of that! Jesus is your immortality. In his death, Jesus has destroyed the power of death. In his death and resurrection, Jesus has set you free from Generative Death Anxiety. You do not need those immortality projects. They may be helpful and beneficial ways to pass the time between your sacramental death in baptism and your physical death of going down to the grave, but they do not provide immortality. Only Jesus does that. Believe it! You are set free!

Table Talk: Discuss the shadow death has cast upon humanity or your life personally.

Pray: Heavenly Father, give me such faith in Jesus’ death and resurrection that my immortality projects are exposed. Amen

Hebrews 2:14-18 (ESV)

14 Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, he likewise shared in their humanity, so that through death he could destroy the one who holds the power of death (that is, the devil), 15 and set free those who were held in slavery all their lives by their fear of death. 16 For surely his concern is not for angels, but he is concerned for Abraham’s descendants. 17 Therefore he had to be made like his brothers and sisters in every respect, so that he could become a merciful and faithful high priest in things relating to God, to make atonement for the sins of the people. 18 For since he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.

Paul shocks the Romans to whom he is writing. The Greeks and Romans—merely stand-ins for the civilized world—would have understood that righteousness, especially a righteousness like that unto God’s, was something humans could achieve. Plato exemplified this doctrine, which has held hold of the human race since it ate the fruit of that deadly tree. Paul simply declares that righteousness belongs to God alone. With such a declaration, Paul stands counter to the prevalent belief both then and now. Such a claim reduces human enterprise to the mere penultimate. Its reasoning goes like this: when righteousness is God’s alone, all other persons must be unrighteous, making salvation a gift to the unrighteous or impious. Only the godless have a place with God. Think of Jesus’ words here: “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Lk. 5:32).

Paul moves from this shocking declaration to how his hearers might come to know God’s righteousness: It is revealed in the Gospel. That means the revelation itself is the exercise of God’s power… God’s specific power for salvation (vs. 16). The revelation of this power for salvation is given to all who believe. You must not assume here that belief is a work of yours that is traded in some transactional manner to God, and the revelation is what God gives you in return. Cast that assumption aside. The revelation creates the belief that receives it. This belief… this faith created by the gospel… is the life of the righteous because it has been as of old, “The righteous by faith will live” (vs. 17).

Paul is eager to preach the gospel to those in Rome (vs. 15). Paul desires mutual comfort that comes from one faith and is shared by another (vs. 12).  In this mutual comfort, one faith to another faith, the power of God is at work through the gospel. Here, you can discern the origins of Luther’s “conversation and consolation of the saints” as a means of grace. The gospel moves from faith to faith and then back again, faith to faith. The power of God… the salvation of God… and indeed, the gospel of God… all come together in that mutual comfort when the saints converse and console one another with the gospel.

Table Talk: Discuss the distinction between living by faith and living by works.

Pray: Heavenly Father, grant me the enjoyment of being mutually comforted by one another’s faith. Amen

Romans 1:8-17 (ESV)

8 First of all, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world. 9 For God, whom I serve in my spirit in the gospel of his Son, is my witness that I continually remember you, 10 and I always ask in my prayers if, perhaps now at last, I may succeed in visiting you according to the will of God. 11 For I long to see you, so that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you, 12 that is, that we may be mutually comforted by one another’s faith, both yours and mine. 13 I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that I often intended to come to you (and was prevented until now), so that I may have some fruit even among you, just as I already have among the rest of the Gentiles. 14 I am a debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish. 15 Thus I am eager also to preach the gospel to you who are in Rome.

16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is God’s power for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For the righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel from faith to faith, just as it is written, “The righteous by faith will live.”

What a promise! In the grace of God, we have gifts, unique gifts. Christians are not cookie-cutter the same. We are unique, distinct persons. Even as the new creature in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17), the work of God’s grace delivers us into personal individuality. The work of God’s grace does not add supernatural abilities or powers to our natural human ones. God’s grace is a work of God that puts miserable sinners to death, ending their misery. Out of that death, God’s grace raises up saints to walk in the newness of life. The death worked by grace is the alien work of God. The raising up worked by God’s grace is the proper work of God. God grants his gifts through his alien and his proper work.

These eleven verses hold twenty-nine distinct commands. The imperatives overwhelm us. Their demands weigh us down. The charge of hypocrisy haunts us. Idolatry lies not far from us as pride and despair tempt us: the hypocrisy of pride claims us when we think of attaining the commands; the hypocrisy of despair claims us when we think of failing the commands. We come to idolize either our attaining or our failing. Relief from this burden… relief from this weight of demands… relief comes only through death. God’s promise and prophecy given to Adam there in the Garden of Eden must be brought to fruition, “In the day you eat of it, you shall surely die” (Ge. 2:17). Just so, God’s grace carries out God’s alien work and puts the sinner—that’s you—to death. But God’s grace is not through with you. Grace reaches into that death to fulfill another promise, “Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live…” (Jn. 11:25).  Just so, God’s grace carries out his proper work of raising up sinners to newness of life as children of God.

Children of God have new ears that go along with being a new creature in Christ. These new ears hear no threat in these eleven verses as holding commands. No, these verses simply describe what the children of God will be doing, not because they are commanded to it but because it is now their nature to do it. Children of God cannot help themselves. They must… they will… and they do… love without hypocrisy.

Table Talk: Discuss the difference between love on command and spontaneous love.

Pray: Heavenly Father, work your will upon me that I would receive both your alien work and your proper work. Amen

Romans 12:6-16 (ESV)

6 And we have different gifts according to the grace given to us. If the gift is prophecy, that individual must use it in proportion to his faith. 7 If it is service, he must serve; if it is teaching, he must teach; 8 if it is exhortation, he must exhort; if it is contributing, he must do so with sincerity; if it is leadership, he must do so with diligence; if it is showing mercy, he must do so with cheerfulness.

9 Love must be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil, cling to what is good. 10 Be devoted to one another with mutual love, showing eagerness in honoring one another. 11 Do not lag in zeal, be enthusiastic in spirit, serve the Lord. 12 Rejoice in hope, endure in suffering, persist in prayer. 13 Contribute to the needs of the saints, pursue hospitality. 14 Bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse. 15 Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. 16 Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty but associate with the lowly. Do not be conceited.