Called by the Gospel:
Justification and Vocation
Eighth Annual Vocation
Symposium
Trinity Lutheran Church
Norman, Oklahoma
April 14, 2007
Pastor Rolf Preus
Part One: The Call to Faith
A. Called to Do Nothing
When we talk
about vocation we can talk about what one is called to do. Or we can talk about the one who is called
to do it. I suspect that most people
think first of what one is called to do.
After all, that’s the whole point of vocation, isn’t it? We want to know that what we are doing is
what God has called us to. This will
bring us satisfaction in doing it. But
when we consider Christian vocation we may not begin with what we are called to
do. That’s because God does not call us
to do anything until He calls us to do nothing. It is the call to do nothing that makes us Christians.
Faith is born in
the doing of nothing at all. As St.
Paul teaches, “To him who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the
ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.” (Romans 4:5) The one that works for a righteousness that
will avail before God commits mortal sin in all his works. Only the ungodly are justified. We must be ungodly before we can be
justified. And since the ungodly are
incapable of doing anything good, we cannot be justified except by doing
nothing at all. It is in this context
that we must understand the familiar words from Luther’s Small Catechism:
I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in
Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him, but the Holy Ghost has called me by the
Gospel.
Christian
vocation is first of all the call to faith.
Without faith it is impossible to please God. Without faith we have no righteousness at all. Without faith we cannot worship God. All our works are sin. Indeed, the holier we intend them to be the
more outrageously they offend the divine majesty. There can be no talk about Christian vocation apart from the
justification of the sinner by faith.
For when God calls us to faith He justifies us through faith. And since faith trusts solely in the works
of Christ and not in its own works it must be through faith alone that we are
justified. So then, before we can speak
of what we are called to do we must speak of our call to do nothing at all.
Religious people
don’t want to do nothing. The religious
impulse is to do something. And this
refusal of people to do nothing at all is the source of all false teaching and
idolatry. It bears the evil fruit of
every self-appointed and therefore godless standard of holiness. Religious people refuse to do nothing at
all. To require this of them is
intolerable. It requires that they
repudiate their religion. But they are
bound and determined to be faithful to their religion of works. They may agree to listen to a discussion of
Christ’s holy life, perfect obedience, sacrificial death, and triumphant
resurrection. It makes for good drama,
after all, and no religion is complete without the dramatic element. But when God begins to tell the ungodly
sinner that he can do and may do nothing whatsoever to advance godliness, it is
at that point that God becomes a devil in the mind of the unregenerate but
religious man. And so there is no holy
vocation. There cannot be. There is only sin and judgment.
God must kill
before making alive. He must kill the
false faith of the self-righteous sinner.
He must destroy his religion of works-righteousness. Only in the destroying of this religion does
God call. Indeed, Christian vocation
embraces the life-long divine assault against the innate religion of fallen
man. The truth confronts the lie and
sets the sinner free. In that freedom
God calls His children to do freely what they were incapable of doing while
under the tyrannical delusion of works-righteousness.
This delusion is
grounded in the rejection of a bitter truth that nobody wants to face. It is clearly taught in the Holy Scriptures,
but it insults the religious sensibilities of fallen man. The truth is that we are by nature incapable
of doing good. We reject this truth
because we judge by false appearances.
We think that our freedom to choose this or to reject that specific
external act of the body is proof of a spiritual ability to do those things
that God requires of us. The Bible
teaches something quite different. St.
Paul writes:
Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not
subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.
So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. (Romans 8:7-8)
Again, he writes:
These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom
teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with
spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of
God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are
spiritually discerned. (1 Corinthians 2:13-14)
The Lutheran Confessions
confess this biblical truth quite clearly.
We read in the Formula of Concord:
That
original sin in human nature is not only a total lack of good in spiritual,
divine things, but that at the same time it replaces the lost image of God in
man with a deep, wicked, abominable, bottomless, inscrutable, and inexpressible
corruption of his entire nature in all its powers, especially of the highest
and foremost powers of the soul in mind, heart, and will. As a result, since
the Fall man inherits an inborn wicked stamp, an interior uncleanness of the
heart and evil desires and inclinations. By nature every one of us inherits
from Adam a heart, sensation, and mind-set which, in its highest powers and the
light of reason, is by nature diametrically opposed to God and his highest
commands and is actually enmity against God, especially in divine and spiritual
matters. True, in natural and external
things which are subject to reason man still possesses a measure of reason,
power, and ability, although greatly weakened since the inherited malady has so
poisoned and tainted them that they amount to nothing in the sight of God. (FC
SD I 11-12, Tappert)
The religion of
works-righteousness teaches that we become righteous by doing righteous
things. One becomes good by means of
doing good. This is quite impossible. The Lord Jesus teaches the very
opposite. He teaches that whoever sins
is a slave to sin. A slave cannot set
himself free. Only the Son of God can
do that. If you believe that doing holy
things makes you holy you cannot believe in Jesus. For the one who does that which makes us holy will be the one in
whom we trust. If Jesus does what makes
us holy we will trust in Him. If we do
what makes us holy we will trust in ourselves.
The religion of works-righteousness is incompatible with the Christian
religion. It does not honor God. It is idolatrous. It falls under the woe of the Holy Scriptures:
Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil;
Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness;
Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! (Isaiah 5:20)
Since we are
evil by nature when we do what we by nature can do we do evil. When we attempt to make ourselves good by
doing evil we are calling evil good. To
reject the doing of Christ as the only doing by which we can become holy we are
calling good evil. But God threatens to
punish those who call evil good and good evil.
The prophetic woe stands to the end of time.
When it comes to
the doctrine of Christian vocation it matters very much where we begin our
discussion. Beginning in the wrong
place will permanently skew the discussion.
Unfortunately, this is what often happens. Since the topic is vocation, it stands to reason that what one is
called to do should be the chief concern.
But what stands to reason is wrong.
The religion of works-righteousness places what we do at the center of
our concern. That’s to be
expected. In that religion what we do
is the foundation for what we are. We
become holy by doing holy things. But
the call from God is first of all the call to faith. The just shall live by faith.
What we do must always be subordinated to what we believe. What we do will be imperfect in this life
because the flesh will cling to us as long as we live in these mortal
bodies. But what we believe is
perfect. It is the gospel of Christ in
which there is nothing but purity and perfection. We believe what God teaches.
His doctrine is His alone. We
are called to live as He commands. But
our lives will never reach perfection this side of eternity. Listen to how Luther contrasts doctrine and
life. He writes:
Doctrine is our only light.
It alone enlightens and directs us and shows the way to heaven. If it is shaken in one quarter, it will
necessarily be shaken in its entirety.
Where that happens, love cannot help us at all. We can be saved without love and concord
with the Sacramentarians but not without the pure doctrine and faith. . . For
this reason, as I often advise, doctrine must be carefully distinguished from
life. Doctrine is heaven; life is
earth. In life are sin, error, impurity,
and misery – with vinegar as men are wont to say. There love should close an eye, should tolerate, be deceived,
believe, hope, and bear everything; there the forgiveness of sins should mean
most, if only sin and error are not defended.
But in doctrine there is no error, and hence no need for any forgiveness
of sins. Therefore there is no
similarity at all between doctrine and life.
One little point of doctrine is worth more than heaven and earth. This is why we cannot bear to have it
violated in the least. But to errors of
life we can close an eye almost to the point of blindness. For we, too, daily err in life and morals,
as all saints do; and these imperfections they confess earnestly in the Lord’s
Prayer and in the Creed. But by the
grace of God our doctrine is pure. All
our articles of faith are sound and are grounded in Holy writ. The devil would gladly contaminate and
overturn these. Therefore he so
cunningly attacks us with the specious argument that the love and harmony of
the churches are not to be violated, etc.[1]
God’s gospel is
a heavenly teaching that enlightens us.
This is why the doctrine of the gospel must remain pure even if
everything else in the world is polluted and corrupted. For we are called by the gospel. The call from God is a call out of darkness
into light. When we walk in darkness we
don’t know where we are going and we cannot rightly understand what we are
doing. The call out of darkness into
the light of God’s grace is a call to deny ourselves. Jesus says:
“If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and
take up his cross, and follow Me. For
whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for
My sake will find it. For what profit
is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what
will a man give in exchange for his soul?”
(Matthew 16:24-26)
The call to deny
ourselves, to lose our life for Christ’s sake, is the invitation to do nothing
at all but to rest in the wounds of Jesus.
As Jesus said:
Come to Me, all you
who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for
I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)
The rest that
Jesus gives is the forgiveness of sins.
This is the peace that sets our hearts at rest. The burden of our sin that lay heavy upon us
is taken off of us and placed on the Lamb of God who bears it all away. We need do nothing to make ourselves
righteous. We are righteous by virtue
of the righteousness of Jesus that is reckoned to us. We need to do nothing to make ourselves holy. We are holy by virtue of our baptism that
has washed all our sins away by the blood of the Lamb shed for us on the
cross. We are called to deny everything
we have done or could have done whether in service to this or that god or in
service to religious standards we chose for ourselves. We are called to die to self and to live a
new life. Only when our call from God
is grounded in the vicarious satisfaction of Jesus Christ and our justification
by God’s grace alone through faith in Christ’s blood shed for us can we rightly
consider and properly understand the doctrine of Christian vocation. There can be no theological shortcut that
begins with a consideration of what the Christian is called to do and neglects
first to consider what makes a Christian a Christian. For only the good tree can bear good fruit. It is as Jesus says:
Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears
bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad
fruit, nor can a bad tree
bear good fruit. (Matthew 7:17-18)
This cannot be
overemphasized. It is not something
that people naturally accept. It flies
in the face of reason. We will not
believe it if we rely on observation or common sense. This is a matter of divine revelation. It is a matter of faith.
Every philosophical system of ethics determines the good of the deed
according to the deed that is done.
Some will judge a deed by its consequences. Others will judge it according to immutable moral laws. Others will insist that the situation itself
determines which deed is good and which deed is bad. And, of course, they will argue with each other about whose
ethical system is the best. But
everyone will begin with the deed and go back to the doer of the deed and
define the doer by the deed he has done.
But God doesn’t do it that way.
He begins with the doer of the deed and from there He defines the deed
that is done.
The doer of the
deed is called to be good. When God
says that he is good he is good. When
the one God says is good does the deed that God has given him to do that deed
is good. This is the Christian doctrine
of vocation. The justifying word
imputes to us the righteousness of Jesus.
This is how the word renders us clean and spotless before God. God says we are righteous. So we are.
The word of Jesus both calls and cleanses us. As Jesus says:
You are already clean because of the word
which I have spoken to you. Abide in
Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides
in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are
the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without
Me you can do nothing. . . You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed
you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father
in My name He may give you. These
things I command you, that you love one another. (John 15:3-5; 16-17)
We cannot love
one another until we are made clean by Christ’s word. God defines this love.
God is its source. This love is
eternal. The Father loves the Son from
eternity. In time the Son is incarnate
by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary and is made man. He reveals this eternal love in all He says and does. He is begotten from the Father from
eternity. He is also chosen or elected
from eternity to be the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. It is on the cross where He is lifted up to
die for us that this love is displayed with crystal clarity. It is given to us in the word by which we
are called. It defines our relationship
with God and with one another.
B. Called and Elected: Time
and Eternity
In order that we can see clearly how faith and love relate to one another in our Christian vocation it may be helpful to take a look at our vocation from the perspective of eternity. St. Paul gives us a glimpse of this in Romans 8:28-30 where we read,
And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.
Who is doing the doing here? It is God from eternity to eternity. Only a fool would try to peek into eternity when he is so obviously bound by time. We can’t see tomorrow, much less into the eternal past or into the eternal future. For this reason the doctrine of predestination frightens away many Christians to the extent they either dismiss it out of hand as being contrary to a revered notion of freewill or they discard it as a hopelessly intricate philosophical burden too heavy for them to bear. Please, spare us talk about predestination! We aren’t here to endure such imponderables.
But this doctrine is no burden. In fact, it removes all burdens from us. There is no better perspective from which to view our Christian vocation than the perspective of our eternal election by God. So let us examine these inspired words of the apostle.
St. Paul begins by asserting that everything works together for good for those whom God has called. They are identified as those who love God. They love God because God called them to do so. Now let us consider the verbs that follow. In developing the concept of Christian vocation, the apostle assigns the following five verbs to God: God foreknows, God predestines, God calls, God justifies, and God glorifies. Of these five activities ascribed to God, three of them take place in eternity and two take place in time. God foreknows, predestines, and glorifies us in eternity. There is no access to the eternal except through the temporal. We are bound in and by time. God speaks to us where we are. Of the two activities that occur in time one is revealed and one is hidden. We can identify the hidden only by what is revealed. The call is revealed. You witness Holy Baptism. You hear the words. You feel the water. You see the sign. But you cannot see justification. You cannot feel or touch the forgiveness of sins. You can hear the words that give it but you cannot hear forgiveness. But you most certainly can apprehend the call by your senses. You can identify it quite specifically. God calls us in time and God calls us in a specific place in a specific way by specific means and all of this can be clearly identified.
Have you ever met an evangelist who informed you that God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life? No one can argue with that. But when it comes to identifying just what that plan is, well, this is where faith can be sent off course into a dead end. For here it is that God’s clear and identifiable call is often replaced by human imagination. What is God’s plan for your life? Can you discern God’s will? Are you living in God’s will or outside of God’s will? Where is God leading you? How can you know? Have you talked it over with the Lord in prayer? Have you waited for His guidance? Do it, and then, when He gives you direction, you should follow it. After all, God has a wonderful plan for your life, but it is up to you to discover what it is.
But that’s just not true. You have no need at all to learn of God’s plan for your life. In fact, you’d be better off not knowing. If God wanted to tell you He’d tell you. Why should you need to know when God knows? After all, it’s His plan, not yours. When you imagine that He has told you what He hasn’t made plain in the Holy Scriptures you substitute your own notions for God’s word. This is the source of no end of trouble. It is quite damaging to faith. It is spiritually dangerous to assign to God your own ideas of what He has planned for you. For if you persuade yourself that your own plans are His plans, then when your plans don’t pan out you may begin to question God.
Your baptism stands here in time as the bridge to eternity. It joins you to your election in the eternal past and to your glorification in the eternal future. It calls you into the vocation God has prepared for you. It ushers you into the wonderful plan God has for your life. Far better that you know you are baptized than that you know God’s plan for your life. For who and what you are is not determined by what you will be doing. It is determined by what God has given to you in Holy Baptism.
Your baptism is your call to whatever vocation you have. We must learn to go from the revealed to the hidden, from the outside to the inside. Don’t look within yourself to find some kind of divine guidance from which you will gain information on God’s plan for your life. Don’t pretend that prayer is a means of gaining information from God.
According to last Sunday’s Fargo Forum, a 2005 poll of Americans by Newsweek and Beliefnet found that twice as many people felt more connected with God while praying than while in a house of worship. It is clear that people feel closer to God when they are doing the talking than they do when God is talking to them. They believe that divine guidance comes from within themselves. But within ourselves is the trouble from which God must deliver us. When Jesus speaks of God answering prayer He says, “If you abide in Me, and my words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.” (John 15:7)
Prayer always submits to the clear word of God. When we pray – especially when we pray – we must learn to test and measure every thought and feeling we have by that which is outside of us: the objectively identifiable word of God. Then, guided by God’s word and not our own notions, we will be able to find joy in doing what God has called us to do.
Baptism isn’t a mere outward expression of the inner faith. It is the source of faith. It is the foundation for faith. For the Lord Jesus Christ has invested in this holy sacrament His divine authority to forgive. “I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins.” And this remission covers us in everything we think, say, and do. Don’t look inward where doubt and sin lurk to con you into doubting God. Look at your call in Holy Baptism. Your baptism remains throughout your life the divine assurance that the forgiveness you hear pronounced upon you in the absolution is intended for you. Your name and God’s name are joined. The forgiveness you have by faith is no accidental or temporary blessing. It is guaranteed by your baptism.
What has God called you to do? Whatever it is, God gave you this call in Holy Baptism. When you look to this external and identifiable call God grants you a glimpse into eternity. From the eternal past He knew you. He didn’t merely know that you would some day be born and live and die. He knew you personally and chose you to be His dear child. He predestined you in love to be conformed to Christ’s image which is the very image of God. Everything He did in time to accomplish this He chose to do for you, in Christ, that is, for Christ’s sake, from eternity. As surely as God calls you in Holy Baptism, He loved you before time began, predestined you to suffer with Christ and be glorified with Him. Your baptism justifies you. It calls you. It not only has the power to transcend space and time to join you in union with the death and resurrection of Christ, it has the power to traverse eternity, binding you today to the eternal gracious decree of God in Christ to justify you and glorify you.
So what has God called you to do? He has called you to love.
Part
Two: The Call to Love
A.
Faith and Love
The call to do nothing is the call to
faith. Faith cannot do something and
remain faith. When faith is defined as
an activity it is defined contrary to the gospel. Whenever we speak of faith as if it is doing something we are
speaking according to a figure of speech known as metonymy. One word is substituted for another word to
which it is closely related. For
example, Jesus says: “This cup is the New Testament in my blood.” He is speaking metonymically, referring to
the wine by using the word cup. He does
not mean cup when He says cup. He means
wine. Likewise, since love is the fruit
of faith it is quite common to use the word faith metonymically to mean love. A famous instance of this is found in
Luther’s definition of faith in his introduction to the Epistle to the Romans
from his 1522 translation of the Bible.
Luther writes:
Instead, faith is God's work in us that changes us and gives new birth from God. (John 1:13). It kills the Old Adam and makes us completely different people. It changes our hearts, our spirits, our thoughts and all our powers. It brings the Holy Spirit with it. Yes, it is a living, creative, active and powerful thing, this faith. Faith cannot help doing good works constantly. It doesn't stop to ask if good works ought to be done, but before anyone asks, it already has done them and continues to do them without ceasing. Anyone who does not do good works in this manner is an unbeliever.[2]
Luther begins by referring to faith as faith and as he enters into a discussion of the fruit of faith he continues to use the word faith to refer to its fruit. This is a powerful rhetorical device, employed to draw special attention to the inseparable bond between the faith that does nothing and the active love that flows from it. From the call to do nothing comes the call to love. Faith and love cannot be separated. But they must be sharply distinguished. The role of faith cannot be granted to love, nor can the role of love be granted to faith. Confusing what each is will lead to a doctrine of vocation that is decidedly unchristian.
Simply put, we receive the call from God always by faith and by faith alone. It is never by love that the call is received. Our love will only get in the way of faith and fight against it if it is made into a means of receiving the call. God always calls us through faith. We are justified through faith and through faith alone. Our love cannot form or deepen or augment the righteousness by which God justifies us. When it comes to justification, love must remain silent and make no claims. We are called by God as God justifies us. The call from God is always the call of the gospel that forgives us all our sins and sets us before God as saints.
The source of love is justification. God justifies you by calling you and in justifying you He calls you to love. The essence of this love is not ours to determine. St. John writes,
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. (1 John 4:10-11)
Since God’s love determines for us what love is, we may never define love according to any other standards than God’s. This is vital to an understanding of Christian vocation. We are never called to do anything but to love. The form that this love takes is determined by God. Were this love without form it would be void. St. Paul tells us the form that this love is to take. He writes:
Owe no one anything except to love one
another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall
not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not bear false witness,” “You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as
yourself.” Love does no harm to
a neighbor; therefore love is
the fulfillment of the law. (Romans 13:8-10)
Our love is of no benefit at all when it
comes to receiving the call from God.
We have seen that we are called to do nothing before we are called to do
anything and love is incapable of doing nothing. Faith is passive. Love is
active. Faith receives. Love does.
Faith rests still in the wounds of the Savior. Love is busy doing whatever the neighbor needs. Faith does no work but trusts in the work of
another. Love flows from faith. We can no more separate faith and love than
we can divide the body from the soul, but as important as it is that these two
be kept together, they must always be strictly distinguished so that we do not
begin to trust in our love and thus trample underneath the blood of the
covenant by replacing Christ’s righteousness with our own.
Since the righteous do righteous things,
the love that issues from the faith through which we are justified is pure and
holy and acceptable to God. It is
formed by God Himself. The works that
love does are of God’s choosing. St.
Paul writes:
For by grace you have been saved through
faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest
anyone should boast. For we are His
workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared
beforehand that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:8-10)
Your faith is of no benefit to your
neighbor. Faith benefits the one who
believes. “For by grace you have been
saved through faith.” The faith through
which one is saved is always personal.
It is confessed corporately but the believing is always personal. I suspect that oftentimes our Evangelical
friends think that we Lutherans are denying this fundamental feature of faith
when we reject their decision theology.
We deny that faith is a decision of the sinner to invite Jesus into his
heart to become his personal Lord and Savior.
We do not deny that the faith through which one is justified and saved
is personal. We reject decision
theology because it changes faith into something else. When faith becomes one’s personal decision
the human decision becomes the decisive feature of faith. Faith becomes a human work. It is no longer simple trust in what God
gives us in His gospel.
But we must not permit our rejection of
what is wrong about decision theology lead us to neglect or deny the correct
emphasis on the personal nature of faith.
Faith is not an inert acceptance of theological propositions. It is personal trust in the gospel of
Christ. Trusting in His gospel is
trusting in Him. The one who has this
personal faith is the only one who benefits from it.
On the other hand, the one who loves
receives no spiritual benefit from loving.
This is because all possible spiritual benefits are received by faith
alone. Since love doesn’t benefit the
one who loves, and since love defines what a good work in the sight of God is,
a good work is never done for the purpose of benefiting the one doing it.
About twenty years ago I participated in
a debate with a Mormon at the Missouri Synod campus church in Grand Forks,
North Dakota. The debate covered quite
a bit of ground and after each of us had had the opportunity to question the
other it was opened up to questions from the crowd. A young Mormon, clearly nervous about the possibility of
offending me, said that he thought he heard me say (but he was quite sure he
heard wrong) that doing good works does not benefit you in any way. I told him that he had heard me
correctly. I repeated myself. Doing good works doesn’t help you at
all. There was an audible collective
gasp in the room coming from several mystified Mormons. The young man then blurted out: “Then why do
good works?” I replied: “To help your
neighbor.” There was stunned silence in
the room. The Lutherans
understood. They had heard it
before. The Mormons were simply floored
by such a radical notion.
This distinction between faith and love
can also be described as two different kinds of righteousness. There is the righteousness of faith and the
righteousness of love. The righteousness
of faith is the righteousness that faith receives. It is Christ’s righteousness.
The righteousness of love is the righteousness that love does. It is the Christian’s righteousness. Christ’s righteousness is perfect and
without flaw. The Christian’s righteousness
is imperfect and tainted by sin.
Christ’s righteousness is the beginning and foundation of the
Christian’s righteousness. The
Christian’s righteousness is the fruit of Christ’s righteousness. Love is the fruit of faith.
During the past generation a doctrine of
self-esteem has invaded the church and permeated Christian theology. It posits the claim that if we are to love
our neighbor we must first learn to love ourselves. Self-love becomes the basis of loving others. The ego is at the center of love. Love is equated with selfishness. Ayn Rand has been baptized and made into a
Christian. Any concept of Christian
vocation grounded in the justification of the sinner by God’s grace for
Christ’s sake through faith is lost.
The biblical and Lutheran doctrine of
vocation is inextricably bound to the doctrine of justification. The faith by which the sinner is justified
is born in repentance. That is to say,
it is born in hatred of self. The
self-esteem gospel is false at its very root.
Listen to how Luther speaks of the
righteousness of love in a sermon he preached on Palm Sunday, 1519:
Therefore it hates itself and loves its
neighbor; it does not seek its own good, but that of another, and in this its
whole way of living consists. For in that it hates itself and does not seek its
own, it crucifies the flesh. Because it seeks the good of another, it works
love. Thus in each sphere it does God’s will, living soberly with self, justly
with neighbor, devoutly toward God.[3]
If you want to find freedom, find it in
faith. Don’t look for it in love. Faith sets you free from all demands. Love makes you everyone’s slave. When faith is attacked, you stand firm and
yield nothing. This is
self-defense. No human authority has the
right to question the authority of Jesus Christ, the sin-bearer, to forgive
sins. Faith and the righteousness of
faith depend on this authority. But
when love is attacked, confess your sins, humble yourself before others, and
take as your example Him who silently bore the abuse and scorn of wicked men
even while He was establishing that righteousness by which we are justified
through faith alone. For to this you
were called.
The self-esteem gospel is nothing but a
namby-pamby form of legalism. It teaches
you to find within yourself something of which you can be proud. Rejoice in it. In this way you will find yourself able to relate to others in a
positive and affirming way. But if you
live under judgment of yourself you’ll learn to stand in judgment of
others. You won’t be able to serve
anyone else until you learn to serve yourself.
Aside from its transparently
self-centered approach to vocation and its sanctification of selfishness, the
self-esteem gospel changes the purpose of the law. The law no longer condemns.
It enables. This is the essence
of legalism. The law becomes the means
of obtaining spiritual benefit for the one obeying it. This is true of every form of legalism from
the Pharisees of Jesus’ day to the slick religious entrepreneurs of the
electronic church.
In order that the law may become the
means of spiritual gain, it is essential to alter it so as to make it
doable. The Pharisees (whose religion
became, in time, indistinguishable from Judaism – one reason why the term
“Judeo-Christian” is an oxymoron) put a “hedge” around the divine law. They replaced the Ten Commandments with 613
commandments. There were 248 positive
obligations and 365 negative prohibitions.
These rules were designed to enable practitioners of them to obey the
Ten Commandments. The divine law of
love was reduced to human rules. Listen
to what Jesus had to say about this as St. Matthew recounts (Matthew 15:1-9)
Then the scribes and Pharisees who were
from Jerusalem came to Jesus, saying, “Why do Your disciples transgress the
tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat
bread.” He answered and said to
them, “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God because of your
tradition? For God commanded,
saying, ‘Honor your father and
your mother’; and, ‘He who
curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’ But you say, ‘Whoever
says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from
me is a gift to God”—then he need not honor his
father or mother.’ Thus you have made the commandment of God of no
effect by your tradition. Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you,
saying:
‘These people draw near
to Me with their mouth,
And honor Me
with their lips,
But their
heart is far from Me.
And in vain
they worship Me,
Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’”
Human tradition negates divine law. This is what all forms of legalism do. Nowadays the word “tradition” has a negative
connotation. So we hear of principles
instead. Do a Google search for
“spiritual principles” and you will find such titles as, “Manifest Your
Destiny: The Nine Spiritual Principles for Getting Everything You Want” and
“Seven Spiritual Principles to Successful Living.” Put principles into practice.
It’s all about empowerment. As
you apply the spiritual principles you gain control over your life. You’re in charge.
The Christian doctrine of vocation denies
this at every level. We aren’t in
charge of the righteousness by which we are justified. We aren’t in charge of the call of the
gospel that justifies us. And we’re not
in charge of what we are called by God to do.
God is.
Legalism is designed to replace God’s
authority with human authority. It is
easy to discern whether or not the rules established by human authority are
being violated. A man is working on the
Sabbath or he is resting. You either
drink and smoke or you don’t. Sin
becomes easily identifiable. Anyone who
knows the rules can identify sin.
Legalism redefines sin so that it is clearly visible to man and thus
controllable and measurable by means of human effort. Pious pretences to seeking divine guidance and direction
notwithstanding, legalism seeks to eliminate God’s authority. Antinomians are those who reject God’s law
quite openly and boldly, claiming that it does not apply for one reason or
another. Legalists are those who
replace God’s law with their own rules, traditions, principles, or
whatever. Legalism and antinomianism
are, at root, the same. The divine law
exposes both and both seek to destroy the authority that exposes them. Once the divine law is silenced by human
authority the gospel becomes merely academic knowledge and thus irrelevant to
the Christian’s life. This results in a
dead orthodoxy where the doctrine matters little and our holding on to it is
merely another religious obligation to fulfill.
God calls us into freedom, but God never
puts us in charge. Christian vocation
is not simply a matter of applying legal principles to this or that human
activity. For the application of legal
principles always puts the one who applies them in charge. But God is in charge. Christian vocation is a matter of submission
to God. First we are called to
faith. God defines and forms it. Then we are called to love. Again, God defines and forms it.
B.
The Form of Love
The Ten Commandments set the form for the
love that marks our vocation. We are
called to love. Love is a verb. Love does.
It doesn’t construct abstract theories about what to do in this or that
or the other hypothetical circumstance.
In a day of diminished moral discernment it may appear helpful to delve
more deeply into moral theology as a discipline. I ran across a college textbook on Catholic Moral Theology
several years ago and was impressed by the careful reasoning that went into the
moral distinctions and the setting forth of a clear hierarchy of moral
standards. I found it persuasive and
intellectually stimulating. Who can
deny that Christians need to learn how to make moral decisions? But there is something much more useful than
the development of moral theory as an abstract discipline. That would be committing the Ten Commandments
and the explanations provided in Luther’s Small Catechism to memory. There is a reason we require our catechumens
to memorize the Ten Commandments and Luther’s explanations. This is the framework within which we live
the lives of love that God has called us to live. The shape of the Christian’s vocation – regardless of the specifics
of the station to which he is called – has already been determined by the Ten
Commandments. We need not learn how to
parse the grammar of an abstract system of morality as if to justify our
behavior. We are already justified by
Christ’s blood. We need rather learn
how to love our neighbor.
Luther’s explanation to the Ten
Commandments in the Small Catechism is the best book of Christian vocation ever
written. The First Table of the law
pertains to true faith in God and true love for God. The First Commandment calls for faith. “We should fear, love, and trust in God above all things.” The Second Commandment calls for prayer, for
without God’s help, we cannot but fall into unbelief and every kind of
sin. Therefore we should “call upon
[God’s name] in every trouble, pray, praise, and give thanks.” The Third Commandments directs us to the
source of faith and love: God’s word which, if we “hold it sacred and gladly
hear and learn it,” will establish us in the true faith and be the means by
which the Holy Spirit will pour God’s love into our hearts.
Just as the First Commandment is the
foundation for all the following commandments, so is the Fourth Commandment the
foundation for everything that follows.
All human relationships can be placed into three general categories:
domestic, ecclesiastical, and civil.
The domestic estate is primary.
Prior to the existence of church or state – while His creation was as
yet untainted by sin – God made man in His image, both male and female, joined
them in marriage and promised to bless them with children. Thus, the office of father and mother was
placed into creation in our innocence before the Fall. Because of sin the parental, that is, the
domestic estate is identified by the Fourth Commandment. After all, the law is made for sinners, not
for righteous people. But the domestic
estate, unlike the ecclesiastical and civil estates, existed in Paradise when
there was as yet no sin.
After the Fall, God established both the
ecclesiastical estate and the civil estate.
To the church He gave the gospel so that faith might be born. To the civil authorities God gave the power
to coerce outward obedience by the threat of punishment. The Old Testament does not have that clear
distinction between church and state that we find in the New Testament, but the
difference between spiritual and temporal authority is clearly distinguished
throughout the Holy Scriptures. The
spiritual authority is the authority of the gospel to forgive sins. The temporal authority is the authority of
coercion to maintain order in the world.
The spiritual authority does not coerce. The temporal authority has no power to forgive sins. The spiritual authority has no power over
the body. The temporal authority has no
power over the soul.
The bridge between the ecclesiastical
estate and the civil estate is the domestic estate, which preceded both of them
and upon which both of them depend. To
father and mother God has given both spiritual and civil authority. Indeed, all civil authority is derivative of
the domestic estate. The Fourth
Commandment tells us to honor father and mother. In the Catechism we learn that this applies as well to “masters”
or “other authorities” or “superiors.”
Likewise, the spiritual authority given
to the church is also present in the home as both Moses and Paul teach fathers
to bring up their children in the nurture of God’s word. Moses writes:
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one! You shall love
the Lord your God with all
your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. And these words which I command you today
shall be in your heart. You shall teach
them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your
house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise
up. (Deuteronomy 6:4-7)
St. Paul writes:
Children, obey your parents in the Lord,
for this is right. “Honor your father and mother,” which
is the first commandment with promise: “that
it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.” And you, fathers, do not provoke your
children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the
Lord. (Ephesians 6:1-4)
Examples of devout mothers from Hannah to
Lois and Eunice show that the spiritual care that women provide for their
children is necessary for the maintenance of the office of the holy ministry
that belongs to the church.
When it comes to Christian vocation, the
domestic estate dominates the discussion.
Consider, for example, the Fifth Chief Part of the Catechism, where we
are asked which sins we should confess.
Here is how the answer begins: “Here
consider your station according to the Ten Commandments, whether you are a
father, mother, son, daughter, master, mistress, servant.” Notice how most of the stations in life
mentioned fall under the domestic estate.
In the Table of Duties, Luther sets forth the biblical duties incumbent
upon twelve distinct vocations: 1) For bishops, pastors and preachers; 2) What
the hearers owe to their pastors; 3) Concerning civil government; 4) What
subjects owe to the magistrates; 5) For husbands; 6) For wives; 7) For parents;
8) For children; 9) For male and female servants, hired men, and laborers; 10)
For masters and mistresses; 11) For young people in general; and 12) For
Widows. Again, notice how the domestic
estate dominates.
The home is where our picture of God is
formed. Martin Luther, in the Large
Catechism, speaks of a “majesty hidden within” our parents. (LC, I, 106) To honor father and mother is to honor God
Himself. This is what children are
called to do. They are called to do so
when they are children. They are called
to do so when they are grown. Their
doing of it is precious. The value of
the honor that a child shows to his parents is not determined by the child, the
parents, popular opinion, or the church.
It is determined by God. Listen
to comments from Luther on the Fourth Commandment from the Large Catechism:
You should rejoice heartily and thank God that he has
chosen and fitted you to perform a task so precious and pleasing to him. Even
though it seems very trivial and contemptible, make sure that you regard it as
great and precious, not on account of your worthiness but because it has its
place within that jewel and holy treasure, the Word and commandment of
God. O how great a price all the
Carthusian monks and nuns would pay if in the exercise of their
religion they could bring before God a single work done in accordance with his
commandment and could say with a joyful heart in his presence, “Now I
know that this work is well pleasing to Thee!” What will become of
these poor wretched people when, standing before God and the whole world, they
shall blush with shame before a little child that has lived according to this
commandment and confess that with the merits of their whole lives they are not
worthy to offer him a cup of water? It
serves them right for their devilish perversity in trampling God’s commandment
under foot that they must torture themselves in vain with their self-devised
works and meanwhile have only scorn and trouble for their
reward. (LC I 117-119)
Self-devised works stand in opposition to
God-ordained works. Nothing is more
precious than honoring our parents.
God has not called us to dishonor those in authority
but to honor them. While every
Christian has the duty to confess what is right and true, no Christian has the
obligation to disobey the government unless the government requires the Christian
to disobey God. As American Christians
we need to hear this. Martin Luther
King’s doctrine of civil disobedience was wrong and contrary to the biblical
teaching on Christian vocation.
Christians have no right, to say nothing of a duty, to disobey unjust
laws. Consider St. Paul’s letter to
Philemon. You cannot read this short
letter without knowing that Paul wanted Philemon to grant Onesimus his
freedom. But the apostle did not
require it. I do not believe that the
Apostle approved of slavery. Indeed,
slavery as an institution runs counter to Paul’s teaching. But neither did he believe in civil
disobedience as a public confession. He
encouraged Christian slaves to submit to their masters. A Christian can serve in a holy vocation
even when it requires him to suffer injustice.
For this is what our Lord suffered, leaving us an example to follow.
God does not call us to do what He has not commanded
be done. The call is always from
God. The call is always from faith to
love. God determines the form that love
takes by His holy commandments. It is
not a good work when it is not commanded by God.
Part
Three: The Divine Call
A Christian has but one call. It is the call of the gospel to faith. St. Peter writes:
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His
own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out
of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had
not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy. (1 Peter 2:9-10)
The call out of darkness into light is
the call to faith and from faith to love.
This is the vocation of every Christian. When we use the word vocation, however, we are ordinarily
referring to a particular job or position or responsibility that one has. The Catechism uses the term “station in
life.” This is the concrete context
within which we are to love our neighbor.
The call of the Christian is from
God. It is divine. God calls us to be holy and by His call
renders us holy. God chooses holy works
for His holy people to do. These works
are holy because the holy God has commanded them. They are holy because they are done by God’s holy people. They are precious to God. Luther writes:
Who can adequately proclaim the usefulness and the
effect of even one work that a Christian does in faith and on the basis of
faith? It is more precious than heaven and earth. Therefore the whole world
cannot grant a reward in this life equal to the value of one truly good work.[4]
What is your job? Are you a mother, a
father, a son, a daughter, a farmer, a laborer, a schoolteacher, a businessman,
a student, a husband, a wife, a preacher, a grandfather, a lawyer, an
administrator, a grandmother, a civil servant?
The parameters of your specific station or stations in life may vary and
change with time. The duty to love and
the form that love takes will not change.
A student is to study diligently, do honest research, attend classes,
and show the teacher due respect. The
husband is to love his wife with a devotion that puts her needs above his
wants. A preacher is to study God’s
word, preach it and teach if faithfully, and care for the spiritual needs of
the congregations he serves. A laborer
is to give an honest day’s work for his wages and to regard the property of his
employer with as much respect and concern as he regards his own. Schoolteachers are to treat the students
with the same paternal or maternal devotion that they would show if the
students were their own children.
When a Christian does these things he is
offering up to God what is precious to Him.
We show forth the praises of God by doing what God calls us to do. The essence of what we are called to do is
to love. The form love takes is
determined by the Ten Commandments.
This love is no abstract concept.
It is always realized in concrete specificity as it finds expression in
carrying out the various duties imposed by our station or stations in
life.
But we don’t do our duties as we
should. In fact, we sin in everything
we do. How can sin be made holy? Clearly, it cannot. When God justifies the sinner He does not
justify sin. He forgives it. He covers it. He remits it. He removes
it by a gracious decree that speaks from the vicarious intervention of Jesus
Christ, the Righteous. Now there
remains nothing but righteousness, for the sin is forgiven. The holy deeds that the holy God gave His
holy people to do are purged of the sin that attached itself to them.
This gracious decree is no mere
theological construction that we ponder in our hearts. It is a public preaching of the Holy
Spirit. God Himself speaks words that
enter into our ears and we receive the promises these words provide. We sin.
We confess. God absolves. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and
just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness.” (1 John
1:9) So life goes. Justification is not a process in the sense
that it is incomplete and reaching toward perfection. But it is a continual thing. One doesn’t get justified and then that’s the end of it. God justifies us every time He speaks His
justifying words to us. Faith lives on
this word of justification. We are
called to express this faith in love.
The love is defined by the Ten Commandments. It is expressed in the specific vocations in which God has placed
us. It is corrupted in its very active
tasks from within and without. And so
this imperfect and sin-tainted love must constantly be rendered holy by means
of the imputation of Christ’s perfect righteousness to us.
There is no greater responsibility in
this world than to proclaim the gospel and administer the sacraments of Christ
through which God justifies sinners and makes them saints. Apart from the proclamation of the gospel and
the administration of the sacraments no righteousness is bestowed, no faith is
born, no love is elicited, and no holy vocation is realized in the lives of
anyone at all. There can be no doubt
that preaching the gospel and administering the sacraments is the most
important task God has given us to do.
But it does not follow from this that
those who do this work do holier deeds than those whose vocations require of
them different duties. As we have seen,
we do not judge the goodness of a deed by the deed itself but by the goodness
of the one doing it. The deeds are holy
because they are done by holy people.
The Christian mother who wipes the snot off her baby’s nose and changes
dirty diapers is doing deeds as holy and precious in the sight of God as is the
pastor who preaches the gospel and administers the sacraments. True, you can enter into heaven with a
snotty nose and dirty diapers, whereas the gospel the preacher preaches is the
power of God unto salvation, the baptism with which he baptizes saves, and the
Lord’s Supper he administers gives the forgiveness of sins. But the God who justifies sinners by the
reckoning of the gospel word the preachers preach is the same God who values
the offerings of His children by the measurement of the merits of Christ’s
blood.
As we sing:
I have naught, my God, to offer,
Save the blood of Thy dear Son;
Graciously accept the proffer:
Make His righteousness mine own.
His holy life gave He, was crucified for
me;
His righteousness perfect He now pleads
before Thee;
His own robe of righteousness, my highest
good,
Shall clothe me in glory, through faith
in His blood. (ELH 182 verse 6)
The only value our works have is a
borrowed value, regardless of how important the work is. That borrowed value comes solely from the
blood and righteousness of Jesus by which everything the saints do is
sanctified.
The church cannot provide any more
sanctity than that provided by the gospel and sacraments of Christ. In the Creed we confess that we believe in
the Communion of Saints. The holy
people are made holy by means of the holy things they receive. They aren’t made holy by means of the holy
things that they do. The minister who
preaches the gospel and administers the sacraments of Christ is not sanctified
by means of his preaching the gospel and administering the sacraments. What sanctifies his labor for the Lord and
makes it holy is the same thing that sanctifies the labor for the Lord of every
other member of the congregation. It is
the hearing of the gospel and the receiving of the sacraments in faith through
which we are sanctified. One achieves
no holier status when he is called and ordained into the office to which the
preaching of the gospel and the administration of the sacraments have been
entrusted. To teach that some works are
holier than other works because they are done in the church or for the church
or by someone who has received a call from the church is to distort the
gospel. There is no greater holiness
than what we sinners receive by simple faith in the gospel and sacraments. To suggest that a Christian who is called to
proclaim the gospel and administer the sacraments has a holier calling than a
Christian who drives a truck for a living is to set aside the doctrine of
justification and replace it with the false doctrine of works-righteousness.
The truck driver is obliged to pay the
taxes due, to follow the regulations that govern his business, to be faithful
in every relationship, and to reflect the love of God in Christ in all that he
says and does. He must do so when
people don’t know he’s a Christian because you can’t tell by looking at
him. His holy vocation is a part of his
life – a part of him – because he doesn’t just drive a truck. He serves God by loving his neighbor in
doing his job faithfully and honestly.
This is a sacrifice of thanksgiving to God.
The Christian high school student who
refuses to work on Sunday mornings because he needs to go to church does a good
work, a holy work, pleasing to God. When
he insists on attending the Divine Service before coming to work he confesses
the faith by which sinners are justified and saved. The same student who expresses his rejection of evolution, his
opposition to abortion, homosexuality, and other sins, and his belief that
Jesus Christ is the only Savior sinners have is confessing the faith to which
God called him. He’s doing what Jesus
did when He made the good confession before Pontius Pilate.
Christian truck drivers, Christian high
school students, and Christians in a whole host of God-pleasing vocations
express their faith in love for their neighbors every day of the week. They are called by God to do so, and they
don’t need a call from the church in addition to what God gives in His precious
means of grace. No higher spiritual
status can be obtained in this world than that bestowed by God in Holy Baptism.
Martin Luther preached against the false
notion that the celibate life of the monastery was superior to the married life
lived out in the world. Love for
neighbor is best expressed, not in avoiding interaction with those outside the
church, but in working for them and with them and in serving them in Christian
love. There is a modern monasticism
among Lutherans that suggests that doing something “for the church” is somehow
superior to doing something disconnected from the church. This notion has let to a proliferation of
“ministries” as more and more people seek ecclesiastical sanction for their
vocations.
But they don’t need them. With what can the church sanctify anything
at all? What does she have? She has God’s word and that’s all she
has. To issue “divine calls” to various
“ministries” invented by Christians as if God is thereby bestowing a sanctity
upon these vocations that He wouldn’t otherwise bestow is to return to the
Roman Catholic doctrine of the church.
Rome claims churchly authority beyond the authority of the Holy
Scriptures. Rome says it is holy because
the church does it. But that’s not
so. It is holy because it is sanctified
by God’s word.
The word vocation comes from the Latin
word vocare which means to call. Since the call is from God we may say that
every Christian has a divine call. But
here is where just a little bit of confusion sets in. Whereas we could use the term “divine call” to refer to the
divinely given vocation of every Christian, the church has traditionally used
the term “divine call” with specific reference to the public ministry of
preaching the gospel and administering the sacraments. We read in Romans 10:15, “And how shall they
preach unless they are sent?” This is a
standard proof text for the requirements we Lutherans set down in the Augsburg
Confession, Article XIV, which says: “Our
churches teach that nobody should preach publicly in the church or administer
the sacraments unless he is regularly called.”
God sends those the church calls.
The apostles were sent immediately, that is, directly by the Lord Jesus
Himself. In the post-resurrection
appearances of Jesus recorded for us in the four Gospels we read how He sent
out the original preachers and gave them and their successors the divine
mandate to preach the gospel and administer the sacraments throughout the whole
world until the end of time. Unless the
preachers are sent by God they have no right to preach. God said through Jeremiah, the prophet:
I have not sent these prophets, yet they ran. I have not spoken to them, yet they
prophesied. (Jeremiah 23:21)
You cannot trust a preacher who has not been sent by
God to preach.
That the original apostles were sent by Jesus is
undeniable. The very word “apostle”
means one who is sent. Their successors
in the preaching office are also sent by God.
We read in Acts 20:28 that the presbyters or elders of Ephesus, also
called pastors and bishops, who were charged to feed the whole church of God
were put into office by the Holy Spirit.
The mediate call, that is the call from God through the church, is as
divine as the immediate call. So while
we Lutherans do not insist on apostolic succession by an unbroken chain of the
laying on of the hands from the apostles to this day as is claimed by our
friends in the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox communions, we do insist
that we have the apostolic ministry of the word. This ministry belongs to the whole church, specifically every
single Christian congregation, and through the church God Himself calls men to
preach the gospel and administer the sacraments and through these, as through
instruments, the Holy Spirit works faith where and will He pleases in those who
hear the gospel.
Within the traditions of the Missouri
Synod, the Wisconsin Synod, and the Norwegian Synod – the synods that made up
the Synodical Conference of the Nineteenth Century – there were a variety of
opinions on the matter of a “divine call” for a parochial schoolteacher. Some connected the schoolteacher’s office to
the pastoral office and taught that he had a call derived from the pastor’s
call. This became the dominant view in
the Missouri Synod, though there have always been some in Missouri who held
that the office of schoolteacher was derived entirely from the parental or
domestic estate. Still others, notably
the so called Wauwatosa theologians from the Wisconsin Synod in the early
Twentieth Century, developed the theory that God didn’t really institute any
particular office of the ministry but simply gave the church Carte Blanche to form as many offices as
she chose in which this or that duty of the preaching office would be carried
out. According to this opinion the parochial
schoolteacher has a divine call into the public ministry of the word just as
the pastor does, albeit to a more limited form of it than the form of the
parish pastor.
We don’t have the time today to delve
deeply into these views and the various controversies that ensued over the
years. Suffice it to say, the debate
rages in our day and likely won’t be settled until Christ, the Good Pastor,
returns to judge the living and the dead.
But the confusion about the “divine call” has, I believe, damaged our
appreciation of the divine vocation of the Christian day schoolteacher.
I hope you don’t mind if I have some
personal observations and make reference to my own personal experiences. I come from the frigid North where we don’t
believe in getting personal, except perhaps with members of your own family,
but down here in Oklahoma I imagine that sharing personal religious experiences
is pretty standard. For some reason
unknown to me God chose to bless my wife and me with twelve children. Our children have attended both public and
parochial schools. They attended
parochial schools from 1983 to 1997 and spent a total of 73 years under the
care of parochial schoolteachers. I became
a father in 1976 and I became a pastor in 1979 so I have a little bit of experience
in both of these divinely instituted vocations. I have related to parochial schoolteachers both in my capacity as
their pastor and in my capacity as the father of children entrusted to their
care in the classroom. I have taught my
children as a pastor and as a father. I
have catechized hundreds of children of all ages over the years.
I am persuaded that we have done a great
disservice to Christian parochial schoolteachers by teaching them that they
have a call from God through the church into some kind of a ministerial office
of the church. It is true that the
congregation establishes the school. It
is true that the teacher teaches God’s word to the children. It is true that Christian day school
teachers are under the doctrinal oversight of the called and ordained ministers
of the word. All of these things might
lead one to adopt the view that the parochial school teacher serves in the
ministry of the church and should receive a divine call from the church.
But God has given the duties of the
Christian schoolteacher to the parents of the children. I would submit to you that there is no
higher calling from God than to be a father or a mother. God established this holy vocation in
creation before there was a church or a state.
What God established in creation He reestablished in the giving of the
Ten Commandments, making the Fourth Commandment the foundation for every
commandment that follows it. Not only
is the integrity and health of the home necessary for the maintenance of order
in the nation, it is vital for the health of the church as well. The actual task of a Christian day
schoolteacher is not to act as a pastor for the children but to act as their
father or mother.
I know what a pastor is. I know what a father is. I know what a schoolteacher is. I have been all three. And I know that the duties of the pastor and
the duties of the schoolteacher are fundamentally different.
Pastors cannot exercise any form of
physical discipline. We cannot impose timeouts on erring members. We cannot give a detention to the man who
gets drunk and beats up his wife. We
can’t assign sentences to the parishioner who falls into the same sin again and
again. We cannot give out a failing
grade to the parishioner who sleeps during the sermon. We can preach the gospel and administer the
sacraments of Christ. No one can be put
on probation. We must rely completely
on persuasion. A pastor cannot rely on
coercion. He cannot make demands beyond
that which is clearly set forth in God’s word, and then he can only point to
what is written. He cannot impose his
will, even when his will is informed by God’s word. His office is the ministry of reconciliation. The purpose of his office is that Christians
hear the gospel by which they are justified.
If the minister of the word were to rely on rules, coercion, or
measurements of spiritual progress what kind of minister would he be? An insufferable legalist to be marked and
avoided by all Christians who hunger and thirst for the righteousness of
Christ!
A schoolteacher couldn’t survive for one
week with the restrictions that must be applied to a pastor. His duties, like the duties of fathers and
mothers, embrace both the ecclesiastical and the civil estates, and should he
neglect his authority to keep order in the classroom, watch out!
So then why do we speak of a “divine
call” for schoolteachers in Christian day schools? Is it not to acknowledge that the work they do is divinely
ordained and that God blesses it? Is it
not to confess that the teaching of God’s word to God’s children is a holy
thing to do and those who are entrusted with this holy task must be gifted by
God to do it? All this we can and
should confess, and we can do so by grounding the office of schoolteacher in
the parental estate where it belongs.
Every Christian father and mother has a divine call to bring up their
children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, to indoctrinate them in the
rudiments of Christian teaching, to provide a Christian example for them, to
teach them how to get along in life, and to love them as precious gifts of
God. To entrust their instruction to a
Christian schoolteacher is all the “divine call” a schoolteacher needs.
Every single Christian is divinely called
and every single Christian vocation is offered up to God and graciously
accepted by Him. We should not speak of
a “divine call” to a parochial schoolteacher as coming from God through the
church for there is nothing given to the schoolteacher to do that is not given
to the parents of the children to do first.
The office of schoolteacher derives entirely from the office of father
and mother and not from the public ministerial office that Christ has established
in and for the church.
This is Luther’s position on the matter
and the teaching of our Lutheran Confessions.
In the Large Catechism under the Fourth Commandment Luther writes:
Out of the authority of parents all other authority
is derived and developed. Where a father is unable by himself to bring up his
child, he calls upon a schoolmaster to teach him; if he is too weak, he enlists
the help of his friends and neighbors; if he passes away, he confers and
delegates his authority and responsibility to others appointed for the purpose. (LC I 141)
There can be no divine call from God
through the church to an office in the church that God hasn’t established. To teach schoolteachers that they have a
gospel ministry is to mislead them.
Much of what they must achieve as schoolteachers simply cannot be
achieved by the gospel. Their
responsibilities are fundamentally different than those assigned to the
ministry of preaching the gospel and administering the sacraments, but they are
no less divine.
There is no pecking order among the
various Christian vocations to which God calls His children. It’s not as if this Christian has a higher
or holier status than that Christian.
Our only righteousness is Christ’s.
Is there something lacking in His holiness? Or do we need to supplement it with our own? As far as the ministers of the word are
concerned, they are all equal. They all
have the same duties. They preach the
gospel and administer the sacraments of Christ. They aren’t holier than other Christians because of the office to
which they have been called.
The dignity of the domestic estate has been neglected
and denigrated not only by libertine forces outside of the church that promote
every kind of sexual and familial deviancy imaginable, but by Christians within
the church who fail to honor the holy vocation of Christian father and
mother. It is within the home that the
vocation of the Christian takes shape.
By all means, we should give our offering to the church. It is our duty. If we have the time, the inclination, and the ability, by all
means we should volunteer our time to help in those areas where we can
help. But the church would be better
served if we as fathers, mothers, sons, and daughters were to regard the works
of love we do in the home as the offerings most precious to our gracious
God. The greatest love we can show our
children is to teach them God’s word so that they can confess it before men as
Christ our Lord tells us to do. Faith
alone makes us Christians, but by our confession the world knows we are
Christians. And there is no vocation to
which God calls His children where they cannot confess Christ as the Redeemer
of the world and the Savior of sinners.
[1] What Luther Says: An
Anthology, Volume I. Compiled by Ewald M. Plass, CPH, 1959, pages
414-415
[2] Translated by Rev. Robert
E. Smith from DR. MARTIN LUTHER'S VERMISCHTE DEUTSCHE SCHRIFTEN. Johann K. Irmischer, ed. Vol. 63 (Erlangen:
Heyder and Zimmer, 1854), pp.124-125.
[3] Luther’s Works, American Edition. General Editors, Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut
T. Lehmann. Fortress Press,
Philadelphia, 1958, Volume 31, page 300
[4]LW Volume 26 page 334.