This sermon was preached on Oct. 27, 2021 in LSTC’s Augustana Chapel. Reformation Day was celebrated during this service. The sermon text was Romans 3:19-28.
“…since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith.” Romans 3:23-25. And verse 28, “For we hold that a person is justified by faith apart from works prescribed by the law.”
These verses are central to what has become the doctrine of justification by grace through faith. As such, Romans 3:19-28 is an apt text to consider as we celebrate Reformation Day. And because of its doctrinal weight, it is a particularly challenging text to say anything meaningful about. Over the last few weeks, I have felt this text, at least partly about the danger of religious legalism, bearing down upon me with the full force of centuries of religious legalism. As a non-Lutheran, non-tenured member of the faculty, to deviate too far from how justification by grace through faith has been traditionally understood feels like a dicey proposition in a Lutheran seminary.
It would, frankly, be much less work to say a few words about how grace empowers us to be free of Empire’s promises that wealth, whiteness, and masculinity will justify our existence and avoid looking to closely at what the denomination that employs me is actually doing. It wouldn’t be a false message. Unfortunately, it is not the message that has risen from this text, demanding that I find the words to convey it today.
So, what is this Pauline passage about?
Is it about justification as the spiritual salvation of sinners as the power of grace frees us from religious legalism?
Or is it about the political liberation of nations as the power of grace frees us from dependence on imperial law?
My answer is “yes.” That is, I will offer a “both/and” response in this sermon.
We love “both/and” thinking at LSTC and, as I understand it, in the ELCA. “Both/and” statements reflect academic maturity. To move past the terms of a problem as it’s presented to you and to forge your own intellectual path is to receive the admiration of professors and seminarians alike. “Both/and” is an elegant way to deal with scripture’s many contradictions, enfolding seemingly mutually exclusive texts into one, coherent salvation story. “Both/and” thinking is an important component of antiracist work, as we challenge false binaries that are imposed on us. At its best, “both/and” thinking is an intellectual structure of mutual accountability between complex truths that displaces the need for a singular, hegemonic truth, embraces creative tension, and encourages the discernment of real binaries from false binaries.
However, the “both/and” structure offers a dangerous temptation. It can be a pathway to what Dietrich Bonhoeffer called cheap grace. In Discipleship, Bonhoeffer wrote, “Cheap grace is preaching forgiveness without repentance; it is baptism without the discipline of community; it is the Lord’s Supper without confession of sin; it is absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without the living, incarnate Jesus Christ” (44).
When we prize that “both/and” structure in itself, we can find ourselves saying, in effect, “sure, you believe what you want, I’ll believe what I want, and we’ll just agree to disagree.” Seeking an escape from conflict or tension, we can find ourselves rejecting binaries that are not, in fact, false. We can find ourselves rejecting, for example, the binaries between just and unjust, or love and hate that are, at times, very real. We can find ourselves offering cheap grace.
Today, Romans 3 can help us to do two things. First, as we celebrate Reformation Day, it can offer a fuller understanding of what it means to live as those who’ve inherited the spirit of the Reformation…to live as those who are justified by grace through faith, apart from works prescribed by the law. Second, in these last days of LGBTQIA+ History Month, exploring a theological “both/and” reading of Romans 3 – holding together spiritual salvation and political liberation – will help highlight and offer insight into the mistaken ethical “both/and” response to LGBTQIA+ inclusion that plagues the ELCA.
Before I return to Romans, I want to take a few minutes to lay out the ethical problem presented by the ELCA’s response to the question of inclusion for LGBTQIA+ folks.
“Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust” – a 2009 social statement – establishes the basic logic of how the ELCA addresses inclusion of LGBTQIA+ folks in church membership and rostered ministry. To be clear, the focus of this social statement is on sexuality, but as far as I can tell, this is the logic by which the ELCA navigates broader questions of LGBTQIA+ inclusion.
Much of this statement’s content is insightful. It places intimate relationship at the heart of the divine-creaturely relation, affirming relationship as fundamental to creaturely existence. The statement reveres human sexuality as a gift, experienced in many ways (though not a gift enjoyed by all). It acknowledges that, given the influence of sin, sexuality can bring harm, but rejects same-sex attraction and sexual activity as forms of such harm. Rather, coercion, isolation, and abuse are highlighted as sinful expressions of sexuality that require this gift to be bound in structures of trust, including marriage for whomever it’s legally available and family in its many forms. In this social statement, sexuality is treated as a matter that impacts society at every level, and that must be addressed not only in personal, private relationships, but also in workplaces, churches, and our broader society.
We might go further than this social statement on some of these points. We could, for example, question the statement’s emphasis on monogamy and respectable marriage. The fact is, there are folks out there demonstrating that polygamous relationships can provide the kind of care and nurture that humans seem to need, even without much in the way of social recognition or support. Ultimately, though, I think the social statement handles sexuality and its social and legal context reasonably well.
There is a fundamental flaw in how this statement addresses sexuality, however: it commits the ELCA to respect differences of opinion on the matter of sexuality and to honor the "bound consciences" of those who disagree.
This is how the statement explains the concept of bound conscience: “if salvation is not at stake in a particular question, Christians are free to give priority to the neighbor’s well-being and will protect the conscience of the neighbor, who may well view the same question in such a way as to affect faith itself. This social statement draws upon this rich understanding of the role of conscience and calls upon this church, when in disagreement concerning matters around which salvation is not at stake, including human sexuality, to bear one another’s burdens (Galatians 6:2), honor the conscience, and seek the well-being of the neighbor” (“Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust,” note 26).
Let’s not explore the question of which neighbors’ well-being we are to prioritize. I think this sermon is inflammatory enough as it is…
In effect, the argument is that matters of sexuality are not matters of salvation, so those whose faith might be shaken by LGBTQIA+ inclusion should be free to continue their exclusionary practices. Agree to disagree, shake hands, focus on what really matters: salvation.
Congregations and ecclesial institutions that cling to exclusion as a consequence of their faith are thus free to contribute to homophobic and transphobic death-dealing elements of US American national culture and global Christianity in the name of the ELCA. Those that present themselves as open and affirming or Reconciling in Christ are left to doubt that their denomination is meaningfully committed to LGBTQIA+ inclusion. The “both/and” stance taken by the ELCA toward LGBTQIA+ inclusion is an ethical failure, justified by dubious – if time-honored – theological claims regarding salvation.
So, what does Romans 3 have to tell us about salvation? Let me break that into two questions – “What is the law?” and “What is justification?” – each of which are answered in two ways by Paul.
Let’s consider the dominant interpretation of Romans 3, at least historically dominant among Lutherans.
Law, in Romans 3, represents religious legalism. Now, this doesn’t have to draw on the anti-Jewish interpretation that wrongly claims legalism is essential to Judaism and that Christianity, in its freedom, is defined by contrast to Judaism. Setting aside that prominent anti-Jewish theological error, we can embrace Paul’s rejection of the notion that our salvation is secured by perfectly obeying any set of rules, including those that promote justice and equity.
Justification, in this interpretation, is the means by which sinners’ souls are saved from divine judgment. Law, in this religious sense, can help to reveal sin, guiding us into the awareness that we fall short of being the loving, joyously interdependent creatures we were created to be. When law captures us, however, we are brought no closer to that love and joy. We languish in the awareness of our shortcomings and, lacking any hope of true relief from the ghosts of our past mistakes and oracles of our future failings, our souls suffer.
Those of us who find ourselves captured by the law of religious legalism truly need to be saved, to be assured that the God who could stand in judgment over us has declared that we have been pardoned, that all our sins, past and future, are forgiven. We need do nothing to earn this pardon, but are simply required to accept it and are thus called to witness to others that such glorious relief is possible. That we are, fully and forever, justified by grace, apart from any works, free of judgment under the law of religious legalism.
Woven into this message of salvation is a second model of law and justification. If we take Paul’s historical and cultural context seriously, as my teacher Brigitte Kahl taught me to do, we can discover that the concept of “works” had a particular meaning in the Roman Empire.
Roman political life was, in addition to attaining a reputation for martial valor, a matter of making and spending money on behalf of the Republic/Empire. Such displays of wealth constituted the legal basis of key political offices in the Empire. The legitimate path to formal political power within the Roman Empire was to build roads, aqueducts, temples, and monuments, and to offer feasts and games open to all.
This concept of good works was essential to the justification provided for the emperors’ increasing distortion and capture of Roman law. Practically, the emperors ruled primarily through their control of Roman legions. There was no legal or moral justification for perpetual dictatorial rule, however, so the emperors justified their military control, in part, through their liberal use of the spoils of war on behalf of the people of Rome. Imperial good works provided legitimacy to the imperial war machine that devoured nations and produced disenfranchised Roman subjects.
In critiquing the role of works as justification before the law, Paul wrote words that would almost certainly have been received as seditious by loyal Romans. Add to that the fact that this critique of a figure Rome venerated as near to the gods, if not divine himself, was coming from a leader of the Jesus-following Jewish cult that refused to participate in the religious rites that secured Roman prosperity and supremacy…and I don’t even have time to talk about the role that circumcision – discussion of which provides the immediate context of this passage – played in justifying Jesus-followers before Roman laws regarding religious practice.
You could argue, I suppose, that Paul could have been ignorant of the meaning implied in his words, written to a church in the heart of the Empire. I don’t believe for a moment that the Spirit was ignorant, though. I think that the Spirit that empowered Moses when he demanded freedom for his people from Pharaoh, that emboldened Nathan when he said to David, “You are that man,” that came down upon the son of Mary in the River Jordan and defied the cross, the ultimate instrument of Roman imperial power…I think that Spirit knew exactly what it meant to say, in Rome, that works do not justify one before the law. I think the Spirit knew what it meant to proclaim, in shadow of one who claimed for himself lordship over nations, influence over creation, and mastery of all religion, that boasting is excluded by the law of faith.
Justification apart from this law of good works meant that there was a source of security outside of participation in Roman modes of political power, that legitimate power could be received only by grace, freely offered to all, grounded in the death of Jesus on a Roman cross, and available to those who believed in him. Justification by grace meant that, even as a member of a subjugated nation, one’s existence stood on some ground other than Rome’s dangerous, exploitative benevolence.
Two models of law and justification are at work in Paul’s letter to the Romans, then. On the one hand, we are sinners confronted with a religious legalism that demands perfect piety, yet are justified before any law by the one who died on the cross, apart from any personal merit and requiring nothing more than that we receive the faith offered to us in the Spirit. On the other hand, Empire justifies itself by placing us in a position of dependence on it and demands that we accept as legitimate that set of powers and structures that determine which lives are and are not livable, yet we are justified in rejecting dependence on Empire and clinging to our true creator and sustainer, the one whose rejection of Empire was made complete on the cross and was offered to us without the need for any merit and requiring nothing more than that we receive the faith offered to us in the Spirit.
Spiritual salvation and political liberation, both are essential to an understanding of justification that frees us from captivity under law.
How, then, might holding these two models of justification together illuminate the issue of LGBTQIA+ inclusion in the ELCA, and by extension, what it means to radically embrace grace today?
In short, we must recognize that human sexuality – or, rather, any Christian response to human sexuality – is a matter of salvation. To accept the idea that LGBTQIA+ inclusion is optional is to exalt the law of Christian nationalism and accept that it offers justification in place of grace.
Our response to human sexuality is a matter of salvation when our understanding of grace will be called into question by that response. It is one thing to proclaim that grace is freely offered to all, that it is not withdrawn simply because we continue to sin, to proclaim the good news to those who struggle to accept grace and reject the temptations of Empire. It is quite another to wrongly accept inclusion and exclusion as equally valid expressions of Christian practice when we need simply wait a few weeks until Transgender Day of Remembrance to be reminded that exclusion crucifies our siblings.
As it stands, the ELCA has established a policy grounded in cheap grace. Many of us know it is deeply sinful to exclude LGBTQIA+ folks – whether with open, hateful speech or equally hateful subtlety – and yet absolution is offered without even a hint of repentance or confession. Grace is treated as if it is powerless, as if change is not possible, as if God’s love is something to hedge our bets on, as if we can’t tell the difference between those who are being crucified and those who are holding hammers and insisting that they’re just following orders from on high.
It is the work of the church to offer a clear, grace-filled call to correct consciences that have been warped by fear of political change and captivity to religious legalism. The church must recognize that, in this case, many bound consciences are in bondage to Empire, in bondage to death. To offer that call for repentance is not to choose political liberation over spiritual salvation. Rather, we must proclaim both the salvation of sinners from religious legalism and the liberation of the masses from laws that perpetuate inequity and injustice in our world.
Neither political liberation nor spiritual salvation requires us to stand by as thousands of communities compel beloved LGBTQIA+ children of God to grapple with disproportionate levels of poverty, despair, and death. Rather, both modes of justification demand that we take grace seriously. We must proclaim the power of grace to wash away even those sins of exclusion that destroy lives, embrace the capacity of grace to restore community scarred by such sin, and recognize the witness of grace in the many LGBTQIA+ pastors, deacons, and other ministers who’ve already offered their leadership in this church.
As we celebrate Reformation Day, then, and reflect on one of the key passages in the Lutheran confessional tradition, what might we say it means to live as those who are justified by grace through faith, apart from works prescribed by the law?
As always, it means trusting that God is with us as we inevitably fall short. It means hoping that God’s grace will once again work in ways that defy the limits of our imaginations. And it means determining those actions that are demanded of us not because they are prescribed by any law but because they are demanded of us by our faith…by that persistent compulsion to turn once again to the cross and refuse to stand apart from those who can’t so easily remove themselves from its terror or who refuse to do so. Living as those justified by grace through faith means responding to God’s grace as if it truly has the power we proclaim that it does. Not offering cheap grace in the guilty awareness that it’s been offered to us, worried that taking a stand will expose the crumbling foundations of our glorious self-righteousness, but extending to our siblings in Christ the call to discipleship…the call to turn their backs on that which has promised them communities with an unblemished moral fabric and turn toward a love that will call them to question the very basis of their morality.
Now, I’m not denying that there’s a place for strategic conversation in the context of long-term relationship building, or suggesting that what you all need to do is go tell folks that the church is messed up because it’s been captured by sin. Rather, I want to stress that, as Martin Luther believed about his time, this is a time for the church to offer a clear witness, not only in its words, but in its policies, and in its sacraments. This is no time for justice-loving Christians to wring their hands about offering a bold witness to God’s power and presence, to the church’s call to work for justice and healing.
In fact, there is no time for that, not in a country drowning in its bloody legacy of Christian nationalism, not in a world somehow simultaneously burning, flooding, dying, and growing out of all balance. Death is making its presence known in every corner of the globe, and we must powerfully proclaim and daily live out the good news that death’s hold on us has been broken.
So, church: you who have been baptized into Christ’s death and reborn through those dangerous waters into new life, you who share Christ’s table with sinners and saints across time and space, you who follow the call to seek justice and proclaim the good news of God’s boundless grace…you are all God’s beloved children. In God’s grace, justified by the crucified one before any law that might capture you and compel you to concede to some corrupted conscience, you have been empowered to love others, freely and fiercely.
So be bold, and ask what would it mean to truly be a church that loves that way, free and fierce. Ask what it would mean to demand that of your church. And ask what it would mean to be that church, now and in the challenging times to come.