Silliman University Church Reflections

Galatians 2:15-21 “We have put our faith in Jesus Christ, that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified. (16) “I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.

In the 5^th century there was a man named
Saint Augustine, a philosopher and theologian who became the Bishop of Hippo. A Latin church father, Augustine is one of the most important figures in Western Christianity. He framed the concepts of original sin and just war. Augustine is best known for opposing heresies, such as by Pelagius who held that people can have the ability to choose to be good to such a degree as to merit salvation without divine aid. Augustine said we are justified by faith alone.

In the 16^th century, a German monk of the Augustinian order, Martin Luther refused to obey the Pope, in selling indulgences, to raise money to rebuild the St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Luther was a theologian, university professor, church reformer who changed the course of Western civilization.

Roman Catholic theology stated that faith alone cannot justify man; but faith expressed in charity and good works (fides caritate formata) can justify man. These good works could be obtained by donating money to the church.

Luther challenged this notion.^.. According to him, salvation is a free gift of God, received only by true repentance and faith in Jesus, a faith given by God unmediated by the church. Luther said we are justifed by faith alone.

Now we study one of the verses Luther and Augustine used. Our NT text today Gal 2:15-21

Justification by faith. Dying to the law. Justified by faith. Crucified with Christ. I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. What do they all mean?

1.        Are we justified/made right with God, by faith or by works?

Or can we build a ladder to heaven? This question was a serious question not only for Augustine and Luther, but St Paul, as well.

Paul debated with the Judaizers, Jewish Christians, apparently and initially with Peter among them, who imposed Jewish circumcision and dietary laws, on Gentile believers, arguing that one is justified by law, by following God’s commandments.

Paul argued as Augustine after him, that salvation is a free gift of God’s grace. All they needed was to confess with their mouth and believe in their hearts that Jesus died for our sins, and they will be saved.

2.        Now How is Living for the Law, Wrong Dying?

Justification is an act of God whereby He declares, on the basis of the perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ, that the sinner who puts his faith in Jesus is “not guilty” and made right with God.

When the Judaizers claimed that the Gentiles had to be circumcised and follow the Jewish dietary laws, they assumed a religious superiority. If the Law of Moses was debased, then Christians would be conformed to the world. It was a kind of superiority they were proclaiming. They said, in effect, that there is only one way to God. It is the Jewish way.

But Paul said, “No, that’s not true.” We are all justified before God in the same way. We are justified by faith. It has nothing to do with our cultures.

Paul said, if we choose to live by the law, we only prove that we are sinners (18). Living by the law is dying for the wrong reason. The law gives us no power to obey. Once broken the law condemns us over and over, reminding us how unworthy we are before God. Through the Law, no one can be declared righteous since no one can perfectly obey the Law. But through faith in Christ, the believer is regarded as righteous.

3. Finally, how is Dying to the Law, Right Living?

Now for Paul it was important to Die to the Law in order to live rightly with God. We must put our faith in God, not in our works. We must put ourselves in God’s hands completely. It is the grace of God that makes us right, no obedience to the law can make us right. Therefore, we must die to the Law.

Martin Luther affirmed this by saying: “If ever a monk got to heaven by monkery, I would have got there too; all my brothers will testify to that. For if it had gone on much longer, I would simply have martyred myself to death with vigils, prayers, reading and other work.” Thanks be to God, through grace I am saved.

Living for the law, is a deadly notion. We are fundamentally idolatrous. Believing that one can do things to be right with God, is the way of death, Paul says. For when we develop a checklist of what to do and what not to do, and religiously follow that list, in order save ourselves, we deceive ourselves.

For our actions will always fall short. To believe that our actions can be sufficient will make the death of Jesus on the cross unnecessary.  Living for the law is wrong dying. Dying to the Law is Right Living. Paradoxically…Paul finds life in death (20). I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Without faith in Jesus, God’s grace is insulted (21). “If righteousness comes by keeping the law, the Cross was the biggest mistake in the universe.” Or as Paul put it, “Christ died for nothing.”

Thank God, you are full of grace. You forgive even our attempts to save ourselves, as if we are God.

(sermon delivered at Silliman Church, 12 October 2008)

“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith– and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-”Eph 2:1-10

Today we celebrate World Communion Sunday. All over the world, Christians of different nationalities and confessions – Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Reformed, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Congregational, Baptist, Pentecostal, will take the bread and the wine together, in obedience to the instruction of our Lord to “do this in remembrance of me”.

It means we have the opportunity to be united as believers today to partake of bread and the wine, symbols of Christ’s broken body and blood shed for all our sins. We take communion in the hope of finding ways in which this unity can be expanded through joint ministries tomorrow and in the future. As we celebrate Reformation Month this October, we remind ourselves of the need to understand our faith, acknowledging our real differences, but reaching out to proclaim Christ through these differences. Let us be clear that our doctrines are 95% of the time in agreement. Today, we celebrate an incomplete agreement and put our differences aside, and take the bread and wine, as Jesus instructed us. So that we may live today under God’s grace.

How do we live under God’s grace? The word “grace” has both Latin and Greek origins. It means favor or kindness shown without regard to the worth or merit of the one who receives it and in spite of what that same person deserves. The Hebrew word for grace is “chanan” properly, to bend or stoop in kindness to an inferior; to show favor or compassion for others.

When we receive the free gift of salvation in Jesus Christ, despite our unworthiness, we live under grace. When we let Christ live within us, we begin to have a mind set of thankfulness. We begin to look beyond ourselves, beyond the confines of our interests as narrow communities. We begin to show the products of salvation – a humble thankfulness, a largeness of mind, a deep concern for others, a willingness to understand and to sacrifice one’s self in love as God loved, and a life of power thru the Spirit.

Living under the law, in contrast to living under grace, is a way of life where everything we do is legal and moral but also self serving. When we cannot work together with others to serve God’s people, the needy and sick, because the differences in the way we pray stand in the way of mission, we live under the law and not by grace. When we go to church to get the approval of people rather than to worship God and to genuinely express love for neighbors. That is living under the law, not under grace.

We worship God on Sundays, and forget about him the rest of the week. We like the church to be a good reflection of our faith convictions, but we are not willing to put in an effort to be Christ’s forgiving and redemptive church. This is living under the law not under God’s grace. This reminds me of a quote –  “A lot of church members who are singing “Standing On The Promises” are just sitting on the premises.

Living under grace means acknowledging that God is working through various media or channel, through different people, who we may not necessarily agree with. God works through different events, if only we are keen to see with eyes of faith. There has been so much criticism in campus and on the internet for Erap Estrada’s speech at the Luce auditorium, with some people saying, Erap has absolutely nothing to say that is constructive. Silliman has debased itself. This is living under the law. When we live under the law, we effectively say, God’s grace is powerless to make good of someone so unworthy. Those who are anti GMA should not criticize Erap, he is an oppositionist too. Those who are pro GMA should not criticize Erap, she pardoned him. But our interest is to listen to his side of the truth.

We are often too self righteous. We think we have become dirty simply by witnessing the work of those who we think are not as pure as ourselves. We are so concerned about staining ourselves. We are such perfectionists that nothing satisfies us. And yet, we lift not a finger for the work of the Lord. Another quote — Quit griping about the imperfections of your church; if it were perfect, you couldn’t belong.

Living under grace means allowing Christ to rule our hearts, so that we may be able to forgive those who have made mistakes and who have harmed us. Living under grace means accepting our own faults especially faults of pride, the most common of our weaknesses. God is not glorified when we quarrel, no matter how principled we think the basis of our quarrels is. In reality, it is just our face we are saving. That’s living under the law.

Living under grace means giving faithfully our tithes and pledges acknowledging a basic truth that all we have is God given. This includes pastors, called to give their most excellent service.

Pastors however, are not perfect. A story goes : “After the Church service a little boy told the pastor, “When I grow up, I’m going to give you some money.” “Well, thank you,” the pastor replied, “but why?” “Because my daddy says you’re one of the poorest preachers we’ve ever had.”

Grace defines both the heart and the hand of God. It expresses God’s attitude towards persons and God’s actions to favor us. It is goodwill in spite of our unworthiness and lack of merit.

Living under grace therefore means being thankful everyday to God “For by grace we have been saved”. It is having love and compassion for others; having a forgiving heart; being open to God’s work in others; and being able to give of ourselves unselfishly, “for we were created for good works.”.

There is a purpose for this. Living under grace enables us to be a partner to make God’s glory known. Under grace, we are the salt of the earth and the Light of the world. We are given God’s grace to lead others to God. Rom 1:5

We have received grace. Now let us live under God’s Grace.

(Sermon for World Communion Sunday, Oct. 5, 2008, Silliman church)

John 14: 1-14

The Bible says many wonderful things about death. Jesus said, “I am the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in me, even though he dies, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die. I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. I died, and behold I am alive forever more, and I hold the keys of hell and death. Because I live, you shall also live.” John 11:25-26

But the trouble is that we have trouble believing these things. We think of death as an end to all good things. But life is a mixed bag — life, health, love, fellowship, creativeness, are wonderful. But life is also about sickness. Failure. Pain. Suffering and Death. Life and Death are in fact a continuum. And death must be seen as a part of life, not the end of it. Unless a seed dies and falls to the ground, it cannot bring new life. Yet we don’t like death. We prefer only the good things in life. We think that death is failure to live. It’s the victory of nothingness.

Scripture teaches that the death of a believer is a wonderful thing.

1 Cor. 15: 42-43 – “The body that is sown is perishable. It is raised imperishable. It is sown in dishonor. It is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness. It is raised in power. It is sown a physical body. It is raised a spiritual body.

That should be the way we look upon death. We love life. But we cannot live forever in perishable bodies. We live in a cruel world, a world of many hardships, trials, tears, sorrow, and suffering. Now when death comes, the end must come to the perishable body; so that we may rise in an imperishable body. Such a spiritual body takes us into the presence of the Lord, where we shall have perfect health and perfect rest. Then we will say that death is, after all, a good friend. We look upon death as an enemy, but really death takes us to a better place.

Psalm 116:15 says, “Precious in the sight of God is the death of His saints.” When a Christian dies, it is a matter of concern to the Lord. He knows about every breath that we draw, every pain that we endure, every groan Psalms 116 says, not that death is precious in our sight, but in God’s sight. The Psalmist is talking about death from God’s standpoint.
We can’t understand the why’s and how’s of death. But we do have this wonderful promise from God. The Bible says, (Ps 127:2) “God giveth His beloved sleep.” Now sleep is a wonderful thing. We can’t do without it, but it can never compare with the sleep God gives.

What a different sleep that is indeed. We go to sleep tonight and when we wake up tomorrow we have the same problems and worries and aches and pains that were ours when we went to bed. Inflation is growing, the peso is depreciating. Poverty is growing. But when we go to sleep in Jesus, we soon wake up on a new shore and find that it is heaven. We breathe a new air and find that it is celestial air. We feel the touch of anew hand on ours and find that it is God’s hand.
I want to share with you some visions described in Scriptures about what death is.

1. It means a change of environment. Our physical environment is prone to degradation. Our moral lives as well are prone to degradation. But when God’s people die, they go to a place where these things can never touch them. There is for them a complete change of environment. On earth there is degradation and guilt. In heaven there is no degradation, no more guilt. On earth there is discord. In heaven, harmony. On earth, shortages. In heaven, there is Shalom – which is a Hebrew word that means nothing is broken, nothing is missing and wholeness. On earth pain, in heaven Shalom.

2. It means a change of nature. Here we are burdened with physical and aging bodies, with one ailment replacing another. First blood pressure. Then high sugar. Then uric acid. Then. Arthritis. Then loss of memory and ultimately failure of organs. The law of diminishing returns applies to our bodies. But in heaven, there is no wear and tear, because our bodies won’t be physical.

3. It means a reunion with our loved ones. You have sat by the bedside and watched some one deteriorate and die. You have looked into their faces for the last time and wept many tears, but they are not gone from you forever if they have accepted the love of God in Jesus Christ.

 4. Finally, it means that we will see Jesus. If it were not for him, there would be no heaven. But, praise God, we shall see him and we shall know him and we shall fall at his feet and thank him for saving us and bringing us safely home.

Times as these give us pause. We pay tribute to the outstanding life of a good Christian – Col. Roman Yap. From his life, we gain inspiration and an example of how we may live our lives passionately for God. But more than that we look forward to being with God for eternity when life has been spent for God’s purpose.

We are reminded of the Scriptural promise – “nothing can separate us from the love of God, not death, nor life”. This is God’s promise and our hope.

(Sermon for the Memorial Service of Col Roman Yap, 1 Oct. 2008, Silliman church.)