Grace alone is our theme for the day.
The final 3 weeks texts leading up to Lent presents a wonderful opportunity to rejoice in grace alone, faith alone, and Scripture alone – the three sola’s of prophetic, apostolic and historic Christianity – all centered in Christ alone and to God alone be the glory.
Romans 3: 22 For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
John 1: 14 The Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only begotten Son from the Father, full of grace and truth
Romans 11:6 (That if) it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace.
And Jesus presents to the character of grace, that it is not on the basis of works, by telling us a parable in which workers who worked only 1 hour graciously and generously received from the Master the same wages as those who worked 12 hours, who bore the burden of the day and the scorching heat.
But that of course does not seem fair to those who worked. So they grumble.
But the master of the house will say, Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?
It is a constant blessing to see your works of love.
Some of you work or worked incredibly hard in jobs, blessing your employers, and now use the money you’ve earned to bless your family and others and Christ’s Church.
Some of you work so very hard in sacrifice to care for other, children or moms and dads as they get older or other family and friends as they need help.
St. James will say:
I will show you my faith by my works. (James 2:18)
And you often live this.
You love God and His Word and His Christians and you support this building and this pastor and the mission and ministry of Christ’s church.
You often experience suffering and trials with faith and hope and love, trusting in God’s will, even when it isn’t matching up with Your will.
Your mercy, prayers and kindness, your generosity and gifts, your forgiveness and wisdom, especially your Christian wisdom offered to those outside of the faith,
your encouragement and love and mercy for those of the household of the faith,
for me and my family, even, are all amazing ways Christ works through you.
It’s a constant blessing to see your works of love.
And with all of God’s authority behind this statement, I must say this:
God does not love you because of that.
God does love you. He is kind toward you. He is pleased with you. He looks upon you with a smile and has favor for you.
But His everlasting love and favor for you is completely undeserved, not based on those works.
Every gift you have in this life and every promise you have of eternal life now and the eternal life of joy to come is not 99% God and 1% you and your awesomeness.
It is 100% God.
His love for you isn’t based on those works of love, or anything else.
Otherwise grace would no longer be grace.
No other word in the Bible describes God’s attitude toward you better than grace.
Christians have turned grace into a helpful acronym to teach us what it is.
God Richest at Christ’s Expense.
…God gives us amazing riches, in this life and in the life to come, you have amazing riches.
And all these riches are all free. It cost you nothing.
Otherwise grace would no longer be grace.
The workers who worked only one hour did not deserve that denarius, the full days wages, they received it by grace, because of the masters generosity.
God’s riches don’t cost you anything, but they did cost.
The Master’s payment was still a payment.
God’s riches do cost, but Christ was willing to pay that expense.
And it was quite an expense.
Have you ever been shopping or at ballgame or gotten a doctor bill and been like, “Whoa! I wasn’t expecting it to cost that much.”
Christ paid the bill.
You did not and you don’t have to.
Otherwise grace would no longer be grace.
It’s not fair.
And that’s great news for us, sometimes.
But Jesus sets before us this parable today as we consider grace alone to warn us that we don’t always want it to be by grace.
We sometimes think we want fair.
We sometimes think we want what we’ve earned.
Especially if we’ve worked hard.
Especially if we think we’ve earned more than others.
Those who work more should get more.
But that’s when we don’t really know how much God’s riches truly cost.
We can’t afford to make that payment. You and I don’t have it in ourselves.
Martin Luther grew up being taught that God’s grace was something that he should find within himself.
He kept trying different ways to keep trying to put more grace in himself by what he was doing. Fasting, beating himself, praying more, loving more, giving more.
And then, he would look within himself and still find sin.
Pray more, love more, give more, be better, be kinder, be more courageous, work harder.
And he’d look within himself and still find sin.
Luther wasn’t struggling with some sort of self esteem issue, he was simply experiencing the truth.
And if when you look deep within yourself and don’t see the same, then simply believe what the Scriptures says about what is inside of you.
St. Paul says, sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.
In our Epistle, he speaks of how he constantly has to fight with himself by exercising self control…lest after preaching to other he himself would be disqualified.
One Lutheran hymn says it this way:
Our flesh has not those pure desires the spirit of the law requires.
And
From sin our flesh could not abstain, sin held its sway unceasing;
Jesus comes with grace and truth, and this truth must constantly be revealed to us to fully understand His grace.
I could stand up here all day and encourage you in your works, and of course you need that, but you can look in your heart and still see laziness, jealousy, despair, and things like coveting.
Shouldn’t the workers have been happy that they got what they were promised by the master of the vineyard? But they wanted more when they saw what others got. We always want more.
Luther looked within and didn’t struggle with pride: Come on, God, give me what I deserve.
He struggled with despair, “Please God, don’t give me what I deserve. Give me a little more time. I’ll try even harder.”
But pride and despair are two sides of the same coin, and that coin is looking into your own heart.
And the harder you try to get out of it, the deeper you fall.
It’s like quicksand.
I’ll have to take others word for this, I’ve never been stuck in quicksand, but I have been stuck and keep getting stuck in sin, and I get it.
The harder you try to get out of quicksand, the quicker and faster you sink.
When we think we can get out of our sin by earning God’s favor, we heap sin upon sin. We sink deeper and faster.
Because first, we can’t get out of our sin. And second, because we don’t have to, Jesus can and Jesus did.
You don’t have to look within yourself to make payment for your sin and your guilt and the reception of all God’s riches.
Because Christ has paid for that expense.
We ought look nowhere else other than the One does rescue us.
You are (!) justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
God’s riches for you at Christ’s expense.
Grace is looking at God’s smile upon you, His promises of love and peace and joy for you even in times of suffering,
It is looking at His forgiveness and pleasure for you, especially when you are battling sin within yourself,
It is looking at God’s amazing riches for you, constantly receiving them freely, and knowing that it’s only from Christ’s expense.
That payment has been made and you cannot undo the payment, but you can continue to receive those riches.