Reformation for Advent: Sola Gratia – Grace Alone

Ephesians 2:8-9 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— ⁹ not by works, so that no one can boast.

I begin almost every sermon the same way, with the prayer, “Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.”

Grace and mercy. We often use those words interchangeably. It’s easy to think they are the same.

They are not.

There is a subtle, but very real, difference between the words “mercy” and “grace.” Imagine for a moment that you’ve fallen behind in your car payments, in your house payments, and in your credit card bills. The businesses to whom you owe money expect to be paid. That’s understandable. At first, they ask nicely for their money. Then, they get more aggressive. They send you bills in the mail. They call you incessantly. Eventually, they take you to court.

There’s no question that you owe them. You have an unpaid debt.

Now, here’s where mercy and grace come in. You are standing in the courtroom before the judge. You know you’re guilty. He knows you’re guilty. You beg for mercy. You ask the judge not to pronounce the punishment you deserve. You ask the judge to set aside the law and forget about justice. That’s not something a good judge should do. Still, that is what happens when the judge grants you mercy. Mercy is you not getting the punishment you deserve. You go free because your debts have been forgiven.

Grace, as I said, is different.

In the same scenario, you beg for mercy, but the judge does more than grant you mercy. He grants you grace. The judge says to you, “You don’t deserve it, but I’m going to have somebody else make all of your payments. This same person will spend time in prison for your crimes of not paying your debts.”

Grace is someone else receiving the punishment you deserve. You go free because your debts have been paid for by someone else.

Do you see the difference? Mercy is not getting what you deserve. Grace is getting what you don’t deserve.

On occasion, you may see a judge who has discovered some kind of extenuating circumstances, so he offers mercy to the guilty party. Seldom, though, will you see a judge give grace. And, you will never see a judge sentence his own son to pay for the punishment and debt of someone else. That would be unthinkable! It wouldn’t make sense. It wouldn’t be fair.

But, that’s exactly what happens when grace is given to us by God through His Son, Jesus.

Mercy and grace are both God’s gifts to us. St. Paul explains about grace this way: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.”

We are not surprised by God’s judgment, but grace still stuns us! God’s judgment has never been a problem. We expect God’s anger, His wrath, His condemnation. Lightning bolts on Sodom; burning sulfur on Gomorrah; the firstborn dead in every Egyptian household; fiery serpents biting the disobedient Israelites; the earth swallowing up the followers of Korah. That’s what God is supposed to be doing. Punishing the wicked.

Grace doesn’t make sense. Peter denied Jesus three times, and yet he is forgiven and is told to feed Jesus’ sheep? The thief on the cross probably lived a life of crime, and yet he makes a deathbed confession and gets to enter paradise? Saul persecuted and killed Christians, and yet he is converted into the Apostle Paul?

All of these men should have been punished horribly for their crimes against God and man. Instead, they received grace.

We, too, have sinned against God and man. We were born in sin. We live in sin. We sin in our thoughts, in our words, and in our actions. And then, when God, in His grace, sent His only begotten Son into the world to be our Savior from all that sin, what did we do with Him? We murdered Him! We nailed Him to a cross. We crucified the very Son of God with our sins.

We have committed crimes against our Lord, which we can never make right. We have rung up a debt of guilt that we could never repay. There is no question of our guilt or that we deserve to be punished.

We cannot be forgiven on our own. We cannot earn God’s love. We do not deserve eternal life in heaven.

This, of course, is the point St. Paul was making to the church in Ephesus when he wrote these words that have been memorized by so many of us: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

St. Paul wanted believers in every generation to know that if you’re trying to get to heaven through your own accomplishments, you’re not going to make it. No matter how good, how impressive, how dedicated you’ve been, you’re not going to make it – not on your own power.

In spite of what we have done; despite everything we’ve left undone; God, our divine Judge, has decided not to give us the punishment we deserve. That’s mercy.

Of course, the Lord couldn’t set aside His laws. Seeing our helpless condition, the Lord Jesus was born into this world to take our place. As our Substitute, He would have to live a perfect life by fulling all the Commandments in our place. He resisted the devil’s temptations every time. God made His Son Jesus pay our debt with His holy, precious blood. Jesus took our punishment so that we could go free. That’s grace.

As we continue to celebrate the 500^th anniversary of the beginning of the Lutheran Reformation, it is important that we recall and reclaim the precious truths that we are saved by grace alone, we receive this through faith alone, we learn of this in Scripture alone, all through Christ alone.

Even while Martin Luther was posting his 95 Theses, he still did not quite understand God’s grace. He didn’t know where to find it. Luther grew up believing the Roman Catholic teaching that grace was a quality that God infused into the soul. God gave you grace in the beginning, but then you cooperated with that grace by doing the very best you could do to obey God’s commandments. God’s grace would help you along the way. It would give you the power to do those things that would make you holy. Luther was taught that you looked for God’s grace within your own heart.

Luther did not find grace in his heart. All he found was sin and guilt. It wasn’t until the Holy Spirit led Luther to find grace in Christ Jesus, that he really understood and appreciated God’s grace. From that point on, Sola Gratia – Grace Alone – became a comfort for Lutheran and a foundation for the Lutheran Reformation.

Grace is often taught as God’s favor. It is His undeserved kindness. It is His unmerited love. An easy way to remember what grace is is by turning the word into an acronym. Since we’re WELS, we know all about acronyms. I send my kids to WLS and SLHS, which are in the WELS. Or, since I serve on the Southeastern Wisconsin District Mission Board of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, that’s a little too long to say. So, I just say that I serve on the DMB of the SEW in the WELS. Much clearer.

An acronym for grace is “God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense.” God has given you the riches of washing away your sin in baptism; the riches of absolving your guilt with His Word; nourishing your faith with His Supper; opening heaven by His Son’s hellish punishment. He gives these riches to you freely, without cost. It is not from yourself. It is a gift of God.

But these riches came at Christ’s expense. Jesus paid the debt. He endured God’s wrath. He died our death. He suffered our hell. He has set you free before the Judge. Now you may enter your new home in heaven.

As Lutherans celebrating the 500^th anniversary of the Reformation, let us always remember the difference between mercy and grace. Mercy is not getting what you deserve. Grace is getting what you don’t deserve. Mercy is God forgiving your debt. Grace is God allowing His Son to pay your debt. Now you are free. Free to be forgiven. Free to be a child of God. Free to enter heaven. All because Jesus Christ paid the price. That’s grace, and grace alone. Sola gratia. Amen.