Spirituality of the Cross -- Bearing the Cross in Vocation

Notes from Chap 5

Bearing the Cross in Vocation

• For all of the exalted spiritual significance in everyday life posited by the doctrine of vocation -- how God is present and active in our work and our relationship -- it is evident that we often fail, suffer, and experience frustrations in our vocations.

• Since God is at work in vocation, observes Wingren, the devil seeks to thwart vocation. One way is to turn it away from sacrificial service and love of neighbor to a 'theology of glory', to self-aggrandizement, pride in good works, and the achievement of a spiritually vacuous success.

• Another ploy of the devil is to pry the person out of his or her calling.

• Trials in vocation drive us to prayer. Prayer, from our perspective, brings God into our vocation.

• "Prayer is the door through which God, Creator and Lord, enters creatively into home, community, and labor." (Wingren)
  

Spirituality of the Cross - Having a Calling

Notes from Chap 5

The Spirituality of Ordinary Life

Having a Calling

• The Lutherans were the first to use 'vocation' to refer to secular offices and occupations.
• Behind the term is the notion that every legitimate kind of work or social function is a distinct 'calling' from God, requiring unique God-given gifts, skills, and talents.
• "God does not need our good works, but our neighbor does." Wingren in the Exposition of Psalm 147
• Strictly speaking, we do not "serve God' -- rather, He is always the one serving us; instead, we serve our neighbors.
• The vocation of marriage itself causes selfish human beings to care for each other and support each other more than they would on their own.
• The vocation of parenthood causes normally selfish adults to sacrifice their own needs for the well-being of their children.
• Our own sinful inclinations do not necessarily thwart the way God works in vocation.
• Essentially, your vocation is to be found in the place you occupy in the present.
• Vocations are multiple. Any given person has lots of vocations.

Spirituality of the Cross -- Vocation

Notes from Chap 5

Vocation

The Spirituality of Ordinary Life

• Luther described the various occupations -- parenthood, farming, laborers, soldiers, judges, retailers, and the life -- as all being "masks of God."




• In the doctrine of vocation, spirituality is brought down to earth to transfigure our practical, everyday life.
• God is sovereign over every aspect of His creation.
• Lutheran theology speaks of TWO kingdoms, that God rules both the spiritual and the earthly realms, though in different ways.
• In the spiritual realm, He works, as we have seen, through the Word and the Sacraments.
• In the earthly realm, He rules through vocation.
• God is providentially at work caring for His people, each of whom contributes according to his or her God-given talents, gifts, opportunities, and stations.

• God, who pours out His generosity on the just and the unjust, believer and unbeliever alike, hides Himself in the ordinary soical functions and stations of life, even the most humble.
• All of the vocations are thus channels of God's love.
• "God bestows all that is good on us," says Luther, "but...you must work and leand yourself as a means and a mask to God."

Spirituality of the Cross -- The Hidden Life

Notes from Chap 4

Spirituality of the Cross
The Hidden Life

• The Lutheran evangelical theology of the cross offers a theology of suffering, but more than that, it offers a practical, realistic and spiritually-dynamic paradigm for the Christian life.

• The theology of the cross is not asceticism.

• Bearing one's cross has to do precisely with the suffering that we do not choose for ourselves, the trials and difficulties that are imposed on us from the outside, that we have no control over whatsoever.

• Bearing the cross often has to do more with the petty, ordinary obstacles and frustrations of everyday life.

• Ironically, what in many traditions would be a sign of spiritual failure -- doubting one's election, feeling God's absence --- for Luther is a sign of the greatest sanctity, reserved (thankfully) for the spiritual giants.

• To believe in God's Word of promise, despite one's feelings, is faith. That is why all trials, both major and small, are occasions for the exercise of faith.

• "We live by faith, and not by sight." 2 Corinthians 5:7

• In the darkness, when we cannot see, we can only listen for God's voice, whereupon we can draw closer to the hidden God.

• When we are in desperate need, we pray with an intensity, a heartfelt passion, that is particularly genuine and authentic. Crying out to God in the depths of one's need is an act of faith and an occasion in which the hidden God who answers prayers draws closer.

• For now, it must be remembered that God is hidden -- that is, He cannot be seen or experienced -- in the crosses we bear, He is nevertheless genuinely present, a real presence grasped by faith.

• Luther speaks much of how our 'old man' is in conflict with our 'new man'. The baptized, converted sinner is given a new spiritual nature, a new life in Christ through the indwelling Holy Spirit.

• Only at death, when the flesh passes away, will this conflict be resolved, with the regenerated nature attaining full perfection when it enters eternal life. But in the meantime, the new man is hidden.

• God sees Christians through the prism of the cross: Our sins and failures are hidden by the blood of Christ; our ordinary lives are hidden, and we are robed by Christ's righteousness. When God looks at a Christian, He sees Jesus.

• God's Spirit is at work in the lives of every Christian, mysteriously changing the heart, acting with Word and Sacrament, ministering in trials and tribulations, creating someone who will stand before God in heaven as holy.

• But this process cannot be evident to the naked eye, nor can it be measured and tracked, nor is the Christian himself necessarily conscious of how far he has come.

Spirituality of the Cross -- Bearing the Cross

Notes from Chapter 4

Spirituality of the Cross
Bearing the Cross

• Being helpless and utterly dependent, is precisely our spiritual condition.

• We are utterly helpless to save ourselves.

• We are to rest in utter dependence on Jesus Christ. "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." (2 Corinthians 12:9)

• The attitude of complete, self-sufficiency cannot only undermine faith, it can wreck God's design for human relationships.

• Both the Law and the cross drive us to an ever-deeper and more-intimate dependence on Jesus Christ, who meets our sin and our sufferings in His cross.

Spirituality of the Cross -- The Hiddenness of God

Notes from chapter 4

The Theology of the Cross
The Hiddenness of God

• The hiddenness of God is one of the most profound themes in Lutheran spirituality.

• To say God is hidden, of course, does not mean that He is absent. On the contrary, somewho who is hidden is actually present, just not seen.

• Coming to faith, involves being broken by the Law, coming to grips with our moral failure. Legalistic religions, in which one saves oneself by one's own efforts, are very specifically theologies of glory, optimistically assuming success and glorifying the powers of the successful, virtuous person.

• When we realize just how lost we are, then we cling to the cross, trusting Christ to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. This is saving faith, the theology of the cross.

Spirituality of the Cross -- Holy Communion

Notes on chap 3

Presence of God The Sacraments
Holy Communion

• In our relationship with God, He is the one who acts. We do not seek Him: He seeks us. We do not love God: He loves us. (1 John 4:10)

• This action is OBJECTIVE. God comes to us from the outside. Though it is true that Christ and the Holy Spirit come to dwell in our hearts, they are not a mere function of our psychological state, our experiences, or our inward selves.

• Look to something OBJECTIVE and tangible: to the cross, to God's Word, to the immutable promises of God.

• Christianity has always affirmed the religious significance of the physical.

• The means of grace through which the Holy Spirit works on us to create faith and spiritual growth are evangelical. That is, they bear the Gospel of forgiveness through Christ.

• In the sacrament of Holy Communion, all of Lutheran spirituality is crystallized: God acts, objectively, through matter, embodying the Gospel and promising the forgiveness of sin. And, more than that -- or rather, making all of these efficacious --- is the real presence of Jesus Christ. This another astonishing claim, one which many Christians draw back from, but one that is at the pulsing heart of Lutheran evangelicalism.

• The Lutherans' exceedingly high view of the sacraments derives directly from their exceedingly high view of God's Word.

• The Lord's Supper is nothing less than the Gospel.

• God routinely feeds His people, with their daily bread and with Himself. It is His actions, and even our blindness or dull insensibility does not take anything away from His gifts.

• Without food, we would starve to death.

• The Gospel of Christ converts us, but it also nourishes us.

Spirituality of the Cross -- Baptism

Notes from Chap 3

The Presence of God
The Sacraments -- Baptism

• Lutheran spirituality is a sacramental spirituality, centered in the conviction that the Holy Spirit actually descends in the waters of Baptism, and that Christ is really present in the bread and wine of Holy Communion.

• Lutherans believe that the Gospel is conveyed, objectively, when a human being, even an infant is baptized. The Gospel is also conveyed, objectively, when the Lord's Supper is celebrated and the communicant is fed with bread and wine, in which is present the actual body and blood of Jesus Christ given for the forgiveness of sins.

• The Holy Spirit is strongly at work in local congregations, unlikely as it may sometimes, seem, as the pastor proclaims the Word and teaches and applies it to his people.

• According to Romans 6:3-5, Baptism unites a person to Christ, specifically, to His death and resurrection.

• As Luther explains in the Large Catechism, "To be baptized in God's name is to be baptized not by men but God himself."

• Infant Baptism, in fact, is perhaps the best illustration of justification by faith. Faith is not a matter of intellectual mastery, nor is it a decision. Faith is trust, a relationship of utter dependence on Christ.

• Baptism plays a continual role in the spiritual life of Lutherans. We are always told to 'remember your Baptism'. Every day when you wash your face, said Luther, you should think of your baptism.

• The fact of one's baptism is also tied to the assurance of salvation.

Spirituality of the Cross -- The Bible

Notes from Chap 3

The Bible

• God, in His direct inspiration and providential control of history, caused His Word to be put into writing. Consequently, Christians believe that "all Scripture is God-breathed." (1 Timothy 3:16)

• Christians believe that God's Word is something tangible, written down ink and paper, accessible and objective.

• Lutherans and other Christians agree, then, that the Bible is authoritative. It is the source and test, the touchstone, of all valid theology.

• Lutherans and other Christians agree that the Bible gives us accurate information about God's action in history.

• Lutherans, however, see something else happening when we read or hear the Bible. It is a means of grace. God is literally and objectively present and working, inscribing in our hearts the gift of faith.

• The content of God's Word is Law and Gospel. The Bible reveals God's holiness, His will, His demands, and His judgments. The Bible also reveals His love, His grace, and His promises -- how God constantly rescued His children from their sin-caused slavery, how Christ offered Himself as the expiation for our sins.

• To read the Bible as a spiritual venture is to be confroned, in the most personal terms, with God Himself.
  

Spirituality of the Cross -- The Word of God

Notes from Chap 3

The Word of God

• Central to every level of Lutheran theology and spirituality -- its source, its method, and its practice -- is the insight that God Himself addresses human beings through human language.

• For Lutherans, God comes from the outside; the Holy Spirit is to be found objectively. God speaks directly and effectually to us in His Word.

• The Christian's relationship to God, like all other relationships, thrives on two-way conversations - the Christian speaks to God by prayer, and God speaks to the Christian who rad His Word.

• Lutherans insist that the Bible, though written by human beings, is indeed the Word of God.

• The main difference between God's Word and merely human words, is that God -- the Holy Spirit -- promises to be at work whenever His Word is spoken. "My word that goes out from my mouth", says the Lord, "will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it." (Isaiah 55:11).

Spirituality of the Cross -- The Means of Grace

Notes from Chapter 3

The Means of Grace
The Presence of God

• We are saved solely by the action of God: He is the one who saved us by performing everything we could not.

• Lutheran theologians speak of "objective justification". Strictly speaking, justification took place outside of ourselves, in the actual historical events of Christ's death and resurrection. On the cross, two millenia ago, our salvation was accomplished as an objective event.

• Though Christ atoned for the sins of the entire world, it is clear that not everyone has faith.

• If faith is not a decision nor an experience nor some inner work, and if salvation is totally the work of God, it would seem that faith too must be the work of God.

So the big question is:

How do we attain a saving, life-changing faith?

The answer, in Lutheran spirituality, has to do with the so-called means of grace. We are connected to Christ, and the Holy Spirit works both faith and good works in our lives by means of the Word and the Sacraments.

This is a broadcast from Law & Gospel (Pastor Tom Baker) on the Means of Grace from February 28, 2008
http://www.kfuoam.org/mp3/LG/Law_Gospel_Feb_28.mp3

Spirituality of the Cross -- The Paradoxes of Lutheranism

Notes from Chapter 2

Paradoxes of Lutheranism

• Lutherans tend to be highly conscious of sin, without falling into moralism.

• Lutherans treasure theology and have a rich intellectual tradition, while emphasizing the limits of speculative reason.

• Lutherans are skeptical of mystical emotionalism, but they cultivate an intense inner piety and a worship centered in in effacable mysteries.

• The Christian, according to Luther, is simul justus et peccator -- at the same time righteous and sinner.

• The Christian is totally free, yet a slave -- in Christian service -- to everyone.

Spirituality of the Cross -- Law and Gospel

Crucifixion (Città di Castello Altarpiece)
Raffaello, 1502-03

Notes on Chapter 2

Justification
Law and Gospel

• "There is no one righteous, not even one [so much for moralism!]; there is no one who understands [so much for speculation!]; no one who seeks God [so much for mysticism!] Romans 3:12

• A genuine confrontation with God's Law destroys complacency, security, and every shred of self-righteousness.

• For Lutherans, God's Law has many 'uses' -- to restrain evil in society; to serve as a guide for Christians; to cut through our layers of self-deception so that we realize just how lost we really are. In biblical language, the Law brings with it the 'conviction of sin', inspiring 'repentance'.

• The Law is the prelude to the Gospel. Those broken by the Law are convinced of their need and of their inability to save themselves. Then the message that God does it all comes as an astounding relief, as good news.

• Faith itself is considered by Lutherans to be a gift of God, created in the human heart as His action through the Holy Spirit. Properly speaking, it is Christ on the cross who saves. Faith is simply dependence on that sacrifice.

• The pattern of conversion is repeated every Sunday, in the confession and absolution, in the pastor's sermon which is always a proclamation of Law and Gospel.

• He [Luther] said that we should be broken by the Law and animated by the Gospel every day: "The old Adam in us, together with all sins and evil lusts, should be drowned by daily sorrow and repentance and be put to death."

• Those who have been justified by Christ are changed from the inside. Good works flow unconsciously from the work of Christ.

• Christians, however, have a double nature -- indwelling Christ [Luther's new man] and the old sinful nature from Adam ["the old Adam"]. These are in constant conflict.

• The disciplines of prayer, confession, and the ministry of Word and Sacrament, enable the Christian to grow in holiness and good works -- a process known as sanctification.

• There is a dynamic oscillation between lows and highs, knowledge of sin and knowledge of forgiveness, repentance and assurance. The Gospel is to predominate.

Spirituality of the Cross -- Justification

Notes on Chapter 2

Justification
The Dynamics of Sin and Grace

• Instead of insisting the human being attain perfection, Lutheran spirituality begins by facing up to imperfection. We cannot perfect our conduct, try as we might. We cannot understand God through our own intellects. We cannot become one with God.

• We do not have to ascend to God; rather, the good news is that He has descended to us. Lutherans insist that there is nothing we can do, but that God does literally everything.

• Human sin and God's grace are the two poles of Lutheran spirituality. They are resolved in the principle by which, it is said, the church stands or falls; justification by grace through faith.

Paths to God

• Moralism -- seeks to earn God's favor, or a satisfying life, through the achievement of moral perfection. Good people go to heaven, it is thought, while bad people go to hell.

• Speculation -- the assumption that knowledge is the key to spiritual fulfillment. Many answers have been offered, but they keep changing, as the history of human thought shows. One school of philosophy is succeeded by another, and even scientific theories keep having to be revised.

• Mysticism -- attaining the ecstatic experience of becoming one with God. The techniques of achieving such experiences are varied, from ascetic self-denial to elaborate methodologies of mediation, but they all promise spiritual ecstasy and supernatural empowerment.

• Lutheran spirituality begins with the insight that all human efforts to reach God are futile. God is the one who is active, not human beings. The issue is not our ascent to God, but God's descent to us.

Lutheran spirituality is all about what God does. To rescue us from our miserable and depraved human condition, He became a human being Himself. The God-man Jesus Christ accomplished the perfection moralists only aspire to and took upon Himself the punishment for everyone's moral failures by dying on the cross. The spiritual life has to do with recognizing God's work -- what He accomplished on the cross and what He continues to accomplish in people's lives through the Holy Spirit.

The Spirituality of the Cross

This is Lent and a time to reflect on your faith. There are many ways to do that. Three years ago I read The Spirituality of the Cross, The Way of the First Evangelical by Dr. Gene Veith. I have re-read the book 4 times since. It is a short book, as books on theology go, and easy for the average person to read. Dr. Veith is a layman -- not a theologian or a pastor. The book is free of technical language. I have underlined, highlighted and filled a notebook with notes.

The table of contents reads:

Introduction: The First Evangelical
Justification: The Dynamics of Sin and Grace
The Means of Grace: The Presence of God
Theology of the Cross: The Hiddenness of God
Vocation: The Spirituality of Ordinary Life
Living in Two Kingdoms: The Sacred and the Secular
Conclusion: Worshiping God

Some notes from the first chapter:

• The term "evangelical" is simply a term derived from the Greek word for "Gospel", which in turn literally means "good news." "Evangelical" means someone who focuses on the Gospel of Jesus, the good news that Christ, through His death and resurrection, has won forgiveness of sinful human beings and offers salvation as a free gift.....the word "evangelical" meant Lutheran.

• They (Lutheran) were also the first to emphasize the Gospel to such an extent that it became central to every level of their doctrine and practice.

• The fact is, there can be no spirituality without theology, no religious experience apart from religious belief.

• One of the strengths of the Lutheran tradition is that theology is taken seriously and has been thoroughly worked out.

There is a study guide available for download through the Concordia Publishing House.