Trinity 1
Dear friends in Christ. In today’s Gospel reading, we hear our Lord talking about the ultimate end of each person—heaven or hell. Jesus describes eternity in pictures and expressions taken from this visible world. This is the only way that we can understand the eternal.
Although people today think that everybody—except maybe for the most evil—will go to heaven; although even many supposed Christians actually deny there is a hell; and even though the very topic of hell is so offensive to modern ears, hell and its torments are real; it is a real place of actual torment. Jesus tells us the words of the rich man suffering in hell: Send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame. But being even more politically incorrect and intolerant to us moderns, Jesus then goes on to say that the rich man calls out to Abraham for Abraham to send Lazarus to his brothers to warn them to repent so that they, too, do not come to hell. But Abraham’s response? They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. In other words, the Word of God is enough. It works faith and when it is rejected, nothing can help the person: If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.
Notice: also tied in with this is the other intolerant/ insensitive teaching of Jesus—is that not just any religion saves. The only saving faith is that worked by the word— Moses and the prophets; the only saving faith is that faith which has Jesus and His work at its focus, center. Elsewhere Jesus says to the Jews [John 5.39]: You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they that testify of Me.
The other fascinating thing about our text is that heaven, the place of the blessed, is described as Abraham’s bosom. Abraham is the father of believers and host of the people of completed righteousness. Elsewhere [Matthew. 8.11 NKJV] Jesus says: And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. St. Paul puts it this way [Gal. 3.7,29 NKJV]: Only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham…For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus….And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, and heirs according to the promise. Abraham is a brilliant example of faith, faith of an OT believer; and here he—the father of the faithful—is pictured as welcoming them into heaven. What a beautiful way of showing that heaven is not by our works and merits but by God’s grace through faith in Jesus—or in the words of our text: And [Abram] believed in the LORD, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.
As we examine our text today, we will see that Abraham’s faith is the same faith as every Christian. In other words, the way the OT faithful were saved is the same way we NT Christians today are saved—by God’s grace through faith in the Savior, Christ Jesus. The foundation of faith is the same—namely the word and promise of God; and the reward of faith is the same—Christ and His spiritual blessings.
1. What made Abraham significant is the fact that God had promised him that he would be an ancestor of the Savior of the world; that the line of the Savior would go through him. I will make you a great nation…and in you [that is, in your Descendant, the Messiah] all the families of the earth shall be blessed. What makes this all the more remarkable is that when God had promised Abram this, he was already 75 years old! And now when the events of our text happen, Abram is even older and he and his wife are still childless. How can he be the father of a great nation, one of whom would be the Messiah?
The essence of the promise of the Savior is there. Abram believed God when God told him that one of his descendants would be the Savior, the one who would crush the devil underfoot destroying him and his works: sin and death. Not only did Abram in faith believe this but he, just like all the other OT faithful, put his trust and confidence in this Savior who was coming—and in Abram’s case would be his direct descendant. To be sure, Abram didn’t know how many years later; he didn’t know how it would take place in the womb of Mary; but he simply trusted in the Savior and His work Whom God said was coming as his descendant—the descendant of an elderly man and woman. Although all the details were not fleshed out to Abram, he believed the Lord’s word and promise. That word and promise is the foundation of faith. Jesus, Abram’s descendant according to His human nature, praised Abram’s faith looking forward to Him as Savior, as Jesus told the Jews [John 8.56 NKJV]: Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.
Dear Christian, Abraham’s faith is a picture of our faith; in fact his is the same faith as ours. The only difference is that he looked forward to the coming Savior, Whom God said would be one of his descendants and we look back on the Savior, Christ Jesus, who has already come. In the case of Abram and all the OT believers they didn’t have all the details; Jesus, the Savior, and all His saving work was in the future. But God, by His word spoken by the holy prophets, worked mightily to bring them to faith and keep them in the faith. The word and promise of God was the foundation of their faith.
How blessed we are! We live in the time after Jesus, the Savior, the Messiah has come and carried out His saving work. The salvation of the world is not some future event—like it was for the OT faithful, and therefore could possibly be held as doubtful—but it is an accomplished fact. The cross had the holy God nailed to it; it has been stained with His holy blood. The tomb in which He laid is empty. The Father had accepted His work. But our faith is still like Abraham’s—the word and promise of God is still the foundation. The word of God He spoke by His holy prophets foretelling and His holy apostles announcing the completed work of Jesus is the foundation of faith; faith holds to that word of God as truth. Faith holds to that promise of God to forgive us our sins for the sake of Jesus who lived a holy life for us and suffered and died for our sins; faith holds to the absolution and to that peace and reconciliation Jesus brought about.
This is the same faith the Holy Spirit worked in the hearts of the OT believer; it’s just that the time perspective is different. For them, like Abram, it was to come; for us it has come and is fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth.
But like we see with Abram—whom God Himself told that he would be the ancestor of the Savior—faith is a struggle. It was for him as well as for us! But Abram said, "Lord GOD, what will You give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?" Then Abram said, "Look, You have given me no offspring; indeed one born in my house is my heir!" Faith is a struggle because, like Abraham, we try to figure it out! Here in our text elderly childless Abram tries to figure out how he will be an ancestor of the Messiah. He tries to figure out what God is up to. God had promised him a son/ an heir/ one whom the line of the Messiah would go through; but so far God was not delivering. He couldn’t figure out what God was up to.
This, too, is a picture of our faith. It is often filled with struggles/ wrestlings with the Lord. Why this? Why that? All too often what we are as baptized Christians—God’s dear children and heirs of heaven—doesn’t seem to match up with what our present situation is like. We try to figure out what the Lord is up to—but with our sin corrupted mind we can’t; we seemingly flounder filled with doubts.
And then there’s the sin that we struggle so hard to resist and fight against. By the sin we so easily fall prey to, it so often looks like we are anything but Christian. But in his struggle because of his sin weakened self, what did Abram do? He talked with the Lord. "Lord GOD, what will You give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?" Yes, he couldn’t understand what was going on, the way the Lord was working, so in faith Abram talks to Him about it. The same with us—when we are at a loss as to the Lord’s dealings with us; when we are at a loss when it we continue on in sin in spite of our best attempts to fight against it; we go to the Lord in prayer asking for His help, guidance, strength, protection, peace, etc. Faith in the Lord, holding to His word and promise, will drive us to prayer. Prayer is our Spirit-worked faith in action.
2. How gloriously, in grace, the Lord rewards the faith He has worked in us. Notice the very beginning of our text: After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, saying, "Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward." When the Lord comes, He always comes giving gifts and blessings! Abram sees the word, the Son of God, the preincarnate Christ. Even though it is in a vision, Abram, a sinner is afraid in the presence of the holy God. But notice that the Lord here right away reassures him and gives him a great promise: I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward. Strengthened by that promise of forgiveness, blessing and protection, Abram is bold to speak to the Lord: Lord GOD, what will You give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus? And the Lord goes to great lengths to reassure Abram: "This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir." Then He brought him outside and said, "Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them." And He said to him, "So shall your descendants be." Notice what the Lord does to reassure Abram—He attaches a sign to the promise. Abram’s servant, Eliezer, will not be Abram’s heir; instead an actual physical descendant from Abraham will be the heir of Abram’s goods and more importantly, the heir of the prophecies of the Messiah. The Lord then goes to great pains to assure and reassure Abram of this by taking Him out and showing him the stars of the night. The sheer uncountable number of stars is to remind Abram of the great number of people that will be his descendants—physically, the Jews; spiritually, all people having the same faith he had in the coming Savior. But one of His physical descendants would be the Savior of the world, Christ Jesus. Now, each time Abram saw the stars at night, he would be reminded of God’s faithfulness to His promise and of the Savior!
Dear Christian, we have the same grace of the Lord assuring us and reassuring us that His word and promise is true. Not only do we have the account of the completed work for our salvation recorded for us as fact in Holy Scripture, but we have a sign added to that word—namely the water of holy baptism and the bread and wine of the Blessed Sacrament. Here, in these an outward sign is attached to God’s promise to forgive us our sin. In holy Baptism, the water is added to the word that washes away our sin and brings us into God’s holy family; in the Holy Supper with the outward/ physical Bread and Wine we receive Jesus’ very body and blood for the forgiveness of sin. The outward sign of the water of baptism and the bread and wine of the Blessed Sacrament assure us that what God promises us in these sacraments, He is actually giving us—just as Abram had the assurance of countless descendants, one of whom would be the Messiah, each time he looked at the stars. How his faith was strengthened by this; how our Lord strengthens our faith as we remember and receive His holy sacraments!
Abraham’s faith is the faith of every true believer. Great is the reward of faith—a reward God gives in grace. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward. Christ Jesus is that great reward of faith. By faith we have and embrace Christ and all His gifts and blessings of forgiveness, life, and salvation. INJ Amen.