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I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.”

᛭ INI ᛭

Our Congregation at Prayer verse last week was, “No one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Cor 12) You can’t believe Jesus is Lord apart from the Spirit. You can’t you “say,” that is, you can’t “confess” that He is Lord without the Holy Spirit. “If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.“ (Rom 10)

What does “confess” mean? What does it mean to “make a confession”? We use that word in two different ways. We confess our sins. We confess our faith, using words like the Apostles’ or Nicene Creed or other words. Both uses mean to admit or acknowledge, to reveal or declare something. Either you’re declaring wrong-doing (that’s confession of sins), you’re declaring your faith, your personal belief, or declaring the Christian Faith.

In our Gospel reading the Tax Collector confesses his sinfulness. The pharisee and Cain from our Old Testament reading fail to do so. In our Epistle reading Paul lays out and confesses the Christian Faith. Confessing your sins and confessing the Christian Faith both revolve around the same central idea. This idea is the heart and soul of the entire Scriptures, as Paul confesses and the Tax Collector, too. That central idea is this:

THE LORD GRACIOUSLY MAKES ATONEMENT FOR SINNERS.

(I. This drives the Confession of Sins.)

THE LORD GRACIOUSLY MAKES ATONEMENT FOR SINNERS. This is clearly seen in the suffering and death of Jesus. That’s the Lord graciously making atonement for sinners. He does something they don’t deserve—dying in your place. That’s the clearest revelation of who God is and the lengths He goes to make you innocent in His book. God’s eternal plan even before He created the universe from nothing was to make atonement for sinners. He created a universe He would redeem.

That God makes atonement for sinners not only gives weight to the forgiveness of sins, but it also drives the Confession of Sins. That’s what Jesus’ parable lays bare. The tax collector in Jesus’ parable believes in “The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.” (Ex 34) He’s the One “Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases, Who redeems your life from destruction, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies, Who satisfies your mouth with good things, So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” (Ps 103)

The tax collector believed all that, and so he confesses his sin. The pharisee did what he thought was right, felt better about himself because he was doing so well, and certainly better than the tax collector. The pharisee believed God rewarded him for being so good and nice, and God was there if he needed Him. But based on what he says, the Pharisee didn’t really need much, did he?

Belief that God actually forgives sins in and through Christ Jesus alone is what actually drives us to confess our sins. There’s no reason to be afraid when it comes to confession. We’re afraid to put into words what God already knows. He knows what you’ve said, what you’ve done, even what you’ve thought and felt that led you to say what you said, do what you did, or even the stuff you’ve thought and felt that hasn’t yet turned into words or actions. But don’t worry! “If you confess your sins, God is faithful and just to forgive your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness.” (1 Jn 1)

He delivers that forgiveness in concrete ways and in concrete places. In the Parable the characters were at the Temple. That forgiveness pours forth from Christ. In Words and water and blood that hinge and hang on Good Friday Calvary. Not just Calvary: Easter, too! Right before His death Christ institutes His Supper. Right after His resurrection, the Absolution. His earthly ministry began in the Jordan and ended with His command to baptize.

THE LORD GRACIOUSLY MAKES ATONEMENT FOR SINNERS.

(II. This fills the Confession of the Faith.)

This is what we confess to the world. Each must believe this personally to be saved, but it’s also what we confess to the world. This is exactly what Paul lays out in 1 Corinthians today. I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. What Paul says to the Corinthians is true for them and true for you. That message is “the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved.”

So, we confess this faith. We say “Jesus is Lord” by the Holy Spirit. He gives us the heart to believe it, and the mouth to speak it. To say and believe that Jesus is Lord is to say that He’s Savior, He’s Redeemer, that He’s the One, the only One, who makes atonement for sinners.

We confess the summary of what that all means in statements of belief we call Creeds. Creeds aren’t just statements of belief though. When we say Creeds we’re speaking spirit-filled words because we’re summarizing what the Spirit tells us in the Bible about Jesus, His Father, and how all that comes to us in by the Spirit working in the Word and the Sacraments. (This is clear from the fact that the Nicene Creed literally just uses 1 Corinthians 15:4 basically word for word.) In a sense, then, Creeds are sermons, and through them we preach faith not only into our own hearts, but into the ears and hearts of those around us. Through this preaching you “will strengthen and preserve them in the one true faith unto life everlasting.”

That’s what we say and hear each time we confess our baptismal faith and show love for each other in the words of the Nicene Creed. “For us men and for our salvation He came down from heaven…[He] suffered for us under Pontius Pilate.” These words cue us in to the fact that these words aren’t just for each of us individually, but us as a congregation, and even words that we preach to the world.

But what about the Apostles’ Creed? I field this question a lot… I know of no better answer than that of the Small Catechism itself.

Daily Prayers

How the head of the family should teach his household to pray morning and evening

Morning Prayer

In the morning when you get up, make the sign of the holy cross and say:

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Then, kneeling or standing, repeat the Creed and the Lord’s Prayer. If you choose, you may also say

Evening Prayer

In the evening when you go to bed, make the sign of the holy cross and say:

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Then kneeling or standing, repeat the Creed and the Lord’s Prayer. If you choose, you may also say

Your Home Altar then echoes the Church Altar, and the Church Altar is just an expansion and extension of your Home Altar. Through the Apostles’ Creed the Holy Spirit is daily preaching faith not only into your heart, but the hearts of your entire household, which is what the Congregation at Prayer equips you to do…

(Conclusion.)

Paul says, I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” That is, THE LORD GRACIOUSLY MAKES ATONEMENT FOR SINNERS.

Belief in that drives us to confess our sins, just like you tell a doctor what’s wrong to get the right medicine treatment. The Lord’s medicine is the forgiveness of sins that He delivers through the Word and the Sacraments, as His Word makes clear. But THE LORD GRACIOUSLY [making] ATONEMENT FOR SINNERS is the chief article of the Christian Faith, believing that saves, of course. But we also confesses it, preach it, not just me but you, in the words of the Creeds, each for their own time, place, and way. That’s just the Small Catechism. But each confesses this great truth: THE LORD GRACIOUSLY MAKES ATONEMENT FOR SINNERS, for you.

᛭ INI ᛭