Law and Gospel
Preached at St. James' Goshen on June 7, 2026
The propers can be found here. We are following track 2.
Starting today, we will be hearing lessons from Paul’s Epistle to the Romans every Sunday until mid-September.
This epistle one of, if not the most influential book of scripture in the history of Christian thought. It is Paul’s longest letter, and the fullest articulation of his Gospel message as the apostle to the Gentiles.
Which is why it is important for us to remember that when Paul wrote this epistle, he was not setting out to write sacred scripture for Christians two thousand years later, but a letter to a specific community for a specific reason.
Paul wasn’t sitting in an office at the University of Jerusalem composing a systematic articulation of what God has done in Christ, but was figuring this all out on the ground while sharing the good news and establishing new communities of Jesus followers.
Specifically, Paul was writing to the church in Rome, whom, unlike the recipients of his other biblical letters, he had never met and did not found. He is presenting his understanding of the Gospel to them in preparation for a planned visit to the city, hoping to gain their support for further missionary ventures.
Nor should we make the mistake of interpreting Paul’s discussion of faith and the law, which we heard today, as being about Christianity versus Judaism. Christianity and Judaism had not yet parted ways. Paul and the rest of the first generation of Jesus followers would not have understood themselves as being part of a new religion but of a movement within Judaism that proclaimed Jesus as the Messiah.
Acts two states that in the immediate aftermath of Pentecost, the Jesus followers in Jerusalem continued to worship daily at the temple, while also eating together in their homes.
We can compare this to how Methodism started as a renewal movement within the Anglican Church, initially continuing to worship and receive the sacraments at their local Anglican parishes while also meeting together in Methodist groups for Bible study, prayer, and preaching. Methodism didn’t become a separate denomination in the United States until independence caused an institutional crisis for the colonial Church of England and didn’t separate in England until after John Wesley’s death.
Similarly, it took a couple of generations, and the traumatic destruction of the Jerusalem temple, for Judaism and Christianity to crystallize into distinct religions.
Paul is not rejecting Judaism or casting it as a “works-based” religion.” For observant Jews, then and now, upholding God’s law is not an impossible burden by which one tries to earn God’s grace, but the joyful response of God’s chosen people to the favor God has already shown them.
Jesus was an observant Jew, as were the twelve and most of his followers during his earthly life.
After his ascension, they had to figure out what to do when Gentiles started joining their communities. Did they need to convert to Judaism and observe Jewish law in order to follow Jesus?
Some, like Paul, argued no. God had done a new thing in Christ reconciling all people to themself.
Others insisted that Gentiles needed to become Jewish and observe the law God had given Moses on Mount Sinai.
In 49 AD the emperor expelled all Jews from Rome, leaving behind a predominantly Gentile church. After this edict lapsed in 54 AD, some began returning to the city, restarting debates about Gentile inclusion.
This is the context to which Paul is responding in the lesson we heard today.
Paul appeals to Abraham, the great patriarch of the Hebrew people. He points out that before Moses received the law and before Abraham himself had been circumcised as a sign of his covenant with God, scripture records that he was counted as righteous because of his faith in God. Thus, Paul argues, faith is the key to our relationship with God, not observance of the law.
This doesn’t mean that the law is bad or unnecessary. It was still given by God, and Paul isn’t telling his fellow Jews they need to abandon it. But neither are Gentiles who have come to faith in Christ required to become Jewish and observe it in order to have a right relationship with God.
Later Christian tradition built on Paul’s argument about faith and the law to describe the relationship between law and gospel in the Christian life. While I am not convinced the way later generations of Christians articulated this insight completely fits with Paul’s intent, and this dichotomy has definitely fallen into later anti-Jewish prejudice, I still think it can be a helpful concept.
The law holds us accountable, telling us what God expects of us and how they want us to live. And, as humans living in a fallen world, we will inevitably fall short. We cannot by our own power live a life perfectly free of sin, but will screw up.
But when this happens and we recognize our sin and its consequences, the Gospel points us towards God’s grace. Through his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus healed the breach, reconciling us with God and with each other.
Not because of anything we did to earn it, but because God loves us and wants to have a relationship with us.
And when we, through faith, accept that free gift of grace, we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to live like Jesus did.
Imperfectly, and always needing grace and forgiveness, but also being formed closer and closer to who God created us to be.
We were created in God’s image. Sin has marred and hidden that image, but cannot erase it.
In Christ, that image is restored.
We stand in a long line of Christians throughout the ages, around the world, and here at St. James who have turned in faith to Christ and received his grace. The grace that we receive in baptism, where we are marked as Christ’s own forever, and renew and reaffirm when we receive Christ’s body and blood in the Eucharist.
Salvation is not earned by good behavior. And we do not have to leave behind those parts of us that make us who we are to follow Christ.
Grace is a free gift, available to all through faith.
Thanks be to God.