Only One God Saves.

 

Sermon for Lent 2, Reminiscere, March 13, 2022

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

Isaiah 45:20-25  ²⁰Gather!  Come!  Draw near together, you survivors from the nations.  They have no knowledge—those who are lifting up their idols of wood and praying to a god that cannot save.  ²¹Make an announcement and come close.  Let them consult together.  Who made this known ahead of time?  From time past who announced it?  Was it not I, the LORD?  There is no god except me, a righteous God and Savior.  There is no one except me.  ²²Turn to me and be saved, all you ends of the earth, because I am God, and there is no other.  ²³I have sworn by myself.  From my mouth a righteous word has gone out, and it will not return unfulfilled.  Indeed, to me every knee will bow, and every tongue will swear allegiance.  ²⁴“Only in the LORD,” they will say of me, “Only in the LORD is there true righteousness and strength.”  To him they will come and be ashamed—all those who are angry at him.  ²⁵In the LORD, all the descendants of Israel will be justified.  They will be praised by him. (EHV)

Only One God Saves.

Dear friends of the saving Lord,

            Imagine for a moment, that you are sailing across the ocean when suddenly your ship is torpedoed, and you are cast out into deep water, hundreds of miles from any shore, with predators of the deep circling around you, giving you no chance of swimming to safety.  

Immediately, however, there is good news, a rescue mission is begun, and from one ship, many helpers are throwing out a lifeline to pull struggling swimmers to safety.  But then, we notice something strange; while this one crew works to save desperate people treading water, other boats come on the scene from every direction.  However, from all those surrounding boats, pirates trying to steal the wealth of your soul are throwing out life jackets filled with lead which serve only to make it impossible for the weighted-down individuals to reach safety. 

Sounds nuts and even criminal, doesn’t it?  How could these pretend rescuers, who had volunteered for the mission, be throwing out something that only makes the struggle to survive impossible?  Yet, dear friends, that is exactly what every religion devised by the world does.  They send souls to the depths of hell.  Only faith in Jesus saves, so here, the Lord God reminds us that Only One God Saves.

Our sermon text comes in the middle of God’s promise to use a Persian king named Cyrus to rescue Israel from exile in Babylon.  Isaiah wrote this prophecy even before Israel’s enslavement, about one hundred sixty years before Cyrus would come to power and allow the Jews to return home.  Therefore, though first fulfilled in Cyrus’ time, this prophecy is truly the story of God’s rescue mission for all people. 

The Lord says, " Gather!  Come!  Draw near together, you survivors from the nations.  They have no knowledge—those who are lifting up their idols of wood and praying to a god that cannot save.”  The One true God, who alone created all things, is calling to all the people of the world to abandon their false gods and trust in Him.  We are fugitives in the world, for this is not our true home; we merely tread water, here, in this ocean on sin temporarily infested by powers opposed to the Almighty Lord.

Through His prophet, the Lord points out the silliness of worshipping gods that cannot even carry themselves but must be carried by the people who worship them.  To our minds this seems like total foolishness, yet how many people of our world still worship gods that are just that helpless?  We could look to a long list of idols and other things in which modern man puts his trust: Buddha, philosophy, scientific theory, the thousands of Hindu gods, crystals, planet earth, the government, even man himself. 

So, where do we put our trust?  Do we trust in the God who created the world, or is our trust in something He created?  Where do we turn for help?  When things go wrong, do we immediately turn to the Lord God for aid, or do we go to Him only as a last resort?  Do we, first, try to solve our problems on our own, or are we continually trusting God for help in everything, whether we’re having trouble or not?  Do we consider ourselves masters of our destiny, or humble sinners in need of a Savior?

What carved images do we carry in our pockets?  A rabbit’s foot?  A lucky charm?  Confidence in your own abilities?  Trust in government to provide and protect?  Perhaps, a refusal to recognize the need to be ready for the end of the world, or the end of our lives, especially when we are still young? 

On the other hand, have any of us grown so confident in God’s love, that we refuse to recognize His perfect justice?  Statistics show that something like seventy percent of the people in our country believe in heaven, and that they will go there, but only about twenty percent still believe there is a hell, or that God would ever exile anyone in that eternal punishment.  Unfortunately, those who hope God will not punish unbelief are trusting in an idol that has no power.

The Lord God cries out to all the people of the world, “Make an announcement and come close.  Let them consult together.”  God is saying that regardless of what false teaching you grab for your rescue, no matter what false god or false doctrine you trust, they all are lead weights that only pull you down to the depths of hell.  The counsel of idols is deadly, for they are powerless.  Only One God Saves.

The Almighty declares, “Who made this known ahead of time?  From time past who announced it?  Was it not I, the LORD?  There is no god except me, a righteous God and Savior.  There is no one except me.”  From the beginning, God has shown His might and authority visibly with His creation.  Then, with His Word, He proclaimed His intent to save.  Look up at the heavens and see God’s mighty hand at work, holding the stars in their regular patterns of travel.  See how He provides life and sustenance to every part of His creation, but most important, hear the Word of the One God who has declared a solution for death! 

Dear friends, all the gods the human mind has dreamt up over the course of time offer one thing only: commands to serve their lifeless images.  In reality, all false religions are human reactions to the devil’s taunts and the natural knowledge of God’s divine wrath for sin.  Yet, these man-made idols offer nothing but death to a people trapped in an ocean of sin and headed for the eternal deep of hell. 

However, the one true God offers a solution.  That one true God created the world exactly as He wanted it, then watched His sinless, special creation turn against Him, but what was God’s amazing response to mankind’s rebellion?  He graciously promised to take all our sins upon Himself and save all who trust in Him.  That One true and faithful God is the God of the Bible: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

He asks, “Who made this known ahead of time?  From time past who announced it?  Was it not I, the LORD?”  When Adam and Eve stood before their Creator trembling in shame and fear, God said to their deceiver, “I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed.  He will crush your head, and you will crush his heel." (Genesis 3:15)  Their Creator had a plan to save them from the hopeless shipwreck of their sin.

Through Abraham, God furthered His salvation plan for all people, and throughout history, God has repeated His promise of salvation through prophet after prophet and to this person and that, and still, so many people put their hope in the created things of this world, which are no more beneficial for salvation than a lead-filled jacket tossed to a person treading water in the ocean. 

Through the prophet Isaiah, the Lord calls to us, “Turn to me and be saved, all you ends of the earth, because I am God, and there is no other.”  No other god even thinks to save man from his sin—no other god has the power to save, because even if it had physical life, it would be under the same curse of death that each of us face.

However, the one living God promises, “I have sworn by myself.  From my mouth a righteous word has gone out, and it will not return unfulfilled.  Indeed, to me every knee will bow, and every tongue will swear allegiance.”  The apostle John wrote, “The Word became flesh and dwelled among us.  We have seen his glory, the glory he has as the only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14)  God’s Son, Jesus, is God’s chosen instrument to restore peace between God and man.  The only One who could save us is the One who had the right to condemn us for our rebellion. 

Dear friends, there is nowhere else for a sinner to turn.  Only One God Saves.  The gods of the world offer only death, and their teachers throw only the heavy weights of law.  Jesus offers life everlasting, because He fulfilled the law on our behalf and took our death, our punishment for sin.  For Jesus’ sake, the Creator and Lord of all has declared the world forgiven.  Jesus’ perfect righteousness, lived on this earth for sinners like you and me, along with His death in our place, restores peace with God; His resurrection declares our reconciliation with God complete. 

“Only in the LORD,” they will say of me, “Only in the LORD is there true righteousness and strength.”  To him they will come and be ashamed—all those who are angry at him.”  The Savior came from God with all His power, authority, purity, and holiness.  He entered the world to live and die to carry out His Father’s plan of rescue, and for His perfect obedience, God put all things under Jesus’ control. 

A few moments ago, we professed our faith in Jesus saying, “He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from there He shall come to judge the living and the dead.”  All who trust Jesus for forgiveness and salvation have Him as their Rescuer; we need no other.  On the other hand, God declares that those who seek help elsewhere will be ashamed, for at Jesus’ return every knee will bow, both in heaven and on earth.  No one will reject Him anymore.  Yet, all who have rejected Him, here, will suffer in the eternal fires of hell, ashamed and angry at their own foolish rejection.

God says, “In the LORD, all the descendants of Israel will be justified.  They will be praised by him.”  In his letter to the Romans, Paul tells us that the true “descendants of Israel” are all those people who believe in Jesus for forgiveness and salvation.  Therefore, through faith in Christ, we are justified, that is, we are declared righteous in God’s sight, and in Him, alone, we will be glorified. 

The Christian Church has often been pictured as a rescue ship on the ocean of this world.  The lifeline thrown from God’s true Church is faith in Jesus Christ, alone.  Anything else anyone might offer for salvation is only a burdensome weight that pulls the sinner down to his doom. 

In your Baptism, your Lord Jesus Christ, by the lifeline of faith, pulled you out of sin’s vast ocean to give you life everlasting.  Being both true God and true Man, Jesus lived and died for you, so that by going through death in your place, He would bring forgiveness and eternal life to you by faith.  Thus, Jesus, with His Father and the Holy Spirit, is the Only One God Who Saves.  Amen.

The peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus unto life everlasting.  Amen.