Law, Gospel, and Participatory Preaching
One of the comments to this week’s Dear Partner in Preaching, on “Practicing Advent,” raised a great question: is inviting people to practice sharing their faith law and, if so, where is the Gospel?
I ask this kind of question myself all the time. But to help you ask and answer it with me, I’ll offer a little bit of background.
I am a Lutheran preacher. And when it comes to preaching, the most important thing for Lutherans is to distinguish rightly between law and gospel. (Actually, it’s not only Lutherans who focus on this distinction, but we certainly talk about it a lot!)
In short, law stands for all those things that come to us as commands from God. Law represents the “shoulds” and “should nots” of our lives.
Martin Luther further distinguished between two kinds of law or, really, two functions (or impacts) of the law in our life. The first was to tell us what we should or shouldn’t do in order to help us get the most out of life in this world together. And “together” matters, as the “first use” of the law is oriented to the needs of our neighbor. Luther’s logic – actually, he would say this is God’s logic, particularly captured in the Ten Commandments – is that if we are looking out for each other life goes a lot better. When you only look out for yourself you a) see others as competitors and b) can count only on yourself to look out for yourself. But when you look out for your neighbors, and your neighbors reciprocate, then a) everyone around you is a potential collaborator and partner and b) you’ve got tons of people looking out for your welfare even as you are looking out for theirs.
So that’s the “first use” of the law, something Luther also called the “civil use” of the law because it helps us create and maintaining flourishing civilization. (Some time back I posted a great bit by Louie CK that illustrates the first use in a rather humorous way; you can find it here if you’re interested.
But there’s a “second use” also, and that function of the law kicks in when you don’t follow the first. This function or work of the law is to make you aware that you’ve fallen short. It points out where you broke or ignored the law. And it creates in you a recognition that you need forgiveness. This second use of the law is sometimes also called the “theological use” of the law because it makes us aware of our brokenness and sin and consequent need for grace and forgiveness. This use of the law drives us to Christ, the source and embodiment of God’ grace, love, and forgiveness.
(In a sense, you can think of the first use of the law as the speed limit sign on the highway – put there to keep us safe and protect us and other drivers from our unwarranted belief that the place we need to go is a little more important than the places everyone else wants to go – and the second use of the law is the state trooper who pulls you over with lights flashing and sirens wailing when you’ve been speeding.)
The gospel, in contrast, represents the good news that God loves us and wants nothing more than to forgive us, shower grace upon us, and return us to a joyful life of service with and to our neighbor. (It probably stretches the analogy too far, but the gospel would then be the magistrate who forgives you the speeding ticket, wiping it clean from your record, and sends you off in every confidence that you will drive safely.)
So preachers of many traditions, but especially in the Lutheran tradition, want to make sure that their sermons distinguish between what is “law” and what is “gospel.” More than that, Lutheran preachers want to move from preaching the law (in its second use) that makes manifest our need for grace to proclaiming the gospel that makes equally manifest God’s grace to us in Jesus.
The concern for distinguishing all of this correctly is simply that bad things happen when these two are confused or unduly separated. I’ll take the problem of separating law and gospel first. Law – our need for grace – when it is not followed by forgiveness only leads to despair. And gospel apart from law makes little sense and even is rather insulting. I mean, absent the belief that you’ve done something wrong, me offering you forgiveness is pretty offensive. (“I forgive you.” “What the heck did I do?!”)
Confusing the two can be equally problematic. For instance, if I tell you that I will forgive you if you do such and such for me, you’ll probably be quick to realize that I haven’t actually forgiven you at all, I’ve just set conditions on our relationship. It would be kind of like a loved one saying that he/she loves you just the way you are, but would love you even more if you lost ten pounds or were willing to help out around the house more. Do you see what I mean? Adding a condition to a promise undermines, if not betrays, the initial promise.
It’s this particular concern – that the gospel I preach is actually the law – that most haunts Lutheran preachers. God’s grace is meant to be free, and when I encumber it with conditions I’ve nullified the gospel for which Jesus died and was raised again. Sometimes that confusion is clear, as when preachers in particular traditions say that God loves you but that if you don’t accept Jesus into your heart you’re going to hell. (This is what Karl Barth called “the gospel at gunpoint” – it’s offered as a promise, but really it’s a threat.) But more often, this confusion of law and gospel happens in a well-intentioned kind of way. Once I’ve identified our need for forgiveness and then proclaimed God’s grace, I might then suggest that we should now love our neighbor. True enough, of course, as forgiveness frees us to love and serve each other. But is that “suggestion” really a command? And if I as the hearer take that command seriously won’t I just end up falling short and feeling condemned by the law? These are the kinds of concerns Lutheran preachers agonize over. (And, if you’re reading this as a hearer of sermons, it gives you an idea just how hard your preacher works! 🙂 )
(I should also add here that several traditions, especially those that connect to Calvin but also some Lutheran traditions, think this is exactly what preachers should do, ending their sermon with a “third use” of the law, but that’s another question altogether.)
Okay, so that was a longer and somewhat stream-of-conscious “bit of background” on law-and-gospel than I’d imagined. But if you’re still with me you can perhaps imagine how this relates to participatory preaching. In short, is inviting people to participate just another way to create a burden for people? That is, are we telling them they have to do something and therefore making the gospel conditional? So, this week for instance, when I suggest that we might give people a chance to practice sharing their faith – or even ask them to think about that – is that law or gospel?
I don’t yet have an answer. But I do have two thoughts that I’ll share and then invite your response in the comments below.
First, I think it’s incredibly important to remember that Luther actually didn’t insist on distinguishing between law and gospel per se but rather between the function of the law and the function of the gospel. That is, you can best tell the difference between law and gospel not simply from what your words say (content) but from what your do (impact). Language is both contextual and forceful, and we only know what someone means by the impact of those words on us.
We know this from everyday experience. When I say “you’re welcome” after you’ve said “thank you” those words mean one thing. When I say “you’re welcome” after you – or, more likely, my kids – forgot to say “thank you” those words mean something quite different. Same words, but different impact and so different meaning.
This is true of theological language as well. For instance, is “Jesus is coming soon” meant to encourage (“hang in there, Jesus is coming soon to redeem and save”), comfort (“Jesus is coming soon and all will be well”), warn (“get your act together because Jesus is coming soon”) or threaten (“Jesus is coming soon, and boy is he pissed off”)?
So law and gospel are about impact. Which raises for me the question, is an invitation the same as a command? When you are invited to a party is that the same as when you’re told you must be at a meeting? (I know some invitations are veiled commands, but I mean when it’s a genuine invitation.) Similarly, when I invite someone to participate, to practice sharing their faith, does that create for them a burden of the law or does it create the sense of new possibility of the gospel? This is a real question for me and I suspect that other things – including the rest of sermon, my tone and tenor in making that invitation, and my general relationship with people – all affect whether they experience that invitation as law, gospel, or something else.
Which brings me to a second observation and question: can we – should we – divide everything into only law and gospel? Law and gospel ultimately is a way for Luther to describe what happens when God gets involved in our lives. The manifest example throughout Scripture is that God’s involvement creates two experiences for us, the first of recognizing that we are not God and cannot live in God’s holy presence and second of hearing and receiving God’s promise of love, healing, forgiveness and redemption. That first experience is one of death; the second of new life. And that movement from death to life is an incredibly important, even central, dynamic of the Christian life.
But does it describe everything about the Christian life? Are their aspects of our faith and life in the world that don’t fit into these categories? And if faith formation or catechesis one of those things? That is, what if practicing our faith isn’t imagined as either the promise of the Gospel – it’s not – or a law that we should follow – it’s not that either. What if, again, it’s just an invitation to live more fully into, or even sense more three-dimensionally the reality of, the promise God has made and keeps apart from all of our efforts. God makes the promise. God keeps the promise. But we’re invited to hear it and live into it more fully.
When I think about it this way, it reminds me a bit of Holy Baptism. I mean, the genius of infant baptism is that we can’t do anything for ourselves as infants and so infant baptism highlights and safeguards the promise that Baptism is all God’s doing. And yet the rest of our life we’re invited to claim our baptism, live into it, trust it. Luther was fond of telling people to remember their Baptism, that every encounter with water was a chance to remember and live more fully into God’s baptismal promises. Is that law or gospel? Or neither? Or something else?
Well, that’s some of what I’ve been thinking. Long entry, I know (sorry!). But I’d definitely be interested in your thoughts – both preachers and listeners! – as these are genuine and pressing questions for me. If you are willing share your thoughts and insights in the comments section below, others can chime in as well and we can talk about all this together.
Let me first say that I so appreciate your weekly sermon helps and encouragements. They help me a great deal.
When I preach I want to be sure that people hear the gospel or at least give it my best shot at getting a gospel word across because when I discovered Article IV of the Augsburg Confession in seminary it blew me away and gave my life new joy, even as a life-long Lutheran Christian.
But I also love what Article V says about the Holy Spirit producing faith in those who hear the Gospel.
Now I’m not saying the exercise about practicing sharing our faith is a bad thing. I did it in my congregation once before when you made the suggestion and people really liked it. And it connects perfectly well with the gospel reading about John being a witness to the light. But to me it just logically leads to a lesson, a “moral of the story” that we should be witnesses. Period. End of story.
One way that I learned to distinguish law from gospel (in Paul Scott Wilson’s “Imagination of the Heart”) is that the law puts a burden on us while the gospel puts the burden on God. Even if my sermon this Sunday has a good word of encouragement to be witnesses to the light, to be willing to share about our faith or what our church means to us, at that point the burden is still on us. I’m still searching for the word that puts the burden on God.
Thanks for your comments, Thomas, both here and the one that got these reflections going. Paul Scott Wilson is a good friend and I’ve learned a lot from him as well. But I guess my question in your use of Paul is whether, by a strict definition of law and gospel, we give the impression that there is nothing for us to do in the world, or at least that we should never talk about doing anything, or even that God doesn’t want us to do anything, lest we be confused that we think we’re earning our own salvation. At some point, it all seems a little much, and assumes that we can’t distinguish between God’s activity on our behalf and the invitation to live in and through the joy of God’s salvation. The invitation to participate more fully in God’s salvation doesn’t feel like the law to me, not in its first, second, or so-called “third” use. It seems, if anything, sheer gift to be able to revel in God’s blessings. I guess I wonder if we give someone a gift at Christmas does their unwrapping the gift mean that they suddenly think they did the work and gave themselves the gift? Or if a recently engaged person shows her ring to a friend and shares her joy, is she claiming that this is all her doing?
Well, these are some of my questions. Thanks, again, for the conversation.
From one accused of Calvinism: That is my understanding of the third use of the Law: “Let none of us deem ourselves exempt from this necessity, for none have as yet attained to such a degree of wisdom, as that they may not, by the daily instruction of the Law, advance to a purer knowledge of the Divine will.” Calvin, Institutes, II.vii.6-12 That the Law is a gift. So the contemplation even sharing of it is a great Joy not a burden, light yoke and such.
I’m starting to see your point. I like the idea of “get to” vs. “got to” to help clarify that. My sermon borrowed a lot from you but I was still feeling like there was a lot of “got to” in it. When I tried to find a gospel message it dawned on me that it might be in the “gaps” of the reading, the parts we’ll hear on the Second Sunday of Christmas. “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.” “The Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” “From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” The gospel is what John points to and what we are called to witness to.
A simple phrase I encountered 15-20 years ago has been very helpful in these matters: “We GET to, more than GOT to!” I think it comes from Methodist professor Albert Outler. I think that’s Grace empowering our practice.
“Sometimes that confusion is clear, as when preachers in particular traditions say that God loves you but that if you don’t accept Jesus into your heart you’re going to hell. (This is what Karl Barth called “the gospel at gunpoint” – it’s offered as a promise, but really it’s a threat.)” This resonated with me today – had a mini-crisis this week around the LYO adviser accepting a bunch of Gideon teen ‘LifeBooks’ from our church member, which she agreed to have our students distribute at the high school (because he is not allowed) without checking with me. We had an interesting discussion: do we quibble over doctrine – a doctrine/understanding about God that I think is critical – or do we simply get SOMETHING about God/faith/Jesus into teenage hands? I’ve preached on law/gospel and our inability to participate in our own salvation often, but not clearly enough, it seems.
Rita, As a parent (non-clergy) I think it matters deeply what we put into our teenagers hands. I recently moved my family to a church (ELCA) within our school district so my children could grow up in church with other kids from school. I was shocked when the discovered that the teen-friendly bible chosen for my 6th grader is NIV. It has created the opportunity to talk about the differences in biblical translations and how theology/point-of-view changes how we read and interpret scripture. Most of the problems I see with this particular bible (the Rock Solid Faith for Teens Bible) come from the side notes and discussion questions. I’m pleased that my son has been able to, thus far, stand on his own and call out what he see’s as BS. If you think doctrine is critical, then it’s not a quibble. Peace. t
We are currently studying 1st Corinthians in our bible study class. I have often thought that Paul indulged in “fear based” preaching and Chapter 11 from Verse 27 on kind of illustrates this for me. He’s writing to the people in Corinth who are, apparently, not very enlightened souls…some are hogging all the food at the love feasts, some are getting drunk, some are looking down on the poor…not very nice stuff.
He says, “For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves. That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep. But if we were more discerning with regard to ourselves, we would not come under such judgment. Nevertheless, when we are judged in this way by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be finally condemned with the world.”
I object strenuously to his words here. Yes, we can probably overeat, take drugs, get drunk and ruin our health and wellbeing in any number of ways, but this is not some curse of the Lord, as he implies! And, there’s nothing in Jesus’ behavior or teaching to ever suppose that he would bring illness upon anyone.
Paul, himself, is the one who is judging and condemning….not the Lord. His words seem to have more to do with his Pharisaic upbringing than anything based on Christ or his teachings.
Not to stick Calvin in where he’s not wanted (but wouldn’t he himself do the same?), but I think what you’re talking about really is the third use of the law that you glossed over. Calvin is down with the Lutheran uses, but he sees the third as the “now what?” The difference is that now when the law tells us what God intends us to do, it’s in the sense of an invitation. Having been called to account and pardoned, we’re free to participate in God’s work. It’s the same logic by which Paul ends every letter with a list of imperatives: you’re free, so now you can get down to business.
Doesn’t seem much like “freedom” does it? Unlike Paul, I think Jesus never compelled anyone to do anything or demanded anything from anyone. He always asked, “What do you want?”
I think God is more like that…”What do you want? Can you use my help with it?” He’s never pushy or bossy.
I’m not convinced sharing our joy about our life in Christ – which is what I think witnessing is – is third use of the law. I suppose it can be – “now you better go out and tell everyone or else” – but doesn’t have to be. Otherwise, everything Luther remembered his baptism or invited others to do the same we’d have to call that the third use as well. Invitation and command feels different, a little like Jim’s distinct between “get to” and “got to.” Thanks for continuing the conversation.
I think the motivation behind the “witnessing” is pertinent. Paul’s remarks to the Corinthians are a witness to what he believes, not necessarily the truth about God, but more the truth about himself and what he believes. Nevertheless, it’s in the bible, so some people think they must take everything Paul says as truth. I think this is unfortunate and reckless.
One may “get to” witness but that’s not always such a good thing to the one who has to hear what is said!
Others feel they’ve “got to” witness for some sort of brownie points, aka, those who are compelled by some teachings to wander door-to-door sharing what they’ve learned…whether it’s true or not, that is the question.
Some “believers” have never even read the bible and are content to believe whatever they’re told. “Buyer beware” applies!
I often explain to my folks thatone way to interpret this text is to ask the question is God holding up for me a mirror or a window. The mirror is like God saying will you just look at yourself. For better or for worse we get a hard view of our humanity. Then God holds up the window through which we can see into the heart of God. We experience through Christ God’s greatest desire for us and we are given the gift of new life through God’s grace. So if it is a mirror we are looking at the law the calls us to question our motivations our actions and ask if they are oriented toward God and our neighbor. If we are looking through the window we see promise, grace, love and redemption.
I apologize for making two comments, however I’m moved to share that my congregation wants to reach out and be open to new people – I interpret that as being moved by the Spirit; and I feel compelled to explain what that looks like – witnessing; which I encourage to be the telling of the story with minimal commentary. Like, “this is what happened.” And waiting for the question, “And then what happened?” (Audrey West at LTS Resource day). I don’t have to tell anyone else what happened (from Scripture or my life) for an experience to have happened but I want to, I enjoy it, I relive and live in new ways in the sharing.