“WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE LUTHERAN”

Text: John 8:31-36 – Reformation Observed

Sunday October 25th, 2026

Trinity – Creston

       Grace, mercy, and peace is yours from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!

       Our text for this Sunday (Reformation Observed) is the Gospel Lesson from John 8 that was just proclaimed.

Let Us Pray:  Dearest Jesus, send your Holy Spirit to remind that being Lutheran is simply confess the truth of  what the Bile clearly teaches.  Faith in Jesus Christ.  Faith alone, Grace alone, Scripture alone.   Amen.

Dear Fellow Redeemed in Christ:

To Be a Lutheran Is to Be a Christian.

I.   We Lutherans are the church as old as the creeds, the apostles, the prophets, Abraham, Noah, and Adam—the church of Jesus.

II. We Lutherans sing, read, and confess in accordance with the Holy Scriptures.

III. We Lutherans are set free from Satan, free from fear of death, free to love the Lord who loves us.

IV. We Lutherans embrace the truth—the simple truth that our salvation is the work of Christ alone.

V.  We Lutherans confess the full body of doctrine, with all its parts working together.

As Christians, we embrace the truth, we confess the truth, and we proclaim the one who is the way, and the truth, and the life. The truth matters, for it is the truth alone that saves us. We are Lutheran, and we are proud to say so.

Not that we chose the name, mind you. It was first applied to us as a kind of mockery, as if somehow we were following the teachings of one man rather than the teachings of the Scriptures. At that time of the Reformation, the church in Rome mocked us as Lutherans. So be it. We wear the name proudly, like a badge of honor.

What does it mean to be Lutheran? Well, it’s helpful to remember that we are first and foremost Christians.

To Be a Lutheran Is to Be a Christian.

I.

Do not buy into the lie of thinking that our church began in 1517 or 1530. Our roots run much deeper. Open up our Book of Concord and find therein the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Athanasian Creed, believed by all Christians since the earliest centuries.

Our church is the church of our fathers, the church fathers. Our church stands on the apostolic word, inspired by the Holy Spirit and recorded in our New Testament.

But if you want to go back further, ours is the church of not only the apostles but also the prophets who came before them. Isaiah believed in Jesus and foretold his virgin birth, prophesied his death as the payment for our sins.

Moses likewise spoke the Lord’s words, and his telling of the Passover gave us a picture of a lamb slain for our sins, blood that cleanses us and saves us from death. But go back further still, to Abraham, to Noah, and to Adam, the father of us all. They all believed in the one true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They all embraced the God who would send his Son for our salvation.

All of this is to say, Lutheranism is not some Johnny-come-lately. Luther did not ignite a revolution as if to destroy. He came as did John the Baptist, to reform, to call home the people of God—back to what God has always taught.

That’s what prophets do. They call us back to God, and back to the truth. “Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful” (Joel 2:13). That is our message.

Luther was simply living and preaching the words of Jesus, who said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (vv 31b–32).

Luther came, as do all prophets, to reform, to rebuild, to call us back home, to read the Scriptures, and to embrace the truth. Embrace the one who is alone the way, the truth, and the life.

II.

What does it mean to be a Lutheran? Well, it matters that we sing songs that teach the faith, that we dig deep, that we grow deep roots, so that we pass on to our children the great heritage that is ours.

This means that it does us well to sing the great hymns of old, so also to read our Lutheran confessions, and always, always go back to the Bible, which is the ultimate authority. “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples.”

No, the authority of the church does not depend on any one man. It depends on the Word of God, to which we must always return. And the creeds we confess, we confess because they are in accordance with the Holy Scriptures.

III.

What does it mean to be Lutheran? It means to be set free from bondage to Satan, free from fear of death, and free to love the Lord who loves us so.

It means that we can go to sleep at night knowing that we are forgiven.

It means that our past does not take away from us our future, for our debts have been paid.

“The truth will set you free.” The truth is that the Son by his death on the cross has set us free indeed. The truth has set us free.

IV.

What does it mean to be Lutheran? It means to embrace the truth. “You will know the truth.” Do not be deceived. Some say that there are so many different church bodies, so many different religions, that you can never really know the truth.

Indeed, the truth is marvelous, and we could not in a thousand lifetimes truly and fully understand the greatness of our triune God, nor appreciate fully the mystery of the incarnation and the wonder of a God who loved us so much that he gave for us his Son.

But the Reformation began with the simple truth that our salvation is the work of Christ, and Christ alone. There is no need or command to pray to the saints.

A person upon death should be left with no uncertainty, no thoughts of an imaginary purgatory, for Christ has paid the full price of our salvation. There is no need for us to justify ourselves, for Christ is our righteousness. For us he has lived the perfect life; for us he has shed his blood and died.

V.

What does it mean to be Lutheran? It’s not all that complicated. We are saved by grace through faith, we baptize our babies, and we confess that our Lord gave us his true body and blood in the Lord’s Supper.

These are no small things, for the truth is not like a laundry list. Doctrine is like a body, with all the parts working together.

Why do we baptize babies? Well, that fits in with the truth that Christ died for all people. Fits in with the truth of original sin, that we are all born with it. Fits in with the idea that salvation comes from Christ and that faith is a gift. And so on and so on.

“If you abide in my word,” all my word, “you are truly my disciples.”

So, I would say, dear Lutheran friends, you are in the right place. And as we celebrate the Reformation, we have so much to be thankful for.

In Christ, we may rest well; our consciences are made clean by the blood of Christ. Our guilt has been taken away, for we rest in Christ, who is the Lord of the Sabbath, who is our rest.

Amen.

Now may the peace of God which far surpasses all human understanding keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior.  Amen