Whose Faith is it Anyway?

“and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20

Whose Faith is it anyway?

When I was growing up it didn’t bother me to hear the word “evangelical” nor did it bother me when I was instructed to evangelize as part of what it meant to be a Christian. As I grew older, I became more uncomfortable with the word. Even speaking of Jesus seemed awkward around friends of mine who were not practicing Christians or practicing any religion for that matter.
When I was in high school a friend of mine and a teammate on the varsity football team was a born again Christian. I remember his passion for the Lord and he was not shy about sharing his faith in Jesus. It was around this time that I became uncomfortable with even speaking about Jesus or using the word “evangelical” or feeling called to evangelize others. He would pass out pamphlets with some scripture verses on them. I remember the front of my pamphlet sounded like Good News! It was telling me what God had done for me through Jesus Christ, but on the back of the pamphlet had a picture of a skull and cross bones describing what would happen to me if I made the wrong choice. That didn’t seem like Good News, it didn’t seem like that God I had known my whole life. I then became uncomfortable in sharing and proclaiming this Good News.

As I struggled and questioned my faith I began to understand God’s grace, and the salvation God gives in a new light. I went from serious doubt to a relative attitude towards my faith (a very watered down version of Christianity) to reclaiming what it meant to share the salvation Jesus Christ has won for us. I can call myself evangelical with pride and make no apologies for evangelizing!
Martin Luther states in his commentary on Galatians 2:17 “Either we are not justified by Christ, or we are not justified by the Law. The fact is, we are justified by Christ. Hence, we are not justified by the Law. If we observe the Law in order to be justified, or after having been justified by Christ, we think we must further be justified by the Law, we convert Christ into a legislator and a minister of sin.”
What I saw by other Christians as evangelizing was actually as Luther points out “…turning Law into grace, and grace into Law.” Luther’s commentary on verse 20 shares with me something that truly is Good News! Luther writes, “What awful presumption to imagine any work good enough to pacify God, when to pacify God required the invaluable price of the death and blood of His one and only Son?”
The NET Bible (New English Translation) and some other biblical translations translate Galatians 2:20 slightly differently. That slight difference makes all the difference in how I understand God’s grace and the Good News of Jesus Christ. “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So the life I now live in the body, I live because of the faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Faith begins then when God is faithful!? Even to the cross!? When this was revealed to me, I had no shame in sharing it because Jesus did not come across to me as a legislator of sin, but my Redeemer from it!
If this is what we share with others as a church then no one should be ashamed of sharing what Jesus Christ has done for us. Words like “evangelical” and what it means to be evangelized shouldn’t be given new catch phrases so as not to offend others but they should be reclaimed and reformed (We are still a reforming church, right?) from the abuses they have gone through over the years.
This Good News of Jesus Christ has freed me. There are many out there who are burdened in this dark and broken world, struggling to find meaning, anxious about the perishable promises, feeling unloved and unwelcomed, not knowing whether there is a God or, if there is, whether that God loves them and has saved them.
We walk through this Lenten wilderness as a reminder of the captivity we would be bound to if salvation were up to us, and if God lacked grace and mercy. We know the story of salvation; as a Christian people we are as my former bishop, Stephen Bouman of the Metro NY Synod said “an Easter people living in a Good Friday world!” Let us share the Good News that frees us all!


Let us pray,
Good and gracious God, in our faithfulness may we always be reminded that it is your faithfulness that has saved us. May all that we do in word and deed demonstrate to others the freedom you give to your people through the cross that has turned death into life. We ask this through Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.