“Be Diligent to be found by Christ in Peace, Spotless and Blameless”
2 Peter 3:8-14
12/10/08
In last week’s epistle lesson from I
Corinthians chapter one, we heard from God’s Word that He would
faithfully keep us blameless until the day when Jesus comes back for
us. It was God who through His Word and Baptism called us into
fellowship with His Son in the first place. And He continues to
work this fellowship with Jesus through the Sacrament of the Altar,
where we partake of our Lord’s body and blood. The Apostle
Paul writes in his letter to the Ephesians that God sanctified us by
cleansing us with the washing of water with the Word, so that He might
present us to Himself glorious, having no spot or wrinkle or any such
thing, but holy and blameless. And St. Jude assures us that God
will keep us holy and blameless when he writes, “To Him who is
able to keep you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence
of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior,
through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and
authority, before all time, now, and forever. Amen.”
But in tonight’s epistle lesson, the Apostle
Peter instructs us to be diligent to be found by God in peace, spotless
and blameless. How is it that God, on the one hand, declares us
blameless and keeps us blameless until the day of Christ Jesus, but
that, on the other hand, we are told to be diligent to be found by Him
in peace, spotless and blameless? Does what Peter write here
contradict what Paul writes elsewhere? Does our blamelessness
depend on us?
First, what does it mean to be blameless? It
means to be guiltless, free from sin. As Paul writes, no one can
bring any charges against us in Christ. That includes God
Himself. Jesus does not condemn us; He came to save us. And
God does not condemn us, because Christ’s blood has washed away
our sins. Our sins are not counted against us, because they have
been atoned for by Jesus, they have been forgiven, and they have been
removed from us as far as the east is from the west. To be
blameless before God, then, means that we stand before Him in peace,
clothed with Christ and His righteousness, given to us at our
Baptism. Having been cleansed from all unrighteousness through
this holy bath, we can’t be any more blameless before God than we
are now in Jesus. We didn’t become blameless before God on
the basis of our works. Nor do we become any more or less
blameless based on how much or little we sin. Our blamelessness
before God does not depend on our holy or godly living, but on Jesus
Christ and His work alone. His blamelessness is a gift to you.
But this is not a one time gift. We received
it by faith at our Baptism, but God continues to give this
blamelessness of Jesus to us through His Word and the Lord’s
Supper. And here is where the diligence on our part to be found
by Him in peace, spotless and blameless comes in. If we were to
cut ourselves off from these things, we would soon lose our blameless
status before God. And so we are urged to continue to put
ourselves on the receiving end of these gifts. It’s a third
commandment issue. God’s commandment is that we keep the
Lord’s Day holy. Luther explains that this means we should
fear and love God, so that we do not despise preaching and His Word,
but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it. Anyone who
despises God’s Word and Sacraments will surely not be found
blameless in Christ on the Last Day, even if he or she were baptized,
because it is those who believe and are baptized who will be saved; but
those who do not believe will be condemned. Faith comes by
hearing, and hearing by the Word about Christ, whether that Word comes
through the Scriptures, through Baptism, or through the Lord’s
Supper. Where there’s no hearing of the Word about Christ
there can be no faith in Christ. Where there’s no faith in
Christ, there’s no blamelessness before God, because apart from
faith in God’s Word its impossible to please God.
This is what it means, then, to be diligent to be
found by God in peace, spotless and blameless: it means to
persevere in the faith by continuing to hear God’s Word and
receive His gifts, in order to abide in Christ until the end; as Jesus
says, “Abide in Me and I will abide in you.” To abide
in Christ is to abide in His Word by faith, in spite of all the
temptations and troubles that would try to get us to abandon faith in
His Word. The Christians to whom Peter was writing were
experiencing all kinds of suffering and tribulation. He
encourages them not to give up hope, but to stand steadfast in the
faith until the end. The Lord will come someday and bring us to
that new earth in the new heavens that He’s going to
create. This hope should encourage you to hold fast to
God’s Word until the end. And as you hold God’s Word
sacred and gladly hear and learn it, receiving His body and blood in
His Supper for the forgiveness of your sins, God will keep you
steadfast in His Word and faithful to the end.
And so both are true: God will keep you
spotless and blameless in Christ as He works through His Word and
Sacraments to do this, and we are to diligently apply ourselves to the
hearing and believing of God’s Word, so that we might be found
blameless in Christ on the Last Day.
For Christ’s sake we are at peace with
God. There’s no need to try to become blameless in His
sight by our own works or efforts. We can rest in the knowledge
that God has declared us blameless and will keep us blameless in
Christ. Now that we are blameless before God in Christ, however,
we are also to live as His blameless children before the world.
Our righteousness does not consist in this holy and godly living, but
we live holy and godly lives because we are holy and godly in
Christ. Therefore, we are to be diligent not only in the hearing
of God’s Word, but also in the doing of it with the help of the
Holy Spirit, who has made our bodies His temple since our
Baptism. The work of the Holy Spirit is to make us holy.
Again, before God we can’t get any holier than we are in Christ,
because nothing can be added to Christ’s righteousness that is
ours by faith. But before our neighbor our holy living must
always increase and improve. The outstanding debt of love we owe
our neighbors will never be paid off. And so we are to be
diligent about living in love towards one another until our Lord comes
for us. This holy living of ours is also a work of the Holy
Spirit in us. As we hear His Word and receive His gifts, God
works in us the holy living He requires. And we are not like wood
or stone that does not participate in this work of the Spirit, but
having been born from above, born of the Spirit, we cooperate with the
Spirit as obedient children.
Many times, however, we are not obedient children
and must be disciplined. We must live in repentance, confessing
our sin, and receiving God’s abundant pardon and peace which He
gives us in Christ through His Word. Though we may suffer much
like these early Christians did, we do not need to despair that God has
rejected us, but remember His promise to keep those in perfect peace
whose mind is stayed on Him. Then we can look at the suffering we
face in this life as the discipline of a loving Father, whose greatest
concern is that He keep us spotless and blameless until the day of
Christ. God does not want us to be swept away by the lusts of
this world and lose our faith. And so He often uses suffering in
this life to draw us back to His Word from which we’ve wandered,
in order to keep us unstained by the world. John writes that this
world and its lusts are passing away, but the one who does the will of
God remains forever.
The will of God is to believe in the One whom He has
sent to present you blameless before Him in His blood. The blood
of Jesus Christ applied to you in Baptism cleanses you from all sin;
therefore, you are holy, blameless, and righteous in God’s
sight. And God will keep you blameless through His Word and
Sacraments until the end as you persevere in the faith by the power of
the Holy Spirit. In the meantime He will work to cause you to
live as the holy and blameless people that He’s made you to be in
Christ, as you look forward to His coming in hope and joy, with the
promise of the world to come as your inheritance in Jesus. Amen.