Today in worship, we had the joy of celebrating a baptism at Christ the King. In the sermon, I reflect on the Holy Spirit’s work of justification and sanctification, and talk about Paul’s image of the Fruits of the Spirit and what a life rooted in baptism looks like, according to Galatians 5. The Apostle Paul reminds us that we are called to freedom in Christ, not for the purposes of self-indulgence, but to love and serve our neighbors. The life of faith bears fruits of the Spirit: Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Today’s Scripture readings are Galatians 5:1, 13-25; Psalm 16; and Luke 9:51-62. I found helpful Melody Martin’s blog post at Concordia Publishing House on Understanding Justification and Sanctification as well as Sven Anderson’s article Sanctification and Lutheran Ethics in the ELCA’s Journal of Lutheran Ethics. And although this sermon doesn’t pull from it, the one other time I’ve preached about a Lutheran understand of sanctification was on April 18, 2021, so feel free to read that one too.
Here’s the the sermon audio podcast and the livestream from Christ the King with the baptism.
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen
We have the joy this morning of celebrating a baptism, hearing God’s promises spoken through word and water to Betty. In the waters of baptism, Betty is claimed as part of God’s family, a member of the body of Christ. She’s sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked with the cross of Christ forever.
And aren’t these great Scripture readings for a baptism? The Gospel reading talks about following Jesus, which is of course what we do once we’re baptized. Jesus is honest that following him involves sacrifice, but he’s worth following as he leads us to the kingdom of God.
The Psalm talks about the security of being in Christ. God shows us the path of life; there is fullness of joy in God’s presence.
And my favorite of these three, this wonderful reading from Galatians about the fruits of the Spirit.
Some of you were here last week when I said the good news of the Gospel is not “Shape and do better.” It’s not even “Be more loving, more faithful, have more patience and gentleness.” The Gospel message is God loves you as you are, God claims you.
Betty isn’t doing anything to deserve baptism. Her resume of good works is pretty short—and that’s the point. Baptism is an expression of God’s love, God’s grace, not anything we do.
When we receive that love, as we grow up and remember the gift of baptism, it shapes how we live. But baptism is the starting line, not the finish. The goal is not to get baptized and then just wait for heaven; baptism is the foundation for how we live as children of God in this world.
I want to talk about two church words today. Sometimes churches like wrapping up simple ideas in complicated words, but these words are important.
13 letters: Justification. Justification is become right with God. It’s about God forgiving us, making us righteous, restoring us to right relationship with our Creator.
In Jesus’ death and resurrection, God redeems us and gives us eternal life. We can’t earn forgiveness, we can’t save ourselves. God does it. God declares we are forgiven and accepted. That’s justification.
The second church word is sanctification. 14 letters. Sanctification means being made holy, and it’s about how we live out this eternal life God has given us.
Sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit, who’s at work transforming our lives. I know I’ve already shared this quote, but listen again to what Martin Luther says about the Holy Spirit.
“I believe that by my own understanding or strength, I cannot believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him—remember, this is all God’s work; we can’t do any of it on our own, we can’t even choose to believe in God on our own—but instead the Holy Spirit has called me through the gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, made me holy, and kept me in the true faith.”
The Holy Spirit is making us holy. That word holy means set apart for God, purified. In baptism, God cleanses us, washes us, joins us into the body of Christ.
The Holy Spirit is renewing our lives, forming us to be more and more holy, more and more like Jesus. Our goal as Christians, as a church, is to live more like Jesus, to see people with love the way Jesus sees them. We’re trying to forgive as he forgives, to treat our neighbors the way Jesus does, the way he told us to.
Love God with all that you are and love your neighbor as yourself. That’s our call as baptized children of God. We pray for the Holy Spirit to transform to transform our hearts, to make us more loving, to shape how we live.
But this is a lifelong process, not something we’ll complete. One of the key insights of our Lutheran tradition is that in this life, each of us is both saint and sinner at the same time, forgiven, but still sinful, never perfectly holy.
The Holy Spirit is constantly calling us to Christ to receive forgiveness, because our human nature is always selfish. We are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves. We can love our neighbors, and we should always try to do better, but we’ll never succeed in reaching perfection.
That might pessimistic—maybe it is—but I think it’s honest. There’s humility in recognizing nobody is perfect, and there’s grace for that. I appreciate it when obituaries say someone “completed their baptism” – it’s a euphemism for death, but it’s recognizing our sanctification is not complete until we go home to heaven.
Now, there is a loophole there. If God’s already saved us, if how we live now doesn’t determine if we get into heaven, can we just do whatever we want? Some of those desires of the flesh could be pretty fun! Maybe not the strife and anger, but maybe a little carousing, some sorcery, a bit of licentiousness—could be kind of entertaining. God forgives, right?
The apostle Paul wonders the same thing. He asks in Romans 6: “Should we continue in sin in order that grace may increase? By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it?”
But faith makes a difference in how we live, because the Holy Spirit is working on us, transforming our hearts, renewing us as God’s children. God forgives, and God calls us to follow.
I’m convinced Galatians 5:13 is one of the most important verses in the Bible. Paul says, “You were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another.”
Justification is about how God sets us free from the power of sin and the death our sin leads to. And sanctification is about how we use our freedom. We’re called into community, caring for each other, loving and serving our neighbors. We are freed from sin, and freed for love and service.
Paul tells us what being shaped by the Holy Spirit looks like, the fruits growing from [Betty’s] baptism: Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Those are all good things. Grace grows good fruits. They’re not easy, they take cultivation—the fertilizer of prayer, the soil of a community, time to grow. Maybe even some weeding.
And we can’t grow them perfectly. But they’re also things we can practice. So how will you use your freedom? What fruit are you growing in your life?
Again, we can’t do it all on our own. We can’t make ourselves holy. But we can choose how to use the freedom God gives us.
So this week, I invite you to consider which of those fruits the Holy Spirit is nudging you to tend and cultivate.
Take a fruit paper, write one down: Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control—write one down, put it somewhere you’ll see it, and look for opportunities this week to put it into practice. And may God continue to help you grow in faith.
Let’s pray: Gracious God, thank you for redeeming us. Thank you for forgiving us, cleansing us of our sin, and calling us to follow you. Thank you for being with us every step of the way, in every stage of our lives, and never giving up on us. Lead us, guide us, nudge us by your Holy Spirit to grow closer to you, to answer your call, and to bear good fruits. In Jesus’ name, Amen.