October 6, 2023

Today's Reading: 

Daily Lectionary: Nehemiah 1:1-2:10, 1 Timothy 1:1-20

The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners… (1 Timothy 1:15)

In the Name of Jesus, Amen. In Jesus, God saves sinners. Jesus is God. All things were created through Him. Jesus is fully man. He became enfleshed in the womb of the Virgin Mary. Jesus became a sinner. He claimed your sins as His very own. They stuck to Jesus, the God Man. You hear the voice of Jesus, the sinner, in the Psalms calling your sins His. Jesus prayed, “I acknowledged my sin.” The Psalms are the Lord’s prayers given to the baptized, prayers by the sinless Son of God as sinner. God made Him who was sinless to be sin in your place. In Jesus, God saves sinners. 

Jesus needed saving. He became the foremost of sinners. Only He as God could save Himself. Only He could die for the sins that had become fully His. In the ignorance of unbelief those surrounding the cross unwittingly suggested He do that very thing…save Himself. “Save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross” (Matthew 27:40). “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!” (Luke 23:3) And He did just that, save Himself and us. By dying in the flesh, made to be sin, as God, sin lost all its power. In Jesus sin died. By saving Himself as sinner in our place He fulfilled His Father’s will to save sinners. In Jesus, God saves sinners. 

Jesus wasn’t about saving Himself, clearly. He was all about saving you. This was His Father’s will. You can’t save yourself from sin. Jesus did the saving by dying. He rescued you. It is a trustworthy confession that Jesus came into the flesh to save sinners. This is the theme of the entire Bible. He did not come as a lawgiver to beat you down into despair and submission. He came as Savior. He came for all sinners. And that includes you! In Jesus, God saves sinners. 

It is a sin to doubt what God has said He has done and will do. It is sin to think in your heart that God can’t forgive and save you. He forgives your doubts as well. Those doubts were on Him at the cross. They died. Faith, God given faith, firmly planted in you, believes, clings, trusts and accepts that Jesus is the Savior of sinners. You may not always feel that way, but it is true, nonetheless. God said so. In Jesus, God saves sinners. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

I acknowledged my sin to you,  

  and I did not cover my iniquity;

I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,”  

  and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. 

I call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised,   

  and I am saved from my enemies. (Psalm 32:5; 18:3)

-Pastor Preston Paul is pastor at St. Matthew Lutheran Church, Almena, WI.

Audio Reflections Speaker: Pastor Jonathan Lackey is the pastor at Grace Lutheran Church, Vine Grove, Ky.

Study Christ's words on the cross to see how you can show more Christlike grace in your life. Perfect for group or individual study, each chapter has a Q&A at the end, and the back of the book includes a leader guide. Available now from Concordia Publishing House.