What is a Lutheran?
Romans 3:19-28
October 26, 2025 anno Domini
Today could be the most self-serving day of the Church Calendar because it is the Reformation. We celebrate being Lutheran and we talk about Martin Luther. There is nothing more dangerous than talking about yourself, because you lie and all your stories are favorable to you. We should probably skip observing Reformation Sunday for all its dangers, but I love it too much to skip it.
How would you answer the question, “What is a Lutheran?” Or to put that question in Lutheran language you’re familiar with – “You’re a Lutheran. What does that mean? “
First, being a Lutheran means you can’t talk about yourself. That’s how Paul begins the Epistle – we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped. If you think church is for good and holy people, if you come to church to show God how much you love Him, if you believe there is anything in you that God loves, you are not a Lutheran.
According to St. Paul Lutherans shut their mouths about themselves before God. We have nothing to say because we believe what God’s Word says about all of us.
“None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” (Rom 3:10b-12)
Do you believe those words? There isn’t a righteous person on earth, not a single one. No one understands God. No one seeks God. They (which means you) are all worthless. Not one of you is good.
That is what God says of humans.. Because of sin your human nature is totally corrupted. You don’t have a bit of good in you and you don’t have an inkling of spirituality, and the best of your works is evil in God’s eyes. You are unrighteous through and through.
This is what the first Lutherans described about our condition. Sin is a horrible dreadful hereditary sickness by which the entire human nature is corrupted. Original sin is a complete absence of the righteousness and goodness Adam and Eve had in the garden. The sinfulness with which you are born is a deep, wicked, horrible, fathomless, mysterious, and unspeakable corruption of your human nature and all its power. (Solid Declaration, Article 1). Don’t become a Lutheran in the hopes of boosting your self-esteem. There is nothing in your self that God esteems.
Lutherans worship as we believe. The liturgy does not begin with “Lord, we’re here, aren’t you glad?” but In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. And then we confess the truth – Our help is in the name of the Lord. If you, O Lord, kept a record of sins, O Lord, who could stand?
You know who the Lutherans were in the Bible? The people who didn’t talk about themselves, the people who didn’t try to get one over on Jesus. The prostitutes and tax collectors were Lutheran, the lepers, the sick, everyone who came to Jesus with nothing. They held the Lutheran faith. They didn’t talk about themselves. They simply said, “Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
If you are a Lutheran Christ is the center of your life. He is your faith, your hope, your Savior, your boast. You hold to all of Christ – that He was born of the Virgin, that He is true God and true man, that He calmed the sea and raised the dead, that He died on a cross, and rose three days later. What He did – you believe. What He said – you confess. What He wants – you desire.
Christ is the sinner’s – and therefore the Lutheran’s – only hope. Because of your sin you have nothing to boast about before God. There is nothing in you for Him to love. Through the law comes knowledge of sin. That is the reason your mouth is shut. You have nothing to say, but thankfully He does. But now the righteousness of God has been manifest apart from the Law … the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.
Paul is using legal language here. Your sin breaks the God’s Law. The punishment your crime earns is the death of your body and the death of your soul. You are in the Devil’s prison, condemned to hell. It’s the death sentence, with no chance of parole. Good behavior isn’t going to get you out because you cannot undo your sin or stop sinning or win God’s favor. Your only hope is someone busts you out of prison.
God does just that, except He does it legally. He accomplished a righteousness that pays your debt. It’s not anything you do, earn or win. This justification, this righting of your wrong, was worked by God Himself in the person of His Son. Jesus was born without sin, conceived by the Holy Spirit in the Virgin Mary’s womb. He never sinned throughout His life. He kept every commandment. He went to church every Lord’s day. Obeyed his mother and father perfectly – even took care of his mom when He was dying. He always told the truth. He didn’t compromise. He loved every one of his neighbors more than Himself. He did that for you. He is God’s righteousness for you. Then God put Him forward as the propitiation for your sin. The punishment you deserved was visited on Christ. He paid your death, your hell, your sentence to hell, with His blood.
Lutheran believe that Christ is our righteousness because He lived a holy life and He died with and for the sins of the world. God’s blood, shed on the cross, is the just payment for your sin. What must you do to receive that pardon, that declaration of justification, that good news that you are “not guilty” in Christ? Believe it, trust it. Take to heart the Word of God and the work of Christ and God declares you righteous. You’re justified when you believe. As St. Paul writes, we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
Some people get annoyed when I say things like the Bible is full of Lutherans. I’ve been a pastor long enough to enjoy annoying people, in the hopes that annoyance teaches them. If the faith we Lutherans hold is not the faith taught and confessed and believed by the people in the Bible, then we should find another denomination or religion. It might sound boastful to say Noah was a Lutheran, Abraham was a Lutheran, Peter and Paul were Lutherans, but saying that gives you opportunity to confess that you believe exactly what they believe. Or you could use what I said in the sermon – the prostitutes and tax collectors, the lepers and the lame, were Lutherans. They had nothing but their sin and death. They came to Jesus with their cry, “Lord have mercy on us.” And they were justified, He declared them righteous with God, not guilty of sin, forgiven, free. That’s what a Lutheran is and that is what a Lutheran believes. In the name of Jesus. Amen.