Read the Large Catechism with me.
Ten-minute studies on short readings from the Large Catechism.
Let's do this.
Click on the link below and read the short assigned reading. Then, if you have time, check out what I have to say about it. If not, no problem. Just soak up the goodness of the LC.
The Fifth Commandment Part 2: Click here and read 188 - the end of the Fifth Commandment.
The basics:
- Our heart is not to be full of anger and hatred for anyone, especially those who do us evil.
- You are not only guilty for doing evil to others but also for not doing good for them when you are able.
- God calls all those murderers who do not give counsel and help in distress.
- Even though we have not actually done harm to someone else who is hurting in front of us, we have nevertheless, suffered him to perish in his misfortune if we do nothing to help him.
- When we do not help someone in need when we are able, it is no different than if we were to see one drowning and could save them but choose not to reach out to them.
- God urges us to truly noble works in this command - gentleness, patience, love, and kindness to our enemies - and reminds us to remember the First Commandment, that He is our God and will assist and protect us in order to quench the desire of revenge in us.
- Luther spends the last paragraph of this section discussing the Carthusians [a group of monks who remove themselves from society and claim to live pious and holy lives]. He calls out their hypocritical behavior and their sad choice to remove themselves from the cross of living with and loving their enemies.
My thoughts today:
As a pastor's wife who had the privilege of living through the seminary years with my husband, I know something about living in a community of like-minded people. And while I miss those days with a deep longing in my soul, I have to recognize my own sinfulness in coveting that type of community. I don't mean to say loving the time there is wrong - most certainly not. Someday, on the Last Day, we will live in a community much greater and much more in unity than even those seminary days. So, hoping for that type of community is indeed hoping for the coming of our Lord. But until that Day, God has placed us out in the world to live among those who disagree with us and those who hate us and those who wish to do us harm and those who are our enemies.
My husband read (and encouraged me to read along with him, which I did...for...well, for awhile...and someday I will finish) a book by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Lutheran theologian during the Nazi regime. Life Together and Prayerbook of the Bible by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. This book is about community. It is amazing. It details the intense desire of Christians to be in community with each other, while pointing out the needs of having Christians dispersed in the world to serve and love their enemies. This man knew something about loneliness in the faith. He knew something about enemies.
When reading about those Carthusians today, I thought about Bonhoeffer and his words concerning our balance of needing those who believe the same as us and needing to bear the cross of loneliness in a world who needs Christ's love through us.
I so desire to be the hypocritical Carthusian.
And that is a sin. It is a sin to turn my head from those who need saving.
In the words of Luther, "It is just as if I saw some one navigating and laboring in deep water [and struggling against adverse winds] or one fallen into fire, and could extend to him the hand to pull him out and save him, and yet refused to do it."
In my sorry state of sinfulness, I rejoice in Christ's forgiveness. For He is the One who reaches down to pull Peter from the waves of unbelief. He is the One who continues to pull the likes of men, even His enemies, from their own drowning in unbelief. He saves. He loves. He shows patience. He forgives. And until all the saints can be together in community, He gives me fellow believers to accompany me here and He gives me the Communion rail to find His peace with all those who have gone before me.
With that peace and with that forgiveness, I attempt to go on loving and serving those who hate me. With the help of God, I strive to honor the Fifth Commandment in a world full of drowning sinners, of which I am the chief.
