“If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:31-32)

The Word of God, the truth of Christ, the freedom of the Gospel are the cause of our rejoicing on this Reformation Sunday. Reformation Day is actually on Friday, October 31st, the Eve of All Hallows, the day an Augustinian friar and professor posted his 95 theses for debate on the door of St. Mary’s church in Wittenberg 491 years ago. Who would have guessed that an academic piece of paper, in Latin no less, would have sparked one of the most significant movements in the history of Christianity? But that is the way of the Gospel - from tiny, insignificant beginnings to something that embraces the wo

The Pharisees were at it again, plotting to get Jesus tangled up in His own words. They were looking for what Sarah Palin called a “gotcha”. Get Jesus to say something that could be used against him. A sound byte. Slip of the tongue. Get Him to take sides in a debate. And what better debate subject to trap Jesus than taxes. Everyone has an opinion about taxes. It’s a perfect snare. A lose/lose situation. Get Jesus to go political over taxes and the whole movement will be over in a heartbeat. You can almost see them rubbing their pharisaical hands together in delight as they send their flunkies to Jesus with their stumper of a question.

Sometimes you need to lose your religion in order to gain Christ. It sounds strange, I know, but it’s true. Sometimes you have to lose your religion, your view of God, the world, you. Sometimes you have to drop dead to all your preconceptions and funny notions of how God should be and what rules He should play by. The apostle Paul lost his religion. Big time. He had reason to boast. He enumerates the reasons: circumcised on the 8th day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew among Hebrews. You couldn’t get more Jewish than Saul of Tarsus. He was a card-carrying, life-long member Israelite. A lifer, we call them. Like “lifer-Lutherans” and “cradle-Catholics.” There was not a conscious moment of Paul’s life when he wasn’t a Jew.