[Footnote 1: This and all the following sermons on the Epistle Texts
were first printed in 1540 and 1543 and included in the Epistle
Postil.]
1. When God was about to lead the Israelites out of Egypt, he
commanded, shortly before their departure, that they should eat the
Passover the night they started; and as a perpetual memorial of their
redemption, they were annually, on the recurrence of the season, to
celebrate the feast of Easter for seven days. A specially urgent
feature of the command was that on the first evening of the feast they
must put out of their houses all leaven and leavened bread, and during
the seven days eat none but the unleavened bread, or cakes. Hence the
evangelists speak of the feast as the Feast (or Days) of Unleavened
Bread. Mk 14, 1; Lk 22, 1.
2. Paul, in this lesson, explains the figure in brief but beautiful
and expressive words. He is prompted to introduce the subject by the
fact that in the preceding verses of this chapter he has been
reproving the Corinthians for their disposition to boast of the Gospel
and of Christ while abusing such liberty unto unchastity and other
sins. He admonishes them that, possessing the Gospel and having become
Christians, they ought, as becomes Christians, to live according to
the Gospel, avoiding everything not consistent with the faith and with
Christian character--everything not befitting them as new creatures.
3. So the apostle uses the figure of the Paschal lamb and unleavened
bread requisite at the Jews' Feast of the Passover, in his effort to
point the Corinthians to the true character and purpose of the New
Testament made with us in the kingdom of Christ. He explains what is
the true Paschal Lamb and what the unleavened bread, and how to
observe the real Passover, wherein all must be new and spiritual. In
the joy and wealth of his mind he presents this analogy to remind them
that they are Christians and to consider what that means.
His meaning is: Being Christians and God's true people, and called
upon to observe a Passover, you must go about it in the right way,
putting away from you all remaining leaven until it shall have been
purged out utterly.
What Paul means by "leaven" is told later in his phrase "neither with
the leaven of malice and wickedness"; he means whatever is evil and
wicked. Everything foreign to Christianity in both doctrine, or faith,
and life, is "leaven." From all this Paul would have Christians purge
themselves with the same thoroughness with which the leaven was to be
put away from their Easter according to the law. And, holding to the
figure, he would have us observe our Passover in the use of the sweet
bread, which, in distinction from the leaven, signifies sincerity and
truth, or a nature and life completely new.
4. The text, then, is but an admonition to upright Christian works,
directed to those who have heard the Gospel and learned to know
Christ. This is what Paul figuratively calls partaking of the true
unleavened bread--or wafers, or cakes. We Germans have borrowed our
word "cakes" from the phraseology of the Jewish Church, abbreviating
"oblaten," wafers, into "fladen," or cakes. How else should we
gentiles get the idea of cakes on Easter, when at our Passover we, by
faith, eat the Paschal Lamb, Christ? We are admonished to partake of
the true unleavened bread, that life and conduct may accord with faith
in Christ, whom we have learned to know. Paul's admonition begins:
"Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?"
5. This by way of introducing the succeeding admonitions. Leaven is a
common figure with the apostle, one he uses frequently, almost
proverbially; employing it, too, in his epistle to the Galatians (ch.
5, 9). Christ, also, gives us a Scripture parable of the leaven. Mt
13, 33. It is the nature of leaven that a small quantity mixed with a
lump of dough will pervade and fill the whole lump until its own acid
nature has been imparted to it. This Paul makes a figure of spiritual
things as regards both doctrine and life.
6. In Galatians 5, 9 he makes it more especially typify false
doctrine. For it is just as true that the introduction of an error in
an article of faith will soon work injury to the whole and result in
the loss of Christ. Thus it was with the Galatians. The one thing
insisted upon by the false apostles was circumcision, though they
fully intended to preach the Gospel of Christ. Such innovation will
pursue its course with destructive sweep until even the uncontaminated
part becomes worthless; the once pure mass is wholly corrupted. The
apostle writes to the Galatians (ch. 5, 2): "Behold, I Paul say unto
you, that, if ye receive circumcision, Christ will profit you
nothing." Again (verse 4), "Ye are severed from Christ--ye are fallen
away from grace."
But in this text he has reference more particularly to an erroneous
idea concerning life and conduct. In this instance it is likewise true
that, once the flesh be allowed any license, and liberty be abused,
and that under the name of the Gospel, there is introduced a leaven
which will speedily corrupt faith and conscience, and continue its
work until Christ and the Gospel are lost. Such would have been the
fate of the Corinthians had not Paul saved them from it by this
epistle admonishing and urging them to purge out the leaven of
license; for they had begun to practice great wantonness, and had
given rise to sects and factions which tended to subvert the one
Gospel and the one faith.
7. This is, then, wise counsel and serious admonition, that faithful
guard be maintained against the infusion or introduction into doctrine
of what is false, whether it pertains to works or faith. The Word of
God, faith and conscience are very delicate things. The old proverb
says: "Non patitur jocum fama, fides, oculus;"--Good reputation, faith
and the eye--these three will bear no jest.
Just as good wine or precious medicines are corrupted by a single drop
of poison or other impurity, and the purer they are, the more readily
defiled and poisoned; so, also, God's Word and his cause will bear
absolutely no alloy. God's truth must be perfectly pure and clear, or
else, it is corrupt and unprofitable. And the worst feature of the
matter is, the sway and intrenchment of evil is so strong that it
cannot be removed; just as leaven, however small the quantity, added
to the lump of dough, soon penetrates and sours the whole lump, while
it is impossible to arrest its influence or once more to sweeten the
dough.
8. The proposal of certain wise minds to mediate, and effect a
compromise, between us and our opponents of the Papacy, is wrong and
useless. They would permit preaching of the Gospel but at the same
time retain the Papistical abuses, advocating that these errors be not
all censured and rejected, because of the weak; and that for the sake
of peace and unity we should somehow moderate and restrict our
demands, each party being ready to yield to the other and patiently
bear with it. While in such case no perfect purity can be claimed to
exist, the situation can be made endurable if discretion is used and
trouble is taken to explain.
Nay, not so! For, as you hear, Paul would not mix even a small
quantity of leaven with the pure lump, and God himself has urgently
forbidden it. The slight alloy would thoroughly penetrate and corrupt
the whole. Where human additions are made to the Gospel doctrine in
but a single point, the injury is done; truth is obscured and souls
are led astray. Therefore, such mixture, such patchwork, in doctrine
is not to be tolerated. As Christ teaches (Mt 9, 16), we must not put
new cloth upon an old garment.
9. Nor may we in our works and in our daily life tolerate the yielding
to the wantonness of the flesh and at the same time boast the Gospel
of Christ, as did the Corinthians, who stirred up among themselves
divisions and disorder, even to the extent of one marrying his
stepmother. In such matters as these, Paul says, a little leaven
leavens and ruins the whole lump--the entire Christian life.
These two things are not consistent with each other: to hold to the
Christian faith and to live after the wantonness of the flesh, in sins
and vices condemned by the conscience. Paul elsewhere warns (1 Cor 6,
9-10): "Be not deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor
adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with men, nor
thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners,
shall inherit the kingdom of God." Again (Gal 5, 19-21): "The works of
the flesh are manifest ... of which I forewarn you, even as I did
forewarn you, that they who practice such things shall not inherit the
kingdom of God."
10. Warrant is given here likewise for censuring and restraining the
rash individuals who assert that men should not be terrified by the
Law, nor surrendered to Satan. No! it is our duty to teach men to
purge out the old leaven; we must tell them they are not Christians,
but devoid of the faith, when they yield to the wantonness of the
flesh and wilfully persevere in sin against the warning of conscience.
We should teach that such sins are so much the more vicious and
damnable when practiced under the name of the Gospel, under cover of
Christian liberty; for that is despising and blaspheming the name of
Christ and the Gospel: and therefore such conduct must be positively
renounced and purged out, as irreconcilable with faith and a good
conscience.
"Purge out the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, even as ye are
unleavened."
11. If we are to be a new, sweet lump, Paul says, we must purge out
the old leaven. For, as stated, a nature renewed by faith and
Christianity will not admit of our living as we did when devoid of
faith and in sin, under the influence of an evil conscience. We cannot
consistently be "a new lump" and partake of the Passover, and at the
same time permit the old leaven to remain: for if the latter be not
purged out, the whole lump will be leavened and corrupted; our
previous sinful nature will again have supremacy and overthrow the
faith, the holiness upon which we have entered and a good conscience.
12. Paul does not here speak of leaven in general; he commands to
purge out the "old leaven," implying there may be good leaven.
Doubtless he is influenced by respect for the words of the Lord Christ
where (Mt 13, 33) he likens the kingdom of heaven also to leaven. In
this latter case leaven cannot be bad in quality; rather, the object
in mixing it with the lump is to produce good, new bread. Reference is
to the Word of God, or the preaching of the Gospel, whereby we are
incorporated into the kingdom of Christ, or the Christian Church.
Though the Gospel appears to be mean, is despicable and objectionable
to the world, yet such is its power that wherever introduced it
spreads, finding disciples in whom it works; it transforms them,
giving to them its own properties, even as leaven imparts its powers
to the dough and causes it to rise.
But Paul refers here to old, inactive and worthless leaven. He means
teachings, views, or manner of life resulting from the Old Adam, from
flesh and blood, and destructive of the pure, new doctrine, or a
nature renewed by Christianity. Later on he terms it the "leaven of
malice and wickedness," and in the verse under consideration bids the
Corinthians be a new, pure lump.
13. Note the apostle's peculiar words. He enjoins purging out the old
leaven, assigning as reason the fact: Ye are a new and unleavened
lump. By a new unleavened lump he means that faith which clings to
Christ and believes in the forgiveness of sin through him; for he
immediately speaks of our Passover: Christ, sacrificed for us. By this
faith the Corinthians are now purified from the old leaven, the leaven
of sin and an evil conscience, and have entered upon the new life; yet
they are commanded to purge out the old leaven.
14. Now, how shall we explain the fact that he bids them purge out the
old leaven that they may be a new lump, when at the same time he
admits them to be unleavened and a new lump? How can these Corinthians
be as true, unleavened wafers, or sweet dough, when they have yet to
purge out the old leaven?
This is an instance of the Pauline and apostolic way of speaking
concerning Christians and the kingdom of Christ; it shows us what the
condition really is. It is a discipline wherein a new, Christian life
is entered upon through faith in Christ the true Passover; hence,
Easter is celebrated with sweet, unleavened bread. But at the same
time something of the old life remains, which must be swept out, or
purged away. However, this latter is not imputed, because faith and
Christ are there, constantly toiling and striving to thoroughly purge
out whatever uncleanness remains.
15. Through faith we have Christ and his purity perfectly conferred
upon ourselves, and we are thus regarded pure; yet in our own personal
nature we are not immediately made wholly pure, without sin or
weakness. Much of the old leaven still remains, but it will be
forgiven, not be imputed to us, if only we continue in faith and are
occupied with purging out that remaining impurity.
This is Christ's thought when he says to his disciples (Jn 15, 3),
"Already ye are clean because of the word which I have spoken unto
you," and in the same connection he declares that the branches in him
must be purged that they may bring forth more fruit. And to Peter--and
to others--he says (Jn 13, 10), "He that is bathed needeth not save to
wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean, but not
all." These passages, as is also stated elsewhere, teach that a
Christian by faith lays hold upon the purity of Christ, for which
reason he is also regarded pure and begins to make progress in purity;
for faith brings the Holy Spirit, who works in man, enabling him to
withstand and to subdue sin.
16. They are to be censured according to whose representations and
views a Christian Church is to be advocated which should be in all
respects without infirmity and defect, and who teach that, when
perfection is not in evidence, there is no such thing as the Church of
Christ nor as true Christians. Many erring spirits, especially strong
pretenders to wisdom, and precocious, self-made saints, immediately
become impatient at sight of any weakness in Christians who profess
the Gospel faith; for their own dreams are of a Church without any
imperfections, a thing impossible in this earthly life, even they
themselves not being perfect.
17. Such, we must know, is the nature of Christ's office and dominion
in his Church that though he really does instantaneously, through
faith, confer upon us his purity, and by the Spirit transforms our
hearts, yet the work of transformation and purification is not at once
completed. Daily Christ works in us and purges us, to the end that we
grow in purity daily. This work he carries on in us through the agency
of the Word, admonishing, reproving, correcting and strengthening; as
in the case of the Corinthians through the instrumentality of Paul.
Christ also uses crosses and afflictions in effecting this end.
He did not come to toil, to suffer and to die because he expected to
find pure and holy people. Purity and holiness for us he has acquired
in his own person to perfection, inasmuch as he was without sin and
perfectly pure from the moment he became man, and this purity and
holiness he communicates to us in their flawless perfection in so far
our faith clings to him. But to attain personal purity of such
perfection requires a daily effort on the part of Christ, until the
time shall have come that he has wrought in us a flawless perfection
like his own.
So he has given us his Word and his Spirit to aid us in purging out
the remaining old leaven, and in holding to our newly-begun purity
instead of lapsing from it. We must retain the faith, the Spirit and
Christ; and this, as before said, we cannot do if we give place to the
old carnal disposition instead of resisting it.
18. Note, one thing the text teaches: Even the saints have weakness,
uncleanness and sin yet to be purged out, but it is not imputed unto
them because they are in Christ and occupied in purging out the old
leaven.
19. Another thing, it teaches what constitutes the difference between
the saints and the unholy, for both are sinful; it tells the nature of
sins despite the presence of which saints and believers are holy,
retaining grace and the Holy Spirit, and also what sins are
inconsistent with faith and grace.
20. The sins remaining in saints after conversion are various evil
inclinations, lusts and desires natural to man and contrary to the Law
of God. The saints, as well as others, are conscious of these sins,
but with this difference: they do not permit themselves to be overcome
thereby so as to obey the sins, allowing them free course; they do not
yield to, but resist, such sins, and, as Paul expresses it here,
incessantly purge themselves therefrom. The sins of the saints,
according to him, are the very ones which they purge out. Those who
obey their lusts, however, do not do this, but give rein to the flesh,
and sin against the protest of their own consciences.
They who resist their sinful lusts retain faith and a good conscience,
a thing impossible with those who fail to resist sin and thus violate
their conscience and overthrow their faith. If you persist in that
which is evil regardless of the voice of conscience, you cannot say,
nor believe, that you have God's favor. So then, the Christian
necessarily must not yield to sinful lusts.
21. The Holy Spirit is given for the very purpose of opposing sin and
preventing its reign. Paul says (Gal 5, 17): "For the flesh lusteth
against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh ... that ye may
not do the things that ye would." And again (Rom 8, 13): "If by the
Spirit ye put to death the deeds of the body, ye shall live." Also
(Rom 6, 12): "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye
should obey the lusts thereof."
"For our passover also hath been sacrificed, even Christ."
["For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us."]
22. Here Paul assigns his reason for the statement just made--"Ye are
unleavened." They are a new, unleavened or sweet lump, not because of
any merit on their part, not because of their own holiness or
worthiness, but because they have faith in Christ as the Passover
sacrificed for them. This sacrifice makes them pure and holy before
God. They are no more the old leaven they were when out of Christ. By
this sacrifice they are reconciled with God and purified from sin.
23. Likewise for us God institutes a new ordinance, a new festival.
The old has given place to something wholly new. A different and
better Passover sacrifice succeeds that of the Jews. The Jews had
annually to partake of their offered sacrifice, but they were not
thereby made holy nor pure from sin. Theirs was a sign or earnest of
the true Passover to come, the Passover promised by God, in the shed
blood of which we are washed from sin and wholly healed--a Passover
the partaking whereof we must enjoy by faith. We have now one
perpetual and eternal Easter festival, wherein faith is nourished,
satisfied and gladdened; in other words, we receive remission of sins
and comfort and strength through this our Passover, Christ.
24. The meaning of the phrase "sacrificed for us" has been explained
in the sermon on the Passion of Christ. Two thoughts are there
presented: First, necessity of considering the greatness and terror of
the wrath of God against sin in that it could be appeased and a ransom
effected in no other way than through the one sacrifice of the Son of
God. Only his death and the shedding of his blood could make
satisfaction. And we must consider also that we by our sinfulness had
incurred that wrath of God and therefore were responsible for the
offering of the Son of God upon the cross and the shedding of his
blood.
Well may we be terrified because of our sins, for God's wrath cannot
be trivial when we are told no sacrifice save alone the Son of God can
brave such wrath and avail for sin. Do you imagine yourself able to
endure that wrath of God, or to withstand it if you will not consider
this and accept it?
25. The second thought presented in the sermon mentioned is, the
necessity of recognizing the inexpressible love and grace of God
toward us. Only so can the terrified heart of man regain comfort. It
must be made aware why God spared not his own Son but offered him a
sacrifice upon the cross, delivered him to death; namely, that his
wrath might be lifted from us once more. What greater love and
blessing could be shown? The sacrifice of Christ is presented to us to
give us sure comfort against the terrors of sin. For we may perceive
and be confident that we shall not be lost because of our sins when
God makes such a sacrifice the precious pledge to us of his favor and
promised salvation.
Therefore, though your sins are great and deserve the awful wrath of
God, yet the sacrifice represented by the death of the Son of God is
infinitely greater. And in this sacrifice God grants you a sure token
of his grace and the forgiveness of your sins. But that forgiveness
must be apprehended by the faith which holds fast the declaration,
"Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us." By this promise must faith
be comforted and strengthened.
"Wherefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with
the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of
sincerity and truth."
26. Having, then, a Paschal Lamb and a true Easter, let us rightly
value them. Let us observe the festival with the gladness it ought to
inspire. Let us no longer eat the old leaven, but true wafers and
paschal cakes. Where the Paschal Lamb is, there must be the unleavened
bread. The former is Christ sacrificed for us. To this sacrifice we
can add nothing; we can only receive and enjoy it by faith,
recognizing it as a gift to us.
However, possessing the Paschal Lamb, it is incumbent upon us to
partake also of the sweet festal bread; in other words, while
embracing the faith of the Passover, we are to maintain the true
doctrine of the Gospel, illustrating it by the godly example of our
own lives. We should live an eternal Easter life, as it were, to carry
out Paul's analogy, a life wherein we, as justified, sanctified and
purified people, continue in peace and the joy of the Holy Spirit, so
long as we remain on earth.
27. In this verse, as in the preceding one, Paul contrasts the leaven
and the unleavened bread. He makes leaven a general term for
everything which proceeds from flesh and blood and an unrenewed sinful
nature, but classifies it under two heads--the leaven of malice and
the leaven of wickedness. By "malice" we understand the various open
vices and sins which represent manifest wrong to God and our neighbor.
"Wickedness" stands for those numerous evil tricks, those nimble,
subtle, venomous artifices practiced upon Christian doctrine and the
Word of God with intent to corrupt and pervert them, to mislead hearts
from the true meaning thereof. Paul warns (2 Cor 11, 3): "But I fear,
lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, your
minds should be corrupted from the simplicity and the purity that is
toward Christ." Under "wickedness" comes also such evils as hypocrisy
and other false, deceptive dealing practiced in the name of God by way
of adorning and covering the sin; false teaching and deceptive action
passed off as right, proper and Christian. Such wickedness Christ
terms "the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod." Mk 8, 15.
This sort of leaven, particularly, we have in the world to an
unspeakable extent in this last and worst of times.
28. To the leaven of malice and of wickedness, Paul opposes the leaven
of sincerity and truth. To be sincere is to live and act in an upright
Christian way, prompted by a faithful, godly heart, a heart kindly
disposed to all and meditating wrong and injury to none; and to deal
as you would be dealt with. To be true is to refrain from false and
crafty dealing, from deceit and roguery, and to teach and live in
probity and righteousness according to the pure Word of God. Truth and
sincerity must prevail and be in evidence with Christians, who have
entered upon a relation and life altogether new; they should celebrate
the new Easter festival by bringing faith and doctrine and life into
accord with it.
_Easter Monday_
Text: Acts 10, 34-43.
34 And Peter opened his mouth, and said: Of a truth I perceive that
God is no respecter of persons: 35 but in every nation he that feareth
him, and worketh righteousness, is acceptable to him. 36 The word
which he sent unto the children of Israel, preaching good tidings of
peace by Jesus Christ (he is Lord of all)--37 that saying ye
yourselves know, which was published throughout all Judæa, beginning
from Galilee, after the baptism which John preached; 38 even Jesus of
Nazareth, how God anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power:
who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the
devil; for God was with him. 39 And we are witnesses of all things
which he did both in the country of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom
also they slew, hanging him on a tree. 40 Him God raised up the third
day, and gave him to be made manifest, 41 not to all the people, but
unto witnesses that were chosen before of God, even to us, who ate and
drank with him after he rose from the dead. 42 And he charged us to
preach unto the people, and to testify that this is he who is ordained
of God to be the Judge of the living and the dead. 43 To him bear all
the prophets witness, that through his name every one that believeth
on him shall receive remission of sins.