O perfect life of love! All, all, is finished now.
All that He left His throne above
To do for us below.
No work is left undone of all the Father willed;
His toil, His sorrows, one by one,
The Scriptures have fulfilled.
No pain that we can share but He has felt its smart;
All forms of human grief and care
Have pierced that tender heart.
And on His thorn-crowned head and on His sinless soul
Our sins in all their guilt were laid
That He might make us whole.
In perfect love He dies; for me He dies, for me.
O all atoning Sacrifice,
I cling by faith to Thee.
In every time of need, before the judgment throne,
Thy work, O Lamb of God, I’ll plead,
Thy merits, not mine own.
Yet, work, O Lord, in me as Thou for me hast wrought;
And let my love the answer be
To grace Thy love has brought.
~Henry W. Baker
Artwork by Paulo DuqueFrade, Gilles Catelin and Alonso Cano
For by grace you have been saved through faith;
“Therefore it is for the children. The child is small and knows he is small (that is all that Jesus singles out in the child; He says nothing of his innocence, loveliness, or charm); the child is always looking up to persons greater than he; he cannot ever forget how small he is, and he has not yet learned to deceive himself into the belief that he is as big as anybody. The child receives. Children are the world’s best askers and beggars; they are the world’s best accepters of gifts and receivers of presents. – The finest characterization of our Lutheran Confessions is Schlink’s, who says that they breathe the air of child’s delight at having received a gift. “Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” “Humble himself” – a child does not make himself smaller than he is; he knows how small he actually is. That is why turning, being converted, is a turning to childhood. That is why greatness comes to the childlike. The emptiest receives most; only he will be great for whom “greatness” has lost all meaning, for whom only God is great, as only God is good. God is Creator, and he works ex nihilo. He puts Himself into selfless lives; He pours the wine of His gladness into empty cups; He fills empty hands; He justifies the ungodly and raises the dead. When the brazen idol of our greatness has melted before the blaze of God’s greatness and lies a little pool to reflect God’s glory and the glory of our lord Jesus Christ, then we shall have begun to be Christians, then we have become at least apprentice theologians.” ~Martin Franzmann
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