Second Sunday of Lent (Heb. 1:10–2:3; Mk. 2:1–12)

“I am the door: whoever enters through Me will be saved” (Jn. 10:9). This is the same as what the Lord says elsewhere: ”No one comes to the Father except through Me” (Jn. 14:6).

And He confirmed it even more directly when He said: ”Apart from Me you can do nothing” (Jn. 15:5).

A true Christian is one who is wholly in Christ, and who has everything of value within himself from Christ. His justification is Christ’s, and his body also is Christ’s. The one who is saved is saved because he is clothed in Christ. Only in this state does he have access to the Father. We are those who have fallen away from God and are therefore under His wrath. Only when God’s justice yields and His mercy extends toward us and receives us as we draw near—when we draw near in Christ and through Christ—only then are we accepted. The seal of Christ is imprinted on the whole nature of the Christian, and the one who bears it will walk through the valley of the shadow of death and fear no evil. For this purpose we have the sacraments—baptism and holy communion, mediated for post-baptismal sinners by repentance. But this is from the Lord’s side; on our side, to receive them, the proper receptive dispositions must be formed in the spirit: faith, which confesses, “I am lost and am saved only by the Lord Jesus Christ”; love, which strives to dedicate everything to the Lord and Savior, sparing nothing; and hope, which, expecting nothing from itself, is confident that it will not be abandoned by the Lord, but will receive from Him every help—both inward and outward—throughout life, until it is taken to where He Himself is.