Beautiful Feet! Romans 10:5-17

Today we’re going to talk about beautiful feet, the feet that carry those who proclaim the good news.

It must be tough to be a foot; to have someday standing on you or walking on you every day, especially if you have plantar fasciitis, or neuropathy, or some other ailment.

When your foot or feet are injured, it’s hard to be on them, every step hurts. When they heal, it feels so much better.

Yet even when our feet are hurting we must go on and do our jobs, and live our lives. Even when it’s difficult to do so, we must go on believing the good news, and sharing it with others.

In our epistle today Paul quotes Isaiah in saying how blessed and beautiful are the feet that carry the good news, and he makes clear that the good news is the message of salvation by faith in Christ.  

Paul begins by contrasting the righteousness that comes by keeping the law, the commandments, to the righteousness that comes by the gospel, by faith.

God commands us to keep his laws, and if we do, we’re righteous, having no guilt, and having no reason to die, having every reason to live in the presence of God. But nobody has ever been able to do that, except One. 

And so our epistle reminds that our righteousness, and thus our salvation, can only come by faith in One who has done this, Jesus, and not by our good works.

It’s vanity to think that we can earn our salvation by our own deeds. To believe that one has to be very unaware of his or her shortcomings.

Paul is addressing this impossibility of saving oneself when he says, Do not say in your heart, Who will ascend into heaven (to bring Christ down), or who will descend into the abyss (to bring Christ up from the dead).

Only God could send His Son from heaven to save the world, and only Jesus could do what needed to be done to save us.

And only God could raise his Son from the grave for our eternal life, not any of us.

If we could do what Christ did, come down from heaven, live a perfect life, die to win forgiveness for the world, and then rise for the salvation of the world, if we could do that then we wouldn’t need to believe in Jesus for our salvation; we could just believe in ourselves.

But none of us can do any of that, so we need to believe in the only One who could, and did.

In our Gospel today, we see the failings of even the great disciple, Peter, as doubt overcame him, and he could only reach up for Jesus to save him.

In our Old Testament, God confronts Job’s vanity in blaming God for his troubles. And he reminds Job that he is God and Job is not. He’s the one who made the world. And we can add to that, redeemed the world.

So rather than blaming God for our troubles, the answer is to repent of your lack of faith, and believe in Him to help you in the way that He knows is best. Have faith in Him.

Regarding faith, Paul goes on in our epistle and says, the Word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart (the word of faith we proclaim), the message that we’re saved by faith in Christ.

Paul is quoting Moses in Deuteronomy 30:12-14, ¹² It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ ¹³ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ ¹⁴ But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.

Paul makes clear that this means believing it; it happens in your heart, that’s faith!

Verse 9, because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

Your mouth says what your heart believes, when you’re being consistent. When we proclaim the Creed, when that’s what your heart truly believes, then you’re justified before God for eternal salvation, for love and joy and glory forever.

Verse 11, For as the Scripture says, Everyone who believes in Him will not be put to shame. Paul is paraphrasing Isaiah 28:16.

We can look back in life, and see things or people we trusted in, and now wish we hadn’t. That won’t happen with putting your trust in Jesus. You wont’ be sorry.

Peter must regreted when he didn’t trust Jesus and began to sink in the sea, and he was happy when he did trust him and take hold of his hand.

How much more happy Peter was, when, after suffering the great injustice and crime of being martyred, killed by the enemies of Christ, he was taken into the glory of heaven.

I can say without a doubt that Peter now has no regrets for following Christ.

In the same way, we will have no regrets for having denounced sin and the devil, and having confessed our faith in Christ.

Jesus will not leave us hanging. He didn’t leave Peter hanging but reached down and saved him; He didn’t leave Job in his grief; He won’t leave us in our troubles.

Most of all He won’t leave us without an eternal home after we die. In Christ, we will live forever with no regrets, no shame, no sorrow.

How sad it would have been if we had never been told of all this, the gospel. How blessed we are that someone shared this good news with us.

Our Epistle says, How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”  Again Paul is quoting Isaiah.

If Jesus had never sent His Spirit to empower the apostles to go out into the world and proclaim his death and resurrection, and if people had not continued to share the gospel in every generation, then where would we be today?

We’d be left never having heard it, and not believing.  Thanks be to God that that’s not the case. 

Two years ago we celebrated our 150^th Anniversary, and we remembered and gave thanks for the pastors and teachers who taught the Word of God to our forefathers in this place.

I read in the chronicles of the congregation that our first missionary pastor would walk through the trees and around the slews to get to Winsted, to preach the gospel there, and baptize, and give Holy Communion.

One of my professors in college told me about his grandfather who walked from my home town of Canby, Minnesota to White, South Dakota, to preach the gospel there, about 30 miles across the prairie, and then back again. He said he died at 51; his body was all broken down because it was so hard on him to make that journey all those years.

How beautiful those feet that walked across the prairie to bring the good news to those homesteaders in South Dakota in the 1870s.

How beautiful the feet that brought the gospel to Hollywood Township, and from here to McLeod County.

How beautiful those pioneers who started this church with a school, and saw to it that their children heard the good news so they could have grace and faith to live by.

How beautiful your grandparents and parents who shared the gospel with you, and brought you here, or to another church to hear it.

How beautiful when you share the good news with your children and grandchildren.

How beautiful this church, when we, who know Christ, make him known in our community and beyond.

Without the gospel there’s no chance for us or anyone. With it comes the opportunity and power to believe.

Always believe and confess the good news you’ve been given, and look for opportunities to share it with someone who hasn’t heard it, or needs to hear it.

It’s a beautiful thing to do!

And as you share the good news, know that the peace of God, which passes understanding, will guard your heart and mind, in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.