One of the ways I know the Father is talking to me is when the same message arrives from several different sources. Take today, for instance.

I’d been thinking a lot about grace. In teaching Romans–I’m about to do that for the sixth time since the first of January–the subject of grace figures prominently into Paul’s presentation of the gospel message. In that epistle, he keeps hammering on the fact that if salvation is by grace, then it’s not by works, not by law, not by heritage, nor birth nor merit of any kind whatsoever. If salvation is by grace, then no human can take credit for it and no one can boast about receiving it. It’s of God from first to last. All we can do is receive it or reject it.

A front-page article in the Times-Picayune for today (Thursday, February 7, 2008) was headlined “N.O. nuns play role in Giants’ miracle.” Subtitle: “Their medal provides divine intervention.”

Sister Kathleen Finnerty, Superintendent of Schools for the Archdiocese of New Orleans, used to head a school in New York City where Giants’ owner John Mara’s children attended. Since she and the nuns of the Ursuline Convent are big football fans, rooting especially for local boys Payton and Eli Manning, they were praying for the Giants to win the Super Bowl game last Sunday evening. Sister Kathleen told the newspaper, “Some of the sisters down here are 80 to 90 years old, and they are football addicts. So, when the Giants made the Super Bowl, one of them said to me, ‘We can’t let Eli down. We have to get Our Lady in on this.'”

That’s what she said: “We have to get Our Lady in on this.”

With that, they took a medal of the Blessed Virgin and blessed it, and Sister Kathleen mailed it off to John Mara. “I think I wrote that the Giants could use a little divine intervention,” she says.

The reporter notes that during the game, Mara was spotted reaching into his pocket on several occasions. Someone asked what he was doing and he told them, “I had a little medal this nun sent me. She sent me a great letter a couple of days ago with this medal of the Blessed Virgin, and she said, ‘I guarantee you this will bring you luck.’ I did reach in for that.”

Now, I’m not sure how much of that was serious and how much was tongue-in-cheek and I’m not going to act like a Baptist and criticize the Catholics. Just reporting the story.

Then, the February 11, 2008, copy of Newsweek arrived this morning. Page 16. Headline: “4 Sale: Bones of the Saints” by Lisa Miller. Subject: religious relics are being sold on eBay, some for bids starting as low as 40 dollars.

Relics are “sacred objects of veneration,” Miller says, “souvenirs of a holy life.” In most cases they are a hank of hair or a piece of a bone from a saint. “Tiny antique body parts,” she calls them.

To a lot of people, but mostly Roman Catholics, such relics “have healing powers,” the article states. But while the Catholic Church loves those things (the basement of the Vatican is filled with such), it forbids the buying and selling of them. A fellow in Los Angeles, Tom Serafin, is working non-stop these days to putting a stop to eBay’s selling relics. Ironically, Mr. Serafin collects relics himself.

Serafin owns 1200 relics, most of which he says were given to him after he kept asking for them. He keeps them in two giant safes in his home. Among his most prized possessions are a piece of “The True Cross” and a splinter of the crown of thorns. That’s what he says.

Later this month, a few of Serafin’s most treasured relics are going on display in Manila where the archbishop anticipates 1.5 million people will come to “venerate” them. (“Venerate” = “to regard with respect and reverence.” It ain’t worship, but stops a half-inch short.)

The Newsweek article ends with this telling paragraph:

“The sale of relics on eBay may just be another small sign of our society’s lust for material satisfaction, but the ire it provokes is deep and old. Is it really possible to purchase a piece of God’s grace and mystery with a credit card? Or are such gifts given by God alone? These are the questions that prompted Luther to nail his memo to the church door in 1517; it is certainly too much to expect the folks at eBay to have to answer them.”

I read somewhere that London Pastor John Stott was sharing the gospel with a coal miner who could not grasp the concept of grace. “I have to deserve it,” he kept insisting. Finally, Stott said, “How did you get down into the mines this morning?” The miner said, “Rode the elevator down, the same way I do every day.” Stott said, “That must have been very expensive. How can you afford it?”

“Oh, it’s free,” he laughed. “Free to me, but it sure cost the mine owner a lot of money!”

Pastor Stott said, “My point exactly. God’s salvation is free to you and me, but it cost Him dearly in giving His only begotten Son to die on Calvary.”

In case anyone thought Martin Luther settled that issue nearly 500 years ago, it’s time to think again.