As many of you heard from Pastor von Hindenburg last week when he referred to a recent Bible study: ”God is love… He does not desire the death of a sinner, but rather that he would turn from his wicked way and live.” That is true.
Even so, the Divine love of which we speak in the One True Church is not how the world understands that word, love. …For more, click on the title above.
Category: Sermons
There is no other God
A lot of people are mad at us this week. Not at you, in particular, not even at the pastor. They’re mad at Christians in general.
Why? Well, this is the week of the church year in which we Christians don’t play nice with the rest of the world. We are exclusive. We make claims about God that many other people on the planet cannot stomach and will not tolerate. …For more, click on the title above.
Holy, Holy, Holy
“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts! The whole earth is full of his glory.”
This is the call of the angels. And with the angels’ song and Isaiah’s reaction to what he sees, we learn something about who God is, about who He is as the most holy above all things. …For more, click on the title above.
Whit Tuesday: Remembering the gift of the Law
We, as Lutherans, believe that we receive through Baptism; forgiveness of sins, deliverance from death and the devil, and the promise of eternal salvation. We also know that none of these come about from our own doing—they are gifts. We receive the Holy Spirit through the water and the Word so that we might have faith to believe in the promises of God. These Samaritans had been baptized, but our text says they had not received the Holy Spirit….For more, click on the title above.
The church in Christ speaks one language to all nations
Fifty days have passed since our celebration of Christ’s resurrection from the dead. According to ancient calendars brought into our day, this is the third great feast of the Church Year. In the Israelite tradition, Pentecost had been held 50 days, that is, seven weeks plus one day, after the wave offering of the barley sheaf during the Feast of Unleavened Bread (Lev. 23:15-16). It was also called the Feast of Harvest (Ex. 23:16; cf. 34:22) and, “The day of first fruits…“(Num. 28:26)….For more, click on the title above.
Remain in sacrificial love, sharing it in prayer
The Epistle reading for today, in its original language, appears to be divided into just three sentences. It is composed of just 81 words that are recorded in texts with the
best testimony as to that which was long ago contained in the Autographs. (Those are the original New Testament manuscripts of the Apostles and Evangelists).
As today’s I Peter text is combined with the other readings chosen long ago for public proclamation on this day named Exaudi, that is, “’Hear,” Sunday, the Holy Spirit continues to use it to call the faithful to continue clinging to God’s Word. We are freed to do so with the biblical surety that He does hear us….For more, click on the title above.
The ascended Christ and the earthbound church
We have this attitude about us sometimes, don’t we, when we’re approaching the apostles within the Scriptural narrative, that we are supposed to find a way to fold ourselves into them. That is, we’re supposed to identify with the apostles in some kind of Christological way. I can say that our lives are supposed to be cruciform, that is, grafted into Christ’s pattern of suffering and exemplifying His love. But that’s done through the power of the Holy Spirit and was a clear promise from the Father echoing throughout both the Old and the New Testaments. We have no such promise regarding the apostolic life. …For more, click on the title above.
The peace that surpasses every human mind
Today, that you might hear what the assembled pastors and other professional Church workers heard at Advent Evangelical Lutheran Church in Zionsville, IN, the text of that sermon with be soon proclaimed from this pulpit. This is, in part, because pastors that are called to this congregation are responsible to inform our members of that which we are asked to proclaim elsewhere.
Before that, though, it can be helpful for us to remember that, during this week of the Church Year, God’s Word leads us into an annual time that is specifically set aside for prayer. …For more, click on the title above.
God builds His church
Today the Christian Church remembers two pieces of this foundation: St. Philip and St. James. Through his prophets and apostles, God laid the foundation. God built the house, every wall, room, and floor on the Cornerstone of Christ Jesus, not with brick and mortar, but with his holy precious blood and his innocent suffering and death. …For more, click on the title above.
Kyrie Eleison
what is this week in the Easter season? Cantate Sunday. Cantate is Latin for sing; so that makes this Singing Sunday. This name is based on the incipit of the Introit (which we learned about in Bible class a few weeks ago) for this Sunday which comes from Psalm 98, “Oh sing to the Lord a new song.”…For more, click on the title above.