A blog of the Evangelical Lutheran Liturgy
One of the great joys of having a Lutheran school is being able to proclaim the Word of God to the students in chapel every day. This can be a difficult thing to navigate, especially as the age and maturity of the students can range so drastically, even in elementary school!
Read MoreIn secular Greek, at the time of the New Testament, the word ekklessia meant an assembly or a gathering. In the New Testament it is used a jargon word that for those who are gathered by God as His people. See, in particular, Acts 2:47, 5:11. 7:38, 8:1, and 9:31. We often translate ekklesia into English as “church, but in English the word “church” is more than just people.
Read MoreAs Easter approaches, the crass marketing gets ramped up. We will soon see the embarrassing spectacle of CoWo pastors wearing bunny ears and turning our Lord’s resurrection into something being promoted by the ubiquitous publicity and marketing firm of Fake & Gay.
Read MoreA sermon for Sexagesima
Read MoreFirst let us get the scene itself clearly before us. The path, which is spoken of here, is not intended to receive seed; its function is to enable people to walk upon it. It is beaten down and quite smooth. There are even asphalted paths and there are asphalted hearts too. They are smooth and often they look quite presentable. In human intercourse they play their part. Paths and streets also have names; you must know them if you want to get somewhere. And there are a great many people whom you must know—just as you must know these streets—if you want to get somewhere. They hold key positions, they are influential, and only through them will you get somewhere. This is good and quite in order. Nobody will blame a person for being influential. And nobody will blame a path for not being a field or for being hard. On the contrary! But that which is an advantage in one way can be a hindrance in another.
Read MoreFor longer blogposts, I often embed an audio feature that allows you to listen to a post. Is this helpful? Do you use this feature? Is it worth continuing to do this?
Read MoreThe perfect church service would be one we were almost unaware of; our attention would have been on God. But every novelty prevents this. It fixes our attention on the service itself; and thinking about the worship is a different thing from worshipping.
Read MoreOur regular guest contributor, the Rev. Vincent Shemwell, recently appeared to discuss usury in the history and life of the church on the popular podcast “On the Line.” Take a look/listen, and you can read in more detail about any of the eras or authors mentioned using the index below. You can also hear an interview on the subject with Rev. Shemwell on the Gottesdienst podcast.
Read MoreOne of the personal organizing principles I have adopted is called the Stockdale Paradox. Admiral Stockdale was the ranking U.S. prisoner of war in Vietnam. He observed that men who clung to unfounded optimism were the men who failed and died as POW’s but those who faced their brutal circumstances head-on, and at the same time kept faith that they would prevail, are the ones who survived and even thrived in difficult times.
Read MoreIn the years immediately preceding the 1869 General Convention, Walther, as synodical president, advanced his opposition to lending at interest with a vehemence that was increasingly impossible to ignore. This growing boldness obviously did not go unanswered by those with a more permissive view of usury. For instance, in January 1867, an article published in the American Lutheran, commenting on Walther’s theses against usury, expressed the author’s lament over what he derisively described as the “sheer impracticality of the so-called Old Lutherans.” Rather than retreat, Walther replied to the attack with open polemic, writing (Lehre und Wehre XIII [February 1867], 54): “We firmly believe that nothing could cause the ‘American Lutherans’ to recoil from us so-called Old Lutherans more irrevocably than Luther’s teaching on usury; for a Christianity that demands more than so-called revivals, after which one continues, as a businessman, to act exactly as before, is, to them, an intolerable inconvenience.”
Read MoreThe world wants us to believe that deviant sexuality is just another shade of normalcy, that two men or two women in a sexual relationship can be a “marriage” and the source of a stable, moral, and wholesome environment for raising children. And liberal Christians have every manner of workaround to explain away “fundamentalist” passages in the Scriptures that say things that conflict with our postmodern permissive take on sexuality.
Read MoreI have read some foolish, naïve, and stupid responses, borne of ignorance and romantic illusions. The one response that I think is spot-on was offered by Ad Crucem News. You can read it here. I highly recommend that you do so! My thoughts on this are based on my own encounters with Antifa mobs over the course of the summer of 2017 in New Orleans. I received a quick and immersive education on the subject.
Read MoreAnd yes, finding an authentic Lutheran liturgy can seem like groping about in the dark, and can be frustrating, demoralizing, and discouraging, there is a resource that can help.
Read MoreLeave off, I say, the folly of modern day ‘witnessing’ of Jesus, and confess, rather, the testimony of these Apostles. Let the pure light of the Apostolic witness shine forth. Ponder instead in your heart their witness to you, and if you would speak about the Lord Jesus, speak of their witness.
Read MoreThe above video is, at the same time, funny, tragic, illustrative, and instructive.
Read MoreWe Lutherans sometimes fall victim to the “too Catholic” superstition. We are ashamed of our venerable traditions of blessing people and objects, even when they appear in our Small Catechism,
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