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Power and Humility
Rachel Held Adams writes about Mark Driscoll* and such mega-church consumerist evangelicalism: When you build your church and your culture around hierarchy and power, you are naturally going to be 1) highly-organized, and 2) personality focused. But when you build your church and your culture around humility and service, you are naturally going to be 1) organic, growing at the grassroots level, and 2) less dependent on one or two flashy personalities and more dependent on the daily faithfulness of regular people…. The Mark Driscolls of this world pull in (and publicize) the big numbers because that is how they measure success…. We are part of a living, growing Kingdom in which the last will be first and the first will be last, in which the peacemakers and the merciful and the meek … Read entire article »
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A Rant which May not Impress You, if Read Correctly
“How many of us have actually ever read through the Bible? We get bits and pieces of it, but never read through chapter-by-chapter.” A layperson said this to me the other day. The … Read more »
Law/Gospel Outlines?
I preached an unusual sermon Sunday. It was the infamous Law/Gospel outline. You probably have heard thousands of these. I’ve preached my fair share. Here’s the way they usually go: Here’s the Word … Read more »
Sermon Writing Advice
This is inside baseball, folks, so your mileage may vary. Whatever lectionary (sequence of readings for Sundays) you use, you’ll end up with three readings and propers (introit, gradual, etc) for the Sunday. … Read more »
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Holy Cross Day
On this day in 335 AD the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was dedicated in Jerusalem with a piece of the True Cross that St. Helena, mother of St. Constantine the Emperor … Read more »
Another Pastor Leaves
Dan Woodring announces his conversion to Roman Catholicism on his blog. Dan was active in Higher Things, a confessional Youth Organization, and somewhat prominent in the Confessional scene within the LCMS. The … Read more »
What is the Big Deal?
My wife couldn’t quite pin down what the deal was. She calls the Blessed Virgin “Mary, the mother of our Lord.” She said, obviously, that my Lord is God. Quite right. And this … Read more »
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A Rant which May not Impress You, if Read Correctly
“How many of us have actually ever read through the Bible? We get bits and pieces of it, but never read through chapter-by-chapter.” A layperson said this to me the other day. The more I think about it, the more upset I get. I get upset with myself for not reading Scripture devotionally as often as I should. But I get really upset with others if its true. Is it true? Are you all completely ignoring the Word of God to such an extent that your only exposure to it is the readings on Sundays and the bits and pieces and verses you might read in The Witness or the occasional Bible study you attend? Seriously? You call … Read entire article »
Law/Gospel Outlines?
I preached an unusual sermon Sunday. It was the infamous Law/Gospel outline. You probably have heard thousands of these. I’ve preached my fair share. Here’s the way they usually go: Here’s the Word of God. Oh, there’s law. God says you should be doing such and such. You don’t. You need Jesus to forgive you. Conclusion. It’s not a horrible outline, but I think it should be generally avoided. While Lutherans are supposed to properly distinguish Law and Gospel, that doesn’t mean to use it as an outline. Rather, it means to distinguish between the works of the Law and Gospel, the work of law and law of love, the work of flesh versus the life of … Read entire article »
Sermon Writing Advice
This is inside baseball, folks, so your mileage may vary. Whatever lectionary (sequence of readings for Sundays) you use, you’ll end up with three readings and propers (introit, gradual, etc) for the Sunday. Often they work together, with a common theme bridging all the propers together. This is very common in the One Year lectionary, especially with the collect, introit and Gospel. But don’t assume they all go together the same way, or that you have to connect them. Look, especially in the Three Year lectionary, there is the feature of a lectio continua (or really a lectio semi-continua) –a series of readings from one book, not necessarily coordinated with the Gospel. And in the One Year … Read entire article »
Dare we Neglect the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity?
This article shows us why the worship of the Holy Trinity is at the heart of our Christian faith. Because we have failed to affirm the One in Three and Three in One at every time and place and place Him in the center of our worship and thought and sermons we have this false religion which denies the essence of … Read entire article »
Unionism and Worship
Why is it that the LCMS seems more concerned with “joint worship” and “serial prayer” with other ministers than with the forms of worship? I mean, some congregations’ worship is identical to worship at any number of protestant churches down the street from them and there are no “rules” or CTCR statements regarding this. What sends a bigger message of … Read entire article »
Admitting Inexperience and Leading Nonetheless
Some of the Lutheran pastors and I were supposed to study Greek this morning, but instead, we spoke about causistry and pastoral practice–wedding stuff, mostly. It is fun and thought-provoking, to consider what I usually do and how it differs with some of the other pastors’ practices. But one bit of discussion stood out for me: the importance of being earnest, of just speaking the truth. Admitting ignorance, admitting inexperience, admitting weakness. It’s actually quite powerful. It relaxes you, it relaxes those around you. It helps your hearers or co-workers or audience know what to expect. It’s even more authoritative, though it sounds like it would be the opposite. Leaders don’t want to admit they are wrong … Read entire article »
Back with Both Feet In
Something about returning from vacation and being up to your neck in work and church and family schedules… it makes you want at least another week just for decompression. Ease back into it, you know? Maybe I should be preparing better. In happy news, Christmas Eve worship was beautiful, Christmas Day was wonderful, St. Nicholas was good to us, God was … Read entire article »
Merry Christmas and Auf Wiederlesen!
An early Merry Christmas to all of you. This will be my last post until after the new year. I’ll be spending time with the family until Monday, when we will all load in the car and drive, drive, drive to Tennessee to see my in-laws. I’m looking forward to being offline for the next ten days. I may go through Skyrim withdrawal, but that might not be a bad thing either. I have mixed feelings about being gone next week. We have a number of folks here having surgery and going through some heavy trials, and part of me wants to be around or available. But I want and need to see my in-laws who … Read entire article »
National Lutheran Pastor’s Wives Day
Ok. Actually the commemoration of Katherina Von Bora, the wife of Martin Luther. Legend has it she was the author of the “What does this mean?” portions of the catechism, as Martin would ask himself that aloud, and Katie told him. Like a good pastor’s wife, full of wisdom. They would also write and direct children’s Christmas programs for their kids … Read entire article »
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- Christopher Hall on A Rant which May not Impress You, if Read Correctly
"See. You're not impressed. :) Seriously I sympathize with what you are writin…" - Chris Jones on A Rant which May not Impress You, if Read Correctly
"This is a modern problem, which is to say that from a Christian perspective it i…" - Christopher Hall on Law/Gospel Outlines?
"I think your opinion is very good, Chris. And Bill...hmmm...not a fan of preachi…" - Chris Gillespie on Law/Gospel Outlines?
"I'm a novice so my opinion isn't worth much. I try to communicate the theme(s) o…" - weedon on Law/Gospel Outlines?
"Odd as it may sound, my usual outline is OT to Gospel to Epistle. Within this r…"