Holy Spirit

LCMS President on unity in doctrine and life (second of three)

July 12, 2010

In the quotation I posted yesterday, C.F.W. Walther (the first LCMS president) talked about the disastrous effects of disunity. Here he speaks about the blessings of unity in the Church: Christian unity always produces a blessing. If the Church is one in doctrine and life, in faith and love, it shares its gifts and knowledge. [...]

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Pentecost sermon

May 25, 2010

Employing technology is not morally or spiritually neutral. Scientific advancements bring new problems, as the tools we use end up using us, changing us. The invention of the automobile, the airplane, the telephone, and now mobile technologies have changed how and where people live, how we see the world and interact with each other. You’ve [...]

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Litany of the Holy Ghost

May 19, 2010

We’re observing the Vigil of Pentecost a few days early at Immanuel, since we have a regular Wednesday evening service (usually Vespers or Evening Prayer). The following is the Litany that we will pray tonight. I don’t know its original source, but I found it in Daniel Reuning’s Historic Lectionary Resources. P Lord, have mercy [...]

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All Christians Are Members of a Holy Order

May 17, 2010

Luther on John 14: A Christian, however, can glory truthfully and with good reason, and he can say: “I believe in the Holy Spirit, who makes me and all believers holy. Therefore I am a member of a holy order, not that of St. Francis but that of Christ, who makes me holy through His [...]

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Pentecost

May 31, 2009

Note: Linden Katherine Hemingway was baptized during the Divine Service at which this sermon was preached. Spirit – it seems impossible to grab hold of what that really is. Spirit is something shapeless and ephemeral, usually synonymous with enthusiasm or excitement: like team spirit or school spirit. Precisely because you can’t nail “spirit” down, it’s [...]

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Exaudi – the Sunday after the Ascension

May 24, 2009

  Today is an in-between Sunday. The Ascension was this past Thursday, and Pentecost is next Sunday. Jesus left the disciples, and the Spirit had not yet come. They were left to themselves. What happens when you are left to yourself? When a Christian comes face-to-face with his failings, his imperfections, his selfishness, lack of [...]

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The Holy Spirit's public witness

May 22, 2009

Luther on the objectivity of the Holy Spirit’s testimony: No one in need of comfort, therefore, should wait until the Holy spirit in all his majesty speaks to him personally from heaven. For the Holy Spirit carries out his witness publicly in the sermon. That is where you must seek and await him, till the [...]

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Filioque

May 22, 2009

St. Augustine on the procession of the Spirit from the Father and the Son: Perhaps someone may ask whether the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Son. For the Son is the Son of the Father alone, and the Father is Father only of the Son; but the Holy Ghost is not the Spirit of one [...]

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Lent 5 midweek sermon: Romans 7.1–8.1

April 1, 2009

This sermon concludes our Lenten midweek services, wherein we read and meditated upon Romans 4:1–8:1. When President Bush landed on USS Abraham Lincoln on May 1, 2003 to announce the end of major combat operations in Iraq, there was a banner displaying the words “Mission Accomplished.” That phrase would later come to haunt Bush’s presidency, [...]

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Spirit bearing witness

January 13, 2009

The Venerable Bede, on the meaning of Jesus’ baptism: When the Lord was baptized in the Jordan, the Spirit descended on him in the form of a dove, bearing witness that he is the truth, that he is the true Son of God, that he is the true Mediator between God and humanity, that he [...]

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