This month we celebrated the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. This formational political document invokes “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God.” Political independence for the founders never meant independence from God. And He has put our Synod here for this moment. The Creed we confess is a Declaration of Dependence….
Read More“First be reconciled to your brother.” First. Wouldn’t you rather it be last? When someone is angry with you, do you want to go to the person and get it resolved right away?
It’s easier to tell someone else. To complain. To spin the narrative such that the other person looks bad. “It’s not my fault. It’s never my fault. Everybody else around here is terrible.”
Read More“Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it.” That was man’s original work. Get married, have babies, make the world beautifully ordered.
But there is a great difference between work and labor. Work is good. Labor is what happens when death enters the world, and creation becomes hostile.
Read MoreMost of the parables Jesus tells are stories. Today’s parables are just brief images. They have the Lord’s characteristic absurdity. You have a blind man being led by another blind man. And you have an eye surgeon who is going to remove a splinter from a patient; but the surgeon has a beam sticking out of his eye, the kind of long board you’d pick up at a lumberyard. This is camels going through eyes of needles kind of stuff, or a farmer who just throws the seed everywhere. Jesus uses absurdity and hyperbole to make the point: Blind people shouldn’t lead the parade, and people with logs in their eyes shouldn’t be surgeons. He applies that to life in the church. Deal with your own blindness. Deal with the beam in your own eye.
What’s happened in recent years, though, is the splinter and the plank have been reinterpreted to mean little sins and big sins.
Read MoreIn today’s Gospel, Jesus tells the Apostles to go and tell people about His resurrection and forgiveness. You have something similar at the end of Matthew, where Jesus tells the Apostles to go and make disciples by baptizing and teaching. These are all works of the Holy Spirit. The call for the apostles to go and absolve is preceded by Jesus giving them the Spirit. In Acts 2, when the people are brought to contrition for their sins, Peter announces to them the gift of Baptism, which bestows forgiveness and the Holy Spirit. He even says it is for the children along with their parents. Jesus established means to deliver to us His gifts.
Remember a couple of weeks ago, we saw that the New Testament never calls pastors “priests.” We have other words like bishops, presbyters, pastors, rulers, teachers, and deacons – but never priests. That’s because Jesus is the last and final priest. He is the one mediator between God and man….
Read MoreMy only experience with caissons is in the logistics of death. I’ve walked behind caissons at Arlington Cemetery, as the body rolls to its resting place. These committals have taps, and guns, and an officer with a folded flag. Other burials have just a few people, grieving alone while the madding crowd continues its frenzy, oblivious to their doom.
It’s there, at the graveyard, where you really wonder what’s true….
Read MoreThat term scapegoat, it comes from the Day of Atonement. On Sunday, we talked about the two bulls, one for the High Priest, the other for the people. There were also two goats. One goat was killed, and like the bulls, the blood of this goat was brought into the Holy Place.
After the blood had been sprinkled on the altar, then the other goat, still living, is brought to the High Priest. The instructions for this are …
Read MoreLike father, like son.
Adam hides. Cain deceives. And the field is dyed red with Abel’s fresh blood.
Like father, like son. All the way down to us.
Who will take responsibility?
We demand it from others. If someone does us wrong, we want them to pay….
Read MoreThe New Testament never uses priest for the office Jesus instituted. The only priesthood Jesus establishes is the collective, royal priesthood of all the baptized. St. Peter writes to the whole church: “You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light” [1 Pt 2.9].
A church that has special, ordained “priests” denies the pure Gospel. That’s because in the NT, Jesus is the priest….
Read MoreOne woman listened to a rebellious angel, and she likewise rebelled.
Another woman listened to an obedient angel, and she said, “Amen.”
One man fell, and brought the world to ruin.
Another Man came down from heaven to raise up the fallen world.
One tree infected mankind with bitterness.
Another tree appeared bitter but restored sweetness to our race.
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