-
Craving Popularity in the Church
By Holly Scheer The church seems like the last place that popularity should matter. After all, aren’t we all sinners, desperate for grace? Aren’t we all on equal footing as we wait for God’s very good gifts? Unfortunately, it often seems or feels like there’s a hierarchy in both the church and the synod. It doesn’t take long for it to become clear that, just like in any group, there are the people who seem to be sought out, admired, looked up to — and those who aren’t. It can feel like we see the same names writing books and devotionals, the same faces leading the fellowship meal committees and hosting…
-
Getting Kids to Church is Simple
-
Article XVIII: Of Free Will
67] The Eighteenth Article, Of Free Will, the adversaries receive, although they add some testimonies not at all adapted to this case. They add also a declamation that neither, with the Pelagians, is too much to be granted to the free will, nor, with the Manicheans, is all freedom to be denied it. 68] Very well; but what difference is there between the Pelagians and our adversaries, since both hold that without the Holy Ghost men can love God and perform God’s commandments with respect to the substance of the acts, and can merit grace and justification by works which reason performs by itself, without the Holy Ghost? 69] How…
-
Article XVII: Of Christ’s Return to Judgment
“66 The Seventeenth Article the adversaries receive without exception, in which we confess that at the consummation of the world Christ shall appear, and shall raise up all the dead, and shall give to the godly eternal life and, eternal joys, but shall condemn the ungodly to be punished with the devil without end.” Source.
-
Faith and Freedom in the Gospel
by Vanessa Rasanen I’m sitting in the late afternoon sun, my baby in her exersaucer on our back patio while the big kids help their dad with some yard work. It’s a struggle to see my typed words through the glare off my laptop, but I push on, because this is a rare moment when I have to just sit and write while enjoying the sound of our kids laughing and loving this spring weather. Never mind that just on the other side of the sliding door is a sink full of dishes from two meals and a laundry basket overflowing with clean clothes needing to be folded. There are…
-
Loss, Grief, and Miscarriage
–This post was submitted anonymously. I had a miscarriage, and it’s a secret. My child, which was being knit together by God in a secret place died, and became a secret also. He was alive inside me long enough for me to begin dreaming about what his life would be like, but not long enough to seem real now as I look back to this shadowy time in my life. This child, who in my imagination was my son, was a gift given to me years after I had given up the possibility of carrying a child. My pregnancy test turned positive only hours before I heard my pastor preach…
You May Also Like
The Defense of the Augsburg Confession
Junk Food
How to not drown in disappointent
-
Good Friday Anniversary
By Sandra Ostapowich Happy Anniversary! Who has a wedding during Holy Week?? On Good Friday?? That’s just insane, right? This day is all about Jesus, it’s sacrilegious to do anything but contemplate Christ’s death for us that day. Well, it’s an arranged marriage for one thing. The groom’s Father set it all up a while back. Way back even before there was a when (Eph. 1:4-10). See, the LORD wasn’t surprised when Adam and Woman fell into sin. Jesus becoming Man and dying on the cross for our sins wasn’t a Plan B to mop up the mess we’d made of everything. No, it was the plan all along. Twisted?…
-
Blessed Easter!
He is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia! Have a blessed Easter. Go to church. Celebrate the love our dear Lord has for us and the wonderful news that our Lord conquered the grave. He is risen. He is risen indeed, Alleluia. Photo Credit to Jim Forest. Creative Commons License.
-
Holy Week
by Holly Scheer Sunday was Palm Sunday. We have entered Holy Week– the holiest of weeks in the church year, in which we follow the final footsteps of our Lord from his Triumphant entry into Jerusalem, remember the institution of the Lord’s Supper, mourn the betrayal in the garden and pray as He suffers on the cross. And on Sunday we rejoice in the Resurrection and the forgiveness and peace that is ours as beloved children of God. Holy Week brings so much of our theology into perfect clarity in such a short period of time. It is a week filled with the best of news — we are loved, we…
-
Amnesty
By Sandra Ostapowich For all your sins, you are forgiven in Christ. For all the times you were ashamed of the body the Lord gave you, you are forgiven in Christ. For all the times you compared your size to another woman, you are forgiven in Christ. For all the times you worried that you had completely messed up your life, you are forgiven in Christ. For all the times you dressed to tempt men, you are forgiven in Christ. For all the times you took pride in your modest attire, you are forgiven in Christ. For all the times you wished you could take back your hurtful words, you are…
