Saint Matthew's

Late this afternoon, I had a long discussion with a recently married man who is having a wee-bit of trouble getting into the “marriage” thing he signed up for in July. He and his bride did not go through traditional marriage counseling classes before walking down the aisle. While their description of their wedding was something out of a fairy tale, they seem to have a misunderstanding about what a marriage really is and what it is based upon.

Marriage is not the wedding day. Mouthing vows is the easy part. Living them is an entirely different bucket of fish. The wedding day is the party. The honeymoon is an extension of the party atmosphere. When the plane arrives at the airport and the honeymoon is over, real life begins and the marriage starts. All those issues of living together, combining stuff, moving to a new home, figuring out how work schedules and private time can somehow mingle, paying the bills, walking the dog, making dinner, planning for children and where to raise them, talking about life, etc. should have at least been mentioned prior to the “I do’s.”

Too many times the emotional physicality plays the primary impetus for any couple thinking about getting married. Emotional couples who want to get married usually base their decision on a never ending “love” that they share, that the time they spend between the sheets is earth moving, that the bars they frequented as a couple will always play a major part in their continued relationship, that their individual lives won’t change much, etc. That is why marriage counseling is oh, so important. Couples have the opportunity to reflect, talk about, and understand that marriage in the church is about more than the human reflection on a couple living together in order to get health benefits. For at the heart of any marriage is God.

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. Genesis 2:24

Two becoming one. Not in some metaphysical or psychological way, but in a deeply spiritual manner where God brings them out of their individual lives and makes them one till death do them part.

Newly married couples who are having a challenge “getting into married life” need to take serious time to reflect on why they got married in the first place. Life for them changed dramatically when they said their “I do’s.” On their wedding day when their dog walked down the aisle wearing a suit – that was for show, for fun. Now that they are together as one flesh, they have to realize that now someone has to actually walk Fido.

Also over at my non-church blog (I don’t know why I keep calling it a “private” blog since everyone can read it), I discuss an article found in this morning’s Wall Street Journal written by author Brian McCracken concerning “cool Christianity.” My post narrows his thought specifically to the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod and how it has been dealing with modern evangelism issues through the “Ablaze!” program.

As I wrote:

The challenge for a church that has reached the fork in the road is to decide which road to take. Even though many people like the idea of a church being “cool” and hip, the fact is that without Jesus Christ at the core of the entire life of a church, the church is merely a social club that does a lot of cool things. The question of why the church is needed is not answered in this modern idealistic social club view; instead of being embraced by our Lord in Word and Sacrament, church becomes a place to see people, to work on projects, and to hear the pastor talk about his new tattoo.

No, I do not have a tattoo.

I didn’t want to re-post that blog here, so here’s the link to go over and read it.

There is one major aspect about the life of our Lord Jesus Christ that modern society has tended to forget — while Jesus was a friend of sinners, he wasn’t in favor of sin. He told the sinner to “go and sin no more,” a bold statement that many clergy people today are either afraid of saying because they fear they will alienate members of their church or too weak kneed to preach boldly.

At the heart of this understanding of sin and the sinner is the true understanding of Law and Gospel.

Modern day theologians who stand in pulpits tend to blend the two together, not fully distinguishing the two. Gospel can easily become Law while at the same time, the Law can override the true understanding of the Gospel. In no place else is this seen as clearly than in the sin-sinner dynamic.

Jesus was not a friend of sin. He abhorred it. Within every fiber of His holy, innocent body, the God-man knew that is was sin and sin alone that kept the Creation made through Him from being close to Him, the Father, and the Holy Spirit. Sin that sang a loud song whenever one of God’s creation rejected Him for something of the world was never a friend of God. This sin filled the creation and the sinner rejected God.

So God came to rescue the sinner from sin and to crush the head of Satan, the father of sin and destruction.

And when Jesus preached this rescue, this salvation, this love of God beyond any human understanding, Jesus would never mince words. He boldly spoke of the need for God’s healed Creation to live lives according to God, not by the sinfulness engulfing the world. And when He condemned the sin, He did so without fear for that is what a good preacher does — He lays out the Law to God’s children.

In my opinion, Jesus wouldn’t have made it so well in our day because society has evolved (or is de-volved?) into a politically correct mass of fear and sin. The culture preaches that we should let the sinner do what their sinful bodies want and no one can say anything different. More and more, even within the Church, this disgraceful fear takes hold of preachers and laity, letting the sinful feel good as they spit in the eye of Christ.

But Jesus wouldn’t remain silent. He opened his mouth and vigorously pounced on the sinful world.

The courage of our Lord Jesus Christ needs to be on display by God’s undershepherds, those whom He called into the harvest field to serve. If we can’t stand and call a sin a sin, then what good are we?

Yet, in this sinful condemnation, our Lord Jesus Christ showed the blessedness of the Gospel, in His life and His actions at the cross of Calvary where He gave up His life for us as His body was broken and His blood shed to pay our sin debt to the Father. He did all the good on our behalf, and we realize the glorious fruits of this work as our Father through His Holy Spirit builds faith in this Lord Jesus and grants us forgiveness of sins, peace, and salvation solely by this faith.

The Good News is only Good News when we understand why it is Good News. It is about God saving His people. It is about God’s love, pure and simple.

And that is the balance of the Law and Gospel in the life of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord.

Ooo eee ooo ah ah, ting tang
walla walla, bing bang
Ooo eee ooo ah ah, ting tang
walla walla, bing bang

In this morning’s “Belief” page in the New York Times, they highlight a popular Nigerian Witch doctor who has received a great deal of international publicity due primarily to her beliefs and charisma. The opening sentences from the article:

At home in Nigeria, the Pentecostal preacher Helen Ukpabio draws thousands to her revival meetings. Last August, when she had herself consecrated Christendom’s first “lady apostle,” Nigerian politicians and Nollywood actors attended the ceremony. Her books and DVDs, which explain how Satan possesses children, are widely known.

So well-known, in fact, that Ms. Ukpabio’s critics say her teachings have contributed to the torture or abandonment of thousands of Nigerian children — including infants and toddlers — suspected of being witches and warlocks.

By just strapping on her sandals and walking down the street, Ukpadio is so filled with the Holy Spirit that she can point out all the kids who are possessed. In fact, she believes and teaches that if a child 2 years old and younger has nighttime crying fits, then the child is a tool of Satan. I guess she ignores the pain from teething and colic, but what to I know.

Thank God I am Lutheran.

For Lutherans, part of understanding why Christianity is so broken up into denominations and inter-denominations and location-specific house churches is to accept the very reality that theology divides. And that, in itself, is a good thing. LCMS Lutherans believe, teach, and accept the unaltered Book of Concord, the confessions of the church, as the true exposition of Holy Scripture. However, most LCMS Lutherans really don’t care much about the Book of Concord; they want the spiritual strength given by our Father in heaven to His people through the means of grace in order to live life in this very sinful world.

The relationship of God and humankind is very specific in the Lutheran context — the Triune God is the Creator, the Provider, the Redeemer, the Faith-Giver, the Sustainer, and the Sanctifier. We are just reminded that God gives this all to us out of a love we’ll never understand because He loves us. This grace comes from on high, not because we’re deserving of it, but because He loves those whom He created.

When looking around at other religions and Christian faiths, in particular, we see churches professing a kind of self-spiritualization. God is there, but you have to make the first move. Of course, if this kind of a God was all loving and caring, why would He wait for us to take the first step? A loving God takes that step before we can ever think of it, and within the Lutheran worldview, this is central to our understanding of God and humanity.

God comes to us first.

Before we could even dream of taking that step toward God, we Lutherans believe that God has already taken that first and most important step to our hearts and minds through His Holy Spirit.

This spiritual worldview is not very popular. The world of Christianity challenges us and defends its “We Open Our Hearts to God First” theology, which, to be honest, is very comforting for sinful people. For in this theology, we believe that we’ve changed because we’ve made ourselves strong. Too bad, it makes no logical sense.

I started thinking about this last night after my interview on KFUO-AM Radio with Roland Lettner. The topic we discussed dealt with whether or not a Christian can lose their salvation. Of course, the answer to that theologically challenging topic is “yes.” But not all Christians believe this is true; they say that once a Christian receives faith and salvation from God, they can never lose it.

In the somewhat educated opinion of this parish pastor, this does not jive with the theology of “We Open Our Hearts to God First” preached by these theologians.

For if one can open their hearts to God and let Him in, then why can’t they kick Him out?

To understand God in a biblical sense, God has always come to His people, just like He continues to come to us today through the means of grace, His Word and Sacraments received happily and openly by God’s sinful, yet forgiven, children. God doesn’t wait for an invitation — He comes to comfort and forgive us sinners, building us up to live our Christian lives is service to Him and our neighbor.

That is just one reason why church still matters.

When it comes to religion, many times it all comes down to perspective.

We Christians say that Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world. To weak-kneed and non-Christians, they see our exclusive proclamation that salvation only comes through faith in Jesus Christ as hogwash. They view an exclusive God as a cruel God. Why would this type of God let people be condemned? Their perspective is grounded in feelings instead of God’s Word.

Our spiritual perspective comes down to that blessed Word, which is our Lord Jesus Christ.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” (John 3:16-18)

The question for the Church is how we make this paramount religious perspective the dominant force within our faith. The heart of the Christian is to tell this Gospel perspective to everyone where we live our days as defined not by our jobs or families, but by our faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. This is THE Christian perspective, for in this life our faith and hope in Him comes first.

Christians are being killed in Iraq for being Christian.

Radical Muslims are moving to eradicate the tiny Christian population. I guess the cross scares the heck out of the armies of hate. Keep the Iraqi Christians in your prayers.

Why is it that a growing number of 18-30 year olds, known as millennials, have a negative view of organized religion? A recent survey released by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life shows that least 25 percent of 18-30 year olds do not have ties to a specific religion. They don’t go to church or pray. Religion is not important to them and their lives. Instead, they view themselves as “agnostic,” “atheist,”or “not affiliated.”

As a pastor, to hear that a quarter of “just out of high school, just out of college, just starting their lives” young people don’t have any connection to God is disconcerting. It saddens me that so many 18-30 year olds are ignoring their God who loves them beyond any measure. For a brief moment, while that 25 percent number is staggering, we have to take a step back realize a few things:

1. Seventy-five percent of 18-30 year old people do have some kind of religious affiliation;

2. People of my Generation X generation fell into a 19 percent non-religious number; the current millennials show a six percentage point increase that should be concerning many church goers; and

3. Could it be that the church is the problem?

This is an issue that every pastor has dealt with or is dealing with today. Here at Saint Matthew’s, we have a number of millennials who don’t attend church regularly. I don’t know if they read the bible on their spare time or even spend some time during the day in prayer, but if they are like those in this survey, they don’t do any of it. I’ve tried to gauge why these young people do not come to church regularly or reach out for God, but I don’t have any answers.

Personally, I believe it all falls under the banner, “A Victim of Culture and Society.” People live in the real world and they are challenged daily by issues and ideals that go against God. It is just easier for most people to reject God than to stand up for their faith.

While in my office this morning, I’ve been listening to Gus Lloyd, the host of “Seize the Day” on The Catholic Channel on Sirius XM and in the 9am hour, he’s been discussing this topic. One gentleman who falls into that 18-30 year old category called in and basically laid down his law – the church has nothing for him. Lloyd correctly surmised that this man had suffered some hurt at the hand of the church and tried to make a critical point – one that I totally agree with:

Sometimes God’s people stink.

Speaking of Lutheran churches specifically, they are run by older and established members and nearly none of them are willing to give anyone younger than 30 a chance at anything. There will be times of real conflict where the younger person will just leave the church altogether. It the old “It’s my church. I’ve been here longer” mentality.

This falls in line with my tired old line, “The problem with the Christian Church is Christians.”

When I have time later on today, I will expand on this point a bit.

Scientists have detected a planet some 247 Trillion miles away from Earth that apparently has similar characteristics of our home planet (it may have water) and could possibly sustain life (because it is possible that is has water).

This “Super Earth” is 247 TRILLION miles away (scientists contend this is relatively close to us), yet those who spend a lot of time looking into the sky can hypothesize that it has water, has temperatures that rise in the daytime up to 250 degrees, is a heavier planet than Earth, and it has an “extraordinarily deep ocean.”

Did you catch the point that this planet is 247 TRILLION miles away? Scientists can barely see to the bottom of our oceans (a distance that is a lot closer than 247 TRILLION miles), yet they hypothesize with some certainty that a planet 247 TRILLION miles away has a deep ocean and you’ll need a lot of sun screen if you pay a visit.

Without a sliver of doubt, people will readily accept this hypothesis while at the same time, they’ll go toe-to-toe with me regarding the true meaning of Christmas and doubt Jesus’ birth.

“I don’t know if anybody is going to be able to convince me that God exists,” (Bruce) Sheiman said in an interview, “but they can convince me that religion has intrinsic value.”

I saw this story yesterday in USA Today, but I was just lazy enough that I didn’t take time to comment on it.

Apparently, the recent attempt by atheists to claim that people who believe in God are just plain nuts hasn’t done much to swell their ranks. No one likes an arrogant, hard-nosed God hater. Instead, they’ve taken a new track, pushed by author Bruce Sheiman, one that puts a happier face on the non-God crowd. They now don’t want to criticize those who believe in God, but they want everyone to just get along.

Isn’t that nice? I guess the New Atheists have found that people don’t respond well when their religious beliefs are attacked as phony. Gone are the days when public religious expressions are mocked by the anti-God people — they now will speak of what unifies people of all faiths (you need a strong faith to believe that everything was creating from sheer dumb luck).

Yes, it is a public relations move.

Should be interesting…

I laughed when I read that the Roman Catholic Church is moving to allow fallen-away Anglicans who are upset at their church for allowing gays in their clergy ranks to come home to mother church to keep their liturgical worship rites they used as Anglicans.

Pope Benedict XVI approved a new church provision that will allow Anglicans to convert while maintaining many of their distinctive spiritual and liturgical traditions, Cardinal William Levada, the Vatican’s chief doctrinal official, told a news conference Tuesday.

Essentially, Anglicans will have to convert to Catholicism, but then they are allowed to keep their liturgy and worship style.

To me, this doesn’t make much sense.

If an Anglican converts to Catholicism, then they are no longer Anglican, but Roman Catholic.

(I copied this post from my personal blog – reviovine.com)

The title of this post comes from the Washington Post “On Faith” blog. This week, they challenge religious-oriented people to tackle the question whether God has been or should be taken out of the marriage rite.

Legally, a church cannot officially “marry” anyone in the eyes of the state without the couple receiving a state-issued marriage license. Hypothetically, if a couple walked into my office this morning and asked me to marry them this afternoon, my first question to them would have to be whether they have a government-issued marriage license. Of course, I’m talking hypothetically — I wouldn’t marry anyone who showed up on my doorstep and begged me to marry them right away.

The relationship between God and marriage and the state is challenging one, especially in our day when gay marriage is a hot topic. Those who subscribe to the biblical and traditional marriage rite of one man and one woman are being questioned as to their subscribing to their beliefs and, when they hold to their understanding of marriage in a God pleasing sense, are being described as wanting to take away civil rights from their opponents. Or, as I’ve been accused of, being filled with hate for gays. On the other hand, those who want the government to allow same sex couples to be legally married, are being attacked as being deviants.

(more…)

This morning, I wrote a semi-lengthy piece responding to a quote that a friend of mine found in a book he is reading. My post deals with how my mother instilled in me the importance of going to church.

To read it, click over to my personal blog.

I think this is going to be my weekend parish announcements article – it just fits.

Just when you thought that the Episcopal Church — split by its recent acceptance of homosexual clergy — couldn’t get even more torn apart, they do this.

It is almost like the Episcopalians are intentionally trying to eliminate the true voices of Bible scholarship from within their denomination in order to create a secular, socialized church. Their leadership is taking this church down a secular path by making the entire theology and structure devoid of any centralized Scriptural understanding of the law and replacing it with a post-modern thought process.

“Well, God loves everyone. So should we,” goes the mantra of secular Christians who reject the Law as holding any part in their lives. This creeping rejection of the Holy Bible as God’s Word is nothing new — even within the Lutheran house, we’ve battled this reduction of God’s Word during our bitter battles in the history of the LCMS.

Secularism creep is trying to destroy the church. Thanks be to God that God promises this will never happen. We need to stand firm in His Word and trust in Him while fighting for Him who saved us from sin.

From page one of the Holy Bible to the last, the message is the same: God’s plan of salvation for His people. That is the most basic and critical understanding of the biblical canon. To see the bible as anything less or anything more misses the point that God so loved His creation, He did everything to see that we’d be with Him for all eternity. And He did so by sending his only-begotten Son to die for the sins of the world, that all who believe in Him would not perish, but have eternal life (paraphrase of John 3:16).

No matter the different authors, writing over centuries and centuries, the Bible that we have today is the Word of God and His plan of salvation for us. There is nothing inconsistent with that one basic and central thought that is woven through each word and page of that blessed book.

But…

According to Bart Ehrman, we would be wrong to centralize the message of Holy Scripture into this one area. We must, according to Ehrman, take into account the history surrounding the writers and why they may have written to a particular audience to express a specific topic, of course minimizing why the authors, especially of the Gospels, would write what they would write – to tell the story of God’s salvation through Jesus Christ. Maybe the authors wanted to tell a particular story about Jesus instead of telling the Good News in its blessed glory: God the Father sending God the Son to save His people.

Ehrman is more worried about perceived inconsistencies in the Gospels rather than what the Gospels express and extol. To him, apparently the Gospels are more about the audiences of the writers rather than the deep-rooted meaning of salvation. Take Matthew’s Gospel for a moment — Ehrman seems to be more concerned as to why Matthew would write for a Jewish audience instead of the importance of seeing how God’s plan of salvation comes through God’s chosen people, that they are central to this salvation, not apart from it.

I need to pick up Ehrman’s book to understand his thought process that is clearly linked to the historical critical method that takes Christ and His work on behalf of humanity at the cross and minimizes it to virtually nothing.